Off The Map

Off The Map came out on DVD recently with a great commentary track and a Sundance Anatomy of a Scene feature. The story is from a play by Joan Ackerman and she also wrote the screenplay. This gives the film a grounded, real feel, instead of story by committee, as we see so often these days. Although I thought the director made a very apt comment on that; there is the story you write, the story you film and the story you edit.

This story is pretty simple on some levels, it's about a man, a woman and their twelve year old daughter living off the land in northern New Mexico in the late 70's. They decided to follow Joni Mitchell's advice and get themselves back to the garden. This is where IRS agent, William Gibbs finds Joan Allen's character, Arlene, nude. It's Adam and Eve all over again, if Adam was a lost and damaged soul trying hard to fit into "the system". Instead he ends up in love with Arlene, and in love with the incredible landscape... so much so that he ends up there for all time, chalk pastel in hand. Whatever he couldn't find with the IRS, he found in the desert, with a man, a woman and a child.

Living a lifestyle of ultimate simplicity, they have no iPods, no iBooks, no cell phones, no phone at all, no TV, no movies, no internet, no electricity, no plumbing, no music... sounds pretty sparse huh? I don't think I could do it, and I've lived in a car for months at a time, just to be in that kind of landscape.

Yet, halfway through the film, William tells the depressed Sam Elliot character, Charlie, that he's the luckiest, most brilliant man he's ever met. He owns his own home, has years worth of firewood, food and clothes, a beautiful wife and daughter, and all the freedom in the world. And, it's true, Charlie has opportunities for happiness that few urban, or even rural Americans have. Moreover, he has his freedom, which very few Americans have, at least in this way, true self sufficiency.

Although, hmmm, lots of folks all over the world have it. Many call it poverty. And the "free, self-sufficient" people of the world survive at God's pleasure. They live a drought or locust away from starvation. Anyway, Charlie doesn't feel like the luckiest genius in the world during this film. I guess some people are depressed and you don't know it unless you really get to know them. With Charlie, it's pretty obvious, he just sits around in the outhouse all day. That's depressed. No wonder his wife, luscious angel that she is, gets pretty peeved when it's time to go... did she not notice all that open desert out there?

I did. The director, Campbell Scott, who also directed and starred in The Secret Life of Dentists, was inspired by some of the incredible landscape photography in classics such as Terrence Mallick's in Days of Heaven. New Mexico has long inspired artists such as Georgia O'Keefe and the fictional William Gibbs, who exhibits his work in Santa Fe, an incredible art community.

Artists do tend to congregate where there is "good light", which often translates, to me, as clear air and gorgeous vistas. Maui, Carmel and Sedona all have active local art communities. But truly, Santa Fe pales them. So I applaud this film for its incredibly inspiring panoramas and the attention it pays to art and Santa Fe and a lifestyle few dare to lead.

Anyway, the twelve year old girl grows up to be Amy Brenneman, who, as a pensive adult Bo, looks out of her corporate job window to think about her carefree, if quiet, childhood, and the summer her usually powerful Dad was so under-stimulated he decided not to talk for six months... till he got some antidepressants that made him attack his friends.

I wonder what she's thinking there. Where's my iPod? How did I handle a childhood so boring that the only entertainment we had was listening to Mom read a book? Thank God my life was so empty because now I'm the only Gen-Xer in my whole company without ADD? I miss a life that was real and free and filled with love and adventure? Who knows, but this DVD should get you thinking.

Fade to Black

Far from fading to black... more like black is back. The film is about Jay Z's concert at Madison Square Garden last year which came about two weeks after the release of his final album, The Black Album. What stunned me is that this is the first hip hop concert at the Garden since '81. Hip hop has dominated the pop charts for quite a while now and has made serious inroads into pop culture, so, again, it was very surprising that huge selling recording artists can't sell out, or even book stadiums. I assume if they have trouble with the Garden, it's worse elsewhere, and I'm not aware of any rappers playing stadiums.

I guess hip hop fans buy records and tons of clothes & other merchandise but still the acts, all black except for Eminem, can't get cred from Clear Channel. I wish they'd done more to explain this or his album, and, frankly this wasn't the best film I've ever seen, but, it did make me a bit more curious about Jay Z and just how much racism is at work here. Because, my impression thus far is that corporate America is definitely noticing some buying power here, though, as I've speculated before, that may only extend to McBugers. It's fine to get them fat and fighting over sneakers, just don't put 30k of em on our streets, right? It's like the mob, when they went into drugs, went into the ghettos...didn't want their own kids on drugs.. it's us and them and after all we're only ordinary men.

Jay Z is like the Ray Charles of the day... a black man who not only has a genius for music but business as well... a very rare combination for anyone. I guess at this point, he feels the non-artistic talents are more lucrative... what a newsflash. I'm coming around to rap but his is hardcore, very little actual music, lots of dope beats and rap. He's a rapper through and through though, makes them up wholecloth in his head, on the spot. It is an artform for sure, spontaneous, improvisational... comes straight from the heart. Like scratching, it doesn't have enough "music" for me. I guess I need to expand my understanding of, or definition of, music and Jay Z, as well as Eminem, who did a phenomenal job with Eight Mile, have helped me to do that.

For some reason, and I really don't think it's racism, Eminem comes across to me and Jay Z still seems a bit too gansta, at least in tone. I couldn't make out any of his lyrics during the whole two hour film, at least half of which was the Garden show itself. Music is one thing, drive-bys, come on. Promoting guns and violence... no. Eminem is now much more introspective and most of his raps are about getting above the white trash mentality and the anger... dealing with his mother, ex-wife and the other low-lifes he's risen above.

So, as proven by Danger Mouse, all is not black or white... but it all derives from those.

Scratch

Wow. It's stuff like this that gets me excited about documentaries. Like Riding Giants, which I just reviewed, this film sheds light on an important, yet little understood subculture. While Giants took me back to the waves I grew up around, this one takes me back to Brooklyn, where both my parents grew up. While surfing existed in Hawaii since at least the eighteenth century, the technology needed for turntablism has only been around a century and it wasn't until the 70's that the art form and culture started to develop in the Bronx & Brooklyn. However, hip hop culture is about the MC, or rapper, graffiti and breakdancing as well as the DJs.

I think many have a harder time getting cosy with this subculture, even though it has infiltrated the larger society to the tune of a multi-billion dollar industry. No mass advertiser these days ignores hip-hop culture. Surfers, they can offend. Yet, while everyone can get behind sun and fun, mainstream America has certainly not gotten to the point where there's any acceptance or interest in scratching per se. The mainstream culture has embraced Eminem, the Great White Hope, now the sexy JB knighted Usher, and the Peas and Outkast who have done an amazing job of weaving in some dope beats. But, musically, the pure scratch sound has yet to be understood or accepted by more than a small group.

I must admit, even I have a hard time warming up to the sound, but then I've never been into pure percussion. I can groove to a close in funk beat. I remember dancing in such a tight groove, we had whole basements of people on one hip, so, I can understand it on that level, but, musically, I need more melody.

As NY started to seriously deteriorate in the 70's Afrika Bambaataa went to Africa and came back to organize gangbangers into dancers and musicians. Breakdancing, rapping and stepping emerged. Before long the DJs started to pull out the funk breaks from songs and played them sequentially, devoid of the melody lines, pretty logical step when you're jocking a dance party... and that's how it built. Yeah baby, the DJs discovered hip hop and still command it today. They got tired of being shunted to the back like the drummers always are, they wanted to step out, and they did.

It's now the fastest growing cultural trend we have. Take a look at Big Champagne and tell me music is not about hip hop now. Soon these labels are going to be in quite a little situation. They've ignored hip hop, to their detriment, for a long time now. Why? You guessed it. Copyright. They don't want to find themselves on the other end of a lawsuit. This has helped to keep hip hop independent, which is great. It's also satisfying to see the labels cut their own fuckin throats by not supporting an art form that builds up on the stuff THEY own. It shows you just how short-sighted they are. Then again, aren't we all. The film ends with a Bill Gates mentality progenitor in his own mind saying he thinks he deserves a dollar every time someone scratches.

The problem stems from the fact that the courts pulled back from the de minimus standard and will let rights holders extract whatever they can get for use of their little sample, which is essentially free promotion. These compositions include so many samples, no label will touch it because they'll have to take loss to pay for the rights no matter how successful the end product is.

So, let's talk about DJs because this is mother's milk to me. This was my original creative musical outlet and I understand the attraction. Learning to play a musical instrument is challenging because you have to put in so much time and focus before you can get anything out of that instrument that sounds good. There are only two ways out... the turntable and vocals. And that's why I've specialized in those two. Putting records together requires a huge understanding of the content out there, at least to do it well. I always felt that what I did on radio was an art form. I would play instrumental breaks, almost always intros and outros, since they were about all I could reliably find on the vinyl, on top of each other so that the one going out and the one coming in would form something totally fresh.

They had a similar idea downstate, only they started using only the breaks from JB, Sly, George Clinton and started getting intimate with the turntable, which I love. We're always taught to respect the needle, don't scratch the record and the defiance appeals to me. They also seem to be constantly cueing on some other control, I don't pretend to understand the art form. In fact I almost got into an argument with some SF record shop owner who clearly felt I didn't fully appreciate it. He should have understood his role a a disseminator better because if it's hard for me to get it, with a strong dance and music background, it's hard for lots of folks.

I was about four seconds into this flick when I went for the turntable in the garage. It had Magical Mystery tour already on it and I went to town, so did my nine-year-old daughter who saw it out and wanted "to play it". It's kind of like playing the spoons, or advanced finger tapping. I mean, I watch guitarists finger that neck constantly, I could do it all day and love what I'm listening to. I doubt I will ever feel that way about the turntablists, though they do have a lot of dexterity. But, they have built up an ADD music form that will last a long time. They are now selling more turntables than guitars. Turntablism is being taught at the prestigious Berklee School of Music. And, again, it's a very approachable instrument, offering not only instant gratification but a unique combination of physical, mental (remember... got to know your music) and musical elements.

We're in an age of digits and snippets and beats, so this is the future. At the same time, we have the warmth and intimacy of vinyl. In the end, it takes a lot of balls to address the turntable successfully. Like the surfers, you are dealing with a moving target. I'm glad to see this burgeoning, young independent music scene take hold in this area. We haven't seen a music scene as strong in this area since the Summer of Love. And it's definitely in the big clubs like Ruby Skye and DNA Lounge. The SF dance scene, and probably most other cities, is pretty much dominated by hip hop now.

Festival Express

This film spent a little time in theatres before coming out on DVD last week. I highly recommend it. The idea of Utopian communities has always fascinated me. On one of my first car trips from NY to CA, I read The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests. Ken Kesey was one of the first people to take acid, and, like Leary, was very adept at portraying it's benefits. He first recieved it from the US Gov't. who wanted to explore its potential as a weapon. When they realized the drug made people happy, insightful, fulfilled... of course they outlawed it and put out horror stories about it to scare the public.
Anyway, Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters rolled across the US in a psychedelically painted bus called Fuurther (which, I believe is now in the Smithsonian) and freaked out every small town from here (literally) to Akron.
The Festival Express train rolled across Canada taking the Dead, Janis and many other musicians to a series of fesivals in 1970. But, whereas Kesey and his group were too tripped out to ever get their morass of footage together, this other guy had great footage. Why he sat on it for 35 years I can't tell ya, but I sure enjoyed seeing Jerry and Janis jamming. In some ways it seemed like any one of a hundred jams I've been to, people sittin around, coming up with songs, singing, guitarists riffing off each other.
Jerry was never changed by the success he achieved, nor Bob, any of them. Multimillionaires, but still the same basic loving, open-minded, visionary, rebel-free-thinkers they always were. They epitomize, to me, everything a musician should be. When a bunch of fans couldn't get into the concert, they went to a local park and played for free, the Dead gave more free concerts than anyone, also made more money than anyone. They were a one hit wonder, never sold albums because they allowed their fans to tape their shows, there was always a sea of mikes at every show. Their archive will probably never be surpassed.
The unique type of dedication of the fans has never been duplicated. The band's relationship with its fans was open, organic and natural... very unusual for entertainers at that level. Actually, it was the Deadheads that most made the band extraordinary, it was a whole lifestyle, a community. The most loving scene you could imagine.
The scene on the train, as in Fuurther, as in some of the communes I lived on, was very utopian. It stands in stark contrast to many other scenes that I see around me today, where people seem so competitive, so much attention to image, posturing, placement. At work, it at least made sense, there were some 30 incoming associates going for one or two partnership possibilities. But then I saw it among housewives and thought, get me a jam session...something, this is ridiculous.
Jerry always stayed closest to the music. For a man as adored as he was, the lack of ego was astounding. In his mind, he was a musician, he wanted to play music for people, he wanted them happy and safe. If you looked at him two seconds too long, he would call you on it. He died when I was pregnant with my daughter, this after losing Bill Graham while pregnant with my son four years earlier. Thanks to bands like Dave Matthews & Phish, some of their ideals live on.
So, if anyone finds my "Utopian Dreamer" button at Foothills Club, give it back. I lost it at Ladies Poker Night, though, I did come away with the trophy for biggest winner of the night. Jeez, you couldn't make this stuff up. Was somebody trying to tell me something or what? I still have my "Romantic Idealist" button (two, actually), not taking that anywhere, and my "Hardened Cynical Bastard" button. I think, for me, the two are worn in tandem.

The Stamford/Stanford Wives

I knew it would be only a matter of time before I'd have to cough up some more personal perspective. This archetypal, modern classic was recently remade and just came out on DVD. Given that the housewife scene is something I'm very familiar with.. got to comment. Without even having finished watching the DVD, there are several flavors that taste familiar.
First off, I definitely identify with that feeling of the protagonist, like, "is this whole fuckin town nuts... or is it ...ME??" Hmm, I guess I'll have watch the rest to find out. Fortunately, I do still remember the older, darker version. In those days, we took our Feminism more seriously, not to mention proudly. Back then, I thought to myself, as we all did, "That will never happen to me!" So, seeing this new version, having just come out the other side of that scene, very interesting.
Anyway, the other thing that felt mucho familiar was this feeling of boys team/girl's team, each having it's own agenda. Though the movie really only addressed the male agenda. What a send up on the classic stereotype of what men want out of life and in their women, the insecure geek aspect... believe me, if there's anything I can relate to (or failed to). They want things that are mutually exclusive. For example, great sex and the whole Martha Stewart thing. Based on my experience, once the woman buys into the whole female encampment thing, that's the focus, the guy is, as my nine year old so tactfully put it, "the money man". Most women buy into it because they drift in and forget it's not the only game in town, they also become trapped economically. The saddest part is that their world gets so small. If anyone has an agenda, it's the women, because most of these women are above this level of banality and do feel some inner frustration... I hope. Maybe that is the question, and a very important one, the story seeks to address. Is this work divided model working?
In some ways, yes. You should see these kids. Many don't see the Dads much, the classic complaint of my own generation, and they may soon look on the housewife moms very unfavorably, all my friends and I did. But, they've got it damn good, maybe spoiled, but still good. The Dads also seem to have it pretty good. They mostly love their work, the structure generally works for them. They resent feeling second to the kids, resent the lack of love & sex. And many of them can't see straight for the pressures on them. But, they're men. Gifted by God with denseness and obliviousness. It's mild. I think it's the women who mostly take it on the chin, unless they very proactively address it when the kids get older and more independent. Cause, that's the rub. It changes. The kids do grow up and want independence. Can you really make your whole life just about doing service to everyone around you? What then is your own identity as a person? The guys, at least, have careers. No one really thinks mothering is a lifetime career. It's not. Check out Desperate Housewives, now #1 show. The term will now be an entrenched part of the lingo & the "problem" will hopefully get some attention. Who knows, maybe some day the focus will turn to the real problem. What's the real problem? Cowboy capitalism.
A better model, in terms of the health of the relationships themselves, and the culture (as in Europe) is two parents both working a human schedule AND having a good standard of living, not having huge pay differentials. I would imagine those couples are much better off, because the two are still equals who relate to each other not two people living in largely different worlds. That works for most people, but not for companies, who would rather pay for one worker, one training, one set of benefits, one set of individual needs - which are ever so pesky. My own scenario highlights the whole thing perfectly; high pressure job - two choices - job or kid - not both - not here.
As you will see again and again, if you look, in this country, it's the corporate interests that call the tune (remind me to discuss one of my favorite films - Network). The gov't. is really all we have to look to for mollification, and that's why it pains me so much to see those interests buy silver spoon sons and enough propaganda to convince every churchgoer in every little podunk, backwoods town from here to hicksville... successfully....that if you just wave your flag, and thump your bible long enough, everything's gonna be alright. It's the U.S. Blues, right here in Stepford, your own hometown.
What I think every person should consider is... is this working for me? Cause, if it's not, change it. We may not be able to make all the global, political changes we might like, but we can each live our own lives as fully as possible, whatever the larger context, and in so doing, bring awareness to those around us. Remember, the communities of hollow people we see in Stepford are lacking. It's structure and form, all the trimmings, but it's empty, as shown in the movie. We want a society of fulfilled, aware people... so we don't keep killing folks in wars all over the place or work our lives away, feeling empty and vaguely dissatisfied.

The Girl With the Baadasssss!

The Girl with the Pearl Earring and Baadasss! (both now on DVD)... you couldn't think up two more dissimilar settings, but the themes are almost identical - the struggle between the artist and the powers that be. Girl With the Pearl Earring is a fictional story about the subject of a famous Vermeer painting. I discussed the book in several book groups. It was a favorite, had all the earmarks; female protagonist that was overlooked in regular history... but we modern women see how things looked through their oppressed eyes (in contrast to our own....) The girl, and Vermeer, himself were completely subject to the personal, corrupt whims of the one wealthy patron in town.

In Baadasssss!, Melvin Van Peoples had to go to extraordinary lengths to get a film made, including turning his social conscious-raising, groundbreaking (for example, music was far more integral and blacks had never been portrayed so militantly before, paving the way for Shaft etc.) film into a porno flick in '71, because as a black man, even one of the most powerful black men in Hollywood at the time.... it was what he had to do to get it made. So, as MVP, the son, who made the movie, in referring to the state of change that occurred between the making of his father's film and his own, said, "Plus ca change, plus ca res meme". The more things change, the more things remain the same.

But....not always. In the struggle between art and money, art sometimes wins. When? When the real power asserts itself, i.e., when the public demands it. The context of Melvin's original film is the perfect illustration. He got nothing from the studios, even though, at the time, they were selling themselves off for parts because they refused to make relevant films. The studio system was dying and in it's place independent young auteurs like Beatty, Spielberg, Peckinpaugh, Hill, Scorcese, Lucas & Coppolla were capturing the market. There is a great film about this called "Easy Riders and Raging Bulls". The studios tried to pump out musicals and bedroom farces while kids were being beaten in the streets and they just could not sell it anymore. Every time the infrastructure gets too big and arrogant, they sow the seeds of their own undoing. Yin/yang... eternal truth. Pride goeth before the fall. It happened to film in the 70's, it's happening to music now.

In addition to the above themes, the film sheds light on the extreme state of racism that existed in Hollywood at the time (not that it's much different today) and pervaded not only the town itself and the ability of non-whites to work, but the images portrayed and the attitudes which disseminate from Hollywood to the rest of the world. Melvin relied on something which existed at that time and then somehow fell apart... a somewhat organized underground. It provided him with a guerilla MO and an audience. He succeeded at getting the film made and it went on to become the top-grossing independent film made that year.

It grossed $15M at $1./ticket which translates into a $120M film today, a hit by any standards, particularly given the cost of the film, which Mario won't disclose, but was probably pretty low. Melvin had some major names work on his film, basically for free, out of respect for the project and its pedigree.

Bond ReBourne

I ususally don't like Cold War spy stories, because they did much to exacerbate ill will during the actual, horrible, Cold War. But, the Cold War is over, Russia is doing relatively well, as are most of Capitalism's new converts, at least the non war-torn ones. I like Capitalism the way Locke envisioned it, the invisible hand having the power. The invisible hand is the collective will of many individuals acting, basically, in their own self interest, doing what they are interested in, if not what they love. If I ever saw Capitalism working the way it should, I would be very happy. And, there are sectors that function well. But, our USA snapback, we won the cold war so we can now screw the poor over the top approach is also crumbling.

What tends to defeat optimal operation is restricted distribution channels and sleepy, bought, governments. We get all our crap at Wal-mart, eat Big Food (see Super-Size post 12/13/04), take Big Drugs and listen to Big Music all because they are advertized on Big TV, which is what Americans watch. Truly local radio & televsion, like mom & pop, or even mid-sized stores and restauraunts just can't compete with the economies of scale afforded to those able to achieve critical mass in terms of size. They can never operate as cheaply as big companies, which are powerful enough to buy and sell in massive quantity & have the rules swing their way. We let these companies amass power and then they argue, quite convincingly, that we can't afford to have them fail. What's Big Music's plea? "Oh, save our jobs". Big Timber, Steel, Tobacco... they all use it. Then, we subsidize them. Trump fumbled his way into bankruptcy, but the banks bailed him out because he was too big to let fail. We bail out Chrysler, the S&L's & many more in less visible ways.

This bigness is exactly what made Communism fall and it's ailing our own economy. Even though we still have enough base to support the top now, we are becoming increasingly top-heavy. We'll soon start seeing major chinks as it sorts out who's going to take care of the health of this sick nation. You can only screw people so far, then they become dependant.

The movie itself, other than the Capitalism angle, is nothing I would have written blog about, until I saw, yes, the commentary track. The director, Paul Greengrass, expressed such depth and understanding of, not only the film technically, which you always get. or of the acting, which you sometimes get, but, the social and politcal context, which you hardly ever get (giving me lots of turf to trod). This guy went through a whole analysis of how James Bond represents this traditional view of man, who was tough and sure and didn't need to question or feel and how Bourne represents the new man, willing to feel and question, somewhat lost but honest and brave, willing to face fear in a way Bond never would.

So then I went into the whole name thing, Bond suggests something sturdy, steadfast & true. Jason Bourne certainly seems like a modern twist on the name, same initials, but the name suggests birth, modernity. Hence my cute title above. In the end, I had to agree, you could certainly analyze the two classic Cold War spies in terms not only of economic and political change over the past 50 years, but the changes in what men expect from themselves and each other, particularly relative to women.

I do agree that men seem more willing today to question, but most of them still have a much harder time accessing emotion than women. And this comes from a man, by the way, who put it in those terms, but, I think that is it. It's not that they don't feel or care, they just don't have as many connectors. Women sponge it all up, with men, it has to go through channels. I think that, and a variety of other factors, may always make it somewhat hard for men and women to relate to each other, but it's still the best. Get too many women together and it's like the emotional Apocalypse, but too many guys don't do much better. I love men, but I think a lot of people don't relate well to the opposite sex. I think there is a lot of misunderstanding and distrust and lack of common interest. I mean why do so few women really love sex & music the way men do? I can understand why the guys don't go in for make-up or whatever, but sex & music are universally good, aren't they??

The executives around here are supposedly new male, went to college, grad school, early work with women Now, they know a few women who've risen into their ranks, but their wives & women in their community - all from Stepford, er Stanford, whatever. It's not the new deal. Meet the old boss same as the new boss. Did we get fooled again? Is this new male, old male, lost male, stale male... what? Cause these women, if anything, seem the worse for the early uppage. It just makes it more frustrating for them now. Bottom line, we still view the care of one's own children as essentially a self gratification and not a contribution to society. Even when it is considered work, it's the absolute lowest grade. Cultures are typically evaluated in large part on the status of women and though the status of women has steadily risen in this country, we are definitely very far from any meaningful equality.

Women now earn $.75 to the male dollar, up from $.50, twenty years ago, but still not equality and it also doesn't factor in the millions of women not in the workforce. If you accounted for every full-time mom, ascribing to them what is a typical salary for childcare, I guarantee you the pay rate for women would be right back at $.50. If you look at the very upscale, "progressive" Palo Alto, which charges the highest price per 3BD/2BA home in the country, you'd see more like $.25 women... IF you gave them the 25k mom-salary bone. The average guy around here makes well into the six figures and most of the women earn nothing. Jobs alone, made 74M last year... you do the math....$.25 is very generous. So, if this is the scene in one of the most educated, technically advanced towns in the country... has Bond been reborn?

I guess I'll have to ask my friends in the little male movie group the PA execs go to, where they snicker over T&A in the Bond blowouts and then go home to not have sex with their wives. In my extensive, though not yet exhaustive "research" on single men, I think most are pretty clueless, but, so are most women, many of whom cannot be surpassed in terms of vapidity. However, I have found some very cool men. I guess I would put it this way. Today, and increasingly (though it ebbs and flows), there are opportunities to do more than fit into sexual stereotypes and social strictures. One can make their own way toward being a full human being and thus attract others similarly inclined.

Shattered Glass

It's amazing how appropriate people's names are sometimes. Glass, a young reporter for the New Republic, was caught cooking at least 27 of his 41 published features. He "shattered" the myth of objective, factual journalism when he knowingly tells a class, "you can check against objective facts, but not against the word of the writer". Although any reputable magazine or paper does check facts, to protect themselves against libel or invasion of privacy, there are some things, obviously lots of things, that cannot be checked. In fact, the New Republic was fastidious, running each story through dozens of fact checkers and editors. So, what about the NY Times? The Washington Post? NBC? AP? What makes them any different?
When Hillary Clinton spoke about "the vast right-wing conspiracy" everyone laughed at the notion of smoky rooms and Skull & Bones handshakes (which I'm sure did take place). What she really referred to is the unspoken agenda of a huge block of people who act in concert without any central plan. These trends definitely occur in the press and now, even hard facts and austere publications are up for grabs. In these days, when the most revered of our institutions, like the Catholic church, and the self proclaimed Prince of Pop are lambasted.... what do we turn to? Oh yes, the internet.... no wonder things are crumbling even faster... word's out.
But, we still need lots of improvement. Although my twelve year old son gets most of his news from the international press over the internet, most adults I know are still in the dark ages, drinking up what the major news organizations are offering up. I watch it just so I can understand why most of the country is so backwards and stupid.

Before Sunset

I saw this film twice in the theatre, rare for me. I hate these multiplexes and their film choices, which have a huge impact on what can and cannot get made in Hollywood. This was in one of the shrinking number of independant theatres. Even still, I greatly prefer DVD's cause I hate sitting in one uncomfortable chair for long periods and, basically, I'm hooked on commentary tracks. Watching a film without the commentary track, now that I'm spoiled, is like having sex without coming (this is a rough analogy, folks, commentary tracks are nowhere near orgasms, in my book). I want the whole deal, the movie and the director's analysis of it. Or something, Michael Moore let his interns do the commentary track, which was a good move. I like Mike, but he is a bit pompous in his own Midwestern effacing, modest way. Even when the director just drivels on about technical issues, it provides a much appreciated perspective, since I'm now directing films myself. Sometimes the commentaries are truly interesting, particularly with the great directors. Anyway, I digress, again.

I also saw Before Sunrise, which shows the principals meeting on a train in Europe and spending one wonderful day together. They, for some reason, don't exchange info but plan to meet one year later. The girl's grandmother dies and she can't make it, though the guy does. He writes a book, basically about the experience and nine years later, while promoting the book in Paris...guess who shows up? This is the setting for Before Sunset. They roam around Paris, again. He's supposed to get back on a plane to his wife and kid, but never quite makes it. As they go through their second date together you begin to realize that these two, although they've certainly gone on with their lives in the interim, never really got over each other. That original, though very brief, first encounter, was IT. But, they were both young and neither realized it at the time. It's only when they see each other again, with the benefit of nine years worth of perspective, that they can see it. It's an interesting twist because I think what happens 99% of the time is the exact opposite, two people come together in their twenties, everyone around them is pairing up, they do it too, and then realize later on that it was NOT the real thing, just the right time.

