bringing out the dead

just went back in time to watch a paul schrader flick that i didn't watch back in the day.



bringing out the dead

(and i, too, like some of you, can't help but use a princess bride voice in my head when i say the title.)

but in general i liked this movie much more than I expected to. i remember that it got uneven reviews back in the day, but ultimately i really liked the story.

schrader seems to be always writing these stories which are straight up redemption stories with a very sort of clear grammar of fall and redemption -- but never so on the nose that you walk away from the movie feeling preached at.

in fact, what i think i like MOST about his movies is that often, his *very flawed* hero is weary and desperate, but in some way recovering or doing better than he has been doing -- and then he gets faced with this temptation which is very clearly the point of entry *back* into the darkness that he was starting to emerge from -- and here's where the stroke of genius (for me) is -- Schrader has made the character's self / longings / motivations so *real* to me -- that I want it too. For the character. Even while I don't want it. While I hate it. I, the viewer, can enter pretty fully into the magnitude of the moral choice. Understand the stakes, and then choose the *wrong* road.

I don't feel like writers are able to make us feel so much consonance with the characters very often.

Light Sleeper & Auto Focus really have this same thing going on, too. And so if and when the characters make it out of the slough of despondence that they choose (different outcomes in each of these movies) - it feels *so much more* hard won / lost -- so much more MOVING to me as a viewer.

(some of bringing out the dead *is* uneven. use of voice over, jarring camera work which isn't evenly utilized throughout the film. some bits that seem tonally wrong -- BUT ultimately, i'd argue that the story (all the plot points) and the characters *work* really well.)

Reminds me of Pedro The Lion's work. Beautiful depiction of the darkness ends up alluding to the beauty of hope and light, too...

peace~

we are the ones we have been waiting for

clipping from sojourners --

When I was growing up, it was continually repeated in my evangelical Christian world that the greatest battle and biggest choice of our time was between belief and secularism. But I now believe that the real battle, the big struggle of our times, is the fundamental choice between cynicism and hope. The choice between cynicism and hope is ultimately a spiritual choice, and one that has enormous political consequences.

good words follow these -- all from Jim Wallis' Stanford Commencement address. He talks about vocation -- inspiring and challenging for those of us who often think of ourselves as adrift in that particular river of questions...

attn: artist-types feeling patient and ready for inspiration

go here.

no really. its cool.

and if you don't like it. don't tell me. because i might not like you anymore.

kudos to Joe

my friend Joe Scalzo just won an award...in the Associated Press Society of Ohio's 2003 newspaper competition...

First-place honors went to: Joe Scalzo, best sports writer. About Scalzo, the judges wrote: "Writes with attitude and confidence. All of his stories and columns are a pleasure to read."

Scalzo also finished in third place as best sports columnist with the judges writing: "Funny stuff, self-deprecating at times. Written to be enjoyed. Columns have attitude and personality without being arrogant."

if you want to write to Joe -- email me -- and i'll send you his e-mail.

those of you who are his friends aren't surprised to hear him praised as a talented writer -- i just want to know when he managed to get that arrogant tone out of his voice...

repented? bless you.

Given my post yesterday, this email update from Nicole Poston, a woman in my church, (who is studying spanish in Honduras) caught my attention. She's talking about her teacher:

He teaches me Honderenismos like the phrase you say when you are about to sneeze and then you don’t. De lo arrenpentidos esta lleno el Reino de los Ceilos. The Kingdom of Heaven is full of repenters already. The idea is that when you sneeze you are repenting, so when you don’t sneeze people say this to mean, don’t worry too much, there are enough repenters already there.

sneezing / repenting?

sneezing

i LOVE sneezing.

it is one of the perfect human experiences. if i were starting a religion, one of the ten pillars would have to do with how sacred sneezing is.

they expurgate evil fluid.

for some they spring from light.

they include uncontrolled feelings.

they demand complete attention.

they sew together the dialectic of profound felt experience with insistent public expression.

like spiritual insight, they are almost impossible to conjure or manufacture.

a fake sneeze may fool others, but to the faker, its just a stupid irrelevant replica.

~

good flix / part two

Capturing the Friedmans is a compulsively watchable commentary on the american family, the politics of sex in our culture / suburbia, the nature of hysteria...and more subtly on the voyeurism & documentary-culture which define:

the blogosphere.

reality television.

parasocial relationships / industry exploitation of celebrity culture.

i'm not a naysayer of any of these cultural realities. obviously i'm in the blogosphere with two feet...but the mcluhanesque idea that we only understand the ways our technology impacts us -- "in the rear view mirror and fading fast" -- seems particularly apt in this particular story.

the filmmakers have a tenderness for all of their characters -- and it would be easy for them to demonize several of the characters -- so the remarkable ability to maintain the full roundess of David (the amateur documentarian) and the Mom...

is amazing.

The final shot of Howard Friedman -- is a coup in the whole voyeurism subplot which involves YOU the viewer in a complicated ambivalent relationship with your own watching (a story line arguably initiated with David's dictum, "If you're not me, STOP watching this! This is PRIVATE!)

and on a MUCH lighter note --

but a great documentation of the *beauty* of how a cultural performance can give some otherwise marginal members of a group both a grammar and a voice for participation in (ultimately) the larger cultural millieu is --



Spellbound

and while we're on the subject -- the other must-see-andrew-list-of-documentaries-for-everybody?

Hoop Dreams



American Movie



and hands on a hard body



for a less universal recommendation, but a must-watch if you live in my geographical world --

Go Tigers is a great depiction of the complexities of how football culture interplays with everything else here in mideastern Ohio.

credibility matters

i mean that title NOT in the way you first read it.

there's been a horrific shift in the american political landscape which conflates:

celebrity culture *&* infotainment *&* religious discourse

and now people say things (regularly) like:

but, how you know that he (X politician -- fill in the blank) is _a good christian_.

OR

at least you always know _where he stands on things_. He takes one position and always sticks to it.

OR

its our duty to support _men of god_ in their political office.

I understand that in the post-clinton / monica-gate / it depends on the what the meaning of is *is*...

that the idea of a SIMPLE STRAIGHTFORWARD LEADER seems like a good solution to the danger of legalese shiftyness.

but this morning, while reading the news, I bumped into this story about the "godly" John Ashcroft whose minions have been working night and day to carefully parse the meaning of

SEVERE PHYSICAL AND MENTAL SUFFERING -- words which constrain the define the borderland between torture and coercion within the US consititution....

Of course this stuff probably won't get airtime or real play in the mainstream newsmedia -- but the reality is that politics and government and legislative demand an ability to live in the murky realms of grey which define the ugly land of legalese...

why won't the evangelicals pass around excerpts from this memo on email linked up to what a faithful upstanding member of his congregation Ashcroft is?

...

and the problem with voting for George Bush because he's a simple, straighforward fellow is this:

he *is* responsible for all of the specific policy decisions that have been made on his watch by his people.

Cheney's Halliburton fiasco -- is PART of G.W.'s moral character.

Ashcroft's careful legal defense for the untenable torture/coercion at various sites in the U.S. occupation --- IS part of of GW's moral character.

The new US foreign policy of unilateral engagement based on the simple (and wrongheaded) suspicion of WMD -- is part of GW's moral character.

that is -- if moral character is why we vote on presidents or politicians -- I'd much rather vote on their policies and their appointments.

movie thumbs up

here's the list of recommendations from my last two weeks of (catching up) movie viewing:

Girl With A Pearl Earring



I love how the director / cinematographer cultivate this sense that -- there are ways of seeing the world -- that are better and worse. All the good ways of seeing include -- paying attention.

by the time Vermeer finds out / connects with / teaches Grete about cultivating a way-to-see-the-world -- we're right along with him. And her. Because of the beautiful filming.

And speaking of beautiful filming:

Elephant



thanks erik for reminding me to rent this film

By Gus Van Sant -- is a great film. I'm relieved to be able to say so, because, though i Liked GoodWillHunting -- I didn't think it had the same courageous VISION that Drugstore Cowboy & My Own Private Idaho had. It's like he has this beautiful way of seeing the broken parts of the world. That definitely comes out in this Columbine-esque tale.

Both films are slow, but demand patient attention.

I had more, but have to go grade...

Thinking of you (that is, if you're reading, those of you who I'm thinking of...)

peace~