A vivid recording of the trauma that so many more people have experienced since things started getting nasty in the 80's.I liked the commentary from social service workers interspersed with the slice-of-life scenes. Even the venture-capitalist could see that Republican policies were tearing the *real* economy apart. The documentary illustrated painfully how peoples' lives can be torn apart by the vicissitudes of the business world. My eyes were welling with tears all through it.Canada has followed a parallel although not so brutal path of reducing real wages and benefits and shredding the social safety net. Cold comfort to imagine that we do not have quite such a harsh social landscape as does the USA.

Several heart-wrenching stories... Truly, many people find themselves lost and despairing in these tough economic times. Problems with this "documentary" though were due to the frequent excerpts where "experts" briefly explained that the problem is capitalism and the wealthy getting richer. They explained how America is a corrupt system where big companies leave to exploit cheap labor in other countries simply for profit. Likewise, it's explained to us that the American Dream is now nothing but a lie and, if you're not already rich, you're screwed.OK. Some of that rings true. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. U.S. companies do off-shore their operations. Nevertheless, there are many contributing factors other than greed.A propagandist from the other side could easily bring in "experts" who substitute "government" and "regulation" for "capitalism" and "greed". A religious individual could emphasize "moral decay". The real truth though deserves more honest exploration, and liberal puff pieces like this only polarize and mislead people.Furthermore, one person's wealth has little to do with another person's wealth potential. There's money laying around everywhere. There's also something to be said for thrift, determination, perseverance, not to mention, etiquette on the job and when applying for one.Perhaps the investment in this film would have been more fruitful if the producers had brought in experts that know how to see money, and have them show these folks how to recognize it. Maybe the experts could simply have explained hot to get a job, keep it, and use it to get a better job while providing guidance on how to use the already existing lifelines to stay afloat. Instead, the audience had to suffice with what was served up as tripe for the ignorant and naive.

This show totally distorts the truth, but I've come to expect that of HBO and "documentaries" in which they are involved. I knew what this was going to turn into, but I had to wait until just past the 20 minute mark to see a person say that the solution was to regulate capitalism. From there the untruths and out and out lies flowed freely. The truth of the matter is that Jimmy Carter started this economic meltdown with the Affordable Housing Act which turned into the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) and became the real reason we had the economic crash of 2008. Of course it was aided along the way by Clinton during his reform of the CRA to get rid of down payments, and added incentives in some cases and arm-twisting in others to get banks to lower requirements or make loans without down payments and with many safe-guards to qualifying borrowers removed.Then, during the Bush administration, questions started being asked and answers were not forth coming. Bush requested hearings on the potential of a housing/economic crisis which was totally blocked by the likes of Congressman Barney Franks in the House of Representatives and Senator Chris Dodd who were chairs of the respective committees in the House and Senate which oversaw the housing market. Their alleged wrong doing was never really investigated, but included alleged sweetheart deals on prices and interest rates and several business opportunities which allegedly bordered on possible bribes. If HBO wanted to do something that matter and be honest about it, then they should do a "documentary" on the Affordable House Act/Community Reinvestment Act, the changes incorporated by Clinton and how Franks/Dodd blocked our only chance to stop the crisis before we got to where we are now.In short, American Winter (2013) is nothing less than Marxist propaganda laying blame on Capitalism and the rich. Nothing about the massive wrong-doing by leftist extremist giving away America's future. Then along comes Obama who is constantly preaching class warfare and laying the blame on the "rich." The producers and directors of this show have absolutely no concept as to what makes a society and economy successful. ...and it definitely isn't taxing the very corporations and individuals who can pull us out of this downward spiral into oblivion that is going to save us. These leftist, Marxist extremist are going to run out of other people's money in the near future. When that happens welcome to yet another failed experiment in Socialism - exactly like it has failed in every instance socialism has been tried.

American Winter (2013) *** 1/2 (out of 4) Another very good documentary from HBO takes a look at eight families living in Portland, OR who are suffering from being unemployed. The documentary crew spends time with the families as we see them struggle to pay their bills and many are forced from their homes and into homeless shelters. We get interviews with the adults as well as their children but also social workers who talk about the desperate times that so many Americans are in right now. As someone who works with people being on their bills, I thought this film did a pretty good job at showing how easy it is for someone to go from living comfortable to being poor in the matter of months. I guess some people can't fully understand how quick it happens unless they've been through it but this film does a good job at showing just how desperate these times can be. All eight families have different stories to tell but they're all basically wrapped around not being able to pay your bills after losing a job. Some of these people have been out of work for over two years and it's easy to see why the savings just don't last very long. Directors Harry and Joe Gantz really do a nice job at giving the viewer an idea of why these situations can turn so bad but they also question why more isn't being done. There's a lot of political talk about how the poor are taxed more and how companies are making record profits yet lower class families aren't seeing any benefits. I must admit that I find it shocking that this country can send so much money to other countries yet so many here are living below poverty. American WINTER is certainly an eye-opener and one just hopes that they're never in this situation.