Secret Agent Gal Movie Reviews

Janie Jones: Abigail Breslin sings, uplifts band drama - 3 stars

Abigail Breslin can sing. In Janie Jones, Breslin’s voice and fresh, unaffected performance add soul to the road indie. David M. Rosenthal writes and directs the semiautobiographical drama.

Breslin (Oscar nominated for her supporting role in Little Miss Sunshine) is remarkable as Janie, the 13-year-old no one wants. She gets dropped off with her rock singer dad Ethan Brand (Alessandro Nivola) while her mom Mary Ann Jones (Elisabeth Shue), a former groupie, begins meth rehab.

Ethan didn’t even know he had a daughter. The sensitive chemistry between Breslin and Nivola (an accomplished musician who starred in Junebug) grows as Ethan’s career declines. He drinks heavily. The group begins to break up.

Ethan hears Janie playing and singing a folk-y ballad one day. Cautious at first, he warms to fatherhood.

The duo sings well. Irish singer-songwriter Gemma Hayes wrote the songs performed by Breslin. One of the ballads, Fight For Me, has been released. Eef Barzelay of the band Clem Snide wrote Nivola’s tunes.

The two develop camaraderie. “You look like sh-t,” she tells him. “You tell the truth, I like that,” he replies. Ethan decides to go solo. He invites Janie to join him on stage.

As Ethan takes more responsibility for his life, he slowly heals. When he acknowledges Janie as his daughter on stage, it’s a great film moment.

The band drama is a long cliché of swearing, drinking, drugs and one night stands. The first half is especially trite as the action lags. Finesse and originality were needed.

Ethan is arrested one night when he beats up an audience member flirting with Janie. His daughter hocks his guitar to bail him out. Ethan’s manager Sloan (Peter Stormare) remains a trusted friend even after he leaves the singer.

Finally Ethan must visit his mother Lily to ask for a loan. Frances Fisher is great as the Chicago socialite meeting her granddaughter for the first time.

Breslin, now 15, performs with a friend in the pop-rock/retro band CABB. In her next movie, New Year’s Eve, she plays Sarah Jessica Parker’s troubled daughter.

If you like Janie Jones, you might enjoy:  Crazy Heart; Somewhere.

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Janie Jones    2010  /  NR  /  1 hour, 46 min

 

Cast Overview: Abigail Breslin, Elisabeth Shue, Alessandro Nivola, Brittany Snow, Peter Stormare, Frank Whaley, Frances Fisher

Director:  David M. Rosenthal

Genre:  Indie, Drama, Music

 

 

Thrive follows the money to reclaim our future, wealth - 5 stars

Everyone can Thrive, according to a new, leading edge documentary impressively researched and organized by business executive Foster Gamble. A wake-up call with a plan, it’s now on DVD and screening nationwide. Steve Gagne directs.

Change is imperative. Nothing less than transformation – personal, social and global – will enable humanity to thrive, according to Gamble, co-founder of CASSonline.org.

Daring to follow the money, Gamble and his wife Kimberly Carter Gamble analyze underlying causes of scarcity and suffering worldwide.

The heads of three famous families have manipulated world wealth as part of a global domination agenda for centuries, Gamble asserts. Not everyone in these families is corrupt, he adds.

The Bank for International Settlements (called “the central bank of central banks”), international central banks, and national central banks control resources. Big banks, corporations and governments lie beneath central banks in a “pyramid of power.”

Elite central bankers control finance, energy, food supplies, education, the media and other systems. By keeping countries and citizens in debt, they effectively stifle human potential with the help of corporate-owned media, governments, major foundations, the IMF and the World Bank.

Many national economies have been harmed, according to the film. The elites are actively seeking to destroy the U.S. economy, experts say.

The number of global elites is tiny, says Gamble. In the U.S., the ratio of citizens to these elite bankers is a million to one, he maintains.

Individuals can exercise power in many ways. Bank locally. Buy and invest responsibly. Seek out news from independent sources. Take part in mass, critical actions. The Thrive website lists suggested actions.

Express your uniqueness, says British author David Icke. Fear of ridicule is one way the global elite gets us to impose its norms on one another.

Free, unlimited, clean energy is the film’s central, revolutionary theme. Two elegant designs, the torus and the Vector Equilibrium (VE), can be used to produce free energy and promote international well-being, Gamble explains.

The torus (or flower of life) is an energy pattern that appears in nature and across cultures. The VE is the underlying structure of the torus, a 64-sided pattern that is “the blueprint by which nature forms energy into matter.”

