Queen of Versailles [2012]

MPAA (PG)  Roger Ebert (3 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1132362/
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120801/REVIEWS/120739997

Queen of Versailles (directed by Lauren Greenfield) is a documentary with a "reality show" feel to it about time-share real estate magnate David Siegel, his "force of nature" wife Jackie and their large (8 kids) family.  "Back in the day" (before the collapse of the real estate market's collapse in 2008) they were on their way to building the largest "family home" in the United States complete with something like 14 bedrooms, countless baths, multiple pools, 2 tennis courts and a bowling alley.  (Hence the reference to Versailles...).

It would be easy to make fun of these people, especially at the beginning of the documentary, which was filmed _before_ the housing market collapse.  Back then David Siegel came across to me as a supremely arrogant man claiming to have "single-handedly" made George W. Bush the president of the United States, saying ON CAMERA that he'd "prefer to not get into exactly how," because (snickering) "what [he] did was probably illegal." (Note to enterprising journalists and/or dare one dream an enterprising district attorney willing to look under a few rocks to see whether there was anything to Siegel's boast there or not.  Siegel is a resident of Florida after all (and back then a very rich and flamboyant one) when Bush was declared the winner of the year 2000 Presidential election after the infamous problems with the vote in that state...).

However, whether or not Siegel ends up serving any time for possibly stealing an election from the rest of the country, "his man," GW Bush, who along with his wife, were shown visiting his/Jackies "smaller home" (half the size of the larger "Versailles" that they were building...) ended up producing Siegel's own downfall: Time-share real estate king that Siegel was, his kingdom collapsed largely collapsed after the financial crisis dried-up the cheap loans on which his business depended.  As soon as people couldn't purchase (or "flip") those time shares that his company was selling, Siegel's own business fortunes dried up as well.

A good part of me smiles, saying "couldn't have happened to a more deserving guy."  Yet, there's something sad about watching a man with a family struggling to pay his bills and keep his home (palatial as Siegel's was...) even if he was a billionaire and had made his fortune, in good part, swindling much poorer people of their money as well.

Siegel's wife Jackie is arguably even more complex.  One _could_ wish to dismiss her as "some kind of ditzy, simpleminded trophy wife" that one could expect to see on a "reality show" style documentary.  But _if one is honest about it_, she's far more complicated/compelling than that: Born in a small town in upstate New York, she was both good looking and driven as a teen / young adult.  As a result, she did really achieve actually quite a bit on her own _before_ meeting Siegel.  She got an engineering degree, worked for IBM as an engineer for some time.  When she found that work _deathly boring_ she went into modeling and competing/succeeding in various beauty contests.  And after she married Siegel, she apparently even won the Mrs America beauty contest one year, before settling down and having her seven kids with him.  Afterwards, she continued to be active in the beauty pageant circuit, as a coach/supporter, etc.  One could initially try to dismiss her, but honestly, she did quite a bit with her life.  And at least on camera, she didn't come across as some sort of a deathly snob.  At the beginning of the film, she was simply up-to-her-eyeballs in money.  Perhaps she could have become someone more like Melinda Gates, wife of Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates, that is true.  But Jackie came across in the film as basically "a small town girl" who "really, really made good" (imagine going to _her_ class reuinon ;-) ;-), and yes, with her "billions" (and later simply "hundreds of millions" ... ) she arguably "still shopped at Walmart."

Yes, their house (that thanks to the financial crisis they were unable to complete) was ridiculously extravagant.  But I'd probably focus more of my arrows on her husband than her.

Anyway, Queen of Versailles is not a profound movie.  I didn't and wouldn't necessarily want to pay "full price" to see it.  I'm still not sure I particularly like the family.  The film's definitely of the "reality show" genre.  But, argh!  I can't outright hate it or hate them. ;-)

And there it is ... there's a good part of me that would say that if there EVER WAS "a poster family" deserving of an _extended_ "time share" visit to a Communist Era "re-education camp" then the Siegels would be that family. (I'd love to see David doing some time swinging a pick-axe in some Siberian rock-quarry somewhere.  And there are honestly NOT many people I'd EVER wish that for ...)  But the Siegels do remain "regular folk" too ... Sigh ... ;-)


ADDENDUM:

While "in theaters in major markets," many "Independent" / Foreign Films and Documentaries are  available for home viewing in the U.S. through the IFC Video On Demand service (type in your zipcode and cable provider to see if this service as available to you) or for download via services like Sundance Now and/or Itunes / Amazon Instant Video.  Eventually, these films become available for rent in the U.S. via NetFlix or Blockbuster.com.   More obscure titles can also be found via Facets Multimedia's DVD Rental Service.


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The Campaign [2012]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  Roger Ebert (2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB review
Roger Ebert's review

The Campaign (directed by Jay Roach, written by Chris Henchy and Shawn Harwell) is without a doubt a very crude film.  As such, the film will be off-putting to a fair amount of viewers, particularly older ones, regardless of political affiliation.

That said, I must say that I share the film-makers' disgust with the current political process in the United States where candidates (and their backers) will say truly almost anything to win.  And I would share to a large extent the film-makers' political view.  I do believe that political money corrupts.

What's my out of this dilemma then?  Honestly, in my daydreams, I've toyed with "revisiting monarchy" because at least then governance would be "left to the King" who we could then ridicule and criticize ... and, yes, I know we'd probably end up in some dungeon ... but we wouldn't be afflicted by the AWFUL political ads that THIS FILM actually so wonderfully, mercilessly, and IMHO _so justly_ lampoons.

What's then is the film about?  Will Farrell plays Cam Brady a four time Democratic congressman from North Carolina recognizably modeled after former presidential and vice-presidential candidate John Edwards.  He's arrogant, morally reckless and not particularly bright, but he runs unopposed.  Why?  Because he knows his District.  He says B.S., says it proudly, with conviction.  But he doesn't do anything, one way or another, to harm his district.  He's basically a mascot, a clown.

He does, however, get himself into trouble by leaving a lengthy over-the-top sexually explicit message on the wrong answering machine (He thinks he's leaving the message on the voice mail box of a campaign worker he had just had <....> with, and instead leaves it on the answering machine of a humble Christian family about to say grace before their meal).  It was an unbelievably stupid mistake.  But then in real life, not a few months ago, Democratic Representative Tony Wiener from New York did something similarly stupid, sending a sexually explicit photograph of himself to a campaign worker, thinking that this would be both somehow "appropriate" and "not get out."  Welcome to the digital age ...

Seeing Cam Brady wounded, the Motch Brothers (played by John Lithgow and Dan Aykroyd) modeled after the astro-turf Tea Party financing Koch Brothers see an opening.  They want to turn Cam Brady's 14th Congressional District into basically "China today" by getting wavers to reduce the wage, safety and environmental standards in the 14th District to China levels calling the process "insourcing").

When Cam Brady in a fit of conscience (or stupidity?) refuses to go along with their plan, they decide to put-up a candidate to run against him.  Who?  It doesn't matter to them.  They open their roladex and find an old friend Raymond Huggins (played by Brian Cox).  Raymond's too old and probably too smart to run.  So they decide to go with his nice and somewhat loser son Marty Huggins (played by Zach Galifianakis) instead.  Putting $1 million down in a Super Pac in his name, they figure that they can turn him into whoever they want.  Indeed, they bring in a "fixer" named Tim Wattley (played by Dylan McDermatt) who so completely "makes over' Marty's life that he gets rid of his two little Chinese dogs, replacing them with a "poll tested" Lab and Collie.  Much ensues ...

Most of what ensues has little to do with the people of  "North Carolina's 14th Congressional District."  Cam Brady continues to run on his tried and true slogan of "America, Jesus and Freedom" until he's found to not be able to recite even the Lord's Prayer when challenged by Marty at a debate.

Marty then pushes the "character" issue further by composing a terrible ad featuring him asking Cam Brady's 10 year old son: "Does your father play with you?" The boy answers "no, not really, he's too busy."  Marty continues: "I'll play with you."  "Okay."  "You know you can call me daddy, if you want" "I'm not sure" "Don't worry, if your daddy isn't a real daddy, you call me daddy instead."  "Okay, daddy."  "I'm Marty Huggins, and if your daddy won't step up and be a real dad, I will... and I ever so reluctantly endorse this message..."

Seeing that ad, Cam Brady becomes incensed demanding "He steals my son, I'll sleep with his wife!"  So he does, seducing Marty Huggins' nice, naive and somewhat frumpy wife and puts the resulting pixelated sex tape on YouTube, running perhaps the first political ad with the disclaimer "This Political Ad is intended for Mature Audiences Only ..."

