Films that demonstrate how governments or quasigovernmental groups have violated or promoted the values in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
THE INVISIBLES BRINGS HIDDEN BERLIN JEWS OUT OF THE SHADOWS Hitler rounded up most of the Jews in Germany for evacuation to death camps. From 1943, when the Nazis declared Berlin free of all Jews, about 7,000 remained in Berlin, hiding out as best they could, whereas only 1,700 survived by the end of the war. The […]
LITHUANIANS MOURN IN ASHES IN THE SNOW Made for about $5,000, Ashes in the Snow (Tarp pilku debesu) is based on the novel Between Shades of Gray, which dramatizes how Lithuanians were treated by the conquering Soviets during World War II. Beginning with a calm day in a Lithuanian town in early 1941, the film focuses on the fate
ON THE BASIS OF SEX CELEBRATES RUTH BADER GINSBURG’S STRUGGLE The film On the Basis of Sex is a biopic of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who became an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court in 1993 and has authored landmark rulings to bring gender equality to the United States. The focus is on her extraordinary quest to be accepted
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GREEN BOOK FOCUSES ON A BLACK PIANIST IN THE SEGREGATED SOUTH Dr. Don Shirley (played by Mahershala Ali) was a Jamaican-born American musician whose talents Igor Stravinsky described as “virtuosity is worthy of Gods.” After studying and performing in his youth, he decided to pursue a doctorate of Music, Psychology, and Liturgical Arts. The film Green Book features
Political Film Review #579 Read More »
GREEN BOOK FOCUSES ON A BLACK PIANIST IN THE SEGREGATED SOUTH Dr. Don Shirley (played by Mahershala Ali) was a Jamaican-born American musician whose talents Igor Stravinsky described as “virtuosity is worthy of Gods.” After studying and performing in his youth, he decided to pursue a doctorate of Music, Psychology, and Liturgical Arts. The film Green Book features
AT LEAST 600,000 NEED TO SEE BOY ERASED In small towns throughout the United States, where college education is a rarity, many children grow up in authoritarian families and attend church services where the pastor tries to explain what is happening by referring to the Christian bible as the only source of wisdom. Jared Eamons (played
BLACKKKLANSMAN IS THE FIRST ANTI-TRUMP FILM SO FAR Released to coincide with the one-year anniversary of the Charlottesville weekend incident, BlacKkKlansman identifies President Donald Trump as the fulfillment of the dreams of Klansman David Duke. The film begins and ends with documentary footage. Civil War carnage is presented in the beginning. Charlottesville chaos is captured toward the end.
FREAK SHOW EXPOSES THE REAL FREAKS Transgender persons are increasingly finding acceptance on an equal basis with everyone else, based on the doctrine of integrationism. The Social Darwinist doctrine of assimilation requires conformity, leaving transgender persons as permanent outsiders. The two doctrines collide in Freak Show, directed by Trudie Styler. Most action in the film surrounds Billy
BITTER FATE EMERGES IN SWEET COUNTRY In the 1920s, Australians were still trying to set up cattle farming in the Northern Frontier, using some of the aboriginal peoples but not all. The farmers, an unruly lot, meet for booze in a nearby town but otherwise have to cope with difficult terrain. Some of the aboriginal people
THE POST CELEBRATES MORE THAN FREEDOM OF THE PRESS When The Post begins, Daniel Ellsberg (played by Matthew Rhys) is with a unit of soldiers in Vietnam in 1966, finding out that the Viet Cong rule the country in the night. One day, while flying home on Air Force One, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (Bruce Greenwood) summons