Thanksgiving means eating and shopping, but that can’t take up the whole four-day weekend. If you’re looking for an alternative family activity, the movie theaters have some great options.

The USA Film Festival screened this movie last week and I needed an escape so I grabbed my friend Diane and we headed to the Angelica Theater. A delightful, and pure movie with great humor that puts you in a really good mood. And me being an Irish Catholic New Yorker, my full name is Scott Fitzpatrick Carlson, brought back many memories from my parents and grandparents tales from this beautiful and innocent time period. And yet the little battle between the Italians and the Irish was real. With everything going on in the world today and with the big debate about refugees this also is a timely film with hilarious insights. It made me contemplate a bunch about the Syrians. My mom grew up in Queens and she and her best girlfriend who was Italian, they were known as “the Thick Mick and the Skinny Ginny”. I haven’t heard those words in a long time.

BROOKLYN tells the profoundly moving story of Eilis Lacey (Saoirse Ronan), a young Irish immigrant navigating her way through 1950s Brooklyn. Lured by the promise of America, Eilis departs Ireland and the comfort of her mother’s home for the shores of New York City. The initial shackles of homesickness quickly diminish as a fresh romance sweeps Eilis into the intoxicating charm of love. But soon, her new vivacity is disrupted by her past, and Eilis must choose between two countries and the lives that exist within.