The benefits of a charter school education, though an integral issue, could serve as an informative yet boring talking head documentary.  Filmmaker Madeleine Sackler ensures this mistake does not occur with The Lottery (Great Curve Films, 80 minutes), a riveting look at four families desperate to send their children to the Harlem Success Academy, which was founded by Eva Moskowitz. To enter the academy, they must participate in a public lottery and hope that their kids are the lucky ones. Moskowitz, who comes off as a force of nature in the doc, gets ample screen time as she takes on the UFT (United Federation of Teachers) and reasons with Harlem residents who view the charters as an intrusion to their neighborhood.  ”When you watch these parents protesting, you want to grab them and say `do you remember when you were a child and you wanted to be an astronaut or a scientist or President of the United States and you couldn’t because no one taught you which direction to go to get there so wanting to be an astronaut seemed as far away as the moon,” says Harlem Success Academy parent Karl Willingham, in one of the doc’s more evocative moments.  The true heart of the film, however, lies not in the politics but in the dreams of the lottery hopefuls: Eric Roachford is a married MTA bus driver who doesn’t want his son to enter his line of work; Laurie Browne-Goodwine is a single mother raising a child whose father is incarcerated; Emil Frances Yoanson is an elderly Ivory Coast immigrant and former musician who pins his hopes and dreams on his son; and deaf single mom Nadiyah Horne is determined to have her daughter Ameenah graduate college.  Their journey to that fateful day is uplifting and heartbreaking, as not every person gets their prayers answered. TV on the Radio members Tunde Adebimpe and Gerard A. Smith provide a pitch perfect score for the feature. DVD FEATURES: The Lottery contains a Q&A panel from the Tribeca Film Festival featuring Eva Moskowitz, director Madeleine Sackler, Chancellor Joel Klein, and Harlem Success Academy parent Karl Willingham. The disc also contains deleted scenes, a theatrical trailer, and reviews of the film from various publications (including The Wall Street Journal).

- Greg Srisavasdi