Influenza 1918, American Experience

Director: Robert Kenner
Narrator: Linda Hunt

sez says:  interesting bit of history. It must have been frightening to have lived through this epidemic. 600,000 dead in the USA, 33 million dead around the world-and this all happened in a very short time.  It started sometime in 1918 and hit its peak in October of that year, then mysteriously it tapered off.  No one anywhere had any idea how to stop it.  Certainly people tried, scientist worked feverishly, people turned to folk medicine, but there was nothing that worked.  And it was not killing the weakest members of society-it was killing the strongest.  A reminder that we really don't have all the answers--not then, not now. GRADE B -

Riddles Of The Sphinx , NOVA 2010

sez says --What happened to NOVA? It use to be such a good, reliable show. Now it is all hyped up language and hold your breath cliff-hanger talk that is really off putting.  The Sphinx is an iconic image and so I thought it might be interested to learn a little about it..and that is what I learned, just a little bit.  So sure I now know something more than I did but it was hard work listening to the dialogue, that wanted to make the story into a race of some sort, saying things like: "Just in time" somebody is studying the Sphnix! --Huh? Even I know that people have been studying the Sphinx for a long time.  Oh well --maybe I just need to give up on the NOVA series.

mjc:  agree with the sentiment about how the show was constructed, all breathless and awestruck.  They could have had the camera slowly wander around the giant statue and it would have been more interesting. GRADE D

Sam Cooke, Crossing Over, 2010

Director:  John Antonelli
Topic: Sam Cooke, American Music and Race Relations
Narrator: Danny Glover

sez says:  what a delight it is to hear this music and to learn a little more about this talented man.  The film makers tried hard to make each stage of his life 'yet another dramatic moment.'  but his life was not so very dramatic. The subtext is he had enormous talent, he was ambitious and he worked hard. That added up to many accomplishments. Tragedy also entered his life but his ultimate downfall came from his life long habit of chasing women.  Too bad for us. He died at age 33. GRADE C

mjc says:   pretty guy; pretty music.

Killer Subs in Pearl Harbor, 2009

NOVA  Premiere Broadcast on PBS: January 5, 2010

sez says: This has interesting new information about the details of exactly what happened at Pearl Harbor,,,but how annoying can you get with all the hyperbole about 'at last the truth is told' -- the material doesn't need that kind or stupid talk.  A puzzle has been pieced together.  We know more now than we did previously, and some interesting scientific specialties were used to get the new picture in focus. So if you are interested in what happened at Pearl Harbor you will find this interesting..but you may find your self talking back to the TV about the hype and drama the script engages in.  I wish they wouldn't do that. GRADE D


mjc says:  all I could think about was how much I wanted to get in the warm Hawaiian waters and float around.  OK, I know that is retrograde, but it was what I thought.  That, and how horrifying it would be to be one of the crew in the midget submarines the Japanese had created.

Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind 'Little Women', 2009

Director: Nancy Porter
Topic Louisa Alcott

sez says: I am not much taken to the documentary style used here. People in period costume reading lines from the works of people in the past...but it is a known style and I can put up with it. And it is done here as well as it is done anywhere. They do have some pretty impressive 'cast' members. New England in the mid-19th century must have been a grand place--full of people serious about ideas and trying to live life according to their own lights. One of my favorite lines is when Louisa says she was not allowed to wear clothing made of cotton--the product of slave labor, or silk because it was produced by degrading worms, or wool because it was robbed from sheep.  I appreciate the aim of harming no one and nothing,  I came away from this seeing Ms Alcott as a hard working, driven woman, who searched a long while to find a niche for herself that would save her and her family from poverty.  Once she found one she was not to be stopped.  Think whatever you want of her literary skill, she cannot be faulted when it comes to determination, perseverance and a manic work-ethic.  She because a very wealth woman with those attributes--and talent may not have been much involved at all.

mjc:  of interest was the look into early New England literary connections and the various ways in which folk tried to make something "new" in the New World, communes and towns alike. GRADE C

Woody Guthrie: Ain't Got No Home, 2007

Director Peter Frumkin
Topic Woody Guthrie

sea says: what a great American and what a talented man.  there is a subtext in this documentary saying he may have been a bit of a bastard as a human being. But no one is perfect and what he did right sure is wonderful.  This film reinforced my belief that the song "This Land Is Your Land" should be our national anthem.  My favorite story, told about WG in this documentary, is about him integrating the soldiers on a ship in WW2.  The documentary is good--but it is worth watching the whole thing just to learn about what he did that night. GRADE B-

mjc says:  I am always amazed when I am reminded of the songs that are part of our heritage as Americans that came from WG's head and heart.  Thank you Woody

Capitalism, A Love Story, 2009

Director Michael Moore
Topic Capitalism
 IMDB Link:  Capitalism

sez says:  Good for your Mr Moore --  I don' agree with you on every issue but it is way over due for American's (and all the aspiring capitalist in the world) to look at our economic system from the bottom up, there may be a baby in the bathwater that we want to save--but it is time to dump the bathwater. GRADE B

mjc says:  I am grateful to Mr. Moore for tackling this up to now taboo topic:  that is, our economic system is at its basis operating on principles that most of us struggle against in our relationships with those we care about:  greed, selfishness, me first, etc.  Thanks for suggesting that there is another way.

No Impact Man: The Documentary, 2009

Director: Laura Gabbert & Justin Schein
Starring:  Colin Beavin & Michelle Conlin
IMDB Link:  No Impact Man

sez says: She did not like this guy 'No Impact Man'  because he could find electric power to run his computer but could not find it to run a small cooler to keep milk cold for his children.  Yes, he ran his computer off solar power--but priorities are priorities--and his proved to be selfish, even in the face of claiming he was attempting to demonstrate how we as a culture 'can do with less'  -- I guess it still comes down to WHO is going to do with less. GRADE C-


mjc says:  can't imagine why this guy's wife put up with this nonsense; or is he so desperate for work he had to generate this junk?  Obviously it did the trick!

Tyson, 2009

Director:  James Toback


Starring:  Mike Tyson
IMDB Link:  Tyson

sez says:  a look at a part of American culture that isn't often seen and well worth the time to watch. GRADE B-

mjc says:  the impact of a good man on a struggling teenager trying to be a good man, and his slide from grace.