My brother, who lives in a sparsely populated state, once said he'd like the place even better if it had fewer people than it did. That may sound misanthropic, but I can sympathize. Where I live, it's nearly impossible to walk out the door without falling over someone or getting an earful of overheard chatter from people you don't even know. One expects occasional inconveniences such as these as part of the price of living in society, which is why rules of courtesy are necessary. Of course, that only works if people follow them, while my observation is that people seem not to have heard of them. Whose idea was it to do away with the Golden Rule?
People talk about feeling alone in a crowd, but in my experience that would be a rare thing these days; others are all too apt to enter my personal space, whether I'm drinking coffee, reading, walking through the park, or shopping for groceries. If someone isn't blocking my light in the cafe, he's talking too loudly on his cell phone, pulling out in front of me on the street, or failing to keep his dog under control so that I can walk in peace.
Were all of these people raised in a barn? Are they exhibitionists? Are they merely addled? Are they trying out for reality TV? Who told them being obnoxious is a good idea? Am I less forgiving than I used to be? (Any and all of these could possibly be true.)
This afternoon, I was sitting in a corner chair in the coffeehouse, minding my own business, as usual. I had been sitting outside, though it was a shade too cool for that, and I moved indoors when it looked like I could find a seat. I had, unfortunately, forgotten my earplugs, which is a real no-no if you plan to spend any time at all in Starbucks, but I was engrossed in my book, and things seemed to be going fairly well until other people started filling up the corner where I was sitting.
Now, don't get me wrong, I get it that Starbucks is a public place and that they're in business to keep the seats filled. But this particular Starbucks has a number of segregated seating areas, designed, I'm told, to create quiet places for people who want to read or study. I was sitting in a screened-off area near a large table where people usually congregate with books and laptops, but for some reason, everyone who entered that space was incapable of doing so without creating a scene, a not uncommon thing in Starbucks. People in line near the pastry case seemed intent on projecting their voices to the farthest corner; a large woman flounced in front of me, noisily taking the adjacent chair with a bit more ado than was really required; another patron walked back and forth in front of me several times, talking loudly on a cell and (quite unnecessarily) bumping my footrest; someone else camped out in my peripheral vision, apparently to read his text messages--not quite in my space but just close enough to be annoying.
Any one of these would have been irritating by itself; in the aggregate, it was just plain ridiculous. I got up and left.
Well, this story ends a little better than it begins. Rather than going home mad, I decided to take a short drive. I checked out the site of the future branch of the public library on Richmond Road and stopped to get gas. While I was doing that, I noticed some very dark clouds massing in the northwest: really Old Testament, Wrath of God thunderheads. I thought I could get home before they arrived, but since I was on a side of town I rarely visit any more, I drove around for a while, marveling at how little I remembered of the streets, though I used to be out there quite a bit.
Over here lived someone I interviewed when I worked at the newspaper; back there somewhere is a church I've been in, though I couldn't begin to find it now; my brother used to live on that street; I used to know someone who lived down that hill. It was almost as if I'd driven into a time warp, and I wandered around for a while, pleasantly lost. The leafy suburban streets looked both familiar and unfamiliar in the altered light of the approaching storm; it felt a bit like Van Gogh's Starry Night, a little town drowsing under a tumultuous sky. I seemed to be reclaiming something that belonged to me in the process of driving around.
When it started to rain, I was still in the wilds of suburbia. Lightning flashed, thunder rumbled, and small bits of hail hit my windshield. I decided I should be getting home, in case the weather got worse, so I started in that direction. I kept remembering people I'd known who lived in this house or that one--where are they now? The church steeples on Tates Creek Road stood up dramatically against the thunderheads, water was ponding by the side of the road, the wipers could barely keep up with the rain, and I . . . was feeling much better.
A spring thunderstorm doesn't sound calculated to be calming, but somehow it had that effect. Actually, I think it was just catharsis. Just when I was feeling like a thundercloud myself, here came a real one, washing everything clean. When I pulled out onto the road I live on, the changed light (aided, maybe, by my feeling of having revisited the past) made the street look subdued and elegant, like an old black and white photograph. I almost expected to see a Model T drive by.
It was still raining when I pulled into our parking lot, and I still had a little coffee left in my cup, so I sat for a few minutes and read some more of my book until the downpour eased a little. It's ironic that driving around in a thunderstorm could be more relaxing than sitting in a dry, well-lighted coffeehouse, but those are the facts. Sometimes a little solitude is better than a crowd.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Friday, April 24, 2015
Shadows and Mirrors
I saw an article online a while ago that, in honor of Shakespeare's birthday, listed his Top Ten insults. Apparently, there's a tradition of doing this every year, since I found similar lists in various publications from years past. That started me thinking about what Shakespeare means to me and whether I could compile a list of my own--Favorite Shakespearean Moments, or something like that.
I remember someone saying to me once that she wondered if people pretended to like Shakespeare more than they do because it seemed to be expected of them. Maybe that happens sometimes, but I think the Shakespearean allure is very real and due to a variety of factors, including the fun of costume drama, the power of his language (which sometimes catches people unaware), and the appeal of his sense of humor.
I can recall many hours spent in a local park on warm summer nights as the annual Shakespeare festival played to a large audience of people of all ages. Gathered together in the humid dark, with trees framing the stage and crickets trilling in the background, everyone seemed to fall into the spirit of things, willingly entering Shakespeare's world for an evening, despite the time, distance, and nuances of language separating us from him. These evenings were always festive; even children seemed to respond to the pratfalls and physical comedy though they may not necessarily have understood the plots.
As with many people, the first Shakespeare play I ever read was Romeo and Juliet, which I still enjoy. Of the other tragedies, I like Hamlet best; of the comedies, it's hard to pick just one, but maybe A Midsummer Night's Dream would do for a favorite. In high school, I once had to memorize and recite Hamlet's soliloquy, and, on another occasion, enact the witches' scene from Macbeth, along with three other students and a cooking pot borrowed from my mother (dressed in black crepe to stand in for the cauldron).
I was entranced by Kenneth Branagh's film of Henry V and captivated by a filmed version of The Tempest from Stratford, Ontario, that starred Christopher Plummer. (To date, I haven't seen a version of The Tempest that I didn't like.) I finally appreciated Othello when Mr. Branagh's Iago reminded me of some Machiavellian workplace politics I had experienced, and A Midsummer Night's Dream ended up in my dissertation when I remembered that mazes are mentioned in the play, giving my fourth chapter a welcome buoyancy.