What does all this mean? “Goodbye Exxon Mobil, goodbye oil, goodbye coal, goodbye linear transmission of electricity,” says Steven Greer, M.D., Director of The Disclosure Project.

Did you know that Dr. Royal Rife invented technology that cured cancer in the 1920s? Have you heard of Nikola Tesla, who invented a technology that produced free, unlimited energy in 1901? The work of both men was destroyed, and their reputations were ruined. Archival footage shows government agents seizing revolutionary technologies.

For those who doubt futuristic exposes like this one, detailed information sources are listed on the film’s website.

Prominent scientists and thinkers are interviewed, including: Nassim Haramein, cosmologist and inventor; Paul Hawken, environmentalist and entrepreneur; Catherine Austin Fitts, former Assistant Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development; Vandana Shiva, environmental activist and eco-feminist; and Elisabet Sahtouris, evolutionary biologist and futurist.

How can the world thrive? Gamble integrates progressive, conservative and libertarian ideas into a model for change:

Stage 1 – Reform. We would reform current systems to “bring integrity and healing to our current condition.”

Stage 2 – Limit Government Control to enhance the “protection of individual rights and the commons.”

Stage 3 – Voluntary Cooperation would flourish as people live by “rules, but no rulers.”

Economic reform in Stage 1, for example, includes: stop bailouts; dismantle the Federal Reserve; withdraw support from the IMF, World Bank, and Bank for International Settlements; refuse international taxes, and monetize debt.

Following these steps would transform the arts, economics, education, environment, governance, health, infrastructure, justice, media, relations, science, spirituality and word view.

Gamble acknowledges that he was born into the wealthy Procter & Gamble family, but has forged his own career path.

Integrity, freedom and compassion can become the world’s guiding principles, says Gamble. Bold and honest, this film offers hope and a blueprint for change.  

If you like Thrive, you might also enjoy: 2012: Time for Change; I Am; Happy.

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Thrive   2011  /  PG-13  /  2 hours, 12 min

Cast Overview: Foster Gamble, Duane Elgin, Nassim Haramein, Steven Greer, Jack Kasher, Daniel Sheehan, Adam Trombly, Brian O'Leary, Vandana Shiva, John Gatto, John Robbins, Deepak Chopra, David Icke, Catherine Austin Fitts, Kimberly Carter Gamble, G. Edward Griffin, Bill Still, John Perkins, Paul Hawken, Aqeela Sherrills, Evon Peter, Angel Kyodo Williams, Elisabet Sahtouris, Amy Goodman, Barbara Marx Hubbard

Director:  Steve Gagne

Genre:  Documentary, Current Affairs, Science & Nature

 

2012: Time for Change advocates "evolve to solve" strategies

Evolve to solve. Daniel Pinchbeck investigates how to survive and thrive during changing times in the wide-ranging documentary 2012: Time for Change.

Thoughtful and visionary, director Joao Amorim’s film transcends apocalypse hype by advocating action. It’s now screening nationwide and streaming via Netflix.

Pinchbeck walks his talk as he shares common sense ways to live consciously so that all can thrive on earth. The founder of the Evolver social movement and editorial director of Reality Sandwich interviews scholars and leaders around the world.

Animation is also used to investigate spiritual practices, sacred activism and new technologies to help us survive change with grace and ease.

Functional design, habitat restoration, ecological detoxification, intentional community, aquaponic agriculture, wind power, open source currency and diverse currency tools are among the ideas examined. The film is similar to the documentary Thrive and surpasses Armageddon dramas like Battle Los Angeles.

“Apocalypse” means “uncovering,” and doesn’t necessarily signal doom, according to Pinchbeck. “Focusing on what will happen in 2012 may just be the wrong question,” Pinchbeck told a meeting of the Left Forum in New York City. “We should just be really asking . . . . ‘What type of change can we bring about?’ It’s going to be up to individuals and then communities to make a profound shift.”

Archival footage of the “Leonardo da Vinci of the 20^th century,” design scientist R. Buckminster Fuller, is shown. Groundbreaking technologies for sustainable energy, health and farming have already been developed, says Pinchbeck. These advances have been suppressed by powerful special interests time and again, he maintains.

Futurist Barbara Marx Hubbard cites Fuller. “We now have the resources, technology and knowhow to make the world a 100% physical success for everyone without taking it away or destroying our environment,” she says.

