QUOTE FOR THESE DAYS

"The barriers which keep the feet from the dance are the same which in a dream paralyze the effort to escape and hold us powerless in the track of some murderous pursuer. Pant and struggle but you cannot move. The birth of the imagination is like waking from a nightmare. Never does the night seem so beneficient." —William Carlos Williams in the prologue to KORA IN HELL

AMERICAN GANGSTER

As traditional as Thanksgiving: American gangster myths and movies. This season’s top entry is maybe overcooked. I felt like I was watching two movies. The one starring Denzel Washington was like an African-American GODFATHER II, in which Denzel proves himself once again to be a genuine movie star. You just want to watch him do whatever he’s going to do, whatever the story.

Which is fortunate, because the story is erratic and full of scenes that seem like non-secquitors. Poor Cuba Gooding Jr. plays the more famous Harlem drug lord, Nicky Barnes, in a story line that obviously got chopped so that his role becomes a slightly glorified cameo that doesn’t quite fit, and there’s other storylines that make even less sense.

The other movie stars Russell Crowe floundering for the first time in my experience. His Australian accent comes through his attempt at a New Jersey accent that I couldn’t figure out where it sounded like it was from, but no Jersey I live in or grew up in.

The one scene with both Washington and Crowe in it, is excellent. Two great actors kicking ass. But in the rest of Crowe’s scenes, it’s hit or miss, unusual for him. But it could just be the writing, because the story too often doesn’t make any sense.

Let’s see, a really straight cop, a boy scout type pisses all his fellow cops off when he turns in a ton of money he stumbles on and could retire on, money meant for corrupt cops, (which seemed contrived to this member of an extended family with a lot of Jersey cops in it, not the corruption but every other cop supporting it), and then when given the chance to head his own outfit of dedicated detectives, he chooses guys who seem more interested in booze and broads than solving crimes. Huh?

And it’s long. But there’s enough great scenes, disjointed or not, to make it worth seeing, and in the end it’s a pretty good attempt to create another crime-boss classic. It doesn’t achieve that, but it manages to mythologize Frank Lucas, the real life Harlem drug lord the film’s about, creating another glorified crime boss.

On the way out of the theater in Jersey where I saw the movie, an older black gentleman entered the elevator car me and Terence Winch were in. When I asked the man if he was coming from GANGSTER, he nodded, so I asked what he thought of it and he said, with quiet dignity, “I’m ashamed I paid to see it.”

I said, “Because it glorifies Lucas?” Thinking he, like me, was afraid of the impact it would have on yet another generation of African-American boys, and not just them, wanting to grow up to be gangsters. But he surprised me and said, “Because I knew Frank Lucas, I helped put him away. He was…” and then he said something that meant evil, no good, destructive, heartless, a man who had done enormous harm, but I can’t remember exactly the words he used because I was so startled.

When I asked, “You mean you worked with the cop Russel Crowe played?” The man said, “No, I worked for the DEA.” By then we were on the first floor and were getting off. I watched the man leave the theater ahead of us, and despite my criticsms of the DEA, for a minute I felt a little ashamed myself.

TCM

The best thing on TV for me lately has been a Turner Classic Movies series of “celebrity” programmed nights.

Matt Gruening, the guy who created THE SIMPSONS chose a movie the other night made around 1941—BLUES IN THE NIGHT—the stars of which I didn’t know with a few exceptions like Lloyd Nolan playing the bad guy owner of the Jungle Nightclub (!) and Jack Carson doing a pretty weak job of pretending to play the trumpet.

It was set in the world of, supposedly, “jazz” purists in a small combo, led by a B-movie star I never saw before who wasn’t very good, playing a dedicated jazz artiste, who under the influence of an evil woman, turns his back on the pure jazz of his group—which sounded like a cross between mediocre Dixieland and popular music of the era, but earned them little money—to become a novelty song piano player for a successful big swing band (oh no!).

I can see why Gruening chose it, because it has some of the strangest surreal montages I ever saw in a movie, and because so many of the scenes are preposterous—like the final one with the band happily back together, traveling, and living in a boxcar on a train! “Jazz” playing “hoboes” in suits and ties and with instruments, along with the trumpet player’s singer wife in perfect make up and stylish dress, living and playing music in a boxcar!

Then last night the guest programmer was the opera star Renee Fleming who chose, among other flicks, SONG OF LOVE, a Katherine Hepburn vehicle, with Paul Henreid (Ingrid Bergman’s husband in CASABLANCA) and Robert Walker (the insane bad guy in STRANGERS ON A TRAIN) as, respectively, the composers Robert Schuman and Johannes Bhrams (with Hepburn as Clara Schumann).

It wasn’t terrific, but certainly was interesting, with Hepburn and Walker in the same flick. But Fleming also chose a movie in which Luis Rainer plays the wife of Johan Strauss, called THE GREAT WALTZ. If you don’t know Luis Rainer you should, a two-time Academy Award winner, still alive, she was one of the strangest stars Hollywood ever produced. Her gestures and invented mannerisms for different movie characters could seem to slide into over the top melodrama and yet at the same time, in the same gesture seem to be the most restrained and underplayed moment in film history!

She was unique. If you ever see her name in a flick, stop and watch, and you’ll see what I mean. Especially THE GREAT WALTZ where she plays the devoted and long suffering wife-of-a-genius with so much panache, her non-singing-or-playing role seems as operatic as the other leads who play and conduct and sing at full volume and full speed (some of the scenes of people waltzing make you finally understand why that dance music was so revolutionary, it turned Europeans into whirling dervishes getting high on what the movie portrays as the hypnotically addictive rhythm of spinning around a dance floor to a ¾ beat.

What a kick to see films rarely or never found on TV presented by talented creative people who aren’t afraid to stand behind their personal taste, no matter how quirky. I don’t know when it’s on exactly, I just stumbled on them on various nights, but it’s probably listed as “guest programmed” nights. Check it out.

AND NOT SO COMIC

Many friends have sent me either the text for this Keith Olberman editorial, or a link to various sites that feature it, so for those of you who haven't seen it: here it is.

A LITTLE COMIC RELIEF

Trying to get to sleep last night, I thought, okay, enough emotional heaviness for a minute, and decided to make an alphabet list of movies that always make me laugh, or at least smile very broadly.

So here ‘tis:

ANNIE HALL and AIRPLANE!
BRUCE ALMIGHTY (the scene where Carrey’s character gets Steve Carrel’s newsman character to talk infantile gibberish on camera) and BULLETS OVER BROADWAY (Dianne Wiest’s performance)
CLERKS and CLERKS II (hey, I love Silent Bob and Jay)
DUCK SOUP and DUMB AND DUMBER
EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT SEX (BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK) (not Woody’s best, but a few choice scenes)
FLIRTING WITH DISASTER (Tea Leoni at her best, but everyone in this shines) and A FISH CALLED WANDA
GET SHORTY (a couple of very funny bits, and a great underrated movie)
HARD DAY’S NIGHT, A (too many great bits to name) and THE HORN BLOWS AT MIDNIGHT (underrated Jack Benny flick)
IN & OUT (when is Kevin Kline not great?) THE INSPECTOR GENERAL (I love Danny Kaye, what can I say)
JERK, THE
KICKING AND SCREAMING (Will Ferrell flick with a few funny bits, mostly involving Mike Ditka!)
LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE, THE LADY EVE, and LIAR, LIAR (the scene where Carrey’s unscrupulous lawyer fights with himself in the men’s room)
MY COUSIN VINNY (she deserved that Oscar, far as I’m concerned) and THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO LITTLE (underrated Bill Murray comedy/action flick)
NAKED GUN and NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ANIMAL HOUSE (Belushi at his best)
O?
PLAY IT AGAIN, SAM and THE PINK PANTHER
Q?
RADIO DAYS and THE ROAD TO MOROCCO (I don’t like Hope but love Crosby’s easy banter)
SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN (Donald O’Conner’s “Make’em Laugh” number), a SHOT IN THE DARK (Sellars at his best, for me), STIR CRAZY (Pryor and Wilder), SILENT MOVIE (Mel Brooks and Sid Caesar!), and STRIPES (a few great Bill Murray scenes)
THIS IS SPINAL TAP, THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY and SOAPDISH
U?
V?
WAYNE’S WORLD
X?
YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN
ZOOLANDER

BCDS FOR PTSD

The following is an e mail I got from my friend, the poet and veteran, Bob Berner, this morning. I thought it was worth posting the entire message:

Here, from NPR yesterday, is evidence of even more despicable treatment of GIs and vets--in effect, BCDs for PTSD. You got a messed up kid in your outfit? Section 8 him or BCD him out and the VA won't give him any benefits. So what if he hangs himself with a garden hose in the basement of his parents' house? It was a pre-existing condition, not service-related. Toughsky-shitsky, boychiks. The money that would have paid for your benefits now goes to Blackwater. And isn't this a splendid little war after all?
Pax et Pecunia,
Bob
NPR.org Text-Only (go to NPR.org graphical version)
Home > Program: All Things Considered
LISTEN: Army Dismissals for Mental Health, Misconduct Rise
By Daniel Zwerdling
All Things Considered, November 15, 2007 · New Pentagon figures released to NPR show that since the United States invaded Iraq, officers have kicked out far more troops for having behavior issues that are potentially linked to post-traumatic stress disorder than they did before the war.
The numbers raise troubling questions about how the military is handling mental-health issues.
NPR has reported that servicemen and women who come home with serious mental-health problems, such as PTSD, often can't get the medical treatment they need.
And some commanders, in fact, have kicked troubled troops out of the military instead of trying to help them.
Until now, NPR reports have included anecdotal evidence, because the Pentagon has not released detailed statistics.
Rise in Personality Disorder and Misconduct Dismissals
NPR asked the U.S. Army and the U.S. Marine Corps to disclose how many troops have been discharged by their commanders in recent years and why.
The Marine Corps has not provided statistics.
But an Army chart, which NPR recently received, shows that since the United States invaded Iraq:
-- Commanders have discharged almost 20 percent more soldiers for "misconduct" than they did in the same period before the war;
-- Commanders have discharged more than twice as many soldiers for "drug abuse" (a subset of the "misconduct" category);
-- Commanders have discharged almost 40 percent more soldiers for "personality disorder."
In all, the Army has kicked out more than 28,000 soldiers since the war in Iraq began on the grounds of personality disorder and misconduct.
Those statistics "trouble me," says Stephen Xenakis, a psychiatrist and retired brigadier general who used to help run the Army medical system.
"It raises questions," he says. "Are we doing the right thing by the soldiers?"
Behaviors Linked to PTSD
Xenakis and other mental-health specialists who work with the military say the Army's statistics seem to corroborate what many former soldiers and Marines have told NPR.
Those servicemen's and women's records show that after they came home from Iraq or Afghanistan, and were diagnosed with PTSD or other mental health disorders, they started breaking Army rules and, in some cases, the law -- from not showing up for formation and going AWOL, to using illegal drugs.
Xenakis and other specialists say those kinds of behaviors are common among soldiers with mental disorders like PTSD.
"That's exactly how those problems would show up," Xenakis says. "Drinking, drugs … (the soldiers) medicate themselves. They say 'Why should I keep my uniform all starched and neat when I just buried two of my buddies?'"
Yet, the troops NPR has interviewed had trouble getting intensive medical treatment. Instead, their commanders discharged them for "misconduct," which means the soldiers lost some or all of their military benefits.
The Army chart obtained by NPR -- showing increased rates of "misconduct" and especially "drug abuse" -- is consistent with those anecdotal accounts.
Personality Disorder: 'Deeply Stigmatizing Diagnosis'
Some mental-health specialists are especially worried that commanders and military medical staff are abusing the diagnosis of "personality disorder," which commanders have used to discharge some soldiers who were also diagnosed with PTSD.
Psychiatrist Jonathan Shay, who has been studying combat veterans for more than 20 years at the Department of Veterans Affairs and other institutions, criticizes the use of personality disorder partly because it's a "deeply stigmatizing diagnosis," he says.
Shay says that when the military diagnoses soldiers with personality disorder, it is saying, in effect, that fighting in the war didn't cause their mental health problems.
"It's saying, in essence, you're rotten and have been rotten since childhood," he says.
If true, Shay wonders, why didn't Army doctors diagnose such a serious and deep-rooted psychological ailment when they were recruiting the prospective soldier?
Avoiding Paying Disability Benefits?
Shay says the Army's statistics, showing that discharges for "personality disorder" have increased in recent years by almost 40 percent, suggest that the military may be abusing the diagnosis because doing so is convenient.
Under the Army's rules, it takes a commander months to expel soldiers on the grounds that they can't function due to PTSD -- and the military has to pay the soldier disability benefits.
But if a psychiatrist diagnoses a solider with a "personality disorder," the base can discharge him or her in less than two weeks without paying any disability.
"It troubles me that it appears that sometimes, mental-health professionals are ready to be the willing servants of the command," Shay says.
He worries that military doctors are telling commanders, in effect, "'If you want me to get this kid out quickly, I'll do it. It doesn't matter how much I have to bend my own conscience or bend the facts to do it.'"
NPR submitted requests to five spokesmen at the Pentagon and U.S. Army to interview a top official about these issues. These requests were not granted.
Medical specialists who reviewed the statistics stress that the Army's numbers don't prove that commanders are getting rid of soldiers who developed mental-health problems in the war. But they say the figures should prompt the military to do much more research.

HMMMMM...

Check out this article on the big Dick.