Worthy of a longer, more patient treatment. Camera work too jerky for my tastes, the shots of a cloudy Genoa present a claustrophobic atmosphere quite fitting the film.
Monday, September 08, 2008
Giorni e Nuvole (Days and Clouds) by Silvio Soldini
Frantically edited, Cassavetes-esque emotionally-charged atmosphere, but also somber in a way, a phenomenological treatise on fall from a financial pedestal, as compared to a existential one in "Time Out".
Worthy of a longer, more patient treatment. Camera work too jerky for my tastes, the shots of a cloudy Genoa present a claustrophobic atmosphere quite fitting the film.
Worthy of a longer, more patient treatment. Camera work too jerky for my tastes, the shots of a cloudy Genoa present a claustrophobic atmosphere quite fitting the film.
Saturday, August 30, 2008
A Guide to using your computer as a video player
Many people ask me many questions regarding playing video files on the computer. Some queries are about the media, some are about media players, some about subtitles, and some about hardware and projection systems.
I have prepared a succinct, distilled guide to the perplexed where I cover most of the ground. I have composed it in LaTeX, since I don't like MS Word, google page creator etc. much. The downside is that it is therefore available in PDF. (HTML output doesn't do justice to the images).
A Guide to Using your Computer as a Video Player
I have prepared a succinct, distilled guide to the perplexed where I cover most of the ground. I have composed it in LaTeX, since I don't like MS Word, google page creator etc. much. The downside is that it is therefore available in PDF. (HTML output doesn't do justice to the images).
A Guide to Using your Computer as a Video Player
Thursday, August 28, 2008
L'Emploi du temps (Time Out) by Laurent Cantet
There have been very few films about the bleakness and corruption of corporate life. If Michael Clayton was a tour de force depicting a crisis of conscience in two men whose jobs were to defend the corrupt, Cantet's Time Out is a haunting and oblique meditation on the utter meaninglessness and the soul-sucking quality of white collar jobs.
Time Out has echoes of L'Adversaire (The Adversary), though it eschews the latter's "thrilling" aspects to tell a more sober tale. The performances of George Clooney in Michael Clayton, Daniel Auteuil in The Adversary, and of Aurélien Recoing in Time Out are all marvelous and painstakingly real. Especially the final long shot of Michael Clayton and the final sequence in Time Out bring to mind something I read a while back: It takes great effort to portray the natural in art.
Inspired from actual events, and open-ended in its conclusions, Time Out paints a time-line in the life of Vincent, a just-fired consultant at a top firm, where he had been working for more than a decade. Vincent inexplicably hides the news of his firing from his family, and does not want to get hired again.
He loiters around office buildings, playgrounds, markets, visits a UN office in Switzerland, memorizes some passages from a promotional flyer and almost effortlessly starts taking money from his friends to invest in a fake venture.
He takes money from his father, gives a large gift to his son, concocts fanciful tales of his working for the upliftment of Africa, and slides further and further into an abyss, like a dead body. Not having intimacy with anyone in his life, he hesitatingly meets a failing musician friend whose very spontaneity and tenderness is congruent with his failure in life.
In the only glimmer of redemption, he meets a smuggler of fake goods (Jean-Michel), becomes his partner, and is genuinely surprised at Michel's openness and his disregard for what other people, including Michel's own family, think of him.
Vincent on the other hand, is so closed from his wife (Muriel) that even his vulnerability towards her is fake. Trying to explain his suffering, he instead tells her about the stresses at his non-existent workplace. Muriel's sympathies are not entirely clear. Is she a caring wife, or a subtly manipulative one? Similarly, his father! Is he the reason for Vincent's life of pretense, where he dare not be himself and risk being judged harshly?
In an amazing take on the abstract nature of modern managerial work, Vincent's smuggling of fake but tangible goods, versus the dead existence of his earlier life, brings a hint of joy in his life. But he is again torn apart when his wife disapproves of him. He gives up the only thing that seemingly brought him happiness, through which he could step outside the world of rules and manners.
The film also comments on the hollowness of international aid, the predatory nature of globalization and the greed-driven investments in "Emerging Markets".
Muriel exposes him to everybody. I don't think she was asking for help. The way the children react towards their father is a scathing indictment of what their mother must have told them about Vincent. Everybody gangs up against him and in a harrowing sequence of images, he is humiliated by his own children, runs away from his family into a frightening void of darkness.
At the end of the film, he appears as a dutiful, corrected version of himself, applying once again for a mind-numbing management job, a job which will require his "personal" involvement (as the recruiter says). The final sequence is so calm and reserved that its utter darkness and sense of hellish tragedy is depicted nowhere but in the cheerfully dead eyes of Vincent, and in his singular acceptance of all the conditions of his fate.
Vincent may not be scared of what lies ahead, but we are.
Time Out has echoes of L'Adversaire (The Adversary), though it eschews the latter's "thrilling" aspects to tell a more sober tale. The performances of George Clooney in Michael Clayton, Daniel Auteuil in The Adversary, and of Aurélien Recoing in Time Out are all marvelous and painstakingly real. Especially the final long shot of Michael Clayton and the final sequence in Time Out bring to mind something I read a while back: It takes great effort to portray the natural in art.
Inspired from actual events, and open-ended in its conclusions, Time Out paints a time-line in the life of Vincent, a just-fired consultant at a top firm, where he had been working for more than a decade. Vincent inexplicably hides the news of his firing from his family, and does not want to get hired again.
He loiters around office buildings, playgrounds, markets, visits a UN office in Switzerland, memorizes some passages from a promotional flyer and almost effortlessly starts taking money from his friends to invest in a fake venture.
He takes money from his father, gives a large gift to his son, concocts fanciful tales of his working for the upliftment of Africa, and slides further and further into an abyss, like a dead body. Not having intimacy with anyone in his life, he hesitatingly meets a failing musician friend whose very spontaneity and tenderness is congruent with his failure in life.
In the only glimmer of redemption, he meets a smuggler of fake goods (Jean-Michel), becomes his partner, and is genuinely surprised at Michel's openness and his disregard for what other people, including Michel's own family, think of him.
Vincent on the other hand, is so closed from his wife (Muriel) that even his vulnerability towards her is fake. Trying to explain his suffering, he instead tells her about the stresses at his non-existent workplace. Muriel's sympathies are not entirely clear. Is she a caring wife, or a subtly manipulative one? Similarly, his father! Is he the reason for Vincent's life of pretense, where he dare not be himself and risk being judged harshly?
In an amazing take on the abstract nature of modern managerial work, Vincent's smuggling of fake but tangible goods, versus the dead existence of his earlier life, brings a hint of joy in his life. But he is again torn apart when his wife disapproves of him. He gives up the only thing that seemingly brought him happiness, through which he could step outside the world of rules and manners.
The film also comments on the hollowness of international aid, the predatory nature of globalization and the greed-driven investments in "Emerging Markets".
Muriel exposes him to everybody. I don't think she was asking for help. The way the children react towards their father is a scathing indictment of what their mother must have told them about Vincent. Everybody gangs up against him and in a harrowing sequence of images, he is humiliated by his own children, runs away from his family into a frightening void of darkness.
At the end of the film, he appears as a dutiful, corrected version of himself, applying once again for a mind-numbing management job, a job which will require his "personal" involvement (as the recruiter says). The final sequence is so calm and reserved that its utter darkness and sense of hellish tragedy is depicted nowhere but in the cheerfully dead eyes of Vincent, and in his singular acceptance of all the conditions of his fate.
Vincent may not be scared of what lies ahead, but we are.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Depiction of Women in Sikh scriptures, some selections
Sikhism is often considered a progressive religion, in that its founders shunned the caste-hierarchy and ritualism prevalent in Hinduism and Islam at that time. However, only its socio-cultural aspects can be considered moderately progressive; its spirituality is strictly orthodox and congruent with major Hindu beliefs in reincarnation, Maya, the timeless God, etc.
This article is a collection of some verses from the Adi Granth, the holy book of the Sikhs. These verses are either about women, or use revealing female metaphors to illustrate a point. Some of these metaphors betray the viewpoint that the writer of the verse held towards women.
First, a review of the book The Better Half of Sikh History. It is an important work written by a scholar under the supervision of a oft-maligned Sikh scholar, Harjot Oberoi.
From the article:
Now, the verses themselves:
Page 1352, concerning a man following a woman:
This article is a collection of some verses from the Adi Granth, the holy book of the Sikhs. These verses are either about women, or use revealing female metaphors to illustrate a point. Some of these metaphors betray the viewpoint that the writer of the verse held towards women.
First, a review of the book The Better Half of Sikh History. It is an important work written by a scholar under the supervision of a oft-maligned Sikh scholar, Harjot Oberoi.
