The Eyes Of Tammy Faye with Tammy Faye Messner: DVD Cover
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The Eyes Of Tammy Faye Director: Fenton Bailey, Randy Barbato Cast: Tammy Faye Messner, RuPaul

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  • DVD Release Date: 07/22/2003
  • Original Release: 2000
  • Rating: Rated PG13
  • Sales Rank: 47,033

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Scenes

Features

Closed Caption; Full frame; English and Spanish subtitles

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Scene Index

Side #1 --
1. Window to the Soul [2:25]
2. Fall From Grace [2:05]
3. Raised in Religion [2:16]
4. At First Sight [2:48]
5. Truth Behind Puppets [2:28]
6. Hollywood [2:01]
7. Where Others Feared [2:46]
8. Family People [3:58]
9. Heritage U.S.A. [4:18]
10. Broken Ground [3:29]
11. Moral Majority [4:14]
12. The Dragon [3:11]
13. A Higher Calling [3:48]
14. Pure Torture [3:42]
15. Already Guilty [4:28]
16. Kills Their Wounded [3:17]
17. Don't Label People [3:28]
18. Back in Front [4:42]
19. Power Look [4:16]
20. Desert Sanctuary [3:29]
21. Special Guest [2:52]
22. Burying the Past [3:14]
23. People Count [3:05]
24. Credits [1:51]

Scene Index

Editorial Reviews

This rapturous documentary charts the path of former evangelist icon Tammy Faye (formerly Bakker), from her days as queen of the PTL (Praise the Lord) Ministry to her fall from grace and subsequent drug addiction to her relative exile. Codirectors Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato start their devotional film by showing the woman today, living quietly in the same Palm Desert house that she escaped to with Reverend Jim Bakker in 1987. Her shoulders thickly padded and her face masked by a thick cosmetic shield ("...eyelashes one-by-one, mascara, eyebrow pencil," she recites as if a litany), Bakker reintroduces herself to us by reading sad verse and making fairly creepy comments about collecting the glasses of dead friends and relatives. Soon, the constants in her life are established -- puppets, Jesus, toy dogs, and eyelash glue -- and we quickly realize these passions are just as human as anyone else's. Stopping well short of ridiculing their subject, Bailey and Barbato paint Faye as a surprisingly earnest figure who has supported people often rebuffed by some fundamentalist Christian groups, including AIDS victims and drug abusers. As kooky as she seems, and as easily lampooned as she may be, Tammy Faye is treated with love by these filmmakers. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Eyes's second half, a day-in-the-life of her post-PTL-scandal recovery period. Somehow, The Eyes of Tammy Faye manages to be as fascinating (and far less smug) than most viewers would probably expect. Eddy Crouse, Barnes & Noble

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Eyes Of Tammy Fayeby Anonymous

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November 11, 2003: 'I think the eyes are so important. I believe they are truly the windows of the soul,' says Tammy Faye Bakker-Messner. Since Tammy Faye wears a mask of make-up, including her cherished L'Oreal Waterproof Lash Out Mascara, one finds a soul once you move beyond her eyelashes. Her soul is apparent along with her faith. Twelve years after the dramatic collapse of the Christian empire of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, 'The Eyes of Tammy Faye' tells, for the first time, what really happened. Tammy Faye Bakker explains what really happened to her and her husband when they lost control of the first and most successful television ministry of its kind. PTL was the first network to launch its own satellite - 'broadcasting 24 hours a day until the Second Coming', and the first - and only - to build a theme park, a huge Disney style Christian retreat that Jim built from donations from his loyal viewers. It was called Heritage USA. It's attendance was behind Disneyland and Disney World. Their fall was as spectacular as their rise. It was the biggest scandal of its day, and one of the big crashes of the late 1980s. The Bakkers found themselves crucified in the court of public opinion for their greed and supposed corruption. Tammy Faye ended up at the Betty Ford Clinic, and Jim was imprisoned. 'The Eyes of Tammy Faye' explores the dark workings of the televangelist industry and shows how Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker were tricked out of their ministry by rival televangelist Jerry Falwell, leader of the moral majority. Falwell, it is claimed, promised help and support, then denounced them, staged a coup, and needlessly forced their ministry into bankruptcy. From the trailer and teaser, I thought 'The Eye's of Tammy Faye' would be humorous and poke constant fun at Tammy Faye. To the contrary, I wasn't sure if it was a documentary or not. According to Fenton Bailey, director of 'The Eyes of Tammy Faye,' 'Well no documentary is objective; the notion of 'fly on the wall' filmmaking is a contrived pretense because it is a scientific fact that the moment one observes something, the thing that is observed changes. Once you put a camera in the room, the room changes. The camera is less a fly on a wall than it is an elephant in a room, and anyone who pretends or acts as if a camera is not there is doing just that; they are pretending and acting. Therefore the very notion of objective filmmaking is a nonsense. Especially when you get into an edit room and start cutting because then - like it or not- a point of view is determining what is excluded and what is included.' 'Most award winning documentarians have a definite agenda, and/or point of view, this is rarely challenged because their agenda or point of view aligns with the politically correct opinions of their audience and their critics,' explained Bailey. 'This is perhaps, where we have failed and hopefully we will continue for the rest of our careers.' Besides her eyelashes and make up (which most of it is permanently tattooed on), Tammy Faye's faith is the makeup of her life. If more so-called Christians would follow the scripture in Luke 6:37 like Tammy Faye, 'Stop judging others, and you will not be judged. Stop criticizing others, or it will all come back on you. If you forgive others you will be forgiven,' we would have a truly spiritually diverse world. Tammy Faye shares with the audience her favorite scripture, which is Psalm 91. 'Those who live in the shelter of...