murahta

The Virgin Spring (1960), Dir: Ingmar Bergman

2010-01-29T22:27:00.000-08:00

While travelling to church one day to deliver candles, the daughter of peasants in 13^th Century Sweden is raped and murdered. The story might end there, but for the fact of the parents’ generosity. The attackers emerge from the forest where they left the daughter’s body seeking shelter for the night, which is unwittingly provided by their victim’s family.

It might not need saying, but this is not an easy film to watch. The rape scene is horrific (and I do question somewhat the decision to show as much of the act as Bergman did, although Agnes Varda’s Vagabond is one of very few films I’m familiar with that refuses to let viewers bear visual witness to the act), the revenge sequence terrifying and the parent’s collection of their daughter Karin’s body is absolutely heart wrenching. Then, too, is the build up to the rape sequence, involving one of the family servants, Ingeri, a pregnant young woman clearly meant to serve as a feral, dirty foil to Karin, a woman whose terror of the woods as a result of her own assault is so great that she refuses to enter and lets Karin go on alone. Although Ingeri eventually catches up to Karin, she is not in time to be of any real assistance.

The Virgin Spring is stark and beautiful. The relative silence gives the emotional turmoil of the various characters more time to resonate and sink in. The young brother of the attacker (arguably with his own complicity) futilely piling loose dirt on Karin’s body. Ingeri holding a rock she cannot throw at the attackers that eventually slips from her grip. The father as he removes each item of his daughter’s clothing from her attacker’s bag. That Ingmar Bergman gives his characters room to be and breathe makes the film all the more poignant and touching.

Rating: 10/10

Genre: Foreign/Drama

Length: 89 Minutes

Diabolique (1954), Dir: Henri-Georges Clouzot

2010-01-29T19:40:00.000-08:00

Having had enough of Michel’s cheating and abusive ways, his wife Christina and mistress Nicole plot together to kill him. Their bond (and nerves) starts to unravel, however, when Michel’s body turns up missing.

Diabolique is a taut and suspenseful thriller. In one scene, when relatively cool-headed Christina has grown nervous enough to start pacing and the camera keeps pace, I could feel my own anxiety level ratcheting up alongside hers . While many modern viewers might not find this film terrifying by today’s standards, the last five minutes or so of the film had me holding my breath like I haven’t since Cary Grant carried a poisoned Ingrid Bergman down the stairs in Notorious.

Clouzot does a wonderful job using objects in the scene to underscore the tension between the two women once their plan has gone awry. From screens to the phones to lamps, objects serve to visually reinforce the split between Christina and Nicole.

And the closeness again when they begin to believe everything is going to turn out OK:

Trailer*:

Rating: 10/10

Genre: Foreign/Thriller

Length: 119 Minutes

* You'll notice the big hit in the trailer is "Don't reveal the ending." I attempted to craft the review and very brief summary so as to give nothing away. It wasn't easy in this movie given the way truth and madness are a central part of the plot.

Drown, Junot Díaz

2010-01-29T00:55:00.001-08:00

For quite some time, Amazon has been recommending that I read The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and, at this point, I feel as if I’ve trained Amazon well enough to trust it. I was rather convinced I owned this book and that I even knew where I managed to hide it, but when I went hunting through my stacks I came up empty handed. Realizing, then, that I’d not be reading the book quite yet, I decided to dive into Junot Díaz’s debut, a collection of short stories entitled Drown. The stories center around the experiences of various men (and boys), with a heavy emphasis on the immigration experience. For the most part this book had me wondering about the hype and, occasionally, it left me cold.

Authenticity issues: I think it’s challenging to narrate from a child’s point of view and I certainly find myself questioning the authenticity of a child narrator’s voice from time to time. I’ve not yet been able to articulate what I think constitutes authenticity and I suspect it’s deeply personal, depending a lot upon the kind of child you were and the kind of children you continue to surround yourself with. However, just one story into Díaz’s collection and I was already having the debate, which is a good enough sign that I found the narrative problematic enough not to be fully immersed. Other stories, like “Fiesta, 1980” felt a little more successful in this regard and, fortunately, there is a wide range of narrators so it is not as if this was a collection-wide issue for me.

