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Reviews
Mississippi Damned (2009)
Beautiful and Close to Home
I loved this movie. I thought it was realistic. I have lived bits and pieces of this story and it broke my heart and inspired me in so many ways. Kari's story of being talented and stuck in a place with no opportunity struck me particularly. I came from nothing, graduated with a Masters last year, and have a great job now. I cried so hard for Kari during all the times she had go to others looking for ways to pay for college, because I know what it's like to struggle to find funding for college, knowing that even though you could go to school close to home, home is part of the problem and that if you don't get out now you never will. Everyone around you is already pushed to the brink and can't help you even though they desperately want to. And when she left for college at the end, I sat and cried for almost 15 minutes, because I myself rode a greyhound bus for 18 hours out of my poverty-ridden city to a new shining life at my college while leaving behind my parents in that hole. To this day I still carry a twinge of that guilt with me. My mother also struggled with cancer and mental illness so when Delores became ill, I knew how the characters felt. I also know people like Sammy who left and through bad fortune ended up coming right back to the squalor. It's heartbreaking, but it's so very true and it happens all across America everyday. If you truly want a picture of what poverty looks like for human beings and are looking to try and understand why people don't just "pull themselves up", I recommend watching this movie.