Michael Galinsky Movies

Graphic designer Daniel Goldstein leads the fight to prevent government and big business from razing an historic, Brooklyn, N.Y. neighborhood to make way for a more than a dozen skyscrapers and a new basketball arena for the New Jersey Nets. When the local government announced they would be using eminent domain laws to level the Prospect Heights neighborhood and make way for the Atlantic Yards project, the locals became deeply divided; while some saw the project as a way to bring jobs to the area, others were enraged at the thought of being forcefully evicted from their homes. Later, the government awarded the contract to Forest City Ratner -- a private contractor -- and the wheels of change were set into motion. As construction begins, tensions flare and it begins to appear as if the opponents of the project have run out of options. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

In 1999, as George W. Bush's bid for the presidency was gaining momentum, free-lance writer J.H. Hatfield contracted with St. Martin's Press to write a biography of the Texas governor and son of former U.S. President George Bush. When St. Martin's published Hatfield's book, entitled Fortunate Son: George W. Bush and the Making of an American President, it gained overnight media attention for its allegation (supported by unnamed sources later revealed to be insiders in the Bush campaign) that Bush was arrested for cocaine possession in 1972, but the Bush family exerted political pressure to have the incident wiped from the records. Alarmed by the controversy the book had generated as well as revelations about Hatfield's past which cast suspicions on his credibility (including the fact he was a convicted felon), St. Martin's buckled under pressure (some allegedly exerted by the Bush family and their legal team) and recalled the book. After Fortunate Son disappeared from shelves, Sander Hicks, a young political activist and punk rock singer, approached Hatfield with a proposal to reissue the book through his small leftist publishing company, Soft Skull Press. Horns and Halos is a documentary which examines the controversy over the book but places its main focus on two major players in this story -- Hicks, whose energetic idealism doesn't always mask his naïveté or his endless self-promotion, and Hatfield, a kind but troubled man whose ambition and desire for literary success, coupled with a desire to tell an important but controversial story, proves to be his undoing. Horns and Halos was named Best Documentary Feature at the 2002 New York Underground Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Tara (Tara Jane O'Neil) is growing weary of her life at the Rocket House, a party pad filled with crashing slackers, artists, and rock bands. She works as a ticket taker at a movie theatre and hangs out with a group of friends who are equally aimless, skateboarding through the streets of Louisville, KY, and just generally waiting for their lives to start. Her brother, Otis (Ian Svenonius), is the arrogant lead singer of a local rock group called the Guilloteens, and one night after a gig, Tara and her pals steal the band's van (still full of equipment) and head off into the night. The next morning they find themselves in Chattanooga without money or food, so they pose as a touring rock band called Truckstop and talk their way onto the bill of a local punk show. Despite being utterly unfamiliar with the instruments in their hands, they pull off the ruse, and the band they play with loves their noisy, chaotic sound. Even after their secret is revealed, their hosts give them encouragement and tutoring to allow Truckstop to continue on the road. What starts as a romantic adventure, though, degenerates into bickering, bad luck, and boredom. Half-Cocked features members of indie bands like Retsin, the Make Up, Rachel's, and June of 44 as actors, plus an appearance by Memphis rockers the Grifters. The soundtrack includes music by Freakwater, Sleepyhead, Unwound, Smog, and others. ~ Fred Beldin, Rovi