Directed by Barry Levinson
Narrative Feature | USA | 1999 | 127 min | English, German, and Yiddish with English subtitles
Acclaimed filmmaker Barry Levinson (Rain Man) returns to his hometown of Baltimore, the setting of his Diner, Avalon, Tin Men, and Homicide films. The result is LIBERTY HEIGHTS, a warmly funny, semi-autobiographical tale told with an uncompromising eye for period detail and eye-filling scale that includes 4,000 extras. The year is 1954, a season of dramatic social flux that Levinson explores through the eyes of a Jewish family, the Kurtzmans (Adrien Brody, Ben Foster, Joe Mantegna, Bebe Neuwirth). Friendship, romance, rock-n- roll, courage, racism, Cadillacs, Halloween (should a nice Jewish boy dress up as Hitler?): the times are indeed changing. The Kurtzmans and America will never be the same.