Scenes From a Blog

I wanted to write about Scenes from a Marriage (1973) which I saw for the first time yesterday. But my life got in the way.

It's always interfering with my plans. Life is.

I want to do this. Then that happens.  I really hate that old saw about a sure way to get God to laugh is to make plans. You've got to make plans. You can't just wander about life aimless (though I've tried it). And what kind of God is that laughs at us mortals because we have goals, aspirations, hopes and means of trying to execute them? Does God burst into giggles because we tell someone: today I plan to catch up on my letter writing, then go grocery shopping and maybe watch a movie. That's cold.

Actually life is endlessly entertaining simply because it's so unpredictable. Wow, didn't see that coming, can be a lot of fun. Or not.

Life is really interesting if you can discuss it in an interesting way. That's one thing I got out of Scenes. It was directed by Ingmar Bergman. He was really really good at directing  seemingly ordinary people in that he made them interesting. Look, if you can make something compelling out of the story in Scenes you're something special. I mean the title says what it is. That's it. You follow a married couple. They're more interesting perhaps than most. But still....

A lot of directors today, hell, most directors today, can't tell an interesting story even if they employ explosions, car crashes, aliens or gun fights. You ever had an earnest child tell you a story in which there are all kinds of scary monsters and wild action scenes? It can be cute and a sign the child is perhaps precocious, but really you're mostly indulging the child (and rightly so). That's what a lot of filmmakers are like. "And then this happened and then that, and then this and then that. Pow. Boom." Yawnsville.

So I'm not getting into detail here, but Bergman proved with Scenes (as he did with many other films) that just observing human interaction can be fascinating. Even if none of the people has super powers or is a murderer or has two heads. Erland Josephson and Liv Ullman starred in Scenes. Ullman I could watch read the phone book in Swedish without subtitles. By the way, I thought Scenes from a Marriage was terrific.

I never did get to writing about it though. I had a lovely dinner with my family. I walked to a bookstore. I suffered through horrific results in sports events watched and attended. I washed tons of dishes. I listened to Chet Baker and Bill Evans (not live, they're both dead, it was a CD). I wasted time on the internet (that's just way to easy to do). I sat on our back deck and read Hemingway.

None of this was filmed by Bergman or anyone else. Though if the Swedish director was around and a camera was handy he'd have doubtless made a pretty good film of it. Imagine, me a star!

So I'm sorry that I didn't get around to writing about Scenes From a Marriage, though you may have noticed that in a roundabout way I sorta did. Kind of.

Annoying Gym Singer, Too Much TV, Harlow & Clarke, A Lighter Shade of Bergman And An "Interesting" Film

Today in the gym there was an awful sounding racket emanating from a woman's mouth. It suggested a wolverine drowning. Several of us looked over in her direction only to discover that this woman was "singing" in accompaniment to her IPod.  Her shoulders were shimmying, apparently in response to the music. These movements looked to be less a rhythmic reaction to pleasant sounds and more an upper body seizure. Our performer was a greying woman on the downhill side of middle age. No one wants such distractions when trying to lift weights. Least of all disagreeable ones. There's one bloke I see at the gym all too often who hums incessantly. We don't need that. Then there are those who go beyond the expected grunts and groans huffs and puffs that normally accompany vigorous exercise. There's one chap who when running on the treadmill sounds like a winded water buffalo. It's heard to imagine a human can make such a sound. And don't get me started on all the whistling in the locker room....

I'd been pushing myself physically recently and keeping generally quite busy besides. So I designated yesterday as a day to stay off my feet and do nothing more taxing than operating the remote control. I ended up watching three movies, a soccer match, part of a baseball game, part of a hockey game, an episode of HBO's The Ricky Gervais Show (absolutely love him and the show) and glimpses of the NCAA basketball tournament and a few other shows including the first half hour of Saturday Night Live. All this in a span of 14 1/2 hours. Yikes! Talk about binge watching. Besides the visit to the gym I'm doing some serious reading and writing today to balance the scales a bit, although it'll take several days, if not weeks, to offset so much time in front of the idiot box.....

The first two films I watched were part of TCM's pre code Forbidden Hollywood set. They were Red-Headed Woman (1932) starring Jean Harlow and Waterloo Bridge (1931) featuring Mae Clarke. I'd seen both films before but only once and in each case a good five years or so ago. Like gazillions of other people I love Jean Harlow. As she did on occasion, in Red Headed Woman she plays a right proper stinker. She was as a subtle as jackhammer in her use of men for riches and attendant comfort. Harlow was even better playing sweetie pies. Her life was cut way, way, way too short at age 26. Yet she still appeared in Red Dust (1932), Hell's Angels (1930), Platinum Blonde (1931), Bombshell (1933), Dinner at Eight (1933), The Public Enemy (1931), China Seas (1935), Libeled Lady (1936) and Wife vs. Secretary (1936), plus whatever the hell slipped my mind. That's all in an eight year span. It's mind boggling to think what more she'd have done in another 30 or so years.....

Much as I love Harlow, I preferred the second feature of my matinee yesterday. Mae Clarke, best known for getting a grapefruit facial from James Cagney in the aforementioned Public Enemy, was -- and I hate myself for overusing this word -- underrated. If you're unfamiliar with Ms. Clarke, just watch Waterloo Bridge (and for God's sakes don't waste your time with the saccharin re-make). She plays an out-of-work chorus girl in WWI London whose had to turn to prostitution to make ends meet. A naive young solider from a wealthy family falls for her and she tries to do what she envisions is the right thing. The -- oh my God here it comes again -- underrated James Whale directed. Douglass Montgomery, who didn't have much of career otherwise, was wonderful as the love struck 19 year old. Waterloo Bridge is quintessential pre code viewing and indeed a must see for any film lover. Yes, I think it's underrated.....

