Kathryn Edmund Savides: September 23, 1915 - January 26, 2004
(Happy Birthday, Mom)
RED JACKET
She was borne away by an engine ornate, fiery and black
on a rescue mission: to oversee an uncle's burial.
Huge Uncle Bill had been the King Kong
in our family fairy tale, bolting rows of sweet corn
and inhaling ingots of butter at Reunions,
beer bubbling out of his ears, Snickers bars up his nose,
his roaring beefy tongue popping with hotdogs
and Scottish curses, a new wife
sitting on his hand every few years.
Suddenly he'd exploded, his football-sized pigskin heart
split at every seam,
and our mother's calmness was frantically summoned
by the hysterical fourth wife.
Mom rode to the rescue on a dragon-black train,
bolt upright and pushing it all the way. Once there
she ordered the special, jumbo casket,
she blessed the giant's exploded corpuscles
with a gentle veil of white flowers,
dignified his furry pagan paunch in a kingly suit of black.
She directed when cables would lower his bulk,
heavy as a crusader in full mail, to the inner earth
where seethed gobs of minerals, and his ancestors' lacy bones.
Old wives' and young wives' cupid's-bow kisses
colored his big ornery face
ravishing shades of rose.
At the funeral lunch, the peach-fed oils of Mother's baked ham
soothed mourners' torn nerve endings.
The precise rectangles of her bar cookies
made them feel they could go on.
At home we shivered in coldest eclipse,
for she was the queen
of our tribe of dwarves.
At five years old
I fought my baby instinct to stroke her red jacket
in the closet where it glowed.
Finally one midnight the dragon brought her back.
Finally we could breathe her warm air again.
But I'd heard that corpses were green,
and rotten-bellied with fear
still had to ask.
Yes, she said, Uncle Bill had been a little green,
but he was now shining in Heaven,
silvery with Grandma and Father Abraham.
She believed it, too.
When she looked up, all of her beloved dead
were sparkling in the constellations.
My hard little coconut head
processed her words. I looked up
suspiciously at those stars, privately had my doubts:
then looked into her gentle face and decided
then and lifelong,
never to tell her.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
My Favorite Movie Dance, Bar None
In general, I detest movie musicals. When actors begin to dance and sing in a mob, I just wish they'd sit down and shut up. It's probably a genetic thing. My grandfather deeply loved classical music, but if male ballet dancers in tights began doing scissors kicks to Stravinsky across the TV screen, he'd turn it off. My aunt rose and stalked out of the theater during SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS. She claimed she'd been offended by the broad Morning After grins of the Brides. Later, she admitted that the sight of all those actors caroling and prancing around "was enough to make me throw up twice." An uncle has said he can endure THE WIZARD OF OZ, but is waiting for the non-singing, non-dancing version. As for me, over the years I've sighed loudly, gossiped, shredded Kleenexes, devoured Milk Duds, and griped my way through other musicals which friends insisted I see.
But every once in awhile, a song or dance arises so spontaneously in a NONmusical that it's lodged like a sweet ember beneath my ribcage before I even know what hit me. Take Rudolph Valentino's smoking hot tango toward the beginning of the great old silent FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCALYPSE. He awes the murderous drinkers in a cutthroat cantina with his coldly sexy moves, hurling his little monkey-woman partner all over the floor. Ninety years after that scene was shot, it still reduces a female audience to infatuated silence...and a good portion of the male. Or there's that moment in GODFATHER II when the little Vito Corleone, child of a murdered father and murdered mother, completely alone, friendless and quarantined in a foreign country, sits up in his pauper's nightshirt and sings his Italian folk song--in an unwavering voice.
And then there's this movie dance, my all-time favorite....
The film is Jim Jarmusch's DOWN BY LAW, and involves the escape of three prisoners who rush into a swamp for concealment. The most eccentric fugitive is played by Roberto Benigni (of course), and when the trio happen upon a young woman (Nicoletta Braschi), she and Roberto instantly fall in love. One minute they're strangers, and a few heartbeats later you sense they'll never willingly be parted. It's a wonderment, something like watching a car go from zero mph to 1000.
At the breakfast table next day, the fugitives are eating their bacon and eggs. Roberto says casually, "Let's have some music." He turns on the radio and we hear Irma Thomas's slow, lovely, funky version of the blues song "It's Raining." Roberto and Nicoletta begin to dance. Gradually it turns into the sweetest, most intimate and sensual dance you ever saw. There's no showy choreography, nothing especially graphic, just chemistry and true love. And it doesn't hurt that you know Roberto and Nicoletta are married in real life.
You can see it on YouTube, and if you haven't, don't wait another minute:
Down By Law - It's Raining
I'd write it in gems if I could.
