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Director: Sidney Lumet
1988 / 116min / DCP
Two decades after their involvement in the bombing of a napalm factory that resulted in the accidental blinding of a janitor, Arthur and Annie Pope (Judd Hirsh and Christine Lahti)—characters loosely inspired by Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn of the Weather Underground—are still on the move, still one step ahead of the law… but when their now-teenaged son, Danny (River Phoenix), emerges as a piano prodigy, the Popes are faced to make a difficult decision as to whether to keep the family together or leave Danny behind to a future without assumed identities. A testament to Phoenix’s generational talent, as well to that of then-romantic partner Martha Plimpton, here as the daughter of Danny’s high school music teacher, with the duo giving one of the most jarringly real, vulnerable performances of budding first love in American cinema.
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Q&A with screenwriter Naomi Foner moderated by Edo Choi on Thursday, January 29th
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