Last night the missus and I watched Ingmar Bergman's Smiles of a Summer Night (1955). It is much lighter fare than the great Swedish director typically made. It is a ribald comedy chock full of mistresses, adultery and illicit liaisons. Quite the thing for the mid 1950's. Virtually every great director can successfully make a film in another genre. I'd wager that Martin Scorsese could make a jim dandy Western if he'd a mind to. Smiles was the inspiration for one of Woody Allen's lesser efforts, A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy (1982). You could argue that Allen successfully adopted many of the aspects from Smiles in other of his films. But I tend to believe that Smiles is the type of movie Allen would and has naturally made and in many cases better. In any event, Smiles is a delight and while a joyous romp still introduces themes of life and love that Bergman dealt with quite seriously in other films....

Ever hear anyone refer to a film as "interesting"? What they're generally saying is that the picture wasn't all that good but boasts other merits, such as a star playing against type, or a unique visual style or an eclectic cast or the first of its kind. "Interesting" movies are usually badly flawed but not a waste of time as watching them serves another purpose. You just had to see so-and-so in a musical, or what's-his-face's first film or the unique pairing of him and her. Sometimes you don't know in advance that you're going to watch an "interesting" film. You go in looking forward to seeing something special and finish being satisfied that, well at least it was "interesting".  So it was the other day when I watched a film called The Law (1959) directed by Jules Dassin. The cast featured Gina Lollobrigida, Marcello Mastroianni, Melina Mercouri and Yves Montand. Not too shabby. The Law was set in Italy with a primarily Italian cast but directed by a Frenchmen and spoken in French. Of course. It was a howlingly adequate film, though at two hours pushes the boundary of how long a film can be mediocre before it slips into bad. Ms. Lollobrigida was at her loveliest, which is much like saying that the sun was at it's hottest. Fifty years ago she could be gorgeous doing push ups with a baggy grey sweatsuit on. Mastorianni was charming as ever and there were all manner of interesting characters and incidents but thrown all together it just didn't work. It was like putting a lot of really tasty ingredients together to make a bad stew. Except that it was "interesting"....

Now I ask a personal favor. If anyone is acquainted with a woman who makes noises akin to a walrus in heat whilst listening to the music on her IPod. Please do us all a favor and tell her to put a sock in it. At least while she's out in public. Cheers.

I Go A Long Way to Say Nice Things About Three Films: La Strada, Groundhog Day and No Country For Old Men

Truthfully I don't find much of a difference between movies and "real life." Particularly inasmuch as films are so integral to my understanding of the world.

Many of the films I like the best help inform my understanding of the universe. They can serve as a prism through which I view the world or as window or better still a way to feel about the world.

I'm growing increasingly impatient with films that waste my time. Of course being particularly careful about what I watch helps, but still there's always an occasional stinker that I sit through quite by mistake.

A bad movie is like some interloper who strikes up a conversation with you while you could be reading a really good book.

Regular readers of this blog (both of us) know that I've been contemplating death a great deal these days. The passing of one my very best friends (a previously healthy athletic person two years my junior) a few weeks ago has had a lot to do with this. But so too has been my obsession these past few months with the films of Ingmar Bergman and Woody Allen. Whether Bergman's Cries and Whispers (1972) or Allen's Love and Death (1975), the topic of human mortality is ever present in their work. As I've previously stated, this is in large part because their film's are great celebrations of life and ergo must dwell upon the opposite.

This has  been a cathartic experience for me and allowed for full recognition and acceptance of the fact that some day I will cease to be too. It's a relief. There's no use getting all depressed about it either. If one wants to feel miserable there's plenty going on among the living to do the job. Humans have thus far show no signs of evolving anywhere near a point where violence is not part and parcel to many of our cultures. That however is a subject for another time.

I've been fortunate enough recently to spend some time with some remarkable films. I've wanted to write about the last three that I've watched, but as I sit in front of a keyboard, or a pad of paper the proper words have eluded me. Mind you I've had plenty to say, but it's all been a lot of adjectives about acting, directing, scripts cinematography and the like.

The truth is I've felt it inadequate to go prattling on about how great something is. There are some really fun blogs that do nothing but extoll the virtues of various stars, directors or genres. Lots of lists, glowing adjectives and photos. This blog has frequently done the same.

But here's the deal: I've realized that far from anything being wrong with it, these are perfectly delightful blogs or blog posts to spend time with. We need not always take a critical eye to those things we enjoy. It's fine sometimes to just lead the applause.

But, you should excuse the expression, that's not where my head has been at recently. I have sought profundity, wisdom and insight. I've only wanted to share truths and stir thoughts. You see, I've gotten rather full of myself.

I hate pretense in others so I shouldn't have a bit of it from myself. Instead let me just rave about those three films I've watched this past week.

First there was La Strada (1954) the film that put Federico Fellini on the proverbial map, at least in terms of the US of A. Anthony Quinn and Giulietta Masina are transcendent as a traveling strongman and his abused assistant. Ms. Masina (the director's wife, by the by) could not be more endearing as the impish, clownish girl who is literally sold to the strongman.

I find La Strada an extremely difficult film to write about. (You have no idea how long it took to come up with the preceding sentence.) For one thing it can initially seem quite depressing.  There is a killing (however unintentional), a consequent mental breakdown. A parting of the ways and the discovery of our heroine's death by the grief stricken strong man. Yet this is an oddly uplifting film.

Perhaps it is simply a case of it being such robust film making. This is a much sparer film then future Fellini classics such as La Dolce Vita (1960). At least in terms of characters. It is at its heart as its title implies a road picture. The road of life maybe. Perhaps a look at destiny.