But every once in awhile, a song or dance arises so spontaneously in a NONmusical that it's lodged like a sweet ember beneath my ribcage before I even know what hit me. Take Rudolph Valentino's smoking hot tango toward the beginning of the great old silent FOUR HORSEMEN OF THE APOCALYPSE. He awes the murderous drinkers in a cutthroat cantina with his coldly sexy moves, hurling his little monkey-woman partner all over the floor. Ninety years after that scene was shot, it still reduces a female audience to infatuated silence...and a good portion of the male. Or there's that moment in GODFATHER II when the little Vito Corleone, child of a murdered father and murdered mother, completely alone, friendless and quarantined in a foreign country, sits up in his pauper's nightshirt and sings his Italian folk song--in an unwavering voice.
And then there's this movie dance, my all-time favorite....
The film is Jim Jarmusch's DOWN BY LAW, and involves the escape of three prisoners who rush into a swamp for concealment. The most eccentric fugitive is played by Roberto Benigni (of course), and when the trio happen upon a young woman (Nicoletta Braschi), she and Roberto instantly fall in love. One minute they're strangers, and a few heartbeats later you sense they'll never willingly be parted. It's a wonderment, something like watching a car go from zero mph to 1000.
At the breakfast table next day, the fugitives are eating their bacon and eggs. Roberto says casually, "Let's have some music." He turns on the radio and we hear Irma Thomas's slow, lovely, funky version of the blues song "It's Raining." Roberto and Nicoletta begin to dance. Gradually it turns into the sweetest, most intimate and sensual dance you ever saw. There's no showy choreography, nothing especially graphic, just chemistry and true love. And it doesn't hurt that you know Roberto and Nicoletta are married in real life.
You can see it on YouTube, and if you haven't, don't wait another minute:
Down By Law - It's Raining
I'd write it in gems if I could.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Moving Actor: "Whoa, Look At You Go!"
Actors fight, dance, leap from great heights and even walk better than you or I do. They may be privately shining with sweat from the effort of making these moves, but up on the screen they're dusted with stars. We've spent many a happy hour admiring them in the dark. Here I'm going to concentrate on several of my favorite actor-walks (although, just to break it up, I'll include one demented little jig.)
l. John Travolta owns the best walk in the business, and he shows it all in his street-strut through the credits in SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE. He steps out strong in his pointy-toed red shoes which match his flare-collared red silk shirt. The infatuated camera admires him from the ground up, lingering on the billowing cuffs of his black polyester slacks. He's also carrying a paint can, but is way too cool to care. That whole white-suit/dancy-dance nonsense he gets up to later is pallid by comparison.
Travolta also delivers a hugely satisfying moment when he climbs stairs in a busy restaurant to vent justice. In GET SHORTY he's been insulted by a wannabe-tough henchman standing on a landing. Wrong move, goon! Travolta heads up the stairs with that brisk can-do set of his shoulders. He's unhurried, with a confidence so staggeringly complete he doesn't even look cross. He collects the nasty guy like a bad debt and heaves him down the stair rungs like manure off a pitchfork, all without missing stride. Travolta is the Walk King of his generation.
2. In my opinion, Richard Gere is never convincing in good-guy roles. Maybe it's too much of a stretch, who knows? But he did surprisingly well in INTERNAL AFFAIRS as a cheating, lying, betraying, fornicating, murdering bad guy. He was also very effective as a shameless sleazebag of a celebrity lawyer in PRIMAL FEAR (although outgunned, I'd say, by Ed Norton's jaw-dropping debut performance). And years ago he was also good in AMERICAN GIGOLO--avaricious, social-climbing, amoral and sexy. All of which brings us to his walk.
Maybe it's not his fault. After all, human babies learn to walk around a year of age. But Richard Gere walks like a tart. He walks as if he's thinking about his hips more than men usually do. There's a crisp little hitch in his get-along, to put it mildly. This fits in with his dark and ambiguous roles, but is one of the reasons we can't believe him in the saintly ones.
3. John Wayne walks with his whole bulky body, something like a sasquatch would, as if he were holding the sky up on his big shoulders and the earth down with his feet, and plowing ahead no matter what the plague or disaster. In THE SEARCHERS, for five long years he never ceases to search for his kidnapped niece, by sunlight, moonlight, firelight, through storms and floods, under attack and threat of death. He searches mostly by horseback, but also in large part by the almost demented concentration and unstoppable forward impetus of that walk. We never doubt he'll find her, and he does.
4. Now for a dance: Donald Pleasence is an English actor known for his extreme style, which reached its height when he played Mike Myers' unfortunate doctor in the HALLOWEEN series. In the Western WILL PENNY he's a wicked psycho/preacher who's trying to force a virtuous widow (Joan Hackett) to marry one of his heart-stoppingly hideous, homicidal sons. There's a moment when he seems to have won, and in sudden celebration he does an evil little jig with such vile delight that he almost puts his foot through a chair. We hate him, but the moment still has a satanic glow.
