Last year I wrote about Malala Yousafzai, an amazing young woman. Her story is so inspirational. Named for an Afghan folk heroine, the activist Pakistani teenager was shot in the face and left for dead by the Taliban in 2012 — but recovered and went on to speak out about the gross injustices in girls’ education in her country and around the world, winning the Nobel Peace Prize along the way. The Malala Fund, which she co-founded with her father Ziauddin Yousafzai, is building schools in Jordan, Pakistan and Lebanon. I was so inspired by the film made about her, He Named Me Malala and the 25-minute conversation I was fortunate to be a part of with Malala herself, along with my tween-aged daughter by my side.

The documentary offers a look into Malala’s life both before and after the attack. She was 15 at the time of the incident, when she was singled out, along with her father, for advocating for girls’ education. The shooting sparked an outcry from supporters around the world. Malala miraculously survived and is now a leading campaigner for girls’ education globally as co-founder of the Malala Fund.

#HeNamedMeMalala to Premiere on National Geographic Channel

For all these reasons and more, I’m excited that National Geographic Channel, in continuation of its partnership with Fox Searchlight Pictures, will be airing the documentary commercial free on Monday, February 29, on National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo MUNDO in the U.S., with a global rollout planned within a week in 171 countries and 45 languages.

The robust education program for the film includes free education resources, discussion and curriculum guides, a service learning Toolkit, Books for Change, a Map Maker Interactive, and can be found here. Additionally, efforts to expose students to Malala’s inspiring story resulted in over 180,500 students globally seeing the film in theaters, and in the U.S. reaching students in all 50 states.

Disclosure: I was not compensated to write this review but am working alongside Women Online & The Mission List to help promote the film.

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“I will better serve the world if I don’t have it.”

These are the words expressed by actress/filmmaker Marianna Palka. She is referring to Huntington’s disease, an incurable hereditary degenerative brain disorder which she watched her father die a painful death from as a young mam

In the acclaimed short documentary premiering tomorrow on HBO, THE LION’S MOUTH OPENS, Palka gathers her friends to find out if she has inherited Huntington’s disease. Several other family members got it, including her sister, so the potential for her is quite high. Featuring interviews with Palka, her family and friends, as well as footage from her childhood, the film chronicles how one woman decides to face her demons and accept this potentially life-altering information.

The doc’s title “The Lion’s Mouth Opens” is taken from lines from a poem that Bob Dylan wrote about Woody Guthrie called “Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie” which Marianna recites aloud in the film. The combination of the her words and the home movies are haunting.

When her friend (actor, Jason Ritter, who she has both dated and worked with in the past but they are now friends) asks if she’s afraid, she tells him, “I vascillate between denial… the best place to be. It’s a cool island, a tropical island where you’re bathing in salt water and drinking coconut milk. I go from denial to curiousity to frustration to impatience.” Her friends, including Bryce Dallas Howard, are extremely supportive and are true testaments to her bravery.

Palka is fearless, having created a living will before getting the results. She knows this is not a disease that one can survive, and the documentary slowly builds up the suspense in the big reveal of whether she’s sick….or safe. Flashbacks of her father’s living days are scary as he watch his inevitable deteriation and I hoped so much for this beautiful young woman’s survival.

As she reflects on what led her to this point, Ritter asks if she is afraid of the results, but reassures her, adding, “I don’t think you would ever let something as simple as fear stop you from doing anything.”

Around 30,000 Americans have been diagnosed with Huntington’s disease, and approximately 200,000 more, whose parents were diagnosed with the disorder, have a 50% chance of developing it. Less than 10% of those at risk choose to take the test that reveals if they have inherited Huntington’s. Today, there is no cure.

Only eight years old when her father began showing signs of the disease, Palka watched him deteriorate over the years as, in her mother’s words, “each brick from the castle was just falling out.” Discovering that the gene mutation could be traced back to Palka’s paternal grandmother, she has a 50% chance of being affected.

The news isn’t good. We are witnesses to the scene where she is told she has the gene, with her girlfriends in tow, Howard and Moet Hashimoto. At 32, she’s told the illness could onset in her late 30s to mid 50s. The discovery is both baffling and devastating.

