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THE CELL WARNS JUDGES TO SEND ABUSED CHILDREN TO FOSTER PARENTS A plot involving the pursuit of a serial killer is not uncommon among the many suspense movies for those who like to bite their nails when they run out of popcorn. This year’s best addition to the genre so far is The Cell, directed […]

ABBIE HOFFMAN’S REPUTATION IS VINDICATED IN STEAL THIS MOVIE! Founder of the Yippies in the 1960s, Abbie Hoffman is sympathetically portrayed in the biopic Steal This Movie!, produced and directed by Robert Greenwald. Early in the film, Abbie (played by Vincent D’Onofrio) is registering African Americans to vote in Mississippi in 1965, only to receive

A BRITISH “LIEUTENANT CALLEY” ORDERS A MASSACRE OF INNOCENTS IN SOUTH CAROLINA The Patriot, directed by Roland Emmerich, provides much insight into what the American Revolutionary War was all about and why participants lined up on opposite sides. The action takes place in South Carolina, beginning in 1776; though there is some effort to provide

A CHEERLEADER BECOMES A LESBIAN WITH THE UNWITTING HELP OF HER PARENTS In But I’m a Cheerleader, Jamie Babbit (both director and storywriter) takes us on a journey to “True Directions,” a rehabilitation camp for “homosexual” children whose parents want them changed into “heterosexuals.” Entitled Make Me Over at some cinemas, we see the odyssey

IT’S THE RAGE IS NOMINATED FOR PEACE AWARD Originally on cable television in 1999 as All the Rage, the feature film It’s the Rage, released in Hollywood on July 7 and directed by James D. Stern, has two heavy bookends sandwiching a story about how several people die because of the easy availability of handguns.

A GLADIATOR FINDS VIETNAM ON THE DANUBE In the year 167 a.d., the first full-scale barbarian attack on Rome destroyed aqueducts and irrigation conduits, but the army of emperor Marcus Aurelius repelled the invaders. In 176, Marcus Aurelius and his son Commodus entered Rome after a campaign north of the Alps in which they were

SUNSHINE NOMINATED FOR AWARDS ON DEMOCRACY AND HUMAN RIGHTS “Politics has made a mess of our lives.” These words sum up the three-hour-long saga Sunshine, a film about five generations of a Jewish family in Hungary named Sonnenschein (German for “sunshine”) over the past one hundred or so years that has some parallels with Alex

CATFISH IN BLACK BEAN SAUCE IS NOMINATED AS BEST FILM EXPOSÉ Catfish in Black Bean Sauce is directed, written, and acted by Sino-Vietnamese Chi Moui Lo, who left Vietnam at the age of six, was sponsored by the Jewish League of America and grew up with his nine brothers and three sisters in Philadelphia before

LUMINARIAS NOMINATED FOR BEST EXPOSÉ OF THE YEAR 2000 Because Latinas tend to play a stereotypical role in most mainstream films, the movie Luminarias is a window into a subculture that opens and brings fresh air in a manner similar to how The Joy Luck Club (1993) opened the eyes of filmviewers to the difficulties

A FRENCH FAMILY & A UKRAINIAN ATHLETE ESCAPE FROM SOVIET HORRORS Immediately after World War II, unemployment in France was extremely high. In an effort to lure Russian émigrés back to the homeland, the Soviet Union promised employment, food, shelter, and amnesty, and some naïve Russians returned. The fate of one such Russian and his