The Education of Shelby Knox (2005)

User Rating:

7.8/10   

Directors:

Marion Lipschutz
Rose Rosenblatt

Release Date:

21 June 2005 (USA)

Genre:

Documentary

Tagline:

Sex, Lies & Education

Plot:

A 15-year-old girl's transformation from conservative Southern Baptist to liberal Christian and ardent feminist parallels her fight for sex education and gay rights in Lubbock, Texas. |

Plot Keywords:

Gay Rights | Sex | Education | Texas | Sex Education

Awards:

2 wins & 1 nomination

Cast

Rene Caudillo	...	Himself
Yvonne Caudillo	...	Herself
Shelby Knox	...	Herself
Amanda Noble	...	Herself
Ricky Waite	...	Himself

Runtime:

USA:76 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

Brazil:14 | UK:15 | USA:Not Rated

Filming Locations:

Lubbock, Texas, USA

Company:

Incite Pictures

Soundtrack:

So Wide

Excellent, thought-provoking...

Caught this inspiring and entertaining documentary at SXSW 2005 - it's a great film for teens and families to watch together.

The film follows Shelby Knox, a Lubbock, TX teen, as she fights for sex education in her conservative school, and later for gay rights, while trying to stay true to her Christian beliefs and principles. Though far from a "warts-and-all" documentary, Shelby isn't always cast in a sympathetic light, and many of her peers do question her motivations and perceive her as a spotlight-grabber.

What makes this film truly great is the interaction with Shelby and her conservative Christian parents - though they often disagree, their support for her and willingness to let her come to her own conclusions is truly inspiring and shows how important honest communication can be between parents and teenagers.

I can certainly see why some reviewers here felt this film was anti-Christian and made a cartoon villain of the abstinence-preaching pastor. However, the pastor is actually given plenty of screen time and gives several convincing arguments on why "safe sex" can be truly unsafe, and the film doesn't try to disagree with him. In fact, the movie itself doesn't take a hard stance one way or another on the issue of sex ed, it simply follows the internal struggle within Shelby and what it takes to be a liberal Christian in today's world.

Overall, this film was one of the favorites of many people I talked to at the SXSW Film Festival, and deservedly so.