DESCRIPTION WITHOUT PLACE.
criticism. decorum. innards. bric-a-brac. nostalgia. nausea. polemics. diatribes. litanies. symphonies. polaroids.
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[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
David Shire, “Theme from The Conversation“ [dir. Francis Ford Coppola, 1974]
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Films of 2011
Here are some films from the last year. Some are on Netflix, some on their way to Netflix, some are still in theaters. In lieu of a numbered ranking, I’ll link to a video that best exemplifies the sense of urgency you should embody.
A. Ludacris, Move Bitch (Get Out the Way)
A Separation [dir. Farhadi]
Drive [dir. Winding Refn]
Take Shelter [dir. Jeff Nichols]
B. The Weeknd, What You Need
The Artist [dir. Haznavicius]
Shame [dir. McQueen]
Prohibition [dir. Burns]
Cave of Forgotten Dreams [dir. Herzog]
C. The Rolling Stones, Waiting On A Friend
Exit Through the Gift Shop [dir. Banksy]
The Skin I Live In [dir. Almodovar]
The Adventures of Tintin [dir. Spielberg]
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On Shame, Mad Men, and Period Pieces
The style of the Sixties in Mad Men is so relentless and polished in every detail that it actually deals a death blow to authenticity. It is caricature, not authenticity, and although that, in a David Lynch sort of way, can be thrilling and effective if you subvert the style to darker devices, Mad Men isn’t sure whether it wants to be pastiche or historical realism. It wants it both ways, and for me, it is this indecision, which feels muddy and expedient as opposed to subtle or sly, that is Mad Men’s self-sabotage—“simultaneously contemptuous and pandering,” as Daniel Mendelsohn put it last year in The New York Review of Books.
-Unfaithful: The False Nostalgia of Mad Men by Jenny Diski (download)
Criticism of the present’s art - especially of an incomplete work - amounts to little more than bear-baiting. I don’t disagree with anything above. Much of the article communicates the sheer vapidity of Mad Men’s fourth season, and few have been able to communicate this as plainly as the author does here. What I think the article accomplishes is less a deflation of the Mad Men myth than how the show’s chosen approach to narrative has constrained whatever we desire from it. The article pinpoints Mad Men’s failings as the failings of all period pieces.
Period pieces work best as exercises in conformity. From painting to sculpture to film, taking on a classical subject in the past’s trappings is best done by following a very simplified set of rules: wear the clothes, look the part, don’t wink. The works that attempt to outwit period piece conventions (Fitzcarraldo and Barry Lyndon are films that come immediately to mind) invariably fail. Mad Men is doing its very best to play it safe, and although that may be frustrating to viewers, the show has no other option.
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On Masterpieces.
Mr. Ledger’s work will outlast the frenzy. But there should have been more. Instead of being preserved as a young star eclipsed in his prime, he should have had time to outgrow his early promise and become the strange, surprising, era-defining actor he always had the potential to be. -A.O. Scott, New York Times.
A.O. Scott praises Heath Ledger in today’s New York Times. Ledger, like other actors and performers who died young, are often praised for the work they may have created as much for the work they left behind. Clifford Brown died in 1956 at the age of 25. His work with Max Roach is gorgeous stuff, but I’m not alone in believing that his career may have complimented the work of Miles Davis (perhaps even reshaping some of the latter trumpeter’s innovations) had his career extended beyond 1956.
This weekend I got my hands on a few Veronica Lake films. Lake received both popular and critical acclaim for a brief part of her career. She is remembered as one of the most glamorous actresses of the early 1940s. Erratic behavior and mental illness are to blame for her short career in Hollywood. She died destitute at 50. Of her eight to ten films still in print, two or three have lasting value. I’ve only seen a few of her performances, but her most remembered film - Sullivan’s Travels - has a witty plot that almost entirely depends on her performance. The DVD was issued as part of the Criterion Collection. The cover is a painting of her face.
The critic Harold Bloom argues that art should be a purely aesthetic pleasure. The second we try to satisfy some other agenda (feminism, multiculturalism, deconstructionism) we further our understanding of that agenda and not the work of art. What makes Ledger’s films important now is that we can’t help but look at his performances with greater scrutiny. A.O. Scott tells us today that we will be rewarded for doing so. He warns us not to look at the circumstances, the gossip, the frenzy. This makes me contemplate whether we respond to masterpieces, American masterpieces perhaps, as works that contain necessary flaws that must be held together by an otherwordly, perfecting presence, one stronger than the work surrounding, one that transcends even death. Ledger’s performances, like those of James Dean and others who died young, may create masterpieces with their mortality.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m 27. I think this is first and foremost a tragedy. But I feel honored to see some of his quieter works, to enjoy them and take the time to praise them.
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