Richard Levien's COLLISIONS: an up-close-and-personal, narrative look at the current havoc being wreaked by Trumps's ICE-men

UPDATE: Collisions is now available 

via streaming and DVD here , 

and thefilmmakers are partnering with the 

National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON) 

to support its Immigrant Worker Safety Net Fund, 

which provides immediate financial support 

desperately needed by workers and their families 

during this current pandemic. 

Immigrant workers are among the most vulnerable 

at this time, and they are largely excluded from 

government programs. From now through 

April 30, 2020, 50% of proceeds from sales 

of "Collisions" will be donated to this fund.

Remember La Misma Luna, that lovely Patricia Riggin/Ligiah Villalobos movie from 2007? In it, a young boy travels from Mexico to the USA to try to unite with his mom, an undocumented worker laboring here and sending money home to her mom and her kids.

That's the movie of which this new one -- COLLISIONS, written and directed by Richard Levien -- most reminds me, in which two children, an older sister and younger brother, desperately try to find their missing mom, who has, while waiting for her green card, suddenly been arrested and detained by ICE (U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement) and is in danger of being quickly, if not immediately, deported back to Mexico.

Both films, their respective director's (Mr. Levien is shown at right) first full-length effort, tackle a subject that remains unfortunately a hot-button issue, and while each relies a little too much on coincidence to be taken as seriously as its filmmaker might wish, La Misma Luna, boasting a starrier cast, along with a good deal more incident and narrative drive, is by far the more entertaining and moving movie.

Still, Collisions -- with its ripped-from-the-headlines central event and consequent plot line -- proves worth a watch, as well. Despite your knowing where the film is going (together with how it will get there), it is, for the most part, well-written and -acted and directed decently enough to pass muster.

The film's four central performances are especially good -- that of the beleaguered mom (played by Ana de la Reguera, above), her smart-as-a-whip and twice as determined twelve-year-old daughter (Izabella Alvarez, below),

her younger sibling (a sweet and slyly scene-stealing Jason Garcia, Jr., shown below),

and finally mom's estranged-and-none-too-happy-to-be-here brother (Jesse Garcia, below, right, in the film's standout performance), who is roped/guilted into helping his niece and nephew locate their mom. You'll quickly figure out that this crotchety uncle will soon bond with his sister's offspring, but Garcia plays it all very well indeed.

Despite the seemingly too-easy locating of mom and the happenstance that allows this, one of the film's strengths is in depicting the ICE-men and other bureaucrats shown along the way who try to aid the two kids. As writer/director, Mr. Levien -- despite the current drastic and unnecessary actions of ICE (under the despicable leadership of Trump and his sleazy minions) -- allows some humanity in these various individuals to shine through, if only briefly.

This helps save the movie from seeming completely one-sided and obvious. And while the film's finale offers certain amount of feel-good, Collisions is smart enough to know that there are no easy solutions available here.

You may wish the movie were a better one, and indeed it might have been. But TrustMovies suspects that you won't be entirely able to shake off either its timeliness nor its commitment to "family."

Running just 82 minutes, Collisions has its U.S. theatrical premiere in Los Angeles tomorrow evening, Thursday, October 3, at 7:30pm at Laemmle's Ahyra Fine Arts, with the cast and filmmaker in attendance. The film opens for a week-long run on Friday, October 4, at Laemmle's Music Hall 3 in Beverly Hills, with a limited release in selected cities to follow.

Philippe Faucon's FATIMA: France's Best Picture winner opens in U.S. theaters

The French, in my humble opinion, have long been perverse -- culturally, socially, politically, sexually, you-name-it-ly -- and this is, to a large extent, part of the country's charm and appeal, especially to some of us Americans who might like to be a bit more sophisticated but may lack the wherewithal. That country's choice this year of FATIMA as its César-winning Best Picture award would seem to bear this out. I can't think of a Best Picture choice from a European nation as unusual and oddly challenging since perhaps Spain's Goya Award to Solitary Fragments (La soledad) back in 2008.

There is little beyond the Best Picture selection that the two films share -- except their superior quality and the fact that they were such a surprise choice. Jaime Rosales' Spanish masterpiece about (among other things) society, family, caring and terrorism runs two hours and fifteen minutes, while Philippe Faucon's (the filmmaker is shown at right) look at the immigrant experience in France lasts all of a mere 75 minutes. Yet in terms of reach and grasp coalescing, the film is near perfect.

If TrustMovies had been voting for this particular award, his choice would have been Marguerite over Fatima for reasons of ambition, challenge and execution, though he loves both movies very much. And god knows, immigration (particularly from Arab countries) remains the hot-button issue worldwide and especially in France where, since (and probably long prior to) The Battle of Algiers, movies have been responding to life and political situations.

M. Faucon's film is simplicity itself, using a quiet documentary style to depict the life of an immigrant family in which the mother, the eponymous Fatima (played, in her acting debut, with self-effacing gravity and style by Soria Zeroual, shown above and further above), is a cleaning lady who works long hours to support her two daughters. Her husband (Chawki Amari, below, right) has left her for another woman, though he does make occasional appearances, gifting his daughters with merchandise like a new pair of sneakers.

