Okay, the Good guys win in the end, but it’s smart leadership I want to see!   

So when Inez initially asked me to whip together 30 movies to stream while under quarantine a few weeks ago, I rapidly put together a list with quick soundbites.  Now that some time has gone by I feel like I should flesh out my introduction a little further. During Week One we visited movies about whether “Man Deserved His Comeuppance.”  Week Two we looked over “The Good Guys Always Win in the End.” This week let’s take a look at smart and inspiring leadership: 

You want it to feel like it could fit a little more into the real world?  Want to think about how a good person, willing to stand up for the little guy, can make a difference?  

Following is a list about good leadership during crisis, three based on real events, two fictional.  

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A Few Good Men  – Tom Cruise delivers one of the best performances in his career as a lawyer who finds himself fighting for the truth and the greater good as opposed to the best outcome for his clients within a cynical system where obedience and respect is considered more important than the value of life.

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All the President’s Men –  There’s something rotten in the White House, and two reporters are going to get to the bottom of it.  A look at Woodward and Bernstein and the days of Watergate.

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Thirteen Days – When the center feels like it won’t hold, smart people with good heads working the problem can save us all.  Kennedy and his level heads work through the Cuban Missile Crisis. 

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Stand and Deliver –  It doesn’t take powerful people to make a difference.  It takes everyday humans caring about other humans. The true story of a high school teacher tasked with a group of students who everyone else has dismissed, and his belief in them showing that every one of us is capable of more than we think, if we are able to believe in ourselves.  

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And Justice for All  – Okay, this one isn’t quite as uplifting, and represents the interesting moral soul-searching that became iconic in the “American New Wave” movement.  I watched this movie with my dad when I was little, and I was blown away by Al Pacino’s performance, and his passion for justice. This Oscar-nominated script is famous for its line “You’re out of order! I’m out of order!  This whole court is out of order!”

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ABOUT JULIA FAIR.  Julia moved to Bainbridge Island three years ago with her husband and two children, and has found her work home at IslandWood. An original native of Mississippi, Julia started her career working on the successful independent film, The Blair Witch Project. Her first produced feature length scripts, Believers and Alien Raiders, were released on DVD by Warner Brothers home video, and she strongly encourages you to rent them as she does still receive residuals on them. Quentin Tarantino counts Alien Raiders as one of his personal favorites, just saying.  Outside of writing, Julia has been heavily involved in research as well as viral marketing for a variety of science fiction and paranormal movies and shows, such as In Search Of and Hellboy. Her experience as an intensive and detailed researcher, as well as a horror and fantasy/sci-fi maven led her to be tapped by Paramount Pictures and Universal Studios where she worked behind the scenes in the Brain Trust for both Stephen King’s The Dark Tower and Michael Bay’s Transformers.  She recently spoke at the Library of Congress, discussing the making of modern myths and how Blair Witch, like War of the Worlds, reveals the way humans can seek out and even forcefully choose to believe misinformation. She enjoys long walks, nature, white papers from the National Institute of Health, the companionship of good friends, and dystopian sci-fi.