An (irrational) aversion: If I weren’t writing this so late I would say, with absolute certainty, that no fewer than 100 MFA programs had students churning out stories on the Raymond Carver model of short story. The thing is, it’s not even so much that I think Raymond Carver is bad, but he certainly never thrilled me so I’m not particularly moved to see any number writers pumping out Raymond Carver with a light sheen of something-ness (be it race, gender, religion, neighborhood, region, etc.) being the only deviations. The first story, “Ysrael” felt to be the most Carver-esque of the bunch, although I certainly felt the influence.* Other stories in the collection are a fairly light wash and didn’t feel altogether complete.

A fury: There are a lot of words out there not to be uttered in polite company because they are offensive, hurtful slurs. Ultimately, I think that whether or not these words can be used or reclaimed is something to be decided upon only by members of that group. I have lived in Dominican neighborhoods and taken trains with Dominican kids and teens. I am fully cognizant of what kind of language they use. However, the language that Diaz chooses to insert to capture these characters is a deliberate construct and I’m not convinced the language he picked is necessary. Further, it’s somewhat telling that use of slurs used against certain people is somehow meant to be indicative of racism, but dropping it casually into conversation is not. Frankly, Díaz isn’t Flannery O’Connor. A reader can’t just blow past him with a “Well, but times have changed.” By the point we were a few times in, I stopped to do my dishes. I cleaned my living room floors. I scrubbed the bathroom toilet. Cleaning is one of those things I hate to do most, but here I was doing it because I was so profoundly disturbed and firmly cast out from the story reading experience.

This book really made me wish I were the kind of reader that could give myself permission to walk away from books, but I'm still at the point where I convince myself if I just keep going, a book will get better. I really wanted to love this Drown. After all, I don’t think I’ve nestled down with short stories since Story magazine folded quite some time ago. And certainly, a lot of people loved this collection. Even people who are passionate about books I love. But I simply wasn’t blown away enough by to push past the points that disturbed me.

Rating: 5/10**

Genre: Literary Fiction

Pages: 208

* I tend not to read reviews or quotes on books I buy because I don’t want to be unduly biased, but if only I had I probably would have approached more cautiously. After all, there was pretty much a note from a reviewer stating “Someone from the Carver School Ahead.”

** Really, I’d almost love to give Drown a 4/10, but it was technically proficient in ways that a book like Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters was not, and there are stories that are quite memorable, at least in part.

Fables: Sons of Empire, Bill Willingham

2010-01-27T12:29:00.000-08:00

I wasn’t a really big fan of the Fables series when I first started reading it which surprised me a bit. After all, I was a voracious fairy tale reader when I was quite young, having devoured all of the “color” fairy tale books in my elementary school’s library in a matter of month. I think part of the reason behind that is that it seemed to me, at least in the beginning, Willingham was only skimming the surface of his fantastic character. I did think the interplay Adversary, the Homeland and Fabletown had a lot of potential, but much of the early volumes felt like soap opera. Within the past few volumes, however, we’ve gotten to know many of the characters on a deeper level and the struggle between the Adversary and the fables has intensified.

I must admit that gruff Bigby is one of my favorite characters in the series so I was happy to see him as a central focus again. I’m really enjoying watching his and Snow White’s pack of children learn, grow and become distinctive entities. I also thought casting Hansel (of Hansel and Gretel fame) as an ascetic, Puritan-like former witch hunter was a brilliant expansion of the original character. Sometimes it seems as if the ones Willingham selects are classic fables in name only, so it’s always nice to see more depth.

In the beginning of the series I was definitely reading to see if they got better and because I’d bought a few volumes at the beginning (since there’s nothing I hate more than discovering I love a comic book series only to run out of issues at hand all too quickly). I very nearly didn’t buy any more, but became convinced after a visit to Jim Hanley’s, that maybe I hadn’t given the series enough time. After all, I’d picked up DMZ, Y: The Last Man and Transmetropolitan within a similar time frame and could not put those down. But I’m glad I gave Fables more time to grow on me.

