American History X

White supremacy is on the rise in Southern California. Following the murder of his father, Derek shoots a black person and executes another. The landscape is anonymous. Front yards, backyards, and the dreary repetition of suburbia mark the coast. Not much changes from day to day. Derek’s charisma and persuasive abilities coalesces the collective anxiety, boredom and hatred of the shiftless white suburban male. He uses these frustrations to promote the idea of white supremacy, and to proclaim that America is in the midst of an immigrant takeover. Action is needed, he thinks. So they trash a Grocery store owned by Chinese. And let a basketball game determine the supremacy of the races and who has access to what land.

In Kai Erickson’s book Wayward Puritans: A Study in the Sociology of Deviance the Puritan’s faced the same problems as the neo-Nazis. The Puritans faced three separate struggles since the 1600s and 1700s. Originally, when the Puritans first washed ashore they faced starvation and the unrelenting environment. There battles were direct. They were fighting against the elements. Then the battle was religious and political. Anne Hutchison questioned the powerful. If in the Puritans eyes, your soul is predestined to go to heaven or hell, and no action on Earth could alter that plan, how could anyone determine that they were worthy of power? So the powerful booted her out of Massachusetts. Later came the witch accusations, witch trails, and witch drowning and witch burnings (and any other bad things you can do to suspected witches). After gaining relative prosperity the Puritans became paranoid of witches. Why? Kai Erickson believes since there physical battles had been conquered, and the land tamed, the new battle was one of things on the periphery. The unseen world became the new menace. The occult, the invisible, became the cause of mass suffering of the people. To the Neo-Nazis the vast invisible oppressor is the Zog machine and the Jewish World Order. Ideas like this thrive with these newbie Nazis.

The 1990s are fairly prosperous. But in the late 1990s movies like American History X, The Matrix, Fight Club, and Office Space, all portray the psychic hardships of the disgruntled semi-affluent. In each movie generally college educated white suburban males see an omnipresent threat or problem that nobody else sees, or has become to deadened to see or react to it. When the world becomes increasingly ambiguous, theories that tap into the mystical universal do well, is something Erickson might say.

Derek sheds this mystism after doing time. Prison is like a personal think tank of Derek. Boundaries are put on him. His intelligence is bounded within the walls. The only person that prevents him from being raped daily is a black man. This along with the self-interest, and doublespeak of the white gang cause him to have a dramatic ideological shift. He rejects his white supremacist past and seeks to escape it along with getting his brother out. But this may no be a movie of shedding hate and walking into the movie with an independent and tolerant mind. Derek sees the death of his father. After that he eventually becomes the leader of a racist organization. Prison changes who he is, but so will Danny’s death. In Totsi, the City of God, and Were once Warriors, the environment and the oppression embedded in it hit everyone the same way. People react in predictable, but not always healthy ways to the environment around them. But in Southern California life really isn’t straightforward, a healthy approach to the world is more likely to come about through the way you look at the world.

American History X. X is an interesting choice for Danny’s teacher to name the class. Malcolm X chooses the name of X when he was in the nation of Islam. It was like a placeholder for him. Since his original name Little was “given to him by white slave masters” X was what he used until, after ultimately leaving the Nation of Islam, he went on a Hajj to Mecca and became El-Hajj Malik El-Shabbazz. The X could be seen as the placeholder for Derek’s mind. The X will be there until something more definitive, true, and permanent comes along for Derek, whatever that might be.

Motorcycle Diaries

Traveling across South America on a motorcycle transformed how Che looked upon the world. Four months of close contact to poverty provided an intimate familiarity with the problems facing the people of that region. Ernesto and Alberto became dependent on these destitute strangers to continue the adventure.

Ernesto saw the inequality that was embedded in the geography of South America. At one point after rolling into town, Ernesto and Alberto have to decide where they are going to sleep. In the mansion on the hill or with the poor people. They choose to sleep among the poor people. It is no accident of what choice they make. In this movie the poor share food, shelter, and provide emotional support to Che and his friend. Of course people from the elite class help him out. But the aspects of wealth provide a barrier for compassion. When his motorcycle breaks down a mechanic refuses to help them because they have no money. Only when he sees the fake newspaper clipping heralding them as handsome glorious disease fighting doctors (too many adjectives? –Yes) are they assisted. There are initial pretensions between him and his friend in regard to class. Alberto pleads with a wealthy landowner that he is a doctor and that in being that deserves to sleep in more respectable surroundings. But after endless miles through the diverse terrain of South America provide an immutable bond to the struggles of the people.

Segregation is a common element in this movie. The poor never live among the rich. Even among the nuns class-consciousness exists. The lepers, though known not to be contagious, are separated on an island to live among themselves. A river separates the doctors from their patients. Che both emotionally and literally overcomes the separation between these two groups when he swims to the other side.

