Sticks and Stones
2001 · 17m · Canada
Directed by Jan Padgett
Genres: coming-of-age, documentary, LGBTQ+
Tones: contemplative, provocative, tender
Children between five and twelve describe bullying and discrimination aimed at them or their families for departing from traditional gender and family patterns, while animated interludes trace the history of derogatory slang and affirm diverse families.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Everyone wants to champion the underdog documentary, but Padgett's doing something sneakier—the animated interludes on slur etymology could've been preachy, instead they're almost anthropological, which makes the whole thing weirder and more subversive than the premise lets on.
A formally considered piece that knows exactly where it sits in the lineage of social-issue documentary and Canadian public broadcasting tradition; the counterpoint between children's testimony and historical animation feels deliberately composed, the kind of structural choice that rewards close viewing.
The decision to have actual kids articulate their own experiences rather than filter through adult narration creates an almost unbearable specificity—you can't generalize away what you're hearing, and that vulnerability becomes the film's entire architecture.