Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Suman Roberson It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Staci Frederick Blistering performances.

davepitts The film is compelling -- especially when the Rosenbergs' sons revisit their old family apartment -- the same kitchen sink is in place. However, there is no real settling of the central question of guilt. The family has had to question whether Julius and Ethel were "totally innocent," as they died claiming. Soviet documents made public in the 1990s list Julius as a spy with a code name. His friend Abe Osherfoff, interviewed in the extras, says that he knows Julius passed on aircraft technology to the Soviets. I am unclear as to whether Ivy Meeropol thinks then it is a proved fact that Julius committed treason. The family position seems to be, yes, Julius was probably a spy, but, no, Ethel wasn't, and no, they never gave away atomic secrets and shouldn't have been executed. Of course, all this is muddied by the witch-hunt hysteria of the times. The questions I am left with: What should have been their punishment? How can the family be sure that Julius never passed on atomic bomb specs? As devoted to the socialist dream as he was, would Julius have hesitated to pass on such information? Granting that David Greenglass's testimony was the only incriminating evidence against Ethel (and thus I agree that she was unfairly convicted) is it likely that she knew nothing of Julius's espionage? Was their silence to the end attributable to the zealotry of their politics? (I think it was, and I find it unsettling that their present-day defenders don't put this into the discussion. Julius was trying to help Stalin's regime -- is there anything noble about that?) Because they refused to talk to the FBI, even on the day of their deaths, we'll never know the whole story.

poets-1 The Rosenbergs are poster children for the black and white horror of what became known as the McCarthy Era, the Communist Witch Hunts, of the early '50s. Their faces, especially Ethel's, is as recognizable to us as McCarthy's himself. Ivy Meeropol, their granddaughter, grew up with an activist father who believed that his parents were, as they said repeatedly and even at their deaths in the electric chair, innocent. Her home was filled with their images, from newspaper accounts, books, and newsreel footage stills, to pieces of art created by the likes of Picasso. But this film only makes passing reference, I feel, to the fact of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. What it does do is present us with a granddaughter's rather guileless investigation of who her family are. Her own name was changed by her father's adoption by another family since his own grandparents, aunts, and uncles--on both sides--Greenglass and Rosenberg-- would not take the two orphaned boys in. Her cousins (one of whom she meets for the first time and who weeps with shame at how his own father--Julius's brother--changed their name to Roberts and refused to even see his two nephews) are complete strangers to her. What does she find out? Does she know her grandparents better? I doubt it. She can't know why the Rosenbergs chose to die rather than betray political beliefs, friends, and their nearly religious conviction that Socialism was humankind's only hope. What she can see is what shame, fear, cowardice, infamy, and love does to a family. I think Lillian Hellman's title for her memoir of the same period names it best: Scoundrel Time. After all, the Rosenbergs' convictions and executions made Roy Cohn into a celebrity. God help us.

williamdoug2001 The entire film is based on a fallacy and therefore makes it difficult to watch. Ivy basis the documentary on the misleading notion that her grandparents are not guilty of being traitors. The facts are that her grandparents were spies. Later, her father Michael says, Julius might have helped the Soviets, but Julius did not do what the government accused him of. Then another person says Ethel was only being a loyal wife.The film is a sophomoric effort to understand the dark stain on her family. The camera work, editing, and narration are all weak. Ivy should have created a documentary on what caused the executions. It wasn't 'red scare', or 'communist witch-hunts'. It was because Julius and Ethel were spies for the Soviets. They are both guilty of betraying their country.

John Seal The historical record currently indicates that Julius Rosenberg probably gave the Soviet Union information, and that loyal wife Ethel was a bargaining chip used by brother David Greenglass to avoid prosecution. That's about as much background as one needs to appreciate and enjoy this deeply personal and very moving film about the aftereffects of the Rosenberg executions, and the worn out 'did they/didn't they' arguments are of only peripheral importance. Filled with fascinating interviews with the Rosenberg's children and a surprising number of elderly compatriots as well as some timely and frightening 1950s footage of anti-Communist hysteria, Heir to An Execution is an emotional attempt by director Ivy Meeropol (granddaughter of the convicted 'spies') to come to terms with a dark chapter in her family history. Strongly recommended.