But my favorite Shakespearean moment is the evening I spent watching a production of Much Ado About Nothing on a London stage years ago. I'd probably read the play but had never seen it performed, and that production remains for me the most magical Shakespearean experience of all. The play starred Derek Jacobi, and, I believe, Sinead Cusack, as Benedick and Beatrice. What made the production memorable was the staging, the brilliant use of a deceptively simple set of angled mirrors on a dark stage, lit from the front, so that all the action took place in a circumscribed area, a pool of light in a sea of black. The characters appeared out of darkness, enacted their scenes in front of the mirrors, and disappeared into shadows, so that the entire proceeding seemed to take place at night, giving an urgency, intimacy, and hectic, dreamlike quality to the quarrels, jests, complications, and ultimate reconciliation of the lovers. The acting was outstanding, and the characters, in contrast to the dimness and confusion of their reflected images, seemed very much alive.
If I could recommend only one Shakespearean production, this would be it. I see myself, wide-eyed and probably open-mouthed, 25 years old, sitting in that darkened theater, the same girl who had recited "To be or not to be" word for word and played a somewhat clueless Macbeth (my main dramatic contribution to that scene being, quite honestly, the soup pot). This may have been the first time I actually got it, the first time I entered Shakespeare emotionally. Every now and then, I can still see Beatrice, still feel the sadness beneath her witty one-liners and her yearning for authenticity in the midst of so much surface show. The happy ending was all the more poignant for complications narrowly averted, and I feel certain everyone left the theater happy that night.
Happy Birthday, William Shakespeare, and thanks for the memories.
I remember someone saying to me once that she wondered if people pretended to like Shakespeare more than they do because it seemed to be expected of them. Maybe that happens sometimes, but I think the Shakespearean allure is very real and due to a variety of factors, including the fun of costume drama, the power of his language (which sometimes catches people unaware), and the appeal of his sense of humor.
I can recall many hours spent in a local park on warm summer nights as the annual Shakespeare festival played to a large audience of people of all ages. Gathered together in the humid dark, with trees framing the stage and crickets trilling in the background, everyone seemed to fall into the spirit of things, willingly entering Shakespeare's world for an evening, despite the time, distance, and nuances of language separating us from him. These evenings were always festive; even children seemed to respond to the pratfalls and physical comedy though they may not necessarily have understood the plots.
As with many people, the first Shakespeare play I ever read was Romeo and Juliet, which I still enjoy. Of the other tragedies, I like Hamlet best; of the comedies, it's hard to pick just one, but maybe A Midsummer Night's Dream would do for a favorite. In high school, I once had to memorize and recite Hamlet's soliloquy, and, on another occasion, enact the witches' scene from Macbeth, along with three other students and a cooking pot borrowed from my mother (dressed in black crepe to stand in for the cauldron).
I was entranced by Kenneth Branagh's film of Henry V and captivated by a filmed version of The Tempest from Stratford, Ontario, that starred Christopher Plummer. (To date, I haven't seen a version of The Tempest that I didn't like.) I finally appreciated Othello when Mr. Branagh's Iago reminded me of some Machiavellian workplace politics I had experienced, and A Midsummer Night's Dream ended up in my dissertation when I remembered that mazes are mentioned in the play, giving my fourth chapter a welcome buoyancy.
But my favorite Shakespearean moment is the evening I spent watching a production of Much Ado About Nothing on a London stage years ago. I'd probably read the play but had never seen it performed, and that production remains for me the most magical Shakespearean experience of all. The play starred Derek Jacobi, and, I believe, Sinead Cusack, as Benedick and Beatrice. What made the production memorable was the staging, the brilliant use of a deceptively simple set of angled mirrors on a dark stage, lit from the front, so that all the action took place in a circumscribed area, a pool of light in a sea of black. The characters appeared out of darkness, enacted their scenes in front of the mirrors, and disappeared into shadows, so that the entire proceeding seemed to take place at night, giving an urgency, intimacy, and hectic, dreamlike quality to the quarrels, jests, complications, and ultimate reconciliation of the lovers. The acting was outstanding, and the characters, in contrast to the dimness and confusion of their reflected images, seemed very much alive.
If I could recommend only one Shakespearean production, this would be it. I see myself, wide-eyed and probably open-mouthed, 25 years old, sitting in that darkened theater, the same girl who had recited "To be or not to be" word for word and played a somewhat clueless Macbeth (my main dramatic contribution to that scene being, quite honestly, the soup pot). This may have been the first time I actually got it, the first time I entered Shakespeare emotionally. Every now and then, I can still see Beatrice, still feel the sadness beneath her witty one-liners and her yearning for authenticity in the midst of so much surface show. The happy ending was all the more poignant for complications narrowly averted, and I feel certain everyone left the theater happy that night.
Happy Birthday, William Shakespeare, and thanks for the memories.
Thursday, April 16, 2015
Death and Taxes, Not Necessarily in That Order
"April is the cruellest month, breeding/Lilacs out of the dead land . . ." --T. S. Eliot, The Waste Land
I was looking up the quotation above in my copy of The Waste Land and saw that I had written a note in the margin about Eliot having turned Chaucer's pilgrim gaiety on its head with these opening lines. Chaucer's spring fever is Eliot's elegy: clearly, these are two different views of spring. Is one more apt than the other? It probably depends on who you ask, or, maybe, when you ask. I don't think the sentiments really contradict each another.
Almost all of us have felt the surge of renewed energy that arrives with spring. Likewise, most of us have known times when we felt out of step with this mood, for one reason or another . . . a personal tragedy or an illness, perhaps. And regardless of anything else that might be happening, April is tax season, not really the highlight of anyone's year. It always seems like a shame to be preoccupied with 1099s and schedule Cs just when the weather's finally getting nice, but, in the wisdom of the Federal government, it has been so ordained that we must suffer (so you know it must be right).
Somehow, I hadn't really paid much attention before to the fact that April 15 is the date of Abraham Lincoln's death. Had you? Maybe it's because April 15 is overwhelmingly associated now with the Internal Revenue Service, e-filing, and tax forms, but it seems a shame that these things so far overshadow such a major tragedy in our history. I hadn't noticed much being made of the anniversary in the past, but this year, as you've heard, is the 150th anniversary of Lincoln's death, and so it has come to the forefront.
To me, collecting taxes is an odd way to honor President Lincoln, but apparently the date was appointed in the 1950s to give taxpayers more financial leeway (the filing deadline used to be March 15). I'm wondering now how much thought went into the selection of the date other than its being conveniently located an exact month later than the previous deadline. Did no one think of Lincoln, did it not seem to matter, or was the need to pick a date already associated with taxes (and thus easy to remember) the most pressing concern? Many people probably make little of the coincidence, but looked at from a symbolic viewpoint, it almost feels like a "papering over" of a painful moment from the past. (Don't tell me these things don't happen--they do.)
