Christmas 2018 Dear Friends and Family, It has been a very big year for me in terms of being busy, traveling, speaking and writing – and grieving. Our youngest sister, Eva Marie, died in April. It was sudden and unexpected. I am including a short memoir of Eva’s last days here. Please join us in prayer for her eternal repose. Her funeral Mass and celebration of life in Fallon, NV at her son’s home on May 5, is something we... Read more
This rather short documentary (43 minutes) by filmmaker Sebastian Gomes is a story of love that comes straight from the heart of people who love the Appalachia mountains and the people who live there. Whether nuns, ordinary folk, or clergy, they make up a group called the Catholic Committee of Appalachia (CCA.) It was founded in 1970 to serve the people of Appalachia, the poor and the entire web of creation. This new film tells the story of the CCA and... Read more
This two-hour documentary, written and directed by Michelle Ferrari, tells the largely unknown story of America’s quest to breed healthy babies – the impulse to perfect humanity – through eugenics beginning in the late 19th century. By the mid 1920’s eugenics was mainstream and codified by laws that restricted immigration and allowed for the sterilization of tens of thousands of American citizens deemed to be “morons,” “unfit,” or poor, illiterate, had a child due to rape, or a prostitute. As the... Read more
In 2008 there was an ominous early morning knock on the door of the Shank family home in Lansing, Michigan. Cindy, mother of Autumn (6), Ava (2) and Annalise (under a year), and wife to Adam, answered the door. Federal agents were there to arrest Cindy on conspiracy charges related to the time she was a live-in girlfriend to a drug dealer named Alex. After Alex’s murder state and federal charges were brought against Cindy; as the girlfriend she... Read more
CBS is getting religion again with this new comedy about Miles (Brandon Michael Hall), an atheist with a podcast who is also a preacher’s kid. After Miles asserts his joyful and confident atheism once again, God friends him on social media and continues to poke and annoy Miles until he accepts. This puts Miles in a place to make a dramatic difference in someone’s life and introduces him to Cara Bloom (Violet Beane), a journalist with writer’s block. Let’s... Read more
This exhilarating and hopeful film tells the story of high school students from several schools in the USA, Brazil (two students from a rural area take on the Zeka virus), Germany (a student takes on aerospace) as they prepare for their state or national science fairs and then, for the winners, on to the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF). It demonstrates not only intelligence and interest in the world and science but that these modest young people, and... Read more
This very funny film documents a weekend of sparkling conversations between Dames Maggie Smith, Joan Plowright, Eileen Atkins and Judi Dench at Plowright’s countryside home. It is intimate, a little salty, and most entertaining. Director Roger Mitchell (Notting Hill), with minimal suggestions to the ladies, turns on the camera and lets these friends chat about their careers, acting, families, and life. Augmented with archival photographs and footage, their stories combine into a thoroughly enjoyable narrative. If you already like... Read more
In Ken Marino’s lightweight predictable romantic comedy, the best part is in the last five minutes and then the outtakes alongside the credits. The cast includes Vanessa Hudgens as Tara, Eva Longoria as Grace, Nina Dobrev as Elizabeth, Ron Cephas as Jones, and Jon Bas as Garrett. The plot entwines the lives of various people in Los Angeles, from childless parents who adopt a young girl and then adopt a dog, to a talk show host’s love life and... Read more
Courtesy of Magnolia Films New York City in 1978 was on the verge of bankruptcy. The tenements of lower Manhattan looked bombed out and graffiti was exploding across the city and on the subway trains to the tune of hip-hop and the vision of break dancing. While many people, if not most, considered graffiti a blight, emerging street artists were paying attention. Today we have Banksy; the late 1980’s had Jean-Michel Basquiat. This new documentary by director Sara Driver... Read more
Marion Cotillard and Charlotte Gainsbourg in ISMAEL’S GHOSTS. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures. Noted French director Arnaud Desplechin’s sometimes interesting, often confusing, random, occasionally frenetic narrative is about a filmmaker, Ismael (Mathieu Amalric) whose wife Carlotta (Marion Cotillard), disappeared twenty-one years previously and has been declared dead. He is still friends with her father Henri (László Szabó) and is in a passionate relationship with an astrophysicist, Sylvia (Charlotte Gainsbourg). Life is good as Ismael works on his new feature film at... Read more
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