On This Day: 1826

Posted on July 4, 2015 by sheila

It was July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of July 4, 1776.

Both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, old men by that point, had been invited to attend celebrations in honor of the day, but due to illness both had sent their regrets and also best wishes, saying they would not be able to attend. Thomas Jefferson’s letter to the mayor of Washington, declining the invitation, ended as follows:

May it be to the world, what I believe it will be (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition and persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government … All eyes are opened or opening to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few, booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately by the grace of God. These are the grounds of hope for others; for ourselves, let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them.

Adams was too ill to put pen to paper. The light was going out. For both of them.

These two men, long estranged due to political differences, (Jefferson referring, in public, to “political heresies” among some of his colleagues, a dig at Adams – the breaking point for the overly sensitive Adams) had finally reconciled. The reconciliation had been engineered by Benjamin Rush, who thought it a shame that these two great patriots, once dear friends, would go to their graves without making up. Benjamin Rush had a dream that Adams and Jefferson became friends again (I wonder if he really had that dream? Or if it was just a fabrication in order to move things along). Rush wrote to Adams,

“And now, my dear friend, permit me again to suggest to you to receive the olive branch which has thus been offered to you by the hand of a man who still loves you. Fellow laborers in erecting the great fabric of American independence! … embrace – embrace each other!”

Adams and Jefferson began to exchange letters, and the correspondence lasted over a period of 12-years, a correspondence that is a must-read: The Adams-Jefferson Letters.

Rush’s dream ended up being prophetic and Adams said so himself: “your prophecy fulfilled! You have worked wonders! …. In short, the mighty defunct Potentates of Mount Wollaston and Monticello by your sorceries … are again in being.” (Adams was always more of an expressive gusher than Jefferson.)

Rush wrote back to Adams, his excitement apparent:

I rejoice in the correspondence which has taken place between you and your old friend Mr. Jefferson. I consider you and him as the North and South Poles of the American Revolution. Some talked, some wrote, and some fought to promote and establish it but you and Mr. Jefferson thought for us all.

Cut to years later: 1826.

On the same day … which happened to be July 4 … which happened to be the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence … John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both died. Within hours of each other.

David McCullough writes in John Adams:

That John Adams and Thomas Jefferson had died on the same day, and that it was, of all days, the Fourth of July, could not be seen as a mere coincidence: it was a “visible and palpable” manifestation of “Divine favor,” wrote John Quincy Adams in his diary that night, expressing what was felt and would be said again and again everywhere the news spread.

John Adams’ last words were either “Jefferson … still lives.” or “Jefferson … survives.”

You could interpret it many ways and that’s what I love about it. His old nemesis, outlasting him. Or feeling hopeful that TJ was still out there. It’s great, either way.

Adams had no way of knowing that Jefferson had actually died a couple of hours earlier, which makes this an even better story. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Thomas Jefferson’s last words are in dispute, but there are enough similarities to suggest that something along these lines occurred. (And these actually weren’t his final words – maybe they should be called his second to final words. His penultimate words.)

According to Robley Dunglison, the attending physician, Jefferson dozed through the day of July 3rd, and woke up in the early evening, saying as he awoke, “Is it the Fourth?”

Dunglison told Jefferson that it soon would be.

Nicholas Trist, married to Jefferson’s granddaughter, remembers it this way: Jefferson woke and said, “This is the Fourth?” Trist remembers pretending not to hear the question, because he didn’t want to tell Jefferson that it was still only the 3rd of July. But Jefferson asked again, “This is the Fourth?” Trist caved, and nodded, and he felt very bad about his lie.

Virginia Randolph, Jefferson’s granddaughter, remembers it differently. She remembers Jefferson waking and saying, clearly, “This is the Fourth.” No question. A statement.

Jefferson faded out after that, and the next day, July 4th, he called out for help at one point and someone remembers him saying, “No, doctor. Nothing more.”

Did Jefferson wait? When he found out it was still just the Third of July, did he wait? In order to die on the Fourth?

I wouldn’t put it past him, he loved symmetry.

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Review: In Stereo (2015)

Posted on July 3, 2015 by sheila

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My second review of the week, the first being Faith of Our Fathers. I didn’t think Faith of Our Fathers was any good but it didn’t piss me off like In Stereo.

My review of In Stereo is now up at Rogerebert.com.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Review: Faith of Our Fathers (2015)

Posted on July 3, 2015 by sheila

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The latest Christian movie from the studio that brought out God Is Not Dead. Faith of Our Fathers is an explicitly Christian film, but that’s no excuse for its lackluster presentation or its bad acting. There are plenty of Christian films that are amazing.

My review of Faith of Our Fathers is now up at Rogerebert.com.

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June 2015 Viewing Diary

Posted on July 1, 2015 by sheila

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 7, “Emily” (1997; d. Kim Manners)
Very intense. Good Lord.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 8, “Kitsunegari” (1998; d. Daniel Sackheim)
Ty Olsson as the green security guard. Hi, Benny from Supernatural! And Diana Scarwid! Sequel to “Pusher” in Season 3. Pretty creepy mind-control stuff.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 9, “Schizogeny” (1998; d. Ralph Hemecker)
Chad Lindberg. Always good. Of course he’s Ash in Supernatural but I first saw him in The Rookie. And Katherine Isabelle, too! They’re teenagers! Supernatural reunion alert. Evil child psychiatrist with a ponytail.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 10, “Chinga” (1998; d. Kim Manners)
Stephen King co-wrote. Holy mackerel! Takes place in Maine. Of course. Loved the teaser. Mulder watching porn in his office. Something’s not quite right about this episode. The tone is off.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 11, “Kill Switch” (1998; d. Rob Bowman)
Extremely entertaining. I especially enjoy Scully showing up in his “dream” and Ninja-fighting all the sexy nurses in white.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 12, “Bad Blood” (1998; d. Chris Bole)
A very entertaining Rashomon-inspired episode. I laughed out loud at this exchange: “I checked into the Davy Crockett Motel –” “It was the Sam Houston Motor Lodge.” Also: Luke Wilson!

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 13, “Patient X” (1998; d. Kim Manners)
Veronica Cartwright! Slightly difficult because there are no subtitles on Netflix and there’s a lot of Gulag Archipelago Russkie-speak. Excellent relationship episode: a sort of destabilizing role-reversal.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 14, “The Red and the Black” (1998; d. Chris Carter)
It’s a maze and I’m lost in it now.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 15, “Travelers” (1998; d. Chris Carter).
Frederic Lane, so excellent in so many films – from Zero Dark Thirty to Ordinary People – not to mention a crucial role in the early seasons of Supernatural – shows up here in a flashback, calling up the whole world of the HUAC and the Communist witch-hunt. It’s a good episode and the period details are very well done.

Iris (2015; d. Albert Maysles).
Maysles’ second-to-last film, a portrait (Maysels-style) of style icon, interior decorator, woman-about-town-with-the-huge-glasses, Iris Apfel. Ted and I went to see it and had a great time. It doesn’t have the profundity of some of his other films (Grey Gardens, Gimme Shelter and his final film – In Transit – which I would pick as one of his best films) – but it was sweet and entertaining. Regina, care to weigh in?? Ha!

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 16, “Mind’s Eye” (1998; d. Kim Manners)
Lily Taylor! Wonderful! And the kindly doctor who shot himself in the hardware store in Supernatural.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 17, “All Souls” (1998; d. Allen Coulter)
Very Supernatural Season 4. Anderson does superb work here.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 18, “The Pine Bluff Variant” (1998; d. Rob Bowman)
Bioterrorism threat writ large. Great shot of the movie theatre with all the dead people.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 19, “Folie a Deux” (1998; d. Kim Manners)
Written by Vince Gilligan, “Folie a Deux” features some creepy effects involving enormous bug-like creatures. The bond between Scully and Mulder has solidified into something nearly transcendent. Are they the “folie a deux” of the title? It did cross my mind. They are becoming one.

Criminal Minds, Season 1, Episode 1, “Extreme Aggressors” (2005; d. Richard Shepard)
Garth from Supernatural shows up. He’s just a kid! I always got a kick out of this show, because I am a sick individual. Alex and I were watching an episode when I was staying with her out in Los Angeles, and she commented from under her blanket on the other couch: “This show should not be called Criminal Minds. It should be called Women Should Never Leave the House.”

Criminal Minds, Season 1, Episode 2, “Compulsion” (2005; d. Charles Haid)
Mandy Patinkin was the draw for me, originally. His performance is so coiled, so focused. I was bummed when he left the show after one season. Years later, I read an interview with him and he was asked about Criminal Minds. He said he devoted himself to the world of behavioral analysis and serial killer research, and it got to him. He had nightmares. He couldn’t deal with it. He had to leave the show. That’s why his performance was so grounded. It was real for him.

The X-Files, Season 5, Episode 20, “The End” (1998; d. R.W. Goodwin).
Season 5 finale. The chess tournament that opens the episode was masterfully done. The entire episode is disturbing, ending with Mulder’s office in flames.

The X-Files Movie: Fight the Future (1998; d. Rob Bowman)
Part of my marathon watch with Keith. LOVED the movie. They almost kiss. Damn that bee-sting.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 1, “The Beginning” (1998; d. Rob Bowman)
Mimi Rogers is excellent in her recurring role. First episode filmed in Los Angeles, and you can perceive a definite shift. Suddenly there are lots of scenes in deserts, beaches, with much sunshine.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 2, “Drive” (1998; d. Kim Manners)
Bryan Cranston OWNS this episode.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 3, “Triangle” (1998; d. Chris Carter)
This ended up being a favorite episode (thus far). Broken up into three acts, each act (more or less) done in one take. So there’s that fun technical challenge to admire. But I also love the time-warp aspect of it, the tesseract element, as well as the fact that you get to see Scully in a flapper outfit – meaning, you get to see her beautiful body. Her clothing is usually so severe and dark and conservative. So to see her dancing around in a tight red dress, showing all this skin … I was like, “There you are!” Anyway, I loved this one.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 4, “Dreamland Part 1” (1998; d. Kim Manners)
I am in love with this two-parter where Mulder, through some problem with the space-time continuum, experiences a body-switch with Michael McKean (who is, not surprisingly, hilarious). Nora Dunn shows up as Mulder’s wife. Hilarious all around.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 5, “Dreamland Part 2” (1998; d. Michael Watkins)
Part 2 of the body-switch. There are a couple things here that delight: Mulder having to deal with being a father, and being totally unprepared for it. Having to deal with his furious and upset wife. Doing a mirror-dance with Michael McKean, both of them in their underwear, which has to be seen to be believed. Silly silly silly. I prefer silly.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 6, “How the Ghosts Stole Christmas” (1998; d. Chris Carter)
Ed Asner and Lily Tomlin! Awesome!

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 7, “Terms of Endearment” (1999; d. Rob Bowman)
A Rosemary’s Baby take-off and quite disturbing, especially because they ask you to basically sympathize with the devil. Like the Rolling Stones did.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 8, “The Rain King” (1999; d. Kim Manners)
Romantic. Adorable! Love this episode! Top 5, for sure.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 9, “S.R. 819” (1999; d. Daniel Sackheim)
Poor Walter Skinner. That disease was totes gross.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 10, “Tithonus” (1999; d. Michael Watkins)
Fascinating concept having to do with immortality. Written by Vince Gilligan.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 11, “Two Fathers” (1999; d. Kim Manners)
The great Veronica Cartwright re-appears, as does the mythology. The alien invasion is going along as planned until, holy mackerel, a rebel force of aliens arrives, fighting with the already-existing aliens, eliminating the Syndicate and wreaking all kinds of havoc. At least that’s what I THINK happened.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 12, “One Son” (1999; d. Rob Bowman)
Part 2 of the episode prior. More great use of Mimi Rogers’ character, as well as The Smoking Man. The conspiratorial feeling is very high. The Syndicate is no more.

Eden (2015; d. Mia Hansen-Love).
I love her work, in general, and this one is extremely ambitious, maybe her most ambitious. I really enjoyed it. My review is up at Rogerebert.com.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 13, “Aqua Mala” (1999; d. Rob Bowman)
Has there ever been a wetter episode of television? I am surprised nobody drowned. Or got electrocuted. Keith told me that fans did not really like this episode. Huh. I am a huge fan of it. I love the ensemble feeling of it, a group of random people holed up in one room, trying to survive. The power struggles, the humor, the suspicions growing, the need to improvise. All as the rain poured down. I really enjoyed it.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 14, “Monday” (1999; d. Kim Manners)
Excellent Ground Hog-ish day episode. It can’t hold a candle to Mystery Spot, Supernatural’s beloved Ground Hog Day inspired episode, but still: really interesting exploration of the concept.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 15, “Arcadia” (1999; d. Michael Watkins)
Scully and Mulder go under-cover as two suburbanites in a scary planned community. Great evocation of the fear/dread of a “normal” life like that (a dread I share), the conformist nature of it, the pressure to be happy/cheerful, despite uneasy undercurrents. Enjoyed the Scully/Mulder dynamic as well (what else is new). Pretending to be married. Sweater slung over his shoulders, arm around Scully’s shoulder – she’s finally like, “Stop pawing me.” He can’t stop.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 16, “Alpha” (1999; d. Peter Markle)
Evil huge dogs on the loose. A bit “meh.”

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 17, “Trevor” (1999; d. Rob Bowman)
“Should we arrest David Copperfield?”
“Yes. Yes, we should. But not for this.”

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 18, “Milagro” (1999; d. Kim Manners)
This episode is a psychological and emotional mind-fuck. Written for the great character actor John Hawkes, he is intense and creepy as the novelist who becomes obsessed with Scully. They have a scene in a church (he stalks her), where he tells her who she is, what he sees in her, what he has sensed – and watch Gillian Anderson’s close-up reaction in response. Incredible acting, of the RE-acting variety. What he says takes her breath away, terrifies her, moves her (he SEES that in me?), and repulses her – all at the same time.

Supernatural, Season 2, Episode 16, “Roadkill” (1999; d. Charles Beeson)
A re-watch for the re-cap, which is here. I love this episode.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 19, “The Unnatural” (1999; d. David Duchovny)
David Duchovny written and directed. I love baseball. And the final scene is a masterpiece, one of the most romantic scenes in the entire series.

Love & Mercy (2015; d. Bill Pohlad).
I absolutely loved this movie about Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys. Thoughts here. It’s in my tentative ever-changing list of Best Films of 2015 so far. Other contenders (and many of these were made in 2014, but released in 2015, so that’s what I go by): Clouds of Sils Maria (Review here, Mad Max: Fury Road, In Transit (Albert Maysles’ final film – review here, Girlhood (review here), Ex Machina, The Ocean of Helena Lee (review here), Welcome to Me.

Goodbye First Love (2011; d. Mia Hansen-Løve).
Re-watched in preparation for her latest film, Eden, reviewed for Rogerebert.com. It’s a beautiful and poignant story about first love, told in Hansen-Love’s very unique style.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 20, “The Three of a Kind” (1999; d. Bryan Spicer)
A Lone Gunmen-centric episode and that is always a good thing. I love those guys.

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 21, “Field Trip” (1999; d. Rob Bowmans)
A Rashomon-ish (kind of) episode, where we see Scully and Mulder’s different interpretations/experiences during a hallucination. Fascinating psychologically because you see what Mulder needs from Scully, you see what Scully needs from Mulder, and neither of those things are really fore-fronted when they both are in their right minds. This episode, in some ways, reminded me a lot of Supernatural‘s “What Is and What Should Never Be,” in my Top 5 episodes of the entire series. I’ve seen it the most times, and it never gets old. The Supernatural episode is a similar exploration into entering into an alternate reality, and how seductive those paths not taken can be. The tricks your mind plays on you … to show you what you ultimately want … and how difficult it is to even perceive that that is an alternate reality. I loved “Field Trip.”

