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Connie has been reviewing film uninterruptedly since 1970 (47 years) and routinely covers the Chicago International Film Festival (14 years), SXSW, the Austin Film Festival, and others, sharing detailed looks in advance at upcoming entertainment. She has taught a class on film and is the author of the book “Training the Teacher As A Champion; From The Godfather to Apocalypse Now, published by the Merry Blacksmith Press of Rhode Island.

Best of the 2025 Nominated Films

By Connie Wilson

On March 1, 2025

In Movies, News, Politics, Pop Culture, Reviews

BEST PICTURE

Here are my thoughts on this year’s Oscar nominees:

Full disclosure: I’ve only seen 9 of the 10 nominated films. I did not see “I’m Still Here.” But, still 90% is higher than the average viewer.

My personal favorite of the nominated films is “The Brutalist.” I was amazed at the fact that a film this polished could be made on a $10 million dollar budget. The sets, featuring the futuristic architecture of Laszlo Toth (Adrian Brody) were fantastic. The Vista-Vision resembled 35 mm film and was gorgeous on the big screen. The shots of a sun over water or a hill where the construction is happening are truly beautiful, not to mention the marble quarry in Italy.

If “The Brutalist” doesn’t win, I hope that “A Complete Unknown,” the Bob Dylan movie prevails. It was my second favorite of the other nominated films, which are: “Anora,” “Conclave,” “Dune: Part Two,” “Emilia Perez,” “Nickel Boys,” “The Substance” and “Wicked.”

BEST DIRECTOR

Put me down for Brady Corbet for “The Brutalist,” despite the fact that the BAFTA crowd likes “Conclave.” (Well, at least the story about the death of a Pope is timely, but so is the “Brutalist’s story of anti-Semitism. Again, if Corbet does not win, I’m cool with James Mangold for “A Complete Unknown.” Not really a prediction, but my own hopes.

BEST ACTOR

I’m torn here, again, between Adrian Brody and/or Timothee Chalamet. I’d be cool with either one carting off the trophy, and I think one of them will—probably Adrian Brody. But it was quite the achievement for Chalamet to both play the dramatic role and sing all the songs himself. Kudos!

BEST ACTRESS

I’m thinking Demi Moore, because the Emilia Perez lead (Karla Sofia Gascon) shot herself in the foot with her unwise Tweets. Demi has been coming on strong and she and Kieran Culkin promise to be interesting recipients of any award. For my money, the best two performances this year didn’t get nominated at all, and those would be Amy Adams in “Nightbitch” and Nicole Kidman in “Babygirl.”

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Kieran Culkin in “A Real Pain” is supposed to have this sewed up. (I actually saw that one.) I would not mind seeing it go to either Edward Norton for “A Complete Unknown” or Guy Pearce in “The Brutalist.” This one could go a different way, since the others in the category are so worthy, also.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Zoe Saldana in “Emilia Perez” seems to have this one in the bag. No idea why anyone thought that Isabella Rossilini’s very small role in “Conclave” deserved a nod.

“Retirement Plan:” The 7-Minute Short That Tells the Truth

By Connie Wilson

On February 20, 2025

In Editorial, Humor and Weird Wilson-isms, Movies, Music, Politics, Pop Culture, Reviews

“Retirement Plan Plan:” A 7-minute short from Screen Ireland featuring Domhnall Gleeson.

I recently had the pleasure of viewing a 7-minute short that is to screen at SXSW in March entitled “Retirement Plan.” From Fis Eireann/Screen Ireland. It was written by John Kelly and Tara Lawall and was an absolute delight. If you have the opportunity, don’t miss it. It is narrated by Domhnall Gleason (Bill Weasley in the “Harry Potter” franchise) and shows a man of retirement age musing about all the great things he is going to do in retirement. Meanwhile, in the background, John Carroll Kirby’s simple piano tunes tinkle pleasantly, with the song “Walking Through A House Where A Family Has Lived” giving you another idea about the light-hearted tone of the short piece.

My favorite exchanges were the narrator saying, “I will paraglide.”

In the next frame, he is shown with a walker and says, “I will NOT paraglide.”

The animated character that animators Marah Curran and Eamonn O’Neill present to us in the short muses on many things he will do in retirement: He will read 35 years of books that he has been putting off reading. He will clean his desktop. He will birdwatch. He will swim every morning. He will hike (“Camping is HORRIBLE!”) The camping line made me think of Woody Allen’s famous line about how his idea of “roughing it” was watching black-and-white TV. [Agreed.]

I’ve been retired for 22 years. I joined a gym with a pool in November. It is almost March. I have yet to swim even once. While I did swim (4 times) last year, the chlorine was so bad that I thought I was going to sink to the bottom of the pool, unnoticed, and drown. (Nobody else is swimming during a weekday afternoon; there is no lifeguard). I only learned on a Monday last year when they canceled the children’s swimming class that the chlorine ratio was totally screwed up. So much for, “No, Doc, I don’t know why I get dizzy and almost pass out while swimming. That never happened to me before I retired.” (It could be because L.A. Fitness didn’t bother to check their chlorine levels; some of the kiddies ALSO almost —or did?—pass out. THEN they fixed it!)

HOUSTON ART GALLERY

Lolita at the Houston Art Gallery.

I related to the cartoon character’s comment that he would go to an art gallery and “I will want to be there.”

I recently went on a 3-day trip to see Gauguin paintings at the Houston Art Museum. A really unpleasant woman within the Museum followed me for 4 rooms because I leaned against a wall in the first room. I was severely chastised for same. (There were no paintings nearby or on the wall). She finally cornered me in the fourth room, asking me if I “wanted to talk to her manager.”

My response was, “No. I don’t want to talk to your manager. And I don’t want to talk to you, either. I just want to get out of here. I have a bad knee and I felt dizzy. Which would you rather have had me do? Lean on the wall or pass out on the floor?”

Lolita and I were not destined to become buddies.

I enjoyed the trip, overall, but found myself (once again) trying out a retirement activity with a downside.

OTHER THINGS TO TRY IN RETIREMENT

What other relatable activities does our retired figure discuss?

“I will take better care of myself.” Right. I spend one day a week visiting doctors. (Today: bloodwork; tomorrow, the endocrinologist). This is my Most Normal Retirement Activity: visiting doctors’ offices. Oncologist. Endocrinologist. Heptologist. Dentist. Oral Surgeon. Podiatrist. Dermatologist. Primary Care Physician. I read an article recently that said that this is common in we “mature” individuals and doctors make no effort to help you consolidate the MANY appointments. Today, I was told that an A1C would cost me, personally, $84, because “you’ve had too many tests and your insurance won’t cover it.” [No kidding. I thought I was simply in training to become a human pin cushion.]

Elise Wilson in action. (This is how I envisioned my volleyball playing would appear. It did not.)

“I will finally find my sport.” That’s not gonna’ happen, either. While playing volleyball in a co-ed league, a demented stork-like 6′ 5″ person (male) on the other side of the net spiked it down, hard, on 5′ 2″ me. My left elbow dislocated as I turned a backwards somersault. A nice nurse in the gym ran over and said, “I think you just broke your arm.” We went to the emergency room where I was injected with intravenous valium and X-rayed to see if I HAD broken my arm. (No, but I still have bone chips in my left elbow and it aches when it rains.) I spent 6 months in a sling, invested many dollars in front-closing bras and capes, and had to go to physical therapy to address the torn ligaments and tendons. Not fun for me. The insertion of the elbow back into the socket was not fun for the 2 men attempting that task, nor for me. (The spouse waited in the hall). The little blonde diving in the clip above is my 16-year-old granddaughter, Elise. This is how I envision my volleyball playing looked. Sadly, it did not.

“I will completely nail my final words.”Probably not happening, either. I always liked the guy that wrote, on his tombstone, “I can’t be dead. I still have checks.” That retort has not aged well. There’s always W.C. Fields’ “All in all, I’d rather be in Philadelphia” for a final greeting from the grave.

BEST LINES

From the 7-minute short “Retirement Plan” from Screen Ireland.

In addition to the line “CAMPING IS HORRIBLE” and “I will not paraglide,” I laughed the hardest at the vow to “haunt the absolute shit” out of an enemy. As the author of “Ghostly Tales of Route 66” I hope this option is open to me in the after-life. I have a couple of “friends” (I use the term loosely) and relatives who, after 35 to 60 years of faithful friendship and loyalty on MY part, backstabbed me into wanting to come back as one of the ghosts of Route 66 and give them a little taste of the misery they’ve visited upon me since 2005 (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!)

CONCLUSION

I honestly have not laughed so hard at a 7-minute bit in a long time. I would like to thank Fis Eireann/Screen Ireland for this truly delightful (and accurate) presentation on retirement. As someone who loved her job and didn’t really want to retire in 2003, [but did], I salute you.

Retirement sucks, basically.

It means you have to actively seek out things to do and “travel more” and “birdwatching” and “gong to plays” (“I will find out if I like plays”) isn’t cutting it. (I have learned I prefer movies to plays. Hell, I prefer shorts like this one to most plays.)

Retirement was the worst idea I have had—if it was even MY idea. I seem to remember my spouse of 57 years suggesting we would travel more, blah, blah, blah, but that went out the window when he began playing golf locally in multiple golf leagues with his old high school, elementary school, and work colleagues. The last time we traveled anywhere was before the pandemic. (I’m not counting the time shares bought in the nineties, because we go to those every year as our “home away from home.”) Me? I did not grow up in his home town and, post-work, it’s been unfun and dull. I hear that the Governor of Iowa has just declared all of Iowa a disaster area because of the bird flu, and we’re very close to Iowa. I would really like to leave any disaster area before disaster strikes (and they closed the only theater on the Illinois side of the Mississippi for over a year!)

VACATIONS?

The previous owners of Royal Resorts properties in Cancun (we owned at the Sands and the Islander) dumped it into the Holiday Inn Vacation Club All Inclusive world recently. That is a special kind of backstabbing. They built a kiddies’ pool right outside of our first floor digs. Now I get to listen to screaming kiddies knocking themselves out on the water slide at the crack of dawn. I can hardly wait. Does that sound like fun in retirement? [Just shoot me now.]

From the short “Retirement Plan”(Fis Eireann/Screen Ireland).

If I were to be asked what I would recommend people do in retirement, I would recommend that they watch this 7-minute film, because it has summed up my own reaction(s) perfectly, including the line “I will find out what a pension is.” I have. It’s not great. Between the taking of half of my Social Security moneys because I had been a teacher and we had a state pension system (I spent more time in the private sector, but Social Security still took half) and the potential insolvency of the Illinois TRS (Teachers’ Retirement System), who knows? I may be back at work before long.

Don’t give up your day job, but do try to see this wonderfully honest and creative short 7-mnute film. After all, if you’re retired, that still means that for that retirement day, instead of having 1,440 minutes to fill with useless activities, many of which you won’t enjoy, you will only have 1,433 minutes to fill.

“Sorry, Baby” at Sundance 2025

By Connie Wilson

On February 13, 2025

In Movies, Pop Culture, Reviews

Eva Victor appears in Sorry, Baby by Eva Victor, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Mia Cioffi Henry.

One of the films that “sold” at Sundance 2025 (to A24) was the 103 minute comedy/drama feature “Sorry, Baby,” which went for $8 million. Shot in Massachusetts, it was also one of the films I had been looking forward to the most, because Lucas Hedges (Oscar-nominated for his role as Patrick Chandler in 2016’s “Manchester by the Sea” at 20 years of age) was cast as Gavin. The film was written, directed and starred Eva Victor as Agnes.

THE BAD

Eva Victor wrote an extremely small part for Lucas Hedges and totally wasted his presence for 2/3 of the film, preferring, instead, to focus on herself as the lead actress. Yes, it was a film about Agnes’ sexual experience with a married professor and her extreme (and belated) bad reaction to same, but when the talented now 29-year-old Hedges was onscreen, his part consisted primarily of an bathtub scene where his lines included, “I’m embarrassed and I was hiding my dick.” In fact, when he first appeared onscreen as Gavin, he almost immediately disappeared and it was not clear if he was going to return at all!

Ms. Victor responds to the awkward nude bathtub badinage with, “It’s okay. I was covering my breasts. Oh, wait. Can I look at it? I have never seen one that soft. They’re better like this.”

Probably not a scripted exchange that is going to garner Lucas Hedges his second Oscar nomination.

The scene that featured Ms. Victor with a baby was also weird.

I’m guessing that Eva Victor has no children, but, whether she does or not, the conversation she wrote for herself to have with a friend’s infant she is babysitting was strange. She talks about how the infant can tell her anything and says, “I’m sorry that bad things are going to happen to you. If I can ever stop bad things from happening, just let me know. I feel bad for you, in a way, but you’re alive and you don’t know that yet. But I can still listen and not be scared. So that’s good. Or that’s something at least.”

Again, probably not scripted dialogue that is going to win Ms. Victor Oscar nods.

I have two kids. I guarantee that this is not “normal” banter with an infant. If it had been comedic (see “Nightbitch”) I might feel differently, but it just struck me as reaching and unlikely and not normal in the world I inhabit.

The film was punctuated with sub-titles. “The Year with the Bad Thing” or “The Year with the Good Sandwich” onscreen as subtitled portions of the main story did not seem like a great idea. Some of the sub-titles were barely related to what we then saw onscreen.

The delayed PTSD concerning Agnes’ (Ms. Victor’s) interaction with her college professor seemed over-wrought and not very true-to-life (besides barely being depicted, since we just see her rush from the house.)

As a young college student, Ms. Victor’s character went to her married male professor’s house to discuss a paper. He made sexual advances, which are not described as that aggressive. In fact, the entire escapade was not very clearly depicted or described. Did Agnes actually feel she had been raped or…? Had she simply been a very bad judge of character in agreeing to visit the married professor’s house while his wife and family were out of town? Did he truly force himself upon her? Could she have said “no” more forcefully? She is shown pursuing the issue somewhat at the college offices on campus, but learns that the misbehaving professor (previously her favorite) has apparently already resigned and left town. (Quick work there!)

You’ll have to see the film when A24 streams it to answer the questions above for yourselves. Upsetting, yes.

To have a full-blown breakdown while behind the wheel of a car, years later? Seemed contrived. It did lead to a nice character turn from John Carroll Lynch as Pete, however,— (the genesis of “The Year of the Bad Sandwich” bad sub-title.) I thought back to Emerald Fennell’s master class in scripting the results of such an encounter in the 2020 film “Promising Young Woman” with Carrie Mulligan. A different premise, yes, and not meant to be humorous at any point, but at least what, exactly, had happened to that girl was clearly spelled out, rather than the muddied version here. At times, the episode seems to have severely and seriously impacted Agnes. At other times, she seems to have moved past the trauma fairly quickly—until a triggering incident while driving.

Just left me feeling that the behind-the-wheel PTSD scene was overblown and belonged in a different movie.

THE GOOD

Eva Victor, director of Sorry, Baby, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Lee Dubin.

There is a courtroom scene that was quite amusing. I hoped for more like that one—scenes that would seem natural and normal and life-like and realistic. It was well done. There were good lines here and there, such as, “I did not think I would end up looking like a yam with a mouth on it.” And it was nice to see more female directors/writers coming up through the ranks,.

Director of Photography Mia Cioffi Henry acquitted herself nobly and the music by Lia Quyang Rusli was good.

Here’s what “Ioncinema” said about “Sorry, Baby:” “We imagine it’ll be extra champagne uncorking for some of the A24 folks who landed the film for a cool 8 million dollars – today’s IndieWire poll of the Best of Sundance (as voted on by 176 critics) further confirms that the breakout film at this year’s Sundance Film Festival was Sorry, Baby – which placed highest not only in the Best Film category but also topped the Best Performance, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best First Film lists. Eva Victor‘s debut did not claim the Grand Jury Prize but did manage to win the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award and had several distributors on the chase to land the rights.”

That is heady praise and means I am out of step with the mainstream reaction. I have a theory that the reason it was praised so highly is that almost ALL of the rest of the Sundance offerings were about death, dying, illness, or other such catastrophes. It was hard to find a comedy—although “Andre Is An Idiot” would qualify, except for the fact that it’s about a terminally ill man cataloguing his last months on the planet.

CONCLUSION

For me, there was promise in the courtroom scene for a Funny Film of the Future. Just looking at the credits, it seemed that the writer/director/star highlighted herself overmuch, which ended up hurting the film. Wasting Lucas Hedges in his role as Gavin was but one example.

It was not a “bad” film, but I’m still scratching my head over the over-emphasis on Agnes and the timing of Agnes’ trauma, etc.. For me, the emphasis on Agnes’ trauma was inconsistent with a “comedy” and her breakdown was overdone. And, then, too, there was the waste of other talented cast members, like Naomi Ackie as best friend Lydie and Kelly McCormack as Natasha.

(And don’t get me started on the complete waste of the uber talented Lucas Hedges.)

“Omaha” Is A Film For Our Times from Debut Feature Film Director Cole Webley

By Connie Wilson

On February 3, 2025

In Movies, Pop Culture, Reviews

Molly Belle Wright appears in Omaha by Cole Webley, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute.

“Omaha” is the first feature film from working cinematographer Cole Webley, who has numerous IMDB credits for shorts and commercial work. He told Kate Erland of “IndieWire:” When you’re in this business, when a script comes along that everybody knows just needs to be made into a film, the writing’s on the wall.”

That script, written by Robert Machoian (2020’s “The Killing of Two Lovers”) is a parable for our time(s). It came to Webley’s attention as he was setting about directing his first feature film, which premiered at Sundance on Opening Night. It’s a touching film. If “Sorry, Baby” was bought for $8 million by A24, (only the third film so far to nail down a deal), this one is worth three times that. (Never waste an Oscar-nominated actor like Lucas Hedges in a tiny part!)

FILM OPENING

A father is shown waking his two children and loading them into the car for a cross-country road trip from Utah to Omaha, Nebraska. (He tells the older child to take what she’d take if the house were on fire.) I had not read extensively about the film. The devastating plot is concealed so long that I had to talk my spouse into sticking with it. I pointed out the superior cinematography (Paul Meyers), where even a random shot on the highway was primo, and the acting, which is top-notch.

His response was, “Yeah, but what’s going on?” So, I found out, told him by revealing the key plot point early, and he got to see one of my two favorite Sundance 2025 feature films this year, The other was “Train Dreams,” which sold in the high teens to Netflix.

The key plot point is hidden from the audience’s view until you’ve devoted almost an hour to the 83-minute movie. In today’s period of short attention spans and ADD/ADHD, maybe the audience could have been let in on the sub-text a bit sooner? (I taught for MANY years, so bear with me on that slight criticism.)

HIDDEN PLOT POINT

(*Do not read this if you want to be “surprised” by the plot’s key point.)

In July of 2008 Nebraska became one of several states that passed a Safe Haven law that allowed unharmed infants to be dropped off at a hospital without penalty where they would immediately become a ward of the state. The Nebraska law failed to specify an age for the children being abandoned. Before the Nebraska legislature fixed the loophole, thirty-five children had been abandoned—none of them infants and five of them from out-of-state.

Screenwriter Machoian heard about the last woman from Davis, California who managed to be the last parent to make the trip to Omaha out of desperation to take advantage of the loophole. The law was clarified to mean infants younger than 30 days. Miachoian described the genesis of the script during the Q&A: “For me, I had just finished grad school, we had 6 kids, and we were super poor. I was aware that if something happened to my wife (as it does to the wife in “Omaha”) I would be overwhelmed.”

Director Webley told Filmmaker magazine: “The idea that you can just poo-pooh something because you’ve never been in that situation, or you can’t see or feel it, it really scares me as a society—that insular feeling that we don’t have to think about that because we’re not going through it.”

John Magaro, Molly Belle Wright, and Wyatt Solis appear in Omaha by Cole Webley, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute.

Amplifying the timeliness of the film, Webley added: “I would guarantee you that this guy probably didn’t vote blue. He seems like a blue collar dude. He probably was raised in a conservative environment. Who knows how he voted? But I can tell you that, for me, as someone who definitely isn’t aligned with what’s happening in the country right now, I see this man as a human being who’s struggling and has trauma. Compassion should rule the day, not punishment.”

Webley continued, “And if I wanted this movie to do anything without being didactic, it would be that it places humanity upon the people on the edges and the fringes of our society. We’re so ready to forget them because we don’t know them or see them every day. We’re so ready to judge them, ready to say, ‘deport them.’ But these are people who are trying. And if they’re not trying, they probably need help and a system that is going to provide options rather than punishment.”

ACTING

John Magaro, Molly Belle Wright, and Wyatt Solis appear in Omaha by Cole Webley, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute.

The lead (Dad), John Magaro does a great job of showing us a caring father pushed to the brink. But the accolades went to the two young actors playing Ella and Charlie, his 9 and 6-year-old children. Molly Belle Wright, in particular, who played Ella was a real find. Wyatt Solis played the younger brother, Charlie. Said Director Webley, “Molly’s like a professional actress. She was 9 at the time and she’s incredible. I can’t wait to see her blossom. It was like working with two adults when she was in the room.”

During the Q&A, he expanded on working with such young actors: “But when we got into the car (all real, no green screen), it just became really clear that Wyatt (age 6) was not going to do the same thing twice.” Webley described Wyatt as “the tip of the spear” and Magaro—who only met the kids three days before filming was to start—said during the Q&A, “Wyatt’s like Brando. He does what he wants.” (Laughter) Child labor laws dictated that Wyatt could only be filmed three hours a day and Molly for four. Only Rex, the golden retriever, had to be recast, but he is “alive and well in Utah,” where most of the film was shot, (with some footage in Wyoming and Nebraska.)

DIRECTOR

Cole Webley, director of Omaha, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.
Courtesy of Sundance Institute.

Webley told Filmmaker magazine, “I see my job directing as mostly guide rails. I don’t like to talk a lot about back story. I want my actors to take their role and their job is to go and find that person. And John came prepared. And I was making sure I had given John every opportunity within the scene to nail who this man was.”

The children came off as totally natural. Their dancing and clowning around, which was captured over the 27-day shoot, was perfect for setting the tone of the film family. It was clear from talk about camera lenses and the beautifully framed shots (as they leave town and as they arrive in Omaha) that Webley is an accomplished cinematographer with a real eye for what he is shooting. He echoed another Director I spoke with in Nashville recently, Jason Reitman of “Saturday Night,” who said that 90% of a film’s success is in the casting of a (good) script.

MUSIC, EDITING

The Christopher Bear music was good. The scene in the car where the three rock out to “Mony Mony” by Tommy James and the Shondells was great. (Check out Wyatt in the back seat going ballistic!) Jai Shukla did a great job editing the beautifully-shot footage.

CONCLUSION

I watched A LOT of films over the course of Sundance 2025. At least 25% of them focused on death and dying. This one was about life and living. It was about how hard it can be when society’s safety nets are removed and disinformation and lack of compassion rule the day. This is a gut-wrenching film; a “happy ending” is not in the cards. But it is well worth watching and trying to feel for the people involved on a human level.

As a former teacher from a long line of educators, I felt for the children in this story. First, the kids lose their Mom. Then, they lose their home. Then they lose their dog. Ultimately, they lose their Dad? It is hard to get behind that decision, but the film helps to dramatize the plight of many struggling working class families. Those in power may put down anyone with compassion as a tree-hugging liberal, but the truth is that humanity requires us to empathize with those going through rough times, not to penalize and ostracize them.

“Andre Is An Idiot” Sundance Film Promotes Colonoscopies at 45

By Connie Wilson

On February 1, 2025

In Health/Medicine, Humor and Weird Wilson-isms, Movies, Reviews, Science and Medicine

Andre Ricciardi appears in Andre is an Idiot by Anthony Benna, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.

Andre Ricciardi was an eccentric advertising man who lived an interesting and unusual life. Even one of his daughters (Tallula and Delilah) described her father as “he looks like someone who lives on the street.” In this 88-minute film we learn that Andre has dubbed himself an idiot because he rejected his best friend Lee’s invitation to join him for a colonoscopy when they turned 50 (born in 1968). Roughly one year later. after ignoring some symptoms, Andre was diagnosed with terminal Stage 4 colon cancer that had spread to his liver.

Andre told his mother, “If I don’t defeat this, you’re right: I’m a fucking idiot.”

DATING HISTORY

Andre had a long history of doing idiotic things. While drinking in a bar with a girlfriend and a friend named Johnny D, Janice, the bartender, tried to get Johnny D. to marry her so she could stay in the country. Janice was Canadian and her green card was expiring. Johnny D was reluctant, but Andre stepped up, in return for a trip to Mexico contingent upon the promise that they would stay married, legally, for two years. Andre shared that “My girlfriend got drunk and spent the night in Golden Gate Park alone.”

Andre then arranged to have the new couple appear on The Newlywed Game Show, figuring that would be good practice for Janice’s INS interview. Since they didn’t know much about one another, they devised an elaborate scheme to win. This included always picking the nicer answer and, if there were two choices, pick the one with the highest letter of the alphabet. The couple won their episode and, with it, a trip to the Sonesto Beach Resort in Anguilla. The vacation was a success and they remained married until Andre’s death in 2023, which was a 28-year run.

FAMILY

Andre and Janice had two daughters, Tallula and Delilah. Best friend Lee (who looked a bit like Seth Rogen) shared a story about Andre reading “Helter Skelter” aloud to one of the girls when she was hospitalized. Janice and Andre married in 1995 and remained a couple until he died in 2023 at age 55, after being diagnosed at age 52.

ON DEATH & DYING

Andre undergoes 50 rounds of chemo, which he tolerated surprisingly well, something he attributed to a murky and complex relationship with drugs and alcohol. (“Nothing more serious than meth and heroin.”) Andre felt he tolerated chemo so well because of his 35-year relationship with hangovers, although he finally was told, “You’ve gotta’ start taking better care of yourself.”

We see Andre hitting his bong of a morning. When he needs someone to portray his reluctant father, Tommy Chong enters the picture. Andre says, “There is an awkwardness between people and death.” Friend Lee adds that the two “find humor in shitty situations.” Explaining that he anticipates that death will be nothingness, Andre says, “I’m not afraid the way so many people are of dying. I’m afraid for the people I’m leaving behind…Dying is surprisingly boring. This is like a vacation for me. I feel that everything should fall into this ‘I’m dying’ mode and it isn’t and it doesn’t. How mundane my own death is. It’s hard to think of a more serious topic than dying of cancer. I am using a proportionate amount of humor.”

CAUSES of CANCER

Andre offers up a variety of creative ways in which his cancer might have been contracted, including eating salami, ingesting rat poison, and his mother running behind DDT trucks when she was eight.

HUMOROUS SUGGESTIONS

Director Tony Benna of "Andre Is An Idiot"

Anthony Benna, director of Andre is an Idiot, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Traci Griffin Benna.

Andre and Lee embark on a van journey that reminds of “Will and Harper,” the documentary about Will Ferell and his trans-gender best friend Harper Steele. While traveling the country, the pair work on a death yell, as instructed by an online guru. Andre’s is “So long. Suckers.” Lee hollers “Come and get me, Spaceman.” After the two scream, vigorously, into the void of an echoing canyon in the desert, Andre observes, “You might actually die doing this.”

GAME SHOW IDEA: Peter, Andre’s therapist, listens to Andre’s latest off-the-wall idea of a game show entitled “Who Wants to Kill Me?” This actually isn’t such a unique idea. I reviewed a movie entitled “The Show,” (2017) directed by Giancarlo Esposito and starring Josh Duhamel, where people are paid to let others murder them, live, on television. Andre’s therapist, Peter, suggests, “You have the capacity to find the comedic in everything.” Andre is very interested in discussing having his head transplanted onto a healthy body, but he is too sick to make the lengthy journey. Andre’s eyelashes grow amazingly long due to side effects from one of his medications. He does well tolerating 50 rounds of chemo, but lost 20 pounds on radiation and says, “It was fucking hell.”

MUSIC

Dan Deacon provides some rhymes that amuse, including this verse: “Cancer’s always been depressing. It’s never been pleasant. It don’t care if you’re a royal. It don’t care if you’re a peasant.” We also hear a song in which the lyric is “Please remember to feed the cat. Please remember that I’m never coming back.”

PSA

Ultimately, Andre wants to encourage others to get life-saving colonoscopies. He approaches his old agency, Mekanism Ad Agency and Jason Harris, his former boss, to encourage them to mount a PSA campaign that would urge people to get a colonoscopy when they are 45. These PSA billboard ads are still in the works, but the meeting with his former employer is also humorous as Andre is pitched various creative ideas for the ads.

CONCLUSIONS

Andre’s last message, delivered by A.I. is this: “I sat with fear today. I didn’t run from it or try to defeat it. Instead, I greeted it like a friend and let it wash over me again and again, terrifying me. But it was okay. My fear is insignificant compared to the love around me. I wept for the first time in years. It was remarkable. I thought I needed suffering, but, instead, I got bliss. My heart has never been more open and my fear of death, also tapping at my window, feels a bit more familiar and a little less powerful.”

Also from Andre who is shown near the end stroking Waffles the Cat: “We paint the portraits we want people to see, but the most beautiful portraits are the ones that show the flaws within us.”

A great epitaph for a true original. The Q&A following the film was worthwhile, so here it is:

Q&A:

Q&A with best friend Lee and Director Tony Benna:

Q: How did you end up doing this film with Andre?

A: I worked with Andre over the years. Every project Andre ever had was insane. Cancer is not funny, but Andre definitely is. I wanted to get some of his outlandish stories on film.

Lee added: “We kind of signed in blood to do whatever he wanted us to do. Andre and I worked together for years. He always talked about making a really funny documentary about something really serious.

Q: How did you stay out of the way at the house?

A: Janice opened up her house. She would make muffins for us to take home. We just honored Andre’s wishes. I think that’s what kept him going. At the final point, when he kind of went downhill, it seemed just natural.

Q: Editing question about how much Andre was involved.

A: Andre got to see quite a bit of the scenes, including the Death Yell scenes. It was a four-year film project. He didn’t get to see a final cut but he felt it was in good hands.

Q: What would Andre think about this?

A: (Lee) He’d try to sabotage it somehow, saying, “How did we get here?”

Q: What’s the status of the PSAs?

A: They’re not out yet, but the idea is to get them out and to spread the word. From the beginning Andre said, “Let’s try to help people.” He had one idea that involved me getting a colonoscopy live while doing a Q&A, but that didn’t fly.

Q: What darlings did you have to kill?
A: We did radiation sessions. The head transplant guy in Italy Andre was really interested in, but he was too sick. It felt like Andre would have been proud of the edits. The puppets,. The animation. Something raw and amazing. This film is kind of representative of the kind of work Andre would have done in his life.

Q: Who did the animation?

A: (Tony Benna) I did the animation. We had 6 weeks to do 3 minutes of stop-animation. It was very rushed. It was very time comsumng.

See this one, if you can. It was well worth the time.

“Mr. Nobody Against Putin” Screens at Sundance Film Festival

By Connie Wilson

On February 1, 2025

In Education, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology, Movies, Politics, Reviews

Pavel Talankin, director of Mr. Nobody Against Putin, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Helle Moos.

“Mr. Nobody Against Putin” about the Putin-dictated shift in Russia’s schools was made possible by a young Russian schoolteacher named Pavel (“Pasha”) Talankin. At the time of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Pasha was serving as the school videotographer and event coordinator for Karabash Elementary School, the biggest school in what is a very small town of 10,000 people deep in the Ural Mountains, Russia’s industrial heartland. Karabash was world famous because it was once dubbed “the most toxic place on Earth,” with an average life expectancy of 38 and a huge copper mining plant that has blackened the mountaintop with pollution. One commentator called it “the most depressing place I’ve ever been” and “the darkest place on the planet.” But to Pasha it was home, where he lived near his widowed mother (his father drowned in a lake when Pasha was 9) in a two-bedroom apartment in the city center. Pasha’s humble flat contained 427 books, carefully arranged by color coding, and he has a dog named Nebraska.

NEW RUSSIAN PROGRAM

At the outset of the Russian invasion, Pasha sent out an e-mail ( described as “an overly long e-mail”) about the exhaustive program Putin’s government was pushing on Russian schools. The New Federal Patriotic Education Program was an impediment to actual teaching. Said Pasha, “Few of us were prepared for such an effort to interfere in our ability to teach…I am a teacher forced to do the exact opposite of what a teacher should do.” I could relate to Pasha’s dismay, because I lived through a push from those above me in pay grade to make all of us jump through hoops to select students for the Scripps Spelling Bee Competition. It soon became clear that 75% of my classroom time would have had to be spent doing spelling bee trials to select the finalists. The other things I was supposed to be teaching, which included, at that time, literature, grammar, composition and spelling, were to be shunted aside in favor of the Spelling Bee lady, who apparently outranked me on the food chain (even though I was ostensibly Department Chairperson and had been there many more years and had an actual degree in my subject area, which this woman did not. She, however, was married to a fellow School Superintendent; I was not). I soon cut to the chase and selected my contestants based on abbreviated preliminary bees, which left me free to go back to actual teaching. Things did not go quite as smoothly for the woman who insisted that ALL of our classroom time be spent running things the way the local newspaper dictated and she soon ran in a ringer who had not competed at all, as he was in the hospital with a broken leg during her many elimination bees. But he had an I.Q. of 152, so the rules that Mrs. Superintendent had imposed on us all soon went out the window, given the upset wins her trials were creating.

But for Pasha, the restrictions were going to get worse, and they came from much higher up.

NEW RUSSIAN TREASON LAWS

A still from Mr. Nobody Against Putin by David Borestein and Pavel Talankin, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Pavel Talankin

Initially, shooting the film for this documentary was risky, but not illegal. But in April of 2023 Putin and his government passed a law mandating life imprisonment for treason and strengthening the laws about “treason.” Things would become increasingly dangerous for Pasha as he filmed what was happening in Karabash.

Pasha: “It’s a very unpleasant feeling. It’s like you’re in a room and the walls are closing in and the air is leaving. You remain trapped in the system. I love my job, but I don’t want to be a pawn of the regime.” Pasha actually resigned his position at one point, but when director collaborator David Borenstein contacted him, suggesting they act on Pasha’s idea, he withdrew his resignation and set about documenting what was going on in Russian schools. Pasha: “I’ll use my camera to film the abyss this school is sinking into.”

Others in the town mention how even first graders are being asked to recite war poems.

Pasha: “Since last year there is no freedom to be found here. All Russian movement is for the children’s movement.” Every day there are clubs being formed that resemble the Nazi Youth Clubs of Hitler’s day/ Victory Day, the holiest day of the year when parading crowds carry pictures of their dead veterans, seems to suggest, “Maybe one day you can be a dead soldier, too.” Pasha notes that the young people will have to carry the burden of victory over evil. Pasha: “All of you will die, but know one thing: Mother Russia will never forget you. Every warrior’s name will be carved into a plaque.”

At this point, Russia is losing 1,000 soldiers a day in the Ukrainian conflict. Says Pasha, “It’s now time for the mercenaries to teach: marching drills, grenade throwing competitions, shooting competition.” The film of boys as young as 10 being handed guns and sighting down the length of them is frightening. They are shown handling weapons of the Great Patriotic War, including Mosin, SVT machine guns, etc.

There are scripted lessons after scripted lessons. Proof that the school is complying with the directive is required. Soon, the scripts are given to the students, as well. They are being brainwashed by the state in the New Federal Patriotic Education Program.

KARABASH ELEMENTARY SCHOOL HISTORY TEACHER

David Borestein, director of Mr. Nobody Against Putin, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Helle Moos

Pasha films history teacher Pavel Abdulmanov. Abdulmanov is strictly by the Russian book. He suggests that, “It’s so crucial to eliminate dissenting views so there is no split in our Mother Country. If you don’t like it, go to the country that you think is better.” When asked to name the Russian historical figures he admires most, he names Lavrentiy Beria, Stalin’s father of the Gulag system; Viktor Abakumov, Stalin’s spy hunter; and Pavel Sudoplatov, Stalin’s assassin for enemies. Sudoplatov masterminded the murder of Leon Trotsky from an ice pick driven into Leon Trotsky’s brain. Abdulmanov tells his students daily that “Russia could destroy Ukraine in a couple of days” and warns that countries in Europe will “soon be riding horses” as there will be no wheat or oil from Russia. He also tells the students that “state policy in Ukraine is decided by radicals and Nazis,” suggesting that Russia must eliminate the Nazis in power in Ukraine. Abdulmanov was given a luxury apartment as a reward for being named Teacher of the Year at the school.

