FILMS from AFAR

This surprisingly tender and personal story of one man's connection to two individual whales is a remarkably rewarding watch. Patrick and the Whale clocks in at a reasonable 53 minutes, during which time viewers are treated to spectacular images from both above and below the ocean surface. The visuals are gorgeous and will stick in the memory, but what makes this film so magical is its star and narrator. Dykstra forges relationships with his whales, most of whom he has named and can identify individually. He communicates with two specific females via clicks on the side of his camera; they approach him and check him out through what he calls a "3D sonar scan." His connection is so deep that he sheds tears when he thinks he's offended one of them, and again when she returns and entrusts her beloved calf to his supervision while she deep-dives for food. You'll learn plenty from this film about whale behavior, but you'll also be prompted to think about the best and worst of human behavior and our complicated relationship with nature. Read the full review at Common Sense Media Images courtesy of Prime Video

Iranian film The Seed of the Sacred Fig opens with a description of a plant whose own seeds grow to eventually strangle its host tree. In the film, children grow to eventually question their parents’ values – and, in the case here of Iran, call for the overthrow of an authoritarian government, stifling social traditions and use of violence against citizens. What makes this film so impactful is the way one family’s story is developed to reflect and embody the realities of an entire society. Tellingly, last spring, director Mohammad Rasoulof was sentenced to eight years in prison in Iran and other punishments for his critical work. He concluded shooting this film clandestinely and, in a tale worthy of its own film, made his way out of Iran on foot. He now resides in exile in Germany, which nominated Sacred Fig to represent it in this year’s International Oscar race. The film also screened in competition at last May’s Cannes Film Festival. In Sacred Fig , Rasoulof incorporates actual video footage, mostly shot on cell phones (so, watched and exchanged appropriately by young characters on their phones) from the mass protests that gripped Tehran in 2022. The real-life suspicious death at a police station of 22-year-old protestor Mahsa Amini is also incorporated into the storyline. In the film, the older daughter Rezvan’s (Mahsa Rostami) best friend Sadaf (Niousha Akhshi) gets similarly caught up in protests, violently shot and unjustly arrested. The rising tension on the streets seeps into the household and family. Dad Iman (Missagh Zareh) has just been promoted to a government investigator role. He is working morning until night handling protestor arrests, despite his initial discomfort at having to rush investigations and even death sentences. Mom Najmeh (Soheila Golestani) is mostly focused on the improvements the promotion will bring to their lifestyle – a bigger apartment, a new dishwasher – and to making sure her daughters comply with morality rules for women in public. She serves her husband’s every request and need. When Iman’s government-issued gun goes missing in their home, and the family’s address gets published online, dad begins feeling increasingly paranoid. Rezvan and younger sister Sana (Setareh Maleki) empathize with the protestors’ demands, undermining everything their father stands for. Najmeh, initially stuck in the middle and supportive of both her husband and the propaganda coming through the news, eventually has to take a side when events start slipping out of control. The first half the film spends significant time on developing these characters. Two intimate scenes in particular are set to haunting music and given significant screen time – Najmeh removing buckshots from Sadaf’s face and dropping them, slow-motion, into a bloodied sink, and later Najmeh painstakingly grooming her husband’s face and hair. Najmeh is the cornerstone between facets of her family – between genders and generations. She is both caretaker and protector. She has a line in the film where she tells her daughters she’s tried to shield them from their father’s rougher side, which seems intended to explain his eventual unraveling. In earlier scenes, Iman seems genuinely troubled by the ethically questionable requirements in his new job, and he admits to his wife in a private late-night conversation that he’d like to give his grown daughters a hug and a kiss. Later, he subjects his family to interrogations and detentions like the inspector he has become. His unraveling in the latter half of the film is suspenseful, with final cat-and-mouse scenes playing out in an especially memorable location, but the ending could feel somewhat forced upon these characters. However, this meshes with their intended embodiment of the polarization between generations and genders in Iran, and the unraveling of traditional values and social mores, in particular women taking back power and agency. This review originally ran on AWFJ.org Images courtesy of Neon

The subject of this short film will only be familiar to niche audiences, which doesn't detract from the value of sharing her unique life story, but could limit the movie's appeal. Indie filmmaker Julia Reichert, the title subject of  Julia's Stepping Stones , passed away in 2022, before she had completed this autobiographical short. Her partner, Steven Bognar, finished it instead. Reichert lived at once an ordinary and an extraordinary life. Ordinary, because many women of her class and generation experienced similar upbringings and faced parallel barriers–in fact, this is the subject of her own first film,  Growing Up Female. Her life was extraordinary because she actively fought barriers of sex, class, and race, first by joining the burgeoning "women's liberation movement," and then by becoming an independent filmmaker, producer, and distributor taking on social justice topics. This short film has intrinsic value as a first-person historical document, and a companion piece to Reichert's own filmography. However, it's a disappointment that all that we see of her contemporarily is from behind, while she talks on the telephone, even as we're offered plenty of photos of her younger self. It's the one place where the 32-minute short feels incomplete. That's assuming that leaving off where her career begins was a conscious choice; if not, then the incompleteness of the film is part of the story. Read the full review at Common Sense Media Images courtesy of Netflix

This poetically-narrated, beautifully-visualized short film offers a glimpse into the world of an exceptional teenager and a poignant documentation of her inspiring story. It is a testament to director Julio Palacio's insightfulness that  Makayla's Voice: A Letter to the World  is kept to 24 minutes, especially in an age of overly-long documentaries. In that amount of time, the film conveys the very special person Makayla is, and the shock her parents felt when she first began communicating via a letterboard at age 14. It turns out Makayla is intelligent and deeply thoughtful, nearly a poet. "I dream of one day hearing my voice," she says (via an actor's voiceover). Makayla compares feeling trapped inside her body to the way the artist Van Gogh felt trapped inside his emotions. He used color to communicate while Makalya sees color in emotions and actions: "my soul sees what others cannot." Palacio dexterously visualizes these themes and ideas through a variety of techniques, from animation to on-camera interviews, from daily footage to lyrical images of nature that very nearly match the poetry of Makayla's words. Read the full review on Common Sense Media . Images courtesy of Netflix.

Santosh  has been selected to represent India in the International Oscar category. Crouched in this brooding, well-acted and adeptly structured two-hour mystery, viewers will find layers upon layers of social critique of modern Indian society. We meet Santosh (Shahana Goswami) just as her husband Raman has been killed while on duty for the local police. In one of the next scenes, the camera watches her, head bowed, as her parents and in-laws argue over who will take care of her now. She’s not deciding her future, they are. When she’s offered the opportunity to “inherit” Raman’s job in what’s called a “compassionate appointment,” drawing a salary as well as widow’s compensation and an apartment in the deal, she jumps on it. This economical opening offers us all kinds of details, beyond the disempowered status of women, such as that Santosh’s was a “love marriage,” and that her husband was respected for his integrity. Although we are only just getting to know the film’s protagonist, these details set her up as a hero worthy of our support. As this sophisticated tale unfolds, however, we find ourselves questioning our own faith in Santosh, realizing how little we have actually been told. Santosh initially tries to do good in her role as “lady constable,” but the male-led police force is corrupt to its core, bullying or ignoring lower castes, accepting bribes and serving as the butt of online jokes about their incompetence. When Santosh gets wrapped up in a case of a murdered 15-year-old girl, led by female superior Geeta Sharma (Sunita Rajwar), she finds skills and courage she didn’t know she had.  Santosh leans on her superior for assistance, but then finds herself trapped in following her lead on questionable methods and ethics. It appears that’s just the way things are done, and there are “untouchables” that you don’t want to touch in India just as there are wealthy landowner “untouchables” you cannot touch, even with the law on your side. At least in Sharma’s case her motivation includes helping empower women. Goswami is physically perfect for this role, not just because her natural good looks can be comfortably played down to appear more average. It’s her wide eyes that are most memorable. They embody the character’s own metaphorical eye-opening. The camera also takes on her wide-eyed perspective in some scenes; in others, it accompanies her and witnesses her contained anger, humiliation, pride and understanding.   Review originally published on AWFJ.org Images courtesy of Metrograph Pictures