Many cultural creatives have planted “seed ideas” to help humanity, Hubbard says. These are quietly growing and taking root. “The only way to get to the future [Fuller] was seeing was about completely transforming your consciousness, loving one another as yourself,” she says.

Hot button issues like water scarcity and depleted soil are reviewed. Michael Dorsey, Ph.D. of Dartmouth College notes that current economic and social systems do not deliver justice, environmental protection and human rights. “The system is broken,” he believes.

 “Water’s the next oil,” warns Maude Barlow, Senior Advisor on Water Issues to the United Nations. “Water scarcity has already reached a dire limit for two billion people in the world,” she says.

“As water becomes more corporately controlled, as water becomes more expensive because it’s controlled for profit, it’s going to be denied to people who can’t afford it. It’s already happening now in communities in the global south where water metering is going on,” according to Barlow.

The “Green Revolution” has led us to “an incredible amount of dependency on corporations to supply seed, to supply chemicals,” says Penny Livingstone-Stark, a permaculture designer. Monoculture farming, she says, serves to “disconnect people from their land, pollute water systems, deforest the earth.” Livingstone-Stark explains how using soil biology sustainably perpetuates living systems and increases crop yields.

Reclaiming our lost connection to nature is the key to healing individuals, societies and the planet, Pinchbeck concludes.

Policarpo Chaj, activist and executive director of Maya Vision, explains how past and future are cyclical in Mayan thought. The 2012 prophecy of earth changes and economic downturns is already happening, Chaj and other scholars say.

Filmmaker David Lynch, who has practiced Transcendental Meditation for almost 35 years, tells Pinchbeck that he overcame anger shortly after he began meditating. Looking within helped him “find infinite intelligence, creativity, bliss, energy, love, power,” he adds.

A weak link here is Pinchbeck’s use of a psychoactive root bark to jump start his self-discovery. Using a drug for self-empowerment seems counterintuitive and harmful.

British rock singer Sting, who co-founded the Rainforest Foundation and practiced Ashtanga yoga, notes that he also took the drug. Fasting and meditation are just as effective ways to connect with the Divine, Sting adds.

Pinchbeck sees an empowered “global tribe” replacing poor, suffering masses. His essay collection Notes from the Edge Times has just been published.   (4.5 out of 5 stars)

If you like 2012: Time for Change, you might enjoy:  I Am; Happy; Waste Land; 2012; Thrive.

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2012: Time for Change    2010  /  NR  /  1 hour, 40 min

Cast Overview:  Mitch Horowitz, Michael Dorsey, Ph.D., Gaspar P. Gonzalez, Penny Livingston, Maude Barlow, Bernard Lietaer, Joel Kovel, Michael D. Coe, Ph.D., Policarpo Chaj, Tiokasin Ghosthorse, Terence McKena, Steven Colbert, Sting, Dennis McKenna, Barbara Marx Hubbard, R. Buckminster Fuller

Director:  Joao Amorim

Genre:  Documentary, Spirituality, Science & Nature, Current Affairs, Animation

Martha Marcy May Marlene: Elizabeth Olsen flees cult trauma - 4 stars

Elizabeth Olsen bursts into stardom in Martha Marcy May Marlene. Her dynamic and restrained performance marks writer-director Sean Durkin’s astounding feature debut.

This indie psychological thriller disturbed and fascinated me as much as The Exorcist, where evil ensnares a privileged and morally vulnerable victim.

After her daring escape from a creepy cult in upstate New York, Martha (Olsen) is rescued by her sister. She struggles to recover herself and become whole. Her progress is tortuous.

Zombie-like Martha looks serene. Inwardly, she’s falling off a cliff. She hides what happened to her, not asking for help. When confronted she screams, “I’m a teacher and a leader,” parroting the words of a cult leader Patrick (John Hawkes) who she can’t forget.

Martha’s confusion deepens as she stays at the Connecticut lake house of her sister Lucy (Sarah Paulson) and brother-in-law Ted (Hugh Dancy). The sisters grew apart after their mother died, and Lucy now feels responsible for Martha.

How could someone disappear for two years without a word? Lucy and Ted are stunned when Martha strips at the public lake. She even creeps into their bed one night while they make love.

Through flashbacks that blur place and time, we glimpse Martha’s life at a ramshackle farmstead. She confuses memory with the present, and so do we. In the cult she befriends Zoe (Louisa Krause) and Watts (Brady Corbet).

Revering their leader, the residents follow bizarre rules. They do chores but eat only once a day, at supper. The men finish eating before the women can begin. Wearing tattered hand-me-downs, they believe they will prosper someday.

Hawkes (Uncle Teardrop in Winter’s Bone) plays Patrick with skeevy menace. Slowly, his deranged beliefs emerge. He rapes the women by turns in the night. New women are dressed, drugged and coached before their first rape.

"You're my favorite," Patrick tells her. Martha struggles, then submits. Later, she coaches newcomer Sarah (Julia Garner) before her “first night.” Patrick plays Marcy’s Song on the guitar for the group. “Well she, she’s just a picture that lives on my wall / Just a picture, that’s all” he croons.

The isolated community must surrender body, mind and spirit. Fatherly and quiet, Patrick suddenly threatens individuals. They must be willing to kill for him.

Jody Lee Lipes’ cinematography and Zac Stuart-Pontier’s editing enhance the introspective drama.

Durkin told Filmmaker Magazine that his early years in a religious school inspired an interest in cults. He won a Directing Award for this film at Sundance 2011.

Olsen will appear in several films in 2012, including Peace, Love and Misunderstanding with Jane Fonda and Catherine Keener; Silent House with Adam Trese; Red Lights with Robert De Niro, Cillian Murphy and Sigourney Weaver; and Liberal Arts with Josh Radnor. Olsen studies theater full time at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.

A Silkwood-like ending is deeply unsettling. Oscar nominations are likely for Olsen and this film.

If you like Martha Marcy May Marlene, you might enjoy:  Take Shelter; Somewhere; Winter’s Bone.

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Martha Marcy May Marlene    2011  /  R  /  1 hour, 41 min

Cast Overview: Elizabeth Olsen, Christopher Abbott, Brady Corbet, Hugh Dancy, Maria Dizzia, Julia Garner, John Hawkes, Louisa Krause, Sarah Paulson

Director:  Sean Durkin

Genre:  Indie, Drama, Psychological Thriller

 

The Way: Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez heal heartbreak - 5 stars

Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez heal a father’s heart and find wholeness in the sensitive drama The Way. Set along the Way of St. James (Camino de Santiago) from France to Spain, the film is directed by Sheen’s son Estevez, who appears as a ghostly muse.

The most powerful movie is sometimes the simplest. Sheen’s deep, rousing performance and Estevez’s minimalist, mood-centered direction fill The Way with meaning. Cinematographer Juanmi Azpiroz captures action along the breathtaking pilgrimage route.

Daniel (Estevez) has died in a freak accident in the Pyrenees, known for unpredictable weather. He was nearly 40 when he decided to postpone doctoral studies and walk the 500-mile-long trek.

Tom Avery (Sheen) just lost his wife a year ago, so losing his son is devastating. The conservative ophthalmologist travels from Ventura, California to identify Daniel and have him cremated.

The Way is the best father-son drama I've seen in years. It's nothing less than a healing for the male heart.

With Daniel’s backpack and provisions, Tom decides to complete his son’s journey. He will walk to the cathedral where the Apostle James is said to be buried. Local police warn him about the dangers. Tom is stoic. He has nothing to lose.

Sheen’s intensity and talent are mesmerizing. A winner of Emmy and Golden Globe awards, he’s played presidents and generals, fathers and coaches. Sheen evokes manhood with strength and sensitivity.

Tom scatters Daniel’s ashes at especially beautiful vistas. He remembers how his son pissed him off. “You don’t choose a life, Dad. You live one,” Daniel once told him. Tom speaks little, but you can feel his brokenness.

Tom sees Daniel wherever he goes. The son becomes father to the man. Tom appreciates the wordless visits. Still peace eludes him.

Empty but determined, Tom surrenders. Three travelers gravitate around the angry American. Numbness gives way to fury for the grieving dad.

Deborah Kara Unger plays Sarah, a sharp-tongued Canadian who wants to quit smoking. Yorick von Wageningen plays Joost, a friendly Dutchman who’s desperate to lose weight but loves regional cuisine. James Nesbitt is engaging as Jack, a bombastic Irishman with writer’s block who begins to chronicle Tom’s story.

His companions irk him, but Tom discovers himself by being around the others. Each traveler has wounds to heal. Finally Tom empathizes. He begins to understand why the journey was so important to Daniel.

Each must resolve personal issues and find truth. Gently insistent spiritual undertones never become overbearing. An encounter with a young gypsy thief (Omar Munoz) and his father (Antonio Gil) is especially moving.

