People Before Profit blog

Profit takers reimagined as nation makers

Fri, 30 Nov 2012 11:19:00 +0000

The recent four-part History Channel series, The Men Who Built America, was constructed upon the premise that a handful of wealthy, powerful men determined the course of the nation at the turn of the last century, making lasting contributions as well as strengthening the nation while filling their pockets. Over the course of the series we watch the expansion of capitalism in the US from the civil war through to the early 20th century, and we are served dramatized sketches of famous captains of industry. This is certainly a period worthy of time and interest, and the men profiled (Cornelius Vanderbilt. John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, J. P. Morgan and Henry Ford) are without doubt both important and interesting, but the program is seriously flawed and riddled with injustice to both truth and perspective.

One can easily imagine why such a premise for a documentary series seems worthwhile at this point in time. We seem on a trajectory away from being the most powerful economic power on the planet, so retracing the path would seem at the very least instructive. We also find ourselves challenged by growing income inequality that by all rights should belong in the past of any society moving forward, so again some historical insight seems prudent. But what we find in this production is shallow hagiography. This is unavoidable given the approach the producers took: they regard these few as innovators rather than opportunists, and benefactors rather than exploiters. One doesn't necessarily need to have an opinion one way or another about any of these men to recognize that there's little depth to this effort. The production is more docudrama than documentary. We are treated to handsome actors and lots of CGI in narrated live action sequences in place of sober narration and actual images from the era. This approach is common to History Channel material, and it's neither substantial nor rewarding. There's a reason people laud Ken Burns and his thorough and earnest approach, while the folks who create this sort of softer, more entertainment-oriented material remain unknown. The staging tends to favor creating little vignettes of melodrama rather than offering insight.

Of course, the on-screen commentary proves even more of a problem. There's a large number of present-day business icons- from Alan Greenspan and Jack Welch to Russel Simmons, Donny Deutsch and even Donald Trump (!) This means there's much hot air generated, and amusingly these potentates spend as much time talking about themselves as about the historical figures we're supposedly learning about. There are a few biographers and historians featured, but nothing fresh or even particularly interesting surfaces. Instead we get observations like "Morgan was steely-eyed and knew how to get what he wanted." No, no real revelations here.

The trouble really is obvious just in reading the title: do the producers really think these few men built America? Even during the time in which they were prominent, weren't their successes derived from the many who did the real work, who toiled for meager wages while this handful amassed obscene power and wealth? Placing these men within the context of the cost they exacted would make more sense of their true legacy. Indeed, workers are featured sparingly, and though both the Homestead Massacre and the Johnstown flood are worked in, these are done in service to the part they play in Andrew Carnegie's narrative, so the emphasis is rather at cross purposes to any real understanding. Each of these industrialists were important in many ways, chiefly as instigators of mass movements of money, resources and effort, but they are inseparable from the many who they relied upon to realize profit. There's also a lack of regard for the true dimensions of what they achieved. There's no recognition of the fact that all that's shown followed the industrial revolution that was centered in Great Britain, nor is there mention that America only reached its potential as a world power and solid economy in the century that followed, as capitalism moved towards becoming a bureaucracy that wiped out the sorts of figures that these men were, replacing them with specialized management.

As the series reaches home plate the ideology at work is even more evident: the claim is made that safer workplaces and better wages miraculously follow as capitalists become more wise and resourceful, with Henry Ford, of all people, a force of beneficence. It seems that regard for workers was handed down as a gift, even from the very titans who once hired private armies to kill. This is a plain lie that ignores the very real battles working men and women (and children) fought in demand of fairness. It's another reason this series fails. The attempt seems to be a portrait of naked capitalism, but it ends up as airbrushed nudity, with the many blemishes and scars rendered invisible. Having digested the series as a whole I'm curious as to its origin and purpose. It's not too much of a stretch to imagine that this series might have been conceived as provident of the election of a business icon to high office. Could this have been wrought as a celebration of a President Romney? If so, it is another failed campaign to define this country as the product of capitalism. Making history is harder than making money.

In memoriam: baseball labor pioneer Marvin Miller

Fri, 30 Nov 2012 11:00:00 +0000

Marvin Miller (pictured), the labor leader who built the Major League Baseball Players Association into sports' most powerful union, died Nov. 26. He was 95.

Imagine a time when a professional baseball player was technically "owned" for life by his team and couldn't play for any other team unless the change was approved by his owner. Professional athletes had few rights beyond whatever their owners granted them-low pay, weak pensions, no real compensation for the wear-and-tear on their bodies, no freedom of movement or ability to determine where they lived or for what team they played.

The system made team owners very wealthy off the hard work of the players without allowing the players to share in the revenue their efforts produced.

Marvin Miller took over the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA) in 1966 and developed it into the most powerful union in sports. During that time - and in the years after - Miller's efforts also led to a total overhaul in the way that sports teams treated players and thus led to a revolution in professional sports.

"Marvin exemplified guts, tenacity and an undying love for the players he represented," said DeMaurice Smith, Executive Director of the NFL Players Association, affiliated with the Metro Washington Council. "His most powerful message was that players would remain unified during labor strife if they remembered the sacrifices made by previous generations to make the game better. His passion for the players never faltered, and men and women across all sports are in a better place thanks to his tireless work."

Click here to read Kenneth Quinnell's full post on the AFL-CIO Now blog.

Photo courtesy thanksmarvin.com, story via Metropolitan Washington AFL-CIO Council.

“Red Dawn” a disappointing remake

Thu, 29 Nov 2012 15:27:00 +0000

The remake of Red Dawn is so bad, it's...well, bad.

No one who goes to see a movie about a Chinese - sorry, North Korean - invasion of the United States is expecting high art, or even low art. Still, one could be forgiven for expecting at least a good time, but the movie doesn't even deliver on that front.

Originally, Dawn was to have been about a Chinese invasion of the United States. The decision to change the villains from the Chinese to North Koreans was purely business: China took offense at being portrayed as a villainous nation, and said that the movie would not play in the lucrative Chinese market unless the bad guys were made something else. The filmmakers went back in and digitally changed flags and posters on walls, redid the credits, and turned the Chinese actors (who look and talk like Chinese actors) into the most well fed North Koreans (aside from the sexiest man alive) in the world.

