Best Kept Secret
When they answer the phone at John F Kennedy High School in Newark, they add the tag line ‘New Jersey’s Kept Secret’ and after watching Samantha Buck’s heartbreaking documentary you can understand why they so deserve to make this claim. You will also soon realise that most of the credit for the remarkable activities and achievements … Continue reading
Bethlehem
This tense taut thriller is about yet another deadly incident in the ongoing struggle in the Middle East and was written by a former Israeli Secret Agent and a Palestinian journalist. Yet despite its bipartisan credentials the overwhelming feeling that you come away after watching ‘Bethlehem’ is that the world is split into different camps … Continue reading
A Better Life
When you are an undocumented immigrant just trying to survive daily life in the US can be very tough. Carlos, a middle-aged Mexican, and single parent gets by working as a gardener tending the lawns of wealthy Los Angeles homeowners. He lives hand to mouth in a tiny rundown house, barely making ends meet, with Luis his teenage … Continue reading
Beyond Assignment
The movie followed three photo/journalists in far flung parts of the world as they went about their work. The fact that they were all located in dangerous regions made it more fascinating, and that they all happened to be women added a certain frisson to the documentary Mariella Fuller is a Swiss/Lebanese photo/journalist who originally went to … Continue reading
Beyond The Hills
If I had to summarize Romanian filmmaker Cristian Mungiu’s latest movie in one word, it would unhesitatingly be ‘bleak’. From the isolated Monastery with no running water or electricity nestling in the hills beyond a remote village where even the summers look cold and uninviting, to the plot which is about an ex-orphanage girl who … Continue reading