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Amelia – sp – Most people know the story of Amelia Earhart, the famous female pilot who tried to fly around the world and disappeared. So when Hollywood decides to make a biopic about this famous aviatrix, it might not be easy to come up with any big surprises in the story, which was the case with this movie. Ted Waitt a wealthy businessman was always interested in this story and decided to put up all the money if necessary, and produce this movie. He brought in Oscar awardee screen writer Ron Bass (Rainman) who told us that he wrote 7 drafts of the movie and emphasized the fact that Ms Earhart had an alcoholic father who rejected her and led to her trying to achieve some kind of affirmation from men and also through her accomplishments of doing what no one has ever done. The Director whom they had on board left the project and Mira Nair came on to direct and brought on well know writer Anna Hamiliton Phelan (Gorillas in the Mist) who did 13 rewrite versions and ultimately emphasized Amelia’s love of flying and the great feminist hero status that she became. Hilary Swank was chosen for the lead and Richard Gere was given the role of her promoter and the person whom she ultimately married. Swank gave the character great likeability and conveyed the determination, which dominated her. Ultimately we found there was not enough of this character to hold our attention. Not only were there no surprises in the movie but despite Ms Swank’s fine performance, there was not much depth or intrigue in the film’s portrayal of this great American hero. We believe that Mr. Bass’s vision of the character perhaps would have offered more to the movie. There were some wonderful flying scenes, beautiful landscapes, well done period clothes and a full strong soundtrack. The interspersing of some actual newsreels was also a nice touch. (2009)

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A Serious Man – rm – This Coen Brothers film is a painful comedy, which takes place in a Minnesota Jewish community in 1967. Larry Gropnik, played by Michael Stuhlberg is a midwestern physics professor who is trying to be a good guy and a devout Jew. He feels all is as it should be with his children and his wife as well as his with his quirky brother who lives with them. He is preparing for his son’s bar mitzvah, believes he properly handles a student who doesn’t like a final grade and deals with the everyday problems of neighbors and TV reception. But then his life begins to unravel. Everything seems to be going wrong and although he seeks the wisdom of three rabbis, none are in a position to explain how Hashem – the word for God – could let this happen. Joel and Ethan Coen who have written, produced and directed this movie have captured the period with the houses, cars, synagogue and dress as well as the essence of the characters. If non-Jews created the film, they might even be called anti-Semitic. The Coens have satirized these Jews and their values to the point of a mockery. The opening of the movie shows us a brief scene in an 1800s European Jewish shtetl where the beliefs and values of the people living there would have been viewed as ridiculous to the Jews of the 1960s, as many now will view those of the people portrayed in this movie. Each generation can look back at their parents and grandparents and question how they lived their lives. In the end, whether the Coens meant it this way or not, we realize that this movie is about all cultures and about every serious man and woman’s search for the meaning of life when things begin to go wrong. This film will give you a lot of laughs but it is not a fun movie to watch. (2009)

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An Education – sp – How often does it happen that a promising high school student goes astray and blows the opportunity for a great college education? It could be drugs, alcohol, falling in love or whatever. In this movie set in London in the early 1960s, it is an attractive extremely bright 16-year-old girl (Carey Mulligan) with no apparent drug use but occasional cigarette smoking, who hopes to get into Oxford, study English, speak French and explore the classics. Through a chance meeting with a somewhat older man (Peter Sarsgaard), she becomes enamored with him, his apparent wealth and appreciation of music and all the fine things. Her parents don’t have a clue what is going on and her father (Alfred Molina) concludes this guy is a fine fellow. He would not even object if she decides to skip college and go off into the sunset with this wonderful man. This film adroitly directed by Danish director Lone Scherfig focuses closely on Carey Mulligan, this delightful young women who is in every scene and we clearly see her evolution. The photography of this period piece is well done particularly of the English countryside, the automobiles and the clothes. Things are not always what they seem to be and the movie has a storyline that you may not anticipate. The script is actually based on a true-life situation originally written recently by women now in her 60s. There is also a questionable anti-Semitic theme, which can lead to some interesting post movie discussions. Susan and Michael differed on the final value of this film as Michael also felt that it had some unresolved and unaddressed moral issues. We ultimately went with Susan’s rating as we both thought the movie was worth seeing. (2009)

