Apologies & Oscars

An apology, Gentle Readers, for my absence.  Between the holidays and the beginning of the new semester here at Very Small College, I have been a busy little bee.  Also, I haven’t read much that was worth discussing--mainly fluff.  Mindless fare which is fine for lulling me to sleep at night, ‘cuddled doon’ in my fleece sheets and goosedown comforter.  It’s not great, however, for semi-intelligent discussion with nebulous blog-readers.  I have been thinking of you, however, and so I dispense with the sorries and jump right into one of my favorite times of year: Oscar Season.

I am back to enjoying it in a modest way, after some years of burnout following my time at Very Distinguished University in the heart of Entertainmentland.  So I am attempting to see all the major contenders, and I shall try to redeem myself in my friend Danny’s Oscar pool (one year I got all the winners wrong.  ALL OF THEM.  He’s offered to start an anti-award with my name on it.  Oh, the shame).  I just wish this weren’t the year of White Man Problems.  A little diversity, please.  So let's begin with the one nod to diversity, shall we?

1) Selma.  It's really good.  It is not the Best Picture of the year, but it is pretty damn solid.  I am unconvinced that it is a great film, as such, but it is an important film, and certainly one that I hope makes its way into high school curricula across the nation (regardless of whether the movie wasn't nice enough to white people in power...REALLY?).   The march-cum-riot is heartbreaking and visceral, as it should be.  It's not needlessly gory, but it doesn't pull any punches, and the majority of the violence feels emotional, rather than the physical violence we've become immune to in films. 

As a movie, it has some problems.  I took issue with the sound, of all things.  There is one particular moment near the end, during the triumphant march (really, do I need to yell “Spoiler alert?”  It’s history, people!), when you see the actors singing “We Shall Overcome.”  But it’s overdubbed by a reedy modern folk song.  That’s not what I wanted to hear; I wanted a cacophony of voices joining together in recognition of a moment.  The music I wanted came at the end of the credits, and it’s a recording from the Smithsonian of the Selma workers singing together.  It’s scratchy, and it’s off-key-ish, and it’s authentic and very moving.  That’s the music I want to see over black and white footage of the march, not something designed to play on radio. 

I wasn’t crazy about some of the director’s choices, but overall it’s very good.  David Oyelowo is excellent, and I would rather have seen him nominated for Best Actor than the film up for Best Picture.  He’s bulked up a bit to play MLKJr, but if you like 'em a little slimmer, he’s incredibly foxy in Kenneth Branagh’s As You Like It (terrible film, BTW).   His MLK has a lot going on behind his eyes, and he truly owns the quiet moments of the film. 

One of the movie's strongest points was its emphasis on the politics behind the march.  People in power kept pushing MLK to broker a deal, to give something in order to gain support, to meet “The Man” halfway.  And the refusal to do so was impressive; his non-violence movement was already working with so little, the film made you recognize the insult of being asked to give something up when nothing is being accorded to the movement in the first place (does that run-on make sense?).  These people can't play give and take: they have nothing left to give.  It's a new way (for me) to look at the specific politics of this one moment, and I found it thought-provoking.

2) The Imitation Game.  A better film, overall, as a film, than Selma.  Guess which one I think more people should see, however?   Sorry, Sexyman Cumberpants.

World War II.  Bletchley Park, England.  A gathering of brilliant men convene to attack Enigma, the unbreakable cipher the Germans are using to encode their communications.  Enter Alan Turing, antisocial (likely autistic) mathematical genius who invents the first computer to break the code and win the war.  For a movie about a bunch of guys doing puzzles and sitting in an office failing to break a code, it's quite a riveting movie.  I held my breath waiting for a computer to finish its calculations; that’s impressive direction. 

The cast is fantastic, especially the young man playing adolescent Alan Turing, Alex Lawther.  He's really quite extraordinary.  And don't get me started on Benedict Cumberbatch, whom I adore.  The film is tightly plotted, builds some nice tension, and the denouement of Turing's career is heartbreaking.  I left the movie just muttering "WOW, that was good."

