March 2014 book and film review

BOOKS


THE JUNGLE, by Upton Sinclair. In the early 1900s, a family of Lithuanians seek a better life in the land of the Free and find themselves in the windy city, where they find employment in the vast meat processing concern called "Packingtown". They soon find life is hard, harder even than their own benighted country which they rapidly (though not out loud) regret leaving in the first place. Wages are just above starvation level (a dead worker is of no use to the bosses) and living conditions are no better than the coal towns of the Welsh valleys in the 19th century. But they are young, full of vigour and determined to make a go of their new life.


Despite this, they are gradually worn down by privation and injustice, to the point where some of them yearn for a new political system which will supply a little more justice for the worker and a little less profit for their masters.


Upton Sinclair was one of America's most famous and effective "socialist writers". This book brought about some important changes to the way livestock was turned into food, with new food hygiene regulations and better pay and conditions for the workers. In the years following the end of the American Civil War, plutocratic families like the Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, Melons and Guggenheims were allowed to practise capitalism on a scale unprecedented since the feudal system of the Middle Ages, and it was only progressive republican presidents like Theodore Roosevelt with his anti-trust laws and writers like Sinclair who set about stemming the worst of their excesses. This book is a cracking good read as well as being socially important. Read it, and remember how little has changed. In those days it was Standard Oil and US Steel, now it's Apple and Google and Amazon.


A TALE OF TWO CITIES, by Charles Dickens. An old man, almost in a catatonic stupor after years of incarceration in an attic in Paris, is rescued by his daughter and brought to England where he stages a slow, but almost complete recovery. The daughter then falls for a handsome Frenchman, little knowing he is the son of a hated aristocrat. Years later, during the time of the Great Terror, he returns to France to wind up a family business, but is snagged by the proles who are anxious to introduce him to Madame la Guillotine.
A Tale of Two Cities has one of the most famous opening lines in English literature:
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" along with a similarly renowned closing line:
"This is a far, far better thing I do now than I have ever done before". These lines alone establish Dickens's classic as one of the foremost novels of the 19th century, though I have to say that much of what lies between these two immortal lines fails to live up to expectations. For me this is not one of the master's greatest offerings. The characters are not as sympathetic or vividly authentic as some we have seen in his other novels, and the plot does not roil quite as exhilaratingly as we might hope. But I will say this: his evocation of the claustrophobic and terrifying atmosphere of Paris in the years following the French Revolution of 1789 is conjured with great skill, as he shows that absolute power is just as dangerous, whether it is in the hands of the aristocracy or the mob.


THE SLAVE, by Isaac Bashevis Singer. In the Poland of the 18th century, a young Polish Jew has his family killed in a pogrom while he is sold into slavery far from his birthplace. Forced to become a cowherd, he lives in constant fear that the locals will simply tire of him and come in the night to murder him. But one woman takes a fancy to him and makes the walk up into the high pastures every day to give him food. Actually she'd like to give him more; everything in fact. He likes her as well but his religious teaching forbids any carnal relations between the two. So year after year goes by, with the sexual tension gradually building between them. Then one day a delegation from his old village arrives and offers to buy his freedom and take him home. But what to do about his would-be squeeze? Can he bring her with him? Of course not. She's a shickse, so it's impossible. Isn't it?


Isaac Bashevis was born and raised in Poland but wisely emigrated to the States in 1939, where for the rest of his long life he produced novel after novel (all written in Yiddish) of such skill and beauty he was finally awarded the Nobel Prize in 1978. This novel is apparently a typical example of his work: a superbly wrought and utterly human account of life and death in a land where life has always been cheap and inter-racial hatred never far from the surface. This reader's verdict: absolutely brilliant.


FILMS


STILL ALICE (2014) W/D- Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland. An eminent New York academic (Julianne Moore) begins to notice she no longer remembers things as well as she used to. Slowly at first, because her high intelligence has enabled her to work in adaptations to her life which effectively mask it, it gets worse.


