Headline October 08, 2016/ ''' *[STUDENT] MORRIS FROM AMERICA* '''

''' *[STUDENT] MORRIS FROM 

AMERICA* '''

*THE STUDENTS OF PAKISTAN*  - very much alive and eyeing the spotlight, should consider taking their blinders off,   for just once.

From Mother earth  -everything : Water, Sunshine, and pure, pure beauty.  

BUT, to an enlightened generalist- The Pakistani students hate reading anything beyond their daily grind and they hate writing anything from the sweat of their brows. The UN report is precise: 

Pakistan faces : 50 years lag in primary education. And Over 50 years in secondary. And by the way, in just about every other sphere  of existence, it is *moonshots*  behind.

*!NO STUDENT!. NO ANY STUDENT IN LORD'S entire world,  can ever be true, or has ever been true to himself, if he/she  has not stepped forward to serve a cause higher than his/her  own concerns*    

'' MORRIS FROM AMERICA,'' Chad Hartigan's charming new film, begins with a father-son-discussion on  *hip-hop*.

It's partly an affectionate intergenerational dispute; a 13-year old Morris [Markee of Christmas] is skeptical of his father's  old-school dogma, which his dad,  Curtis {Craig Robinson}, dismisses his son's taste as too pop.

The conversation also provides a clue about the movie's own strategies. It's a pop confection with a rough, honest-texture, real but raw and suffering with an infectious sweetness that lingers after the final shot.

As Curtis puts it, he and Morris are  ''the only brothers in Heideberg,'' black American family in the perplexing and sometimes unfriendly environment of a picturesque German town.

Curtis. a former soccer player in the United States, is on the coaching staff the local team, and the rest of his back story is conveniently blurry. Like almost every other single dad you see in a movie, he's is a widower, a shortcut to audience sympathy that Mr. Hartigan might have had the wit to avoid.

But the novelty of the setting and the familiarity of the premise  -an adolescent boy navigating a bumpy stretch on the road from boyhood to maturity   -combine to give  ''Morris From America'' buoyancy and heart.

Mr. Christmas is an unusually subtle actor for someone his age. [He was 15 when the film was made]. He resists the temptation to make Morris precocious or cute, or to win, over the viewer's sympathy, and instead takes us inside the young man's confusion.

Like other teenagers, Morris is both smart and clueless, and equally capable of sharp insights and colossal errors of judgment.

Adding to the befuddlement is Katrin [Lina Keller], a slightly older girl [with a significantly older boyfriend] whom Morris meets at the youth center. He has been encouraged to go there by his German tutor, Inka [Carl Juri], who serves, somewhat awkwardly, as his quasi-therapist and surrogate big sister.

Katrin, a cynical and capricious queen bee, a beautiful and more than a little cruel. She genuinely likes Morris, which means she like to humiliate and torment him. She encourages him to rap at the center's talent show, with disastrous results.

''Morris From America'' is blunt about German racism, which has a different texture from its  American variety, partly because young, right-thinking Germans consider themselves entirely free of ancestral bigotry.

A counselor at the youth center suspects that Morris is a drug dealer.

The other kids blithely give voice to obnoxious assumptions about his basketball skills and his physical prowess. He's either a mascot or a scapegoat.

Without minimizing the pain and injustice of Morris's situation, Mr. Hartigan, whose previous features as a director are ''This is Martin Bonner'' and ''Erin and Brie Are on a First Date,'' handles the film's racial dimensions with a gentle touch.

The movie's most satisfying achievement is its sense of proportion. There is plenty of drama in a teenager's everyday life   -no need to sensationalize - and  ''Morris from America'' -feels true to both the pleasures and the frustrations of its title character.

And let's not forget about Curtis. Mr. Robinson, who has long been a stalwart supporting player in  big and small screen comedies, has my vote for father of the year.

If there is anything harder than being a 13-year-old-boy, it's living with one, and Mr. Robinson and  Mr. Hartigan nail the particular challenges of that condition as well as anyone I can think of. Curtis, who has his own emotional and professional needs, must juggle an expanding number of conflicting duties.

He's supposed to be a role model and a pal, to set limits and set his son free, to leave the boy alone and to be there when he's required.

Morris and Curtis live in a state of mutual bewilderment, but the love between them is the beat that drives the movie's flow. The authenticity of some of the rapping means that-

''Morris from America''  has an an R-rating  but if you know someone Morris's age swearing is not a deal-breaker for you, this is a perfect movie to see together-

As the new school year approaches:

With loving and respectful dedication to Students of Pakistan, Lighting the Candles of Knowledge and Hard work:

Merium,Rabo,Haleema, Dee, Saima, Malala/Nobel Prize, Sarah, Aqsa, Paras, Sorat, Sanyia, Armeen/Amina/Eman/LUMS, Zainab, Mahnoor, Nina, Tooba, Hussain, Mustafa/Ahsen/LUMS. Ibrahim, Zaeem, Hazeem, Asim, Noman, Haider, Abu Bakr, Hamza...............

And to the students, Professors, and Teachers of the World. See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society and Twitter-!E-WOW! -the ecosystem 2011:

''' Renaissance Students '''

Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless