Sally Pacholok (born ca. 1970)

Sally Pacholok is a US movie that is based on a true story: the life and career of Nurse Sally Pacholok. It premiered in February 2015 at the Washington DC Independent Film Festival and was released on DVD in March 2016. Here is some basic information about it:

** Produced by Elissa Leonard and Jeremy Morrison
** Directed by Elissa Leonard
** Written by Elissa Leonard and Patrick Prentice
** Run time: 86 minutes

The cast includes the following:

** Annet Mahendru as Sally Pacholok – a hospital nurse

** Richard Pilcher as Andrew “Andy” Pacholok – Sally’s father

** Andrew Ballard as Dr Jeffrey Stuart

** Maboud Ebrahimzadeh as Dr Praveen Kumar

** Michael Gabel as the hospital administrator

** Bethany Hoffman as Jo – a hospital nurse

** Michael Mack as the hospital lawyer

** Bolton Marsh as Dr Brandt

** Harlan Workas Dr Faber

** Maria Broom as Dr Moran

** Stan Kang as Dr Lee (not identified by name)

** Ron Heneghan as Dr Bennett (not identified by name)

** Wes Johnson as Dr Dubrowski (not identified by name)

** Mark Ziv as Peter – a patient and a computer whiz

** Ali Elk as Peter’s mother

This movie is a (partial) biography of Sally Pacholok, who was born ca. 1970. It covers fifteen years of her life (1990-2005), because those years were a crucial time in her life. The story begins in 1990 when she is diagnosed with B12 deficiency, and ends in 2005 when her first book about this medical problem is published.

In 1990 Sally is working as a paramedic at an ambulance service. She is also studying to become a registered nurse. But she feels weak for no apparent reason. Fortunately, she is diagnosed with B12 deficiency, and this saves her life. Treatment of this problem is cheap and easy, once the correct diagnosis has been made.

Sally completes her education and begins working as a nurse at a hospital. While working as a nurse, she meets many patients who show the same symptoms as she had before. But when she suggests to the doctor in charge that the reason for these symptoms might be B12 deficiency, she is always brushed off.

After a while, she is called into the office of the hospital administrator who gives her the following message: “A nurse does not give medical advice to a doctor. It is the other way around.”

In spite of this warning, Sally embarks on a personal campaign about this issue. She is on a one-woman crusade and she refuses to give up, even though the doctors refuse to listen to her. Why is this case so important to her? Because B12 deficiency is lethal: it can kill a person, if it is not diagnosed in time.

After a while, she becomes known as “Sally B12.” This nickname is not a compliment; it is not a sign of respect. It is a sign of disrespect. In fact, many people around her think she is just ridiculous.

But Sally is good looking and sometimes she is asked out on a date. When this happens, she says: “I will go out with anyone, as long as he is not a doctor.” She follows this rule until she meets a doctor who takes her seriously: Dr Jeffrey Stuart, who is the son of one of her patients.

Jeff is so interested in Sally that he is ready to listen to her, and very soon he realises that she is right: there are in fact many medical cases where B12 deficiency is the answer. Jeff tells Sally that she should write a book about it and after a while she has completed a manuscript. The next step is to find a publisher who is ready to publish it.

Eventually, she gets a positive response, but the publisher has an important suggestion: she should team up with a doctor in order to give the book a solid medical foundation. She does not have to look very long to find one: the obvious choice is Jeff, who is her partner in life. They go over the manuscript together, and in 2005 the first edition of their book is published. This is where the story ends.

While this movie is based on a true story, it is not a documentary film. It is a dramatized version of events. Not everything happened exactly as portrayed in the movie. But the basic story-line is true, including the information about B12 deficiency.

An on-screen message at the end of the movie tells us that Sally and her father as well as Jeff and his mother are real persons, but all other characters in the movie are fictional characters, who were created for dramatic purposes.

As you can see, this movie is not only the story of Sally and her life, it is also the story of a serious medical issue that is often ignored: B12 deficiency. But if I say this is a movie about B12 deficiency, you might think it is a boring movie, and this is not the case. Therefore it is better to say that this is a movie about a nurse who dared to defy the medical establishment.

B12 deficiency is a serious issue. And this movie has a serious message. But it is not only a serious movie. There is also some humour in it. In fact, this movie has a good combination of funny and serious elements. This is one reason why it is a great movie.

What do reviewers say about it? On IMDb it has a rating of 84 per cent, which corresponds to four stars on Amazon. If you ask me, this average rating is too low. 

On the US version of Amazon there are eleven reviews of this product. The average rating is 4.8 stars.If you ask me, this average rating is much more appropriate. I want to go all the way to the top with this product. I think it deserves a rating of five stars.

PS # 1. Filmmaker Elissa Leonard became interested in the question of B12 deficiency many years ago. First, she made a 50 minute documentary film about it: Diagnosing and Treating Vitamin B12 Deficiency. It was released in 2011. It is available online, because she wants to spread the word about this issue as much as possible. Later she decided to make to make a movie about it. The movie was made in co-operation with Sally and Jeff.

PS # 2. At the end of the movie (during credit rolls) there are brief excerpts from the documentary film that was released in 2011. There is also a photo which shows four persons standing next to each other: on the right we have Annet Mahendry and Andrew Ballard, who play Sally and Jeff in the movie; on the left we have the real Sally and the real Jeff.

PS # 3. The following article is available online: Elissa Leonard, “Meet Sally Pacholok, the next Erin Brockowich,” Women in Film & Video, 20 March 2015.

PS # 4. A second edition of Sally and Jeff’s book was published in 2011: Could It Be B12? An Epidemic of Misdiagnoses. On Amazon UK there are more than 100 reviews of this product. The average rating is 4.8 stars, which is an unusually high rating for a medical textbook.

***** 

Sally and Jeff have a website. Here is a link:

B12 Awareness

*****

 

Sally Pacholok and Jeffrey Stuart 

presenting their book about B12 deficiency: 

Could it be B12?

*****

 

 Sally Pacholok standing next to a poster for the movie about her life

*****

Joan Trumpauer Mulholland (born 1941)

An Ordinary Hero is a documentary film about Joan Trumpauer Mulholland (born 1941), who was a civil rights activist in the 1960s. Here is some basic information about it:

** Written, produced and directed by Loki Mulholland – Joan’s son
** Distribution: Taylor Street Films
** Run time: 90 minutes
** Released in 2013

In the beginning of the film, Loki explains that his mother never talked much about her past. He knew she had been a Civil Rights Activist, because he had seen some of her old pictures, but he did not know any details.

In 2011, however, things changed. In that year, he accompanied his mother and several other civil rights activists on a trip to Mississippi that was organised to commemorate the 50-year anniversary of the Freedom Rides of 1961. And during this trip he began to understand more about her life.

He decided that he wanted to make a film about her, so he established a team and did some interviews, not only with Joan but also with other witnesses who knew her at the time and with some scholars and experts. The result is this film which premiered in 2013.

PART ONE

When a son makes a film about his mother, you might worry that the product is unprofessional; too positive or perhaps too negative. You might also worry that the contents are boring, because we only see a mother and her son talking to each other. In this case, this fear is completely unfounded.

Loki and his team have created a very professional product and when you see the long list of witnesses, you will understand that this is not just Loki talking to or about his mother. There are many witnesses here and they all offer some useful insight into the time of the Civil Rights Movement and Joan’s role in it.

Here are the names of the witnesses in alphabetical order. Most of them (including Joan) are Civil Rights Activists. If they have another background, this is noted:

** Reuben Anderson, former Mississippi Supreme Court Justice

** Luvagh Brown

** Dion Diamond

** Eric Etheridge, author (see the PS below)

** Reverend Reginald Green

** Reverend Ed King

** Hamid Kizilbash

** Dorie Ladner

** Joyce Ladner

** Jerry Mitchell, investigative reporter, the Clarion Ledger (see the PS below)

** Michael J. O’Brien, author (see the PS below)

** Joan Trumpauer Mulholland

** John R. Salter, Jr., sociologist at Tougaloo College, author (see the PS below)

** Hank Thomas

** Congressman Bennie G. Thompson

** Sylvia D. Thompson

PART TWO

In this film, we hear about some of the episodes in which Joan was involved. The Freedom Rides of 1961 and sit-ins at several lunch-counters. Between the talking heads, contemporary evidence is shown, often old photos in black-and-white. During the film, we also follow Joan to different locations which are connected with the Civil Rights Movement and with her past:

** Tougaloo Southern Christian College. Joan was the first white student to enrol in this institution which was known as a black college.

** Parchman Penitentiary in Mississippi. Some of the Freedom Riders were arrested and sent to this place in order to break their spirits. At the time Parchman was known as one of the worst prisons in the US. When some of the former Freedom Riders visited the place in 2011, the reception was friendlier than when they arrived in 1961!

** Arlington National Cemetery. Joan visits the grave of Civil Rights Activist Medgar Evers who was killed outside his home in June 1963.

** The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial located in the West Potomac Park, not far from the National Mall in Washington, DC.

Joan was an unlikely member of the Civil Rights Movement for two reasons: (1) she was white and (2) she was from the South. Many southerners were shocked to find out that she was a part of the Civil Rights Movement. They thought she must have lost her mind. They thought she had a mental problem. This was the only way they could explain why “one of their own” could betray them like this.

But Joan had not lost her mind; and she did not have a mental problem. She saw something which she thought was wrong, and she decided that she had to do something about it – she must try to make it right - if she ever had a chance to do so. As it happened, she had several chances and she took them.

As Loki explains, his mother’s decision to take this step has haunted and defined her life ever since. As Joan explains, once she had taken the first step, there was no turning back, and in a way this was a good thing, because there was only one way to go from there and that was forward.

CONCLUSION

An Ordinary Hero is a wonderful life-affirming film. The story of the Civil Rights Movement has been told many times before, but here the story becomes very personal, because we meet some of the people who were there and who made history with their actions.

Loki made this film as a tribute to his mother. He wanted the world to know the history of her life and her contribution to the movement. But he himself does not figure prominently in this film. In fact, we almost never see or hear him. He stays in the background. While Joan gets a chance to tell her story, even she does not appear that often, although she is the main character here. Most of the time is devoted to the other witnesses who give their testimonies about Joan. If you ask me, this is a good approach.

An Ordinary Hero cannot be described as an objective film. It does not offer the positive and the negative facts about Joan. But I still think it can be described as a true story.

The witnesses are positive. They praise Joan for what she has done in her life. There are no negative witnesses. But I am not going to complain about it. This is Loki’s portrait of his mother and he is allowed to paint it any way he wants.

Joan does not describe herself as a hero. But many people who know her well have used the word to describe her. When you have watched this film, I think you will say this is a case where this word is justified, where it is used with a good reason.

What do reviewers say about this film? On IMDb it has a rating of 82 per cent; and it has won several awards. If you ask me, the positive reviews and the prestigious awards are fully justified. I want to go all the way to the top with this product. I think it deserves a rating of five stars.

PS # 1. For more information, see the following books, written by authors who are interviewed in the film:

** Breach of Peace: Portraits of the 1961 Mississippi Freedom Riders by Eric Etheridge (large format, hardcover, 2008)

** We Shall Not Be Moved: The Jackson Woolworth’s Sit-In and the Movement It Inspired by Michael J. O’Brien (2013, 2014)

** Jackson, Mississippi: An American Chronicle of Struggle and Schism by John R. Salter, Jr. (2011)

PS # 2. Civil Rights Activist Anne Moody (1940-2015) is mentioned several times in the film, but she is not interviewed. Her autobiography Coming of Age in Mississippi was first published in 1968. It was reprinted in 1992 and 2004.

PS # 3. Jerry Mitchell, investigative reporter at the Clarion Ledger, has a website that is called “Journey to Justice.” A story about Joan and the film about her life was posted here on 11 March 2013.

PS # 4. Freedom Riders is a documentary film that was shown on US television (PBS) and released on DVD in 2011 in order to commemorate the 50-year anniversary of the Freedom Rides. Joan is one of several witnesses who are interviewed in this film (which is an episode of the long-running program American Experience).

*****

This piece was first published on this blog in November 2016.

It is reprinted here, because it fits the topic of the month:

Women, who played an important role in history.

*****

 

The mug shot (police photo) from 1961

*****

 

 Joan holding the mug shot from 1961 in her hand

*****