Birth is an epically complicated subject, and the documentary Birth Story mostly does justice to it. Ina May Gaskin is the world's most famous midwife. She was a caravanning hippie who decided to go to Tennessee and set up a farm commune, which opened in 1971 and is still going strong, training midwives and delivering babies. The directors do a good job interweaving new and historical footage of the founding midwives' halcyon days. Gaskin's philosophy is simple: relax. But in the force field of childbirth, that's got to be the hardest thing of all to do. (JEN GRAVES)