Of course, we now have a more recent tragedy associated with April 15, that of the Boston Marathon bombing. I was out walking the other day, a lovely, mild evening on which the local park was filled with young people dressed for prom night, the sparkling colors of their clothes competing with the tulips and blossoming trees for brilliance. As this exuberant crowd of students, parents, and friends milled around, the Boston tragedy came into my mind. I agree, it's sad that such a festive evening turned my thoughts toward something so tragic, but there it is: the mood near the finish line in Boston that day must have been similarly exuberant.
Loss is no respecter of seasons. Personally, I've lived through tornadoes, a fire (which actually occurred on April 15 some years ago), the death of a friend, and traffic accidents, all occurring in or near early April. Some of these events affected me greatly, and some very little in the long run, but one thing I do know is how surreal the beauty of the season seems under circumstances of loss, how disconnected one can feel from the flow of things. I've come through most of these events in no way diminished (except for losing the friend). I love spring, but I can't help but think of the people whose lives were interrupted that day in Boston and wonder how they're coping.
There's no bringing back Martin Richard, Krystle Campbell, Lu Lingzi, or Sean Collier, no undoing the devastating injuries suffered by the survivors. It's hard to take in the scope of what occurred until you imagine it happening to someone you love, in which case it comes into focus pretty quickly. I look at the Kentucky springtime unfolding all around me and wonder how long it will be before the survivors can look with anything but grief at the beauty of a Boston spring.
Death and taxes. Death and new life. Tragedies occur, and somehow life moves on. Is there a point to this post? Well, yes, there is. I keep thinking of smiling 8-year-old Martin Richard, holding up his sign, expressing his wish that people would stop killing each other. I often think, when I read arguments and counter-arguments for fighting terrorism with more war, that it's amazing the human race has come as far as it has. Why wouldn't you look for those who support terrorism, financially or otherwise, and charge them in a court of law? Isn't it more salutary to treat acts of terrorism as crimes than to start wars that seem untenable from the outset and may do little to address ultimate causes? We go around in circles, never getting to the bottom of things. Our government makes a show of being tough on terror but merely perpetuates it (and for this, we pay taxes).
Martin Richard will never see it, but for his sake, I'm making a plea that we do some soul-searching as a society and try to look more deeply into the root causes of terrorism. This will probably hurt. I believe that many people who consider themselves completely opposed to terrorism actually support it by trusting the government to fight it on their behalf, a government that is not only dysfunctional but also not opposed to doing away with constitutional rights in its quest to--it tells us--make the world safer. The government doesn't always have a vested interest in telling the public the truth about things--far from it. But the public always has a duty to insist on it.
I was looking up the quotation above in my copy of The Waste Land and saw that I had written a note in the margin about Eliot having turned Chaucer's pilgrim gaiety on its head with these opening lines. Chaucer's spring fever is Eliot's elegy: clearly, these are two different views of spring. Is one more apt than the other? It probably depends on who you ask, or, maybe, when you ask. I don't think the sentiments really contradict each another.
Almost all of us have felt the surge of renewed energy that arrives with spring. Likewise, most of us have known times when we felt out of step with this mood, for one reason or another . . . a personal tragedy or an illness, perhaps. And regardless of anything else that might be happening, April is tax season, not really the highlight of anyone's year. It always seems like a shame to be preoccupied with 1099s and schedule Cs just when the weather's finally getting nice, but, in the wisdom of the Federal government, it has been so ordained that we must suffer (so you know it must be right).
Somehow, I hadn't really paid much attention before to the fact that April 15 is the date of Abraham Lincoln's death. Had you? Maybe it's because April 15 is overwhelmingly associated now with the Internal Revenue Service, e-filing, and tax forms, but it seems a shame that these things so far overshadow such a major tragedy in our history. I hadn't noticed much being made of the anniversary in the past, but this year, as you've heard, is the 150th anniversary of Lincoln's death, and so it has come to the forefront.
To me, collecting taxes is an odd way to honor President Lincoln, but apparently the date was appointed in the 1950s to give taxpayers more financial leeway (the filing deadline used to be March 15). I'm wondering now how much thought went into the selection of the date other than its being conveniently located an exact month later than the previous deadline. Did no one think of Lincoln, did it not seem to matter, or was the need to pick a date already associated with taxes (and thus easy to remember) the most pressing concern? Many people probably make little of the coincidence, but looked at from a symbolic viewpoint, it almost feels like a "papering over" of a painful moment from the past. (Don't tell me these things don't happen--they do.)
Of course, we now have a more recent tragedy associated with April 15, that of the Boston Marathon bombing. I was out walking the other day, a lovely, mild evening on which the local park was filled with young people dressed for prom night, the sparkling colors of their clothes competing with the tulips and blossoming trees for brilliance. As this exuberant crowd of students, parents, and friends milled around, the Boston tragedy came into my mind. I agree, it's sad that such a festive evening turned my thoughts toward something so tragic, but there it is: the mood near the finish line in Boston that day must have been similarly exuberant.
Loss is no respecter of seasons. Personally, I've lived through tornadoes, a fire (which actually occurred on April 15 some years ago), the death of a friend, and traffic accidents, all occurring in or near early April. Some of these events affected me greatly, and some very little in the long run, but one thing I do know is how surreal the beauty of the season seems under circumstances of loss, how disconnected one can feel from the flow of things. I've come through most of these events in no way diminished (except for losing the friend). I love spring, but I can't help but think of the people whose lives were interrupted that day in Boston and wonder how they're coping.
There's no bringing back Martin Richard, Krystle Campbell, Lu Lingzi, or Sean Collier, no undoing the devastating injuries suffered by the survivors. It's hard to take in the scope of what occurred until you imagine it happening to someone you love, in which case it comes into focus pretty quickly. I look at the Kentucky springtime unfolding all around me and wonder how long it will be before the survivors can look with anything but grief at the beauty of a Boston spring.
Death and taxes. Death and new life. Tragedies occur, and somehow life moves on. Is there a point to this post? Well, yes, there is. I keep thinking of smiling 8-year-old Martin Richard, holding up his sign, expressing his wish that people would stop killing each other. I often think, when I read arguments and counter-arguments for fighting terrorism with more war, that it's amazing the human race has come as far as it has. Why wouldn't you look for those who support terrorism, financially or otherwise, and charge them in a court of law? Isn't it more salutary to treat acts of terrorism as crimes than to start wars that seem untenable from the outset and may do little to address ultimate causes? We go around in circles, never getting to the bottom of things. Our government makes a show of being tough on terror but merely perpetuates it (and for this, we pay taxes).
