Movie Reviews
AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS: THE DOCUMENTARY Review
More than a million homeless people in the United States lack basic needs, self-worth, medical care, and a sense of community. Each person has inherent dignity, because every person is created in God’s image. The government may have failed, but private citizens have rallied to answer the call. AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS: THE DOCUMENTARY stands apart because it lays out the need, while also highlighting some solutions. However, the movie has plenty of disturbing content about crime, poverty, substance abuse, and mental illness. Strong caution is advised for pre-teenage children.
Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:
Strong Christian, biblical worldview in documentary about the issue of homelessness, with dozens of interviews of experts, government officials, homeless people, doctors, and charity workers, including many Christians;
Foul Language:
No foul language;
Violence:
Some discussion about violent crime, plus a brief scene from an upcoming movie where a man holds a knife against an elderly homeless man;
Sex:
No sex;
Nudity:
No nudity;
Alcohol Use:
Discussion about alcohol abuse and alcoholism, and the need for rehab and recovery;
Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:
Discussion about drug abuse, overdoses and the drug epidemic and the need for better rehab and recovery programs; and,
Miscellaneous Immorality:
Some discussion about mental illness and its effect on homelessness.
AMERICANS WITH NO ADDRESS: THE DOCUMENTARY is a very well thought out, superbly executed, and inspirational documentary that explores the current homeless crisis in the United States. All political parties agree that the government has failed to solve the problem, and some argue that the government has made the problem much worse. This masterfully done documentary includes content with adult topics, such as drug use, violence, broken families, and crime. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises extreme caution for children.
The movie explores the homelessness epidemic in 20 cities across 18 states in the United States. It interviews dozens of people about the subject, including experts, government officials, policemen, homeless people, doctors, and people working in nonprofit groups giving food and shelter to the homeless.
According to the United States government, homelessness rose 12% in 2023, to 653,104 people. Also, it’s been estimated that one third of the population knows a family member or a friend who became homeless in the last year. Homeless encampments that were once only associated with “Skid Row” in big cities are now seen everywhere. Yet, government spending on homelessness has tripled in the last 12 years.
The documentary says the homeless problem isn’t new. In fact, it’s been brewing since Congress passed the IMD Exclusion Act of 1965, which left the problem of homelessness to the states. This essentially means that the federal government will not offer assistance to any homeless persons between the ages of 21 and 65.
In 2013, the federal government began providing HUD housing to homeless persons without requiring treatment for substance addiction recovery and mental health illnesses. Experts agree this is a system set up to fail. To make matters worse, in the last several years, state governments have stepped in to provide clean needles, straws and other paraphernalia to assist homeless people in their substance abuse issues. Hospitals are only allowed to provide 15 beds to mental health patients, no matter the size of the hospital. Many people in need are turned away or end up in prison. The rate of incarceration has exploded in recent years. Moreover, the closure of most mental hospitals in the 1970s and 1980s only made the problem worse.
The system clearly is broken, the movie argues. In fact, the movie shows that many of the measures taken have been detrimental to those in need and is costing taxpayers even more money. For example, the city of San Francisco spends $257,000 per day to clean up homeless encampments. This doesn’t solve the problem, because the homeless population simply moves to another nearby location.
More than physical needs, scores of people are bereft of love, self-worth and a sense of community. Each person has inherent dignity as every person is created in the image and likeness of God.
The movie quotes Mother Teresa, a champion for the homeless, who once said, “We think that sometimes poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty.” Then, movie also quotes the co-founder of the Salvation Army in 1865, Catherine Booth, who said, “You are not here in the world for yourself. You have been sent here for others. The world is waiting for you.” Amy Grant personalizes it best in the movie when she ponders, “What if I were that person? Because life can turn on a dime.”
The government has failed us, but private citizens have rallied to answer this call to care for our brothers and sisters who are “outcasts, lost and forgotten.” Some of these organizations across the country include Step Up, Haven For Hope, Community First! Village, the Salvation Army, St. Vincent De Paul, Harbor of Light, Helping Hands, and The Helping Up Mission, a collaboration between Johns Hopkins University and The Helping Up Mission. These programs are spread out across the country. All of them are successful, to one extent or another, the movie notes.
In the end, the movie’s best, most enlightening parts are the stories of the people involved in this issue, whether it be the homeless people themselves or the Christians and charity workers helping them.
Desert Warrior, 2026.
Directed by Rupert Wyatt.
Starring Anthony Mackie, Aiysha Hart, Ben Kingsley, Ghassan Massoud, Sharlto Copley, Sami Bouajila, Lamis Ammar, Géza Röhrig, Numan Acar, Nabil Elouahabi, Hakeem Jomah, Ramsey Faragallah, Saïd Boumazoughe, and Soheil Bostani.
SYNOPSIS:
An honorable and mysterious rogue, known as Hanzala, makes himself an enemy of the Emperor Kisra after he helps a fugitive king and princess in the desert.
With aspirations of being a historical epic harkening back to the sword and sandal blockbusters of yesteryear, Rupert Wyatt’s seventeenth-century Arabia tale is about as generic and epically dull as one would expect from a film plainly titled Desert Warrior. Yes, there appear to be real locations here, and there are some admittedly sweeping shots of various tribes storming into battle on horseback and camels, but it’s all in service of a mess that is both miscast and questionable as the work of a filmmaking team of mostly white creatives.
