Richard Ades

Growing up poor and desperate in small-town Ohio

Ruth (Jessica Barden) and her brother, Blaze (Gus Halper), struggle to stay afloat in the Ohio-made drama Holler. (Photos courtesy of IFC Films)

By Richard Ades

Some have compared Holler to Winter’s Bone, as both depict a desperate life as seen through the eyes of a teenage girl. Then again, lots of flicks have been influenced by that 2010 classic. The flick that Holler most reminds me of is Annie Silverstein’s modest 2020 release, Bull.

In both cases, the young heroine has been left with heavy responsibilities because her mother is in jail. And in each, she finds herself attracted to a man who’s eager to lead her into a life of crime.

Made and set in small-town Ohio, the new film centers on Ruth (Jessica Barden), who lives with older brother Blaze (Gus Halper) in a house without running water because they can’t afford to pay the utility bills. Ruth is on the brink of high school graduation, and Blaze is determined to give her a chance at a brighter future by pushing her off to college. Ruth refuses, however, being unwilling to leave her brother when he has few prospects for employment.

Then the two are offered a job by Hark (Austin Amelio), who runs a shady recycling business. The job pays well, but it involves the illegal and potentially dangerous task of collecting aluminum, copper and other scrap materials from factories that have closed down.

Much to her protective brother’s chagrin, Ruth seems to take to the work and, worse yet, shows signs of taking to Hark. Is her future doomed before it has a chance to get started?

Holler is the feature debut of writer/director Nicole Riegel, who sets the unsentimental (and reportedly semi-autographical) tale in her hometown of Jackson, Ohio. The picture it paints of daily life is not likely to turn Jackson into a tourist destination.

Like rural areas all over the Midwest and Appalachia, the town is cursed by a lack of work and a rampant drug problem—the latter being represented by Ruth’s mom, Rhonda (Pamela Adlon), who ran afoul of the law after becoming addicted to pain killers. Ruth is fortunate to have the support of her brother and a kind family friend, Linda (Becky Ann Baker), but the clear message is that her only hope for a happy future is to escape.

British actor Barden leads the competent cast with her scrappy portrayal of Ruth, and director of photography Dustin Lane captures the drama of the girl’s life with gritty (if sometimes frustratingly dark) images. That helps to compensate for a script that is a bit predictable and more than a bit vague on a key question: Namely, how can college even be an option for Ruth when she has no way of paying the costs that routinely leave middle-class kids in debt?

Like Bull, Holler also has an ending that will dissatisfy some viewers, though for different reasons. While the earlier film left things largely unsettled, this one tries too hard to tie up loose ends. Still, it’s an impressive debut with an important message, even if that message is delivered imperfectly.

Rating: 3½ stars (out of 5)

Holler (rated R) opens June 11 at select theaters and VOD outlets.

Trans athletes fight for the right to compete

Andraya Yearwood is a trans female athlete from Connecticut whose success in track and field events has been cited as evidence by backers of efforts to ban trans girls and women from competing.

By Richard Ades

Mack Beggs has a problem. The Texas teen is an accomplished wrestler, but the state forces him to wrestle girls. That’s because Mack was born a female, and though he’s begun transitioning to male, Texas law requires young athletes to compete in the gender they were assigned at birth.

Mack is one of three teenagers portrayed in Changing the Game, a documentary directed by Mark Barnett that examines the controversial issue of trans athletes in a way that’s compassionate, thoughtful and evenhanded. It’s also comprehensive, as each of the youths lives in a different state, and each state has a different way of dealing with the issue. Also featured are:

• Sarah Rose Huckman, a competitive skier who lives in New Hampshire, which allows trans athletes to compete in their chosen gender, but only if they’ve undergone reassignment surgery.

• Andraya Yearwood, a track athlete who lives in Connecticut, which allows all athletes to compete in their preferred gender regardless of where they are in the reassignment process.

On the surface, Andraya is the most fortunate of the three since her state takes the most liberal attitude. However, the film reveals that law and public opinion don’t always jibe. When the tall and muscular Andraya wins a track victory, her success is marred by critics who feel she has an unfair advantage over her competitors. (In fact, backers of recent Ohio efforts to ban trans female athletes from competing have cited as evidence the success of Andraya and another trans Connecticut track star who also appears in the film.)

Mack Beggs is a trans male wrestler who’s forced to compete with girls due to restrictive Texas laws.

Like the states they live in, the three featured athletes are a study in contrast. Mack is shy and soft-spoken, while Sarah is an outgoing blogger who challenges her state’s trans rules. Finally, Andraya is a fierce competitor on the track but is uncomfortable over the criticism she receives, especially since she has a double-minority status as someone who’s both trans and African American.

Just as fascinating as the athletes themselves are the glimpses we’re given of the family members and friends who surround them. Many of them upend stereotypical expectations.

A case in point: Texas wrestler Mack is being raised by Southern Baptist grandparents who claim they’re as conservative as they come. In fact, grandmother Nancy is a deputy sheriff who owns several guns—and is prepared to use them to defend her grandson against anyone upset by his success on the mat. Meanwhile, grandfather Roy struggles to remember which pronouns to use with his grandson, but he apparently has a firm grasp of why Mack is who he is. “You gotta feel good about yourself,” Roy says.

The lesson seems to be that when someone has a personal connection to a trans person, political dogma and prejudice can’t help giving way to love and acceptance.

Just as impressive as the documentary’s portrayal of the athletes and their families is its depiction of their critics. While some deal in hateful stereotypes, others are more measured and logic-minded.

Those who think Mack shouldn’t be wrestling girls—something with which Mack himself agrees, of course—say his use of testosterone supplements makes it unfair. And people who argue that Andraya shouldn’t be competing with cisgender girls say it makes a mockery of Title IX rules that were designed to level the playing field for female athletes.

Such criticisms can’t be dismissed as groundless, showing that the issue is far from black and white. Then again, no one who believes in equality can dismiss these trans athletes’ right to be true to who they are and to pursue their dreams just like their cisgender counterparts.

Far from being a clinical study of a hot-button sports issue, Changing the Game is illuminating, heartwarming and inspiring. It deserves a gold medal.

Rating: 4½ stars (out of 5)

Changing the Game is available on Hulu beginning June 1.

Welsh town antes up to buy a racehorse

Jan Vokes (Toni Collette), her husband, Brian (Owen Teale, left), and Howard Davies (Damian Lewis) cheer on the racehorse they and their neighbors jointly own in *Dream Horse*. (Photos by Kerry Brown/Bleecker Street and Topic Studios)

If you like horses and you like Wales, Dream Horse has a lot to offer. But if you also like drama, you’ll find more of it by actually visiting Wales and taking in such impressive sights as Mount Snowdon or one of the country’s ancient castles.

Though based on the fascinating true story of a Welsh village that sponsored a racehorse named Dream Alliance, the filmmakers are too polite and easy-going to turn it into a scintillating tale. Director Euros Lyn and writer Neil McKay, both of whom have worked mainly in television, seem loathe to put either their characters or their viewers through much hassle as the film trots through its predictable paces.

The central protagonist is Jan Vokes (Toni Collette), who holds down two jobs and looks after her aging parents while her unemployed husband, Brian (Owen Teale), mostly lolls in front of the TV. Not surprisingly, Jan is a bit dissatisfied with her existence. So when a bar patron named Howard Davies (Homeland’s Damian Lewis) tells her about the practice of forming a syndicate to own a racehorse, she gloms onto the idea.

In no time, she’s passing out fliers and calling a town meeting for anyone who wants to ante up a few pounds for the chance to make a few more pounds. At first it seems like no one will show up, but then a whole bunch of people show up—only to be left in darkness as the electricity cuts out. No problem. Someone just drops a few coins in the meter and they’re off, literally, to the races.

The meeting largely sets the pattern for the rest of the film: Problems arise, only to be solved with a minimum of complications or surprises. The result could be called a feel-good movie, if you don’t mind also feeling a little bored.

Jan (Toni Collette) and Dream Alliance share a post-race moment.

The story really should have been more interesting, as it involves a frankly risky venture: The syndicate members have to buy a mare, mate her to a talented sire and hope she gives birth to an equally talented offspring.

One reason the flick doesn’t live up to its potential is that we don’t know enough about most of the characters to understand why they’re willing to take the chance. Since they live in a former mining town, it would seem logical that they need a new source of income, but we mostly get the sense that they simply want an escape from their everyday routines.

The same goes for the two characters we do know something about: Jan and Howard. Jan, as stated, is bored with her life and marriage, while Howard longs to escape from his humdrum job as a tax accountant. Actors Collette and Lewis are capable of creating interesting and complex characters, but here they’re never given the chance. (Their Welsh accents are impeccable, though.)

If there’s one thing that helps to make up for the film’s lack of drama, it’s the musical soundtrack. The action is regularly punctuated with uplifting ballads, the most uplifting of all being the Welsh national anthem, which is sung lustily prior to a key race.

Even more fun is the song that accompanies the closing credits. Paying homage to the country’s patron saint of pop music, the cast takes turns singing the Tom Jones hit “Delilah.” It’s an irresistible moment, one of the few in this good-natured but uninspired telling of what should have been an inspiring tale.

(Note: The real-life story of Dream Alliance was told earlier—and, by some accounts, better—in Louise Osmond’s 2015 documentary Dark Horse: The Incredible True Story of Dream Alliance. It is available through YouTube and other VOD outlets.)

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)

Dream Horse opens May 21 in theaters nationwide, including Central Ohio’s AMC Easton Towne Center 30, Cinemark Movies 16-Gahanna, Cinemark Polaris 18, Crosswoods 17 and Pickerington 17. It will be available through VOD outlets beginning June 11.

United by music, divided by ideology

Brothers Ilmar Gavilan (left) and Aldo Lopez-Gavilan play together after years of separation in *Los Hermanos*. (Photo by Melissa Bunni Elian)

By Richard Ades

Music. Politics. Brotherly love. These three forces collide in Los Hermanos (The Brothers), a bittersweet documentary about siblings separated by 90 miles of ocean and 50 years of economic policy.

Ilmar Gavilan and younger brother Aldo Lopez-Gavilan were born into a musical Cuban family. As boys, both were encouraged to develop the talents they so obviously inherited from their parents, but rather than bringing them together, this shared interest soon tore them apart.

Aldo, a budding pianist and composer, was only 8 when 14-year-old Ilmar set off to Moscow to hone his skills as a violinist. Eventually settling in the United States (the documentary doesn’t explain how this came about), Ilmar was free to perform with just about anyone except the brother he left back in Cuba. Due to U.S. trade embargoes and travel restrictions against the communist society, collaborations between the two were nearly impossible.

The documentary, fluidly directed by Marcia Jarmel and Ken Schneider, draws a stark contrast between the brothers’ lifestyles. While Ilmar plays and tours with a chamber group called the Harlem Quartet, Aldo deals with the limitations of making music in a poor and isolated country. In all of Cuba, we learn, there are only two or three performance spaces with decent pianos. And when Aldo does play in a concert, he often is responsible for prep work that anywhere else would be handled by backstage technicians.

One thing is clear. Despite the differences in their daily lives, the brothers are alike in their devotion to their chosen art form. Ilmar is a gifted violinist, while Aldo’s keyboard virtuosity, particularly when he’s playing one of his own rhythmically complex pieces at breakneck speed, marks him as a musical genius.

For this reason, as well as their family ties, the brothers desperately want to play and record an album together. When Ilmar succeeds in visiting his homeland for the first time in years, it looks like this just might happen. But it’s not until Barack Obama becomes president and relaxes trade and travel restrictions against the island that they’re completely free to share their talents.

They even arrange a joint tour of American concert halls, as documented in the film’s most joyful moments. However, joy turns to dread when then-presidential candidate Donald Trump begins appearing on TV screens and threatens to reverse Obama’s conciliatory policies toward Cuba.

As concerned as Los Hermanos is with politics and brotherhood, it’s really the music that ties the film together and constitutes its greatest strength. Specifically, it’s the music of Aldo, which makes up the bulk of what we hear throughout. Whether fast, jazzy and avant-garde or slow, simple and heartfelt, it never fails to impress and delight.

It’s the music, if one reads between the lines, that also makes the film’s most salient political point. We realize that the U.S., by cutting itself off from that island to the south, is not only depriving two brothers of each other’s company—it’s also depriving us of the enjoyment we could be getting from extraordinary Cuban talents like Aldo Lopez Gavilan.

Rating: 4½ stars (out of 5)

Los Hermanos will be available in theaters and via virtual screenings beginning May 14. For ticket information, visit hermanosbrothersfilm.info/screenings.

War-traumatized Marine seeks healing on the road

Iraq War combat veteran Jonathan Hancock walks across America in *Bastards’ Road*.

By Richard Ades

Jonathan Hancock can’t stop replaying a horrifying moment from his service in the Iraq War: After firing a grenade toward an enemy position, the Marine watches helplessly as a child runs onto the scene just in time to be blown up.

This slow-motion memory is one of many that torment Hancock as he undertakes a 5,800-mile journey in the documentary Bastards’ Road. Also on his mind are the many comrades he lost during the war, and the many more who were lost after their tours of duty due to PTSD and suicide.

It’s partly to prevent more losses—and partly to deal with his own internal demons—that Hancock decides to set off the morning of Sept. 11, 2015. Strapping on a backpack adorned with a Marine banner, he leaves his home in Maryland and begins walking. His plan is to take a roundabout cross-country route that reunites him with fellow comrades who survived the war, as well as the families of those who didn’t.

Directed and edited by Brian Morrison, the documentary takes its title from the nickname of Hancock’s Marine unit: “The Magnificent Bastards.” Visually, the film is a beautiful travelogue that includes some of America’s most striking vistas. Psychologically, it’s a revealing dissection of the lasting trauma that war can create in those who fight it.

At times, the two sides of the film’s personality don’t quite gel, especially when soothing ballads are heard during Hancock’s wanderings. They seem out of place because we know they don’t reflect his state of mind.

More convincing are the comments Hancock and others make about the changes war can create in a human being’s psyche: Battle takes away one’s belief that everyone is basically OK. It forces one to adopt behavior that would be inappropriate in ordinary life—and that must be abandoned if one survives and returns to that life. And it forces one to face the deaths of those who don’t survive. “We didn’t know how to deal with that,” Hancock says.

A recurrent theme of Bastards’ Road is the importance of veterans’ admitting when they need help. Due to macho pride—or to shame over their inability to get on with their lives as some of their comrades seem to have done—many don’t seek that help. Instead, they turn to drugs, alcohol or worse. One result, the film states, is that the suicide rate among veterans is 50 percent higher than it is among the general population.

To counteract this disturbing trend, Hancock meets with as many former comrades as he can during his journey. Together, they commiserate over what they went through in Iraq and encourage each other to get counseling if they need it.

Coincidentally, just two days after watching Bastards’ Road, I caught a 60 Minutes report on the “Ritchie Boys,” a secret U.S. military unit formed during World War II. The unit included many German Jews who had fled to America and were eager to use their knowledge and language skills to help defeat the Nazis. What struck me the most about the interviewed veterans was the pride these elderly men took in their long-ago war efforts.

That set me to thinking. Though PTSD obviously has been around since warfare was invented, it must be at least a little easier to recover from serving in a just and universally supported cause like WWII than it is to recover from serving in an ill-conceived and widely condemned conflict like the Iraq War. But that’s a question that Bastards’ Road never takes up.

Ignoring the politics of the situation, it instead focuses on the psychological damage the war did to those who fought it. In the process, it offers new insights to those who weren’t there and, hopefully, a bit of healing to those who were.

Rating: 3½ stars (out of 5)

Bastards’ Road is available via VOD/digital platforms and DVD beginning May 11.

Walken stars as Monsanto-fighting canola farmer

Percy Schmeiser (Christopher Walken) is in no mood to be pushed around in *Percy vs. Goliath*.

By Richard Ades

When a Canadian farmer takes on the chemical giant Monsanto in Percy vs. Goliath, the result is similar to what happens when an American farmer takes on DuPont in 2019’s Dark Waters: Determined to protect its profits, the corporation threatens the farmer with ruin by dragging him through endless court battles.

The films are also similar in another respect: Both are earnest but sometimes preachy efforts that score more points politically than they do dramatically.

The new flick does have one big advantage over its predecessor in that it stars Christopher Walken as heroic Saskatchewan farmer Percy Schmeiser. Even playing a mild-mannered character whose chief attribute is stoicism, Walken supplies enough edge and mystery to add a smidgeon of unpredictability to a tale that otherwise offers few surprises.

Percy, 73, has spent his life farming the land and using the agricultural techniques he inherited from his ancestors. “I’m a seed saver,” he explains, meaning he collects the seeds from each year’s crop and replants the ones that gave him the best yields. That makes it doubly surprising when Monsanto hits him with the claim that he’s been using its genetically modified canola seeds without paying for them.

Convinced he’s been unjustly accused, Percy turns to local lawyer Jackson Weaver (Zach Braff), who advises him to pay the demanded fine rather than risk a much bigger loss by forcing Monsanto to take him to court. When Percy refuses to back down, he ends up getting himself in more trouble than he could have anticipated. In the process, he gains the attention and support of activist Rebecca Salcau (Christina Ricci), who represents a nonprofit group that opposes Monsanto’s attempt to monopolize the international market with its expensive GMO products.

Screenwriters Garfield L. Miller and Hilary Pryor adapted the tale from an actual court case that happened around the turn of the millennium. Directed by Clark Johnson, it’s brought to the screen with cinematography (by Luc Monpellier) that’s sometimes more dramatic than the action. Besides being relentlessly low-key, the film undercuts itself with characters whose behavior occasionally seems inconsistent.

Percy is said to be shy, but he throws himself into a public speaking tour in an effort to publicize his case. Similarly, Jackson downplays his legal ability, but he argues cases like a Canadian Perry Mason.

Then there’s Rebecca, who mostly comes across as selfless and dedicated but at one point turns ruthless and manipulative. And Percy’s wife Louise (Roberta Maxwell) can’t seem to decide whether she supports her husband’s crusade or opposes it because of all the grief it’s brought the family.

None of these inconsistencies is impossible to believe. The problem is that the actors aren’t given enough opportunity to smooth out the transitions.

The film also makes other strange choices, such as when it leaves out the climactic moment in Percy’s first legal go-round with Monsanto. Instead, Percy and his lawyer simply review the development after the fact.

Percy vs. Goliath deserves credit for exploring a controversial issue that affects farmers not only in North America but worldwide. It falters only by failing to deliver its history lesson with all the drama it deserves.

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)

Percy vs. Goliath (PG-13) is available in theaters and from VOD outlets beginning April 30.

Prospective dad hires surrogate mom; complications ensue

Matt (Ed Helms) hires Anna (Patti Harrison) to have his baby in *Together Together*.

By Richard Ades

I used to look down on the term “gentle comedy,” sarcastically defining it to mean “a comedy that isn’t very funny.” Together Together may have changed my mind.

Written and directed by Nikole Beckwith (whose previous film output is limited to 2015’s Stockholm, Pennsylvania), the flick lives up to both aspects of the genre. It’s sometimes really funny, and it’s always exquisitely gentle yet incisive as it orbits two people drawn together by both contractual requirements and emotional needs.

Matt (Ed Helms) is a 40-something man who’s tired of waiting for the perfect partner to come along before he can start a family. Anna (Patti Harrison) is a 20-something woman who answers Matt’s ad for a surrogate to bring to term the fetus formed by his sperm and an anonymous donor’s egg.

On paper, their duties are straightforward. Anna will give birth to the baby, then disappear as Matt begins experiencing the joys of fatherhood. But it’s all complicated by the months of shared responsibilities that must precede the birth, not to mention the years of pain and loneliness that brought each of them to where they are now.

We learn something about Matt’s unsuccessful attempts to find a life partner, and we learn more about Anna’s past traumas: While still a teenager, she got pregnant, had a son and gave him up for adoption. It’s an experience that interrupted her education and drove a seemingly permanent wedge between her and her family.

Ordinarily, a film that brings together a lonely man and an equally lonely woman is setting us up for a romantic connection, but Beckwith offers little hope for such a development. Instead, Matt and Anna establish boundaries, then cross them, redefine them and attempt to re-establish them as they stumble into something resembling friendship. But is any kind of friendship a good idea in a relationship that’s predestined to end after nine months?

The trickiness of their situation is explored in sometimes cringingly awkward scenes involving counseling sessions and such prenatal traditions as picking out a crib and hosting a baby shower. It’s also explored more hilariously in interactions with characters such as their sarcastic sonogram technician (Sufe Bradshaw) and Anna’s self-involved but occasionally perceptive co-worker (Julio Torres).

As welcome as the latter scenes’ laughs are, the film’s real source of joy is the delicate chemistry established by its two leads.

Helms’s Matt is an occasional blunderer whose heart nevertheless serves as a reliable rudder. Harrison’s Anna approaches life with a combination of amusement and determination that serves as an equally trustworthy guide. Together, despite their differences in age and temperament, the two sometimes manage to complement each other in ways that render their lives more bearable.

That makes the apparent temporariness of their bonding all the more bittersweet.

Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)

Together Together (rated R) is available in select theaters, including Central Ohio’s AMC Easton Towne Center 30, Cinemark Polaris 18 and Crosswoods 17. It will be available digitally beginning May 11.

His feet say yes, but his religion says no

*Hasidic Jew Moshe Yehuda (Jos Laniado) and dance instructor Viviana Nieves (Karina Smirnoff) ponder how to enter a tango contest without touching.*

By Richard Ades

Oh, those crazy Orthodox Jews. What bizarre dilemmas will their beliefs get them into next?

I’ve mentioned before that I’m a fan of Shtisel, the Israeli TV series about an ultra-Orthodox family living in Jerusalem. It’s partly because of my affection for the show that I thought Tango Shalom might be worth a look. Now making the rounds of Jewish film festivals (though it actually was shot several years back), it’s the story of Moshe Yehuda, a Hasidic Brooklynite who wants to dance the Argentine tango.

Since Orthodox men are forbidden to even shake hands with women who aren’t their wives, doing the tango with another woman is clearly off-limits. Yet Moshe (Jos Laniado) has what he believes are extenuating circumstances.

Moshe desperately needs money to support his family and to help younger brother Rahamim (Claudio Laniado) pay for his upcoming wedding. And if he wins an upcoming tango competition, he’ll take home enough cash to solve both problems. Surely the rules can be bent just this once?

Shtisel is full of such collisions between faith and personal needs and wants, but its approach is a bit more nuanced than the movie’s. Well, more than a bit. It’s like the difference between dropping a cherry on a sundae and dousing it with high-fructose corn syrup. For starters, some of Tango Shalom’s characters are such over-the-top stereotypes that it’s impossible to see them as real people.

Oy vey, do they drop a lot of Yiddish words! And oy gevalt, are they emotional! Example: When Rahamim shows up at a family dinner after shaving off his Hasidic beard, his mother (Renee Taylor) doesn’t just give him the evil eye. She bawls at full volume, even though her son’s fiancée and prospective in-laws are present.

Moshe, fortunately, is portrayed in a more restrained manner, but even he has his cartoonish moments. When a non-Orthodox woman tries to shake his hand, he recoils in horror like he’s just seen a ghost. And when a female doctor wants to perform an examination involving his private parts, he flees her office without even bothering to cover his backside (which probably violates a few Hasidic rules on its own).

Moshe (Jos Laniado) is comforted by the one woman he’s allowed to touch, wife Raquel (Judi Beecher).

A true family affair, Tango Shalom was directed by Gabriel Bologna and was co-written by his late father, actor Joseph Bologna, and Jos and Claudio Laniado, who are brothers in real life as well as onscreen. In addition, Joseph Bologna was the husband of cast member Taylor and played Father Anthony, one of several non-Jewish clerics Moshe turns to for spiritual guidance after failing to receive helpful advice from his own rabbi. Finally, the film’s lively score was co-written by the director’s wife, Zizi Bologna, and Zoe Tiganouria.

Other cast members include Judi Beecher as Moshe’s long-suffering wife, Lainie Kazan as Rahamim’s prospective mother-in-law and a surprisingly good Karina Smirnoff (of Dancing With the Stars fame) as a widowed dance instructor who urges Moshe to enter the tango contest with her because she has financial needs of her own.

Despite its excesses and occasional inaccuracies—for one, Orthodox people do not as a rule enter non-Jewish houses of worship, as Moshe does early on—it’s hard to dislike Tango Shalom entirely. It creates a quirky situation and works it out in an ingenious way while beating a drum for religious tolerance. But it does all this in such an exaggerated, farcical way that only fans of old-fashioned Borsht Belt humor are likely to find it irresistible.

Rating: 2½ stars (out of 5)

Tango Shalom can be viewed online through May 2 (in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia only) as part of Pittsburgh’s JFilm Festival. Visit filmpittsburgh.org/films/tango-shalom.

Man searches for past shaped by racial prejudice

Columbus resident David Bynum recaps his search for unknown family members in From a Place of Love–My Adoption Journey, a modest documentary he wrote and directed himself. For a review, visit the Columbus Free Press website.

Young activists work to revive former mill town

The Place That Makes Us, directed by Karla Murthy, focuses on efforts to rescue Youngstown decades after its steel mills closed down. Read the review on the Columbus Free Press website.