"12th and Delaware," new film about crisis pregnancy centers by Jesus Camp makers

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I have seen so-called "crisis pregnancy centers" from the inside out. My mom volunteered for one, and dragged us kids along as she and her prissy religious friends did their damnedest to scare young girls out of getting abortions. They would make them watch The Silent Scream, show them pictures of bloody aborted fetuses, threaten them with frightening stories about "botched legal abortions" and the "dangers of legal abortion". I saw it all.

And of course this is where my mother made me go when I became a pregnant teenager. And it worked: I was terrified of abortion, for years.

Until I needed one.

The disgusting rhetoric and disinformation used by CPCs to guilt-trip girls seeking information about how to handle unplanned pregnancies is the subject of a new film, 12th & Delaware, which is receiving excellent critical reviews.

Sundance Review: 12th & Delaware - Cinematical

Whether you're a hardcore pro-lifer or you call yourself uncompromisingly pro-choice (or, of course, if you fall somewhere in the middle), the fantastic new documentary 12th & Delaware represents your side of the argument remarkably well. But think about that for a second: Am I actually asserting that one little 80-minute documentary is able to capture both sides of this monumentally difficult subject? And with taste, class, and artistic craftsmanship, no less? Absolutely. What co-directors Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (Jesus Camp, also great) have built here may just be the finest documentary film ever made about the abortion issue. (I certainly haven't seen them all, but this one's pretty damn remarkable.)

With no narration, only a small handful of on-screen facts, and a complete lack of talking-head windbag interviews, 12th & Delaware simply drops us right into the middle of one particular intersection in Fort Pierce, Florida. On one side of 12th street is an abortion clinic. Directly across 12th is a pregnancy care center -- the kind that actively tries to prevent women from having abortions. With picketers on patrol virtually 24/7 and with doctors forced to leave the facility beneath coats and blankets -- let's just say 12th & Delaware is not exactly a friendly intersection.

I found the Chicago Tribune's review to be particularly compelling:

'12th and Delaware' filmmakers find common ground in abortion debate - chicagotribune.com

Filmmakers find common ground in abortion debate
2 Florida clinics share corner in '12th and Delaware'
By Kenneth Turan, Tribune Newspapers critic

January 26, 2010

It's not like Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing are new to the making of powerful documentaries. But even for them, "12th and Delaware," which debuted Sunday at the Sundance Film Festival, was a disturbing, unnerving experience they don't hesitate to describe as life-changing. When Ewing half-jokingly tells someone, "I hope it haunts you for the rest of your days," she is referring to what it did to them.

...

Because they found the CPCs, in Ewing's words, "upsetting, shocking, disturbing, confusing," they were not eager to make one of them the subject of their next film. "We wanted to move on, we were tired, weary of conservative America." But Sheila Nevins, who runs documentaries for HBO, was compelled by the idea, and so the film was begun. It was not an easy process.

For one thing, it took Grady and Ewing a year and a half to gain access to a facility. Then it took a year of filming to get the job done.

Initially, the film was to be only about the CPC, and Grady and Ewing make being there sound like combat. "It was excruciating," says Ewing, "like Lars von Trier had assigned us to make a Dogme film on this corner for a year."

The experience was especially difficult because of the fragile emotional state of the women — often teenagers — who came into the CPC.

"Honestly, that was the hardest thing for us as two women," Grady says. "We really had to be objective and watch extremely vulnerable women not get comforted, not get relief. That wasn't our role, but it hurt.

It hurts in so many ways. I wonder how much of this film I'll be able to watch before I just cry.