South Africa after Mandela's Release

One wonders how Clint could be doing the films he does based on the fact that he is betterknown as a no-nonsense actor of many westerns, in films like The Good The Bad and The Ugly by Sergio Leone.But here he is many years later dealing with difficult topics like a child kidnapping with Angelina Joli and now a film, Invictus which shows South Africa reforming after Mandela's prison release.
Here is a golden globe award winner film, starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon; the story of Nelson Mandela taken from the perspective of his attempt to reunite the country.It goes into the mind of the man as he recites the poem that gave him a sense of purpose and transports you across rugby playing fields as the country gears itself for recognition in the political sphere.
I wonder too how much of Morgan's monologues came from him originally but no matter,I take it that he must have been inspired enough to be as conciliatory as his lines portrayed him to be.He had to face his peers who challenged his pacifist ways in not excluding the Africkaner security people who guarded the previous President and he had more than enough savvy to keep some of the former cabinet members too.
One would have liked to see more of his personal dilemma. The absense of his wife of so many years and a daughter who could not see how her dad would obtain political unity through sport, made him a lonely man. That loneliness was effectively shown when he wanted to see his daughter once and she turned him down and then when they were together she commented on how her mother did not want to have reminders from Mandela, in the form of rosary bead bracelet.
The film is not drowned in politics, instead it takes a youthful approach in showing how Mandela would deal with other nations and keep rugby in the back of his mind. And the final showdown with a New Zealand team combines rugby playing with the notion that South Africa wanted to be accepted as a reformed country. That was Mandelas dream come true.

Being Unwelcomed

I don’t know how they got there, they must have walked all the way or hid under trucks that crushed them whenever bumps were hit. It did not matter to the hosting nation that they would all huddle at soup kitchens on the Calais coast yet there was not to be any contact with the locals. If you were caught abetting these immigrants you could be sent to prison and if they swam across the Channel and drowned, they would be sent back anyway. Their soaked bodies would be useless across the sea.

The story is quite believable, there have been issues with people wanting to get across the channel just like that and the acting is quite realistic. Aside from a couple of slight editing glitches, like one where you see the French gold medal winner picking up the Kurd boy at the soup kitchen all of a sudden. One supposes he must have seen him waiting in line for food, as before, only the public likes to be reassured of a certain sequencing of events in the editing process.

I was not clear of how the police obtained the gold medal from the dead body of the boy; maybe there was a mention that it was found with his mate that accompanied him to the house of the swimming instructor. The two Kurds were hosted at this instructor’s house against the will of the authorities who questioned the man on several occasions; that was the backdrop to creating the necessary tension in the plot as one wondered whether the boy would get sufficient training before his host would be caught. Bilal, the boy never made it and his girl had to marry someone else her successful father chose, the life of the girl and her dad was the subplot in the picture. Naturally she was brokenhearted to learn of her lover’s demise in his effort to reach her.

Being Up in the Air

Imagine you have been working for a company for years and now have to get laid off by a fourth grader as someone put it in the film. The young lady was not so young as to be in primary school but her character could have been classed as such for her to be a naive as she was about adult relationships that exist today. Then she was just out of school and very hopeful as are so many of them when they get their first careers. Only that career was unusual for someone just starting off. It had to do with her wanting work at firing people for other companies. America is downsizing again!

What can I learn from the film about social trends? That a single guy might think he has all the cards in his hands about picking up a woman when he wants and finds out that if she is only looking for pleasure and there are no bonds, then nothing should be expected. But that is the life choice of the main fictional character in the office suit running to awareness meetings, so that he can prepare his agents on how to fire. His personal life remains up in the air and nothing is ever set in stone but it must get pretty lonely whenever he gets the urge to date as couples regularly do.

George Clooney played well in his role as a believable firing agent who asked people to open themselves up after years of working in one company. He acted alongside a younger woman fresh out of college who had her hopes set up for meeting the right man and that failed miserably. Good contrast between her squeaky-clean persona and George’s. Good believable romanticizing on the side as even George is fooled into what he would never have wanted: a committed relationship.

The relationships are somewhat flighty just as the trips between the cities that the actors took along the way but that is how it is now when one can’t even be sure that you can hold a job even firing people!

Wrap Around Stories

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On Green Theaters

Are there any green theaters out there? It may be an art form with an environmental responsibility as it may be one with a social or political responsibility, theater if it wants to be cutting edge and if it wants to present a critique in an artful manner, there are innumerable topics and subject matter that will gain public attention and support. It would however be useful and responsable if the theater in question thinks of how it will use and reuse its materials especially if it wants to be cost effective. In the case of green theater one has to think energy efficiency. The only drawback regarding the popularity of theater altogether in Montreal, is that people are still mostly mezmarized by the big screen something that we got through cinemascope and watched intently to see Lawrence of Arabia gallop across the Arabian peninsula. I think there are many supporters of minimal scenery but not enough to get theater to have a greater impact. I say minimal because if this is going to be a starting out company, their money is best invested in the training of actors, finding a venue and in this case building a green theater and that would be where the light used is more energy efficient. The building or revamping an old space to a new one will take time and money. So for those of you interested in seeing that kind of theater happen, then it would be time to show your support.

Look at the Brighter Side

About the Documentary Fired:

I would like to see something informative but it sounds like much of this has already been experienced. You know, the been there, done that. It's time to move on rather than getting into the nitty gritty of how bosses are inhuman enough to ask favor after favor and then when it comes to getting fired they break their own rules to suit the occasion. In my situation, I was even offered a vacation the day before I got the axe, looked entirely ridiculous, not to mention being told that since I wanted a holiday, the evaluation period for my 'quality' was shortened. Well you advise the employee before the firing so he has a chance to improve. Anyway as you can hear, that incident is relatively fresh on my mind; frankly the job place did me a favour so that I don't have to suck up to idiotic behavior patterns on the phone lines. Ah ,but one doesn't want to bite the hand that feeds, so maybe there is an advantage in seeing documentaries like this for people to see how they can turn around the situation in their favour and look for something more rewarding. People need to have respect for themselves and need to know that their employer respects them. If the movie shows perseverance in getting over the past for a brighter work future than that is a good thing.

Critique on Soderbergh's War Film

The latest on Soderberg's recent film:

I'll go to see the movie because Soderbergh has creative genius, because to be creative doesn't mean spewing out creative genius one after the next. The ability to produce cutting edge stuff runs in highs and lows, get it? And you'll always be looking for something new to outshine the past, we live in a world of what else there can be to titillate your fantasy. Now it's all too easy to criticize the film because it 'deconstructs' the cinematic form many film students rave even to today. But that is because we're uneasy about pulling the stops out on the epics like Casblanca even though you get great current star performances, good working scripts and reminiscent camera angles from contemporary films like this. Why is that? Probably because we're so busy respecting the dead that we don't give ourselves the chance to fathom something outside Casblanca and The Dirty Dozen mind schemes. Too bad.

Western Watchers

On the Film 'Propostion':

Used to watch westerns back in the day, that somebody can learn from Peckinpah and Ford and generate new interest in otherwise ordinary stories is good. I may be past the interest stage of seeing gun toting vengeful actors searching for a good gunfight but am always there when it comes to decent plot. Adding the Australian outback adds some mystique too and helps me to further recover from ever wanting to be be remided of moral sub-texts behind gunslingers for hire shooting indians. Morality was expedient back then but there is nothing wrong with presenting issues where survival is paramount and morality is just a notion.

Recently saw Match Point which although different in some ways to the Woody Allen genre is much the same in how he his actors intermingle and the social banter that oozes out of their mouths. It seems he is a prisoner of his own psychological fears of having to deal with a dominant mother who always has to see her kids married. That has been a subplot in Woody's films for decades.
There is a bit of novel symbolism but nothing original, the tossing of the ring over the canal fence much reminds me of the falling ring in Sixth Sense. Somehow it connects the real world with an ethereal one and it is a parallel to the ball that doesn't make it over the net. They demonstrate the failure of the young man to come to grips with his relentless passion but also to rid himself of any guilt. He is metaphorically throwing the prospects of a peaceful marriage away.

Aida re-done

Verdi's Aida is a slice of history in itself. Italy put it on at the Caricalla in the mid-80's and the costumes, marching theme and backdrop was stupendous to observe. The arched remanants of the old salt stores served as entrances and exits. The light reflecting off the old brick added to the majestic atmosphere of the music but one has to draw a line between the pagentry of the opera and the opera piece itself. That is to say a good opera isn't necessarily something that has to have dozens of participants, victory marches and gold tinted gowns. That Leger is pumping new blood into the piece is also of no surprise when one is aware of its popularity and wants to draw additional public.

Opening People's Minds

Re: 'Mohawk Girls' Documentary

Recently I had the pleasure of partaking in a short film where native students were taken advantage of by clergy teachers. Native children in other films are seen as glue sniffers and their parents as permanent alcoholics. I learned that a number of films had already been made showing the downside of native societies in Quebec, not necessarily on the south shore. So much attention has been down on their going to drugs, never being able to make in the big world that most of us have developed misconceptions about natives being unable to compete with their white colleagues. Isn't it time to pull the plug on this perennial negativity?
Now advertising Mohawk plight is the first step, then concerned citizens should make an effort and bridge the ties between the reserve and the city. It's time to permanently remove the associaition we have of Kahanwake as just a place to pick up cheap smokes and where teenage girls do nothing more than get pregnant. More opportunities should be made available to Mohawk children so that the bubble isolating form the city in their view is removed.

White Planet

Movies like this do build awareness but sadly to say no one here has the courage to spell out the reality of documentaries on the Arctic North. Political interest on the vanishing wildness type pictures has never been a popular subject especially when legislators are busy just classifying what nature there is to exploit. If it's oil, it means that a pipeline from the McKenzie delta is more important than indigenous indians living at the river delta and much more important than which way caribou migrate. If ice is melting faster than it is reformed, no amount of cinema celluloid is going to keep penguin numbers from dwindling.
In recent years more attention has gone more on preventing polar bears from reaching inhabited areas in the north than preserving the white bear's population. Seal pups on ice floes grab more attention for their fur and for their survival But I can still pretend that nothing is happening that far north, can't I? And who really cares about the two or three degrees warming over James Bay and the consequent premature vanishing snow cover on the way to Ungava. The mine industry might refer to the melt as an excuse to better road development in the region and so it goes, exploitation versus survival played out year after year as arctic species disappear.
But the images are lovely, some people may think twice about about depleting the wildlife there. We can all pretend that all is well, so far away from city life, that films on the morth are going to solve the artic dilemma by itself.

Hoodwinked

Fine the way of animation studio is to go towards something more 'organic'. Why not just say that the creators want something that is close enough to being human without the hassle of dealing with costumes and actors memorizing their lines?The film is probably a great way to reintroduce a tale that sublimally informs youngsters of the darker side of human nature. The big bad wolf will get his due no matter what the art form...hmmm.
Now I have an issue about always seeing famous names for the people doing voices for animated cartoons. It doesn't have to be that way as there are other creative talents with voices yearning to speak out. I know this because of years of voice work myself at lesser known sound studios. Don't know whether to point my finger at the studio for taking advantage of an actor's celebrated status to bring in a box office cache, controlling American distributors or both.

Living Among the Grizzlies

About the film on Treadwell's encounters with grizzlies:


The way to succeed these days is to do something off the wall but it doesn't mean one has to throw ones life away. The fact that this guy was able to sober up to face a challenge of this sort is inspirational but reckless. Did his girlfriend share his passion or was drawn along out of compassion? One could even say he was responsible for her death and now we're going to celebrate his egocentric prowess. Do we all care enough about bears to watch them share the same plateau, maybe not. Still because of the audacity to live among beasts known to attack humans is reason enough for the curious to go and see the film. One wonders how the man was able to stay off the bear menu for 11 summers.