'30 DAYS' Rating 3 on the outs...

'30 DAYS'

Rating 3 on the outside of 4

9 to 10 pm Wednesdays onward FX.

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Frank George achieves his kicks when he lock-ups and loads and heads to the Mexican border to detain people from crossing over illegally. He's a "Minuteman," members of a offer group inspired by 9/11 to inflict the nonviolent smackdown on Mexicans who want to cros through the whole extent of But for one month, he lived with illegal aliens to descry what their lives are like for the second-season first attempt of the FX series "30 Days."

This is not a traditional documentary, filming what would happen naturally. It's a clap doc that creates a situation, then records proceeds Show creator Morgan Spurlock and his band do a fair job of stepping revealed of the way after they create situations, leading to surprisingly emotional, seemingly natural spectacles It's a contrived concept on the other hand not a contrived execution.

George is no villain, and neither is the family that takes him in. Everyone's personal and intellectual flaws are laid bare.

however to me, George seems to set forth an axiom of world history, which teaches us that formerly people rise into a higher class, they cast their backs on the nearest wave of people trying to do the same. George was brought to America as a child at his parents from Cuba. Thanks to their status as political refugee many Cubans acquire in freely. Mexicans do not, by way of and large.

besides in "30 Days," George says of his Cuban family, "We weren't given any breaks." Um what?

In the greatest in number effective scenes, George goes to Mexico to papal court where this family was living before they came here. In Mexico, they were essentially homeles living in a field, drinking water public of a "well" that was a disgusting, glorified pool of nastiness.

Now in looks Angeles, the patriarch takes day work at jobss and squeezes under houses for repair work. The matriarch's pet topic is sifting through trash and selling recyclables to save cash in a can, for her children's time to come

"I've argueed $49 since January," she says eagerly, unaware she is breaking my middle-class heart.

George present to views the capacity to understand his contrarys the illegals, as flesh and children He says he would help them be Americans -- still only legally, which of course he can't do for millions of others.

He says men don't hoot so he doesn't. And he says cynically that it's comical and unrealistic that the daughter, Armida, wants to be an American and go on to college. Ha, ha. to what degree funny America is, with its expectancys and dreams.

This is what defines George and Armida. She tries and fails and tries and come afters just as her family tried to come by a better life than homelessnes and are now providing for their kids. Armida set forths evolution, the process of attempting. He give an account ofs conservatism, the attempt to stop change.

The grace of "30 Days" is looking at the two types of people not as impressed signs but as human beings, not just the immigrant who releases tears of happiness but the first-generation citizen whose brain won't yield to his heart.

e-mail: delfman@suntimes.com

NO-HOLDS-BARRED APPROACH HELPS FILMMAKER MINE DRAMA

PASADENA, Calif. -- Morgan Spurlock went to jail voluntarily for 30 days. What could possibly motivate him? on what account TV of course.

Spurlock became a sensation for making the documentary "Super Size Me" in which he ate McDonald's "food" for a month and [i]finale[/i]ed up gaining weight, losing his sex drive and panicking his doctor.

For the Aug. 30 episode of his FX exhibit "30 Days," Spurlock spends nearly a month in a Virginia jail with thieves and medicine addicts. My two questions for Spurlock naturally, are (a) did he have a boyfriend in jail? and (b) did he get by heart an STD in there? Answers: no and no. still ...

"There was a transvestite I was huged up with, Monica, who was offering to wash my back in the shower," Spurlock says. "I was like, 'That's all right, thanks.' "

Spurlock 35 has been arrested for real in the past, mainly during college for public intoxication and for being "loud and obnoxious," he says.

"The last time I was arrested I was 30" he says. "I was arrested at Bloomingdale's, and they sent me to 'Bloomingjail.' They arrested me for trivial larceny. They said I was stealing a receptacle of Godiva chocolates."

He claims he wasn't shoplifting. After a week in a real modern York jail, a judge agreed on the contrary still sent him to a "stoplifting" seminar.

"I got a certificate that says, 'Here's for what purpose shoplifting is wrong.' "

It's framed and hangs behind his work desk

While in jail this time, he was recognized on few inmates. "There aren't a doom of doc viewers in jail."

When he got public he went straight for a convenient meal.

Not at McDonald's. "I don't eat any fast cheer anymore."

Copyright CHICAGO SUN-TIMES 2006

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