CIVIL WAR IS MIXED UP Despite a lot of publicity for the film Civil War, the efforts of an Englishman to direct a film about a civil war in the United States is a spectacle but politically amounts to a flop. Despite the director’s denials, the film’s president is a substitute for Donald Trump, as […]
SWEETWATER REMINDS FILMVIEWERS OF THE EARLY DAYS OF CIVIL RIGHTS PROGRESS In 1990, a man by the name of Nathaniel Clifton (played at age 78 by Everett Osborne) is driving a Chicago taxi. After his rider asks to increase the volume of an ongoing basketball game, a discussion begins, and the driver reveals that he
Political Film Review #675 Read More »
SWEETWATER REMINDS FILMVIEWERS OF THE EARLY DAYS OF CIVIL RIGHTS PROGRESS In 1990, a man by the name of Nathaniel Clifton (played at age 78 by Everett Osborne) is driving a Chicago taxi. After his rider asks to increase the volume of an ongoing basketball game, a discussion begins, and the driver reveals that he
BEST FILMS FOR 2023 There were thirteen nominated films in 2023. Political Film Society rules, based as they are on the Academy Award rules, require a maximum of five films in each category. To narrow the lists, members are entitled to vote for up to five films in each of two categories, with a deadline
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In 1823, slavery still existed in Africa. Europeans were recruiting from the Oyo Empire, which in turn was trying to conquer the Dahomey Kingdom using firearms traded for slaves. The focus in the film is on the Agojie warriors, an army of female soldiers that consistently prevail in combat but oppose slavery despite Dahomey’s participation
PURSUIT OF FREEDOM DEMONSTRATES REFUGEE ANGST Based on a true story, Pursuit of Freedom begins in 2007, when life of a Ukrainian family near the Russian border is depicted as precarious (though most filming is in a town in Texas). Razmig (Mike Markoff), the father, is trying to support his wife, three children, and a
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NO NO GIRL DEALS WITH THE AFTERMATH OF JAPANESE INTERNMENT In 1942, some 120,000 million Japanese, whether born in Japan or the United States, were told to leave their homes for internment camps until the war with Japan ended. They abandoned jobs, homes, and the property inside homes. One such family lived in Tustin, Orange
PURSUIT OF FREEDOM DEMONSTRATES REFUGEE ANGST Based on a true story, Pursuit of Freedom begins in 2007, when life of a Ukrainian family near the Russian border is depicted as precarious (though most filming is in a town in Texas). Razmig (Mike Markoff), the father, is trying to support his wife, three children, and a
Political Film Review #659 Read More »
THE WALK TELLS WHAT WAS WRONG ABOUT SOUTHSIDE BOSTON When the Supreme Court decided Brown v Board of Education in 1954, the focus was on the southern states, where Blacks sometimes lived near Whites but went to different schools. Yet in northern cities school segregation existed because of residential segregation. While the focus was on
I’M CHARLIE WALKER IS A BIOPIC ABOUT A BLACK ENTREPRENEUR Director Patrick Gilles has chosen a unique person to honor in I’m Charlie Walker. A self-confident African American living in San Francisco in the 1970s, driving a truck, is being treated as a second class citizen by many employers until one day he learns of
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