And that's it. In what is really one of the simplest plot developments I have seen in a Hollywood movie for many years, Julianne Moore (as big a cert for best actress Oscar as Eddie Redmayne was for best actor) demonstrates with extraordinary skill and subtlety the terrible scourge that Alzheimer's disease is, not simply for her but also for her family. The family members are also excellently portrayed, especially by Alec Baldwin as her husband and by an unexpectedly good Kristen Stewart as one of her daughters. If you only go to the movies once this year, make it this one. You won't regret it, though don't expect a bundle of laughs.


BIRDMAN (2014) D- Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu. A fading Hollywood superstar who made his reputation (and money) as a mythical superhero seeks to kick-start his fading career by producing and starring in a Broadway play. Events conspire to confound his plans: one of his co-stars breaks a leg (literally) and then he hears the NYT's leading drama critic is about to publish a review trashing his best efforts. Things don't look good so far...


This is the latest in a line of highly articulate movies (New York Synechdoche, Me and Orson Welles) that intermittently hit our screens and blow us away with the sheer audacity of their writing. This writing though, does not come without its own problems. Three screenwriters are credited, and it seems there were almost intractable script problems from day one. It took nearly two years to agree on the script, and despite its tremendous cleverness one still wonders if they got it completely right. But one does become deeply involved with Michael Keaton's character as well as the people around him who at turns help him out and stand in the way of bringing about his apotheosis. There are still some minor issues about the plotline for my money, but let's not be too pedantic. It's still a damn good film.


SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN (2012) D- Thalik Bendjalloul. (documentary) In the early 1970s a new singer/songwriter known as Rodriguez appeared on the scene, think a kind of Bob Dylan meets Jose Feliciano though with a tougher, more streetwise edge than either. But he failed to make an impression on the American public, and following a disastrous show when he was pretty much booed off stage, he virtually disappeared from the face of the Earth. Entirely by chance, his songs were played in an Apartheid South Africa where they struck a chord with the disaffected (white) youth of that pariah state. Unbeknown to the artist himself, his records started selling by the million there and at one point he was the most popular recording artist in South Africa. Small point: where did the money go? His American manager insists he never saw any of it, and that in the US he sold about six records: "I bought one, Rodriguez bought one and I think his family bought the other four", he reports.
Then in the 1990s two South African hyper-fans sought to find out what had happened to their hero. Did he set fire to himself on stage, as a popular rumour had it at the time, or did he shoot himself in the head on stage, which was another equally popular folk legend? The answer, as they eventually found, was stranger than either of these theories, but I try not do spoilers in this blog. See it for yourself and find out. The journey's worth it...


BEAUFORT (2007) D- Joseph Cedar (Israel) In 1982, during the disastrous Israeli incursion into southern Lebanon, troops occupy a decaying crusader castle and make it their home. For 18 years. Finally, in 2000, the soldiers are preparing to quit their mountain redoubt. But Hesbollah aren't about to let them go quietly...


A realistic and thoughtful Israeli film which, like the grunts themselves, is not interested in the politics of the situation. The soldiers are just happy to go and frustrated at the repeated delays that continue to put them in jeopardy. Like a lot of British war films of the sixties, there's the inevitable bolshie one who wants to know why they are there in the first place, but the others don't care. They just want to be back home with their families. Will they make it, or will Hesbollah's increasingly accurate shelling take them out even as the last convoy of trucks is taking them home?
A creditable offering, and not half as bellicose as its current generation of political leaders.


THE BABADOOK (2014) D- Jennifer Kent (Australia) A single mum does her best to bring up her son by herself in semi rural Australia. Then she finds a rather strange pop-up book called "The Babadook" on the bookshelf and selects it as bedtime reading. Big mistake. The story turns out to be much too dark for a six-year-old and she abandons it. But things begin to happen which suggest the book is not simply a work of fiction: perhaps it has a personality of its own and that personality is not nice. Not nice at all. In fact even their lives come under threat, despite Mum's attempts to exorcise its evil influence from their home.


