2008-05-13 - 22:45
Together with a lot of other people, I was stacked in a pile at an infirmary to wait for an operation that I needed badly. The need was holding me there; I wasn't sure I could move.
A large woman got up stealthily, pulled out what appeared to be a penknife, and stabbed a man in the neck. There was no sound, but I was certain that he was dead.
The woman came toward me on her way out, so I closed my eyes and pretended to be asleep. My conscience, however, wasn't happy, and, afraid as I was of her, I tripped or stopped her and woke everyone up with a modern hue and cry.
She did not seem fazed. Without words, I understood that those people on her side were going to challenge those on mine. This puts the odds with me, I thought, because most people will choose right over such an obvious wrong. Yet nearly everyone in the infirmary gravitated to the murderess. The only person I remember clearly on my side was a co-worker from IT. I felt set up for failure and a growing sense of terror.
My co-worker stepped forward. He proved to be proficient at some martial art, although his blows somehow never connected. I wondered why the masses didn't get rid of us offhand, or if they meant to drag out the agony one by one. I could see that my co-worker was only exhausting himself and that we were being toyed with.
Then I saw that some of the men were dressed as cowboys and were quietly trading guns. I thought, "Why don't they just shoot us then?" I wondered, too, if the cowboys were secretly on the side of justice after all.
The suspense continued.
2008-05-13 - 20:05
2008-05-08 - 07:45
One early morning in my sleep it came to me that our next group of presidential candidates should include a pregnant or nursing woman. When I first woke up, this seemed brilliant for reasons that I now have to make up.
First, I should note that this concept is in no way self serving. At nearly 47, I am well past my reproductive peak. The odds are that pregnancy is not in my future, so I am not the candidate that my dream life is proposing (your loss). My nieces are too young for the presidency, so I'm not looking out for their interests, either. My dream life can't even come up with an idea that would benefit me or mine.
Let's assume our pregnant/nursing candidate is over 35 and under 40, which seems reasonable if we assume a non-assisted pregnancy. Some would say that, while technically qualified, our under-40 mother-to-be is too young. On the other hand, the minimum age of 35 is purely arbitrary (perhaps even set partly because at one time many people would have completed their families by then), and there are people in their 50s and 60s who will never be mature no matter how long they live.
Some feminists will undoubtedly object on the principle that the president of the United States shouldn't be such a blatant brood mare, symbolic of male oppression and stereotypical gender roles (or perhaps they would come up with a more original, sophisticated argument full of portent and devoid of meaning). I could argue that a pregnant president symbolizes fertility and the rich potential of the future, and that it's progress not to sacrifice such symbols.
(Or she could simply be a woman who happens to run for office during pregnancy.)
Some might say that the last thing the nation or the world needs is a hormonal woman with power. Nonsense. All of us are prone to hormonal fluctuations, and we've had at least a few presidents whose hormones overcame their common sense (if they had any). On the other hand, few people are as motivated to build a better world than mothers, especially new mothers. A woman with a baby suddenly realizes, if she hasn't already, that it does matter that food is safe, that workers are treated fairly, and that polar bears continue to be available to grace the cover of National Geographic. The next generation shouldn't suffer for the excesses of their parents and grandparents.
There's the issue of lying in; for a few days the president will be physically but not mentally incapacitated. That's no different than when our past middle-aged male presidents have been hospitalized for various procedures from which they duly recovered. A woman can serve as president from a bed as well as a man. In fact, with planning, she need not leave the White House at all. She could give birth right at home, next to the red phone if necessary.
As a nursing mother, our president is going to be busy and tired‹some might say too busy and too tired to run a nation. I would point out that, while Hillary Clinton claims that she will be fully suited and ready for when The Call comes at 3:00 a.m. (as though she is hoping for The Call, although why at that time who can say?), our presidential mother doesn't need to claim anything of the kind. As any parent knows, mothers are on the alert for when the call comes‹the call of hunger, damp diapers, crankiness, or loneliness. New mothers are naturally wired for the needs and crises that arise in the wee hours.
What about matters of state? With all the responsibilities of motherhood, how could our president attend to tricky trade, military, and other important negotiations? If George Bush can interrupt a diplomatic dinner with vomiting, why can't our president take a little time off now and then to nurse? I'm not suggesting that the presidential offspring be brought to the table and that our leader nonchalantly whip out a breast, but perhaps these occasional short breaks will serve to easy any building tensions and to remind all the parties of what is really important‹our shared future.
Of course, in time the presidential infant would become a toddler. How cute would the White House holiday card be if it could star not only the presidential pets but a winsome toddler, too? In the meantime, the media would not be distracted by critical issues such as the partying, drinking, and drug habits of presidential adult children, or his or her sexual proclivities. The worst that the press would be able to report is that the president's toddler knocked little Susie over in day-care or piddled on the Oval Office carpet, for which we'll find it easy to forgive him or her. By the time he or she is seven or eight years old, our president, assuming she had earned a second term, will be leaving office, at which point we might be ready for another First Baby.