One daughter, a pretty teen played with haughty, angry rebellion by newcomer Kenza Noah Aïche (above, left), can't seem to stifle that anger and so makes her mother's life more hellish than it needs to be, Fatima's older daughter, Nessrine (played by Zita Hanrot, below, left, of Eden and The New Girlfriend) is about to enter medical school and desperately needs more money, not to mention more confidence, to manage this. It is a testament to the filmmaker's skill that he handles all three actresses, as well as the rest of his diverse cast -- fledglings and pros -- so well that they appear a most believable family, within the fuller society at large.

Not all that much "event" takes place throughout the movie, but what there is proves enough -- along with the utter truthfulness of how Faucon dramatizes what we see -- to capture our mind and heart. I don't remember ever experiencing such enormous and unadulterated joy at a character's success as I felt at the close of this film. (I believe that is Zakaria Ali-Mehidi, above, right, who plays Nessrine's new friend Sélim.) How M. Faucon introduces us to cultural habits involving dating and sexuality, as well as how important image and reputation are to the older generation, is handled particularly well -- with an understanding of both the positive and negative aspects involved.

Faucon, as director and co-writer, shows us how especially difficult life can be for immigrants like our heroine, who do not learn to speak and write French. Late in the film, writing in her own language, Fatima demonstrates a keen intelligence, as well as poetic gift, as she describes a generic, all-purpose Fatima, without whose help and care, the French-speaking "white" populace could barely exist.

The blessings and rewards of a film like this one may be diminutive and quiet, but they are all the more impressive for the way their small size turns into vast scope. From Kino-Lorber, Fatima opens this Friday, August 26, in New York City at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and then on September 16 in Los Angeles at Laemmle's Royal. Elsewhere? Let's hope that, once word-of-mouth grows a bit, the film will find further venues. Click here and then click on PLAYDATES to keep up with future bookings.

Don't just stand there: DO something! Lee Hirsch's BULLY arrives on DVD & Blu-ray

If nothing else, the much-talked-about documentary, BULLY, which arrives this week on Blu-ray and DVD will make grateful those of us who grew up far outside small-town America. Not that we weren't bullied (I sure as hell was) but being from a big city like Los Angeles, where I lived in the Silver Lake area back in the 1950s, both my junior-high and high schools offered, even then, a diverse enough population that I could find at least a small group of kids with whom I fit in. In the America shown in Bully -- shot in Georgia, Oklahoma, Iowa and Mississippi -- the small minds and large bodies we see and hear are often enough to make you want to run screaming from the room.

Whether it's the bullying students, their parents, police officials or school administrators, most of these people appear as witless cretins who don't have a clue to what's going on -- or worse, have many, many clues and simply don't give a damn. The film's director and co-writer Lee Hirsch, shown at right, must have either appeared as a fly on the wall or ingratiated himself something fierce to let these people allow him to film what he did. Or maybe they're simply too stupid to understand how they come across. This movie's shocks come not so much from the bullying itself, which has always gone on, but from the uncaring attitudes of so many of the adults. Yes, there are some genuinely caring folks shown here -- at community meetings, and among the parents of the bullied kids, but much of what we see will have you wanting to toss tomatoes, if not hand grenades, at your TV screen and the crass sample of humanity displayed.

Sympathy-wise, it's the bullied kids themselves who register most strongly, the first of whom we see, Tyler, can no longer be helped, as he ended his life before the film began. The others -- Alex, Ja'Meya, Kelby, Devon and a couple more -- come to us and at us like the good kids they are, enduring the kind of pressure and abuse that, I think, can finally cause total flip-outs and school massacres. Alex in particular (above), with his gorgeous Angelina Jolie-like lips (don't give up, Alex: you're gonna be a heart-breaker in a few years!) will break your heart for more immediate reasons, as you watch him endure the kind of bullying on the school bus (even when this footage is shown to the school administrators, little seems to change) that no kid should have to countenance.

On the bus, in the hallways, classrooms, the school grounds in general, we see it happening, and the babble from the adults in charge is non-stop appalling. If Ja'Meya (shown above, with her mom) gets a little less bullying time that the others, the fact that she decides to do something about this on her own makes her behavior seem less criminal than a means of self-preservation. Of all the kids on view, it's Kelby (below) who, despite everything, seems to have the inner strength to somehow persevere. Watching this young lady think, communicate, or just "be" proves inspiring.

Instead of building, Mr Hirsch allows his film to deflate somewhat by the finale, trailing off into the feel-good story of groups springing up around the country dedicated to preventing bullying. Good luck; everything helps. Though attracting enormous media coverage for all sorts of reasons prior to its theatrical release (a hallmark of the fabled Weinstein ability to garner PR), the film did not come near setting the box-office on fire. It should be seen, however. Perhaps home viewing, where families can stop in the middle when necessary to discuss what they're watching, in an ideal venue for this hot-button subject.

Bully (not to be confused with the Larry Clark film of a decade back) from The Weinstein Company and running 98 minutes, hits the street on DVD and Blu-ray today -- Tuesday, February 12 -- for rental and sale.