Entertainment

Bonsai People

Muhammad Yunus won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for his pioneering work fighting poverty in his homeland, Bangladesh, where he lends money to poor women to start businesses. The concept has been enormously successful, and Time magazine has included Yunus, 71, on its list of “60 years of Asian heroes,’’ while the Wharton School of Business has named him one of “the most influential business persons of the past 25 years.’’

Yunus would seem to be a prime candidate for a movie about his work. Unfortunately, director Holly Mosher’s by-the-numbers documentary “Bonsai People’’ isn’t the answer. Using boring lectures by Yunus and pedantic commentary by Mosher, it has all the excitement of an infomercial touting mattresses.

Compounding the problem, NYU grad Mosher barely mentions news that Bangladeshi regulatory officials have pushed Yunus out of the bank he founded 30 years ago.