The Clouds of Sils Maria

"A thin line separates love from hate, success from failure, life from death, a line as difficult to walk as a razor’s edge." -- W. Somerset Maugham.

I'd also add, reality from illusion. What are the stories we tell ourselves? How much of what we believe is real and how much is based on molding our thoughts and feelings to a scenario of our own making? As the characters traverse the mountainside, they're traversing this thin line by throwing out ideas, holding onto some and rejecting others, because they either don't fit, or they hit too close to home.

Both of these journeys take maps; one is a chart of the region and the other is a script, full of the past and present blending together, creating a fertile field of self reflection. I like maps. I want a map of sorts, to sort out what is going on in this movie. I'm going to take Valentine's arm as my map. There are three dominant tattoos and they may have some insights into the story.

The eye from the painting Guernica: Some say the eye represents the sun, others, interrogation. Picasso himself said it wasn't up to the artist to define the symbols, but for the public to use their own understanding. So if I were to try and look at it through Valentine, I might see it as representing her as the observer, seeing all and interpreting what is paraded before her. Maria dismissed her impressions as too simplistic, but sometimes greater truths are very simple and unfortunately for Maria, biting.

Three fishes from a David Foster speech: "There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, 'Morning, boys, how's the water?' And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, 'What the hell is water?'" Foster goes on to say, "The immediate point of the fish story is that the most obvious, ubiquitous, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and talk about." He continues on explaining, how often what we think is certain, turns out to be completely wrong. I know this is the case, more often than I'm comfortable with. Yentl had it right. "The more I learn, the more I realize the less I know." As the personal assistant, Valentine is constantly having to negotiate the "waters" and accommodate Maria's viewpoint. For a long time, she is willing to be told she's wrong and is open to learning. Maybe too long. Her ability to consider other truths and her desire to be with Maria, keeps her in a less than ideal relationship and it takes its toll.

A smile at the foot of a ladder: This is also a title to a fable written by Henry Miller, who's aim was to write truth, the way he sees it. About the main character he said, "[he is] unique in that he came from the blue. But what is this blue which surrounds and envelopes us if not reality itself? . . . We have only to open our eyes and hearts, to become one with that which is." I like to think of Valentine hiking, while working through all that she has gone through with Maria and coming to the realization that her own instincts are right and should be honored." That blue sky and the clear air awakens her to what she must do.

True Grit (2010)

I reckon there’s been a lot of misjudging around these parts and the biggest culprit is likely to be me. Now the Duke cast a mighty long shadow and it’s regrettable that I took so long to walk out from underneath it to lift my face to the sepiad sun. For a collaboration of a whole passel of people commenced to not only fill those big boots, but made an effectual artistic impression as well.

Saturated with aged colors and textures, the town and costumes are the first signs that give me the notion I’m in for a full immersion and then it’s a done deal when the words come. Words flowing out, out of all manner of mouths: determined, grizzled, tongue mangled, slack jawed, spittle flying. I watch again with the subtitles so I can gather up all of the words that had fallen past me. How came Mattie by way of her vocabulary? Just fourteen and out trading a horse trader? I’m envious and in want of them powerful words. There’s no better sport than word sparring and I figure the film is chuck full of them--lively times.

Memorable scenes are aplenty, but I’m tied up with the starlit run. The great big night sky gives the illusion that, borrowing a line from Clark Gable, “the stars are so close over your head, you feel you could reach up and stir them around.” Worry catches in my throat and I hold out little hope for that horse.

As for misjudging, it’s like what that documentary coach said about how football doesn’t build character, but reveals it. Same goes for man hunting in Choctaw Territory. That particular brand of adversity reveals a lot about the characters of a so called, unattractive girl, a buck-skinned dandy and a washed up bushwhacker marshal. As I see it, observation gives credence to a person, not his trappings. I also fetch something else from this tale. I’d been reading some dialogue from Before Sunrise and the line that came back to my remembrance during this movie was “If there's any kind of magic in this world it must be in the attempt of understanding someone, sharing something.” Isn’t it in the finding of that which compels Mattie to move Cogburn to her family cemetery? After all, isn’t that what we’re all looking for, to know and be known?

Another Year

Gardening is a chore—the weeds, the watering, and the waiting to taste that first tomato. But the law of the harvest is so much more than the final product (though that’s especially nice). It’s perceiving the movement of air, the feel of the soil, and the bending of muscle. When Gerri lifts her face to the sun and breathes in the moment, I know she understands.

