|
 |
• Click here to see
the First Coast News segment about "BRATS: Our Journey Home!" or go directly to
http://wm.wtlv.gannett.edgestreams.net/news/2007-05-25/bratsthurs11p.wmv (Windows Media Player)
• Click here to
read the original story on First Coast News.
First Coast News/WTLV-Channel 12 News segment - Jacksonville, FL
"'BRATS: Our Journey Home' Makes First Coast Debut"
Kyle Meenan
Aired May 24, 2007
When Filmmaker Donna Musil completed her documentary in the fall of 2006, she didn't go with
the major film companies for distribution.
She's sharing her story -- the story of millions of children who grew up as sons and daughters
of servicemen and women -- one city at a time.
The documentary, "BRATS: Our Journey Home" is perhaps a bit ironic in the sense military children
featured in the film HAD no set home... at least not the ground zero most of American kids enjoyed
year after year growing up.
In the opening scenes is a shot of Musil herself as a child in Korea in the 1960s. Just one of a
dozen chapters of her life growing up around the world that helped inspire her to put the story she
shared with so many others to film.
"BRATS" presents a kind of healing to all those children who moved so frequently and gained
strengths and weaknesses along the way.
"We really miss that environment in some ways... and did you join the military yourself?"
Musil is answering dozens of questions from a roomful of moviegoers who have remained in their
seats long after the closing credits have rolled.
The film has touched them deeply. Some, having old wounds opened... others finding clarity to
years of emotional fog.
Musil is traveling around the nation sharing her baby with tens of thousands of others. And at
each stop she's taking the time to answer the myriad of questions to help her audiences understand
the outpouring of emotions they experience watching "BRATS."
"There's so many things I want to say but I need to digest the whole thing!" said Garf Cooper.
Another woman in the audience shared her appreciation.
"It was very well done. And it helped me to feel a lot of reasons why I have gone through some
of the things that I have gone through. Feelings. Emotions, and so forth growing up trying to
figure things out."
"At the same time that (military) life gave us so many strengths, but it also didn't teach us
certain skills that we kind of need as an adult," said Musil.
In less than one year, the "BRATS" tour has visited more than three dozen cities... and with an
estimated 15-million brethren on the horizon, its story carries a common thread, touching the heart.
|
|
