Joel P. Engardio, Producer/Director, 'Knocking'

"When my mom took me door-knocking on Saturday mornings to deliver the Watchtower magazine and a Bible message to the neighborhoods of Saginaw, Michigan, I didn't realize I was a defender of America's essential freedoms: speech, religion and personal liberty. I was just a kid who would rather be home watching cartoons on television like the other kids."

Tom Shepard, Producer/Director, 'Knocking'

"By delving deeply and personally into the lives of several Witnesses, watching them struggle with life's biggest challenges, watching them celebrate deeply held convictions and watching them negotiate their faith in a world often at odds and even hostile toward them, we begin to empathize and see Jehovah's Witnesses as real human beings, not just caricatures on our doorsteps."

Joseph Kempler, Holocaust Survivor

"My name is Joseph Kempler. 'Knocking' tells a story that I saw with my own eyes. I am a Holocaust survivor, raised as a Jew in Poland. I lost my faith because of the things I saw and experienced in the Nazi camps. But ironically what I also saw eventually restored my faith in God. I won't say more about my story here, or the struggles I and my family face because of the past. I'd like to say something about the present." More from the 'Knocking' Blog

Lillian Gobitas-Klose

"[The film shows how] my brother and I were expelled from school in the 1930s for refusing to say the pledge of allegiance and how our case Minersville School District v. Gobitis (the court clerk misspelled our name) went all the way to the Supreme Court." More from the 'Knocking' Blog

Dr. Viktoria Hertling, University of Nevada

"In the eyes of the Nazis, the Jehovah's Witnesses were Germans, Aryans, just like themselves. They were incensed when Jehovah's Witnesses refused to accept the authority of the state. They spoke out against the persecution of Jews when most people were quiet. The Nazi state considered them extremely dangerous."

Rabbi Michael Berenbaum

"The largest question in our world today is whether people of uncompromising faith are going to destroy the other, or embrace the other. Whether people of uncompromising faith are going to see it is imperative to act out with violence towards the other, or to act out with decency and dignity towards the other.So the question of our world may not be whether or not we're going to have fundamentalism, or whether fundamentalism is bad, but what type of fundamentalism we're going to have."

ITVS Community Cinema Events

ITVS Community is proud to support KNOCKING with a variety of community outreach events and materials, in anticipation of its national broadcast on Independent Lens on May 22, 2007.

ITVS Community Cinema is our flagship national monthly screening series featuring special previews of upcoming Independent Lens films, along with panel discussions, guest speakers and more.

ALABAMA

Mobile
May 5, 2007 , Saturday, 2:00 PM
Mobile Public Library, Moorer/Spring Branch Screening Room
4 South McGregor Avenue
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org

Montgomery
May 15, 2007 , Tuesday, 7:00 PM
Equality Alabama Education Center
821 S. Perry Street
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org

ARIZONA

Phoenix
May 16, 2007 , Wednesday, 5:30 PM
Arizona Interfaith Movement Offices
1710 E. Indian School
For more info contact: chi_do@itvs.org

CALIFORNIA

Los Angeles
May 18, 2007 , Friday, 7:30 PM
Pacific Design Center
8687 Melrose Ave. @ San Vicente Blvd.
For more info contact: chris_holbrook@itvs.org
RSVP to: lareservations@yahoo.com

Oakland May 9, 2007 , Wednesday, 6:30 PM
Oakland Museum of California
10th and Oak Street/next to Lake Merritt BART
For more info contact: moriah_kinberg@itvs.org

San Diego May 9, 2007 , Wednesday, 6:00 PM
San Diego Central Library, 3rd Floor Auditorium
820 E Street
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org
RSVPs are not needed for this event

San Francisco
May 8 , 2007 , Tuesday, 6:00 PM
San Francisco Public Library, Koret Auditorium
100 Larkin Street
For more info contact: moriah_kinberg@itvs.org

