-Calvin Coolidge
"Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. It may not be difficult to store up in the mind a vast quantity of facts within a comparatively short time, but the ability to form judgments requires the severe discipline of hard work and the tempering heat of experience and maturity."
-Calvin Coolidge
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There are some movies that I watch and recognise are really well done and well acted, and yet despite their undeniable technical brilliance, I find myself unable to enjoy them. This is one of them. There are of course others which I've mentioned in the past... Gone With The Wind, Wuthering Heights, and The English Patient to name a few. My distaste generally boils down to one main factor: I thoroughly dislike the central characters- Scarlett and Rhett, Heathcliff and Catherine, Lazlo and Katherine... these are all deeply unpleasant people. The same can be said of Andrew Neiman and Terrance Fletcher in Whiplash. Whiplash was written and directed by Damien Chazelle, who also did Grand Piano, a movie which I reviewed last year and quite liked. Were there unbelievable parts in that film? Absolutely, but I enjoyed watching it so was more inclined to overlook its flaws. With Whiplash I was admittedly far less forgiving of its excesses (at one point it devolves into almost an action movie, complete with a car crash and race through the streets) because I wasn't having a good time. Terrance Fletcher is skillfully played by J.K. Simmons, but the fact is, his character has no redeeming qualities; he's a psycho abusive bully to the point where he's almost cartoonishly villainous. It's hard to pretend that a teacher who routinely screamed at and berated his students, threw chairs and cymbals at them, and repeatedly slapped them across the face- and drove one to suicide- wouldn't have been fired, sued, and quite possibly jailed for his behaviour. I guess we're supposed to empathise with Miles Teller's character Andrew Neiman, but I struggled to do so. Yes, he's the main- although by no means the only- target of Fletcher's abuse, but this does not mean that he's a good or admirable person. We see that he's willing to sabotage others to get ahead- the incident of the missing music score- as well as destroy personal relationships. This includes his relationship with his father, whom he clearly looks down on because he failed in his dream of being a writer. His father is a successful teacher, clearly loves his son, supports Andrew's ambitions despite not understanding his obsession, and- more to the point- foots the bills for his expensive music school. Despite this, Andrew values his good opinion less than that of the physically and emotionally abusive monster, Fletcher. The tough but fair teacher who pushes a prodigy to be the best that they can be is a cliche, sure, but it's better than whatever this is: two self-obsessed egomaniacs engaged in a toxic battle of wills, willing to use and abuse each other to further their own ends. The only people I felt sorry for in this film- besides Andrew's father- were the other musicians in the final competition. They are having their chance of advancement destroyed by these two jerks who are selfishly engaged on a course of mutually assured destruction. While definitely not an expert, I do know a little about making music, having played first clarinet in my high school's band and sung in various community and church choirs... we won't mention my sadly mediocre ukulele skills. More to the point, I have a few friends who are professional musicians, though I suppose organists and cellists don't have quite the same coolness factor as jazz musicians. But one thing which struck me as being missing was any sense that these people actually took joy in their music. In my experience, there's always a magic moment where, after working on and struggling with a difficult piece, it all comes together and everyone- singers, instrumentalists, or both- are all united in a sense of wonder and satisfaction at the beauty of the music they're creating. Never once did I feel this, or think that the characters felt this, in Whiplash. Making music didn't seem to be the ultimate goal here; rather, it was a weapon to be wielded against each other in a rather tawdry power struggle. There is no joy in, or love for music expressed in this film. Instead, it's a source of bitterness, resentment, and cruelty. In the end, that may be what I find most unlikeable about this movie. Related Posts:"Beavers build houses; but they build them in nowise differently, or better now, than they did, five thousand years ago. Ants, and honey-bees, provide food for winter; but just in the same way they did, when Solomon referred the sluggard to them as patterns of prudence. Man is not the only animal who labors; but he is the only one who improves his workmanship." -Abraham Lincoln The Lake Isle of Innisfree WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade. And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow, And evening full of the linnet’s wings. I will arise and go now, for always night and day I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey, I hear