5. For me, the most endearing walk is that provided by Roberto Benigni in IL MOSTRE (THE MONSTER). Through his usual series of disastrous misunderstandings, Roberto's character Loris is under suspicion of being a mass murderer. Nicoletta Braschi is the tough-minded undercover detective assigned to his case. She shadows Loris constantly, and gradually becomes fascinated by the wildly eccentric little man.
Now, the walk: in an early scene, with typical Benigni reasoning, Loris has decided he'll avoid the notice of his landlord, to whom he owes money, if he crouches down and walks like a duck below the man's line of vision. He does this more or less successfully, but rather sadly. There is something very lonely about a man who is walking like a duck all by himself. But Nicoletta sees this ruse of his. By this time she's realized that, evidence to the contrary, he's an innocent at heart. She gently crouches down beside him, and as they duck-walk away together, his face lights up with a shy man's happiness. It's a fine moment.
l. John Travolta owns the best walk in the business, and he shows it all in his street-strut through the credits in SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE. He steps out strong in his pointy-toed red shoes which match his flare-collared red silk shirt. The infatuated camera admires him from the ground up, lingering on the billowing cuffs of his black polyester slacks. He's also carrying a paint can, but is way too cool to care. That whole white-suit/dancy-dance nonsense he gets up to later is pallid by comparison.
Travolta also delivers a hugely satisfying moment when he climbs stairs in a busy restaurant to vent justice. In GET SHORTY he's been insulted by a wannabe-tough henchman standing on a landing. Wrong move, goon! Travolta heads up the stairs with that brisk can-do set of his shoulders. He's unhurried, with a confidence so staggeringly complete he doesn't even look cross. He collects the nasty guy like a bad debt and heaves him down the stair rungs like manure off a pitchfork, all without missing stride. Travolta is the Walk King of his generation.
2. In my opinion, Richard Gere is never convincing in good-guy roles. Maybe it's too much of a stretch, who knows? But he did surprisingly well in INTERNAL AFFAIRS as a cheating, lying, betraying, fornicating, murdering bad guy. He was also very effective as a shameless sleazebag of a celebrity lawyer in PRIMAL FEAR (although outgunned, I'd say, by Ed Norton's jaw-dropping debut performance). And years ago he was also good in AMERICAN GIGOLO--avaricious, social-climbing, amoral and sexy. All of which brings us to his walk.
Maybe it's not his fault. After all, human babies learn to walk around a year of age. But Richard Gere walks like a tart. He walks as if he's thinking about his hips more than men usually do. There's a crisp little hitch in his get-along, to put it mildly. This fits in with his dark and ambiguous roles, but is one of the reasons we can't believe him in the saintly ones.
3. John Wayne walks with his whole bulky body, something like a sasquatch would, as if he were holding the sky up on his big shoulders and the earth down with his feet, and plowing ahead no matter what the plague or disaster. In THE SEARCHERS, for five long years he never ceases to search for his kidnapped niece, by sunlight, moonlight, firelight, through storms and floods, under attack and threat of death. He searches mostly by horseback, but also in large part by the almost demented concentration and unstoppable forward impetus of that walk. We never doubt he'll find her, and he does.
4. Now for a dance: Donald Pleasence is an English actor known for his extreme style, which reached its height when he played Mike Myers' unfortunate doctor in the HALLOWEEN series. In the Western WILL PENNY he's a wicked psycho/preacher who's trying to force a virtuous widow (Joan Hackett) to marry one of his heart-stoppingly hideous, homicidal sons. There's a moment when he seems to have won, and in sudden celebration he does an evil little jig with such vile delight that he almost puts his foot through a chair. We hate him, but the moment still has a satanic glow.
5. For me, the most endearing walk is that provided by Roberto Benigni in IL MOSTRE (THE MONSTER). Through his usual series of disastrous misunderstandings, Roberto's character Loris is under suspicion of being a mass murderer. Nicoletta Braschi is the tough-minded undercover detective assigned to his case. She shadows Loris constantly, and gradually becomes fascinated by the wildly eccentric little man.
Now, the walk: in an early scene, with typical Benigni reasoning, Loris has decided he'll avoid the notice of his landlord, to whom he owes money, if he crouches down and walks like a duck below the man's line of vision. He does this more or less successfully, but rather sadly. There is something very lonely about a man who is walking like a duck all by himself. But Nicoletta sees this ruse of his. By this time she's realized that, evidence to the contrary, he's an innocent at heart. She gently crouches down beside him, and as they duck-walk away together, his face lights up with a shy man's happiness. It's a fine moment.
Friday, September 4, 2009
"In Praise of Aging". Photographs by Sandy Wojtal-Weber. Poem by Gerda Lerner.
This beautiful little book might just as well be called "In Praise of Living" because to use Lerner's words it is about "celebrating what is/ what still is..."
Sandy Wojtal-Weber is an accomplished photographer with an instinctive skill in seizing images from the natural world, with tenderness and grace, at just the right moment. It is no surprise to learn that she particularly admires the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson. In this book, her pictures illustrate the lines of Gerda Lerner's poem "In Praise of Aging." Many of the photographs were taken at Parfrey's Glen, in Wisconsin, as well as other far-ranging locations. The two sunflowers were taken from her garden.
Essentially, Lerner's poem is about living life mindfully, with both gravity and joy, in a way that moves us naturally to an acceptance of the end of life. For example, on an early page Lerner writes "On that path, step by step,/we must give up something forever..." Wojtal-Weber's accompanying picture is of a rocky, steep, and difficult climb through heavy woods. At first glance, it might almost signify Gethsemane. Yet the texture of the stones and mossy boulders, the green beauty of the woods, show the indestructable loveliness that accompanies us through hardship.
Wojtal-Weber's pictures are fully true to the object or scene in her lens, and sometimes something more: an homage. The two pages of glorious sunflower budheads--"discovering the pleasure of the modest particular/Growing awareness of purposeful seeing"-- for the first time made me think the words "Powerful! All-seeing!" about a bud. Her color photographs are often sumptuous, her black and white winter scenes impeccable. Although her work is the furthest thing possible from sentimental, the viewer's sense is that she has captured these images with respect and love.
There is a great deal to admire and enjoy here, not least the last picture. It shows a curling green frond, with behind it a huge, veined green leaf and the words "and grace." But perhaps my favorite image of all is of the bird--with fragile limbs and delicate beak, but mighty wings--flying straight up into a storm so threatening it looks like the bottom of the sea:
"Courage."
Sandy Wojtal-Weber is an accomplished photographer with an instinctive skill in seizing images from the natural world, with tenderness and grace, at just the right moment. It is no surprise to learn that she particularly admires the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson. In this book, her pictures illustrate the lines of Gerda Lerner's poem "In Praise of Aging." Many of the photographs were taken at Parfrey's Glen, in Wisconsin, as well as other far-ranging locations. The two sunflowers were taken from her garden.
Essentially, Lerner's poem is about living life mindfully, with both gravity and joy, in a way that moves us naturally to an acceptance of the end of life. For example, on an early page Lerner writes "On that path, step by step,/we must give up something forever..." Wojtal-Weber's accompanying picture is of a rocky, steep, and difficult climb through heavy woods. At first glance, it might almost signify Gethsemane. Yet the texture of the stones and mossy boulders, the green beauty of the woods, show the indestructable loveliness that accompanies us through hardship.
Wojtal-Weber's pictures are fully true to the object or scene in her lens, and sometimes something more: an homage. The two pages of glorious sunflower budheads--"discovering the pleasure of the modest particular/Growing awareness of purposeful seeing"-- for the first time made me think the words "Powerful! All-seeing!" about a bud. Her color photographs are often sumptuous, her black and white winter scenes impeccable. Although her work is the furthest thing possible from sentimental, the viewer's sense is that she has captured these images with respect and love.
There is a great deal to admire and enjoy here, not least the last picture. It shows a curling green frond, with behind it a huge, veined green leaf and the words "and grace." But perhaps my favorite image of all is of the bird--with fragile limbs and delicate beak, but mighty wings--flying straight up into a storm so threatening it looks like the bottom of the sea:
"Courage."
Sunday, August 23, 2009
French Movies Break My Heart...And Gladden It
I saw my first French movie at the age of ten. It was a bitterly cold winter's day, and I sat with classmates in the odd but glorious little bijou theater in Baraboo, the exuberantly gilded Al Ringling. The Al Ringling is supposed to be a tiny replica of a theater in Versailles. What Versailles is doing in cow country, I don't know; but I've always enjoyed the place.
The double bill that Saturday matinee was WHITE MANE and THE RED BALLOON, both directed by Albert Lamorisse. It should have been called the Killer Bill. At first the other kids and I were just having a typical afternoon at the movies. There was a lot of boisterous climbing over seats in the dark, hissed arguments, fighting over arm rests, and a strong smell of funky winter coats and barn boots, as well as a constant hail of flying goobers. But then we started to actually watch the film. I've never really recovered.
WHITE MANE takes place in the Camargue, which is a harshly beautiful region of France, on the sea. A brave little boy, Folco, befriends a gorgeous wild stallion. White Mane is the glittering silver of moon and stars and sea foam. Folco defends the horse against greedy, brutal cowboys who would break the animal's proud spirit, use and destroy him. The cowboys start a fire to trap White Mane. He barely escapes. He's forced into a savage fight with another stallion for dominance, loses and almost dies. This horse goes through more suffering than the whole cast of Les Miserables. Throughout, the boy Folco (always dressed in white) does his best to defend him. In the end, after a terrifying chase Folco and his beloved horse are backed against the wild sea by the cowboys who want to trap them. Because we in the audience were Americans, we fully expected some version of the cavalry to thunder up and save them. In our movies, it always did. But instead, the French boy on his French horse wheels his magnificent stallion away from their tormentors and rides straight into the sea. Not only is there no land in sight, but we slowly realized they would have to swim across the Atlantic to find any. The camera follows the struggling pair until the stallion's snowy mane disappears--inevitably, beautifully, agonizingly--into the sea foam...
Soft little voices could be heard throughout the theater. "Where--where are they going?" "Are they...DEAD?" There were sobs, many of them, and the loudest was mine.
We perked up a little when the next film appeared: THE RED BALLOON. Oh, this was more like it! We'd swoop and soar on a jolly red orb, and forget all about Folco, who was our age, glugging the icy grey waters at the bottom of the sea.
The French boy in THE RED BALLOON wore a tragic little grey sweatsuit throughout. Young though we were, we noticed that he was the only one of the children who was dressed this way. His home life with his cranky grandmother sucked. And he was heartbreakingly isolated. He had no friends, not one. The other children were really mean to him, even for the French. Then one day he finally found a friend, a big red balloon which followed him, and which was so sensitive to his moods that they ran and danced and sang together. They were soulmates. We sighed with relief. Thank God he wasn't alone. Now he had this superbly bouncy and upbeat red friend. But the mean children hunted them down. They punched the fragile little boy, and pricked--killed--the beautiful balloon. It deflated before our eyes, and lay dead on harsh stones. And the "happy ending" consisted of the little child in his grey sweatsuit being lifted up to heaven by a cluster of balloons.
Once again soft little voices arose in the theater: "Where--where are they going?" "Is he--DEAD?" And more sobs. I staggered outside, glazed-eyed, having undergone my first aggravated battery and sophisticated sucker punch at the hands of European cinema. Worse, somehow I knew I would never be able to forget White Mane, or the all-too-human red balloon. And I never have.
Eight years passed. I went to a college which had a very, very serious Film Society. Film critic Mike Wilmington went to the same college, and has written about movie discussions which ended with members throwing hot coffee in each other's faces, or rolling on the floor searching for strangle holds. My sophomore boyfriend, whom I'll call Wally, cultivated his cinematic tastes like fine orchids. For example, he thoughtfully described an ex-girlfriend by saying, "She has this wild mane of black hair, like Stefania Sandrelli in SEDUCED AND ABANDONED." He also mocked Ingmar Bergman as "Swedish chicken fat," but not very loud.
Wally told me that my ignorance of fine European film was barbaric. We would go see JULES AND JIM that very night. And we did. For the first time I saw Jeanne Moreau in the role of Catherine. Catherine is a born muse. She has a subtle, fascinating smile which ensnares the friends Jules and Jim with its mystery. "Where does that smile come from," these European men wonder, in their sumptuous ponderings, "what does it mean?" ("Who the fuck cares?" one American girl in the audience thought, but didn't say.) Catherine breaks the hearts of both Jules and Jim, not once, but many times. She marries Jules on a whim, is the worst mother since Medea, flares through the movie like a psychotic comet. In the end, when Jim tries to escape her, she murders him and herself by driving off a bridge--still with the same mysterious smile.
As we left the theater Wally raved about her: "Oh man alive, Catherine is the queen of everything, her smile, those eyes, that little song she sings--"
"She's an evil bitch!" I protested. "She ruined their lives. She's a murderess--"
"She's a REAL WOMAN," Wally sighed adoringly. "American girls just don't have that subtle femininity."
I dumped Wally. And that evening I wanted to dump Catherine and Jules and Jim, and White Mane and the Red Balloon too. But I never did, because in their arbitrary, violent, and often exquisite ways, they'd already invaded my bloodstream.
The double bill that Saturday matinee was WHITE MANE and THE RED BALLOON, both directed by Albert Lamorisse. It should have been called the Killer Bill. At first the other kids and I were just having a typical afternoon at the movies. There was a lot of boisterous climbing over seats in the dark, hissed arguments, fighting over arm rests, and a strong smell of funky winter coats and barn boots, as well as a constant hail of flying goobers. But then we started to actually watch the film. I've never really recovered.
WHITE MANE takes place in the Camargue, which is a harshly beautiful region of France, on the sea. A brave little boy, Folco, befriends a gorgeous wild stallion. White Mane is the glittering silver of moon and stars and sea foam. Folco defends the horse against greedy, brutal cowboys who would break the animal's proud spirit, use and destroy him. The cowboys start a fire to trap White Mane. He barely escapes. He's forced into a savage fight with another stallion for dominance, loses and almost dies. This horse goes through more suffering than the whole cast of Les Miserables. Throughout, the boy Folco (always dressed in white) does his best to defend him. In the end, after a terrifying chase Folco and his beloved horse are backed against the wild sea by the cowboys who want to trap them. Because we in the audience were Americans, we fully expected some version of the cavalry to thunder up and save them. In our movies, it always did. But instead, the French boy on his French horse wheels his magnificent stallion away from their tormentors and rides straight into the sea. Not only is there no land in sight, but we slowly realized they would have to swim across the Atlantic to find any. The camera follows the struggling pair until the stallion's snowy mane disappears--inevitably, beautifully, agonizingly--into the sea foam...
Soft little voices could be heard throughout the theater. "Where--where are they going?" "Are they...DEAD?" There were sobs, many of them, and the loudest was mine.
We perked up a little when the next film appeared: THE RED BALLOON. Oh, this was more like it! We'd swoop and soar on a jolly red orb, and forget all about Folco, who was our age, glugging the icy grey waters at the bottom of the sea.
The French boy in THE RED BALLOON wore a tragic little grey sweatsuit throughout. Young though we were, we noticed that he was the only one of the children who was dressed this way. His home life with his cranky grandmother sucked. And he was heartbreakingly isolated. He had no friends, not one. The other children were really mean to him, even for the French. Then one day he finally found a friend, a big red balloon which followed him, and which was so sensitive to his moods that they ran and danced and sang together. They were soulmates. We sighed with relief. Thank God he wasn't alone. Now he had this superbly bouncy and upbeat red friend. But the mean children hunted them down. They punched the fragile little boy, and pricked--killed--the beautiful balloon. It deflated before our eyes, and lay dead on harsh stones. And the "happy ending" consisted of the little child in his grey sweatsuit being lifted up to heaven by a cluster of balloons.
Once again soft little voices arose in the theater: "Where--where are they going?" "Is he--DEAD?" And more sobs. I staggered outside, glazed-eyed, having undergone my first aggravated battery and sophisticated sucker punch at the hands of European cinema. Worse, somehow I knew I would never be able to forget White Mane, or the all-too-human red balloon. And I never have.
Eight years passed. I went to a college which had a very, very serious Film Society. Film critic Mike Wilmington went to the same college, and has written about movie discussions which ended with members throwing hot coffee in each other's faces, or rolling on the floor searching for strangle holds. My sophomore boyfriend, whom I'll call Wally, cultivated his cinematic tastes like fine orchids. For example, he thoughtfully described an ex-girlfriend by saying, "She has this wild mane of black hair, like Stefania Sandrelli in SEDUCED AND ABANDONED." He also mocked Ingmar Bergman as "Swedish chicken fat," but not very loud.
Wally told me that my ignorance of fine European film was barbaric. We would go see JULES AND JIM that very night. And we did. For the first time I saw Jeanne Moreau in the role of Catherine. Catherine is a born muse. She has a subtle, fascinating smile which ensnares the friends Jules and Jim with its mystery. "Where does that smile come from," these European men wonder, in their sumptuous ponderings, "what does it mean?" ("Who the fuck cares?" one American girl in the audience thought, but didn't say.) Catherine breaks the hearts of both Jules and Jim, not once, but many times. She marries Jules on a whim, is the worst mother since Medea, flares through the movie like a psychotic comet. In the end, when Jim tries to escape her, she murders him and herself by driving off a bridge--still with the same mysterious smile.
As we left the theater Wally raved about her: "Oh man alive, Catherine is the queen of everything, her smile, those eyes, that little song she sings--"
"She's an evil bitch!" I protested. "She ruined their lives. She's a murderess--"
"She's a REAL WOMAN," Wally sighed adoringly. "American girls just don't have that subtle femininity."
I dumped Wally. And that evening I wanted to dump Catherine and Jules and Jim, and White Mane and the Red Balloon too. But I never did, because in their arbitrary, violent, and often exquisite ways, they'd already invaded my bloodstream.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Cee-Cee Chews Me Out
The background to this post is that I write letters to the editor, early and often, usually about justice issues. I'd like to think of these letters as bold and illuminating, but friends keep me from vanity with remarks like, "I see where you were gassing away in the paper again," or simply "Blah, blah, blah."
My friend Cee-Cee (not her real name) is a retired policewoman. I met her, if that's the right word, when she called me up very late and out of the blue, to chew me over, grind me up and spit me out for a letter of mine she'd just read. The letter concerned what I saw as a poor judgment call on the part of a police officer.
Keep in mind that this was around midnight. I'd been asleep. Cee-Cee, a stranger to me then, has a voice of mighty thunder when upset, sort of like God and Thor combined. She said, or shouted, that although the facts in my letter were "technically correct," I had written it in a spirit of smug fault-finding and from a place of ignorance. Like most civilians, I had no idea of the thousands of judgment calls which every officer is required to make, often under severe stress. Neither I nor any other civilian would hear about the great majority which turned out to be right. Cee-Cee said I'd been wrong to zero in on this officer's rare mistake, when what mattered was an honorable career as a whole.
I was speechless for once. You would be too, if the side of a mountain suddenly split off and fell on your head, or if an avenging angel suddenly swooped down out of heaven and began flogging you like a racehorse. But I come from an ancestry of bossy teachers and ministers confident in their salvation, and those genes kicked in. I told Cee-Cee the truth. I said that I admired the police, because they have such a tough job. I said that I would never say or even think a single harsh word about an officer, as long as he seemed to keep alive and active in the front of his mind the fact that he'd promised to protect and serve the innocent public. He had not vowed to protect and serve himself.
"This cop you wrote about is a good one," Cee-Cee said bluntly. "You were wrong." Then, still angry but in a lower voice, she said, "I bet that if you ever needed help, you'd be the very first to be yelling for the police to come and save your puny butt!"
I said, "You got that right, I'd be the first, and if there were some number before 'first' I'd be that. I would stand there screaming like a toddler for them to come and rescue me, to come charging up in their shiny cars and obliterate criminals threatening me and sweep me to a place of safety, because in crisis that's their duty. That's what 'Protect and Serve' means!"
Unexpectedly, I heard Cee-Cee's deep, jolly, and striking laugh for the first time. She said, "You don't expect much, do you? You certainly are a STUBBORN little shit." I wasn't crazy about being called a stubborn little shit, but her tone had warmed up. After that the conversation was much more amicable. She even generously allowed that my letter had been "an honest, though stupid, mistake."
And a few minutes later, after a thoughtful pause, she said slowly, "Not that every single cop who ever existed was an altar boy or altar girl. There's a story or two I could tell you--no names, though--"
"Over a glass of good red," I said. "My treat."
"Deal," she said, and laughed.
And I think that Cee-Cee is a woman who keeps her word.
My friend Cee-Cee (not her real name) is a retired policewoman. I met her, if that's the right word, when she called me up very late and out of the blue, to chew me over, grind me up and spit me out for a letter of mine she'd just read. The letter concerned what I saw as a poor judgment call on the part of a police officer.
Keep in mind that this was around midnight. I'd been asleep. Cee-Cee, a stranger to me then, has a voice of mighty thunder when upset, sort of like God and Thor combined. She said, or shouted, that although the facts in my letter were "technically correct," I had written it in a spirit of smug fault-finding and from a place of ignorance. Like most civilians, I had no idea of the thousands of judgment calls which every officer is required to make, often under severe stress. Neither I nor any other civilian would hear about the great majority which turned out to be right. Cee-Cee said I'd been wrong to zero in on this officer's rare mistake, when what mattered was an honorable career as a whole.
I was speechless for once. You would be too, if the side of a mountain suddenly split off and fell on your head, or if an avenging angel suddenly swooped down out of heaven and began flogging you like a racehorse. But I come from an ancestry of bossy teachers and ministers confident in their salvation, and those genes kicked in. I told Cee-Cee the truth. I said that I admired the police, because they have such a tough job. I said that I would never say or even think a single harsh word about an officer, as long as he seemed to keep alive and active in the front of his mind the fact that he'd promised to protect and serve the innocent public. He had not vowed to protect and serve himself.
"This cop you wrote about is a good one," Cee-Cee said bluntly. "You were wrong." Then, still angry but in a lower voice, she said, "I bet that if you ever needed help, you'd be the very first to be yelling for the police to come and save your puny butt!"
I said, "You got that right, I'd be the first, and if there were some number before 'first' I'd be that. I would stand there screaming like a toddler for them to come and rescue me, to come charging up in their shiny cars and obliterate criminals threatening me and sweep me to a place of safety, because in crisis that's their duty. That's what 'Protect and Serve' means!"
Unexpectedly, I heard Cee-Cee's deep, jolly, and striking laugh for the first time. She said, "You don't expect much, do you? You certainly are a STUBBORN little shit." I wasn't crazy about being called a stubborn little shit, but her tone had warmed up. After that the conversation was much more amicable. She even generously allowed that my letter had been "an honest, though stupid, mistake."
And a few minutes later, after a thoughtful pause, she said slowly, "Not that every single cop who ever existed was an altar boy or altar girl. There's a story or two I could tell you--no names, though--"
"Over a glass of good red," I said. "My treat."
"Deal," she said, and laughed.
And I think that Cee-Cee is a woman who keeps her word.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
"Just Another Shade of Blue" and "Casualty Crossing" , by Kevin Hughes
Kevin Hughes has a Superman job and a Clark Kent job, although there may be disagreement as to which is which. He's a Dane County Sheriff's detective with a 30+-year career, and he also writes mystery novels.
"Just Another Shade of Blue" was Hughes' debut novel. It was based on the real-life homicide case of Doris Ann McLeod, which he investigated. The novel achieved the almost impossible task of finding justice for the murder victim by setting forth the circumstances of her tragic life. From childhood onward she had been so isolated and exploited, so uniformly betrayed, that when she disappeared nobody reported her missing. A mutilated corpse was found, but its identity remained a mystery for many months. The actual McLeod case was solved, in the end, by the strangest of flukes: a toddler happened to lisp a few words, chilling ones, that a detective realized were a description of the victim's terrible last moments. In Hughes' book, Detective Toby Jenkins finds a solution every bit as harrowing and odd.
Hughes' second novel, "Casualty Crossing," begins by describing the abusive home life of 14-year-old Billy: "He was the kid who ate lunch alone, who chose to sit in the back of the room. In the locker room, eyes were blind to the bruises on his back as he quickly changed outfits. Those bruises weren't small; it was just that nobody noticed the wallflower of a kid or had any reason to care." Billy has a confrontation with his violent, repulsive slob of a stepfather, Virgil--and it has to be said that Virgil is so evil, most readers will want to somehow jump into the book and knock his head off. Billy flees in terror, the book follows him on a desperate odyssey without ever pausing for breath, and so do we.
Hughes gets so many things right in these books. He has the storytelling instinct which drives action ahead--not always gracefully or smoothly, but then, these are mystery novels, not ballroom dances. The dialogue, especially between T.J. Jenkins and his colleagues, is the tough real deal: it jumps back at you with raw candor. And it's a pleasure to make the acquaintance of T.J., although he isn't one of your glamorous pretty-boy detectives, consulting wine lists, and combing society nymphets out of his hair. He's defiantly rough around the edges. He has an alcohol problem, is on terms of mutual contempt with a boss, his divorce left him with little more than the shirt on his back, and he's often rude, crude, and unkempt. (The grimly hilarious first scene of "Casualty Crossing", which has a hungover T.J. frantically smelling garments in his scruffy wardrobe to find the least gamey for a court appearance, demonstrates the last.)
In one scene, T.J. describes his world as "shitty," and himself as a buffoon. But the reader sees much more. T.J. is honest to the bitter end. He's loyal to friends, and he has a tremendously cranky but real dedication to his job. He has skills: in the crunch and at his absolute best, he can see like a deaf man and hear like the blind. He's committed to hunting bad guys, and he protects and serves the innocent. He gets the important things right.
"Just Another Shade of Blue" was Hughes' debut novel. It was based on the real-life homicide case of Doris Ann McLeod, which he investigated. The novel achieved the almost impossible task of finding justice for the murder victim by setting forth the circumstances of her tragic life. From childhood onward she had been so isolated and exploited, so uniformly betrayed, that when she disappeared nobody reported her missing. A mutilated corpse was found, but its identity remained a mystery for many months. The actual McLeod case was solved, in the end, by the strangest of flukes: a toddler happened to lisp a few words, chilling ones, that a detective realized were a description of the victim's terrible last moments. In Hughes' book, Detective Toby Jenkins finds a solution every bit as harrowing and odd.
Hughes' second novel, "Casualty Crossing," begins by describing the abusive home life of 14-year-old Billy: "He was the kid who ate lunch alone, who chose to sit in the back of the room. In the locker room, eyes were blind to the bruises on his back as he quickly changed outfits. Those bruises weren't small; it was just that nobody noticed the wallflower of a kid or had any reason to care." Billy has a confrontation with his violent, repulsive slob of a stepfather, Virgil--and it has to be said that Virgil is so evil, most readers will want to somehow jump into the book and knock his head off. Billy flees in terror, the book follows him on a desperate odyssey without ever pausing for breath, and so do we.
Hughes gets so many things right in these books. He has the storytelling instinct which drives action ahead--not always gracefully or smoothly, but then, these are mystery novels, not ballroom dances. The dialogue, especially between T.J. Jenkins and his colleagues, is the tough real deal: it jumps back at you with raw candor. And it's a pleasure to make the acquaintance of T.J., although he isn't one of your glamorous pretty-boy detectives, consulting wine lists, and combing society nymphets out of his hair. He's defiantly rough around the edges. He has an alcohol problem, is on terms of mutual contempt with a boss, his divorce left him with little more than the shirt on his back, and he's often rude, crude, and unkempt. (The grimly hilarious first scene of "Casualty Crossing", which has a hungover T.J. frantically smelling garments in his scruffy wardrobe to find the least gamey for a court appearance, demonstrates the last.)
In one scene, T.J. describes his world as "shitty," and himself as a buffoon. But the reader sees much more. T.J. is honest to the bitter end. He's loyal to friends, and he has a tremendously cranky but real dedication to his job. He has skills: in the crunch and at his absolute best, he can see like a deaf man and hear like the blind. He's committed to hunting bad guys, and he protects and serves the innocent. He gets the important things right.
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