An entertaining and genuinely frightening movie with some of the understated atmosphere of fear that was so brilliantly created  in the original 1963 film The Haunting (and not its terrible 1998 remake with Liam Neeson and Catherine Zeta Jones, which was more laughable than scary).


HAXAN (1922) W/D- Benjamin Christensen. (Danish, documentary) Also known in Britain as A History of Witchcraft through the Ages, this alternative title neatly sums up the subject matter of the film, which is based on a famous 16th century German text known as the Malleus Mallifecarum, or "Hammer of the Witches" which was a sort of do-it-yourself guide to finding your witch, torturing her (it was usually her) to get at the truth, then how to dispose of them once condemned. It is reckoned that followers of the guide may have murdered over a million innocent women in the three centuries following its publication, and this extraordinary film, incredibly advanced for its time, illustrates all the horrible steps from apprehension, through torture to execution. It uses straightforward documentary techniques but also some amazing dramatized scenes which set the scene for dramatized documentaries for the next century. Groundbreaking.


BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB (2001) P- Ry Cooder, D- Wim Wenders. In a "let's put on a show" tradition which goes back at least as far as A Midsummer Night's Dream, American musical icon Ry Cooder goes in search of some of Cuba's most talented jazz musicians in order to bring them together for a one-off concert in Amsterdam. In so doing he wanders the shanty towns of Havana to find a collection of legendary musicians, living quietly (and in great poverty) and puts his great idea to them. Laconic, laid back fellows that they are, they gladly agree, not only to Cooder's proposal but also to having Wim Wenders and his film crew record the whole thing for posterity. The result is an amazing piece of film making, unique in its structure and exceptional in terms of its musical quality. I happened to watch this film on "World Happiness Day" and I can say it was an excellent choice for that day (or any other come to that); watching it certainly made me happy for nearly two hours.


CHRONICLE (2012) D- Josh Trank. Three teenagers discover a new sinkhole has opened up in the woods close to their homes. They go inside to investigate, where they find a curious glowing material coating the walls. They go home, and find the next day that the hole has fallen in blocking the entrance. Then they find strange things are happening to them... They can move chess pieces by the power of their minds, even cause them to hang weightless in the air. Before long they can do much more, cause a car to veer off the road with a wave of the hand; next, they can fly...
But with great power comes great responsibility and these three adolescents are in no way equipped to deal with their newly acquired superpowers. Trouble, bad trouble is just around the corner.


Entertaining debut from director Josh Trank who was given a big budget to work with and amply justified the outlay. I thought the pace flagged a little about twenty minutes before the end but otherwise this was a very satisfying little movie.


MELANCHOLIA (2011) D- Lars von Trier. An exoplanet the size of Jupiter is discovered to have entered the Solar System and might be on a collision course with Earth. Some astronomers say it will just miss Earth, others (whose pronouncements are suppressed by governments fearful of mass hysteria) say there will be a direct hit, in which case all life on Earth, indeed Earth itself, will be annihilated. As the planet, named "Melancholia" draws nearer until it is clearly visible in the night sky, two sisters watch its approach with a mixture of apprehension and stoicism.


A fascinating premise created by one of the world's most innovative directors, this film is saturated with sublime images of the new planet and emotionally overpowering music, particularly Wagner, which is interesting in itself as it wasn't that long ago that Von Trier in his famous "Dogmae 95" treatise insisted that films should, among other things, be made solely in the 4/3 format and be free of any musical soundtrack. He breaks both of his own rules here, making a picture of incredible beauty and emotional power. Kirsten Dunst shows she is capable of turning in a really superior acting performance on screen, as does Kiefer Sutherland who plays her astronomer brother-in-law and demonstrates that he doesn't have to shoot someone every five minutes to make his screen presence felt. Astounding.