And Baby Makes Two; Making Babies

So, you want green eyes, brown hair and dimples? How about some fries with that? In Making Babies, Cryobank counselors ask potential clients similar questions while they scan their overflowing database of healthy sperm donors, looking for the Right Stuff. Today, biological clocks are stuck in prime time thanks to the nature-override capabilities of egg nucleus transplanting, gestational surrogates, or embryo and sperm cell freezing that can keep reproductive material on ice indefinitely. We are taking control of our own evolution and by Dolly, this is exciting and terrifying stuff.Viewers are privy to the thoughts and ideas of couples, infertility specialists, physicians, bio-ethicists, and consumer marketers, as they discuss reproductive medicine, the mutable nature of family, and the art of building babies (think electronic shopping carts: we watch as two lesbians cruising the net looking for Mr. GoodDNA become downright giddy over the available choices--with no strings attached!--for their ideal sperm-man). In addition, the program includes a peek at an annual infertility convention where vendors hock their latest merchandise to hopeful consumers (an over $2 billion industry), looks at the preventable complications many patients (and babies) suffer at the hands of overzealous infertility doctors (nearly 50% of in vitro treatments result in multiple births), and explores the latest ethical hot spots, including the emerging practice of lawyers serving as agents for donors who wish to auction off their beautiful-people-eggs-and-sperm.As we enter the Brave New World of the 21st century, science is bringing us a plethora of baby-making options designed to fulfill the family needs of infertile couples, alternative lifestyle couples and single moms who want something to cuddle, but don't want to deal with, in the words of author Suzanne Finnamore (Otherwise Engaged), "a sock on the floor [that] isn't just a sock on the floor anymore. It's a sock on the floor for the rest of my life." Superbly addressing many complex subjects, Making Babies, which originally aired on PBS's Frontline series, is highly recommended. Aud: H, C, P. (N. Plympton)In a similar vein, And Baby Makes Two looks at the lives of modern women leading busy lives who, although they might have envisioned a day when they would be married with children, suddenly realize that the mid-thirties have arrived and Their Real Lives still haven't started. Casting one eye on the ticking biological clock and another on the time-consuming quest of finding the perfect partner, some decide to dive--initially--into the gene pool solo. This film chronicles the two-year journey of a handful of such women from New York City, who choose artificial insemination, conception with a male who will not be involved as an active father, or adoption. Neatly combining an objective point of view with personal stories, the film documents the difficulties involved in getting pregnant after the customary child-bearing years, risks and benefits of fertility drugs, pros and cons of an absentee or uninvolved father, the adoption alternative, and the procedures, costs and frequent disappointments of artificial insemination. In addition, the video interviews the women's parents about their reproductive years, effectively contrasting the differences between traditional and non-traditional ways of creating a family. Highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (J. McDaniel)