Description
In this documentary marathon, revisit three essential FRONTLINE documentary series exploring the costs of the American Dream and the families fighting to survive it.
These groundbreaking and award-winning documentaries span three decades of FRONTLINE's reporting on real Americans, telling their stories of struggle in their own words:
- More than a decade ago, director Jezza Neumman explored poverty in the United States as it’s rarely seen: through the eyes of children. His documentary "Poor Kids" told the stories of Kaylie, Johnny and Brittany — three American kids trying to overcome generational poverty. "Born Poor" revisits the same children, now grown, chronicling their lives from childhood to the present day. Neumann also produced the 2020 film "Growing Up Poor in America," which follows three children and their families in the battleground state of Ohio as the COVID-19 pandemic amplifies their struggle to stay afloat.
- Filmed over more than 30 years, "Two American Families" is a portrait of perseverance from FRONTLINE, Bill Moyers, and filmmakers Tom Casciato and Kathleen Hughes that raises unsettling questions about the changing nature of the American economy and the impact on people struggling to make a living. It tells the saga of two families in Milwaukee, Wisconsin — one Black, the Stanleys, and one white, the Neumanns — who have spent the past 34 years battling to keep from sliding into poverty, and who refuse to give up despite economic challenges.
- From a team led by award-winning filmmaker Mike Shum, "American Voices 2026" is the latest installment of a unique filmmaking effort begun in 2020. That’s when Shum and FRONTLINE started documenting the lives of voters with differing viewpoints as they navigated a year of extraordinary tumult, from the pandemic to protests to the polls, in the documentary "American Voices: A Nation in Turmoil." Four years later, "American Voices 2024" chronicled how their hopes and fears had changed since 2000, amid another polarizing election season.
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Looking for more documentaries? Start here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_pPc6-qR9ZwlDyyk6o-X_gib47lpqlGP
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FRONTLINE is produced at GBH in Boston and is broadcast nationwide on PBS.
Funding for FRONTLINE is provided through the support of PBS viewers and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, with major support from Ford Foundation, and Fialkow Family Foundation.
Additional support for FRONTLINE is provided by the Abrams Foundation, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Park Foundation, Heising-Simons Foundation, and the FRONTLINE Trust, with major support from Jon and Jo Ann Hagler on behalf of the Jon L. Hagler Foundation, and Corey David Sauer, and additional support from Koo and Patricia Yuen, and Laura DeBonis and Scott Nathan.
Corporate support for FRONTLINE is provided by The Economist.