This poignant film about family, love, war, and loss is a throwback in style and subject matter to similarly sentimental fare out of Europe from several decades ago . The Children's Train is reminiscent of 1990s-era Italian classics like Cinema Paradiso, Life is Beautiful and Malena in narrative style and a somewhat wistful portrayal of mid-century Italy. Life was harsh in wartime – illiteracy, poverty, hunger, and death. But the portrayal on screen softens that harshness through the lens of a child's more innocent perspective. Color schemes in Train also soften, from the crisp modern day to the pastels of the Mediterranean flashbacks and the natural hues of the inland north, where 8-year-old Amerigo finds a new life. The music complements these tonal changes. Based on true events of children sent to live with families while waiting out the bombing of Naples in the mid-1940s, the film shows a sensitive boy's life as being marked by women. Absent their men sent to war, women kept families and societies functioning. Amerigo's birth mom does what she has to in order to put food on the table. She tells her son – whose name sounds like "America" (and whose last name translates to "hope") – that his father is in America seeking his fortune. In Cinema Paradiso , the fatherless child imagines his dad to be Clark Gable, and cinema is used as a metaphor for changing times. In Train , music, an education, and the values of communism and feminism represent the framework for a happy life and a rewarding future, something Amerigo intuitively knows when he makes the heartrending choice to board the train north a second time. Read the full review on Common Sense Media . Images courtesy of Netflix.

In a time when immigrants from south of the border are being vilified in the US, a film like Sujo offers a poignant rendering of the brutality which forces some people to flee their homes. From writing-directing team Astrid Rondero and Fernanda Valadez and a female-dominant creative and technical crew, the film won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and was selected to represent Mexico in this year’s International Oscar category. Sujo is a tense film full of visual symbolism that takes an unexpected turn in its third act. The main character is a boy who survives and ultimately gets a chance at life only because of three women who intervene at key moments to save him. As a small child, Sujo is found abandoned in a car. His beloved father, a sicario, has been killed. His aunts hide him away and negotiate with men who want the child dead. He’ll grow up to bring them trouble, they say. They know this because there’s no other path for boys and men in this rural area of Michoacan named, appropriately, Tierra Caliente. Sujo’s aunt, Nemesio, promises to keep the boy hidden away from the town, ruled over by the cartel. He’s raised alongside his cousins, Jai and Jeremy. Though he misses his father, and he’s raised in poverty, he is well cared for and loved by his aunts. As the boys grow, however, they begin to push their boundaries, eventually and inevitably getting involved with the cartel (each is branded with a large, tattooed number in the gang on his chest). When Jeremy is killed, Nemesio rushes Sujo onto a bus bound for Mexico City and tells him never to return. This is where the film takes an unexpected turn. Now college-aged, Sujo begins to make a life for himself in the city. He finds work unloading produce at a warehouse. One day he wanders into a college class, and the professor takes him under her wing. When Jai comes to town, the violence and rage of his past life revisits him, threatening to upset the balance and future Sujo is slowly shaping. The two parts of the film have very different looks and feels. The first two acts construct a portrayal of a bucolic rural area infested with violence. An opening scene shows a horse escaping a rural rodeo. The horse gallops across a flat landscape, a location we will see again and again as people escape violent men, running in one direction or another. The horse has more symbolism than we realize until the end of the movie, and it’s just one of many wild animals DP Ximena Amann’s camera captures. There seems to be a constant barking, bleating, howling, hooting or neighing heard in the distance and through the fog of these lands, reminding