Poor Mary trying to live off borrowed light. As the dinner party reminisces about the past, Mary is left “outside” looking in.  She recognizes the light and wants to bask in it, but it’s not hers and she’s unable or unwilling to create her own.

Pieces of Lou Reed’s song, “Perfect Day” kept playing in my head throughout the film.

You just keep me hanging on…

Just a perfect day
You make me forget myself
I thought I was someone else
Someone good

You're going to reap just what you sow…

South Riding

Andrew Davies adapts again! 

This time it is the novel by Winifred Holtby. The town couldn’t be smaller, but the characters are as big as life. Each, with their foibles and agendas, vie for space and influence. 

As good as the characters are written, the brightness comes from the actors that play them: stoic David Morissey, able-to-tackle-any-emotion Anna Maxwell Martin, hope-springs-eternal-Penelope Wilton, and last but definitely not least, more-charm-than-what’s-good-for-him Shaun Dooley. 

I just read about a 1938 filmversion with Ralph Richardson and Glynis Johns as his daughter! I love how a movie can open up a whole treasure trove of unexplored possiblilities of other films and actors’ work.

The Tree of Life

The film was as fluid as a daydream and just as personal. 

Childhood holds the firsts, the discoveries that never again have the same impact. Glimpses of the universal brought my own story into play and it became nearly impossible to separate the two. Whose pain was I feeling, mine or Jack’s? I flew with the mother. My gullibility disappeared with R.L.'s. The father's hand (and dinosaur claw) pushed, pushed--stay down, comply, look. The mother's hand brushed lightly, to distract, as if to say, avert, look away. There was ugliness in both as well as beauty. For no one is complete, but all is made well and whole in the wave of redemptive power.

At moments of frustration, where I wanted to know what I was supposed to understand, I recalled Clovis and sdedalus’ modern art advice. Stop trying. Experience it. That made all the difference. All that needed to be clear, was and the rest…well, that’s for another viewing.

Jane Eyre (2011)

Jane Eyre 2011, you won me over. I tried to ignore you and pretend you weren’t there, but you kept beckoning and I was weak.

You accordioned down, leaving behind the superfluous and farfetched (i.e. St. John’s familial connection). Because you combined scenes so seamlessly, it left time for lingering on the sublime. 

Your Mr. Fassbender is a magician—probably the first Rochester to let the audience in on his true feelings while still keeping Jane in the dark. 

And Jane! Never play poker Ms. Wasikowski, for your internal workings play clearly across your face. Bad for cards, but perfect for an actor—especially for a character whose story is mainly told through her thoughts. 

It’s also about time we got Dame Dench’s take on Mrs. Fairfax.

So JE 2011, you brought me something new even though you are the umpteenth rendition. I’m sorry to have doubted you.

"Of course we forgive you, Sandy.  In the saddest way possible."

I Wish, I Wish... Hanna and Certified Copy

Why is it so difficult for me to just enjoy what a movie has to offer instead of wishing for what it could have been?

Case in point #1:  Hanna

If there wasn't my revered Joe Wright (Pride and Prejudice) and Saoirse Ronan--who owned the film, I would have walked out of the theater and said, "Okay, whatever." But they were there and I walked away vexed. Instead of living, by proxy, Hanna's experience, I was continually sidestepping the plot holes, pretending not to see them (Hint: spoiler Homing beacon? Huh? end spoiler). I wanted more Ursula Le Guin's character Tenar from The Tombs of Atuan. "It was very strange. Living, being in the world, was a much greater and stranger thing than she had ever dreamed." I have to admit that I am not an action film aficionado--no crossing the t's or dotting the i's here. Bring on the handheld!

#2 Certified Copy

I rarely get to go to a bona fide art house cinema and was thrilled to be there. I watched and waited and wished to love it. I must have fallen asleep for a while because when I opened my eyes, they had shifted in their chairs and were now discussing how he snores when he sleeps. I was mortified to think that I might have just foreshadowed to the audience around me that piece of dialogue. Here I had beautiful actors, beautiful scenery, beautiful languages, but the self absorbed dialogue was no more interesting than what I hear around me on a typical day. The film left me as cold and detached as William Shimell's character.