***

Don’t Change the Subject- sp

This is a documentary about suicide, by a film maker who lost his mother to suicide when he was a young teenager. It seems to be his attempt to understand that tragic event in his life at the same time he is making film that he hopes will save some lives. Usually we don’t review films before they are ready to be released. In fact, the final edit on this movie has just been tweaked. It hasn’t hit the film festivals yet and a distribution deal has yet to be made. We hope in a small way, the availability of this review will help the process along as well as encouraging folks in the mental health community to consider using this film as a discussion tool at professional meetings and most of all to be used for educating the public.  According to the National Institute of Mental Health suicide is 10^th leading cause of death in the U.S. and the 3^rd leading cause in the age group 15-24. There are 11.3 suicides deaths per 100,000 people in this country. An estimated 11 attempted suicides occur per every suicide.

While these and other statistics are important, this film is not about numbers and risk factors. It is about real people who tell little pieces of their stories. It is about people who came very close to killing themselves but for some circumstance or reason didn’t do so. It is about the film maker who comes across as a very likeable guy who is trying to figure out why is mother, who he believed loved him, would leave him by her own hand. He reads her letters, listens to tapes of her talking, looks at old film clips and ponders this issue with his older brother, aunt and step mother who married his father after his mom died. His brother never understood how she could have done this when she was in the music business and knew how important was his debut as an opera director that was happening the following week. His aunt, who was a psychiatrist, knew her sister had problems but didn’t see this coming. His stepmother only recently reveals her own special connection with suicide. While the film maker may not have ever completely understood why his mother ended her life, he did realize that more then how she ended her life, she should be remembered for how she lived her life which included much love and support to her children. This message alone gives the film great value.

The filmmaker, Michael Stutz is also the director, writer and producer. He does goes beyond just his own story and some close up vignettes of people who struggle with depression and have come close to doing this fatal deed. He follows a talented choreographer who is preparing a group of young dancers to perform a piece about autopsies. The result is as dramatic as is the meaning to young performers who had to come to grips with what their dance was about. We are introduced to a fairly successful comedian who has a team of writers help him prepare his material that daringly enough is going to be about suicide. It is always tricky business when humor is touching a potentially raw nerve. You have to understand, as a psychiatrist I usually don’t even like it when people use the word “crazy” in stories or in every day life but I appreciated the use of humor in this film. In fact the highlight was a piece by a comedian who did a monologue as a character who was leaving a video to his family prior to his suicide. He said just about everything a loved one would dread that their family member who was ending their life might say about them and how the suicidal person felt about them. It brought me to out loud laughter and will be for me one of the most unforgettable parts of this film about a very serious subject.

I said earlier that I hope professionals will view and use this film in their efforts to prevent suicide. It is not because this film will necessarily educate my profession about suicide. It didn’t really examine the difference between suicide attempts and suicide gestures nor did it attempt to show the different psychiatric diagnosis that people who attempt suicide might have. In fact there wasn’t much of a psychiatric presence in the film. However it has the potential to be very meaningful to anyone who has struggled with suicidal thoughts, had fleeting suicidal thoughts or has been close to anyone who has had these issues. Unfortunately there are a great number of people in at least one of these categories. This film can save lives so it deserves to be seen and will be a worthwhile experience for many people. I don’t know yet when and how it will be distributed but more information about it can be obtained on the following website: http://www.dontchangethesubject.org/  (2011)

***

Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness-rm – If you only knew that Solomon Rabinowitz alias Sholem Aleichem had originated the story of Fiddler on the Roof, “that would have been enough.” However this documentary attempts to show how this creative Jewish writer born in Russia in 1860 singularly chose to use Yiddish, which was basically a spoken language of the shtetl and make it a literary form to educate and entertain thousands if not millions of people in Europe and the new world during most of his life time (and beyond). Yiddish was the special language of the Jews consisting of mixture of German, Russian, Hebrew and probably a lot more. It allowed more expression of feelings, especially humor and it was experienced as the language of the people. This fact plus the insight into the struggles and emotions of the people about whom Shloem Aleichem chose to write in a very prolific manner, made his writing very popular. This was the period of time when people living in their small enclaves began to migrate to the cities as well as across the ocean to America. When he died in 1916 there were more than 100,000 people at his funeral in New York which not only was viewed as a tribute to him but as a demonstration of the emerging Jewish culture in the new world.  This documentary while emphasizing his place as a writer and as a Jewish icon also provides some insight into the ups and downs of his life style, which included being a stock market speculator who ultimately failed in his financial dealings. It shows somewhat of a picture of his family life as a dedicated parent although it doesn’t say much about his wife and his marriage.  The visual story is made mostly with archived photos of the people of his time including what seemed to be a repetitive photo of him along with a few video clips- the most riveting being the one from Fiddler. This is an enlightening view of a person about whom so many of us have heard, but don’t really know. If it has not been done yet, a fictionalized version of this story with the details flushed out even more with some imagination, if necessary, will make a fantastic feature film. You can start speculating on who should play the lead. (2011)  

