[ripples]

What films have you seen that have portrayed people within the adoption triangle? I'd be interested to review how adoption, search/reunion, adoptees, relinquishing parents, adoptive parents, are portrayed in the mass media.

For starters, here are the films that I'm aware of (so far I've seen all of them except numbers 1, 2 and 9):

1. The Child (L'Enfant) - (Cannes Film Fest winner: birth mother discovers boyfriend sold their baby on black market) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0456396/

2. The King - (Official selection at Cannes Film Fest: revenge by adoptee on birth father) http://www.jumpstreetfilms.com.au/king.html

3. The Official Story - (Academy Award winner: Argentinian adoptive mother who searches for the birth mother) http://www.library.american.edu/subj.../official.html

4. High Tide - (Australian Film Institute winner: birth mother who finds daughter in trailer park) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095305/

5. The Daughter from Danang - (Sundance Film Festival winner: docco about reunion between Vietnamese born adoptee and her birth family) http://www.daughterfromdanang.com/

6. Rat Race - (reunion between first mother and daughter, while not central to this comedy flick, the reunion is shown) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0250687/

7. Broken Flowers - (Cannes Film Festival winner: birth father receives anonymous letter about his son and searches for him)
http://www.festival-cannes.fr/films/...d_film=4278008

8. First Person Plural - (San Francisco International Film Festival winner: docco about Korean-born adoptee who unites her biological and adoptive families) http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2000/firstpersonplural/

9. DMC: My Adoption Journey - (docco about famous hip-hop/rap musician who searches for his birth mother)
http://www.vh1.com/shows/dyn/vh1_roc...de_about.jhtml

10. Smoke Signals - (Sundance Film Fest winner: Native American man embarks on journey to collect the ashes of his father who'd abandoned him) http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/alexie.html

11. Secrets and Lies - (Oscar-nominated film about African-British woman traces her birth mother to a lower-class Anglo-British woman who denies it) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117589/

[Opus]

Great thread! Out of your list I've seen three: Daughter from Danang, Secrets and Lies, Smoke Signals. All three are excellent and would recommend them to anyone.

Here are my recommendations for adoption themed flicks:

1. Flirting with Disaster - a comedy in which an adult adoptee on a cross country trip is in search of his birth parents (http://www.allmovieguide.com/cg/avg.dll).

2. Catfish In Black Bean Sauce - a Vietnamese sister and brother adopted by an African American couple reunite with their birth mother. A comedy-drama (http://www.allmovieguide.com/cg/avg.dll).

3. My Flesh and Blood - documentary about a single mother raising 11 children, all of whom were adopted from the CA foster care system (http://www.allmovieguide.com/cg/avg.dll).

4. Fakin Da Funk - comedy-drama where a Chinese boy adopted by an African American family faces a culture clash in his neighborhood as an adolescent(http://www.allmovieguide.com/cg/avg.dll).

5. Losing Isiah - drama about an African American boy abandoned by his birth mother and adopted by a white couple. Birth mother eventually contests adoption and a custody trial ensues (http://www.allmovieguide.com/cg/avg.dll).

6. Who are the Debolts (and where did they get 19 kids)?
A documentary about a family where 13 of the kids were adopted (http://www.allmovieguide.com/cg/avg....avg&sql=A54399).

I don't know if there are any Soprano fans out there but there is currently an interesting adoption story line involving one of the major characters. I won't spoil it here, though.

[proudmommyof 2]

Immediate Family-awesome movie-late 80's. Glenn Close and James Woods are entering into the (new at the time) world of open adoption. It looks at adoption from birthmom's perspective, too, although more from adoptive parents. The movie makes you fall in love with all involved.

[ripples]

Hey Opus and Katrina,
Thanks for your posts - I look forward to watching these flicks. I'm almost inspired to try to organize a film festival/discussion group about adoption to help generate further understanding in the wider community. So far 18 flicks - whatta lotta discussion generators!

[Opus]

That's a great idea, a simple query in Amazon DVDs came back with 11 pages of adoption themed movies. Many of them I've seen but forgotten that they had adoption in their story line, e.g. The Bad Seed.

