Born for You
Alba has Down's Syndrome and was left in the hospital when she was born. Thirty families rejected her before the court decided to entrust her to Luca: a Catholic — and gay — single man.
Alba has Down's Syndrome and was left in the hospital when she was born. Thirty families rejected her before the court decided to entrust her to Luca: a Catholic — and gay — single man.
Pierluigi Gigante
Luca Trapanese
Teresa Saponangelo
Teresa Ranieri
Barbora Bobuľová
Livia Gianfelici
Alessandro Piavani
Lorenzo
Antonia Truppo
Nunzia
Iaia Forte
Antonia
Giuseppe Pirozzi
Paolo
Sypario
Drag Queen
Liliana Bottone
Claudia Di Marcello
Alba has Down's Syndrome and was left in the hospital when she was born. Thirty families rejected her before the court decided to entrust her to Luca: a Catholic — and gay — single man.
Based on a true story, this follows the struggle of Luca (Pierluigi Gigante), a gay Roman Catholic in Italy, to adopt a child. He lives with his partner Lorenzo (Alessandro Piavani) and runs a community facility that looks after people with conditions such as Down’s Syndrome. The two men are keen to have a child that will carry their own names, but despite that being perfectly legal they have faced consistent prejudice from the authorities and are routinely being rejected. Then he hears of one baby, Alba, who has been abandoned at birth by her mother after she was born with Down’s. He attempts to offer her a stable and loving home, but despite the fact that her condition is deterring (37) other sets of potential parents, he is rejected. This puts considerable strain on his relationship and swiftly he finds himself alone. Fortunately, he encounters a feisty single-mum lawyer “Teresa” (Teresa Saponangelo) who agrees to help him take up the cudgels. What chance they can buck the system and manage to adopt the infant? Some of this is shot in a faux-documentary style and that, I found, did rather sterilise the human impact of much of this. Also, it plays a little to the sentiment of the scenario a little too bluntly for me, and overly relies on our own (presumed) innate reaction to this ridiculous situation rather than use the acting, dialogue and drama to convince us of the obvious flaws in the application of the legislation and of the wider societal attitudes to gay adoption. Clearly Luca is a stable and loving man, but little effort is really made to get under his skin. We are told, via flashbacks, of a childhood friendship that ends sadly - but that story is left incomplete and we also have the obligatory gay nightclub-induced one night stand, albeit with someone he already knew, that seemed incongruous to the point Fabio Mollo was trying to make. Although it does touch on religiosity, it doesn’t really develop that very fully either nor the nature of his relationship with his somewhat sceptical mother. All of that said, though, it is still quite a provocative drama that invites us to consider so much of what drives homophobia. Parliaments can legislate till they are blue in the face, but if those responsible for implementing the rules have a widely held bigotry of their own then things may never change on the ground for the real people caught up in this most emotionally charged of circumstances. Both Gigante and Saponangelo deliver well enough, the scenes with her own mischievous kids do raise a smile and it’s worth two hours as an introductory critique on the “industry” of adoption.
During a blizzard in 1964, Dr. David Henry delivers his son Paul with the help of nurse Caroline. But when Henry realizes his wife is also carrying a girl with Down syndrome, he hands the second child over to Caroline without his wife's knowledge. Henry's fateful decision yields grave consequences for his family over the next 20 years.
Bobby Griffith was his mother's favorite son, the perfect all-American boy growing up under deeply religious influences in Walnut Creek, California. Bobby was also gay. Struggling with a conflict no one knew of, much less understood, Bobby finally came out to his family.
Matteo is a young successful businessman, audacious, charming and energetic. Ettore instead, is a calm, righteous, second grade teacher always living in the shadows, still in the small town from where both come from. They’re brothers but with two very different personalities. A dramatic event will force them to live together in Rome for a few months, bringing up the opportunity to face their differences with sympathy and tenderness, in a climax of fear and euphoria.
Clara and Felice struggle to raise their three children in 1970s Rome. The eldest, Andrea, is transgender and yearns for another life where he gets to live as the boy he knows himself to be. Clara instinctively strives to protect her son by escaping into their imaginations to defuse family tensions.
A Midwestern husband and father announces his plan to have a sex change operation.
Dr. Matthew Clark is the head of a state institution for intellectually disabled children. Jean Hansen, a former music teacher anxious to give her life some meaning, joins the staff of the hospital. Jean, who tries to shelter the children with her love, suspiciously regards Dr. Clark's stern training methods. She becomes emotionally involved with 12-year-old Reuben Widdicombe, who has been abandoned by his divorced parents.
Based on a true story. Liz Murray is a young girl who is taken care of by her loving, but drug-addicted parents. Liz becomes homeless at 15 and after a tragedy comes upon her, she begins her work to finish high school.
Russ Millings has just been released from prison after serving 21 years for a 3rd strike conviction for possessing an ounce of marijuana. As he tries to adapt to a world he doesn’t recognize – including trying to learn how to use the internet – he finds an abandoned baby in a dumpster behind the fast food restaurant where he works as a dishwasher. Unsure of what to do, and caught between impulses of kindness and panic, Russ soon realizes this could be his chance at redemption.
Lamb, based on the novel by Bonnie Nadzam, traces the self-discovery of David Lamb in the weeks following the disintegration of his marriage and the death of his father. Hoping to regain some faith in his own goodness, he turns his attention to Tommie, an awkward and unpopular eleven-year-old girl. Lamb is convinced that he can help her avoid a destiny of apathy and emptiness, and takes Tommie for a road trip from Chicago to the Rockies, planning to initiate her into the beauty of the mountain wilderness. The journey shakes them in ways neither expects.
Jared, the son of a Baptist pastor in a small American town, is outed to his parents at age 19. Jared is faced with an ultimatum: attend a gay conversion therapy program – or be permanently exiled and shunned by his family, friends, and faith.