Weirdos: A Homeschool Documentary
“Weirdos: A Homeschool Documentary” looks into the lives of homeschool families and why they would choose to dedicate their time, resources, and hearts to this lifestyle. Discussing topics of child development, struggles, passion-led learning, misconceptions, freedom and more, all while following the story of one town’s journey to build a thriving homeschool community and the benefits that having a strong support system provides to the individual families.
Our Story
As a married director/producer team and homeschool parents of 3 children ourselves we have not always been in, or even understood, the world of homeschooling. Like so many who choose this path, the option had not even occurred to either of us in the beginning and was definitely not our plan.
Once the idea did come into our minds in the early years of our oldest child’s life, we had a hard time knowing if it was completely crazy and it still took several years of talking about it and lots of research before we made the choice to try… little did we realize how much it would shake up our relationships when we told people what we were doing. After several months of receiving unsupportive reactions, having tear-inducing conflicts and not having the words, or confidence, to properly explain things the way we wanted to, Matt said “I just wish there was a documentary we could show them so they could understand WHY we would want to do this!” After looking at what the available options were, nothing was what we were wanting to share, and out of our frustration was born our inspiration. Create what you wish you had. We combined our passions for documentary filmmaking and homeschooling to create a tool for those in our situation to share with their friends and family.
From the very beginning we have had three main objectives: maintain a very high level of cinematic beauty and quality, show that homeschooling is widespread and for any “type” of family, and focus on the positives, the “why” behind the reason people choose this lifestyle-the joy, the freedoms, natural development, etc.
After spending over 2 years creating this documentary; our love for, commitment to, and confidence in the decision to homeschool is deeper than we ever would have thought possible. The story we have had the honor to tell has shifted and morphed with time as the voices of the interviewees led us down the path of their experiences, their lives, and into their hearts. This is their story. If we chose to, we could spend the rest of our lives filming and editing and still never be able to represent every possibility that homeschooling offers because it is vastly different for every single family, every child, and every moment in time. In the end, the essence of what makes it wonderful is that it is as open as life itself.
-Amanda Black, Producer
The Team
Matt Black - Director
Award winning documentary filmmaker, Matt has a natural ability to find a unique story and tell it in powerful ways that connect to the audience.
With over ten years experience, Matt has a deep passion for storytelling and the technical skills for high end productions.
AManda Black - Producer
Since a very young age, Amanda has dedicated her life to early childhood education. Her years of endless research lead her to homeschooling her own children and now she shares her passion for it with others.
A talented producer, Amanda has worked on many outstanding productions.
Dustin Merrill - D.O.P.
As a world renowned videographer, Dustin has traveled to all corners of the world finding and filming the beauty all around him.
Working as the Director of Photography for this film, Dustin is an expert at getting remarkable images even in the most rushed and impossible situations.