November 9, 2023

The Elephant Whisperers (2022)

Bomman and Bellie, a couple in South India, devote their lives to caring for an orphaned baby elephant named Raghu, forging a family like no other that tests the barriers between the man and the animal world. (May be found on Netflix)

December 14, 2023

Butta Bomma  (2023)

After dialing the wrong number, a young woman befriends a rickshaw driver, but their romance takes a sudden turn when a stranger enters the picture. (May be found on Netflix)

January 11, 2024

Mansfield Park (1998)

One of the few adaptations of a Jane Austen movie directed by a woman, this film elaborates on darker, more menacing themes, such as slavery, sexual repression and female subjugation. (May be found on YouTube, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and Apple TV)

February 8, 2024

Minari  (2020)

A Korean family moves to an Arkansas farm in search of its own American dream. Amidst the challenges of this new life in the strange and rugged Ozarks, they discover the undeniable resilience of family and what really makes a home. (May be found on amazon Prime, Apple TV, and YouTube)

March 7, 2024

The Quiet Girl  (2022)

A quiet, neglected girl is sent away from her dysfunctional family to live with foster parents for the summer. She blossoms with their care, but in this house where are meant to be no secrets, she discovers one. This movie is based on Claire Keegan’s book Foster which we are reading for January 2024 book group. (May be found on Hulu, YouTube, Apple TV, and Amazon Prime)

April 11, 2024

The Persian Version  (2023)

Leila is an Iranian-American woman who strives to find balance and embrace her opposing cultures. When her large family reunites in New York City for her father’s heart transplant, she keeps everyone at arms length–until a secret is revealed.

May 9, 2024

Descendant  (2022)

The award-winning filmmaker Margaret Brown returns to her home town of Mobile, Alabama, to document the search for and historic discovery of the Clotilda, the last known ship to arrive in the United States, illegally carrying 110 kidnapped Africans. She chronicles the descendants of the last known enslaved Africans brought to the US aboard this ship. (May be found on Netflix)

June 13, 2024

Women Talking  (2022)

The women of an isolated religious colony in Bolivia reveal a shocking secret about the colony’s men. For years, the men have occasionally drugged the women and then raped them. Based on a 2018 Canadian novel by Miriam Toews. (May be found on Amazon Prime, YouTube, and Apple TV)

July 11, 2024

Bird  (1988)

Director Clint Eastwood directs this heartfelt study of pioneering bop saxophonist Charlie Parker. Moving forward and backward through life before his death of a heroin overdose at age 34, the film shows the saxophonist’s difficult relationship with his wife, but also features lengthy scenes of Parker improvising on stage, lit with the neon and cigarette smoke of vintage jazz clubs. (May be found on YouTube, Apple TV, and Amazon Prime)

August 8, 2024

Into the Arms of Strangers  (2000)

For nine months prior to WWII, in an act of mercy unequalled anywhere else before the war, Britain conducted an extraordinary rescue mission, opening its doors to over 10,000 Jewish and other children from Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia. These children (kinder), as they came to be known, were taken into foster homes and hostels in Britain, expecting to be reunited with their parents. The majority of them never saw their families again. (May be found on Amazon Prime and Apple TV)