Movie Review: Mr Jones

I wrote my senior thesis at the Jackson School many years ago on Collectivization, which I have long considered a criminally under-appreciated story in the West, the lone exception being the recent Red Famine by Anne Applebaum, so I was excited to see a review of the film Mr. Jones in today's New York Times.

This work by Polish director Agnieszka Holland, who years ago directed the exceptional WWII/Holocaust drama Europa Europa, covers the story of Welsh Journalist, and former advisor to Lloyd George, Gareth Jones and his trip to the Soviet Union in the early 1930's. I still find it appalling that so little is known about an event in which somewhere between 3 and 10 million people were murdered, so maybe I am biased, but I found it a quite interesting portrayal, if sometimes a bit surreal. Admittedly I was quite the fanboy when George Orwell made a cameo. Well, that and the fact that Walter Duranty is essentially the main villain. Did I mention that I was the president of the local Anti-Walter Duranty Society? Regardless, it is an important story that is competently portrayed in a new an interesting way, and deserving of your attention in an era when we are often left with watching the latest superhero movie for the 4th time.