Tried to watch a movie I got in the mail all the way through late tonight (actually last night now) and just in the last few scenes it started skipping, returning to the beginning of the flick. Frustrating. So I just spent a half hour trying to get it to work and finally gave up. Another problem unrelated to my brain surgery.
But earlier in the day I drove for only the second time since the surgery, only this time all alone (the first time a friend drove with me just in case). I haven't been listening to the radio when driving with others, too much going on and since the surgery I like it one thing at a time where possible.
But I thought I'd turn the radio on in the parking lot to catch the weather and then I couldn't remember how to work the radio! In a car I've been driving for several years. Could not for the life of me figure it out. I was getting more and more frustrated, feeling almost like I was being tricked, or punked I guess my 12-year-old would say.
I gave it up and tried again when I got back home and was parked there. Same problem until just before giving up I realized there were buttons for the radio on my steering wheel and I tried them and bingo, it worked and I remembered then how I used to control the stations and volume etc. It all came back and suddenly seemed so obvious.
Like so much of my experiences lately.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
STILL RECOVERING
After the snow storm yesterday and last night, it looked like a Christmas card out there today. I couldn't resist taking a stroll through our little village with the idea of doing some holiday shopping.
I went into two little stores, one that sells only things made out of recycled materials, like coasters from the center of old 33rpm records, and another that sells artsy odds and ends which seem pretty unique.
In the first store there was Christmas music playing—Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons singing "I Saw Momma Kissing Santa Claus" in that falsetto voice of his that only a tough Italian kid from Jersey could have gotten away with back then—and four or five customers in a very small shop.
I circled the tiny place looking to see if there was something I might get someone and found one little item and then after going through the whole store decided on another I had seen. But when I tried to find it I couldn't, and as two of the customers paid for their merchandise and one of them took a cell phone call and the music changed and I kept circling the room unable to find this item, I began to feel overwhelmed by it all. I focused on one thing until the other customers left and then asked the store owner to help me find what I was looking for.
In the next shop, just as small if not smaller, there were even more customers, but the music wasn't as distracting and I was able to grab a few small items quickly and a young woman asked if I wanted them wrapped before I even took them to the counter. But as she was wrapping them and I was paying I realized I wouldn't be able to remember what was in them so I borrowed a pen to write names on each one but then stopped because I couldn't remember who I had intended to give them to!
I left there anxious and exhausted and went back to my apartment feeling like I needed a nap. So, not entirely recovered. But still, the reading is almost back to where it was, and writing this has been a lot easier than it was just a few days ago, and I made it through the day with my 12-year-old here this evening with two classmates and another on the phone finishing up a project due in school tomorrow morning and I'm alive and cancer free with almost all my faculties intact, so still feeling enormously grateful and very lucky.
I went into two little stores, one that sells only things made out of recycled materials, like coasters from the center of old 33rpm records, and another that sells artsy odds and ends which seem pretty unique.
In the first store there was Christmas music playing—Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons singing "I Saw Momma Kissing Santa Claus" in that falsetto voice of his that only a tough Italian kid from Jersey could have gotten away with back then—and four or five customers in a very small shop.
I circled the tiny place looking to see if there was something I might get someone and found one little item and then after going through the whole store decided on another I had seen. But when I tried to find it I couldn't, and as two of the customers paid for their merchandise and one of them took a cell phone call and the music changed and I kept circling the room unable to find this item, I began to feel overwhelmed by it all. I focused on one thing until the other customers left and then asked the store owner to help me find what I was looking for.
In the next shop, just as small if not smaller, there were even more customers, but the music wasn't as distracting and I was able to grab a few small items quickly and a young woman asked if I wanted them wrapped before I even took them to the counter. But as she was wrapping them and I was paying I realized I wouldn't be able to remember what was in them so I borrowed a pen to write names on each one but then stopped because I couldn't remember who I had intended to give them to!
I left there anxious and exhausted and went back to my apartment feeling like I needed a nap. So, not entirely recovered. But still, the reading is almost back to where it was, and writing this has been a lot easier than it was just a few days ago, and I made it through the day with my 12-year-old here this evening with two classmates and another on the phone finishing up a project due in school tomorrow morning and I'm alive and cancer free with almost all my faculties intact, so still feeling enormously grateful and very lucky.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
PRECIOUS
Yeah, I know, I can't believe I watched it either. Especially after I've been saying that since the brain surgery I don't want to watch heavy, melodramatic, take-themselves-too-seriously kind of movies. But they sent it to me and I was alone and had watched everything else I've gotten to date so...
But afterwards I had to see something else to sort of clean the palate of my post-brain-surgery mind, and luckily FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL was just starting on TCM (how brilliant of Turner Classic Movies to see that FOUR WEDDINGS is already a "classic"). I remember decades ago when the movie CHINATOWN first opened, I was living in DC and went to see it with a bunch of friends. Afterwards I talked them into following it up with another new movie that had just opened, the Hollywood musical classics compilation THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT! I don't know how my friends felt about it, but it helped me avoid some nightmares that night.
Same with FOUR WEDDINGS after seeing PRECIOUS, the full title of which they kept using at the recent Golden Globes announcement ceremony—PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL PUSH BY SAPPHIRE. Maybe one of the reasons I could take PRECIOUS was that I had read PUSH when it first appeared in excerpt form in THE NEW YORKER, I also knew Sapphire as a poet and read last Spring with her at that Bowery Poetry Club Hollywood-themed benefit. When Sapphire reads from PUSH, she really pushes the words and dialect and accent so they're more pronounced than in the film, as are the rhythms and the graphic scenes, which makes it an unforgettable experience.
Knowing what to expect, the film was less graphic than I'd anticipated, which helped me watch it, though there were a few moments when I was tempted to turn it off. It's not like I, or any of us (maybe I should say many of us) don't know about the kinds of horrific realities PRECIOUS addresses. But what's the point of bringing horrible stuff up in a movie or any work of art? If it's sensationalism, well, sometimes that can work in a way that adds more to our understanding despite the manipulative and exploitative aspects, especially if we approach the work of art with the expectation of sensationalism.
But if it's presented as an attempt to create a unique work of art, and it's about pain and misery and hardship and oppression and brutality and ignorance and prejudice and etc.—all things most of us know pretty well from at least the news if not our own lives—it has to be done in a way that brings something new to the mix.
PRECIOUS does that, at times. And the attempt to do that, to create a unique work of art, is obvious. Director Lee Daniels tries hard to make this horrendous but ultimately affirmative story work in a way we haven't quite seen before. There are moments in the film that are brilliantly original, but there are also moments that are totally cliched, obviously borrowed from older films that dealt with some of these issues like brutality and sexual and physical violence, or classroom situations or angel-of-mercy types, etc.
But Daniels and screenwriter Geoffrey Fletcher give everything enough of a twist to make the overall experience of the film unique. The circumstances of the protagonist alone does that—i.e. Gabourey Sidibe, the "unknown" actress who plays the obese, very dark-skinned, teen aged initially functionally illiterate girl. Obviously we haven't seen a Hollywood movie starring anyone quite like her, though we've seen aspects of this character in recent decades.
I must admit I can't stop replaying scenes from it in my mind which is a sign, for me, of having had a really intense movie experience. I loved Sidibe and only hope Hollywood finds more roles for her and she doesn't become a one movie phenomenon. And I can see why Mo'Nique is getting nominated (my typing has improved enormously over the past few days but as an example of my post-op brain having it's own intentions I first typed "nominationed") and Oscar buzz and making critics' "best-of-the-year" lists. Though Daniels lets her down I think in the last few moments of her last scene in the movie, making it a little too obvious and melodramatic. But up until then, she gives one of the most amazingly intense performances in movie history. Frightening and repulsive, yet compelling.
There are other surprising performances as well, including one by Mariah Carey, an uneven attempt but I blame the director for that, and despite the sometimes wrong choices there are enough perfectly acted moments in her characterization of what looks like a completely make-up free social worker to deserve accolades. Lenny Kravitz does a good job in a small role as well, and lots of others.
But the entire film is uneven, with some things working and some not. And that uneveness is not to be taken lightly. But in the end I have to say I'm glad I saw it, and I applaud the effort the director and everyone else made to bring such an unlikely work to the screen pretty plausibly and in many ways originally.
PS: And, I might add, I'm grateful that I was able to watch it and understand it, even getting a lot of the more nuanced bits (though it's not a very nuanced movie for the most part) and not feel overwhelmed by it in the ways I have been post brain surgery. Either another sign of my rapid recovery, or an indication that the the way the film was made kept it accessible and obvious enough for me to take it all in.
But afterwards I had to see something else to sort of clean the palate of my post-brain-surgery mind, and luckily FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL was just starting on TCM (how brilliant of Turner Classic Movies to see that FOUR WEDDINGS is already a "classic"). I remember decades ago when the movie CHINATOWN first opened, I was living in DC and went to see it with a bunch of friends. Afterwards I talked them into following it up with another new movie that had just opened, the Hollywood musical classics compilation THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT! I don't know how my friends felt about it, but it helped me avoid some nightmares that night.
Same with FOUR WEDDINGS after seeing PRECIOUS, the full title of which they kept using at the recent Golden Globes announcement ceremony—PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL PUSH BY SAPPHIRE. Maybe one of the reasons I could take PRECIOUS was that I had read PUSH when it first appeared in excerpt form in THE NEW YORKER, I also knew Sapphire as a poet and read last Spring with her at that Bowery Poetry Club Hollywood-themed benefit. When Sapphire reads from PUSH, she really pushes the words and dialect and accent so they're more pronounced than in the film, as are the rhythms and the graphic scenes, which makes it an unforgettable experience.
Knowing what to expect, the film was less graphic than I'd anticipated, which helped me watch it, though there were a few moments when I was tempted to turn it off. It's not like I, or any of us (maybe I should say many of us) don't know about the kinds of horrific realities PRECIOUS addresses. But what's the point of bringing horrible stuff up in a movie or any work of art? If it's sensationalism, well, sometimes that can work in a way that adds more to our understanding despite the manipulative and exploitative aspects, especially if we approach the work of art with the expectation of sensationalism.
But if it's presented as an attempt to create a unique work of art, and it's about pain and misery and hardship and oppression and brutality and ignorance and prejudice and etc.—all things most of us know pretty well from at least the news if not our own lives—it has to be done in a way that brings something new to the mix.
PRECIOUS does that, at times. And the attempt to do that, to create a unique work of art, is obvious. Director Lee Daniels tries hard to make this horrendous but ultimately affirmative story work in a way we haven't quite seen before. There are moments in the film that are brilliantly original, but there are also moments that are totally cliched, obviously borrowed from older films that dealt with some of these issues like brutality and sexual and physical violence, or classroom situations or angel-of-mercy types, etc.
But Daniels and screenwriter Geoffrey Fletcher give everything enough of a twist to make the overall experience of the film unique. The circumstances of the protagonist alone does that—i.e. Gabourey Sidibe, the "unknown" actress who plays the obese, very dark-skinned, teen aged initially functionally illiterate girl. Obviously we haven't seen a Hollywood movie starring anyone quite like her, though we've seen aspects of this character in recent decades.
I must admit I can't stop replaying scenes from it in my mind which is a sign, for me, of having had a really intense movie experience. I loved Sidibe and only hope Hollywood finds more roles for her and she doesn't become a one movie phenomenon. And I can see why Mo'Nique is getting nominated (my typing has improved enormously over the past few days but as an example of my post-op brain having it's own intentions I first typed "nominationed") and Oscar buzz and making critics' "best-of-the-year" lists. Though Daniels lets her down I think in the last few moments of her last scene in the movie, making it a little too obvious and melodramatic. But up until then, she gives one of the most amazingly intense performances in movie history. Frightening and repulsive, yet compelling.
There are other surprising performances as well, including one by Mariah Carey, an uneven attempt but I blame the director for that, and despite the sometimes wrong choices there are enough perfectly acted moments in her characterization of what looks like a completely make-up free social worker to deserve accolades. Lenny Kravitz does a good job in a small role as well, and lots of others.
But the entire film is uneven, with some things working and some not. And that uneveness is not to be taken lightly. But in the end I have to say I'm glad I saw it, and I applaud the effort the director and everyone else made to bring such an unlikely work to the screen pretty plausibly and in many ways originally.
PS: And, I might add, I'm grateful that I was able to watch it and understand it, even getting a lot of the more nuanced bits (though it's not a very nuanced movie for the most part) and not feel overwhelmed by it in the ways I have been post brain surgery. Either another sign of my rapid recovery, or an indication that the the way the film was made kept it accessible and obvious enough for me to take it all in.
Friday, December 18, 2009
FIVE WEEKS IN ANOTHER BRAIN
Five weeks today since my brain surgery, and it's amazing how far I've come.
Some of the highlights for me:
The day of the operation, being told later that as soon as I was wheeled into the recovery room, I sat right up and began talking instead of taking the usual hour or more to slowly come out of the effects of the anesthesia. High from the drugs I was saying things like "I can see the atoms in your hand" and "I can feel your thoughts" to my family and friends who were there.
Later that evening and the next morning I was overwhelmed by the joy of being alive and by the work of kinetic art I could see out the window of the recovery room—a view of a portion of the East River with tugboats and other vessels working their way up and down it including under the Triborough Bridge and the overhead trams going back and forth to Roosevelt Island, part of which was also visible (I'm pretty sure, though at the time I could not name anything and felt I was looking out at a scene in Europe).
Those first days in my hospital room where my capacity for speech seemed "normal"—despite my inability to remember certain words and basic math and directions or telephone numbers etc. And the mix up with the hospital room phone because we talked the nurses into letting me take a room with no roommate the first night and then chose the bed nearest the bathroom instead of the one assigned to me so people calling either got no answer or the wrong patient when I finally got a roommate (two different ones over the five days I was in the hospital).
Coming home to my apartment and spending time with my 12-year-old son and my grown daughter and son and daughter-in-law and grandson. Eating hot, home-cooked meals made by my daughter or daughter-in-law or grown son or friend Sue who all cared for me during the first weeks night and day, and others who dropped off food almost every day, and digging these meals more than I ever had (craving, as I still do, warm home cooked meals to anything else now, no more of the daily salads I ate for lunch or microwaved frozen food etc.)
Sitting happily enjoying just being alive in between eating or visiting with someone during the early days when I couldn't do much anything else.
Being overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support from around the country and even the world. Family and friends getting their church congregations and temples to pray for me, or entire convents full of nuns in one case. Feeling humbled and almost embarrassed by the attention and concern.
The first time I could read something, even if just simple directions on the hospital room wall, then reading at home an entire paragraph in a magazine but only able to read it out loud, not silently to myself. Then being able to do that too. Until now, I can read THE NEW YORKER with only the occasional need to reread a word or phrase and even that, this morning, seems to be almost gone (though I do tire more quickly from any of this).
The first movie I could watch all the way through and completely understand and not feel overstimulated or made anxious by—THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY.
The first TV show I could watch all the way through and enjoy—an episode of 30 ROCK, which as I pointed out at the time I had found the humor of a little too broad and obvious before the operation. The first time I could watch THE DAILY SHOW, only a few days ago, whereas before it was too layered in irony and Jon Stewart's presentation too rapid in his physical and vocal and intellectually nuanced interpretations despite the obvious broadness on the surface of his humor.
The first time my brain began to see whatever I looked at as one continuous reality and not a fragmented disparate collection of visceral data too complex and multiple to comprehend or deal with.
The day I got the reproductions of art by Fairfield Porter and Picabia that so mesmerized me with their beauty I felt overwhelmed with joy that I was capable of not only seeing them as complete and whole works of art instead of as atomized pieces of color and texture etc. but that I was able to just dig them as the creative bounty they represented that I thought for awhile might be denied me in my new mental state.
The first time I could listen to music and not feel disturbed by the separation of the musical elements in my brain—a multiplicity of dissonant notes and sounds and parts of sounds etc.—but instead could experience it as a continuous, integrated, complete and comprehensible musical experience.
There's more, but this is getting way too long for a blog post (as I guess is often the case with me, though not in previous weeks when I was struggling just to be able to write anything coherently) so let me end with this: being able to write this much without needing to make endless corrections on almost every word, but instead feeling that I'm ninety per cent back to "normal" with my typing this morning, light years beyond what I could do just a few days ago, let alone weeks.
Hallelujah!
Some of the highlights for me:
The day of the operation, being told later that as soon as I was wheeled into the recovery room, I sat right up and began talking instead of taking the usual hour or more to slowly come out of the effects of the anesthesia. High from the drugs I was saying things like "I can see the atoms in your hand" and "I can feel your thoughts" to my family and friends who were there.
Later that evening and the next morning I was overwhelmed by the joy of being alive and by the work of kinetic art I could see out the window of the recovery room—a view of a portion of the East River with tugboats and other vessels working their way up and down it including under the Triborough Bridge and the overhead trams going back and forth to Roosevelt Island, part of which was also visible (I'm pretty sure, though at the time I could not name anything and felt I was looking out at a scene in Europe).
Those first days in my hospital room where my capacity for speech seemed "normal"—despite my inability to remember certain words and basic math and directions or telephone numbers etc. And the mix up with the hospital room phone because we talked the nurses into letting me take a room with no roommate the first night and then chose the bed nearest the bathroom instead of the one assigned to me so people calling either got no answer or the wrong patient when I finally got a roommate (two different ones over the five days I was in the hospital).
Coming home to my apartment and spending time with my 12-year-old son and my grown daughter and son and daughter-in-law and grandson. Eating hot, home-cooked meals made by my daughter or daughter-in-law or grown son or friend Sue who all cared for me during the first weeks night and day, and others who dropped off food almost every day, and digging these meals more than I ever had (craving, as I still do, warm home cooked meals to anything else now, no more of the daily salads I ate for lunch or microwaved frozen food etc.)
Sitting happily enjoying just being alive in between eating or visiting with someone during the early days when I couldn't do much anything else.
Being overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support from around the country and even the world. Family and friends getting their church congregations and temples to pray for me, or entire convents full of nuns in one case. Feeling humbled and almost embarrassed by the attention and concern.
The first time I could read something, even if just simple directions on the hospital room wall, then reading at home an entire paragraph in a magazine but only able to read it out loud, not silently to myself. Then being able to do that too. Until now, I can read THE NEW YORKER with only the occasional need to reread a word or phrase and even that, this morning, seems to be almost gone (though I do tire more quickly from any of this).
The first movie I could watch all the way through and completely understand and not feel overstimulated or made anxious by—THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY.
The first TV show I could watch all the way through and enjoy—an episode of 30 ROCK, which as I pointed out at the time I had found the humor of a little too broad and obvious before the operation. The first time I could watch THE DAILY SHOW, only a few days ago, whereas before it was too layered in irony and Jon Stewart's presentation too rapid in his physical and vocal and intellectually nuanced interpretations despite the obvious broadness on the surface of his humor.
The first time my brain began to see whatever I looked at as one continuous reality and not a fragmented disparate collection of visceral data too complex and multiple to comprehend or deal with.
The day I got the reproductions of art by Fairfield Porter and Picabia that so mesmerized me with their beauty I felt overwhelmed with joy that I was capable of not only seeing them as complete and whole works of art instead of as atomized pieces of color and texture etc. but that I was able to just dig them as the creative bounty they represented that I thought for awhile might be denied me in my new mental state.
The first time I could listen to music and not feel disturbed by the separation of the musical elements in my brain—a multiplicity of dissonant notes and sounds and parts of sounds etc.—but instead could experience it as a continuous, integrated, complete and comprehensible musical experience.
There's more, but this is getting way too long for a blog post (as I guess is often the case with me, though not in previous weeks when I was struggling just to be able to write anything coherently) so let me end with this: being able to write this much without needing to make endless corrections on almost every word, but instead feeling that I'm ninety per cent back to "normal" with my typing this morning, light years beyond what I could do just a few days ago, let alone weeks.
Hallelujah!
Thursday, December 17, 2009
MR. LUCKY
Like I've been saying, I'm a very lucky man. Today the neurosurgeon agreed. He told me he'd always remember me as a very lucky patient, maybe his luckiest. The way my particular problem manifested itself made it pretty unusual, and it seemed almost miraculous that it hadn't spread to the rest of my brain and that almost five weeks after surgery I'm on the path to being totally recovered.
I'm typing this after a long day. I'm tired and I'm making mistakes I have to correct pretty regularly, but nowhere near as many as I was making just days ago. And only a few weeks ago it would have taken me a half hour or much more to write a short post (mostly rewrite, over and over again to correct the errors).
Pretty much all my faculties are working almost normally. I do get tired more easily, and I still mistype too many words when I write, I still feel overwhelmed around too many people or too much stimuli.
But I can read and write (even if not as much or for as long) and I can listen to most music and watch most movies and TV shows and appreciate more than ever the art I love and most of all the people I love, which turns out to be even more, a lot more, than I even knew.
And despite the problems that this challenge created and the ones that were there before the brain surgery and still are or the new ones that might, well probably will, present themselves, as I keep saying—I'm an awfully lucky guy.
(Just watched two black-and-white 1940s Hollywood flicks on TCM—CHRISTMAS IN CONNECTICUT and HOLIDAY AFFAIR—that probably evoked that last phrase, or the language of it, and made me smile a lot and be grateful for all that there is in this world and life to supply us with so much joy, especially this time of the year, despite the sometimes sad memories and current difficulties and probable struggles to come.)
I'm typing this after a long day. I'm tired and I'm making mistakes I have to correct pretty regularly, but nowhere near as many as I was making just days ago. And only a few weeks ago it would have taken me a half hour or much more to write a short post (mostly rewrite, over and over again to correct the errors).
Pretty much all my faculties are working almost normally. I do get tired more easily, and I still mistype too many words when I write, I still feel overwhelmed around too many people or too much stimuli.
But I can read and write (even if not as much or for as long) and I can listen to most music and watch most movies and TV shows and appreciate more than ever the art I love and most of all the people I love, which turns out to be even more, a lot more, than I even knew.
And despite the problems that this challenge created and the ones that were there before the brain surgery and still are or the new ones that might, well probably will, present themselves, as I keep saying—I'm an awfully lucky guy.
(Just watched two black-and-white 1940s Hollywood flicks on TCM—CHRISTMAS IN CONNECTICUT and HOLIDAY AFFAIR—that probably evoked that last phrase, or the language of it, and made me smile a lot and be grateful for all that there is in this world and life to supply us with so much joy, especially this time of the year, despite the sometimes sad memories and current difficulties and probable struggles to come.)
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
FUNNY PEOPLE & BROTHERS
I've never been crazy about negativity including in films. But since my brain surgery, I have an even stronger aversion to the darkness that so many critics and academics and "intellectuals" seem to thrive on and celebrate.
I've written about this before (but finding the post and linking to it is too difficult for me right now, though I address it in the BOOKWORM radio interview there's a link to toward the top right of this blog page), that one of the best examples is the critical treatment of William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac. Misogynist Burroughs, who shot his wife between the eyes in an attempt to shoot a cocktail glass off her head (the way I heard it) and glorified cynicism and elitism and all kids of negativity, was adored by critics and academics and supposed avant-gardists while Kerouac with very few exceptions until very recently was dismissed as some kind of sentimental primitive, even though he had an enormously bigger impact on writing in general let alone on the course of cultural history, and had a much deeper and more realistic (i.e. unsentimental) perspective on so many more aspects of social and political and intellectual and spiritual life in mid-20th Century, so much so that a lot of his perceptions are only now being recognized for their impact and accuracy.