I guess one lesson I take from this is how difficult it can be to appreciate something without comparison, without perspective. Or how people's interests and goals, and what they look for in a partner, can change over time. But, also, how our basic natures stay the same. My son turns thirteen today. In my religion of birth, though never affiliation or practice...he is a man, now. Although he's grown quite a bit in these thirteen years, so much of what I see in him today is exactly the same nature I've seen at every point along the way since his birth. I've learned and grown incredibly, experienced so much in my life, but my own nature is essentially unchanged and will probably remain so. If people are lucky or strong their core does remain authentic and one can stay in touch with that always. But so much comes along in our lives to change us, change our fundamental relationship to our own inner nature. I think most people are compromised. Their egos damped down continually by demands of those around them. It is easy to lose touch with oneself, and I honestly believe the great majority of humanity does just that. Thoreau said it best, "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation".

So, when two people, "have chemistry", I think it's essentially the coming together of two genuine kindred spirits. It's powerful stuff, because, for whatever layers of platitude and compromise are involved, the real stuff always bubbles up, like weeds coming up through cracks in the sidewalk. BUT, that's only half the story, and, the film is equally attentive to the other critical component... timing. Sometimes we do meet the right person, but, it's the wrong time. Sometimes we meet the somewhat right person, and it's the right time. I've experienced both, not only with men but with jobs and artistic opportunities. So much of it is chance, or fate, out of our control. The only part we can control is to just be attentive to when those connections, that chemistry, does occur & try to appreciate and fulfill it. The most important part, I think, is staying true to that inner core and connection to our maker, that way you can trust your instincts, even when the noise around you is drowning it out.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: Externally Enhanced Denial

The convention of this film is that it takes place at a time when the technology exists to help people erase pesky memories, maybe other thoughts too. Just go in, put on a Devo hat, and one of their highly trained professionals will muck around in your mind looking for distasteful thoughts and delete them. Sounds pretty plausible to me. After all, if this service were actually possible, I'm sure it would be a huge success. Just ask the alcohol & drug companies, or entertainment companies, or psychologists.... better yet, go ask your best friend what the connection is between their family of origin and their current life.

If denial were a fungible commodity, it would be the world's biggest selling entity. Most people are ten times better at denial than incorporating and dealing with their many, often confusing, often painful, thoughts and feelings. I'm no exeption, my denial about my childhood lasted till I was 38. And, I like to see stuff, I welcome awareness, and that is unusual. Most folks seem to think it's quite pesky, gets in the way of all the important stuff they want to do. For me, I need the awareness first, in order to determine what I want to do. I think for many others, it works the opposite way. They start from what they think they need to do; thoughts that fit, stay, thoughts that don't...go. We all have some control over what we think. Problem is, it's not total control. And, that's where the helpers come in... drugs, distraction, denial. All of it can work, for a while, to a degree.

Alright, you know the drill... what's the next question? What is the cost? According to the movie, it's based on the classic quote by George Satayana, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it". Which is exactly what happens to the principals. Although the movie offers the possibility that the second, unaware do-over, will work out better. The cost...not fucking learning from your own life. Now, for some reason I will never understand, that does not seem to bother many people. It bothers the living shit out of me, even to see it in others, because, to me, life is for learning and loving, that's it. Why? That gets me to the quote that really came to mind, that frequently comes to mind. It's one of my favorites and Nicholson delivered it beautifully in Easy Rider.

I mean, it's real hard to be free when you're bought and sold in the marketplace. Course, don't ever tell anybody that they're not free, cause they're gonna get real busy killin' and maimin' to prove to you that they are. Oh yeah, they're gonna talk to you and talk to you about individual freedom - but, they see a free individual, it's gonna scare 'em.

There is nothing we cherish in this country more than freedom. But, I look around at these highly educated people, some of whom have very little quality of life. For all the gloss, they do not seem happy, and they certainly don't seem free. Maybe we don't go in for Devo hats, but something is messing with the minds of these people. Otherwise, they would demand more out of life. So, as CSN&Y said, "Find the cost of freedom". What is the cost? Your denial. That's what you need to cough up, in order to get free. It may not sound like a high price, but it is. Even still, self-induced amnesia is still quite attractive, because you can't always get what you want. It's hard though, when you're flipping through your RS 500 - Collector's Issue and see the face you're trying to forget, again staring.

Anyway, I highly recommend seeing this great film, which should get an Oscar nod, on DVD. It includes a chat between Jim Carrey & Michel Gondry, the gifted director. They talk about the night the elephants were being brought through NYC for the circus and how they spontaneously mobilized to get footage, and how one night Jim ended up driving a bed around Jersey freeways for hours. I think back to my earlier post and how he once tried to squelch all that with Prozac. His life stands in such stark contrast to that. He lives out everyone's fantasy. He gets paid $25M to ride around on a bed, and chase elephants with Kate Winslet... can't beat that. You can see why he'd be so attracted to the role, a guy willing, literally, to pay for brain damage, in order to turn off the pain. It stands for exactly what Carrey is so proud to have avoided.

Corporate America Rocks

I read about this film in Indie Slate (link is above), not your most mainstream of magazines, but, it's a great story, so here it is, of course, in a nutshell.

About 20 years ago these guys in Denver tried to make some lame music video of their band. So, this film, Corporate America Rocks, is about these same guys, now sort of corporate misfits, who put the band back together and then win a Battle of the Bands. They used their old footage and tons of underused talent in Denver that is left over from their own boom times, mortgaged their houses to the hilt, whipped up tons of enthusiam for filmmaking in Denver, including half the city for some huge Battle of the Bands scene, and now they're on the road with their film. Pretty amazing, huh? There is a ton of underused film talent around here too, but it is becoming more and more utilized and the community is pretty extensive and thriving as it's easier to get a foothold here than in Hollywood. It's nice to see the opportunities spreading out... we don't need to get all our entertainment from Hollywood and all our culture from New York.

Anyway, I love this Dad/corportate wonk band concept. Probably a third of all the Palo Alto bands I know of are Dad's bands and at one time, we were planning some city-wide battle of the Dad's bands (who knew we were overlooking a great movie opportunity?) What's a Dad's band? A band of Dads, family guys, around here, executive types. In fact, the first band I ever sang with was the pentultimate Dad's band. It should be a movie in itself, business movers & shakers strumming their old favorite songs together for school fundraisers. It was quite the juxtaposition. First of all, these guys, many of whom were allowed to their echelons on the basis of their supposed management skills, certainly didn't exhibit them, seeming quite convinced they were titans of industry, kings of the housewife set AND good musicians, regardless of reality. Sometimes things go to people's heads and it would be interesting to see how this group would come across on film.

As the internet grows and the economy slows, we're getting more and more starter art. People are finding others who are interested in making art, so more and better projects are starting, particularly in film and with bands, both of which require collaboration. There are more and more sites to help people find, grow and promote creative projects.

Maybe there will always be blockbusters, and hit songs and shows that everyone will want to have seen and discuss around the watercooler. I'm hoping though that awareness of these grass-roots level art enterprises will grow and that people will have interest in smaller projects. This blog, for example, averages 40 hits a day on nothing other than word of mouth. And, despite my disinterest in Martha Stewart's wares, her concept of omnimedia, mutually promotional, symbiotic projects, is a good one. In my case, I basically promote my art and film projects on the blog, and will promote my band too, when we're ready to gig.

Artists are more frequently using the internet to promote their projects; Blair Witch Project got to a pretty visible level that way. All this reality TV also takes it down a notch, we're getting more and more used to being entertained by reality. Think about our entertainment in the 40's and 50's, we had whites playing people of color, June Cleaver doing housework in heels and pearls...very glossy, unreal stuff. But, now people can handle reality better, so projects can be very approachable from a production viewpoint. At the same time, you can do almost professional quality CG, modeling, special effects & editing with a G5, or even a G4.

As I ended college we were still coming out of a bad recession and I remember someone in one of my classes saying, you know maybe there's something good about recessions. I looked around at the economic devastation and thought she was out of her mind. But, in the economic downturns we've been through in the past 20 yrs., her comment keeps coming back to me. Things keep cycling around, there have been upturns and downs. And, it tends to be those down times where people turn to the Dad's bands, to music and art and quality of life, to taking off work, mortgaging your house and making a movie about your band.

Super-Size This

Super-Size Me and This So-Called Disaster... looks like these two will duke it out for Best Documentary since Moore pulled Farenheit 911 from the category in order to pursue a shot at the Best Picture Oscar, which he should get. 2004 could easily be called the year of the documentary. Super-Size got a super duper reception because Farenheit 911 made it cool to speak out again. The blue-state baby showed that lots of Americans are willing to cough up $10. to hear the truth cause it's the only place left we can get it. Clearly, neither Farenheit or Super could have gotten traditional financing or distribution, much less ever have seen the light of day on our airwaves, or cable, or anything supported by corporate America, which is pretty much everything. For Farenheit to make $120M is staggering, and really says a lot about the quality of information disseminated in this country. Even big budget films are thrilled to break the $100M mark.


This So-Called Disaster shows the three weeks of rehearsal leading up to the opening of The Late Henry Moss, a play by Sam Shepherd performed in 2000 in San Francisco by Sean Penn, Nick Nolte and others. No lightweights here. Shepherd is arguably one of our greatest living playwrights and Penn one of our greatest actors... and it's certainly in evidence here as the play deals with Shepherd's relationship with his alcoholic father, who died in 1984. Although Shepherd is a thoughtful introspective writer, it took him 16 years to be able to put this story down, understand it, grapple with it. It's like the expression that the last thing a fish can see is water. The really big things that color our life and perceptions - those are the hardest things to see and understand. Most of us just keep reenacting our childhoods one way or another, until we can see it in perspective.