Che notices how constant poverty eviscerated the lives of the mountain people of Peru. Having food to eat and having a place to sleep become luxuries that are too expensive for the millions of poor to obtain. Class inequality causes people to participate in the destruction of their own land. Many gather in early morning for the possibility of working in the coalmines. Some are chosen, but are still facing low wages, and likely an early death. These things become ingrained in Guevara’s mind. These are memories that provide the seeds for his revolutionary ideology.

When Che moves beyond the comfortable existence of the middle class he sees first hand the hardships of reality. This movie is incredible. The still video photographs of the people of the America’s are composed beautifully and the movie is sentimental and meaningful without being pointlessly nostalgic or didactic. Being a constant witness to the geography of any land and people has the power to change the philosophy of anyone. A broken down motorcycle provides Che and Alberto to the path towards seeing humanity as a whole. It is impressive how much Che learns from his journey, and the dramatic change it brought to his life.

South Africa (Beat the Drum)

AIDS is gargantuan problem in South Africa. One in 5 people have HIV or AIDS, and in total 5 million people of South Africa have it (CIA world factbook). Various articles discussing the matter note that the life expectancy has decreased by 10 years because of it, and that only until very recently has the government taken truly meaningful steps in addressing this disease.

In this way the movie is a public service announcement. It follows a boys journey to Johannesberg. It is a high risk world. Truck drivers pick disease laden prostitutes off the sides of roads, and despite the immense risks follow their desires.

South Africa is a diverse country. According to wikipedia, it is more known plant life than almost any other country in the world. But the movie shows mostly a dry, somewhat flat, farm community of South Africa. The other world they show is Johannesberg which is busy, thriving, slummy, and dirty all at the same time. The negative or positive aspects of the city are emphasized dependent on what economic situation you are in.
But AIDs spreads across all economic barriers and geographic terrain. In a way AIDS thrives so much in this world due to the interconnectedness that is caused by a global economy. Economic necessity has forced many South Africans from farms to cities, and within the cities. The constantly changing life of the population leads to interactions of every kind, and with this an AIDS epidemic that cannot be localized or controlled. From reading, it seems that AIDs has hit the poorest communities the hardest. With poverty often comes a lack of education, self denial, and superstitions associated with the contraction of the illness.

There isn’t any government leadership on addressing the AIDS problem in this movie. Most people are ignorant, or don’t care about the illness. The movie addresses a great and terrible problem, but it comes across somewhat forced. A rich white guy who doesn’t give a damn about anything but money (although previously he once had a heart), suddenly after discovering his activist son has died (is on the verge of death)of AIDS focuses his finances towards the creation of homes for orphans and creates a work place that provides voluntary and free AIDS tests.

The movie does show that paths necessary in addressing the AIDS problem. In the small town, people step forward to vocalize that there is a problem going on. They are specific about the origins of the illness, and the importance of being tested, and what measures to take to decrease the likelihood of transmitting the sickness. Despite the constant stream of horrible things that happen in this movie, there is an upbeat and positive tone to the production. This is a movie that shows the devasting effect that AIDS has on South Africa, and also shows the ways common citizens can take in trying to remedy one of the greatest problems facing the world.

Singapore

This is a movie about the lower middle class grind. Upward mobility is not easy to come by, even if you are young and recently graduated from a University. Success is even harder when one lies about achievements. Singapore is like the United States only richer (per person) and more modernized. Wearing a tie and suit doesn’t mean life is going to get any better. Only through the miraculous intervention of the lottery does the patriarch of a family make it out of these economic doldrums. The middle class is feeling the squeeze in Singapore. One character is forced out of financial necessity to consult his high school yearbook to find people to sell insurance to. Singapore is very clean. There isn’t any litter. There doesn’t appear to be any homeless people, Just government projects and repo men. The poverty is in terms of debt not personal possessions.

Singapore is flat, hot, and tropical. There are a lot of people and not much space. If you are rich you can have access to golf courses and better-looking prostitutes (if that is your thing). But in the 270 square miles of Singapore (wikipedia) those with and those without inhabit the same areas. The symbols of success are accessible to anyone who is approved for a credit card. If a person dies rich enough paper mache mansions and sports cars are set afire in honor. Status is very important in Singapore. The economy is thriving but international competition has made “making it” difficult.

Modernization, fierce competition, and the disintegration of the family explain, in part, why there is such rampant urination in the elevators of Singapore. This quiet and wet act of defiance helps highlight the anonymity of life in this country. Nobody seems to have any friends. The family that we witness in this movie is small and they don’t particularly love each other. In the process of spending their collective days scraping by, going to work, cooking, and dreaming of a better life they don’t take the opportunity to understand the people that surround them. The character that returns from “graduating” college has a difficult time viewing his parents as something other than a source of cash. The people of this movie dedicate their lives to the acquisition of money. It is a hard task to succeed in, and those who win die spontaneously, or are later left out in the cold.

This movie is a social critique on the dangers of modernization. The needs of the human soul (like being treated with love and respect) are in low supply in this movie. Intimacy is outsourced to a sympathetic Chinese prostitute. Family stories are told only after, and not during, the life of a loved one. Nobody puts much effort to give a damn about anyone else. There are exceptions to this. But the subject of money is rarely separate from the words and actions of the people presented in this film.