Martin Richard will never see it, but for his sake, I'm making a plea that we do some soul-searching as a society and try to look more deeply into the root causes of terrorism. This will probably hurt. I believe that many people who consider themselves completely opposed to terrorism actually support it by trusting the government to fight it on their behalf, a government that is not only dysfunctional but also not opposed to doing away with constitutional rights in its quest to--it tells us--make the world safer. The government doesn't always have a vested interest in telling the public the truth about things--far from it. But the public always has a duty to insist on it.
Thursday, April 9, 2015
A Tiger and a Unicorn
Just think, only a month ago we were digging out from a foot of snow. Although the calendar said March, the reality outside was deepest winter. And that was our second storm in little more than two weeks. A lot of people said the second one was worse. In my little pocket of the world, we seemed to get the same amount of snow both times, although there was more drifting with the first storm; a car I could see from my living room had snow to the top of its wheel wells and wasn't moved for a week. Driving across the parking lot was akin to sledding on a glacier.
The second snow, though formidable enough to halt travel statewide, ended up melting away like a mere dream of winter in only a few days of sun; it just couldn't hang on like the first one. A week later, it was hard to believe it had even happened, though memories of digging a path for my car with a dustpan as a frosty afternoon turned to purple twilight and my nose turned pink assured me that, yes, I had indeed been there. One week more, a mild, sunny day, and I was driving around with the radio on and the window rolled down, and the world seemed a different place, if only for an afternoon.
After lingering in the borderland of winter's-over-but-it's-not-quite-spring, we had another cold night on Saturday--but the next day, Easter, I saw my first blossoming trees of the season, and a day later there were even more. With the heavy rains of the last few days, the border of the sidewalk next to our building has sprouted some ground cover that almost looks like small shrubs, and the grass, which had been brown and lank except for some green tufts, is suddenly thick and lush, a riot of vegetation.
If March came in like a lion (and it did), April has been tigerish in its own way. We've gone from frozen waste to uproarious jungle, with pollen flying, birds darting, and lightning flashing. If this spring were music, it would be Stravinsky's strident Rite of Spring, not Vivaldi's sweet and chirrupy Four Seasons. The human world may flounder and fumble, but the natural world streams on.
I saw a political headline today: "2015 is all about 2016." I guess I should care, but I'm more excited at the moment by the weeping cherries, crab apples, and redbuds and the prospect of putting my winter things away. Show me a politician as reliable as the return of spring, and I'll show you a green and gold tiger romping in the tall grass with a unicorn. I'm not sure that the first sight isn't much rarer than the second one.
The second snow, though formidable enough to halt travel statewide, ended up melting away like a mere dream of winter in only a few days of sun; it just couldn't hang on like the first one. A week later, it was hard to believe it had even happened, though memories of digging a path for my car with a dustpan as a frosty afternoon turned to purple twilight and my nose turned pink assured me that, yes, I had indeed been there. One week more, a mild, sunny day, and I was driving around with the radio on and the window rolled down, and the world seemed a different place, if only for an afternoon.
After lingering in the borderland of winter's-over-but-it's-not-quite-spring, we had another cold night on Saturday--but the next day, Easter, I saw my first blossoming trees of the season, and a day later there were even more. With the heavy rains of the last few days, the border of the sidewalk next to our building has sprouted some ground cover that almost looks like small shrubs, and the grass, which had been brown and lank except for some green tufts, is suddenly thick and lush, a riot of vegetation.
If March came in like a lion (and it did), April has been tigerish in its own way. We've gone from frozen waste to uproarious jungle, with pollen flying, birds darting, and lightning flashing. If this spring were music, it would be Stravinsky's strident Rite of Spring, not Vivaldi's sweet and chirrupy Four Seasons. The human world may flounder and fumble, but the natural world streams on.
I saw a political headline today: "2015 is all about 2016." I guess I should care, but I'm more excited at the moment by the weeping cherries, crab apples, and redbuds and the prospect of putting my winter things away. Show me a politician as reliable as the return of spring, and I'll show you a green and gold tiger romping in the tall grass with a unicorn. I'm not sure that the first sight isn't much rarer than the second one.
Thursday, April 2, 2015
Rogue's Gallery
According to Chaucer, April is the month when people "long to go on pilgrimages." In his day, when the urge hit, people struck out for Canterbury to see the cathedral and its relics. Of course, that was England in the Middle Ages, but something like the same idea probably still applies. Spring break commonly falls in April, though trips to the beach or Disneyland are much more common than pilgrimages to holy shrines nowadays.
When I was younger, I took it for granted that people were just more pious in the Middle Ages, but now I suspect that for many pilgrims, devotion was just an excuse for a vacation, a break from the everyday grind. For them, going to Canterbury was something like going to Daytona, or even Vegas.
I've actually been to Canterbury, though I didn't do it according to the Chaucer plan. I arrived there on a bus, in the month of July, with my camera and my grandmother. (This was the same summer I traipsed around half of southern England looking at Gothic buildings.) I was very interested in what you might call the numinous properties of Gothic, but I wouldn't term myself a pilgrim in the strict sense of the word. I was more interested in aesthetic, historic, and imaginative inspiration than in a religious experience, and I wasn't disappointed in what I saw.
I remember that Canterbury Cathedral could be seen from a long way off across the countryside; once it came into view it towered over everything else. I imagine that for medieval pilgrims, regardless of their original motivations for taking the trip, the constant and ever more dominating presence of the object of their journey must have been awe-inspiring, perhaps a bit like approaching the doors of heaven. It would have been the presence around which everything else arranged itself, like Wallace Stevens' jar upon the hill in "Anecdote of the Jar." This was probably true even for the most jaded.
Can you imagine traveling with such a crowd today? I suppose it wouldn't be unlike a bus tour or a cruise, in which you're thrown in with such a random sampling of humanity that there's no telling who you might be sitting next to, knave, fool, criminal, or saint. Although it's been a while since I read The Canterbury Tales, my recollection is that while the last group was in short supply, the other three categories were amply represented. Perhaps it's unfair, since it's been a while since I read the Tales, but when I ask myself now if I would have chosen to take such a journey with a crew like that, the answer is no. It may just be that the rogues stand out more in my memory. It's also true that I've never been one for group travel to begin with.
Of course, I'm being a little facetious. Chaucer's idea, I think, in depicting such a cavalcade of characters is to provide amusement. It's a comedy, with all the vices (and virtues, naturally) of humanity on display. You're meant to recognize, with a wry smile, characters that remind you of people you know (and perhaps yourself, if you tend toward introspection). The Canterbury Tales is, after all, a species of armchair travel. You're not actually on the trip--you're at one remove from it. Except insofar as life itself is a journey . . . but never mind that . . . Chaucer has made it possible for you to just sit back and enjoy this one.