The film brought back a lot of memories for me of my time spent in near-empty theatres acting, directing, hanging out, hanging lights, making the soundtrack. It's a huge effort, magical and worth it to watch a story come to life. My time constraints and ADD propel me to tell my stories on film now, but it's amazing to watch the raw power of these actors, stripped of film's accouterments, sort of like the movie Dogville, with its barren set. You're watching some guy clump around a barren stage, but it's Sean Penn acting. Acting is such a collaborative art but at it's heart is the actors abillity to get real and express that. It's powerful to watch a good actor act. OK, but here's music's ultimate trump, if I could have a choice of Brad Pitt or Usher perform for me, personally, gotta go Usher.

So, now for the real meat of this post, Super-Size Me. If you haven't already heard, it's about this guy who eats nothing but McDonalds for a month and trashes his health. I would love to see a Super-Size 911 treatment of a number of other atrocities to the public in the name of profit: alcohol, tobacco, legal drugs and, yes, the one I really want to see, enough to make it myself, the one that shows the music business for what it really is. Bowling For Columbine and Roger & Me both exposed pressing problems successfully. In fact, today, Dec. 27, (remember, I update these posts) word is out that Moore is about to target this legal drug mess in his next film...bravo.

If there is anything super sized it is the problem of obesity in this country, 60% of all American adults are overweight. Now, you will not find a stronger advocate of personal responsibility than me. I guarantee it. I decided at a young age that the only aspects of your life you can control are those that you take responsibility for. I lived for many years with someone who took no responsibility for his actions, so my feelings on this are very strong. And while overweight people are certainly responsible for their condition, the folks that add all these addictive and fattening ingredients to our food are also responsible. The government agencies who are supposed to be paid by the public and protecting them, but who instead allow the practices and cover-ups to go on have much bigger failed responsibilities.

Much of the issue, for me, has to do with transparency & disclosure, putting the real story out there. Farenheit & Super-Size were successful because they gave the public information that had been kept from them. Most people are weak, easily led, easily exploited. Want proof? Half of our population is obese. Not one of those people wants to be obese, I doubt those people became obese on natural foods. They ate foods processed and promoted by big companies belonging to GMA, the grocery lobby. The diet industry alone is a 35 billion dollar business.

There is plenty of blame to go around but, in my mind, companies will always seek a profit, it is the government's job to protect the public. As long as we allow these powerful lobbies in DC we are going to continue to see our "protectors" at the beck and call of corporate interests. Meanwhile these corporate suppliers mess with our food supply to make food more addictive & fattening. There is simply no other way to explain the sudden rise of obesity over the past 30 years, and it is, in fact mentioned in all the literature on the subject. Obesity is about to pass tobacco as the leading cause of preventable death in this country. The CDC is about to lower the life expectancy. For the first time a generation will not expect to live longer than its parents. These are serious problems.

I blame the companies primarily for marketing so seductively to children. Commercial time to them won't get curtailed without public pressure on legislators because the networks make huge money from food related ads. Even a diligent parent has to send their kid to school, where there is lots of very unhealthy stuff, even here in Palo Alto, where my friend JudyAnn and many others went to great pains to put better food choices in the schools. But, they come into these strapped districts (they're all strapped, even here) with "free money". Only it's not free, the money going into those machines is coming from us. We did get the soda out of the schools last year, but, this is Palo Alto, not a particularly typical town. We've kept out Wal-mart and a lot of box retailers, we had Cable Co-op for a long time, etc.

These big food companies constantly advertise to children, not just McDonalds but every tasty treat you could imagine. The average child sees 10k commercials per year, 95% of which are for high sugar/fat processed foods. I have to keep what little processed, commercial type food there is where the kids can't get it without my permission. It tastes great. It should, they spend millions to make it that way, fat & sugar naturally taste good. At the same time the government doesn't crack down on advertising to kids, spiking our food or failing to inform, it makes schools test the hell out of these kids academically so that they cut PE & recess (but not lunch) in favor of test-taking classwork. One third of all children born in 2000 are expected to get diabetes in their lifetime.

The best part of the DVD is the interview with Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, who refused to participate until he saw how successful the film was. He discussed the relationship between Ray Kroc & Walt Disney, friends who shared a desire to market a fairy tale version of the world to children, a belief in better living through chemistry and technology and a Nazi style of management.

He says that agriculture has changed more in the last 30 years than it had in the previous 30k as this heavliy tested, processed, uniform, gargantuan Disneyite food product grew in popularity. In 30 years we went from a few hundred outlets to 30,000 McDonalds alone. A typical hamburger today contains over 1,000 cows, any one of whom could have mad cow disease or ecoli. The goal is to make a uniform, good-tasting & inexpensive product. It's all one big, bland morass of goo, laden with, literally thousands of chemicals. It reminds me of my 80 Days post about the guy who wanted to find the "average color of Palo Alto". Let's get out the blender to make our melting pot, at least it tastes good and is fast, right?

Now real food can't compete price-wise and the system has been co-opted, again, by a relative few who now have a huge amount of power to direct the food supply. The cost of all this is borne by society who are all but voiceless to a nameless, blameless (but tasty) problem. The poor, of course take it the worst because, we all know what fast food is don't we? It's poor man's food. But, it's spreading, throughout the food chain. You can still cull the top, organic, natural etc., but, I eat out a lot, who knows what's going on there? We're all connected and so is our food.

I was talking about this with a friend last night. He's a biochemist and said the reason kids are maturing at younger ages these days is due to the growth hormones in our food. He also said they had to change the parameters for post-mortem libidity. Dead bodies decay slower now than they used to because of the preservatives we ingest in the foods we eat. So, I would say, avoid McDonalds like the plague if only on the basis that they treat their employees like shit (for example, if a location tries to unionize, they close it). Avoid processed foods, especially those labeled "diet", try to keep everything as natural as you can but hey, every day is a risk. I am at least a moderate, if not high risk taker and I'm sorry, but when it comes to my food, I like it good.... and McDonalds is definitely NOT my idea of good, no matter how you look at it.

There is a ton of important information in this DVD that affects everyone. We live in a world where Mc Donalds and other huge chains literally dominate our landscape. We all eat this food, live off it. Every day, one fourth of our population eats in a fast food restaurant, 40% of which are McDonalds. Why isn't this information getting out there? Why is eating all this stuff not looked upon the way smoking or drinking is looked at? It's clearly a bigger killer. It's the media! No matter what show you produce, it's going to have to go through some major outlet, from ABC to A&E, they all rely on this sector for a huge chunk of their advertising, these commercials are absolutely pervasive in our culture, which is all that sustains these networks. They are often cash cows for the conglomerates that own them because that's where all the big companies plow their profits. McDonalds and Pepsi both spend more than a billion dollars a year on advertising. How do food companies continue to show growth? Well, that's a good question, one not asked my the movie. After all, the population isn't growing. We're just buying more and more food to feed the same amount of people.

A nice fat, drugged out population will sit in front of the TV & watch their commercials. If something goes wrong with your body, and it will, consume some of the many drugs you'll see advertised there. I mean, is this where our economic growth is going? It's where our country is going. Fat and happy Americans electing fortunate son liars to drop bombs around to show our weight.

We Don't Live Here Anymore

I guess the title of this movie, which was in limited release, (check out the trailer on the link above) is taken from the '70's Neil Simon play/movie Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. The Alice that didn't live there anymore, like the Alice in Wonderland and White Rabbit song and of diary fame (talk about your trips!) and seen most recently on cute, creative Gwen Stefani is the Alice that took a little trip through the looking glass to elsewhere and when she got back, she still looked the same but she didn't really live there anymore. I can definitely relate, to Alice, and the characters in the story.

For a while, the marriages still looked good: nice houses, nice lives, nice friends, family fun, kids happily unaware of the very complicated feelings of their parents. What kinds of feelings? Boredom, jealousy, resentment, frustration, anger... none of them really getting what they need from their spouses. So, they cross pollinated. Definitley the explicit version of Wife Swap.

It had many uncomfortable similarities, to my life and to my movie. My movie (the one I'm making, not the one I'm living) also has two couples who have some (not all, thank you) cross couple attraction issues but mine has much more focus on the career aspect. Where the guys in the movie are both hot English professors, my guys are hot Silicon Valley hotshots who also have creative backgrounds/ambitions that they miss/aspire to and who got caught up in the dot.com bust in different positions. My film will aslo deal more with the housewife issue, it will go into the women's backgrounds and show their respective frustrations, one with being at home w/ young kids, the other with lack of artistic & "marital" success.

This film was similar to mine in that it does show one couple really getting into those kitchen scenes, where those frustrations over daily life and those character flaws you've dealt with too long just fly. I guess one thing you look for in films like this is that real feel. This is where you want your drama so good that it really does feel like you are a fly on the wall in someone else's home, and you have that somewhat comforting feeling of, ok, it's not just us, all couples go through this. But, not all couples do.... even in the movies, this one or mine.

Some couples just stuff it and stuff it, or think of other things besides their actual life, or manage to small talk or just somehow or other don't face it. And both my movie and this one have a couple like that. In that couple, the guy is so focused on his writing, or is just internally strong, he doesn't really look to the wife for inner satisfaction. He doesn't really NEED his wife. She's basically a weak, empty person and it's not till she gets her gumption up by steaming up her husband's best friend that she feels strong.

So, who's more sympathetic? All four of them cheat, so you can't use that for the qualifier. So, what's the qualifier? The timing? Thr reason? The one who cheats because she's can't feel loved (Edith)? The one who cheats cause he wants love (Jack)? The one who cheats because he wants excitement, and, becaused he can (Hank)? Or, the one who cheats out of revenge (Terry)? Once you're in the Devolution of Marriage Zone is it all about assigning blame and pegging relative moral positions? Well, there certainly are a lot of moral issues and there's usually a lot of blame at that point. Questions like, do I stay or do I go, how long can this go on, can it get better, how can I even imagine such a different life or so much upheaval, how can I go, how can I stay, how can I make myself love this person, how can I get what I need, what's gonna happen to the kids, can I go a lifetime without the sex or love I need???

It's interesting to watch all the marriage unwinding dramas: my two (the real and unreal) and this film and the many similarities between them. The same basic issues come up over and over, who's doing what, who's not doing what, all the annoyances and weaknesses and failings, the lack common interests, the lack of interests period... the lack of passion. In my now very jaded view, based on dozens, if not hundreds of conversations with people about this, I think most people are lucky if they get a good solid love affair once or twice in their life.

But, even if all is going well, once you have kids (the American Dream), the kids require so much energy and focus for so long, it's just really hard to maintain the closeness, trust, intimacy. If the sex goes, it's really hard to get any of that back, and if you start running into respect issues on top of that....well, let's just say that most couples run into obstacles cause, aside from the eventual boredom, the deck is essentially stacked against us just in the form of inhuman work hours in this country. In fact, a French friend of mine, without kids, ran into marriage ending problems just because of the work hour ethic around here.

I really do think that long term monogamy is not for everyone. A lot of people do crawl up in it out of fear of change, fear of the unknown, but yet bored once the sexual charge wears off and if you're not really marching to the same drum at that point, with common interests, passions and goals, then you're basically just co-existing. A good friend of mine works with her husband, they're both counselors & run the Growth and Leadership Center, go into therapy every time there's a problem and really hash it out. They are one of the few couples I know of who I really think are happy together, and even they have issues. They deal with them relatively openly and well, but it took decades of psychological training to do that. Most either fight or seethe or avoid, like the classic roles above...ending up in marriages that don't live here anymore.

A Home at the End of the World

Such Netflix synchronicity that I should get this DVD after We Don't Live Here Anymore. It's such a poignant counterpoint. It reminds me of my comparison of the counterpart paintings (Start:Heart and APart:Heart), one was all strucured and prim but kind of empty, the other was full and vibrant, but may be harder for folks to grasp or embrace.

The homeless group (they don't live THERE anymore, anyway) has all the structure, but it's devoid of love and affection. Even the two having the affair don't seem to have real love, they're just acting out of frustration and boredom. All the issues in that movie had to do with people loving people they weren't supposed to love, sexually enjoying people they were not supposed to enjoy, being attracted to people they weren't supposed to be attracted to, doing things they weren't supposed to be doing. And you know what? Despite the beautiful homes and children and perfectly socially acceptable lives, not one person in that whole film was really happy, really loving.

The closest was Hank, who did allow himself outside the stifling rules that made everyone miserable and tore the families apart. Hank was not selfish or a hypocrite though, he set up the affair for his wife and was happy that she was being attended to by the other guy. What is love if it isn't wanting happiness for the other person? He wasn't particularly deceptive either, he didn't seem to make much secret of his activity, as opposed to his wife, who coyly tells Terry to confront her cheating husband (the one she's fucking). Many may see him as the villian of the film because he had affairs first, but I see him as the closest to being loving, honest & happy character....the only smart one, because he understood the inablity of the marriage/rule structure to deliver on the American Dream of promised happiness. And, he didn't just sit there and wallow, he did what he could to make his life happy within the structure. His wife did not, and, in the end, he could not make the happiness for her. I wonder if she'll ever find peace and happiness... I doubt it, because she doesn't look to herself to find it. She was looking to Hank to provide it for her. She was looking to bask in his attention, his light, because nothing was really emanating from within.

The group whose home was at the end of the world, at least did have a loving harbor. The ever-chameleon-like Robin Wright Penn plays a free spirit who involves herself with two childhood friends that had played some gay as kids. When they reconnect as adults, the three of them live together and raise the kid she becomes pregnant with, by whom, I don't know. They never struggle to love each other or follow the rules. They do struggle a bit with the unconventionality & complexity of it all, but, it seems like such a better struggle. It's a them against the world kind of thing. They know they're different, they know they'll stand out in suburbia, but there's so much love shared freely between them. None of them feel compelled to love each other or be with each other but the whole movie is a giant love-fest, showing true caring and insight. When seen next to the other movie - it's such a stark contrast.

In the film Sissy Spacek plays a very loving, progressive mom of one of the guys (she's effectively a mom to both). She had a traditional marriage and she expresses regret at having lived so much of her life in a small box & she clearly admires the younger woman for the courage of her choices.

I can tell you, from my own perspective, I've found it's easier to worry about fitting into a larger society than deal with family members who expect you to fit into their box. First the marriages are about love and creating this ideal life together, then you have kids, your attention turns to them, you stop exercising your marriage muscles and coast on your previous love, secure in your marriage to act as a crutch and hold everything together. At first you think it'll all get back to "normal", that fun, free love, but it never really does. So, you fit yourself more and more into the marriage and, increasingly, community structure. The people within become more attuned to the kids, community, responsibilities & structure and less attuned to their own needs, since they're not allowed to follow them. They get cut off and sad because the structure, and now even their spouse, doesn't really support them as individuals. The structure is about structure and, like corporate America, sustains itself with rules and expectations. It's not about love anymore, it's about playing the game, by the rules.

The rules and structure are not without reason and purpose, and Ray Kroc and Walt Disney, who I discussed in the Super Size post used pervasive and rigid rules coupled with constant spying to build those businesses into what they are today... big and getting bigger and profitable. When cults use these tactics it's called brainwashing, when corporate America uses it, it's called productivity and when parents use it, it's called bedtime. But, it's all basically the same. Follow the rules and do what you're supposed to do, and you'll be watched. That's exactly what my marriage felt like for many years. How can you love in that kind of environment? If love isn't given freely, it's not love. I certainly didn't feel loved, I felt trapped.

In my Stepford Wives post I ask if this divided work model of marriage is working. The answer is no, but, now I realize it's not just that the work is divided, it's that the love gets replaced by obligation. Steven Stills tells us, "If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with". Now, I interpret that in the sense that if you love God and yourself, you're always with the one you love, even when those closest to us are not really loving us or us, them. But, we all understand what that line really means, it was a hit song for a reason, all the teens were singing it. Sometimes we can't get the person we think we want so we try to love the one we're with, the one who wants to be with us. And we all know how tough it is to do that, because love and obligation never seem to coexist well together.

The Mindcontrolled Candidate

More Netflix synchronicity. The term is from Carl Jung, who wrote about collective unconscious. He was a student of Freud's who noticed classic archetypes and meaningful coincidences - synchronicity. This DVD came near the Bourne flick I just wrote about. Again, the Cold War, which was the setting of the book and 1962 film. Both feature men who can't remember. Seems there are a lot of male protagonists these days who are not in touch with deeper thoughts and feelings. Bourne, gets conked on the head, Carrey, in Eternal Sunshine goes in for voluntary mind deletion (see my 12/7/04 post) & the principals in Manchurian Candidate have had small but effective chips implanted in their heads. Well, you can't say men aren't creative in the ways they can figure out to numb their brains.

Like Bourne, this story is supposed to be current. This version features a monstrously mindcontrolling Meryl mom who's a successful politician in her own right (though she got her seat from her husband, not uncommon) and a venal Carlyle/Haliburtonesque Manchurian Global instead of Korea as the looming dark power. The great Demme tried to "stay in front of the news". Shooting started before Gulf Oil Play II started, but, the players are pretty obvious, especially when the film opens with a great Wyclef Jean version of Fortunate Son... we all know who that is. I just see Cheney & Rumsfeld's scared old Cold War visages on every twisted face on screen.

When I saw them literally screwing into their candidates brain I thought, you don't have to do all that, just pick someone who has already been cultivated, play to their ego, win their trust... isn't that exactly what we have? And, Jon even says the mom is the real villian, the real power. I do disagree though. Although the real imprint we get in life comes in childhood and mismanagement of that can really interfere in one's life, the kind of active, content oriented influence they talk about in the movie is very difficult in this day and age, unless you cut off media, and parents DO do that, even around here.

So, what's the big message? Our leaders are not in control - they are puppets of the military industrial complex Eisenhower warned of & Kennedy died of? Well, that's one of them, and the fact that we are all ever puppets of our parents until we find the chip and dislodge it is probably another. But, I see even deeper messages in this movie. It has to do with the reactions these men have to the lack of access to their thoughts and feelings. It has to do with the fact that there was some inner kernal each principal had, where they did remember and know truth.

Not just the principals in this movie but all these men with lost minds movies, and there have been many... these men are searching. Men are searching for truth. Careers are not panaceas, they don't address the inner needs. And if the men can't trust women, don't have women they can look to... it's tough... maybe as tough as it is for women to get male support in the workplace. Despite the current feel of these movies, or maybe because of it, men are not portrayed in the classic macho mode, they are portrayed as gentler but lost. They are trying harder, but the link between men and women is still fragile, we're still very far apart. It costs women careers and it costs men their wholeness. It costs our society to tip macho... wars start, people contract, socially and economically.... it's all connected.

When you talk about mind control you need to ask about free will. Can someone's mind be controlled by others? Absolutely. We've all heard about the cults, several of whom have committed mass suicide & heard war stories. Demme said something very interesting in the commentary track. He said that what he learned about mind control in making this film is that you don't need torture to control someone. The key is sleep deprivation and making them uncomfortable and disoriented. Another classic mode used by the Moonies, and other cults, is to deny privacy. Without any access to their inner guides, people lose their center and look to those around them to tell them what to do... and then... they often do it. We can clearly see the danger when it comes to cults, but that doesn't happen to us, right? As I said in the reality posts (12/31/04 & 11/26/04), we often can't see things when they are too close.

I don't know anyone who has focused more on keeping in touch with intuition and center than myself, BUT, when I heard Demme say that all you really need is lack of sleep.... so much came clear. When my kids were young, the combination of pregnancy and childcare, and my marital situation, left me extremely sleep deprived for many years. Although I'm usually very protective of my alone time, that's just impossible as a diligent young mom...so, no privacy either. For many years, I was a good mom, but I was not really myself.

In a way, it absolutely is brainwashing. It has all the attributes, and the fact that it may have been a good and right and extrememly common choice does not change that fact. However, as the film so wonderfully highlighted, there is always a kernal of truth that survives. Our core never leaves us. It can feel like a recurrent dream, as in the film, or an unidentified longing or incompleteness. Sometimes we barely see, hear, feel it, BUT, it never leaves us completely. God never leaves us completely, we just stop listening sometimes. I was very lucky. I walked into a band room one night, and the music & other things brought me back. It would have happened anyway, though maybe not so Tsunami-like.

It's not just the men that are lost, it's all of us. The constant backgound soundtrack of our lives fills us with so much noise and so little silence. How many of us understand the value of spending time to just connect with our inner voices, thinking about who and where and what we are? Most don't dare do that, because it will cause them confusion, or, they might have to make changes, and people fear change. I did. We focus on this exciting and demanding world of coworkers and family members, who all want something from us, and media constantly coming at us.

I was found, and then I lost it for a while when I focused on my career and law school and a fabulous love affair and then my kids. It was worth it, so they will have a chance at inner peace for their own lives, so I could experience putting others truly before myself, so I could be in full relationship to someone else, so I could learn and earn. Fortunately for me, I had built something very solid and real that I was able to call upon to find myself again. I had spent many years in my youth questing for peace, learning about psychology and spirituality, meditating, focusing on awareness etc. partially because my parenting had been so harsh. For some, all that's been built has been a career or some type of external structure and, for all the external benefit that affords, it means very little in the end compared to the inner structure of peace, love and understanding that can be built.

We all have two lines. One leads within, to God. One leads out to the material world and other beings around us. We choose how to open those lines. In my view, the vast majority of people, no matter how religious sounding, have an oil pipeline to the outside world and a copper thread to God. And, though we are not being fed instructions to assasinate, only to assimilate, we are much like the Manchurian Candidate, ever searching for the real truth and struggling to find it and communicate, knowing it's there somewhere. We feel the pull, but until we let the truth find us, there is no resolve or direction.

In my own life, I found that by listening to those barely audible messages, they got louder and I got happier. It did cause me to restrict up on the pipeline, and that does have a cost. In my case, I think probably in all, it's well worth it. No amount of social standing or money was ever comparable to the inner happiness. There is a price to pay for everything, a price to pay for inner peace and a price to pay for "success". But every great teacher we have ever had has said that it's the inner peace route, not the material route, that is the true goal. So, I'm gonna go w/ Buddah & Jesus.

Anyway, I heartily recommend the DVD, if, for no other reason, than to see the "political pundits", actually artists, discuss profound issues such as whether our culture is becoming too "gangsta", or too apathetic. Probably both, but I also think there is hope we could see another age of aquarius enlightenment-type 60's, but a slow burn, mellower thing. The 60's was like the trailer, a little peek of all to come. The real deal could start. We've got the 9/11/war/Big Co. takeover issue to mobilize folks if we could get a spark lit. We have the internet still infiltrating. I guess the wild card is the kids, you start drafting these puppies and all hell is gonna break loose, I guarantee it, cause these kids are hooked up. and their parents aren't WWII relics. We're boomers and some of us do remember.

Open the Void

I had a few contenders for this one: Touching the Open, Voiding the Water . This sounds really harsh, but, in light of the most recent and most horrific natural disaster, the Tsunami, there can't be much denying.... God does not care if you die, if your kids die, if you drown in the ocean, if you fall off a mountain...God does not care. YOU care. Those who love you here, care. Your ego, that knows the material world, cares. Your body cares about pain. God cares if you learn. God cares if you love. God cares far less about your physical life than your inner life. You are part of God, you came here to live and learn and be in a body so respect nature... it is not a fucking Disney ride. It is nature, it is God, it does not care, so take care of yourself.

Open Water is a great DVD, with lots of info about indie filmaking, and I'll also discuss Touching the Void, which I saw this summer. Open Water is made by a scuba diving/filmaking plus full-time job/young kid couple, who, god help them, deserve every success, about a young scuba-diving couple who get left behind a dive boat in, you guessed it...open water. It is based on an actual incident. Touching the Void was made about two men who ran into trouble decending a Chilean peak, and the DVD features their own interviews as well as re-enactments of their ordeal.

Both real incidents, but, no reality TV here, yet. All dialogue is scripted. Although some of the comments in Void were true, like "Simon, Simon...where are you??" In the all male Void, one guy literally cuts off the dangling "friend" to fall through a chasm in the mountain. They both somehow soldier on to survival, but the real world lambasts the cutter. Out in the Open we have the loving but late couple hanging out in the ocean doing, saying, thinking amazingly little except wonder where the sharks and boats are. Needless to say, the girl blames the guy, he gets munched by sharks and who knows if someone will come rescue her in time. Too many metaphors!

We often find ourselves stripped down to our essentials, facing nothing but fear, uncertainty, your god and yourself. I have definitely found this in nature, spending weeks at a time in very sparsely populated terrain, and I've gone days at a time seeing no people at all, just nature. It is a very risky thing to do and was particularly risky for me in a beat up old car, not even checking in with people, no cell phone or GPS in the 80's. And, unlike those in the movies, and most sane people, I often travelled alone. I felt God would take care of me, and, we were close. But I must have been extremely lucky, too.

But again, it's not just when you're voluntarily or involuntarily alone, or injured, or lost in nature (I've been both of those too, definitely not fun). I think people encounter the solitary nature of their strength & soul & connection to God in many ways throughout their lives... if they choose to do so and allow that in their lives. I think I prune down every seven years or so, go through a major life change, meaning, basically, I have lost people and pretty padding from my life, and that has promted much growth, and the addition of wonderful new people and lessons. But, pruning is cutting, it hurts.

I think the lesson we should take from these films, other than respect nature and connect yourself to God, is - how to choose our paths in life, make decisions that will lead to our true growth and happiness. The two films highlight two routes, based on differing circumstances relative to choice and control. On the mountain, the guys, if they just kept moving, could at least see which way was down. Direction was clear, the only issue was whether they could move through the pain. Real life rarely offers such clear direction.

In the open water, there really was nothing they could do. The only boats were very far and current was pulling them. Talk about afloat. They had each other, and their love., but no clear direction. In their case it was more about how to accept their fate than fight it, or strive toward it. It's like the cliche dorm poster (which I hope is in the public domain sinced I don't remember the author), but it's true;

God grant me the courage to change what I can,
The peace to accept what I cannot change,
And the wisdom to know the difference

I find it so sad to see people trying to change things they can't, like other people. Or, to see them accepting situations they could extricate themselves from.

Even the most seemingly powerful among us stand helpless to many things and even those that seem the weakest do have power in their lives if they choose to exercise it. We all answer to God. As Dylan said "You gotta serve somebody". The externals we see are meaningless compared to the inner workings of people, who face death and sadness and joy and love and confusion and choice with compassion or selfishness or awareness or obliviousness. That's what was on view for us in these films and we can see the same attitudes and choices in those around us, it's just a bit harder to make out without the starkness of life and death staring us in the face.

It's a big wide world out there, if the fishy sharks don't eat ya, the human ones will. Make peace with the fact that no matter what the life around you, it is filled with dangers, like all others, and it is up to you and you alone to make your life filled with learning and loving. Focus on the experience of your life, your real life, as you live it, and yet, vision the direction you want to go, when you can.

And, last lesson here, face your fears head on. Those cast adrift had to. You can probably ignore yours, most of us just avoid things that challenge or scare us. I guess everyone fears change to some degree. But, if you can't strip away the padding and face your fears, you're dodging your own life and power. You're on the run. You shouldn't need a catastrophe to address your own life, but, that is too frequently the case. It's often not till we face our own, or a loved ones, mortality that most of us test our mettle and learn those hard lessons, figure out what life is really about. By then it's often too late to make our lives what we would have wanted them to be. This is not a dress rehearsal. It is your life. Live it! While you can.

Slideways

Playing at the Aquarius, Sideways confused me at first, particularly the title, till I visualized it. I see the outgoing actor character pulling Paul Giamatti's dead weight character like a ball & chain, sideways, along the ground. The two childhood friends are travelling up the coast, through Los Olivas, which is a little wine region near Santa Barbara. Giamatti & the two women they meet are wine aficionados & from what I heard from a vintner at dinner last night, the dialouge was very authentic.

Anyway, the two guys approach life in opposite ways. One is a confident risk-taker who wants to have some big fun before his impending nuptials & the other is basically scared of his shadow, resistant to everything except his ex-wife, who's majorly moved on, until the end where he does finally open up a bit to a woman and shows some balls on a caper to help his buddy.

I do feel sorry for the flaccid folks of the universe. How do they stand such boring lives? What do they think at the end...wow I made a million meals and now I don't have to make any more... nice life, thanks god. I remember as a child asking my grandmother what was important to her and she actually did say food. Why do so few people really live their lives? I don't get it, I never will. I guess it's fear of risk. Some seem compelled in life to avoid pain & therefore risk. Others have more confidence in their ability to handle pain & adversity and put the need for security below the need for growth and excitement.

I'm sure heaven/nirvana will be very peaceful and happy, and many folks seek that peace on earth. That stuff is important to heal pain. I've cried tears here, many, they were salty and real. The material world is so changing and amazing, filled with imperfect and interesting people. I am exactly where I want to be, doing exactly what I want to do.

But I felt sorry for this little man. I hope the daring actor will have some positive effect on his life... it looked like it did, at least for a while. Do the boring ever get better on their own, or do they just latch on to a live one for their once-in-a-lifetime ride.. always being pulled sideways instead of unfolding in an upward or expansive ripple of risk? You can't sub out growth. No amount of money or fastening of oneself to another, or to a church or a social group, will give a person the understanding & connection they seek in life. It's a road we each have to travel alone.

This film is the subject of an upcoming discussion group at my church, where, I assume, the issue of various moralities will arise. The actor guy not only seeks to and does cheat on his wife-in-two-days-to-be, but he leads on and lies to one of the women he cheats with. I think most people would agree that's immoral & Giamatti doesn't really do anything overtly wrong except break and enter to retrieve his friends wallet containing the super-special wedding rings.

Jack is definitely about excitement & comes off as immoral, yet I sympathized and identified far more with him than the half-dead Miles. The lying crap, I hate. But, his overall attitude is far more appealing to me. I wonder if my church friends will see it the same way?

I wonder if they will notice the more subtle immoralities of the understated, underalive one. For example, he's the one who lets on that Jack is about to be married. Ooops... did that just slip out, did I just betray my friend? Was I trying to protect someone here, was I trying to be honest with this woman or was I jealous of my friend and secretly wanted to see him (literally) busted? Either way, the guy takes no responsibity, and even lies to Jack that he did not bust him. What about the immorality of not taking responsibility for yourself, hiding from your life, lying to your friend? I believe he also lies to the woman that he is a published author when he's not.

For me morality has to do with honesty, authenticity, taking responsibility for everything you can and dealing the best you can with the rest. People are sometimes so ashamed of honoring themselves or even just standing up and being themselves that they become some sad, buckled version of themselves. To me, that disrespects the unique person God created and is therefore immoral.

Parents do need to sublimate themselves to their children to an extent and sometimes people need to appropriately put their own individual needs below that of others in working or possibly even social situations, or in marriages. I'm not Ayn Rand here glorifying some self-absorbed lifestyle. I'm just saying that we need to accord our inner spirits the same respect and dignity we afford anyone else, and Miles' dishonesty, not only with others, but himself as well, makes his moral shortcomings more significant than Jack's in my opinion.

irobot

1984

Is this supposed to be a take off on iBook, iPod etc.? Is Apple the new HAL? The director & writer certainly do talk about HAL on the DVD, mostly about the various personalities of Frankenstein's monster, HAL & VIKI. They are all created by men, only to take on a personality of their own, with their own agendas, even feelings, the real, human kind.

Of course this theme has been explored often in film and story from Pinocchio to Millenium Man. The role of man creating something in his own image has always interested us. And, almost always, the thing turns on us.

I discussed the Man vs. Machine theme earlier in this blog (11/8/04) while discussing Bob Zemekis' Polar Express. But this is more like Man Makes Man-like Machine. As we come closer to being able to replicate ourselves, can we doubt that we ourselves have been replicated by something higher, in his/her image? And, have we turned on it, the way our creations turn on us?

In the film we have the war-like robot Trojans, the super-smart feminine and idealistic yet all to robotic VIKI and humans who trust the machines and those who don't. In the human, non-human and probably even inhuman worlds, we all have our roles. What could be less human than the proles and Party members of 1984? Just because you're human, doesn't mean you're a human being. Humanity can be stripped from us, even as we more accurately make machines human.

So, obviously we have the technology to make replicates of ourselves that are physically stronger than what God gave us. We've all heard of bionics. Who's smarter? Last time I checked, we were. No one has been able to make a computer who can beat a chessmaster at the game... if that's the test.

Now, I don't know many human beings who could tell me 10k websites on the internet with the word "Imagine" on them, as Google can. But then again, I doubt any computer could write the song Imagine. Can we imbue robots with feelings? That one has definitely been explored, in all the stories mentioned. But, can we imbue them with creativity? With judgment? With compassion? Has our own creator done that?

Though humanity can be replicated to an extent, the creations, at a certain point develop free will. What is humanity without free will? Nothing. It's a necessity. We had to be imbued with free will in order to be made in God's image. And lots of us make very bad choices with that free will, we've all hurt others, we've all hurt ourselves. But, that's part of the deal. We do have free will, we do have to make choices and we do have to live with them.

People get so scared of that responsibilty sometimes that they just don't exercise it. They wait for things to happen. They don't realize that waiting is a choice, sometimes a very expensive one. Most people I talk to have no real vision for themselves, their own lives, not to mention their town, country, world, or sometimes, even their kids. The one "vision" I see is folks wanting to be rich and give their kids what they think it takes to be rich. But, that's pretty limited, I mean in vision, not in prevalence.

During the tsunami, the animals escaped... almost every single one. Stupid humans went into the retracting sea but the animals got the hell out of dodge. Did God give them sensors he didn't give to us, the ones he supposedly loves the most because he created us in his own image? Why would God do that? Did he expect us to use our wondeful Sensoria sensors... the ones we made with our big brains?

Or did God give us sensors some of us didn't use? If I saw that ocean retract I would have cleared the beach. I never had heard it was a waarning sign of Tsunami's, but I know nature enough to know that a huge movement like that implies something big and ominous. Nature is yin/yang, action/reaction, ebb and flow, what goes in comes back out... what goes around comes around.

Some of us aspire to be more like machines: diligent, efficient, unemotional, these characteristics are among those most richly rewarded in our society. I aspire to be more like God. Original, creative, spontaneous, compassionate. I hope to develop those internal sensors, and help others to see the humanity within. We shouldn't turn our backs on our creator, when we do, we fear, we misjudge, we live less than human lives.

It's a personal challenge for each of us to find that happy medium between the demanding high-tech world and the inner one of spirit, but, as we see in all these films, humanity is demonstrated as love and compasssion.

Garden State Dynamite

Garden State

Talk about your ironic epithets, for those of you unfamiliar, NJ is to NY what NV is to CA. It's where you go when you can't get in the other place. And it's portrayed beautifully, as it is in Napoleon Dynamite, two lush, gorgeous films. Napoleon had the easier time of it, with all the colorful 70's kitsch. To do that with rainy garbage dumps in NJ takes talent.

Then again, taking that Iowa farm stuff like cow udders and corporate chicken coops (definitely would not like to play the game there), into the mainstream, as Napoleon did, takes guts. These 20-something-slice-of-life-sensitive-boy films have been doing quite well, as Brothers McMullen did. Well, most of the movie audience is young male.

God knows, I'll be lucky to get my film sold to the O channel. But, I do like the fact that toned down films, without violence or much CG, are doing well. It opens the door for post-bust-valley-mid-slice-of-life films.

Garden State was written, directed & starred in by Zach Braff who must have gotten quite a leg up from Scrubs & found himself a nice rich sponsor (see my previous post). Seems like they had a nice budget. It's about a guy who, at 26, catches on to Daddy's game, confronts him, takes responsibility for his life, gets off the meds & guilt trip Daddy put him on & goes out to make his life. He even gets the lovely, yet, as she said in her own words on the commentary track "merely acting", Natalie Portman, whose film experience outweighs his tenfold.

I find it quite inspiring to watch people say, as the guy in this case did, literally, "This is it, this is my life." Personally, the actress in me always adds, this is not a fucking dress rehearsal. This is it, your actual life. The interesting part, to me, is that, you don't just do that once. In fact, I think many people never say that.

No game is ever won while you're still playing it. Until you cash in your chips, you are still in the game. As long as you're breathing you need to keep reminding yourself that this is your life and if you're not happy, change it. Yes, Zach & Natalie walk off into the glaring JFK sunset (sunrise?) at the end. But I think the young ingenues may realize somewhere down the line that, as Eminem would say, you need to keep cleaning out the closet.

I haven't learned an actual new lesson for a long time, yet, every day is a learning experience cause you meet new people, have new experiences (hopefully) and have to apply new stuff to the same structures to make sense of it. Here's a good example. I worked at a big law firm, lots of competition, the game, you know, the whole bit. Then, when I got to a certain point with the mommy stuff it was like, wait a minute, this is just like Wilson (except you don't see it coming till it's too late) except we have to cater everything ourselves and we don't get paid. Live and learn.