Marty, in turn incensed then comes with a gun to Cam Brady's "hunting photo op" and just shoots Cam in the leg and leaves, not even bothering to make it look like a Dick Cheney-like "hunting accident."  And what happens?  Marty's poll numbers "get a bump of 2-3 points" for shooting his opponent in the leg....

If this all seems appalling, it's because it is.  Yes, the film makers exaggerate.  But honestly not much.  And yes, BOTH candidates eventually catch themselves before completely falling off the cliff.  So there is a "happy ending" of sorts.  But what an ugly mess ... as is, honestly, the political process in the United States today.


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The Bourne Legacy [2012]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Roger Ebert (2 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1194173/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/12mv091.htm
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120808/REVIEWS/120809988

Bourne Legacy (directed and cowritten by Tony Gilroy along with Dan Gilroy based on the Bourne Series of novels inspired by the Bourne trilogy by Robert Ludlum [IMDb]).

To a fair amount of critics and presumably moviegoers, the Bourne series of films really should have ended with the adaptation of the Ludlum's third and final novel in his Bourne trilogy.   In most cases, I'd agree with that assessment.  However in this case, I do actually see a rather compelling (rather than purely financial / profit-making) purpose in continuing the series beyond the three original installments.  This is because as Bourne Legacy rightly points out, the "secret government program" in which the Jason Bourne character had been a member would have been _much bigger_ than simply a single agent named Jason Bourne.  There would have been other agents.

So Bourne Legacy is precisely about "another agent," one whose name is Aaron Cross (played by Jeremy Renner), with similar if ultimately different questions than Bourne.  If Jason Bourne's fundamental quest was trying to figure out who the heck he really was or had become, Cross's questions were "what exactly am I ultimately part of?" and "how many others are there 'like me'?"   So I found Aaron Cross' character easily as compelling as Bourne's was in the first Bourne film, Bourne Identity [2002].  I also do believe that Tony Gilroy had more freedom in exploring the nature and ramifications of the program to which both Jason Bourne and Aaron Cross belonged in making Bourne Legacy than when he was simply making films out of the remaining novels of Ludlum's trilogy.  (I didn't particularly like Bourne Supremacy [2004] or Bourne Ultimatum [2007]).

Here I would add a note of respect for another film that Tony Gilroy had written and directed, Duplicity [2009], which along with the first Bourne film, Bourne Identity [2002], I had found to be probably the most compelling spy story of the past 10 years.  As in Duplicity [2009] (which was actually a semi-serious / semi-comedy about contemporary industrial espionage) so in Bourne Legacy (which gloried in the "compartmentalization" of government sponsored intelligence operations), it would seem to me that Tony Gilroy has as good a knowledge and _intuition_ as anybody today about how contemporary intelligence operations work. 

The compartmentalization of the program to which Jason Bourne and Arron Cross belonged (and its members resulting isolation...) also makes for a relatively simple story to tell.  There were very few characters of consequence present in the current story:  There was Cross, presumably a "field agent" who we meet on a (solitary ...) "endurance training exercise" out in the wilds of Alaska.  There was the program's chief "handler" back at Langley/Washington (played by Edward Norton).  And there was a "biochemist" Dr. Marta Shearing (played by Rachel Weisz), who Cross remembered because he had once been ordered to "come-in" to a lab, presumably somewhere in the Washington D.C. area, where after a physical, she had given him a couple performance enhancing drugs (both physical and mental) to take as part of his regimen from then on.

It was obvious that those drugs had been given to him (and presumably to other agents in the program) to improve his performance (and he seemed to particularly enjoy the intellect enhancing drug that he was given for reasons that are explained in the film).  Yet the larger question of "why" he (and presumably other agents) were being given these drugs wasn't particularly clear (Yes his performance would obviously "improve," but why? why would that be important?)  Yet, he followed the orders, until, of course, it suddenly became clear to him that the program was being "rolled up" (ended) from "far away" (Langley/Washington), for reasons that were, once more, "unclear."  So, of course, much ensues ...


Hence as much as I know that many viewers would wonder "why is there a Bourne movie being made _without_ Jason Bourne?" I honestly think that I "got it."  And I also will maintain that this is probably the best "Bourne movie" since the first one, even if it doesn't have Bourne in it, precisely because it helps present  Bourne's "world" from another (and perhaps larger) perspective.  So give the film a chance.  I think it's far better than one would originally expect it to be.


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Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days [2012]

MPAA (PG)  CNS/USCCB (A-I)  Fr. Dennis (2 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2023453/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/12mv087.htm

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days (directed by David Bowers, screenplay by Gabe Sachs along with Maya Forbes and Wallace Wolodarsky based on the children's book series Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney [IMDb]) is the third installment in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid franchise and IMHO _much_ better (if still racially problematic) than the second installment called Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick's Rules [2011].

Indeed, the previous film began what became a year long preoccupation of mine on this blog regarding the presentation of race in contemporary American children's films.  The almost complete absence of people of color in that second installment had frankly stunned me, especially since nearly half or even _over half_ of the children in the United States today are "of color."

Indeed, the only person of color in "Rodrick's Rules" was that of the "rich Indian kid" named Chirag (played by Karan Barr) who returns (mercifully actually with a much smaller role) in the third film.  In that second film, aside from poor little Chirag (or actually "super rich" Chirag, who actually everyone else in the film was given the permission to _pick-on_.  Honestly how unbelievably appalling that was!!), one could count _on less than one hand_ the number of "people of color" appearing in the film _even as extras_ or _even simply standing somewhere in the background_ in the films shots.  Again, I just found that simply unbelievable.   

This third installment seems to do much better in this regard.  True, the main cast of the series had already been set -- and they were all cast white except for that poor little rich Indian kid.  So not much can be done there.

HOWEVER, the film makers did do two things that help to mitigate the oversight.  (1) In the larger group shots in the film, there almost always some African American extras present.  So the film is no longer "bleached white."  (2) Many times during the course of the film, the film-makers purposefully refer back to the drawings of the children's books in which the "stick figure" drawings in the books are largely drawn in a non-racial sort of way.

Still, I do have to note that the ONLY person of color (except for Chirag) who's given a line to say in the entire third installment is "the receptionist at the country club" to which one of the families in the story belonged.  THAT'S IT, though I suppose _one could say_ that the lack of African American and Hispanic characters of consequence in the story _could_ become an opportunity for film-going families (both "of color" and "white") to discuss with their children why this would be so:  Why would the only African American in the entire picture (and there were no Hispanics at all) be shown as working as the "receptionist" at the "good white people's country club?"

Still, believe it or not, I continue to maintain that this was _better_ than that second installment where no one "of color" except for that poor little rich Indian child had a line or was even present in the picture at all.

And while there were no Hispanics at all even in the third installment, at least part of the plot of the third installment involved the holding of a "sweet sixteen" party for the older sister of one of the characters in the story, which _could_ hint at the Hispanic tradition holding Quinceañera celebrations for Hispanic girls turning 15.  Having presided at something like 4-5 dozen Quinceñera Masses over the years, I would say that since the Hispanic Quinceañera celebrations are so tied-up with both Church and Community (there's a whole "court" of the girl's friends that are called in to participate) the Quinceañera celebrations are generally far nicer, more positive celebrations than the somewhat snobby and certainly "religion free" "sweet sixteen" celebration depicted in this film.  Still at least the presence of the "sweet sixteen" party in the plot of the story could allow Hispanic viewers to think of their own Quinceañera traditions.

Yet I keep trying to say that this third installment is actually better than the second one.  How?  I suppose it's in the interaction between the main characters, the main character / "wimpy kid" George Heffley (played by Zachary Gordon) who'd really just prefer spending his time playing video-games indoors in front of his TV, and his dad Frank (played by Steve Hahn) who'd really like to see him more outdoors, even though he himself wasn't exactly "cool" or particularly athletic when he was young.  There's also George's best friend Rowley Jefferson (played by Robert Capron) and his somewhat snooty parents.  Finally there's George's older and though he thinks that he's so cool, actually quite lame brother Rodrick (played by Devon Bostik) and George's sincere but Sarah Palin-like mother Susan (played by Rachael Harris).  And in this installment, the Heffleys also get a rather entertaining / problematic dog...

It's all quite good / fun actually.  I just honestly wish it didn't all remain so obviously (and needlessly) "white."  It's 2012.  We should honestly be beyond this by now.


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Total Recall [2012]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (L)  Roger Ebert (3 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (2 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1386703/
CNS/USCCB review -
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/movies/12mv086.htm
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120801/REVIEWS/120739999

Total Recall [2012] directed by Len Wiseman, current screenplay by Kurt Wimmer and Mark Bomback is a somewhat-to-significantly reworked remake of the film Total Recall [1990] directed by Paul Verhoeven and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.  The basic storyline in both cases was inspired by science fiction writer Phillip K. Dick's [IMDb] short story "We Can Remember it for you Wholesale" [PDF].

What's the story about?  Douglas Quaid (played in the 2012 version by Colin Farrell and in the 1990 version by Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a common laborer/factory worker living in a world set a significant time into the future.  He lives in a non-descript apartment in large high rise/tenement, has a beautiful wife named Lori (played in the 2012 version by Kate Beckinsale and in the 1990 version by Sharon Stone), and does his job.  But he's bored.

Douglas Quaid sees advertisements for a new service called "Total Recall" which promise to give one _in two hours time_ the memories of a perfect vacation or fantasy without actually having to go (or spending the money to go...).  Quaid, bored with his life and also broke, decides to give it a shot.  When he comes to the "Total Recall" studio, he's told that he really could order anything.  Did he ever dream of being a "powerful man," a "sport's hero," heck even a "secret agent."  All was possible.  Just sit back, dose off (with help of some sort of a sleep inducing agent) and let the Total Recall people implant the memories.

So Douglas Quaid is strapped into his chair, all sorts of gizmos are put around his head, he's given an IV to feed the sleep inducing agent into his blood stream, and then ... something goes wrong.  The rest of the movie (a SciFi spy caper) ensues... 

Note to Parents: While this new 2012 version is rated PG-13 (!!), perhaps because most of the beings shot up in the new version were "androids" as opposed to human beings, I'd still would have preferred that the film would be rated-R like the 1990 version.  (And IMHO the 1990 version probably should have been rated NC-17 if the rating was honest).  Still, the truly gratuitous violence aside, I found the 1990 version fascinating and the new one as well.  Ask yourselves:

(1) Was the "rest of the story" in the film "real" (really happening to Douglas Quaid) or was it just the 2 hour "secret agent fantasy" that he paid Total Recall to "implant" into his brain's memory?

(2) Isn't the experience that Douglas Quaid paid the "Total Recall" service to give him kinda what _we_ pay for when _we_ go to the movies?  For the price of admission, _we're_ transported by the film-makers to a different time and place, and often enough we identify with / experience vicariously the experiences of the protagonist(s) of the story that we watch played out on the screen before us.  And then, after our 2-3 hour "session" is done ... we go home with the memories of what we had just experienced "implanted" in _our_ brains.

Viewers of the current version of the film will also see more or less obvious homages to other Sci-Fi / Adventure films including: The Bourne Identity [2002], Star Wars [1977], Inception [2010] and Raiders of the Lost Ark [1981].

So if you can stand (and many won't be able to stand) the near constant chase scenes, the constant shattering of glass, and the blowing-up/dismemberment of countless androids as well as body-armored humans (who often look almost like androids) then there's actually something beneath the surface of all that mayhem for you.  But as in the case of the 1990 version, the new 2012 version of the story continues to be told in a very violent way.

As such this film continues to both frustrate and fascinate.  Yes, it is violent (again, even the newer version deserves parental involvement, hence an R rating).  On the other hand, the concept underneath it is brilliant and the film arguably expresses what we ourselves experience every time we go to the movies.


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Negroes with Guns: Rob Williams and Black Power [2004]

MPAA (Not Rated)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing

Negroes with Guns: Rob Williams and Black Power, a documentary directed by Sandra Dickson and Churchill Roberts about pro-gun Civil Rights era North Carolina African-American activist Robert Williams, is a film that I honestly never would have heard of before beginning my blog.  Yet as a Catholic priest who is also a blogger writing about films, I find myself (often smiling from ear to ear) in a rather unique position to give voice to such well made and provocative films as this.  I belong to a universal (Catholic) Church, one that firmly believes that we are all God's children and since I write in my spare time and simply for the occasional donation, I actually get to write more freely than most anybody else about the films that I choose to see (and as readers of this blog will certainly note, I really, really enjoy casting a "very wide net.") So I'm becoming more and more certain that a lot of the films that I write about on this blog are films that they too would probably have never heard of otherwise.  Yet hopefully, readers will rind the films reviewed here compelling and, further, written about in a compelling way ;-)

I discovered this film last week while I was looking for a place that was showing the recently released youth oriented dance movie Step Up Revolution [2012] but in 2D rather than the "industry preferred" 3D (which would have also cost me $4 more to see it...).  Most of the mainstream theaters in Chicago were only offering one showing a day of the film in 2D and, unsurprisingly, at very inconvenient times.  However, I found that the ICE (Inner City Entertainment) theater chain had a multiplex on 87th Street off of the Dan Ryan expressway in Chicago that only showed the film in 2D (and at multiple times).   I found this just great. It was while I was there I found out that ICE ran a monthly program called "Black World Cinema" and that this particular film was playing the following Thursday at the theater.

Those who've followed my blog would know that I've come to appreciate the various film festivals that pass through Chicago during the year as well as the more "avant guard" / "art theaters" in Chicago like Facet's Multimedia (Near Northwest Side), the Gene Siskel Film Center (Downtown) and Landmark Century Centre (Lincoln Park), The Music Box Theatre (Northside).  So it has been a joy to discover ICE Theaters on the South Side as well.  And I do hope to see / review films from the Black World Cinema series as they occur from now on.

Negroes with Guns is a documentary that has aired on PBS's Independent Lens program about Robert Williams, who during the Civil Rights Era of the 1950s-60s when honestly no one knew how the struggle for black equality was going to end up took a very "Southern path" to the Civil Rights Struggle.  He started  _peacefully_ arming blacks, by starting a series of legal gun clubs across North Carolina though mostly centered around his home Monroe County.  He did work with the NAACP and had _some_ contact with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr's Southern Christian Leadership Conference.  But as a representative of the NAACP in the documentary noted, both the NAACP and the SCLC frankly kept a distance from Robert Williams and his Black Guard for fear of losing northern white liberal support. 

The documentary also showed that Robert Williams' approach did eventually get him into trouble.  In 1961, during a particularly tense summer when a number of NAACP/SCLC "freedom riders" had arrived in Monroe County and were peacefully protesting in the center of town, a couple of local white women perhaps trying to avoid the protests in the center of town ended up making a wrong turn and passed through the African American section of town instead.  Finding themselves surrounded by ARMED BLACK MEN and actually having been escorted by Robert Williams out of the neighborhood and back onto right road, they turned around and accused Robert Williams and his men of having "kidnapped them."  This became the pretext that the local police needed to try to bring an end to Robert Williams' group.  Informed that the State Police were going to come and arrest him, Robert Williams and his family fled the back roads out of the county and (perhaps tragically) out of the state.  Since he crossed state lines, he found himself as a fugitive wanted by the FBI.    So he ended up fleeing all the way to Castro's Cuba, which certainly _did not_ ingratiate him the U.S. government at the time.  Remember, only a short time later came the Cuban Missile Crisis.  (Then during his time in Cuba, Robert Williams did produce a radio program of his own design FOR (Communist) Cuba's foreign radio service called "Radio Free Dixie).

Finding himself on the other side of Cold War lines, he was something of a hero for a time in the Communist Bloc, but he remained too independent.  Eventually, he found himself going to Communist China in the late 1960s.  Finally, as U.S. President Richard Nixon began his overtures to opening diplomatic relations with Communist China, Robert Williams was allowed to return to the United States.  Soon after being "extradited" back to North Carolina almost immediately after returning to the United States (he arrived initially to Detroit) the "kidnapping" charges that he faced in North Carolina were quietly dropped as well.

In the documentary Robert Williams is portrayed as having been an inspiration for the subsequent Black Panther movement.  That may be.  However, upon his return, Williams remained rather quiet, never being particularly interested in becoming a "successor figure" to either Malcolm X or Martin Luther King, Jr as the FBI had apparently feared.  Indeed, it would seem that Robert Williams never really advocated violence (hence probably why he was able to return and why the charges against him in North Carolina were dropped).  Instead, he simply advocated armed self-defense claiming equal rights as whites to the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (which guarantees the rights of Americans to bear arms).

I found the situation that got Williams into trouble in North Carolina as more or less inevitable.  And all things considered, at least nobody died in that confrontation that resulted in Williams having to have to flee for his life all the way to Castro's Cuba and Communist China before he was able to come home.  However, I do believe that people do have a right to self-defense.  I'm not sure if guns are necessarily the solution (and Williams life can be taken to teach lessons on both sides of the "gun" question in the United States:  If Williams and his group were not armed, perhaps he would not have had to flee all the way to Cuba to save his life.  On the other hand, I've never been threatened with being lynched or having my house threatened with being burned to the ground.  So I think I understand Williams' dilemma and why he chose to advocate the path that he did.

In any case, this documentary certainly gives _everyone_ much to think about.


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Sacrifice (orig. Zhao shi gu er) [2010]

MPAA (R)  Roger Ebert (3 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1726738/
Roger Ebert's review -
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120725/REVIEWS/120729989

Sacrifice (orig. Zhao shi gu er), directed by Kaige Chen, screenplay by Ningyu Zhao is a Chinese historical drama (subtitled) filmed out of Shanghai based on a Chinese opera set in the 6th century BC in China.

Cheng Ying (played by You Ge) a doctor is attending the pregnant daughter of the King/head of the powerful Zhao family.  While he has been a doctor for many years, Cheng is especially happy these days because after many years he and his wife were finally able to have a child of their own as well.

Well, just as the daughter of the king was going to have her child, an angry general Tu'An Gu (played by Xequi Wang) storms the King's palace with his men and proceeds to kill everyone of the King's family except for the daughter, who being in labor was in another building.  She gives birth to her child.  But finding out what had just happened to her family, she gives the child, a son, to the doctor asking him to save him by raising him as his own (as a commoner, not knowing his actual heritage).  The doctor agrees, taking the child to his home.

Tu'An Gu in the meantime finds out that the king's daughter had given birth and not finding the infant, orders his men to close all the gates of the citadel, search all the homes and carry to him every infant in the citadel figuring that all the parents of the children abducted in this way could come to him, one by one, to plead for their children's lives, leaving the one who belonged to the daughter of the king alone to die.

But it does not turn out that way.  The doctor's wife, now suddenly with two infants decides to hide her own while handing over the daughter of the king's child to Tu'An Gu's men.  BUT the doctor feeling obligation to his former patient, goes back to Tu'An Gu to claim the child as his own.  Now Tu'An Gu is confused.  He knows the doctor attended the daughter of the king.  He also knows that the doctor recently had a child himself.  And the doctor had come to him somewhat suspiciously late to ask for the child back.  Who's child is it?  And shouldn't there be two children there that the doctor's supposedly taking care of now?

If this seems convoluted, it is.  And yes, even Tu'An Gu is confused.  He goes back with his men to the doctor's house to find the other child.  But even when he finds the second child (one can't easily keep a newborn quiet for an extended period of time), what then?  Which child is whose?  Much ensues ...

History and martial arts buffs will like this film as the costuming and as well as the combat scenes are certainly authentic.  My only complaint would be that the films feels like one that would have been produced during the Ben Hur [1959] era of film making.  As such, I would suspect that many Americans may find the sets, cinematography and even the dialogue (subtitled though it may be) somewhat "dated."  Flashier Chinese "period pieces," like Snow Flower and the Secret Fan [2011] and Detective Dee and the Phantom Flame [2011] still seem to be coming out of Hong Kong rather than Shanghai.

On the other hand, one also has to realize that the screenwriter Ningyu Zhao had actually lost a decade of his life during China's Cultural Revolution which extended from 1966 to 1976. Ningyu Zhao had been a rising star in Communist China's film establishment prior to the Cultural Revolution and only after it was over, was he able to begin rebuilding his career.  So it should not necessarily be surprising that his style would have been influenced by the great Hollywood epics made in the late 1950s through mid-1960s in the West The Ten Commandments [1956], Ben Hur [1959] or Cleopatra [1963] (and somewhat "stuck" in that time). 

However, in any case, Sacrifice (orig. Zhao shi gu er) makes for a good film for those who'd be interested in Chinese history and culture.  And perhaps the comparison between the films being produced in Hong Kong vs Shanghai will serve to improve the films coming out of both places.


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