LASHING OUT

Feeling an uncontrollable urge to lash out, one morning Pasha plays a recording of Lady Gaga singing the United States National Anthem, rather than the Soviet anthem. Soon thereafter, a police car is parked outside of Pasha’s apartment.

PASHA’S MOTHER

Throughout the film Pasha is shown bringing his mother flowers as she works to repair damaged school books in the school library. He repeatedly praises his mother. She is a particularly dour woman who never expresses any warmth towards her only son. At one point, he says he is going to stop over with something for her that evening and she tells him “Forget it.” Her view on the changes in the school’s atmosphere : “I am sorry, but people love war. It’s always been like that. People love to shoot each other.” Also representative of the town’s collective feelings is Masha, one of Pasha’s students, whose brother is drafted into the war effort. She says, “I could care less about the war as long as it doesn’t impact me personally.” This seems to be the main opinion of the town. (Masha’s brother eventually defects and is killed.)

GRADUATION

Pasha is in charge of arranging for Graduation Day. He addresses the assembled crowd, saying, “My dear friends: wherever your life takes you, I wish you solid ground under your feet. There’ll be turning points you’ll have to choose. Sometimes to express your love, you must sacrifice everything, but I know that your choice will come from your heart. Thank you so much for working with me through this year. I love you very much. The time for the last bell has come.” This heartfelt speech is followed by dancing in the most toxic town on Earth and students tossing Pasha into the air in celebration.

That night, he flees Russia. He is being paid as co-director of this impressive effort for the BBC’s Storyville, but he was not present at the Q&A at Sundance.

Mr. Nobody Against Putin: Graduation Day

A still from Mr. Nobody Against Putin by David Borestein and Pavel Talankin, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute.

CONCLUSION

Pasha put in three years of work on the project. He tells the camera, “Even a guy like me should have some principles. By June I am done here.”

This was a brave act of principle in the face of an oppressive autocratic regime. Having just completed a University of Texas class entitled “Putin’s Rise to Power” that laid out the ways in which Putin has closed down and expelled Western journalists from Russia. I am now enrolled in a class entitled “Misinformation and Disinformation.” Our first lecture went into a great deal of detail about how difficult it is to get truthful reporting out of Russia.

This documentary is a real treasure and should be seen by anyone who loves democracy. It was a courageous and brave act by someone who has risked his entire life to help alert the world to the truth of Vladimir Putin’s plans for world domination.

“Train Dreams” is Break-Out Film at Sundance 2025

By Connie Wilson

On January 31, 2025

In Movies, Reviews

Joel Edgerton and Felicity Jones appear in Train Dreams by Clint Bentley, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Adolpho Veloso.

One of the big break-out success stories of Sundance 2025, so far, is “Train Dreams,” the 102 minute film based on Denis Johnson’s novella. Director Clint Bentley premiered the film on January 26^th at the Library Center Theatre in Park City and it has since been snapped up by Netflix for a figure said to be “in the high teen millions.” Only Alison Brie’s and Dave Franco’s horror film “Together,” bought by WME Independent, has created more buzz this year so far about a Sundance purchase.

Black Bear productions, established by Teddy Schwarzman in 2011 to market quality films to the UK, Ireland and Canada is behind this film. Schwarzman, a former lawyer, was behind 2014’s “The Imitation Game.” Now he is involved with Director Clint Bentley’s look at the areas where logging and the railroad were big industries at the turn of the century as the country was laying railroad(s).

That theme attracted me to this film, since my Norwegian immigrant grandfather was said to have helped lay the B&O Railroad (before dying young of Tuberculosis). I was also familiar with cast members Joel Edgerton, William H. Macy, Felicity Jones, Clifton Collins, Jr., and narrator Will Patton. Add to that that the fact that the director co-wrote and produced “Sing Sing” for A24 and won a 2021 Sundance U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Best Actor and I’m in.

The film pulls from the novella of the same name. Screenwriters (Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar) have adapted its poetic language, as when the film opens with these words: “There were once passageways to the old way. Even though that has been rolled up like a scroll and put somewhere, you can still feel the echo of it.”

Clint Bentley, director of Train Dreams, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Clint Bentley.

Robert Grainier is a logger who works for $4 a day and travels to where the trees are, whether in Bonnie’s Ferry, Idaho, as far east as the town of Libby, 40 miles inside the state of Idaho, or in the Spokane area. Grainier is portrayed by Joel Edgerton (“Loving”) and he is a bit of an enigma. He (somehow) lost his original family and watched Chinese families being mass deported from his former home town. Robert quit attending school in his early teens and his life really starts when he meets Gladys at church.

Within three months the couple are inseparable and build a cabin on an acre of wooded land. Soon, they have a daughter, Kate, but Robert is constantly leaving their small cabin in the woods to work alongside men from Shanghai and Chattanooga as a logger. In the summer of 1917 he worked for the Spokane International Railroad and witnessed racism against Chinese laborers, who were sometimes summarily executed without cause, which bothered Robert’s conscience a great deal.

In the course of his work as a logger, Robert met many characters, including one portrayed by William H. Macy who used explosives to fell trees—sometimes successfully. In another incident, a Black man crashes into the logging camp, demanding to know the whereabouts of a man named Sam Loving from New Mexico. When one of the loggers makes a break for it (apparently because he IS Sam Loving) that man ends up dead, shot in the back. Incidents like these, including details about Hank Heeley, who lived in the trunk of a felled tree, comprise the narrative.

In between these logging adventures, Robert returns to his family in the small cabin in the woods and to his beloved wife Gladys and daughter Kate although he says, “He began to feel a dread, like some punishment was seeking him.”

When Robert returns to his small cabin in the woods this time, there has been a terrible fire (that looked all too reminiscent of the recent Los Angeles fires.) His cabin and family are gone. For two weeks he searches for Gladys and Kate. The acting in the scenes where Edgerton is mourning his lost family and sleeping outside, exposed to the elements, are especially good and the cinematography of the area (Adolpho Veloso) is gorgeous.

The visual effects of the fire, coupled with great vistas and good sound all contribute to a superior film. Robert held out some faint hope that Gladys and Kate might still be alive and come home, so he lived on speckled trout during the summer and began rebuilding the cabin. As the novella said, “He wandered the city as though he were looking for something he had lost, out of time and space. He kept waiting for his wife and daughter to return.”

While in a theater in town, Robert sees his face in a mirror for the first time in a decade, and says, “He felt that he was just only beginning to have some faint understanding of his life, even though it was now slipping away from him.”

Aside from the logging adventures (later, he takes a job helping move people) the main message is that Robert spends what is left of his life mourning his lost family. The film also comments on racism in America. This made it a fine companion piece to the Sundance film “Third Act” that I had just watched, which referenced discrimination against Japanese Americans and the interment of Japanese Americans during WWII.

It’s a beautifully done film with good acting and some historical worth, as well.

“2000 Meters to Andriivka” Premieres at Sundance, 2025

By Connie Wilson

On January 31, 2025

In Editorial, Essays on Politics: Best Political Essays & Ideology, Movies, Reviews

A still from 2000 Meters to Andriivka by Mstyslav Chernov, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Mstyslav Chernov

AP journalist Mstyslav Chernov filmed “20 Days in Mariupol” two years ago. His first documentary showing the Russian invasion of Mariupol won the Oscar as Best Documentary of the year at the 2024 Academy Awards.

At Sundance this year the 97-minute documentary “2000 Meters to Andriivka” embeds Chernov and Cinematographer Alex Babenko with troops advancing approximately one mile to the embattled town of Andriivka in Ukraine. Andriivka is representative of so many Ukrainian towns and villages seized by Russian troops. Onscreen, as they get closer to the town, the distance still to be traveled is shown in a kind of count-down fashion.

THE GOAL

The Russians have mined each of the sides of a forested area, the Zhyzhky forest, where the enemy has dug in. If the 93^rd brigade can make its way to the town, it will help cut the Russian supply line to the Russian-occupied city of Bakhmut. The Zhyzhky forest has had three previous Ukrainian attempts to make it to Andriivka, in June, July and August, only to see the front line of brave Ukrainian soldiers mowed down by Russian troops.

The goal? “If we are lucky, we’ll get there and see the raising of the Ukrainian flag.”

They do get there, but the town is totally destroyed.

THE FIGHTERS

The bravery of the Ukrainian men is admirable, but it all seems so futile.

Mstyslav Chernov, director of 2000 Meters to Andriivka, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by Jeff Vespa

Chernov has conversations with individual fighters—Freak, Kavun, Gagarin—and we see bodies littered everywhere on the hellscape that was once a forest leading towards the small village. The village of Andriivka, itself, when they finally reach it, is as decimated as the Gaza Strip. There really isn’t a building, as such, to hang a flag on or over. When Chernov is asked during the audience Q&A how things changed after the men reached Andriivka and raised the Ukrainian flag, he said, “It became sort of anti-climactic and climactic.” There is a small moment of humanity when one of the Ukrainian fighters finds a small kitten and smuggles it out with him.

FREAK ET. AL.

Freak is one of the fighters we get to know. He is only 22 years old and talks about his previous time at university. He says his plan is to “go in with the thought that I’m going to stay alive.” (Freak is injured 6 months later and his body is never recovered.)

A 46-year old military policeman (and a grandfather) who volunteered to defend Ukraine says that he should not be made out to be a hero. “I haven’t done anything heroic , yet here I am on camera. It shouldn’t be like that. There are those who have done so much.” He worries that his wife back home won’t have clean water and that he didn’t fix the toilet well enough before he left for war.

Gagarin is shot and falls, onscreen. (Later, the soldier who held Gagarin’s hand as he died, will also be killed in a drone strike in his village). Gagarin’s funeral is the 56^th funeral in his small town. The town turns out en masse and there is much mourning and crying. One of the mourners says, “We are burying our children. Women bury their husbands. Our boys still had everything ahead of them. They could have been entrepreneurs, agriculturists. When the time came, they took up arms to defend us.”

CONCLUSION

Where “20 Days in Mariupol” was optimistic, now, with a new administration in place, one that seems much less interested in supporting Ukraine in its struggle against Russia (and much friendlier towards Putin), the counter-offensive does not seem to be viable. Russia now controls abut 20% of Ukraine as of January, 2025.

Director Chernov said, “I don’t want to to speak to any of my relatives right now, because I would want to tell them that everything is okay and it’s not.”

I felt depressed after the November presidential election and on January 20th. I’m even more depressed after viewing this remarkable film about what is actually happening in Ukraine. It should be seen in a double viewing with another remarkable Sundance film, “Mr. Nobody Against Putin,” which depicts how Russian schools are being told to brainwash students and turn them into soldiers at increasingly young ages.

“Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore” at Sundance 2025

By Connie Wilson

On January 30, 2025

In Movies, Pop Culture, Reviews

(Deaf actress Marlee Matlin appears at Sundance 2025. (Photo courtesy of Sundance Institute).

Deaf actress and activist Marlee Matlin was born 58 years ago in Morton Grove, Illinois. When asked to do a PBS Masters biography of her life, she requested a deaf director. Shoshanna Stern became the guiding force behind this autobiographical recounting of Matlin’s life and career.

She lost her hearing at 18 months of age for reasons never completely determined. As she shares, her parents never got over the guilt. She describes a childhood feeling of being cut off, dismissed and ignored, saying, “That’s just how it was as the deaf girl.”

Although she had always loved to perform, she was often not allowed to audition because of her handicap.

MARLEE & WILLIAM HURT

However, when the play “Children of a Lesser God” was being made into a movie, the search for a deaf actress to play the lead led to casting the then 19-year-old Matlin in the part, opposite William Hurt, who was then 35. Sparks flew. The two became a couple for a brief period, which led to charges of abuse on Matlin’s part and denials on Hurt’s. She has said, “Bill Hurt was threatened by my youth and the sudden change in my success from just one movie.” Her autobiographical recounting of their romance in “I’ll Scream Later,” written in 2009, also described sexual molestation at ages 11 and 15.

Matlin’s impassioned performance in “Children of a Lesser God” won her the Oscar as Best Actress of the Year in 1987, but also contributed to the break-up of her romance with the much older Hurt. One thing that Marlee has acknowledged that was a positive from her time with Hurt was that he convinced her to get clean from a dependence on drugs and alcohol and to go to rehab, as he had done. She checked into the Betty Ford Center. She remains married to her husband Kevin Grandalski after four children and 32 years, which may be as major an accomplishment as being the youngest woman (and only deaf actress) to win the Academy Award for Best Actress.

MARLEE & HENRY WINKLER

When Marlee was twelve years old, a chance meeting with Henry Winkler in Chicago—then riding high as the Fonz on “Happy Days”—led to a lifetime friendship with the actor and his wife. In fact, Marlee lived with the Winklers for two years and was married to her current husband, a Burbank police officer, in the Winklers’ back yard in 1993.

ACTIVISM

Marlee has leaned into activism on behalf of the deaf, although she claims, in the documentary, to have been uninformed about deaf issues when she achieved prominence for her Oscar win in 1987. As she said, “I was thrust into it, but nobody explained it to me.” One of her projects, (undertaken with the help of Iowa Senator Tom Harkin, who had a deaf brother) was to make all television sets captioning capable, to aid with language deprivation that the deaf encounter.

Matlin’s involvement with the 2022 film “Coda” is included, which won three Oscars for Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Actor for Troy Kotsure, who said, “What kept me inspired was Marlee Matlin.”

Matlin’s words at that time were “Let’s move forward. Let there be other firsts.”

Matlin is shown in her car with Billy Joel’s song “My Life” playing, mouthing the words, “I never said I was the victim of circumstances.”

CONCLUSION

The look at Matlin’s career was interesting. I know from my 20 years of teaching next door to the hearing impaired room at the junior high school level (as well as from having deaf students in my classrooms) that a deaf student who is doing well in school is often a truly brilliant individual. The hurdles for deaf students who are often “left alone to solve it on their own” are huge. She admits in the documentary that, “I have no idea how I survived.”

Matlin has a production company and has several projects in the works, including a desire to work again with Director Shoshanna Stern.

“Sally” & “Marlee Matlin” Screen at Sundance, 2025

By Connie Wilson

On January 29, 2025

In Movies, News, Pop Culture, Reviews, Science and Medicine

Sally Ride, first American female astronaut in space

Sally Ride appears in SALLY by Cristina Costantini, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by NASA.

The first two Sundance 2025 offerings I watched turned out to have very similar themes, although focused on two very different people.

“Sally,” was a 103 minute documentary helmed by Cristina Costa, which screened at the Ray Theatre in Park City at Sundance 2025 on January 28^th, 2025.

The second 97-minute documentary, directed by deaf director Shoshanna Stern, “Marlee Matlin: Not Alone Anymore,” helped open the Sundance Festival and profiled Marlee Matlin, the first deaf actress to win an Academy Award and the youngest at 21 to win in the Best Actress category. [My review of her story will follow “Sally.”]

