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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)

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In the Valley of Elah – nf – This is a story based on an incident, which actually happened during the current Iraq war. It follows the story of the grieving father played extremely well by Tommy Lee Jones as he seeks to find out what really happened to his soldier son. You might say this is an excellent detective story but it is also an expose of the morality of the war and the psychological damage that it has inflicted on so many soldiers. There were wonderful supporting roles by Charliez Theron and Susan Sarandon. Several of the young actors who played soldiers were actually combat veterans, which added to the depicted realism. 2007

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Casablanca – nf – We had to see this classic so should you even if you have seen it awhile back. It is amazing to appreciate that this film made in 1942 about wartime Casablanca and the interface of various people who want to escape the iron hand of the Nazis, before anyone really knew how things would work out. Beautiful Ingrid Bergman and debonair and yet tough Humphrey Bogart in their classic performance. You will be reminded of all those classic film lines such as “Here’s looking at you kid “. Thoroughly enjoyable. 1943

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Frost/Nixon – rm – This is the story of the remarkable series of TV interviews that David Frost, a TV emcee type person had with the then deposed ex-President Richard Nixon. If you recall this historical time you will relive the unique situation our country was going through. The depiction of Nixon and Frost is quite good and the actual interviews are apparently true to the transcript of the programs. They do seem to have captured the fascinating personality of the flawed President. The writer and director did take some poetic license with some of the interactions which they purport to have taken place between Frost and Nixon which disappointed us when we learned this from other sources This made the movie less significant in our minds and takes away from our valuation of the movie although it is still immensely enjoyable. 2008

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Easy Virtue – sp- Noel Coward was obviously a genius and this movie is based on a play that he wrote when he was 25 years old. It is a period piece set in England where a young man (Ben Barnes) comes back to the family manor with a new glamorous American wife (Jessica Biel) who just came in first at the Grand Prix auto race in Monte Carlo. Most of the stuffy British family especially the mother (Kristin Scott Thomas) can’t handle her and her modern ways. Colin Firth does an excellent job portraying the father who has his own history. The plot has depth to it and the screenplay is true to the Coward genre, which includes many witty lines from him as well as from writers Stephen Elliot and Sheridan Jobbins (the latter was a guest at our course). Although it is not a musical, there is a most enjoyable musical background with many pieces by Coward. 2008

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Doubt – sp – It is so remarkable that Meryl Streep can star in a musical comedy such as Mama Mia and also turn in such a perfect performance as the powerful but yet the ultimately doubting nun in this movie. Phillip Seymour Hoffman does an equally fine performance as the Priest of questionable character. Viola Davis is the supporting actress who plays the mother of a young student and matches these stars in her one moving scene. John Patrick Shanley wrote the Broadway play and the screenplay as well as directing this film version. He brings to us an ethical issue, which has relevance in many situations. 2008

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Changeling – sp – The amazing thing about this movie as told to us by long time TV writer, first time screen writer Michael Straczynski is that all the details in this movie are true as is much of the dialog which was taken from court transcripts. The time is 1928 Los Angeles with period clothes and automobiles setting the atmosphere while the story with very fine acting provides the drama and emotion. Director Clint Eastwood stays true to the story and script and once again shows how he has evolved into one of our finest contemporary movie directors. The Los Angeles Police Department is the villain of this movie and a young mother who doggedly wants her missing child returned to her, magnificently played by Angelina Jolie, is the heroine. John Malkovitch also turns in a sterling performer as the anti-police crusading reverend. A totally unsympathetic depiction of psychiatric treatment disturbed Michael but probably was mostly true at the time. 2008

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Baby It’s You – nf – This movie was made 26 years ago in 1983 and it is about growing up in the mid 1960s. Those of us who were around at that time should be able to attest that it depicted this era quite well. The setting is senior year of high school in New Jersey where a college bound upper middle class Jewish girl played by Rosanna Arquette has a romance with blue collar Italian boy played by Vincent Spano. She goes away to Sara Lawrence and he follows his not so obtainable dream working in Florida. The trials and tribulations of a young woman in her first year at an all girl’s school with dorm life, alcohol, marijuana, and visits from the guys from Princeton etc are nicely captured by Director /Writer John Sayles with the help of an appropriate sound track. Some resolution of the unfinished high school romance has to be played out as is often the case in all generations. We thought this movie can be evocative for those who lived through those years or thereabouts and yet could also find meaning to today’s youth who would be using their cell phones or texting rather than the dormitory hallway telephone. That almost make this a classic. 1983