Sanctions
deplored
ROBERT BLAKE is Father Hardstep and Natalie Core is Mother Maggie in "Hell Town," an NBC-TV program which does not overly impress reviewer Michael Gallagher: (NC photo)
'Hell Town' no tribute to inner· city workers By Michael Gallagher The televison elite are not inNEW YORK (NC) - In the terested in the implications of pilot movie for "Hell Town," the the Christian faith. They're con new NBC-TV sel"ies in which cerned, rather, with using Cath Robert Blake plays Father Noah olidsm, the most photogenic and "Harostep" Rivers, our hero colorful form of Christianity, as breaks into the apartment of a an exotic background to tell mentally disturbed man whom stories simple enough to enter he has good reason to think is .. tain a mass audience. sexually abusing his own daugh I like Blake as an actor and I ter. He knocks the 'alleged per much prefer his Father Hard petrator out and makes off with step to that wimp chaplain of the little girl. "M.A.S.H." The latter's sole Earlier, Father Hardstep, a function was to make the secu tough ex-convict who is the pas lar humanism that permeated tor of an inner-city parish in' "M.A.S.H." all the more wise Los Angeles, uses the same andsophist,icated in contrast. brand of Catholic Action on a That, however, is my last good pusher. word for Father "H." . Then, in the first regular epi Contrast him with a real priest, sode of "Hell Town," Father "H" Conventual Franciscan Father and an elderly black man with Bruce Ritter, who 'actually does a double-entendre, n,ickname rescue the innocent from ex break into the apartment of two ploiters. Father Rit~r's 42nd pimps, beat them up and snatch Street environment in New York from their clutches a neighbor _ a morass of sleaze, brutality hood girl who has gone wrong. and viciousness ,with none of the But in the second episode, specious color favored ,in prime which aired Sept. 18, the crea time excursions into squalor _ tive spiTits behind the show makes "Hell Town" seem like a toned things down a bit. The real nice place to live. only rough ,thing Father "H" Nor are the kids Father Ritter does on camera is tackle a flee rescues quite, the angels with ingteen-ager. But don't think he's gone soft. dirty faces whom. we see on "Hell Town." The brutalization He threatens with physical as sault a burly dog catcher wh<? they suffer is not something to wants to take away a miracle be shucked off after' a bit of working goat with suffilient stern talk and Jov,ing care ora lick from a miracle goat in time charm to bring a brutalized 5 year-old out of his trauma. And, for the final commercials. I single out Father- Ritter be-. just as in the pilot and the first epis04e, another sexual ex cause I know him, but there are ploiter of the young bites the other priests and nuns, ministers dust, only this time off camera. ,and lay people throughout the The creative spirits behind the country who, for the love of God, show spare no effort to depict daliy confront the terrible prob priests and nuns in a favorable lems of our inner oities. light, but their desire to be kind . "Hell Town" is no tribute to out runs their capacity to do so. them. It exploits and vulgarizes The result is a condescension everything that they do and the much >like the unwitting racism sufferings of the victims as well. of the old travelogues that And for what? To fit everything showed us happy, contented na into the conventions of network tives with whom we would never television and sell lots of panty change places. hoses and detergent:
By NC News Service 'U.S. economic sanctions against Poland are "unjust," Po land's primate, Cardinal Jozef Glemp, said repeatedly during a Sept. 17 to 24 visit to Detroit, Philadelphia and Washington. Caminal Glemp said the "rup ture" of economic and scientific ties imposed by the sanctions caused "great damage to the Po lish people." Following imposition of mar tial law in Poland in 1981, Presi- ' dent Reagan suspended goverri ment-sponsored shipments of agricultural and dairy prodUcts to the Polish government; stop ped renewal of the Export-Im port Bank's credit insurance for Poland; suspended Polish air line operations ,in the United States; and stripped, Poland of tariff breaks for its exports to the United States. The tariff penalties remain in effect. At a Washington press con ference, the cardinal said he was convinced that "in the next few weeks" an agricultural furid for Polish farmers would become legally established. Under the proposed fund, the Polish church hopes to raise $L8 billion, mostly from the United States, and Western European countries, to aid Po land's milion private farmers.
Montie P'lumbing & Heating Co.
,With 31,000 Subscribers, It Pays To
Adyertise In The Anchor
MARRIAGE
PREPARATION
AT ITS BEST!
Give" Gift Certificate For" Weekend A.way
679-5262
1i' .=:;'.:.
LEARY PRESS
WALL«ALL A COllECTION OF HRPFUl FLOOR
H,INTS BY 'AL' GARANT
GARANT FLOOR COVERING CO. FALL RIVER 1801 SO. MAIN ST. (Showroom) . 30 CRAWFORD ST. (Warehouse) Carpet & Vinyl Floors • Mannington • Congo!eum • Ceramic me • Armstrong
. 674-5410
EE
For Info Contlct
ED & BECKY ST. PIERRE , 1021 Itl' Strllt Fill Itlver, MA 02720 Tel. 1175-22711
SHAWOMET
GARDENS
102 Shawomet Avenue Somorset, Mau.
Tel. 674-4881 3V2 room Apartment
4V2 room Apartment
Includes beat, bot water, stove reo
frlgerator and maintenance service.
OHLV FUll·lINE RELIGIOUS &lF1 STORE ON THE CAPE
BUFFINTON FLORIST, INC. . , •
,
•
cIlIrint-
. ..30
490 ROBESON STREET FALL RIVER, " MASS.
Tel. 678-5651 Member F.T.D.A.
Over 35 Years
of Satisfied Service
Reg. Master Piumber 7023
JOSEPH RAPOSA, JR.
I
• OIIEN: lion • Sel; •• 5:30 °OPEN7DAYS
428. MaIn $1 , HvannlS
775-4180 John & ':Aory Lees. Props.
Retire
Rich
432 JEFFERS~ STREET Fall River 675·7496 '
DOLAN-SAXON
Individual Retirement Accounts from Citizens-Union.
Funeral Home
CITIZENS~~
123 Broadway
TAUNTON
824·5000
SO~I~J~Ht {i
Cornwell Memorial ~hape/, 't:lc. 5, CENTER STREET
WAREHAM, MASS. DIGNIFIED FUNERAL SERVICE DIRECTORS
GEORGE E. CORNWEll
EVEREn E.ICAHRMAN
295.1810
Mortgage & Home Improvement Money? Of Course! '
Christian and family Video Store
ENTERTAINMENT THE WHOLE FAMILY WILL ENJOY
It. ~ ..... ~
665 KEMPTON ST.• ·NEW BEDFORD 992-1625 MON - SAT 10 - 8
piping sysitems iDco . . X·RAY QUALITY PIPE FABRICATION
SPRIN~LERS • PROCESS PIPING
PLUMBING. GAS FITTING. HEATING
New BedfOrd InStItution fOr 5avinQS
Now 11 convenient offices including Seekonk &: Taunton.
32 Mill Street (Route 79)
...
Assonet. MIA 02702
644-222} •