REEL SOUTH

Series / 8 Seasons

REEL SOUTH is a PBS documentary series that showcases authentic stories which unearth the spirit of the South today. The series explores layers of Southern life across themes of social justice, cultural experience, environmental challenges, and more. REEL SOUTH aims to leverage our region’s rich storytelling tradition as a catalyst for positive change — in the American South and beyond.

Watch: S10 E1002

26m 18s

Ingrid teaser

1m

A successful fashion designer who gave up her big-city career, Ingrid Gipson discovered a reclusive life of solitude and unhindered creativity in Arkansas’ rural Ouachita Mountains. As if through poetry, she opens up her world again to those of us willing to listen.

Saint Cloud Hill teaser

50s

Captain Chris Scott rallies a colony of tent residents to defend their provisional homes against the forces of gentrification. As development encroaches on the community, the tragedies and personal experiences of a displaced community resurface among those clinging to their last remnant of stability.

The Well-Placed Weed teaser

1m

Growing up in rural South Carolina, celebrated American garden designer Ryan Gainey developed a love of plants at an early age. After moving to Atlanta in the 1970s, Ryan began designing gardens in affluent neighborhoods and around the world. A contradictory character, offensive and tender, artificial yet truly authentic, Ryan was known for his love of beauty and the ability to create it.

Santuario episode teaser

40s

After 25 years of living in the United States, Guatemalan grandmother Juana Ortega is threatened with deportation and soon takes sanctuary in a small North Carolina church. As time passes, and state lawmakers continue to ignore the family's pleas for a stay on her deportation, Juana's spirits slowly sink. And yet, Juana is patient that in God's house, God will answer her prayers.

Lumpkin GA teaser

50s

In a fading Georgia town, a community recalls its dark past and faces a grim present. An undocumented immigrant, caught in legal limbo and facing deportation, contemplates his future. In the midst of it all, a massive, private immigration prison generates millions in profits. Where these stories meet, the hidden epicenter of America’s immigration crackdown is revealed—a place called Lumpkin, GA.

Gimme a Faith teaser

1m

Thousands of Chinese students arrive in the United States each year, often confronting loneliness and culture-clash upon arrival. Arriving in North Carolina to study filmmaking, Hao Zhang is surprised to find a unique community of Chinese students, connected by a newly discovered evangelical Christianity that is often at stark odds with their communist roots in China.

A Texas Myth teaser

50s

The Glover family invites an indigenous activist group to start a protest camp on their land in West Texas. Roughly 20 miles north of the US-Mexico Border, the Two Rivers camp sets out to fight the same company that built the pipeline at Standing Rock. As more oil and gas projects threaten the region, their struggle reveals much about the colonial legacy of Texas and the price of activism.

Two Trains Runnin Teaser

50s

Set during the height of the civil rights movement, a band of blues hounds traveled to the Deep South to find two forgotten blues singers. Finding them would not be easy. There were few clues to their whereabouts. It was not even known for certain if they were still alive. And Mississippi, that summer, was a tense and violent place. Featuring music from Gary Clark Jr., Lucinda Williams and more!

Fiesta Quinceañera teaser

1m

Life for a Latinx immigrant family in the New South can be challenging and sometimes terrifying, but thankfully, there’s always a fiesta to take you through the night. Three Latina girls and a seasoned drag artist hose their own quinceañera, a complex and colorful rite of passage, showcasing the creative spirit of Latinx communities and their struggles to retain their roots and traditions.

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