BREAKDOWN: 1975 – Review by Lynn Venhaus

In this Wayback Machine, called Breakdown: 1975, we travel back 50 years to a pivotal year that defined daring, imaginative filmmaking, and how coincidentally, it happened between the resignation of President Nixon and the Bicentennial birthday celebration. In Morgan Neville’s well-intentioned documentary, he puts the chaotic 1970s in perspective, touching on how young talented filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman and Steven Spielberg were inspiring a cinematic revolution. Studios took risks, and moviegoers responded in this heralded New Hollywood. As exuberant as this fertile time was, in real life, America was going through dismal days post-Watergate and Vietnam.

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ELLA McCAY – Review by T.J. Callahan

Everyone needs an Aunt Helen…especially if she’s played by Jamie Lee Curtis. Good thing Ella McCay has one…to keep her in check when her fast-paced life starts to unravel. Emma Mackey is Ella, a 34 year old go-getter who’s already the Lt Governor of her home state and in the pole position for political stardom…until she gets her shot at the top job too soon.

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AWFJ Movie of the Week, Dec. 29-Jan. 4: A MOST VIOLENT YEAR

Opening Jan. 2, AWFJ’s Movie of the Week is A Most Violent Year, writer/director J.C. Chandor’s follow up to Margin Call and All Is Lost which stars Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain as a couple fighting to achieve their dreams in the violent surrounds of New York City, 1981. Read on…

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