People Before Profit blog

“10 Items or Less”: A movie you might have missed

Fri, 30 Jan 2015 12:43:00 +0000

The picture 10 Items or Less, from 2006, is the sort of gentle, insightful film I wish they made more of. Morgan Freeman is endlessly engaging portraying an unnamed, but well known Hollywood actor, who has not made a picture for the past four years. A meticulous practitioner of his craft, the actor wishes to roll up his sleeves and do some on-location character studies for his next role as a supermarket manager. The clueless lackey of a dubious production company thus drops him off at a grocery store in the community of Carson, California, a largely industrial Los Angeles suburb. It is here that he finds himself stranded, as his ride never returns, and he is placed into the hands of a sympathetic, if unimpressed, checkout employee played by Spanish actress, Paz Vega.

The day's adventures will take the duo to fast food joints, big box stores, into a confrontation with a former spouse, and most memorably, to a car wash. The two are fast to form a candid mentor/pupil relationship as Freeman gives Paz pointers for an upcoming job interview. Of course, as the day goes on, every once in a while it is not so clear who is learning from whom. Freeman's character at times appears silly, but is always sincere and good natured, as he makes the best of each of the somewhat ridiculous roadblocks that the two encounter on the way to get the actor back home to the exclusive enclave of Brentwood.

When watching 10 Items or Less, you will no doubt find other familiar faces in small roles, such as Jim Parson who plays the character Sheldon Cooper on the television hit series The Big Bang Theory. We also get a few glimpses of Bobby Cannavale and Jonah Hill.

Another star of the film is Paz's yellow AMC Gremlin vehicle, the car assembled by United Auto Workers at the once thriving plant in Kenosha, Wisconsin. It is this unlikely conveyance that will take the two through a multitude of greater Los Angeles area landscapes from non-descript dusty back alleys, to the glittering neighborhoods populated by Hollywood power couples.

This is a film that portrays working people with the honesty and affection they so richly deserve.

Viewers of this enjoyable movie are well advised to watch it all the way through the closing credits in order to be treated to a couple of more humorous moments, while enjoying the Latin soundtrack.

Photo: Wikipedia (CC)

Everything old is old again: A word on remakes and sequels

Wed, 28 Jan 2015 13:49:00 +0000

I just heard rumor yesterday that Disney is going to be involved in remaking Indiana Jones, with Chris Pratt as the ideal leading man, in place of Harrison Ford. If true, this is only the latest in an ongoing, decade-long problem. Film studios are trying to remake, reboot, and add new installments to, or spinoffs of, every successful or memorable film you can think of, and destroying the legacies of those films in the process. And there's a reason for that.

Big film studios are becoming greedy. This is the driving motivator behind the whole thing. It's safer to stick with tried and true film franchises that people recognize, and it's been proven that tapping into someone's nostalgia generally piques that person's interest. So, for example, a new Star Wars film won't even be questioned by the average moviegoer. It's Star Wars! It's a guaranteed money-maker. The Transformers movies? They'll make 10 of them, at least. And then there's that nostalgia. A lot of people remember the Ninja Turtles from their childhood, so they'll flock to see a really bad live action rehash of it starring Megan Fox as Megan Fox.

The irony here is that the film studios are missing the whole point. Popular film series like Star Wars were successful because they offered something new, original, and well done. Scarface was loved because it was such a good film, with a stellar lead actor. A remake would only look like a poor imitation, bordering on parody, by comparison.

There are so many things in this world that are better because they're unique. There's only one Golden Gate Bridge. Only one Vitruvian Man (though it has been parodied). There's only one Stonehenge. Would anyone want to try and make a copy of any of these things? It wouldn't be as good as the original. It would have no authenticity.

But one has to, unfortunately, look at this from the perspective of a big film studio. They've determined that it no longer matter if the films lack quality or distinction. The bottom line is what matters, as opposed to taking risks on something new, which, if it doesn't pan out, means money taken out of their pockets. That sort of gamble used to be worth it - it's how great film classics were born.

But studios don't need to do that anymore. Today's generation of kids won't know that the original Indiana Jones or the 80's version of The Goonies (yes, that's being remade) is better. They'll simply be stuck with a low-quality copycat. Film studios know that. They're banking on it. Because they can show each new generation a lesser, regurgitated form of what their parents or grandparents watched.

The sad thing is, it wasn't always that way. Basically, when I was a kid, things were different.

Consider this: in 2014, there were at least 40 major movies that were either remakes, reboots, sequels, threequels, prequels, or spinoffs. In 2004, there were just 19. In 1994, there were 11. And in 1984, there were - wait for it - five. Notice a pattern here?

And it's only going to get worse going forward. Within the next few years, the following remakes, reboots, etc. could all possibly hit theaters:

Terminator, Indiana Jones, Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, Batman, Power Rangers, Goosebumps, Ben-Hur, Frankenstein, The Crow, The Mummy, Poltergeist, Tarzan, Scarface, Pet Sematary, Little Shop of Horrors, King Kong, The Toxic Avenger, Weird Science, Friday the 13th, A Nightmare On Elm Street, The Ring, The Grudge, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Predator, Gremlins, Ghostbusters, Jacob's Ladder, The Omen, Flatliners, An American Werewolf in London, Jumanji, Highlander, Tomb Raider, The Goonies, Robin Hood, The Three Musketeers, Green Lantern, Spawn, Van Helsing, Stargate, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, and The Wild Bunch

Excited yet?

Some people will argue that we're seeing so many remakes because there are just no new ideas left; that there's nothing truly original that can still be done. That's not true. In fact, there are plenty of original ideas out there. Books, alone, provide an excellent example. Check out the Powder Mage trilogy by Brian McClellan, or The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson. Really, really original offerings with exciting twists and compelling narratives.

Look online. There's tons of creative content being developed and uploaded to YouTube every day. Online streaming is big, too. Shows are debuting on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, etc. And I'm sure there are plenty of people trying (and failing) to get their creative movie ideas pitched to big film studios. Take it from someone who writes fantasy - there's no shortage of creativity out there. It's simply a matter of whether that creativity is being repressed. And it is. In the interest of profit. Another ripple effect of capitalism.

But something needs to change, and soon. From the days of ancient Greece and Rome to the modern era, what we now call "pop culture" has always existed, in various forms. Where would we be without the tales of Ulysses, or the writings of Sophocles? Or the works of William Shakespeare? A dearth of new forms of art, whatever format they may be in, is bad for us as a culture, and as an intellectual society.

We will continue to be "dumbed down" as creativity is shunted to the sidelines, and as we are handed shoddy versions of things that already exist. Without new ideas to provoke us, inspire us, and become part of our lives, we will continue to run along like hamsters trapped in a cycle of cultural repetition. And that's a really big loss.

As Bertolt Brecht once said, "Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it."

This article was reposted from my blog at BlakeDeppe.com.

