WHO WAS ON TRIAL IN AMERICAN TRAITOR? An American citizen named Mildred Gilliars (played by Meadow Williams) was in Germany when World War II began, hoping to became a famous actress. Approached by radio program director Max Otto Koischwitz (Carsten Norgaard) one day in 1941, he presents her with an extraordinary opportunity—work as a high-profile […]
THE COURIER IS NOT JUST ANOTHER SPY MOVIE Directed by Dominic Cooke, The Courier is the story of how the gravity of the Russian threat came to the attention of President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missiles Crisis of 1962. The basic facts are quite simple: In 1960, the Kremlin discovers that Major Pyotr
THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7 IS HOW IT REALLY HAPPENED On August 26, 1968, the Democratic Party was scheduled to begin its national convention at the Chicago Hilton and was expected to nominate as their presidential candidate Hubert Humphrey, who was expected to continue American involvement in Vietnam. Protesters from several different groups called
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BEAUTIFUL BOXER PORTRAYS A FEMALE’S FIGHT TO LEAVE A MALE BODY Beautiful Boxer is a biopic about the sexual identity of a famous Thai kickboxer. Of the many ways to tell the story, director Ekechai Uekrongtham chooses to have a fictional American reporter interview Parinya “Nong Toom” Charoenphol (played by kickboxer Asanee Suwan), who in
Boys of Abu Ghraib Portrays War Crimes Without Saying So With such a film title, one might suppose that the boys were the hundred or so young Iraqis confined at the prison, including one who observed his sister’s rape and another who was subjected to excessive cold in order to obtain a confession from his
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SPIKE LEE REWRITES HISTORY IN C.S.A.: THE CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America, directed by Kevin Willmott, is a mokumentary, that is, a film in the format of a documentary but about untrue events. What if the South won the Civil War? That is the premise of the film, which is
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TWO REVIEWS SEPARATED BY 20 YEARS COSTA-GAVRAS’S AMEN DOCUMENTS THE NAZI HORRORS (February 15, 2023) Many films have emerged recently to contradict those who have denied the Holocaust. Amen, directed by Constantine Costa-Gavras has trumped them all, providing specific documentation from an unwilling participant who supplied gas to the death camps, with a story based