WHY CAPTAIN PHILLIPS IS A MORE PLEASURABLE FILM THAN SANDRA BULLOCK'S SHEENA IN THE 21ST CENTURY'S SPACE WALK AND GRAVITY PLUNGE

WHY CAPTAIN PHILLIPS IS A MORE PLEASURABLE FILM THAN SANDRA BULLOCK'S SHEENA IN THE 21ST CENTURY'S SPACE WALK AND GRAVITY PLUNGE (as crafted as it is). Unless of course if you found some old Owsley acid stored in your mother"s stored away " do not touch box " than take it and do plunge with her into IMAX heaven.

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A friend in LA (actor/teacher Sally Kirkland) who was in my class with Lee Strasberg many years ago asked "Should I see Captain Phillips ?" Well I will say the same thing to her that i will say to you : "it will have you on the seat of the pants throughout. Barkhad Abdi, 

the Somali lead actor's performance is breathtaking and nomination deserving. Hanks reminds us of what we almost forgot. He is a superb actor when given a role and a script and and a director that challenges him. He more than rise to the task. Director Greengrass has always managed to foreground human conflict against a background of geo-political storytelling. He makes Captain Phillips a larger than life hero who would be willing to sacrifice his life by getting into a life boat with the hijackers and leaving his crew safe and alone on the ship. The only sour note appears very near the end. Another glorification of the Navy Seals, our government's Al-Qaeda targeted killers- for-hire . At SUNDANCE 2013 TWO important documentaries told very different stories about the Navy Seals. DIRTY WARS

reveals the truth behind the Navy Seal media spin that was most recently seen in the HBO documentary MANHUNT about  the CIA/women agents/seals ossama 

And now there is the "controversy" ablaze about the accuracy of the portrayal of Tom Hanks character. Captain Phillips is a NARRATIVE film not a documentary. Narrative films can make their own reality and Greengrass does in this does in this his narrative “docudrama.” Captain Phillips is storytelling at the highest popular culture level. Beautifully written and crafted,expertly paced, edited and acted. Now the hungry money vultures -like litigants are circling in a swarm over this critically acclaimed storytelling yelling 'Fire in the house of truth". Read how  Greengrass  appropriately answers the anonymously posted attacks on his creative integrity.

director paul Greengrass responds to captain phillips naccuracy-claims/

Captain Phillips trailer

REEL DEAL: Movies that matter REVIEW: LOVELACE

LOVELACE  dirs. Rob Epstein and Jeffery Friedman.

The birth control pill freed women from the tyranny of their body and gave them choice over sexual pleasure. It also made for a world that fundamentally changed the mating game. The rules had been that good girls do not fellate or god forbid put out until they were married. This drove men crazy. The pill changed everything. Women were free to use their bodies for pleasure and men took full advantage of this new freedom, resulting in many cases where women had even less right to say no than they did under the old rules.  In the early ‘70s, despite women’s liberation,  a porn based aesthetical representation of women and their bodies emerged.

It is against this background that Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman tell the story of the first above ground porn star, Linda Lovelace and her worldwide fame as the woman who could. Epstein and Friedman's background as Academy Award wining documentary filmmakers and their learning adventure into narrative film making (HOWL, the story of Allan Ginsberg infamous censorship battle) mesh into a triumph of historical and critical pop culture storytelling ,

LOVELACE world premiered at the 2013 SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL.

Threading through a seedy, steamy story of the dark side of the porn industry with an appropriate soundtrack that embraced porn and glamorizes the exploitation of women against the Nixon years of puritanical outrage and a sanctimonious push for censorship, LOVELACE dramatically exposes the modification of moral values and the implicit commmodification of sexual freedom for profit.

Linda Lovelace is a would-be actress who falls in love with the wrong kind of men and will do anything to please them. For $200 to pay the rent, she stars in a porn movie for a mafia-related porn director and graphically performs oral sex that will forever change what men will expect from women regardless of what a woman wants or needs.

Against a cheesy Technicolor landscape of Miami and San Fernando Valley’s tacky glamour and an appropriately almost but not too overheated script by Andy Bellin, we meet a cast up to the demands of representing a world not as glamorous as the people in it think. Amanda Seyfried is perfectly cast because of her voluptuous body and over ripe lips.

One performance steals the film and should win her an Academy Award nomination. Unrecognizable as Linda Lovelace’s ultra conservative Florida mother is Sharon Stone. 

Hers is the real indelible performance in the film. Both the art direction and costumes are point perfect.

LOVELACE is a timely meditation on sexual freedom and the commodification of the body.  Epstein and Friedman have their fingers on the pulse of America.

(version of this review appeared in Westview News August 1st 2013)

Tonight at the Tank Lucy Winer takes us where we do not want to go....... and need to .... I'm going 

MENTAL HEALTH CARE: A PAINFUL LEGACY AND TODAY’S CRISIS

Screening & Discussion with LUCY WINER
Filmmaker of "Kings Park: Stories from an American Mental Institution" and 
STEPHANIE SCHROEDER, Activist & Author "Beautiful Wreck: Sex, Lies, and Suicide"
Trailer:
http://kingsparkmovie.com/

Thursday, May 23, 2013
6:30-9:15 PM
The Feminist District
The Tank- 151 W. 46th St. (b/t 6th & 7th Ave) 8th Floor, NYC 10036
elevator access
Subway: N,R,Q to 49th St. or B,D,F,M to Rockefeller Center

One of the films that failed to get nominated for an Academy Award  this year for best Documentary was Lee Hirsh's THE BULLY PROJECT. It premiered at Sundance 2011. Bought by Harvey Weinstein and then laid on the shelf for over a year despite media stories about adolescent suicide and anti-Bullying legislation. That a dishonest doc like HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE could suck all the air out of the Academy awards nominations room left the BULLY PROJECT in the smoke.  I hope you will seek it out on the various Video on Demand sites  (Hula+, NetFlix etc). It is a remarkable study of just how young the kids themselves are who bully and reflects upon the families they come from and the schools they attend. Tragic are the parents and the sensitive, non-invasive camera and Hirsh's interviews keeps you present when you would want to turn away. Shocking is the footage of kids bullying other kids.  Here is an interview with the Director which is a perfect setup for watching this important documentary.


Jim Fouratt chats with Lee Hirsh about his film THE BULLY PROJECT

REVIEW : : DISCONNECT director Henry-Alex Rubin

In theaters now  DISCONNECT explores how new technologies impact on people's lives and raises questions of authenticity, intimacy, boundaries and privacy as it weaves CRASH like stories that have a La Ronde like human contact template. With a excellent cast that includes Mr. Everywhere ALEXANDER SKARSGÅRD and the indelible HOPE DAVIS  questions of cybersex, fake identities, inauthentic intimacy. voyeurism  and most dramatically  identity thief. How humans are trained to change by machines could be one way to look at this provocative film, or how human beings actually are capable of human emotions like empathy , anger, compassion, revenge which machines are not. DISCONNECT is disruptive on a personal level of  how a viewer may behave in cyberspace and holds out the hope that humanity still exists in a world where tabloid journalism and TMZ blur what is private and what is public.  Director HENRY-ALEX RUBIN and writer  ANDREW STERN are to be commended for peeling back the so "freedom of expression" the internet was to promote to reveal how twisted human values  can be in the interface with social media . Yes you can think how a powerful progressive politician was humiliated for a twitter mistake and made to publicly self-flagellate for what should have been a private matter .His non-crime was to have made his tweet  public ...and then to deny his action.. a cyber activity that millions of computer users participate in every day. See DISCONNECT it will give you second thoughts about what happens when you use click on social media site!

Troubling Doc on Internet piracy surfaces at SXSW 2013

Reel Deal SXSW 2013 review

TPB AKA (The Pirate Bay Away from Keyboard)

director: Simon Klose (Sweden)

Troubling film about the most successful creative work piracy website ( the Pirate Bay) based in Sweden. The US government pressured the Swedish Government to prosecute the stealing of and distribution of copyright work and profiting from it.. What is troubling is the the film makes heroes of the three founders and sees them as bravely fighting to keep the Internet free from government control by censorship and protection of copyright The downloading of creative work owned by an artist is quite different I believe from downloading a diplomatic cable, a corporations cover up game plan or posting a video that shows a government or an agency or corporation or an individual is lying or breaking the law. Not one frame that I can remember dealth with the ethical question of if you you think you have the right to download without compensating the creative work of anyone be they a Hollywood studio or an individual poet or indie rock musician, how is the creator to be economically compensated for their creative labor?

TPB AFK is well crafted and structured with the rhythm of an action film shot by a smart slacker complete with a sound track that would also work for a classy horror film.

TBK AKF is a necessary, must-see film to understand how non-creative people (computer geeks are essentially scientific technicians. Science geeks even when gifted with genius are not, in my view, artists.) feel they can profit ( usually by sex industry adverts) from the "free" distribution of an artist's creative work be it film, writing or music or visual art without the artist's permission because their tech skills create a pathway. The conflating of what many artist call “thief” with freedom of expression and unregulated Internet is the the core and nexis of the ethical problem. I fear what will ultimately happen is the diminishing of artistic authenticity and originality because of the lack of economic protection and incentive and the devaluing of artistic and creative labor.

This kind of disconnect will fundamentally diminished both the incentive to create and the quality of creative work if the common ethic is it is OK to "steal" or upload anything on the Internet without respect for copyright. There is no discussion of revamping of copyright a la Creative Commons in the film except for a one sentence throw away line.

What is documented in TPB AFK is how the arrogant academic driven definition of free is practiced in real time, not theory, by 21st century creative work thieves.

In the post screening Q&A (attached) the director lays out why he spent 5 years following this story. When asked how were artists to survive, the best he could say was; " I don't know. A new distribution steam needs to be developed that answers that question, " He did say from day one he has made his film available for free on the Internet (YouTube etc) . His producer who paid for the work and the theatrical distributor both present in the audience did not participate in the Q&;A .                                             
                                        (cc) jim fouratt March 9, 2013

Su Freidrich talks with Reel Deal's Jim Fouratt about her new film Gut Renervation...

Award winning indie film director and Professor at Princeton 

talks about the making of Gut Renovation where Freidrich 
and partner and roommates lived until almost overnight when the politicians led by Mayor Bloomberg and Speaker Christine Quine destroyed a neighborhood by changing zoning laws. It is a common story in many cities  Freidrich lived thought it and film it almost from beginning to the end. A sad human story told in cinematic images that capture the grief of gentrification for those who were living in a community so targeted, A must see for any local activist involves in trying to save a community fron disappearing

My Reel Deal: Movies that Matter review

publish : WestView News March 1st

Gut Renovation dir Su Freidrich

Prize winning experimental and avant-garde film maker Su Friedrich is best known for making art-driven films based on her experience as a girl, daughter, woman, and a lesbian.  She seems to be inspired by the story telling technique of shappic savant and award winning film maker Barbara Hammer.  Yet her new film is anything but arty.  Gut Renovation is a study of the policy of Mayor Bloomberg and City Council under the leadership of Christine Quinn that allows real estate developers to go on a rampage of destroying neighborhoods like in Coney Island, Hunters Point in the Bronx, and parts of Brooklyn in order to let real estate developers build luxury housing.  This is just like what happened in  Greenwich Village with St. Vincent's Hospital. 

Gut Renovation is shot in a traditional documentary format.  It is more personal and intimate. Friedrich puts herself front and center as she sees the working class neighborhood she had moved to with her partner, after having to flee SoHo rising rents. The place is Williamsburg where she had moved in 1989. At first she and her fellow working artists were invisible in the manufacturing-heavy, working class family community. However, as she integrated into her community together with her partner, her roommates, and other artists, they became more visible. Things really began to change in 2005 when City Council made a major change in the zoning, opening up the largely manufacturing neighborhood to residents.  The changed started almost immediately.  Buildings mostly owned by members of the Orthodox Jewish community started to be sold and the businesses they house were forced out. Freidrich has two stories she is documenting.  Firstly, the change in the physical neighborhood and secondly, how it was affecting her home, her relationship, her roommates, and her friends and neighbors.

Nothing about Gut could be called "arty;” and yet it is artful.  It certainly has the clarity and sensibility of an artist.  Freidrich also has a sense of humor which permeates through the reality of the destruction of neighborhood. She began, with her partner, mapping the zone boundaries and labeling the buildings and whorehouses around her as they were sold, cleared of tenants and renovated, When she got to 173 ... yes, 173 buildings,  she knew it was time to move as she would not be able to afford the new building.  A sad story rooted in politicians’ insensitivity to what makes a community and how greed ruins almost everything. Sad, yes, but necessary viewing if you want to fight NYU or know we need a full service hospital back in the Community. 

TV’s most Islamophobic show - Salon.com

Almost  everyone I know (including myself) says HOMELAND  was  their favorite must watch TV show this season ( It's on cable which means it is ok for smart  "I don't watch TV except for news programs" folk to 'fess up. even  though the producers brought to public acclaim and ratings rule the pro-torture "24", the TV  favorite of those forgotten villains  Dick Chaney and Donald Rumsfeld   Or should I say this show bleeds into creating a film  audience for Zero Dark Thirty?  Or should I ask is it a good thing that smart little girls have a new alternative to SUPER MODEL as a choice of  what they want to be when they grow up? Is it really true that that best CIA/NSA agents are women ?  Will only a radical feminist who thinks there is no essential difference between men and women except for acculturation be jumping up and down with joy as Claire Danes character and Kathryn Bigelow direction exposes the stupidity of men as they use their female brains to  'save the world? Well here is a "she said , he said in print/online reactions " .. Where do you stand?

Laila Al-Arian is a journalist based in Washington D.C. critiques HOMELAN

Yair Rosenberg suppots HOMELAND, He s a writer for the NYC based Zionist publication T

Hey I didn't miss a single chapter but had this uneasy feeling from day one. Only asking but I will duck just in case !

REVIEWS MARCH 2012 :

REEL DEAL : MOVIES THAT MATTER jim fouratt March 2012 March in NYC is both a movie lover’s paradise and a movie goers hell! Major specialty programs are being spooled all over the city and movies that matter are premiering almost daily.

Let’s Go to the Movies!

I took myself to the BA cinematek for : New Voices in Black Cinema Festival . Infiltrating Hollywood: The Rise and Fall of the Spook Who Sat by the Door, directed by Christine Acham and Clifford Ward. woke me up to a lost film. The documentary tells of the making and suppression of The Spook Who Sat by the Door (1973) directed by Hogan’s Heroes actor and TV series director Ivan Dixon. A feature based on Sam Greenlee’s controversial novel of same name.(1969). Dixon assembled a first class cast to bring to life a serious satire of black stereotypes. The story revolves around the first black CIA agent who resigns at the height of Panther Party visibility and moves to Chicago to teach his CIA skills to black militants. Spook captures both the stereotyping of black people by white Americans and the emerging Black Power movement. Politicians and the FBI took it seriously and saw it as realistic threat to law and order. United Artist bowing to pressure pulled the film after its opening week.RISE and FALL documents what happened and why the film disappeared. In 2004 it finally surfaced on DVD. Both films are charged with the passion of racial change and racist fears. See them.

TRAILER: http://youtu.be/uUV3yD5Ofkk

Lets take a peek at some of the stronger Festival films playing in March:

Rendez-vous French Cinema (Lincoln Center/IFC/BAM) Each year this round up of French Film plays 50 cities in US presenting the best of the current crop of French films and classic features as well as documentaries and shorts. Here is a taste :

17 Girls directed by Delphine & Marian Croulin


The real life story of 17 teenage girls in one high school deciding to get pregnant reverberated around the world. In 17 GIRLS the Croulin sisters take a hard look at the pastel bathed ocean-side town where the girls went to school. A narrative film that is unsettling as the teens mouth feminist slogans to justify controlling their bodies in a way that twists normal feminist discourse. How school officials and parents react when the teens insisted on playing family and live collectively in defiance of their age and experience, Boys don't seem to matter , except as a means to end.

38 WITNESSES director Lucas Belvaux Loosely based on a best-selling novel by Didier Decoin that itself was a gloss on the infamous 1964 Kitty Genovese murder case. Belvaux looks at the moral morass some of the silent witnesses find themselves in as a probing journalist tires to reconstruct the crime. The reverberation of this specific Paris set crime is world wide in cultures where people do look away in order to not have to be involved. Reminds me how here in Greenwich Village how the closing of a hospital happened with the silent complicity of many residents and all the elected politicians. 38 Witnesses reveals how silence can speak very loud in human conscience and seep into personal and intimate relations.

UNFORGIVABLE director Andre Techine French directors make movies for adults. How nice given all the foolish and gross out films Hollywood desires, fetishes, emotional blocks and survival. UNFORGIVABLE takes two people finished with the frolic of youth and has them collide in the loveliest of cities, Venice. He (Andre Dussolier) is a 60 something author divorced with a seen-it-all actress daughter. She (Carole Bouquet) is a late 40’s beauty who has beguiled men and women for almost 30 years and now works as a real estate agent He wants a place to write and she takes him to parts of Venice off the tourist path. He falls into instant lust and immediately proposes. She has been around the block just too many times to take him seriously. But her closest friend and former lover (Adriana Asti),(the two are still emotionally involved), reminds her the clock is ticking. They marry and then the real intrigue begins. Inspired by the same titled novel by Philipple Dijan this is a movie that could inspire a Showtime series.

UNFORGIVABLE trailer: https://vimeo.com/40657738

NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS MoMA/ Linclon Center 5

BROKEN CAMERAS Directors: Emad Burnat and Guy Davidi Countries: Palestine/Israel/France Sundance award winner 2012 5 BROKEN CAMERAS made by a Palestinian and Israeli tells the story of how an amateur photographer bought a video camera to document his family and over the course of five years records the plight of Palestinians as the Israeli government moves settlers on to the land held traditionally by Palestinians. He has to use five different video cameras each subsequently damaged by bullets or rocks. One ordinary family and their friends in a small village are the subject of this deeply moving documentary. When the Sundance award was announced both filmmakers took the stage and between held the coveted award. Together they give visual hope for the future. When the politics of the grandfathers on both sides loses it sway

5 Broken Cameras TRAILER https://vimeo.com/15843191 .

TEDDY BEAR Director: Mads Matthiesen Country: Denmark Winner of the audience award for World Narrative film at Sundance 2012 TEDDY BEAR is the story of steroid sculptured body builder who at 38 still lives at home with his emotionally incestuous mother and how he finally breaks away from her and finds true love in Thailand of all places. Describing the narrative line does not do justice to this sensitive study of how one finally grows up and must leave home. His mother is something to reckon with! Must admit when I first read the film’s description I though I would pass on it until a fellow critic I trusted suggested it would surprise me. It certainly did. So I will suggest the same to you

TEDDY BEAR trailer: https://vimeo.com/42099311© jimfouratt 2012 (cc) Jim Fouratt/ReelDeal Movies" Movies That Matter feedback welcome reeldealmovies@gmail.com