But the point of this post is to say that since my brain surgery and the changes it has caused, some of which are receding, but many of which are not, I feel that my distaste for cynicism and violence, especially in popular culture, has increased to the point of my finding it hard to dig it at all. This has manifested itself most obviously in the films I've been watching in recent days (that I've been sent on DVDs by studios courting voters for the various awards to come in the new year).
FUNNY PEOPLE and BROTHERS are perfect examples of this. There are scenes in FUNNY PEOPLE that are funny, and some that are even poignant or "deep"—but overall, the film came across to me as highly cynical in a way that seemed to be touting an idea of "realism" that equates soullessness and joylessness with seriousness. A total bummer as they used to say in the '60s when there was more joy in the midst of a pointless war for which civilians were being drafted and killed in numbers that dwarf those of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan combined, and when on top of that there was the Civil Rights struggle (which produced its own casualties) and much more that made reality less than happy, and yet there was plenty of joy to go around.
In FUNNY PEOPLE, the premise seems to be, yes it's true comedians are really tortured souls who laugh to keep from crying. A point we've seen made before and sometimes illustrated with a story and characters that evokes sympathy and understanding and maybe even some kind of enlightenment. But in this flick which has tons of comics playing roles small and large, but hinges on Adam Sandler's star turn, the FUNNY PEOPLE of the title can't help revealing themselves as just petty envious small-minded self-centered jerks. It's a pity, because the movie is filled with talented comic actors who have given us some of the funniest moments in recent movie history, but in what seems to be an attempt to expose all that as phony and pointless (except for a few caveats here and there and the very last scene) FUNNY PEOPLE makes a point of the pointlessness of it all.
BROTHERS has a much more noble goal, it would seem, and a much more successfully "serious" pedigree, as it's directed by Jim Sheriden and stars a select ensemble cast that includes some terrific performances. Toby MaGuire has already won a Golden Globe nomination for a performance I found too robotic and un-nuanced for my taste (I would have nominated Jake Gyllenhaal who plays his brother in the film and manages to hit almost every note in any great actor's repertoire), and though at first I resisted Natalie Portman's acting as less than impressive, she won me over in the course of the movie, and Sam Sheperd pulls off one of his most memorable screen appearances in years.
But in the end, the violence and dysfunction of the characters and their world (and the underlying "reality" of so much of the pointless violence of the Afghan War and by extension most if not all wars), as well as the tension that creates, made me want to turn the movie off go see a comedy, like what was popular in the '30s that those Great Depression era audiences flocked to—musical comedies and romantic comedies and Hollywood formula boy meets-girl-or more often girl-meets-prince stories that made it seem easy or likely or at least possible to imagine a world where every one lived like the "swells" in "swanky" joints surrounded by nothing but beauty and luxury.
I won't go that far, and of course there were many movies from the 30s that emphasized the tragic aspects of that period (GRAPES OF WRATH) or the proletarian struggles to overcome the tragic whether successfully or not (PUBLIC ENEMY), but at least in this stage of my recovery, I'll take the more fun movie fare like IT'S COMPLICATED, or at least the less melodramatic less operatic approach to the possibly tragic aspect of these times, ala UP IN THE AIR, over the more obviously heavier fare like FUNNY PEOPLE and BROTHERS.
Maybe it's time to watch SULLIVAN'S TRAVELS again.
PS: As you can probably tell, my writing/typing is continuing to improve. Been working on it in "occupational therapy"—but my stamina in terms of writing is still pretty shortlived. Reading however is returning to close to normal, YEAH!, to the point of my picking up some poetry yesterday and reading a few pages. But no matter where I am in my progress, I continue to feel completely accepting of where I am and am grateful for exactly that.
I've written about this before (but finding the post and linking to it is too difficult for me right now, though I address it in the BOOKWORM radio interview there's a link to toward the top right of this blog page), that one of the best examples is the critical treatment of William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac. Misogynist Burroughs, who shot his wife between the eyes in an attempt to shoot a cocktail glass off her head (the way I heard it) and glorified cynicism and elitism and all kids of negativity, was adored by critics and academics and supposed avant-gardists while Kerouac with very few exceptions until very recently was dismissed as some kind of sentimental primitive, even though he had an enormously bigger impact on writing in general let alone on the course of cultural history, and had a much deeper and more realistic (i.e. unsentimental) perspective on so many more aspects of social and political and intellectual and spiritual life in mid-20th Century, so much so that a lot of his perceptions are only now being recognized for their impact and accuracy.
But the point of this post is to say that since my brain surgery and the changes it has caused, some of which are receding, but many of which are not, I feel that my distaste for cynicism and violence, especially in popular culture, has increased to the point of my finding it hard to dig it at all. This has manifested itself most obviously in the films I've been watching in recent days (that I've been sent on DVDs by studios courting voters for the various awards to come in the new year).
FUNNY PEOPLE and BROTHERS are perfect examples of this. There are scenes in FUNNY PEOPLE that are funny, and some that are even poignant or "deep"—but overall, the film came across to me as highly cynical in a way that seemed to be touting an idea of "realism" that equates soullessness and joylessness with seriousness. A total bummer as they used to say in the '60s when there was more joy in the midst of a pointless war for which civilians were being drafted and killed in numbers that dwarf those of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan combined, and when on top of that there was the Civil Rights struggle (which produced its own casualties) and much more that made reality less than happy, and yet there was plenty of joy to go around.
In FUNNY PEOPLE, the premise seems to be, yes it's true comedians are really tortured souls who laugh to keep from crying. A point we've seen made before and sometimes illustrated with a story and characters that evokes sympathy and understanding and maybe even some kind of enlightenment. But in this flick which has tons of comics playing roles small and large, but hinges on Adam Sandler's star turn, the FUNNY PEOPLE of the title can't help revealing themselves as just petty envious small-minded self-centered jerks. It's a pity, because the movie is filled with talented comic actors who have given us some of the funniest moments in recent movie history, but in what seems to be an attempt to expose all that as phony and pointless (except for a few caveats here and there and the very last scene) FUNNY PEOPLE makes a point of the pointlessness of it all.
BROTHERS has a much more noble goal, it would seem, and a much more successfully "serious" pedigree, as it's directed by Jim Sheriden and stars a select ensemble cast that includes some terrific performances. Toby MaGuire has already won a Golden Globe nomination for a performance I found too robotic and un-nuanced for my taste (I would have nominated Jake Gyllenhaal who plays his brother in the film and manages to hit almost every note in any great actor's repertoire), and though at first I resisted Natalie Portman's acting as less than impressive, she won me over in the course of the movie, and Sam Sheperd pulls off one of his most memorable screen appearances in years.
But in the end, the violence and dysfunction of the characters and their world (and the underlying "reality" of so much of the pointless violence of the Afghan War and by extension most if not all wars), as well as the tension that creates, made me want to turn the movie off go see a comedy, like what was popular in the '30s that those Great Depression era audiences flocked to—musical comedies and romantic comedies and Hollywood formula boy meets-girl-or more often girl-meets-prince stories that made it seem easy or likely or at least possible to imagine a world where every one lived like the "swells" in "swanky" joints surrounded by nothing but beauty and luxury.
I won't go that far, and of course there were many movies from the 30s that emphasized the tragic aspects of that period (GRAPES OF WRATH) or the proletarian struggles to overcome the tragic whether successfully or not (PUBLIC ENEMY), but at least in this stage of my recovery, I'll take the more fun movie fare like IT'S COMPLICATED, or at least the less melodramatic less operatic approach to the possibly tragic aspect of these times, ala UP IN THE AIR, over the more obviously heavier fare like FUNNY PEOPLE and BROTHERS.
Maybe it's time to watch SULLIVAN'S TRAVELS again.
PS: As you can probably tell, my writing/typing is continuing to improve. Been working on it in "occupational therapy"—but my stamina in terms of writing is still pretty shortlived. Reading however is returning to close to normal, YEAH!, to the point of my picking up some poetry yesterday and reading a few pages. But no matter where I am in my progress, I continue to feel completely accepting of where I am and am grateful for exactly that.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
TRANSCENDING LIMITATIONS
First of all, I am one lucky person and I know it. I've heard from—and/or of—so many people who have been through brain surgery and had or are having miraculous recoveries (like I feel I am), but also of many struggling to overcome the limitations the surgeries have caused.
Limitations on one's talent(s) or creativity or physical capabilities or capacity for empathy or understanding or intelligence etc. have always interested me. I remember reading once that Irving Berlin, considered by some to have been the most prolific and successful songwriter in American popular cultural history, could only play in the key of C, so in order to write songs in other keys he had a special device created for the piano he composed on—sort of like a giant capo, that little bar that guitarists strap around the neck of their instruments to make it possible for them to transpose songs into keys they could otherwise not play in—so he could continue playing the notes as if in C but thanks to the device they would come out as being in whatever key he chose to set the device to.
Even though I knew that story and others like it, I was still always hard on myself for not living up to some imaginary standard that always seemed to be out of my reach. Then one day I was laying on a couch in a place I was renting in Santa Monica lamenting the loss of Marvin Gaye who had just been shot and killed by his father when I had this epiphany about my musical abilities. I had always judged myself harshly for not being able to play as uniquely and brilliantly as Bill Evans or Thelonious Monk. But suddenly I understood that if I had only mined the musical talent I had and accepted its limitations and worked within them, I might very well have ended up with an equally unique and maybe even brilliant sound.
It seemed so clear I wondered why I hadn't seen it before. But now, recovering from the enormous limitations I started out with after the brain surgery only a little more than four weeks ago, I understand how easy it is to allow natural or imposed limitations to create a sense of frustration and futility when you're constantly comparing yourself to some implied standard either from without or within.
Fortunately, I surrendered pretty completely to whatever the outcome might be from the beginning of this adventure, which I believe may be contributing to my rapid recovery in some ways. Even if just in attitude. And it gives me more insights into transcending any limitations—health, age, experience, expertise or lack of it, etc. I'm not talking about any New Age-y idea of being responsible somehow for calamitous circumstances beyond our control (like many health problems etc.) but rather of realizing and accepting the reality of whatever limitations might be keeping us from accomplishing something in ways we think we have to and instead using those limitations as a means of achieving whatever it might be we're trying to accomplish.
Like me playing piano only in the key of C or limited to certain ways of using chord changes to reinforce the melody line etc. Or using language that's limited to the vocabulary I have access to at any given time (much more limited four weeks ago, and still compared to pre-operation) and making it achieve my aims anyway (Dr. Suess anyone?), etc.
We've all witnessed or heard stories of people who overcome enormous limitations to their physical or cognitive capabilities after car accidents or war injuries or getting hit by lightening etc. All I'm trying to share is my realization that all our limitations of whatever kind or magnitude can be faced the same way, with the idea of using those limitations to create something uniquely ours from simple nuances of personality to entirely new creations of art or science or etc.
And PS: today's typing was yet again improved even from yesterday's, making writing this post the lest difficult yet. Like I said, I know I am one very lucky person.
Limitations on one's talent(s) or creativity or physical capabilities or capacity for empathy or understanding or intelligence etc. have always interested me. I remember reading once that Irving Berlin, considered by some to have been the most prolific and successful songwriter in American popular cultural history, could only play in the key of C, so in order to write songs in other keys he had a special device created for the piano he composed on—sort of like a giant capo, that little bar that guitarists strap around the neck of their instruments to make it possible for them to transpose songs into keys they could otherwise not play in—so he could continue playing the notes as if in C but thanks to the device they would come out as being in whatever key he chose to set the device to.
Even though I knew that story and others like it, I was still always hard on myself for not living up to some imaginary standard that always seemed to be out of my reach. Then one day I was laying on a couch in a place I was renting in Santa Monica lamenting the loss of Marvin Gaye who had just been shot and killed by his father when I had this epiphany about my musical abilities. I had always judged myself harshly for not being able to play as uniquely and brilliantly as Bill Evans or Thelonious Monk. But suddenly I understood that if I had only mined the musical talent I had and accepted its limitations and worked within them, I might very well have ended up with an equally unique and maybe even brilliant sound.
It seemed so clear I wondered why I hadn't seen it before. But now, recovering from the enormous limitations I started out with after the brain surgery only a little more than four weeks ago, I understand how easy it is to allow natural or imposed limitations to create a sense of frustration and futility when you're constantly comparing yourself to some implied standard either from without or within.
Fortunately, I surrendered pretty completely to whatever the outcome might be from the beginning of this adventure, which I believe may be contributing to my rapid recovery in some ways. Even if just in attitude. And it gives me more insights into transcending any limitations—health, age, experience, expertise or lack of it, etc. I'm not talking about any New Age-y idea of being responsible somehow for calamitous circumstances beyond our control (like many health problems etc.) but rather of realizing and accepting the reality of whatever limitations might be keeping us from accomplishing something in ways we think we have to and instead using those limitations as a means of achieving whatever it might be we're trying to accomplish.
Like me playing piano only in the key of C or limited to certain ways of using chord changes to reinforce the melody line etc. Or using language that's limited to the vocabulary I have access to at any given time (much more limited four weeks ago, and still compared to pre-operation) and making it achieve my aims anyway (Dr. Suess anyone?), etc.
We've all witnessed or heard stories of people who overcome enormous limitations to their physical or cognitive capabilities after car accidents or war injuries or getting hit by lightening etc. All I'm trying to share is my realization that all our limitations of whatever kind or magnitude can be faced the same way, with the idea of using those limitations to create something uniquely ours from simple nuances of personality to entirely new creations of art or science or etc.
And PS: today's typing was yet again improved even from yesterday's, making writing this post the lest difficult yet. Like I said, I know I am one very lucky person.
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