With the current housing crisis, more and more young people are continuing to live with their parents or are moving back into their childhood homes. The film is an urgent reminder emotionally strong and often tangled bonds between parents and adult children.
17 and Life Doesn’t Wait. Distribution – Good Docs. 2019. 80 min. and 58 min. DVD UPC unavail. $129, schools/public libraries. ¬Streaming options avail.
“Audrey, Kiki, and Mich don’t seem to mind cameras following them around, sharing their senior year in different parts of the United States and Canada. Kiki hopes for a basketball scholarship; driven Audrey plans on Harvard; and Mich goes to an alternative school, loves art, and wonders if smoking weed would be a problem if she were president. The girls are likeable, occasionally mugging for the camera, and viewers will likely identify with aspects of messy rooms, pets, video games, and Instagram angst, as well as weightier issues such as a suicidal sibling, sexual identity, and feeling safe at school. This film is perhaps most useful for professional development, as it gives a window into the concerns and responsibilities of those coming of age in 2020. VERDICT Reassuring to high school seniors, who may wonder if everyone else has it more figured out, and a useful prompt for pre-service teachers to remind them that under an “I’ve got this” attitude, teens still benefit from sensitive adult support.”
Emily Dreaming, My Millennial Life. Photo: Maya Bankovic. Makin’ Movies 2016
My Millennial Life is invited to the Portland Film Festival as part of the alumni stream. After having its Portland Festival premiere in 2016, it’s again part of the festival, streaming with a diverse array of new and compelling films. The Portland Film Festival runs from October 6 – November 8 and tickets for streaming the films are available.
Maureen is participating on an alumni panel, which you can you can tune into beginning November 6, 10am PT on. The panel participants will discuss what they are doing now and what happened distribution-wise to their films now screening at the festival.
We’re really excited the film’s been nominated by the Canadian Academy of Cinema & Television for a CSA Award. A special congratulations to our editor, Cathy Gulkin. The Awards will be announced mid-May.
In My Parents' Basement is available to screen in Canada on hoopla and Worldwide on google play / youtube for rent
With humour, depth and compassion, the award-winning documentary explores the stories of three adult children who have returned to their parents’ home to live. As we watch each of the subjects and their families grapple with living together. Future dreams, past failures and the present struggles of daily life are captured in close-up over a nine-month period of time.
Through conversations, anecdotes, arguments and unpredictable emotional highs and lows, In My Parents’ Basement sheds light in the parent/(adult) child bond and offers insight into the myriad of issues triggered by an adult family living together, once again.
In this darkly humorous hour-long documentary, we meet Bob, an articulate 34 year-old who has lived with his parents for two years and shows no signs of moving out. He struggles with depression, dislikes sunlight, and can’t seem to hold down a job.
Nancy, at age 42, is vulnerable: she was kicked out of her boyfriend’s apartment and can’t afford a place of her own. She’s sharing the basement with her grandmother, while trying to get her pet grooming business off the ground.
Denise and David are a young married couple. They work full time, but have moved in with Denise’s parents to save money for a house. Living with the in-laws, though, has turned them into permanent infants.
In My Parents’ Basement reflects a growing phenomenon in today’s society, and as the documentary unravels, it becomes painfully clear that being a parent or a child is a lifelong calling that requires superhuman patience, compassion, and strength.
Original Broadcaster: TVO Commission / CBC / SCN / ACCESS
Producer/Director: Maureen Judge
My Millennial Life is a Gold Medal winner in Documentary at the 2017 New York Festivals, Film & Television Awards.
Big thanks go out to the millennials — Hope, Meron, James, Emily, Kirsty, Tim and Mark — who gave their time and shared their stories, my producing partner Charlotte Engel (Rock Yenta Productions), and to production team who participated in the making of the film.
The film could not have been made without the generous support of our broadcaster TVO, Bell Fund, Rogers Documentary Fund, CMF, iChannel, and the Canadian Federal and Provincial Tax Credits.