Indeed, these must be super-North Koreans. The idea of the movie was already absurd: Can anyone really imagine China taking over the United States? At least there were real fears, however unfounded, during the 1980s. Now, the biggest fears about China involve them simply beating us at building their economy and competing on the world stage. Still, at least they are a big country that, were they to go completely insane, they could possibly invade the U.S., at least for a moment.

This movie asks now, though, to suspend our disbelief even further: a tiny little half-nation, with a population akin to the New York City metropolitan area, has somehow taken control of the U.S., the third largest nation in the world with a population of well over 300 million. Even if the entirety of North Korea were sent to invade the U.S., the numbers alone would win the day for America: there would only be one occupier for every 12 Americans.

Perhaps they could take over Spokane, where the movie takes place, but the whole U.S.?

Of course, the filmmakers are not stupid, and they do fumble around for a bit trying to explain how the numbers work. North Korea, you see, had some help from the Russians and an electro-magnetic pulse that knocked out all of the American military and civilian electronic infrastructure. For some reason, though, North Korean electronics - not necessarily known for their high quality - are able to withstand the EMP. Also, the Russians seem to only have been called up after the small band of high schoolers (this absurdity was from the first movie) began the rebellion.

Plot holes galore aside - and really, if there's some good action on the screen, who cares about a few plot holes? - the movie still just does not work.

The original Red Dawn, made during the height of 1980s Cold War paranoia, was fun and, according to some - your reviewer included - a cult classic. In that version, a group of red-blooded American teenagers watched their school get invaded by Soviet-backed Nicaraguan paratroopers who shot their teachers, sort of John Hughes-gone-awry. This time, we don't even get a remake of the school scene; everyone is at home when the North Koreans invade, and only then do they go out to find their friends. Is it too much to ask that an action movie about bad guys taking over our country be badass?

Strangely, the present version has a bit more character development than the original, but is anyone looking for that in Red Dawn? The characters more closely resemble contemporary American society as well, but only slightly. By my count, there are exactly two African Americans amongst the good guys, and one of their fathers is a traitor working with the - who was it? North Koreans? I kept getting distracted by the fact that the actors were Chinese.

Speaking of Asians, there were none amongst the good guys. That's too bad, especially given that all of the movie's bad guys, aside from a few collaborationists and a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Russian special operative, were some sort of Asian. It would have been nice if one of the patriots were Korean or Chinese. Perhaps a Chinese actor playing a Korean-American patriot?

The film had its moments, including some poking fun at the original, especially the famous deer blood-drinking scene (important in film history as one of the more prominent of the examples to be used to justify the creation of the PG-13 rating). Still, a good moment here or there cannot justify an otherwise dull movie.

Avoid the new Red Dawn. Instead, save your money and re-watch the old semi-classic on DVD. Or, better yet, just get to the theater early enough that you can see Skyfall.

Movie Review
Red Dawn
2012, 114 mins., Rated Pg-13

Photo: On the set of the Red Dawn film. Flickr

2012 baseball season showcased Venezuelan talent

Wed, 28 Nov 2012 13:00:00 +0000

The 2012 World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Detroit Tigers was very entertaining, even though the dominant four-game sweep by the Giants sucked some of the on-field drama from the games. However, this drama was supplanted by a political context that has not been discussed very much.

This baseball season and World Series showcased the level of talent from Venezuela.

Venezuelan Miguel Cabrera of the Detroit Tigers became the 12th player and first Latin American to win the Triple Crown by leading the league in batting average (.330), home runs (44) and runs batted in (139.) He was joined by fellow teammates and compatriots Aníbal Sánchez, Avisail García and Omar Infante in representing Venezuela in the World Series. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Giants fielded multiple Venezuelans who excelled in their play including José Mijares, Marco Scutaro, Gregor Blanco and Héctor Sánchez. Most notable for the Giants was third baseman and World Series Most Valuable Player Pablo Sandoval. Sandoval had a .500 batting average during the Series and became the fourth player in Major League Baseball history to hit three home runs in a World Series game.

This level of elite talent from Venezuela in Major League Baseball is a testament not only to their ball-playing abilities but to the increasing presence and opportunity for Venezuelans to showcase their skills in Major League Baseball. As baseball historian Rob Ruck stated, "We've had any number of exceptional Venezuelan baseball players come on in the last decade and I think that in general Venezuelan baseball has really over the last 20 years become a much more significant part of the game."

For years, many of Major League Baseball's Latino players have come from the Dominican Republic. This is no surprise since it is incredibly easy for baseball teams to set up academies there and sign a multitude of players for bonuses that are a fraction of what American prospects would receive. Prospects often are pulled out of school to train full time with their "buscones" and the "buscones" also receive a large percentage of the prospect's signing bonus if a team negotiates a deal with that player. This system has been fraught with abuse, age/identification fraud by players and exploitation as MLB teams prey on financial desperation and precarity to ensure a massive supply of labor on the cheap. Epy Guerrero, an elite Dominican baseball scout, noted : "[MLB] came here, and I think they took advantage of a community, a republic, which they subjected to their influence... Because this is an exceedingly poor country. The way I see it, they crushed our country."

The system became such a liability that Major League Baseball has worked in the last few years to curb some of the worst abuses and to ensure basic rights for the prospects.

It was in the realities of this plunder that Hugo Chavez's government in Venezuela began ensuring that there were basic protections for his nation's baseball prospects. Instead of "buscones" profiting,10% of a signing bonus would be paid to the government. Chavez's government has passed regulations ensuring that all contracts for players aged 16-18 will have to be approved by the government, that prospects will receive a proper education even as they continue their baseball training, and that prospects will receive compensation if they are injured.

These basic protections have only added fuel to the anti-Chavez fires that burn in much of the U.S. mainstream media. For refusing to let his country be used as a natural resource to enrich U.S. corporate entities, he has been vilified by the millionaires and billionaires who run the front offices of Major League Baseball and its teams.

