"Peace was not made for the sake of Justice but Justice demanded for the sake of Peace." - St. Augustine
Once justice has been served, forgiveness, often with hard work, is much more likely. Too often, though, where justice is nowhere in sight there can be no peace. In resentment we experience our pain over and over, reliving injury without mercy. It is a chain that binds us to everything we hate and, like an anchor, will almost certainly drag us down to drown in the things we abhor most.Tonight we'll look at The House of the Spirits as well as The Painted Veil, films that take on our all too human impulse to strike back hoping to punish the worst of our tormentors rather than striving to overcome our pain through understanding as much the role we play ourselves in perpetuating our very worst misery. In order to truly experience our lives in all its creative beauty and unchecked, unimaginable potential, we must forgive wherever and as much as humanly possible. Or NOT.
Someone get the lights (and pass the day glow pop corn, plz...)
The House of the Spirits (1993)
So far as the United States is concerned, the whole of Latin America is a haunted house of wounded spirits.
The House of the Spirits is the 1993 Chilean-Danish-American epic film that spans four generations within a cruel and brutally oppressive patriarchal South American household. This film manages to blend the very real though magical life of the spirit, unhampered by religiosity of any kind, in a most fittingly surreal manner while transcending larger cultural specifics as well (more on that later from this particular Danish POV). Based on the sprawling auto-biographical magical realism of Isabel Allende's novel of the same name, the film emerges from it's beginnings deep down in the spirit world to the harshest of modern histories most regrettable political travesties and our shamefully shared history. The cast is perhaps even a bit overly stellar boasting some big names from the cinema's brightest sidewalk marque. "Its star quotient is truly staggering..." starring Jeremy Irons, Meryl Streep, Glenn Close, Winona Ryder, Antonio Banderas, Vanessa Redgrave, Maria Conchita Alonso, Armin Mueller-Stahl and Jan Niklas. At a total budget of an estimated 25 million dollars, box office returns barely totaled a fraction more that six million with particularly poor distribution a culprit. This "classic" became a sleeper overnight. Glenn Close and Meryl Streep alone turn in performances worth at least 50 million dollars a head by themselves. Considering it's message concerning the politics of constant social struggle and warfare which strikes at the heart of the human spirit, this film is an invaluable eye opener.
Liberally adapted for the screen from Allende's semi-autobiographical novel by Danish film legend Bille August, two time Palme D'or, Academy Award and Golden Globe winner, the screen play tames the furiousity and extensive list of characters down to a manageable handful that makes the author's story transferable to film in a kind of ordered coherency required despite a few moments of ghastly super realism.
Mr. August has clearly been galvanized by the passion and colorfulness of this story, even as he supplies a welcome restraint. He makes "The House of the Spirits" a cool, ravishing film filled with odd gaps and understated miracles...
This odd Danish-Latin hybrid amounts to magical realism on ice.
August has eliminated Clara's brothers and focused the family as it evolves on its underlying feminine strength and spirit having to live, sometimes barely co-existing, enmeshed in its antagonist personified by the longest enduring character of all, the brutal, fated to be Senator and landowner millionaire Esteban Trueba, played by Jeremy Irons. To make a very long story short the wealthy landowner and Senator winds up betraying his country, community, and family to the Pinochet like militarist who overthrow a democratically elected workers party. Not terribly off from the realities of Chile on September 11th, 1973 when the American CIA partnered in the military coup that ousted the socialist government of President Salvador Allende, first cousin once removed to the stories author. And suddenly the film becomes all too real and personal.
"The House of the Spirits" (is) a cool, ravishing film filled with odd gaps and understated miracles...
Its sensibility is distinctly feminine, despite the fact that some of it is narrated by Esteban Trueba (Jeremy Irons). Esteban, a cold and ambitious man, is no match for any of the women in his life...
The women are the mesmerizing spirits in this story, not least because they happen to be played on screen by Glenn Close, Winona Ryder, Vanessa Redgrave and Meryl Streep. Many of the film's satisfactions come from simply watching these players interact...
Ms. Streep's Clara, the story's clairvoyant character, is the daughter of Severo del Valle (Armin Mueller-Stahl), a liberal candidate for political office. This big, ambitious drama watches Clara's fortunes shift until she is inextricably tied to the conservative Esteban, who has political ambitions of his own...
Ms. Ryder makes yet another radiant impression as the Trueba who pays the heaviest price for Esteban's actions...
"In the big house on the corner," Ms. Allende writes late in her novel, "Senator Trueba opened a bottle of French Champagne to celebrate the overthrow of the regime that he had fought against so ferociously, never suspecting that at that very moment his son Jaime's testicles were being burned with an imported cigarette." Mr. August's "House of the Spirits" should not be overly faulted if it fails to achieve quite that level of breathtaking ferocity. There are plenty of moments when it comes close. Glossy as it is, this film still knows how to be tough. - The New York Times
In Chile 1973 it was September 11th, of all the dates that might have been destined to live in infamy in the United States, when the CIA conspired with Army General Pinochet who lept into action to overthrow the democratically elected socialist government of President Allende. Only one move by the United States in a long series of resilient and residual Anti-Communist McCarthyism that ingrained itself upon the nations psyche and foreign policy for decades to come.
