a post about XXXX

Banished was great. It told the story of three towns in the U.S. -- in Missouri, Georgia and, if I remember correctly, Arkansas -- which all, in the early 1900's banished blacks from their town, causing them to leave behind their land and their histories. The whites in the town today have varying degrees of commitment to addressing the sins of the past, but each still stop, I would argue, before the point of true self-examination. This sentiment carried forth into the Q and A, which I needed to abandon out of discomfort for the self-congratulatory tone of the white people who were featured in the film. They aren't bad people, but their limitations can be summed up by the woman who walked out of the theater talking about her organization -- again, in self congratulatory tones -- does diversity training once every two years.

Yeah . . . not so much.

Then I watched two other films that I said I wouldn't blog about because of potential conflicts that this would cause for their ability to get into other festivals, which is actually pretty annoying because

I HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY ABOUT THEM.

The first one is a film about XXXX and it's done in an entirely engaging way. The filmmaker is someone with whom I went to college. I remember thinking he was quite the stud back then, in a rather nauseating way, but he's actually kinda dorky and kind of endearing. Anyway, his aim with the film is to XXXX XXXX XXXX because he doesn't see enough of that today, but I think that XXXX XXXX might have the opposite reaction and resent the comparison.

The second film is about an XXXX in XXXX XXXX for XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX and the off part is that the festival selected the film for this new fund they developed this year that will raise money for the subjects of the documentary, who often get overlooked once the lights come up. So, you would think that maybe, since I have the link to the film's web site and could encourage all of you to give it a look AND MAYBE MAKE A DONATION, it would make sense to link to it.

But I can't.

I think I can write about the film I am going to see tonight -- as well as the four I am going to see tomorrow.

So, I will.