The X-Files, Season 6, Episode 22, “Biogenesis” (1999; d. Kim Manners)
Oh my God.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 1, “The Sixth Extinction” (1999; d. Kim Manners)
Thrilling.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 2, “The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati” (1999; d. Michael Watkins)
Part II is even better. Again with the exploration of alternate reality, a road not taken. With a killer emotional final scene. This episode killed me.

Hondo (1953; d. John Farrow).
Yeah, I think I covered my thoughts on Hondo here.

Ex Machina (2015; d. Alex Garland).
Great and provoking film. My review here, and excellent conversation in the comments.

Catchfire (1990; d. Dennis Hopper).
What the hell happened. Great cast: Dennis Hopper, Jodie Foster, Dean Stockwell in a small part. My favorite actor! Catherine Keener shows up in one scene. But it is not a good movie. The romance part (which is what the story ultimately is about and leading towards) does not work at ALL. But it’s always good to see all of these people.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 4, “Millennium” (1999; d. Thomas Wright)
Well. A lot happens but all I care about is: OMG THEY KISS.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 5, “Rush” (1999; d. Robert Lieberman)
Tormented teenagers. I was mainly thrilled to see a young Nicky Aycox, who played such a crucial role in Supernatural. She’s totally different here, too.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 6, “The Goldberg Variation” (1999; d. Thomas Wright)
Shia LaBeouf as a sick child. Wow. Willie Garson, too! I first saw him in his recurring role in Sex and the City but guy has been around forever.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 7, “Orison” (2000; d. Rob Bowman)
Some pretty cool special effects in this episode, showing how this guy could slow down time. Beautifully done.

Siberiade, Parts III and IV (1979; d. Andrey Konchalovskiy).
Watched Parts 1 and 2 of this epic last month and finally got around to watching the final two parts as I was recovering from surgery. The entire movie tells the story of 20th century Russia through the focus on one village in Siberia. There are no scenes in Moscow or St. Petersberg. Those cities are very very far away. The village, though, is impacted by the gigantic events happening thousands of miles away. It’s a haunting and beautiful film, made in the final gasp of Communism before the Imperium crumbled. It’s honest, angry, and true. Terrifying, really. I highly recommend it.

Magic Mike (2012; d. Steven Soderbergh).
I love this movie. I love Channing Tatum. I love strippers, especially male strippers. One of the actors, Joe Manganiello, became so fascinated with the world of male strippers that he made a documentary about them. I reviewed for Rogerebert.com. And Channing Tatum is incredible. A natural. The way he flirts. It’s so friendly. Guys who don’t have the knack for it will never understand why the girls go for such men. It is because he treats women with kindness and a sort of egalitarian humor. The romance aspect of Magic Mike was fascinating. Michele and I are going to a screening for the sequel on Monday night, so I figured I should re-watch to get in the mood. As if the sexy trailer didn’t already put me in the mood. Soderbergh is great, but for me this is about the performances. Also the fact that Channing Tatum is filmed dancing in long takes, so we can perceive that it is actually HIM doing all that incredible movement. The movie is a celebration of the beauty of the male form and how much we straight ladies love it. More of that, please.

Felon (2008; d. Ric Roman Waugh).
Starring Stephen Dorff and Val Kilmer. About a guy (Dorff) imprisoned for murder (in what was obviously involuntary manslaughter.) It’s a pretty typical prison drama, elevated by Dorff’s raw honesty (he’s amazing) and Kilmer’s performance as a brutal murderer who will never get out of prison, who takes Dorff under his wing. Sam Shepard shows up. Harold Perinneau has a huge part (I love him, I was in a class with him and his wife – and she plays his wife in Felon as well – many years ago. Good kind people.) Nate Parker, whom I fell in love with in Great Debaters and then fell even more in love with in Beyond the Lights plays a rookie prison guard, horrified at the treatment of prisoners. Worth checking out, for the acting alone.

2 Fast 2 Furious (2003; d. John Singleton).
Comfort food. Why do these movies work SO WELL? So many reasons. The presence of Paul Walker, who is friendly and open and has a good sense of humor about himself. The 100% diverse cast. The car chase scenes are amazing. Eva Mendes was wonderful and looked phenomenal in her white pants. The joshing-around of all the guys. Friendly and funny. The presence of women everywhere, not just as hot babes in bikinis, but also as race enthusiasts and outlaws. Just like the guys. It’s exhilarating and it’s kind of a world I want to live in, as weird as that sounds.

The Searchers (1956; d. John Ford).
Masterpiece. I cry through the last 10 minutes, every time. From the moment Wayne lifts Natalie Wood up into the air, her terror, her little helpless fists … to the final walk-away, seen through the door. I did this whole post on John Ford’s use of doorways in The Searchers.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 8, “The Amazing Maleeni” (2000; d. Thomas Wright)
This episode started off a mythical day with Keith where we watched 10 episodes in a row. When we emerged from the dark room, Dan – who had had a full day, had gone into the city, seen a show, had some lunch, returned home, did some writing, watched a movie – all as Keith and I did one thing all day – looked at us and said, “You two …” and then trailed off. We waited. Dan said, “You need help.”

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 9, “Signs & Wonders” (2000; d. Kim Manners)
Kim Manners in top form. Terrifying episode with scary backwoods religions, and lots and lots of snakes.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 10, “Sein und Zeit” (2000; d. Michael Watkins)
An extremely sad episode, with Mulder starting a search for a little girl who disappeared. He becomes convinced it is connected to his sister’s disappearance.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 11, “Closure” (2000; d. Kim Manners)
Part II. With a frankly emotional ending scene that lay me flat. I was in tears. The episode is about letting go.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 12, “X-Cops” (2000; d. Michael Watkins)
An entire X-Files episode done in the style of the reality TV series Cops? Yes, please. Hilarious.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 13, “First Person Shooter” (2000; d. Chris Carter)
A video-game episode. Interesting gender dynamics here. It’s a boy’s world, and the girls are just living it, but it is the girls, ultimately, who are in power. Who dominate. Who save. The boys don’t get it. The episode leaves that element of it unspoken but it is there. The blinders of boys who honestly believe they are Top of the Heap and can’t understand that there is more to life than that. They aren’t evil, these boys, just blinkered to some degree. I really liked this episode.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 14, “Theef” (2000; d. Kim Manners)
Billy Drago is superb as the “villain” in the piece. He is legitimately frightening. He has tapped into this guy’s objective in a very real way. He’s not phoning it on or sketching it in. It feels real and inhabited.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 15, “En Ami” (2000; d. Rob Bowman)
WEIRD. Written by William Davis (i.e. The Smoking Man). I found it fascinating and disturbing, Scully lured away from Mulder, hiding things, lying, keeping secrets. Just a reminder of how close these two have become.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 16, “Chimera” (2000; d. Cliff Bole)
A raven stalks the land. A bad omen. Yet another episode showing domesticity and suburbia and normal life in a sinister light. Mulder and Scully do not live in that world, and at this point, they COULDN’T live in that world.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 17, “All Things” (2000; d. Gillian Anderson)
Holy shit-balls. This episode wrecked me. I’ve lived it.

Inside Out (2015; d. Pete Docter)
A profound film. I sobbed openly in the darkness at one point. I loved how one of the main themes was that Sadness was side-lined, she was not allowed to be in charge of anything, Sadness is seen as bad or wrong in our psychotic culture. Inside Out puts it out there that Sadness is important, Sadness is necessary, Sadness breeds compassion (responding to someone who is devastated with chirpy chippy Joy is actually callous and cruel, however well-intentioned the chirpy person is). Sadness also intensifies Joy, when it comes. I loved the film.

Inherent Vice (2014; d. Paul Thomas Anderson)
My third time. It’s amazing how the shots stick in my brain, even though I’ve only seen it 3 times. I have memorized shot sequences in many other movies, through repetition and study and all that. But Inherent Vice‘s shot-construction stuck in my brain instantly. And the performances just get better and better with repetition, and I’m seeing more and more. I am in love with this film. It’s a masterpiece. And that final shot! Bittersweet nostalgia mixed with raging paranoia, the glance at the headlights in the rear view mirror. YES. The 1970s in a nutshell. America in a nutshell. My original post about Inherent Vice is here.

Magic Mike XXL (2015; d. Gregory Jacobs)
To die for. Just as good as the original. I read a comment on Facebook from some person I don’t know: “Everything that is good about this movie is due to the cinematography.” (Because Steven Soderbergh shot it.) BZZZZZT. WRONG ANSWER. The cinematography is, indeed, great, because it allows us to see all of these guys dancing – and it films it in a way that shows us they’re really doing all that. It’s not a quick-cut frenzy like so many dance films utilize. But I would say that “everything that is good about this movie” has to do with Channing Tatum’s presence, and the raucous hilarious ensemble around him and how they create the relationships between all those guys. Honestly, the director-focused auteur theory of movies is so limited. It means people can’t SEE properly. How can you watch that movie and credit its success ONLY to the cinematography? How can you not see the effectiveness of the ensemble acting and not perceive that that is really why the whole thing works? Ugh. Anyway, let’s not focus on that unpleasantness. I went to a screening in a packed theatre with my friend Michele and the majority of the audience were women. Who screamed and hooted and hollered throughout the film. It was a fabulous atmosphere. I’ve got more to say about this film and how friendly it is about female desire/sexuality … but I’ll get into that at another time. LOVED. IT. I’ve had a rough month. I went on a promising date with a guy I really liked that then went very wrong in the last 5 minutes. I’m disappointed, and the disappointment is exacerbated by the fact that three days after the date I had surgery on my lady-parts and have felt helpless and scared about it. I’m exhausted and disheartened. The disappointment of the date was then immediately followed by a sexual assault (by a stranger) that went down 5 minutes after the date ended. I can’t make this shit up. I walked away from the date thinking, “What the hell was THAT” and headed down to Port Authority, and 5 minutes later a man jumped out of the shadows, literally, and attacked me, grabbing my breasts, hard, and shouting in my face. I survived, obviously, punching the guy in the chest, shouting “Fuck off” in his face (all of this happened on crowded 8th Avenue) but it was upsetting (although the date was more upsetting – I think because with the assault I reacted in the moment and left nothing held back: I experienced it, I reacted appropriately, and it was over. With the date, I felt … deceived. And couldn’t really address it. So it cast a shadow. I crack myself up because once I got the guy off me, I kept walking down to Port Authority, thinking, “Okay, so where was I. That date. What the hell was THAT?” It was like getting a bug-bite. A slight annoyance.) Anyway, in the intervening time, however, somehow the entire experience has been looped together into one experience: Bad date (Raiders: “Bad dates”), sexual assault, something seriously wrong with lady-parts. I am trying to untangle it because they are all separate things, but they all happened at the same time so they feel connected. My sexuality under attack. Anyway, I’ve felt blue and beat up. Magic Mike XXL helped give me my Mojo and confidence back – or at least feel that buzz of desire and happiness again. I don’t mind going personal. That’s what movies can do. I walked out of the movie feeling good and happy. And sexed up. Life is good.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 18, “Brand X” (2000; d. Gillian Anderson)
Too many bugs, thankyouverymuch.

The X-Files, Season 7, Episode 19, “Hollywood A.D.” (2000; d. David Duchovny)
Ridiculous and funny. “Hollywood Babylon” in Supernatural obviously takes its cue from this episode, as well as the whole Carver Edlund book-series thing, with Supernatural being turned into first a television show and then a musical. Where Sam and Dean have to play themselves, or watch high school girls play them, and how strange it is. Here, Mulder and Scully are played by Garry Shandling (WTF) and Duchovny’s real-life wife at the time Tea Leoni. There’s one scene where Shandling, doing research for his character, asks Mulder, “Right or left?” Meaning penis placement. Mulder is mortified, amused, tuned into the surreal. But even funnier, in the background of the scene, Tea Leoni has asked Scully to show how she runs in those heels. And Leoni whizzes back and forth, back and forth, charging across the background, “practicing” her running. It’s hilarious.

Posted in Monthly Viewing Diary, Movies, Television | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 32 Comments

The Books: The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West 1911-17; “The Future of the Middle Classes: Women Who Are Parasites”

Posted on June 30, 2015 by sheila

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On the essays shelf (yes, there are still more books to excerpt in my vast library. I can’t seem to stop this excerpts-from-my-library project. I started it in 2006!)

NEXT BOOK: The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West, 1911-17

Here, in this Nov. 1912 essay published in The Clarion, Rebecca West takes the gloves off. On second thought, I don’t think she ever had her gloves ON. The fight for enfranchisement was important. Rebecca West believed women needed to be full participants in the culture, and did not need men to protect them. Especially since the men who fought to block women voting ended up showing their real colors, their small-minded vicious natures. I am going to let such bozos decide my fate? Her life was punctuated by assassinations of world leaders, which she gets into at great length in her masterpiece Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. And as nations organized themselves into war machines, she resented it on a profound level. The world of men (politics, leadership) was in charge, but women were dragged along in the wake of these catastrophes, having no “say” in any of it because they couldn’t vote or lead. Rebecca West was not stupid and did not believe that if women were in charge things would go much better. But she certainly wanted to participate, fully, so that she felt somewhat in charge of her own fate. Voting is powerful that way. It may be somewhat illusory, but it gives you a sense of agency, and if your country is going to drag itself into war, and women’s husbands and brothers and fathers would march off to be slaughtered, then, yes, women had an interest in that. It affected them personally. And to have such gigantic events occur, repeatedly, without participation in the ballot box … was outrageous.

But West was always interested in multiple things at the same time. She was not a one-issue kind of person, and her “take” on things often differed from her suffragist sisters. When the suffragette movement moved in an anti-sex way, she balked. When the suffragettes focused only on domestic things, she clocked it as the middle-class bullshit that it was. There were real problems in working-class England, and the suffragette movement was mostly a middle-class one, with middle-class concerns. West burst onto the scene, guns blazing, with a Socialist mindset. She wasn’t just interested in getting the vote. She wanted the entire system to be changed, so that people got paid a decent wage, people had clean water to drink, people weren’t ground down by poverty. The vote was just a PART of the struggle and it was disheartening to her to see suffragettes focus only on the vote. Her columns were always a cry for MORE change.

And here, she takes on the middle-class woman, what she called – repeatedly – “parasite women.” Society was set up in a certain way, with certain assumptions. Victorian culture was a monolith, and its values were omnipresent and engrained. The middle-class woman was born and bred to be a “parasite” on society – far more than working-class women, who may have needed help from the larger culture, but were out there participating in the economy. Middle-class women sat at home, and organized church mission societies, and lived off the wealth of others. They did nothing. They had babies and kept a nice home and were never expected to work for a living. West could be vicious towards the parasite woman, although she understood why they had become parasites – the entire culture had a vested interest in keeping women out of the public sphere. But that time was over. Revolution was coming – social and economic – and women needed to walk out their front doors, put on their big-girl pants, and try to make it out there in the world, without protection of husband/father/whatever. The economic situation of England was too dire. Girls in that economic class may still have been raised with the expectation that they would marry someday, and be taken care of for the rest of their lives – but real world situations was making that an old-fashioned fantasy.

The working-class was suffering. The middle-class was shattering, and also finding it hard to support itself in the way that they thought they would be accustomed to. Certainties were breaking up, falling apart. The year is 1912. Just two years before Gavrilo Princip stepped out of the crowd in Sarajevo, his action cracking apart the entire edifice of the world, the final nail in the coffin to Victorian certainty about itself. West sensed something was coming. She didn’t know what it would be. But things were ending and it was not going to be pretty. Women needed to participate, fully. Society could no longer support them or protect them. That type of life was done. Middle-class women (and men) were, of course, the last ones to understand this, and they held on tightly to what they were accustomed to. West went after them, and after them hard, in column after column.

For her, suffrage was just one teeny part of the puzzle. The much bigger element was economic and social reform, and because she was educated and understood world history, she knew that that “reform” probably would not march forward in an orderly manner. She knew that bad times were coming and she was deeply concerned about the fact that middle-class women put their hands over their ears and eyes and refused to acknowledge it. She did not understand such passivity – she had always had to work for a living (and remember, she’s only about 19, 20 years old here). Whatever was coming was going to be huge, and she wanted women to gear up, be ready for it, throw themselves into the fray. All of them. Working-class women were already doing the lion’s share of the work. They had been working for generations. The fantasy of “little wife at home” was purely middle-class in origin. That world was about to end. West sensed it. And she sensed revolution of some kind would follow. Economic strife/change often lead to revolution. I mean witness the panic going on in Greece at this very moment!

Her piece here is a long one, but I’ll excerpt the opening bit. I love her analogy about the railyard at the bottom of the hill.

Excerpt from The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West, 1911-17: “The Future of the Middle Classes: Women Who Are Parasites”, by Rebecca West

Life ought not to be divided into watertight compartments. Apparently feminism seems a simple matter to many suffragettes, like floating a patent medicine. One advertises the principle of the equality of the sexes with immense vigor and publicity until the public begins to swallow it. As to the effect it has on the public the suffragette cares as little as the patent-medicine vendor. Indeed it is often explained at suffrage meetings that the women’s vote will have no appreciable effect on the social structure, and will simply act as a police des mouers to suppress the White Slave Traffic. It is strange that the middle-class woman, who forms the backbone of the suffrage societies, should believe that one can superimpose the emancipation of women on the social system as one sticks a halfpenny stamp on a postcard. For in the social developments consequent upon the emancipation of women she will probably play a great and decisive part.

For the middle-class woman comes of a class that is in a state of chaos. The present position of the middle classes may be symbolized by certain distracting disturbance of the residents of Hampstead. On a hillside starting at Church Row and extending down to the Finchley Road there is an area of immensely valuable house property. Those who dwell in Fitzjohn’s Avenue and the surrounding parts have arrived at the summit of the middle classes. After that they can only soar upwards to Park Lane. They have everything that money can reasonably be expected to buy, and certainly more than is good for them.

Yet at the bottom of the hillside there is a railways goods yard. That means a persistent and uproarious disturbance of the middle classes every night in the year. Engine whistles shriek, trains puff and rattle, men shout, and there is that particularly maddening reverberation of buffers all night long. Up in Fitzjohn’s Avenue members of the middle classes may be dying, and members of the middle classes may be being born – these last in the minority, for birth-rate is very low in such parts – but this infuriating disturbance goes on. There is also the uncomfortable circumstance that every now and then a shunter gets crushed or a boy gets mauled to death by a runaway capstan, but these things rarely come within the cognizance of Fitzjohn’s Avenue. Even without that the night is made hideous.

Now the people in Fitzjohn’s Avenue are the railway shareholders and directors. It was entirely on their shoulders to organize the railway system so that the good yards and sidings were at some distance from human habitation. It was their business to discover that all those vans that are shifted about are not really necessary: most of them work about six months out of a life of seventeen years, and spend the rest of the time wilting in sidings and being repaired. But they did not take the trouble. So now the world of work, which they refused to organize economically and justly, has its revenge on them by destroying their night’s rest.

There you get the position of the middle classes today. It used to be imagined in Victorian days that to be a member of the middle classes was to be in a position of perfect security. One rose from the working classes by the practice of what one Samuel Smiles called “self-help”; that consisted of practicing the baser Christian virtues in order to steal the job of the man above you. Thus one attained in the middle classes, and after an unexciting life, died, leaving a large middle-class family, perfectly confident that they, too, would have large middle-class families. There would, please God, always be a sufficient residuum of the self-helpless, idle, thriftless and drunken to do the work.

But now there is no such feeling of security. The special circumstances which helped the middle classes to this prosperity do not now operate. The wealth that flowed into England at the beginning of the last century was largely due to the fact that after the industrial revolution the manufacturer found himself in power over a vast reservoir of amenable labor. Trade unions were still illegal combinations, so the adult worker was cheap indeed, and cheaper still the labor of little children. Out of this slavery England sweated enough wealth to enable herself to resist Napoleon without unduly feeling the financial strain. Thus she was able to pursue her commercial way unruffled at the time her European rivals were hopelessly overcome by the Napoleonic Wars. Again, we see that the poor, in asking for a greater share of the national wealth, are neither thieves nor beggars, but simply workers presenting an account for services rendered.

But England has outlived these advantages. The European countries have recovered and, with wits sharpened by adversity, are formidable rivals. The middle-class man is hard hit by this readjustment of things. Moreover, his two errors of judgement are coming home to roost. First of these is the idea about the thriftlessness and worthlessness of the working classes. The working classes have rebelled against him; and they are so clever and so fit that they have got a good deal out of him already and they are going to get a lot more. Free education, free libraries, the Workmen’s Compensation Act – all such things as those come out of the middle-class man’s right-hand pocket. His other error of judgement, snobbishness, which makes him love all loves as one should only love the Lord, makes him feel deeply surprised when the rich and great do not assist him in his hour of need, but pick his left-hand pocket with their demands for rent for their overpriced and capriciously disposed-of land. Between them he is plucked very clean. That is, of course, only from his own point of view. But it is perfectly true that there is a very black future for the middle-class man. There is not the slightest prospect of his being able to live up to his present standard of comfort for more than one generation.

That means all hands to the pumps. The middle-class woman will have to come out and work for her living. Not as the exception, as it was ten to twenty years ago; not in the minority, as it is now; but as the general rule. The middle-class woman will have to stop being a parasite.

There is no question that she will be able to compete equally with men. But what will happen next? What will be the effect on the labor market?

Posted in Books | Tagged , , , | 6 Comments

The Books: The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West 1911-17; “An Orgy of Disorder and Cruelty: The Beginnings of Sex Antagonism”

Posted on June 25, 2015 by sheila

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On the essays shelf (yes, there are still more books to excerpt in my vast library. I can’t seem to stop this excerpts-from-my-library project. I started it in 2006!)

NEXT BOOK: The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West, 1911-17

The fight for women’s enfranchisement was bitter, protracted and violent. The suffragettes of England had organized themselves to such a degree that they would show up at various political meetings, where the men were discussing Important Things (usually leaving out the issue of votes for women), and demand rowdily from the back or from the galleries that they address their concerns. Riots broke out, with women being thrown down stairwells and beaten to a pulp (as today’s excerpt, an article in The Clarion from 1912, describes.) Rebecca West herself was present at many of these events, from when she was a teenager, witnessing the callousness with which polite requests were treated. No wonder women resorted to more violent means. If you could be thrown into the bushes just for shouting “Votes for Women,” then that was a clear signal of how threatened/closed-off the power structure really was. The press, both Tory and Liberal, did not comport themselves particularly well, which is why the feminists started their own newspapers (which is how Rebecca West got her start as a journalist).

Rebecca-West

The power structure was so set in stone, and very few people give up or share power willingly. That’s how seductive power is. This should not be a surprise, or a revelation. I think it was Napoleon who observed, from afar, George Washington’s second term as President, and remarked, “If he walks away from office, he will be the greatest man who ever lived.” And of course, Washington did walk away. Napoleon could never do it. Because once you have a taste of Rule, you want more. And more. History is full of examples. So the men, who owned all of the arms of power, did not want to give it up. The fight for enfranchisement was like lancing a boil or something: all this nasty shit started coming out, shit that was always there in the patriarchal system, and yet hidden from view before women started saying, “We don’t want this.” Now that really was a revelation for many of the women, fighting the fight: Look at how much they HATE us. They had sensed that hatred and contempt, but it had been hidden from view in a veil of politeness and deference, required by the Victorian patriarchal system which put women on a pedestal. Once that pedestal crashed, out came this roaring rambunctious hatred, and for many it was upsetting, sure, but for many others it was the force that drove them on. As in: Okay, now we know the truth, now we have confirmation: they despise us. So we will be DAMNED if we let men who are so small-minded, so hateful, rule over our lives and destinies.

Rebecca West, who enjoyed men a lot, who always was ready to point out that “sex antagonism” (men hating women, politics favoring men over women, etc.) could work both ways, and she wanted men to understand that. As she wrote later in this essay:

It never seems to strike men that a party which renounced the principle of liberty, when dealing with women, might renounce them when dealing with men.

There was a lot of rage-boy whining going on, which we all should be familiar with today. Witness GamerGate. Or John Oliver’s recent rant about the Internet and women. Go to any article that discusses John Oliver’s rant, and then read the comments. Sex antagonism is alive and well. These boys are like, “Yes, women should be equal. I should be able to punch a woman in the face, and not be judged for it. If I can punch a man, why can’t I punch a woman?” Oh boo-hoo, baby wants a bottle. How about we stop punching altogether and start talking and listening? This just goes to show you that a sense of entitlement is very engrained – it is somehow encouraged, by osmosis, and so when something comes along that threatens that, people flip OUT. I read some of the vicious misogyny and think: Who raised these monsters? Shame on Mom and Dad both: You both did a terrible job. Well, that’s one thought. The other one is: My goodness, I am glad I hang around men who like women. Jeez Louise, boys, it’s just so much easier in life when you like women. So much else starts to make sense then. (The opposite is true as well, ladies.) The last one is: Do these people not know ANY women they like? Mothers? Grandmothers? Sisters? Daughters? A 2nd grade teacher who praised your drawings? Nobody? How can you generalize about women so? It is so revealing of your intellectual limitations and you are not even AWARE of it. I can’t generalize with total certainty about men because I know far too many men who have ZERO to do with the stereotype.

Anyway, reading Rebecca West’s pieces about the violent fight for enfranchisement is a bummer because so much of that shit is still going on AND it is my point of view that it is definitely worse now than it was back when I was coming of age. I think it’s because every bozo now has a microphone on the Internet, whereas once upon a time, the bozos had to write out their manifestos in long-hand on a legal pad, like every other crazy person, and none of us had to hear any of it.

The article excerpted below describes “an orgy of disorder and cruelty” that followed a bunch of suffragettes breaking up a speech made by Lloyd George (soon to be a national hero, but West had no use for him) in his home town of Llanystumdwy, where he was opening up a village school. He portrayed himself as a paragon of a family man, wife and kids, the ultimate politician with his smiling brood around him, and West thought it was all bullshit (as the opening paragraph below expresses. I love it when Rebecca West does not pull her punches.) Lloyd George was a Liberal, and, famously, one of the engineers of the modern welfare state, as many would call it. Rebecca West despised the Liberals, almost more than the Tories, because of the hypocrisy and “littleness” on display in much of their politics and attitude. She continued to be relentlessly logical, pointing out the fallacies in the arguments propping up “sex antagonism”. She was unwilling to give the Liberals a pass, because they were for the “right” things, like health care and education and blah-dee-blah. She saw it all as a bunch of windy rhetoric: these guys wanted a pat on the head for being less awful towards women than the Tory party.

And so, the riot that broke out at Lloyd George’s speech-making day in his home town, was a symbol to West, a warning to other suffragettes who put their hope in the Liberal party, who were willing to compromise/wait/forgive.

West was never afraid to “take on” a sacred cow. Lloyd George was something of a sacred cow (and would be even more so throughout World War I, when he served as Prime Minister). In 1912, he presided over a riot, throwing up his hands helplessly at the sight of women being punched in the face, when he just as easily could have done something. West did not forgive or forget. Mind like a steep trap, if you’ll forgive the cliche.

One of her most famous quotes (which she used a couple of times, both in her masterpiece Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, and also in one of her earlier articles) was the following:

A strong hatred is the best lamp to bear in our hands as we go over the dark places of life, cutting away the dead things men tell us to revere.

I tend to agree with her. She never forgot her various hatreds, and was able to pull them out when she needed them. “Yes, he may have done much good in this sector, but let us never forget his appalling behavior HERE.” People have short memories. West did not.

I am piecing together the event that prompted the following article based only on West’s description and my own vague knowledge of Lloyd George. The book Young Rebecca suffers from a total lack of explanatory footnotes, or explanatory contextualized opening paragraphs. There was so much wrestling back-and-forth going on, in print, with journalists arguing it out in their columns, and West is responding to a pious “Liberals patting themselves on the back” article about the “orgy of disorder and cruelty”.

Here’s the excerpt.

Excerpt from The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West, 1911-17: “An Orgy of Disorder and Cruelty: The Beginnings of Sex Antagonism”, by Rebecca West

With the modesty for which he is notorious, Mr. Lloyd George celebrated his birthday last Saturday by presenting, far from anonymously, to Llanystumdwy, the home of his boyhood, what the Daily News called “a village university.” It was a village institute. He found himself unable to perform the act of generosity without the support of his wife and family and five MPs. “In the absence of Mr. Winston Churchill, the ceremony of opening the outer entrance was performed by Mr. Mastermind MP, who was presented with a golden key for that purpose, and upon reaching the institute, the door of the building was opened by Mrs. Lloyd George, to whom another key had been presented.” The whole George family was present in ecstasies over the noble deed. Miss Megan Lloyd George, that unremarkable child whose bare legs twinkle across the stage of English politics, was photographed all day, playing with daddy or pushing a go-cart in the garden. The festivity was as characteristic of Mr. Lloyd George’s generosity as of his modesty. The institute was built with £1,000 which was awarded to Mr. Lloyd George in a libel action. We may receive the statement without rapture if we reflect that he charges his unhappy country £5,000 a year for his services in hatching addled Insurance Acts. It was a debauch of vulgarity. And there was something sinister about it. No one would mind if the George family went to Blackpool for the day and ended up by changing hats and singing comic songs on the promenade. But this brandishing of the simple pieties and Christian virtues under the camera’s eye is false and dangerous. So no one need have been surprised when the celebration suddenly turned into an orgy of disorder and cruelty, a letting loose of Hell.

Some suffragettes turned up at the opening ceremony. They reminded Mr. Lloyd George that the question of enfranchisement of women had not been settled. They were tactful. They did not point out the plain truth – that it is galling for women to be cheated out of their citizenship by such an inefficient person as Mr. Lloyd George. They made remarks such as “Votes for Women”, and expressed disagreement with various challenging statements that he made. Nothing they said could have aroused the fury with which they were received. A gentleman named Mr. P.W. Wilson, who occupies a confidential position in the Liberal world, claims to have made a protest.

“Remember,” he exclaimed, when he saw a fellow-Liberal scratching a suffragette, “she is a woman!”

He was thereupon hustled, and quite rightly, too, for making such a silly remark. The questions were not in the least provocative of scratching, and had the questioner been a man, there was not the slightest reason why he should be scratched any more than a woman.

To prove that everything is for the best in the best of all possible worlds, Mr. Wilson tells us that afterwards one of the men who had hustled him came up to him and, touching his hat, begged his pardon. How like the vanity and littleness of liberalism to record solemnly a triviality like that when describing a scene as brutal and perilous as a battlefield!

The population of Llanystumdwy showed clearly that, though it had been given a village institute, what it really wanted was a village shambles.

Think of a mob of screaming, shrieking men, convulsed with liberalism, throwing themselves on singlehanded women, beating them with sticks and stones, tearing out their hair in handfuls, and stripping them down to the waist! Think of them dragging the bleeding bodies of their captives towards the village pump, pitching them over hedges, and trying unsuccessfully to dip them in the river!

Then listen to the speech with which Mr. Lloyd George was leading their hearts heavenwards:

There is no country where political warfare is fought under stricter and more honorable rules of fair play and personal chivalry, than in Great Britain. That is a worthy pride and boast for this land, and they fight all the more effectively because they fight honorably.

The right honorable gentleman broke the chain of his argument for another distinguished son of Llanstumdwy. Seeing a suffragette pinioned by this fellow, who was pummeling her face with his fist, “I am sorry in my heart,” he complained, picturesquely. “I would do my best to protect their lives, but I cannot be responsible any longer.” It was only by a miracle that his fellow countrymen did not take the hint.

It is impossible to take this scene as a mere bit of rowdyism. It happened under the auspices of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and it was performed by the supporters of the present Government without fear of arrest. It is an event of profound significance.

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Review: Ex Machina (2015)

Posted on June 21, 2015 by sheila

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Ex Machina knocked me out. Knocked me OUT, I tell you.

Written and directed by Alex Garland (a novelist and screenwriter), it is a first feature: extraordinary, considering the authority the film carries. There are no first-time jitters in evidence. No grabbing-for-the-brass-ring and showing the strain, common of first-timers. Garland knows exactly what he is doing, what story he is telling, and how he wants to tell it.

I saw it without reading the reviews – only hearing the raves. That is the way to go. I’ve read reviews since and they give a lot away. I will try to not do so here, but feel free to skip the review – and SEE the film, and then come back to discuss. Because watching the film with little prior knowledge meant that I did not know what was coming, I had no sense of the trajectory of the story, and was able, then, to be drawn into this creepy claustrophobic world. If Caleb feels trapped, if Ava feels trapped, then so did I.

Briefly: the film wastes no time getting started. A young programmer named Caleb (Irish actor Domhnall Gleeson) wins a company-wide contest. He works for a Google-ish Search engine called Blue Book, invented by a genius named Nathan (Oscar Isaac). The “prize” is a week spent in Nathan’s secluded (putting it mildly) hideaway in the mountains, an extended one-on-one. Nathan is a mysterious figure, a Citizen Kane, whom nobody has really seen. To get to his home, Caleb has to board a helicopter, which flies over glaciers, through mountains, white and green, to a small green valley where there is an empty field. The helicopter drops Caleb off, the pilot saying, “The house is over that way. Just follow the river.” Confused, in his suit, holding his suitcase, Caleb makes his way through the forest to a house buried in the woods. He is issued a key-card by a robotic female voice at the front door. Once inside, he descends a glass staircase into the house proper. The furnishings are elegant and spare, there are glass windows everywhere, looking out on the river, the trees. But there’s no one around. No one greets him at the door. He finally comes across Nathan, bearded, shirtless, punching a boxing bag out on the back porch. Nathan greets him with a “Hey there, bro, what’s happening?” vibe that is both disarming and somewhat suspicious. (Oscar Isaac’s performance is incredible.) Whatever Caleb, clearly a good boy trying to make a good impression, in his suit, calling Nathan “sir”, was expecting, this sweaty guy talking about how he’s detoxing after a hangover, in a “You know how it is, right, dude?” manner, is not it.

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Why has Caleb been brought there? What are the two men going to do for a whole week in isolation? Caleb has been kept in the dark. Nathan has an air of excitement and focus that looks either sinister or enthusiastic, depending on the moment-to-moment behavioral cues. Alone, in his mountain lair, Nathan has been working on something, something big, something that will change the world (even more than he already changed it, with Blue Book). He has been working on A.I. technology. For years. And he thinks he’s finally getting somewhere. That a breakthrough is imminent.

But it needs to be tested by an outside eye, which is where Caleb comes in.

Enter Ava (Alicia Vikander), the Artificial Intelligence. She is kept in a glass-walled room. Her arms and her torso are see-through, showing blinking circuitry within. The film is broken up with chapter-markers: “Ava: Session 1” or “Ava: Session 2.” Caleb’s job is to have sessions with Ava, and then report back to Nathan his impressions. Nathan can be frightening. He is charming, but he can also “turn.” He’s volatile. What he wants from Caleb is not a nerdy lecture on her impressive and fluid vocabulary and her understanding of semantics. What Nathan wants is Caleb’s emotions: Do you FEEL that she is human? What do you FEEL when you are in her presence? Nathan doesn’t mention the “uncanny valley”, although that is what I thought of. What Nathan is interested in is Caleb performing The Turing Test.

Caleb’s sessions with Ava proceed. Nathan quizzes Caleb afterwards.

ex-machina-meeting-ava-680x380

Shit gets twisted, dark, and terrifying. I had no idea how the story would go. All bets seemed to be off.

And that’s about all I’ll say about the plot. I did flash on last year’s magnificent Under the Skin (my review here), and there are many similarities, especially in Ex Machina‘s interest in exploring gender, and what that means, how it presents, how we respond to it, the “state” of being a woman, and what that actually means. The “state” of being a man, and how that informs/distracts/enlightens. How does one understand who one is on this basic level? Under the Skin was practically a gender-studies thesis, although that makes what is riveting and visceral sound dry and academic. These films do not lecture. But they have more to say about the realities of gender imprisonment (for both men and women) than more realistic films. Good science fiction can address the human condition with total confidence (I am thinking of Philip Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? – thoughts here – turned into Blade Runner, of course – another source material I thought of after I came out of Ex Machina, blinking into the raw rainy morning. I had been on a date the night before, that went really well, sparks! fun! talk! he spent the whole night glancing at my mouth! Yay! – and then careened off the rails in the last 5 minutes, so I was still trying to shake it off the following morning. AND, to intensify the literary conceit, as I walked down 8th Avenue to the subway, post-date, I was assaulted. I was walking in the “lane” next to the bike-path, because the sidewalk was crowded, which meant I was next to the line of cars that park along that lane. A guy lunged at me from out of a car, grabbed my breasts, hard, he hurt me, and said “Nice titties.” I am not even kidding. Had he just watched the despicable Me and Earl and the Dying Girl or something? I bashed his hands off me, said, “Fuck you” and kept walking. I forgot about it promptly because I went back to the weird date in my mind, thinking, “What the hell just happened.” I didn’t even remember the “titty”-grab until the next morning because the date was on my mind. I know, I’m strange. Like … the titty-grab was not the weirdest thing that happened to me that night. The entire night was like Womanhood in Microcosm, with all elements represented. In regards to the date, I felt like I had joined a cult for 36 hours and was trying to come out of it. Ex Machina spoke into that personal experience, as all good films do. It wasn’t just about me, but there was a dovetail present – and I’m sure if I saw it on another day, with no great-date-that-turned-super-weird followed by a-scary-stranger-grabbing-my-breasts directly in my rear-view mirror it would have reminded me of other things, other experiences.)

There is a deep and very human empathy at work in Ex Machina, startling and strange considering the scientific and spare environment of that house, its chilliness, its intimidating perfection. I don’t need all films to be kind and empathetic towards women. I honestly don’t. I loved Wolf of Wall Street, and was so frustrated with the “It’s misogynistic” commentary. For God’s sake, of COURSE it was, because those guys in the film were misogynistic ass-clowns. What do you want? One of those douche-bags to suddenly spout a regretful monologue, “Oh my God, I am a misogynistic asshole and I am so sorry!” Or to have Scorses somehow point an arrow at all of them, telegraphing, “This is bad behavior.” Have you seen a Martin Scorsese film before? So what you are saying is, you would have liked Wolf of Wall Street better if it had been a bad film but showed the “enlightened” viewpoint? Get outta here with your bullshit. Showing something is not necessarily endorsement. I want to put that on a billboard.

But Ex Machina has something to say about women, and how they are viewed, the prisons men put them in, literal and imaginary. It’s subtle and sneaky, there isn’t too literal a point made of it, but it’s there, it’s the atmosphere of the film, it’s the air it breathes.

However: more than Under the Skin, or any other film/book about A.I., what Ex Machina reminded me of was the famous French folktale about Bluebeard, clearly a deliberate choice. Bluebeard, who gives his wife a set of keys to every room in his castle, telling her that she can go in any room she likes, except for one room. She is forbidden, under any circumstances, to go into that one specific room. She has a key to the room on her key-chain, but she must never ever unlock that door. She promises. But of course Bluebeard goes away, leaving her alone in the castle, and she makes a beeline to the forbidden door, opens it, and finds, to her horror, all the bodies of Bluebeard’s murdered wives.

Film-making pioneer Georges Melies made a film in 1901 called Bluebeard, and the moment of revelation is horrifying and evocative.

bluebeard

Nathan was Bluebeard. The key-card that Caleb is issued opens only some of the doors in that massive house. Nathan tells Caleb: “You can go in any room that the keycard lets you into. But if the door won’t open, then that room isn’t for you. Kapiche?” Caleb says Fine. Yet the longer he is there, the more he wants to know what are in the other rooms. The other rooms could also be representative of Ava herself, mysterious and conscious, yet clearly robotic and see-through. What is inside her? She seems to have feelings that happen organically. Is it a trick? What is it like to be her? Embedded in this is the “unknowability” of women (from the male standpoint), men who struggle to put themselves in a woman’s shoes (human or A.I.), because desire messes everything up. Desire is good and human, don’t get me wrong, but it also can cloud compassion. Caleb is forced to consider Ava, outside of any desire he may feel. It is a destabilizing experience for him. He is forced to understand who she is, outside of his own conception of her, of women in general.

Caleb goes further and further into Bluebeard’s castle, and finally, of course, the forbidden doors he wants to go into will be unlocked. The fairy tale makes that inevitable. He will find out Nathan’s secrets. He will understand what he has walked into. He will understand the stakes, he will see all.

And that’s all I will say. More would be unfair.

Just see it.

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This Magic Mike XXL Trailer Is Insane

Posted on June 20, 2015 by sheila

It’s an assault on the senses, and has its own narrative thrust (puns are inevitable), which has nothing to do with story, although you get snippets of it here and there. The snippets (“Let’s go compete in Florida” “Let’s get new routines”) are not the focus of the trailer. The focus is to overstimulate you through quick-flashing visual information. It creates a VIBE, in other words. So few trailers create a VIBE of any kind. Compare to most trailers: they obediently walk you through the plot (sometimes the entire plot), stringing together what are clearly the high points, all underscored with generic music. Unimaginative. Boring.

Magic Mike XXL may or may not be any good, but that is one hell of a compelling and sexy trailer. Trailers are interesting although I don’t put much stock in them (at least not in terms of what it might say about the actual movie). Trailers are launched and some critics pontificate, “Judging from the trailer, such-and-such looks like it’s going to be a huge disappointment/everything I’d hoped for/Meh.” Come on, people. You write about the industry. Don’t you know how advertising works? You should know better than that. Trailers are their own THING, and of course are meant to make you want to go see the movie. But so few trailers accomplish that. The ones that DO (like the Mad Max: Fury Road teaser trailer, for example – INSANE.) are fascinating works of art in and of themselves. One of the best trailers I’ve ever seen (both in terms of how it is put together AND in terms of how it worked on me, assaulted me, made me think: “I MUST SEE THAT MOVIE.”) was the first trailer for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I wrote a whole thing about it. The beauty of it was that the film was just as good as the trailer promised. But the trailer was fascinating because – it told you everything, but it also told you nothing. It had its own style, and it used “Mr. Blue Sky” as its underlying soundtrack, and the images used were startling and strange, especially when seen out of context, before you had seen the movie. What was it about? What the hell?? There are other Eternal Sunshine trailers, more conventional ones, like this, but that first one … Wow.

But back to Magic Mike XXL, which I can’t wait to see:

Last year, I reviewed a movie directed by Joe Manganiello (an actor in the original Magic Mike), who became so fascinated by the male stripper scene through his role that he decided to do a documentary about La Bare, a high-end insanely elaborate male strip club in Dallas (if I ever visit Dallas, I am going! Like, I’ll get off the plane, catch a cab, and say, “Take me to La Bare.”). It was a very sweet movie, strangely enough, and I highly recommend it – it was called La Bare, and here’s my review.

In the meantime, let’s watch that insane trailer again. Hats off, ad-men. Ya done good.

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Check

Posted on June 20, 2015 by sheila

chess

It was a drizzly morning. I went to an early movie this morning before my doctor’s appointment. Movie was down in Union Square, near my docs, so emerging from the subway is when you walk into Chess-Land. It had started to rain, not much, not heavily, but a persistent little drizzle.

But rain won’t stop the Union Square chess community. Neither will snow or blazing sun.

Things change all the time, all around us. The change is sometimes terrible, sometimes welcome.

But these people playing chess are eternal. I find it comforting.

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Happy Birthday, Paul Muldoon

Posted on June 20, 2015 by sheila

imgpaul muldoon1

“This work [Paul Muldoon’s book ‘The Annals of Chile’] gives the impression of coming clean and being clandestine at one and the same time. It is Joycean in its combination of the everyday and the erudite, but it is also entirely sui generis, a late-twentieth-century work that vindicates Muldoon’s reputation as one of the era’s true originals.” – Seamus Heaney

A giant in modern poetry (not just modern Irish poetry), Paul Muldoon is, like Heaney, a rural Ulster man. He grew up on a farm in County Armagh, a Catholic in the middle of a Protestant majority. His parents tried to shield the family from the political realities of the moment, although they were nationalists themselves. The Troubles reverberate through his verse. He’s published over 30 books of poetry. He is now a professor at Princeton. He’s won the Pulitzer Prize. He’s won every prize. He is self-taught.

Michael Schmidt, in Lives of the Poets, wrote of Muldoon:

He was born in Portadown, County Armagh, in 1951 and brought up near the Moy, a village to which his poems return. Muldoon’s mother was a teacher with strong literary interests, his father a farm laborer friendly to the Republican cause, a Lawrentian formula that resulted not in Sons and Lovers but in poems about complementarities and incompatibilities. Fruitful and tragic misalliances are a recurrent theme in his poems, wired and triggered by ironies that can be unexpectedly savage or heartbreaking.

He went to Queen’s University Belfast, where Seamus Heaney was one of his teachers. It was a hot time in Belfast, not just politically, but in the literary scene, and Paul Muldoon was very much a part of that. Some of the names at the time: Michael Longley (post here), Derek Mahon (post here), Ciarán Carson (post here), Medbh McGuckian (post here), Frank Ormsby, Muldoon – they were all part of the Belfast Group, a writer’s workshop. Heaney was a member of the group, and much of his earliest work came out of that workshop.

One of Muldoon’s idols and guiding stars was Robert Frost. Muldoon said of Frost:

Frost was important to me early on because his line, his tone of voice, was so much a bare canvas.

Seamus Heaney wrote about Muldoon’s love of Frost, deepening our understanding of the connection between these two apparently disparate poets:

Robert Frost, a poet whose roguery and tough-mindedness are admired by Paul Muldoon, once wrote about the art of filling a cup up to the brim ‘or even above the brim’. This impulse to go further than is strictly necessary is presented by Frost as the most natural thing in the world. It’s why young boys want to climb to the tops of birch trees and why grown-up poets write poems.

Muldoon is a big risk-taker in his verse, like Frost was. He is dazzling, but not in a showy way. He’s a bit in your face. His poems are intricate and, at times, daunting, but at the heart of them is deep feeling Muldoon tries to wrestle into form. The pages of today’s poetry journals are filled with Muldoon imitators, but the original has the breath of life in it, whereas the imitators often come off as tricky, too-clever, self-conscious. Muldoon is a brainiac, as most autodidacts are. He is voracious in curiosity and scope. Information is there to be used, messed with. He is respectful, but not overly so. He’s a lot of fun to read.

Michael Schmidt again:

His formal and verbal inventiveness leads away from self. In Madoc he risks rewriting the lives of Coleridge and Southey, as if they had fulfilled the ambition of Pantisocracy and set up their community on the banks of the Susquehanna. Philosophers from the ancient Greeks to Stephen Hawking comment tersely and in character on the enterprise. It is very funny, very learned, a high-table game. He speaks for a while histor of thought, talked down, as it were, but not trivialized. “I’m interested in ventriloquism, in speaking through other people, other voices.”

With all of this, Muldoon is also one of the most eloquent poets of “the Troubles”.

If you’re not familiar with Paul Muldoon’s stuff, check him out. Just pick up any given New Yorker.

Muldoon:

I’m very much against expressing a categorical view of the world. I hope I can continue to discover something, and not to underline or bolster up what I already think I know.

While he often writes long poems, today I’m posting a brief one. It’s only five lines, but it gets more profound with every successive reading. As you think about it, cracks in what you think it is open up … and then more cracks, and suddenly the entire culture from which Muldoon sprung is visible.

Ireland

The Volkswagen parked in the gap,
But gently ticking over.
You wonder if it’s lovers
And not men hurrying back
Across two fields and a river.

Posted in On This Day, writers | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments