Four women across America navigate childbirth in radically different ways, revealing the hidden tensions between autonomy, medicine, and power at the universal threshold of life.
CHOICES is a feature documentary that follows four American women as they cross the threshold of childbirth. Each expectant mother makes a different choice: scheduled c-section or VBAC, hospital birth or home birth or freebirth. While the circumstances vary, the stakes are shared: how to bring a child into the world in a way that feels right, and what it takes to hold to that decision. Ultimately, what unfolds is beyond anyone’s choosing.
The Mothers
Tanya is a mother and doula living outside Sacramento, California. After a positive home birth with her first child, she chooses a freebirth for her second—guided by a desire for autonomy as well as financial realities. Rooted in a lifestyle of simplicity and connection to nature, she approaches birth with a deep sense of self-reliance.
Ebony is a first-time mother and physical therapy assistant living in Charlotte, North Carolina. She plans for a hospital birth with hopes for a vaginal delivery, while remaining open to intervention if needed. Aware of disparities in maternal outcomes for Black women, she builds a support system that includes a Black doula. As her induction date draws near, she is confronted by the mounting pressures within the American workforce and the medical model of care.
Jade is a mother of two and podcaster living outside Austin, Texas. After two previous c-sections shaped by trauma, she explores the possibility of a VBAC, but encounters conflicting guidance from medical providers and her larger community. She navigates through these competing narratives, seeking a path that feels safe, self-directed, and sacred.
Bethany is a mother and model living between Los Angeles and Denver. Supported by her trusted team—a midwife, an OB, and a doula—she prepares for her second home birth, this time in the water. She approaches pregnancy, birth, and postpartum with intention and care, held by resources and support, yet shaped by the demands of travel and a public-facing lifestyle.
Timeline
Background Research
December 2023 – February 2025
interviews with elder birth attendants
Story Research & Casting
February 2025 – September 2025
interviews with prospective subjects; selected four mothers from 100+ applicants
Production
April 2025 – January 2026
verité filming across the U.S.; followed four families through pregnancy, birth, and early postpartum
Post-Production & Festival Submissions
September 2025 – February 2027
editing, finishing, color grade, original score, sound design and mixing
Impact Development & Preview Screenings
September 2026 – March 2027
strategy development with impact producer; community screenings to inform distribution
Engagement
CHOICES contributes to a broader cultural shift in how birth is understood, experienced, and supported in the United States. Rather than advocating for a single model of care, the film creates space for a more nuanced, human-centered conversation—one that honors the complexity of individual experience while illuminating the systems that shape it. We are particularly interested in how the film might foster open communication across differing perspectives and create opportunities for individuals and groups to reexamine their assumptions, choices, and practices. We are developing an impact-oriented distribution plan that includes screenings paired with facilitated discussions for the communities most directly connected, including expectant parents, birth workers, medical professionals and students, and policy makers.
Background
The United States is currently facing a maternal health crisis, with the highest maternal mortality rate among high-income nations. Black women are more than three times as likely to die from pregnancy-related causes as are white women, and these disparities persist across income and education levels, pointing to the systemic factors that shape care, access, and outcomes. Many mothers and families remain unsupported during the postpartum period and must navigate early parenthood with limited access to paid leave and structural support. Globally, the U.S. remains the only high-income country without a national paid parental leave policy.
Families in America are living in a paradoxical moment: there is unprecedented access to information and technology alongside increasing scarcity of time, rest, nourishment, and community support. In this landscape, birth is often treated not as a physiological process, but as something to navigate within layers of productivity, protocol, and liability. A growing number of mothers and expectant parents are seeking models of care outside institutional structures—VBAC delivery, doula services, midwifery, home birth, and freebirth—in search of experiences more aligned with their values and sense of autonomy.
CHOICES does not argue for a single “right” way to give birth. Instead, it stays close to the raw lived experience of four mothers, each navigating a different choice. Through these stories, birth becomes a lens into broader questions of personal agency and collective responsibility in contemporary America.
Directors’ Statement
We aspire to co-create work that fosters a greater sense of coherence, connection, and care—work that shifts cultural stories in the direction of freedom and peace. CHOICES has expanded our capacity to love and to listen, as individuals and as a family. We want to share what we ourselves have received through its gestation: a deeply immersive experience in which you can set aside preconceived beliefs and encounter each mother’s story on its own terms. We hope the film invites you into an open space for inquiry, reflection, and reverence for the act of bringing life into the world.
Our Story
In September 2023, we packed our car with a few belongings, a duffle of film gear, and our three-month-old son. Over the next year, we interviewed elder birth attendants around the world to learn about birth as a universal rite of passage. This project has since evolved into the feature documentary CHOICES. During 2025, we followed four expectant mothers across America. As each welcomed a new baby, our own baby grew into a toddler, and we grew into a family film crew. We were invited into the lives of these families in some of their most tender moments of becoming. We’re making this film because we are forever in awe of what people can hold in the passage of birth.
The Team
Colette Legarrigues, producer, co-director
Martin Legarrigues, co-director, cinematographer, editor
Rivkah Beth Medow, consulting editor
Justin Pearson, sound designer
TBD, original score
TBD, colorist
Support the Film
CHOICES is an independently produced film. We are currently raising funds to support the completion of post-production, including editing, sound design, original score, and color. Contributions will also allow us to develop and carry out an impact-oriented distribution plan, in collaboration with an impact producer, designed to extend engagement beyond traditional film exhibition.
Fiscal Sponsorship
CHOICES is fiscally sponsored by The Film Collaborative, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. This means that all contributions to the film are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. All donations directly support the completion of the project—including post-production, distribution, and community impact.Through this partnership, we are able to receive tax-deductible donations while maintaining creative control as independent filmmakers.
Ways to Give
Online (Credit Card or PayPal)
The most direct way to contribute is by clicking the donate button above. Please consider covering the small credit card processing fee to make the most of your gift.
ACH, Wire, Zelle, or Check
Contact The Film Collaborative at fiscalsponsorship@thefilmcollaborative.org for instructions.
Stock Donations
Donating appreciated stock may provide tax advantages and increase the value of your contribution. Contact The Film Collaborative at fiscalsponsorship@thefilmcollaborative.org for instructions.
Donor-Advised Funds (DAF)
Instructions for contributing from a DAF are here.
