Lost In Translation

To Kill A Mocking Bird Revisited

Malcolm Gladwell reevaluates a classic, Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird, in the New Yorker:

On what side was Harper Lee’s Atticus Finch? Finch defended Tom Robinson, the black man falsely accused of what in nineteen-thirties Alabama was the gravest of sins, the rape of a white woman. In the years since, he has become a role model for the legal profession. But he’s much closer to Folsom’s side of the race question than he is to the civil-rights activists who were arriving in the South as Lee wrote her novel.

Think about the scene that serves as the book’s centerpiece. Finch is at the front of the courtroom with Robinson. The jury files in. In the balcony, the book’s narrator—Finch’s daughter, Jean Louise, or Scout, as she’s known—shuts her eyes. “Guilty,” the first of the jurors says. “Guilty,” the second says, and down the line: “guilty, guilty, guilty.” Finch gathers his papers into his briefcase. He says a quiet word to his client, gathers his coat off the back of his chair, and walks, head bowed, out of the courtroom.

“Someone was punching me, but I was reluctant to take my eyes from the people below us, and from the image of Atticus’s lonely walk down the aisle,” Scout relates, in one of American literature’s most moving passages:

“Miss Jean Louise?” 
I looked around. They were standing. All around us and in the balcony on the opposite wall, the Negroes were getting to their feet. Reverend Sykes’s voice was as distant as Judge Taylor’s: 
“Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father’s passin’.” 

If Finch were a civil-rights hero, he would be brimming with rage at the unjust verdict. But he isn’t. He’s not Thurgood Marshall looking for racial salvation through the law. He’s Jim Folsom, looking for racial salvation through hearts and minds.

“If you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you’ll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks,” Finch tells his daughter. “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view . . . until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.” He is never anything but gracious to his neighbor Mrs. Dubose, even though she considers him a “nigger-lover.” He forgives the townsfolk of Maycomb for the same reason. They are suffering from a “sickness,” he tells Scout—the inability to see a black man as a real person. All men, he believes, are just alike.

*There's a rebuttal in The New Republic:

As is so often true of these Gladwellian comparisons, this one is extremely tough to swallow (perhaps this is not surprising: Gladwell recently wrote on his blog that, "[O]f course non-symetrical comparisons are far more interesting and thought-provoking than symetrical comparisons.") Putting side-by-side a famed populist governor and an intensely self-controlled yet also passionate fictional lawyer is bound to cause some strain, but Gladwell's case here is particularly weak... 

Horses

I recently read Philip Shaw’s 33 1/3 book length essay on Patti Smith’s seminal album Horses.  Shaw is a Reader in the English Department at the University of Leicester; therefore his analysis is rife with theorists like Lacan, Benjamin, Freud, Jung, and others. But I think the real strength of his book lies in the biographical sketches he provides about her early life and development as an artist. Shaw does an admirable job with explaining how Smith got tot eh point where she could record an album like Horses and provided insight into the background and lyrics of the songs. For example I was unaware that “Redondo Beach” was code for a gay beach in the LA area. It was interesting to hear her past with people like Sam Shepard and the whole downtown scene. I find a many of Smith’s songs timeless-and the ones from this album include “Land,” “Gloria,” and “Redondo Beach.”

August Movies 2009

I had the opportunity to see several films while on vacation on the plane and in theaters. One of the first was Duplicity, a corporate spy thriller form Tony Gilroy starring Clive Owen and Julia Roberts. It was entertaining but not particularly ground breaking or especially memorable, however a pleasant way to spend a few hours on a plane. I enjoyed Gilroy’s Michael Clayton a lot more. 

Star Trek, one of the big summer blockbusters, had gotten a significant number of positive reviews, so I was curious to see what it was all about. I’m not particularly a “trekie” however I have warm memories of watching the series as a child. So I like to think I came in with an open mind, but I walked away feeling that it was OK. It seemed to have a lot of contrived plot devices, and character clichés. I basically think it was over-rated in my opinion.

The Hangover, on the other hand, really lived up to its hype. It was also widely praised. Perhaps, it is telling that Todd Phillips, director of the equally hilarious Old School was the director. It essentially has a no name cast, but I think that Zach Giladious emerges as the most memorable character from the film with his courage to do anything like give hugs in a jockstrap. The ending montage of the pictures taken on a digital camera was worth the price of admission alone.

Generally, I think Michael Mann films are technically brilliant but often over long and flawed. Therefore, I thought that Public Enemies would be best watched on the big screen and it was a visually stunning film more effective for that medium. I think the film was a bit long and perhaps a bit too meandering in its plot, but I think it stands out as one of Mann’s finest films.

Two Lovers directed by James Gray starring Joaquin Phoenix and Gwyneth Paltrow was extremely disappointing. The film has been getting a lot of good press. But I found Phoenix and Paltrow unbelievable. They were caricatures of stupid borough stereotypes. Their characters seemed much too old to be so naïve as far as relationships go. Isabella Rossilini and Mori Moshov seemed like they came from a different movie. It is a largely contrived film with unsympathetic characters all around. Are there any people like these really?

Bruno had some laughs, but he’s no Borat. I think this sort shtick is done. He can’t possibly do another film with Ali G can he? Unfortunately I have read too much about the film and was privy to most of the jokes in advance. That said it was still pretty entertaining.

I admit that Pixar films are very entertaining even if they are mainly for children. But they keep getting explained as masterpieces of complexity of the human condition and I have to defer a bit. I recently saw Up and while it is an entertaining little cartoon I find that it offers more than other serious minded dramas of the same ilk. It’s a fine film, but no masterpiece. 

World Cinema

Japan Related Links

At the NY Times there's an interesting article about the cultural differences a mother prepares her bicultural Japanese son for when he goes to camp in America:  My Un-American Son.

Here's another from the NY Times about the high quality bakeries in Tokyo: Bread As Fashion, Tokyo Style.

There's a documentary called, Yasukuni, of the controversy of Yasukuni shrine that's now play ing in America-review courtesy of the NY Times.

Predictably, The Cove, a documentary about the dolphin slaughter that takes place yearly in Taiji, Japan is being shut out of Japan. From F*ckedgaijin.

Deadline Hollywood has just received this note from Fisher Stevens [Producer]:

I have been involved with many films over the years as an actor, director and producer. But working on The Cove has been one of my proudest moments in 28 years of being in the business. Getting the opportunity to make an exciting film, and one that can actually make a difference, is why I got into filmaking in the first place. That is why I was so disappointed that our film, after winning awards in the last 13 film festivals it had entered, was rejected by the Tokyo Film Festival, whose theme this year is green. Not that it is that much of a shocker, but the main goal for making the film was to shut down the cove in Taijii, Japan, where 2,300 dolphins are killed every year. Most of the Japanese population has no idea that this is going on. What better way to let them know than to premiere it on the green carpet of this year's festival. We have sold the film in over 20 countries and sadly have yet to find any distributor who will go near the film in Japan. We will continue to do our best to get the film out in Japan but it is a shame that, after being accepted in festivals all over the world, that we couldn't get into this one.

Sincerely,

Fisher Stevens

Bangkok Chinatown

Bangkok's Chinatown is near the historic Hua Lamphong Railway Station.

The Chinatown gate.

San Chao Poy Sien shrine.

Shark's Fin soup is quite popular here.

Dried snakes.

Also dried sea horses, scorpions, and rats.

Birds of a feather.

Colonial style.

Seafood.

Love and Hydrogen

I think Isaiah Berlin’s classification of writers as hedgehogs (those who have one great theme) and foxes (those who have many themes) can be a useful classification of writers. Jim Shepard is definitely a fox. In this collection, Love and Hydrogen, much like last year’s Pulitzer Prize nominated collection Like You’d Understand is a dizzying array of original and inventive stories. There are quirky tales of dysfunctional families: “gun lobby,” “Runway,” and “The Morality of Parents.” He has a number of sports related stories, some of which infuse historical events into them like “Batting Against Castro” (about baseball and politics in pre-revolution Cuba) as well as “Ajax Is All About Attack” (which is about 60s politics in The Netherlands and soccer).  One of Shepperd’s greatest strengths is the adolescent coming of age story: “Mars Attacks,” “Glut Your Soul On My Accursed Ugliness,” “and “Spending The Night With The Poor.”  It is also apparent that Shepperd often infuses his stories with scientific or historical research: gay Nazis in love in a zeppelin (“Love and Hydrogen”), WWII battles behind occupied lines (“The Assassination of Reinhard Heydad”), deep sea exploration (“descent into Perpetual Night”) and exploration of uncharted lands (“Astounding Stories”) to name a few of his forays into history and science. I’d like to read one of his novels and see how he manages to sustain a story into a longer narrative.

Food: Bangkok 2009

Mix noodles from a food court-still awesome.

Lebanese food in Bangkok-a great bargain.

Never had this before-ham and cheese deep fired roll ups? Delicious.

More great noodles.

Som Tum=Papaya salad=spicy freshness...

Did I mention noodles were cheap and delicious?

Singha is always a good choice.

These are not nachos, but very tasty anyway.

Spicy chicken basil stir fry with rice-my favorite Thai dish.

Morning glory in oyster sauce-a;ways tasty.

LeFenix

This time in Bangkok I stayed at a boutique hotel, LeFenix on the trendy Sukhumvit Soi 11. It is directly across from Q-Bar and down the road from Bed Supper Club (guests of the hotel can get free entry at both since they belong to the same group). It also has a very cool rooftop bar of its own, Nest.

I believe it came out to $67 a night for a single room.

This couch is in the lobby between the 8th floor rooms (where I was staying) and the entrance to Nest.

Wilco, Novelle Vague, and Andrew Bird

The latest Wilco release, known as Wilco (The Album) is not a surprising album, but it is one that I felt I warmed up to more easily than their last album, Blue Sky Blue. The standout tracks are “Sunny Feeling” and “You Never Know” with infectious keyboard motif. Other standout tracks include: “You And I” and “Bull Black Nova.” This isn’t ambitious as Yankee Foxtrot Hotel, but a very solid and worthwhile effort.

Nouvell Vague’s latest effort, 3, has another stellar collection of new wave songs rearranged in bossa nova fashion. This collection has several guest vocalists like Martin Gore of Depeche Mode and Ian McCulloch. I think the tracks that work best are: “The American” (Simple Minds), “Blister In The Sun” (The Violent Femmes), “Ca Plane Pour Moi“ (Plastic Bertrand), and “Road To Nowhere” (Talking Heads).

I also recently got Andrew Bird’s 2007 release Armchair Apocrypha. It is solid but I don’t like it as much as this year’s release, Nobel Beast. Some of the better songs are: “Firery Crash”, “Dark Matter”, and “Spare-Ohs.”