Lost In Translation

What Cho Seung-Hui Got Wrong About Oldboy

Here's an interesting discussion by Grady Hendrix in Slate about the film, Oldboy, that some say inspired the Virgina Tech killings:

It's taken professional pundits several days to link the Virginia Tech shootings to a violent piece of pop culture—frankly, I think they're slipping. A photo of Cho Seung-Hui wielding a hammer—included in the package that Cho mailed to NBC News—mimics a scene from the Korean movie Oldboy. Over on her blog, showbiz reporter Nikki Finke demonstrates the standard-issue rending of garments and crying to the heavens that comes when a violent movie seems to inspire a horrific act: "I just don't understand how critics with even a shred of humanity keep supporting films that celebrate violence in all its awfulness."

Oldboy, the 2004 Cannes Grand Prix winner, is hardly a celebration of violence, although it does depict bloodshed with all the graphic panache of 300. It's the second film in Park Chan-Wook's unofficial "Vengeance Trilogy," which started with Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002) and ended with Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (2005). Despite being a trilogy, the three movies have nothing in common beyond their determination to map humanity's self-destructive drive for revenge.

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In the end, Oldboy bears no more responsibility for the Virginia Tech shootings than American Idol, but it's fortunate that it has come up. In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter a few years ago, Oldboy's director Park said, "My films are the stories of people who place the blame for their actions on others because they refuse to take on the blame themselves." And that's one of the smartest things that anyone's said so far about the motives of Cho Seung-Hui.

Conversations: Patti Smith

There's an interesting interview in Salon's Conversations with Patti Smith, who is set to release a new album soon:

Patti Smith has never been shy about using her words to express how she feels. Consider the first line of her very first album, 1975's "Horses": "Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine." But on her new record, "Twelve," out April 24, the veteran rocker lets the words of others speak for her.

No willy-nilly collection of personal favorites, "Twelve" is a summation of Smith's feelings on the current state of the world -- a passionate mix of frustration and hope. Featuring her takes on political songs like the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter" and Tears for Fears' "Everybody Wants to Rule the World," as well as era-defining cuts like Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit" and Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit," the album offers a fascinating look at the music that means something to Smith.

A firm believer in the galvanizing power of art, Smith, 60, sat down with Salon in the offices of Columbia Records not long after her induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to discuss her sense of the country's mood, the Web's profound influence and how music can be an agent of change.

Recently I've been listening to more Patti Smith as I recently picked up Radio Ethiopia (with the excellent trracks "Distant Fingers" and "Poppies") and Wave (mostly for the transcendent "Dancing Barefoot In The Park"-one of my all time favorite cuts). A few months back I got the brillant Easter, which is my second favorite Patti Smith album, the classic Horses being my favorite.

Nightwork

I recently stumbled across Anne Allison’s anthropological study of hostess bars, Nightwork, at a used bookstore after seeing a reference to the work in one of Sawa Kurotani’s Behind the Screen columns. Even though a lot of the fieldwork was during the heady bubble days when corporations had these enormous entertainment budgets, I think Allison has a lot to say about work, play, sexuality, marriages, and Japanese society. I have to admit it is one of those largely Asian customs that I always found somewhat baffling, why would you pay an exorbitant price to be indulged by women who were clearly only doing so because they were paid and think Allison has done a remarkable job of explaining the appeal of such institutions. One of the greatest cultural differences between Americans and Japanese can be seen by the lines that separate work from play and public from private in the two cultures. There is less of a strict divide in Japan, where workers are often expect to put in long hours of unpaid overtime and often meet with clients or co-workers for drinks after working hours-in both cases it is important to maintain “ningen kankei” (human relations) with both sets of people-and this is often done through drinking and this drinking is often done at hostess clubs.

Allison also points out that the role of the hostess is often associated with creating a pleasant atmosphere by keeping the conversation going about trivial things and flattering and joking with the men in the group-relieving any of them of the burden of playing host to their clients/and or colleagues. I see this as another example of “ameru” where they are expected to be indulged by the hostess who take care of their drinks, light their cigarettes, and tolerate their lewd behavior, stupid jokes, bad singing, and other boorish behaviors.

The roles of husband and wife are much more clearly drawn in Japanese society as well where the male is only responsible for working and being the breadwinner, while women are solely responsible for the household and the raising of the children. They rarely spend leisure time together, and Allison quotes many men who say that they cannot relax at home, thus they need somewhere outside the office and home to do so. The family doesn’t play as prominent role in Japan as it does in America. For some reason playing with the children at home isn’t a relaxing activity for the average Japanese male. Allison also looks the extremely strong between mother and children, especially men. She quotes Ian Buruma who sees the codling of men and indulging them with maternal-like acceptance of behaviors seem insulting or invasive by the hostess/mama.

I found this to be a well-researched and fascinating look at male and female roles in society, as well as an understanding of the role the mizu shobai (Water trade) plays in society. It is written in academic style, however, it is not complettely unreadable and quite provocative in several sections.

The Last Days of The Sopranos

I've been keeping up with the final season of The Sopranos via the Internet and some of the loose ends that I thought were glossed over in previous seasons are starting to congeal (ie the death of Adriana, Christopher's battle with addiction, Meadow's break up with Finn, etc...) in the new season. Although, I still enjoy the show, however, I think it hasn't been as consistant since about Season three. So far, the second half of Season 6 has been pretty good, some of the episodes in the first half were quite tepid. There's an interesting season long discussion going on between two writers at Slate, which appears every Monday if I'm not mistaken.

One of the writers proivded a link to a Mob Nickname Generator. Inexplicably mine was: Patrick "The Hawk" McCoy. I would have thought there would be some sort of ethnic slur involved in the naming of an Irish mobster, but what the heck-give it a go.

The Last King of Scotland

I have to admit that I was compelled to see The Last King of Scotland to see what many said is a breakout, Oscar nominated performance of Forest Whitaker as Idi Amin. And he does give an outstanding performance, thus living up to the hype. However, it is another one of those movies about a foreign land as seen through the eyes of a European-there are countless examples: Blood Diamond, The Constant Gardener, etc… The story arc is usually predictable as they emerge from starry-eyed optimism or bleary-eyed cynicism to see the evil being done in whatever third world country, which causes the protagonist to have a moment of clarity and do the right thing. That being said I rather enjoyed the first half of the movie where the Scottish Doctor, played by James McAvoy, decides to leave Scotland to see the world and have an adventure and finds that the new president of Uganda is a great fan of the Scottish. The second half do the move glosses over the atrocities that saw 300, 000 of his countrymen killed in his brutal regime. I think the violence is metaphorical, but it isn’t enough to convey the banality of his evil. It’s another case where the movie makes me more interested in the reality and the source material. Someone also recommended the novel to me as well, so I might have to take a look sometime soon.

R.I.P. Kurt Vonnegut

Last week saw the death of Kurt Vonengut, he was a favorite in high school and college. His Slaughterhouse-Five inspired a visit to Dresden while traveling in Germany in 1992. There's a good Obituary in Slate-here's a bit from it:

In New York, many years later, I came to understand that a number of intellectuals thought Vonnegut was for students—for the kind of immature, emotional readers who get caught up in Dune or The Fountainhead: a "phase" author. But it's never struck me that there is a mature, dispassionate stance on death, greed, cruelty, and human weakness that sober-minded adults ought to graduate to, after reaching some arbitrary educational high-water mark, that would elevate them beyond Vonnegut's whimsically bleak philosophy. In 1945, as an American POW in Germany, he saw the human carnage of the Dresden firebombing. It shaped his tragicomic worldview; he never "got over it." Should he have? Are not some offenses worthy of unending outrage, even once we've accepted the fact that they have occurred and will continue to? Why would the telegraphic, absurdist elements of Vonnegut's books invalidate their originality or seriousness? Who decides that you can't outgrow Catch-22 but you can outgrow Slaughterhouse-Five?

I think the author has a valid point here, but I do feel as though I have outgrown his work. I haven't read a book of his since I graduated from college in 1992. However, I do have fond memeories of reading his books and feel that his outlook had an influence on my own thinking about the world.

Homicide

I was so blown away by the great writing on the HBO TV series The Wire that I felt compelled to track down the book that started it all, Homicide, by the series creator David Simon. Simon spent the entire year of 1988 with a unit of homicide detective units in Baltimore, a very rough and tumble city in the days of the cocaine boom. First of all Simon has a gift for narrative and was able to gain a great understanding of the politics, procedures, and personalities of the subjects of the book so as to make it come alive on the page. He also manages to demystify the process of homicide investigation by showing how it takes place mainly with witnesses and proof like murder weapons rather than fingerprints and DNA. He also shows how the internal politics of an institution like the police department affects the workings of a place like a homicide department. Furthermore, the realities of the justice system are also laid bare. It is a fascinating look at how these institutions work.

Truth is often stranger than fiction, which is proved in this book where he has borrowed several personality types, quotes, stories, and actual events from this book to use in The Wire. For example, the opening sequence of the first season shows McNulty talking with a witness who explains why "Snot Bogie"was shot down: He always stole the pot when the boys were playing dice and they finally got sick of it and shot him. McNulty asks why they let him play if he always took the pot when it got big. And the "yo" (as the detectives call the homeboys) says: "We gotta let him play this is America."

Another great anecdote borrowed from the book was when a detective used a service revolver to kill a mouse at home. He quips, I thought about leaving him out as a warning to the others.

It is a compelling fascinating read that produced the long running TV series Homicide: Life On The Streets as well. I look forward to tracking down his second book, The Corner, and seeing the subsequent HBO miniseries of the same name.

Interview: Nick Cave / Grinderman

Salon's Conversations has an interview with Nick Cave talking about his latest release with a new band called Grinderman, which I have recently acquired and enjoyed. It is much noisier and more hard driving than his last release. Here's what Salon says about Cave:

Long one of rock's most darkly charismatic figures, Nick Cave has filled his career with songs that married an almost biblical sense of morality and justice to an evocative, highly literate lyrical style that marked him as sort of a louder, angrier Leonard Cohen. Cave's new album, recorded under the name Grinderman (and without his longtime backing band the Bad Seeds), finds the Australian singer-songwriter, who turns 50 this year, making some of the noisiest, harshest music of his career. The reasons for the added aggression? He's getting old and, if songs like "No Pussy Blues" are any indication, he's not getting laid.

Rail thin and dressed all in black, with a long handlebar mustache hugging the sides of his mouth, Cave -- accompanied by Grinderman drummer Jim Sclavunos (hear them both in this podcast) -- cut an imposing figure as he spoke with Salon about an album that he says came out of a "monumental midlife crisis."

Daito Bunka University-Higashi Matsuyama Campus

The Daito Bunka University Higashi Matsuyama Campus is about an hour from Ikeburkuro and is a very expansive campus-complete with playing fields and waterworks. Luckily I only have to commute there once a week, becasue it's a haul.

Oprah's Book Club: The Stranger's View

I came across this entertaining article about Oprah's latest book club selection, Cormac McCarthy's The Road, in The Stranger:

No, the real eye-opener is that The Road is the most depressing book that McCarthy has ever written, which is saying an awful lot. It's about a father and his son wandering across America after an unspecified apocalypse. It's fabulously well written—a friend of mine said, "It's like someone asked Shakespeare to write a whole book about the color gray." Ash falls from the sky and covers everything. People are dead or dying on almost every page. One of its most colorful scenes involves a baby being roasted on a spit, for Christ's sake. And, thanks to Ms. Winfrey, it's probably going to be the best-selling and most widely read novel of the year.

One has to wonder how Oprah's book club will take this selection—will soccer moms across the country slit their wrists after being exposed to McCarthy's Mad Max–meets–The Sorrows of Young Werther magnum opus? Even the book club questions on Oprah's website are depressing: "How is McCarthy able to make the postapocalyptic world of The Road seem so real and utterly terrifying? Which descriptive passages are especially vivid and visceral in their depiction of this blasted landscape? What do you find to be the most horrifying features of this world and the survivors who inhabit it?"*

Never fear. According to the Oprah message boards, it looks like the American reading public is gonna be just fine, thanks to their uncanny ability to make any reading experience wholly and utterly about themselves. One woman offers this critique: "My initial thought was, I love how the book is blocked into short paragraphs. This makes it easy to read in the bathroom, during commercials, between innings in baseball games... I am only on page 40 and I already feel more appreciative of the view out my window." Another woman decides that The Road must lead to Jesus Christ: "I kept thinking while reading... this would suck, but God would be with you and whatever the outcome, it would be God's. Being able to trust in God makes any trouble easier to get through and if I were ever in such a situation, I think it would be comforting to know that you are nestled in the hand of God no matter how bad the view."