COLORADO

Denver
May 2, 2007 , Wednesday, 7:00 PM
Starz Film Center
900 Auraria Parkway
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Washington
May 13, 2007 , Sunday, 7:00 PM
Busboys and Poets
2021 14th Street, NW
For more info contact: michon_boston@itvs.org
RSVP to: knocking@communitycinema-dc.org, 202-939-0794

FLORIDA

Miami Beach
May 24, 2007 , Thursday, 8:30 PM
Miami Beach Cinematheque
512 Espanola Way
For more info contact: chi_do@itvs.org

GEORGIA

Athens
May 3, 2007 , Thursday, 7:00 PM
Athens-Clarke County Library
2025 Baxter Street
For more info contact: johanna_brown@itvs.org

Atlanta
May 8 , 2007 , Tuesday, 7:00 PM
Decatur Library
215 Sycamore Street
For more info contact: johanna_brown@itvs.org

IDAHO

Boise
April 24, 2007 , Tuesday, 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM
Boise State University Student Union Building, Barnwell Room
For more info contact: lynn_allen@itvs.org
For groups of 10 or more, please RSVP to lynn_allen@itvs.org

Nampa
April 28, 2007 , Saturday, 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM
Boise State University West Campus, First Floor Theater
5500 E. University Way
For more info contact: lynn_allen@itvs.org

Pocatello
April 18, 2007 , Wednesday, 5:30 PM - 7:00 PM
Idaho State University Pond Student Union (Bengal Theater)
For more info contact: lynn_allen@itvs.org

ILLINOIS

Chicago
May 2, 2007 , Wednesday, 7:00 PM
Facets Cinematheque
1517 W. Fullerton Avenue
For more info contact: naomi_walker@itvs.org

LOUISIANA

New Orleans
May 5, 2007 , Saturday, 6:00 PM
Ashe Cultural Arts Center
1712 Oretha Castle Haley Blvd.
For more info contact: info@charitablefilmnetwork.org
RSVP to: info@charitablefilmnetwork.org

MASSACHUSETTS

Boston
May 23, 2007 , Wednesday, 7:00 PM
Democracy Center at Harvard Square
45 Mt. Auburn St.
For more info contact: awheeler@bostoncares.org
RSVP to: awheeler@bostoncares.org

MICHIGAN

Grand Rapids
May 1 , 2007 , Tuesday, 7:00 PM
Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts
41 Sheldon Boulevard SE - Theatre
For more info contact: maurinem@gvsu.edu
RSVPs are not needed for this event

MISSOURI

St. Louis
May 24, 2007 , Thursday, 7:00 - 9:00 PM
Missouri History Museum
Lindell and DeBaliviere in Forest Park
For more info contact: abell@mohistory.org
RSVP to: reserv@mohistory.org

NEW YORK

Ithaca
May 18, 2007 , Friday, 7:00 PM
Henry St. John Building, Suite 103
301 South Geneva Street
For more info contact: info@stamp-cny.org
RSVP to: info@stamp-cny.org

PENNSYLVANIA

Philadelphia
May 9, 2007 , Wednesday, Doors Open at 6:00 PM,
Screening at 6:30PM
The National Constitution Center
525 Arch Street
For more info contact: cindy_burstein@itvs.org
RSVP to: 215-409-6700

Pittsburgh
May 3, 2007 , Thursday, 7:00 PM
Point Park University, 212 University Center Screening Room
414 Wood Street
For more info contact: infocinema@pointpark.edu
RSVP to: infocinema@pointpark.edu

SOUTH CAROLINA

Charleston
April 30, 2007 , Monday, 6:30 PM
Charleston County Public Library, Auditorium 2nd Floor
68 Calhoun Street
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org
RSVPs are not needed for this event

WASHINGTON

Seattle
May 19, 2007 , Saturday, 4:00 PM
Northwest Film Forum
1515 12th Avenue at Pike Street
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org

WISCONSIN

Sheboygan
May 15, 2007 , Tuesday, 7:00 PM
John Michael Kohler Arts Center
608 New York Avenue
For more info contact: patrick_baroch@itvs.org