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Sarasota Scene: Film Fest

April 9, 2016April 9, 2016 JWF 3 Comments

FILMS!

We have been immersed in film this week taking advantage of some of the offerings of the Sarasota Film Festival. One of the things we’ve noted is how difficult it is to make a film that has momentum with a clear dramatic arc that engages and holds the viewer’s attention. A filmmaker can have a meaty topic or a good story line, but fail to turn this into a film that doesn’t drag or sag. That said, our scorecard so far this week is one excellent film, one very good, one tedious, and one slightly weird. Here are the films (in order of viewing):

Frame by Frame. Challenging our (Americans’) view of Afghanistan, this documentary traces the careers of four Afghan photographers (one female) as they navigate a post-Taliban media world. The firm bursts with unexpected color and gorgeous scenery juxtaposed with shots of conflict. It takes too long to make its focus clear, but I’d still give it B+/A-.

Five Nights in Maine. This was one of the so-called Centerpiece films in the festival and I expected to really like this feature. Alas, the story of widower Sherwin (played by David Oyelowo of Selma fame) who goes to Maine to visit his late wife’s mother is slow to the point of tedium. The scenery is vintage rural Maine, but there were lots of missed opportunities to enrich the narrative—what was Uncle George’s role; how might nurse Anna have connected more with Sherwin; and what was his wife Fiona’s backstory with her mother. My rating: C minus.

Raising Bertie. This documentary takes on an important issue: How do you nurture and motivate poor black young men to become productive adult citizens. Focusing on rural Bertie County in northeastern North Carolina, the film follows three young men over the course of six years as they repeat grades in high school, age out of the public school system, and struggle to find purpose for their lives. It is a close look at the devastating impact of poverty and meager educational resources. Like first novels, this film could have done with more editing (I’d cut about 15 minutes), but it is still worth seeing. My grade: B/B+

Embers. A science fiction feature, Embers presents an “end of the world” scenario in which society has been destroyed, buildings are bombed out, and a few individuals roam around, mostly unaware of and unconnected to each other. They have lost their memories and if they do meet and connect, as one couple does, the next day they start afresh with no recollection of the day before. A father and his grown daughter have escaped this fate by living sealed in an underground bunker. Intriguing premise, but never quite comes together in a suspenseful way. Even the ending seems less than it could have been. My rating: Wacky; but one of the reasons one goes to film festivals is to experience what you might not otherwise have!

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

I’ve read selected chapters of Andrew Solomon’s tome, Far from the Tree, and plan to take it up again, so was prompted by this brief acquaintance to read his essay about why he travels. I love traveling to new places and the trip I made that was the most different and probably the most enlightening was three weeks in Madagascar in 2009. The quote below from Solomon’s article, “Dispatches from Everywhere” in the April issue of Conde Nast Traveler resonated with me. I think it also relates to how a film about photography in Afghanistan (see above) can change one’s perspective—not the same as going there, but still being exposed through a different lens.

“Some of my traveling has been glamorous, some of it terrifying, but it has had a cumulative humbling effect. I started traveling out of curiosity, but I have come to believe in travel’s political importance, that encouraging a nation’s citizenry to travel may be as important as encouraging school attendance, environmental conservation, or national thrift. You cannot understand the otherness of places you have not encountered. If all young adults were required to spend two weeks in a foreign country, two-thirds of the world’s diplomatic problems could be solved. Travel is a set of corrective lenses that helps focus the planet’s blurred reality.”

On the Road: Tar Heel State

December 9, 2015December 12, 2015 JWF Leave a comment

North Carolina was a large source of tar, pitch and turpentine for many years and around the time of the Civil War became known as the Tar Heel State and its inhabitants Tar Heelers. Tar was used to coat the bottom of boats and a large amount was exported to England. Initially, the term was a derogatory one, but later was adopted favorably as the state’s and its residents’ nickname.

We spent a week in North Carolina at Thanksgiving. We didn’t see any tar or turpentine, but did enjoy touring the Reynolda House in Winston-Salem, country home of A. J. Reynolds of tobacco fame and his wife Katharine. Katharine was a very progressive woman for her time (1920’s) and she oversaw the building of the home, the creation of a school for the workers, and the beginnings of a village. At one time, 300 families lived on the estate. Unfortunately, she died in childbirth and barely spent any time here. The house is impressive—bungalow style with an expansive main room featuring double staircases and an Aeolian organ plus garden rooms, porches, a jazzy red and white lower level bar cum entertainment space, and a stunningly gorgeous swimming pool! The bungalow movement emphasized fresh air for good health and the porches and patios are designed to promote it. There are also extensive gardens, most of which were dormant, but a few rose blooms and cabbage heads remained and the conservatory showcased seasonal poinsettias and a few bromeliads.

The featured exhibit, The Artist’s Garden: American Impressionism and the Garden Movement, 1887-1920, is a very pleasing collection of paintings. Some familiar names here, Childe Hassam, for example, but mostly not works we’d seen anywhere else. Organized by the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, it is worth seeing.

Central North Carolina has a lot of clay and has been a locus for pottery since the 1700’s. Seagrove, south of Greensboro, and the surrounding area abound with studios open to the public. We were there the day before Thanksgiving so many studios were closed, but we took advantage of the North Carolina Pottery Center to get oriented and see samples of about 80 different potters’ work. We then visited three studios and vowed that we needed to return for a full day to leisurely tour the area. As you can see, I prefer the more contemporary designs.

Bookstores for Book Lovers

I’m a longtime connoisseur of bookstores, particularly independent ones. I have my favorites in the U.S. and even a few in the U.K. In my opinion, a good bookstore smells of paper and ink, is light on the non-book miscellaneous merchandise (note cards are fine), has nooks and corners where you can linger and browse, offers a comfortable chair or two, and is laid out more like a maze than an array of aisles.

In Durham, we re-visited The Regulator Bookshop, a favorite haunt for at least 30 years. Located in the bustling 9^th Street business corridor, The Regulator is scruffy in a good way. There is a side room off the main area devoted to magazines and greeting cards, an open area with tables of books and books on shelves, a raised area for kids’ books, and a very welcoming long banquette. Many years ago, I spent several hours in that spot reading to my young son while our car was being repaired. Downstairs, where once there was a coffee bar, there is now a space for events surrounded by used books and remainder titles. Overall the store is inviting and always lively with readers of all ages.

A more recent addition to my list is McIntyre’s Books in Fearrington Village (near Chapel Hill) where for ten years or so, we’ve whiled away an occasional hour or two. It’s more genteel than The Regulator which, considering its clientele of largely retirees, makes sense. The store is carpeted and feels like being inside a home. There are multiple rooms (one devoted to books for children through teens), another with a fireplace and comfy chairs, and yet another in the back packed with mystery books. There are appealing displays of the latest titles and staff recommendations along with a focus on local and regional fiction and nonfiction. I always find something to buy—usually too many “somethings!”

Book of the Week

I just finished Colum McCann’s latest work, Thirteen Ways of Looking, which is a collection of one novella and several short stories. Not only is McCann an elegant stylist who makes every word count, he is accessible and witty and portrays his characters with compassion and understanding. The title novella beautifully captures the thought processes and asides of a retired judge as he reflects on his career and negotiates lunchtime conversation with his favorite waiter and his fragile son. And I thought the last story of a damaged nun, an outlier who is revisited by past trauma, was brilliant. The New York Times included this title among its 100 notable books of the year.

Header image: Discovery Room at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh

(All photos copyright by JWFarrington)

On the Road: Onward to Bethlehem

October 6, 2015October 9, 2015 JWF Leave a comment

Recently, we spent several days in Potsdam, NY, at Clarkson University, my husband’s alma mater, where the president and his wife warmly welcomed us. The fall foliage colors are late in arriving this year and most of the trees were green and yellow with just a few dabs of red beginning to appear. I strolled a path along the Raquette River at the edge of the campus and spotted a red maple leaf on the ground, about the only one I saw. The river was calm and serene. Farther on, the path skirts the lovely and historic Bayside Cemetery with its impressive red sandstone gate.

Since then, we have re-connected with family in Albany—first, second and third cousins and some one or twice-removed (love that terminology!)—and dined and visited with former colleagues and friends at Lehigh University in Bethlehem. We had not been on the Lehigh campus for eight years and it was a pleasure to see how lovely it still is (but, oh, the hills, I had forgotten the steep grade). We kept running into people we knew so got a tour the new science building, walked through the Asa Packer Dining Room in the University Center, and of course, re-visited Linderman Library.

Recently, Architectural Digest included Linderman as one of the 12 most stunning libraries in the world! I had the privilege of being involved in this renovation project and now, this library is the place on campus to study and to be seen. It even has a café—a source of controversy for some students when it was being planned! Hard to believe given today’s café scene.

While in Bethlehem, we also visited the ArtsQuest complex located in Southside Bethlehem at the Bethlehem Steel plant which shut down completely in 1995 and sat untouched for almost twenty years. The complex includes: SteelStacks, a performance venue, the Banana Factory, an arts center offering classes and exhibits, a Sands casino, and the headquarters of the local PBS station. The highlight for us was the Hoover-Mason Trestle, Bethlehem’s answer to New York’s High Line.

This trestle walkway, on the site of an elevated track used for moving raw materials, takes you along side the blast furnaces and sheds where the steel was produced. These are massive structures and being able to walk closer to them gave me a better sense of the immensity of the operation and the dangers involved in the work. Information panels line the walkway and tell the story of the immigrants who labored here, the women who took over during WWII, and the steelmaking process itself. It was fascinating! What an effective transformation of these hulking edifices into an educational and fun attraction. The trestle only opened a few months ago so many of our friends haven’t yet visited.

On the Road: North Country

September 24, 2015September 24, 2015 JWF Leave a comment

We left home several days ago and you might say we’re rambling through our past. By the time October has ended, we will have visited almost every place we’ve lived during our married life and then some. It’s a journey with many stops and numerous opportunities to re-connect with old friends and touch what once was.

First stop, a town we never lived in–Lake Placid, NY. This is in the North Country. In New York State, there’s New York City and, in the eyes of Manhattanites, everywhere else. For them, upstate NY begins at about Poughkeepsie. If you’re a true upstater, however, then you know that upstate means Albany and then proceeding west Utica, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo. That’s real upstate, complete with snow and cows. Farther north than upstate is the North Country, dotted with rugged small towns, little lakes, and the expansive and very protected Adirondack State Park.

Located within the park, the village of Lake Placid sits mostly on Mirror Lake and close to the lake whose name it bears. It was the site of both the 1932 and the 1980 Winter Olympics and we encountered Olympic memorabilia and reminders throughout the town. The architecture here with its emphasis on dark wood and heavy beamed ceilings made me think of Aspen, Colorado, although Placid is a much more modest place.

A little jewel, Mirror Lake is ringed by boat clubs and tidy beaches, elegant homes, tasteful shops and restaurants, charming inns, and here and there an inviting park bench. The lake is small enough that we easily walked the circumference in about an hour, keeping up a fairly brisk pace.

One day we drove over to Saranac Lake, dubbed the capital of the Adirondacks. This lake is pleasant enough, but sadly, the town has suffered economically and is marked by empty storefronts and not a lot of activity that would attract a visitor. At least not this time of year, perhaps during ski season.

Our next excursion was to Whiteface Mountain, about a 30-minute drive from Lake Placid. Whiteface has the distinction of being the 5^th highest peak in New York State (just under 5,000 feet), but is the only one which has a special highway which takes you to just shy of the summit. Two enterprising men began lobbying the state government in the 1920’s for this highway and it was finally approved by then Gov. Franklin Roosevelt. Construction began in 1931, but the road didn’t officially open until 1935 when President Roosevelt dedicated it as a memorial for veterans.

It’s a beautiful road with lots of places to stop and admire the views. And, you could also say it has the grandest visitor center one could imagine. The Castle is made of granite (recovered from the construction work) and is an imposing presence there at the top. After we parked and briefly visited the Castle, we had the choice of doing the last 275 feet to the actual summit on foot over jagged and slippery rocks or by elevator. We chose the latter and walked down the drive and then into what was a long low tunnel (lighted, but somewhat claustrophobic for my taste) to the elevator.

The operator operator was a bit mechanical in manner, but did share a number of facts about the conditions above and the best times to see the views. The ride was slow, up the equivalent of 27 floors, and we exited into an enclosed space. Going outside we walked around for views on all sides.

The sky was blue with a few high clouds and we could see not only Lake Placid and Mirror Lake, but also over to Lake Champlain and into Vermont. Lovely, despite being 48 degrees with a very stiff wind! It’s worth noting that Roosevelt wanted to ensure access for everyone (and he used a wheelchair at this point), hence the elevator.

Header photo: Mirror Lake at sunset

Category: Travel

Sarasota Scene: Film Fest

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On the Road: Tar Heel State

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On the Road: Onward to Bethlehem

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On the Road: North Country

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