Category: Film

Manhattan Diversions: Movies, Art, etc.

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RECENT FILMS
Free Solo
This is a breathtaking and stunning National Geographic documentary about free soloing on Yosemite’s El Capitan. That is, climbing its 3,000 foot rock wall without any ropes. The first person to ever do that was Alex Hannold in June 2017, and this is the story and the backstory of that historic climb. What makes this such a fascinating film is that you learn a lot about Alex as a person and what drives him and why, as much as he can articulate it, he feels compelled to undertake such a risky climb.

The film crew, several other professional climbers, and his girlfriend Sanni, are also prominently featured. I found the fears of the film crew on his behalf and Sanni’s candor about their relationship and her concerns about how Alex communicates emotion added a richness and intimacy to the film. Highly recommend it!

A Star is Born
This is the fourth version or re-make of this film, this time starring Bradley Cooper who also directs it, and Lady Gaga. I’ve heard Lady Gaga sing a few times, but it was a new and amazing experience to see her develop in this part. The movie has lots of loud music and is as much a concert at times as it is a drama. Cooper stars as Jackson Maine, a popular singer on his way down, and Lady Gaga as Ally, the ingenue he discovers whose career quickly outstrips his.

I thought the film was a bit long and slow in parts, but appreciated that although Jackson lets her down repeatedly, Ally is never mean or nasty, but basically loving, not a side of celebrities that movies always depict. Go and you may leave humming the tune to “Shallow.”

EXHIBIT NOTES
Dorothea Lange’s America at Reynolda House Museum of American art
In North Carolina, this small gallery photography exhibit consists of a number of Lange’s portraits and scenes depicting poverty and hardship during the 1920’s and 30’s. Also included are photos by Walker Evans and others from the same period. What made the exhibit more meaningful for me were the longer explanations of context and setting on some of the labels. If you to to Winston-Salem, you can also tour the Reynolds home (he, the tobacco baron) and the attractive gardens on the property.

Delacroix at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
The 18th century French painter, Eugene Delacroix, was a master draftsman. This small exhibit focuses on a variety of sketches and drawings he did in preparation for larger paintings. Several small watercolors are also included.

Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevich:  The Russian Avant-Garde in Vitebsk, 1918-1922 at the Jewish Museum

This featured exhibit covers a short period in Russian art after the overthrow of the czar when Chagall and others founded an art school.  The dominant art movement was Suprematism, founded by Malevich, which used basic geometric shapes and a limited color palette in both painting and architecture.  Chagall soon drifted away from strict adherence to it.

FABULOUS PLAY!


Most everyone has seen one version or another of My Fair Lady and probably one of the film versions which has a happy ending, not part of George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion.  This new production at Lincoln Center is truly a My Fair Lady for our time. Lauren Ambrose is luminescent as Eliza Doolittle, who starts out as a lonely flower seller, but comes into her own as a woman by taking up Professor Higgins’ offer to pass her off as a lady.
The stage sets are amazing with a pointed contrast between Higgins’ elaborately designed house and the often bare stage on which Eliza sings or cavorts. Choreography is exuberant, occasionally to the point of boisterousness, as in Alfred Doolittle’s rousing rendition of “Get Me to the Church on Time,” complete with dancers in drag. Silver and lilac costumes in the Ascot scene are sumptuous and cooly elegant. All the songs and the singing are wonderful—both Eliza’s and the professor’s.

What might surprise you is how this production ends, but I won’t tell, except that it’s the right ending for today. Our performance featured a number of understudies including Tony Roach as Higgins and Joe Hart as Alfred Doolittle, and they were so good, I probably wouldn’t have known they weren’t the usual leads. If you have the chance, see it!

Note:  Header photo is of Delacroix’s A Moroccan Couple on Their Terrace, 1832.  Photos by JWFarrington.

The Literary Life

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TIMELY FILM—The Wife
I read Meg Wolitzer’s novel of the same name, but I think the film version of The Wife is better. Glenn Close gives a stellar performance as Joan Castleman, the dutiful, somewhat subservient wife of literary rockstar and new Nobelist, Joe Castleman. With just the slightest change in expression, Close portrays a whole range of suppressed emotions from anger to frustration, boredom, and puzzlement. Only once does she really erupt into a violent outburst and that is quickly transformed into the actions of a caring spouse.

As the couple proceeds through arriving in Stockholm and all the press and trappings leading up to the actual Nobel ceremony, it is clear that all is not hunky-dory in the marriage nor in their relationship with writer son David. Through flashbacks we see undergrad Joan, who has talent as a writer, and her mentor professor Joe and then the early years of their marriage. In Joan’s beginnings as a writer lies the crux of this too timely film. Also very well played is aspiring biographer Nathaniel who is like a pesky fly that keeps returning. Well worth seeing!

READING—THE LITERARY LIFE
A Life of My Own by Claire Tomalin
Before reading her memoir, I knew of Claire Tomalin primarily as a biographer as I’ve read hers of both Jane Austen and Thomas Hardy. Before she discovered her calling as a chronicler of other’s lives, Tomalin had a successful career as first a reader of manuscripts, a writer of book reviews, and then most significantly, as a literary editor at a number of notable publications including the Sunday Times.  

British by birth, her mother was a musician and composer and her father held posts with the United Nations and other NGOs. As a child, she was exposed to good literature, theater, and opera and in her youth and adulthood became acquainted with many of the literary luminaries of the time.  In short, her intellectual life was rich in culture.

Her personal life, however, had its challenges, particularly during the riotous 1960’s. Her first husband, Nick, was charismatic and an accomplished reporter, journalist and TV broadcaster, but also unreliable and regularly unfaithful.  Her youngest son was born with spina bifida and one of her daughters suffered from severe depression.  Left a widow with young children in the 70’s, she initially cobbled together a series of part-time jobs and kept on going with determination.

While Tomalin shares some thoughts about these tragic events, she is not the most revealing of memoirists. Her book at times reads like a diary of all the meetings, assignments, conferences, and lunches she took part in with a host of boldface names. Perhaps because I am interested in what goes into the business of book publishing and reviewing and the journals associated with it, I found these details mostly fascinating and, consequently, the book held my attention. Others might find this aspect tedious.

Nonetheless, Tomalin succeeds in portraying what it took for a woman of her generation (born in 1933) to carve out a rewarding career and, ultimately, to craft a happy second marriage. She is generous toward her friends, both old and new, and seldom spiteful. For another view, see the excellent one in the August 23 issue of the Wall St. Journal. (~JWFarrington)

OF LIBRARIES AND BOOKS
While visiting my Chapel Hill sister, we stopped by her local library, Chatham Community Library. What was interesting to me is that it is a hybrid library, a combination academic library for the community college and a library for the general public. It’s a new building and a very attractive one! I chuckled at some of the end-of-the-stacks posters and thought that the faux fireplaces were a nice touch.

 

We also paid a visit to one of our favorite bookstores in North Carolina and that’s McIntyre’s at Fearrington Village. As usual, I succumbed to a book for myself as well as a few for my granddaughters. Tired of browsing, the Chief Penguin and my brother-in-law made themselves comfortable on the bench outside.

Note:  All photos ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved).  Header photo is the interior of the Chatham Community Library.

Maine Time: Two Takes on Identity in Life

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This week Maine is sunny and Maine is always quiet.  Activity besides reading consists mainly of walks around the neighborhood, trips to the general store, and dinners with friends, punctuated by the occasional movie or boat trip.  Included in this blog are a few photos of the local scene plus reviews of a new documentary and a compelling novel.

FASCINATING DOCUMENTARY

The Gospel According to Andre

Andre Leon Talley, a black man, grew up in North Carolina in the 1950’s and 60’s when segregation was still the norm and options for blacks were limited.  Raised by his grandmother, his childhood was strongly grounded in the life of the church and the values it represented.  From an early age, Talley was drawn to fashion and after earning his degree at Brown University, he began working in Paris, writing and commenting on the fashion scene there.  Later he came to New York and worked at Vogue with both the legendary Diana Vreeland and the meticulous Anna Wintour.

Over time, Talley became an icon for others aspiring to a career in the fashion industry.  A large man physically, his mode of dress and his style have always been colorful, bold, and uniquely his.

Kate Novack is the producer and director of this excellent documentary covering Talley’s career.  She has creatively combined a wealth of archival footage of life in Durham, NC in the 50’s and 60’s and the fashion scene in Paris and New York in the 70’s with interviews with Talley’s contemporaries, colleagues, and friends from his childhood.  While racism is an underlying current, it is not dwelled upon.  The interviews with Talley himself take place interspersed throughout the film leading up to the 2016 election.  The scene on election night is remarkable for its restraint.

On a personal note, Kate Novack is someone I know a bit since she is the daughter of very good friends. The Chief Penguin and I had the pleasure of viewing the film at a special showing at the local nonprofit theater in Boothbay Harbor complete with a Q&A afterward with Kate.  It was informative to hear more about the making of this film.

Kate and spouse Andrew Rossi are also the creative team responsible for two other recent documentaries: First Monday in May, and Page One about the New York Times.  They are all worth seeing!  For more about Kate and the Talley film, here’s an interview by Garage.

 

SUMMER READING

Timely Novel about the Immigrant Experience

#13  The Leavers by Lisa Ko

This 2017 novel is another one that made multiple best books of the year lists and was also a National Book Award finalist.  It’s a vivid portrayal of a Chinese mother and her son who at various points navigate the different physical and cultural worlds of Fuzhou, China and the Bronx. Pregnant by a neighbor she has no interest in marrying, Polly leaves China for New York City where Deming is born. She works first on a factory floor and later in a nail salon.  When she realizes she can’t work and take care of him, she soon sends him back to China to live with his grandfather.  When he’s older, she brings him back to the U.S.

Deming makes the adjustment to the city, grooves to all its sounds and colors, and is comfortable living with his mother, her boyfriend Leon, Leon’s sister Vivian, and her son Michael who becomes his good friend.  Until the day his mother doesn’t come home.  Feeling abandoned and rejected when he hears nothing from her, he must then cope with white foster parents, being adopted, and living in suburban upstate NY.  Ten years later at 21, having spent the past ten years as Daniel Wilkinson, he seeks to locate his birth mother.  The novel alternates between Deming’s life in the United States and his times in China and sections in Polly’s voice about the torture of being deported and the new successful life she builds in her native land.

My only quibble is that it could have been more tightly edited at points to sustain the forward momentum.  Nonetheless, it is a richly imagined novel of identity:  how does one figure out who he or she is, how does he find a way to believe in himself, what must one do to belong, and what is acceptable behavior and what is selfish.  Both Deming and Polly wrestle with the issues of who they are and what living a fulfilling life means. Each is a multi-layered character with Polly being especially complex.  (~JWFarrington)

Note:  All photos ©JWFarrington.

Manhattan Inside: Films & Books

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The rainy gray weather of the past week kept us inside, and we focused on seeing newly released films, heavy ones with religion at the core, but also the somewhat frothy Book Club.  We took the 6 line from 59th Street station down to Bleecker Street and the Angelika Film Center where we saw three of them.  I also found time to do a bit of reading.

FILM FARE

Book Club

This movie is funny and fun, a chick flic for the retirement set.   But it isn’t all fluff as there are some poignant moments midst the humor and the sex jokes.  And the four stars, Jane Fonda, Diane Keaton, Candice Bergen, and Mary Steenburgen, are perfectly cast. 

Fonda is a rich single hotel owner, the kind of brittle stylish female she does so well.  Keaton is nervous and anxious, a recent widow, who’s being micromanaged by her adult daughters.  Bergen is the more sedate, serious one of the group. Divorced 18 years, she’s a federal judge who lives alone with her cat.  Steenburgen, a chef, has a recently retired husband who seems to have retired from any and all fun.

When one of their book group selects Fifty Shades of Grey for their next meeting, the fun begins as each woman in her own way shakes up her life or gets it shaken up (see Steenburgen’s flight).  Yes, there are men involved, and they provide the spice or the yeast or whatever metaphor you prefer.  As in all good romances, there is a happy ending!  See it, have fun, and end feeling good or, at least, happy.

On Chesil Beach

  Ian McEwan’s novel is short, more of a novella really, and I wondered how it could be turned into a full-length feature film.  The answer lies in the fact that McEwan, who wrote the screenplay, expanded the story to continue on from 1962 to scenes in 1975 and 2007.

The rendering of 1962 in all its youthful innocence is spot on as this young couple meets and courts and then marries.  They each bring baggage from childhood exacerbated by their difference in social class and compounded by their different expectations.  It’s unclear what Edward will do long-term while Flo is committed to a career in music with her string quartet.  What results is a wedding night neither would have predicted. The novel ends ambiguously; the film gives us the coda to 1962.  It’s beautiful, and at times, painfully sensitive, to watch.  Saoirise Ronan and Billy Howle star as the wedded pair.

ASPECTS OF FAITH

Pope Francis:  A Man of His Word

This documentary shows the human side of Pope Francis and both his compassion toward those less fortunate and his global concern.   It is, however, mostly talking heads, the pope’s primarily, as he and others give speeches and make pronouncements before Congress and at tragic events or situations in many countries.  It’s good, but not great and definitely too long.  It would have benefited from much editing.

First Reformed

This is a strange and weird movie that combines a troubled hermetic minister with a troubled environmental activist lawbreaker.  Set in bleak upstate New York, it is dark, dimly lit, and stark.  Reverend Toller, minister at the historic congregationless First Reformed Church, has a job there solely by the grace of the enterprising successful minister at the evangelical Abundant Life church.  Abundant Life owns 250 year old First Reformed.

Toller is divorced, grieving and guilty over the death of his soldier son, and berates himself for his perceived shortcomings.  He’s called upon to counsel Michael, at the request of Michael’s pregnant wife Mary, who is fearful about her husband’s dark tendencies.  How the lives of these three intersect around the issue of climate change and the future of planet Earth makes for a dark, disturbing film.  While the critics have accorded it high praise, I did not find it entirely convincing or satisfying. Ethan Hawke stars.

 

RECENT READING—HISTORICAL AND MYSTERY

White Houses by Amy Bloom

It is accepted knowledge that Eleanor Roosevelt had a very close friendship with journalist and reporter Lorena Hickok.  Whether that friendship constituted a physical affair is debated.  What Bloom has done in this sensitively written novel is to depict an affair based on Hickok’s reminiscences of their times together. The novel is set over several days in 1945 after the death of FDR and Hickok goes back in time to recount instances in their friendship, a trip she and Eleanor made together, embraces stolen in secluded corners, and her own years of living in the White House.

Reference is made to historical events and, we have Hick’s thoughts on FDR’s affair with Missy LeHand and his relations with other women.  We never have Eleanor speaking in her own voice; all is filtered through Hick. It’s a lovely novel and created based on Bloom’s extensive research into nonfiction works, correspondence and the like. (~JWFarrington)

To Die But Once by Jacqueline Winspear

I have liked some of the Maisie Dobbs better than others and thought some were more fully developed than others. This one I enjoyed very much.  The year is 1940 and Maisie is asked to find out why a neighboring family hasn’t heard from their son recently.  Joe is working for a painting company and usually calls home weekly. When he turns up dead, Maisie’s investigation takes her deep into the wartime letting of contracts and who shares information that is classified.  The secondary characters, Billy Beale and Sandra, her associates, as well as her friend Priscilla and family, all have rich roles in this book. Even the events surrounding the Battle of Dunkirk have a place.  (~JWFarrington)

Notes:  Images are from the web:  Book Club from deadline.com, On Chesil Beach from nytimes.com, and the photo of Roosevelt and Hickok from advocate.com.  Header photo by the author.