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Amreeka – rm – A divorced Palestinian women and her 16 year old son get an answer to a request made several years previously allowing them to emigrate to the United States . They move to middle America to live with her sister and her physician husband who have three children. The time period is just after the United States has invaded Iraq and the mood of the United States and their Illinois community appears to be a generalized anti-Arab feeling. There is taunting of the children in school and the doctor’s patients are leaving his practice. The difficulties of this new immigrant and her son to adjust to a new country with problems for the mother of getting a good job and conflicts in school for the teenager could have been the tribulations of other groups at other times. The story line only briefly reflects upon the Palestinian-Israeli issues and there is a suggestion of hope for future relationships in the appearance of kindly Jewish principal who befriends the struggling Palestinian women who is trying to make it in America. This is a somewhat simple film that is not done badly and is a story worth telling. (2009)

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The Lives of Others – nf – When this movie was first showing in local theaters we both recall thinking that despite good reviews , it was probably going to be a very dreary film about listening in to people’s conversations, so we skipped it. We now see how wrong we were, as we were very riveted to this sensitive historical drama set in East Germany during the mid 1980s. It is the story of the surveillance by the secret police of a successful playwright and his actress girlfriend. There is an opportunity to see conflict, change and growth in the main characters, particularly in that of the most committed officer who is secretly spying on this couple for the government and comes to understand them. The movie reflects the oppression that so many people endured during this time, as well as exposing some of the hypocritical motives of the people who persecuted them. It is suspenseful yet evokes emotion and has a subtle and near perfect ending. The actors are excellent veteran German actors and the playwright and Director is East German Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck who made his debut feature film with this movie which won a well-deserved Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. The Netflix DVD has a not to be missed interview with this relatively young director which highlights the research and great thoughtfulness which went into the script, casting, music and production of this outstanding, authentic movie. The movie is in German with subtitles. (2007)

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Ghosts of Mississippi – nf – Michael stumbled on this movie on HBO which is available on Netflix. Initially I thought it was another Law & Order or Cold Case TV program. I may have seen before but am very glad I came across it. This 1996 stunning movie directed by Rob Reiner is the story of the persistence of a Jackson Mississippi Assistant District Attorney, played by Alec Baldwin, to retry white supremacist Bryon De La Beckwith played by James Woods who received an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of this despicable man who assassinated civil rights activist Medgar Evers in 1963. Whoopie Goldberg plays Myrlie Evers the widow who never gave up her quest to see justice served for this crime and actually was a consultant for this film. The cast also included James Nelson, William Macy and Virginia Madsen. The film was made two years after the front-page courtroom drama, which rectified the failure of two previous trials 30 years previously. It is a reminder of the racism, which existed in the south, at that time and how there are persistent remnants of it. But it also showed how there was change in an evolving south and in our justice system. The American Film Institute in 2008 chose the courtroom scene to be included in its all time list of best courtroom movie scenes. The entire film should be mandatory viewing for new law graduates and probably even for all high school students. The movie certainly touched my emotions. (1996)

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Brief Interviews With Hideous Men – sp – This is a somewhat unusual film which uses a mostly non narrative style of brief interviews with men plus a series of disjointed scenes of interaction mostly between the young women researcher played by Julianne Nicholson and various men. There appears to be an attempt to provide insight into these men’s relationships with women and perhaps into their sexual feelings. The screenplay was written and directed by John Krasinski in his first movie who also acted in it. The content was taken from the writings of David Forster Wallace an essayist and novelist who died last year by suicide at the age of 46. He apparently has a large following that meet regularly on the Internet to discuss his obtuse writings. The acting in the movie was quite good and included Tim Hutton. The Director of Photography was renowned cinematographer John Bailey who was a guest at our screening. He described how three different editors all tried their hand at putting together this movie. In our opinion we don’t see the threads that this final version used. There was one small segment in the film, which seemed unrelated to the others but was quite riveting. It showed an older black man recounting the inner life and feelings of his father who worked for many years as an attendant in a high-end hotel men’s room. We will be surprised if this movie generates much momentum and may not even make it to your local screen. (2009)

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Gotta Dance – sp – When the New Jersey Nets Professional Basketball team decided that they wanted to include a senior dance group among their half time entertainment, they advertised that they were holding open auditions. Film Producer and documentary filmmaker Dori Berinstein saw the ad and grabbed her camera equipment and decided this was the subject of a film that she wanted to make. The rest is history. 11 women and one man ranging in age from the sixties to the eighties made the team. This documentary film is about these people, their individual stories and how they came together. It showed how it is never too late to do something you really love doing and do it well. It could have been anything, but in this case it was dancing and much to even the dancer’s surprise they were molded into a cohesive group with a main feature of hip hop dancing. The film maker skillfully weaved the dancer’s interesting personal vignettes with the story of their training to ultimately perform in front of 20,000 people in a packed arena. There were moments of suspense and moments where you could share their jubilation. The film succeeded not only in telling this unusual and inspiring story but also by appearing to touch the emotions of most of the audience who gave six members of the group who visited our screening a standing ovation. (2009)