****

Super 8 rm If you have seen anything about this movie directed by J.J. Abrams and produced by Steven Spielberg you know that it is about young children, making a movie, science fiction, a train crash,  the world being threatened and a  scary monster from outer space. This may sound like some coming attractions of a bunch of other movies that you have seen in the recent past which you should have been advised to take a pass on. However, the real filmmakers of this picture achieved a touch which not only held our interest, stimulated our thinking but also pushed our emotional buttons. It is well know that Abrams and Spielberg (in different generations) started making films at rather young ages. One could just picture them recalling their idealistic creative youth and putting it into this band of preadolescent kids who are on their super 8 movie making project when all hell breaks loose in their hometown. In the course of confronting supernatural forces and life threatening “ special effects” we get a chance to examine the relationships between these kids as well as the tension and bonding between two  of them and their single parents. We get a glimpse at young budding romantic feelings and also see how most kids would like to imagine they might be a hero and confront dangers. We also are reminded of the potential that our military may not always get it right  It is suspenseful, adventuresome, fun and poignant all at the same time. The young films makesrs as played by  Riley Griffiths, Ryan Lee, Gabriel Basso, Zack Mills and Joe Courtney  are wonderful in their roles as they show their enthusiasm , humor and horror. Courtney also has the opportunity to reach down into his short life and demonstrate some effective emoting. Elle Fanning, the younger sister of the talented Dakota Fanning is a real standout as the young girl who joins the boys in their filmmaking adventure. Every detail of the plot may not be completely clear but nevertheless you will be on the edge of your seat   emotionally whipped around and still have a lot to think about when you leave the theatre. This adds up to a worthwhile movie. (2011)

****

Inside Job-nf– Filmmaker Charles Ferguson takes a long, hard skillful look at the individuals and their actions which brought about the global economic meltdown of 2008. It is hard to come away from this Oscar nominated documentary without feeling some combination of anger and depression. Anger, because you see self-serving greed and even corruption among the financial leaders of this country. Depression, because you see that many of people in charge of our financial institutions today including many in the  highest positions in government are still not inclined to make changes to prevent  another financial crisis. If you can take a dispassionate view of this story, it feels as if you are watching a film showing you something about how the rise and  fall of the Roman Empire came about in some distant time. In this case however we are dealing with contemporary times. We learn how an economic boom led to a desire among those in the financial and banking industries to make  even more money as they transitioned from carefully investing their own money to going public and now risking other peoples’ money for tremendous payouts for themselves. The complicated concepts of derivatives is actually made sickeningly clear as we see how investments were really bets with essentially no clear downside for the bankers but devastating results for the middle class. No place was this more relevant  than in the home mortgage market where the financial guys would make their money on the volume of the mortgages sold and not on quality or  the ability of people who bought them to pay them off. Matt Damon is the narrator of the film although Ferguson does much of interviews. The film is interspersed with film clips of the leading players of this giant debacle from the officers of the big financial institutions to the well known faces in government including Paulson, Greenspan, Geitner and others with major government responsibility for regulation and policy. We see the story of the  march of deregulation from the Reagan, through the Bush years even including some during the Clinton White House. There is also  the apparent failure of the Obama administration , despite their bailout successes , to have regulated and overseen what should be regulated and overseen.  The lack of prosecution of some of the glaring criminal activities is highlighted and the obscene executive compensations, sometimes more than a hundred million dollars,  for people who participated in very questionable actions is spelled out. . (See an article MB wrote in the Huffington Post about this issue  over  a year ago). It is also quite disturbing to see the failure of he academic community to acknowledge the payments they receive from interested parties for their speeches and writings which supported the unstable financial situations that occurred. (These days the medical community is usually obligated to make disclosures of potential conflicts of interest  when speaking or writing ) Granted, the filmmaker is trying to make a point about the inside job, which was pulled off on the American people. There may be some other points of view, which he didn’t show but interviews made with top people, and the facts presented make it pretty easy to vote for conviction if we were the jury (even without cross examination from another viewpoint). Ferguson did have a great deal of access to top people some of whom asked him to turn off the camera once they were shown their inconsistencies. The movie is well edited to one hour and 48 minutes. Most of the film is sharp and well framed. When archival footage is used and it makes a point, you don’t mind if it isn’t top-drawer quality. Although a year old, it is still right on the mark for today. If you have a stake in this economy and the future of our country, you better understand what this film is saying. (2010)

****

All She Can (previously named Benavides Born) –sp  When a movie can target a contemporary social issue in human terms with a fresh approach, it deserves attention. Young people growing up in South Texas, despite many of their families having lived there for several generations, have very few options for breaking out of poverty and achieving the American dream. Husband and wife filmmakers Amy Wendel and Daniel Meisel  looking to write their screenplay and make their first feature film were drawn to this area and wanted to tell this story. They spent a great deal of time in and around Benavides Texas where they came to understand the plight of a number of young people in this community. The main character of their screenplay is Luz (Corina Calderon) a high school senior and a competitive weight lifter who sees the possibility of winning the state championship as the road to a college scholarship which will pay for her college education. In reality, other sports provide the more likely avenue for college scholarships although the introduction of this mostly unknown high school competition is part of the attraction and fascination of this movie. In Texas the top 8% of any high school class is accepted to the University of Texas but they have to come up with the money to pay for tuition. Perhaps this is why this film also showed the friendly military recruiters in the halls of the high school and also why a disproportionate number of our combat soldiers come from rural areas such as the one shown in this film. This also accounts for the desperation that we see in Luz and the extremes to which she is willing to go to win her weight lifting championship and achieve her goal of getting a college education. This is not your typical “ Rockyesk “ movie where the hero or heroine is shown delivering their triumph in the end. In fact, despite the difficulty and hardships of the struggling high school students, the film reminds us that this is nothing compared to the desperation of the people risking their lives and the lives of their children as they sneak across the border. This determination becomes the inspiration of the main character and of this movie. This film will touch your emotions as well as educate you about some painful realities in this country. It merited being selected for the Sundance Film Festival this year and we highly recommend it.

****

Made in Dagenham- nf- If you are one of those people who care about the important equal rights and social justice moments, especially those of the last 50 years, you will not want to miss this movie. It is a dramatization of a true story that took place in 1968 when the women in a Ford manufacturing plant in London who sewed the upholstery for the car seats demanded the same pay as men for their work. The movie shows the coming together of three unlikely allies in the cause of justice for women. Rita O’Grady (Sally Hawkins) a young factory worker becomes incensed when she realizes the inequalities towards women and takes a leadership role in organizing the strike of the 187 women of a factory which also employs thousands of men. She by chance meets Lisa (Rosamund Pike), wife of one of the company executives who despite being wealthy feels treated as a second class citizen even in her marriage and lends encouragement to the beleaguered strikers. Ultimately a meeting with the British Secretary of Labor Barbara Castle (Miranda Richardson), who also identifies with the strikers who by this time are quite determined although holding on by their finger tips. Despite facing the serious threat of Ford pulling out from England Carson  then institutes the deal which promises near parity with men and a plan to put forth equal rights legislation. The dramatic victory at the conclusion will send a chill up your spine and a tear to your eye. The acting is excellent and it was well directed by Nigel Cole . There are no big surprises but the movie will grab your emotions. In a sense, it  channels the 1979 classic film Norma Rae which told the true story of one woman’s battle to organize the minimum wage workers in a cotton mill and which earned Sally Fields an Academy Award. We need films like this to remind us what determined people can do and how some things are worth fighting for. (2010)

****

The First Grader-sp We take for granted that everyone in this country is entitled to an education. We especially can appreciate it when we see it through the eyes of eager children trying to learn the their ABCs in a dusty one room class room in Kenya where the government has decreed, for the first time, the right of everyone to be educated. We are taken to a new level of appreciation when we see it from the point of view of an 85 year old man Kimani Ng’ang’a Maruge (Oliver Musila Litondo) who is determined to join this class and get the education he never had and learn to read. This is based a true story of a   man who became a national hero in Kenya and a symbol of the universal desire for education as his quest ultimately brought the real Maruge from his country village to address the United Nations. However important this theme may be, there also was another story going on here. This proud man had been part of Kikuyu tribe, which produced the Mau-Mau rebellion, which ultimately led to the Kenyan independence from British colonial rule. He demands and gets the respect as others realize that he had been one of freedom fighters who took a sacred oath to return the land controlled by the British back to the native people. As a young man he endured torture and witnessed the death of his wife and children at the hands of the British who demanded that he give up his oath of resistance. The movie flashes back from the present day of this old man trying to learn to read to when he was resisting the powerful British. This is a poignant and dramatic story about a piece of history that most of us do not know much about. It is based on screenplay by Ann Peacock but carried forth and molded by director Justin Chadwick. It is all the more remarkable because it paints an extremely negative picture of colonial Britain by this British Director with the initial support of the BBC, which took the project into development. The school children and most of the characters were not professional actors but all real life Kenyan people. This included the children and their school, which was quite genuine. The exception was Naomie Harris an outstanding English screen actress who had a major role-playing Jane Obinchu the schoolteacher who believed Maruge deserved the opportunity to learn to read. The performance by Litondo as Maruge is totally believable, as he seems to embody this “Mandelaisk” persona. Litondo is a native Kenyan who used to be a news anchor with no previous acting experience.  Harris, Chadwick and their entire crew spent several weeks in Kenya working with locals and preparing to shoot this movie there. The result is an extremely, sensitive effective and emotional film. A middle school teacher in our audience mentioned how she was inspired to go back into her classroom and we all could feel the awe and the thirst for learning that young people and a deprived older man might feel. We also have had our interest peaked to learn more about this very interesting and complicated piece of African history about which this story only scratched the surface. It is a movie that should not be missed. (2011)

