Tonight on HBO: The Normal Heart (And More Movies About The Fight Against HIV-AIDS)

Posted on May 25, 2014 at 10:00 am

Larry Kramer’s searing drama “The Normal Heart” was an anguished cry for attention, for help, for respect, for change in the earliest days of the AIDS crisis. It was inspired by Kramer’s own experience as a founder of the activist Gay Men’s Health Crisis. The all-star cast includes Mark Ruffalo, Jim Parsons, Taylor Kitsch, and Mark Boner, with Julia Roberts as a sympathetic doctor. HIV-AIDS, originally identified as “gay cancer” in the US was even more terrifying because at the time the stigma and oppression faced by gay men and the large numbers who were not public about being gay made it much more difficult to get the attention of the medical authorities and the government. Then-President Ronald Reagan did not speak out about AIDS until more than 36,000 had died. Early GMHC materials carried the slogan “Silence = Death.”

More films about this era:

Longtime Companion Bruce Davison, Campbell Scott, Dermot Mulroney, and Mary-Louise Parker star in this outstanding early film (1990), brilliantly acted, sensitively scripted, heartbreaking.

And the Band Played On HBO produced this excellent film about the conflicts, failures, and early triumphs in the fight against HIV-AIDS, starring Matthew Modine, Lily Tomlin, Steve Martin, and Alan Alda, based on the brilliant reporting by Randy Shilts.

How to Survive a Plague The first reported cases of HIV-AIDS were published in the same week that the first consumer video cameras became available. Activists documented every meeting and initiative on video and this superb documentary shows how Kramer and others worked to increase funds for research and make experimental treatments available.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwhFS1mUaVY

Angels in America Tony Kushner’s searing drama is an epic of immense scope and power.

Related Tags:

Lists Television

Memorial Day Movies

Posted on May 25, 2014 at 8:00 am

I’ve already written about great documentaries and feature films about the military to watch on Memorial Day. This year, I will add some of the recent documentaries about our 21st century conflicts. They are not pro-war or anti-war. They are pro-soldier.

The War Tapes Operation Iraqi Freedom was filmed by three soldiers on the front lines in 2006.

Restrepo This documentary tells the story of the deployment of a platoon of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan’s Korengal Valley. The movie focuses on a remote 15-man outpost, “Restrepo,” named after a platoon medic who was killed in action.

Gunner Palace This film shows us the lives of soldiers from the 2/3 Field Artillery in a bombed-out former pleasure palace once belonging to Uday Hussein.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjM3CtXAbyo

Bomb Hunters: Afghanistan The US Army’s 23rd Engineer Company is are charged with clearing routes in southern Afghanistan and disarming the military’s number one threat: IEDs.

Related Tags:

Holidays Lists

The 60th Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education

Posted on May 17, 2014 at 10:42 am

Sixty years ago today the US Supreme Court issued one of the most momentous judicial decisions in history: Brown v. Board of Education, reversing past law holding that “separate but equal” schools violated the Constitution. My sister, Martha Minow, wrote an acclaimed book about the decision and its legacy: In Brown’s Wake: Legacies of America’s Educational Landmark.

I also recommend:

Beyond Brown: Pursuing the Promise A documentary about the impact of the Brown decision on American schools.

Separate But Equal Sidney Poitier plays Thurgood Marshall, who argued the Brown case before the Supreme Court and later became the first black Supreme Court justice. The details of the case are fascinating, especially the lower court ruling from an unsympathetic judge that vastly enlarged the scope of the case and the “doll test” that the lawyers used to demonstrate that there is no such thing as “separate but equal.”

Thurgood Laurence Fishburne plays Marshall in this biography.

Little Rock Central High: 50 Years Later The ugly desegregation battle in Little Rock inspired several films including this documentary update.

Ruby Bridges Disney’s film about the little girl who became the first black student in her school is a good introduction to this history for children.

Bright Road The exquisite Dorothy Dandridge stars in this film about a warm-hearted teacher at a segregated school.

Related Tags:

Lists

List: Godzilla Movies

Posted on May 14, 2014 at 8:00 am

One of the most famous movie monsters of all time, Godzilla, returns to the screen this week in a big-budget film starring Bryan Cranston. It’s a good time to take a look at all the various versions of Godzilla that have trashed cities and terrified the populace since the monster’s first appearance in 1954’s “Godzilla” from Japan, directed by Ishirō Honda.

In Japanese, the monster is called “Gojira,” based on combining the words for whale and gorilla. The original idea was inspired by the fears following the onset of the atomic age. But in his many following incarnations, Godzilla was sometimes the hero as well as the threat. Godzilla has appeared in games, comic books, television, and big and small budget films. The name has become a concept so embedded in our vocabulary that it shows up in terms like “Bridezilla.”

Highlights include the 1956 Godzilla: King of the Monsters, with Raymond Burr and dual-monster battles Godzilla vs. Mothra and King Kong vs. Godzilla.

It is generally agreed that the low point was 1992’s Godzilla with Matthew Broderick. It isn’t that bad — until it goes completely off the rails in the last half hour. Here’s hoping this one is worthy of the name.

Related Tags:

Lists Special Effects

The Five Meanest Mothers in Movies

Posted on May 10, 2014 at 8:00 am

I’ve posted several times about my favorite movie mothers, all loving, kind, supportive, and wise. I thought it would be fun to share some of my favorite mean movie mothers, too.

1. Now, Voyager Bette Davis is a repressed single woman who lives with a mother so controlling she literally throws herself down the stairs just to spite her daughter. Davis only survives with the help of a compassionate therapist played by Claude Rains, the love of handsome but unavailable Paul Henreid, and, perhaps most important, the opportunity to help another abused daughter.

2. The Manchurian Candidate Angela Lansbury was only three years older than Laurence Harvey, who plays her son, but that just adds to the unnerving evil of the mother she plays. Meryl Streep played the part in the remake and she was scary even crunching the ice from her drink.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGqiVOqxpOo

3. Carrie Piper Laurie is almost as scary as Sissy Spacek in this story of a repressed and repressing mother whose fanaticism fuels her daughter’s telekinetic fury.

4. Precious Mo’Nique won an Oscar for playing a monstrously abusive mother because she showed us that she was a victim as well as a tormentor.

5. Mommie Dearest The memoir of the daughter adopted by Joan Crawford inspired this sizzling story with a dynamic performance from Faye Dunaway as the star who could throw a tantrum over a wire hanger.

And don’t forget that my ebook 50 Must-See Movies: Mothers is free through tomorrow.

Related Tags:

For Your Netflix Queue Lists