A sense of community grows among the four and extends to others who walk. With references to cell phones, The Way also meditates on how disconnected we have become in the information age.

The Way allowed Sheen and Estevez to explore their Spanish culture and Catholic religion together. Charlie Sheen, the star’s other son, battled publicly with drug addiction as this film was made. The mystical bond between fathers and sons is tempered by real life frustration in this vision quest. 

Estevez has directed a dozen television shows and films. He starred in The Breakfast Club and Young Guns. Estevez and Sheen have made other movies together, including The War at Home and Bobby. 

The Way is a memorable exploration of manhood, heart and healing. Nature’s fearsome beauty unleashes a majestic resolution.

If you like The Way, you might enjoy:  The Music Never Stopped; In a Better World; Beginners; Thor.

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The Way    2010  /  NR  /  1 hour, 55 min

Cast Overview: Emilio Estevez, Martin Sheen, Deborah Kara Unger, Yorick van Wageningen, James Nesbitt

Director:  Emilio Estevez

Genre:  Drama, Independent

Restless: death haunts young lovers - 2.5 stars

Death lurks while two teens fall in love in Restless, Gus Van Sant’s Harold and Maude inspired drama. Mia Wasikowska (The Kids Are All Right; Jane Eyre) and Henry Hopper (Dennis Hopper’s son) star.

The opening is intriguing. Enoch (Hopper) is a glum high school dropout who wears black and crashes funerals. He grieves vicariously for his mom and dad who died in a car accident. Enoch survived. He likes to remind others that he was “dead for three minutes” and awoke from a coma.

Annabel (Mia Wasikowska) is an optimist who talks to her hero Charlie Darwin. A winsome sprite with a brain tumor, she has three months to live. Annabel admires birds and beetles, and dubs herself a naturalist. She has transcended anger, living in acceptance and humor.

The two meet at a memorial service. Enoch rebuffs her, but Annabel persists. She recognizes a kindred soul. “Seen any good funerals lately?” is a conversation starter for these two.

I like odd movies, and really wanted to like Restless. Sentimental and trite, it tries too hard with swells of loud music and distracting flourishes (Annabel’s vintage wardrobe is endless). Talented Wasikowska has her moments, but Hopper struggles as morose Enoch.

The movie lingers in a graveyard of clever banter. The action falls flat even with a flurry of bucket list antics. Annabel accepts death as a friend, making light of the inevitable. Enoch is more obsessive.

They must race to fall in love. Their relationship is believable and painfully finite. With no future, they must live in the moment. Death is their silent partner.

Henry helps Annabel make the most of her last days. Scene after scene is artfully framed. Annabel looks healthy and radiant throughout. Restless is a felt experience. A valuable dramatic experiment, it falls short with one note whimsy.

What does work is the ghost. Enoch’s friend Hiroshi (Ryo Kase) was a kamikaze pilot in World War II. Still dressed in his jacket and flight cap, he pops by for witty conversation or a game of Battleship. Hiroshi lends a playful, quasi-fantasy quality here with comic relief. His character suggests that life and death are one, an ongoing continuum.

As Enoch’s mentor, Hiroshi isn’t afraid to talk sense to him. They get into a fist fight, providing welcome conflict. Something keeps the pilot hanging around, which is revealed at the movie’s end.

Restless lacks the nuance and power of Van Sant’s Elephant, Paranoid Park and Milk. This film avoids exploring the mystery of death and the meaning of existence.

A chalk-on-asphalt drawing of two fallen teens holding hands is the tipoff. Restless draws a happy face on death.

Other movies you might enjoy:  50/50; Love & Other Drugs.

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Restless     2011  /  PG-13  /  1 hour, 33 min

Cast Overview:  Henry Hopper, Mia Wasikowska, Ryo Kase, Schuyler Fisk, Jane Adams, Chin Han, Lusia Strus

Director:  Gus Van Sant

Genre:  Drama, Fantasy

Everything Strange and New: an ex-bachelor confesses - 5 stars

 

A family man endures a mid-life crisis in Everything Strange and New, Frazer Bradshaw’s drama that simmers beneath middle class life in North Oakland, California. The film was nominated for Best First Feature at the 2011 Spirit Awards. It's now streaming online.

Jerry McDaniel is Wayne, a husband and carpenter yearning for the carefree days before his two sons were born. Wayne and his homemaker wife Renee (Beth Lisick) enjoyed each other much more then. Wayne didn’t yet know that she had a mood disorder. Renee lashes out at him often, usually about money. He reminds her to take her meds.

Their mortgage is now higher than what their home is worth. Adulthood becomes a monotonous struggle. Yet when Wayne takes his family to a restaurant, or reads a bedtime story to the frolicking four- and five-year-olds who ignore him, he seems like the perfect dad.

Everything Strange and New shows house after house in a low income neighborhood along Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard. Wayne stands on a rooftop, looking out over other rooftops like Larry Gopnik in A Serious Man. For a brief moment, I feared that he would jump.

Set in a liberal, economically depressed area, the film is punctuated by sudden, exultant strains of a post-modern jig. Melancholy is lightened with daily routines. Kent Sparling wrote the outstanding score. Saxophonist Dan Plonsey performs.  

Where’s the excitement, the sense of new possibilities? Wayne goes out with his buddies for beers after work.

It’s “easy to forget” how much he loves his wife and sons, and how much they love him. Meanwhile he renovates a Victorian home for another unseen family. The camera lingers at a window. Outside is a tree. You can imagine how beautiful the space will become, and sense the memories it will hold.

Bradshaw finds hope and possibility in everyday images, startling you with the avant garde. When Wayne opens the front door one day, he hears Renee talking to the kids. Like a stranger, he stands and listens. The eerie, alien moment lengthens. Who are they? Who is he? He turns to leave.

 

Wayne tells his friends Manny (the late Luis Saguar) and Leo (Rigo Chacon Jr.) that he wants to study electrical engineering. “I think I missed my calling,” he says. “It’s not about being happy all the time,” Manny tells him. “It’s about being happy more than not.”

Each friend faces his own crisis. Wayne discovers Manny in his car getting a cocaine fix. Not long afterwards, Wayne is surprised when Leo comes on to him as they watch the game. Divorced father Leo says he’s not gay.

McDaniel’s heartfelt, quiet voice-overs reveal modern angst. Arms and legs swing from his tall, lithe frame. Playing the sad clown at a birthday party, he wears baggy overalls.

Bradshaw weaves experimental elements into the narrative in a natural, enigmatic way. Families pose for portraits. Traffic moves backwards. Wayne appears in his clown makeup, imagining what he would really like to be doing. The gently surreal, futuristic feeling.

McDaniel also played a clown in the video Sonata (2004). Lisick has directed, written and acted in several short films including Sinking State and Diving for Pears.

Bradshaw also served as cinematograper, writer and editor for this film.

If you like Everything Strange and New, you might enjoy:  A Serious Man; Barney’s Version.

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Everything Strange and New     2009  /  NR (language, sexual situations)  /  1 hour, 24 mins

Cast Overview:  Jerry McDaniel, Beth Lisick, Luis Saguar, Rigo Chacon Jr., Oliver McDaniel, Finnegan McDaniel

Director:  Frazer Bradshaw

Genre:  Drama, Indie

 

How to Start Your Own Country - 5 stars

 

Why not start your own micronation? Hundreds around the world have. Jody Shapiro visits a half dozen of the better known tiny nations in his comical documentary How to Start Your Own Country.

The Canadian filmmaker tickles and informs us with notions of country, patriotism and self-empowerment. Diplomats and United Nations officials share their views in this imaginative jaunt around the globe.

There are 192 member countries of the U.N. A few – Israel, Liechtenstein, Kosovo and Bosnia – asserted nationhood despite international disapproval. While new nations seek international recognition, “the U.N. is a country club,” says William Worster, a lecturer at The Hague University.

Shapiro follows the self-styled leaders with acceptance, rendering the wonderfully weird as noble and bizarre. You might call them patriots, kooks, or even true visionaries. These founding fathers are unique.

The countries range in size from 1.3 acres to a few miles. One has no land at all. There’s an “ecclesiastical principality” called Seborga, established within Italy in 820 A.D. with a population of 340. There are visionaries at The Seafaring Institute who expect to house 100,000 people at sea within 25 years.

Who knew that the smallest micronation, Molossia, was founded in 1998 in northern Nevada? President Kevin Baugh, wearing self-styled military regalia, shows us Molossian stamps and currency. His 1.3 acre nation boasts a population of six, including his three dogs. They operate on Molossian standard time.

Baugh admits that he’s required to pay taxes, and visits the United States often for supplies and services. Still, he relishes his independence. Inspired by Peter Sellers in The Mouse That Roared, he’s realizing a boyhood dream.

His Royal Highnesses Prince Leonard Casley founded Hutt River Province, 75 square kilometers (“about the size of Hong Kong”) in western Australia. In the face of national wheat farming restrictions, he seceded in 1970. Princess Shirley reigns by his side. Australian politicians seem skeptical, but give Prince Leonard his due. 

Going independent isn’t easy, and often means scarce supplies. “It’s a hard life but it’s our own life,” says Prince Leonard.

 

In the middle of Long Island Sound lies Dumpling Island, founded by President Dean Kamen (inventor of the Segway and other futuristic technologies). Kamen proudly notes that the Dumplonian Empire produces its own wind and solar energy. This makes it a model for the United States, he says.

The New Free State of Caroline’s Founder Gregory Green has realized an “alternative option for empowerment.” Costumed like pop artists or Lady Gaga fans, citizens parade on the beach behind Green. As their national anthem plays, a flag flies high above.

Caroline has no land. Its location is variable, says Green. Over 1500 have become citizens just by contacting him. Caroline is “a state of mind” across borders, the leader declares.

The Seasteading Institute received a half million dollar grant from Peter Thiel, an early Facebook investor and the CEO of Paypal. Patri Friedman, executive director, says he’s inspired by the idea of a true frontier, the chance to experiment with “beautiful cities” floating on the ocean. The group is staffed with idealists in their twenties.

What about hurricanes and tsunamis? Engineers are studying ocean currents, wind energy and solar panels as they design and test the mechanical basis for seasteads.

What makes a country? There’s a common purpose and unifying mission. These groups enjoy a psychological liberation, according to Erwin Strauss, author of How to Start Your Own Country. 

Friedman envisions social advancement, the chance to revolutionize governments by experimenting with different ways of life. For Kamen, nationhood means “a shared understanding and a respect among people for a set of ideas.”

Shapiro is also known for directing the Green Porno short film series for the Sundance Channel.

 If you like How to Start Your Own Country, you might enjoy:  Happy; I Am.

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How to Start Your Own Country     2010  /  NR  /  1 hour, 12 min

Cast Overview:  Kevin Baugh, Patri Friedman, Dean Kamen, His Royal Highness Prince Leonard

Director:  Jody Shapiro

Genre:  Documentary

 

 

Another Earth: Brit Marling seeks cosmic redo in Sundance award winner ****1/2

 

What if we could start over, erase our most painful mistakes and move forward? Another Earth explores guilt and grace as its signature image, a blue-green planet, hovers above. The sci-fi indie won the Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize (for films with a science or technology theme) and a Special Jury Prize at Sundance 2011.

Rhoda Williams (Brit Marling), who has just won a scholarship to MIT’s astrophysics program, parties herself into a stupor and decides to drive home. Speeding along, she gapes at a turquoise disc in the night sky, a newly discovered duplicate planet earth. With sickening inevitability, she crashes head on into another car, killing a mother and son and leaving a father comatose. Dazed, she wanders the scene.

Another Earth blends science fiction, art and emotional truth. Mike Cahill’s feature debut is stark and understated, a contemplation of regret and human possibility. Cahill co-wrote the mesmerizing, imaginative script with Marling, drawing upon the theoretical physics of parallel worlds.

Released from prison four years later, Rhoda is a shell of herself. She moves back in with her upbeat parents and wisecracking brother. In an attic room, she gazes lovingly at a poster of the Horsehead nebula. Rhoda ponders distant Earth 2. She is that far from forgiving herself.

Newcomer Marling is a talent to watch. She embodies desolation with other-worldly poise and willowy beauty. A felon, Rhoda takes a school janitorial job because she doesn’t want to talk to people. She trudges to and from work, hunched, her face hidden under a hood. Eventually she befriends an elderly janitor Purdeep (Kumar Pallana).

 
                            

William Mapother (In the Bedroom and TV’s Lost) plays John Burroughs, a Yale professor and composer who is the other survivor of the tragedy. Rhoda rehearses her confession and knocks on his door one day. When he answers, she loses her nerve. She pretends to be a maid, asking if he would like a free trial house cleaning. Drunk and depressed, he accepts.

The characters of Another Earth don’t interact so much as they revolve slowly through each other’s orbits. There’s a sense of vast eternity, a lonely hum. Mapother and Marling are remarkable alone and together. Dazed and tentative, they become animated, then withdrawn. In time, they grow more fluent with each other.

John confronts Rhoda. He knows she is lying. She has never cashed his checks. The Maid in Haven cleaning service has never heard of her. Still he’s drawn to her. Their romantic pull, while unlikely, is mysterious and certain as a law of physics.

Purdeep acts as a kind of shaman for Rhoda. He’s the first one who is able to evoke real feeling from her. In an exquisite scene, he coaxes her back to life from what may be his deathbed.

Cahill’s cinematography is observant and reverent. His use of a hand-held camera helps build delicious anticipation. John and Rhoda emerge as she clears the clutter of his rural farmhouse. Dust motes float like disembodied souls.

Contact is made with Earth 2. Rhoda enters an essay contest to win a space shuttle trip to the planet. John fears for her safety, but she has nothing to lose. Throughout the film, an astrophysicist muses reassuringly over the radio. “There’s another you out there. . . . Therein lies the opportunity and the mystery.”

The film’s startling end could be seen as inspiring and hopeful. It all depends on how we look at it.

If you like Another Earth, you might enjoy:  Hereafter; The Ledge.

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Another Earth     2011  /  PG-13 /  1 hour, 32 min

Cast Overview:  William Mapother, Brit Marling, Kumar Pallana, DJ Flava

Director:  Mike Cahill

Genre:  Sci-Fi, Indie, Drama

 

Missing Pieces: Mark Boone Junior kidnaps his way to love ****

 

Kidnapping meets romance in the indie psychological drama Missing Pieces. Director Kenton Bartlett’s feature debut asks big questions and answers them with mind-bending originality. I want to feel something real. I want to feel happy. Why is this happening? It's now streaming online.

Missing Pieces investigates the brink of wholeness. Impressively crafted on a low budget, it’s a tale of dissolution and survival, a sly mix of Criminal Minds and the spiritual genre.

Mark Boone Junior (Memento; Batman Begins; Sons of Anarchy) is fascinating as David Lindale, a man whose life implodes after a head injury. With his mind and emotions fractured, he poignantly struggles to win back his exasperated ex-girlfriend Delia Greenly (Melora Walters). Soon his actions take a disturbing turn.

David seems gentle, but we don’t know what he’s capable of. Recovering from an accident, he has stopped taking his medication. While making his rounds as a delivery man, David meets Maggie Anderson (Taylor Engel) and Daylen Gordon (Daniel Hassel). With the sure insight of a damaged human being, he immediately recognizes that the two are missing pieces of their lives, too.

Using sparse, strong dialogue, Bartlett (who also wrote and produced the film) weaves in excerpts from a self-help tape. These represent David’s efforts to heal and to reclaim his life. The effect succeeds with preachy truisms like, “The only way to be happy is right here in this moment.” Loneliness becomes tangible.

David devises a plan: observe love. The world becomes his laboratory. If he can isolate two people and provide them with the right questions and instructions, can he reproduce the formula for happiness and love? Boone Junior reveals the monster within all of us.

Constant cuts to different lives and characters obscure the narrative. The logistics behind David’s grand experiment stretch belief. The harrowing journey runs a bit too long. Still this is a film worth seeing for its rich storytelling, challenging and original premise, and compassionate vision.

 

A turning point is reached when David realizes, “I need to give more.” He approaches Delia again.

Boone Junior creates an arresting portrait of despair and hope that anchors the film. Walters (Boogie Nights; Magnolia; Big Love) convinces as an aggravated woman who knows when it’s time to give up. Engel and Hassel debut with fine performances as Maggie and Daylen discover themselves and each other under extreme conditions.

Cinematographer Jonathan Arturo uses the camera in a full, free way that captures small, personal worlds in the context of sweeping, natural landscapes. Longing, fear and anger are evoked with a beautiful, understated color palette. Several scenes come to life like Andrew Wyeth paintings. Filmed primarily in Birmingham, Alabama, Missing Pieces was also shot in Colorado, South Dakota and Utah.                 

Richey Rynkowski (orchestrator assistant on Black Swan) creates original music that resonates and adds dimensionality.

Missing Pieces is a cry from the depths, a demand for answers from a seemingly indifferent Universe, a creepy trek towards self-actualization and love.

 If you like Missing Pieces, you might enjoy:  The Ledge; The Perfect Host; The Tree of Life.

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Missing Pieces     2011  /  NR /  1 hour, 57 min.

Cast Overview:  Mark Boone Jr., Melora Walters, Daniel Hassel, Taylor Engel

Director:  Kenton Bartlett

Genre:  Indie, Psychological Drama, Suspense