Photo: The iconic Indiana Jones series is merely one group of films possibly getting a remake. | IFC

Book offers analysis on Communist International

Mon, 26 Jan 2015 15:10:00 +0000

The history of U.S. communism and the Communist Party, USA isn't an easy subject to write about. In fact, the Communist Party's contributions to American democracy, workers' rights, African American equality, peace, and a host of other issues, is still hotly contested.

Add into the mix the impact the Moscow-based Communist International (CI) had on U.S. communists and the subject becomes even more contested. Jacob A. Zumoff's "The Communist International and US Communism, 1919-1929" is a welcomed addition to this complex, nuanced and contested history.

Zumoff offers a wealth of documentation to support the often positive, though sometimes negative, impact the CI had on U.S. communism.

He starts his analysis with a brief overview of the forces that coalesced around the Socialist Party, the IWW, and a number of other radical groups, to eventually found the Communist Party, USA and eventually seek support, guidance and legitimacy from the newly formed Soviet Union. An understanding of this uneasy partnership adds historical context to many of the inter-Party conflicts and divisions that would emerge over the ten-year period Zumoff writes about.

After dealing with the formation of the CPUSA, Zumoff switches gears and focuses on the Party's "fight for legality" and the question of influence within mainstream workers' organizations, primarily the conservative-led AFL trade unions.

While the CI based its tactics on "a systematic drive to win the majority of the working class, first and foremost within the old trade unions," (italics in original) not all U.S. communists agreed. Additionally, while Lenin argued against "revolutionary impatience," some communists - formerly of the IWW and/or other radical workers' organizations which were born out of attempts to organize outside of the confines of a conservative, predominantly white AFL leadership structure - interpreted the ascending 'Red Scare' as evidence of the immediacy of revolution and the need to build so-called revolutionary unions, and an underground communist organization.

These questions, and others, helped to shape and mold communists' perspective on legality. As Zumoff writes, "Trying to become a legal party became one of the first battlegrounds to 'Americanize' the Communist movement," of which the CI played a decisive and positive role. In fact, CI leaders claimed "any delay in creating a legal party would be 'a very great mistake,'" (italics in original) and that U.S. communists "should make use of every inch of the ground" and not "...lock ourselves in amongst ourselves." It was added, that this was the "unquestionable instruction of the Comintern."

Obviously, the newly-formed Communist Party and its leadership sincerely grappled with the right tactical and strategic approaches and actively sought the CI's advice and guidance.

Zumoff is at his best when analyzing communists and the labor movement. While, "Most historians who study the influence of Communists in the trade-union movement usually begin in the 1930's, skipping the party's first decade to move on to the era of the CIO," writes Zumoff, this ignores at least "two key aspects of Communist labour work in this period."

"First...in the mid-1920's, the vista for Communist work [in labor] appeared wide. Second, if Communist work in the labour movement did not pay immediate dividends, many of the cadres in the Communist movement in the 1920's went on to play important roles in the 1930's" with the emergence of the CIO. "Furthermore, the relationship between Communists and important labour leaders in the 1930's - especially John L. Lewis - were conditioned by the party's activities in the 1920's."

In short, the Party's work within and outside of the conservative-led AFL, laid the ground work for the emerging CIO-led battles that would ultimately reshape the American labor movement in the years to come.

Party leader Max Bedacht argued that "[AFL president] Gompers, as well as the Industrial Workers of the World, wished and still wish one thing: that the revolutionary workers should leave the trade unions, i.e., they pursue the one and the same reactionary project." However, his opinion was not shared by all communists at the time, and it was partly due to the CI's prestige, influence and ideological insight that early U.S. communists shifted gears away from independent, radical - and isolating - unions and started the tedious, years-long effort of winning influence, trust and leadership among the masses of rank-and-file workers in conservative unions - an effort that would eventually payoff big-time, as the Communist Party would become the most influential radical, Marxist organization in the history of the American labor movement.

Zumoff also spends considerable time on the CI's impact on the CP-affiliated foreign-language federations and their ultimate dismemberment, as well as on the internal power struggles within the Communist Party and the CI's decisive influence on Party leadership at that time. The last four chapter deal with "The Negro Question" and the CI's influence among black and white U.S. communists and the formation of the thesis on "Self-Determination."

While I don't agree with all of Zumoff's arguments, The Communist International and US Communism, 1919-1929 is a detailed, nuanced book that analyses a very important period in U.S. communist history. It is a book worth reading. And reading again.

The Communist International and US Communism, 1919-1929

Jacob A. Zumoff

Brill, 2014, 443 pages

“Billy Elliot”: Broadway musical meets proletarian drama

Fri, 23 Jan 2015 13:08:00 +0000

The genius of Billy Elliot the Musical and secret of its success is that this stage adaptation of the 2000 movie Billy Elliot written by Lee Hall and directed by Stephen Daldry combines two distinct theatrical esthetics. On the one hand, you have Broadway musicals, with all the glitz, razzmatazz, spectacle and foot stomping often associated with this generally commercial, crowd-pleasing form of expression, as in, say, Irving Berlin's Annie Get Your Gun. On the other hand, Elliot also incorporates the dialectic of proletarian drama, which roots the characters and plot firmly in class conflict and consciousness, as in Clifford Odets' 1930s Waiting for Lefty.

As this is a UK-set story, Elliot also integrates elements of an offshoot of proletarian theater - the so-called "kitchen sink drama" - which prominently featured working-class "angry young men" in the lead roles: A good example is John Osborne's aptly named, powerful 1956 play Look Back in Anger, adapted for the screen in 1959, starring a rarely better Richard Burton, Mary Ure, and Claire Bloom, directed by Tony Richardson.

Of course, there have been socially conscious musicals such as the anti-racist South Pacific and West Side Story, and even proletarian musicals, like Marc Blitzstein's Depression-era The Cradle Will Rock.

But Elliot is a much more hybrid mode of theatrical expression. Essentially, it's the story of a 12-year-old son of the working class who strives to become a ballet dancer, set against the backdrop of the historic coalminers' strike in the not-so-Great Britain of the 1980s, and reactionary Prime Minister Maggie Thatcher's brutal suppression of this year-long struggle.

La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts' production is stellar, and especially notable because due to the lead actor's injury during rehearsal, at the last minute Mitchell Tobin stepped in and filled Billy's shoes - and does so admirably. Dana Solimando's choreography, accompanied by a nine-piece orchestra wonderfully playing Elton John's music, is spot on, as are scenic designer Stephen Gifford's sets. Paul Rubin's flying sequence is a show stopper that would give even Ethel Merman pause, and the mise en scène, populated by a large cast, rendered by director Brian Kite, musical director John Glaudini and Solimando, is top notch.