3) Birdman (or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance).  I’m still processing this one.  Part of me adores it.  It’s a smart, funny Michael Keaton as a Hollywood superhero has-been (and I love that the original Batman is playing down-at-heels Birdman) and his attempt to re-invigorate his career by writing, directing, and starring in a Broadway production of a Raymond Carver short story.  Needless to say, it all goes to hell.   

Cue conversations about theatre vs. film, artifice vs. art, relevance vs. tradition, being vs. seeming, etc., etc., etc.  Plus, Edward Norton plays the most obnoxious method actor/asshole in existence.  Can we please just give him the Supporting Actor statue now?  He’s GENIUS. 

But then there’s this odd layer of magical realism, or imagination, or psychosis, or something, and I’m just not sure it works.  Keaton’s character is telekinetic, and can fly, and hears the voice of his Birdman alter-ego in his head, and it’s just...off.  I would get really wrapped up in the drama of the characters, and then something magical would happen, and I would think “Oh, right.  We’re doing that here, too.”  I may have rolled my eyes at the screen once or twice.  A week after watching the film, I liked the magic a bit more, but it was vaguely irritating in the theatre...It is, however, really interesting.  And the acting is superb. 

Nota bene: Pop a Dramamine if you get easily motion-sick.  The film is practically all one take, and the camera swoops beautifully around and between the actors, only enhancing the claustrophobic feeling of backstage. It's a technically impressive feat, and really quite cool.  But it can be a little queasy-making if you have a soft tummy.

4) The Grand Budapest Hotel.  I know that Wes Anderson is supposed to be the disaffected voice of my generation, etc., etc. 
Sometimes he’s great and I love him (Rushmore, Bottle Rocket). And sometimes he’s twee and irritating and I want to punch him in the face (The Royal Tenenbaums, Moonrise Kingdom).  But oh my Lord, I love Grand Budapest!  I adore the sets, the costumes, the actors, the story, the dialogue, the weird kitschy fun of it.  It manages to be ridiculous and crazy and screwball and still be soulful and sad and moving.  That's a helluva balancing act to pull off.  I just love this movie.  And it’s one of the few out on demand (and HBO), so if you haven’t seen it yet, steal someone's HBOGo password!

5)  The Theory of Everything.  This Oscar Season is my year for oddly sexy British male eye-candy.  Sexyman Cumberpants, Ralph Fiennes, David Oyelowo, and now Eddie Redmayne.  Granted, not so much with the sexy as Stephen Hawking, but O for the awards show pictures! OK, now that my ovaries are under control (seriously, all I need to make it perfect is Tom Hiddleston, Jason Statham, and Clive Owen), let's talk about the movie.

...which is effing fantastic.  Redmayne's portrayal of Stephen Hawking is heartbreaking.  He's brilliant, and goofy, and funny, and he retains all of that as you watch his body disintegrate.  And talk about acting with your eyes: for the last two-thirds of the movie, his dialogue is either mumbled into near-incoherence, or delivered through computer. That's a rather extreme acting challenge.  

Furthermore, I can't even imagine how much pain Redmayne had to  be in after a day of filming; his body is agonizing to watch as Hawking's ALS takes its toll.  

The film is not so much about the science; it's more a biopic of Hawking's marriage to fellow scholar Jane Wilde (played by English rose-y Felicity Jones) as their marriage and Hawking's illness  takes its toll on both of them.  While the movie does a very credible job at explaining the strained but loving relationship between the two, I do wish there had been more science (yep, I said that.  In public. I want science.).  Hawking's brilliance is not only theoretical; it's also in how he has made physics accessible.  The physics in this movie isn't accessible, in fact, it's mostly ignored.  I just wish more effort had been made to highlight how such an incredible brain continued to affect the world, even as it became more and more trapped in its own universe.

And the "big" ones I've not seen: 
American Sniper.  Haven’t gotten there yet.  Not sure I can gird my loins tightly enough. 
Boyhood.  Haven’t seen it yet.  Fascinated by the idea; not sure if I’m anticipating something beyond the "let's-film-for-12-years" gimmick. 
Whiplash.  I desperately want to see this, but I missed it playing in local theatres.  (Now I'm starting to miss living in Entertainmentland.)  I adore J.K. Simmons, and  I’m pretty excited to watch him chew some scenery. Plus, jazz drums!!

 
So with what I've seen, I'm going with Selma for Picture, Eddie Redmayne for Actor, I haven't seen enough of the women but I quite liked Felicity Jones for Actress, Ed Norton or JK Simmons for Supporting, Keira Knightley for Supporting, and Richard Linklater for Director.  But what the hell do I know?  I'll be on my couch with the rest of the world, eating popcorn, waiting for Sexyman Cumberpants to photobomb someone, and yelling about how great Neil Patrick Harris's opening dance number is.  There IS an opening dance number, right, NPH??

Bookzzzzzzz

Apparently, I need a nap.  A long one.  Two of my most recent reads have been, quite unintentionally, re-tellings of Sleeping Beauty.  Then I caught Maleficent.  This theme is not helping with my yawns.  

Anna Sheehan's A Long, Long Sleep is fun.  Fluffy, and somewhat predictable, but fun. Poor little rich girl Rose Fitzroy has just been woken from her stasis tube...after 62 years.  Needless to say, somethings have changed.  During her extensive nap-time,  the world suffered through a few resurgences of plague--seriously, bubonic plague returned--and social upheaval.  Rose is overwhelmed with the new world, complete with an overload of new technology, political maneuverings she can't understand, and atrophy-induced physical weakness.  Oh, and embarrassing teen crushes (told you it was fluffy, Gentle Readers). 

The ending is a bit odd, and feels vaguely icky, but it does wrap everything in a nice, neat little bow.  I have a feeling that with one of the Big Reveals in the climax of the book, we'll be seeing a sequel, possibly a trilogy.  I'm not planning on reading the possible sequels--this one wasn't strong enough to pique my ongoing interest--but I'm sure there's a YA audience out there somewhere that will.

Speaking of YA re-tellings of Sleeping Beauty, I also finished Karen Healey's When We Wake.  My favorite part of the book is the cover.  This is not necessarily a slam: LOOK AT IT!  It's gorgeous.  The book is, you know, readable.  Tegan is a contemporary teenager who dies suddenly and wakes up a hundred years from now in a military facility.  (Note to self: don't donate your body to science in Australia; you'll become cryogenic government property.)  Australia is the preeminent world power in a future of food and water shortages, rising ocean tides, and dying ecosystems. So Tegan talks her way into going to school (where she crushes on the one boy she shouldn't), agrees to supervised media outings (that go horribly wrong, of course), and realizes that the future is still full of prejudice, cruelty, and indifference (shocking).  Oh, and there are chase scenes, because, you know, she once did parkour for fun...and now she does it to save the world!   

Will it have a sequel? you ask.  Yup.  I saw While We Run in the bookstore just today.  Nope, I won't be reading it.  But I do want to wear the book cover makeup for Halloween.

Then, absolutely without planning it, I swear, I went to see Maleficent in the local second-run movie theatre.  While this movie is certainly not all it could be, it was pretty good.  I did roll my eyes more than once in the dark, I must admit, but I blame Disney for keeping to the animated Sleeping Beauty script a bit too closely.  Not sure we needed the three fairies, and some of the clunky dialogue could have been re-tooled.  Plus, I know we needed to see Prince Phillip, but I just wanted to give him a haircut; he looks like Justin Beiber.  And am I the only one who noticed that Sleeping Beauty was only asleep for, like, 20 minutes?  That's not Sleeping Beauty; that's Napping Teenager.  

But can we talk about the costumes?  O holy schnikes, Gentle Readers, I want me some Maleficent horns.  Apparently they were made for the movie by artisans who specialize in fetishware.  I don't know what kind of fetish needs to have Maleficent horns, but I might be willing to look into it.  The costumes are just SO GOOD.

I just can't get on board with the critics, though.  This is not a "feminist revisionist backstory" of an evil fairy, O Kate Taylor of The Globe and Mail!  It is certainly female-centric, and yes, it passes the Bechdel Test with flying colors, but I really can't see it as a feminist fairy tale.

My biggest issue is the rape narrative.  When greedy Stefan is tasked with destroying Maleficent, he can't stab her to death while she's in a drugged sleep.  They're childhood friends, after all.  But he has no problem sawing off her wings, in a pretty clear rape narrative.  He can't dominate her through penetration, so he violates her body through mutilation.  Thanks, Disney.  You gave me nightmares.  

While Maleficent does reclaim her agency and her power, she does it through violence and a continuation of abuse.  Plus, if we read the narrative in this way, her (spoilers!) reclamation of her wings at the end is a weird negation of the violence visited upon her.  It's as if the movie is trying to erase her trauma.  This doesn't feel like a healthy working-through of issues (or, you know, a kids' movie).  I love Jolie in the movie, and I want her clothes.  But I have serious reservations about the film.  I found it watchable, but I just can't enjoy it.   

I need a new fairy tale to fixate on.  Maybe a nice Little Red Riding Hood.  Death to the wolf, and all that...

Sovereign, Deadly, Perfect

Somewhere in an abandoned subway tunnel of New York, a guerrilla film screening is about to begin.  The film was never released, and bootleg copies are rare.  A group of rabid fans has followed hidden clues and mysterious graffiti markings to gather here, in the dark, to watch a horrifying psychological thriller helmed by Oscar-winning auteur Stanislas Cordova. 

Critics’ darling Cordova took the movie world by storm and won an Oscar for Thumbscrew, but then as his work became more disturbing, he was dropped by the major studios.  He retreated to his Adirondack estate, The Peak, where he continued to produce films which never saw general distribution.  One can only see them in floating screenings as above.  Cordova gave one interview to Rolling Stone in the '70s.  The rest is silence.

In homage to his searing films, fans—called Cordovites—are tasked to challenge themselves to see the world’s possibilities.  They use horror to push past the morality and mundanity of everyday life and “suck the marrow” out of experience.  Except, instead of being outdoorsy like Thoreau, they hold secret screenings of Cordova’s movies in sewers and try to scare the crap out of each other.  

Never heard of Cordova?  Yeah, well, that’s because he doesn’t actually exist.  He’s the shadowy recluse at the heart of Marisha Pessl’s second novel, Night Film.  Quite frankly, I’m kind of sad it’s all fiction.  As a reader, I want badly to see one of his movies.  (Rob Brunner has a great NYTimes article about the problem of loving nonexistent works of literature and cinema here.)

The mystery that shrouds the filmmaker seems impenetrable.  Disgraced journalist Scott McGrath has tried once before to expose Cordova, with disastrous results.  But now the director’s daughter Ashley, the enigmatic piano prodigy, has been found dead, and McGrath has a chance to redeem himself.

Before anything else, let me point out that this book is great fun.  It’s a claustrophobic, huddled-in-bed, late-at-night kind of a read.  You expect to look up from the book and see someone outside your window, smoking a cigarette under a streetlamp.  Watching you.

It does, however, have some issues.  I was surprised at how clunky parts of it were, since I really enjoyed Pessl’s first book, Special Topics in Calamity Physics (2006).  I can’t decide whether this book needed a little more time to marinate, or whether an overly long period of navel-gazing was its problem.  Certainly it could be tighter.  Witches, demons, Indian burial grounds, missing children, sexual deviance, drug abuse, art, music, and criticism: there is a rather sprawling list of topics addressed. 

The writing does have some lovely moments, but they are overshadowed by some fundamental problems.   The tone of the first-person narration seems naïve, almost juvenile, not at all in the style of a hardened newspaperman.  There is also Pessl’s penchant for italics.  This book is full of them.  Without necessity.  There is rarely a page without italics.  The italics don't seem to be a part of the character's voice, so I can only presume that they are part of Pessl's literary style.  It’s annoying.

Furthermore, I found the protagonist triumvirate of aggressively naïve Nora, drug-dealing Hopper, and world-weary Scott McGrath to be trite and irritating.  They all lacked depth and interior conflict.  I kept hoping Nora, in particular, would meet with an accident.  Sadly, she survives. 

 

Scott McGrath, our intrepid reporter and narrator, is a man who used to be a highly respected investigative journalist.  His past triumphs included exposés of cartels, dictators, and politicians.  But his illustrious career came tumbling down when he trusted the wrong (unverified) source and slandered Stanislas Cordova.  On live television.  Seems like a rather amateur mistake for a hardened journalist, dontcha think?

He is joined in his quest by two unsuccessful foils.  Nora Halliday is a wannabe actress with little to no talent, whose main purpose in the novel seems to be using her mindless worship of Ashley Cordova to push McGrath forward in his investigation.  Hopper begins as a seemingly-random hanger-on of Ashley, but his “big reveal” is neither unexpected nor particularly helpful.  His purpose in the narrative is to provide otherwise-unknowable information.  He’s a walking info-dump with an attitude.  

Our protagonists are not complex characters.  But the book is not about them.  It’s about Cordova and his weirdness.  And that’s when it gets gooooood.  Cordova is absolutely the most successful character in the book—the one character that’s not there.  As a filmmaker, he inspires generations of misfits and thrill-seekers.  His very inaccessibility is his greatest asset, both in the reality of the book, and the reality of the reader. 

It’s hard not to draw parallels between Cordova and troubled or reclusive filmmakers in “the real world.”  Cordova’s obsessively secretive sets, his intimate involvement with the lives of his actors, the blurring of reality and fiction all sound like accusations leveled against many intense 20^th-century directors, most notably Stanley Kubrik.  During the book's scene at an underground sex club called Oubliette, it’s nearly impossible not to think of Eyes Wide Shut.  

In an effort to ground these fantastical set pieces in reality, the book is chock-full of “documentary” evidence.  There are police reports, web searches, phone book pages, and newspaper articles.  While the evidence is well-presented, any book that uses this device is bound to suffer in comparison after JJ Abrams’ S.  This book’s use of “evidence” is solid, but it can’t begin to compete with S.  I’m not sure that any book can.

Pessl has also allowed some web content to the book, explaining in an afterword that a reader can continue to explore the world of Night Film.  There is, indeed, an app for that.   I’ve not played with the extra content, but I have to admit, it struck me as a bit cheesy.  A successfully built world should make a reader want to remain within its bounds, certainly, but this attempt to make the book a multi-media experience feels forced.  There is, however, some lovely art inspired by Cordova, including these awesome mock-ups for his faux films. 

One of my favorites is this one for At Night All Birds are Black:

As the story progresses, any semblance of reality begin to unwind.  There is a great, trippy sequence where McGrath gets stuck in a series of obsessively detailed Cordova film sets.  At this point, he has no idea what is real and what is fiction.  It’s one of the best sequences in the book, and absolutely worthy of reading alone in a darkened room.  By the time he escapes, you as the reader are seriously questioning whether he is a reliable narrator, or whether he has, in fact, lost his mind.

Because by this time, McGrath has developed a sneaking suspicion that he is inside a Cordova narrative (frankly, so have you, Gentle Reader).  There is some lovely metafictionality, as McGrath begins to interpret actual events as if he were the protagonist in a Cordova film.  He asks for help from Cordova scholars, trying to determine where his path in reality will take him, but using clues from the corpus of the filmmaker’s work.  It’s delightfully weird and twisted, a little like a literary take on Scream's rules of horror movies.

So, the characters can be one-dimensional, the writing veers from insightful to trite, and the plot structure is uneven.  House of Leaves it’s not.  But it’s readable and fun.  And if you read it late at night with most of the lights off, it’s enjoyably creepy.  I dare you to get through the book and not want to crash an underground Cordova screening. Happy searching...