The Lottery (2010)

One of the 15 documentaries to make the short list of the Oscar nominations. In direct competition with the higher profile Waiting for 'Superman' this is probably one of the underdogs in the race. Starring Cory Booker who is the current mayor of Newark, NJ and starring in the Oscar nominated Street Fight which documented one of his mayor races. I'm a huge fan of Street Fight enough to give it a 10/10, so it was nice to see he is actually mayor now.

The big flaw of the film is that it is very heavily one sided, enough that if it was sold as an advertisement for charter schools you wouldn't doubt it. It portray charter schools as the absolute solution, and don't get me wrong they really look like a good idea. But this isn't dolphin killing, there is another side. They didn't interview anyone from the public school side. The only time we encountered these people we were told they were hired by Acorn, thugs, or painted them in a really bad light in a heated debate with uneducated responses.

I have mixed feelings about this film because it does actually show a solution to a big problem. The most interesting thing said in the whole thing is that parents are very forward thinking about everything except education. We want new medicine, new electronics, new everything, yet we want our kids to go to school just like we did. The same hours, the same curriculum, the same learning techniques. Why is this? It is a very good point and something I will take away from this film. I'm glad I watched it, but I also really like documentaries, I really don't see how this will pull out a nomination.

Vote: 7/10

IMDB Link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1515935/

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