Reviews

At Home in Utopia

A colorful, learned documentary

By GERALD PEARY | June 4, 2008

3.5 Stars

At Home in Utopia

Local filmmaker Michal Goldman, who founded the Boston Jewish Film Festival, has toiled for many years on this excellent, learned documentary about New York City’s historic United Workers Cooperative Colony. Left-wing Jews in the 1930s, mostly from the garment industry, bought up apartment buildings in the Bronx where they might live out their egalitarian Communist dreams. Through superb interviews with colorful, articulate ex-Coop members, Goldman gives a vivid, breathing history lesson of a time when many American Jews defined themselves by their radical politics (as opposed to, in the future, by standing strong for Israel). One issue she never addresses: did any of the Coop Jews she met find a need in their lives for shul? 57 minutes | MFA June 12 + 15 + 19; JULY 3 + 6

Before the Rains
Competent, intelligent, unadventurous
Up the Yangtze
The new Chinese Dream
Pit bulls
And the Brattle’s WW2 flicks
More

Topics: Reviews , Movies , Entertainment

Comments

Add a Comment

ARTICLES BY GERALD PEARY

DAYS AND CLOUDS | October 09, 2008
Well shot but predictably depressing

RELIGULOUS | October 02, 2008
Unabashedly agnostic and skeptical

ALLAH MADE ME FUNNY | October 01, 2008
But not that funny.

BLINDNESS | October 01, 2008
An old-fashioned disaster-movie yarn

TO HELL AND HARRY | September 24, 2008
Hell Girl, The IT Crowd

See all articles by: GERALD PEARY

Most Viewed

Most Emailed

I HAD AN ABORTION
Forty percent of American women have abortions by the time they're 45. I'm one of them.

BULL DISCLOSURE
As the candidates prep for the final debate, it’s a fitting time to ask: why do some journalistic conflicts of interest become scandals, while others get almost no attention at all?

THE MELTING POT
Dip into confusing dining

HOT LOVE
Taste the flames inside Boston's secret world of fire artists

SCHLEPPING FOR OBAMA
The Boston roots of Sarah Silverman's Jewbama crusade

WORDS AS MUSIC
Alan Lupo was many things — among them, the best metro columnist Boston may ever see

SCHLEPPING FOR OBAMA
The Boston roots of Sarah Silverman's Jewbama crusade

BULL DISCLOSURE
As the candidates prep for the final debate, it’s a fitting time to ask: why do some journalistic conflicts of interest become scandals, while others get almost no attention at all?