The Mother's Day Tribute

Bring on the nostalgia.

It was my mom who took me to see my first movie in an actual movie theater. We went to the American Theater in Parkchester, in the Bronx. I was two years old at the time. Before this, I'd been exposed to television, mostly Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. The American is one of those tiny movie houses that looks exactly as it did in the 1960's, with wrought iron framing to its chairs (the "new seats" advertized in the marquee are from 1975). My mom had gone to that same movie theater as a kid. Back then, there had also been The Circle Theater, a couple blocks away, but The American, larger in size and more centrally located in the neighborhood, stood the test of time (while The Circle became a Lucile Roberts gym). She took me there to see The Adventures of Milo and Otis (1986). Even though this movie came out before I was born, they often showed older movies at a discounted rate.



Note: The Mr Pizza to the left is also still there. Their pizza is baller.



    

 
Keen to not be one of those parents who brings a crying kid to a movie, my folks eased me in to the process of sitting still for a long period of time in public with a couple local restaurants. Once it was clear I wasn't going to throw a fit while I waited for pancakes to arrive at our table, I guess they assumed I was ready to sit in a dark with popcorn. According to my mom, I was completely mesmerized by all 76 minutes of the film. I was particularly fixated on the birthing scenes, in which Milo and Otis become parents and the audience watches a litter of kittens and puppies being born. I started miming this scene with my hands once we got home, making a circle with one hand and pushing my other hand through it. "They went floop!" I would say as my hand/kitten was born. At this point, my mom thought it was as good a time as any to explain where babies come from. Yes, when I was two.

It was, thus, at the age of two, I began to understand the world with a more solid grasp of where I came from. A sense of origin and an understanding of self are definitely two things I've gotten from my mom. It's a somewhat archetypal thing, the idea of Mother and Birth as the place and time of origin for all things, from people to the universe in certain myths. In my case, I suppose it's genuinely true. My mom has always been the one of my parents who has been keen to educate my on my family's cultural history, on the truth behind things my dad would rather have remain as skeletons in the closet. For this I owe her my thanks.

The other major thing I owe to my mom is the skill to loaf around. I say "skill" because there's a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it. Being a slovenly couch potato every day of your life is both physically and mentally unhealthy. Every now and again, however, it's perfectly healthy to stay in your pajamas all day and watch movies.

I also say "skill" because I've learned that some people don't know how to enjoy doing nothing. I've meet several people who have told me they find it difficult to watch movies because they either can't stay focused on one thing for so long or they don't see loafing around as productive. These are ludicrous claims as far as I'm concerned. Ether that, or a tragic result of our society's diminishing attention span. The thing about loafing around is that it actually is productive. Rest and "zoning out" are good ways to recharge, to empty mental space for new challenges and information. To this day, when my mom and I take off from work to spend time together, we rarely go out and do anything other than groceries. Precious time is usually spent snuggled on the couch or in bed watching something mind-numbingly feel-good like Kate and Leopold (2001) or Julie and Julia (2009).



We're going to be here for a while.



I should also thank my mom for recognizing the type of kid I was- an introvert. A lot of people mistake introverts for being people who don't like people. An introvert is actually someone who uses a lot of energy during social interaction, whereas an extrovert gains energy from social interaction. There's a fantastic TEDTalk in which Susan Cain explains this in detail, especially the ways in which the power of introverts can be leveraged. Another way to look at it, and how I look at it as a professional educator, is that at the end of the day some kids need a ball and some kids need a pillow. Guess which kind I was (no matter how much I tried to deny it).

I'm awake. I swear. Naps are evil! I....! zzzzzzzz

So, belatedly for Mother's Day, and every day, I guess, I'm thankful my mom successfully taught me the art of loafing. I've since found friends who have also mastered this art and have been able to pass it on to those who feel insecure being "unproductive". To those of you still unsure about the validity of staying on your butt all day, I challenge you to find copies of your two favorite movies, sit back with a snack and someone you love. You may be surprised at how the day seems to disappear with seemingly nothing accomplished. Just remember, you're accomplishing a lot of things your mind and your body have been needing for a while.

What Christian Social Workers Wish Was Legal- Black Snake Moan

[Note: Sooooo many spoilers.]

The thing about life is that is doesn't always go as planned. Not a huge revelation for most of you reading (I hope), but this week's ruminations on film is a written testament to this. I had all these plans to write about my feelings about the 1956 remake of Ben Hur. It should be noted my many, deep, and conflicted feelings toward this film are part of why I began this blog. I was set with screen shots, gifs, and snarky remarks. Then Black Snake Moan (2006) happened.

