The Education of Shelby Knox (2005)

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:

Christian | Texas | Conservative | Southern Baptist | Gay

Awards:

2 wins & 1 nomination

Cast

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

Directed by
Marion Lipschutz
Rose Rosenblatt

Produced by
Charlotte Buchen	....	additional associate producer
Charlotte Buchen	....	field producer
Sally Jo Fifer	....	executive producer: ITVS
Rebecca Honig-Friedman	....	associate producer (as Rebecca Honig)
Amy Kohn	....	additional associate producer
Amy Kohn	....	field producer
Marion Lipschutz	....	producer
Cara Mertes	....	executive producer: P.O.V.
Rose Rosenblatt	....	producer
Jeremy Stulberg	....	additional associate producer
Jeremy Stulberg	....	field producer
David Valdez	....	additional associate producer
David Valdez	....	field producer

Original Music by
Rick Baitz

Cinematography by
Gary Griffin		(as Gary Keith Griffin)

Film Editing by
Rose Rosenblatt
Jeremy Stulberg

Art Department
Manny Palad	....	graphic designer

Sound Department
Susan Bryant	....	additional sound recordist
Johanna Bystrom Sims	....	assistant sound editor
Petr Cikhart	....	additional sound recordist
Mike Gibson	....	additional sound recordist
Tom Lino	....	audio mixer
Jordan Polk	....	additional sound recordist
Jiri Suchanek	....	additional sound recordist
David Valdez	....	sound recordist

Camera and Electrical Department
Deborah Eve Lewis	....	additional photographer (as Deb Lewis)
Rick Mize	....	additional photographer
Mike Ogletree	....	additional photographer
Sam Shinn	....	additional photographer

Editorial Department
David Fresko	....	assistant editor
Larry Loonin	....	editing consultant
Steve Pequignot	....	on-line editor: Glue Editing & Design
David Petersen	....	editing consultant

Music Department
Jason Gordon	....	music consultant
Barbara Lynn Jacobs	....	musician
Wade Tonken	....	music mixer: Noize Factory
Wade Tonken	....	music producer: Noize Factory
Sean Tyroler	....	music consultant

Other crew
Josh Braun	....	distribution advisor
Christopher Dean	....	research assistant
Diana A. Delatorre	....	research assistant (as Diana Delatorre)
Kavitha Dulai	....	research assistant
Roger Kass	....	distribution advisor (as Roger E. Kass)
Esther Lee	....	research assistant
Rebecca Lemaitre	....	research assistant
Spencer Merolla	....	research assistant
Tatiana Mirville	....	bookkeeper
Janima Nam	....	researcher
Matt Pare	....	production assistant
Terry Purinton	....	research assistant
Emily Shepherd	....	research assistant

Production Companies

• Incite Pictures (as Cine Qua Non/Incite Pictures)
• Independent Television Service (ITVS) (in association with)
• P.O.V./American Documentary (in association with)

Distributors

• Docurama (2006) (USA) (DVD)
• ITVS (2005) (USA) (TV)
• Sony Music Entertainment (2009) (Japan) (TV)

Other Companies

• Glue Editing and Design  on-line editing (as Glue Editing & Design)
• Noize Factory  music mixing
• Noize Factory  music production

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:

Love Is a Game

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.