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Movie Review
Janice Meredith
E. Mason Hopper

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Like February’s showing of The Wizard of Oz in Wilmington, this showing of Janice Meredith was part of Ohio Goes to the Movies. And like my review of that event, this post is not really a review of the movie, but of the overall experience. On the other hand, since I’m quite certain that readers are nowhere near as familiar with Janice Meredith as they are with that Oz movie, and because it is pretty impressive, I’ll not ignore the film completely.

The venue for the showing was the Arcanum Opera House, built in 1889. Arcanum is a small town not far from Greenville, where actor Walter Law spent his formative years before moving to Dayton. Law appears in Janice Meredith, which is the connection to Ohio that led to its inclusion in the Ohio Goes to the Movies schedule.

The building served its original purpose until 1928, then played a variety of roles before being put to use housing Arcanum’s village offices. When the village government planned to construct a new building for their offices and move out, the opera house was in serious danger. The construction did happen, and the opera house was vacated in 2020, but a group was formed in 2019 to save it. The Arcanum Preservation Society has plans to restore the building and has made some serious progress in that direction.

Walter Law appeared in more than 40 movies during his career. His earliest film work was with Fox Film in New Jersey. He moved to Hollywood in 1920 and continued his career there. He most often appeared in supporting roles, and that is the case here. Law plays General Charles Lee, one of General Washington’s subordinates. That was essentially the entire description of his character I had on Friday, and I did not spot any reasonable candidates during the opera house screening. Although the quality isn’t nearly as good as what we saw on Friday, the movie is available on YouTube, so, armed with a somewhat better description of the character, I made a serious attempt to find him by picking out and studying scenes with Washington. No luck. I know he’s in there somewhere, but I can’t tell you where. I can tell you where that basket on the left side of the picture ended up. I was there with friends Terry and Sue. Everyone was given numbered tickets when we arrived, and Sue’s number won her a nice movie-watching kit.

Prior to Friday, about all I knew of the film was that it was a romance set during the American Revolution. Just before Friday’s showing, I learned it was “a little longer than most silent films”, and later learned that meant 11 reels or 140 minutes. But it wasn’t just its length that set the movie apart. It was a true epic with scenes of big battles and social gatherings, and extended shots tracking galloping horses, including Paul Revere’s. There is notable comic relief aided by W.C. Fields’ first motion picture appearance. Following the battle at Lexington, three of the wounded — or maybe ghosts of those killed — arise and form the trio of Archibald Willard’s Spirit of ’76 and march toward the camera while subsequent battles appear below them.

By the film’s end, I could not help but think this was the Gone with the Wind of the silent era. Like the Civil War epic released just fifteen years later, Janice Meredith features the beautiful daughter of a wealthy landowner, in love with an unconventional fellow whom her father definitely does not approve of, all while the war rages around her. It’s not entirely the same, though. When Janice Meredith ends, its protagonists are about to be married rather than separated, and this time the rebels win.

Movie Review (JK)
The Wizard of OZ
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

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Of course, I’m just kidding about reviewing the greatest movie ever made. What I am reviewing is seeing The Wizard of Oz in a theater for only the second time. The first time was in 2022, when it was shown in theaters nationwide to commemorate Judy Garland’s 100th birthday. This time, it was shown as part of Ohio Goes to the Movies, a Signature Event of America 250-Ohio.

Ohio Goes to the Movies sponsors free showings of movies with Ohio connections at locations spread throughout the state. One of The Wizard of Oz showings was in Wilmington on Sunday. That’s where my daughter lives, and she and my grandson attended too. Not every seat was filled, but the event’s popularity prompted a second showing. Megan and Wes got there early and secured tickets for the first showing. Good job.

The movie is connected to Ohio through having two major roles played by actors from here. I was aware that Margaret Hamilton, who played Almira Gulch and the Wicked Witch of the West, was from Cleveland, but I don’t believe I knew that Uncle Henry was played by a fellow from Xenia, Charley Grapewin. Grapwin literally left home to join the circus and first played Uncle Henry in the 1903 Broadway stage production of The Wizard of Oz. Xenia is about twenty miles north of Wilmington.

There were some prizes awarded by raffle, but I didn’t bother to register, so I’m not sure how that worked. There were also some live games being administered by familiar-looking characters, and the concession stand staff was very much into the spirit of the day.

Once we were in our seats, all of the Oz folks except for the Scarecrow (possibly too busy selling popcorn) hung out near the screen for a round of trivia. I would not have done well and stayed quiet. Did you know the flying monkeys were paid $25 per “swoop”? Everybody knows what came next, and it was just as cool as I remembered it.

I think I’ll probably attend at least one more Ohio Goes to the Movies event. 1935’s Annie Oakley will play at Greenville’s Wayne Theater in July, and I’d like to be there. Maybe I’ll see Buffalo Bill Cody or Chief Sitting Bull at the concession stand.

Movie Review
Frogman
Rotting Press, Feral Child Films

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Frogman is a horror movie. I’m pretty sure the last horror movie that I paid to see in a theater was The Exorcist in 1973. I did that because I liked the book. I went to see Frogman because I liked the festival.

The legend of the Loveland Frog/Frogman can be traced to 1955. It got a little boost in 1972, but only recently has this creature of widely varied descriptions been seen as a crypid to embrace, promote, and maybe make some money off of. Perhaps the first example of the latter was the musical play Hot Damn! It’s the Loveland Frog in 2014. I missed it then and only became aware of it as the second attempt (AFAIK) to make something of the legend — the Frogman Festival — was taking shape. That first festival, which I attended, took place in 2023, with the fourth annual event set for March 2026.

Just over a year ago, Hot Damn! It’s the Loveland Frog was revived for a few performances in Loveland itself. I jumped at the chance to attend and reported on it here. About the same time, plans were announced for a city-connected Return of the Frogman Festival, which would take place that October and every leap year thereafter. I was out of town during that festival and may have been most disappointed by a missed opportunity to see the recently released Frogman movie. When I heard of plans for an October 2025 showing, I jumped again.

By the time I arrived at the Loveland Stage Company theater, I had read many of the reviews at IMDB and was prepared for a pretty bad movie. In hindsight, I think some of those negative reviews were well off the mark. To be clear, there are probably at least as many positive reviews as there are negative. It’s just that the negative ones had made more of an impression on me. After seeing the movie, I’m firmly in the “not as bad as expected” camp.

The audience no doubt had something to do with that. Of course, anything connected to the Loveland Frog is best experienced in Loveland. This crowd was there to have fun — several wore frog suits — not to be frightened. There are a few something-suddenly-jumps-at-you scenes, but they were, at least in this setting, pretty ineffective. I heard no gasps or screams. I did hear many laughs.

The Loveland of the movie is not the Loveland of the viewing. The movie was shot in Stillwater, MN, which isn’t all that much bigger than Loveland, OH (19,000 vs. 13,000), but somehow feels like it is, and the St. Croix River really is much bigger than the Little Miami. Some scenes in Fargo were shot in Stillwater, so there is that.

The Frogman of the movie may or may not be the Frogman of the legend. The frogish creature in the movie only appears in very brief glimpses and usually with less than optimal lighting and focus. My size appraisals range from about the size of a large cat to bigger than the biggest grizzly. In the novel The Exorcist, much of the supernatural goings on happened out of sight or were caught ever so briefly from the corner of one’s eye, leaving the reader to accept them or not. In the movie, that ambiguity got lost. There is no doubt that I, her on-screen mother, and everybody else in the theater saw Linda Blair’s head spin like a top. That, in my opinion, was a major shortcoming of the movie. Although the thing appearing in those on-screen Frogman glimpses might not exactly match any of the descriptions reported in real life, the quality of the glimpses is sort of similar. 