From the article:
'The Ultimate' in Sikh scripture was most often conceived in masculine terms, as Akal Purakh, Karta Purakh' (p. 11). Moreover, 'numerous passages in the scripture associate woman with 'maya,' that which is sensual as opposed to spiritual (p. 11; Guru Granth, pp. 41, 796) [and] women are exalted when obedient and subservient as wives to their divine husbands and men are ridiculed when they are not dominant' (p. 12; Guru Granth, p. 304).
Now, the verses themselves:
Page 1352, concerning a man following a woman:
Mānas ko janam līn simran nah nimakẖ kīn.Page 304, concerning a man following a woman:
Ḏārā sukẖ bẖaio ḏīn pagahu parī bėrī.
You obtained this human life, but you have not remembered the Lord in meditation, even for an instant.
For the sake of pleasure, you have become subservient to your woman, and now your feet are bound.
Jorā ḏā ākẖiā purakẖ kamāvḏė sė apviṯ amėḏẖ kẖalā.Page 871, regarding widow remarriage:
Kām viāpė kusuḏẖ nar sė jorā pucẖẖ cẖalā.
Those men who act according to the orders of women are impure, filthy and foolish.
Those impure men are engrossed in sexual desire; they consult their women and walk accordingly.
Kẖasam marai ṯao nār na rovai.Page 874, regarding being born as a woman:
Us rakẖvārā auro hovai.
Rakẖvārė kā hoė binās.
Āgai narak īhā bẖog bilās.
When her husband dies, the woman does not cry.
Someone else becomes her protector.
When this protector dies,
he falls into the world of hell hereafter, for the sexual pleasures he enjoyed in this world.
Mahā māī kī pūjā karai.Page 303, regarding the status of an "abandoned woman":
Nar sai nār hoė auṯarai.
One who worships the Great Goddess Maya
will be reincarnated as a woman, and not a man.
Oh gẖar gẖar handẖai jio rann ḏohāgaṇ os nāl muhu joṛė os bẖī lacẖẖaṇ lāiā.Page 581, regarding the character of a husband-less woman:
He wanders from house to house like an abandoned woman; whoever associates with him is stained by the mark of evil as well.
Hao muṯẖṛī ḏẖanḏẖai ḏẖāvaṇīā pir cẖẖodiaṛī viḏẖaṇkārė.Page 651, regarding the status of a "wicked, forsaken woman":
I too have been defrauded, chasing after worldly entanglements; my Husband Lord has forsaken me - I practice the evil deeds of a wife without a spouse.
Har jīo ṯin kā ḏarsan nā karahu pāpisat haṯiārī.Page 472, regarding the menstrual cycle:
Ohi gẖar gẖar fireh kusuḏẖ man jio ḏẖarkat nārī.
O Dear Lord, let me not even see them; they are the worst sinners and murderers.
They wander from house to house, with impure minds, like wicked, forsaken women.
Jio jorū sirnāvaṇī āvai vāro vār.Page 526, concerning thoughts about a woman:
Jūṯẖė jūṯẖā mukẖ vasai niṯ niṯ hoė kẖuār.
As a woman has her periods, month after month,
so does falsehood dwell in the mouth of the false; they suffer forever, again and again.
Anṯ kāl jo isṯarī simrai aisī cẖinṯā meh jė marai.Page 1243, concerning a woman acting wise:
Bėsvā jon val val auṯarai.
At the very last moment, he who thinks of women, and dies in such thoughts,
shall be reincarnated over and over again as a prostitute.
Rannā hoīā boḏẖīā puras hoė saīāḏ.Page 556, regarding one's progeny and wife:
Sīl sanjam sucẖ bẖannī kẖāṇā kẖāj ahāj.
Women have become advisors, and men have become hunters.
Humility, self-control and purity have run away; people eat the uneatable, forbidden food.
Kalī anḏar nānkā jinnāʼn ḏā auṯār.
Puṯ jinūrā ḏẖīa jinnūrī jorū jinna ḏā sikḏār.
In this Dark Age of Kali Yuga, O Nanak, the demons have taken birth.
The son is a demon, and the daughter is a demon; the wife is the chief of the demons.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
The Fervor of One's Likes
Have you noticed that you can usually forgive someone who likes something that you don't like, but that it is much harder to accept someone's criticism of what you really like?
Throughout the internet, and especially since the advent of blogs, one finds people airing their evaluations, likes, dislikes, opinions on every imaginable ideology, religion, sect, artifact, artist, film, song, piece of music, ban, band, brand, ...
I claim that identification with an object or opinion (whatever it may be), and getting excited about it to the extent of hating anyone who doesn't like it as much as you do, is a pernicious facet of the human condition. It is not very different from killing for one's God or religion, and from wanting to become an evangelist for something that has touched one's core.
Many years back, when I was reading about the Robert Bresson film Au Hasard Balthazar, I came across an extremely weird (to me at that time) comment by a critic (mind you, a critic, not a fan):
Similar sentiments, less vehemently expressed, can be found in the vast majority of human beings who identify with particular pieces of culture. This identification is extremely strong when the artifact is of one's own creation. I have seen artists hurl ugly invectives at their critics, while discussing a sublime song that they had composed. I have heard of painters and sculptors acting extremely weird when someone dares to point out a flaw in their work.
And since religious feeling is the most personal creation of all, and the relationship with one's deity the most hallowed, criticizing that is considered the ultimate in bad manners.
Since long, I have wondered about a dichotomy: Every religion preaches universal brotherhood, but the followers of that religion are willing to kill those who disagree with their beliefs. But now I understand that the universal brotherhood is a very faint secondary aspect of religion, the primary aspect is that of a personal (psychological) aggrandizement.
It is the inner self which feels attacked when that aggrandizement is vilified. No wonder the critics are seen as forces of evil who must be destroyed to uphold righteousness. This righteousness is nothing but one's own feelings of being good, right, a believer in the truth, etc.
And as I see it, this malady is spread far and wide in humanity, not just amongst the religious fundamentalists. We all identify with certain objects and things and art-instances which make us feel better about ourselves, and anyone who weakens the "purity" of that feeling becomes the object of our dislike or derision. What gets attacked in these milder cases is the pride in, and identification with, one's tastes and choices.
As the communication arena explodes with accessibility, this problem is going to get worse. There are no sacred cows anymore, everything is being criticized by at least some people on the internet. This does introduce a certain dread in a normal human being who dares to type in the name of his favorite film, or of his hallowed saint, in Google's search box. God knows what abominable words, what attacks on his cherished identity might be there in the first few results! I observed long ago, when internet was in its infancy, that the World Wide Web will provide like-minded people with a platform to huddle together and echo each other's prejudices. That it will lead to a narrowing of one's horizon, not a widening of it, because one will have the choice to interact only with those who agree with oneself. Contrast this with a live association, where you cannot politely ignore a contrarian viewpoint. You have to respond to it or risk being called a snob.
...
I am an avid watcher of films and I like to read about films that I have liked or disliked.
An extremely interesting website for film buffs is the Rotten Tomatoes index of film reviews. It categorizes reviews as favorable and unfavorable. I have noticed how I overlook with disdain the negative reviews for a film I like, and how I appreciatively smile when a reviewer gives 4 stars to a film I have liked.
And it is not something that I am guilty of for being an amateur. One of my favorite critics on the net, a seasoned professional, has this to say on the front page of his website:
Barry Schwartz describes it nicely in his book, The Paradox of Choice, when he talks about choosing films to screen for his family and friends:
Now back to where we started: It is easier to accept (rather tolerate) someone liking what you don't like because it doesn't attack your sense of identity directly. You may even silently gloat, and feel superior at the inferior choice of the other person. However, if your choice is directly criticized or shown to be inferior, then the pain is palpable.
And this proclivity to hold one's beliefs and opinions strongly to one's chest is reinforced in no uncertain terms in our culture:
Throughout the internet, and especially since the advent of blogs, one finds people airing their evaluations, likes, dislikes, opinions on every imaginable ideology, religion, sect, artifact, artist, film, song, piece of music, ban, band, brand, ...
I claim that identification with an object or opinion (whatever it may be), and getting excited about it to the extent of hating anyone who doesn't like it as much as you do, is a pernicious facet of the human condition. It is not very different from killing for one's God or religion, and from wanting to become an evangelist for something that has touched one's core.
Many years back, when I was reading about the Robert Bresson film Au Hasard Balthazar, I came across an extremely weird (to me at that time) comment by a critic (mind you, a critic, not a fan):
Whoever didn't weep at the end of Au Hasard Balthazar should be hit with a Mack truck outside the theater. (Gary Indiana)Now the irony is, Balthazar is an elegy moaning the lack of regard for one's fellow living beings.
Similar sentiments, less vehemently expressed, can be found in the vast majority of human beings who identify with particular pieces of culture. This identification is extremely strong when the artifact is of one's own creation. I have seen artists hurl ugly invectives at their critics, while discussing a sublime song that they had composed. I have heard of painters and sculptors acting extremely weird when someone dares to point out a flaw in their work.
And since religious feeling is the most personal creation of all, and the relationship with one's deity the most hallowed, criticizing that is considered the ultimate in bad manners.
Since long, I have wondered about a dichotomy: Every religion preaches universal brotherhood, but the followers of that religion are willing to kill those who disagree with their beliefs. But now I understand that the universal brotherhood is a very faint secondary aspect of religion, the primary aspect is that of a personal (psychological) aggrandizement.
It is the inner self which feels attacked when that aggrandizement is vilified. No wonder the critics are seen as forces of evil who must be destroyed to uphold righteousness. This righteousness is nothing but one's own feelings of being good, right, a believer in the truth, etc.
And as I see it, this malady is spread far and wide in humanity, not just amongst the religious fundamentalists. We all identify with certain objects and things and art-instances which make us feel better about ourselves, and anyone who weakens the "purity" of that feeling becomes the object of our dislike or derision. What gets attacked in these milder cases is the pride in, and identification with, one's tastes and choices.
As the communication arena explodes with accessibility, this problem is going to get worse. There are no sacred cows anymore, everything is being criticized by at least some people on the internet. This does introduce a certain dread in a normal human being who dares to type in the name of his favorite film, or of his hallowed saint, in Google's search box. God knows what abominable words, what attacks on his cherished identity might be there in the first few results! I observed long ago, when internet was in its infancy, that the World Wide Web will provide like-minded people with a platform to huddle together and echo each other's prejudices. That it will lead to a narrowing of one's horizon, not a widening of it, because one will have the choice to interact only with those who agree with oneself. Contrast this with a live association, where you cannot politely ignore a contrarian viewpoint. You have to respond to it or risk being called a snob.
...
I am an avid watcher of films and I like to read about films that I have liked or disliked.
An extremely interesting website for film buffs is the Rotten Tomatoes index of film reviews. It categorizes reviews as favorable and unfavorable. I have noticed how I overlook with disdain the negative reviews for a film I like, and how I appreciatively smile when a reviewer gives 4 stars to a film I have liked.
And it is not something that I am guilty of for being an amateur. One of my favorite critics on the net, a seasoned professional, has this to say on the front page of his website:
Karina Longworth loves both Silent Light and Sleeping Dogs Lie. I may have to swoon.This facet of liking people who like our choices, and disliking those who don't, is getting accentuated by the plethora of choices that we have in today's world. More and more, our choices are defining us in today's world of wide availability. If someone criticizes our fond choices in today's flood of options, it hurts a lot more than if our choices were restricted.
Barry Schwartz describes it nicely in his book, The Paradox of Choice, when he talks about choosing films to screen for his family and friends:
Choosing a movie for others is not my favorite activity. There is pressure to choose a film that will surprise and delight people. And in my circle, it had become something of a parlor game to make fun of a bad selection and the person responsible for it. On the other hand, the critics back home were only kidding. And more important, even if they were serious, they were fully aware that the options at the local video store were profoundly impoverished. So, back in Swarthmore, nobody had high expectations, and nobody seriously faulted the chooser for whatever he came home with.I posit that this pressure is not just due to a belief, but due to an actual fact of identification with our likes and dislikes. And the more obscure our likes, the more vehemence we display in their defense. After all, we can't really blame advertising or peer pressure when we choose something obscure to love.
Then I moved to the heart of downtown Philadelphia. Three blocks from my house is a video store that has everything. Movies from every era, every genre, every country. So now what's at stake when I go to rent a video for the group? Now whose fault will it be if I bring back something that people regard as a waste of time? Now it is no longer a reflection of the quality of the store. Now it's a reflection of the quality of my taste. So the availability of many attractive options means that there is no longer any excuse for failure. The blame for a bad choie will rest squarely with me, and the stakes involved in my video choice have escalated.
Even decisions as trivial as renting a video become important if we believe that these decisions are revealing something significant about ourselves.
Now back to where we started: It is easier to accept (rather tolerate) someone liking what you don't like because it doesn't attack your sense of identity directly. You may even silently gloat, and feel superior at the inferior choice of the other person. However, if your choice is directly criticized or shown to be inferior, then the pain is palpable.
And this proclivity to hold one's beliefs and opinions strongly to one's chest is reinforced in no uncertain terms in our culture:
"A man who won't die for something is not fit to live. " (Martin Luther King)Opinions and aesthetic choices and responses make for richness in humanity, it is the vehemence and affective reactions to opinions that I question.
"Those who stand for nothing fall for anything." (Alexander Hamilton)
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