They Came Together [2014]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (3 Stars)  RE.com (1 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (C. Lemire) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

They Came Together [2014] (directed and screenplay co-written by David Wain along with Michael Showalter) seeks to be an Airplane! [1980] style spoof of romantic comedies.  It's certainly a worthy project.  Whether or not it succeeds will probably depend on the viewer.

The story of how Molly (played by Amy Poehler) and Joel (played by Paul Rudd) "came together" is told in the context of a dinner that they were having with another couple, Kyle and Karen (played by Bill Hader and Ellie Kemper), at some bristro somewhere in Manhattan.  Kyle and Karen had just finished telling Molly and Joel how they had met and fallen in love, and one of them (no doubt to their later-regret) asked Molly and Joel to tell them their story.  They quickly replied, in unison, that their story could easily be made into a rom-com.  And they quickly (and methodically ...) elaborated.  "You see, what first attracted me about Joel, was that he was _vaguely_ and yet not explicitly/aggressively Jewish," Molly begins.  "Jewish-lite," Joel concurs.  "And we must confess that the third protagonist in our story was clearly New York," they add, again in unison.

What follows is 80 minutes of one rom-com cliche after another, some work, some don't, but most do:

There's Joel's "hot" but cold ex Tiffany (played by Cobie Smothers).  He keeps telling her, "I love you."  She keeps finding creative ways to avoid saying "I love you" back... ;-).  And later she dumps him for his back-stabbing rival from the office named Oliver (played by Jack McBrayer).  Then there's Joel's salt-of-the-earth, best buddy from work named Bob (played by Jason Mantzoukas) who Joel nearly kills playing nerf-football in their high-rise Manhattan office ("Go deep," Joel tells Bob.  Well ...).
On the other side of the coin, Molly begins the story having broken-up with her boyfriend, but having just opened an unbelievably cute candy shop named "Lower Sweet Side" (or something as lickerish covered with syrup as that) which was by her own estimation "charming, adorable and impossible not to like."  So completely fulfilled did she feel running this shop, that she would give the candy she made away to all the little kids that came there FOR FREE ... This of course put her in financial trouble, as her nice-but-super-dorky accountant Egbert (played by Ed Helms) tried to warn her about.  Poor dorky Egbert, of course, harbored a not so secret crush on Molly as well.  Then there was Molly's looking-out-for-her and perhaps necessarily black coworker/BFF Wanda (played by Teyonah Parris) who was concerned that, really cute candy shop "success" or not, Molly would not really be happy "without a man in her life."  (I say Wanda was "perhaps Molly's necessarily black BFF" because with the exception of a tiny bit part played by Kenan Thompson as "Teddy" the "black buddy" member of Joel's "pick-up basketball game" crew, there's not a single person of color in the film and even white-oriented rom-coms now tend to have a requisite "person of color" playing _some_ significant supporting role.  Hence, Wanda ... who seemed to exist apparently to give Molly support when(ever) she needed it most...).  Molly also had a disapproving older sister (a la Jerry McGuire [1996]) and a little boy who immediately took a liking to Joel.  And her parents were _a kick_ (Mrs Robinson [1967] / Meet the Fockers [2000] ;-)

Well, what could go wrong?  Well ... there has to be some drama/conflict/turn of events in the story, in order to make a movie.  And there are plenty... Remember Molly has a "super cute, pink covered, neighborhood candy shop.  Well, Joel works as some sort of a middle-level manager for a faceless / Evil candy conglomerate out to destroy cute neighborhood candy shops the world over ... Then of course they have to have a fight.  The ultra-hot yet really, really cold ex has to make a re-appearance.  There has to be some dramatic resolution at the end. 

Does it work?  Again, it'll depend on the viewer.  But there's some very, very funny stuff in this film that IMHO makes up for the groaners.


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Third Person [2013]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (1 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (2 Stars)  AVClub (D)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review
RE.com (S. Wloszczyna) review
AVClub (A.A. Dowd) review

Third Person [2013] (written and directed by Paul Haggis) focused on a writer (nominally named "Michael" and played by Liam Neeson) and the creative writing process plays like a contemporary "who-done-it" inviting audiences to try to figure out what's actually going on.  As in the case recent films such as Crash [2004] (written and directed by Haggis as well) and Babel [2006], there are actually three stories playing out and they are intertwined.  The question in this appropriately R-rated mystery-of-sorts becomes: how?

In (perhaps) the main story there's said writer Michael (played aforementionedly by Liam Neeson).  We find him residing (temporarily?) in a quite swanky hotel in Paris.  At the beginning of the film, he's flown-out his beautiful, more-or-less-clearly adoring, and certainly _much younger_ writer, lover, muse Anna (played by Olivia Wilde) to join him there, at his Paris hotel, for a while.  She arrives, complaining half-for-real / half-flirtatiously "Did you really fly me all the way out here 'on points'?"  Michael does have a wife (played by Kim Basinger) back in the States ...

But there are two other stories going on.  The second involves a rather strung-out/irritated American sales rep named Scott (played by Adrien Brody) apparently finishing-up some sort of a clothing business venture in Rome.  It's clear as day that he hates being there and would just like to get back home (presumably in the States).  But with some time to kill, he comes across a bar named "Cafe Americano" on a random street somewhere in the city center (near apparently the Pantheon).  When he enters it, he finds to his further annoyance that there's nothing "American" about it.  It's just like any other random Roman coffee bar in city.  The barista has soccer jersey on, speaks no English and when Scott asks if by chance he could get a Budweiser, he's given a Peroni (warm to boot ...) instead.  Asking indignantly why the place is called "Cafe Americano," he gets a similarly indignant shrug in return as if to reply: "I don't know and I really don't care, you annoying ugly American jerk."

Well while sitting there, nursing his warm beer, looking forward to just getting the heck out of the place/city/country/continent in a couple hours, a somewhat exotically dressed darker-skinned woman (played by Maran Atias) enters.  It's obvious, that the barista doesn't particularly like her either.  Why?  Well, she's a "zingara" (gypsy).  But barely in control of his emotions, Scott, steps in to defend her, and so, the barista gives her a drink ... some sort of a liqueur, interestingly enough served _cold_.  So Scott asks for (whatever it is) the same.

The woman and Scott get to talking.   The woman, named Monica, we find doesn't particularly like Scott either.  In fact, she seems angry at everyone and everything.  It turns out that she's been told to come to that particular bar to wait for a phone call.  Why?  Well, it appears that she's some sort of a Romanian immigrant and she has been trying to get her daughter over to Italy, not particularly easy, especially if one's skin-color betrays you as a gypsy (a Roma...).

So Scott, initially not a particularly sympathetic guy, soon finds himself getting sucked into a story that goes way beyond his normal experience.  Now how much of what Monica is telling him is for real?  How much is some terrible lie concocted to take advantage of a gullible "ugly American" who hated the place anyway?  She always tells him just enough, with just enough intensity that he (and the audience...) is left bewildered and willing to give her "the benefit of the doubt" in hopes of "choosing to do the right thing" ... So that's the second story that's unspooling.

But wait, one more tidbit to reveal before going to the third story: It turns out that Scott's not necessarily all that anxious to go home to the States either.  He's just anxious, period.  Why?  Well, he seems to be clinging to a random voice-mail message from his own 8-9 year old daughter that he's been saving on his cell-phone for something like a 100 days.  The message has no particular importance to it.  So why keep it?  Obviously, because he hasn't seen her (or talked to her) in a very long time.  So why then is he getting sucked into the exotic/tormented Monica's sob-story?  Shouldn't he be looking at his watch and looking for an excuse to get to the airport ... Instead, he chooses to delay his departure and enter into Monica's world (or Monica's "world" ...).

Okay, going on to the third story.  This one, set in New York, involves a young once would-be actress named Julia (played by Mila Kunis) who's found herself in a very-very ugly child-custody fight with her former husband, an artist named Rick (played by James Franco).  Apparently, Julia was accused of trying to kill their 8-9 year old son in some terrible/neglectful way.  She's emphatically defended her innocence BUT her very emotion in this matter has proven to be to her detriment as her similarly harried (it's tough being taken seriously as a woman in this world) / business-like (and not particularly convinced) lawyer (played by Maria Bello) keeps reminding her.  The fundamental charge against Julia has been that she's "irresponsible."  But how does one maintain a job if one was previously "a struggling actress" and one's now constantly being called to make random, though always important, court appearances/depositions/evaluations, etc with everyone more or less convinced that "she did it" and is "simply in denial?"  The poor woman HAD VOLUNTEERED for a lie detector test (against the advice of her similarly harried/but businesslike lawyer...) and then (because she was so upset, so trying to prove herself innocent) FAILED IT.  So then this story is playing out as well.

So these are the three stories that are playing out in the film and one assumes from the beginning that they are somehow interelated.  How?  Well that's the rest of the film ;-)

I know that the other reviewers (above) didn't particularly like the film, BUT I DID.  I loved the guessing.  What's "real"?  What's not?  What's "based on" / "inspired by reality"?  Etc, etc.  It's definitely an R-rated movie (more for sex than for violence) but I do think it makes for a good contemporary "mystery": what was "really" going on?


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Congo: White King, Red Rubber, Black Death [2003]

MPAA (UR would be R)  Slant Mag (2 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (4 Stars)

IMDb listing

NYT (M. Dargis) review
AVClub (N. Rabin) review
Slant Magazine (E. Gonzales) review
Village Voice (J. Land) review

Congo: White King, Red Rubber, Black Death [2003] (written and directed by Peter Bate) is an originally BBC produced documentary that I recently purchased at the 2013 Chicago African Diaspora Film Festival held recently at Facets Multimedia in Chicago.  (As my religious order's annual Provincial Chapter conflicted with much this year's festival, instead of attending many of this year's selections, I purchased a number of films from previous festivals that they had on-sale at the showing, of the one film, Jews of Egypt [2013] at this year's festival, that I did manage to see).  The current film, is available for purchase on DVD at AfricanDiasporaDVD.com as well as Amazon.com.

Using several contemporary documentary techniques (that annoy some of the reviewers above) including some re-enactments and an IMHO quite interesting/compelling "courtroom" device in which late-19th century Belgian King Leopold II (fictiously) stands trial for crimes against humanity, Congo: White King, Red Rubber, Black Death [2003] certainly makes its point: What Leopold's henchmen perpetuated in HIS PERSONAL COLONY of the Congo conceded to him by the "Berlin Conference of 1884-85" (which he then had the gall to give the truly Orwellian name "The Congo Free State") was simply ghastly ... and arguably gave rise to the modern human rights movement.

So what did Leopold and his henchmen do?  Well, as soon as he received title (from the other European powers, NO, ZERO, NONE AFRICANS INVOLVED) to the still largely unexplored Congo basin of Africa, he declared ALL VACANT LAND in the Colony "the State's" (that is HIS) and all work done on said "vacant land" could only be done "for the benefit of the State."  So in effect, HE TURNED THE ENTIRE CONGO BASIN INTO A GIGANTIC LABOR CAMP WHERE ALL THE INHABITANTS BECAME HIS SLAVES.  Having set this ground rule for the function of HIS PERSONAL COLONY, the colony was then organized TO SIMPLY EXTRACT the wealth of this region (and boy did it turn out to be phenomenally wealthy in natural resources -- in rubber, ivory, later gold, diamonds, rare-earth minerals, etc) FOR HIS OWN ENRICHMENT and (EVENTUALLY) Belgium's.  His approach became A MODEL for the Czars, Stalin and Hitler when they came to build forced labor camps of their own...

The atrocities were appalling.  Native inhabitants of the land, requisitioned for various extraction services (in the early years, mostly for the collection of rubber and ivory) who did not "meet quota" were simply shot, often several lined-up and shot with ONE SHOT together (to SAVE BULLETS), THEIR RIGHT HANDS CHOPPED OFF (and SMOKED, so that they would not decay...) AND KEPT "AS A RECORD."  When the threat of CERTAIN DEATH was not deemed a "sufficient incentive" to make the laborers work, soldiers TOOK THE VILLAGERS' WIVES/DAUGHTERS HOSTAGE (having their way / VIOLATING them in the meantime...) while the men stuggled in the forests to collect their quota.  AND ALL THIS WAS DONE UNDER THE VAINER OF BRINGING "EUROPEAN CIVILIZATION" (!!!!) TO THE CONGOLESE "SAVAGES."  Such then was "the white man's burden" in the Leopold's "Congo Free State" ... a "burden" that ONLY PERHAPS a Nazi SS-Einsatzgruppen member or a Soviet NKVD officer tasked with machine-gunning Jews or putting bullets into the backs of the heads of "class criminals" could "appreciate."

This is an absolutely galling documentary but rightfully so.  If Leopold II lived today, he'd certainly deserve a cell in the Hague next to Milošević, Karadžić and Mladić if not worse.  Great documentary!


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Cinemanovels [2013]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (2 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (M. Phillips) review

Cinemanovels [2013] (written and directed by Terry Miles) is a Canadian indie film, that in its politeness, even as it touches potentially explosive subjects, feels to this American (re)viewer remarkably ... Canadian ;-).  The film has played recently at Chicago's Facets Multimedia,

The film centers around a nice if seemingly ever disappointed 30-something Canadian woman named Grace (played by Lauren Lee Smith) married to a polite (if at times amusingly contradictory) 30-something Canadian investment banker named Ben (played by Ben Cotton).

Together they've been trying to have a child and it hasn't been particularly easy.  Indeed in the opening scene, we see the two in a rather perfunctory if at least apparently "private" room in a fertility clinic with Grace (hand off-screen) apparently tugging at Ben's ... in hopes of collecting a sperm sample to leave at the clinic, the sounds of some sort of a porn film heard in the background.  It seems rather clear that neither of them are particularly into it -- it becomes clear as the film goes on, that they've been "there" before -- but the task needs to be done.   Eventually, there's "success."  Ben's sperm sample is dutifully collected in a specimen cup and just as dutifully capped.  Ben puts his pants back on, kisses his wife and presumably heads off to work.  Grace is dutifully left to carry the capped specimen cup to the nurses' station for analysis.  But it's obvious that she's tired of this, or otherwise doesn't see the point.  On the way to the nurses' station, she stops in a bathroom and ... switches the sample for a few mL's of hand soap ;-).  Would ANYONE really recognize the difference (of course they would ... BUT WOULD IT MAKE A DIFFERENCE ANYWAY ...)?

So we get a sense of Grace's state of mind fairly early on.  Now why would she be like that?

Well, it turns out that she's the daughter of an über-famous Canadian, francophone to boot, (fictitious) director, recently deceased, named John Laurentain.  We hear him eulogized by two super-earnest, indeed fawning media critics at the close of some random CBC television program as: "One who taught us all, anglophone and francophone, what it means to be Canadian."  Wonderful.  The only problem for Grace is that SHE HARDLY KNEW HIM.  WHY?  BECAUSE HE RAN OFF WITH A YOUNG (presumably) QUEBECOIS STARLET NAMED "SOPHIE" WHEN GRACE WAS THREE (Sophie, who then starred in most of Laurentain's films, was played absolutely perfectly in her magnificently _pretentious_ existentialist 60s-70s era roles by Cate Michaud).

So, "national" / "Quebecois" treasure though he was, he was also a "___" as Grace's best friend Clementine (played by Jessica Beals) reminds her.

Yet "____" though he was, he was ALSO Grace's dad.  So ... early in the film, after going over to sign some papers at her father's film production company (presumably in Montreal or Toronto), she finds herself volunteering to curate a "retrospective" of her father's work EVEN THOUGH SHE HATED HIM AND HAD NEVER EVEN SEEN ANY OF HIS THIRTY-FOUR (!) FILMS, but also PRECISELY BECAUSE IN LIFE SHE KNEW NEXT TO NOTHING ABOUT HIM THIS COULD PERHAPS HELP HER TO UNDERSTAND WHO HE ACTUALLY WAS.  Talk about inner conflict ... When she explains all this to Clementine, she (as supportively as she could) just shakes her head ...

The rest of the movie unspools from there.  Unsurprisingly, Grace procrastinates with the project, even as she ALSO remains supremely ambivalent about whether she really wanted a child with her investment banker husband (who for amusement liked collecting and READING pompous, extremely _heavy_ "classical Communist literature" on the side ;-).  Eventually, she gets help from a young media exec / neighbor of theirs named Adam (played by Kett Turton) who it turns out to have written his thesis on her father's work.

It's all quite painful, but as the film proceeds (not much of a SPOILER) ... she inevitably comes to better understand her now deceased father.  And indeed, this is why I went to see the film, and why I do think that the film would be worth the time to see for MIDDLE AGED CHILDREN of (NOW) AGING OR EVEN DECEASED PARENTS.

I do honestly believe that as one enters into one's own middle age, one can come to start to understand the decisions / mistakes / "mistakes" of one's parents when THEY were middle-aged and PERHAPS then one can come to accept them and, as needed, forgive them.

This is a Canadian film, so it is LESS angry than the recent American film People Like Us [2012] that covered similar ground.  Still, it gives middle aged people, perhaps angry at their parents, a chance to reflect on their own parents' lives and perhaps be able to understand them better and forgive them as well.

In that sense, I can only applaud this very nice, if at times exasperating, appropriately R-rated, Canadian film: It tries really hard to make, in the end, a very nice point. 


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Transformers: Age of Extinction [2014]

MPAA (PG-13)  CNS/USCCB (A-III)  ChicagoTribune (1 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (2 1/2 Stars)  AVClub (C-)

As part of my contribution in our parish's participation in the Archdiocese of Chicago's Campaign "To Teach Who Christ Is," I've decided to forgo seeing (and therefore reviewing here) one or two movies a weekend and instead contribute the money I would have spent to the campaign.

I'm trying to be strategic about this, picking movies that would "hurt somewhat" to miss, that is, films that are not "so bad" that I wouldn't see them anyway nor movies that I really would need to see/review or else my blogging effort would cease to be worthwhile.

As per my custom, I will try to provide links to usual line-up of reviews that I also consider as I write my own.

This week I chose to not see ... Transformers: Age of Extinction [2014].  To some that may be "no surprise."  Yet, I did actually write extensively (and reviewed quite favorably) the previous installment Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon [2012].  It's just that on a limited budget ... Plus, why do these films have to be sooo loooonnnnggggg?  Anyway, since T3:DotM [2012], there have been several other popular films that have continued to discuss humanity's increasingly complicated relationship with technology (notably Her [2013] and Transcendence [2014]. In addition, the Science Channel's popular series Through the Wormhole [2010+] devoted an entire episode to the question of whether Robots will be the next step in human evolution).  So if nothing else, as one watches (or simply calls to mind the prospect of) GIGANTIC transformer robots descending onto earth to ABSOLUTELY DEMOLISH humanity's most prized previous achievements, perhaps this can be an invitation to reflect on the possibilities and implications of the increasingly blurred distinction between us and the gadgets we make.

Then again, we might just stand mesmerized in front of the fireworks and mayhem.  The 4th of July is coming up, after all...

In any case, there's plenty of mayhem in the Transformer films.  Perhaps though, they can still invite us to reflect on something more substantive than just crashing buildings ...(We've been through that for real afterall...)


ADDENDUM:

Fascinatingly, Transformers: Age of Extinction [2014] became the first movie of 2014 to break $100 million for its opening weekend in the U.S.  Generally movies like this are supposed to "do well" overseas.  But in this case, this movie hasn't even been released outside of the United States until the World Cup ends, and it still made this kind of money _here_, domestically in the U.S.A. 

I've long maintained on my blog that when a film like this -- basically "HUGE shape-shifting ROBOTS arrive FROM OUT OF NOWHERE to SMASH THINGS (as well as each other)" -- makes this kind of money, it's because it "speaks to people" on "a deeper level" that goes beyond the rational.  This film is clearly one of archetypes and the collective subconscious:  Technology can be experienced today as "shape-shifting" and punishing / humiliating to "ways" and achievements "of the past." 


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Kirikou and the Sorceress (orig. Kirikou et la Sorcière) [1998]

MPAA (Unrated/w. Parental Warning)  Eye4film (3 1/2 Stars)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars with Expl)

IMDb listing
NYT (E. Mitchell) review
BBC (J. Russell) review
Eye4Film (A. Wilkenson) review

Kirikou and the Sorceress (orig. Kirikou et la Sorcière) [1998] [IMDb] (written and directed by Michel Ocelot [IMDb] is a children's animated film based on West African folk-tales that I recently purchased at the 2013 Chicago African Diaspora Film Festival held recently at Facets Multimedia in Chicago.  (My religious order's annual Provincial Chapter conflicted with much this year's festival.  So instead of attending many of this year's selections, I purchased a number of films from previous festivals that they had on-sale at the showing, of Jews of Egypt [2013], that I did manage to see).  The current film, Kirikou and the Sorceress [1998] [IMDb] is available for streaming-rental on Amazon Instant Video and for purchase on DVD at AfricanDiasporaDVD.com.

Parents should know that this film is an originally French rendering (though dubbed in English) of a traditional West African folk tale.  So the characters are depicted as dressed, or more to the point, as undressed, as one would expect to find them in their traditional West African village: the women are depicted topless as a matter of course and children playing in rivers and streams or dancing on the village grounds are depicted naked as well.  This is all done basically in "National Geographic" style, but it certainly deserves note here.

The story is about a precocious boy named Kirikou (voiced by Doudou Gueye Thiaw in the French version and by Theodore Sibusiso Sibeko in the English one).  At the beginning of the film, still in his mother's womb, he tells his mother (voiced in the French version by Maimouna N'Diaye, and in the English version by Kombisile Sangweni) that it's time for him step-out and enter into the world.  She tells him that if he can tell her that already from the womb, that he could make his own way out on his own, which he then does -- crawling out from under her skirt.

He then asks for his father and his mother tells him that all the men of the village have been killed and eaten by a wicked sorceress named Karaba (voiced in the French version by Awa Sene Sarr and in the English version by Antoinette Kellermann).  Karaba was a hateful woman who lived in the woods outside the village.  She had been tormenting the village for years.  And yet, no one could get to her as she was protected by a large number of animated wooden fetishes (statues).

So leave it to the little boy Kirikou to slowly remove the curses set against the village by this seeming evil sorceress, peal away her defenses and finally through the assistance of a wise old man (voiced in the French version by Robert Liensol and in the English version by Mabutho Kid Sithole) who lived in a citadel deep inside a nearby volcano, figure out why the sorceress was acting so wickedly and how she could be changed.

Of course, the story ends well, with Kirikou saving everyone and all.  The traditional "National Geographic" style nudity may disconcert many American viewers.  However, the payoff to others would be the realization that this story, based on traditional West African folk tales, certainly predated the recent Disney film Maleficient [2014], and probably predated the first rendering (in story book form) of Wicked (1995) which sought to understand/give context to two of the most notorious "wicked" witches of Western / European folk tales.


