Category Archives: Culture Clash

Culture Clash, Historical drama, Politics, War

MacArthur’s lark: Emperor **

September 14, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on March 9, 2013)

The heroes and villains are not easily delineated in Emperor, an uneven hybrid of History Channel docudrama and Lifetime weepie based on Shiro Okamoto’s book and directed by Peter Weber. Set in post-WW 2 Japan at the dawn of the American occupation, the story centers on the roundup of key Japanese military and political leaders to be tried for war crimes.

President Truman has appointed General Douglas MacArthur (a scenery-chewing Tommy Lee Jones) to oversee the operation; he in turn delegates “Japan expert” Brigadier General Bonner Fellers (tepid leading man Matthew Fox) to see that the task is executed pronto. Fellers is also directed to investigate whether the biggest fish, Emperor Hirohito (Takataro Kataoka) gave direct input on war strategy. MacArthur has allotted him only a week or so to conduct his investigation (no pressure!).

Indeed, the question of the Emperor’s guilt is a complex one (and the most historically fascinating element of the film). Was he merely a figurehead, kept carefully squirreled away in his hermetic bubble throughout the war and occasionally trotted out for propaganda purposes? Or did he have a direct say in military decisions, perhaps even giving a blessing for the attack on Pearl Harbor?

And there is the cultural element to consider. MacArthur (at least as depicted in the film) was shrewd enough to realize that if he could build a working relationship with Hirohito, perhaps the Emperor could in turn persuade the populace to cooperate with their overseers, thereby expediting the rebuild of Japan’s sociopolitical infrastructure. Even if he was a paper tiger, the Emperor’s words traditionally held substantial sway over the Japanese people.

Unfortunately, screenwriters Vera Blasi and David Klass shoot themselves in the foot and sidestep this potentially provocative historical reassessment by injecting an unconvincing romantic subplot involving Fellers’ surreptitious search to discover the fate of a Japanese exchange student (Aya Shimada) who he dated in college (the young woman, whose father was a general in the Imperial Army, returned to Japan before the war). The flashback scenes recapping the relationship are curiously devoid of passion and dramatically flat, grinding the film to a halt with each intrusion.

While Fox has a touch of that stoic Henry Fonda/Gary Cooper vibe going for him, his performance feels wooden, especially when up against Jones, who makes the most of his brief screen time (even he is given short shrift, mostly relegated to caricature and movie trailer-friendly lines like “Let’s show them some good old-fashioned American swagger!”).

I get the feeling that at some point during the film’s development there was an interesting culture-clash drama in here somewhere. But when the denouement is a re-enactment of an historic photo that slowly dissolves from the actors into the actual photo? That is almost never a good sign…

Culture Clash, Road Movie, War

Can’t we all just get along? – Zaytoun **1/2

September 6, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on October 26, 2013)

I say chatzilim, you say maqluba: Zaytoun

Human conflict is as old as, well, the human race…as Mel Brooks’ “2000 year-old man” once confirmed to interviewer Carl Reiner after being asked to recall the very first national anthem, singing “They can all go to hell…except Cave 76!“. After many millennium’s worth of mass destruction and horrible suffering, you’d think we would all have come to the logical conclusion that war, as Bertrand Russell once pointed out “…does not determine who is right, only who is left.”

However, “logic”, it would seem, is for wusses and has no place on the manly battlefield. But I can always dream, can’t I? As Carl Sagan observed, we are all made of the same “star stuff”, so why can’t we just get along? (and again, I’m being logical…so pardon my naiveté). A few filmmakers have explored that theme over the years, in parables like La Grande Illusion, Hell in the Pacific, Enemy Mine, and now in a new film called Zaytoun, from Israeli director Eran Riklis.

The backdrop is war-torn Beirut in 1982. A 12-year old boy named Fahed (Abdallah El Akal) lives in a Palestinian refugee sector on Beirut’s outskirts with his widower father and grandfather. Needless to say, life in 1982 Beirut isn’t easy for Fahed and his young friends. When they’re not at home nervously scanning the skies for Israeli jets that frequently swoop in on suspected PLO targets embedded in their neighborhood, they’re having guns waved in their faces and getting shooed away by their Lebanese “hosts” whenever they venture into the city, where they play fun games like daring each other to dash across sniper alleys. Not that they are strangers to guns; we observe them as they engage in mandatory PLO-sponsored combat training, as well as political indoctrination.

Fahed’s father spends his spare time doting reverently over a potted olive tree. He shows his son how to properly nurture this delicate heirloom; his dream is to one day replant it into the soil of the family’s home town across the border in Israel/Palestine (whichever one’s preference). If it sounds like foreshadowing, you would be correct. Fahed’s father is killed in the first act via Israeli air strike, stacking the deck with assurance that freshly-orphaned Fahed’s first face-to-face meeting with The Enemy is less than congenial. The object of his reflexive derision is an Israeli pilot named Yoni (Stephen Dorff), who has been captured by the PLO after bailing out nearby.

Fahed and his friends taunt the imprisoned Yoni, after the PLO has “softened him up” a bit in an attempt to gather intelligence. Yoni responds in kind, calling them “little terrorists”. Yoni makes an escape attempt, after which Fahed gratuitously shoots him in the leg while he is still locked in his cell; obviously, this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. It’s never made clear what prompts the PLO to leave their valuable prisoner (whom they intend to trade for Israeli-held Palestinian brethren) in the charge of 12-year olds, but Yoni soon convinces Fahed to help him escape by playing on the boy’s desire to visit his ancestral village so he can fulfill his late father’s dream. In strict adherence with Road Movie Rules, these mutually wary travel companions slowly Form A Special Bond.

If I sound like I’m mocking my own pacifist sentiments, it’s not that I disagree with The Message in Riklis’s film; it’s just that he and Palestinian-American screenwriter Nader Rizq have oversimplified their narrative, which is rife with cliché and topped off with a tear-jerking denouement right out of an Afterschool Special. For example, the situation in Beirut in 1982 was complex, what with the Lebanese civil war, the PLO cells and the Israeli military involvement. Most viewers would understand why there was no love lost between the Israelis and the Palestinians, but in one scene Fahed and his friends are called “Palestinian dogs” by the Lebanese soldiers (maybe police?). Why? Was this a sentiment shared by all Lebanese? One Palestinian character is noted to have been killed by a “Phalangist sniper”. Who were the Phalangists again…and what was their beef?

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been raging since 1948, so what was the significance in informing us that this is “Beirut, 1982” but then offering no further exposition? Some historical context would have been helpful (as it is considered rude to do a Wiki search on your cell during a movie screening). Then again, maybe I’m looking on the wrong side of the lens. After all, if an Israeli director and a Palestinian writer can collaborate to create art, then maybe we can all get along (eventually). Perhaps in this case, the medium is the message.

Culture Clash, Documentary, Religion, The Environment

Postcards from the dreamtime: Samsara ****

August 31, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on September 8, 2012)

Though the Christian view of the world has paled for many people, the symbolic treasure-rooms of the East are still full of marvels that can nourish for a long time to come the passion for show and new clothes. What is more, these images — be they Christian or Buddhist or what you will — are lovely, mysterious, and richly intuitive.

-Carl Jung

In 1982, an innovative, genre-defying film called Koyannisqatisi quietly made its way around the art house circuit. The piece (directed by Godfrey Reggio, photographed by Ron Fricke and scored by Philip Glass) was generally received as a transcendent experience by admirers and dismissed as New Age hokum by detractors. The title is taken from the ancient Hopi language, and describes a state of “life out of balance”.

There are likely as many interpretations of what it’s “about” as there are people who have viewed it; if I had to make a generalization, I’d say it’s about technology vs. nature. Reggio followed up in 1988 with Powaqqatsi (a more political entry illustrating Third/First World disparity) and the slick yet curiously uninvolving sequel Naqoyqatsi in 2002.

Cinematographer Fricke has since become a director in his own right; most notably with his 1985 IMAX short Chronos, and the 1992 theatrical length feature Baraka. The latter film is frequently mentioned in the same breath as Koyannisqatsi; while it shares some themes and (obviously) a very similar visual aesthetic, Baraka stands on its own. The title is a Sufi term that roughly translates to “a blessing”, and indeed, this globe-trotting cultural/anthropological journey was more pan-spiritual in nature than Reggio’s film; proving that Fricke had his own unique vision.

Taken as a whole, all of the aforementioned films form a sub-genre I have dubbed the “Jungian travelogue”; a narrative-free collage of mesmerizing and thought-provoking imagery (natural and man-made) that jacks the viewer directly into humankind’s collective subconscious (or…not).

For those familiar with the director’s oeuvre, Fricke’s latest film, Samsara (currently in limited release) may initially unfold like a “greatest hits” collection of somewhat familiar imagery. Languidly paced scenes of Buddhist rituals? Check. Joshua trees silhouetted against a time-lapsed night sky? Check. Hyper-accelerated time-lapse sequences mirroring the dizzying pace of a mindless consumerist society going nowhere fast? Check. And so on.

The title is a Sanskrit term signifying “the ever turning wheel of life”. And appropriately, Fricke plays “pick up sticks” with the spokes, leaving it up to each individual viewer to reinvent their own wheel, as it were. In other words, if you just “turn off your mind, relax and float downstream” (as a great English poet advised) there is as much here for a thinking person to ponder as there is to savor.

Or, if you prefer to enjoy it on aesthetic terms, I think the film (much like its predecessors) works fine as pure cinema; a visual tone poem that intoxicates all the senses. Be forewarned, however, that it isn’t all soothing images (animal lovers in particular should be advised that there are scenes filmed in a Chinese poultry processing plant that are potentially upsetting).

If you have an opportunity to catch it on the big screen, I would highly recommend you do so; this is one of the most beautiful looking films of 2012. Interestingly, it was shot in 70mm, but the 65mm negative was scanned to DCP, enabling exhibitors to project it in hi-res 4k format. The results are stunning.

And again, don’t feel pressured to “connect the dots”, because there will not be a pop quiz afterwards. At the end of the day, whether you interpret the film as a deep treatise on the cyclic nature of the Omniverse, or see it merely as an assemblage of pretty pictures, doesn’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.

I think the director drops us a clue early on in the film, as we observe a group of Buddhist monks painstakingly creating a sand mandala. At the end of the film, we revisit the artists, who now sit in silent contemplation of their lovely creation. This (literal) Moment of Zen prefaces the monks’ next project-a ritualistic de-construction of the painting. And yes Grasshopper, it is a very simple metaphor for the transitory nature of beauty, life, the universe and everything. But, as they say, there’s beauty in simplicity. Take the wheel, for example…

Art world, Culture Clash, Romantic Comedy, Writers

New York, Nouveau York: 2 Days in New York ***1/2

August 18, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on September 15, 2012)

As Woody Allen continues gallivanting around Europe, leaving his home kingdom of Manhattan vulnerable to incursion by Visigoths and Vandals, the inevitable has occurred. In fact (and as if to prove that turnabout is fair play), it is likely that around the same time the quirky NYC native’s ode to the City of Light, Midnight in Paris was opening in theaters, a quirky Parisian-born filmmaker was quietly invading Allen’s beloved Big Apple, churning out precisely the type of oft-lamented “earlier, funny” movie that his most ardent fans have been wishing (in vain) he would someday resume making.

So who is this usurper, laying claim to the Sacred Throne of Neurotica? Julie Delpy, best known to American audiences for her work in Richard Linklater’s popular diptych Before Sunrise and Before Sunset, began tasting the whine in 2007 by writing, directing and co-starring in 2 Days in Paris; she’s made a sequel called 2 Days in New York…and it’s one of the funniest films I’ve seen in 2012.

Delpy again casts herself as Marion, a French ex-pat living in Manhattan. The 2007 film followed her and neurotic American boyfriend (Adam Goldberg) on a trip to Paris, where they found themselves reassessing a tempestuous relationship. Five years have passed; in a cleverly staged preamble, we discern that while they ended up having a child together, they amicably decided it would be best for their mutual sanity if they went their separate ways.

Marion has a new man (sort of) in her life, her long-time friend turned lover Mingus (Chris Rock) who has a tween daughter from a previous relationship. The four all live together in a cozy Manhattan loft. Marion and Mingus are the quintessential NY urban hipster couple; she’s a photo-journalist/conceptual artist; and he’s a radio talk show host who also writes for the Village Voice.

Marion is on edge. She has an important gallery show coming up. Then there’s her family, who have just flown in from France for a visit and to get acquainted with her new Significant Other. The relatively buttoned-down Mingus is in for a bit of culture shock.

For starters, he finds that Marion’s father (real-life dad Alpert Delpy, reprising his role from the previous film) reeks of imported sausages and cheeses, which he unsuccessfully attempted to smuggle through airport security. Marion’s exhibitionist sister (Alexia Landeau) parades around the apartment in various stages of undress, and her perpetually baked boyfriend Manu (Alex Nahon) is nothing, if not eccentric . And yes-Franco-American culture-clash mayhem ensues.

Compared to the previous film, there is some unevenness in the script; this could be attributable to the addition of co-writers Landeau and Nahon this time out. But still, for the most part, it works nicely, thanks to the charming Delpy’s ability to elicit consistent belly laughs, despite her tendency to vacillate from high-brow to low-brow (first rule of comedy: whatever works).

It’s interesting to see Rock essentially play the straight man (although he still fires off some of the film’s funniest lines). While I think he is brilliant as a stand-up, I’ve found much of his previous film work only so-so; I suspect this to be not so much a reflection of ability as choice of projects). He’s very good here, just from reining it in a bit. Vincent Gallo has a hilarious cameo (playing himself…and parodying himself) that doubles as a satirical jab at art poseurs. OK, so it isn’t Annie Hall, but this is about as close as you’ll get in 2012.

Culture Clash, Dramedy, Family Issues, Rock 'n' Roll

A shoeshine for your soul: Le Havre ***1/2

August 2, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on November 12, 2011)

W.C. Fields once cautioned “Never work with children or animals.” I suppose you could say that Aki Kaurismaki has completely thrown caution to the wind with his new film. In Le Havre, the latest in a long line of deadpan character studies, the Finnish director weaves a deceptively simple tale about an elderly French author named Marcel (Andre Wilms) who is taking an open-ended hiatus from writing, opting instead to make a less-than-modest living shining shoes in the picturesque port town of Le Havre.

In a dryly amusing opening, Marcel andfellow shoe-shiner Chang (Quoc Dung Nguyen) stand impassively at a busy metro station, wistfully tracking the parade of shoes worn by passers-by, not unlike a dog who sits by the dinner table with infinite patience, fixing a Mesmer stare on your fork as if willing a morsel to fall its way.

Hell of a way to make a living, but it seems to suit Marcel just fine. He revels in the easygoing camaraderie among the inhabitants of his almost Utopian neighborhood, and is perfectly happy to come home to his wife Arletty (Kati Outinen) and his dog Laika (played by the director’s own pooch) to drink a little wine and enjoy a simple meal.

One day, as he is lunching down by a pier, he is startled by a commotion of police, who seem to be looking for somebody. While the police are still poking around, Marcel spots a young boy (Blondin Miguel), half-submerged in the water and obviously frightened out of his wits. Marcel quickly puts two and two together, but keeps a poker face until the police have left the area. He offers the boy food, and, as they say in the movies, it’s the start of a beautiful friendship.

The remainder of the narrative deals with Marcel’s efforts to reunite the boy (a Senegalese refugee who was smuggled into Le Havre in a shipping container) with his mother, an illegal immigrant living in London. As he keeps one eye on a highly suspicious police inspector (Jean-Pierre Darroussin) Marcel is aided by fellow villagers, who pull together to form an underground railroad, of sorts.

Although the story is set in contemporary times, the film reminded me of Jean-Pierre Melville’s WW2 French Resistance tale, Army of Shadows. There are parallel themes of loyalty, selflessness and the kind of collective idealism that seems to belong to a bygone era. Stylistically, however, Kaurismaki and Melville could not be any different. To say that Kaurismaki likes to populate his films with quirky characters is an understatement.

For instance, I’d love to know where he found Roberto Piazza, as “Little Bob”, a musician who Marcel recruits to perform a makeshift benefit concert. To look at this odd little gentleman, you’d never dream that he could rock out the way he does once he’s onstage (it’s like the first time you saw Andy Kaufman “become” Elvis). Little Bob also gets the best line (“She’s like the road manager of my soul.”).

