Potato Dreams Of America

Books By Patti Liszkay
​ Available On Amazon

​"Equal and Opposite Reactions" http://amzn.to/2xvcgRa
and the sequel, "Hail Mary" https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
By Patti Liszkay
Available on Amazon.

​
​POTATO DREAMS OF AMERICA

     Last weekend I watched an offbeat, wonderful movie on Amazon Prime called "Potato Dreams of America."
    The premise of the film at first sounded like that of a schmaltzily predictable bad Hollywood  romantic comedy: a Russian woman becomes a mail-order bride to make her and her son's escape to America.
     But the film turned out to be neither schmaltzy nor predictable nor bad nor a rom-com. However it  tells a story that might well be tossed off as too dramatically unbelievable ― if the story  weren't in fact the autobiography of filmmaker Wes Hurley.

      Wes Hurley with his mother.

     Hurley wrote his story as a dark comedy that starts out  during his adolescence in the harsh final days of the Soviet Union. But in spite of  the darkness there are moments of light and sweetness,

...as well as laugh-out-loud moments, as when the young protagonist imagines himself watching TV with Jesus,

...or deals with his grandmother.

     The movie does, thankfully, move from darkness to light, and even during the scenes in which one is most worried or distressed for the safety or well-being of the intrepid heroine and her lovable son,

...one is grateful to know that this is a true story so that, as one reviewer put it, "The very existence of 'Potato Dreams of America' is its own happy ending."
        But in addition to its likableness,

...the movie, for me, raised some thought-provoking questions:
     What does it take to make a person reject the peer values of  their country, their society, their family, and those all around them?

      Does living under a repressive government - or a repressive religion, society or in any repressive environment - make people more unkind to each other?

      Are people kinder the freer their country - or their religion - is?

       And how is it that people who live in a free and democratic society will nonetheless choose to yolk themselves and others to  the tyranny of an oppressive, intolerant religion? 
     And what difference does it make if a government changes its name from Communist to Republic  if the lives of the people don't change?

...or if they're still under the thumb of a brutal tyrant?

     And, finally, how much of a coincidence is it that this movie  was released just a weeks before another true story of the human misery caused by an autocratic and imperialistic Russian government would begin playing out in real time?

      Sometimes truth is more unbelievable than fiction.