***

Thunder Soul – sp- This is a true story destined to be an American legend. An all black 1970’s Texas High School stage band with a music director, who could have been a professional musician but chose to teach and use music to change young people’s lives, becomes the “best band in the land.” They introduce the rhythms of funk music along with great body movements by the band as they present their powerful sound. They win all kinds of competitions and trophies including the coveted band competition in Alabama. They get invited to play in Europe and Japan where they received acclaim on a par with professional musicians. 30 plus years later filmmaker Mark Landsman is listening to NPR and hears the story of this band and decides he might want to make a documentary about them. He visits the now retired leader Conrad O. Johnson, known as Prof, in Houston and convinces him to tell his story as he constructs a documentary about that historical time in the history of of Kashmere High School and this band. Much to his surprise, he then learns that some of the old band members are planning a surprise reunion concert for old Prof who has had failing health. The film becomes about these now older band members who return to prepare for this get together all with heartfelt stories about how the Prof and the band had been so meaningful to them. There are film clips of the 1970s with many of the band members in full Afros and the band with its full rich sound. These mostly guys and some gals are older, wiser, larger but still remember how to play as they are whipped into musical shape by one of the members who has taken on the leadership role for the reunion concert. The views of the musicians now in their 50s along with the wonderful sound which they can still make is captured quite well. In fact the background soundtrack throughout, even when the band is not seen playing, sets the mood and the joy of the film. There are some wonderful clips of Prof as a younger man and now as his once young charges have returned to pay tribute to him. Jamie Foxx loved the film idea and took on the role of Executive Producer. We only wish that Landsman had chosen to tell us a little more about how the returnees had been impacted by their experience, which they all agreed, had changed their lives. Had any of them become professional musicians? Had they passed on this great musical experience to their children? While we suggested to Landsman that it would be great to see a little of this info in the credits, he felt that it was mainly about the music and the personal stories were secondary. He did drop the tidbit that he is working on a fictional version for a feature film, which I am sure, will be a great opportunity to fill in the blanks in this great story. (2011) 

***

the Freedom- sp– This is a very important film but it is not yet ready for prime time. The version we were shown is not the final cut as the filmmakers Josh and Rebecca Harrell Tickell are still tweaking this film. We hope it will be pared down a little and the message focused and sharpened.  The premise of this documentary is that there need not be a. hopeless dependency on oil in the United States. The answer is that with determination and fortitude, as was shown by our forefathers in the founding of our country and in dealing with so many other crises, we can free ourselves from the ever increasing obligation and desperate need for foreign oil. Furthermore, that we can do this without doing the “drill baby drill “ thing in our own land and water nor do we have to utilize the ever dangerous nuclear power . The film proclaims that we can  solve our energy problems by primarily using ethanol and other biodegradable energy sources. They attack the arguments that experts have made that say that ethanol takes food away from human, emits more greenhouse gases than gasoline. They show that it can even be made from waste and compared to gasoline is cleaner burning and reduces every single tailpipe emission. They make these type of arguments over and over again and use numerous people such as former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, as well as US Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack and many others.  They make their case that we can do this and that we must do it. So this is an attempt at a strong educational documentary, which basically says we have been misled in this country by the right, the left and mainly by the ever present, ever powerful oil industry. They show how the oil industry argument can be taken apart whether it is made by their expert spokesperson or by a Professor at Cornell who doesn’t really think that Ethanol is the answer. So this is also a call for change, a call for banding together and a call for action. Unfortunately, this is the frustrating part of this movie. Assuming that you buy their argument or most of it, what are we to do? It is fine that we see the filmmakers driving around in their Ethanol burning vehicle. We are briefly told that for $80 we can buy a device for our car that will allow us to use various grades of Ethanol that are now available at some gas stations. This will “probably” be less expensive than regular gas. OK, I want to do it and try it but please tell me more about it and reassure me that it is safe for my car. Let’s start a movement so everyone who sees the film will do this and give us a sticker for our car that says we are part of the new movement (and publicize your film). There is no such energy coming from the film and I couldn’t even find more information about how to do this on their website which at the end of the film said if you want more information go to www.thefreedomfilm.com. The website  has some educational things but is mainly there to  publicize the film . We are also told in the film that we need to grow our own food, use solar energy and this will complement our new use of Ethanol. Jump to their web site – there is no data on joining the new “ Victory Garden Club” movement and no data and charts about costs and savings if we climb aboard with alternate energy. I know this is just a documentary film. It is really one voice against a very strong and persistent voice of the oil industry. However, I feel for the film to be successful it has to fully identify with the movement and try to jump-start the flow to Ethanol, which they claim is essential. For every one person who is moved to action by this movie, they will talk to at least ten people about what they are doing and that is how you get a buzz on the energy front and for this movie.

***

Salvation Boulevard-sp   If you are not part of it – what could be a better subject for satire than a big Texas like Evangelical Church? Director and co-writer George Ratliff did just this thing and interestingly enough he told us that the previews are doing well in the midst of the bible belt. In addition to a well-written story with some good comedy and many surprise twists, this film project pulled together a great cast who created the zany characters who are up on the screen for 95 minutes. Dan Day (Pierce Brosnan) the church leader who is on the verge of building his Christian City on the Hill with a medical school, a law school and everything else when something happens that make him respond in not the most holy manner. Carl Vandermeer (Greg Kinnear), a former Deadhead (follower of the Grateful Dead) has settled into a clean life as a family man and a regular church goer  when he gets tested and then can’t believe he had been a follower of the good Dan Day. His journey is the heart of the film and the center of most of the comedic moments. Then there is his wife Gwen (Jennifer Connelly) who is hilarious as the dyed in the wool follower of Dan Day and his movement as well as being a weird artist. Honey Foster (Marisa Tomei) is a security guard with a heart of gold and she herself is former Deadhead who still likes to smoke her pipe. Ed Harris gets into the character of Dr. Paul Blaylock who in many people’s opinion ( but not the Evangelical crowd ) would be the voice of reason, but he gets a bullet in his head which does slow him down. Most people in the theatre seemed to have had a good time. There were a lot of laughs and the satire was as expected but the story was not predictable. So a good time was had, but it probably won’t be very memorable.  (2011)

***

Another Earth- sp This film grabs you from the beginning and then leads you into a unique premise. Screenwriter and director Mike Cahill in his first feature film is clearly quite talented and achieved a very good-looking film on a shoestring budget. He and co writer Brit Marling, who also starred in the movie have a great imagination and a very subtle touch. They also pulled in excellent photography and great music background to sustain the mood of the film. Veteran actor William Mapother  joins them and he and Marling appear to occupy the screen just about all the time. Flashes of television news reports, talking heads and other clips establish the appearance of “ Another Earth” or “Earth Two “ as it is called.  We also see our twin planet in the sky throughout the film and are introduced to the idea that that such a situation would appear to have everything  including people exactly the same as on our own Earth.  The implication to Marling’s character is quite profound as both  characters are enduring unbearable suffering. In our post film  discussion with Cahill and Marling  it seems that they feel that the human condition leads people to have a  great desire to understand themselves and the possibility of meeting oneself, commiserating and perhaps even altering one’s fate and suffering is a universal fantasy. Perhaps because we are always preoccupied with the idea that self reflection and therapy is the way to go when there is such a need or perhaps we just  couldn’t give up our reality base, the movie didn’t work as well with us as it did with the Sundance crowd who chose it as a festival winner and with Fox Searchlight who picked it up for big time distribution. It will be making the rounds later this month, on this Earth. (2011)

***

Buck-sp– We came to this documentary film  knowing that we might not be the ideal audience for it since we are not big animal lovers or horse fans. Certainly the opening countryside scenery was beautiful and seeing the horses running free in the lush meadow was very attractive. Buck Brannaman, the main subject of this film is very appealing and has a commanding presence not only on the screen but in person as a guest at our screening. His sensitivity and ability to connect to horses is remarkable and has been a game changer in the approach to training them. He actually was the person about whom  Robert Redford fashioned his acclaimed movie, The Horse Whisperer . Reford appeared in this documentary and told how Brannaman is the real deal and ended up being more than the inspiration of  the script of his  movie but became a key advisor and actually was a his double in several scenes in which he did his magic with horses. The story hook of this documentary which caught our  attention was how Buck the man had started off as Buck the young kid performing in rodeos with his brother Smokey from a very young age with rope tricks and horse riding. Behind the scenes and at home their father beat them unmercifully. Ultimately Buck was placed in a foster home when outsiders discovered the whip marks on his body. Flash forward now to Buck working with a vicious angry young colt that can’t be controlled. Buck comes to understand the history of this damaged at birth horse which was treated badly by his owners and thus rather than attempting to dominate it, he tried to empathically understand it seemingly based on his own experiences. Obviously he can’t do this by psychotherapy and while we get some idea of his ability to communicate with the horse, it is something we, the audience have very little understanding of how he does it. He apparently has been very innovative with his concept of “starting” a young wild horse rather than the tradition of “ breaking” it. We wish that there had been more narration and explanation during  the somewhat repetitive scenes of working with the horses and training them. We saw many scenes with Buck holding flags in his hands and lightly touching the horses with them but we have no idea what that was all about. We also learn that Buck spends 9 months of the year driving around the country holding “clinics” and training people with his techniques while his wife during this time is raising their three kids- one of whom we meet as she is teenage horse women in the image of Buck. It would have interesting to learn more about all his kids and his wife who we briefly meet. In the Q&A period after the film in response to my questions Buck told us that Smokey his brother ended up spending 25 years in the Coast Guard certainly away from horses. The creative force behind the film and director of the documentary is  Cindy Meehl who is a horse owner and became inspired when she met Buck at one of his training sessions. She put together the private funding for her first film of any kind  as well as an experienced team that helped her make it.  The movie made it into the  Sundance Film Festival  and has been invited to film festivals throughout the US and the world. It certainly has made it out of the starting gate. (2011)

***

Midnight In Paris rm-   The movie opens with a couple of minutes of  various beautiful scenes throughout Paris which made us both independently  feel that we are ready for a return trip to the city of lights. Woody Allen wrote and directed the film. You can not help but feel that it is Allen speaking through the main character who is Gil Pender(Owen Wilson),  a disenchanted  Hollywood screenwriter, who is  working on his first novel and is visiting Paris with his fiancée (Rachel McAdams) and her parents (Kurt Fuller and Mimi Kennedy). Gil is enchanted with Paris and would like to live there for awhile but his fiancée thinks  that is a foolish idea. She would prefer to go sightseeing with Carol and Paul,  good friends who just happened to be also visiting Paris. Paul  is a know-it-all (wonderfully played by Michael Sheen) who has the  intellectual connection to Paris as compared the emotional attachment which Gil has formed with this city. Paul has the audacity to debate some historical facts with a museum guide who interestingly enough is played by Carla Bruni, well known singer, model and wife of the President of France. Whereas Gil after a few drinks and some wondering the streets of Paris at night is offered a ride by some party going people in what appears to be a 1920s Peugeot Limousine. He finds himself whisked to late night parties where he meets F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, Alice Toklas, Salvatore Dali and other illustrious persons of Paris of this bygone era. He returns on succeeding evenings where he was picked up to visit to the Paris of old. He even gets Gertrude Stein (Kathy Bates) to read the novel he is writing. He becomes enamored with the mistress of Picasso who prefers to be taken even further back in time as she yearns to be in the Paris of the renaissance. It is then that Gil realize that that it is human nature to want to be back in the good old days and that we never recognize that we all have to live our lives in the present. So maybe after all these years Woody Allen has had a successful psychoanalysis. The result is a very charming, “feel-good” enjoyable movie.

***

Bridesmaids-rm– First of all, this is not just a “chic flick.“ Certainly, the out loud laughter in the movie theatre seemed to more weighted from the young men in the audience. It is an hour and half of good comedy in the genre of Saturday Night Live. Not surprising since the screen writer and the star of the movie is Kristen Wiig. She is Annie, the bests friend of Lillian (Maya Rudolph),the bride to be. Annie’s own life  is not  quite on track especially guy wise and job wise . She is asked to be the maid of honor but encounters Helen (Rose Bryne) who is a recent friend of the bride and seems to have things together including great ideas for the wedding party, wedding dress and just about everything else. There are some great physical comedy bits and lots of clever lines with some very fine comedic acting especially by Ms. Wiig and Melissa McCarthy who plays Megan, the bridesmaid who is as tough as nails but with a heart of gold.  There is also an amusing sex scene and a wild escapade on an airplane. Perhaps some things are a little too far fetched as we are asked to believe that a state trooper albeit one from Wisconsin, (Chris O’Dowd)-the true love interest of Annie- would drive around in his patrol car with  a girl in whom he was interested. Although you are seeing the movie for its comedy, you are also  given a sharp satire that also raises questions about the extremes people go to  in planning the wedding event (picking the dress, the batchelorette party and how the girls support or don’t support each other.) Of course the ending is predictable and there are additional comedy pieces interspersed during the titles at the end. After all it is that kind of film. (2011)

***

Incendies –rm It would help if from the beginning, you were aware that this movie is mostly involved with the vicious  Lebanon civil war between the Moslems and the Christians. It make take a bit to become completely oriented as the movie does consist of alternating stories in different time. It also doesn’t help that it is mostly  in French with English subtitles. But eventually we got the hang of it and the very unusual plot which we are introduced to at the beginning as twins  Jeanne and Simon are being read their mother’s will and realize she has asked them to carry out her final wishes and deliver two letters on her behalf.  Their task seems almost as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack. If you don’t mind fiction being stranger than the really terrible things that happen to people in these type of wars, the movie provides a gripping story. It is horrifying at times with what should be an unexpected ending. It provides lessons of persistence, forgiveness, motherly love  and an appreciation that any one of us if we were switched at birth, could be quite the opposite of the person we turned out to be. The movie, which was co-written and directed by Denis Villeneuve, received recognition with several film festival awards and was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.(2011)