The real point may be that this is picture to appreciate for its richly drawn characters and their experiences and best of all the way their story is told. There are any number of indelible scenes. The circus, the spaghetti dinner, the high wire act, the night in the nunnery.

Okay, I still don't know what to say about La Strada. Except I love it. There, I said it!

Is the second film a contemplation of hell or of redemption?

Is it an amusing comedy or one of the deepest contemplations of the human condition ever filmed?

It is Groundhog Day (1993) and I submit that the answer to the above questions is: both. Surely you know the story. For one man the same day keeps repeating itself and he is the only person aware of it.

The man is Phil Connors (Bill Murray) a conceited, cynical, inconsiderate TV weatherman from Pittsburgh assigned to cover the Groundhog Day festivities in Punxsutawney where a groundhog is called upon every second of February to forecast how much Winter is remaining. Phil is not the sort to do quaint or kitschy, he aspires to a network gig. There's a new producer, Rita (Andie MacDowell) along for the trip along with dopey cameraman (Chris Elliot).

Phil goes to bed at the end of a frustrating day in which a storm has kept him trapped in town. He wakes up the next morning to find that it's not the next morning but the previous one. This happens again, and again and again and again and again for what director Harold Ramis has said is ten years worth of February the 2nds.

It remains a brilliant idea for a film because it is so open to interpretation. I watched it on, of all days, Groundhog Day. It got me thinking about how I would use the blessing/curse of repeating a day. For one thing I'd become fluent in French and for another I'd read all the great works of literature that I've still not gotten around to. But of course the film at it's heart is a study of how we choose to live our lives and interact with those around us. And how rare it is to get a second, let alone a 1,000th chance. Connors finally learns to embrace life and make the most of himself and be honest and loving. What a wonderful message.

We close with No Country For Old Men (2007) one of that tiny, tiny percentage of films that I believe is worthy of the tile masterpiece. The Coen Brothers made as close to perfect a film as possible, right down to and including the ending that had so many yokels saying: "huh?" It was no the nice tidy wrap up that most people want from a movie. It concluded exactly as did Cormac McCarthy's book of the same name that it was so faithfully adopted from.

It is a great gift indeed when a film allows us to decide that nagging question: then what? Besides a pat ending would have ruined the opportunity the NCFOM provides to wonder. Just who or what was Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem)? Why the car accident? Was he meant to symbolize the grim reaper? Why the code of killing he lived by? Why did he so scrupulously avoid blood?

NCFOM is powerful meditation on death. (And is it not interesting that the two main characters who die do so off camera?) It is fascinating to watch the manner in which Chigurh dispenses it and also note how Kelly MacDonald's and Woody Harrelson's characters face the inevitable.

But what came through most clearly for me with my latest viewing was Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones). He has such a sad (and yet sometimes funny) wisdom about the world expressed eloquently (verbatim from the novel) at the beginning and end of the story and a few parts in between. He is involved in no acts of violence but sees its sad aftermath and is left to contemplate it. He makes two references to other heinous crimes. Like many of us Ed Tom can make no sense of this sad aspect of human behavior. Of one crime he says that you could not make such stuff up and "I'd defy you to try."

This is not, in some respects, an easy film to watch. But it is so very rewarding. This is a case of film making aspiring to the power of great literature and actually succeeding. 

The Death of a Friend

A good friend of mine died last night. He was a year younger than me.

Goddamn cancer.

The death was not unexpected as he had been under hospice care for the last month or so. It hurts all the same. This is one of those cases of someone who truly will be missed. He seemingly knew everyone and was liked by all. He was an educator, a coach, an activist and, more importantly, someone highly skilled at the art of friendship. Among his greatest talents was the ability to listen and to relate to people of all types. Berkeley celebrates its diversity. He lived it.

I'm still in middle age, yet I find that the longer I'm around the more I'm confronted by death. My best friend died nine years ago this month. I'm still not over that. We try to make sense of these premature endings. My friend's mother said at the time that clearly God had other plans for her son. What plans could be so urgent that he was taken away from two young step sons and a two year old biological son?

I'm guilty of constantly trying to find meaning in events. Reasons for the often cruel capricious nature of life. It's easy enough to find lessons from something horrific like the Holocaust, but meaning? Good luck. If I trip, fall and sustain an injury I'll reckon I've been guilty of hubris lately and needed a comeuppance. More likely I was just being unmindful of a wet surface. But the search for a deeper meaning is constant. Particularly in the case of death and most particularly when someone dies before old age.

When unfortunate circumstances befall someone we know it is natural to imagine the same thing happening to us. Thus the death of a friend or relative leaves us contemplating our own mortality. We might focus on the uncertainty of a hereafter or assess what impact we've made on our world or what we hope to accomplish in our remaining years.

It can seem rather depressing. But it is all the nuts and bolts of being a member of the human race.  To deny that the inevitable awaits us to tell ourselves a great and terrible lie. Staring death square in the eye is healthy. Understand that its embrace will come to us and now is the time dance in another direction.

I've been watching (perhaps coincidentally, perhaps not) a lot of films lately that deal with death and dying. That is to say I've been watching a lot of Ingmar Bergman and Woody Allen movies. Last night at the very time my friend was breathing his last I was watching Bergman's Winter Light (1962). It concerns a pastor experiencing a crisis of faith. He meets with a suicidal parishioner who he is unable to help.

Bergman and Allen have dealt with life and living so effectively in their films because they look at its polar opposite: death. They understand that nothing can make life seem more precious, more meaningful and more important than the understanding that it is finite. They do not depict death in comic book terms with evil doers getting their just rewards or heroes dying valiantly as martyrs. Their deaths and the manner in which characters face them are expressions of the reality of human existence.

