‘Losing Isaiah’

This 1995 film is a highly affecting balancing act: A white social worker, Margaret Lewin (Jessica Lange, pictured), adopts an African American crack baby, Isaiah (played as a 3-year-old by Marc John Jeffries), and the baby’s biological mother Khaila (Halle Berry, also pictured) tries to get him back. Director Stephen Gyllenhaal brings out the passion in the material without slobbering all over us. He understands the importance of what is ultimately at stake here--Isaiah’s future (HBO Saturday at 8 p.m.).