I had lunch the other day down here in Zihuatanehjo with my new friend and restaurateur, a Spaniard-Italian-Mexican, Milano (names have been changed to protect the innocent), and we talked about the Drug War here that has killed over 35,000 people in the passed 6 years, of the upheaval among the unemployed youth in Spain today while that nation, 35 years after emerging from the Fascist rule of General Francisco Franco to become a democracy has never really looked hard into resolving all the pain and suffering, the loss of life for tens of thousands of Spaniards, in trying to heal from their own civil war and pre-World War II nightmare. We talked of how I was there in Madrid in 1969 only to be arrested and deported by Franco's fascist police, the Falange, and the notion that no-one can be counted on in any international venue to push for reconciliation if that won't come from within ones own nation. And I thought of these words from Judge Baltasar Garzón on May 14th and how he might as well be speaking for many other nations from a number of still struggling Latin American countries while noting the role, or lack thereof, of the United States.
Seventy-five years ago in my country, Spain, one of the darkest and saddest chapters in the history of humanity began. It lasted more than forty years and even today, after 34 years of democracy, it has not been definitively read or closed, or as such, overcome. An unjust and illegal war, though perhaps all wars are, was begun in 1936 by those who scorned the freedom, legality and democracy of the Republic. It was done by those for whom the life of their equals held little value and who, by their decisions, launched a bloodbath between brothers and sisters, with tens of thousands of them tortured, disappeared, and executed without trial; thirty thousand children (known as the Lost Children of Francoism) were stolen from their families simply because their parents were supporters of the Republic, a crime that, according to the new regime, made them unfit to raise their own children...
(W)hile the western democracies stood by, silent and motionless...
With you or without you, we must work towards Justice everywhere as well as at home.
Ya me voy a Havana! More people than ever attended any rally in Havana, or anywhere else in Cuba, for Fidel Castro attended the second Latin music festival for Peace without Borders (Paz sin Fronteras) in 2009. It's never to late for change and change is now way overdue - Change based in justice, love, understanding and forgiveness all around.
*
*
*
*
*
INTERMISSION
Happy Birthday, Clint Eastwood (May 31st, 1930)
Clint Eastwoodat the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival.
h/t to The Man With No Name whose Spaghetti Western music soundtracks of the early 60s can only be classified as pre-punk and may have unleashed a revolution of its own.
*
*
*
*
*
IN THEATERS NOW
The Hangover II has already achieved it's Hollywood movie industry backers goal in making more money than any other comedy ever (even itself) during this past Memorial Day weekend release. Two hundred million bucks in five days all for elevating dick jokes to a new high. It's now chick dick jokes with monkey penises just a little bit funnier since monkey dick jokes in any language are funny according to the script writers. As funny as Zach Galifianakis may be on his own, he really ought to stick to shooting heroine on late night TV. This all man, wolf packed flick is something a little more than your worst-than-the-first sequel only now its gotten down right offensive the second time around. But, hey, monkeys smoking like Gandalf in Middle Earth and chopping off your finger when you're REALLY drunk IS kind of funny in a Quentin Tarantino, Four Rooms rip off kind of way so what else isn't imaginative about four guys getting totally hammered? Did I mention the chicks with dicks comedy?
Perhaps the only justification in recognizing the popularity of The Hangover and it's box office smashing sequel is to understand both as metaphor for the nation as a whole currently suffering from a blackout after eight years of drunken insanity under littl'ol' Dubya Bush, Jr. out from under Scrub-brush, TX. all the way to DC (Hollah! Dat city o' squalla!) and suddenly coming to in a strange land (for Republicans at least) every one of which want to blame each and every self imposed major economic catastrophe on the current administration and now they've woken up with "Kill Medicare!" tattooed all over their face. Let's just hope that's the meta-point behind these popular "black" comedies (no pun intended). What were they thinking, indeed.
On the other hand, the ladies have gotten their own response out to The Hangover in the movie "Bridesmaids", released May 13, taking a swing at traditional tried and true marriage rituals especially from the other side of the gender fence (and they do it without even having to black out hardly) in setting loose their own repressed but understandably righteous better half anger. I haven't seen this one as yet but have it on my radar after Ellen DeGeneres quipped back at critics, "Of course women are funny!"
It doesn't matter if you're a man or a woman -- funny is funny. When I saw this movie, I looked around the theater and there were men and women all having a good time. There were couples and people dressed up like crazy bridesmaids. There was even a man wearing nothing but kitchen utensils. Looking back, I may have been at a Lady Gaga concert.
Good enough for me.
*
*
*
*
*
FLASHBACK
Catch 22 (1970)
Starring Buck Henry, Alan Arkin, Martin Balsam, Richard Benjamin, Italian actress Olimpia Carlisi, French comedian Marcel Dalio, Art Garfunkel, Jack Gilford, Bob Newhart, Anthony Perkins, Paula Prentiss, Martin Sheen, Jon Voight and Orson Welles the year some claim that the counter culture began to fall apart and go along different paths (as in Art Garfunkel minus Paul Simon). The film reminds us that overall there is no insanity clause.
*
*
*
*
*
*
DOUBLE FEATURE
*
*
*
*
*
*
The Painted Veil (2006)
It's the 1920s, and as China seethes with revolutionary unrest and cholera, an unhappily married British couple, played by Naomi Watts and Edward Norton, drift into a new state of coexistence, carried aloft on opium smoke and their newly liberated desire. It isn't Maugham, but it's mildly steamy and pleasurable... New York Times film review
Once again I'm finding myself recommending a screen adaption of a well known novel which in this case in-arguably improves on the original author's version, specifically W. Somerset Maugham's work of the same title, The Painted Veil. What improves the novel is the emergence of the jilted husband and Doctor, Walter Fane, into the flesh in the person of Edward Norton creating a believably human character of depth and the perfect balance to Kitty, the films two main characters. Edward Norton's superb insight into wordlessly giving some humanity to the dry, angry character on the novelist's page makes his performance in my estimation perhaps Mr. Norton's finest in an already distinguished career. Naomi Watts also turns in an equally remarkable character portrayal as the Dr.'s new wife, a self absorbed, superficial and vain member of the indulgent 20's affluent upper class who is propelled into marrying a man she doesn't love simply in order to secure her station as one of societies coddled few. The cast is further complimented notably by Tobby Jones (once also known as Truman Capote on the screen) who plays Mr. Waddington, the last remaining white man in the Cholera infested central region of China whence the young couple journeys as he serves the popularly unpopular British government as a relatively minor official who has stayed behind out of love for a Chinese girl who also would refuse to leave him if she'd ever even had a choice. Finally, along with a number of excellent minor Chinese cast members, is Diana Rig who turns in another exceptional performance as the Catholic Mother Superior of a beleaguered convent and children's orphanage. At one point the loving Mother describes her marriage to God in the most human terms as an old tired couple who may take one another for granted and rarely talk as they sit on the couch exchanging nods and grunts with one another while still remaining confident that neither would ever leave the other regardless of what may happen in this predictably broken world.
In the opening scenes we see Dr. Fane and Kitty set against the backdrop of the truly spectacular Chinese countryside protecting themselves from the rain with the flimsiest of what had been intended to be stylish, rather than functional, umbrellas. The two patiently wait wordlessly for their Chinese escort into a small disease riddled village of China's most remote center. Through flashbacks we come to understand that the good Dr has most probably dragged his wife along with him in hopes that she would have to suffer, and probably die, for her marital transgressions. Dr. Fane as cuckold is absolutely furious with Kitty though just as likely as furious and disgusted with himself for ever having loved her in the first place. There's little doubt that his primary reason for volunteering for such a dangerous assignment, and trapping Kitty into coming along, is in order to punish her, as well as himself, in a manner that is most severe for his own foolishness as much as anything for which Kitty may be guilty.
Dr. Fane, although he's a medical doctor as well, is primarily a research scientist specializing in bacteria diseases. He's much more adept with a microscope than a physicians bag. In his new assignment which requires he tend to actual sick people instead of simply the microscopic bugs that plague them he discovers in the process not only the human side of his profession but himself as well. Kitty, stuck between an angry Chinese rock and a hard place, has nothing whatsoever to do as well as nowhere to escape to either. She winds up volunteering with the Sisters but not entirely out of boredom as much as desperation and comes to discover a few things about herself as well as the lives of those less fortunate. In short, they both discover that they can become much more than their very worst self indulgent qualities and are inclined through the overwhelming pain and suffering all around to go there instead.
The ultimate cost of maintaining ones anger and contemptuous disregard for others is made painfully clear to Dr. Fane despite his own evolution into becoming fully human and feeling beyond himself. Somewhere he is finally able to forgive as well as accept the price he must pay for redemption. For her part, Kitty learns to appreciate the beauty of little frivolous things like flowers which are destined to die in short order despite all the work and trouble necessary to bring them into this world in the first place.
This film is one example where forgiveness seems to trump justice in the end if it doesn't actually come around to equaling it. The most important thing, you might say, is when the two come together as one.
Produced primarily by Edward Norton with Naomi Watts co-producing, the film was made in cooperation with the Chinese government through Warner China Films and was released in China as well as distributed through regular Western outlets.
*
*
*
*
*
End Credits / Closing Remarks:
Given that the greater part of our site's purpose here on the Street of Prophets is to provide a place where people who might describe themselves as faithful progressives can come together to explore not only faith but the larger questions that revolve around it and our hopes of impacting the world in a positive, progressive way, I am providing these sometime weekly film reviews (whenever). I thought that submitting reviews of controversial or off-the-beaten-track films that often nudge this kind of thought and discussion might be a plus. I'll be offering this each week on Fridays (as the Spirit moves me) and would happily entertain recommendations for future reviews. Feel free to post comments about the films reviewed here today as well as your own recommendations of films you feel may fall along these lines.
My religion is to seek for truth in life and for life in truth, even knowing that I shall not find them while I live. Miguel de Unamuno
Above all, I must admit, I'm a Mac®™. So, forgive me if I'm not totally PC.