I'd love to explore this topic more deeply and hopefully I will soon. However I need to do a little mourning right now. I'll try to avoid depression and remember instead that my friend's life is one to be celebrated and emulated and that my contact with him over the 24 years I knew him was filled with the type of insight and joy he spread. I'm glad too that our beloved San Francisco Giants won a World Series before he shuffled off this mortal coil. He in fact died with his Giants cap on.

Bye buddy.

What's This? Another Edition of Riku Writes Odds and Ends? Already?

I don't think of myself as old, I in fact feel pretty much as I did whilst in my early 20s, sans hangovers. But I remember pay phones, rotary phones and a world without mobile phones. I remember when watching a movie on TV meant watching what was being shown on TV and in real time and with commercial interruptions. I can even vaguely recall shorts and travelogues before movies in theaters and not a single commercial before the film.

Yesterday was a holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. For the life of me I can't figure out why we pretend to honor the man's legacy. He's become nothing more than an icon for the Civil Rights movement. This one day off in January is a way of acknowledging  America's terrible legacy of slavery and de facto apartheid. But the United States in no way recognizes Dr. King's salient message of non violence. Since his death nearly 43 years ago the U.S. has continued to export warfare across the globe, inflicting death and destruction to such far flung places as Vietnam, Iraq and Somalia. The country's military budget swells like the belly of a gluttonous pig. Within the country, gun violence continues and efforts to stem the tide are fought tooth and nail by the NRA which places a higher value on gun ownership than human life.  The African American communities which Dr. King strove to better are particularly riddled by violence and it's brother, poverty. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the poverty level among Blacks is 35% nationwide, compared to 14% for whites. And according to the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence African-American children and teens are almost five times as likely as their white peers to be killed by firearms (11.30 per 100,000 African-American youth vs. 2.31 per 100,000 white youth). Yes the U.S. has its first African American president. Some victory.

The wife and I watched the full five hour version of Ingmar Bergman's Fanny and Alexander (1982) this past weekend. It was like bathing in milk. Actually I don't know that I'd particularly care for bathing in milk. Let's just say that if you've enjoyed the theatrical release you'll love the whole shebang. If you loved the theatrical version, well you're in for an orgasmic experience. Five hours with this film practically flies by. It's so rich in its characters, colors, images and imagination. Add this to the growing list of films I need to devote a full post to.

Not without some justification many people think I'm three-quarters nuts. Particularly on days such as this when it is unseasonably warm, the sun is out and the sky is almost totally cloudless. While you normal people are veritably dancing in the streets I'm miserably awaiting the next cold snap or storm. I really should be living in Northern England. A good mate of mine (hello, Phil) lives there and complains of endless strings of cold, wet, cloudy days. I'd love it. My favorite activities are best or exclusively done indoors: reading, listening to music, watching films, working out, and one other that I shan't mention here as this is a family blog. Anyway I find sunny days boring. Give me clouds, give me sleet, give me high winds. My idea of hell would be living in Arizona year end. This leads to awkward social situations when everyone else is either celebrating the sun or bemoaning the overcast and I'm stubbornly stating the opposite view. Clearly a lot of people just wish I'd go with the flow and follow the weather comments script.

Anyone check out my top ten films for 2010? I presented it, as I've done in the past, without comment. Had I provided a preface or epilogue I'd have railed about what a sub par year it was in films. Usually I have six honorable mentions but this year could barely muster four. And it to have a decent top ten I included two movies that technically were not 2010 releases (The White Ribbon and A Prophet). A small part of the problem was that I wasn't gaga over some of the films that most of you lot loved. I thought The Social Network a fine film but nothing to set off fireworks over. The The King's Speech was, in my mind, flamingly mediocre. The Kids Are All Right was not at all right, in fact I thought it stunk. Almost as bad was Inception, a picture that captured the imaginations of seemingly every 18 year old male in the country. Still I'm not complaining about the off year. Hollywood has had a good run of late and was due for a bit of slump. I've got enough films from the past to catch up with or re-watch anyway.

Thought I should let everyone know that my latest business venture has gone belly up. It seems my idea for non alcoholic whiskey just didn't have a market. I'm now working on the prototype for a home colonoscopy kit. I tell ya, it can't miss!

Wanna get depressed? (Silly question, who doesn't want to feel that life is meaningless and horrid?) Just read the comments that attach themselves like so many barnacles to virtually any news story on the internet. For that matter to many sports or entertainment stories. It's bad enough that people spew such hateful and vile things, but they also carry on nasty arguments with one another. Never mind the total lack of civility, think of the wasted time and energy. It's clear that a lot of folks get in a real lather over what some anonymous bloke living who-knows-where has to say. That same bloke will later return to the article, see the comment on his comment and fire back. It's so bloody easy to be cruel, nasty or viciously sarcastic behind the cloak of anonymity. And such a damn waste of time.

Speaking of waste of times, I hope you enjoyed this latest version of Odds and Ends....

500 Days of Cider Passion Memories Actually -- Thoughts on Recent Films I've Watched

Much to the delight of scores of readers I've been largely absent from film blogging of late. As punishment to those of you who've particularly enjoyed the scarcity of my posts, I now present some thoughts on but a few of the movies I've enjoyed (or sat through, as the case may be) recently.