[hotspice58]

There is a movie (it's been on Lifetime) about a black girl (product of a rape of white woman by black man) who first lives in a group home type setting. She's then adopted by a white couple who divorce. The only person she bonds with is a worker at the group home. She gets married and has kids and at the end, they have her birth mother, the worker from the home and the adoptive mother. It also shows the bio siblings from the birth mother. Great movie.

[hello&goodbye]

There is a new movie in production now staring Diane Keaton & Helen Hunt about a reunion between a birth mother and daughter, I just for the life of me cannot remember the title. However I beleive it will be out this year.

[Opus]

Originally Posted by hotspice58

There is a movie (it's been on Lifetime) about a black girl (product of a rape of white woman by black man) who first lives in a group home type setting. She's then adopted by a white couple who divorce. The only person she bonds with is a worker at the group home. She gets married and has kids and at the end, they have her birth mother, the worker from the home and the adoptive mother. It also shows the bio siblings from the birth mother. Great movie.

Deep in My Heart - its based on a true story, the reunion was covered pretty extensively in the Boston Globe, as it happened here. Anne Bancroft played the first mother.

[ripples]

Another film called "Live and Become" about an inter-country adoptee. The film has been released here in Australia on the art house cinema circuit. Has anyone seen it yet? Here's the overview from the film's official web site

http://www.hopscotchfilms.com.au/flash.html
Romanian-born, Paris-based director Radu Mihaileanu's incredibly moving and highly relevant "Live and Become" follows the life of an Ethiopian boy who is passed off as an Ethiopian Jew to escape his ravaged country. In 1984 in a Sudanese refugee camp sheltering Ethiopians displaced by civil war and famine, the Israeli army has begun "Operation Moses," airlifting thousands of Falashas, or Ethiopian Jews, to Israel. A Christian Ethiopian mother persuades a Falasha woman whose own son has just died from starvation, to allow her son to assume his identity. In tears, she orders her son to never divulge his secret for fear her will be returned, and tells his to "live and become".
Renamed Schlomo, the boy is adopted by an adoring, liberal Israeli couple. However he remains an outsider, surviving only through his family’s love. We follow Schlomo as he becomes a Jewish teenager and an idealistic young medical student. With the help of a local leader, he writes letters to his real mother back home and is forced to make the heart-wrenching decision about whether to admit to the deception that has shadowed his entire childhood.

[maryjanek]

You've got every good one I know of on your list.

If you want to be comprehensive, you could add "Flirting with Disaster," Ben Stiller, Lily Tomlin, 1994. I didn't like it all. Plot concerns an adoptee's search for birthparents.

[ripples]

A new film has been released in Australia about an Aussie adoptee's search for her father and its impact on her birth mom - it's had good reviews so far:

http://www.thecaterpillarwish.com/
http://www.abc.net.au/atthemovies/txt/s1652766.htm

[rilo kiley]

I didn't see you mention "Loggerheads" Did you? I may have missed it. About a birthmother and adoptee reunion taking place in North Carolina. I heard such wonderful things about it.

[lalgee]

What about Antwone Fisher with Denzel Washington? That was a GREAT flick about a boy who searches for and finds his birthmother.

L

[ripples]

Greetings from Taiwan! Tomorrow I'll go and see the Women Make Waves Film Festival's section on "Voices of the Marginalized". They'll screen several films from Australia, USA and Korea on inter-country adoption, including a film about Operation Babylift in Vietnam. I'm so thrilled I stumbled across this film info and will attend all 3.5 hours of films plus the discussion afterwards. Apparently some of the non-Aussie directors will be there to talk about the films. It'll be interesting to see what is shown/discussed (too bad that my Chinese language skills are so poor but I'll do my best to understand). Hey, maybe I'll even have the guts to contribute to the discussion in my rather broken Chinese language.
Program List：：：2006 Women Make Waves Film Festival

[chris1965]

In the movie Touching Wild Horses, the main character played by Jane Seymore is a birth mother who reunites with her birth son at the end.

Touching Wild Horses - Movie Info - Yahoo! Movies