Only the Young / Inocente (ATOM Study Guide)

Inocente

Inocente is fifteen. An undocumented immigrant, living in San Diego, California, Inocente's life has been dogged by domestic violence and homelessness. Inocente is happiest when she is painting and her ambition in life is to become an artist. Her association with A.R.T.S. gives her hope that her dream will become a reality and that her future need not be as despairing as her past. A.R.T.S. stands for A Reason To Survive, an organisation that believes that the visual, performing, and literary arts can transform lives, especially those of children and youth facing major life challenges.

For the past nine years Inocente has been homeless. With her mother and three younger brothers, Inocente has lived in refuges, homeless shelters and temporary accommodation. Inocente's father has been deported for domestic abuse. Her mother is defeated and depressed. The family's status as illegal immigrants and the constant threat of deportation renders every day difficult.

Inocente's life reaches a turning point. A.R.T.S. have chosen Inocente from a group of 5000 applicants to stage an exhibition. She paints non-stop: telling her story; revealing her love of colour and pursuing what she hopes will be her career. Taking control of her own destiny means that she is also ready to live on her own. Inocente's mother is reluctant to let her leave but knowing it is what her daughter wants, she agrees.

Three months and thirty art works later, Inocente's exhibition opens. Every piece sells and even Inocente's mother and brothers accept the invitation to attend.

Only the Young

Canyon Country is a suburban community in the municipality of Santa Clarita, California. Developed in the 1960s as a residential suburb, the economic downturn has hit Canyon Country hard. Businesses have closed and many of the locals are struggling to maintain their home mortgages. Teenagers and best friends, Kevin Conway and Garrison Saenz, the principal subjects of Only the Young live in Canyon County. Skaters and evangelical Christians, Kevin and Garrison, spend most of their time at the local skate park and an abandoned house that they have claimed as their own. Garrison's girlfriend, Skye Elmore, complicates the boys' easy going 'bromance'. More than just a love interest, Skye has her own story to tell.

Filmmakers Elizabeth Mims and Jason Tippet met Kevin and Garrison when they were sixteen-years-old. They spent eighteen months filming the boys skateboarding, falling in and out of love for the first time, cleaning dirty pools for spending money, setting off fireworks and taking to the streets as Gandalf on Halloween. In documenting the boys' lives, Only the Young portrays the aimlessness and urgency of teenagers on the verge of an adult world that doesn't really have much to offer. Unsure of whether to just go along or to rebel, Kevin and Garrison settle for somewhere in the middle.

Inocente and Only the Young are suitable for secondary students in Year 10 undertaking subjects within the domains of English, The Arts and within the strand of Physical, Personal and Social Learning. Both documentaries are suitable texts for study in VCE English and Media. Students undertaking Studio Arts will be interested in the portrait of Inocente as an aspiring artist.