Love Actually (2003). I nestled on the sofa between my two daughters yesterday to watch this light romantic comedy. An hour earlier I had enjoyed some freshly baked sugar cookies. Love Actually is the cinematic equivalent of sugar cookies. It's a hard film to resist what with a cast that includes Colin Firth, Emma Thompson, Hugh Grant, Laura Linney, Liam Neeson and Kiera Knightley to name but a few. It's set in London in the weeks leading up to Christmas. Viewers get to follow a series of romances among members of the upper middle and just plain old upper class. There is nothing the least bit unpredictable or interesting about any of the characters or their fates. Their stories, by the way, are always accompanied by the perfect song or the strains of an orchestra -- just like in real life! (It was eerie to watch Neeson play a man whose wife has just died considering the very fate befell him a few years later). Grant as the the British prime minister is, for the lack of a better word, silly. When he publicly scolds the US president (Billy Bob Thornton) at a joining press conference and to wild applause, the shark has been jumped with a triple summersault. Love, of course, prevails in all the stories, giving a maximum awww effect to audiences. All told this is a Hallmark card without so much as a personal signature. Perfectly worded and ultimately hollow. I preferred the sugar cookies. At least I could dunk them in my tea.

Stardust Memories (1980). One of the best things about this Woody Allen film is that it really annoyed those film critics with outsized egos. Take for example the winner of the  lifetime achievement in pretentious film criticism, Pauline Kael. Critics felt, as did many civilian film goers, that Allen's fans were being singled out for ridicule in this supposedly autobiographical film. Surely skin so must be virtually translucent! Film fans should not be considered off limits for satire. Especially from a director who considers himself fair game. Stardust Memories is clearly a rip off of Fellini's 8 1/2 and Allen would no doubt be the first to admit it. It is the story of a writer/actor/director juggling the vagaries of fame and romances while attending a retrospective of his own work. Stardust Memories is by turns hilarious and a rich commentary on the perils of celebrity. It's poor notices stained the film's reputation but it is a delight for Allen fans and the general public, if only they give it a whirl.

Cider House Rules (1999). I recently began teaching an ESL class on learning English through modern films. The first movie we watched was not of my selection. CHR was a much praised film upon its release garnering seven Oscar nominations including Best Picture. It is based on a wonderful novel of the same name by John Irving and did earn a best adapted screenplay win as well as statuette for Michael Caine as Best Supporting Actor. I make the following comments about the movie, which I'd not since since it's first run, knowing full well that its director Lasse Hallstrom is a native of Sweden. CHR is a very American movie. It's perfectly charming with a touch of comedy, romance and  social messages of great importance. In addition to Caine the cast includes Tobey Maguire, Charlize Theron, Delroy Lindo and Jane Alexander. In many respects it is a "perfect" film because there's nothing much about it to cause complaint. But that's largely because it takes no chances. Set in New England there are abundant opportunities to view the scenery and make it part of the film. The camera, sadly, never lingers. Though over two hours, CHR flies by. It never contemplates it moves from one scene to the next overwhelming us with smart dialogue. John Ford is considered the most American of directors yet his style could be distinctly European, limiting talking whenever possible and utilizing nature at every turn. He'd have done wonders with this story. Hallstrom made a lovely movie that has been pleasing audiences for over a decade. It could have been so much more.

500 Days of Summer (2009). Not often, but sometimes, a new movie comes along that however briefly restores my faith in the modern American film. Such was the case last year when 500 days hit screens. This was the second movie I showed to my class (chock full of current idioms, a language teacher's delight). It's a film that turns the whole notion of romantic comedy on its head. The comedy is there but the cool thing is it all fits with the story. There are no superfluous characters tacked on for easy laughs. There are no cheap and easy sex or flatulence jokes. Also it is refreshing -- and this is no spoiler because we know it from the get go -- that this is not going to be another they-lived-happily-ever-after story. Been there done that to the nth degree. The situations, the feelings, the emotions all feel so real for any of us who have fallen in love and thought, stupidly, that it would last. (Okay sometimes it does but usually there is trial and error required). Joseph Gordon Leavitt as the lead character proves capable of carrying a film. It is through him that we can experience the incredible ride of falling head over heals then landing on our heads. My students loved it despite their limitations with English. It tells a universal story of heartbreak with verve and courage. See here Hollywood, you released this film and proved that you can be real with audiences and let them have fun in the bargain. More please.

The Passion of Anna (1969). As my good friend Monty Python would say: and now for something completely different. I've been bingeing on Bergman lately (Ingmar). Until recently I'd only ever seen five of his films (loved four of them). I've tripled that total in the past six weeks and loved most of what I've seen, liking the rest. The Passion of Anna was the latest and its in the loved category. It's a mark of the great Swede's genius that he could make such seemingly dark films probing the depths of the weightiest issues humankind faces and create entertainment out of it. There is not an ounce of cheap sentiment. There is no snappy dialogue, no trivialities, no hokey music. The films are beautifully shot yet stripped down to the bare essence of the story. Revealing deep truths and providing compelling character studies. POA is a study of four characters living on an island. There are their interactions. Their emotional turmoil. This being Bergman there is silence, God's of course. And there are faces which Bergman used to great effect in telling his stories. POA is as mysterious and unknowable as questions about life itself. And just as wonderful.

Is that all? Hardly. But this was meant to be a sample anyway. Despite your repeated requests to the contrary, I'll try not to be such a stranger. New job and all, you understand. I now leave you with these two no film items.

From the spam folder. About once a week I go to the trouble of emptying the spam folder in my email account. On rare occasions I will trouble to actually read some of the aforesaid garbage just for giggles. I got a real doozy yesterday from a Robert Hill, the subject line was promising,  International Monetary Fund Agency. I present the entire message here verbatim: "Mr. Lonato Paul told us that you are dead, is it truth or not?" I was tempted to reply as follows: "Sadly the reports of my demise are quite true. I write to you from the afterlife where we still have email access. Best wishes!" I thought better of this plan. Lo and behold later in the day Mr. Hill fired off the same missive. I don't know who this Lonato Paul is, but his information is the bunk. At this writing I'm still among the living and plan to remain so as long as humanly possible.

Overheard on the subway. This was the beginning of a cell phone conversation: "Bad news from Wachovia in Sacramento. The first and third floor urinals did not pass inspection." One can only imagine the impact this information will have on the stock market, now that it has "leaked."

God, Faith, Morality and Right vs. Wrong, The Heavy Fare Served by Allen and Bergman in Two of Their Greatest Films

Wood chipper accident kills tree trimmer
Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
(11-16) 14:41 PST CONCORD -- A tree trimmer was killed in a freak accident in Concord when a rope to which he was attached became entangled in a wood chipper, authorities said Tuesday.
Antonio Barajas, 33, of Concord suffered a fatal head injury Monday when he was slammed against a gate of the chipper as it was operating on Snowberry Court, near Cowell and Ygnacio Valley roads, said Krisann Chazarik, spokeswoman for Cal/OSHA.
The agency is investigating the accident, which happened at 1:30 p.m.
Barajas was wearing a climbing rope, which became caught in tree limbs that were being fed into the chipper, Chazarik said. He did not actually end up in the machine, authorities said.
Barajas was a seven-year employee of Traverso Tree Service of Walnut Creek. Five other workers were trimming trees, but none saw the accident, said Alyce Traverso, the company's office manager and wife of the owner.
"They just heard the chipper make a whir sound," Traverso said.
Barajas leaves behind a wife and their 8-month-old son, she said.


The very nature of existence and the real or imagined presence of God in our lives. The fundamental difference between right and wrong.  Great stuff for heated debate, philosophical musings or lengthy discussion. But can you make a film of it?

Ingmar Bergman and Woody Allen did, and quite successfully at that.

Though they dared to tackle these issues on numerous occasions (Allen is still at it) I think their best works in this regard are Bergman's Winter Light (1963) and Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989).

They are in some respects a cinematic odd couple. Allen is a New York born Jew and Bergman (he died in 2007) a Swedish born Lutheran. While both were college dropouts, Bergman started his professional career in the theater while Allen was initially a comic. Yet both started directing at a young age, though Allen's earlier films were strictly comedy and many of his later ones have either been comedies or heavily laced with humor.

Of course, Bergman was a huge influence on Allen who has never hidden his admiration for the great Swede. Indeed in his film Manhattan (1979) Allen's character Isaac Davis claims that Bergman is the only true genius in film. It is not then surprising that Allen has tackled the central issues of human existence in many of his movies ala Bergman.

In Crimes and Misdemeanors we are introduced to a pillar of society, a renowned opthamologist who is being honored at a swanky dinner for his charitable fundraising efforts. Martin Landau as Judah Rosenthal is as genial, affable and respectable man as you'd ever want to meet. But he's also got a neurotic mistress (Angelica Huston) who is threatening to expose their affair. Judah's shady brother (Jerry Orbach) offers a solution -- having her "taken care of." Can Judah even contemplate such an option? To save his marriage and career he sure can and does.

To what extremes will an otherwise moral man go to protect himself? It is in the contemplation of okaying the deed and in living with the consequences, that Judah struggles mightily with his conscience. Though raised in a Jewish home, he is no longer a believer. Yet he seeks counsel from a patient who is a rabbi (Sam Waterson) and their discussion includes the question of whether we can have a moral compass without a belief in God. This element is added: Judah well remembers his father's admonition that "the eyes of God are watching us always" a powerful memory, particularly for an opthamologist. And oh by the way, the rabbi/patient, this truly moral man, is slowly going blind.

Allen's character is an unsuccessful documentary film maker who is saddled with making a film about his super successful brother in law, a God like TV producer (Alan Alda). He'd rather be doing a film on an aged philosopher who shares great insight into the nature of man including his relationship with, who else, God.

Questions of right and wrong, good and evil, faith and secularism permeate Crimes and Misdemeanors, a heavily layered film which reveals more of itself with each viewing. Lesser characters and events take on greater meaning as one studies the film closely and begins to realize that there are are no lesser characters or events.

Winter Light centers around a Lutheran pastor (Gunnar Bjornstrand) who is suffering from a severe crisis of faith. All he wants is for God to speak to him. Instead he is faced with God's silence. Not an uncommon malady for any one, even a man of the cloth.

The pastor counsels a parishioner (Max Van Sydow) who is depressed owing to his belief that a nuclear holocaust is right around the corner. He is suicidal and the pastor is of no help. How can the pastor assure anyone of God's divine grace and eternal love when he doubts the very existence of God himself? The outcome for the parishioner is inevitable.

The pastor is an austere, sullen man whose entire persona seems perfectly in keeping with the harsh Swedish Winter and the rigid lifelessness of Scandinavian Lutheranism. I speak as someone so raised. The iconography is spare and dark, the services dry and rote. Bergman, himself the son of a Lutheran minister, perfectly captures the solemnity and lack of emotion in the services, the cinematic opposite of Fellini's Italian Catholicism. The very barren landscape of the Pastor's church is highlighted by the meager turnouts. It's all enough to make one wonder why anyone wouldn't question his faith.

Happily the pastor is much loved by a woman. Sadly he is incapable or uninterested in accepting her unconditional love. Worse, he is cruel towards her.

It hardly seems like the makings of a watchable film. But Winter Light is not only intriguing for the issues its explores, but is beautifully told by Bergman and cinematographer Sven Nykvist. By the framing of shots and the use of light, the movement of a character into and out of light or darkness, invite us to ask questions about the characters, faith and God's silence. And as in Crimes in Misdemeanors, there are no small characters or events.