it in the deep heart’s core. Related Posts: "You are under the unfortunate delusion that simply because you run away from danger, you have no courage….Back where I come from, we have men who are called heroes….They have one thing that you haven't got! A Medal!" Hollywood is ridiculously self-aggrandizing... just check out any of the numerous award shows where they pat themselves on the back and give smug, self-satisfied speeches if you need proof of this. In the past ten years or so, they've also decided that they are the arbiters of all that is right and good- this, from the enablers of Roman Polanski, Henry Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein, etc, etc, etc. Playing onscreen heroes has apparently fostered delusions of grandeur in which today's "stars" fondly consider themselves to be heroes in real life, saving the great unwashed masses from themselves. They frequently reference the Hollywood blacklisting of the 1950's because, let's face it, they don't have anything else; you'd think it happened last month in stead of almost 70 years ago. This allows them to feel persecuted without actually experiencing any persecution, and brave without ever having to do anything to prove it. They are far more likely to display the exact opposite of courage, especially when dealing with the brutal totalitarian regime of China, because- in most cases- principles come to a screeching halt at the Chinese box office. This obsequious appeasement of, and capitulation to, communist China is almost too ironic, given Hollywood's obsessive preoccupation with McCarthyism. The latest example of this ghastly pandering was perpetrated by alleged actor John Cena, star of Fast And Furious... 9? 14? 36? (I've never seen any, but there appear to be a lot of them). While giving an interview, he committed the unpardonable sin of referring to the country of Taiwan as a country, something which, along with human rights, freedom, and democracy, the CCP refuses to accept is a thing. Fast and furiously, Universal Studios frog-marched Cena in front of a camera to issue a grovelling apology - in Mandarin, no less- as an offering of appeasement to their one true god: the Chinese Yuan. My opinion of Hollywood and its denizens is pretty low; I don't expect much, but is it really too much to ask that they not sing the praises of, and confess their undying love for, a totalitarian government which is running literal concentration camps? It will serve them right if, as in the case of Mulan 2020, their craven self abasement results in financial disaster. I never thought I'd say this, but increasingly my attitude towards the entire Hollywood system is: Maybe the whole Hollywood edifice needs to come crashing down so that the dry rot can be cleared out and something stronger and better built in its place. But I won't hold my breath, waiting. To be fair, there are some outliers: Quentin Tarantino for example, when faced with demands from China that he remove parts of his Once Upon A Time In Hollywood to meet with their approval, told the CCP to go pound sand. And, miraculously, Sony backed him up... maybe they were more intimidated by Tarantino than by the Chinese government. It was a costly decision, as China then banned the film, but at the end of the day they maintained some dignity and self-respect, unlike cowardly John Cena and Universal. Hollywood likes to believe that during World War II they would have been Malta. But the sad fact is, they'd have been Vichy. Related Posts:I've been revisiting some of the mystery novels which I've owned for years... they're sort of the literary equivalent of comfort food. I just finished Death In Berlin, the 1955 book by British novelist M.M. Kaye. Kaye was married to an officer in the British army who was stationed in many places around the world in the 1950's, so she wrote a murder mystery set in each of the countries in which they lived. I own all of these, as well as a couple of other novels by her. Death In Berlin is set in 1953 which is an extremely interesting period because it is after the War, but before the building of the Berlin Wall. Berlin at this time is divided into different sectors for the occupying forces - the Russian sector, the British sector, the American sector- and there's a good bit of tension in the air. Germany is quickly rebuilding, but there are still areas that are filled with rubble, and sightseeing expeditions take groups of tourists to view the bombed out wrecks of former Nazi strongholds and edifices. Near the beginning of the novel, a British officer is murdered, and it is unclear at first if it was a personal matter, a political one, or something else entirely... Here's my somewhat battered copy: Also, I've finished all five existing seasons of The Expanse on Amazon Prime and really enjoyed it, so have downloaded the first novel in the series- Leviathan Wakes. I haven't read very far into it yet, but so far it doesn't disappoint.
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About MeI'm a lover of good books, classic movies, and well-written shows (as well as some pretty cheesy ones, to be completely honest). Categories
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