Rating: 9/10

Genre: Comic book/graphic novel, drama, fantasy

Pages: 200

The Crying of Lot 49, Thomas Pynchon

2010-01-26T15:27:00.001-08:00

After being made the executor of a former lover’s will, Oedipa Mas stumbles across a postal conspiracy. Because of the grand conspiracy/mystery/journey of discovery I couldn’t help but be reminded on some levels of Umberto Eco’s In the Name of the Rose, but Pynchon plunges the reader into much less stable ground. In The Crying of Lot 49, the world Mas inhabits is a little bit off. With character names reminiscent of hygiene products (Emory Bortz) and historical figures (Genghis Cohen) and characters and interactions that border on the surreal (although Pynchon’s deft use of language prevents them from seeming shallow or stereotypical), the atmosphere very much resembles a waking dream.

At one point, as the depth of the conspiracy appears to expand and Mas finally finds herself alone, she convinces herself to go out into the night and simply go where the story takes her. I was all too happy to follow along. I suspect individuals who need to have signposts in books (Where have I been? Where am I going? Where am I right now?) would be rather frustrated by The Crying of Lot 49. It is one of those novels not so much about plot or character, but about a meandering journey. There is no neat conclusion, not even a massive character revelation. Is this really a conspiracy? Is it delusion? Is it an ex-lover’s practical joke? Knowing what Mas takes away towards the end might depend in part on “What comes next,” but if Pynchon had any opinions on the matter, he deliberately chooses to withhold that information from the reader.

When it comes down to it, I’m not even entirely sure that I consider this a wholly satisfying book, although I immensely enjoyed Pynchon’s incredibly vivid prose and sense of humor and play. Reading it, I felt a bit like I was watching a Goddard film . . . appreciating it, but skimming along the surface of it just the same. But I’ve found this to be the case with a number of postmodern novels, and I can’t say that there’s a huge trend as to which ones I really dig into and which I do not. By the time I started to sink into The Crying of Lot 49 just a little bit, it was over. I do, however, feel this is one of those books that must be read more than once so I’ll surely be back again.

Rating: 7/10

Genre: Literary fiction

Pages: 183

On Haiti and Heroes

2010-01-25T22:39:00.000-08:00

“In overthrowing me, you have done no more than cut down the trunk of the tree of the black liberty in St-Domingue-it will spring back from the roots, for they are numerous and deep.”

– Toussaint L’Ouverture

For some reason today I was contemplating who my first black superhero was and it dawned on me it was probably Toussaint L’Ouverture. Ever since I first read about him in Trinidadian author’s C.L.R. James’s The Black Jacobins, I have been fascinated. The white savior narrative is so deeply ingrained in American culture that it was beyond refreshing to come across a black revolutionary leader, and one who orchestrated the defeat of the French while under Napoleon’s command no less.

For obvious reasons, a lot of people are interested in Haiti and that book is definitely a good place to start for those looking for a little Haitian history. It is certainly dense, but I found it a swift read, even as an undergraduate (I first read the book as part of an independent study in college on Haiti).

As far as takes on the current Haitian situation, I found these personal tales of expats exceptionally moving (I also recommend that people check out more Danticat because her writing is lovely and, well, Arcade Fire tends to blow me away, although for some reason I wasn’t familiar with them until I stumbled across them on Ta-Nahesi Coates’s blog):

Author Edwidge Danticat memorializes her cousin Maxo who died in the Haiti quake.

Singer Régine Chassagne discusses her homeland.

POC Reading Challenge

2010-01-25T21:05:00.000-08:00

I think that maybe, um, somewhere I might have, um, said something about no more challenges. The thing about that is, my projected reading list for 2010 so closely tracks this challenge that it would be silly not to participate.

There are five levels available for the POC Reading Challenge and I'm not hesitant to say that I'll be going for level 5, 16-25 books by people of color.

I've already finished American Born Chinese and The White Tiger. I'm not sure yet what my complete list will be, but counting up the To Be Read books I've pulled from my library to read this year, more than half are by writers of color. There's some Toni Morrison in there. Some Orhan Pamuk, Yusef Komunyakaa, Rita Dove, Salman Rushdie, Toni Cade Bambara, Tao Lin, Octavia Butler and Haruki Murakami. I have to admit it. Apart from some classics that have been shuffled to the bottom of the To Be Read pile for a good solid decade (cough), some of the books I've been looking forward to reading the most are by writers of color.

1. American Born Chinese, Gene Luen Yang

2. The White Tiger, Aravind Adiga

3. Drown, Junot Díaz

The Hidden Fortress (1958), Dir: Akira Kurosawa

2010-01-25T20:45:00.000-08:00

I have to admit, I’m a bit of a Kurosawa fanatic. The first time I attempted to watch The Seven Samurai, I couldn’t keep my eyes open. But after that abbreviated viewing it has been nothing but love. While, at this point I’ve probably seen 80% of Kurosawa’s films, I’d yet to watch The Hidden Fortress. The Hidden Fortress did not disappoint. A meditation upon the nature of what is seen/remains unseen, Kurosawa brilliantly intertwines shots of specter-like beings emerging from darkness and fog with ever shifting character and perception.

Sadly, the only embeddable trailer I’ve found is in Japanese, but it still gives a good sense of the grandiosity and beauty of Kurosawa’s filmmaking:

However, you can view an English version here.

Rating: 10/10

Genre: Foreign/Drama

Length: 139 min.

*I had some brilliant stills captured of such things, but Microsoft automatic downloads seem to have become my new nemesis . . . Dear Microsoft, there is nothing more aggravating to night owls than to step away from their computer for a few moments only to find out that their computers have helpfully rebooted to install new updates and what they had been working on is unrecoverable because they had been in the process of overwriting files. I desperately need to change the automatic update setting.

L'Avventura (1960), Dir: Michaelangelo Antonioni

2010-01-19T21:52:00.000-08:00

“How can it be that it takes so little to change, to forget.” – Claudia

While out on a day trip, a member of a boating party mysteriously disappears. Brought together by the search for her, the missing woman’s boyfriend and best friend become lovers.

L’avventura is an elegant and stark film, with superb camera work and costuming. Because I could not help myself before I started to view this film, I glanced at the Netflix reviews and saw so much “sterility,” “pretty but . . .” “I know that this is supposed to be good for you, but . . .” that I very nearly didn’t watch the film. I was afraid that I would find Antonioni too much like Goddard, a director who interests me at times but rarely impacts me on an emotional level. And I can appreciate how L’avventura could have gone that way, too. It is, after all, a depiction of emotional sterility, all the actors arrested at a moment right before they might actually concern themselves with the woman’s disappearance (and some, likely, so vapid and shallow as to never have been close to caring about the disappearance as something other than a slight deviation from scheduled gaiety). But I found myself moved by the distancing Sandro and Claudia attempted (beautifully reinforced cinematically) so much so that I ached for the two at the end and their uneasy release.

Rating: 9/10

Genre: Foreign/Drama

Length: 143 min.

The trailer:

And because it was impossible to narrow these down to a few gorgeous shots:

Covers That Make Me Smile

2010-01-19T14:10:00.000-08:00

A friend who didn’t realize I’d spent the whole day of audio south of the Mason Dixon line, sent me this fantastic cover of a Blu Cantrell song, which was a dirty little favorite when I was younger. In fact, when my father was stationed in Abilene for a second time and we were driving (each in our own car at that point because my brother and I had bypassed driving age) cross country from Virginia to Abilene, I alternated between a mixed tape that featured the original version of the song and an audiotape of Sanctuary by William Faulkner. Of course, Faulkner being what he is, I popped the tapes in completely out of order and didn’t even realize until I was deep in the mountains of Tennessee:

This reminded me of another cover that makes me happy:

And lastly, another delightful take on a song I played nonstop in high school: