Films that bring previously obscured truths about the political process to the attention of the public, showing for example how offices of public trust are used for private purposes.
THE HIDDEN HALF EXPOSES THE ROLE OF FEMALES IN IRAN Many recent films from Iran focus on the oppression of women in post-revolutionary Iran, but none so deeply as feminist Tahmineh Milani’s The Hidden Half (Nimeh-Ye Penhan). Indeed, she was arrested, charged by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Court of supporting “those waging war against God” and […]
GUNFIRE DROWNS OUT THE PLATITUDES OF POLITICIANS IN COLOMBIA Our Lady of the Assassins (La Virgen de los Sicarios) focuses on Fernando (played by Germán Jaramillo) , who was born in Medellín, Colombia, when it was a peaceful if boring farming community. His literary talents took him to Europe, where presumably he lived a full
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BORN UNDER LIBRA EXPOSES IRAN’S MORAL MINEFIELD Born Under Libra, directed by Ahmad Reza Darvish, is the latest of several films from Iran that focus on the absurdity of Khomeni-era restrictions in general and the plight of women in particular. Mahtab Peyman (played by Mitra Hajjar) attends a distinguished private university in Tehran where her
THUMBS UP FOR GREENFINGERS The English are inveterate gardeners, proud of turning adverse soil into lush and manicured panoramas of color. Based on a true story, Greenfingers focuses on Colin Briggs (played by Clive Owen), who has spent most of his life in prison for petty vandalism. One day he is transferred to Edgefield, a
LUMUMBA TELLS THE TRUE STORY ABOUT CONGELESE INDEPENDENCE The English are inveterate gardeners, proud of turning adverse soil into lush and manicured panoramas of color. Based on a true story, Greenfingers focuses on Colin Briggs (played by Clive Owen), who has spent most of his life in prison for petty vandalism. One day he is
BABY BOY NOMINATED AS AN EXPOSÉ ABOUT AFRICAN AMERICAN FAMILIES Baby Boy begins with a voiceover that quotes a psychological theory that racism has made black men into babies, citing three reasons: (1) They call their spouses “mama.” (2) They call each other “boy.” (3) They call their home “the crib.” However, no such terminology
JANITORS FIGHT FOR WAGES AND RESPECT IN AFFLUENT LOS ANGELES Forty million persons have no medical insurance in the richest country in the world, the United States. Among the uninsured are recent immigrants, who often work at wages below the minimum allowed by law while immigration quotas are not relaxed to allow badly needed unskilled
TURKEY’S REPRESSION OF THE KURDS LAUNCHES A JOURNEY THROUGH HELL The title of the film Journey to the Sun (Günese Yoculuk) describes a trek by a young Turkish man, Mehmet (played by Newroz Baz), with the body of his Kurdish friend Berzan (played by Nazmi Quirix) from the European side of Istanbul to Zorduc, a
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As a comic book, X-Men has the distinction of being very political. Directed by Bryan Singer, the film X-Men begins in the Warsaw ghetto of 1944, with an incident in which Magneto as a child (played by Brett Morris) overpowers Nazi police but otherwise is unable to stop the Holocaust. The tagline of the movie, “Join the evolution,” informs
TRAFFIC EXPOSES THE HYPOCRISY OF THE WAR ON DRUGS The War on Drugs has been exposed as a fraud in Traffic, which is based in part on the 1990 BBC miniseries Traffik, which focused on drug traffic from Pakistan to Britain. Directed by Steven Soderbergh, whose Erin Brockovich was nominated for two awards earlier this