If you are not familiar with Kaurismaki’s oeuvre, this might not be your best introduction (for that, I would direct you to his wonderful 2002 film, The Man without a Past). Jim Jarmusch absolutely worships Kaurismaki; they definitely share the same sense of humor, as well as the same sense of, er, pacing…if that helps. You’re not going to see a lot of car chases, okay? And if you can settle in with this tale’s unhurried rhythms, you might just catch the compassion and humanity at its core. Think of it as a shoeshine for your soul.

…and for your dining and dancing pleasure, here’s Little Bob:

Culture Clash, Dramedy, Social Satire, Up the Workers

The discreet charm of the bourgeoisie: The Women on the 6th Floor ***

July 30, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on December 3, 2011)

If there is one thing I’ve learned from the movies (at least ever since Alan Bates said “Zorba, teach me to dance” to Anthony Quinn) it’s that the Noble Peasant has much wisdom to impart to the Uptight Bourgeoisie (particularly when it comes to learning the sirtaki).

The latest example is a French import (set in 1960s Paris) called The Women on the 6^th Floor, an “upstairs/downstairs” social satire from director Phillipe Le Guay. In this case, the servile class occupies the uppermost floor of an apartment building owned by a staid middle-aged stockbroker named Jean-Louis (Fabrice Luchini). Jean-Louis, who inherited the property from his father, lives in a swanky downstairs apartment with his neurotic wife (Sandrine Kiberlane) and two spoiled teenage sons. After the family’s cranky long-time maid quits in a huff, he hires lovely Maria (Natalia Verbeke), who takes a room on the 6^th floor, where she joins a small group of fellow female Spanish émigrés.

It’s obvious from the get-go that Jean-Louis is quite charmed by the young Maria, who invites him upstairs to meet her friends. Although he has lived in the building since infancy, Jean-Louis has somehow never managed to venture up the 6^th floor. At least, that’s the only possible explanation for his “shock” when he discovers the relatively dismal living conditions endured by the nonetheless high-spirited coterie of Spanish maids who live in the servant’s quarters.

Well, mostly high-spirited. One maid gives him a cooler reception. “Oh, don’t mind her,” another one of the women cheerfully offers, “she’s a Communist” (with a heart of gold). At any rate, Jean-Louis is seized by a sudden urge to make amends for the disparity (yes, that fast) and, spurred by his newly found sense of altruism, begins making some capital improvements to the 6^th floor. Now that his armor has been breached, it’s only a matter of time until he’s hanging out with the gals, laughing, breaking out the good vintage from his cellar, and discovering the savory delights of authentic homemade paella. You know-he’s leaning how to dance the sirtaki.

With a trope this hoary, you’d better have something substantive to back it up with, and luckily, Le Guay offers assured direction and well-coaxed performances from his entire cast. Luchini (a 40-year film veteran) brings just the right amount of warmth, poignancy and self-effacing humor to his portrayal of a man coming to grips with an unexpected winter passion. The film’s secret weapon is Verbeke, a voluptuous Argentine who brings an earthy sensuality to the screen that reminds me of the young Sonia Braga. While this film doesn’t break any ground, it may teach you a few new steps.

Culture Clash, Romantic Comedy, Sports

Guys have body issues, too: A Matter of Size ***1/2

July 16, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on October 16, 2010)

You know-us dogs aren’t really so much of the dogs that we think we are.

-from the 1955 film Marty

When you think “star athlete”, it invariably conjures up an image of a man or a woman with zero body fat and abs of steel. It certainly bears no resemblance to the doughy disappointment peering back at us from our full-length mirror (well…speaking for myself). Granted, there is the odd exception-Babe Ruth, CC Sabathia, David Wells, George Foreman, John Daly and Charles Barkley come to mind (and give some of us hope). Not that I ever considered pro sports as a career-but at some point in our lives, those of us who are “persons of size” must make peace with the cards we have been dealt.

Herzl (Itzak Cohen), the unlikely sports hero of a delightful audience-pleaser from Israel called A Matter of Size has been dealing with his “cards” for some thirty-odd years, and has yet to come up with a winning hand. Sweet-natured, puppy-eyed and tipping the scales at 340 pounds, he lives with his overbearing mother, Mona (Levana Finkelstein) and works at a restaurant, commandeering a salad bar.

Mona loves her son, but has odd ways of expressing it (chiefly due to her lack of a social filter). “You’re getting too fat!” she scolds, belaboring the obvious; in the next breath she’s encouraging him to finish up some leftovers in the fridge (eating and complaining…two things my People excel at).

Just when you think the situation couldn’t get more demoralizing for the hapless Herzl, he gets fired from his job, essentially for being visually unaesthetic to the workplace (read: Management objects to having a morbidly obese employee tending the salad bar).

But then, two things happen to Herzl that could potentially turn his present state of gloom around: he experiences a mutual spark of attraction with a lovely woman in his weight watchers group (Irit Kaplan) and finds a new job at a Japanese restaurant, managed by an ex-pro sumo coach (Togo Igawa). Guess what happens? (Hint: As you probably know, sumo is a sport that celebrates and reveres big fellers, elevating them to rock star status).

It would have been easy for directors Sharon Maymon and Erez Tadmor to wring cheap laughs from such a predominately corpulent cast, but much to their credit (and Danny Cohen-Solal, who co-scripted with Maymon) the characters (and actors who play them) ultimately emerge from their trials and tribulations with dignity and humanity fully intact.

Even the sight of four supersized Israeli gentlemen bounding through a grassy field, garbed in naught but their lipstick-red mawashis makes you want to stand up and cheer (as opposed to pointing and snickering). Ditto for an endearing, sensitively directed seduction scene between Herzl and his girlfriend, and a subplot concerning one of Herzl’s buddies who, empowered via the sumo training, begins his journey of coming out as a gay man. Needless to say, the film is ultimately about self-acceptance, in all of its guises.

And that’s a good thing.

Behind the Music, Culture Clash, Dramedy, Family Issues

Mopey white guy with guitar, pt. 2: Wonderful World ***

July 7, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on January 16, 2010)

Wait a minute…didn’t I review this film last week?

Well, sort of…

Can blue men sing the whites?

Or are they hypocrites for singing woo, woo, whoo?

Oh Lord, somebody help me!

-The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band

There was a famous children’s radio show that ran on WOR in New York from the late 1920s through the late 1940s that became infamous when it was rumored that the host, Uncle Don Carney, had once signed off with his signature cheery goodbye to the kiddies, then (not realizing that his microphone was still “hot”) immediately wisecracked, “There! That oughta hold the little bastards!”

I remember listening to it back in the 70s on an LP of legendary broadcasting bloopers compiled by Kermit Schaefer. I was disappointed to learn in later years that the gaffe was actually faked for the album (although most of the other cuts were genuine). Still, the enduring popularity of the urban legend says something about the appeal of the subversive cynic hiding behind the clown face.

This concept has spawned a sub-genre of films that can be traced back to the 1957 Elia Kazan entry, A Face in the Crowd, in which Andy Griffith stars as a backwoods conman-turned media superstar whose vitriolic disdain for his public belies his image as a benignly goofy, “family-friendly” entertainer. Tony Richardson’s 1960 film adaptation of John Osborne’s cynical and scathing portrait of a fading vaudevillian (Laurence Olivier), The Entertainer also deserves a mention. More recent films like Bad Santa, Shakes the Clown and Death to Smoochy have toyed with the same theme. Wonderful World, the directorial debut from Joshua Goldin, fits right in.

“The only crime left in the fucking world is negative thinking,” laments Ben Singer (Matthew Broderick) who holds the view that everything is fixed, yuppies are the root of all evil, and we’re all doomed anyway…so why bother. A failed children’s singer (his sole album long relegated to the dusty cutout bins of history), the divorced Ben now works a dead-end job as a proofreader. When one of his co-workers chastises him for not sharing in the congratulatory excitement surrounding the news that another co-worker (an aspiring actor) has just landed his first television acting gig, he dismisses the scold with a shrug and says “I don’t delude myself with hopes and dreams.” He’s a real piece of work.

Interestingly, however, he does have friends. He participates in a weekly after-hours jam session in the back room of a music store with some pals, and proves to be a decent guitarist; it makes us wonder why he’s squandering his talents. As the music store owner observes, “That’s a shame, to be good at something no one cares about…” (as a blogger, don’t I know that feeling). His roommate Ibu (Michael K. Williams) a Senegalese immigrant, doesn’t let Ben’s chronic glumness dampen his own perpetually sunny disposition, and considers him a friend, despite all of his negative waves.