I didn't eat or drink anything out of the ordinary the night before, so I don't know what inspired this wonderful idea. I'm sure it has some flaws, although I don't see what they could be.
Maybe I didn't get enough sleep.
2008-05-06 - 08:27
On May 1, J. and I attended a private screening of an independent movie filmed in Chicago and written and directed by a student. This is the second or third independent film I've seen in the past few years (Morvern Callar was another), and, with such little evidence, I'm trying not to see commonalities‹and failing.
Both are dark, violent, and at times gory. In this movie are prostitution, HIV, abortion, beatings, obsession, infidelity, at least two murders, and four rapes (including a revenge rape of a man performed by a man who is hired by a female victim). Except for one short moment of slight levity, when the audience allowed itself to laugh hesitantly, the griminess of the film is unrelenting. Even the relatively upbeat ending doesn't quite move the viewer away from the ledge. If you had entered the theater as the most cheerful person in the world, you would exit with an emergency need for Prozac or Zoloft. Five minutes of beauty doesn't redeem two hours of pain.
I would guess that, depending on the source of their funding, independent filmmakers have more freedom to explore the human animal's dark side. They don't have to worry about the spinelessness of studio executives, the profit concerns of shareholders, or protests from mainstream American, which sometimes seems to find Hollywood's output shocking enough. Evil is more compelling than bland good, and some independent films strive to test the limits for the attention.
To be remembered, you have to do or make something memorable. A conventional story with conventional types and levels of sex and violence isn't going to bring you the attention you need to establish your name, reputation, and potential as a film auteur. The adroit portrayal of beatings, rapes, and murders is more likely to capture the attention of even the most jaded audience and critics. Not much new can be said about goodness. There is much that remains to be understood about evil, its causes, and its effects. This movie, and Morvern Callar, tries to hit you in the gut.
Even more so than with Morvern Callar, the visuals were rich, if clichéd. Fades and blurs were overused, along with other techniques that disorient the viewer while indicating transitions. Mostly, they draw attention to themselves, declaring, "Isn't this arty?" The same subject blurs and fades at the beginning and end to tell us that, after all that has happened, the world has come almost full circle, the city is still beautiful, and life goes on.
Film is, of course, a visual medium, and the directors of this movie and Morvern Callar become so focused on the visual art that they forget that, ideally, the visuals should support some kind of story. We get artistically contrived glimpses into the past lives of the three main characters, but they are so fragmented, disjointed, and out of context that it's hard to follow what happened, which makes it nearly impossible to figure out what is happening now. An online synopsis gave me a few clues, but even now I could not describe to you more than the most basic elements of the back stories. Without understanding those, the present is garbled and without the impact it might have had.
At various points the characters' lives intersect, sometimes meaningfully, sometimes not. Unable to pay her cab fare, one of the three female leads gives the taxi driver, also a main character, her phone number (try that in Chicago). As J. pointed out, the act seems significant, but nothing comes of it‹it is a narrative dead end that leaves the moviegoer trying to figure out why. I also note that only in a movie would a woman who is between a man she knows to be a sociopath and an exit door move toward the man rather than attempting to flee.
Visually, the Chicago of this is a fairy-tale place, brightly lit and colorful, with downtown's glass and steel lovingly showcased. Except for some scenes on Lower Wacker Drive and of the taxi driver's spare, decaying room, the city looks like a dream, making the events of the story lines even more nightmarish. Missing from the mix here are the homeless, the insane homeless, the pretend homeless, and the other denizens of the street that even bedroom suburbanites encounter every day. It's Chicago but not quite Chicago‹a Chicago where the surface grit is missing, and the ugliness is underground (literally) and underneath what appear to be normal lives.
All this ends on what appears to be an uplifting note; despite all that has happened to the three characters, they are optimistic and determined‹even the woman with a death sentence hanging over her.
I couldn't share the optimism. After all, as the movie hints, life is threaded. Somewhere, a family must be mourning the murder of a good man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. There are an innocent wife and child whose husband/father has proven to be an obsessive mental case. Then there's the specter of HIV, which, when we think about it, affects far more than the one person we see. There's a lot on the consciences of two of the characters‹or should be. As in Morvern Callar, there's little evidence of it. The film ends in a feel-good way that can't negate the grimness that has been and will be.
In their efforts to create art that stands out, these independent filmmakers try too hard, choosing style over craft and shock over substance, forgetting to let their audiences in on the story and motivations. Both Morvern Callar and this movie are visually full, emotionally empty experiences. A little ambiguity can be thought provoking; too much is only frustrating. A good film, I think, needs to engage people, not alienate them with its self-conscious artiness, coyness, and moral distance.
2008-05-02 - 23:39
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