While the films seemed, on the surface, as though they would have little in common, they both highlighted extremely dedicated individuals rising to the top of their respective fields despite the hurdles of culture, society and, in Matlin’s case, biology. Matlin’s two tattoos that read “Perseverance” and “Warrior” seemed relevant to each.

Both documentaries were helmed by talented female directors and each was at the height of their fame as U.S. cultural icons 35 years ago, in 1986-1987.

“SALLY”

Sally Ride appears in SALLY by Cristina Costantini, an official selection of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. Courtesy of Sundance Institute | photo by NASA.

“Sally” is the story of a woman who spent 27 years hiding the fact that, although she was briefly married to fellow astronaut Steve Hawley and had sexual relationships with other men, she spent 27 years of her life concealing her relationship with another woman. Her love for Tam O’Shaughnessy, a fellow tennis player she met at age 13 when Tam was 12, was something that Sally Ride didn’t come to accept about herself until later in her life.

MALE CHAUVINIST PIG

When women were first being allowed to become NASA astronauts, a fellow astronaut, Mike Mullane, a West Point graduate who served in Viet Nam, is heard articulating the same point-of-view of the newly-confirmed Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. Mullane says on camera that he was a product of his upbringing and the times and that when women were being introduced to the space program, he thought, “I just couldn’t see what they were going to be bringing to the table.” By the end of the documentary, the very same Mike Mullane writes the most heartfelt sympathy note to Sally’s life partner Tam, apologizing for his earlier views and extolling Sally’s expertise and excellence as a role model for his granddaughters.

Describing his earlier self as “a male sexist pig” Mike Mullane said he hoped that Sally’s life example would give his own granddaughters “a future in which women won’t be constrained from pursuing their own dreams.” “They can do the job as well as anyone else.” (One hopes that someone passes that message on to Pete Hegsoeth, who has articulated the exact opposite attitude towards women in the military.)

Billy Jean King, a gay icon who lost everything when her sexuality became public knowledge, was a good friend of Sally’s. She felt that what happened to her when she was “outed” served as an object lesson to Sally Ride. She lost everything and had to start over. As for Sally Ride’s competence in her job, Billy Jean says, on camera, “I think it’s time that women in this country realized that they can do any job that they want to do.. Sally proved it. Done.”

SOCIETAL EXPECTATIONS in the 50a, 60s, 70s, 80s

As the documentary emphasizes through Tam’s words, “I just feel bad that someone the world respected and admired felt they had to hide themselves from the world.”

RIDE’S FAMILY OF ORIGIN

Astronaut Sally Ride (Photo from Wikipedia.org).

When the documentary dives into early influences on Ride, some clues can be gleaned from the brief interview with Sally’s biological mother, a Norwegian woman who spent time as a volunteer prison counselor. She seemed very uncommunicative, very self-contained, very icy as a personality. My own mother was a first-generation Norwegian/Dutch child of immigrants. This stereotype is based on truth. Tam says, “Sally couldn’t share with the people closest to her, even her sister Bear. Sally never talked about it. I didn’t understand why Sally couldn’t or wouldn’t talk to her sister about being gay…“Sally was afraid about how her colleagues and friends felt about her, and how it would affect her work…The fear factor of being gay, of being who you are affected our work and our company. The world is not always kind.”

TAM O’SHAUGHNESSY

Tam, said, “I wanted the relationship validated. It took more of a toll on me than it did on Sally. It just ate at me.” She was gratified to receive the nation’s highest civilian honor from President Obama on Sally’s behalf, posthumously after Sally died of pancreatic cancer in 2012 at the age of 61. The two had filed and became certified domestic partners shortly before Ride’s death in 2012.

Said O’Shaughnessy, “Sally just couldn’t or wouldn’t talk about emotions, even with her sister, Bear, who also left a traditional marital relationship to live with a woman. Bear and her female partner both lost their jobs as Presbyterian ministers when they came out… “I just realized that I loved Sally and we had to find a way to work this out. We couldn’t change the way the world saw us, but we loved each other so much and we wanted to be together, come hell or high water.”

Following Sally’s death, Tam acknowledged their longstanding relationship in her obituary: “I’m just sick of hiding, I’m an honest person and Sally was an honest person. If somebody doesn’t like it, tough.” After Sally’s diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, the two shared 17 months during which “Every week she’d lose something…the ability to go up and down the stairs…In one second our lives totally changed. We were like zombies. It was such a shock.” Sally got the diagnosis one day after delivering a speech at the National Science Teachers Association Conference on March 11, 2011.

THE CHALLENGER EXPLOSION & INVESTIGATION

One of the areas in the film that was somewhat glossed over was the key role that Sally Ride played in discovering what had caused the Challenger to explode on January 28, 1986. Wikipedia has this explanation of the Rogers Commission findings: “After her death in 2012, Major General Donald J. Kutyna revealed that she had discreetly provided him with key information about O-rings, namely that they become stiff at low temperatures. This led to discovery of the cause of the explosion. The temperature at the time of the launch was 36. O-Rings were not safe below 50. To protect her source, this information was fed to Richard Feynman. Ride was even more disturbed by revelations of NASA dysfunctional management decision-making and risk-assessment processes. According to Roger Boisjoly, who was one of the engineers that warned of the technical problems that led to the Challenger disaster, after the entire work force of Morton-Thiokol shunned him, Ride was the only public figure to show support for him when he went public with his pre-disaster warnings. Ride hugged him publicly to show her support for his efforts.”

The Rogers Commission submitted the report on June 6, 1986. I remember how a good friend of ours who was roommates with “Smitty” (the Challenger commander, Michael Smith) at the United States Naval Academy, was shocked and saddened to learn of his good friend’s death, especially when it was preventable. I was then working for Performance Learning Systems, Inc. of Emerson, N.J., one of the nation’s largest teacher-training firms, and I had been assigned to interview Christa McAuliff, the teacher in space, upon her return. I had just spoken to her husband the night before the launch to confirm the various procedures I was to follow to send her the interview questions. I still remember coming out of the college class I was teaching at St. Ambrose University in Davenport, Iowa, and turning on the radio to learn of the deaths of McAuliff and all seven of the crew members.

Sally Ride quit NASA in 1987, saying, “I am not ready to fly again now. I think there are very few astronauts who are ready to fly again now.” She commented on how astronauts have to have a real trust in NASA.

CONCLUSION: SIMILARITIES

Interestingly enough, Marlee Matlin (whose documentary I will review next) won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1987 for the 1986 film “Children of a Lesser God.” This is the same timeline, the same backdrop of historical events then affecting Sally Ride’s life, including her work with the Rogers Commission investigating the Challenger explosion. That investigation triggered Ride’s resignation from NASA and she spent the latter part of her life as a Professor of Physics at the University of California in San Diego, when Stanford snubbed her. (Sidney Drell, who had recruited her to come to Stanford, resigned from CISAC in protest when no department at Stanford was willing to offer Sally Ride a position.) Sally also remained a director of Cal Space until 1996, retiring as a Professor Emeritus from San Diego in 2007. Ride and O’Shaughnessy formed a company to encourage young girls to enter careers in math and science.

Another interesting 35-year-old fact is that the director of Marlee Matlin’s Oscar-winning performance in 1986-1987 was Rainda Haines. Haines was the first female director to have her film (“Children of a Lesser God”) nominated for Best Picture at the 1987 Oscars.