John Reilly

A documentary made at the set up of a theater production, of Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot", directed by Jan Jönson, played by prisoners, at San Quentin State Prison in California.The play is about two men who meet on a lonely country road, waiting for someone called Godot to confirm their lives and make life easier for them to live. Towards the end Godot announces that he will not come tonight, but maybe tomorrow. Producer and director John Reilly and a crew spent four weeks at the maximum-security facility; rehearsal and performance sequences are inter-cut with footage of daily prison life and discussions with the principal characters.

Biography and in-depth look of Beckett and his work.

Through eloquent portrayals of four different life experiences — birth, aging, marriage and the death of a parent — Home addresses how the dissolution of the nuclear family and the increasing control of daily life by institutions have affected the individual. The subjects of this verité documentary include a ninety-four year-old woman in a nursing home and a young man caring for his terminally ill mother at home.

A video exploration of the Declaration of Independence’s most ambiguous "self-evident truth" through portraits of six people whose paths intersect at a maximum security prison in Pittsburgh, PA.

The Irish Tapes is the first major documentary shot on portable 1/2 inch videotape. Directors Irish-Americans John Reilly and Stefan Moore filmed over a three-year period in the early 1970s with the support of the National Association for Irish Freedom, a US group associated with the Official IRA. Originally shown as a three-channel, twelve-monitor video installation, it was later edited for broadcast on television in the US in 1975.

In July 1983, seven United States citizens entered AVCO Systems Division, a manufacturing plant for MX and Pershing II missiles in Wilmington, Massachusetts. They threw blood on blueprints and computers to protest the buildup of nuclear arms. AVCO PLOWSHARES documents the ensuring trial, which includes dramatic testimony on civil disobedience and the question if a greater moral imperative exists beyond the letter of the law. Acting on their own behalf, the defendants argued "the justification defense" to claim their duty as citizens to warn of impending nuclear threats.

“Autobiography and politics intermingle in personal tales from the last wilderness in the Eastern Megalopolis…a complex and compelling orchestration of passions.”

This documentary examines childbirth practices in the United States through four couples experiencing pregnancy and delivery. Each case presents a different approach to birth, ranging from high-technology hospital procedures to alternative methods such as Leboyer and midwife-assisted childbirth.