Palka leaves us with this: “Everyone faces demise. We’re all in that together as human beings.” She is strong but how long will her strength last? Taking a look at IMDB, she has been working hard, with many films coming out in the next year and she is living life like there’s an end in sight. But there doesn’t have to be. With effective medication, the damage to her brain can be prevented.

The problem is that these drugs don’t exist, for Huntington’s or Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and other neurological disorders.

Hopefully, this documentary will push the struggle along and beautiful women like Palka will not leave our world until she has lived a full life.

THE LION’S MOUTH OPENS was nominated for a Short Film Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and received a Special Jury Award at Aspen Shortsfest and an award for Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Short Filmmaking at Cinema Eye Honors Awards, US. The film was directed and produced by Lucy Walker; producers, Marianna Palka and Julian Cautherley; shot and co-produced by Nick Higgins; co-producer, Sabrina Doyle; editor, Joe Peeler.

Watch this incredible documentary tomorrow night (6/1) tomorrow night at 9pm EST on HBO.

Disclosure: I’m a member of HBO’s Documentary Diplomats and was sent a review copy in advance of the premiere to screen. All opinions are my own.

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A world without Joan Rivers. Who can imagine? I grew up with her, as I’m sure you did. She was responsible for so much. She made us laugh. She was a true pioneer. She spoke out for what she believed in. She celebrated life and helped us get through hard times, using her as our example.

Tonight while reading tributes from her Hollywood colleagues, I stumbled across “Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work,” on Netflix. a documentary made in 2010 that saluted her life and career.Her career spanned 4 decades and she paved the way for female comediennes, but she had to fight to get there. She didn’t have the easiest path and this film follows that path.

It begins at a low point in Rivers’ career with a blank calendar and by the end, it was full. She’s been invited to participate in an all-star George Carlin tribute, landed the “Fashion Police” gig and won “The Celebrity Apprentice.” She never really reclaimed her late night status as Jonny Carson’s special guest host but she achieved so much. She became a regular on great TV shows like “The Carol Burnett Show,” “Hollywood Squares,” “Saturday Night Live”, she directed a film and was nominated for a Grammy for her 1983 comedy album. She wrote a New York Times best selling book Diary of a Mad Diva, she had a jewelry line on QVC,  a WE TV reality show “Joan & Melissa: Joan Knows Best?, had a web series and she even earned a Tony nomination for Sally Marr…and Her Escorts.

Joan Rivers lived her life on her terms, doing what she loved, and she loved being in the spotlight even after enduring tragedies of her own, which the documentary touches on. She was someone I admired from a very young age for these reasons. I remember watching her on “The Tonight Show” as she spoke about being a single mother (we watched her morn the death of her husband, which was a big shock back then), life in Hollywood and being Jewish. She was irreverent, frank and daring, a woman who spoke her mind. She would share one self-deprecating joke after another, finding comedy and connection at her own expense, giving voice to things about women’s lives that had never been said. She was the queen of resiliency and was so fearless. It was her work that brought her back. She really loved what she did and was so full of life.

Watching “Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work” tonight was exactly what the doctor ordered. I’m sad. I’m mad. It was a life cut too short, although at age 81, she fortunately did live a long, meaningful life.

Disclosure: I’m a member of the Netflix Stream Team and am required to write monthly posts but all opinions are my own.

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Yesterday I had the opportunity to screen a new documentary called DON’T DIVORCE ME! a new documentary airing on HBO next week.  I was instantly intrigued by the invitation, given the fact that I have newly divorced friends with young children and am the daughter of a divorced couple.  My own parents divorced when I was much older than the young children shown in this film, but I have always thought about the profound impact divorce can have on children.  I see it on my friend’s young children and I was curious to see how one could produce a sensitive, thoughtful movie on the subject.

And this film does.  It’s only 30-minutes long and it’s the kind of movie your own children could watch.  They don’t show parents arguing, they don’t talk about how the parents got to the place they’re in. The focus is on the kids.  It’s about how they are.  Throughout the film, they show kids holding signs, which express their feelings that read:

“Don’t take your anger out on me.”

“Be honest with me.”

“No fighting.”

“Don’t make me a messenger.”

It’s powerful stuff.  Whether these words are written on these signs or spoken out loud, these kids care.  They miss the life they once had with two parents living under the same roof and are struggling to move on.  Brooke, aged 7, boldly and wisely states, “No one invented families.  People made families to spread love.” These kids are let down that their family unit is no longer one. They are insightful and they are all working to build a new future, sometimes with their parents, sometimes alone in their mind,.  What strikes me about them is that they are incredibly resilient.  They even ask each other insightful questions about their situations and these are not kids holding their feelings inside their hearts.

