The Bling Ring [2013]

MPAA (R)  CNS/USCCB (O)  RE.com (1 1/2 Stars)  AVclub (B+)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. McAleer) review
RogerEbert.com (I. Vishnevetsky) review
AVClub (B. Kenigsberg) review

The first thing that needs to be said about The Bling Ring [2013] (screenplay written and directed by Sofia Coppola, based on the Vanity Fair article "The Suspect Ware Louboutins" by Nancy Jo Sales) is that it does not paint a pretty picture of contemporary youth and celebrity culture.  This is an appropriately R-rated picture for rampant, almost incessant, drug use (financed here by stolen goods looted from celebrity homes) and a powdered/fake smiling sociopathic morality that really (sincerely here...) doesn't care so long as "the good times roll."  That said, the second thing that should be said about this film is that this is, of course, its point.  For the second time in several months a youth directed film (the other being Spring Breakers [2012]) has come out that is so searing that it should be able to cut through even the deepest of denials / ecstasy-driven hazes screaming (1) to parents/authority figures WAKE-UP, (2) to the culture HAVE WE REALLY COME TO THIS? and (3) to young people themselves FOR GOD'S SAKE DON'T DO THIS.

To be sure, there have always been films like this.  In my young adult years there was Less Than Zero [1987].  In my parents' generation there was The Wild One [1953] (which the New York Times reviewer at the time commended for being "a picture of extraordinary candor and courage, a picture that tries to grasp an idea even if it falls short of it").  The difference between those films of yesteryear and the two that came out recently is that the older films could be more easily dismissed.  Less Than Zero [1987] was about "rich kids from Beverly Hills" and The Wild One [1953] was about "bikers" (both a relatively small subsets of society).  In contrast, the main characters of the two more recent films (interestingly in both cases, predominantly young women) are thoroughly "main stream."  The central characters of Spring Breakers [2012] are to have been attending a utterly nondescript state college somewhere in Tennessee.  The main characters of the current film, The Bling Ring [2013], come from an utterly nondescript suburb (nominally Calabasas) of Los Angeles.  And in both cases, the young people play their parents and actually even their religion (significant if passing allusions to which are present, again interestingly enough, in both films) for fools. 

What then to make of a film that dramatizes a real crime spree perpetrated by five real-life suburban L.A. teenagers -- played in the film by Katie Chang, Israel Brousssard, Emma Watson, Claire Julian, Taissa Farmiga --  who were so enamored by the lifestyles of today's young "rich and famous" (Paris Hilton, Orlando Bloom, Megan Fox, Lyndsey Lohan ...) that they figured out a way to steal a bit of it (if for the time that it lasted) for themselves?  Well, at minimum, the film should disturb us:

How is it that the parents of these five teenagers would not have an idea that their kids were doing all of this?  After all at minimum, the crime spree itself required that their teenage kids be "out partying" quite late at night repeatedly over an extended period of months (and one would imagine on relatively odd nights ... unless they always broke into celebrity homes "on weekends").  Then these were teenagers, there's only so much "clubbing" that one could do without valid ids (or jobs for that matter to pay for said "bar hopping" ...).

From a societal point of view, I suppose one could say that some of this would be inevitable.  A celebrity culture requires "fans" to adore the "celebrities."  Inevitably, there are going to be "fans" who will take their "adoration" a few steps further one (or even society) would like.  While Katie Chang's character appeared to be less discerning (stealing from rich/flashy people, period), as a group, these teens were fixated on stealing from celebrities (stealing a $1000 purse from Paris Hilton's belongings seemed to mean more than "simply" stealing a $1000 purse...).  But then, honestly, celebrity culture is largely about achieving such "brand recognition."

Finally, to the young: Even if one doesn't immediately understand theft to be morally wrong -- it is, "Thou shalt not steal" is a pretty unambiguous part of the Ten Commandments, and even "coveting" (desiring other people's spouses / stuff) is ALSO against said Ten Commandments -- then at least self-preservation ought to come into play. Eventually everybody gets caught, and the tragedy for those perpetrating this sin is that if one is "really good" at stealing, all that it means is that one's going to get caught with something far larger (and be punished far more greatly) than if one wasn't particularly good at it and was caught right away stealing something much smaller.  This is a standard explanation that I give to kids confessing stealing the proverbial "pack of gum at Walgreens" - Please DON'T DO IT, because EVERYBODY EVENTUALLY GETS CAUGHT and THE "BETTER" YOU ARE AT DOING THIS, THE MORE LIKELY YOU'RE JUST GOING TO GET CAUGHT STEALING SOMETHING BIGGER AND YOU'LL JUST GET INTO EVEN MORE TROUBLE).  It is a very good thing to have a healthy respect for Evil.  We are NEVER "smart enough" and if we "walk the dark side," WE ALL EVENTUALLY GET CAUGHT.

So great film folks!  I hope your film helps prevent other young people from doing something similarly stupid.  Again folks, EVERYBODY eventually gets caught.


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World War Z [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  Chicago SunTimes (3 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (K. Jensen) review
Chicago SunTimes (R. Roeper) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

World War Z [2013] (directed by Marc Forster, screenplay by Matthew Michael Carnahan, Drew Goddard and Damon Lindelof, screen story by Matthew Michael Carnahan and J. Michael Straczynski, based on the novel by Max Brooks [IMdb]) is a summer blockbuster zombie/horror movie, end of story.  It's ancestors might have been much lower-budget fare, but somewhere in the 1970s-80s Hollywood's larger studios figured out that if they improved the special effects a bit, these films would almost always oodles of money.  More recently, the studios realized that if they tweaked the formula a bit more -- "internationalizing" the carnage, perhaps adding "3D" -- they could make even more.

So folks, if you're expecting "Citizen Zombie" then save your money, there's more intelligent fare out there.  But if you're looking for basically a dumbed down (err ... "more Expressionist") version of Contagion [2011]  (Let's face it, even a world-wide outbreak of a mutated Ebola virus couldn't possibly compete with the "worst case scenario" of a zombie plague that turns previously healthy people into crazed flesh-craving zombies within 10-15 seconds "after first bite" by an infected ex-human/turned ravenous zombie) then this might be the summer diversion for you ;-)

And we get to watch the ever likable Brad Pitt playing Gerry Lane, a vague "U.N. super-hero" (an investigator of some sort who the U.N. "goes to" when there's some crisis somewhere and the world is screaming for answers) frantically flying around the world trying to figure out what's causing this zombie apocalypse, how to bring it under control, and perhaps most amusingly, its "Patient Zero" ;-).

His globe trotting takes him (1) to a rain-drenched airbase (that really could be anywhere, but we're told is S. Korea, check, Asian market...), (2) to Israel which probably to its own surprise has found that the "protective wall" that it built around its country to separate it from those living in the Palestinian territories also "works remarkably well against zombies..." (well, as even the trailer suggests, "only to a point ..." ;-) and (3) to an appropriately looking, appropriately "nestled in the foothills" of some European mountain chain, "W.H.O. facility" (European scientists/bureaucrats always knew where to build their labs ;-) where he can talk to some important-looking people with accents and lab coats about what he's discovered outside.

Yes, as goofy as all this may sound, it really is quite entertaining ;-).  Just think, the same movie that used to be made for $50,000 can now be made for $200,000,000 AND STILL MAKE MONEY and more than those who used to make those $50K productions would have ever imagined ;-)

So what can one say about this film: Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky would probably have hated something as stupid as this.  But Kafka?  My sense is that he'd probably gotten a kick out of it ... ;-). 



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Aluku Liba: Maroon Again [2009]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
Official Website

Aluku Liba: Maroon Again [2009] (written and directed by Nicolas Jolliet) played recently at the 11th Chicago African Diaspora Film Festival at Facets Multimedia in Chicago.

It's a fictionalize story of Loeti (played by Loeti Mais) a black man from French Guiana who had left his home village long ago to seek his fortune working as a garimpiero (gold-miner) dredging gold from the mud of the rivers of the rivers of the French Guianese part of the Amazon rain forest.

After a raid by French troops on the illegal gold mine where he was working, he's forced to flee into the forest.  His subsequent journey leads him to appreciate the beauty of the forest beyond the camps where he had worked.  He encounters various exotic birds and animals as well an Ameri-Indian who saves him at a critical point in his journey.  Finally by the river again, he runs into a fellow Afro-SouthAmerican named Captain Laurence (played by Laurence Alota) who takes him then with his boat to the Aluku village where he lives.

The Aluku or Boni people are descendants of self-liberated former slaves from French Guiana and neighboring Suriname.  Once free in the jungles of French Guiana / Suriname, they kept much of their original West African culture.  Needless to say, they have remained very suspicious of European encroachment.  However, for the most part, especially in French Guiana, they have been left in peace.

I first read about similar communities of self-liberated former slaves while stationed at a then Servite parish in Kissimmee, FL, a parish with a primarily Caribbean Catholic population including a substantial Haitian contingent.  

It turns out that similar communities of self-liberated former slaves like the Aluku people of French Guiana/Suriname have existed across the whole of the Americas where slavery once held sway.  In Jamaica they have been called Maroons, in Brazil Quilombos.  Even in the United States in the Gulf Coast regions of the South East (Alabama, Mississippi and Florida) in the 1820s, prior to the subjugation of this territory by the U.S. military, there were communities of self-liberated slaves called the Black Seminoles.

I have also been involved in the translation of a book published by the Servites of Brazil called "The Amazonia That we do not know" which made mention of the Quilombos in its Introduction (the Quilombos of Brazil live in a different part of the Amazon Region from where the Servites generally work) and devoted an entire chapter to the Garimpieros (gold miners) of the Amazon region.

Hence I made it a point to see this film when I read the summary of it by the 2013 Chicago African Diaspora Film Festival organizers.  The film did not disappoint.  Anyone interested in various cultures, Amazon Rain Forest, and even in West African Native Religion would probably find this film fascinating.


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DonT Stop [2012]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing
CSFB* listing
FDb* listing

DonT Stop (2012) [IMDb] [CSFD]* [FDb]* (written and directed by Richard Řeřicha [IMDB] [CSFD]*[FDb]*) is a contemporary Czech/Slovak "nostalgia piece" about growing up loving rock and roll (specifically the punk rock of the style of The Clash) in the 1980s in still Soviet Bloc/Communist Czechoslovakia.  The film played recently at Chicago's Gene Siskel Film Center as part of the 2013 Czech That Film series sponsored by the Czech Republic's Diplomatic Mission in the United States (along with Prague's Staropramen Beer ;-)

Since the 1950s/60s when Rock and Roll took the world by storm, it has been opposed by "traditional authority" pretty much across the world.  Witness films like Footloose [1984] [2011], Oliver Stone's The Doors [1991] and Pirate Radio [2009] or the current controversy regarding the Russian feminist punk rock group named Pussy Riot (more on that controversy almost necessarily below ;-).

In the Soviet Bloc, however, paranoia on the part of the authorities regarding the inherent improvisational freedom present in the rock and roll phenomenon was taken onto another level altogether.  The arrests, trials and convictions of the members of a Czech psychedelic rock group The Plastic People of the Universe in 1976 actually led to the birth to the Charter '77 dissident movement in Czechoslovakia.  The Charter '77 document, cowritten by Czech dissident playwright and future President of post-Communist Czechoslovakia and later the Czech Republic, Václav Havel, was signed by Czech and Slovak artists, intellectuals and _religious figures_ (including Catholic priest and after Communism's fall, Catholic Bishop, Václav Malý*), called on the Communist authorities to recognize and respect the right to free expression along with other fundamental human rights.

It is then in this context, that of the still Communist era in Czechoslovakia, when/where being a member of a rock band wouldn't necessarily just get one in trouble with one's own parents but could conceivably land one in jail ... ;-) that the story of this film plays out.  Yet the story is also about much more than that.  It's above all, a reminiscence (colored of course by time ;-) of what it is/was like to be young:

So late 30-something and (rather respectable looking) Miki (played by Pavel Řezníček [CSFD]*[FDb]*) finds himself stuck in traffic in Prague today.  Putting a tape into the tape-deck in his care, he gets transported back to 1983 ... when as a moody/unsure 17/18 year-old guitar playing and not particularly studious high schooler (played by Patrik Děrgel [IMDb] [CSFD]*[FDb]*) with a similarly nice/still unsure of herself girlfriend named Pavla (played by Viola Cernodrinská [IMDb] [CSFD]*[FDb]*) he had met a far more "together"/confident/"rebelious" drummer (with a spiked, colored Mohawk haircut) his same age named Dejvid (played by Lukáš Reichl [IMDb] [CSFD]*[FDb]*).   

Now a key to understanding the film: Could a 17 or 18-year-old high schooler in Communist-era Prague of 1983 sport a spiked, colored Mohawk?  Dejvid seemed to live in a "tough-looking working class neighborhood," his mother (played by Stanislava Jachnická [CSFD]*[FDb]*) seemed to be "an artist," and Dejvid didn't seem to care what the authorities thought.  (One of the Czech reviewers of the film indicated that folks like Dejvid did exist at the time, but that he like most other high schoolers of the time would have avoided them like the plague, looking at them as being as troubled as the fet'aci (drug addicts) hanging around train stations of alleys today).  So while Dejvid's character was possible, it would seem that the presentation of his character in the film is "colored" by today's Miki (30-40 something, stuck in traffic) reminiscence of him... (He remembers Dejvid as being, above all, young and rebelious ... whether or not he actually wore an alternatively neon-green, blue, or orange spiked Mohawk really becomes beside the point ...

Miki and Dejvid shared a love of western (rock) music of the time, specifically that of the British rock group, The Clash.  Now that's entirely probable.  I had cousins at the time in Czechoslovakia who were fans of groups like Pink Floyd and The Clash.  I remember in those years an older cousin of mine in Prague proudly playing for my sister and I (visiting from the States) his album copy of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon (the record and cover, with the prism and all were authentic). Records like this were not necessarily super easy to find, but they definitely weren't impossible to find either.

Pretty soon, the two, Dejvid and Miki decide to "put a band together."  This becomes, of course, every bit as "epic" a project (especially in one's memories) as those portrayed in The Blues Brothers [1980] or The Commitments [1991] with, of course, elements particular to Prague of that time.  (And the challenges that the two young Czech "rockers" faced was not just dealing "with Communists" but also and above all with family and neighbors):

Miki has to bring his 8 year old sister (played by Monika Svadbová [FDb]*) along to one of their first practices.  She, of course, doesn't understand why they have to "play so loud" ;-), but she kinda likes what they do with her hair (Dejvid's mother, again or an artistic bent, had some hairspray at home.  And so to entertain the 8 year old after she started to get bored, Dejvid comes up with the idea doing something "weird and cool" with her hair.

Then there's a neighbor of Dejvid's (played by Leoš Noha [FDb]*)  who becomes tired of the incessant banging coming out of David's flat.  So he comes up to his flat, bangs on the door and tells him: "Look, you spoiled worthless punk, I actually work for a living, working the graveyard shift. So if you keep banging those drums up in your apartment while I'm trying to sleep, the authorities are the least that you're going to be worried about..."

Needless to say, Miki's parents (played by Jiří Štrébl [CSFD]*[FDb]* and Klára Pollertová–Trojanová [CSFD]*[FDb]*) aren't particularly thrilled with Miki's new friend particularly since Miki's grades were lousy and then they get really pissed off when Miki comes back with his little sister and her hair's sticking out in all directions ;-).

Miki's sensible girlfriend Pavla (played by Viola Cernodrinská [IMDb] [CSFD]*[FDb]*) puts up, at least for a while, with Miki's quest of putting together at band, but begins to remind him "You seem to be thinking mostly about yourself.  What about us...?"

Still things soon start to come together:  Dejvid comes across another, older, neighbor with a garage (and the "old guy" also proves to be hard of hearing ;-).  And they start finding other guys for the band.  There's Viktor (played by Jakub Zedníček [IMDb][CSFD]*[FDb]*) a leather-jacketed basist who also rides a motorcycle and wants to go by the stage name "Vicious."   Then there's Marty (played by Jiří Kocman [IMDb][CSFD]*[FDb]*) a hanger-on who finally convinces Dejvid and Miki that he could be their manager.  Finally there's Inža (played by Oliver Cox [IMDb][CSFD]*[FDb]*) a second, rhythm guitarist, who's kind of a nerd, but he makes his own amps ...

They practice in the neighbor's garage and get reasonably good as a "garage band."  Meanwhile their "manager" hits around a few leads and actually gets them a "gig" down at a club Kladno-way (Kladno being a big industrial town to the west of Prague).

The "gig" proves to be every bit as "Epic" [TM] as they (still teenagers after all ...) would have dreamed.  Marty had gotten them the gig by partly misrepresenting them.  So when they get out on stage, the people in the dance hall expect something very different from what they play (again, shades of the first gig in the The Blues Brothers [1980] ... ;-)  It all ends in a lot of broken glass and a big fight.  (That is, really, really awesome ... ;-) Since the police (even in a Communist/totalitarian country....) can't be everywhere, they manage to get away...

They do get into some (minor) trouble with the law.  Miki's parents, of course, get pissed.  Then the group starts to break-up.  Dejvid and Viktor (aka Vicious) really start to despise/make-fun-of the more nerdy Inža.  Paula gets increasingly frustrated with Miki ("I don't know you anymore ...")  Dejvid finds a "really cool replacement" for Inža who's named Kalič (played by Richard Fiala [FDb]*).  Miki starts to see Kalič as just one big drug-addict who's just bringing Dejvid and the rest of the group down.  So ...

... eventually Miki parts ways with Dejvid, Vicious and Kalič, reconnects with his girlfriend Pavla who helps him pass his Chemistry test (that he had flunked before the end of school the previous year) and Miki even reconciles with his dad.

In other words, Miki's "walk on the darkside" came to an end ... but now, 25 years later, findhing himself "stuck in traffic" ... WHAT MEMORIES THEY MADE ... ;-)  What a lovely little story! ;-) ;-)

Yet, rock and roll, continues to make controversy and make news.  Perhaps the most famous controversy of recent years was that caused by the Russian feminist punk-rock group named Pussy Riot who, in 2012, chose to crash the Russian Orthodox Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow, attempt to play a song called "Punk Prayer" and were promptly stopped by church security officials.  By evening they turned the event into a music video called "Punk Prayer - Mother of God Chase Putin Away."  The Russian Orthodox Church was aghast and Putin's government using cover provided by the Russian Orthodox Church took the opportunity to make examples of them.  The members of the punk rock group were sentenced to 2 years in prison for "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred."

Someone in my position has to ask: Was any of this really necessary?  The group could have made the very same video OUTSIDE of the very same church (Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Savior) to make the same point without any of the resulting repercussions. 

Then to be honest, no one put a gun to any authority's head to respond to Pussy Riot's provocation in the manner that Putin's government did.  One thinks only of a similar stunt performed by Sinéad O'Connor on a Saturday Night Live performance in 1992 the United States, when at the end of her performance on live TV she tore-up a picture of Pope John Paul II saying "Fight the Real Enemy."  She embarrassed the show.  Something like 4,000 complaints were made to the F.C.C. about it afterwards.  But nothing happened.  Nothing needed to happen except that Ms O'Conner simply embarrassed herself ... and Pope John Paul II now Blessed John Paul II will be canonized as Saint John Paul II later this year.  And life, almost immediately after she tore up that picture on t.v. ... went happily on.  Anybody listening ...?

Closer to the ground, it would seem to me that Catholicism has had the least trouble with accepting and even at times blessing "rock and roll" than other religions.  Perhaps this is because the Catholic Church sees itself as a universal Church extending across all space and time.  So "rock and roll" is seen as simply "another cultural expression," one among many, that have existed across time.  Hence in The Commitments [1991], set in Dublin of the 1980s, the group's first "gig" is actually at a local parish function and they receive the blessing of the local priest.  Then, at the current parish where I am stationed, Annunciata in Chicago, our parish business manager (basically my age) was part of a local rock band when he was in his 20s.  Where did he used to play?  Often parish festivals.  And our parish's annual Annunciata Fest is, by and large, a neighborhood music festival.

There's no reason to fight if we don't really want to ... and "rock" is, as this film reminds us, often simply about celebrating (and later remembering) "being young."  So smile and enjoy the music ... ;-)

* Czech language links presently are most easily translated using google's chrome browser


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Shadow Dancer [2012]

MPAA (R)  Entertainment.ie (4/5)  Movies.ie (3/5)  TheGuardian.co.uk (3/5)  ChicagoSunTimes (3 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (3 1/2 Stars)

IMDb listing

Entertainment.ie (G. Burke) review 
Irish Times (D. Clarke) review
Movies.ie review
The Guardian (P. Bradshaw) review

Chicago SunTimes (M. Houlihan) review
AVClub (I. Vishnevetsky) review

Shadow Dancer [2012] (directed by James Marsh, novel and screenplay by Tom Bradby) is a reminder to me that every people has its story.  Since this film deals with the closing years of The Troubles in Northern Ireland and the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provisional_Irish_Republican_Army, the VERY FIRST THING that I did after seeing the movie (that was co-produced by both the BBC and the Irish Film Board) was to check what was written about the movie back in Ireland and the U.K. (see links above).  Since the film was film was fairly well received in both places I proceeded onward.

Now it's not as if I don't know anything about Northern Ireland.  Something like a 1/3 of the Catholics in the United States are at least partly of Irish descent.  The Servites (my religious order) in the United States is also very Irish, including many friars both of Irish American ancestry (born in the United States) and others who were born and joined the Servites in Ireland itself.  Indeed in the years immediately following WW II, it was one of the American Provinces of the Servite Friars who brought the Servite Order to Ireland and the first community that it founded in Ireland was in Benburb located a few miles from St. Patrick's resting place in Armagh in Northern Ireland.

Not being of Irish ancestry and yet being prepared to serve in the American Catholic Church and as part of a (Servite) Province that was heavily Irish, at the close of my seminary studies in Rome, I asked the Servites if I could spend some time in Ireland prior to returning to the United States and I remain honstly profoundly grateful to the Servites for having granted my request, because as the reader will see below, I honestly was given a remarkable experience as a result, and one that directly impacts on my ability to write about this film intelligently:

During my stay in Ireland besides being able to visit Armagh and Knock and Trinity College in Dublin, all the Servite ministries in Ireland, as well as various "towers" and other sites from pre-Christian / early-Christian days ;-), I was given both a whole bunch of reading material (which I devoured) about Ireland as well as the opportunity to stay for a week with a family in Belfast that's affiliated to us through the Servite Secular Order (OSSM).

Among the books that I read, was an excellent one by Robert Kee, entitled Ireland: A History that had served as a companion to a television series, again co-produced by the BBC and RTE (Radio and Television of Ireland), on Ireland's history.  The book, sober, documented, fascinating, challenged some of the longstanding myths about the land and people of Ireland cherished by both sides in the conflict there.  First, Ireland was not simply Gaelic.  It had contacts with Mediterranean peoples from Phoenician/Greco-Roman times.  Further, Dublin itself was first founded as a Viking settlement.  On the other side of the coin, the book helped me to understand why England only began setting up colonies in the New World nearly a hundred years after the Spaniards had come and conquered Mexico and South America, the answer being basically: Why go all the way to the New World to colonize new land when Ireland is right around the corner?  And indeed, BOTH of the major styles of colonization (the Jamestown, VA / Caribbean "Plantation Model" and the "Settlement Model" of the New England colonies, etc) that took place later in the British colonies in the New World took place in Ireland.  Southern Ireland was basically colonized along the lines of the "Plantation Model" (large estates with often absent English landlords), while Northern Ireland was settled by Calvinistic (non-Church of England) Presbyterian Scots fleeing religious persecution in progressively English dominated Scotland, the soon-to-be-called Scots-Irish displacing/marginalizing the native Irish (Gaelic-speaking and Catholic since St. Patrick in religion) population.  Finally, the book pointed-out that at different times in history both Catholic and Protestants in Ireland sought independence from the English crown (in the early 19th century, there was a Protestant Irish independence movement as the Scots-Irish of Northern Ireland didn't much like the English either...).

Then the stay with the family from the Servite Secular Order in Belfast (in the mid-1990s prior to the signing of the Good Friday Accord, at actually roughly the same time in which the current film was set) was truly an experience:  I saw the walls, I saw the murals both pro-IRA and pro-RUC.  We drove past the Sinn Fein HQ with GIGANTIC BOULDERS strewn all around it (said GIGANTIC BOULDERS serving as a rather obvious and apparently quite effective "anti-truck bomb barrier").  I got to see a rather nervous looking patrol of British soldiers walking down a street by a house where we were having tea with a family one time.  Finally, we were even stopped by the British army one time: two armored Land Rovers, with troops jumping out of them briefly surrounded our car.  (We were probably seeing "too much of Belfast..." than would have been typical at the time ...)  Calmly, smiling, with my hands visible, I gently pulled out my American passport to show to the commander.  He took a look at it and soon enough the soldiers were jumping back into the two Land Rovers.  The commander apologized for any inconvenience and they were off again and so were we.  My driver, the wife/mother of the Belfast family where I was staying, started breathing again shortly thereafter ;-)
All this is to say that I honestly "get" the seriousness of the story being told in the film reviewed here:

Okay then, let's get to said film ... Shadow Dancer [2012] begins in 1973.  A ten year old girl is asked by her father who's busy talking on the phone, to run down to the corner store to get him a pack of cigarettes.  Going to the next room, she convinces her little brother run the errand instead.  He goes out.

A few minutes later, there appears to be some sort of commotion outside.  We don't really see the commotion except by way of a glancing view (through the home's front window) to one side.  There is commotion outside but the family itself, minus the little boy who had run out for those cigarettes, is sitting in the kitchen.  Shadows are seen running past that (front) window to the side.  Shots are heard.  More shadows are seen running.  Finally, there's a frantic knock on the door.  Mother and daughter answer, while dad's still on the phone.  A couple of people come rushing into the home carrying the little boy.  Of course, he's been shot.  Of course ... he dies.  Of course, one assumes that the ten year old girl would probably blame herself for her little brother's death.  After all,  she was the one who sent him to get those cigarettes instead of running the errand herself...

Flash forward to 1993, a young woman is seen walking quite carefully along the stairs/corridor of a not particularly busy London Underground station.  When no one is it sight, she lays said purse down on the stairs and then proceeds with a quicker pace to walk away.  She seems to be somewhat schooled in this task.  She turns a few corners, finds a utility door that presumably is normally locked, but isn't now.  She goes through said utility door, passes through a whole series of other, smaller, darker passages.  Finally she comes to another utility door that leads out of the station.  She opens it, gets out of the station, closes the door and proceeds walking at still a relatively adrenaline-driven pace down a nondescript alley becoming more and more confident with each step that "all's gone well" ... 'cept that it hasn't.

Two plainclothes police men with earpieces suddenly appear from around a corner.  They descend on her, and grab a hold of her.  A car pulls up, they push her into a car, get in it themselves and ... take her to ... an "undisclosed location."   Eventually, they take her to a room in some utterly nondescript building.  Inside the room, are simply two chairs and a desk.  There is a fairly large window, but nothing of note can be seen outside.  The walls are white, the floor is tiled, the ceiling looks like sheet-rock.  The room could be of an unfinished office or residential building.  And the place is empty, except of course for the interrogator's station in the room immediately next door.

The would-be interrogator, who we come to know as Mac (played by Clive Owen) lets the woman who we come to know as Colette (played by Andrea Riseborough) stew sitting in her chair in her room for a while to "ponder her situation."  Eventually he gets up, enters her room and proceeds to tell her calmly yet forcefully: "It's over.  We have you.  We have a stack of documents and photos against you. You're going down (for decades of your life).  If you ever want to see _your little son_ again ... you're gonna have to make a deal with us."  She tells him to "F-off" and he leaves the room leaving a stack of the documents and photos against her with her to ponder...

Some time he comes back.  She asks for a lawyer.  He shakes his head and tells her "You don't need a lawyer.  You need us.  These are the papers, all already filled-out (he shows them to her...) All they need is a signature of a judge and your kid will become a ward of the state because you're going to go to jail on terrorism charges... unless ..." Unless, of course, she comes to work for them.  Who is them?  Of course MI5.  The rest of the story ensues ...

Of course, the IRA isn't stupid.  When she does reappear (after even a few hours of having disappeared) there are immediate suspicions... In this kind of shadow war, very few instructions are given to very few people at any given time.  So each time something goes wrong a quick and rather decisive "internal investigation" is done.  So how long can someone be in the IRA, yet spying for MI5 and ... live?


And yet, it's also even more complicated than that.  This is because the I.R.A. isn't portrayed as merely a "terrorist organization."  It's a neighborhood organization.  The people who Colette is being asked to spy on are her own friends and family.  Again, the details of any given "terrorist action" are known by only a very small circle of people (1-2 very close friends or family besides oneself).  And while Colette was caught placing a somewhat over-sized purse (that could have but didn't have to have any bomb in it ... the mere threat of there possibly being a bomb inside was enough...) most terrorist actions were really much more "up close and personal" ... like simply "whacking" (shooting/killing) a R.U.C. police captain (in retribution for a previous action on his part ...) as he got into his car to go to work one day ...

So IMHO the film captured the various dimensions -- official/bureaucratic, familial, both personal and stone cold/macheavellian -- of the conflict in North Ireland very well.  And I'm honestly, very very happy for the people who were involved (on all sides) that THANKFULLY the Good Friday Accord was reached in 1998 and that it has held since.  The shadow war in Northern Ireland was a terrible burden on absolutely all who lived there.  And it is a relief / blessing to all that it's over.


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African Independence [2013]

MPAA (UR)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing
Official Website

African Independence [2013] (written and directed by African American sociologist/film maker Tukufu Zuberi [IMDb]) is am excellent, well presented, feature length documentary that played recently at the 11th Chicago African Diaspora Film Festival at Facets Multimedia in Chicago.  Besides being scheduled to play this summer at film festivals throughout the United States both as part of the African Diaspora Film Festival program and beyond, it has also caught the attention of film festival organizers (and has played) in Brazil, Africa and Europe. 

The film follows the history of the modern African Independence movement from its origins following the end of World War II to the fall of Apartheid in South Africa in 1990.  Since Africa, the second largest and second most populous continent in the world, is both a large and diverse place with over 1 billion inhabitants living among 54 different countries spread across the continent, while making as needed references to others, the film-maker decided to focus on the experiences of four countries Ghana, Zambia, Kenya and South Africa in his presentation of the topic.

Ghana, the former British colony of "The Gold Coast" was the first sub-saharan African country to achieve independence.  Its independence leader Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana's first Prime Minister and later President, had studied abroad and was very much influenced by famed African American scholar W.E.B. DuBois. Indeed, both Kwama Nkrumah and W.E.B. DuBois were instrumental in organizing the 5th Pan African Congress in Manchester, England in 1945 which proved to be a seminal moment for the modern African Independence movement.  Ghana's independence did not arrive until 12 years later.  However, the seeds were planted at that conference and Ghana's independence was achieved by-and-large peacefully through philosophical persuasion (The colonial project had proven to be morally bankrupt in the horror of World War II when Nazi Germany had tried effectively to colonize Poland/Russia and even France.  In the post-War era, the promulgation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights declared all human beings regardless of race or national origin to be endowed with fundamental human rights.  Thus the moral underpinning behind Europe's maintaining large swathes of non-European lands under their domination had evaporated).

Ghana's independence offered the hope that all of Africa's independence could be achieved peacefully.  However, this proved not to be the case.  As noted by Kenneth Kaunda, independence leader and first president of Zambia, interviewed extensively in the film, wherever there was a substantial European minority present, independence came only after a protracted and often violent struggle.  Zambia, the former British colony of Northern Rhodesia still had a relatively small European population, hence independence still came relatively easily (though less easily and less peacefully than in Ghana).  However, in other places, notably in Kenya (whose experience was discussed extensively in the documentary) and Algeria (which perhaps due to similarities with the experiences of Kenya and South Africa, was not) where there were substantial European and otherwise non-native settler populations, the struggles proved to be much more violent.  Among those interviewed in the documentary was a woman who had been involved in Kenya's violent 1952-60 Mau Mau uprising. 

The most difficult situation proved to be that of South Africa.  Here the film-maker, Tukufu Zuberi [IMDb], does a truly remarkable job in presenting the complexities involved by interviewing BOTH of the last two Apartheid-era presidents of then white dominated South Africa P.W. Botha and F.W. de Klerk. (Honestly, film-maker,Tukufu Zuberi [IMDb]'s willingness to include extensive interviews with these to men, and then to allow them to express themselves calmly and clearly, testifies to the sobriety and quality of this project.

So what were the complexities of the South African situation?  First, as F.W. de Klerk pointed-out in his interview, the first modern anti-colonial revolt against the European powers in Africa was undertaken by the (white) South African "Boers," that is to say that after 300 years of living on the land of South Africa, the Afrikaners though of European origin (in times long past) did/do consider themselves to be African (and this was a position that Nelson Mandela's African National Congress also accepted even as it called for a true multiracial South Africa rather than one divided between races/ethnicities).  The second complication was, of course, that of the Cold War, which forced all African nation states to choose allegiances between the two Super Powers (the United States and the Soviet Union) that didn't necessarily make sense to, much less serve the interests of Africans.   P.W. Botha underlined this aspect of the South African conflict noting that a great deal of white South Africans (who were the richer and far more landed parties in South Africa) were simply terrified of the Communists.  (And it should be noted that within a year after the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall, the still Apartheid regime of South Africa legalized legalized Nelson Mandela's African National Congress and released him from prison and four years after that Nelson Mandela was elected as the first president of today's multiracial state of South Africa).

Still the documentary notes well that the Cold War era battle that raged against the Apartheid regime in  South Africa engulfed not merely South Africa itself but also Namibia, Zimbabwe, the former Portuguese colonies of Angola and Mozambique as well as the already independent but still "front-line" states such as Zambia and Tanzania.  And this decades long conflict came quite quickly to an end following the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War.

So today Africa is no longer under colonial control.  Instead Africans now rule Africans across the continent.  What's next for Africa?  It would be the thesis of the film maker, Tukufu Zuberi [IMDb], that the next steps for Africa would be toward greater unity, to take-up anew the Pan-African project envisioned by W.E.B. DuBois and Ghana's independence leader Kwama Nkrumah.  As the film maker noted, Europe, divided for centuries and having suffered through two cataclysmic wars in the last century has recognized the value of coming together as a single entity.  Africa too would benefit from being able to speak more clearly with a united voice.  Finally, African themselves have to begin to think in terms of actions and policies that serve the interests of Africa rather than the interests of outsiders.

All in all, this is an excellent, well organized, thought provoking presentation about where Africa was, where it is today, and where it can go in the future.  For those interested in history, human rights as well as geopolitics, this documentary is well worth the viewing.  Good job!


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Man of Steel [2013]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (C+)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
CNS/USCCB (J. Mulderig) review
RogerEbert.com (M. Zoller Seitz) review
AVClub.com (I. Vishnevetsky) review

Man of Steel [2013] (directed by Zach Snyder, screenplay by David S. Goyer, story by David S. Goyer and Christopher Nolan, based on the Superman [IMDb] [DCComics] character and story of Jerry Siegel [IMDb] and Joe Shuster [IMDb] of DC Comics [Wikip]) is presumably the first installment in a cinematic reboot of the Superhero story. 

Stylistically, the film borrows much from both Zach Snyder's (300 [2006], The Watchmen [2009], Sucker Punch [2011]) and Christopher Nolan's (Bat Man/ "Dark Knight" [2005] [2008] [2012] trilogy as well as Inception [2010]) previous work.  Other stylistic influences would include Riddley Scott's works (Alien [1979+] Series / Prometheus [2012] and Blade Runner [1982]). 

This all makes for a much darker/less colorful, "grittier" conception of the story than the cheerier/campier Superman [1978] [1980] [1983] films starring Christopher Reeve that most viewers of my generation would remember.  However, the darker and even when light is present palider visuals of the film perhaps reflect the darker, less vibrant, still post-9/11 zeitgeist in which we live in.  This allows for an exploration of a variety of angst producing themes (I'm choosing to use the German terms here on purpose) that go beyond the playback of 9/11 and its horrific attendant violent wholesale slaughter of innocents, but also destruction of an entire planet (Krypton from where "Superman" comes) because of mismanagement and greed as well as a society's (again Krypton's) embrace of Science / eugenics /  "social engineering" to a level that resulted in a society where almost no one was even capable of thinking "outside the box" making, once unanticipated problems arose, the society's doom a practically programmed inevitability.  This all makes Man of Steel [2013] not a cheery film but certainly a thought-provoking one.

How does the story here play out?   In the midst of societal collapse on their home planet of Krypton, two scientists, Jor-El [IMDb] (played by Russell Crowe) and Lara Lor-Van [IMDb] (played by Ayelet Zurer) do the "unthinkable" in their society: they conceive and bring to term a child "the old fashioned way" through sexual intercourse and gestation of the child in the mother's womb.  (The film begins by showing Lara Lor-Van [IMDb] giving birth to their son in presumably a lab, with husband, Jor-El [IMDb] helping her through it).

Now why would this be such a "radical act?"  Some background:  According to the story presented, for hundreds of years, Krypton's society was engineering the creation of children in a giant "Genesis Factory." The "Factory" calls to mind conceptually Aldrous Huxley's 1922 novel Brave New World [Wikip] [Amzn] and visually the more recent Matrix [1999] films (as the engineered infants-to-be are shown gestating in sacks in a gigantic tank of presumably amniotic fluid-like ooze connected to a giant kelp/seaweed umbilical cord).  Through this gigantic "hive like" Genesis Factory, infants were produced matching the precise temperaments and capabilities that the society anticipated would be needed when these children grew up.

This all worked well so long as the society functioned within its envisioned parameters.  However, over the course of the previous 100 years (several generations) the society's fuel began to run out.  With an entire society composed of people programmed to think and act only in specific pre-programmed ways, the number of options available to the society to respond to this problem proved limited indeed.  Basically, the society continued to do "more of the same" (extracting its power from its planet's core) to the point that at the beginning of the story here, Krypton's society had literally "hollowed out" its planet's core and the planet was on a course of "implosion," that is, self-Destruction.

Seeing this, Jor-El [IMDb] and Lara Lor-Van [IMDb], the chief scientific consultants to Krypton's government, apparently determined that the whole structure of Krypton's society was programmed to collapse.  Yes, engineering the society's offspring had some theoretical advantages (presumably the needs of the society could be "precisely met.")  However, such engineering had proved incapable of dealing with this existential crisis that the society was now facing.  So the two scientists apparently determined that reintroducing "chance" to reproduction could produce (or could have produced) the offspring necessary to ensure the society's/planet's survival.

Their idea proved too late to save Krypton's society or even its planet.  However, Jor-El [IMDb] and Lara Lor-Van [IMDb] place their infant child (the first Kryptonian child in hundreds of years who was not conceived by any specific programming but instead by love and chance) into a rocket ship and send it hurling into space toward a distant (and by the data that they had on Krypton) compatible planet ... our Earth. 

And so it is that little Kal-El [IMDb] and his craft crash into a field outside of Smallville, Kansas to be found by Jonathan [IMDb] and Martha Kent [IMDb] (played by Kevin Costner and Diane Lane) and the child is raised as their adopted son Clark [IMDb] (played in the film as a child by Cooper Timberline and Dylan Sprayberry and later as an adult by Henry Cavill).

Now growing-up as someone with an exceptional story (at some point in his childhood, his parents do tell him that he arrived from outer space) and exceptional powers is not easy (Krypton apparently had a higher gravity, so Clark Kent [IMDb] finds himself much stronger than people of earth.  He also has x-ray vision as well as apparently an ability to absorb all kinds of other sensory information "all at once" and has to learn, with help of his parents, to "block out" information that he does not need at a given moment to focus on the task at hand).  So Clark [IMDb] grows-up as something of a "special needs" kid and though he is not home-schooled, he's presented as someone who probably would have been a good candidate for such home schooling as though he was (obviously) stronger than anybody else in school, he was so strong that he was afraid to use his strength ... and paradoxically ended up being picked-on and even beaten-up often in school.

Why was Clark [IMDb] being told by his parents to "not strike back" but instead to "take it"?  They were afraid that if it became known that he was exceptional (indeed "super" though that word was studiously avoided throughout much of the film) then it could cause _him_ trouble and even perhaps bring down the whole society (shades of Krypton again?? ;-).  Why?  Well society would not necessarily be able to accept (yet) that we were "not alone" in the universe.  Clark Kent [IMDb] with his special abilities (and the space capsule in which he arrived, when Jonathan Kent [IMDb] kept hidden in the barn) would be a quite literally a "Poster Child" pointing to this reality.

As such, the Clark Kent [IMDb] of this movie, like many heroes in the Comic Book / Super Hero genre spent much of his early life "keeping a low profile," arguably hiding even as he does use his "super powers" especially his strength "for good" as the occasion arose.  (Both sets of his parents would be proud ...)

He comes to be less able "to hide" when intrepid "national security" reporter Lois Lane [IMDb] (played by Amy Adams) from her newspaper, "The Daily Planet," fresh from "reporting on the troops in Afghanistan" comes snooping around a super-secret U.S. Navy dig-site off the coast of Alaska where a gigantic underwater craft had been found frozen in ice.  "So what?  It's probably an old Russian Cold War sub," she asks one of the lieutenants involved in the excavation.  "The only problem, mam, is that the ice in which it was found is 20,000 years old," the lieutenant responds.  Hmmm...

Well, while she's knocking around the dig site, she runs into ... Clark Kent [IMDb].  He had stumbled onto rumors of the dig as well, and had found his way there, taking a job of being a "lowly hand" (and somewhat incompetent one also, if, as the rest of the crew finds out, a really, really strong one ;-) on a commercial fishing vessel (shades of the reality TV series Dangerous Catch [IMDb] ;-). 

Anyway, both Lois [IMDb] and Clark [IMDb] knock about (secretly) the site and he ends up saving her life and in a way that simply does not make sense to her.  Who was that guy who showed-up there, seemed to be investigating the same strange craft as she was, saved her life ... and then disappeared?  She starts to try to investigate him ... The rest of the story follows ...

Twists in the story include that craft frozen in the Arctic ice for 20,000 years was from ... Krypton.  And as soon as it's unfrozen it sends off a beacon signal into space.  Who hears it?  Well other surviving Kryptonians, notably General Zod [IMDb] (played by Michael Shannon) and a party of henchmen/women who had been banished from Krypton in the days just before Krypton imploded for trying to stage a last ditch military coup to try to force Kryptonian government to do something "before all was lost."  Instead, they were captured by still loyal Kryptonian forces and exiled for "treason."  Ironically, on account of their exile, they survived Krypton's destruction. 

When General Zod [IMDb], et al receive the message from the ancient Kryptonian craft that had been frozen on earth for 20,000 years, they head ... to Earth.  This sets off a battle between General Zod [IMDb] and his party on one side and the militaries of Earth on the other as General Zod [IMDb] et al are stll genetically programmed Kryptonian military men/women and patriots who see Earth (in their pre-programmed way) as a place to "rebuild Krypton." 

Much ensues ... and, of course, "mild mannered" Clark Kent [IMDb], who was actually of Kryptonian parents but (1) was conceived freely (without any specific/limiting genetic programming) and (2) was raised by loving Earthling parents ... inevitably gets sucked into the conflict.  Who is he?  What does he want?  Can anyone (both Kryptonian and Earthling "trust him")?  Good ole Kal El / Clark Kent [IMDb], "super hero" that he is, turns out to be the ultimate "free agent."  And yet in the midst of a sudden cataclysmic conflict, he must choose sides.  Guess who he chooses?  And perhaps more importantly, why?

It all makes for a remarkably thought-provoking take on the Superman story.  Really small kids probably won't really understand it, but pre-teens age and above (including said pre-teens' parents) would probably find the film quite interesting and at times fun.

A final word on the visuals:  As is generally my preference, I saw the film in 2D.  However, I get the sense that this film probably would work better in 3D (if the viewer/family in question had the money to see it that way).  I say this because the film seemed rather "pale" throughout and arguably "somewhat out of focus."  The paleness of the imagery may be a stylistic choice on the part of Zach Snyder as his films tend to be "rather Spartan" (those who saw "300" would get the pun ;-) in terms of color.  However, it could also be an artifact of seeing a movie, which was filmed and intended to be seen in 3D, in 2D instead.  Still, I really hate paying the extra $4/ticket to see a film in 3D and I'd understand parents/families reluctant to do so as well...

As such, while conceptually interesting I found the film visually quite a burden to watch, and for me, that's a problem as I do believe that films are supposed to visual stories.  So I can't give it as high a rating as I otherwise would have liked.  I continue to believe that 3D is artistically unnecessary and, above all, a price-gauging technique.


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