****

Henry’s Crime-sp  Henry (Keanu Reeves) is sort of a nebish, stumbling through life as a toll collector on what seemed to be the New York State Thruway,  in a a loveless marriage to Debbie ( Judy Greer). He just seems to have no purpose in life.  Through no fault of his own, he ends up in jail for a crime he really didn’t commit and serves a year in the clinker. He meets Max  (James Caan) an old timer who was once a con or  “confidence” guy who isn’t even sure he wants out on parole even if he could. Henry’s life is about to change after Julie (Vera Farmiga in a great spirited performance) an actress rehearsing for a play in Buffalo runs into him in a chance meeting. Shortly before this meeting Henry has found a goal in life as nefarious as it might be. There is a play within the movie and a Chekhov play at that, which is driven by love, emotion and suspense. At the same time the life of the characters are filled with suspense, drama, passion and the fun of a heist movie plot. Director Malcolm Venville in his second feature film and American debut, seamlessly moves back and forth between these two dimensions  building to a great movie climax in which we heard out loud reactions from the  audience watching the play within the movie  as well as from our audience viewing this screening. Our reaction was very positive and we recommend that this movie not be missed. (2011)

****

Waiting for Forever: This is a quirky but very well done film, which will completely touch you or you will write it off as in implausible fairy tale. Very early in the film you understand that Will Donner (Tom Sturridge) lost his parents in a train crash when he was 10 years old and moved away from his home to live with an uncle, leaving behind his best friend and life long playmate, Emma (Rachel Bilson). Now here is the tricky part. When he gets older Will follows Emma from city to city just to be near her. He has great trouble approaching her and reintroducing himself to her, so this goes on for several years while she ultimately becomes a television actress. Will is content to be a street juggler/clown and gets by. Inevitably things happen. The key to the movie is the acting of Sturridge as he inhabits the character of Will and projects him as likable, sincere guy with a good heart. He doesn’t come across as a psychopathic stalker and doesn’t seem to be psychotic, although he would have to be somewhat damaged by his childhood trauma. You may find yourself rooting for him as he ultimately approaches the love of his life. While Will is certainly an unusual person who lives an atypical life, the other characters in the story demonstrate complexities and realism. Veteran actors Richard Jenkins and Blythe Danner are terrific as Emma’s parents as they deal with the anticipated death of Jenkins’ character. Bilson as Emma struggles with this event as well as her own love life.  Scott Mechlowicz is excellent as the Will’s older brother, now a successful banker. He is frustrated at his brother’s behavior but understanding and loving him as well as having shared the family tragedy. James Keach, veteran actor/producer/director who directed this movie was the guest at our screening. He clearly had an affinity for this story and he described it as a labor of love for which he took no money up front. In his role as director/producer he completed the film in 24 days with a relatively tiny 3 million dollar budget . It will open in one theater in Los Angeles 10 days before Valentine’s Day, which may be just the occasion to draw in people who will spread the warm feelings about the movie.

****

Jews and Baseball rm-  An American Love Story- You don’t have to be Jewish or a baseball fan to get something out of this well done documentary. However, the more you fit into these categories, the more you will want to be sure that you catch up with this film. Every Jewish kid should get a DVD of this film for his or her 13^th birthday. It is written by Ira Berkow, Pulitzer Prize winniing author and directed by Peter Miller. There are interviews with baseball greats and people who knew them. There are also personal comments by people such as Larry King, Ron Howard and Dustin Hoffman The emergence of Jewish baseball stars, mirrors the story of the Jewish immigrants being able to partake in the American dream. The difficulties that these baseball heroes encountered spotlight the anti-Semitism that festered in the United States. The film also makes a point of showing that the problems that these Jews had in taking their rightful place on the baseball diamond were not very different than the next group had in challenging the discrimination barrier in this game. This latter point was illustrated in an incident that happened at the tail end of Jewish icon Hank Greenberg’s baseball career during the rookie year of Jackie Robinson. Robinson was trying to beat a base hit when he collided with Greenberg who was playing first base. As the two highly competitive players brushed themselves off, Greenberg gently offered Robinson good luck in dealing with the resistances, which he knew Robinson, would experience as the first black baseball player. The film tells the stories with interviews of the pioneer Jewish ball players in the major leagues. One such player is the legendary Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodger Sandy Koufax, who will be known forever for pitching four no hitters and also skipping a crucial World Series game in order to attend Jewish high Holiday services. This movie also profiled a budding Jewish baseball player whose name we sadly don’t recall because he only had one major leagues at bat during which time on the first pitch he was hit in the head and suffered a severe concussion. After months of recovery he is still struggling in the minor leagues hoping to come back to major-league baseball with the hope of living his dream. This movie is about the baseball dream that many Jewish kids have had and a select few have realized but it is a dream that every kid understands.

****

The King’s Speech–rm Whenever a new insight into history is provided by a film, it has the potential to be of great interest. If it is done well such a movie is usually a winner. This is the case with The King’s Speech where two great actors  turn in a near perfect performances with director Tom Hooper and the production staff pulling together an authentic period piece which captures pre World War II Great Britain and the royal family. Just about anyone in our generation or any student of this piece of history knows that when King George V of Great Britain died his oldest son became King Edward VIII but shortly thereafter abdicated the throne “to marry the woman I love” who was Wallis Simpson  twice divorced American, making his younger brother next in line to become the new King George VI ( Colin Firth)  just as the World War II was starting.  What you probably did not know was that the new king had a terrible stammer, which presented him with an enormous problem since he was expected to address his people and spur them on in their upcoming battle with Germany led by Adolph Hitler. His wife Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter) even before he ascended to the throne located a somewhat unconventional speech therapist, an Australian by the name of Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush).  Logue insists on a first name basis with his royal highness and includes some exploration of the king’s childhood and his emotional conflicts as part of his speech therapy. Needless to say after some twists and turns, dramatic moments, a great musical background, meeting the king’s young children (now Queen Elizabeth and Princess Margaret), the new king  triumphs while Winston Churchill (Timothy Spall), many others including the whole British Empire cheer him on. Knowing the ending (which you probably knew already ) will not spoil the enjoyment of this superb movie. It may have been a tad repetitious and we would have liked a little more of a psychological explanation or exposition of how  the interaction between the speech therapist and the king led to his improvement ( perhaps there was a father transference) However, it is doubtful that most viewers will find very much lacking from this movie. (2010)

****

Fair Game-rm– This movie retells the well known story of Valerie Plame and how she was exposed as a CIA agent by the Vice President’s office because her husband Joe Wilson decided to write an op-ed piece in the N.Y. Times and tell the story how during his fact finding mission for the U.S. government he found absolutely no evidence of the sale of uranium to build nuclear weapons being sold by Niger to Iraq.  The Bush administration was motivated to do this because they had decided to attack Iraq on the basis that they believed Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and this supposed sale was an important part of the case, which they built for the US entry into this war. They tried to discredit Wilson by claiming his wife really sent him there on a boondoggle mission, that he was unreliable and that she was just a middling CIA agent. The opposite was the truth and the criminal act of exposing her as a undercover CIA agent actually endangered many lives who were part of the overseas operations that she was conducting and ruined her career as well as nearly destroying her marriage. Naomi Watts plays Plame who on one hand lives the life of the housewife next door, taking care of young kids, having evening get-togethers with other couples and discussing current events. However, instead of going to work at her cover job with a financial management firm and taking occasional overnight trips, she is at a fairly high level in the CIA going on overnight dangerous missions. Her husband Joe Wilson, former ambassador to Niger as well as having had other State Department jobs now has his own struggling company and doubles as the housedad when his wife is out of town. He is very well played by Sean Penn, who must have especially relished the role of the guy trying to expose government lies.  Director Doug Liman achieved just the right balance in  showing us the everyday life of this housewife spy, mixed with the frightening missions which she undertook. Watts and Penn brought intensity to the outrage and the despair, which their characters experienced. The location shots were very realistic as were the all too familiar cast of characters including the politicians and the media. The film captured an important piece of history mixed with the drama and the human emotions, which were part of this story. It is not a part of history that we should be proud of but what is encouraging is that this film can be made in this country and this story can be told and talked about as much as we choose to do so.(2010)