During a “Lunch Bunch” scene where four children talk over lunch in a classroom, one tells the others, “Some people think it’s all their fault.” In the case of divorce, everyone feels responsible, especially the children. The film shows children equating memories to objects, as one little girl does in a special pink jewelry box, and how concrete aspects of one’s life makes a difference to kids.

Along the way, you have quick shots, great music (including “Should I Stay or Should I Go” by the Clash), drawings, songs and photos.

The film was made by executive producer Rosie O’Donnell (HBO’s “A Family Is a Family Is a Family”) and Emmy(R)-winning director Amy Schatz (HBO’s “Classical Baby”), and debuts THURSDAY, SEPT. 20 (6:30-7:00 p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO. It’s truly a film from the hearts of the children interviewed in the film.  It’s a film that can help families going through it.

Disclosure: I was not compensated to write this review but I really benefitted from the experience and mean everything mentioned above.

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I saw the most amazing documentary last night called Strangers No More.  My neighbor across the street told me about the film yesterday and I thought I would never make it.  It was to start at 7pm. When my husband walked in at 6:55, I ran out the door.  This was a film that I knew I had to see. I remember when it won the Oscar for documentary short last year, and it got my attention then.  I also love when there are documentaries and quality films playing locally, and the JCC in Scarsdale is a hop, skip and a jump away.

The film is about a school in Tel Aviv where children from forty-eight different countries and diverse backgrounds come together to learn. Many of the students arrive at Bialik-Rogozin School from the Ukraine, Egypt, Nigeria, Darfur, Ethiopia, to name a few places, fleeing poverty, political adversity and even genocide.   Strangers No More follows several students’ struggle to acclimate to life in a new land while slowly opening up to share their stories of hardship and tragedy.  With tremendous effort and dedication, the school provides the support these children need to recover from their past. Together, the bond between teacher and student, and amongst the students themselves, enables them to create new lives in this exceptional community.

The school is so dedicated to these children.  It starts at the beginning of the school year and follows the children until the end of the school year.   The principals and teachers find out the history of the family when the children arrive so they know how to approach the child, and what resources to put into place for them.  They are so invested in each child’s future and want to make it better for them, better from where they come from.  They also want them to learn to love Israel, but it’s a challenge at first.  Not only are they taken away from the land they come from, they have to learn a new language.  But it’s language what brings the kids together.

The film revolves around 3 children in particular.  Each has come from very difficult circumstances.  Esther saw her mother shot right before her eyes. She and her family needed a safe place to turn, and Israel took them in.  There are many children who who have recently come from Sudan; 60 alone last year.  Mohammed, age 16, saw his father die right before his eyes.  His eyes are full of sadness, yet have hope in them.  Yohannes is from Ethiopia.  For a while, no one is sure why he has learning disabilities, but eventually the school realizes that he needs glasses.  One teacher buys him a bike.  All these children needed was a chance.  To live.  Freedom.

According to the film’s official site, “Together, the bond between teacher and student, and amongst the students themselves, enables them to create new lives in this exceptional community.”  It really is a lovely love letter to Israel, a country that originated out of dire circumstances, when after the Holocaust millions of Jews had no place to go.  The school has opened its arms to children who have nowhere to go.  In the end, they give them life.

The film was directed and produced by Karen Goodman and Kirk Simon, whose Simon and Goodman Picture Company is based in NYC. Goodman was in attendance after the film and told about us about how she came to make the movie and about the process itself. She said that the film is airing on HBO in the fall. She is now working with the Israeli government to encourage filmmakers to come to make films in Israel. Next week she is taking her Oscar to the school to show the children and to keep the story alive in the minds of Israeli citizens.

Next week at the JCC Jewish Film Series in Scarsdale, NY, they are showing Barney’s Vision (Wednesday, June 22nd, 7pm). The film starts Dustin Hoffman and Paul Giametti. The film spans three decades of one man’s life. On June 27th, at 7pm, they are featuring the New Yiddish Cinema, a screening of clips and a lecture. You’ll find me at both.

Disclosure: I was not compensated to write this review.

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