Ben does approach a state approximating enjoyment when he spends time with his precocious 11-year old daughter (Jodelle Ferland); although his rampant cynicism is markedly straining their relationship and becoming a source of concern to Ben’s ex-wife (Ally Walker). Ben seems quite happy to continue wallowing in his half-empty glass bubble of apathetic detachment, until a series of unexpected and personally challenging events shakes up his world, not the least of which in the person of Ibu’s sister (Sanaa Lathan) a Senegalese national who shows up on his doorstep one fateful day.

While this is familiar narrative (the self-pitying mope gets snapped out of his myopic torpor by the Free-Spirited Other), writer-director Goldin gives it a fresh spin. I expected things to go in another direction (another black comedy about a bitter children’s entertainer); but was pleasantly surprised by the warmth and humanity at its heart. Broderick gives a nuanced performance that I would put up there with his work in Election. Lathan does a lovely job, as does Williams (you may recognize him from HBO’s The Wire). Wonderful World may not be a major film, but it is a rewarding one.

Culture Clash, Dramedy, Food

First world problems: Eat Pray Love **

July 3, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on November 27, 2010)

Do you remember this popular Top 40 song from the late 70s ?

Oh, I’ve been to Nice and the Isle of Greece,
while I’ve sipped champagne on a yacht
I’ve moved like Harlow in Monte Carlo,
and showed ’em what I’ve got
I’ve been undressed by kings and I’ve seen some things,
that a woman ain’t supposed to see
I’ve been to paradise, but I’ve never been to me

God, I hated that song.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t begrudge the singer’s admirable journey of self-actualization, slogging and suffering along the way through the champagne and tiresome Mediterranean cruises and all, but any schlub who has been to at least two world’s fairs and a rodeo could have saved her the trip by quoting Buckaroo Banzai’s favorite adage:

Remember…wherever you go, there you are.

On the plus side, it only took 4 minutes for the singer to arrive at her epiphany. Unfortunately, it takes the globe-trotting heroine of Ryan Murphy’s adaptation of Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir Eat Pray Love 133 minutes to reach that same conclusion (OK, so it took Tyrone Power 145 minutes in The Razor’s Edge…but who’s counting?)

Julia Roberts stars as Gilbert’s avatar in the film, where she is briefly introduced to us as a seemingly happy, thirty-something NYC-based writer with a loving and supporting husband (Billy Crudup). I say “briefly introduced”, because soon after a research trip to Bali, during the course of which a shaman (Hadi Subiyanto) foretells that she will lose all her money, but eventually return to study under him so that he may impart his great wisdom, Liz decides that she needs to bolt from the marriage; much to the puzzlement of husband and audience.

Since there is virtually no exposition as to why she has the sudden change of heart (perfunctory flashbacks down the line do little to clarify), we just have to assume it’s one of those spur-of-the-moment, “I’ve never been to me” moments.

While the ink is still drying on her divorce papers (at least in screen time), Liz tumbles headlong into a relationship with a hunky young off-off Broadway stage actor (James Franco). The lust, however, soon turns to wanderlust, and Liz decides that maybe what she really needs is to take a year off from…everything.

So, leaving her new relationship somewhere in the neutral zone, she embarks on a three-pronged attack in order to “find herself”, first to Italy (eat), then India (pray) and then Bali (love…oops, is that a spoiler?)

So what does she learn? Want the speed-dating version? Here goes! In Italy, they have like, killer pasta and pizza. Awesome! And the gelato…it’s to die for! Oh…and Italians live in the moment, and they talk with their hands…just like the people on Jersey Shore! And when Liz decides to treat her new Italian friends to an all-American style home-cooked Thanksgiving meal with trimmings, one of the Italians, being unfamiliar with our ways and customs, forgets to defrost the bird. But, not to worry-Liz puts it in the oven, they all go to bed, and then, they have turkey for breakfast. How whimsical!

Next stop: India, where Liz learns piety by scrubbing floors at an ashram. Oh, and gurus live in the moment. Then, it’s back to Bali, where she goes back to the shaman who started the whole thing (he lives in the moment). Then, she meets a sexy Brazilian! (Javier Bardem).

