The 1941 quintessential Welsh-pride movie, How Green Was My Valley, has been reissued on DVD. It really is a splendid tearjerker, though some may find it a wee bit like watching paint dry (alternate title: How Slow Moving Was My Screenplay).

Directed by John Ford and based on the story of Richard Llewellyn, the film is basically a series of vignettes centred on one family and the rough life they have as coal miners. Stunningly shot, it’s also noteworthy for the debut performance of “Master Roddy McDowall,” then 10 years old. He actually delivers quite an endearing performance (the ham-bone touches and campy sideways glances through three hours of ape makeup came later in life). And the film picked up five Oscars, including the Best Picture statuette.

Also out on DVD and VHS is Berkeley in the Sixties, the Academy-Award-nominated doc about the explosive decade and the radical campus. Many of the period’s most noteworthy protest movements, everything from the Black Panthers to anti-Vietnam War activism to women’s lib, all found fertile ground at Berkeley. The film features the expected archival clips (many of them quite brutal) matched by updated interviews with the key players. I loved this film; I thought it captured the era incredibly well, without ever stepping into the maudlin or getting too reverent. :

» Matthew Hays