While writing this, I’ve learned that Frogman is available for streaming from several services, including my go-to freebie Tubi. I’m rather happy that I didn’t know that earlier, as I might have just watched it in my living room and missed the fun gathering at the theater. After being alerted to this by IMDB, I searched for it on Tubi and found it listed beside a 1972 movie named Frogs with Ray Milland and Sam Elliot. In my mind, I had already awarded the Frogman promotional artwork bonus points for its creative facial image formed by branches. After seeing that there’s a good chance it intentionally resembles that of the earlier film, I’m just going to double those points.

 

Movie Review
Ohio: Wild at Heart
MacGillivray Freeman

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This just might be the ultimate selfie. It’s a big-screen movie ordered up by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources starring the natural resources of Ohio. Yeah, that selfie label is admittedly a real stretch — not only because it’s a 45-minute-long movie rather than an in-your-face snapshot, but also because it wasn’t the ODNR holding the camera. That was the talented folks at MacGillivray Freeman, makers of many outstanding features, including the subject of my first-ever movie review.

Of course, I watched Ohio: Wild at Heart at the Robert D. Lindner Family OMNIMAX® Theater in Cincinnati. I was there at its first screening on Friday. This is the third theater, after Toledo and Dayton, to add the movie to its schedule. It will soon be added by several others, as listed here.

The movie begins with the story of the recovery of the state’s bald eagle population from just four nesting pairs in 1979 to nearly 1000 nests today. The successful reintroduction of trumpeter swans to the state, with their removal from Ohio’s threatened species list just over a year ago, is a story told later in the movie. Other successful conservation projects, including major cleanups of the state’s waterways, are also documented. Governor DeWine, who was instrumental in getting the movie produced, emphasizes the word “education” when discussing it. He sees making Ohioans aware of what they have as an important mission. He has said, “If people love the rivers. If they love the lakes. If they love all the beauty of this state, they’re going to take care of it.”

MacGillivray Freeman does a wonderful job of capturing “all the beauty of this state” on the screen. There are gorgeous shots of swans on mirror-smooth lakes, and stunning aerial views of eagles in flight and in nests, of kayaks on rivers, and hikers, bikers, and dog sledders on trails. Yes, dog sledders! Before I saw this movie, this lifelong resident of the Buckeye state had no idea that dog sledding was a thing anywhere within its borders. That’s education.

There are people in the movie. Governor DeWine makes an appearance along with his wife Fran. There are enlightening conversations with folks enjoying all of the things I’ve mentioned, plus bird spotting, firefly watching, and much more. Narration is supplied by a true Ohio natural resource. Archie Griffin, the world’s only two-time Heisman Trophy winner, who was born in Ohio and played his high school, college, and professional football in the state, nails it.

The movie’s website highlights the quote “When we take care of nature, nature takes care of us.” I don’t know if I missed that exact line in the movie or if it’s a minor paraphrasing of a line I did hear and was impressed by enough to make a note of: “We make a commitment to restoring nature because nature restores us.” Both lines are insightful and worth repeating. I have no doubt that Ohio: Wild at Heart will do a fine job of making Ohioans aware of what we have, and I’ve a very strong hunch that it’s going to make a lot of other folks aware of it too.

Movie Review
Porcelain War
Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev

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I have never seen a movie quite like this before. It is classified as a documentary, and it documents a war that is going on at this very minute. As I took my seat in the empty theater, I found myself thinking of the newsreels that were still sometimes shown in front of feature films when I was a kid. Those thoughts weren’t entirely off base even though the upcoming scenes were shot a couple of years ago. Those scenes are not staged. The people in them are not actors. But Porcelain War is a whole lot more than a newsreel. Yes, it shows us near-current events but it also shows us people — artistic, talented, and determined people.

The three stars of the movie are identified as “participants”. One, Slava Leontyev, is also identified as a co-director. Another, Andrey Stefanov, is the movie’s primary cinematographer, a task he undertook for the first time. The third, Anya Stasenko, is also the movie’s Associate Producer. All three are artists who chose to remain in Ukraine to make art as a form of resistance to the 2022 Russian Invasion in addition to more conventional forms of resistance.

The porcelain of the title refers to the small ceramic sculptures that husband and wife Slava and Anya produce. Slava creates the plain white figures that Anya paints. There are scenes of creative sculpting and painting, and there are scenes where the figures serve as decoration or as a member of the cast. There are scenes where the little pieces of art are literally the only bright spot in a screen filled with the devastation of war. They are ever-present reminders of the fight against the destruction of a culture by destroying its art.

The two co-directors’ first in-person meeting was at the film’s premier at the Sundance Film Festival. Their separation by distance and language makes the results of their collaboration even more impressive. Andrey’s “training” by Bellomo’s stateside team had the same issues but also overcame them with quite obvious success.

Two other teams made major contributions to the movie. One is Poland’s BluBlu Studios which created 7,000 hand-drawn frames to animate some of Anya’s artwork in one of the most seamless blendings of media I’ve ever seen. The second is the band DakhaBrakha whose music seems to fit perfectly. The band does not appear in the body of the film but can be seen performing behind the end credits.

It looks like tomorrow (Jan 9) is the last day Mariemont Theater is showing Porcelain War. I know that the recent snow might make that a tough trip even if you are attracted to the movie. That’s a bummer but the movie is worth braving some snow if you’re close enough or watching for showings elsewhere and on other dates if you’re not.

Movie Review
Deep Sky
IMAX Original

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I have not followed every detail of the astounding James Webb Space Telescope’s beginnings but I have been aware of some of the bigger events. I knew when it left Earth atop an Ariane 5 rocket on December 25, 2021, and I listened to reports of its eighteen gold-coated mirrors being unfolded and aligned. I marveled at those first images shared with the world on July 12, 2022. They were impressive on the tiny 6-inch screen on my phone, more so on my compact laptop’s 13-inch screen, and better yet on my small-by-modern-standards 42-inch TV. I need a bigger word than impressive now that I’ve seen some of them on a 72-foot OMNIMAX screen.

Deep Sky was released on October 20, 2023, and has been playing in several theaters spread around the world for a while. It began its run at Cincinnati’s Robert D. Lindner Family OMNIMAX® Theater with an 11:30 showing on Friday, February 2. I was there.

The front end of the movie covers the telescope’s construction, launch, and deployment. Some big numbers were tossed out concerning distance, number of people involved, etc. One that caught my attention was the count of Single Points of Failure (SPOFs). A SPOF is something that causes an entire system to fail if it does. It’s a concept I’m familiar with from my working days in software. A definition found online ends with “mission-critical systems should not have a SPOF”. According to Deep Sky, the deployment sequence for JWST had 344 of them. Not one caused a problem.`

There is a fair amount of computer-generated graphics in the film to illustrate the operation of the telescope in space and other impossible-to-capture views. They are wonderfully done and visually quite stunning on the big dome. Giant images from computers are great and may even equal those produced by the telescope in terms of visual impact but knowing that something you are seeing is an actual capture of something in the real world generates a whole different type of awe. 

There is a lot of awe present in the movie itself. It is apparent in every one of the program participants who put in an appearance. These are people who are truly excited to be part of a project that is advancing mankind’s knowledge of this world and their enthusiasm is more than obvious.

Much of the buzz generated by JWST comes from never-before-seen objects it has captured such as galaxies older than any previously recorded. These are well represented in Deep Sky. JWST has also provided better images of things that have been studied for some time. One example is the supernova of 1604 which was observed by Galileo. Another is the “Pillars of Creation” first imaged by the Hubble telescope in 1995. A JWST-generated image of the Pillars is in the movie poster that begins this article. A Hubble version can be seen here. NASA has made bunches of information about JWST and a huge number of images collected by the telescope available here. As I said, those images are truly impressive even on a display screen that fits in your pocket. You don’t have to attend a showing of Deep Sky to be gobsmacked by those awesome pictures but a 72-foot diameter dome jam-packed edge-to-edge with glowing galaxies will gobsmack you a bit differently and maybe a little harder.