us both of the persistence of the natural world and of the dangers lurking everywhere here. When Sujo settles into the city, the animals disappear, replaced by other dangers. But the dread seems to have disappeared as well. Without it, Sujo is able to get on with the business of living. He has work, a small room in a shared building, and intellectual stimulation in the form of the literature class and books his teacher loans him. He doesn’t need much, but how different his life and his future feel here versus in his dead-end village, representative of so many like it (the number “43” painted on a wall at the university, referring to a group of male college students abducted and killed in 2014, reminds us of this). The women of this story are the caretakers, giving the boys at least a chance at a manhood free from crime and violence. Nemesio even has some powers of divination which help her save Sujo’s life on more than one occasion. In the city, the professor takes over. Though she has plenty of reason not to, she takes Sujo under her wing, shepherding him through the university system. A final scene suggests the promise of a real future for Sujo, once again at the protective hand of a woman who sees not just that he has potential, but that he – like all children, no matter where they’re born – is deserving of the opportunity to live in peace. Despite the darkness in this film, it comes as a relief when it ends on this hopeful note, even if we know for every Sujo there are more Jai’s and Jeremy’s who don’t make it out. Review originally published at AWFJ.org Images courtesy of The Forge

Could the 4-Day Workweek Be the Answer to Finding Work-Life Balance? Change doesn’t come quickly, but there’s a rising movement to make the 5-day week a thing of the past   Article originally published in SUCCESS+ When Greece introduced a 6-day workweek for some business sectors last July, the backlash was immediate. Unions called it “barbaric,” and protestors took to the streets, according to news reports.   In fact, the Greek initiative contradicts a prevailing worldwide trend. Many countries and companies are instead eying a 4-day workweek. In 2022, Belgium became the first country in Europe to give workers the legal right to work the same number of hours in four days rather than five.   Last year, a widely reported 4-day workweek trial in the UK , which allowed companies to tailor the model to fit their individual needs , was the largest of its kind and boasted excellent results. Some 71% of employees reported less burnout and 39% less stress, while 15% of the 2,900 employees who participated in the trail said that “no amount of money” would convince them to return to a 5-day workweek.   Companies in the trial also reported an average 35% increase in revenue. Of the 61 companies that participated in the UK trial, 56 opted to continue with the 4-day workweek. “In Britain, and this is the same in the States as well, we have a culture of very long working hours,” says Joe Ryle , director of the UK-based advocacy group the 4 Day Week Campaign, one of the organizations behind the UK trail. “ Particularly in the UK, we work the longest full-time hours compared to our neighbors in Europe, but we also have one of the least productive economies. What we are producing is a workforce that’s burnt out, stressed, overworked, not very happy.” “It’s time for a change,” Ryle says. “And the encouraging thing is that the 4-day week has come a long way in quite a short space of time.” A Brief History Historical records show that industrial laborers in the 1800s worked as many as 100 hours per week. This prompted the creation of labor unions in the late 1800s that called for limiting the workday to 8 hours. It would take many more proposals and a half a century before Congress would pass the Fair Labor Standards Act, which officially restricted the workweek to 44 hours, amended two years later in 1940 to 40 hours per week.   That model is still the norm. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics , American workers averaged 8.09 hours of work per weekday in 2023. That’s an average, meaning many workers regularly exceed those hours. In some fields, it can be seen as a sign of status and dedication to put in much more.   Still, cracks in the structure and acceptance of traditional work schedules have been appearing for decades. In the 1950s , then-Vice President Richard Nixon promoted the 4-day workweek as a means to raise the “standard of living” for Americans. In the 1980s , the feminist movement began advocating for flexible schedules and maternity leave for women, demands that eventually extended to men. Following the COVID pandemic , many workers realized they wanted more flexibility in their work lives.   