Preserving Family Traditions in 'Hope Ranch'
The death of Grace's father brings challenges as the family tries to preserve their ranch.

Moriondo, a bachelor in his mid-forties, has spent half his life on billiard tables around the world and returns to his home town after fifteen years. Tired, penniless, with a failing budget, he returns above all to rediscover part of what he suffers from having lost: the feelings, the enthusiasm, the memories of youth. Instead he finds many people willing to remain silent and some friends who escape him, like Mambretti. He finds, above all, a mysterious hint of death. In fact, he learns that five years earlier a friend of his, Count Luigi Ambrosi, was killed with a singular system. A cyanide egg. The investigations and the trial recognized a certain "Panozzo", administrator of Count Ambrosi, as the perpetrator of the crime, but the wife of the killed man continues to maintain that an innocent man was convicted.
The death of Grace's father brings challenges as the family tries to preserve their ranch.
I write for a diversity-focused film review blog, so I’ll be honest: I really wanted to like Pretty Lethal. Starring Maddie Ziegler, Lana Condor, Iris Apatow, Avantika, and Millicent Simmonds, Amazon Prime’s new thriller seemed like it would be a girl power movie about dancers with a horror action twist. Sort of a Suspiria for teens. But with shallow and unlikeable characters, a confusing plot, an overreliance on violence, and cringey dialogue, any fun the movie started out with was quickly lost. What was left was a faint echo of greater horror movies about dancers made before.
The Forge is a moving story about a young man’s search for purpose. Through mentorship, discipline, and faith in God, his life is transformed from confusion into clarity, reminding us that true greatness is shaped in the fire of surrender and growth.
What are we willing to walk through to see our dreams come to pass? Our minds might be so wholly alive with the passions we carry and the plans we make to see these things become all we wish them to be, yet life doesn’t always want to come alongside. Instead, obstacles arise, both physical and mental, which attempt to dissuade us or even prevent us from moving forward, stalling or stagnating the momentum to achieve what we desire. The age-old question remains….can we overcome? Or will we BE overcome?
This coming-of-age movie is about a group of girl trying to find their missing friend after a wild night none of them can remember.
Indie director, Niki Caro (known for 'Whale Rider') directs the live-action 'Mulan' and sets another example of strong females fighting against gender inequality.