While I was at the Cincinnati Museum Center, I took in Jane Goodall: Reasons for Hope which was showing ahead of Deep Sky and I snapped a picture of a promotion for the upcoming Pompeii: The Exhibition. All images in this article other than the first two are of a dynamic promotional display in the museum. I very much enjoyed the Goodall movie and there are some sections that take advantage of the IMAX format. I already have my ticket for the Pompeii exhibit which opens February 16. Coordinated with that opening is a return of
Volcanoes: The Fires of Creation which was the first movie shown in the Lindner Theater following its conversion to digital in 2018. I reported on seeing it here.

For both movies that I saw, the familiar psychedelic light tunnel video that traditionally kicks things off was replaced by a video that points out some of the theater’s features while entertaining eyes and ears much like the light tunnel. An attendant told me they have been using the new video for about a month and that the light tunnel is still around and used for some movies.  

Movie Review
King Kong
Radio Pictures

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No, I’m not really going to review an eighty-seven-year-old movie that just about everybody has seen multiple times. But I am going to review the experience of seeing it on the big screen for the first time ever. The original King Kong was released on April 7, 1933, so it’s not quite eighty-seven years old but it’s mighty close. My first glimpse — and it wasn’t a whole lot more than that — was sometime in the mid-1950s.

It was on TV, of course, on what was decidedly NOT a big screen. It was probably in 1957 when the movie made its national television debut. The timing likely wasn’t considered “late-night” then and certainly wouldn’t be now, but it was late enough that I had to beg for an exemption to my normal bedtime. Although I was successful, I did not get the exemption’s full benefit. I fell asleep before the movie started, woke up to watch a few scenes through bleary eyes, then dozed off again before the big ending. Today I can’t even remember what portions of the movie I saw. I remember that I saw all of the giant gorilla, not just his face or hand, and I remember it was dark. Seeing Kong in his entirety narrows it down some. The fact that it was dark does not. The entire film was darkened to obscure, reportedly, some of the bloodier scenes and some details of Fay Wray’s femininity. Fay Wray had lots of femininity.

Since then, there have been several viewings that I did manage to stay awake for. Although the screens were considerably larger and clearer than the one parked in our living room sixty-some years ago, all were on a TV. I think the movie became a favorite the instant I actually saw it all. The story was fairly creative but not particularly complex, and the acting was only a few steps removed from the silent film era. Neither was what attracted me to the film. I appreciated its craftsmanship and the window on history it provided. Stop-action animation and rear projection on matte paintings were not invented for King Kong but they had never been used anywhere near to this extent.

The window on history I mentioned exists largely because the movie was made as a window on, if not the future, the leading edge of the present. The film’s exciting finish features the Empire State Building which had just been completed in 1931. It was then the world’s tallest and would hold that title for almost forty years. The armed airplanes that attack the doomed giant were seen as “the most modern of weapons”. Some were models built for the film but some scenes show actual state-of-the-art military planes from a nearby U.S. Naval airfield. From two decades into the twenty-first century, those bi-planes look pretty primitive. Realizing that they represented the most advanced technology of the day definitely helps generate a real appreciation for the film’s special effects created with contemporary tools.

On Sunday, I finally got to see the big guy on the big screen. Fathom Events put together a one day showing at Regal Cinema. Something I’d recently learned was that King Kong was the first movie with a thematic score. This means it was written to coordinate with and enhance on-screen actions rather than just provide some background music. Sunday’s showing included the opening and closing overture which had naturally been cut from every time-constrained TV version I’d ever seen.

