The Way

The Way is a story about grief and faith: An affluent, emotionally withdrawn eye doctor (Martin Sheen) learns his adult son has been killed in a freak accident while walking the Spanish pilgrimage route, Camino de Santiago. He flies to the French-Spanish border, has his son’s body cremated and decides to walk the route himself, taking the ashes with him.

Tom’s son (actual son Emilio Estevez) appears to his father in flashback. He was a truth-seeker in life who disowned his dad’s values. On the walk, Tom places himself in his son’s shoes and grudgingly starts to open up to other people.

The story unfolds along the father’s pilgrimage set in the gorgeous vistas of France and Spain. This movie depicts how travelling through an unknown land can lead to greater self-knowledge and understanding. It also has great soundtrack!

Cinema Writers Circle Awards, Spain 

2011  Nominated CEC Award Best Screenplay

Movie Guide Awards 

2012  Nominated Grace Award Most Inspiring Performance in Movies

August Rush

This is a story about a young orphan who sneaks away from the orphanage to find his real parents. His mother, eleven years before, believed her baby had died. The boy, Evan, is convinced that he is still connected to his parents through a mysterious tune that comes to him through just about anything that makes sound. One night he sneaks away from the orphanage into the big city where he is “adopted” by Wizard (Robin Williams), the leader of a collection of street-performing kids.  Wizard sees Evan’s gift for music, which he wants to use for his own personal gain. He renames the boy August Rush and tries to manage his career. Meanwhile, August finds the school where his mother studied music and, while sleeping under the bed of a homeless girl in a shelter, writes a brilliant musical score that the school asks to use for their yearly concert in Central Park. At the same time, fate is reuniting August’s biological parents, a concert cellist and a rock musician , who actually only got together for one night eleven years before; the night August was conceived.  A feel-good movie that reminds us of our connections and never to give up, either on love or on our gifts.

…Christine Goyer-Swift

Mao’s Last Dancer

This is the beautiful, rags-to- riches true story of Li Cunxin, a boy with performing arts promise who grew up in poverty-stricken rural China under the dictatorial regime of Mao Tse-Tung. Li Cunxin was one of a handful of children selected from millions, and at age 11 was taken from his parents and trained at a ballet school in Beijing. At the age of 19 he outwitted the bureaucracy and went to Texas, to the Houston Ballet company. In America, for the first time in life, Li experiences freedom – the U.S. being a country where he had been told death stalked the streets and  the sun never shone. In Houston Li becomes a local celebrity and is soon making headlines. Then he impulsively marries an American dance student and announces his intention to defect from China.

This movie makes you feel, long and dream of a better future for those born under Communist rule. In the movie’s strongest sequence, Li goes to the Chinese consulate to argue his case, is separated from his new bride and is detained by his government. In the tense standoff that follows, Li’s new American friends use all their press and government connections to finally obtain the dancer’s freedom.

…Christine Goyer-Swift

The Hunger Games

People who've read the book say you have to read the book first. But I didn’t and I thought the movie was really good. This story is disturbing and actually quite realistic in context with the world we live in. It has a ‘reality show’ theme set in a dystopian future. A totalitarian nation is divided between twelve districts and the Capitol, and each year two young representatives from each district are selected by lottery to participate in The Hunger Games. Part colourful entertainment, part brutal retribution for a past rebellion, the televised games are broadcast throughout the Capitol and the twenty-four participants are forced to eliminate their competitors while the citizens are required to watch. When the star of the show’s (Katniss) young sister is selected as their District’s female representative, Katniss volunteers to take her sister’s place. She and her male counterpart Peeta are pitted against bigger, stronger representatives who have trained for this their whole lives. 

The acting is excellent and those who understand this movie will see it’s a spoof on reality shows, civilized living and what we think we know about people (In reality we don’t really know anything and if we’re willing – or able – to know each other we could never kill). I’m not sure some people understand the deeper meaning of this movie – that we are moving towards, for example, a society of no middle class where those with money rule everything (including the games we play) and the rest of the world starves. What was shocking to me was when some of the audience at the theatre cheered and clapped at Katniss’ conquests. I thought, They don’t know do they? That by cheering they’re playing the game.

I think this movie could be shown in classrooms across the country with a well-intentioned teacher to help show the serious subtleties of this brilliantly made, action-packed film.

…Christine Goyer-Swift