A Portrait of Michael Crichton

A journey to escape boredom.

A film about the composer-musicologist whose music and writing have given Westerners a better understanding and appreciation of Balinese gamelan music and dance. Seduced by recordings of Balinese music he heard in Paris in the 1920s, McPhee traveled to and settled in Bali. He was among a small group of artists and anthropologists who found their way there in the years following the First World War. While there, he not only studied Balinese music and culture, he also documented Bali's rapidly changing traditions. Among his writings are "A House in Bali," from which the text of the film is taken, and "Music in Bali," which is considered the definitive study of the island's music. McPhee's gamelan-oriented music is increasingly becoming a part of the repertoire of American and European symphony orchestras. Filmed in Bali, Europe, and the United States.

Sister Wendy Beckett, Britain's self-taught art nun turned international celebrity, is interviewed by American television commentator Bill Moyers.

Combines live footage from May and June of 1984 of the Meat Puppets, the Minutemen, Twisted Roots, and Redd Kross with interview footage to examine punk rock in L.A. in the early 80's.

The story of a young art lover, chased out of Paris by the Nazis, murdered in the Holocaust in Yugoslavia, whose priceless art collection now lies unseen in the basement of a museum while governments and so-called heirs squabble over its ownership.