Roberts is suitably radiant, flashes her million dollar smile and delivers her patented hearty guffaw right on cue, but she oddly spends a good portion of this very long film as an observer of her character’s journey, rather than an active participant. Consequently, it’s hard for us to really care about what happens to our leading lady; and that is a fatal flaw.

The always wonderful Richard Jenkins (as another American at the ashram) briefly perks up the middle third. But as soon as his character disappears, so does the spirit and energy he brings to the film.

The locales are gorgeous, and there’s plenty of culinary porn for the foodies, but that doesn’t candy-coat Robert’s phoned-in performance and the flat, soap opera-ish dialog (co-written by Murphy and Jennifer Salt). It’s like randomly surfing between Lifetime, The Food Network and The Travel Channel.

Frankly, the Pottery Barn angst on display here is tough to sympathize with in these hard economic times (how many of us can afford the luxury of “taking a year off” to navel-gaze?), and seems bent on perpetrating the Ugly American meme.

In fact, I thought that the depictions of the “colorful locals” encountered by the protagonist on her whistle stops bordered on the kind of colonial stereotyping I assumed Hollywood had abandoned ages ago. You know how they say that “It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey”? In this case, the trip could not be over soon enough.

Culture Clash, Documentary, Politics

Land and freedom: Tibet in Song ***

July 2, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on December 4, 2010)

Did you know that the Tibetans have a traditional song for milking your yak? And yet another to sing while churning said milk into butter? That might sound like the setup for a bad joke, but it’s not. Far from it-especially if you know this: if the Chinese government got wind that you were warbling the yak-milking song (or any traditional Tibetan music) in public, you could be imprisoned. Or maybe tortured. Or killed. Or-how about all three?

I learned all this and more from a fascinating documentary called Tibet in Song, which is really two films in one. Primarily, it is the film that director Ngawang Choephel initially set out to make back in 1995, when he returned for a visit to his homeland after years of exile in India and the United States (his mother had fled Tibet in 1966 with her then 2-year-old son.)

The filmmaker’s intent was to seek out and document the remaining vestiges of traditional Tibetan song and dance, which had become increasingly elusive in the wake of the Cultural Revolution imposed on the country by the Chinese government following the Tibetan Rebellion of 1959.

The first third of the film does deliver a sampling of the region’s folk dances and unique indigenous music, which shares a tonality with Native American chants. One thing it does not share so much in common with is Chinese music. While this latter observation is most certainly not lost on Tibetans, it seems to have been to the Chinese government, which has made concerted efforts, beginning with the Cultural Revolution era and going forward, to replace all traditional Tibetan melodies with Chinese pop songs singing praises to the regime.

One Tibetan interviewee (now an exile) recounts the introduction of radio broadcasts in the 1960s that blasted a steady din of the propagandist pop. Most Tibetans, who are culturally ingrained to express themselves daily in song and dance, had never even seen a radio; it was referred to as “the sound box”. “From that thing, there’s nothing to hear,” his father warned him, “It’s just for transforming ‘us’ into ‘them’.”

The film also recounts a very personal story, precipitated by a profoundly life-changing event that occurred two months into filming. While driving to visit his father, Choephel was stopped at a checkpoint and grilled by Chinese intelligence agents, who confiscated his camera, videotapes and notes. He was immediately accused of “spying” and sentenced to 18 years in prison (no trial).

Undaunted, Choephel continued his project. Fellow prisoners (many of them political dissidents) were happy to share their knowledge of traditional songs, which the director transcribed on cigarette wrappers. When this makeshift archive was discovered and seized by prison officials, Choephel began to commit the songs to memory (shades of Fahrenheit 451).

The studious and mild-mannered Choephel experienced a classic prison conversion, from objective researcher to political activist. “I had joined the (Free Tibet movement),” he recounts in voiceover. Thankfully, after a tireless one-woman campaign by his devoted mother, he was released in 2002, after six years of imprisonment.

Tibet in Song may begin as an academic culture study, but, not unlike the director’s own personal transformation, it becomes an unexpectedly inspirational and moving story. What more could you demand from a film? Singing and dancing? Well, actually…