A Gallup survey of 5,458 US adults in May 2023 found that 77% were optimistic that a 4-day workweek option would enhance their wellbeing more than any other offered initiatives, such as offering mental health days or limiting work outside of work hours.   “In just a few years, we now have evidence that shows that actually when people are working over four days rather than five, not only are they much happier because they have a better work-life balance,” Ryle says, “they also are much more productive in the workplace. They're able to get on with the work that needs to get done in four days rather than five.” The website for 4 Day Week Campaign further broadens the benefits of a shortened workweek out from the individual to society at large, the economy and the environment, through outcomes like lower unemployment, increased productivity, boosts to tourism, more gender equality and wellbeing, strengthened communities, a more sustainable lifestyle and a reduced carbon footprint. “This isn't a change which is going to happen overnight for everyone,” Ryle cautions. “If you look at the history of moving from a 6-day week to a 5-day week, it does take a while. It does tend to take around a decade or even longer for… an entire economy to shift. It's going to take time, and there will be different ways of getting there and it will look different in different sectors.”   One Company’s Experience   Jenna Kutcher, CEO of her own self-named digital marketing firm, opted to try the 4-day workweek for her business after reading Alex Soojung-Kim Pang’s 2020 book , “Shorter: Work Better, Smarter, and Less – Here’s How,” which profiles South Korean companies that went against the grain of local culture and found great success with shorter workweeks.   She was also inspired by a friend who asked if she ever took a “sacred day,” described as “ one day of the week that was reserved just for you. No guilt. Do whatever you need. Fill up your own cup before serving everyone else.”   “That was just a huge challenge to my way of thinking and working,” Kutcher notes. “I was finding that most of the time I was just shifting right from work into motherhood and vice versa.” Curious, she decided to try a 90-day trial of the 4-day workweek. “The expectation for my team was no using Slack on Fridays, no hitting emails, no expecting anyone else to be online.”   Though she says she didn’t want to commit without trying it out first, she found that her team “loved it,” and productivity and profits were not compromised. Outside contractors were informed that Fridays were not a workday, and they proved flexible. “It was a non-contested decision to continue on with a 4-day workweek, which we have done now for over a year because we absolutely love it.”   “My entire team is a team of women. Most of us are mothers. It was just amazing to have a little bit of time for ourselves, but also to fill that day with family, life stuff and admin so that our weekends could be more enjoyable.”   She adds: “Fridays are now my sacred day, where I can fit in appointments, I can go get a massage, I can take a nap, I can spend time with my family or sit down and read a book. And I feel like it's also challenged us in the work setting to be more efficient with the time that we have, but also to not overthink things, to just be in a more active state, whereas I think that a lot of times your projects will expand the amount of time given to them.”   “It’s something that I hope more companies put into practice, especially companies with moms,” Kutcher says. She advocates for companies to give it a trial run, like summer Fridays, for example, to see if it works for them. “I'm just a huge believer that yes, you can do it all, but you need the system and support to be able to do that. And so for me, the four day work week has totally helped.”   Her employees concur. Stephanie Montgomery, in Customer Support, says transitioning to a 4-day workweek has given her “ freedom and flexibility that I didn’t even know I needed.” She adds: “ Being able to fully enjoy my life outside of my job makes me a better employee and you can bet that I’m hustling to complete all necessary tasks by Thursday evening so that I can close my laptop for the week with a sense of accomplishment. ”   Marisa Vittoria, VP or operations, says that as a result of the 4-day week, “ I’m a better mother, wife, daughter, and I’d like to say leader.” She says her family has saved money on childcare and she is now able to spend more time with her retired parents. At work, her time management and execution efficiency have only improved, and “I’ve now become a pro at batching my days to get what I need done, communicating in a more effective and direct manner to manage and execute cross-brand deliverables and still protect evenings with my family.”   “This type of work week takes time, effort, consistency, leadership plus team commitment, and of course a little creativity,” Vittoria adds, “but once a flow is set, it is 100% worthwhile.”

A generation who came of age in the 1960s is going to love this personal take and behind-the-scenes view of the Fab Four's first visit to the USA. For younger viewers,  Beatles '64  might not have the same impact. That's because the film relies on testimonies from people who were actually there: now-elderly female fans explaining their teen crushes and male fans describing their overwhelming emotions at hearing the Beatles' new sound. One man snuck off with a friend to Liverpool, changing the course of his life. They're fascinating memories, but even the music (and film) industry insiders interviewed–including remaining Beatles themselves–could prove unknowns to younger audiences. It's an interesting twist because the film emphasizes that it was the youth who responded to the Beatles' music so exuberantly in their early days. Stodgy parents disapproved. The documentary captures the band's sheer energy and joy in 1964. They are extremely young, and almost giddy at their sudden fame. The Maysles' footage shows them off stage, in hotel rooms and on trains, reacting to what's happening outside their windows. The film also puts their tour into historical context, suggesting their vivaciousness and youth may have helped a generation process violent events in America in the 1960s. It's a unique insider view that captures a moment in time and reveals the power of music. And that's something even the kids can understand. Read the full review at Common Sense Media Images courtesy of Disney+

This intimate yet universal family tale was selected to represent Iran in the International Oscar category. The debut feature shows a lot of promise for writer-director Babak Lotfi Khajepasha. He’s also not the only Iranian nominee contending for the International Oscar; exiled director Mohammad Rasoulof’s also poetically-titled  The Seed of the Sacred Fig,  set against political protests in Tehran, was chosen to represent Germany. Although  In the Arms of the Tree   (Dar Aghooshe Derakht)  touches on divorce, it deals with less controversial subject matter. Its storyline suggests a strong support for the nuclear family, and the cinematography accentuates the beauty of the Iranian countryside. The film is full of symbolism, with the natural world playing a role in the characters’ lives and foreshadowing events to come. Kimia (Maral Baniadam) and Farid (Javad Ghamati) are seeking a divorce due to the wife’s mysterious illness. Showing signs of anxiety, she is unable to travel beyond the 15-kilometer sign on the road out of town, bites her fingers compulsively, faints occasionally and senses dread all around her (like noting the sheep are the color of gravestones). She says she’s “depressed” and “languishing,” and it’s out of her control. Farid seems to still love her and want for their relationship to work, though he’s also flirting with a much younger female employee. Their plans involve each parent taking one of their sons (Ahoura and Rayan Lofti) to live with them. But 11-year-old Taha and his five-year-old brother Alisan are inseparable. The mature Taha takes care of Alisan while his distracted parents are mostly absent and their makeshift babysitter-uncle’s carelessness borders on abuse – though Reza (Rouhollah Zamani) also loves the boys and spends significant time with them.  The parents are advised to implement “distance practicing” to get the boys used to being apart, but more than one person suggests Alisan will “die” without Taha to watch over him. Indeed, Taha saves Alisan’s life in an early scene. It’s one example of the use of foreshadowing in the film. Taha has spotted a white balloon Alisan always ties to his arm floating up into the trees. A crate of baby ducks entrusted to Taha’s care, and the near deaths of fish in the family’s fish farm, likewise parallel later events.  When Farid tries to take Taha away even just for a day, they get into a minor car crash. Farid explains the pending family separation as they sit together on a rock overlooking a river carved into a valley that represents another separation – the border between Iran and Turkey.  In the Arms of the Tree recently won the Special Jury Prize at the 10th Annual Asian World Film Festival in Los Angeles. The film constructs its story deliberately, sticking closely to the family members and revealing clues that build up to a powerful and excruciating third act that forces its characters, brought to authentic life in powerful performances, to reevaluate their lives. Review originally published at AWFJ.org Images courtesy of Luckymatrix

It’s rare that a film can be edgy and entertaining, and at the same time educational. Ireland’s early submission to the International Oscar race, Kneecap is an in-your-face romp packed with sex, drugs and Irish hip hop, starring the real-life members of the band at its heart. It might be a tough sell to aging Academy voters, but it’s a raucously fun ride, and one with a serious message about preservation of the Irish language and the impact years of fighting has had on the Irish people. As young boys, Naoise Ó Cairealláin and Liam Óg Ó Hannaidh are taught the Irish language by Naoise’s militant nationalist father Arlo (Michael Fassbender). Fast forward, and the boys are now hard-partying twentysomethings in constant trouble, and Arlo has become a legend – a political martyr who is either dead or on the run. One night after Liam is arrested and refuses to admit he speaks English, local Irish language schoolteacher JJ Ó Dochartaigh is called in to translate. He’s given a notebook containing Liam’s writings and is later inspired to put his words to music. When Liam is released, JJ convinces him and Naoise to start a band, and JJ joins as manager, mixer and eventual third performer, DJ Próvaí. Under the constant watch of the authorities, especially stern Detective Ellis (Josie Walker), the band begins gaining in notoriety – as much for their rebellious music as for their “anti-social” antics, anarchic concerts and defiantly superfluous drug consumption. The script gives all three characters their own storylines – JJ’s home life and career, Liam’s relationship with a local Protestant girl and Naoise’s emotionally absent parents. Liam’s first-person narration is used sparingly and wittily. He and Naoise explain to the camera in a documentary-style split-screen that they’re part of the “ceasefire generation.” In their typical flippant style, one spits, “The Troubles? I’ve got fucking troubles!” The political is painfully personal for these kids. Director Rich Peppiatt, who wrote the script with band members Móglaí Bap and Mo Chara (Naoise and Liam’s stage names), throws all kinds of fancy camerawork and framing at viewers, set to the band’s own pumping rap. Somehow it works perfectly with the material. Cinematographer Ryan Kernaghan makes it seem like the camera is inside a character’s nose as it sniffs white powder, in his eyes during a hangover, or even inside a slot machine looking out at three perfectly framed band members. One highlight is a cheeky foot-chase scene through the streets of Belfast, with the diagonal white lines on Liam’s green tracksuit conspicuously matching railings and wall paintings and tilted camera angles. Another highlight is one of many drug trip sequences – in this one, the characters turn into Claymation figures in their delirium. It’s hilarious, even though deep down you know there’s really nothing funny about the stars’ compulsive drug consumption. The band is all they’ve got in a gloomy town of stifling police oppression and few opportunities. In this, the film has shades of Trainspotting . Mix in a bit of The Commitments – or, in the case of the uninspired schoolteacher who rediscovers his joy for life, maybe Another Round . The difference is that this one also has a message about the fight to sustain indigenous languages (and, by extension, cultures). End credits close with facts about the passage of the Irish Language Law in 2022 and the fast disappearance of indigenous languages worldwide. It’s a message that never gets lost amid the high jinks of the band members, although the filmmakers have smartly kept the didacticism fully encased in an entertaining package. This review originally ran on AWFJ.com Images courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

This documentary boasts impressive behind-the-scenes access and deft editing with significant archive footage and animated sequences, but it's also one-sided and overly long. Still, considering the fame of this film's subject, and the controversy surrounding her very public court case against another rapper, Megan Thee Stallion: In Her Words should draw a broad audience. She opens up in interviews and reveals very personal feelings and experiences, letting the camera into her bedroom and behind the scenes with her. You know you're not getting the full story, but you do get an inside view. It also takes guts to show such vulnerability, and she seems to want to help others by telling her story. The film relitigates the case against Megan's shooter and shows the impact of public and industry backlash on her mental health. He was convicted in a court of law; maybe this documentary will give her another victory in the court of public opinion. The film also tells the rapper's life story, marked by the early loss of both her parents and a controversial career built around highly sexualized performances and lyrics. The animated sequences are stylish and haunting. You walk away with the sense of a young woman still growing up, learning to handle the pressures of fame, and taking pride in the career and public profile she has constructed. Read the full review on Common Sense Media Images courtesy of Amazon Prime Video