Yes, this movie happened to me.

I say "happened" because it fit into a strange pair of experiences that happened to me in the same evening. I also say this because the story and performances are more than a little traumatizing in the way only truly spectacular film can be. While I'm not sure I agree the all of the message this film  seems to be putting forth or all the artistic choices made by the director Craig Brewer, it worked for me as a piece of cinema that was both entertaining spectacle and thought provoking art. I'm still trying to unpack and process the MANY things that happened in this movie. One of the reasons it's particularly difficult is because of the ways in which the entertaining spectacle aspects of it smash against the thought provoking art portions of it. Never in my life have I seen another film in which the tone of the story was in such stark contrast to the images it presents. For example, take a look at two posters that were used to promote the film:

        

 
One poster looks like something you might come across while watching PBS. The other looks like something you might find in the special section of the video store (if video stores still existed). Not only they imagery, but note the different tag lines: "What ties you down will set you free," vs. "Everything is hotter down south." Without a doubt, the marketing of this movie is a dman shame and probably part of the reason it didn't even come across my radar when it was first in theaters.

[Note: Remember those spoilers I was talking about...?]

Now what is this film even about? With the two sets of imagery duking it out above, it's hard to tell. Basically, this movie plays out like a guide to the Stockholm Syndrome approach to healing. A righteous, religious, black man, Lazerous (Samuel L "Motherfuckin" Jackson), finds a messed up, nymphomaniac, white chick, Rae (Christina Ricci) on the side of the road. He takes her home, cleans her up, then chains her up when she tries to get away, because damn it, her healin' aint done! She's got a poison inside her, like his wife who left him for his brother, and it needs to be sucked out! Exercised like a demon! Over the course of nursing her back to physical and mental health, Lazerous returns to his God-given gift of blues guitar and manages to nurture a budding relationship with the town's pharmasist. At a certain point, Rae doesn't even need to be chained up; she stays and lets herself receive the care he gives. Wouldn't ya know it? They end up healing each other.

Save my soul with your devil music! The irony will be heartwarming!

Things are not nearly as cut and dry as all that. As I said earlier, there's still a lot I'm still working through in my head about this film. One is this contradiction in images and messages. Another is its handling of race and religion. The casting and performances also gave me a lot to think about. At this point I should probably talk about the thing that happened to me right before I went to watch this movie at a friend's apartment. Religion happened.

I had planned to pick up my laundry by 8:50pm since I thought the laundromat closed at 9. In the short walk between my apartment and the laundromat is a house of nuns. No, not a Convent. That's down the street from the Nun House. Elderly Sister Sheila came upon me on the street as I approached the corner. As usual, she was bright-eyed and had something very important to tell me. Also as usual, she had virtually no recollection of who I was. We have met a couple times, but Sister Sheila is a little bit colorful in the way that only those sort of perpetually happy elderly folk with selective memories can be. Perhaps she vaguely recalled my face, but she doesn't know my name nor when we met. I'd like to imagine she knows I'm a member of the parish congregation, but I think I'm aiming too high.

"Have you seen the chapel we have inside?" she asked excitedly. I had, in fact, been inside the Casa de Nun. I explained that I had seen the chapel but aparently I was wrong. I had only been in what used to be the chapel in the 1950s. There was a new one I needed to see NOW.

Surprise! You're about to get kidnapped!

Sister Sheila took me by the elbow and began to pull me up the stoop to the porch of the red brick Victorian house on the corner. I still had my laundry in mind; I wasn't quite sure when the laundromat closed for the night and was worried if she started telling her tales from forty years ago (as she's known to do) I would have to leave my clothes in the the dryer over night. Also, all the clean underwear I possessed was currently in said dryer. Things could have quickly become dire. I supposed I could have politely told her I couldn't stay and briskly walked away, but I believe sometimes the universe puts detours in your way for a reason. The Quest Structure in general assumes detours and distractions are part of achieving an overarching goal. Many spiritual leaders, from ancient Vikings to Niel Geiman, assert that what you do in unexpected situations have karmic outcomes that can be rewarding or damning. With this in mind, I let myself be abducted.

Once inside, we went farther back into the house, past the space I thought was the chapel. As it turned out, the current chapel is actually located at the rear of the house in a newer addition that looks hyper modern, and a little out of place in comparison to the rest of the house. Sister Sheila began giving me a personal tour of the chapel's highlights. I was invited to touch an elaborate wood carving of the Stations of the Cross that had been made and gifted by "someone who lived right on this very block!" We also took some time to admire a beautiful Coptic papyrus painting from Egypt.

After this quick and intimate tour of the private chapel inside Nun Haven, Sister Sheila walked me back to the sidewalk where she had briefly kidnapped me. Just before we said good-bye, she said to me, almost as an afterthought, "The light on the porch is always on. We need people to feel safe." As I went on my way, I tried very hard to make sense of what had just happened.

To my supreme fortune, the laundromat closes at 9:30pm and not 9pm as I originally thought. As I gathered up my clothes I received a text from a friend. "Black snake moan nowish at our place if you want to join!" I did want to join! Black Snake Moan was one of the movies I had been meaning to watch for almost a year. I first learned about it when I googled "under-rated movies." It appeared in a list here and has since been on my personal list of films to see.

Not going to lie, I think my somewhat personal and incidental religious experience that evening impacted the eye with which I interpreted the religious themes of the movie. I thought it was heavy-handed and righteous. That could just be a cultural issue- as a filthy papist from the north east, I have trouble taking certain strands of Protestantism seriously, particularly evangelical strands. As someone who works in the non-profit world, I also find it upsetting when religion is the sole way a problem is resolved in works of fiction.

I'm not sure if watching this with a group of people was better or worse for fully appreciating it, but I'm all about ongoing commentary, and that gets a little weird when you're by yourself. At one point in watching, one of my friends asked if it was directed by Quinten Tarrentino. It wasn't, but for a moment I'd wondered the same thing. We both thought this because so many of the shots had a super pulp style to them. Some of the shots looked like the were ripped from Planet Terror or Grindhouse. The retro bluesy soundtrack, both electric and acoustic, also echo Tarrentino's current thematic fixations, as well as his sometime collaborator, Roberto Rodriguez' style. It's easy for your mind to make these connections when there are shots like this:

And this:

The thing about this movie that's in stark contrast to a Tarrentino or Rodriguez wet dream is that it's not a wet dream. While a woman's body and female sexuality are prominently featured on camera, it isn't the point of these shots. These actions and behaviors indicate something greater about the character and the story, rather than being the object story and characters are mapped upon.

As for performances, I have a lot of feelings about the lead roles. My strongest feeling is that Christina Ricci needs to be in more stuff. Rather, she needs to be in more stuff that lets her show the breadth of her talent. Who knew she could do damaged and sultry? In the same role no less! It's more than a little upsetting how her character was advertized, but I'll save my diatribe on that for another post.

The other major take-away from this film is that if there's anyone I want to have around when I'm having a psychotic break down, it's Samuel L "motherfuckin" Jackson. Now, whenever I feel I just can't deal with whatever's happening in life, I just imagine him holding my face and telling me "You're going to get your shit together. And I will. And I do. And this line from the movie has become a catch phrase among my group of friends. He's been quoted a couple times saying he believes the role of Lazerous in Black Snake Moan is his best performance, and I can't disagree. You know the way Julius says he plans to retire at the end of Pulp Fiction (1994)? Imagine checking in on his character 30 years later. That's Lazerous. With a character that intense, it's easy to create a caricature, but he plays the role with sincerity and and truth.

Get off my lawn... and repent!

Then there's Justin Timberlake. I just... The thing about Justin Timberlake is that I want to like him in this role. He's not bad, perse, he just not beleivable. Southern boy trying to make it big should be easy for him. I mean, he's from Tallahassee, right?  I think he's just too much of a pop star for me to take him seriously in this role. It may not have been the best choice for a film debut. I mean, Mark Walberg didn't start in film with roles like Micky Ward in Fighter (2010). Heck, in his first film appearance, he played himself. Private Tommy Lee Haywood in Renneaisance Man (1994) was the first time he played a role that wasn't Marky Mark. It was a more believable leap from Calvin Klein underwear model to endearing army recruit in a comedy. Half way through the movie I re-cast JT's role with Jake Gyllenhaal in my head. That's really all I can say on the matter.

I'll cry YOU a river!

Further concerns I had, in addtion to the issues of marketing, I think the dealings with race in this movie are more than a little problematic. Rather, for a film whose storyline presents unrealistic miracle redemption, racism the one morally shamefull quality that is never healed or redemed. In the story's climax, I found myself wondering "Are we just going to fly past the fact that Justin Timberlake just called Samuel L. Jackson a Nigger (with a capital fucking N and a hard "R")...? Okay. I guess we are." Five minutes later, Lazerous is the best man in JT's wedding. Maybe this was all part of the sort of mainstream racism present in the world of the story, like how Rae wears a union jack on her t-shirt through 2/3 of the film. Or like Lazerous' reason for not going to the police when he found her on the side of the road (fear of being charged with her assault "just for being black in the area"). Maybe we're supposed to assume or hope there's a missing scene where the characters work shit out. Still, for a film attempts to address issues graphically and head-on, race was confusingly side-swept.

One thing I'm definitely going to need to side-sweep myself, just for the sake of time, is sound in this movie. It is out of hand AMAZING. Not just the soundtrack. SOUND itself is spectacular. I'm honestly shocked this film wasn't nominated anywhere for sound. What I was hearling throughout the movie just as intentional as what I was seeing and deeply impacted my understanding of the world and mental state of the characters. Much like my thoughts on sexism, I'll be saving my feelings on sound in Black Snake Moan for another post. There's just too much to say.

To review, I wasn't planning to write about Black Snake Moan this week. I wasn't even planning to watch this movie. But sometimes, like a nun on a mission, life and happenstance take you places you never thought you'd go. It's possible that redemption is what lies beyond detours one willfully follows, or maybe just a great evening of mind-blowing cinema with friends. Either way, I highly recommend indulging distractions- they may help you on your quest or at least give you puzzles to unpack as you continue questing.

Wes Anderson and the Cult of Nostalgia

[Note: Even though this is about Wes Anderson, this actually contains some spoilers for Midnight in Paris, a film directed by Woody Allen, which has nothing to do with Wes Anderson... Or does it...?]

Quiz Time: Is this a Wes Anderson movie or a Hans Christian Anderson book?

In Midnight In Paris (2011) Owen Wilson's character,  Gil, writes a screenplay about a man who works in a "nostalgia shop." A nostalgia shop, as Gil explains, is "a place where they sell old things, memorabilia." What does this have to do with director Wes Anderson? Didn't Woody Allen direct Midnight In Paris? Those are both sensible questions.

The thing about Wes Anderson is that he IS a nostalgia shopkeeper. 

You know Wes Anderson from his "quirky" and "off-beat" movies that scream "stick a bird on it," like Rushmore (1998), The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), and Moonrise Kingdom (2012), to name a few.  Like a lot of (let's call them) auteur filmmakers, he tends to collaborate with the same actors, writiers, and crew on many of his movies. Among actors and writers, this mainly means Jason Schwartzman, Bill Murray, and college chum Owen Wilson. Can you imagine the crazy shenannegans of these two strapping Texans in their college days? Probably not, since they were most likely closed away in a dark room writing Bottle Rocket (1996), which Owen and brother Luke went on to star in.

What's located in his nostalgia shop? Lots of wood paneling, patterned fabrics, and a lingering scent of the French new-wave (I hear they don't use deodorant). It's a bit like a temple or an occult shop. Among Puertorrican communities, we call this a botanica, a store serving the needs of Santeria religious practices. Wes Anderson's occult is the Cult of Nostalgia. Watching one of Anderson's films is like seeing an old, weird movie, except you're there on opening weekend, in the 70's, and there's no chance to see it again except in theaters because VCRs haven't been invented yet. If you were alive in the 70's, then this literally triggers all the warm fuzzy memories you have of that time. If you weren't alive then, it triggers all the warm fuzzy idealized images of that time.

Much like the French Renaissance courts recalled Europe's Middle Ages, (as a pastoral canvas covered in fair maidens and knights errant), Wes Anderson draws viewers into a soft, primary-colored sense of security, then dashes it to bits with its severely messed up course of events. [Seriously, reread Sir Gawain and the Green Knight- twisted business]. In fact, it seems like The Knight Errant tends to be the protagonist in all of Anderson's films, or at least the character who drives most of the plot. This would also explain why all of the female characters in his films are either prizes in love triangles or in need of a champion to joust away conflict. In fact, the main conflict in each of Anderson's films tends to be about courtly or fraternal love, the two main themes of those nostalgic tales of knights and damsels. It's safe to say that Anderson's nostalgia shop also contains a copy of Mallory's Le Mort d'Arthur, Chrétien de Troyes' stuff, and some of Marie de France's leis. Furthermore, much like characters in Aurthurian legends, actors tend to pop in and out of scenes in these flicks, as if jumping out of the wings of a stage. The presence of lots of doors, windows, and hatches facilitate these actions.

They were all out of shining armor, so I grabbed this.

Speaking of doors n' such, lets talk about the sets and locations this guy uses. Often when watching one of Anderson's movies, I find myself wondering, "When are these stories set?" Occasionally it's made apparent, but often audiences need to look for clues. I find myself picking apart the environment looking for hints, thinking things that I haven't thought since my intro set design class in high school. Things like, "it's before t.v. but after vacuum cleaners, they use metal buckles instead of plastic clasps." Each set and location work for each shot work as a projection of each character, telling much more than dialogue or any kind of non-verbal acting could do. This is not to say his characters are shallow or can't stand without the set. The very opposite, but only because the associations our minds make to the objects, colors, and textures included in a shot evoke certain story lines in our minds. Sets and characters are a single thing, working together to tell a single story rather that providing a place for a story to take place, creating a tapestry (to use the medieval comparisons I made earlier)- a seamless mis en scene. [Note: Jeez, that sounded pretentious.] You could say his shots are 3D in the sense that they project out their intent rather than build in and on top of characters and plot. On a literal level, shots are constructed like old school Disney frames, with different depths illustrated and layered on top of each other for a single image. The result is a lush, textured, fathomless world that speaks clearly for itself; dialogue, at times, seems incidental.

Do you even care what anyone is about to say? No! Because Bill Murray in those pants!

[Note: Here Be Spoilers! Beware!]

The notion of a nostalgia shop in Midnight In Paris is meant to signal a disengagment with the present. Gil was so unwilling to confront many of the issues in his life, that he chose to inhabit a romanticized the past, specifically the 1920's. As one would expect from Woody Allan's m.o., all the authors he idolizes (and reasons he wishes to live in their era) are revealed to be tragic, petty, and unfulfilled. But wait, doesn't that make them all the more cool? No. It doesn't. It just makes them looser dill-weeds who probably just need a hug, but eew, they reek of smoke and alcohol. The huge irony is that the people who live int he 20's idealize the Belle Epoque, the period stretching from the 1870's until the start of WWI. Of course the people of the Belle Epoque idealize eras farther back, and so on, presumably until early man who thought, "Man, living in trees, those were the days! This whole bipedal business is just a departure from real living."

Not only am I not sure what year it is, it's unclear what movie I'm in!

Gill eventually finds balance between admiring the triumphs and aesthetic of the past while living fully in the present. By letting go of obsession with a constructed fantasy, he is able to confront the personal and professional crises in his life. Nostalgia becomes a savored retreat rather than something wrought with the longing of addiction. But what of dear Wesley? More importantly, what of his nostalgia shop? Is it just a place for him to hide from that all too awful present reality? Are we just watching a man work out personal trauma and inability to cope as it literally plays out on the silver screen? Possibly.

As it turns out, dear Wes Anderson's personal life filters into his films quite a bit. He too used to base plays he produced as a kid on well known works of fiction (much like the main protagonist of Rushmore). Wikipedia also tells me that he believes his parents' divorce was the most defining moment in his and his brothers' lives, (much like the siblings in The Royal Tenenbaums). There's also a lot that can be said about his obsession with larger than life father figures, (Bill Murray in virtually all of his films), but I could probably go on for another six paragraphs on that alone. As far as I can see, however, the process of working his shit out via cinema is working. Certainly working financially. Really, he should turn to his parents and say:

If the Brothers Anderson are still working through the trauma of their parents' divorce, partially stuck in a place in the past, it would explain dear Wes' Cult of  Nostalgia and certain aspects of his film making I find most enjoyable. The thing about Wes Anderson's movies that I love is that they take kids as seriously as kids take themselves. I don't know how you felt about all the deep and profound thoughts you had as a kid, but for me they certainly weren't adorable, fleeting, or insubstantial. I hated when adults thought I was "cute." It felt patronizing. Maybe that says more about the kind of kid I was than children in general, but it definitely points to the fact that kids feel they aren't taken seriously nearly often enough. When you're a kid, shit matters! And why shouldn't it? If you've only been alive nine years, then an hour is like two days in adult time. In this way, it's been asserted that Charles Schultz's Peanuts characters have been a huge influence in Anderson's films. (Especially their wardrobes). Maybe this is an underlying factor of any unsorted emotions. Maybe no one took seven-year old Wesley's input all that seriously. Maybe, if someone had just listened, we'd know a very different film maker.

So the next time you see Wes Anderson, give him a hug. Tell him "Ya' did good kid," with a Texan accent if possible. Let him know you're here for him. Here to listen. Say "Thanks for sharing," when he's done talking, then check in a couple days later. Only do this if you're willing to accept the consequences, though; he may start writing his first thriller.

Good night, Wesley. Good work. Sleep well. I'll most likely kill you in the morning.