Year: 2019

OK, folks, so I purchased my Chicago International Film Festival tickets today! If you want to know about the 15 films I’ll be seeing October 17-27, send me an email, and I’ll give you the details. Maybe you’ll want to come along! ...

Reviews of “Raise Hell” and “Puzzle,” as well as a film festival preview and a documentary update, all in the latest Movies with Meaning post on the web site of The Good Media Network, available by clicking here ...

“Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins” (2019). Cast: Molly Ivins. Interviews: Dan Rather, Rachel Maddow, Lou Dubose, Jim Hightower, Andy Ivins, Sara Ivins Maley, Carlton Carl, Dave “Moose” McNeely. Archives: George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, Ann Richards, David Letterman, Morley Safer, John Henry Faulk. Director: Janice Engel. Screenplay: Janice Engel and Monique Zavistovski. Web site. Trailer. Getting the word out about what’s really going on can be quite a challenge, especially when those in the know may try to conceal the truth, soft-peddle its implications or spin it to their personal advantage. Overcoming that takes a writer-investigator who’s willing to dig deep and to keep from caving in to pressure to doctor the information to fulfill a particular agenda. It also helps to inject a little humor to attract and keep the audience’s attention. So it was for a crafty reporter who managed to pull off all of the foregoing, a career chronicled in the enlightening and entertaining new documentary, “Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins.” Even in the heyday of newspapers, it was a rather rare feat for journalists in that medium to attain national acclaim. But one who achieved that – ...

Tune in for the latest Movies with Meaning segment on Frankiesense & More radio on The Good Media Network on Tuesday September 24 at 1:30 pm ET by clicking here. And, if you don’t catch it live, hear and watch it later on demand! ...

“Puzzle” (2018). Cast: Kelly Macdonald, David Denman, Irrfan Khan, Austin Abrams, Bubba Weiler, Liv Hewson, Audrie Neenan. Director: Marc Turtletaub. Screenplay: Polly Mann and Oren Moverman. Story Source: Natalia Smirnoff, “Rompecabezas” (“Puzzle”), 2009 Argentinian film. Web site. Trailer. Many of us look at our lives and see them as complete – only to discover not long thereafter that they’re not. Pieces may seem missing or out of place, realizations that we might view as frustrating, mystifying or even troubling. We could be tempted to ignore those shortcomings, hoping they’ll go away or resolve themselves on their own, but those “solutions” seldom work out as hoped for. It’s times like that when we must make a concerted effort to determine what’s gone awry and take steps to make repairs, a process detailed in the thoughtful domestic drama, “Puzzle,” now available on DVD and streaming services. Middle-aged homemaker Agnes (Kelly Macdonald) is something of a walking anachronism. The forty-something wife and mother leads a modest existence that resembles something more out of the 1950s than the present day. She lives a quiet, traditional life in an immigrant community of Yonkers, having never ventured far from home (even to nearby New York) nor ...

Reviews of “Official Secrets,” “One Child Nation” and “Love, Antosha,” as well as a radio show preview, are all in the latest Movies with Meaning post on the web site of The Good Media Network, available by clicking here.   ...