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Ai Weiwei: The Fake Case [2014]

MPAA (R)  ChicagoTribune (3 1/2 Stars)  RE.com (3 Stars)  AVClub (B)  Fr. Dennis (3 Stars)

IMDb listing
ChicagoTribune (S. Linden) review
RE.com (C. Lemire) review
AVClub (D. Ehrlich) review

About Chinese avant garde artist Ai Weiwei:
         Wikipedia article
         NY Times coverage
         Amnesty International coverage

Ai Weiwei: The Fake Case [2014] (written and directed by Andreas Johnsen) is a documentary which continues to chronicle the struggle of Chinese avant garde artist Ai Weiwei [en.wikip] [ny times] [amnesty.org] with the Chinese Communist government.  The film is intended as a companion piece / sequel to Alison Klayman's documentary about him Ai Weiwei; Never Sorry [2012] reviewed here previously.

I have long believed that the Arts have an intrinsic prophetic _potential_ to them.  Obviously fawning propaganda pieces can also be made to support any "power that be."  However, the Arts can also expose and shame the same powers when they become too arrogant.  I'm also something of a child of the 1968 Prague Spring, my parents' childhood home, a city which dominated by two foreign imposed totalitarian dictatorships for the better part of their lifetimes now proudly celebrates Franz Kafka as one of its own. 

So while there is something of a "piggishness" to Ai Weiwei, a good part of me honestly "gets him," appreciates him and sympathizes with him.  And one gets the sense that famed Czech absurdist playwright, dissident leader during the Communist era, and Czechoslovakia and then the Czech Republic's first post-Communist President, Vaclav Havel, would have absolutely loved him.  For Ai Weiwei clearly uses his art to provocatively shame Chinese government for its arrogance and its negligence. 

For instance (this documented in the first film) after the devastating 2008 Sichuan earthquake which destroyed dozens of schools throughout central China, killing thousands of children (in a country with a rigid one child only population control policy...), after the government proved very much disinterested in compiling the names of the deceased, Ai Weiwei HIMSELF organized hundreds of volunteers to go through the towns and villages to compile the names of the deceased children.  With the least of names (which he displays in his office), he promises to build one day a Washington Vietnam War Memorial style "Wall of Names" in their honor as well.  Then for an exhibition of his art in Munich, he composed a banner along the side wall of the museum utilizing 7,000 children's backpacks declaring in Chinese "She had a happy life until she was seven." This kind of use of art, _contemporary art_, where "the medium" itself can become part of "the message" can not but bring tears to one's eyes.

The current film deals with the harassment of Ai Weiwei by the Chinese authorities.  Nominally, he was accused by China's authorities of "tax evasion."  Yet, he spent some 80 days IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT (except for interrogations...) following his arrest prior to being released on bail (close to $1 million) with the case allowed to more or less expire one year later.  Could ANYONE imagine someone in the United States or in the European Union being held IN SOLITARY / INCOMMUNICADO for 80 days upon arrest for tax evasion?  (Now Vladimir Putin's Russia _did_ order a number of years ago a nationwide confiscation of the computers of opposition organizations and NGOs in a "crackdown" on "pirated software" ... and members of the Russian "punk collective" Pussy Riot [en.wikip] [NY Times] [Amnesty.org], of course, did spend time in jail for "hooliganism" following a "guerrilla art" performance of a "Punk Prayer" at Moscow's Russian Orthodox Cathedral of the Divine Savior asking, among other things, "Mary, Mother of God, drive Putin away." ;-)

The tax evasion case against Ai Weiwei dealt with his company called Fa-Ke, apparently meaning "Drawing and Development" in Chinese, but which carries several amusing meanings in English: transliterated, the company name comes to "Fake" (but what is Art but "faked reality" ;-), and pronounced, the company name sounds remarkably close to sounding like the F-word: "Fah K-eh" (Yes, I did mention that there is a "piggish" quality about him at times ...).

Anyway, Ai Weiwei did apparently eventually "pay up" what he owed (or what he "owed," it's hard honestly to tell...) the government, mostly apparently from donations of supporters (many of whom were local Chinese...).  And he did proceed to make a six scene, sculpture series, chronicling his time in prison, each scene encased in a cell, with viewers required to view the insides of the cell through a slit "just as guard would." 

It all continues to make for an interesting documentary series, and reminds one of both the power of art, as well as of the freedoms in the West that we often take for granted.


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