Judah claims that "God is a luxury I can't afford." In Winter Light the sexton of the church supposes that Christ's greatest hardship was being seized by doubt in his final moments and facing, "God's silence." It's not the stuff of most films but when handled by directors like Bergman and Allen, the weightiest of questions seem perfectly appropriate to tackle in a film. Wow.

The Virgin Spring, An Example of Bergman's Touch

I am a great believer in having as many types of films made as possible. Along with a laugh-a-minute Marx Brothers comedy, you need a good mystery and of course a film that asks the most serious of questions.

It is the latter category in which the great Swedish director Ingmar Bergman excelled.  As evidence I submit The Virgin Spring (1960) which I watched today for the first time.

Towards the end of the film Max Van Sydow's character, Tore speaks to the heavens saying: "You see it, God, you see it. The innocent child's death and my revenge. You allowed it. I don't understand you. Yet now I beg your forgiveness. I know no other way to be reconciled with my own hands. I know no other way to live."

It takes extraordinary courage to make a film that asks profound questions about existence, especially when it goes in with no preconceptions about what the answers are. Bergman specialized in such films. The Seventh Seal (1957) being just one other example.

In Virgin Spring, God is the main character. We never, of course, see the supreme being and he or she is only seldom referenced, but its God's movie all the way.

The Virgin Spring is the story of a wealthy family in rural 14th century Sweden whose  teenage daughter is raped and murdered by goat herders while journeying to the nearest church. The synopsis seems hardly likely to encourage people to see the film, but its done pretty well for its self since being released 50 years ago, including recognition at the Oscars, Cannes and the Golden Globes.

What has drawn viewers and critical acclaim to the film undoubtedly has to do with Bergman's effective way of telling the story and the questions that story asks about, among other things, faith. Lubitsch had a "touch" with his films that made them clever, witty and appealing. Bergman similarly had a touch. One that made the kind of unsavory fare served in The Virgin Spring palatable. Characters were multi dimensional irrespective of how much screen time they had. The worst of the lot were always clearly human and despite their actions, tolerable to watch. Protagonists were flawed (i.e. human) and sentiment was nowhere to be seen.

In Virgin Spring we are invited to watch. The camera allows us to get aquatinted with characters but not intimate. Medium shots with sparing use of close ups keep the film a viewing experience but an engrossing one. It is thus easier to form our own judgments about events and people. The victim here has a half sister who is culpable in her fate. She is at once sympathetic and abhorrent. The vengeful father is more complex that most films would allow him to be too. He is both unwavering in his convictions and doubtful after their outcomes.

Bergman was a complete filmmaker in that he had no major weaknesses. This overall competence allowed him to take on the heaviest of material and not only not make a mess of it but make something quite special.

There is a wonderful simplicity to The Virgin Spring. This makes it all the easier to feel God's presence in the story. We need not be believers ourselves, just needing to accept the fact that a higher power is very much at work in the minds of the characters.

Faith is a heavy cross to bear and can serve as a wonderful reward to the believer. It is also tested mightily throughout a lifetime. It is further complicated by the unique relationship with and perception of their higher power that each believer brings to this most special relationship.

The Virgin Spring can seem a difficult movie to watch. But it's a beautifully told story that rewards us with a golden opportunity to consider some of the central issues of life. I think it so cool that you can get that out of movie.

Films Loved by Film Lovers -- Foreign Language Edition

In my previous post I took on the daunting task of naming films that I believe are particularly loved by film lovers. I simplified the task by naming one per decade and restricting myself to English language films.  Today I offer the sequel to my original post with foreign language offerings.

Before preceding I quote from from that first entry: In no instance am I suggesting that any one of these films is universally loved by every single movie aficionado, such a thing is impossible. And as will quickly become obvious, I have not picked any films lacking broad appeal. I merely mean to say that to the majority of those people to whom movies are more passion that diversion, these films are highly esteemed.

20s Nosferatu (1922). Eighty-eight years after it premiered Nosferatu remains a one of the best horror films ever made. As I said in a post from last Fall: Nosferatu is like a nightmare. Not a gross disgusting one that you want to run away from. No this is a bewitching, beguiling nightmare that despite the better angels of your nature you want to behold. More than that, you want to follow -- where will it take me? Surely this is ultimately harmless, it's only a dream (a movie). All those haunting images and that's not even including Count Orlock (Max Schreck).

30's Grand Illusion (1937). On the surface this is a World War I POW escape film but it is clearly so much more. French director Jean Renoir's masterpiece is also very much about classism, particularly the type that was dying in Europe. It is at once a subtle and clear film, acclaimed by many as a perfect movie. Jean Gabin and Erich von Stroheim lead a terrific cast.

40's Open City (1945). This film from Roberto Rossellini about the resistance movement in Rome during World War II was made just months after the events depicted. Add to this the use of non actors and the actual locations and you've got the greatest example of neorealism ever made. It is heartbreaking, compelling cinema that inspired a genre.

50's The Seventh Seal (1957). Like Grand Illusion, there are those who consider this a perfect film. It is considered by many to be Swedish director Ingmar Bergman's best, which is saying a lot in and of itself. In being so much about death it is really about living and the joys thereto. I expounded on the film recently in this post.

60's Closely Watched Trains (1966). War torn Czechoslovakia is not the ideal setting to "come of age" sexually but one often has to make do. From Czech director Jiri Menzel comes this story of a young train dispatcher who ends up combining sexual awakening with resisting the Nazis. It all comes together in one of the sweetest and saddest films ever made. It's one that could easily have lapsed into sentimentality but managed to avoid cliches and hit all its marks.

70's Aguirre the Wrath of God (1972). In the nearly four decades since completing Aguirre, director Wernor Herzog has continued churning out all manner of outstanding films including documentaries. However this still stands as the piece de resistance of his career. It is a trip. Both in the slang and traditional senses. The story of an ill fated conquistador's search for the mythic El Dorado in the Amazon jungle is a magically crafted elegy.

80's Ran (1985). Akira Kurosawa enjoyed wide appeal among critics and mass audiences alike. You'd be hard pressed to find a film lover who was not a fan of the Japanese director. Any number of his films could have made this list. Clocking in at nearly nearly three hours, Ran is grand, epic film making at its best. It is also one of the better cinematic versions of a Shakespearean play, based as it is on King Lear. Made when Kurosawa was 75 years old and after 45 years of making films, Ran proves the master's skills did not fade with age.

90's All About My Mother (1999). Many of Pedro Almodovar's most ardent fans have expressed varying degrees of disappointment with his latest directorial efforts. It is in good part because of films like All About My Mother which served to set the bar so very high. This is among the Spanish director's most revered films. At his best Almodovar is an excellent director of women and women's stories and this film, starring the wonderful Cecilia Roth, is an excellent example.

00's Barbarian Invasions (2003). The last days of a dying college professor are the subject of this intellectually stimulating French-Canadian film from director Denys Arcand. What could be morbid subject matter is instead engrossing as the soon-to-be-deceased is surrounded by close friends and family for some hearty laughs and provocative discussions. It's one of those films that introduces topics crucial to the very core of our existence.

Others: Le Samurai (1967), La Strada (1954), Port of Shadows (1938), Beauty and the Beast (1946), Y Tu Mama Tambien (2001), Celebration (1998), Metropolis (1927), Murmur of the Heart (1971), Mephisto (1981), Smiles of a Summer Night (1955).

Maybe They Should Have Played Checkers Instead - or - Why I Revere Bergman's The Seventh Seal

"Faith is a torment. It is like loving someone who is out there in the darkness but never appears, no matter how loudly you call." - Antonius Block.

Death.

Silence.

The absence of God.

God's silence.

Who on Earth would want to watch a film dealing with such deep and dour topics? If said film is Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal (1957), count me in.



It's not an easy film for me to watch because I find myself thinking all the damn time. Because Bergman so effectively introduces the weightiest of all themes throughout the film, one is constantly stopping to contemplate them.

Yesterday Howard Zinn died. Today JD Salinger. Life goes on for the rest of us. For now. But whether its in the form of some pale faced bloke in a flowing black cloak or something rather less obvious, death follows us all. All the time. Goodness, have you any notion of how capricious life is? It's something to think about because it may inspire you to appreciate each day. Hell, each hour. Antonius Block (Max Van Sydow) does late in the film. In a break from playing chess with death, he enjoys a simple but tasty repast of strawberries and milk with friends. Antonius, a knight just returned from the Crusades, vows to remember these precious moments.

One thing recovering addicts learn is how great it is to be alive to face life on life's terms. Meaning, it's great to be alive, for the good, the bad, the horrible, the wonderful. So death is the absence of that. Unless it's not and something else awaits. But The Seventh Seal does not deal with the after life. Just the termination of this one.

The Seventh Seal is set in the time of Black Death when plague claimed the lives of perhaps one-third of all Europeans. Understandably, people were obsessed with death. It was omnipresent. Try not thinking about.

People looked for answers and inevitably for scapegoats. As we see in the film one young woman is blamed for bringing the plague because she supposedly had carnal knowledge of the devil. In desperation for answers to the seemingly unknowable, people will grasp at straws and end up clutching one. During the plague, in many parts of Europe, Jews were blamed (as a Jewish friend of mine said with a sigh when I mentioned this once, "of course."). If you don't know who or what's to blame, pick someone, anyone.

The Seventh Seal was based in large part on the iconography of the church of Bergman's childhood, where his father was a preacher. Tis no surprise that it is a visually lush film in dramatic and beautiful black and white.

There is symbolism aplenty and much profundity and Bergman had the confidence to lay it on quite thick. Great directors like him and Fellini are not afraid, nothing is held back. Modern movies are too often a case of, as the old song goes, "the self deception that believes the lie." Many great directors when finding something to say, say it. Loudly.

Bergman doesn't hint at the specter of death. He puts a guy in black cloak and calls him that. In the first scene.

Antonius challenges Death to a game of chess (is life, after all, a game? I dunno, you tell me). If he wins he lives -- yeah, but for how long? In any case he's just "playing for time."  Death must win. Eventually.

The knight and his squire travel to their home, a castle, literally, they've not seen for ten years. They encounter and travel with others, including a couple. Their names? Mary and Joseph and yes they have a baby. Make of it what you will.  That's part of the beauty of The Seventh Seal. You decide. So many choices. So much to think about. Just as in life.

If it all sounds rather bleak, well it's not. It's exhilarating is what. Great art always is. It explores ideas and thus allows you to do the same. So the topic is death. Hey, you wanna appreciate life, you wanna understand "it all" you gotta face the end of "it all." You've got to know it's there. The Seventh Seal is a good place to start.

Is it so terribly inconceivable to comprehend God with one's senses? Why does he hide in a cloud of half-promises and unseen miracles? How can we believe in the faithful when we lack faith? What will happen to us who want to believe, but can not? What about those who neither want to nor can believe? Why can't I kill God in me? Why does He live on in me in a humiliating way - despite my wanting to evict Him from my heart? Why is He, despite all, a mocking reality I can't be rid of? - Antonius Block.