In The Family (2008/Breast Cancer Documentary/First Run DVD)

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: B     Documentary: B

 

 

Breast Cancer is still a horrible disease and between mutated genes being spotted as one of the reasons for the cause and a Bush II Administration policy against the science and progress to stop it (like stem cell research) has caused untold numbers of women to die of the disease when they could have lived.  An Obama victory may finally change that, but until then, Joanna Rudnick’s In The Family (2008) is a powerful portrait of how the director handles her battle with finding out she has a mutated gene and how it ran in her family.

 

This runs a rich, powerful, stark 83 minutes and does an amazing job of capturing her life, dealing with the finality of possible death, of the love in her family and the value of life itself.  To her advantage, she has found the man of her dreams and for a change, it is a functional relationship that plays counter to the nightmare.  She also has a great family and goes out of her way to connect with other women dealing with the situation.  Despite major fund raising efforts and the fact that it is a crisis, Breast Cancer is still too invisible for our own good and there are those perverts and idiots who are more worried about discussing sex than about if women die or not.  In The Family trashes that ignorance by breaking the silence.

 

The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image has been shot in older low def video and can be soft more often than not, but I liked the way this was shot and edited.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 is simple stereo at best, works better, is cleaner and sounds good with editing choices that help.  Extras include a Where Are They Now? piece, Genetics FAQ, PDF DVD-ROM Discussion Guide you can print out and extra scenes worth your time.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo