LATV
was established in 1977 as a tax-exempt non-profit 501c3 organization to “engage
primarily in the specific activity of educational communication”.
The first LATV production took place during humankind’s first landing
on another planet. LATV was at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena as
the Viking I spacecraft approached and landed on Mars. The project scientists
who had spent much of their careers dreaming and planning the mission were
present to witness the landing and anxiously await the first photographs to
arrive from millions of miles away.
As Project Director Gerald Soffen said, “My whole life flashed before my very eyes. The final descent took 18 seconds and I have worked on this project for 18 years. That’s one second per year”. But the aspect, which made this night most magical, was the arrival of the science fiction writers, the very people who had inspired the scientists to go to Mars when they were children. In The Billion Dollar Image, Ray Bradbury, Robert Heinlein, Poul Anderson, Harlan Ellison, and a host of other writers related to us with awe, excitement, and a bit of melancholy how their fantastic musings became reality. Now that their visions had been reached they must pursue new ground to inspire other children with new dreams.
Among other notable productions LATV co-produced Characters: A Variety of Visions, with Los Angeles PBS affiliate, KCET. This critically acclaimed one-hour documentary delves into the world of two deaf brothers and the reality of life when you can’t hear it.
One brother, Harry, is an artist, whose paintings explore the world of deafness, a world in which he immerses himself and rejects the hearing world. The other brother is a mechanic for the finest rider on Kawasaki’s motocross racing team, Gaylon Mosier. Totally immersed in the hearing world and not wanting to associate with deaf people, Rocky lives a life of creative accommodation to communicating in a hearing world and the teasing of his mechanic co-workers.
A thread throughout the program included a variety show staged at the Los Angeles Club of the Deaf and emceed by a deaf standup comic whose humorous and poignant stories highlighted the main points of the documentary. The positive yet realistic approach of this program won acclaim from critics as well as the public.
You Have Got The Power is an inspiring look into the positive determination of several amputees and their families. Tom, who had been a guitar player, tells of how he was determined in the hospital to learn to open a milk carton with one hand. Sixteen year-old athlete Tom insists that he isn’t sentimental about the leg he lost. As he shows off the last plaster cast taken before amputation he stops and says with an insightful grin, “OK, I am sentimental”.
Power received the prestigious John Muir Medical Film Festival award, presented by pioneering heart surgeon, Dr. Michael DeBakey, and film legend, Helen Hayes.
Transplant
Central - LATV |
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