If you're making any spring journeys of your own, safe travels. Watch out for the other guy and all that. As for me, I'm going no farther than the local coffeehouse, where you may see me ensconced with Paul Theroux's The Pillars of Hercules. I've gone by sea, by air, by rail, by land, and on foot, but right now armchair travel is what I like best.
When I was younger, I took it for granted that people were just more pious in the Middle Ages, but now I suspect that for many pilgrims, devotion was just an excuse for a vacation, a break from the everyday grind. For them, going to Canterbury was something like going to Daytona, or even Vegas.
I've actually been to Canterbury, though I didn't do it according to the Chaucer plan. I arrived there on a bus, in the month of July, with my camera and my grandmother. (This was the same summer I traipsed around half of southern England looking at Gothic buildings.) I was very interested in what you might call the numinous properties of Gothic, but I wouldn't term myself a pilgrim in the strict sense of the word. I was more interested in aesthetic, historic, and imaginative inspiration than in a religious experience, and I wasn't disappointed in what I saw.
I remember that Canterbury Cathedral could be seen from a long way off across the countryside; once it came into view it towered over everything else. I imagine that for medieval pilgrims, regardless of their original motivations for taking the trip, the constant and ever more dominating presence of the object of their journey must have been awe-inspiring, perhaps a bit like approaching the doors of heaven. It would have been the presence around which everything else arranged itself, like Wallace Stevens' jar upon the hill in "Anecdote of the Jar." This was probably true even for the most jaded.
Can you imagine traveling with such a crowd today? I suppose it wouldn't be unlike a bus tour or a cruise, in which you're thrown in with such a random sampling of humanity that there's no telling who you might be sitting next to, knave, fool, criminal, or saint. Although it's been a while since I read The Canterbury Tales, my recollection is that while the last group was in short supply, the other three categories were amply represented. Perhaps it's unfair, since it's been a while since I read the Tales, but when I ask myself now if I would have chosen to take such a journey with a crew like that, the answer is no. It may just be that the rogues stand out more in my memory. It's also true that I've never been one for group travel to begin with.
Of course, I'm being a little facetious. Chaucer's idea, I think, in depicting such a cavalcade of characters is to provide amusement. It's a comedy, with all the vices (and virtues, naturally) of humanity on display. You're meant to recognize, with a wry smile, characters that remind you of people you know (and perhaps yourself, if you tend toward introspection). The Canterbury Tales is, after all, a species of armchair travel. You're not actually on the trip--you're at one remove from it. Except insofar as life itself is a journey . . . but never mind that . . . Chaucer has made it possible for you to just sit back and enjoy this one.
If you're making any spring journeys of your own, safe travels. Watch out for the other guy and all that. As for me, I'm going no farther than the local coffeehouse, where you may see me ensconced with Paul Theroux's The Pillars of Hercules. I've gone by sea, by air, by rail, by land, and on foot, but right now armchair travel is what I like best.
Thursday, March 26, 2015
Beat the Mythologist
I've been wondering whether to follow up last week's post on Elaine Constantine's film 9 Kisses, because I guessed that readers who attempted to interpret the film for themselves might be wondering how their results compared with mine. In the last post, I tried to be suggestive only, giving readers the chance to draw their own conclusions. Then an accidental (or maybe synchronistic) event suggested to me that I wasn't finished with the subject and that I wouldn't be beating a dead horse with a follow-up.
Maybe Jung could come up with a better piece of synchronicity, but I'm not sure I could. In my non-blogging life, I've been dithering about whether to purchase a metal knob that would screw in to make one of my dishes suitable for oven use. After having the picture of this metal object in my mind for several days, the similarity between it and an image in 9 Kisses suddenly struck me. One of the eye-catching oddities in the first scene, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Reese Witherspoon, is Ms. Witherspoon's short, screw-shaped metallic skirt, a somewhat loaded symbol, it seemed to me. Having a similarly shaped object surface in my life this week after I wrote the last post has reinforced the idea that the material calls for more amplification.
The caution I've supplied before about reading symbols too literally or mechanically applies here, as always. If you attempted to interpret scenes and found yourself thinking, X always equals this, or Y always equals that, you probably ran into dead ends or things that didn't really work. One of the difficulties of interpreting symbols is the fact that they almost always have many possible meanings. In one context, a color implies one thing; in another, it means the opposite. An identical pair of gloves may mean entirely different things in different situations. Characteristics such as gender and physical appearance may suggest various things--again, meaning is very dependent on the particular dynamics of the exchange.
In Ms. Witherspoon's scene, for example, both characters wear costumes, though only one of them is actually disguised. The scene depicts a tryst in which neither wishes to be discovered, though Mr. Cumberbatch appears to be especially concerned. While the meeting is obviously consensual, Mr. Cumberbatch has taken pains to hide his identity (the mask and gloves), and he keeps his partner waiting, which suggests that he has more power. In addition, he appears to have left a cocktail party or a similar type of gathering, while his partner is kept waiting outside. This, along with Ms. Witherspoon's suggestive attire, implies to me not romance but instead prostitution or something equally illicit; perhaps both parties are men.
In the scene with Laura Dern and Steve Carell, there is extreme hesitation about initiating the encounter, which suggests some taboo the characters are slow to overcome. While both are conventionally dressed, their clothes are nonetheless costumes; Ms. Dern's backless dress suggests that she is outwardly the less inhibited of the two, and that Mr. Carell, the very picture of buttoned-up ordinary middle age, is wearing a more successful disguise. Again, the extreme mortification on being discovered is suggestive; perhaps one of the characters is married. The genders need not be literal, either--this is not an arbitrary suggestion but rather one based on the context.
To me, Jenny Slate's and Rosario Dawson's scene seems not to depict a sexual relationship at all. Their interaction suggests two women of the same status (notice how they're sitting) who spend a lot of "face time" together--friends, perhaps. Clues in the scene imply, however, a predatory relationship, a serious betrayal of some kind. Ms. Dawson has "screwed" Ms. Slate, figuratively speaking. (I know, I know: "Geez, Wordplay, can't you keep it classy?" I would, if only I could.) I read Chadwick Boseman's scene with Kristen Stewart in a similar way. Being knocked off his feet implies an unwelcome shock for Mr. Boseman, one that initially distresses him but is ultimately, perhaps, amusing. Reading clues in the attire, I interpreted this scene as an attack of one man by another; Ms. Stewart's clothing (and her edgy aggression) seemed rather pointedly masculine here. (I'm not suggesting women can't be aggressive; I'm only looking at the specifics of this scene.)
Outwardly, Jason Schwartzman and Patricia Arquette seem to be strangers meeting by chance, although the behavior of each is remarkably odd. Why does Mr. Schwartzman, who is obviously preoccupied, take the time to brush off and kiss the cap of a complete stranger? Why does Ms. Arquette (who also seems preoccupied) appear at first taken aback--even frightened--and why does she return his gesture by first biting him and then laughing? The characters are moving in opposite directions (initially, they seem not even to see one another); it is the handing back of the cap (part of Ms. Arquette's "disguise") that unites them. The backward glances, in Mr. Schwartzman's case, look like a puzzled attempt to figure out what's happened to him even as the ambush recedes in time. Perhaps these people are "strangers" only in the sense of their very unequal understanding of what's taken place between them. Though I don't read this scene romantically (at all), Mr. Schwartzman's gentleness and Ms. Arquette's peculiar aggressiveness, along with the fact that she somehow seems to tower over him, suggest that their genders could be reversed.
In my last post, I pointed out that the characters in the bar scene are very unlike one another, two adversaries involved in a great contest. I based this on their postures, their actions, and the way they're dressed; it's easy to see how different they are. I suggested that perhaps one of them wasn't even a man, and while that may have taken you by surprise, it was just my reading of the extreme difference in the way they're portrayed: they're such opposites in every other way that, in this context, I guessed that different races might symbolize opposite genders. And if you watch their contest closely, you'll see the moment when Mr. Spall reveals both dismay and surprise at his opponent's strength. He only overcomes Mr. Oyelowo by a nasty and unexpected trick that changes the dynamic completely.
I see the "sparring" between partners in the next scene as a metaphor for a romantic relationship between two people who have long been at odds. After Ms. Woodley lands a direct hit on Mr. O'Connell and then tries to made amends, he at first appears shocked--boy, he didn't see that coming. He then responds by ridiculing her, and the two go back to fighting. One senses, though, that a corner has been turned in the relationship, and that Ms. Woodley now sees her partner differently (despite his efforts to "protect his face"). To me, Ms. Woodley's boyish figure, along with the fact that the partners relate to one another by boxing, suggests that both partners are male; Ms. Woodley, however, is the more vulnerable of the two.
The scene in the dance club, to my mind, suggests a political rather than a romantic situation. If I were to ask you which of the two is a Democrat and which a Republican, I think you could hazard a guess, based on their dance styles alone. (I know it's a stereotype, but who looks more uptight?) The final scene, with the runaway groom, seems to me suggestive of a marriage in which there has been some great trouble and an attempt at reconciliation. I read this scene pretty straightforwardly as the story of a marriage in which something momentous (and tragic) has occurred. In this case, the mixed-race marriage might refer to some division--a difference of opinion or a betrayal--that has separated the couple. It may be the contrast between this scene and the one before it--in which the dancing partners seem united mainly by cynicism--but this one, so starkly personal, is one that I initially found to be most disturbing.
I take it that this exercise illustrates why film interpretation (and symbolic interpretation of all kinds) is so challenging. I'm not suggesting that there's always only one way to see things, but I do believe that some interpretations are better than others. That's why it's so hard to use a standard dictionary of symbols to interpret dreams, fairy tales, myths, or anything else. For one thing, a good dictionary only reveals how multifaceted any one symbol can be. Everything depends on context; you look at all the pieces and keep moving them around until something clicks. Word association, hunches, knowledge of human nature--all is fair in love and war (or so they say). I'll limit myself to saying only that all of these are fair in Jungian interpretation.
If you'd like to know more about this kind of approach, take a look at any of Marie-Louise von Franz's works on fairy tales. She uses some Jungian language that might hamper anyone unfamiliar with Jung's theories, but reading just a little of her work will give you the gist of it. She was a very subtle, penetrating, and perceptive interpreter of the meanings latent in traditional stories; I can't think of anyone who does it better. More recent works in the depth psychological tradition suitable for a general audience include Allan B. Chinen's Once Upon a Midlife and Joan Gould's Spinning Straw Into Gold.
Maybe Jung could come up with a better piece of synchronicity, but I'm not sure I could. In my non-blogging life, I've been dithering about whether to purchase a metal knob that would screw in to make one of my dishes suitable for oven use. After having the picture of this metal object in my mind for several days, the similarity between it and an image in 9 Kisses suddenly struck me. One of the eye-catching oddities in the first scene, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Reese Witherspoon, is Ms. Witherspoon's short, screw-shaped metallic skirt, a somewhat loaded symbol, it seemed to me. Having a similarly shaped object surface in my life this week after I wrote the last post has reinforced the idea that the material calls for more amplification.
The caution I've supplied before about reading symbols too literally or mechanically applies here, as always. If you attempted to interpret scenes and found yourself thinking, X always equals this, or Y always equals that, you probably ran into dead ends or things that didn't really work. One of the difficulties of interpreting symbols is the fact that they almost always have many possible meanings. In one context, a color implies one thing; in another, it means the opposite. An identical pair of gloves may mean entirely different things in different situations. Characteristics such as gender and physical appearance may suggest various things--again, meaning is very dependent on the particular dynamics of the exchange.
In Ms. Witherspoon's scene, for example, both characters wear costumes, though only one of them is actually disguised. The scene depicts a tryst in which neither wishes to be discovered, though Mr. Cumberbatch appears to be especially concerned. While the meeting is obviously consensual, Mr. Cumberbatch has taken pains to hide his identity (the mask and gloves), and he keeps his partner waiting, which suggests that he has more power. In addition, he appears to have left a cocktail party or a similar type of gathering, while his partner is kept waiting outside. This, along with Ms. Witherspoon's suggestive attire, implies to me not romance but instead prostitution or something equally illicit; perhaps both parties are men.
In the scene with Laura Dern and Steve Carell, there is extreme hesitation about initiating the encounter, which suggests some taboo the characters are slow to overcome. While both are conventionally dressed, their clothes are nonetheless costumes; Ms. Dern's backless dress suggests that she is outwardly the less inhibited of the two, and that Mr. Carell, the very picture of buttoned-up ordinary middle age, is wearing a more successful disguise. Again, the extreme mortification on being discovered is suggestive; perhaps one of the characters is married. The genders need not be literal, either--this is not an arbitrary suggestion but rather one based on the context.
To me, Jenny Slate's and Rosario Dawson's scene seems not to depict a sexual relationship at all. Their interaction suggests two women of the same status (notice how they're sitting) who spend a lot of "face time" together--friends, perhaps. Clues in the scene imply, however, a predatory relationship, a serious betrayal of some kind. Ms. Dawson has "screwed" Ms. Slate, figuratively speaking. (I know, I know: "Geez, Wordplay, can't you keep it classy?" I would, if only I could.) I read Chadwick Boseman's scene with Kristen Stewart in a similar way. Being knocked off his feet implies an unwelcome shock for Mr. Boseman, one that initially distresses him but is ultimately, perhaps, amusing. Reading clues in the attire, I interpreted this scene as an attack of one man by another; Ms. Stewart's clothing (and her edgy aggression) seemed rather pointedly masculine here. (I'm not suggesting women can't be aggressive; I'm only looking at the specifics of this scene.)
Outwardly, Jason Schwartzman and Patricia Arquette seem to be strangers meeting by chance, although the behavior of each is remarkably odd. Why does Mr. Schwartzman, who is obviously preoccupied, take the time to brush off and kiss the cap of a complete stranger? Why does Ms. Arquette (who also seems preoccupied) appear at first taken aback--even frightened--and why does she return his gesture by first biting him and then laughing? The characters are moving in opposite directions (initially, they seem not even to see one another); it is the handing back of the cap (part of Ms. Arquette's "disguise") that unites them. The backward glances, in Mr. Schwartzman's case, look like a puzzled attempt to figure out what's happened to him even as the ambush recedes in time. Perhaps these people are "strangers" only in the sense of their very unequal understanding of what's taken place between them. Though I don't read this scene romantically (at all), Mr. Schwartzman's gentleness and Ms. Arquette's peculiar aggressiveness, along with the fact that she somehow seems to tower over him, suggest that their genders could be reversed.
In my last post, I pointed out that the characters in the bar scene are very unlike one another, two adversaries involved in a great contest. I based this on their postures, their actions, and the way they're dressed; it's easy to see how different they are. I suggested that perhaps one of them wasn't even a man, and while that may have taken you by surprise, it was just my reading of the extreme difference in the way they're portrayed: they're such opposites in every other way that, in this context, I guessed that different races might symbolize opposite genders. And if you watch their contest closely, you'll see the moment when Mr. Spall reveals both dismay and surprise at his opponent's strength. He only overcomes Mr. Oyelowo by a nasty and unexpected trick that changes the dynamic completely.
I see the "sparring" between partners in the next scene as a metaphor for a romantic relationship between two people who have long been at odds. After Ms. Woodley lands a direct hit on Mr. O'Connell and then tries to made amends, he at first appears shocked--boy, he didn't see that coming. He then responds by ridiculing her, and the two go back to fighting. One senses, though, that a corner has been turned in the relationship, and that Ms. Woodley now sees her partner differently (despite his efforts to "protect his face"). To me, Ms. Woodley's boyish figure, along with the fact that the partners relate to one another by boxing, suggests that both partners are male; Ms. Woodley, however, is the more vulnerable of the two.
The scene in the dance club, to my mind, suggests a political rather than a romantic situation. If I were to ask you which of the two is a Democrat and which a Republican, I think you could hazard a guess, based on their dance styles alone. (I know it's a stereotype, but who looks more uptight?) The final scene, with the runaway groom, seems to me suggestive of a marriage in which there has been some great trouble and an attempt at reconciliation. I read this scene pretty straightforwardly as the story of a marriage in which something momentous (and tragic) has occurred. In this case, the mixed-race marriage might refer to some division--a difference of opinion or a betrayal--that has separated the couple. It may be the contrast between this scene and the one before it--in which the dancing partners seem united mainly by cynicism--but this one, so starkly personal, is one that I initially found to be most disturbing.
I take it that this exercise illustrates why film interpretation (and symbolic interpretation of all kinds) is so challenging. I'm not suggesting that there's always only one way to see things, but I do believe that some interpretations are better than others. That's why it's so hard to use a standard dictionary of symbols to interpret dreams, fairy tales, myths, or anything else. For one thing, a good dictionary only reveals how multifaceted any one symbol can be. Everything depends on context; you look at all the pieces and keep moving them around until something clicks. Word association, hunches, knowledge of human nature--all is fair in love and war (or so they say). I'll limit myself to saying only that all of these are fair in Jungian interpretation.
If you'd like to know more about this kind of approach, take a look at any of Marie-Louise von Franz's works on fairy tales. She uses some Jungian language that might hamper anyone unfamiliar with Jung's theories, but reading just a little of her work will give you the gist of it. She was a very subtle, penetrating, and perceptive interpreter of the meanings latent in traditional stories; I can't think of anyone who does it better. More recent works in the depth psychological tradition suitable for a general audience include Allan B. Chinen's Once Upon a Midlife and Joan Gould's Spinning Straw Into Gold.
Thursday, March 19, 2015
Met in a Dream or Elsewhere: 9 Kisses
Over the holidays, I came across Elaine Constantine's 9 Kisses on the website of The New York Times. It's a series of short films in which pairs of actors create intimate scenes of passion, all of which involve a kiss. When I first saw it, I found it stylish, smart, and instantly memorable, though out of sync with a holiday mood because of the thread of darkness running through it. 9 Kisses resurfaced around Valentine's Day, and, again, as I watched, disturbing ripples underneath the surface of each film seemed to run counter to any manifest notions of romance.
Ms. Constantine's project continues a tradition at the Times of spotlighting each year's great performers, although they usually appear solo and not paired as they are in 9 Kisses. To me it seems that each scene in Constantine's film uses a kiss as a starting point only, a symbol for all manner of passions and exchanges: seduction, bribery, violence, betrayal, and dominance, as well as, more rarely, tenderness (mostly unreciprocated). Of all the genres that seem to fit here, romance is not the one that springs to mind. There's satire, black humor, horror, noir, and maybe even crime-drama but nothing that seems to foretell happy endings for most of the characters.
If movies are the public dreams of our culture, as Jung tells us, there's always latent content to be accounted for. I've studied the films to try and understand why each affected me the way it did, looking at the characters, settings, costumes, props, camera angles, and lighting, noticing what attracted my eye in each case. I looked at neckwear and wristwatches. I paid attention to the music in the background. I watched a film about the making of the project in which the director and actors can be seen working through their ideas, which was fascinating. I believe that you can, as Ms. Constantine says, read the scenes as nothing more than quirky riffs on romance but also that the content is purposely fluid and indeterminate. I'm reminded of Chris Van Allsburg's The Z Was Zapped, an adventurous and provocative ABC book that leaves it up to the reader to interpret the illustrations.
If you're wondering what I mean by latent content, begin with the oddities within each scene that seem to work against the surface story. Two people meet in a fashionable garden for a tryst, which might seem no more than a secret affair except for the odd costuming, the gloved hands on the neck, and the excessively shocked expressions when a light is shone on them. Two middle-aged people on a date seem merely shy until an explosive kiss rips away all veneer of self-control and they become the butt of laughter. Two women celebrating New Year's Eve seem to be lovers except for the way one woman's smiles veer almost imperceptibly from excited to predatory as the other woman sinks slowly out of sight. An intense young woman (and wasn't that actress last seen as a vampire?) closely watches a male singer from the audience before rushing the stage, knocking him down, and then disappearing backstage, obviously pleased.
A preoccupied young man encounters a woman with shopping bags, politely returns her beret, and receives an unusual form of thanks. A game of arm wrestling between a serious, upright contender and his drunken opponent turns into an almost mythic contest of wills before the seedy man resorts to a trick. A trainer is punched by the young athlete he's coaching; overcome by remorse, she kisses him, whereupon he ridicules her. A woman dancing in a nightclub is approached by a man who seems worried by her independent style; she at first appears to rebuff him before they develop an odd sort of rhythm together. An extremely agitated man, apparently (but not certainly) the groom, flees into a garden pursued by a bride who tries, with difficulty, to soothe him with a kiss.
The palette is rather muted in these films, which makes you notice pops of color--a red-and-black dress opposed to a stark white one; yellow ticker tape; a red coat and red lips against skin of extreme pallor; green tape near a microphone stand; a demure pink dress (which turns out, however, to be nearly backless); a stiff, metal-gray skirt worn by a tryster; a white wristband. There are odd pairings, too, in which the couples don't match in size (the man is small and the woman is enormous), or the woman is almost as masculine in clothes and appearance as the man. This might suggest gender reversals, if looked at symbolically.
I found 9 Kisses to be unsettling rather than playful, and many of the scenes resonated, as if I'd seen the characters before. This may very well have been the intent of the director, who wants the viewer to look for the emotional heart of each scene, in which a kiss is merely a stand-in for a variety of transactions, from personal to political. There are many puzzles to be worked out: What are those two men really fighting about? (And are they really both men?) What's behind that pale look of surprise? Does the backseat of that car represent something else? Who are those sparring partners? What's the man at the wedding running away from? I think the film reads more like a parade of the Seven Deadly Sins than a series of romantic idylls, more like Dante's Inferno than Love, Actually, and perhaps that, if you care to go there, is the point.
The link to 9 Kisses is here. If you'd like to learn more about the making of the film, see this short feature with a behind-the-scenes look at the director and actors at work and decide for yourself if a kiss is still a kiss.
Ms. Constantine's project continues a tradition at the Times of spotlighting each year's great performers, although they usually appear solo and not paired as they are in 9 Kisses. To me it seems that each scene in Constantine's film uses a kiss as a starting point only, a symbol for all manner of passions and exchanges: seduction, bribery, violence, betrayal, and dominance, as well as, more rarely, tenderness (mostly unreciprocated). Of all the genres that seem to fit here, romance is not the one that springs to mind. There's satire, black humor, horror, noir, and maybe even crime-drama but nothing that seems to foretell happy endings for most of the characters.
If movies are the public dreams of our culture, as Jung tells us, there's always latent content to be accounted for. I've studied the films to try and understand why each affected me the way it did, looking at the characters, settings, costumes, props, camera angles, and lighting, noticing what attracted my eye in each case. I looked at neckwear and wristwatches. I paid attention to the music in the background. I watched a film about the making of the project in which the director and actors can be seen working through their ideas, which was fascinating. I believe that you can, as Ms. Constantine says, read the scenes as nothing more than quirky riffs on romance but also that the content is purposely fluid and indeterminate. I'm reminded of Chris Van Allsburg's The Z Was Zapped, an adventurous and provocative ABC book that leaves it up to the reader to interpret the illustrations.
If you're wondering what I mean by latent content, begin with the oddities within each scene that seem to work against the surface story. Two people meet in a fashionable garden for a tryst, which might seem no more than a secret affair except for the odd costuming, the gloved hands on the neck, and the excessively shocked expressions when a light is shone on them. Two middle-aged people on a date seem merely shy until an explosive kiss rips away all veneer of self-control and they become the butt of laughter. Two women celebrating New Year's Eve seem to be lovers except for the way one woman's smiles veer almost imperceptibly from excited to predatory as the other woman sinks slowly out of sight. An intense young woman (and wasn't that actress last seen as a vampire?) closely watches a male singer from the audience before rushing the stage, knocking him down, and then disappearing backstage, obviously pleased.
A preoccupied young man encounters a woman with shopping bags, politely returns her beret, and receives an unusual form of thanks. A game of arm wrestling between a serious, upright contender and his drunken opponent turns into an almost mythic contest of wills before the seedy man resorts to a trick. A trainer is punched by the young athlete he's coaching; overcome by remorse, she kisses him, whereupon he ridicules her. A woman dancing in a nightclub is approached by a man who seems worried by her independent style; she at first appears to rebuff him before they develop an odd sort of rhythm together. An extremely agitated man, apparently (but not certainly) the groom, flees into a garden pursued by a bride who tries, with difficulty, to soothe him with a kiss.
The palette is rather muted in these films, which makes you notice pops of color--a red-and-black dress opposed to a stark white one; yellow ticker tape; a red coat and red lips against skin of extreme pallor; green tape near a microphone stand; a demure pink dress (which turns out, however, to be nearly backless); a stiff, metal-gray skirt worn by a tryster; a white wristband. There are odd pairings, too, in which the couples don't match in size (the man is small and the woman is enormous), or the woman is almost as masculine in clothes and appearance as the man. This might suggest gender reversals, if looked at symbolically.
I found 9 Kisses to be unsettling rather than playful, and many of the scenes resonated, as if I'd seen the characters before. This may very well have been the intent of the director, who wants the viewer to look for the emotional heart of each scene, in which a kiss is merely a stand-in for a variety of transactions, from personal to political. There are many puzzles to be worked out: What are those two men really fighting about? (And are they really both men?) What's behind that pale look of surprise? Does the backseat of that car represent something else? Who are those sparring partners? What's the man at the wedding running away from? I think the film reads more like a parade of the Seven Deadly Sins than a series of romantic idylls, more like Dante's Inferno than Love, Actually, and perhaps that, if you care to go there, is the point.
The link to 9 Kisses is here. If you'd like to learn more about the making of the film, see this short feature with a behind-the-scenes look at the director and actors at work and decide for yourself if a kiss is still a kiss.
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