This movie shows the struggle of a group of people trying to live beyond poverty and love the people around them.

South Africa

The rural areas of this film are sparse grasslands. They are uninhabited, except for people journeying around the dirt paths. But then again Tsotsi’s home can be seen as the country. The town isn’t typical. It has a country feel to it, but populated by masses of displaced people. Black people are squeezed into tight confines by the South African government. Blacks are forced to live in one of ten designated districts. Tsotsi has flashbacks of his childhood life on a farm. This is all greatly different than city life. An international airport is close enough to walk to. The city is modern and rich and in stark contrast to the life of people living in cement cylinders.
Like Once Were Warriors whites are seldom seen except in positions of authority. When they cops do a bust on Totsi’s shack there are two cops (one white one black) and the white guy happens to be captain. But apart from the airport scene white people are not present in this movie. That doesn’t mean their influence isn’t felt. Apartheid, the white power structure, has divided society, and has created the poverty that is seen. Apartheid is the major element running throughout this movie, but the white hands dividing the people are not seen. Only the results of forced segregation are seen.
The baby symbolizes Tsotsi’s redemption. AIDS has left Tsotsi an orphan. To survive he robs with his gang of baby faced thugs. Everybody is missing important people in their lives. Tsotsi and his friends don’t seem to have any family. The baby is Tsotsi’s chance to give a normal happy childhood, a childhood that wasn’t granted to him. He adopts a proxy mother who breast feeds the child. He provides food, clothing, and warmth, in the end he gives up the child to the rightful parent. So the baby represents Tsotsi’s misguided desire to live out a descent childhood. The baby is also stands for the typical existence of a child in South Africa. Though Totsi kidnaps (although unintentionally) the child, his actions could be seen as representing the way AIDS, poverty and Apartheid has stolen the lives of young South Africans. That may be a stretch. For sure the baby could be seen as the route of survival for South African children. That tremendous adversity will be subjected to the people of South Africa, but that something good can arise from the most terrible of circumstances. It is hard to discover what the directors meant to symbolize with the baby, but the baby was convenient in showing all the different ways people live in South Africa.
The movie is open ended on the future of South Africa. Poverty, the nearly invisible black middle and upper class, class segregation, and the disintegration of traditional families are all issues that are brought up. Orphans are caring for other orphans. The effects of AIDS and Apartheid are horrific in South Africa and this movie. This film is an indictment on the South African government, and the policies and inaction that led to the poverty in the black communities. And in making such a critique, perhaps the film is hoping for a better future for South Africa. Tsotsi ends up arrested, but in the process of the film he undergoes great personal development. The movie depicts life it is in South Africa. The creators of the film see a problem and hope for change. But the change for a better society is done by making a film for a global audience and reflecting to the world the way life is in South Africa.

City of God

Violence can happen at any moment in the favella. The movie (filmed around 2002) introduces us into the drug wars of the City of God from the 1960s to the 1980s. The gangs, drugs and the everyday life are shown by following Rocket’s life and witnessing his evolution from a child to a photo journalist. Rocket’s personal biography along with his telling of the stories of drug dealers, family members, and just regular people of the city help orient the audience to what is going on in the favella.

Many people die every day in the City. This movie bears witness to this common place violence. Poverty is universal in the favella, even the drug lords live in decrepit houses with concrete floors and walls. Children totting guns, and massive street fights against rival gangs and police does not seem to come from real life as opposed to the gory imagination of an ambitious film director. Statistics pop out when reading about life in the poor side of Rio. Things are better now the articles say. In the 1980s 40 people were murdered a day, now 12 or 14. Also, since the camera films the life of Little Ze we are going to be subject to more bloodshed than normal. He is a remorseless killer with a good business sense. He wants power in one of the most violent places on Earth, and in order to get this a lot of people are going to die. At the end of the movie TV clips are shown of the real Knockout Ned, and the comparisons between that and the cinematic version are incredibly close. This movie looks genuine. However, I don’t think the most accurate way to get a view of life in the favella is of the personal testimonial of some British tourist who gets lost.
This video shows a lot though. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3TLm0ubeZM

The favella and the outside world both have their rich and poor. Wealth is shown through gold jewelry and nice clothes in the favella. The ability that each person has in accumulating guns, drugs, and power determine where someone stands in the class structure. Outside this world being rich is the same as being rich anywhere else. This class structure is shown at all the successful business men in the hotel with their wives, girlfriends, or prostitutes. The same trappings of success are there as everywhere else. The other side of the class structure is the hotel workers, fish salesman, and truck robbers of the town. In the countryside besides a few business men or tourists, people are poor and similar in economic class. There is wealth outside the favella, and the class structure is broken down the same way there as anywhere else in the world (but with a lower GDP) There is wealth in the favella but it belongs only to the drug lords.

This film is shot in a slick way. It is done beautifully. The movie has good music, and is done in a hip way that gives it a style of a Tarintino movie. So here lies the trouble. Making a movie about a favella in the actual heart of the favella is going to be next to impossible. Houses are stacked on houses balanced precariously on the side of a hill. This is not the easiest place to put a film crew who wants to portray a way of life in both an accurate but also aesthetic way. So the film crew films, possibly, in the less favellaish, more open spaces. When I witnessed a brief clip on youtube of a gun battle between police and people in the favalla I saw something different than in the movie. I saw people jumping off of roofs, hiding and emerging from ledges and stairwells. The cameraman must have had tremendous difficulty capturing the moment. In the movie the violence takes place on a flatter surface. But who cares? The life of people is shown in an accurate way, even if the movie films more on areas that are more conducive to camera crews. The favella is more dense and cramped than shown in the movie. But it does give a sense of what it is like there. The countryside is in certain pockets thick with vegetation (as rainforests tend to be). The people of the country live in a barren area marked with homes reminiscent of the suburb with its repetitious construction. There are jungles here and there, but the rural folk live mostly in a dusty, poor world.

Veera-Zaara

In this movie people like to dance. There are solos and giant productions, and all the time watching it, it never occurs to me what this has to do with India Pakistan relations. Singing, dancing, singing and dancing dream sequences, marriage ceremonies, jails, and trials, are all different ways the movie tries to show culture conflict. This all done to address one major thing: India and Pakistan don’t like each other. This is rooted in religion and land. Pakistan was formed in 1947 for the large Muslim population that didn’t want to live under Hindu rule after India gained independence from the British. The CIA world fact book says that there was conflict in 1947 and again in 1965 over control of Kashmir. They are both nuclear states, so the movie has the noble goal of addressing a problem that needs resolving. But Kashmir is not mentioned once in this movie. This conflict is shown through the love story of a Hindu from India and a Muslim from Pakistan (Veera and Zaara). It would be a big issue in both cultures if Hindu and a Muslim got married. It is still a big deal, but a belief that is not as strongly held with the younger generation. The movie is an attempt to have Indians and Pakistanis overcome their social and political barriers and live in peace.

English is used when someone wants to say something smart or important or philosophical. Judges are addressed as “Your Honor” and Veera has the fancy title of “Squadron Leader”. When the Pakistani version of Johnny Cochrane says to the defense attorney “Thank you for teaching me the value of truth and justice”, he says it in English. There is modeling after the British when it comes to the military, education or the court of law, so it is not a surprise when English words pop up in such settings. When the British colonized India in the 1800s (and had tremendous influence with the East India Tea Company in the 1600s) they established many British customs. Even after gaining independence India still has some of the same trappings of colonialism.

This movie has sweeping mountain landscapes, rural villages and rolling prairies but not much city is shown. To watch this movie one would think that India had the population of Wyoming. What is seen of the city is just major monuments or inside train stations or just outside prisons. Characters do not go parading down city streets talking about flowers, love or sunshine. These routines are saved for the countryside.

Songs bring people to the movie. That is what Wikipedia tells me. Also song and dance routines are a good way to lengthen any movie theatre experience into 3 hours. That helps if you want to get out of the Indian heat. Logically song and dance routines are a good way to incorporate a lot of different actors and actresses and film production people. It is just good for the Indian movie community to have many people participating in the movie process. This movie was done in a way that people in India who enjoy Bollywood movies expect. Obviously this movie doesn’t reflect the reality of India. The general public doesn’t fly around on helicopters or look like models. This style of film making is a means of telling a story. Mass producers of pop culture like to tell stories the same way, and Bollywood is no exception. It is a form that has worked in the past, so with a lot of rich peoples’ money involved the format doesn’t change. But the content does change. This movie tries to address political and religious differences the best way it knows how: with good looking people dancing and lip synching.

Beijing Bicycle

There is a noticeable difference in appearance between the poor and rich in Beijing. Though Communist in name the economic policies created in part by Deng Xiaoping have greatly increased industrialization and at the same time class inequality. Like in America, the upper class wear fancy clothes, drive nice cars, and have beautiful homes. The shopkeeper lives where he works. The bicycle messenger spends more than a month of working just to pay for his ride. He is from the country, and it is evident is used to being poor. Towards the middle of the movie he grabs his bicycle and screams, pleading with his high school antagonists. Everyone is aware of the inequality. The students know that, even publicly, they can subject the powerless to brutality. The expensive mountain bike is a status symbol to the student, and to the main character a way to provide him with a more comfortable way of life. Both are frustrated with their financial situations, and take actions to rise higher (monetarily).

People from the country are viewed as ignorant peasants. They don’t have skills the city needs, unless those skills are physical. As large masses of the rural population shift to an urban life they are faced with poverty. The economy is booming, but there are more people than there are jobs. The rural folk have fierce competition amongst themselves. In order to have a low paying bicycle runner job you must memorize all the streets and be swift, and even then you could be fired. People in the city, since there are more of them, are harder to define. What they all have in common is that their place in society is precarious. If you are from the country you have no money. If you are from the city you may be lucky enough to be employed, but there is no safety net in place for those who lose a job. Most people have to expend a tremendous amount of energy just to exist in China. The bicycle thief’s father has been promising for years to buy his son a bike. Yet he is faced with sending another child through education. People from the city are better connected and have more money, but they are confined, like rural people, by the world around them.

The streets are packed with cars and bicycles. The sidewalks are filled with people. There are main streets that run past sky scrappers and street venders, but the back roads are a confusing jumble of lefts and rights. Old men play card games outside their apartments while trucks filled with flour take sharp turns around them. Resources and goods need to be distributed throughout Beijing, but the process looks like a race (and is in part) and is not in the least bit orderly.

The United States likes to have lower, upper, and middle class living in completely different areas. Economic segregation is obvious in America. Things are different in China. In Beijing, a wealthy business owner can look out of his window and see a person sleeping in the streets. Shacks are neighboring posh apartments. The high rises standing above the poverty are monuments to hard work as well as exploitation.

There was going to be little repercussions for beating up the main character. The history of the bicycle is complex. But nobody cared about cutting through the subtleness. There was no reason to. Here is how it went down.
1. Kid throws rock at hip bicycle rider.
2. Kid is seen with some peasant guy.
3, Rock thrower gets beaten up.
From here there really isn’t an in depth discussion into what the main characters complicity is in the entire attempted murder thing. The bloody and hip bicyclist has one of his friends hold onto the main character. In the process of events the bicycle messenger gets beaten up. He could have gotten beaten up because he just crossed the wrong idiot thug. There was probably minimal thought behind the violence; there was little initiative for any the characters to deeply understand the situation. So they didn’t. The bicycle messenger was beaten up because he may have had something to do with the stoning, and there was no harm to them if they were wrong.

We were once warriors

The Maori value strength. As a man, strength is still the most honorable title one can receive; Whether the Maori are embracing their traditional roots or are living lost in the suburbs or underpasses the traits of a warrior are the greatest thing one can be. Physical ability is shown by many of the characters. Boogie transitions between both worlds. He first displays his power by stealing car radios, and in the end by emersing himself in his roots, and performing as part of the group warrior dance at Grace's funeral. Jake, along with most of Maori he hangs out with, is incredibly muscular and enjoys large amounts of drinking, punching, and to a lesser degree, stabbing.
The violence seems to originate from a frustrating confusion of what their life is supposed to be about. Each character is striving for purpose. In their own way, many of the children try to discover their culture. Boogie's older brother Ng, gets his face tattooed and jumped into a Maori gang. Boogie practices throughout the night a ritual warrior dance, and Grace reads and tells Maori stories. Natural and meaningful connections to the Maori past are viewed as the only salvation. The movie most sympathetically looks at Boogie's on going enlightenment. At the dinner table he says to his older brother that he likes his face tattoo. His brother asks if he wants one. He declines, saying that he wears his on the inside. In the movie the need for internal development is linked with, also, an abandoning of modern society. Boogie represents the model for how Maori can transition back to what they had been.
Although never out right defeated, the Maori moved out of the hills, their ancestral homes for thousands of years, and into a world that didn't have a need for them. The oppression of the Maori is invisible. The Maori live in dilapidated houses and are viewed as menaces by the local police department. There isn't an economy to support them. The oppression is a result of the policies of the 85% pakeha (basically white people) of the population. The whites are nowhere to be seen in terms of friendship. When white people are present, it is only to take a child away, and arrest or convict somebody. Jake Heke, the charismatic psychopath, loses his job, but doesn't worry, and waits for the welfare check. Being unemployed pays about as much as having a job. By embracing modernity, or at least, by existing in industrialized society, they have become refugees in their own country. They don't, or aren't allowed by the power structure, to participate in any meaningful way in the economic or political system, so they are stuck.
The worst elements of world are unleashed upon Grace. She is nurturing, and when Jake punches his wife, and is in charge of running the family. She takes on many of the injustices that happen to Maori (and also Maori women) in every day life. These injustices destroy her. Though she represents the cruelties that are subject to the Maori, and sometimes the evils that Maori do to other Maori, she is also a thread connecting past and present. She is buried in the hills her mother grew up in. Her death helps connect the family to their origins and also shows how a broken society can make the innocent victims. The rape committed against her could, I suppose, could just as easily happened in a traditional Maori society, but it doesn’t seem as likely that she would hang herself. The developed world left her with few outlets to find help.
The countryside is, like so many movies we have seen, shown in a positive light. The picnic scene is, unlike most of the movie, quiet (except when Jake talks) and beautiful. The funeral is held in the near mountain like regions of New Zealand. It is the most scenic place in the movie. The city is cold and violent. Mostly it is just ugly. The city is a place to get drunk and waste away. In the country, in the past, they were warriors, and the movie seems to say that to develop as humans that is where they will have to return.

Rabbit Proof Fence

Maps call the area of Western Australia, that Molly, Daisy and Gracie traversed, desert and grassland. The topography of the desert reminded me of the South West United States. Vegetation was scraggly looking, and was similar to Arizona, but hillier. The grasslands, which rolled on with gentle slopes, reminded me of areas I've driven through in Idaho in Wyoming. For the most part though, it was difficult to get a grasp on the terrain of Australia. For a while they would be stomping through trees and lush grass growing near a stream, and then it would be continious grasslands, followed finally by arid desert flats. This movie is more difficult to describe than the others since there is no central location for the charecters to inhabit. Each scene is a new place.
Geography and the progession of the movie are tied together. The movie is a story about 3 girls walking from Southwest australia to Northern Australia. The girls follow the fence that plows through the landscape. As Neville tracks them, he looks at an Australian map with the 3 rabbit fences detailed on it. The entire movie is focused on location, tracking, cities, and distances. The plot focuses on each charecter and how they interact with the landscape. To the girls the land is something that seperates them from their mother. To the tracker the land is a means of acquiring wealth, his knowledge of it is what gets him money, and possibly his child back. For Neville, in this movie, he views the land as a sort of strategic aboriginal Where's Waldo game. The movie shifts from the perspectives and locations of each of these main charecters, but everything is united by the slow progression of 3 children across a desert.
This movie gets some people angry. Others think it is a dramatic and historic portrait of the racist injustices done by the Australian Government against the Aboriginies. Colonial forces make the lives of the native inhabitant horrible. White people on boats are responsible for the deaths of millions world wide. We all have read and know about that. But as history creeps into the present, the crimes of today are not looked at in the same way. Was Neville a racist, or as some writers on the internet say, beloved by the aboriginees. It was the 1930s, Neville was in charge of enforcing the Australian Government's control over the native population. Realistically, this movie is overly dramatic, and portrays the white charecters as one dimensional. Was Neville a racist, probably, but I doubt that he acted like he was shown in the movie. Did he like cricket, could he play a mean saxophone? There has got to be something more to him than was portrayed. Even Kim Jong Il (a pretty terrible person) enjoys a good movie every now and then. In The Rabbit proof fence even the nuns are jerks. There are debates about the historical accuracy of this movie. But really, though the quantity of forced family seperation is debatable, the fact that it happened is less so. Awful things happened to the aboriginees. There are policies of the federal government against this group that are available for anyone to look up. I think why this movie stirs controversy though, is because even if it is showing actual historical happenings, and the lives of real people, it does so at the expense of creating characatures of the bad guys. The debate goes on as to how involved the Australian government should be involved in Aboriginee affairs. Part of the debate by Australians would likely come from guilt, but another part arises on what is the proper way to raise a family. Aborignees and the Australian Government don't see eye to eye. This conflict will continue. In the future, when past historical autrocities don't sting so hard, a more accurate picture of what is happening in Australia will emerge. For know we get some of the story, but a complete understanding at present time seems unattainable.

Train Man!

The landscape of Tokyo is eeirly electronic. Overwhelming advertisements glow endlessly, and much of the architecture is tinted glass and futuristic looking. Natural landmarks are not commonly seen. Tokyo is completely saturated with people. Much is paved over, industrial, and commercial. Tokyo is completly developed, however, when the camera gets out of the heart of Tokyo a much different landscape emerges. Hermess home is surrounded by hills, and has actual PLANTS growing everywhere. For the most part though, Tokyo does not have a horizon; your view, it seems, is obstructed by sky scrapers and businesses until the end of the movie.

Densha has two realities. The first reality is the physical realm. He enters this world when he walks outside, talks to people or doesn't talk to people, and buys groceries. He is not doing so hot here. He doesn't have many friends, and is charecterized as a poorly dressed, akward nerd. The other reality is online, where Densha is incredible. He has a large group of eclectic friends who care about him, and value his humanity. In the rooms of one of his friends, an infinite amount of wires exit the back of his computer. Densha has basically an Iphone and can communicate at any time with his online friends. At the same time technology is depicted in an isolating way. Though a husband and wife are both friends with Densha, they don't even realize it. She cooks the meals, and he just sits in front of the computer. Both seem disinterested in each others life. Technology is also viewed as a crutch. Densha runs off during the date to a computer cafe to get new info to find another location for a date. At this point he almost kills the entire relationship. Otaku means obsessive, and he is obsessed with computers and anime. His imagination is a movie. Outside reality is depicted as a war zone where he and his friends are always inches away from obliteration.
America and Japan have united on what a nerd is. Someone who acts and dresses akwardly, and is a fanatic about computers or some other "uncool" object. In Japan an unhealthy obsession of manga or anime can get you the label of otaku. In the United States it may be chess, computers, or being a fan of Star Trek. I, unfortunetely, like to play chess, and have a closer relationship with the word nerd than most people. Playing chess can lead to the classification as a nerd. Oh well. But it seems to me that both countries have the same perspective on what a nerd is, it differs only in the object of the nerds obsession. Both countries would agree that a nerd had an unhealthy obsessive interest with something (computers or anime or Spock), have no fashion sense, and are doomed to die alone, or possibly, only in the company of other nerds.
Densha does have friends! The intstant messaging shows that there is more to Densha than can be visibily seen. Most people in this movie seem alone. Densha's friends surround the air around him, they constantly type away giving advise, encouraging him to "be a man." The instant messaging also shows how seperate people in Japan are from each other. Rampant industrialization has lead to each person, even coworkers, living completely different lives. There is not a sense of community. Instant messaging can be viewed as a new attempt at creating a community.
The end of the movie can be looked at in two different ways. One level is the societal, the other is the personal. On the personal level, the point being made that the actions of the nerd do not go unnoticed. That despite his akwardness, his positive traits (helpfulness) are seen by those around him. It is a cause to rejoice. Nerds your positive aspects can also be seen! It is a way of saying to the nerd audience, buck up, you have good that others like, now just have some courage. The other way, is it shows how interconnected everyone is. Even though you think many people in your everyday surroundings are strangers they infact are not. Whenever I meet someone for the first time, it is amazing how they start showing up randomly in other places. You run into them while buying underwear, or you catch them driving the opposite direction on dodge street. This could be one of those comments on how despite the vastness of everything we aren't seperate.

Goodbye Lenin

East Berlin is gray and industrial. Drab apartment complexes are sprinkled across the horizon. Surrounding Berlin is the sprawling German wilderness. A trabi is driven on a one-lane road that cuts through the forest to the Kerner’s family home. It is quiet here. This is a place where Alex’s nostalgia lives. The nostalgia conveyed in this movie is not as simple as the superiority of the East versus the West. Alex says, “This is a country that I will always associate with my mother.” East Berlin represents his childhood. The narrator is not impersonal and omniscient. The narrator is, instead, a regular person, and therefore subjective. To Alex the DDR is serenity; this is seen by the opening scene of grainy family videos of the Kerner’s playing in the countryside.
Transition is not easy. Random quotations from Alex can display this. Alex says things like, “you Wessie assholes,” or “…consumption, spiraling consumerism, the rat race isn’t for everyone”. But to Alex it is less about economics, and more about calmness, a more relaxed way of life that will never happen again. Though a lot of what he does is done in the name of protecting his mother, it is also about protecting himself. He wants to make for himself a better life. But in doing this he lies at times, when it isn’t necessary. His girlfriend’s father is now a doctor instead of a cook.
The reunification of East and West Berlin is magnificent. A giant festival occurs as the wall becomes obliterated. That subsides and the comrades are introduced to garish capitalism. Older men and women stand transfixed as a bleached blond on a TV set covers herself in whip cream. They look, not shocked or aroused, just bewildered. The process of reunification will be difficult.
Communism is not always great. Here is a condensed history of bad things that happen in the DDR: free speech marchers receive police beatings in the streets, lines are longs supplies are short, maternity clothes are clownish, banks are so terrible that money seems better put in the inside of walls, non party members are intimidated, there are mass arrests and imprisonments with, seemingly, no trial.
The young adjust quickest to capitalism. The children “pioneer” singers sell their songs of the communist fatherland for 20 marks. The burger sun visors are donned and another day for another deutschmark begins. It is harder for the older generation. An old neighbor of Alex exclaims, “to think we worked 40 years for this”. This era of people is left with nothing to do but get drunk and attend faux communist era birthday parties.
As Berlin becomes reunited the hammer and sickle is now a clever looking TV satellite design on the back of a communist red jump suit. Spreewald pickles? Forget it, now there are a billion brands, endless choice, and an overwhelming and incomprehensible amount of things to buy and sell. Alex childhood is crushed by this onslaught. His heroes have been destroyed, forced by circumstance to drive taxis, or sit dormant in sterile hospitals. The memories of past accomplishments have been forgotten and a new uncertain era begins.
Goodbye Lenin is Alex’s story of transition, but a transition that seems proper. In this world, his hero cosmonaut, Sigmund Jahn, becomes President of all of Germany, and the West embraces a slower paced life in the East. This movie is fueled by nostalgia. It is driven by a sense that things should unfold in ways that leave people dignified and purposeful. But in the end Alex admits that, “it is a country that never existed.” A bronze statue of Lenin getting lifted by a helicopter down the street exemplifies the great contrast between the two worlds of Germany. East Germany is gone forever. Alex’s elaborate scheme to calm the nerves of his mother is a farewell to this way of life, an ending that feels right.

Seducing Dr. Lewis

Isolation: It is obvious that this movie was filmed in Quebec and not in some elaborately rustic Hollywood set. The town of Saint Marie is an island that can only be accessed by boat. Saint Marie is beautiful, but there is no fleet of tourist ships headed its way. One hundred and twenty people can claim to be residents and all of them seem to have lived there their entire lives. The town never speaks of neighboring areas. In fact one resident states that he has never even left (or at least has never been to a city). At one point St. Marie was self sufficient, but now that the fishing economy has petered out the residents can be seen early morning, waiting in line for welfare checks at the post office. Its isolation was sustained by the surplus of fish, but now they feel compelled to embrace the outside world, and industrialization, as a means of supporting themselves.
Landscape: St. Marie has a rocky coastline. It is a cold and wet environment. From the coast the land sharply plateaus, and upon this the town is built. The island has vegetation like Grasses and bushes, but there isn’t any top soil to lead to farming.
rural versus urban: To quickly stereotype, the people in the rural areas like to play hockey, drink beer and go fishing, while the people in the city like to play cricket, snort cocaine and listen to jazz fusion. The townspeople are depicted as provincial and not that knowledgeable about the world outside of their own. The interests of the people of Saint Marie are rooted in the region itself, while the people of the city are having worldly and eclectic tastes. There is one person in the small town that has the internet and he is viewed almost like a genie. Everybody knows each other in Saint Marie, even if they don’t particularly like them they still depend on them day to day. The character Dr. Lewis seems to have very few friends is associations beyond his best friend and his girlfriend.
Much like the city rural distinction the French Quebec vs. the non French Quebec division is rooted in the day to day atmosphere of things. French Quebec is more rural and poor. The architecture is local, that is, they build whatever they need. This is somewhat of a generalization. In non French Quebec more commerce happens, international commerce takes place and local culture and tradition is not as deeply emphasized.
The movie seems to view government in an unsympathetic light. The people are resentful towards being dependent on the government. They would rather work, like nearly everyone, than receive that money. However, things are not going so well, the aid is necessary. Any governmental assistance that would help improve their economy is shunned, and instead only enough money to keep them going is given. The movie views the government as a non-entity. Instead the only source of help that they embrace is industry. Because they will at least provide jobs for the people. Government is seen as something far off and cold, and is not looked toward as a solution for problems.
Transportation: If you have somewhere to go you walk. If you really have some place to go than you take the boat. The island is small so everything is local. Boats to the island are infrequent, and it seems that it is mostly the townspeople that traverse back forth from the mainland.
The people of St. Marie are permanent residents. Everyone seems to have grown up together. You cannot simply move away. Moving away is seen as being a traitor. In the past everyone was a fisherman and if you were a man that was what you would be. The island is more important to people than basic self interest. More money would be made by leaving, but the social support, custom, and traditions are too important for the people to abandon. The people of St. Marie will never leave St. Marie.

The Sun

Senegal is poor. Unemployment is at 48%, literacy 39%, and the median age is just under 19 years old (CIA world factbook). When I started reading articles about Senegal it seemed like two different places were being talked about. There was a reformist Senegal with an emerging private sector, low inflation, steadily increasing GDP, and a stable democracy. This Senegal was the envy of Sub-Saharan Africa. The other Senegal I read about was the one Mambety showed. I think “The Little Girl who sold the Sun” is an allegory on the reform Senegal needs to go through in order to obtain true independence.
It isn’t an accident that Mambety had a disabled illiterate girl as the central character. Sili Laam symbolizes the path the government needs to take to reform itself. She represents change. Throughout the movie Sili does things that a reforming government needs to do; she combats police corruption and releases the innocent from imprisonment, she invested her money to provide assistance to the poor and elderly (giving away coins and providing a shade for her mother), and withstood destruction by self interested factions (when her crutch was stolen). Though the literacy rate is at 50 percent, it is even worse for women who read at only 29%, and Sili is an example of that large group.
The scene where she is walking down the street with her friend, her yelling,“De Soleil” and him yelling the name of the competing paper shows, I think, shows how real independence can be achieved. Her friend doesn’t understand why she wastes her time selling a paper that isn’t as profitable. It is the government paper and only the rich business man or wealthy tourists seem to buy it. She says, “I’ll stay with the Soliel, so it is closer to the people.” In the short term it is against Sili’s self interest to work for the system which does practically nothing for her in return. For example, I read that in the past 11 years the GDP of Senegal has increased at a rate of 5 % a year(7-13-07, “Things not quite right in Senegal”, by Greg Mills) , but that is nowhere near the amount of capital Senegal could be making if their currency wasn’t drastically decreased by the CFA reevaluation. Sili knows that the government is working against her, and even still she persists. I am not sure why she decided to sell 13 papers again only when she made such a large profit the day before. It could be that this is a metaphor for the balance between the wealthy business people and the rest of the population. That short term profit by free enterprise is okay, but self restraint is needed in order to have more financial equality.
When Sili has her crutch taken away by the mob of paper boys she is unable to walk. Her friend picks her up and in the sudden uncertainty of what to do next she says, “We continue.” Sili seems to be symbolizing Senegal’s bumpy, but necessary, path to recovery.

On a different point, this movie was shot amazingly. It took me longer than it probably should have to figure out that it wasn’t an actual documentary. Some of the time it seemed like he just placed the camera in one location and leaves it there for 5 minutes and it never became boring.
Also I found this website that has 13 documentary films by Senegalese people. I watched about Senegalese immigrants living in New York, and also about the country’s hip hop community.
http://www.africanunderground.com/