Immigration

When it was released 32 years ago, Michael Cimino's revisionist Western was considered one of the most colossal flops in Hollywood history. Critic John Powers takes a second look at the film and concludes that it's clearly the work of one man --- he wanted you to remember it forever."

Wolfe tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies that what makes Miami exceptional is the story of how an immigrant community rose to dominate its political landscape in just over a generation. His new novel deals with racial and ethnic conflict among the city's diverse inhabitants.

Junot Diaz's electric new collection of short stories centers around Yunior, a macho yet mournful Dominican-American man. In these stories about love, lust and infidelity, a good man is hard to find — and when he is found, he's always in bed with someone else.

The director's latest film follows a Mexican immigrant living illegally in Los Angeles who tries to evade immigration officials and the city's pervasive gang culture. It's a far cry from Weitz's earlier films, the blockbusters The Golden Compass and New Moon.

Dinaw Mengestu's How to Read the Air is an unsentimental meditation on the immigrant experience and the illusory idea of asylum. With lyrical prose, he reassesses the by-your-bootstraps mythology associated with American mobility.

Drinking didn't stop in the United States from 1920 to 1933 -- it just went underground. Author Daniel Okrent discusses the lasting cultural and political impact of Prohibition in his new book, Last Call.

Journalist Howard Fischer has been covering Arizona state government since 1982. He joins Fresh Air to discuss Arizona's controversial immigration law and other recent bills passed in the state, including one that allows Arizona's citizens to carry concealed weapons without a permit.

In remote places along the southwest border of the U.S., the consequences of recent immigration crackdown have become evident. Journalist Tom Barry says that prisons here hold both legal and illegal immigrants for deportation, many far away from their homes and families.

Writer and director Cherien Dabis talks about her feature film Amreeka, and the immigrant childhood that inspired it.

In 1993, a freighter with 300 terrified, half-starved Chinese immigrants went aground off the shore of Queens, New York. Author Patrick Radden Keefe chronicles the incident in his new book The Snakehead.

Recently issued in paperback, Joseph O'Neill's novel Netherland emerged to immediate acclaim in 2008, and many critics — including Fresh Air's Maureen Corrigan — placed it on a footing with The Great Gatsby.

Hailed as "the best baseball movie ever," Sugar follows one young man's journey from a village in the Dominican Republic to a minor league baseball team in Iowa. Filmmakers Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck talk about creating the film.

In Ramin Bahrani's new film, Goodbye Solo, a Senegalese immigrant cabdriver tries to save an elderly passenger who he suspects is suicidal. Reviewer David Edelstein calls it a "film of overflowing humanism."

After appearing in supporting roles in more than 50 films, actor Richard Jenkins takes the lead in The Visitor, Tom McCarthy's film about a solitary economics professor whose world opens up when he discovers an apartment he rented in New York is already occupied.

With plenty of nods to The Great Gatsby Joseph O'Neill's Netherland explores dreams and ambition in post-Sept. 11 New York City. Maureen Corrigan calls the novel "marvelous."

Julia Preston, national immigration correspondent for The New York Times, discusses the unintended consequences of the U.S. border crackdown — and how the battle over immigration is affecting communities across the country.

Director Stephen Frears. His new film The Queen explores the tension between Queen Elizabeth and Prime Minister Blair in the days following the death of Princess Diana as they struggle to come up with the appropriate official response. Frears's other films include My Beautiful Laundrette, Prick up Your Ears, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid, Dangerous Liasons, The Grifters, The Hi-Lo Country, High Fidelity and Dirty Pretty Things.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg comments on the recent controversy surrounding the Spanish-language version of "The Star-Spangled Banner."

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Sonia Nazario talks about her new book, Enrique's Journey, which traces the path of a young boy from Honduras to the U.S. as he reunites with his mother. Nazario found that 48,000 children, some as young as 7, make the journey alone each year.

Imagine what would go through your mind if your mailbox suddenly became a stream of video, secretly filmed movies that feature you and your family -- and possibly presage a deadly threat. That's the predicament of Cache, starring Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche.