Invisible City

I just got home from watching Invisible City. I had desperately wanted to see this film at Hot Docs 2009, but ended up going to Taiwan instead. Of course I was excited to go to Taiwan and a couple other places (written up here, here, here, here, and here), but I had this feeling that I would be missing out on a very special documentary.
Luckily, The Royal Cinema is screening the film for a week and TVO is screening it as well as hosting a discussion forum about the documentary.
Tonight was the premiere of the film at the Royale and Hubert Davis (director), Mehernaz Lentin (producer), and three of the cast members (Kendell, his mom - Sandy and Ainsworth Morgan) were in attendance.
In education, there's a lot of talk about defining moments. Could this have possibly been one of mine? Did I (re-)discover my passion through watching this film?
For fear of forgetting (I wish that my internal dialogue had an instant transcriber), I'm just going to write a couple words to come back to if I don't get around to flushing out my thoughts from tonight in a more productive space. Teacher identity. Creating a safe environment. Caring. Knowing your student. Taking care of the person before the student. Making learning meaningful. Relevant.
I feel like I've already forgotten about some of the things that this film made me think about.
Very quickly into the film, I asked myself yet again if I'm making as much of a difference as I can. I don't think I'm courageous enough to take the steps to reach my full potential on that front. Or perhaps, (to make myself feel better) I have just chosen a different path. A different outlet for change.
I'm not going to talk about all of the issues in the documentary because there are too many. And depending on the viewer's personal experiences, I'm sure different messages ring stronger than others.
Of course, even better than the amazing documentary, was the Q&A afterwards. It started off with a bang. Kendall's father was in the audience, seeing the film for the first time. It was moving and I heard many sniffles around me. I thought Sandy's voice rang through the strongest. To persevere as a parent, to maintain as much physical and mental presence as possible with your child, to love unconditionally and look for the light at the end of the tunnel. Kendall's story seems to be a successful one, although there were bumps along the way. No doubt, this has something to do with his mother's passion, but I'm sure some of the more tumultuous stories also have a parent/parents who are trying their best, so to a certain extent I take it with a grain of salt. There is no guidebook to parenting and most are doing the best they can, no matter the method.
Anyway, it's pretty clear that I loved this film. I'm sure that there are many other films like it out there, and I hope that this one along with all the rest get out to as many people as possible.
There are many things that I have experienced in my life which shape me or compel me to want to do something. I wonder if this will be one of the things that I act one.