AT THE DEATH HOUSE DOOR is part of Steve James retrospective at the Maysles Institute
AT THE DEATH HOUSE DOOR (Steve James & Peter Gilbert, 2008)
Maysles Institute
343 Malcolm X Blvd. between 127th & 128th Sts.
Thursday, August 4, $10, 7:30
212-582-6050
www.mayslesinstitute.org
For more than fifteen years, Pastor Carroll Pickett served as death-row chaplain for nearly one hundred inmates at the Walls prison in Huntsville, Texas. The soft-spoken man of God would spend the last eighteen hours of each condemned man’s life with him, offering prayer, confession, and, in some cases, a hand to hold. Documentarians Steve James and Peter Gilbert, who teamed up on the Oscar-nominated Hoop Dreams in 1994, follow Pickett as he tells his compelling story with deep emotion and remarkable insight. We see Pickett as he listens to old cassettes he recorded after each execution, talking about his own complicated feelings about his job — something he never shared with his family or parish. He discusses how his personal thoughts about capital punishment changed after the 1989 execution of Carlos De Luna, a young man who claimed he was innocent — and Pickett believed him but never spoke out about it. The film often switches to investigative reporters Steve Mills and Maury Possley of the Chicago Tribune as they research a story about De Luna’s innocence, speaking primarily with one of his sisters, Rose Rhoton, who is ashamed that she didn’t do more to save her brother’s life. But what is clear is that such miscarriages of justice are not any one person’s fault but the result of a severely broken system. James and Gilbert stay out of the way of the story; they do not hit viewers over the head with facts and numbers, they include no third-person narration or random talking heads, and they avoid the expected confrontations over this extremely controversial issue. Even Leo Sidran’s score is even-handed and sensitive. At the Death House Door is a fascinating examination of the death penalty, seen through the eyes of someone who has experienced it in a very personal, powerful way. The film is screening August 4 at the Maysles Institute as part of the Master Class: Steve James series curated by Sylvia Savadjian, which concludes August 5-11 with James’s latest, The Interrupters, which follows an organized group of former gang members trying to stop the violence in Chicago.
A lot of professional fighters face adversity in and out of the ring, but “Irish” Micky Ward took it to a whole new level on his quest to be welterweight champion of the world, as documented in the winning motion picture The Fighter. Ward (Mark Wahlberg) surrounded himself with his family, with his mother, Allice Eklund (Melissa Leo), as his manager, his half-brother, the Pride of Lowell (for once knocking down Sugar Ray Leonard), Dicky Eklund (Christian Bale), as his trainer, and his many big-haired sisters, including Tar (Erica McDermott), Little Alice (Melissa McMeekin), Pork (Bianca Hunter), Red Dog (Dendrie Taylor), and Beaver (Kate O’Brien), part of the team as well. Despite getting pummeled over and over again and continually finding his brother at a condemned crack house, Micky stands by the family until Dicky is back in prison and Micky finally decides to go with a new promoter. As his stock begins to rise again, he is deeply affected by his separation from his family, who are blaming the parting on his new girlfriend, local bartender Charlene (Amy Adams). Based on the true story of the Ward/Eklund clan of Lowell, Massachusetts, The Fighter is a poignant tale of fighting and family, of love and responsibility. Bale, who won an Oscar for his performance, is a whirlwind as the effusive, drug-addicted Dicky, who dreams of helping his brother get a title shot even as he misses training sessions because of his dependence on crack. Leo, who nearly steals the show (and also took home an Academy Award), is virtually unrecognizable as Alice, who can’t understand why Micky would go with a new crew and has quite a few battles of her own with Charlene. And Walhlberg, who trained for several years to get himself in shape for the film, is strong and solid as the conflicted yet determined potential boxing champion. Director David O. Russell (Three Kings) gives The Fighter a realistic feel, at times echoing the documentary that HBO is making about Dicky in the movie, and even hiring Ward’s trainer, Mickey O’Keefe, to play himself. In fact, much of the cast got to meet their real-life counterparts, all of whom loved how they were portrayed onscreen, which is actually quite funny once you see how some of them come off. You don’t have to love boxing to love The Fighter, although fans of the sweet science will be impressed by the carefully choreographed fight scenes, complete with the original HBO commentary (and shot by some of the same cameramen). The Fighter is screening August 3 in Hudson River Park as part of the free Wednesday night RiverFlicks for Grown-ups series, with free popcorn; the schedule, which features 2010’s blockbuster hits, concludes with Scott Pilgrim vs. the World on August 10 and The Town on August 17. For a complete list of free outdoor summer films throughout the city, click 