The story of Emperor Kisraa (Ben Kingsley, a distracting presence even with only one or two scenes) rounding up women from other tribes to be his concubines, which inevitably became the catalyst for a revolution led by Princess Hind (Aiysha Hart), uniting all the divided clans and strategizing battle plans for flanking and poisoning, is undeniably ripe for cinematic treatment. The problem is that what’s here from Rupert Wyatt (and screenwriters Erica Beeney, Gary Ross, and David Self) is less than nothing in the primary creative process; no one seems to have a connection to Arabic heritage or culture, but they have made a flat-out boring film that is often narratively incoherent.
Following the death of her father and escaping the clutches of oppression, the honorable Princess Hind joins forces with a troubled, nameless bandit played by Anthony Mackie (he totally belongs here…), who seems to be here solely to give the movie some star power boost without running the risk of white savior accusations. Whatever the case may be, it’s jarring, but not quite as disorienting as how little screen time he has despite being billed as the lead and how little characterization he has. It is, however, equally disorienting as some of the other names that show up along the way.
As for the other factions, Princess Hind talks to them one by one, giving the film an adventure feel that fails to capitalize on using beautiful scenery in striking or visually poignant ways at almost every turn; the leaders of these tribes also often have no character. There also isn’t much of an understanding of why these tribes are at odds with one another. This movie is filled with dialogue that consistently and shockingly amounts to vague nothingness. Nevertheless, each tribe doesn’t take much convincing to begin with, meaning that not only is the film repetitive, but it’s also lifeless when characters are in conversation.
That Desert Warrior does occasionally spring to life, and a bloated 2+ running time is a small miracle. This is typically accomplished through the occasional fight scene between factions that also serves to demonstrate Princess Hind coming into her own as a warrior. When the tribes are united in a massive-scale battle, and that plan is unfolding step by step, one certainly sees why someone would want to tell this story and pull it off with such spectacle. However, this film is as dry as the desert itself.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★
Robert Kojder
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=embed/playlist
‘4’, the opening track on Richard D James’ (Aphex Twin) self titled 1996 album is a piece of music that beautifully balances the chaotic with the serene, the oppressive and the freeing. It’s a trick that James has pulled off multiple times throughout his career and it is a huge part of what makes him such an iconic and influential artist. Many people have laid the “next Aphex Twin” label on musicians who do things slightly different and when you actually hear their music you realise that, once again, the label is flawed and applied with a lazy attitude. Why mention this? Well, it turns out we’ve been looking for James’ heir apparent in the wrong artform. We’ve so zoned in on music that we’ve not noticed that another Celtic son of Cornwall is rewriting an art form with that highwire balancing act between chaos and beauty. That artist is writer, director and composer Mark Jenkin who over his last two feature films has announced himself as an idiosyncratic voice who is creating his very own language within the world of cinema. Jenkin’s films are often centred around coastal towns or islands and whilst they are experimental or even unsettling, there is always a big heart at the centre of the narrative. A heart that cares about family, tradition, culture, and the pull of ‘home’. Even during the horror of 2022’s brilliant Enys Men you were anchored by the vulnerability and determination of its main protagonist.
This month sees the release of Jenkin’s latest feature film, Rose of Nevada, which is set in a fractured and diminished Cornish coastal town. One day the fishing boat of the film’s title arrives back in harbour after being missing for thirty years. The boat is unoccupied. And frankly that is all the information you are going to get because to discuss any more plot would be unfair on you and disrespectful to Jenkin and the team behind the film. You the viewer should be the one who decides what it is about because thematically there are so many wonderful threads to pull on. This writer’s opinions on what it is about have ranged from a theme of sacrifice for the good of a community to the conflict within when part of you wants to run away from your roots whilst the other half longs to stay and be a lifelong part of its tapestry. Is it about Brexit? Could be. Is it about our own relationships with time and our curation of memory? Could be. Is it about both the positives and negatives of nostalgia? Could be. As a side note, anyone in their mid-40s, like me, who came of age in the 1990s will certainly find moments of warm recognition. Is the film about ghosts and how they haunt families? Could be…I think you get the point.
The elements that make the film so well balanced between chaos and calm are many. It is there in the differing performances between the brilliant two lead actors George MacKay and Callum Turner. It is there in the sound design which fluctuates from being unbearably harsh and metallic, to lulling and warm. It is there in the editing where short, sharp close ups on seemingly unimportant factors are counterbalanced with shots that are held for just that little bit too long. For a film set around the sea, it is apt that it can make you feel like you’re rolling on a stomach churning storm one minute, or a calming low tide the next. Dialogue can be front and centre or blurred and buried under static. One shot is bathed in harsh sunlight whilst the next can be drowned in interior shadows.
Rose of Nevada is Mark Jenkin’s most ambitious film to date yet he has not lost a single iota of innovation, singularity of vision or his gift for telling the most human of stories. It is a film that will tell you different things each time you see it and whilst there are moments that can confuse or beguile, there is so much empathy and love that it can leave you crying tears of emotional understanding. It is chaotic. It is beautiful. It is life……
Rose of Nevada is released on the 24th April.
Mark Jenkin Instagram | Threads
Released through the BFI – Instagram | Facebook
Review by Simon Tucker
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