A Small Act: When Hilde Back sponsored a young, rural Kenyan student, she thought nothing of it. She never imagined her quarterly donation of $15 would pave the way for Chris Mburu's journey to Harvard Law School. Years later, Chris has become a United Nations human rights lawyer working to combat genocide and discrimination. He decides to seek out the stranger who dramatically transformed his life.

Ocean Odyssey: Takes viewers on an undersea journey to remote and magical places. Follow Feodor Pitcairn, a pioneer in underwater HD cinematography, as he explores the marine ecosystems of the Galapagos Islands, the Azores, Hawaii, the Caribbean, and more. (Also on Blu-ray)

The Lottery: Focuses on the charter school experience for African American families. In a country where 58% of African American 4th graders are functionally illiterate, The Lottery uncovers the failures of the traditional public school system and reveals that hundreds of thousands of parents attempt to flee the system every year. (Perhaps this can be a supplement to Waiting For Superman.)

If you enjoy watching romantic comedies, you may find yourself hoping that the next one you view will be a little different, a little more off the beaten path than what studios now produce. The Switch is just that. This romantic comedy is about a family coming together in an unconventional way. Wally (Jason Bateman) is introspective, so much so that he finds it difficult to date women more than a few times. His best friend, Kassie (Jennifer Aniston), upon her fortieth birthday, has decided to find a sperm donor so that she can finally have a child. After drinking excessively at her insemination party, Wally “trades Diane Sawyer to the Vikings” and “hijacks Kassie’s pregnancy” (switches the donor sample with his own), and drama ensues.

One of the excellent performances in this film is that of the young actor Thomas Robinson. As Kassie’s son Sebastian, Robinson is perfect as the introspective kid who would rather have his birthday party at a kill shelter than a rock climbing facility. Jeff Goldblum’s ramblings throughout the film as Bateman’s best friend are also entertaining. At times, some of the comedic effort falls flat; but overall, if you enjoy romantic comedies, this film is worth a view.

May 15th marks the birthday of authors L. Frank Baum, Katherine Anne Porter, and Mikhail Bulgakov.

L. Frank Baum was an American children's author most well known for his story The Wonderful Wizard of Oz; there were at least 17 total Oz books that Baum wrote.

Baum also wrote short stories about the magical land of Mo. You may be interested in looking up other books by Baum which were actually published under the pseudonyms Edith Van Dyne, Floyd Akers, Schuyler Staunton, John Estes Cooke, Suzanne Metcalf, and Laura Bancroft.

Katherine Anne Porter was an American writer and Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner (for The Collected Stories). She was also nominated numerous times for the Nobel Prize.

Porter's novel Ship of Fools was a best-seller and was made into a film starring Gone with the Wind's Vivien Leigh.

Mikhail Bulgakov was a Russian playwright and novelist. His most well known work was The Master and Margarita, a novel about the Devil visiting Soviet Russia. The book is something of a cult favorite now.

In addition, we have a collection of six of Bulgakov's plays. There is also another of Bulgakov's novels at AADL, Heart of a Dog, which is a strange story about a dog-turned-kind-of-man.

This month marks the 70th anniversary of the release of Citizen Kane. Holding the number one spot at the AFI Top 100 Movies list, it is seen by many critics to be the best film yet made. It also used many cinematography methods bringing things like deep focus into popular use.

However, the film wasn't a huge success on first run, having limited released due to theatre fears of retaliation by William Randolph Hearst's media empire. Based loosely on Hearst's life (among others), Citizen Kane was not seen kindly by the magnate. PBS' American Experience produced a documentary called The Battle over Citizen Kane that covered much of the controversy. You can read a transcript online.

And yes, William Randolph Hearst is the grandfather of also famous Patty Hearst who was kidnapped by and later joined the SLA.

While there were many sources of inspiration you can see some of them still in person. Xanadu, the fictionalized mansion in florida was based on the Hearst Castle which is now a California State Park and can be toured by visitors.

orient express
Today is National Train Day, a celebration of national rail travel sponsored by Amtrak.

Locally, Ann Arbor Mayor John Hieftje and the Michigan Association of Railroad Passengers will celebrate National Train Day with coffee and donuts. Mayor Hieftje will read a proclamation from the City in support of train travel and present it to the conductor of Amtrak train #351 heading to Chicago.

The Ann Arbor District Library has a wonderful collection of materials train-related. Here is a small sampling to help you celebrate:

The Train set in Paris 1944, starring Burt Lancaster, is an exciting film about the French Resistance and a German colonel trying to steal a vast art collection.

Strangers on a Train is the film noir Alfred Hitchcock classic.

Orient Express: the Life and Times of the World's Most Famous Train is about the luxurious European train operated by the Compagnie Internationale des Wagon-Lits.

Blood, Iron, & Gold : How the Railroads Transformed the World chronicles one of the greatest technological feats of the 19th century.

China’s Great Train is about the building of the great “Sky Train” the world’s highest railway that goes to Tibet.

May 6th marks the birthday of authors Gaston Leroux, Randall Jarrell, and Theodore White.

Gaston Leroux was a French author most known for his novel The Phantom of the Opera, which has been made into both a musical and a few films.

Leroux also wrote detective novels, two of which have been translated into English: The Mystery of the Yellow Room and The Perfume of the Lady in Black, which are both part of the series on the character Joseph Rouletabille.

Randall Jarrell was an American writer of poetry, children's books, and essays. We have his Complete Poems here at AADL; his collection The Woman at the Washington Zoo won the National Book Award for poetry is within it.

Among Jarrell's works for children, we have The Animal Family, a Newbery Honor Book, and The Bat-Poet, which was illustrated by Maurice Sendak (Where the Wild Things Are).

Theodore H. White was an American historian. His book The Making of the President, 1960 won the Pulitzer for General Nonfiction in 1962. It details the election of JFK, and is the first in a "series" of books about elections.

White's other works include Breach of Faith: The Fall of Richard Nixon, about the Watergate scandal, and his autobiography, In Search of History: A Personal Adventure.

April 23rd marks the birthday of authors William Shakespeare, Ngaio Marsh, and Halldor Laxness.

William Shakespeare was and is probably the most well-known English poet and playwright in history. You may know him for writing Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Love's Labour's Lost, and Twelfth Night. Almost all of his plays have been produced on stage, in film, or both.

Shakespeare's lesser known works, though I feel silly saying that at all, may be some of his many histories, like Coriolanus, about a Roman leader; Troilus and Cressida, a story of the Trojan War; Cymbeline, about a legendary British king and his daughter; or The Life and Death of King John, about the famed signer of the Magna Carta.

Ngaio Marsh was a writer from New Zealand who is probably best known for her detective novels. Her name may also be familiar to those who watch the Inspector Alleyn Mysteries, since the show is based on her works about Roderick Alleyn.

Marsh also wrote short stories, which we have collected in Alleyn And Others: The Collected Short Fiction Of Ngaio Marsh. She wrote so many books that I don't know, really, which one to talk about, so I'm going with the best title: Killer Dolphin, an Alleyn mystery set in the Dolphin Theater.

Halldor Laxness was an Icelandic author and Nobel Prize winner. He wrote three rounds of stories that focused on the Icelandic people: Salka Valka, Independent People, and The Light of the World (also called World Light).

Laxness also wrote The Fish Can Sing, called by the publisher "a poignant coming-of-age tale marked with his peculiar blend of light irony and dark humor". It tells the story of an orphan who changes his dream of becoming a fisherman when he meets an Icelandic celebrity.

Last year I finally got around to reading Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (2005) by Doris Kearns Goodwin and it was surprisingly thrilling to see how our great president brilliantly juggled arrogant generals, jealous cabinet members, a moody wife and personal tragedy against the backdrop of the Civil War. Yesterday I heard that Steven Spielberg is basing his upcoming film about Lincoln on Goodwin's book, and if Spielberg's pedigree isn't enough to excite you about the prospects of this film, consider that he's cast two-time Oscar winner, Daniel Day Lewis to play the president (yay!) and two-time Oscar winner Sally Field to play Mary Lincoln. Other major talent, such as Kevin Spacey and Sean Penn, are also rumored to have roles. I'm nearly as geeked to find out who ends up playing William Seward and Salmon Chase as I was ten years ago when they were casting Gandalf and Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings.

Directed by Julian Schnabel, starring Hiam Abbass , Freida Pinto, Makram J. Khoury , Willem Dafoe, Vanessa Redgrave, Miral is based on the novel by Rula Jebreal, translated from the Italian by John Cullen.

Spanning the years 1948-1994, Miral revolves around the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and real-life Palestinian woman Hind Husseini, who started the Dar Al-Tifl orphanage in Jerusalem in the wake of the 1948 partition of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel.

miral

Soul Surfer is based on the book Soul Surfer : a true story of faith, family, and fighting to get back on the board, about Bethany Hamilton. It is the inspiring story of a talented teen surfer who lost her left arm in a shark attack and courageously overcame all odds to become a champion again, through sheer determination and unwavering faith.

April 15th marks the birthday of authors Henry James, Corrie ten Boom, and Jeffrey Archer.

Henry James was an American writer, probably best known for his novella The Turn of the Screw, often spoken of in terms of its ambiguity; (it is uncertain whether the main character is experiencing ghosts, or psychological repression.)

James has many other stories worth mentioning. The Portrait Of A Lady and The Bostonians are both well-known. Lesser known, James also published travel writings, like Italian Hours.

Corrie ten Boom was a Dutch author and Holocaust survivor; her autobiography, The Hiding Place tells the story of how she aided and hid Jews from the Nazis. It was also made into a movie in 1975.

Ten Boom's family was arrested in 1944, and Corrie spent time in a Dutch prison and two concentration camps. The second concentration camp killed its women prisoners only one week after she was released. Her last book, I Stand at the Door and Knock, is full of Christian devotionals.

Jeffrey Archer is an English author and life peer. He has a novel coming out this year, Only Time Will Tell, set in the 1920s-40s, which will be the first book in series. Last year he published a book of short stories, And Thereby Hangs A Tale.

Archer's first novel was the mystery Not A Penny More, Not A Penny Less, of which Library Journal said "anyone with any interest in money will find entertaining."