The experience was nearly everything I’d hoped it would be. The wall-filling Kong was more frightening than any smaller version I’d seen, and Wray was every bit as alluring as I remembered, and her screams, with an assist from the theater’s sound system, were even louder. That thematic score, which I paid a little more attention to than usual, benefited from the sound system, too. If I ignored the fact that I was sitting in a wide well-padded recliner with NBA sized legroom, I could almost imagine I was watching like it was 1933.

The experience was only “nearly everything I’d hoped” for one reason. In the lead up to Sunday, I’d read a review of the movie which was really a preview of a 2011 screening. It’s here. My anticipation grew when it talked of “seeing it in a packed theater on a big screen with an audience”. I got the big screen but I did not get the packed theater. There were less than twenty people at the 1:00 show. I know that old B&W movies just generally do not draw big crowds but there was more going on here. COVID19, the disease caused by a Coronavirus, was growing. Large gatherings had been banned and the NBA, NCAA, MLB, and other groups had canceled events. In Ohio, schools had already been closed by the governor and within a couple of hours of me leaving the theater, he would close all bars and restaurants. Many museums and other institutions have closed on their own.

That’s why Sunday’s experience was about as far from a packed theater as is possible. Yesterday (Tuesday) the theater itself was closed and so was the Empire State Building observation deck. I’ve only been to the top of the Empire State Building once. It was in the early ’70s when King Kong was no more than forty years old. In a narrow space on an inside wall. there was a heart with the words “King Kong loves Fay Wray”. I’d like to think it’s still there but probably not. 

Movie Review
Cuba
Golden Gate 3D

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A new film will open in the reworked all digital Robert D. Lindner Family OMNIMAX Theater on June 7. A few previously shown films have appeared as part of the theater’s classic series but Cuba: Journey to the Heart of the Caribbean is only the second new production to be shown since the theater reopened in December following a long closure. A post on the reopening and the first film, Volcanoes, is here. There were two members-only showings of the new movie on Saturday and I jumped at the chance to attend. Volcanoes is an awesome movie; Cuba might be even better.

It’s the work of Golden Gate 3D, which I’ve now learned was responsible for two of my favorite 70-millimeter real film IMAX movies: Jerusalem and National Parks Adventure. The images are superb, from scenic panoramas to the microscopic; From world stopping slow motion to the super acceleration of time-lapse. The three storylines do a fine job of holding the film together and moving it along. Then there’s the music. ¡Ay caramba, the music! It grabbed me from the start and never let go through slow soaring overhead shots to frantic-paced dance scenes. I expected to see a long list of contributors when I scanned the credits but it appears that just two men composed all the original music: Andres Levin, who was also the film’s music supervisor, and José María Vitier. Wonderful stuff, fellows.

The storylines involve Havana’s official historian, an aspiring ballerina, and a pair of scientists. Eusebio Leal doesn’t just study history, he preserves it. He is responsible for saving and renovating many of the city’s numerous endangered buildings. He is also responsible for the only direct quote I recall from the movie: “Architecture is frozen music and we are a people who love music”.

It was a major surprise to me to learn that the world’s largest ballet school is in Havana. The movie follows Patricia Torres, one of the Cuban National Ballet School’s approximately 3,000 students, as she works to realize her dream of joining the Cuban National Ballet Company. Fernando Bretos and Daria Siciliano study Cuba’s coral reefs to discover why they are actually recovering while those in other parts of the world continue to decline. Their work provides the filmmakers an opportunity to show off their considerable underwater skills in recording some beautiful scenes.

Two of my favorite scenes are the result of underwater microscopic time-lapse recording. Siciliano tells us that the coral is not inanimate stone but is simply living at a different pace than us. The cameras then demonstrate. The scenes instantly reminded me of liquid light shows I saw in the 1960s. The great music certainly encouraged the idea that I was watching a brilliantly colored high-def high-tech version of hippy era stagecraft.

