Film

[|Cinema Touching Disability Film Festival] “The Coalition of Texans with Disabilities designed the Cinema Touching Disability film festival to improve perceptions and dispel common misperceptions that many people hold about disability. The powerful role that cinema plays in American culture makes a film festival ideal for this purpose. Movies, after all, reflect and shape the attitudes that people have about important social issues, including disability. Each year we show and discuss films that illustrate how well, and how poorly, people with disabilities are portrayed in motion pictures.”

[|Disability Studies Online Magazine: Recommended Disability Videos]

[|Films Involving Disability] This site presents a detailed list of 2,500 feature films which involve in one way or another various disabilities. It is directed towards teachers, students and anyone who has an interest in how disability is represented in films. Films are listed in 15 categories and recommended films. Each category is split into Major and Minor films. Each film is either reviewed or includes a summary. Several of the pages of categories have each movie linked to a separate page for film summary.

[|Picture This…Film Festival] “Canada’s First International Disabilities Film Festival. Films and videos that focus on some area of disability culture, and productions on any subject that are produced, directed and/or written by a person(s) with a disability are the theme of this festival. Entries in English (or sub-titled in English) are welcome from around the world. Held in Calgary, Alberta, Canada (at the Rozsa Centre on the campus of the University of Calgary) in early February.”

[|Rolling] //Rolling// was named best documentary at the Independent Film Project conference for works in progress, held in New York City. The film was also one of 14 new American films chosen by the Independent Film Project for screening at the European Film Market, which was held in conjunction with the Berlin Film Festival. While Berland and her cinematographer both shot footage for //Rolling//, the documentary is primarily filmed by the three participants via video cameras mounted on their chairs: Buckwalter, a clinical psychologist paralyzed at 17; Wallengren, a TV writer with five children who suffered from ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease), which stole his mobility and, finally, his ability to speak and breathe; and Elman, who was the business manager for a department at the UCLA School of Medicine until multiple sclerosis put her in a chair.