Billy rebels against the macho world view of Easington's working-class men, including his Dad (well played by David Atkinson), with their ethos that boxing is for boys and ballet for girls (and "poofs"), even as the miners resist Thatcherism. Feisty dance instructor Mrs. Wilkinson (sitcom actress Vicki Lewis) takes Billy under her wing in order to help him sprout wings. The play, for which Lee Hall also wrote the book and lyrics, is very much an ode to individuality and plea for tolerance regarding gender roles.

Billy's pal, the cross-dressing lad Michael, is engagingly, sympathetically portrayed with proletarian panache by Jake Kitchin, who seeks to fulfill his own unique form of self expression and identity. (It's interesting to note that in keeping with the show's commercial appeal, the play goes out of its way to inform - or relieve? - the audience that the title character is not gay.)

The play's brilliance is that this personal saga is interwoven with the miners' industrial action, pitting the men of the pits against Thatcher's thugs. At this time, when police brutality is a topical issue across America, Elliot boldly depicts workers fighting the cops. Indeed, there are lines and lyrics about "solidarity forever," "marching forward to socialism," and the like, as the miners heroically battle against all odds. Thatcher is a figure of ridicule mocked by miners in a way that one imagines Charlie Hebdo staffers would appreciate. And what lefty could resist a play ribbing Tory Michael Heseltine?

Yet what is the real message of Elliot? Alas, the miners suffered a historic defeat in their class war against Thatcherism. In the aftermath of this and other setbacks for the British proletariat there was a cinematic cycle that eschewed notions of unity and class struggle as the means to a better life. In 1996's Brassed Off and 1997's The Full Monty (also transformed into a musical), nitty gritty Britty proletarians portrayed by Ewan McGregor, Pete Postlethwaite, Robert Carlyle, Tom Wilkinson, et al, posited the idea that while mass action, unions, and the like may have been noble, they are archaic and no longer viable and relevant in our Brave New World of neo-liberalism, outsourcing, downsizing, free trade treaties, automation, and the like.

No, strikers and street-fighting men need not apply: Their day is gone with the wind. Instead, the way to succeed (largely individually, as opposed to collectively) is by performing in a brass band or becoming a stripper. Do the 2000 film Billy Elliot and 2004's Billy Elliot the Musical likewise assert that class struggle is oh so passé nowadays, and the way for (individual) workers to overcome class restrictions is by becoming ballet dancers? And if so, what of the vast majority of miners who don't have this ability? What of their needs? Are they merely doomed to the scrap heap of capitalist history? Those poor sods: Has the fight for individuality superseded sticking together, and competition trumped cooperation during this period of ebb in the workers' movement?

We cannot know what was in Lee Hall's mind and what the playwright's intent was. But I'm mindful of Marx's dictum: "Ruling class, ruling ideas." Nevertheless, having said that, the nearly three-hour, two-act La Mirada extravaganza is indeed great and well worth seeing. The stylized scenes where the miners battle the police is worth the price of admission alone, along with Billy's proletarian pirouettes. I also saw this musical on Broadway, and in its current incarnation, starring stage "savior" Mitchell Tobin, it stands up well - and even flies.

Billy Elliot the Musical is being performed Wednesday-Thursday at 7:30 pm, Friday-Saturday at 8:00 pm, Saturday-Sunday at 2:00 pm through Feb. 8 at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts, 14900 La Mirada Boulevard, La Mirada, CA 90638. For more info: (562) 944-9801; www.lamiradatheatre.com.

Photo: Vicki Lewis as Mrs. Wilkinson and Mitchell Tobin as Billy. Photo by Michael Lamont. http://www.lamiradatheatre.com/billy_elliot.htm

"Afonya": a movie you might have missed

Fri, 23 Jan 2015 11:04:00 +0000

Afonya Borschov is not the type guy you want for a coworker. Trained as a plumber, the apartment buildings that are under his care are plagued with problems, because Afonya is lazy, careless, lies almost nonstop, feigns illness to get out of work assignments and signs off at quitting time even as water gushes from busted pipes. The film Afonya, produced by the legendary Mosfilm studios during the Soviet period, is mostly played for laughs, but before it is over, the film will become something of a meditation on the male midlife crisis.

The character Afonya is a well-known walking embarrassment to his profession, his photo being prominently displayed in a public kiosk illuminating shirkers and those who have failed in their work. Afonya's route to work is filled with numerous detours and when he does finally arrive on the job he begins scheming on how to squeeze his neighbors for bribes or sell spare parts on the side.

After a payday he heads straight to a bar and gets properly drunk, sharing a bottle and numerous glasses of beer with another tradesman. Upon stumbling into his apartment his girlfriend declares she is fed up and storms off. The next day his friend from the previous evening arrives with a folding bed under his arm, having just been given the heave-ho by his spouse, he takes up residence with Afonya and together, they and the apartment itself both begin to slowly deteriorate.

Afonya tries to change his luck by chasing girls that he thinks are of means or could do him some good, all the while ignoring a sweet and giving young paramedic named Katya who wants nothing more than to help Afonya become a decent human being.

Meanwhile the local collective is growing weary of keeping track of all of Afonya's misdeeds and would rather all just go home and watch TV rather than dream up new disciplines to straighten out their least liked comrade. Eventually the vice-chair of the collective comes to his apartment and has a frank conversation with him, telling him that the worst type of person, the one who does the most damage to society in his estimation, is not the traitor or even the murderer, it is the indifferent. The conversation concludes with yet another job demotion, and this time, a warning that a termination is next.

In a brilliant scene, the increasingly depressed Afonya forces himself to have a good time at a pathetic café, where a sad band grinds out some traditional tunes with zero enthusiasm. In this crushing atmosphere of gloom, our hero attempts to perform a joyful dance amongst the disinterested patrons.

Despite his obvious faults, Katya continues to pine for the seemingly loveless Afonya, and when they finally get together she informs him of a colleague at her own workplace that everyone thought was irredeemable, but that view was incorrect she proclaims, "all mistakes can be corrected."

In 1975, the film Afonya was the box office leader for the year in the Soviet Union. The story remains relatable and enjoyable today as well as being an interesting glimpse into the ups and downs of the Soviet experiment.

Photo: Wikipedia (CC)

Nursing home workers write their stories with “Loving Hands”

Thu, 22 Jan 2015 14:48:00 +0000

"With Our Loving Hands: 1199 NE Nursing Home Workers Tell their Story" is an unusual book for several reasons.

First of all, the authors are workers, they're women and they mainly immigrants. The stories are about their lives and about their work in nursing homes as "Certified Nursing Assistants"- work that is underpaid and underappreciated.

The anthology of vignettes is published by Hardball Press and edited by Tim Sheard. In his introduction to the book he says, "when workers are given the time to write, read aloud and discuss their stories, the value of their work is reaffirmed."

The book was the result of a collaboration between Sheard, who in addition to being a writer and publisher is himself a health care worker, and Steve Bender, the executive director of the union's Training Fund, who says, "I hope that reading this beautiful collection will give you some insight into the world that these committed nursing home workers live every day."

As the title says, these are stories about work, but work of a special kind, because in addition to training and practical skills a requirement of the job is kindness. Some of the stories are also about the writers' personal lives and struggles, their family situations and the reasons they become nursing home workers.

Briget Williams writes, "I make it my duty to question all my residents about their earlier days, where they worked, what they did when they were younger, and about their families. So when I am caring for them I see them as the real person and not just a resident."

My only criticism of the book is that the stories don't convey how hard these jobs must be: working with unhappy or uncomfortable patients; doing physically demanding and low paid work. I imagine there must be problems with lack of respect by administrators, and with wages, sick days, and other benefits that the union has fought to extend to all of the workers it represents. I imagine it has to be hard to work in a setting where death is a regular occurrence. In his introduction, Bender says that over many years with the union, he's heard members' stories, some of which make him smile while others "leave me sad and shaking my head." The collection doesn't include many of those, and that left a gap.

But on the other hand, I also understand why the authors chose to write about positive experiences: about overcoming adversity, both in and outside the job, about their pride in what they do, and about how they improve the lives of those they tend to with their "loving hands."

Nursing Home Certified Nurses Assistant Glorin Smith reads a story about a client who did not look well and what she did about it.

Book review

With Our Loving Hands: 1199 NE Nursing Home Workers Tell their Story

Edited by Tim Sheard

Hard Ball Press, 2014, 144 pp, $12.50

Photo: 1199NE members Sharon Benjamin and Advira Linton, two of the authors published in Hard Ball Press book, "With Our Loving Hands," attend a celebratory book launch at 1199Training Fund in New York City, Dec. 11, 2014 (via 1199Training Fund).

“From Spring to Summer”: A movie you might have missed

Fri, 16 Jan 2015 14:52:00 +0000

Ever since the film Comrade Kim Goes Flying made the rounds of prominent film festivals in 2012, there has been an increased interest in motion pictures from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. One that people should check out is From Spring to Summer, a 1988 co-production between studios in North Korea and the Soviet Union.

The film is set during World War II, and follows a fairly well known plot device for movies set at that time, following soldiers who engage in a desperate battle to destroy a key objective. In this case, the objective is a secret germ warfare laboratory where the Japanese engineers of Unit 731 are testing bacteriological weapons on Allied prisoners of war. Unit 731 was an actual team of soldiers and scientists attached to the Kwantung Army. The Kwantung Army was a breeding ground for the worst of the Japanese militarists, producing such notorious characters as Seishirō Itagaki and Hideki Tojo, both of whom would wind up at the end of a rope when convicted of war crimes.

Interestingly, Unit 731 is not widely written about in the West, most likely because the researchers from it who fell into American hands were given immunity from prosecution so they could be folded into the USA's own weapons research program, while those the Soviets captured were quite properly brought to justice for their unspeakable crimes. This is reminiscent of recent reports that the CIA put at least 1,000 Nazis on the U.S. payroll after the war.

As the film opens, we are introduced to Masha Chuganova, a young Red Army solider. Masha has been assigned to an élite squad of Soviet Scouts who are charged with locating and destroying the laboratory. A stranger to the other soldiers, Masha was picked as a replacement for the woman who would normally have gone on the assignment when it was discovered that she was pregnant. Masha is a fitting substitute, however, as she is familiar with the Korean language, culture and customs, thanks to her friendship with Korean families who populated her Siberian hometown.

The film eschews studio sets for on-location shooting and takes the viewer from inside a Soviet submarine to the fascinating expanse of the Korean countryside.

During the mission Masha quickly forms a bond with Choe, the Korean guide of the group, but things go badly for the mission from the start. Choe is ambushed on the first day and the team is in constant jeopardy from then on. Like any good covert mission movie, the film is full of hair-raising escapes, close calls, and running gun battles. It also includes a few unexpected twists.

The Korean people suffered mightily under the cruel occupation of imperialist Japan, just as everyone around the world suffers when capitalist governments use the military to achieve their aims. That sad reality is brought to life in this well constructed war picture.

Photo: Screen shot.

“Selma” will inspire you

Fri, 16 Jan 2015 14:19:00 +0000

The movie Selma is a dramatic portrayal of how history was made by African-American men, women and children and their white allies in Alabama, the cradle of the confederacy. It's about people who decided to take a stand and make the ultimate sacrifice. The opening scene is in Birmingham where the KKK blew up more Black churches than anywhere in the United States. Thus right away we are thrust into the thick of things, the real dirt and blood of battle of the Civil Rights Movement in the mid-1960s with all the emotional and physical pain one can bare. Through the eye of the camera we are immediately swept into the graphically violent acts of KKK terror.

True art imitates life but it can never be art for art's sake. The most elevated art is but a reflection of the struggles, ideas and inspiration of a particular nation, class or race. Through her eloquent and powerful graphic presentation of events leading up to the historic march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, Ava DuVernay, the director and producer of the film, has shown us more social and political truths than all the politicians, pundits and moralists put together. She achieved this by giving a truthful depiction, by having a concrete historical approach to the events described and by giving depth and content to the ideals and genuine passions that express the many-sided facets of individual characters.

There is no abstract moralizing, no impersonations instead of live characters. The cast of characters, Dr. King, Coretta, Malcolm X, LBJ, J. Edgar Hoover manifest from the actions they are engaged in the purpose and direction of the movie. There are bombings, police brutalities and murder, jailing and repression served up by racist white mob violence, the local police and highway patrol. There is the FBI harassment orchestrated by J. Edgar Hoover and buttressed by the political chicanery of LBJ; and yet these courageous people continue to march and protest, continue to rise up in spite of threats, murderous violence, slander and numerous dirty tricks.

They dared to struggle and dared to win. LBJ dared to try to hold the movement back and he lost. But the driving force in the fight for the right to vote was the people, that vast army of men and women who were workers, students, men of the cloth, mothers and their children, seniors, radicals, socialists and communists who put their bodies on the line over and over again; these were the people who came face to face with the armed might of the state, who bled and died in the streets of Selma and yet did not falter in their resolve to march on. It was these people and their leaders, who walked through the valley of the shadow of death, that gave us our finest hour and that fleeting moment of glory before the assassin's bullet found first Malcolm and then King.

Those who decry this movie as a farce because it didn't make LBJ the hero who saved the day are a farce themselves. I am talking about the New York Times and the Washington Post and all their cohorts. Go see the movie and I promise you, that because you have a conscience it will speak to you in the words of Dr. King: "No lie can live forever...Truth crushed to earth shall rise again...I have seen the promised land...I fear not any man...mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!"

This is the movie for the world to see because it gives to one an inside look into one of the most racist and oppressive societies known to humanity. But you can't venture to look and not be moved in your heart and mind to detest the cruelties of racism and to love and be in solidarity with those who fight back. If you are in the struggle it will inspire you to stay in and give more, if you are not it may inspire you to join the struggle and make it your life.

Photo: Still from movie website.

Selma

Director: Ava DuVernay

Writers: Paul Webb and Ava DuVernay

Starring: David Oyelowo, Tom Wilkinson, Carmen Ejogo, Tim Roth, Oprah Winfrey

128 minutes, PG-13

Selma Movie - Glory Lyric Video

Frank Chapman is Education Director and member of the executive committee of the Chicago Alliance Against Racial and Political Oppression.

“Blackhat”: The thinker’s thriller

Fri, 16 Jan 2015 13:04:00 +0000

Around the time the anti-nuclear film The China Syndrome was released in 1979, the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor calamity occurred. Similarly, just days before the opening of Universal's hacking epic Blackhat, the U.S. Central Command's Twitter account was hacked by ISIS. Not to mention the recent Sony saga, wherein unflattering emails and other sensitive data were laid bare, and North Korea was blamed for this computer hacking. Although the DPRK denied these allegations, North Korea's Internet system then experienced technical difficulties, with computer outages.

The above cyberattacks seem like publicity stunts to ballyhoo Blackhat. Not even the most inventive Hollywood press agent could conjure up the PR bonanza Universal is enjoying, free of charge, with Blackhat opening Jan. 16 amidst these hack attacks. But instead of instigating promotions, it seems that director Michael Mann and screenwriter Morgan Davis Foehl have their proverbial fingers on the pulse - not to mention the digital Zeitgeist.

While many action-packed blockbusters full of explosions and nonstop violence are merely mindless "entertainment" and escapist flicks, with their two hour-plus stylish, cinematic work Mann and Foehl have created the thinker's thriller. In it, Chris Hemsworth, who has played Thor in the Marvel movie versions of the Norse God of Thunder, proves he can also portray an action hero outside of a superhero costume. His Nicholas Hathaway is a Dirty Dozen-like computer genius whom authorities release from prison to help them stop an über hacker who has caused a Three Mile Island-like disaster in China.

Along the way Hathaway hooks up with American and Chinese agents and computer whizzes, including Viola Davis as a 9/11-haunted operative, John Ortiz, plus Leehom Wang and Wei Tang as the touching brother-sister team Chen Dawai and Lien Chen. The sprawling movie travels to distant destinations, with great cinematography of Hong Kong, Malaysia and Indonesia: Its location shooting is one of Blackhat's strong suits.

Another great thing about Blackhat is how the camerawork creatively, imaginatively visualizes computer hacking in a cinematic manner. At first, given the whole NSA scandal Edward Snowden heroically revealed, as documented in Laura Poitras' Oscar nominated nonfiction Citizenfour and beyond, this reviewer initially thought Blackhat would be about surveillance, but it's about that other scourge of the Internet, hacking, instead.

Mann has made socially aware films before, in particular 1999's The Insider, about an anti-tobacco whistleblower and how "60 Minutes" blew his story, plus his 2001 boxer biopic Ali, a film that pulled no punches and took off the gloves when it came to Muhammad Ali's resistance to the draft, the Vietnam War, and racism. Blackhat's plot moves in unexpected directions as Hathaway, Lien and company try to unravel the mystery of who did the hacking - and more importantly, why?

Although in its form and content Blackhat is thoughtful (if sometimes ponderous and hard to follow), the movie displays Mann's filmic flair for action. The director brings the same cinematic sensibility to Blackhat's riveting shootouts that Mann infused in 2006's Miami Vice and 1995's Heat. As in his 1992 The Last of the Mohicans, though, Mann combines action with intelligence.

In that age-old tradition of the Western male romancing the "Oriental" female (can you say "Madame Butterfly?"), Hathaway and Lien inexorably couple up. Although the lovers are filmed in bed together, she is always more or less dressed and beneath blankets or sheets, which seems rather odd, considering the fact that it's pretty hot outside (apparently hotter than inside). Perhaps this has something to do with the film's financing and its release in the world's biggest movie market, China? Tang was far sexier in Ang Lee's 2007 Lust, Caution, which reportedly caused her to have problems with PRC film officialdom. The apparent effort to curry favor with the Chinese may also explain the depiction of various PRC authorities, officers, agents, etc.

Another curious thing about Blackhat is how the story unfolds in a futuristic world of hi-tech high rises in Hong Kong and elsewhere, but for some reason the characters usually shack up, lie low and hide out in fleabag low-rise dives. The contrasts are stark.

Nevertheless, by tackling a ripped-from-the-headlines crisis Mann has made the tried and true thriller genre timely and cutting edge, as well as sitting-on-the-edge-of-your-seat exciting. Welcome to the not-so-brave new world of hacking.

Photo: Wikipedia (CC)

Hello to Godard’s latest film, “Goodbye to Language”

Thu, 15 Jan 2015 13:46:00 +0000

During the 70-minute Goodbye to Language (Adieu Au Langage), its soundtrack fades in and out, but to paraphrase TV's 1960s sci-fi series "The Outer Limits:" "There is nothing wrong with your screen. Do not attempt to adjust the picture" - because the effect is deliberate. True to form, this is a Jean-Luc Godard production, after all.

I haven't the slightest clue as to what Godard's latest film is about, and God(ard) only knows if the 84-year-old filmmaker does. Goodbye to Language is completely indecipherable to moi, just as his 2010 film Socialisme was (seriously, comrades, can anybody please explain what that movie remotely had to do with socialism?). Indeed, just about every post-1982 Godard work has defied comprehension and description. Could this Nouvelle Vague motion picture pioneer be any vaguer and more opaque?

Now that this obligatory disclaimer is out of the way, however, please permit me to add that I nevertheless quite enjoyed Goodbye to Language. Godard's 43rd film, and his first shot in 3D, is full of visually striking, shimmering, arresting imagery, and truth be told, is quite beautiful to behold.

This barrage of picture and sound contains some sort of love triangle, including graphic nudity, and a lead actor is completely naked (if furry) throughout Language. That's because this protagonist is a dog, portrayed by Godard's own pet, Roxy. There are stunning images of Roxy, whose snout is quite glorious in 3D, and who provides a kind of animal's eye view on the doings of us mere mortals. Press notes don't reveal whether or not Roxy uses the Stanislavsky Method, and the mutt isn't granting (or grunting) any interviews. But Roxy is a good actor with a naturalistic technique, although it should be noted that this thesp speaks with a canine accent.

Language is full of the Godardian leitmotifs and techniques that he has hurled onto the screen for more than half a century, since his first 2D feature, 1960's Breathless and earlier shorts. There are titles, jumpy cuts, clips from Hollywood flicks, lots of philosophical ruminations, mutterings about Mao and Che, a male/female couple striving to transcend alienation to find love (see Godard's recently re-released 1965 masterpiece Alphaville), the aforementioned full frontal nudity and more.

Interestingly, Language ends with verbal references to the Marquesas Islands, located in Paris' overseas territory of French Polynesia. There is some sort of murder mystery, perhaps terrorism (hey, if you haven't seen it yet your guess is as good as that of the initiated), overbearing, omniscient state oppression and so on, but much of it is off-screen, oblique, fragmented, hard to piece together. Or maybe it's just all in the viewer's poor muddled head?

Jean-Luc Godard is widely regarded as French, but in fact he is part Swiss, and the "genius of Rolle" has lived in the French-speaking canton of Vaud (where Charlie Chaplin spent the last quarter century of his life) near the banks of Lake Geneva (Lac Leman) for decades. In 1960 Godard married his leading lady Anna Karina in Switzerland (they have long since parted ways, on- and off-screen). The New Wave trailblazer has made many films in Switzerland, as early as 1963's Le petit soldat, which was shot in Geneva.

Language was shot largely in Vaud, including Nyon. For some reason it includes recurring shots of the Belle Epoque-era Savoie, a paddle-steamer that sails from Geneva around Lac Leman. Goodbye to Language won the Cannes Film Festival Jury prize and the U.S. National Society of Film Critics award for 2014's film of the year, and was nominated for the Progie Award for Best Progressive Picture and Best Progressive Foreign Film by the James Agee Cinema Circle.

To be sure, Language isn't every moviegoer's cup of Tinseltown tea. Most popcorn munchers at the multiplex keen on explosions, exposition, plot, dialogue, escapist action and other Hollywood movie conventions will probably prefer to spend their greenery elsewhere.

But for those hardy few who favor the avant-garde, experimental, poetic, philosophical and challenging, Godard's newest film is essential existential viewing, must-see cinema by one of our movie masters, as he transports serious cinéastes beyond art's outer limits. One muses that Language is speaking its own language and is as hard to understand today as Breathless' jump cuts were difficult for 1960 audiences to grasp. I for one may not have understood Language, but I sure liked it.

This opulent treat for the eyes features Héloïse Godet, Kamel Abdelli, Richard Chevallier, Zoé Bruneau, Christian Gregori, Jessica Erickson, and Roxy, and is in French with English subtitles. Goodbye to Language is playing from January 23-29 in a rare, week-long exclusive engagement at the Aero Theatre, 1328 Montana Avenue, Santa Monica, CA. Watch for national release.

Hope is the root of activism

Wed, 14 Jan 2015 13:31:00 +0000

During the recent holidays, my wife Susan and I managed to make it to a couple of public demonstrations for justice. In between the various gatherings with friends and religious observations, we also attended a pair of arts events. One was a theater piece focused on the historic Central Avenue of early African-American Los Angeles. The other was a post-modern, experimental movement set, produced by our friend Suchi, who teaches dance at Scripps College in Claremont.

Yes, we celebrated the holiday festivals with religious experiences, friends, activism, and art. You would expect religion and friends from a minister, of course, and maybe political actions - but art?

I believe that aesthetic experiences carry the power to sustain activists. The classic periods of social upheaval almost always come with parallel movements in the arts. In my lifetime, the rise of the United Farm Workers union brought El Teatro Campesino - the agitprop crew who mirrored back to the farm workers the conditions of their work and the oppressive practices of their bosses. The civil rights movement was accompanied by music - not only by well-known performers but by the people on the picket lines themselves. Urban activism in that era often came with theater based in many areas of the country, such as the San Francisco Mime Troupe or the Company Theater in Los Angeles - even internationally with troupes like t he Living Theater.

These experiences sustained our social change work by giving us a reflection of ourselves and our efforts, providing inspiration and self-evaluation. They did then, they still do. As Suchi puts it, "Art [is] sustenance for the long struggle that we are waging for justice, racial equality, fairness. I see the performance very much as a moment to cry, grieve, mourn and reflect on what gives us strength. I hope you feel that way from the performance...."

No wonder, then, that at Suchi's dance concert, I first learned about #Black Brunch, a group of Oakland and New York artists and activists who file into cafés on Sunday mornings in chic parts of the Bay Area and Manhattan, where they announce the names of black youth killed by white police officers, inviting the diners to join them by calling out "ashe" [pronounced ah-SHAY] meaning "amen" or "so be it" after the reading of each victim's name and age. Simple. Straight-forward. Respectful. Then they leave.

Activism like that takes courage and wisdom. It emerges out of deep places in the human spirit, the interior felt-life experience expressed by the arts and also by religion. The symbols and the stories of faith traditions contain motivation for persevering in the work of justice. All religions believe in justice, we like to say, but also in hope. In the religious way of thinking, hope is an ontological strand of belief. It affirms that the "arc of the universe bends toward justice," as Martin Luther King, Jr., liked to quote. Hope means that we believe justice is built into the fabric of the cosmos itself. Our work is to participate in that "finishing of creation," as some of the creeds put it.

Whether or not we consider ourselves religious, or make it a point to set aside time for perspective-changing art experiences, as activists we must find ways that sustain us. Albert Camus, the French writer who lived as part of the Resistance under fascism, wrote about the motivation for a life of advocacy against injustice. For Camus each person must identify their own role within their view of the world. He offered a life lived against the grain as a grounding sense of meaning for one's self.

"I rebel, therefore, I am," was the mantra from one of his book-long essays. We find meaning and define our life's purpose by holding out for justice in a world that seems not to care so much about it. Against that callous indifference, I am because I rebel.

I always think that Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Jan. 15 birthday, celebrated this year on the 19th, is a time for the nation and each of us to consider the values we will live out over the coming year. His holiday next week concludes the winter festivals with a call for clarity and action. It urges us to root those values in deep places in our culture and in our souls. Ashe.

Reprinted by permission of the author and Capital and Main.

Rev. Jim Conn is the founding minister of the Church in Ocean Park and served on the Santa Monica City Council and as that city's mayor. He helped found Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice, Los Angeles, and was its second chair, and was a founder of Santa Monica's renter's rights campaign.

Photo: #blackbrunch in Oakland | Sarah O'Neal

"Little Big Man": A movie you might have missed

Tue, 13 Jan 2015 16:50:00 +0000

The American West was never wilder than in the 1970 film Little Big Man starring Dustin Hoffman in the title role and directed by Arthur Penn. Little Big Man is a relief from the usual nationalistic, revisionist whitewashing that Americans get in narratives regarding their own history.

The film put an end to the portrayal of the settling of the West as a bugle-blowing heroic exercise of taming the savage inhabitants. The U.S. Army is shown as ignorant, cruel executioners of a policy of extermination.

Hoffman plays Jack Crabb, a 121 year old man (with exceptional assistance from make-up artist Dick Smith) looking back at his life as a pioneer in America's Old West. As a 10 year old, Jack is in a wagon train headed into the western frontier. The wagons are overwhelmed by a Pawnee band, but the child Jack Crabb is spirited away and promptly deposited with the Cheyenne where Old Lodge Skins (played by chief Dan George) raises him as one of his own. Jack is given the name "Little Big Man" because he is short but very brave. Later, as a young man, he is recaptured in a skirmish with a patrol of the U.S. Cavalry. Thus begins the character's ongoing back and forth, straddling the two worlds of the Native Americans and European settlers, slipping in and out of each several times, as a series of odd circumstances conspire again and again to return him to the opposite side.

The Crabb character has a variety of adventures associated with this period in history, and interacts with a number of real historical personalities. During one of his stints in the white world, he discovers that he possesses a natural talent as a marksman with a pistol, and attempts to remake himself as a gunfighter. This enterprise meets with hilarious results. Hoffman dons a ridiculous costume and adopts the ludicrous moniker of the "Soda Pop Kid." It is at this juncture that one wonders if the filmmakers had been exposed to the film Lemonade Joe, a 1964 satire on the Western genre that was produced in then-socialist Czechoslovakia. In that film the non-drinking protagonist uses a revolver to shoot a horsefly out of the sky, and the similarities don't end there.

In a horrific scene, George Armstrong Custer and the 7th Cavalry make a surprise attack on the Cheyenne camp at the Washita River. A now-blind and elderly Old Lodge Skins is saved by Jack, but his wife Sunshine, their child, and her sisters are killed. Jack tries to infiltrate Custer's camp to exact revenge, but loses his nerve. Years later, Jack Crabb prepares to commit suicide, but sees Custer and his troops marching nearby, and decides to return to his quest for revenge. Custer hires him as a scout.

Little Big Man is not carried by the considerable acting abilities of Hoffman alone. It boasts an outstanding supporting cast, including Richard Mulligan as George Armstrong Custer, who comes across as a laughable, eccentric and reckless, if occasionally cunning egotist.

Faye Dunaway is a delight as the bored and sensuous wife of a gluttonous minister charged with readjusting the wild native child to white Christian civilization.

Native-American actor Dan George is unforgettable as the tribal elder who takes the Hoffman character under his wing. His best scene comes in the final third of the film when he laments the hopeless situation of the native peoples. He sadly concludes, "If things keep trying to live, white man will rub them out!" and thus realizes that the fate of his people is sealed.

Just last year Little Big Man was added to the National Film Registry at the Library of Congress, deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." A praiseworthy decision, to be sure.

From neo-realism to neo-liberalism: “Two Days, One Night”

Thu, 08 Jan 2015 11:06:00 +0000

The word "depression" indicates a downturn, and can refer to psychological or economic dimensions. In the Dardenne Brothers' Two Days, One Night, Marion Cotillard poignantly portrays Sandra, a Belgian proletarian who is fighting both. After recovering from an illness, Sandra returns to her workplace, a small plant manufacturing solar panels. However, her absence suggests to the firm's cost-cutting owners and management that they can maximize profit by reducing the workforce, and give the employees a soul-wrenching choice: They can vote to retain Sandra or to eliminate her job and each receive a bonus.

Sandra is faced with this conundrum, and as the film title signals, she has a short time to lobby her colleagues to reverse their earlier decision in favor of terminating her. Unemployment, of course, would have a devastating effect on the family of this young mother and wife, so she frantically sets out to sway her co-workers to support her during an upcoming revote and save her job.

Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne's Two Days, One Night is Belgium's Official Submission for Best Foreign Language Film at the 87^th Academy Awards and winner of or nominee for 52 awards. Cotillard, who previously struck Oscar gold as chanteuse Edith Piaf in 2007's La Vie en Rose - one of the rare times a foreign actor has scored a Best Acting Academy Award in a non-English speaking role - is being widely touted for another Oscar nom. (We'll find out Jan. 15 when the Academy announces its nominations.)

Two Days, One Night is made in a neo-realist style, which betrays the Dardennes' documentary background (unlike most movies, it was shot in chronological order). Further enhancing its dramatic impact is that their film is also a microcosm of and parable about the state of the working class and the workers' movement in the contemporary West. As the desperate Sandra tries to rally her comrades against their bosses' ploy, the theme of solidarity is explored against the subtext and backdrop of a ultra-competitive, cutthroat capitalism, where it's every man and woman for themselves. Our age of downsizing and outsourcing has wreaked havoc upon the proletariat, concurrent with the shrinking of unionization and of socialist, pro-worker parties, policies and politics.

In this context it's not remarkable that people will sell out. What is astonishing is how little they will betray each other for, such as the pittance the bosses offer their workers at Sandra's expense - scraps from the capitalists' table, which some of her salivating associates are eager to chomp into in our not-so-brave dog-eat-dog world. At least Sandra's husband Manu (Belgian actor Fabrizio Rongione) and children remain steadfast.

In lots of Hollywood mass-entertainment spectacles about zombies, vampires, alien invasion and superheroes, mindless violence and action fill the screen. But there's more drama and reality in the central storyline of Two Days, One Night: Will Sandra be able to keep her job? Like Antonio in Vittorio De Sica's 1948 classic The Bicycle Thief, the importance of employment for ordinary people is at the heart of the drama.

What may be this film's most profound insight is how the attitudes of Sandra's co-workers and how they treat her affect her mood, temperament and self-esteem. It subtly reveals what could be called a psychology of solidarity - or what happens in its absence. The Dardennes show how the simple act of sticking together - or not - impacts human consciousness (and unconsciousness).

Cotillard is one of those rare actresses who is as much at home in foreign films and indies as she is in Tinseltown blockbusters. American popcorn munchers will recognize Cotillard from her appearances on the big screen at multiplexes in crowd-pleasers such as Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues, The Dark Knight Rises, as well as Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris. Look for her later this year as Lady Macbeth in a film version of the Bard's "Scottish play." Cotillard delivers a tour de force performance as Sandra. It ranks among her best roles, as Edith Piaf and Stephanie, the disabled whale trainer who rediscovers sex in the harrowing Rust and Bone.

According to press notes, the Dardennes are "[k]nown for their starkly realistic approach to working-class themes and characters with a heavy dose of social consciousness." In terms of recent cinema, these co-auteurs are Continental counterparts to Britain's Ken Loach and Mike Leigh. With Two Days, One Night and its stellar lead actor, these co-writers/co-directors have captured a moment in time when the beleaguered proletariat is in retreat, and in dire need of workers of the world uniting.

The made-in-Belgium, subtitled, Oscar-worthy film is now in nationwide release.

Photo: Wikipedia (CC)

"The Imitation Game": Binary consciousness at many levels

Tue, 06 Jan 2015 14:29:00 +0000

The Imitation Game is the enthralling story of an inspired, harassed and troubled genius, British mathematician Alan Turing, whose conquest of the "unbreakable" Nazi "Enigma" code ultimately led to the Allied victory in World War II. Turing was convinced that "Only a machine could beat another machine." Viewed in historical hindsight, "Turing's machine" was in effect the invention of the modern-day computer.

The script by Graham Moore, based on Andrew Hodges' biography Alan Turing: The Enigma, frequently touches on the dichotomous relationship between humans and machines, embodied first and foremost in the person of Turing, who is depicted from the outset as a socially clueless, inwardly focused deep thinker, an "odd duck," someone who today would likely be viewed as being on the autistic spectrum, with a pronounced obsessive-compulsive personality.

Flashbacks to Turing's teenage school years at Sherborne (where some of the filming took place) show his budding relationship with fellow student Christopher, the only person who understood him and encouraged his special intelligence. The two are especially drawn to codes and games, crossword puzzles and cryptograms, which become the primary vehicle of their embedded communication. This friend became, for Turing, a permanent obsession, long after Christopher's early death. Turing named his machine Christopher in his memory, the only object onto which he could project his enduring love.

Even as a schoolboy, Turing understands that people do not usually or entirely say what they mean when they speak, a thematic underpinning that declares itself throughout the narrative. One could say that in-person interactive human communication is but an "imitation" of what is truly meant. Tipped off by the title itself, viewers might well have many engaging conversations with other filmgoers as to just what aspects of the theme they can discern, how many pieces of this intricate puzzle they are able to put into place.

Winston Churchill recognized the primacy of breaking Enigma, and spared no expense. Within short order, Turing beat back the slower, less visionary thinkers on the team, and became its leader. A prickly tension runs between Turing (played marvelously by Benedict Cumberbatch) and Commander Alastair Denniston (a chillingly effective Charles Dance). If the Commander knows anything at all, he knows what three ingredients are needed to win a war: Order, discipline, and chain of command. Turing, of course, knows that his challenge extends far beyond the existing framework of thought and must reach a higher, more inventive, intuitive, even playful level.

One thinks of the work of social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, whose controversial 2012 study The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion denoted differences between the conservative and the liberal brains. One emphasizes control, regimentation, authority; the other openness, tolerance, free inquiry and pluralism. Too many limits can produce an uncontrollable form of disorder and no entrée to the future, while a surfeit of independence of thought and action (perhaps best suited to artists and geniuses) will not by itself get the job done.

Once put in charge, Turing designs an application for new employees based on a sophisticated test of out-of-the-box perception. He dares to hire Joan Clarke (played engagingly by Keira Knightley), a brilliant young woman who is, like Turing himself, an underappreciated intellect very nearly smothered under the blanket of British respectability. The film serves equally well advocating for the mentally "different," homosexuals, and women's equality. "Sometimes it's the people that no one imagines anything of," a thrice-repeated line in the film reminds us, "who do the things no one can imagine."

A leitmotif of the film is the hunt for purported undercover Soviet agents. Much of the war effort depended on secrecy, naturally, but there were Brits at all levels concerned that the Soviet allies be more consulted on Allied strategic plans than some of the Allied leadership seemed willing to provide. Like everything else in this historical thriller, lines are blurred, relationships murky, truth is elusive, allegiances subject to question.

All the while, widespread suffering increases day by bloody day: The Germans' aerial bombing of British cities, increasing hunger in the land, evacuation of children to the countryside, and in the war theaters, torpedoed convoys of supply and troop ships and massive death on the front lines. The high command grows more and more impatient with the Turing team seemingly whiling away their time on a massive room-sized Tinker toy. People are asking, "How long?"

A turning point in the final month of funding granted to the project comes when a low-level auditor of encrypted German broadcasts casually stumbles on the key to Enigma, owing to her "woman's intuition." Again, a case of no one imagining an employee at that level capable of contributing the one necessary critical insight.

The most emotionally wrenching part of the film follows the solution of the Enigma code. That's when it has to be decided, Who can know that the code has been solved? And who determines the application of the new knowledge the Allies have now acquired as to German movements and plans? For if the Germans know that their Enigma has been figured out, they will simply switch to another method of encryption, and the Allies will suddenly be hurled back to square one.

Now that the "Turing machine" has been invented, a new field of statistical analysis using the vast metadata from the Germans must be filtered through an elegant algorithm calculated not to reveal too much, yet effectively to win the war. Yes, all governments lie. At times like these, however, we must admit that secrecy is necessary for the larger aims of civilization, even when - especially when - a great number of lives are on the line. Who draws those lines, and where? Ay, there's the rub, as an old Brit might have said.

Turing's post-war life is treated in the film as well. Hugh Whitemore's 1986 play Breaking the Code was one of the first contemporary acts of revelation about this seminal thinker, so his fate is widely known by now. The height of irony is that someone who abhorred violence - a fair amount had been directed at him along the way - would in the end, on June 7, 1954, commit the act of self-destruction that ended his life of pure torment at the tragically early age of 41, thanks to the British justice system that criminalized sex between men.

The British government eventually came to its senses, and by 1967 no longer defined homosexuality as a crime. Posthumous apologies to Turing were duly issued, and as his role in World War II became known, he was recognized as the man whose keen, hyperactive mind saved an estimated 14 million lives. Whole fields of scientific inquiry and advancement flowed forth from his "Christopher," his bulky, clunking hulk of a machine. The world is inevitably a more complex place to inhabit because of it, in many ways far, far better; in other ways perhaps much worse.

Morten Tyldum directed this superb film, deserving of a huge audience. It won the People's Choice Award at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. A final word goes to the composer of the score, Alexandre Desplat, who at key moments shifts into a Steve Reich type of binary minimalism that perfectly captures the early spirit of computers. Not to be missed.

The Imitation Game

Rated PG-13, 114 minutes.

Director: Morten Tyldum ; Writers: Andrew Hodges (book), Graham Moore (screenplay); Stars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode

Photo: Film still from website.

Stuart Scott captured hearts of millions, including mine

Mon, 05 Jan 2015 13:11:00 +0000

Stuart Scott, acclaimed ESPN sports broadcaster and journalist, who brought his unique style, enthusiasm, and honesty every day to sports reporting and, in doing so, captured the hearts of millions of sports fans, died yesterday at the age of 49 of cancer. ESPN is doing some beautiful tributes to him, many of which are in the words of his coworkers and other people, including President Obama, whom he touched in his life and distinguished career. He was one of a kind and his footprint on sports journalism and young aspiring journalists will continue long into the future. Scott, who included more than a dollop of the energy and language of the hip-hop culture to his journalism when he joined the ESPN team, was, to use one of his famous inventive phrases, "cool as the other side of the pillow." He leaves behind a partner and two beautiful daughters, whom he dearly loved, and many, many more grieving fans, and I'm one of them.

http://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2015/01/04/bts-espn-anchor-stuart-scott-dies.espn

Photo: Stuart Scott (Wikipedia)