There was another flashback of sorts in plenty of shots of the legendary 1950s American automobiles that resourceful Cubans have kept in operation despite the long-standing complete embargo on parts. Of course, keeping the mostly brightly colored vehicles running is not the only place where the embargo and generally poor economy have led to uncommon ingenuity. Agriculture is one such area that is highlighted in the film.

The lack of money and materials is evident in the film from the aforementioned “classic” cars to the deterioration of buildings. Cuba: Journey to the Heart of the Caribbean doesn’t avoid or downplay this aspect of the politically isolated island but the bright and crisp images somehow make it less sad. The music might also have something to do with that. The faces certainly do.

The movie is filled with smiling faces, dancing feet, and drum pounding hands. Most of the people seen in the movie are happy. Of course, this is partly due to the fact that parades and other celebrations are frequent subjects. Not every face is smiling and not every scene is a happy one but there are a lot more grins than grimaces. Somewhere near its beginning, the film talks of Cuba existing in three different periods. There is its glorious past, its uncertain but promising future, and the present. The present is what it is. This movie might make things look a little better than they actually are but I don’t think that’s an intentional misrepresentation. I think its creators wanted to make a joyful and entertaining movie that included some seriously representative images. They used some of the best of the present and included a little bit of both the past and the future. When you see it, and I really recommend you do, be prepared to tap your toes and maybe dance in your seat a little. It’s gonna be hard not to.

Movie Review
The Vietnam War
Ken Burns & Lynn Novick

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This isn’t a very deep review. It is, however, a very deep and sincere recommendation. The eighteen hour documentary is simply the best thing I’ve seen in years. PBS broadcast the first of ten episodes on September 17. I watched it and the next one, and was hooked. Circumstances kept me from watching the remaining episodes when broadcast, but I did eventually see them all via online streaming. It was announced that the stream would only be available through October 15 but it still appeared to be functioning on the 17th. Check The Vietnam War for details and other sources.

There’s no question that one reason I found this production so engaging is its familiarity. I recall many of the described events from when they happened in the 1960s and early 1970s. There was both a refreshing of memories and a filling in of unknown details. But there was also plenty of totally new information, particularly concerning the earliest years, that made me realize things were even more screwed up than I thought they were; And I thought they were really screwed up.

Burns and company pulled together a lot of sources in an attempt to present every aspect from every angle. The result probably isn’t perfect but it’s mighty close. Recent interviews with a variety of participants help illuminate some of those angles and add insight and credibility.

I was more on the sidelines than not, but I was there. Watching this movie made me remember some of the clearly stupid and arguably evil things my country did. Someone in their 20s or 30s for whom the Vietnam War is more ancient than World War II was for me, won’t have those memories to be reawakened. We will see the history telling aspect of the movie differently. But I can’t imagine anyone watching this epic and thinking of it as nothing but a history report. Seeing the divisiveness associated with the Vietnam War in the divisiveness of today seems unavoidable to me. I believe that the twentysomethings of both the 1970s and the 2010s can’t help but see some similarities.

If you’re looking for a little entertainment that will take your mind off the world, this ain’t it. This will, in fact, press your mind firmly against the world of fifty years ago and help it remember and/or understand that world. I’m betting it will also get your mind thinking about the world of today although it probably won’t help in understanding it.  

Movie Review
From War to Wisdom
Daniel R. Collins & Josh Hisle

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I might not even be aware of this movie’s existence if I didn’t know one of the directors. Maybe someone else will learn of it only because they know me. If so, that’s a good thing. And it’s also a good thing if someone learns of the movie by stumbling onto this blog post without knowing either of us. If either of those things happens and someone watches From War to Wisdom who otherwise would not, I’ll be a happy man. It’s a movie that deserves to be seen with a story that needs to be heard.

It is primarily a story of Afghanistan and Iraq combat veterans. To some degree it is a new version of the oft told tale of guys going off to war then having difficulty returning to the civilian world. It’s a view that the tagline “When the war ends, the real battle begins” encourages and the movie’s general organization supports. The film’s front end focuses on the war and the second half focuses on the return. The “off to war” part is made extra effective through the use of gripping footage shot by embedded journalists Mike Cerre and Mike Elwell. The “difficulty returning” part is made personal through excerpts from interviews with those having the problems. But excerpts from those interviews also appear in the film’s early scenes and create a solid connection between the two halves.

Creating a marker between the halves is a text only shot. In front of the shot we see returning soldiers marching between welcoming signs and banners then being dismissed to reunite with their families while veteran Hans Palmer describes the time as “the proudest I’ve ever felt in my life.” Following the text is a scene with Josh Hisle talking about needing a “place to decompress — every day.” He’s sitting outside his apartment waiting for everyone else in the complex — his “area” — to go to sleep. “It’s not insomnia,” he says. “It’s duty.”

Five panels fade from one to another in that near midpoint text shot. The number of troops killed and wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan is mentioned along with the average number of veterans — a gut-wrenching 22 — that commit suicide each day. The last phrase is “many veterans are taking it upon themselves to help their fellow warfighters to truly come home.” That’s what this movie is about. It’s what makes this more than another war sucks story.

War does suck and From War to Wisdom makes that clear. It also makes clear the serious damage that war can inflict on those who survive it and it tells the stories of some of the veterans who overcame that damage. Then the stories go a little farther. Some of those veterans not only overcame their own issues but have made major efforts and established ongoing organizations to help others overcome theirs.

There’s Common Ground on the Hill’s Veterans Initiative that Josh Hisle was instrumental in establishing after he personally benefited from the Common Ground experience. There’s The Battle Buddy Foundation that veterans Kenny Bass and Joshua Rivers created to help other veterans obtain service dogs like Atlas who makes a normal life possible for Kenny. There’s New Directions for Veterans that was established in 1992 by a pair of Vietnam veterans and is represented in the film by Iraq veteran Matthew Lorscheider. Matthew does a pretty good job of capturing the spirit of this film when he says “That’s what we did in the military. Help a buddy out. I’m not going to stop now.”

There are many other examples of veterans helping veterans both in the film and out. They are bright spots and their successes are to be celebrated but they aren’t enough to make From War to Wisdom a feel good movie. It is, however, an encouraging movie and an informative one. Most of the veterans that appear in the film fought in either Afghanistan or Iraq. There is one notable exception. He’s a Vietnam vet who’s legal name is now Ragtime. He is a stained glass artist who teaches at Common Ground and started 1,000 Points of Peace back in 2006. The warriors recorded in this film say many wise things; The “wisdom” in the title is there for a reason. But I found a couple of Ragtime’s utterances particularly memorable. I don’t really think it’s a generational thing but maybe. From Ragtime: “America forgot what it was supposed to be doing… but I remember.”

The movie’s website lists a number of ways to see it. They include purchasing a DVD or watching online as either a rental or purchase.
DVD Online

This is my third movie review. When I did the second, I had actually forgotten the first (which I called a video review) and repeated a line about being even less qualified to review movies than books. I had done a few book reviews before starting this blog so doing some here didn’t feel too awkward. I wasn’t quite as comfortable with music reviews. I remember the circumstances behind that first one. Josh Hisle was working on an album and I knew I wanted to review it when it came out. I reviewed other albums so it would not be the first. Josh got distracted. Not by something shiny but by this movie. Between it and his work with Common Ground and being a full time husband, father, and student there was no time left for an album. That’s OK. It’s a lot more than OK. The album still hasn’t been released but we instead have this movie which I have a hunch is going to do a whole lot of good for a whole lot of people.

Even though I’m still waiting for that album and this is the first chance I’ve had to review a Josh Hisle product it is not his first mention here. He was the subject of this blog’s ninth post (There’s Something Happening Here) in 2011 and appears in at least three trip journal entries: February 19, 2010, July 23, 2010, and October 10, 2011.