It is all too common that western media and the wealthy attack Chavez for a number of his reforms. While criticisms are rightful (i.e., the spate of kidnappings that included Washington Nationals catcher and fellow Venezuelan Wilson Ramos), much of it is the whining of the privileged and those who benefit from a status quo that has its basis in inequality.

Yet, while baseball may become one more space for anti-Venezuela, especially anti-Chavez, rhetoric amongst the government elites, their media outlets and the MLB ownership, a relationship must be maintained with Venezuela by these baseball teams in order to keep access to outstanding players. Baseball has also become a space that allows for the development of internationalized communities - where fans in the United States have the opportunity to cheer for players coming out of Chavez's Venezuela despite the political animosity between the nations. Ultimately, people should, can and do care about good baseball while simultaneously wanting to ensure that the basic fundamental human dignity of the players being signed is protected whether or not they ever make it to the big leagues and regardless of their home nation's political relationship with the United States and wealthy elites.

How "The Hobbit" caused 27 animal deaths

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 16:33:00 +0000

"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" has resulted in an unexpected turn of events: At least 27 animals used in the film have died, after enduring mistreatment and poor, substandard accommodation, said the American Humane Association.

The animals, which were not harmed in the actual filming of "The Hobbit," were subjected to harsh conditions on a farm in Wellington, New Zealand, which, according to a spokesperson for film director Peter Jackson, was housing around 150 animals at the time. Horses, goats, and other animals there had to deal with sinkholes and broken down fencing, which caused them severe injuries.

A pony accidentally broke its back, and had to be euthanized, which was a fate that several other injured animals ultimately faced.

An Associate Press story indicated that wranglers that worked with the animals had complained about the conditions, but their criticisms with the farm were reportedly ignored.

Jackson's spokesman, Matt Dravitzki, said that two horses whose lives could have been saved died simply because proper precautions were not taken. "We do know that these deaths were avoidable," he said, "and we took steps to make sure it doesn't happen again."

The film, the first of a planned sequel trilogy to "The Lord of the Rings" series, is set to premiere in Wellington on November 28, but animal rights defenders including PETA plan to stage rallies against the film.

"Letting these animals suffer needlessly and die takes the entertainment industry a giant and disgraceful step backward," said a PETA official.

Jackson, however, responded directly to PETA's remark, stating, "The production regrets that PETA has chosen to make such a serious accusation, which has stressed many of the dedicated workers who worked with animals on the films."

PETA commented again on its website, saying, "In a movie that features CGI dragons, ogres, and hobbits, CGI animals would have fit in perfectly. Jackson could have made "The Hobbit" without using a single animal - and he should have."

This isn't the first time in recent weeks that a film has been connected with possible animal abuse. PETA also sank its teeth into the new Twilight film, "Breaking Dawn, Part Two," after learning that a post-film premiere party in LA on November 12 included three caged wolves as part of the festivities. Activists noted that the wolves, stressed by "the blaring music and flashing lights," simply did not belong there.

"We must bring the same high degree of safety and humane treatment that has been achieved on set to animals throughout their life, including training, housing, and safe, dignified retirement," concluded AHA president Robin Ganzert. "We owe it to these hard-working and beloved members of our community, just as we work to take care of their human counterparts. Anything less is unacceptable."

Photo: PETA.org

Left on the bookshelf: "My Discovery of America"

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 16:07:00 +0000

Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893 - 1930) is probably best known for his poetry, plays and general Bolshevik agitprop from the early days of the USSR. American audiences however may find the travel narrative of the three months he spent in the Western hemisphere in 1925 to be a more accessible literary contribution, and thanks to the publisher Hesperus, the book "My Discovery of America" is now available as part of their 'Modern Voices' series.

Mayakovsky opens the documentation of his journey by saying "I have lived too little to describe every detail accurately and thoroughly. This little I have lived is enough though, to be able to render the miscellaneous faithfully."

In a trip that included Mexico and Cuba, Mayakovsky's definition of America and his trip to it quite rightly expand beyond the borders of the United States. He notes there is a North, South, and Central America and goes on to observe, "The USA do not even take up the whole of the North - but never mind! - they have grabbed, appropriated and mixed up the name of all the Americas...the United States has established the right to call itself 'America' by force, by means of dreadnoughts and dollars, putting fear into neighboring republics and colonies."

In his own country Mayakovsky was known as a 'Futurist' and in the forward to the book, Colum McCann compares the emotion of his poetry about American topics to that of Crane or Whitman, but in reading his commentary about his unfamiliar surroundings one is reminded more of the gonzo journalism that would not be popularized until almost fifty years later. Have a look at this entry regarding the traffic in Mexico City, "A driver in Mexico City is not responsible for injuries (watch out for yourself!), therefore the average expectation for life without injury is ten years. Once every ten years everyone gets run over. It's true there are people who may go twenty years without getting run over, but that's at the expense of those who have already been run over within five years."

In addition to the political and the social, Mayakovsky proves to be a keen observer of the cultural. His notations on traveling the US by Pullman car are uproarious. He is also not above poking fun at himself and his often poor grasp of the English language. In addition, there are more than one fish out of water type mishaps which he records for the reader's amusement.

A good deal of New York left Mayakovsky not only thoroughly unimpressed but somewhat testy to boot. He positively hated Coney Island, of which he writes, "I have never seen such depravity stimulating such ecstasy." His literary tongue lashing of the weekend refuge may also have had something to do with the fact that an unscrupulous amusement attendant cheated him there. New York natives should take heart however, Mayakovsky's soul was stirred by the site of the Brooklyn bridge and his poem of the same name, which appears in the book, serves as a tribute to the ever inspiring monuments of New York upon which goggle eyed visitors continue to fix their gaze.

The city of Chicago, which according to the author, in comparison to New York could "live without bluster", seemed a bit more to his liking and he praises its energy. There was one aspect of life in Chicago however that he found particularly unappealing. He visited the famed stockyards, and described the outside as "the imaginary - or the real - smell of an entire sea of spilt blood sends your head spinning" and of the interior of the slaughter houses he noted, "here you get all the squealing and the snorting, but at the other end of the works they are already putting seals on the legs of meat - white tin cans, discharged like hailstones, flash in the sun like streaks of lightning."

While in the mid-west he also tours a Ford plant in Detroit and afterwards discusses conditions of same with a correspondent from this very paper, then known as 'The Daily Worker'.

Some of the authors observations carry the very specific time stamp of the date on which he put his pen to paper and should be taken as such, but others are perhaps more relevant today then when he wrote them, such as when he says, "There isn't a country that spits out as much moralistic, lofty, idealistic, sanctimonious rubbish as the United States." He also suggests that instead of Washington, DC, foreign ambassadors should be posted to Wall Street since that is where the real power is. Other times his is almost eerily prescient. In writing a full 15 years before the attack on Pearl Harbor he suggests it may well be the Japanese that challenge the Americans for dominance and whilst witnessing the ongoing industrialization of America he also speculates that it may all one day be replaced by an economy solely based on high finance, writing, "America will become just a financial centre, a money broker of a country." Nor did the boiling racial oppression of the United States escape his observation, writing, "The Negroes who are heated up over the bonfires of Texas may yet prove to be a sufficiently dry powder for explosions of revolution."

The final footnote of Mayakovsky's attitude toward the maddening sights and sounds of America in the roaring 20's is probably best summed up by the fact that after using up only three months of a six month visa he packed his bags and went home to Moscow.

If a lovelorn suicide had not cut short his life, Mayakovsky would have surely marveled at the achievements to come in his own country. One can only imagine what poetry he would have produced in honor of Yuri Gagarin's maiden space voyage. Thankfully the literature he produced lives on and we are fortunate to now have this more obscure entry about our own American history to stimulate our senses.

My Discovery of America, by Vladimir Mayakovsky

Hesperus Press

Paperback, 144 pages, $15.95

Photo: Hesperus Press

Spielberg’s “Lincoln” is for the ages

Mon, 19 Nov 2012 12:26:00 +0000

American democracy is messy, even bloody, and none such a trial for democracy than the American Civil War and the final end to slavery. It was a time that called for profound leadership and action. Would the promise of "all men are created equal" be realized? It was not clear in 1860 when Abraham Lincoln was first elected. It was not clear in 1865, just after Lincoln's re-election as the Civil War was finally coming to a close after four long years and 600,000 dead.

Still facing Democratic and conservative Republican opposition to immediate abolition, Lincoln worried the Emancipation Proclamation would not be enough to guarantee an end to slavery. An amendment to the Constitution would be the only way slavery could be abolished forever from American soil, he said. So began the struggle for votes in the House of Representatives to pass such an amendment in January 1865, just after Lincoln was re-elected. The Senate, dominated by the Republicans, had passed such an amendment earlier.

This intense political period is the setting for Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln." Gone is the idealism that the Civil War was about anything else than slavery. Based on Doris Kearns Goodwin's "A Team of Rivals," Spielberg's Lincoln is a valentine to the better angels of American history and the country's most extraordinary president. With Tony Kushner's screenplay, it's an ode to the fierce urgency of equality, something he inspiringly portrays as part of the American character. Kushner's words burn with fairness held deep in America's breast, like a prairie fire that feeds the deep roots of native grasses and plants.

But it's an actor's tenor voice that brings those words to life. Daniel Day Lewis' portrayal of the poet president is for the ages. It's a gift from an Irish/Anglo son, with all the irony and naturalness that entails. Wasn't Thomas Paine, one of the fiercest advocates of American Revolution ideals, a son of Britain? Here Lincoln is a living symbol - of, for, and by the people.

To say Day Lewis brings Lincoln to life may be an understatement. He channels the multi-faceted Lincoln: the doting and grieving father, the patient and tired husband, the deep and democratic thinker, the practical and savvy political operative, the humorous and human storyteller; but mostly, the tenacious advocate of freedom. This Irish actor stirs American pride.

Day Lewis is not alone in outstanding performances. Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln does something I never thought possible. She makes the first lady sympathetically complex. Field places Todd Lincoln amid the times and its heavy burdens of war, insurrection, grief, and fear, humanizing this often demonized woman.

Tommy Lee Jones, as radical abolitionist Rep. Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania - an overlooked historical figure, brings an oratorical punch to the big screen. David Straitharn as U.S. Secretary of State William Seward, Joseph Gordon-Levitt as son Robert Todd Lincoln, James Spader as Democratic vote wrangler W.N. Bilbo, and Gloria Reuben as former slave and the first lady's confidant, Elizabeth Keckley, round out the cast with memorable performances.

There is close attention to historical detail, even including Ely S. Parker, the Native American lieutenant colonel who served with Gen. Ulysses S. Grant during the war. Portrayals of black Union soldiers in the fight for freedom and equality, along with the moving speech by Reuben's Keckley, as well as other portrayals, shows the agency of Black Americans in the fight for freedom. However, the best known African American champion of slavery's abolition, Frederick Douglass, is notably absent, even though Douglass and Lincoln had a working relationship.

I doubted Spielberg's ability to pull off the dynamics and nuances of our 16th president and the times he lived in, yet, he did. "Lincoln" is his masterpiece. Even though we all know how the vote on the 13th Amendment turns out - Spielberg creates muscle-tightening tension during the movie's two-and-a-half hours. That's not to say that every scene is poetry. There are some awkward-feeling moments that drag. Yet, overall, he gives us plenty to ponder regarding the development of American democracy. In the tradition of say Earl Robinson and his "Ballad for Americans," Aaron Copeland's "Theme for the Common Man," or even Chilean poet Pablo Neruda's "Let the Rail Splitter Awake," Spielberg's "Lincoln" taps into the deep well of diverse American culture that upholds the founding ideals of equality and fairness.

With the re-election of President Barack Obama, you can't help but watch Lincoln and be confident these ideals still burn brightly in the heart and soul of America.

