Does H'wood excuse violence against women?

...Though one in four women has experienced domestic violence, and one in six will be sexually assaulted in their lifetimes, Hollywood is teaching us that violence against women isn't very important in the scheme of things. Of course, there's no evil group of cinematic warlords pushing this agenda, and most people who perpetuate it probably don't mean to... Nevertheless, this blase indifference exists towards women-centric violence, giving a blinding green light to such actions. We already see how image affects girls nation-wide, but think about what this indifference says to those women who are sexually assaulted or beaten across the world. If we don't show that we care -- that it's a very important issue -- these women will suffer in silence, never coming forward because the environment is overrun with hostility and a desire to ignore or downplay the problem.

Also:
- The producer of the Ryan Gosling/Michelle Williams romantic drama Blue Valentine says they won't change a thing about it, despite the NC-17 rating. (Cinematical)
- GLAAD defends their position against the gay joke in The Dilemma. (The Big Picture)
- Valerie Plame, the CIA agent outed by the Bush administration, talks about her biopic Fair Game. (Vanity Fair)
- On the future of Netflix with regard to streaming movies online. (Slate)
- Blind Side 2? Jets linebacker Bart Scott is next to get the Hollywood treatment. (Cinema Blend)
- A first look at the movie version of the best-selling novel The Help. (Awards Daily)
- Singer-actress Doris Day looks back on her long career. (WNYC)

127 Hours

127 Hours
seen @ Sunshine Cinema, New York NY
11.6.10

The year was 1995, and I spent the summer as a counselor at a sleepaway camp in Massachusetts. I was having a good time, even if a certified city boy like me had to learn to overcome my trepidation of living in the woods for two months. I will never forget the pure shock I felt the first night of staff orientation when I realized that just because it's late June doesn't mean the nights are gonna be warm. It was quite the opposite, in fact, and I was kinda miserable for those first few nights before it did get warmer.

One day I signed up to be part of a group going on a hiking day trip to Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire. There were at least 15 or so kids, plus me and a couple of other counselors. I wasn't any kind of hiker, but I was told that this was an extremely popular hiking destination, plus you could see all of New England from the peak. I figured it was worth the trip. It is a lovely place, which I do recommend, and despite what happened to me there, I would like to go back one day.

It started off fine. Our group was part of a number of others along the same trail up Monadnock. I kept a close eye on the kids, who ranged in age from 8 to 12. We made good time. I remember being surprised at the relative ease of hiking the trail. There were some rough spots, but it wasn't as difficult as I was expecting. Having so many other people around us was a comfort.

We were very close to the top when it happened. I was wearing a pair of high-topped Chuck Taylor All-Stars, like the kind my father wore when he was my age. In fact, it was because of him that I bought a pair. (His was red, mine were blue.) They looked cool, but they may not have been the best choice for a hike. I was walking through a rocky slope, and was about to alight onto a patch of dirt in between the rocks. I must've landed the wrong way, because before I knew it, I twisted my ankle and fell down hard onto the earth in a heap, and boy, was I in PAIN!

I don't mind admitting how scared I was. After all, I'd never been in a situation like this before - hundreds of miles from home, atop a mountain somewhere in New England, writhing on the ground, unable to move, much less stand and walk. Maybe I shouldn't have panicked so much - after all, I was surrounded by other people, who were able to, and did, call for help. And yeah, there was a measure of embarrassment at the fact that I was there to look out for the kids and I'm the one who ended up getting hurt instead. What can I say. I'm only human.

A couple of park rangers came up with a stretcher, even as the kids continued on without me. Several kind souls stayed with me until the rangers arrived, and assisted in carrying me down. I still remember what that was like - flat on my back, being hefted down an uneven terrain by a bunch of strangers, looking up into the clear blue sky, which slowly gave way to trees and other foliage. A bit of camaraderie developed among us. There was one girl whose birthday happened to be that day, and when we found out, we all sang "Happy Birthday" to her. All things considered, the experience wasn't so terrible, and it made me forget my pain.

The kids were waiting for me when we reached the bottom. The other counselors had ordered pizza while they were waiting, and once I was able to get inside the van, we drove back to camp. It was early twilight when we left Monadnock, and it got dark before long. The kids had fallen asleep as we wound our way through the twisting, turning road in the dark. I was lucky. I see that now. If we had gone somewhere more remote, help would've been more difficult in coming.

Which leads me to the movie 127 Hours. I swear I almost bailed out on it when the fateful rock landed on James Franco's arm. I had heard all the stories of people freaking out over this movie, and I told myself I could handle it, but when I saw the scene, all those memories of being stuck on Monadnock, helpless, came back to me and I felt my stomach turn. I seriously considered leaving the theater and the amputation scene wasn't for another hour at least! The last time I felt this way over a movie wasn't even that long ago: I got talked into seeing the Lars von Trier film Antichrist with my friend Jenny earlier this year, and she was ready to walk out on it too (and I would've been right behind her), but she and I managed to stick with it. This was different, because of what it reminded me of. Watching it felt too real, and of course, that's the whole point: this is a dramatization of something that actually happened.

Nobody fainted at my screening. Lots of gasps of shock were audible, though. The amputation scene is bloody and gory, but I don't think it's out of proportion to the moment. I mean, it's hard to show a crucial scene like this without a measure of blood and guts, so to speak, but I was able to tolerate it. I do think the ending dragged a bit, though.

A brief word about the Sunshine Cinema: It's definitely a great place for movies. They sell all manner of DVDs of independent films at their box office, which is cool. They do midnight movies, although most of the time they're fairly mainstream stuff. Nothing along the lines of, say, Roger Corman or Hammer horror films or John Waters or anything like that. And they have stadium seating, unlike the Angelika or the Forum, which is a huge plus.

Saturday Set List: Starring in our own late late show

I've decided I wanna expand a bit on the music-related stuff.

Soundtrack of the Week: Slumdog Millionaire

Tonight I'm going to see Danny Boyle's new film, 127 Hours, so expect a write-up of that on Monday. In the meantime, we can enjoy the music from his last film - and since you're probably well-familiar with "Jai Ho" by now, I'm gonna play the other Oscar-nominated song from the film.

A.R. Rahman with M.I.A., "O...Saya"

Song-about-movies of the Week: "Key Largo"

Self-explanatory, I hope. Any song that name drops a famous actor or movie, or anything related to movies. I always loved the song "Key Largo" by Bertie Higgins, and I love the movie even more. The accompanying video is a tribute to not only Bogie & Bacall, but Hepburn & Tracy as well, but that's okay.

Song-that-would-make-a-good-movie of the Week: "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)"

I like it when songs tell stories. Sometimes Hollywood makes movies out of them. This spot will be for my movie pitch based on a song. So try this one on: in a small New England fishing town, Brandy is a waitress at a popular bar and grill. Sassy and salty, she can mix it up with the sailors who adore her, but her heart belongs to one in particular, whose travels keep him away for months at a time. One day he returns to her and decides he wants to give up the sailing life and finally marry her. For Brandy, it sounds like a dream come true... but is it really what he wants? I picture Frances McDormand in this, or, if you wanna go younger, Renee Zellweger or Sally Hawkins (if she can do an American accent). Low-budget, lots of location shots. Light romantic drama, heavy on character-driven humor.

I'll gladly take requests for future songs.

Rocky IV

Rocky IV
seen @ RKO Keith's, Flushing, Queens, NY
1985


As time passes on, as it inevitably must, my memories of the Cold War become more jumbled. I experienced it as a child, therefore I was unable to fully understand the implications of all the saber-rattling between the United States and the Soviet Union. I knew that both countries had nuclear weapons, and I was led to believe, like many of us, that they could be used at any time, for almost any reason. I did not understand why, but who does at the age of ten, eleven, twelve?

Pop culture of the period was filled with Cold War references, naturally. All of us kids watched The Day After on TV and did nothing but talk about it in school the next day (more at the teachers' insistence than anything else). I knew the song "99 Red Balloons" was supposed to be about nuclear war, though I was fuzzy as to how the metaphors applied. I remember my sixth grade history teacher - a remarkably smart and funny man, who made me want to learn - played the song "Russians" by Sting to help us better understand the politics behind the Cold War. (He was very good about using music that way - he also played "For What It's Worth" to explain the 60s to us.) 

Mostly, though, I didn't think about it much. Politics was for grown-ups, and I suppose I, like most of my friends, figured they'd work it out on their own somehow. If there was any lingering fear that perhaps they wouldn't, and war would be declared, it never lasted for long. We didn't live in constant fear as kids. We were too busy having fun. These days, I imagine it might be somewhat different for the generation growing up in the shadow of September 11, as part of the information age of the Internet, but it was easier for us to live our lives as if politics didn't matter. 

When my father took me to see Rocky IV, I knew there would be a Cold War theme running through it, and I think I must've looked forward to it. Watching the great conflict played out on such a ludicrously simplistic canvas as this made it easier to buy into the propaganda, though I wouldn't have thought in such terms back then. It was a packed house, and after it was over, practically everyone was on their feet cheering, including yours truly. God knows what my father must have been thinking during the movie - seeing once again the old cliche of the black guy (Apollo) dying so that the white guy can avenge him and get the glory, hearing so much rhetoric about the Land of the Free as if that were true for all Americans, and being surrounded by so many people, including his own son, willing to buy into it. Maybe he just wanted to see the James Brown cameo. 

The RKO Keith's is no more, sadly. It was located on the intersection of Northern Boulevard and Main Street in Flushing, a neighborhood I frequented constantly as a kid. My best friend Jerry and I would go to the Modell's a few blocks south of the RKO and head downstairs to where they kept a giant bin of baseball gloves, and we'd sift through it trying to find gloves with the signatures of players we liked. For me, being left-handed, it was much harder, because it seemed like there were at least 50 right-handed gloves for every left-handed one. Sometimes we'd go into the old Woolworth's across the street. Inevitably we'd have a pizza at a shop on Roosevelt Avenue near the entrance to the 7 train.

So many places I remember are gone now: the art store across the street from the RKO that I bought my first portfolio case in; the arcade, the music clothing store that I was afraid to go into because they sold heavy metal T-shirts and I was brainwashed into thinking heavy metal was "devil's music" (though gladly, that changed when I got into high school); the mall with a comics shop downstairs; the B. Dalton's bookstore; the Wiz music and electronics store; the Baskin Robbins, the other RKO theater near the Long Island Railroad station - it's all gone. I'm surprised the Modell's is still there. Whenever I pass through downtown Flushing now, I don't recognize any of it. But time passes on... as it inevitably must.

Sita Sings the Blues

Sita Sings the Blues
seen @ Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH
2.28.09

The Wexner Center for the Arts has got to be one of the best kept secrets around in terms of public art institutions. This was one of the many things that made me proud to live in Columbus, if only for a brief time. Located on the Ohio State campus, the Wex showcases a wide variety of exhibits year-round, from music to film to art and more. When I was in Columbus, they had a massive Andy Warhol show that was unique in all the country, and attracted visitors from around the world for months. (I even mailed Vija a copy of the program.) In describing the Wex to my friends back home, I'd compare it to the Brooklyn Academy of Music or the Museum of Modern Art. I can't recommend this place enough if you're in the area, or even if you're visiting Ohio in general.

The Wex screens a variety of international films, past and present, occasionally before anyone else. I saw the Bobby Sands biopic Hunger there before it came to New York, if you can believe that. Often times, the filmmakers appear for Q-and-A sessions. In the summer, classic films are screened outdoors, on the front plaza, with local businesses providing food and drink.

I had first read about the one-woman-animated feature Sita Sings the Blues from Roger Ebert's blog. By the time the film came to the Wex in early 2009, I knew I had to see it. By chance, a couple of old friends from Michigan, Sean and Sophia, were planning to come down to see it as well. Unfortunately, they could only come for the Saturday show, not the Friday night one in which creator Nina Paley would attend for a Q-and-A. A tough decision to make, but I decided to wait the extra day.

Part of what fascinates me about this film is how Paley was able to not only make art out of a personal tragedy in her life, but to find relevant inspirations in other media and other cultures that she could incorporate into her work. Between the Hindu trappings, the 1920s blues music, and the present-day story arc, Sita is a remarkable mash-up of time periods.

While I had a number of friends in Columbus, old and new, there were times when I felt cut off, so to speak, from the life I'd left behind. So I would be not only excited, but grateful, whenever friends came in from out of town, because it would be a tangible reminder of that old life. Granted, I don't see Sean and Sophia that often to begin with, but I do remember thinking how seeing them under these circumstances - living a new life in a different city - felt different. When Bibi and Eric passed my way while touring the Midwest, it was the same, only more so, since I'm much closer to them.

After the movie, we, along with mutual friend Mike and his girlfriend, hung out at a cafe for the rest of the night.

Director Mike Leigh and his actresses

...it is easier to feel one might be a Mike Leigh woman than to generalise about any of them. What Leigh has, in common with Pinter, is a genius for dramatising ordinary people. Unlike Pinter, he is never sinister nor stylised. Pinter enjoys enigma, Leigh is about transparency. You can see right through his characters, you know more about them than they do about themselves. And his films have a good heart. Alongside misery, there is always human kindness. And – tiny but telling detail – his women are forever putting the kettle on (as in life) when the troubles of the day are over or, more often, just as they are getting under way.

Also:
- The Dilemma director Ron Howard says the gay joke is important to the character. (The Big Picture)
- On the ever-evolving state of film criticism... and the democratic response. (Awards Daily, In Contention)
- Fine artist-turned-filmmaker Julian Schnabel on his latest film, Miral. (Guardian)
- Check out these old newspaper ads for horror movies. (Retrospace)
- A review of a new book about the Marx Brothers' Duck Soup: is it the best war movie ever? (Out of the Past)
- This U.S. map assigns a definitive movie to each state. (Huffington Post)

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
seen @ Lincoln Plaza Cinema, New York NY
10.27.10

It’s easy to take a filmmaker like Woody Allen for granted. Time may have distanced us further from his greatest hits (Annie Hall, Hannah and Her Sisters, Crimes and Misdemeanors), but he continues to crank out films on what appears to now be an annual basis. No matter what you may think of the man, the filmmaker is one of the most prolific and consistent ones out there, and you’ve got to respect that much about him.

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, however, did seem like old hat for Allen. Many of the familiar Allen tropes are there, including the Narrator, the Allen stand-in (Anthony Hopkins), the bickering couples, the ingénue whom the Allen stand-in wants to make over – I mean, this is set in England, but story-wise, it could’ve come straight out of Allen’s New York in the 80s. Which is not to say that it’s bad – mediocre Allen is usually better than other filmmakers at their best – only that it doesn’t seem like he’s doing anything different here.

Seeing this movie was a bit of an impulse decision. I was with my friend Andréa, who’s the first friend I made through Facebook – meaning, not the first person I “friended” when I signed onto Facebook, but the first person I “friended” who started as a stranger but became a genuine friend. (Does that make sense? Peculiar how Facebook has changed the very definition of the word “friend.”) It was a rainy afternoon, and after eating, we kinda settled on seeing a movie to escape the blah (yet unseasonably warm) weather.

We saw Stranger at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema, a theater I hadn’t been to in years. Except for the box office, it’s entirely below street level. It’s small, with a bunch of paintings strewn about the lobby and a relatively cheap (for Manhattan) snack bar that includes baked goods like muffins and brownies. The seats, however, were less comfortable than I remember them. I kept fidgeting throughout the movie; I could not get comfortable no matter how I tried, and I don’t recall having this problem before. My seat felt too firm. Andréa didn’t seem to have a problem, though, so it was probably just me.

It’s easy to forget about the Lincoln sometimes when you’ve got the Houston Street trio (Sunshine, Angelika, Forum) plus the IFC Center, all within easy walking distance of each other, and that’s not even including other art house theaters in the Village. I like it fine, though, even if the seats are too firm for me. I went to high school in the area, although I never had any interest in indie films back then. I’d always go to the Loews on 84th Street. (The AMC on 68th Street would come later.)