"Lincoln"

Directed by Steven Spielberg

2012, 150 minutes, PG-13

Photo: A still from "Lincoln."

Skyfall: powerful entry in James Bond series

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 15:57:00 +0000

James Bond is really the original movie franchise. The early films of the 1960s with Sean Connery in the role of Ian Fleming's dapper but cunning secret agent grabbed the world's attention and never let go. Bond endures, and as much as one can credit the simple virtues of a well-conceived fantasy figure, it's also due to smart producers who felt they owed the character a fresh approach every so often.

Bond differs from contemporary movie epics: the character remains a vehicle for grown-up fantasies. As appealing as the action has always been for all ages, the Bond universe is a funhouse mirror of the real world. It magnifies danger and pleasure, simultaneously sophisticated and silly. Bond didn't travel in the same gritty world of intrigue that John LeCarre essayed, and on screen Bond moved even farther from reality as the films became a phenomenon. Once Connery left the series it had already created its own sense of formula. The films could in no way be taken seriously by the late 1980s. Happily, the producers have experimented with the series often, and each time they've bent the material back towards its origins. And being a reflection, however fun, of the real world has been a challenge, as times and global political climate have moved on.

The Bond films of the 1990s were enjoyable, but one can easily imagine the series sliding back into self-parody. That's why one applauds the decision several years ago to tinker again with Bond, winding it back even further both to Fleming and reality (or as close as one can dare). With Casino Royale the Bond films really enjoyed a serious shift that was a success in every way. Daniel Craig was a very grim 007, with only the very slightest of smirks. Many who grew sated with the easy pleasures of the flashier previous films choked a bit on the no-gristle recipe the producers offered. But what a feast it was for those hungry for the best Bond might be.

Which brings us to Skyfall, the latest Bond film. As the third film featuring Craig, it really delivers all that this new approach promised. It feels astonishingly fresh. Its virtues are plentiful, from the best Bond theme song (courtesy of Adele) in many decades, to a villain who is a genuine, abundantly interesting character. Rather than repeat many of the series' formulas, the new film adds them in at angles that make for a Bond film full of surprise. Craig fully owns the Bond character in this outing, and is well served by a screenplay that challenges the secret agent to prove himself within its narrative just as the character must in popular culture, as he strides the decades, leaving the Indiana Joneses and Harry Potters along the path.

Interestingly, Bond often was pitted against the sort of bloated, power hungry technocrats who in the real world do great harm. (What would the Koch Brothers do with a laser weapon satellite?) But the villain in Skyfall (Javier Bardem as "Silva") is a product of the world of espionage - a fallen spy bent on revenge. There's just slight embroidery that suggests Julian Assange (who shares a hairstyle with the film's villain along with the habit of releasing sensitive material on the web). Bond spends a lot of time at home in the United Kingdom in Skyfall, a real departure for the globetrotting spy. It's fun seeing Bond deal with a crowded rush hour on the tube, but there's plenty of weight to the film, and it portrays a ruthless profession that could easily produce a twisted villain (Silva) or a twisted hero (Bond).

The loyalties that are central to the plot are not simple, and this is easily the most profound Bond in that sense. We're still dealing in escapism, and Skyfall manages an interesting compromise- essaying a world of intrigue short on nobility without crumbling beneath any real world issues.

Director Sam Mendes is a real asset: he gets so very much from the interpersonal scenes, and yet he brings a fresh and clever approach to the action in the film. A scene that takes place in a Shanghai high-rise at night is inventive and stupendous, and the finale is fresh and satisfying, far from the spectacle one expects. Judi Dench, as Bond's superior, is more prominent than ever, and Dench really makes the most of the opportunity. A supporting cast that includes everyone from Ralph Fiennes to Albert Finney is expertly used. Naomi Harris brings an awful lot to what is usually a throwaway character (the "good girl"). Indeed, Harris plays a more prominent role as a fellow agent with intelligence and wholesome beauty (but not too good an aim) than the femme fatale of the piece (Bérénice Marlohe).

As always, a James Bond film will offer no insights or grand messages, just a droll but intoxicating escape from the real world. But no one drinks a martini for nourishment. Skyfall is a strong martini with its ingredients shaken to perfection.

Movie review
Skyfall
Directed by Sam Mendes
2012, 143 minutes, PG-13

Surrogate Socialism: The Sessions

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 12:03:00 +0000

The Biblical story of Eden is a tale of claiming the freedom to make our own decisions in life, of taking action that rebels against the established order and demands new levels of responsibility, of becoming fully human.

In The Sessions, the new film directed by Ben Lewin, we find Berkeley poet Mark O'Brien (John Hawkes) in 1988, a new college graduate at the age of 38, triumphant in his manifest victories over the bad deal life has handed him. At the age of eight, he came down with polio, losing muscle control, though not sensation, able to move his head and not much more. He lives his life horizontally: nights in an iron lung, days on an oxygen-equipped gurney.

Infantilized almost all through life by his physical condition, Mark has passively imbibed concepts of shame, judgment, and resignation from his church. He has to ask Father Brendan's counsel (William H. Macy) when he wants to let an unsatisfactory aide go-his first act toward independence.

Mark embarks on a research article about sex and the disabled. First he's intrigued by the lengths disabled people will go to, but as his interest awakens, he also realizes he is about the most disabled of anyone, and that unless he starts making moves, he will soon reach his "use-by date." Ironic and detached, there's still a part of him that wonders if God has a cruel sense of humor. Will he be punished for his fantasies?

Father Brendan, shown as something of a "hippie priest," presumably shares Mark's lack of an intimate, sexual life. But that was by his own choice. He becomes Mark's spiritual guide as the "victim" takes measures to overcome his victimhood. He grants his blessing as Mark seeks out the aid of a sex surrogate, played courageously and honestly by Helen Hunt in a series of "sessions" leading to greater body awareness, self-acceptance, loss of shame and, yes, of his virginity. Having intercourse makes him an adult: He has tasted of the forbidden fruit.

Mark represents a kind of one-man revolution, or micro-revolution: He has transformed his life and consciousness, not just about his body and sexuality, but about his relationship to other people who, if they didn't actively oppress him, at least collaborated in perceiving him as sexless and inert.

Filmgoers may recall Coming Home, a post-Vietnam War treatment of sexuality among vets whose chances for intimacy had been slim, if not completely dismissed. You may also have encountered Too Late to Die Young, a wonderful book about severe disability and the fight-back drive to claim full humanity, by openly socialist writer Harriet McBryde Johnson. And there's an inspiring documentary film about Mark O'Brien called Breathing Lessons (John Hawkes in The Sessions expertly duplicates his voice).

The logic of capitalist exploitation views the self from the outside primarily as our ability to produce goods and services to be bought and sold. The Sessions reminds us that instead we all have the ability to take ownership of our inner compass, disenthralling ourselves from the grip of self-blame and convention, freeing ourselves from powerful psychological, social, and economic pressures. In the micro it becomes a solitary revolutionary act. Multiplied by the vastness of human yearning, it can transform a world.

Humanity has rarely, if ever, plumbed the depth of discovery, kindness, caring, intimacy, and ultimately love that might emerge if we enjoyed the ability to express ourselves in totality, without respect to financial constrictions. Some might call that socialism.

Mark is atypical of the current population of quads in that his disability is not spinal cord injury but rather polio. His ability to experience full sensation contrasts sharply with our returning injured vets from Iraq and Afghanistan. Clearly, their wounds are psychological as well as physical, and in the case of spinal cord injuries, even more challenging than Mark's. It hardly seems utopian to demand the very highest level of care for those who gave so much at their country's call, and if that includes some "sessions" to help restore their sexual confidence, we're all for it.

Some assembly required for "Seven Psychopaths"

Tue, 13 Nov 2012 15:58:00 +0000

In the middle of the movie "Seven Psychopaths," Martin (an alcoholic movie screenwriter played by Colin Farrell) tells his two friends a short, simple, violent story. "I liked it," deadpans Hans (an aging dognapper played by Christopher Walken). "It's got layers."

The flat story that Martin told, of course, doesn't even have one layer, but the movie he's in does. It's not just about an alcoholic writer who gets into gangster trouble with his nutty friends. It's not just about violence, even though it has more than some Tarantino films. It isn't the choppy, incoherent, inexplicable movie that it seems to be most of the way through.

It isn't just about Billy (a neurotic ne'er do well played by Sam Rockwall) even though he's clearly the star of the movie. It isn't about Martin, even though his character is the axis of the stories and subplots whirling through this windstorm. It certainly isn't about Hans, even though I'll admit that I only convinced my movie buddy to buy tickets because I admire Walken so much. Nobody menaces like Walken.

Woody Harrelson, as the bloody gangster whose dog was kidnapped, certainly menaces very effectively in this film, and Walken only has one tiny menacing scene. But nobody menaces like Walken.

If you get through all the pieces and blood smattering, you'll see that it's about peace and friendship, just as Martin says at the beginning, but it's kind of a puzzle that has to be fit together once all the pieces are found. When it comes together, it's a good movie. Even though it's technically British, it's got two American union bugs in the last frame: IATSE and Teamsters.

It's got layers.

"Seven Psychopaths"

Directed by Martin McDonagh

2012, 110 minutes, R

Photo: Rotten Tomatoes

Again: Fifth “Fringe” season an absolute must watch!

Tue, 13 Nov 2012 12:49:00 +0000

It was only weeks ago that I predicted the fifth season of "Fringe" would be its best. After a few shows now the prediction has come true and the program has become an absolute must watch if only because we may not soon see so many important themes explored by any one show.

How far is too far when one aims for a scientific breakthrough? What happens, good or bad, when we break the "laws" of "nature?" Are there really any such "laws" in the first place? Are human beings and their thoughts, emotions, and everything else that goes with them, the result of an evolutionary process that entitles them to no special dignity or respect or is there something else (God maybe?) that makes them deserving of dignity and respect? Or, does their scientific makeup alone entitle them to dignity and respect? Is God redundant? These and other mind-twisting questions were given mind-blowing answers in the first four seasons of the show.

In those seasons, Dr. Walter Bishop (John Noble) learned how dangerous science could be when we go too far and when the wrong people use discoveries for the wrong reasons. He also learned the importance of relationships with other human beings. We ended the fourth season with him loving his son Peter Bishop (Joshua Jackson) who in turn cherishes Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) who, in turn, is pregnant with her and Peter's child. Then there was Astrid, the FBI agent for whom Dr. Bishop, himself, has a special love.

All this love didn't make for peace and happiness, however, as the fifth season begins, not in the present, but in 2036 where the world is now under the fascist rule of the "Observers." They polluted their own world in the future and travelled back in time to take over the Earth, which they had been scoping out for the first four seasons.

Olivia, Peter, Walter, and Astrid had tried to fight the Observers when they first came to Earth in force but found themselves losing the battle. So they placed themselves in "amber," in a state of suspended animation, hoping someone would eventually come along to free them. That someone does come along: Twenty one years later they are freed by Etta Bishop (Georgina Haig), Peter and Olivia's daughter, who they haven't seen since she disappeared at age three when the Observers first landed. Etta is a leader of the Resistance Movement against the Observers.

The first four seasons featured many things, among them artificial intelligence. teleportation, and quantum entanglements. Those things are all present in season five, but with the addition of new issues centering more on humanity and society. How does a fascist society suppress joy, community, education, imagination, private thought, due process, free will, and freedom? How might an individual or a group actually live when freedom is removed? What is it like living in a world where each and every one of your private thoughts can be read? (Not that we havn't gotten at least a foretaste of that already today.)

Heavily explored so far in Season Five is the concept of what humans consider "beautiful," and how that relates to "joy" and "happiness."

In one scene, Walter is being tortured by an Observer.

Observer: "You're trying to think of music. You miss music."

Walter : "There's not a lot of it here."

Observer: "We tolerate it. But it's merely tones, rhythms and harmonic vibrations. I don't understand it."

Walter: "Mostly it amazed me. Music helps you shift perspective, to see things differently if you need to."

Observer: "See things like hope?"

Walter: "Yes, very much like that."

Observer: "But there is no hope for you. Nothing grows from scorched earth."

How do tones, rhythms, and harmonic vibrations, arranged in a certain way, touch peoples' "spirits?" Is the answer to this beyond science? Or does that matter, the important thing being that music does touch our "spirits?" And what of our "spirits?" Are they really a part of our material selves, ultimately knoweable and traceable in their origins, or are they something intangible and "special?"

And what of hope? Is it scientifically explainable? Walter sees a flower growing out of a crack in the sidewalk. Is it scientifically explainable, is it a sign of hope, or both?

These are the questions being tackled in Season Five of "Fringe." I urge you not to miss this show. It may be a long time before anything like it is seen again on TV.

Photo: Season 5 main characters Peter, Walter, Olivia, and Etta. Fringe official Facebook page

Environment, unions, bluegrass, and metal: Panopticon’s “Kentucky”

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 15:54:00 +0000

Louisville's one-man metal band Panopticon has been redefining its genre since 2007.

Vocalist/guitarist/bassist/drummer Austin Lunn plays black metal mixed with bluegrass, called "blackgrass" - a newly emerging subgenre that just a handful of artists currently play. Bridging the gap between his favorite music and his cultural roots, Lunn's newest album, Kentucky, takes an important look at the plight of the Kentucky coal miners, environmentalism, and unions.

Culturally, Panopticon is a band that fits perfectly on the Cascadian Black Metal spectrum. The Cascadian scene is so named because it first developed in the Cascadian Mountain region; such bands played a particular, folk-tinged style of black metal, which almost always touched upon nature and the environment - and sometimes paganism or mysticism. The scene has spread in recent years - as far south as Kentucky, which is where Panopticon took the reigns, linking environmentalism with the historical fight for workers' rights.

Kentucky, in its eight lyrically and emotionally adept songs, covers corporate greed, union busting, environmental abuse, and the bonds of workers and family - and those are just the main themes. Referencing real historical events from the 1930s up to the present, Panopticon laments how mountaintop removal (which involves using explosives to uncover coal) is a profit-driven practice that cuts coal miners' jobs, poisons local ecosystems, and poisons workers themselves.

Worker conditions and union strength

The mountains of Kentucky, said Lunn in an interview with Worm Gear 'Zine, "are being crumbled. Coal companies are always on the defensive, and the Republicans are at it again with the "Stop the War on Coal Act." Mining site areas are among the poorest in the nation, the most polluted with the lowest quality of life, and [the Republicans] say there's a war on coal? How about a war on the environment and workers!

"The legislation is a combination of five bills. Among other things, it would block the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and other sources, and prevent rules on the storage and disposal of coal ash."

Lunn also sings about the anti-union actions that coal miners endured, including the use of "gun thugs" by coal companies (private guards hired to intimidate union organizers and keep them out of coal mines and company towns), and the workers' eventual victory, through organizing under the United Mine Workers of Amerca, that won them unionization and collective bargaining rights.

"Worker conditions and union strength are issues that are close to my heart," Lunn remarked. "I firmly believe the boss needs us - we don't need the boss. So for me, it was moving what happened in eastern Kentucky: there was brutality, bloodshed, and horror, but the people there stood for something, banded together, and fought for what they believed in. I think the union struggle of the 30's and 70's is something we can all learn from - taking responsibility for ourselves and taking care of our communities."

"This is an industry that views workers as disposable, and views the landscape as disposable," says the voice of a coal miner, sampled during the song "Come All Ye Coal Miners."

"These weren't black-clad anarchists or hippies," Lunn clarified. "They were families and the elderly - people wanting their kids to be able to play on the playground toxin-free. The last lines of that song talk about coal companies not giving a sh*t about the people who work for them, or the communities around mining sites."

Moments of pure blackgrass

Overall, Kentucky is generally pretty successful at mixing traditional black metal with bluegrass and, sometimes, folk music. Lunn blends blackened screams with bluesy singing; electric guitar with banjo. The instrumental swaps and combinations seem to work, but there is still some additional blending that could be done. For example, "Which Side Are You On?" (a powerful pro-worker anthem) is entirely a bluegrass song, while "Killing the Giants as They Sleep" is basic black metal. But on songs like "Black Soot and Red Blood," there are moments of pure blackgrass.

The instrumental "Bernheim Forest in the Spring," meanwhile, harkens back to the nature-worship that Cascadian Black Metal was built upon; it also evokes the softer elements of prog metal bands like Opeth. And "Bodies Under the Falls" takes a lyrical left-turn, as it is by and large about the killings of Cherokee Indians in Kentucky by "palefaces." These songs still fit in perfectly with their peers, and measure up to what seems to be the album's main theme: the historical assaults that have been waged against the people and land in Kentucky.

Kentucky teaches the listener that gritty, scream-filled bluegrass is not a paradox; nor is it a trend or a joke. An open mind, and a pair of ears well-accustomed to black metal's sound structure, are required for this music to be enjoyed. But even for those whose taste blackgrass may not suit, Panopticon's lyrical statements alone ought to be appreciated as art with an eye for labor and environmental history.

New bands in the 'Cascadian' scene are now popping up in different regions - from the Rust Belt to the Deep South - bringing along with them perspectives that are progressive and much more philosophical than black metal's Scandinavian pioneers. At the forefront of this movement is Panopticon, who, though having acquired only an underground fanbase, represents pro-union, pro-nature black metal in its finest hour.

Photo: Official Panopticon Facebook page

"All Together": Getting old in new France

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 12:02:00 +0000

If you belong to a certain class - educated, with a nice pension or inheritance - you have a wide range of choices in life. Where and how you live will be among them. These options open the gate to all that ensues in All Together, the new French film scripted and directed by Stéphane Robelin.

The vaguely socialistic title references "The New Communards," consisting of a crack ensemble cast of two actresses well known to American audiences. Jane Fonda plays Jeanne, a retired philosophy professor, and Geraldine Chaplin is Annie, whose family property in a leafy Parisian suburb will serve the collective. French actor Guy Bedos plays Annie's husband Jean, while Claude Rich iss the ever-randy Claude and Pierre Richard plays Albert, Jeanne's husband, the person most visibly affected by creeping dementia. Upcoming actor Daniel Brühl plays Dirk, a graduate student in anthropology, who finds in the newly established home a fitting subject for his thesis, and a career as the elderly group's caretaker.

The five old friends form their house sharing arrangement as a medical and social necessity, reveling in their youthful audacity of adopting "the next hot thing." We can easily imagine these septuagenarians directly involved in the arc of French history as it barreled along in overdrive during their formative years. Born in the 1930s, they experienced World War II and the post-war recovery, the wrenching conflicts over France's colonial wars in Indochina and Algeria, and the near-revolutionary times that culminated in the revolt and general strikes of 1968. Jean reflects on his history of defending landless farmers. One pictures these folks in seminars and mass meetings with the likes of Picasso, Sartre, Camus, de Beauvoir.

We are introduced to Albert in a militant demonstration against the police, not coincidentally for logement - housing - conducted by a multiracial crowd in one of the not-so-chic districts of Paris. Despite a bottle he's thrown at a policeman, Jean can't even get himself arrested: The police simply look right through and past the old. By way of this manifestation of solidarity with their less fortunate countrymen and women, the characters of Jean and Albert establish a central and universal theme of the film: Everyone needs a place to call home.

France is regarded in the top tier of evolved "welfare states," but still, for these activists with some intellectual playfulness and a pronounced joie de vivre still left in them, an institutional senior home, adequate for basic needs, is not an ideal nest for their last years. Needing the bonds of attachment and connection, they still cherish their libations and fine meals, good companionship, and space to exercise their flirtations and assignations. They also need to forgive one another the old affairs and jealousies of yesteryear. These wines age well.

Of course we witness some tension between collectivist and more anarchistic principles, recalling familiar divisions on the left. Yet the film bathes in life-giving symbolism: future burial plots designed to be covered in rose arbors, with benches for lunch and conversation; and at the house, a new swimming pool in the back yard, to attract the grandchildren. Young Dirk, at first curiously more inhibited than his elders, blooms in this lusty environment, profiting from his elders' wholesome example.

In Western countries, the baby boomer demographic bulge is upon us. Last year's Best Exotic Marigold Hotel also shows us globally groping our way toward creating a livable life in the territory where we are heading. With the cooperation of the younger generation helping us to investigate our alternatives, seniors are almost instinctively resisting the hegemonic monetization of our age, in daycare centers for profit, and assisted living communities joined at hefty monthly fees.

Secular rationalists though these oldsters all are, when they join Albert in his Lear-like yelping into the void for his lost "Jeanne! Jeanne! Jeanne!" we can only think of how a French audience will hear a frantic, tribal plea for the aid of Jeanne d'Arc, Joan of Ark, the unifying, patron saint of France, to bring us "all together."

Artist Al Heuer talks pop art and politics

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 10:25:00 +0000

"Political art is a great avenue to capture the imaginations of today's people," said artist Al Heuer, whose neo-Marxist pop art draws inspiration from around the world. Speaking with the People's World, he provided an in-depth perspective on the important role and influence of art - and explained how politics become an important part of that.

"I have always, in my heart, been a Marxist," said Heuer, who, after spending much of the 2000's capturing photos of nature and wildlife, began to pursue an artistic path that was much more closely related to his outlook.

"I live in a very liberal area of Denver, Colorado," Heuer explained. "And yet, out here, there's not much of a political message in art. A lot of galleries want to play it 'safe;' they wouldn't want to jazz things up with something a little controversial." And propaganda, he said, is perhaps just the controversy some people need in order to wake up from their apathy. "Propaganda can be used for good," he said, "not just for bad [purposes]. It can educate and uplift."

Heuer, whose mother was a painter, studied art in college. He started his work in political mixed media art by photographing the effects of the Great Recession; homelessness, for example. He also documented the Occupy movement, which "became a great source of inspiration, and saw the merging of art, photography, and politics; it all really came together."

So what, exactly, is 'neo-Marxist' pop art?

"I say neo-Marxist," he said, "as in, 'taking a fresh, modern look at Marxism.' I believe the time is ripe for a revitalization of Marxism in the U.S." On why he calls his pieces 'pop art,' he said, "Pop art is a nod to the work of [80's artist] Andy Warhol. It also is a term that lightens up the message behind my work."

The contrasting reds and blues of the art draw people in, he noted, whereas dark photos that evoke feelings of poverty and decay could push people away. The pieces also draw inspiration from old Soviet Russia communist propaganda posters. "This is my salute to [those posters]," he said. "They've almost been forgotten as a form of art."

Pop art is made by taking a photograph, removing areas of it, and editing the entire image on a computer. Various Photoshop effects are implemented to achieve the final piece of art. " Certain effects can capture an emotion that might not have been present in the original photo," said Heuer. That's important, because "art has to move people. It has to evoke a reaction."

Heuer, a self-described history buff, also takes influence from important historical figures, including Lenin, Mao, John Reid, and Emma Goldman. "They are the reasons why I became a communist," he remarked.

Heuer further explored communist history when he traveled to China and Russia - places that both provided key opportunities for taking excellent pictures. He spent May Day in Moscow, in fact, where he marched with 50,000 fellow communists and took part in demonstrations against Vladimir Putin.

At the end of the day, Heuer does what does because, when it comes to political activism, "What better way [to take part in it] than through photography and painting?

"Corporations and capitalism have dumbed down art. It's harder to get a message out there today, but it's still possible. I hope it inspires people to ditch the apathy."

"I deeply believe in the causes of the working class," Heuer concluded. And anyway, he added, "I'm from the working class!"

Al Heuer's work is available at http://www.redarmyart.com

Photos: "Rise of the Worker II" and "Red Army Commander" - both pieces by Al Heuer; used with permission.