philosophy in film

[iambiguous]

Lantana is a plant. A weed actually.

As with The Dead Girl this film revolves around characters that revolve around the body of a woman that shows up…dead. If only later in the film and under very different circumstances.

This is how the lives of most of us are. We interact in a particular circle of relationships but those we interact with create or become a part of other circles too. But very, very few have access to all of them. So we see them only from a point of view. And sometimes something traumatic can jolt the cirlces. They bump into each other in ways no one could have foreseen or anticipated.

And relationships in the modern world are often frenetic to say the least. We don’t have the relatively rigid rules that pervaded communities in the past. A proper place for everything and everything in its proper place? How many of us will acknowledge [or tolerate] that?

See how many times you recognize yourself below.

IMDb

[b]Anthony LaPaglia had to work with a dialect coach to regain his native Australian accent. He had lost it from years of working on American movies.

The first film to win all of the top six categories of the Australian Film Institute (AFI) awards: best picture, best director, best actress, best actor, best supporting actress, best supporting actor. It also won for best adapted screenplay. This record remained unbroken until all 13 AFI categories were swept by Somersault.[/b]

wiki

Lantana is set in suburban Sydney and focuses on the complex relationships between the characters in the film. The central event of the film is the disappearance and death of a woman whose body is shown at the start of the film, but whose identity is not revealed until later. The film’s name derives from the plant Lantana, a weed prevalent in suburban Sydney.

trailer: youtu.be/ORI-Gx1UoAw

LANTANA [2001]
Directed by Ray Lawrence

[b]Valerie [a psychologist speaking at a conference]: We don’t know what to feel anymore. We don’t know what’s right or wrong anymore. The confused cry of the modern age. We ask, “What can we believe in? What should we believe in?” Our politicians? Hardly. Our priests? You’d be amazed at how many clients come to see me because they once believed in a priest. It’s not supposed to be that way. But it is. What then? Our parents? “Home is a sanctuary.” For the privileged few. For most, it’s a battleground. It’s not meant to be like that. But it is. Love? Can we believe in love? Feel safe in it? Loving someone means we have to relinquish power. It’s mutual surrender. But how can this take place? Trust. Trust is as vital to human relationships as breath is to life…and just as elusive. Two years ago, my 11 year-old daughter was murdered. Her name was Eleanor. This wasn’t supposed to happen. But it did.

…

Leon [clutching his chest after having sex with Jane]: I get this pain in my chest sometimes.
Jane: You know, you really should have told me that you have a weak heart.
Leon: I don’t.
Jane: It’s because I don’t want to have an affair with…
Leon [angrily]: For Christ’s sake, I don’t have a weak heart, all right? And this is not an affair, it’s a one-night stand that happened twice.

…

Valerie: Do you worry that we don’t make love very often?
John: No. I don’t really think about it that much.
Valerie: Why not?
John: I love you. Whether we make love three times a week or once a month does not really change that.
Valerie: Doesn’t it?

…

Jane: I really like you, Leon. Maybe a little too much. But I’m…I’m starting to wonder just… where this might go.
Leon: I’m still in love with my wife, Jane.
Jane: Right. I’m sorry. So…I’m wondering why…why have you been seeing me if you’re still in love with your wife?
Leon: I don’t know. It’s not something that I planned. Look, Jane, l…This doesn’t have to end badly.
Jane: Just go. Just go. Go.

…

Valerie: Are you trying to justify his deceit?
Patrick: No, I’m trying to understand it. It’s complex.
Valerie: But isn’t it still an act of deceit? No marriage can be based on that.
Patrick: Most marriages are based on that.
Valerie: You think you know what goes on in most marriages?
Patrick: What? Because I’m gay, I can’t have an opinion…?

…

Patrick: I think some women like to live the lie. It’s easier than dealing with the truth.
Valerie: Maybe she loves him.
Patrick: But so do I.
Valerie: Then he has to make a choice.
Patrick: Unless one of us withdraws from the contest.
Valerie: Is love a contest for you, Patrick? Patrick?
Patrick: Yes. Sometimes.

…

Patrick: He takes refuge in me. In what I offer him.
Valerie: What do you offer him?
Patrick: Sex unencumbered by need.
Valerie: Why doesn’t he leave her?
Patrick: Good men don’t know how to leave their wives.
Valerie: Good men or cowardly men?
Patrick: He told me that making love to her was like trying to fill an empty well.

…

Nik: I think Jane was trying to come on to me.
Paula: What? She’s lonely, Nik. And you’re bored. That’s a lethal combination. Stay away from her.
Nik: What’s the matter? You’re a bit jealous, huh? Huh?
Paula: You ever fuck with our marriage, and I cut your balls off. I’ll hang them on the lawn, between your socks and your jocks.

…

Leon: I tell my wife everything.
John: That suprises me.
Leon: Why?
John: Most men hold something back.

…

Leon [the morning after he admitted having an affair]: I fucked up, all right? People fuck up.
Sonja: Really? Well, I don’t. You know what’s so easy, Leon? It’s so easy to go out and find somebody. You know what’s hard? What’s hard is not to.

…

John: What holds your marriage together, Leon?
Leon: Loyalty? Love? Maybe habits sometimes, passion, our kids.
John: Ours was held together by grief. There wasn’t much else left.
Leon: You didn’t love her anymore?
John: I’m saying that sometimes, love isn’t enough.[/b]

[iambiguous]

Sin nombre: nameless. Which is more or less the manner in which many folks here prefer to think of the many folks coming up from down there. They have jobs to do. Okay, let them. As long as they are not our jobs. You know the ones.

As for the cast of characters, the gang’s all here. And all the other ones too. Mostly they prey on and off each other. Which makes them all the more invisible to us. Down there especially.

M13 at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mara_Salvatrucha

I suspect we are meant to watch this and come to sympathize with the plight of those who see the only viable option available to them is to “head North”. But I suspect even more that few minds will be changed.

IMDb

Cary Fukunagra spent two years researching the film, spending time with people on the trains and with gangsters in Central America. He also used two gang members to script edit making the slang and language as up to date and realistic as possible.

trailer: youtu.be/VTSi0pKjC5g

SIN NOMBRE [2009]
Written and directed by Cary Fukunaga

Casper [to Smiley]: To be part of our gang, first you have to kill one of our rivals, a chavala.

Smiley is all of about 12.

Mago: You fucked up, chavala. You put yourself in Mara land.
Chavala: I told you I don’t do that shit no more. I’m just going north.
Mago: You ain’t worth shit, bitch. After we shoot you we’re going to chop you up into 18 pieces and feed you to the dogs.

And that’s exactly what they do…with the kid [Smiley] pulling the trigger.

[b]Mago [to Smiley]: El Mara. Now you’re part of a family with thousands of brothers. Wherever you go, there’ll be someone to take care of you.

…

Horacio: Not even half of these people will make it. But we will.

…

El Sol: 30 seconds of cortes for lying.

…

Casper: Where’s Martha Marten?
Mago: She’s gone.
Casper: Home?
Mago: The Devil took her. You’ll find another.

…

Smilely [to all his half-pint homies]: He killed Lil Mago. He’s been green-lit. It’s the rules.

…

Sayra [to Casper]: Back home, my friend Clarissa made me see this crazy neighbor, Doña Eleanor, you know, like witchcraft? She smoked this puro, then told me with her freaky voice that “You’ll make it to the U.S.A…but not in God’s hand…but in those of the the Devil’s.”

…

Smilely [to Casper]: Mara por vida, homie.[/b]

Then he shoots him dead.

[iambiguous]

A movie about movies. Those who show them. Those who watch them. But not the way we show them or watch them today.

Simpler times? Not really. Just different from the times we know now. And even here there are a gazillion different ways to describe what that means. Maybe the relationship might be described as more intimate. After all, back then there were a lot less distractions available to escape from what most understood to be the daily grind. So “the movies” played a much larger role in the lives of many more people.

But back then only the local priest got to see all the good parts. Kissing, for example. And you can bet that “I” was more deeply
submerged in “we”. And “we” were always far more obsessed with distinguishing what is right from what is wrong.

And since there was usually only one cinema per town, everyone – rich, poor, vulgar, refined, literate, illiterate, Communist, fascist – were all stuffed in it together. That made for some interesting combinations.

One of the best film endings ever.

Ironically, when the film played in Italy, it was not a box office success.

The soundtrack alone is worth whatever you pay for the movie.

IMDb

Giuseppe Tornatore’s intention was that this movie should serve as an obituary for traditional movie theatres (like the one on the film) and the movie industry in general. After the movie’s success he never mentioned this again.

wiki

[b]Seen as an example of “nostalgic postmodernism”, the film intertwines sentimentality with comedy, and nostalgia with pragmaticism. It explores issues of youth, coming of age, and reflections (in adulthood) about the past. The imagery in each scene can be said to reflect Salvatore’s idealised memories about his childhood. Cinema Paradiso is also a celebration of films; as a projectionist, young Salvatore (a.k.a. Totò) develops the passion for films that shapes his life path in adulthood.

The film exists in multiple versions. It was originally released in Italy at 155 minutes, but poor box office performance in its native country led to its being shortened to 123 minutes for international release; it was an instant success.[/b]

trailer: youtu.be/5WQLdZ7d9Lc

CINEMA PARADISO [1988]
Written and directed by Giuseppe Tornatore

[b]Lia: Look, Ma…It’s useless calling him. He’ll be terribly busy, God knows where he is. Besides he might not even remember. Do as I say, forget it…He hasn’t been here for thirty years. You know how he is.
Maria: He’ll remember.

…

Clara: No, she said that someone has died—someone named Alfredo. The funeral is tomorrow. Who is he, a relative?

…

Cinema patron: Twenty years I’ve been going to the cinema and I’ve never seen a kiss!

…

Alfredo [to Toto]: This is not a job for you. It’s like being a slave. You’re always alone. You see the same film over and over and over again, because you have nothing else to do. And you start talking to Greta Garbo and Tyrone Power like a nut! You work on holidays, on Christmas, on Easter. Only on Good Friday are you free. But if they hadn’t put Jesus Christ on a cross…You’d work Good Fridays too!

…

Alfredo [after the arrival of the new non-combustible film]: Progress always comes too late.

…

Alfredo: Out of the fire of love come ashes. Even the greatest love eventually fizzles out.

…

Salvarore: They tell me you never go out, never talk to anybody. Why?
Alfredo: Toto, sooner or later there comes a time when talking or not talking is the same thing. So you might as well just shut up.

…

Alfredo: Living here day by day, you think it’s the center of the world. You believe nothing will ever change. Then you leave: a year, two years. When you come back, everything’s changed. The thread’s broken. What you came to find isn’t there. What was yours is gone. You have to go away for a long time…many years…before you can come back and find your people. The land where you were born. But now, no. It’s not possible. Right now you’re blinder than I am.
Salvatore: Who said that? Gary Cooper? James Stewart? Henry Fonda? Eh?
Alfredo: No, Toto. Nobody said it. This time it’s all me. Life isn’t like in the movies. Life…is much harder.

…

Alfredo: Get out of here! Go back to Rome. You’re young and the world is yours. I’m old. I don’t want to hear you talk anymore. I want to hear others talking about you.

…

Alfredo [to Salvatore at train station]: Don’t come back. Don’t think about us. Don’t look back. Don’t write. Don’t give in to nostalgia. Forget us all. If you do and you come back, don’t come see me. I won’t let you in my house. Understand? Whatever you end up doing, love it. The way you loved the projection booth when you were a little squirt.

…

Wife: Alfredo left something for you. Come and see me before you leave.

…

Salvatore: When did you shut it down?
Spaccafico: Six years ago this May. No one came any more. You know better than me, Mr. Di Vita, the economy, television, videos. By now the movie business is only a memory. The city’s bought it to make a new parking lot. Next Saturday they’re tearing it down…A pity.[/b]

[iambiguous]

Politics, religion, revolution. Way back in the 1960s. And way over yonder in Pakistan. Right at the time Bangladesh was given birth.

This film was originally banned in Bangladesh because [of course] there was a fear it might spark religious tensions. 90% of those who live in Bangladesh are Muslim. So most of that must have revolved around the extent to which the right narrative was being chosen.

This is a true story in the sense that it is based on the actual experiences of the writer and director.

Think of it as the making of dasein en masse. Just a whole bunch of conflicting versions of them. What’s cruical is the access you have [as a child in particular] to alternate narratives. And then [here] the extent to which religion as a moral or spititual narrative becomes subsumed in the political narrative of jihad.

You see all this [back then, now, probably forever] and you shrug: I can’t go on, I’ll go on. What else is there but to choose the least of all worst possible worlds?

IMDb

While the film was not nominated for an Oscar, it was Bangladesh’s first film ever to be submitted to the Academy Awards for consideration to compete in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

The story behind the film: imdb.com/title/tt0319836/faq … q_1#.2.1.1 [IMDb]

trailer: youtu.be/ERpjh_BIshI

And here is a song that sums it all up: youtu.be/KUcgzphu850

THE CLAY BIRD [Matir Moina] 2002
Written in part and directed by Tareque Masud

[b]Teacher at Madrasa: New boy, what is your name?
Anu: Anu.
Teacher: That is not a proper Islamic name. From now on, your name here is Kazi Muhammod Anwarul Islam.

…

Kazi: My son should not see all that Hindu rubbish. I’ll send him off to the madrasa.

…

Teacher: You all know about the holy night of Meraj. On this night, the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, rode a winged horse to have an audience with Allah. On his way back from Heaven, he met the Prophet Moses, peace be upon him. Prophet Moses asked Prophet Muhammad: “How many prayers did you get assigned for your followers?” Muhammad said: “Fifty per day.” Moses cried out: “That’s too much. Go back and ask him to reduce it.” So, Muhammad went back to Allah. On his return he told Moses he got it reduced to five prayers.[/b]

Uh, is this actually true?!!

[b]Teacher [who is against the Islamic radicals]: The truth is you cannot make Islam flourish with politics or arms. It’s by spreading Islamic knowledge that Islam will flourish. But this is not just knowledge. This is also practice. Who is sent to madrasa? Mostly orphans, and children whose parents are too poor to afford food and clothing, not to mention education. Our duty is to take care of them and make them true Muslims. It’s unfair to use these children for political ends.

…

Milon: Uttam, try to understand. It’s not a matter of democracy or national liberation, the issue is economic. Here lies the question of imperialism and the class struggle.
Uttam: You’re still spellbound by your communist ghosts. Despite your differences, you’re like your brother. Kazi’s homeopathy and your “Marx-pathy”. Both came from Germany.
Friend: And fascism is also from Germany. Whether Marxism or capitalism, all “isms” are Western.

…

Uttam: Do you dismiss Islam as Western?
Friend: Not at all. Our Islam has flourished on our own soil.
Uttam: Nothing is purely indigenous, it’s all mixed up.

…

Kazi: Islam will prevail.[/b]

Yeah, one of them. But not his.

Ayesha: Look around you! Your Muslem brothers have burnt your sacred cluster to the ground.

[iambiguous]

Old age. This approach will work for some people. But there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell of it working for others.

Yet, sure, if you can have a go at it, why not? We’re all going to die in the end anyway. Again: whatever works. There are a lot of different ways to love life. So sooner or later you have to come up with a strategy for dealing with its demise.

Aside from God, of course.

In all honesty, practical jokers almost always infuriate me. Especially the ones who are really con artists instead. But then the best ones almost always delight me up on the silver screen.

I don’t buy the ending at all. But maybe you will. Besides, it was the only one available given the market.

trailer: videodetective.com/movies/au … ing/565396

AUTUMN SPRING [Babí Léto] 2001
Directed by Vladimír Michálek

[b]Fanda: I got so carried away I nearly believed it myself!

…

Lara [Son]: His actions just aren’t normal, at his age!
Emilie [Wife]: His age has him down. He’s afraid to die, and he tries to cheat it.

…

Fanda [to Eda]: Well show the nouveau riche lumpenbourgeoisie![/b]

Or maybe not.

[b]Eda: Old age is sad. One should die young.
Fanda: We missed our chance. We gotta stick it out now.

…

Eda: I’d shoot myself if it wasn’t for you.

…

Fanda: What’s the problem, anyway?
Eda: Kidneys, high blood pressure, cataracts.
Fanda: You are lucky! I’ve got arrhythmia, gall-bladder, prostate…but it’s all better than having AIDS.

…

Fanda [to wife]: How could you sell me like this?

…

Fanda [after faking his own death]: Eda just wanted to help me.
Eda: So that you’d realize what you’d lose in him.
Fanda: And he sorta overdid it.
Wife: The taxi cost 500, the coffin 3,000! The fright nearly cost me my life! You put him up to it! You criminal! You liar! You heartless brute!

…

Emilie [at divorce hearing]: …he refuses to admit that at our age our paths don’t really lead anywhere anymore. It’s intolerable. The older he gets, the crazier he gets. He doesn’t go to funerals, he makes fun of death, he makes paper darts out of death announcements.

…

Emilie: Here’s everything ready for when I die. My death announcement, the undertaker’s phone number, my coffin clothes, the addresses where to send the announcements. The funeral music, flowers, even your announcement.

…

Edy: I’m giving up, Fanda. Should we never meet again, it’s been wonderful, it’s been just enough.

…

Fanda [noticing the man at the window is gone]: He’s not there!
Emilie: He sat there dead for three days and nobody noticed.[/b]

[iambiguous]

Cigarettes. One of the most dangerous substances we still have the freedom to choose. To buy, in other words. Hey, when millions of dollars are at stake, moralists will make exceptions.

This is a movie that exposes precisely how the powers that be in “the industry” and in government still manage to keep cigarettes legal. And those who are the toughest on the cigarette folks are those who have the least to lose if they ever were made a lot harder to get.

But who is kidding whom. If you made them illegal, it would be prohibition all over again. Organized crime would just have a new product to sell. It’s probably wiser to just make them more and more expensive. And exclude them from more and more places.

But this is also a movie about how to use language to twist the world into any contraption you need it to be. Providing you subscribe to the concept of “moral flexibility”.

IMDb

[b]Sam Elliott wanted his character to refuse to take the money. Jason Reitman spent three hours persuading him to do the part as scripted.

No one is shown smoking a cigarette throughout the entire movie. In fact, except in the black and white film that Naylor watches, no-one is seen even holding a cigarette. Naylor holds an empty packet and Robert Duvall holds an (unlit) cigar.[/b]

at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thank_You_ … king_(film

trailer: youtu.be/iBELC_vxqhI

THANK YOU FOR SMOKING [2005]
Written and directed by Jason Reitman

[b]Joan Lunden: Robin Williger. He is a 15 year old freshman from Racine, Wisconsin. He enjoys studying history; he’s on the debate team. Robin’s future looked very, very bright. But recently he was diagnosed with cancer, a very tough kind of cancer. Robin tells me he has quit smoking, though, and he no longer thinks that cigarettes are “cool.”

…

Nick Naylor [narrating]: Few people on this planet know what it is to be truly despised. Can you blame them? I earn a living fronting an organization that kills one thousand two hundred human beings a day; twelve hundred people. We’re talking two jumbo jet plane loads of men, women, and children. I mean there’s Attila, Genghis, and me, Nick Naylor the face of cigarettes, the colonel sanders of nicotine. This is where I work, the Academy of Tobacco Studies. It was established by seven gentlemen you may recognize from C-Span. These guys realized quick if they were gonna claim cigarettes were not addictive they better have proof. This is the man they rely on, Erhardt Von Grupten Mundt. They found him in Germany. I won’t go into the details. He’s been testing the link between nicotine and lung cancer for thirty years, and hasn’t found any conclusive results. The man’s a genius, he could disprove gravity.

…

Nick: My point is that you have to think for yourself. If your parents told you that chocolate was dangerous would you take their word for it?
[Children all say no]
Nick: Exactly! So perhaps instead of acting like sheep when it comes to cigarettes you should find out for yourself.

…

Bobby Jay: Did you know that you can fool the breathalizer test by chewing on activated charcoal tablets?
Polly: Well, maybe we should change our slogan to “If you must drink and drive, suck charcoal.”
Nick: Won’t the police ask about the charcoal in your mouth?
Bobby Jay: There’s not a law against charcoal.

…

Joey: Dad, why is the American government the best government?
Nick: Because of our endless appeals system.

…

Nick: What is the subject of your essay?
Joey: Why is American government the best government in the world.
Nick: Your teacher crafted that question?
Joey: Yeah. Why?
Nick: Well…I’ll look past the obvious problems in syntax for a moment, and I’ll focus more on the core of the question. I mean, “A,” does America have the best government in the world? And “B,” what constitutes a “best government”? Is it crime, is it poverty, literacy? Hmm? And America - definitely not best. Perhaps not even better than most. But we do have a very entertaining government…

…

Brad: Nick, your job and everything aside, I hope you understand that second hand smoke’s a real killer.
Nick: What are you talking about?
Brad: I just hope you’re providing a smoke-free environment for Joey is all I’m saying.
Nick: Brad, I’m his father. You’re the guy fucking his mom.
Brad: That was unnecessary.

…

BR: People, what is going on out there? I look down this table, all I see are white flags. Our numbers are down all across the board. Teen smoking, our bread and butter, is falling like a shit from heaven! We don’t sell Tic Tacs for Christ’s sake. We sell cigarettes. And they’re cool and available and addictive. The job is almost done for us!

…

Nick: In 1910, the U.S. Was producing ten billion cigarettes a year. By 1930, we were up to 123 billion. What happened in between? Three things. A world war, dieting… and movies.
BR: Movies?
Nick: 1927- talking pictures are born. Suddenly, directors need to give their actors something to do while they’re talking. Cary Grant, Carole Lombard are lighting up. Bette Davis- a chimney. And Bogart- remember the first picture with him and Lauren Bacall? Oh, she sort of shimmies in through the doorway, 19 years old. Pure sex. She says, “Anyone got a match?” And Bogie throws the matches at her…and she catches them. Greatest romance of the century. How’d it start? Lighting a cigarette. These days when someone smokes in the movies, they’re either a psychopath or a European.

…

Nick [out loud to reporter]: Everyone has a mortgage to pay.
Nick [to himself]: The Yuppie Nuremberg defense.

…

Jack [In Elevator]: Did you hear that?
Nick [pause]: No.
Jack: Exactly.

…

Jeff: Sony has a futuristic sci-fi movie they’re looking to make.
Nick: Cigarettes in space?
Jeff: It’s the final frontier, Nick.
Nick: But wouldn’t they blow up in an all oxygen environment?
Jeff: Probably. But it’s an easy fix. One line of dialogue. ‘Thank God we invented the… you know, whatever device.’

…

Joey: …so what happens when you’re wrong?
Nick: Whoa, Joey I’m never wrong.
Joey: But you can’t always be right…
Nick: Well, if it’s your job to be right, then you’re never wrong.
Joey: But what if you are wrong?
Nick: OK, let’s say that you’re defending chocolate, and I’m defending vanilla. Now if I were to say to you: ‘Vanilla is the best flavour ice-cream’, you’d say…
Joey: No, chocolate is.
Nick: Exactly, but you can’t win that argument… so, I’ll ask you: so you think chocolate is the end all and the all of ice-cream, do you?
Joey: It’s the best ice-cream, I wouldn’t order any other.
Nick: Oh! So it’s all chocolate for you is it?
Joey: Yes, chocolate is all I need.
Nick: Well, I need more than chocolate, and for that matter I need more than vanilla. I believe that we need freedom. And choice when it comes to our ice-cream, and that Joey Naylor, that is the defintion of liberty.
Joey: But that’s not what we’re talking about
Nick: Ah! But that’s what I’m talking about.
Joey: …but you didn’t prove that vanilla was the best…
Nick: I didn’t have to. I proved that you’re wrong, and if you’re wrong I’m right.
Joey: But you still didn’t convince me
Nick [pointing to all the folks around them]: I’m not after you. I’m after them.

…

Jeff: For Pitt to smoke, it’s $10 million; for the pair, it’s 25.
Nick: 25?! Usually when I buy two of something, I get a discount. What’s the extra five for?
Jeff: Synergy. These are not stupid people; they got it right away.
Pitt and Zeta-Jones lighting up after some cosmic fucking in the bubble suite’s gonna sell a lot of cigarettes.
Nick: Well, for that kind of money, my people will expect some very serious smoking. Can Brad blow smoke rings?
Jeff: I don’t have that information.
Nick: Well, for $25 million, we’d want smoke rings.
Jeff: Oh, one other thing- you’ll be cofinancing the picture with the Sultan of Glutan.
Nick: The Sultan of Glutan? The one who massacred and enslaved his own people? Aren’t they calling him the Hitler of the South Pacific?
Jeff: No, I can’t speak to that- All my dealings with him, he’s been a very reasonable and sensitive guy.

…

Lorne Lutch: You look like a nice enough fella. What are you doing working for these assholes?
Nick: I’m good at it. Better at doing this than I ever was at doing anything else.
Lorne Lutch: Aw, hell, son. I was good at shooting VC. I didn’t make it my career.

…

Nick: I don’t think people from the alcoholic beverage industry need to worry about being kidnapped just yet.
Polly: Pardon me?
Nick: Look, I mean, nothing personal, but tobacco generates a little more heat than alcohol.
Polly: Oh, this is news.
Nick: My product puts away 475,000 a year. That’s 1,200 a day. How many alcohol-related deaths a year? 100,000 tops? That’s, what, 270 a day? Wowee. 270 people, a tragedy. Excuse me if I don’t exactly see terrorists getting excited about kidnapping anyone from the alcohol industry. How many gun deaths a year in the U.S.?
Bobby Jay: 11,000.
Nick: 11,000, are you kidding me? 30 a day. That’s less than passenger car mortalities. No terrorist would bother with either of you.
[pause]
Nick: Okay, look…stupid argument. I’m sure both of you warrant vigilante justice.
Polly: Thank you.

…

From Heather’s news article: “Nick Naylor, lead spokesman for big tobacco, would have you believe he thinks cigarettes are harmless. But really, he’s doing it for the mortgage…The MOD squad-meaning, of course, merchants of death- is comprised of Polly Bailey of the Moderation Council and Bobby Jay Bliss of the gun business’s own advisory group, SAFETY. As explained by Naylor, the sole purpose of their meetings is to compete for the highest death toll as they compare strategies on how to dupe the American people…The film, Message from Sector Six, would emphasize the sex appeal of cigarettes in a way that only floating, nude, copulating Hollywood stars could…This did not stop Nick from bribing the dying man with a suitcase of cash to keep quiet on the subject ofhis recent lung cancer diagnosis…Nick’s own son, Joey Naylor, seems to be being groomed for the job as he joins his father on the majority of his trips.”

…

Heather: Hey, Nick, what did you think?
Nick: Heather, uh…I…I mean, there’s a lot of information in here, Heather, that is off the record.
Heather: You never said anything about off the record.
Nick: I presumed anything said while I was inside you was privileged.

…

Nick: How can you do this to me?
Heather: For the mortgage.

…

Bobby Jay: The way I heard it, D.C. police found you naked, laying in Lincoln’s crotch, covered in nicotine patches with a sign across your chest that said…
Polly: He doesn’t need to hear the details.

…

Joey: Why are you hiding from everyone?
Nick: It has something to do with being generally hated right now.
Joey: But it’s your job to be generally hated.

…

Joey: Why did you tell that reporter all your secrets?
Nick: You’re too young to understand.
Joey: Mom says it’s because you have dependency issues and it was all just a matter of time before you threw it all away on some tramp.
Nick: Well, that’s one theory.

…

Nick: Right there, looking into Joey’s eyes, it all came back in a rush. Why I do what I do. Defending the defenseless, protecting the disenfranchised corporations that have been abandoned by their very own consumers: the logger, the sweatshop foreman, the oil driller, the land mine developer, the baby seal poacher…
Polly: Baby seal poacher?
Bobby Jay: Even I think that’s kind of cruel.

…

Bobby Jay: Still feeling like Jimmy Stewart?

…

[the MOD squad pass through a metal detector, which beeps as Bobby Jay passes through]
Bobby Jay [to Nick and Polly]: You guys go on ahead, this might take a while.

…

Senator Finistirre: Please state your name, address, and current occupation.
Nick: My name is Nick Naylor. I live at 6000 Massachusetts Avenue. I am currently unemployed but until recently I was the Vice President of the Academy of Tobacco Studies.
Senator Finistirre: Mr. Naylor, as Vice President of the Academy of Tobacco Studies, what was required of you? What did you do?
Nick: I informed the public of all the research performed in the investigation on the effects of tobacco.
Senator Finistirre: And what, so far, has the Academy concluded in their investigation into the effects of tobacco?
Nick: Well, many things actually. Why just the other day they uncovered evidence that smoking can offset Parkinson’s disease.
Senator Finistirre: I’m sure the health community is thrilled. Mr. Naylor, who provides the financial background for the Academy of Tobacco Studies?
Nick: Conglomerated Tobacco.
Senator Finistirre: That’s the cigarette companies.
Nick: For the most part, yes.
Senator Finistirre: Do you think that might affect their priorities?
Nick: No. Just as, I’m sure, campaign contributions don’t affect yours.
Senator Lothridge: Mr. Naylor is not hear to testify on the goings on of the Academy of Tobacco Studies. We’re hear to examine the possibility of a warning label on cigarettes. Now, Mr. Naylor, I have to ask you out of formality, do you believe that smoking cigarettes, over time, can lead to lung cancer and lead to other respiratory conditions such as emphysema.
Nick: Yes. In fact, I think you’d be hard pressed to find someone who really believes that cigarettes are not potentially harmful. I mean - show of hands - Who out here thinks that cigarettes aren’t dangerous?

…

Nick: Well, the real demonstrated #1 killer in America is cholesterol. And here comes Senator Finistirre whose fine state is, I regret to say, clogging the nation’s arteries with Vermont Cheddar Cheese. If we want to talk numbers, how about the millions of people dying of heart attacks? Perhaps Vermont Cheddar should come with a skull and crossbones.
Senator Finistirre: That is lud- . The great state of Vermont will not apologize for its cheese!

…

Senator Lothridge: What about the children?
Nick: Gentlemen, it’s called education. It doesn’t come off the side of a cigarette carton. it comes from our teachers, and more importantly our parents. It is the job of every parent to warn their children of all the dangers of the world, including cigarettes, so that one day when they get older they can choose for themselves. I look at my son who was kind enough to come with me today, and I can’t help but think that I am responsible for his growth and his development. And I’m proud of that.
SenatorFinistirre: Well, having said that, would you condone him smoking?
Nick: Well, of course not. He’s not 18. That would be illegal.
Senator Finistirre: Yes, I’ve heard you deliver that line on 20/20, but enough dancing. What are you going to do when he turns 18? C’mon, Mr. Naylor. On his 18th birthday will you share a cigarette with him? Will you spend a lovely afternoon - like one of your ludicrous cigarette advertisements? You seem to have to have a lot to say about how we should raise our children. What of your own? What are you going to do when he turns 18?
Nick: If he really wants a cigarette. I’ll buy him his first pack.

…

Nick: Gentlemen, practise these words in front of the mirror: Although we are constantly exploring the subject, currently there is no direct evidence that links cellphone usage to brain cancer.

…

Nick: Michael Jordan plays ball. Charles Manson kills people. I talk. Everyone has a talent.[/b]

[iambiguous]

I love those characters: iconoclasts, skeptics, bohemians, nonconformists…the heterodox outsiders. The loners. The folks that always seem to be way way off-the-beaten-path. The dissidents.

Those [back then] who always said fuck the A list, fuck the jocks, fuck the snobs, fuck the bullies, fuck the SGAs and fuck the sheep.

It’s the only way I could have graduated from high school. Though I’ve matured considerably since then.

Boys will be boys? Yeah, right.

The movie takes place in the mid 1960s—at the very tip of cultural changes that would sweep the industrial world; taking it from Leave It To Beaver to All In the Family. And then beyond.

This is the sequel to The Year My Voice Broke.

Look for Jean-Paul Sartre…ringside.

IMDb

Intended to be the Australian-born Nicole Kidman’s farewell to Australian cinema; by the time the film went into production, she had received international acclaim for her part in Dead Calm, and was being courted by US studios to appear in American productions. She wouldn’t star in another Australian film for another decade, (2001’s Moulin Rouge!). As a result of Kidman’s fame, she received top billing and was prominently featured in print advertising for the film, despite only appearing in a few scenes. Conversely, star ‘Noah Taylor’ only appeared in print ads in silhouette.

In other words, everything the film was trying to expose as a fraud. On the other hand, she hardly had just a bit part in the film. And I thought she really nailed the character.

trailer: youtu.be/NDwVFQkOeLc

FLIRTING [1991]
Written and directed by John Duigan

[b]Danny [narrating]: One thing about boarding school…twenty-four hours a day, you were surrounded. Either you abandoned yourself and became a herd animal or you dug a cave deep into your head and skulked inside peering through your eye sockets.

…

Girl: Anyone got a banana?

…

Melissa: Good match?
Danny: Yeah. Three badly injured so far.
Melissa: You don’t sound very patriotic.
Danny: No, I’m not. I’m here for anthropological reasons.
Melissa: Huh?
Danny: Football. It’s a form of mating ritual. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?

…

Thandiwe [who is from Uganda]: There are other things going on in the world besides skinny rock ‘n’ roll singers jumping around.
Girl: Yes, of course. Little Miss Sophistication can tell us all about it.
Thandiwe: It might actually concern you.
Girl: I doubt if it’ll concern you. They’re certainly not going to mention Uganda. I never heard it mentioned ever. They’re not even in the Olympic games. Probably not eligible.

…

Moderator: Good afternoon. The subject of today’s debate is that this house agrees with Bertrand Russell…that intellectual pursuits are the highest form of human endeavor. And it’ll be ladies first. Speaking for the affirmative Miss Nicola Radcliffe.
Nicola: Professor Barbour, Reverend Nicholson members of the adjudicating panel ladies and gentlemen. And others. The central thrust of our argument will be that the pleasures of the intellect are of a higher order altogether as opposed to the other simple pleasures of life. And, to this end, we will be citing evidence from such illustrious sources…as William Shakespeare, Immanuel Kant, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Bishop Barclay, Samuel Pepys, Sir Robert Menzies, Aristotle…and the Duke of Edinburgh. Firstly, to begin with William Shakespeare…
Danny: I’d like to suggest that rugby football is the highest form of…highest form of…human endeavor. How can one go past the fluid inspiration of Jock Blair sprinting down the wing for a brilliant try? How can one not be moved to tears by the naked courage of a smaller player hurling himself at a much larger opponent bouncing off, but picking himself up again and again… in a frenzy of guts and determination? Rugby football embodies all the noblest virtues enshrined in a school like ours-- teamwork, bravery, pride, school spirit…creativity, intelligence…love of one’s fellow man–surely the virtues which distinguish human beings from brute animals.

…

Moderator: The final speaker for the affirmative side is Miss Thandiwe Adjewa.
Thandiwe: Having listened carefully to the speakers of both sides and wishing to be totally impartial I feel the position for which my team is arguing is untenable…though not for the tedious reasons given by our opponents…the last speaker excepted. My colleagues have quoted many poets and philosophers to support our case…that intellectual pursuits are the highest form of human endeavor…but most contemporary artists seem more interested in bodily functions. For example… ''I don’t want you toast my bread. ‘‘I don’t want you make my bed.’’ ''I don’t want your money, too". ‘‘I just want to make love to you.’’ ‘‘Tutti frutti, au rutti.’’ ‘‘Tutti frutti, au rutti.’’ ‘‘Tutti frutti, au rutti.’’ ‘‘A-wop-bop a-loom-op a-lop bam boom.’’ If these philosopher-poets are any guide the so-called animal side of human beings leaves the intellectual side for dead. Is this just a recent development or are we only now becoming mature enough to reveal our dirty washing?

…

Bourke: Who’ve you got lined up, Embling? Didn’t think you’d ever manage to finish as…as…as…asking someone out.
Danny [voiceover]: People wonder how Hitler managed to get so many followers? It’s never surprised me.

…

Thandiwe: I met Sartre.
Danny: Really? Where?
Thandiwe: In Paris.
Danny: What did you say to him?
Thandiwe: I suggested marriage was a doomed institution.
Danny: What did he say?
Thandiwe: He agreed most people marry to please their parents… or society.
Danny: Not keen on marriage yourself?
Thandiwe: I see so many terrible ones. People just stop communicating. My father and stepmother are brilliant communicators. They hardly ever talk to each other these days…except in public. Anyway, I doubt whether I’ll find anyone complex enough to keep me interested. I lose interest in people. I imagine they’re far more fascinating than they are…so I’m always disappointed.

…

Danny [voiceover]: I would have asked Jean-Paul about anguish. Seemed like a pretty romantic concept at the time.

…

Schoolmate [to Danny]: They can be pretty, you know, desperate, these black women. Look at National Geographic.

…

Danny [voiceover]: When I started thinking about Africa I realized the only images I knew were from old annuals…Tarzan comics, and Hollywood movies. Cannibals with bones through their noses… lions tearing the throats out of antelopes… and a lot of wondrous oozing words… like Limpopo… Zambezi… Mombasa… Tanganyika.

…

Danny [voiceover]: People like to have someone to look down on. Makes them feel better about themselves. No one realized what a great community service I was performing by being the school scapegoat. I didn’t care. I’d met this girl…

…

Green: It’s the elephant dick, sir. It’s rank. It’s going to get up and walk out of here.

…

Nicola: I think we should swap partners in the musical. Why? You’re writing to him, aren’t you?
Thandiwe: Not anymore.
Nicola: What happened?
Thandiwe: He showed one of them around.
Nicola: That wasn’t him. One of the other kids stole it and read it out aloud.

…

Danny [voiceover]: Thandiwe started telling me about Africa as she knew it. How her mother was killed in the Mau-Mau period in Kenya…how her father wrote books about African nationalism and the problems created as the colonial governments scrambled to get out. There had been terrible times the last few years–the Belgian Congo…Zanzibar…Angola…Kenya. Places I’d barely heard of.

…

Danny [voiceover]: I wondered if my old friend Jean-Paul Sartre would have fought in a situation like this. I know Cassius would have. I liked big Cassius. I liked his poems. He wasn’t built like Twiggy, though.

…

Thandiwe: Women’s clothes are much better designed for this sort of thing. You must get all squashed up in there.
Danny: It can get pretty tricky sometimes.
Thandiwe: When it’s big?
Danny: Yeah, if it’s like…when you’re in church or something.
Thandiwe: Does it happen there?
Danny: It can happen anywhere.

…

Nicola: Do you remember the young guy who was fixing the bell tower? I took him a cup of tea each morning before assembly. I liked him, even though he never said much. I used to close my eyes and sit on a chair…and let him touch me all over. As long as he promised not to take anything off. I thought I was so exquisitely daring I’d almost faint. I’d have to sit down. I’d be trembling so much, my legs would’ve given way. Afterwards, I’d be reading the lesson convinced all the teachers must know because I was so…so shivery delicious all over.

…

Danny [voiceover]: I don’t think fate is a creature or a lady… like some people say. It’s a tide of events sweeping us along. But I’m not a fatalist, because I believe you can swim against it… and sometimes grasp the hands of the clock face…and steal a few precious minutes. If you don’t…you’re just cartwheeled along. Before you know it, the magic opportunities are lost. And for the rest of your life it lingers on in that part of your mind which dreams the very best dreams…taunting and tantalizing you with what might have been.

…

Thandiwe: You keep this half of the world going.
Danny: You look after the other!

…

Danny [voiceover]: I realized I hadn’t any idea what she’d gone back to. Her letters came every week. She told me about an army officer called Idi Amin…and how her stepmother had disappeared and she was looking after her brother and sister. We read in the papers her father had been executed. Then the letters stopped.

…

Thandiwe [voiceover from her letter]: ''Danny…we’re in Nairobi now and finally safe. A lot of things have happened. I’m very different to how I was when you last knew me…but I’m waiting for the time we’ll sit down together and look into each other’s eyes again. I look forward to that time more than I can say."

…

Danny [voiceover]: Suddenly, there were much bigger worlds again, and some small place in them for me.[/b]

[iambiguous]

Norway. 1915. Reform school. Brutal conditions. Reactionary governor.

But then one brave individual…

Films like this are made all the time. And that’s because the social, political and economic conditions that spawn them have been around [one way or another] all the time. For example, throughout human history.

It’s like watching the prototype for Cool Hand Luke. Only boys this time and not men. Boys from impoverished and working class communities. More or less uncouth and uneducated.

And as with many such films there are three sets of relationships. The one among the inmates, the one between the inmates and the jailors and the one between the jailors and God.

And, as with the Magdalene Sisters above, the intentions of the jailors can be quite sincere.

Based on a true story:

wiki

[b]The film is a fictionalized retelling of a rebellion among the youth at the Bastøy Reform School during the winter of 1915. The reformatory was located on Bastøy Island in the Oslo fjord south of Horten municipality in the county of Vestfold Norway. The Norwegian government purchased the island in 1898 for 95,000 kroner, and the reformatory opened in 1900.

The rebellion occurred on 20 May 1915, when between 30 and 40 boys rallied around four youths who had escaped and been recaptured. The group refused to work, armed themselves with farming tools and stones, cut the telephone lines and then burned down the barn with stolen matches and cigars. Interestingly, the same barn had been burned down just two years prior.

When instructors and guards failed to quell the riot, the military was called in. Over a hundred troops stormed the island. Also on scene were two seaplanes, two submarines, and the armored ship “Norway” from the naval base Karljohansvern in Horten. Several of the boys escaped into the forest but were later recovered. Officials identified the ringleader of the rioters as a newly-arrived 18-year-old “gypsy boy” plumbing apprentice from Christiania. Three others were identified as his accomplices.

The 1915 uprising did not end the school’s strict disciplinarian methods which continued until 1953 when the Ministry of Social Affairs took over operations. The school was shut down on 1 October 1970. Bastøy Island, once famous for its brutal reformatory, is now famous for the progressive Bastøy Prison founded in 1982 where inmates live in cottages, dine on food cooked by a chef, and enjoy a sauna, tennis courts and horseback riding.[/b]

trailer: youtu.be/mwnXKYNLtvk

KING OF DEVIL’S ISLAND [Kongen av Bastøy] 2010
Directed by Marius Holst

[b]Title card: Bastoy Reform School was in existence from 1900 to 1953. It was an institution for maladusted boys. This film is based on a true story.

…

Erling [voiceover]: I once saw a whale get hit by three harpoons, and still keep going. It took him all day to die. We found the whale again. Got closer than we’d ever been. He was weaker, because of the harpoon I’d hit him with. And covered in scars from all the battles he’d fought.

…

Governor [to stoolie]: See that they learn the rules.

…

Governor: Our goal, and your goal, is to find an honorable, humble, useful Christian boy in you. Shape and polish him. And if we don’t find him, you’ll stay here.[/b]

You knew that was coming.

[b]Governor: He hasn’t learned the rules yet. But he will, right?
Stoolie: Yes, Governor.

…

Governor: C19. Stand straight. Stand straight! This is pretty meaningless, isn’t it? Just like your behavior this morning.
Erling: I’m sorry, Governor.
Governor: No, you’re not.
Erling: It’s just that I don’t belong here, Governor.
Governor: Oh, yes. You belong here. Now carry all those rocks over to that pile. That’s where they belong.[/b]

You’ll know what this reminds you of: 1] Lucas Jackson and the Captain 2] Sisyphus and the boulder. Sooner or later, they break you.

[b]House Father: Forest duty. Half rations.

…

Governor [to House Father]: C1 must read this aloud and execute the punishment.

…

Governor [of Ivar’s death]: …anyway, he is at peace now. God has taken him home.

…

Governor: You’re accused of sexual relations with a child! If there is one iota of truth to that, I’ll have you rot in prison for the rest of your life.
House Father: I understand how hard it must be for a man in your position. With a young wife, all that responsibility, all the choices you have to make. All those funds which were meant to benefit the boys and the island. Funds you have used on yourself, to make your life easier. I understand that. But others might not.

…

Olav: You know what the committee and governor said about us?
Erling: It doesn’t matter. Bastoy is nothing but a small rock in the water.[/b]

[iambiguous]

Some will despise him only a bit more than they would like to be him. Or at least be able to confront all the assholes that make their life miserable…like he does. Of course he’d have to start with himself.

I guess if you find yourself in a world like this you’ve got to come up with something to fit the living from day to day part into. It’s just entertainment though for most of the folks who don’t live in it. But then the one world spills over into the other from time to time and maybe we should think about that more constructively.

Many, however, only think this: As long as the assholes are doing it to each other fuck em. As though a lot of innocent folks don’t eventually go down with them.

But others will glorify this sort of behavior in and of itself. He’s a thug, true, but a witty, charismatic thug. In the end though [and for all too many] he becomes a bloody rock star. But from his perspective, he was just ridding the world of “filth”.

And, after watching this, you can hardly argue with that.

trailer: youtu.be/nDLtDQ55DBs

Mark Read at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chopper_Read

CHOPPER [2000]
Written and directed by Andrew Dominik
From Mark “Chopper” Read’s autobiography

[b]Chopper [to interviewer]: I’m just a bloody normal bloke. A normal bloke who likes a bit of torture.

…

Chopper [to Keithy]: Even Beethoven had his critics. See if you can name three of them.

…

Chopper [after shanking Keithy a zillion times]: You don’t much like me, do you Keithy?..I’m the one who owns the division, mate. Make no mistake about it.

…

Chopper [to prison officals]: Look, all I can tell you is what I’ve already told Mister Beasley: none of us saw anything. It was just one of those things: Bluey Barnes was reading a magazine; Ambrose Hatcheson was taking a piss; Johnny Price was washing his hands; Jimmy Loughnan was watching a bullant crawl across the table, and I was watching Jimmy watching the bullant.

…

Chopper: Look I’m sure when Keithy wakes up from his slumber this morning, he’ll swear to God that I didn’t stab him.
Prison official: Well, he’s not going to wake up…he died this morning.

…

Chopper: Jimmy, if you keep stabbing me, you’re going to kill me.

…

Chopper: Look. The bloke’s been me best mate since 1975. We’ve had our fallouts from time to time, it’s no big deal. Y’know, it’s like… if ya mum stabs ya, whaddya do? Y-ya don’t get upset. Ya don’t get angry, ya go, “Shit, mum’s stabbed me, I better get off to the hospital.”

…

Chopper: It’s all right, Jimmy. I’m not angry with you. You just broke my heart.

…

Chopper: Look, you’re not still angry at me about the leg, are you?
Neville Bartos: Nah, forget about it.
Chopper: Because I don’t know if you remember, Neville, but I had that bloody shotgun pointed at your head. I reconsidered and dropped it down to your kneecap. Remember?
Neville Bartos: Forget about it. All right?
Chopper: I mean, what the bloody hell were you doing getting lippy at me with a bloody shotgun? I had a bloody loaded shotgun.
Neville Bartos: The leg is okay, all right?

…

Chopper [to detective Downie at bar]: You’ve probably read all the newspaper stories about me, and you’ve heard the word on the street about me, and you’ve probably got a picture in your head of what Chopper Read’s like and we’re sitting here at this bar all very nice and cosy and I’m a bit of a let down to you.

…

Detective Downie [about Neville]: So you took him to the hospital?
Chopper: No, I didn’t take him to the bloody hospital. Now tell me this, right? Why would I shoot a bloke - BANG - and then put him in the bloody car and whiz him off to the hospital at a hundred miles an hour? It defeats the purpose of having shot him in the first place. What’s more, it’s bloody insulting, it’s bloody insulting. I mean, am I the only bloody standover man in the country who provides a medical plan for some of these characters?

…

Detective Cooney: We know you didn’t shoot the Turk.
Chopper: I just told you I shot the Turk.
Detective Downie: They’ve picked up the bloke that did it.
Chopper: What fucking bloke that did it? I did it!
Detective Downie: No, Homicide have picked up the guy, right? They’ve even got the murder weapon.
Chopper: What murder weapon?
Detective Cooney: .410 shotgun.
Chopper [pulls out his shotgun]: Here. This bloody .410 shotgun.
Detective Downie: Put it away, Mark. Just put the bloody thing away. This thing’s a .410. Fine, it’s a .410. There’s a fucking million .410s out there. That’s not the .410 that did it.
Chopper [incredulous]: You don’t want this? It’s a fucking murder weapon!

…

Chopper [to Downie]: I’ve never, I don’t think I’ve ever been as bloody insulted as I am right now. I’m sittin’ here confessing to a fucking murder, I’ve known you since I was a fucking pup, right? And you’ve got the fucking audacity to drag this cunt here…
Detective Cooney [Chuckles]: Sort out your boy, will you?
Chopper: …And you look at me like I’m a fucking idiot!

…

Mandy: Jimmy and the boys are bringing the car. You help set up the big fellow, it’ll make you a star.
Sammy the Turk: They said they had it farmed out, they had it ghosted. But when I walked out the door, they just left me posted.
Jimmy: The gun was for real, it was not a lark. But the twit took him out to the wrong car park.
Chopper: Silly boys, that’s all that Chopper had to say, and poor little Sammy got blown away.

…

Interviewer: You’ve written a best-seller…
Chopper: Yeah, I know - and I can’t even bloody spell. What about those poor bloody academics, those college graduates, battling their guts out to write some airy-fairy piece of exaggerated artwork? And here’s a bloke, sitting in a cell, who can’t spell, and he’s written a best-seller. It’s sold two hundred and fifty thousand copies. And it’s still selling. And he’s writing another one. And I can’t even spell. I’m semi-bloody-illiterate. They must hate my guts, eh?

…

Title Card: Mark Brandon Read now lives on a farm in Tasmania. He remains one of Australia’s best selling authors.[/b]

Though he can die anyday now from liver cancer.

[iambiguous]

It’s time for liberals [students of course] to up the ante. Give the reactionaries a good argument, sure, but if they still refuse to see the light…poison them. As in to death.

That’s the premise.

It revolves around the hypothetical of going back in time and meeting Hitler when he was still an art student: If you had the chance, would you kill him then?

It’s just a big fat juicy fantasy of course but, hey, don’t tell me it hasn’t crossed your mind from time to time. I mean, we are talking the most infuriating blockheads here. In or around the vicinity of Talk Radio.

Or, if you are one of the conservative blockheads, reverse it and think of people like me.

It’s the blackest of comedies with lots of political stuff in it.

It also has a really, really good soundtrack.

Too bad about the ending though. Even accounting for the irony that runs rabid throughout the film, I didn’t buy the last dinner guest at all. And the very ending? I mean, come on.

trailer: youtu.be/jNPSHydODoI

THE LAST SUPPER [1995]
Directed by Stacy Title

[b]Norman [on TV]: …and I say angry feminists like there was some other kind.

…

Norman: A storm is brewing my friends. Someone has to stop it.

…

Zach: I was in the Marines. I was in the war.
Pete: War? What war?
Zach: Desert Storm.
Luke: Was that really a war? I just thought that was a Republican commercial campaign.
Zach: You got a problem with patriotism?[/b]

Here we go…

[b]Zach: Hitler had the right idea.
Marc: Excuse me?
Zach: I’m not saying that killing the Jews was right. If he really did. There’s no real proof, you know.

…

Zach: Funny ain’t it. When it comes to buying shit, the Jews always bring the numbers down, but when it comes to WWII, they’re always pushing the numbers up.

…

Marc: What in your infinitely finite wisdom do you think Hitler had the right idea about?
Zach: It’s common knowledge that the Jews, no offense, were stealing money from the Germans, just like they do here.

…

Marc: First of all, the Jews were Germans.
Zach: The Jews aren’t like that. It’s always being a Jew first. That’s why everybody hates them.

…

Zach [to Luke]: You know what my grandfather used to say, “if he knew you boys were going to be so much trouble, we’d pick the damn cotton ourselves.”

…

Zach: You all just sit back, whine and complain like you always do, but you don’t do nothing. You left wingers make me puke. Liberals never take a stand you’d be willing to…
Luke: …to die for?
Zach: Nah. Boy, dying is easy. There is nothing heroic about dying. But if you can take a stand for something you’d be willing to kill for, that is something, something special…We do all the fighting, working and dying, and you do all the bitching.

…

Paulie: Is he really dead?
Jude: Yes, Paulie, he’s really dead. It’s a side effects of having a knife in your back!

…

Paulie: We’ve got to call the police. They’ll understand.
Luke: Sure they would. “College kid kills farm boy war hero.” You’ll probably just get a ticket.

…

Luke: I say we just bury the cracker and have dessert.

…

Luke: People disappear all of the time.
Jude: Especially in Iowa. We probably saved him from an alien abduction.

…

Luke: Do you want to go to jail for this fascist fuck?

…

Marc: Here’s a hypothetical. You’re a time traveler. It’s 1909 in Austria. You’re in a pub having a schnapps with a stranger…a young art student with one testicle. Let’s say his name is Adolf. Now Adolf at this point in his life has done no wrong. He’s not bitter. He’s not angry. He’s committed no crime. He has not killed anybody. He certainly hasn’t started a world war.
Pete: You’re point being?
Marc: Do you kill him? Do you poison his schnapps to save all those millions of innocent people?

…

Luke: What if you kill somebody whose death makes the world a better place? Think about all the right-wing assholes the world would’ve been better off without if someone had wasted them before they did any damage.

…

Luke: The blue bottle is bad. The green bottle is good.

…

Luke: So, Reverend, how did you and Jude come to know each other?
Jude: I interviewed the good Reverned for a research paper I was doing.
Reverend: Yes, on the vileness.
Luke: The vileness?
Reverend: The gay plague of course.

…

Pete: So you don’t believe in comforting the families of AIDS victums.
Reverned: No, I do not believe in comforting the families of irredeemable mortal sinners.
Pete: Of course, AIDS is not a sin, it’s a terrible disease.
Reverend: Not quite. Homosexuality is the terrible disease and AIDS is the cure.

…

Jude: The Reverend is the leader of God’s Way.
Reverend: Homosexuals are the living, breathing cesspool of pathogens. We simply propose to put them out on a desert island with enough foodstuffs to last them for their limited lifetimes. And what would that be…two years tops. That way, for a nominal cost to us they would all die.[/b]

Time for the blue bottle perhaps?

[b]Pete: Call 911!
Everyone: NO!!

…

Paulie: Isn’t violating a woman’s body constitutionally wrong?
Dinner guest: Isn’t leading a man on wrong? If a woman accepts a date with a man, especially in this day and age, she knows what he’s after and she accepts.
Jude: So you think that all dates lead to sex?
Dinner guest: Man is the dominant species. Women are the dominated. They are the weaker sex and always will be.
Paulie: A man does not have the right to rape a woman.
Dinner guest: No, of course he doesn’t, Paulie. Rape is a terrible thing. But it is also much rarer than people think. When a woman cries rape, it’s usually because she’s already consented to sex. And then if she doesn’t allow herself to enjoy it she feels used. So women, vindictive by nature, cry rape.

…

Dinner guest: If I don’t use everything in my power to block the entrance, innocent unborn children will die. And if I have to kill someone to stop that, well, that’s what the Right To lIfe Movement is all about.

…

Norman [on TV]: I’m the first to admit we took this country from the Indians but what were they doing with it anyway; shooting off bows and arrows and using seashells for money.

…

Dinner guest [to Luke]: Brother have you lost your mind, serving me this filthy swine! I can’t eat this. This is why the first thing we must do is eliminate the traitors among us. Then we can concentrate on the true enemy.

…

Dinner guest: You know, I never even thought of it that way. Maybe you all are right. Maybe they are just all people. They got feelings. They got family.
Everyone [in unison]: Uh…uh…
Luke: Well, you are entitled to your own opinion, of course.
Dinner guest: Yeah! It’s true! You got to beat them homeless senseless. Make sure they know their place.

…

Dinner guest: I’m not anti-earth. I’m pro-earthling. It’s kind of hard to worry about the greenhouse effect if you don’t have a house. You see, I think it all comes down to evolution. Survival of the fittest. I mean, if the spotted owl’s time is up…it’s hasta la vista, baby, I guess. Now your damn liberals on the other hand, they’d be protecting the rights of the dinosaurs if they could.

…

Jude: We don’t think we’ve been giving people enough of a chance. Remember the original plan? We said we wouldn’t kill anyone unless we couldn’t change their minds.
Luke: So we haven’t changed anyone’s mind. Maybe we’re not as smart as we thought we were.
Marc: Luke, the guy with the swastika sat down and you told him it was happy hour.
Luke: I figured, “Why waste the food?”
Marc: What food? Man, we’re not even giving people a decent meal anymore.
Luke: The fag-basher had Chinese.
Jude: Chung King is not Chinese.
Luke: We had soy sauce.

…

Dinner guest: Catcher in the Rye is supposed to be art? Thumbelina is art. Catcher in the Rye is just mean-spirited garbage littered with the the “F” word.

…

Pete: Zach probably killed that poor little girl. We did some good then.
Luke: Of course we did.
Paulie: You were right, Luke.
Pete: Horray for us!

…

Luke: We just got rid of a child murderer.
Paulie: Yeah, what if Zach had lived? We stopped him before he killed anyone else. Isn’t that why we started this?
Marc: But look at her. She was just an illiterate!

…

Pete: If he’s in the garden it counts. That’s the rule!

…

Pete: …the court understands that especially in this day and age of AIDS, sexual education must be mandatory to insure the public safety.
Dinner guest: No, that’s not so. Sexual education and free condoms sends a message to kids my age that they should be having premarital sex!..Sexual curiosity isn’t human nature, but rather your generations lower standard of morality that has put my generation at risk. I see a great danger in the world and I want to stop it. We have to get back to family values in this country.
Luke: Have you ever had sex?
Dinner guest: That’s a very inappropriate question for the dinner table.
Luke: How can you sit there, all of 17, and preach to me about family values and sexual education? I knew stuck-up girls like you in high school…You know what you need Heather? You know what you really need? A nice stiff dick to shut that big mouth of yours.

…

Luke: Don’t tell me you’re falling for his shit. He’s Satan, for Christ’s sakes! He’s giving us a prepared speech. He’s so used to defending himself, he’s got an answer for everything. He is an iceman.
Paulie: Maybe we are wrong about him. Maybe he does do this for money and publicity.
Luke: You fucking imbecile, that’s even worse. Creating hate for money, the fucking dollar. Come on! We have Norman Arbuthnot [read Rush Limbaugh] in the palm of our hands!

…

Luke: You guys are all turning into the fucking Stepford wives.

…

Norman: Life gets more and more complicated everyday.[/b]

[iambiguous]

You bump into the past. But not the past as you recall it. That’s where Harry comes in. He sets you straight. Or else. And it’s never really entirely clear the extent to which the encounter in the men’s room was “by chance”.

The “or else” part gets a little tricky though. Harry, you see, is not your ordinary psychopath. Whatever that might be.

He sees a problem. He solves it. What could be simpler? Why aggrevate yourself unnecessarily with the complicated reality of actual human relationships. But it also does a wonderful job in exposing just how aggregvating [and quotidian] those human relationships can become.

A friend like Harry might be nice to have around. Though on a tight leash of course.

Most of us have to make compromises between living our lives the way we wish we could and living them the way we have to instead. Or do we? What happens instead if you decide to make changes? And, if so, how exactly do you go about it?

trailer: youtu.be/07Eq1XYsuto [no subtitles]

WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY [Harry, Un Ami Qui Vous Veut Du Bien] 2000
Written and directed by Dominik Moll

[b]Plum: His motto is, “Solve every problem.”

…

Harry: Adele Cauchy, by the way, introduced me to your poem.
Claire: Your poem?
Harry: You don’t know his poem?
Michel: I wrote a poem for the school magazine.
Harry: “The Dagger in the Skin of Night”. Want to hear it?
Claire: You know it by heart?
Harry: Yes. I remember it well. For me, it’s a classic.

…

Michel: How come you know it by heart?
Harry: I read it so often, it sank in. Plum likes it too.
Plum: He reads it to me all the time.

…

Harry: I just want to help. Money is no object for me.

…

Harry: Like it? It’s your new car.
Michel: What’s the catch?
Harry: No catch. I felt like buying you a car.

…

Harry: You try to hard to satisfy everyone.
Michel: What?
Harry: Don’t you think we have to choose at some point?
Michel: Why ask me?
Harry: I’ve seen you in action. Keeping everyone happy. Juggling with Claire and your parents…humoring everyone.

…

Harry [to Michel]: Isn’t it time to tell your parents to stay out of your life?

…

Father: Didn’t he have a different car?[/b]

Oh yeah.

[b]Harry: People get scared when their parents die. Why? Because they realize they are next in line. It brings their own death closer. On me, it was the opposite. I felt much better.
Michel: You’re saying I’m lucky they died?
Harry: Yes! Use it as a springboard!
[Michel looks at him…the first glimmer of what he is dealing with]
Harry: I could pay you to write.
Michel: You’re talking nonsense. I’m going to bed. So should you. Get out of my room.

…

Eric [Michel’s brother]: What’s up?
Harry: Flat tire I think.

…

Claire: He’s extremely tense. He shut himself in the bathroom to write. I’ve never seen him so hypped up.
Harry: Is that true? He’s writing again?
Claire: He’s gone back to “The Flying Monkeys.”
Harry [with barely disguised glee]: That’s great. Excellent.
Claire: You put him up to it?
Harry: What if I did?

…

Claire: The change in him bothers me.
Harry: It’s natural. He’s at boiling point. We’re touching vital issues. Close to the bones. He’s spreading his wings. Don’t worry about it.
[Claire gets up to leave]
Claire: Stay away from the house. It’s best if you don’t see Michel.

…

Harry: Your life is crap!
Michel: I do what I want.
Harry: No, you do what Clair wants. She won’t let you fulfill yourself. It shows. She weighs you down. She wastes your life! The kids are the same. They stop you thinking.
Michel: Shut up.
Harry: At first, I thought you needed a better family life. Now I see that’s bullshit. The rot lies deeper…Cliare and the kids are like leeches. Cut them off.
Michel: Enough! Shut up! Do I tell you to dump Plum because she’s a pea-brained cow who stunts your mental growth? No. It’s none of my business!
[long pause]
Harry: Do you think Plum is a cow?[/b]

Well, that seals Plum’s fate.

Plum: I know I am superficial.
Michel: Absolutely not. I think you are gorgeous.
[impulsively he kisses her on the mouth…at first she relents but then she pushes him away]
Michel: We’re all cracking up!

But, as the next scene suggests, some more…much, much more…than others.

[b]Harry [putting a plastic bag over Plums bloody head]: Avoids a mess.
[pause]
Harry: You were right. She was a deadweight.

…

Harry [handing Michel a knife]: Deal with Claire. I’ll do the kids.

…

Harry [after Michel sticks the knife in his gut]: Why did you do that?

…

Clire: Any idea where the guest room pillow is?[/b]

Well, he did get rid of his pesky parents. And don’t forget the brand new SUV.

[iambiguous]

He’s really old. But he’s a man. And that means he still thinks about sex…a lot. Impotent or not. Only by then not many of the female gender [or male for that mater] are thinking about him. Not that way. Not unless he can pay for it.

But it’s infuriating [maddening] because he can’t just will himself not to think about it.

And, by then, he is more than willing to make allowances. Practically anyone will do. At least if they are young enough. And [of course] at the age of consent. There must be at least a trillion rationalizations by now. If someone tried to write them all down he’d have to cut down the entire Rainforest just to procure the paper.

Think of it like this: For the aged philosopher, his companion would not exactly have to be a Rhodes Scholar. Maurice is himself refined and intellectual…an urbane sophisticated man. And Jessie? Let’s just say that without the subtitles you’d hardly understand anything she said. We first meet her stuffing her face with Cheetos and watching soap operas.

But she is quite attractive. In the vulgar working class tradition.

Some will accuse him of being…pathetic. Him among them. But what does that really change? She’s got it. He wants it. And debasement, like most other things, is always a matter of degree. Still, all the time you’re thinking: would I put up with that? And: If he were 40 years younger, would he?

Bloody. America needs a word like that. All we have [or so it sometimes seems] is fucking.

trailer: youtu.be/_5NfQyiHEoI

VENUS [2006]
Directed by Roger Michell

[b]Ian: Have you got my glasses?
Maurice: No, you’ve got them.
Ian: Why would I have them. I’m not wearing them, am I? Christ, I’ve lost them now! That’s the worst thing that can happen…
Maurice: They’re in your right hand.
Ian [looking down at them]: Oh, yeah.

…

Maurice: I bet she can’t wait to hear that little tinkle.

…

Maurice [reacting to the doctor’s finger up his ass]: Jesus Christ!
Doctor: The prostate should feel like a peach with a groove down the center. Your’s is a little bumpy but it could easily be nothing. We’ll need to send you to a specialist. So, you should worry a little but not a lot.

…

Ian: It’s only been 24 hours and already I’m screaming for euthanasia!

…

Maurice: You could consult a book.
Jessie: A book?
Maurice: Yeah, you know, two flaps of cardboard with printed pages inbetween.

…

Maurice: I’m here to announce I’ve got you a job. It’s modeling.
Jessie: You’ve done that? What sort of clothes is it? Do you think I’ll get to keep them at the end?
Maurice: I’m not sure about that.
Jessie: Why not?
Maurice: There’s no actual clothes involved.

…

Jessie: You’re having me do a porno?!

…

Jessie [in the museum looking at a nude painting]: Is her name Venus?
Maurice: No. Venus is a goddess. Accompanied by Eros, she creates love and desire in us mortals leading often to foolishness and despair. The usual shit.

…

Maurice: For most men, a woman’s body is the most beautiful thing they will ever see.
Jessie: What’s the most beautiful thing a girl sees? Do you know?
Maurice: Her first child.

…

Maurice: No, you can’t cling to me like this, Ian, we’ll both go down.
Ian: Put me on my feet then, you silly old fool!
Maurice: You’re on your feet.
Ian: Oh, yeah. Well. Thank you.

…

Maurice: I will die soon, Venus. Can I touch your hand?
Jessie: That’s one chat up line I haven’t heard.
Maurice: I’m impotent, of course, but I can still take theoretical interest.
Jessie: Have you been thinking about me?
Maurice: All the time I was in the hospital.
Jessie: What do you think about me?
Maurice: I saw your body.
Jessie: Which part?
Maurice: Your hair, your feet, your legs, your behind, your eyes…
Jessie: My eyes?
Maurice [dreamily, reverentially]: Your elbows…your cunt.
Jessie: Oh shut up…
[long pause]
Jessie: You can touch my hand. But only with your fingers. Anything else would make me vomitus.

…

Maurice: My dear, would you pass me my trousers?
Jessie: What is that?
Maurice: A catheter.
Jessie: Oh, my God!
Maurice: I think it’s leaking.
Jessie: I don’t want it on my shoes! You’re always dripping, Maurice.
Maurice: Oh, hold on.
Jessie: There’s always bits of you where there shouldn’t be!

…

Maurice: Venus. You look like a movie star.
[he kisses her neck]
Maurice: Is there an old man odor?
Jessie: Not so much this evening.
Maurice: I wonder why.
Jessie: You can kiss my shoulders.
Maurice: Can I?
Jessie: Three kisses. Three, I said! And no licking and burping, you dirty, filthy, little shithead.
Maurice [chuckles]: Oh, you please me.
Jessie: And you me.
[he fondles her breasts; she hesitates, then punches him in the groin]
Maurice: Steady! Steady! I’m just out of intensive care.

…

Jessie: Do you believe in anything, Maurice?

…

Maurice: This other man, the other man who loved you, was he not kind to you?
Jessie: He was kind, for a time. He promised me things. He bought me stuff. We had champagne and there were roses.
Maurice: Then you got pregnant.
Jessie: Does everyone know?
Maurice: It’s happened to girls before.
Jessie: Then…then he stopped being kind. He went the other way. A long way that way. He were engaged. I didn’t know. It wasn’t a miscarriage. My mum called it that. It were an abortion. And she made me.
Maurice: Terrible.
Jessie: Yeah. Yeah.

…

Jessie: I want to give you a treat.
Maurice: What?
Jessie [putting her hand between her legs]: Watch.

…

Maurice: “To be or not to be that is the question”.

…

Maurice: Now we can really talk!

…

Waitress: God, he was gorgeous.

…

Donald: How many columns did he get?[/b]

[iambiguous]

The vagabond. Living off her wits. How I wish I had had the balls to become one myself. But few do. It’s not an easy life by any stretch of the imagination. And you can forget about it once children become a part of your life. But there are so many facets of it that appealed to me.

Out of the blue two complete strangers [including the vagabond] bump into each other. They click and become a part of each other’s world. Until they don’t.

They are deeply enscounced in the working class and barely get by. But [of course] they are both very attractive. And quite young. Yet one is ferociously cynical while the other is more in the moment, tender and caring.

The backstory here is how they got the flat they share. An automobile accident put the previous occupants in the hospital. They are in comas. One is just a child. And that becomes a part of the narrative. At least for one of them.

These are characters that jump out at you. For one thing, they make you curious to know what in the past brought them to the present. And you don’t even presume to pin down their future. How many people can you really say that about?

It’s heartbreaking seeing Sandrine in the hospital. It’s probably why folks like me want God to exist: To have someone [something] to rage against for the gap between the way the world is and the way you want it to be instead.

wiki

Research by Dr. Eelco Wijdicks on the depiction of comas in movies was published in Neurology in May 2006. Dr. Wijdicks studied 30 films (made between 1970 and 2004) that portrayed actors in prolonged comas, and he concluded that only two films accurately depicted the state of a coma victim and the agony of waiting for a patient to awaken: Reversal of Fortune (1990), which was based on actual events, and The Dreamlife of Angels (1998). The remaining 28 were criticised for portraying miraculous awakenings with no lasting side effects; unrealistic depictions of treatments and equipment required; and comatose patients remaining tanned, muscular, and suspiciously well turned out.

from the movie [spoiler alert…big time]: youtu.be/VJxtNk5Q9V4

THE DREAMLIFE OF ANGELS [La Vie Rêvée des Anges] 1998
Written in part and directed by Erick Zonca

[b]Isa: You didn’t like being a waitress?
Marie: The boss soon got on my nerves. He treated us like shit, simply because he’s the boss. I slapped him one. He didn’t see it coming. He was bleeding. He won’t forget me in a hurry.

…

Isa: Been to the hospital to see them?
Marie: I don’t know them. I got the flat through my aunt. Besides, they’re in a coma.[/b]

The mother died a few days after the accident.

From Sandrine’s diary: “I feel things inside, overwhelming things. I feel my pulse beating. I’m confused, nervous. Like something missing, a desire. I can’t yet control. On the edge of an abyss, I feel this crazy urge to jump.”

She is the girl in the hospital. The girl in the coma.

Isa [to a man they accost in the mall]: My friend Marie here has been following you for several months. She’s shy, but she knows everything about you. You’re a great guy and you’ve got a lot of money. But she’s shy and comes from a more modest background. These things happen. She wants to know if the lttle detail of class matters or if it’s love that counts.

It’s a game they play.

From Sandrine’s diary: “Woke up expecting something to happen. Nothing…She’ll bring him back and they’ll screw. She’ll say, ‘Hush, Sandrine is sleeping.’ What a bummer, my mother with a guy like that. If I put a carving knife under her matress, he won’t be able to get an erection.”

Isa checks. There it is.

[b]Chris: You’re not the grateful type.

…

Isa [to Marie]: You know guys like him. He owns a club. You’re probably not the only one.

…

Isa [to Marie]: What’s your problem? Is it his contempt rubbing off? Hasn’t taken long, has it?

…

Chis [of Isa]: Does my presense bother her?
Marie: No. Well, yes, but it doesn’t matter.

…

Isa: Don’t humiliate yourself. You’re not his dog!
Marie: I don’t mind. I’ve been humilated before. A shitty life, treated like shit! And you go around with boards with shit written on them!
Isa: Sandrine’s almost dead, you’re lucky to be alive and you run after a jerk?

…

Isa: She isn’t in.
Chris: I know. I’m going to leave her. I want you to tell her.
Isa: It’s not for me to tell her.
Chris: You’re her friend.
Isa: What should I tell her?
Chris: It wasn’t her fault. She’s a nice girl, but it’s over, I’m ending it.
Isa: Why did you go out with her?
[Chris shrugs, Isa slaps him hard in the face]
Isa: You’re an asshole![/b]

Yes. But he is also young, rich and handsome.

[b]Isa: I’d like to see you when you realize that you need other people.
Marie: I’ll send you a photo.

…

Isa: You’re living in her flat and you don’t even know her.
Marie: What do you mean?
Isa: Nothing. You disgust me.
[pause]
Isa: I think we should each go our own way. I’m leaving.
Marie: Right, go ahead. You think you’re perfect. You’re just a hanger on. What can you do for youself, sell cards? That’ll get you far. You’re screwed up and you don’t even realize it. I’ve found someone and I’m happy. That’s why you’re upset.[/b]

Then Isa tells her. Before it’s over Marie pulls a knife on her.

The end is the film is just ghastly. All except Sandrine…who might pull through.

[iambiguous]

Capitalism [as we all know] turns women into men. And how hard is it to figure out the ramifications of that. For all of us, eventually.

It’s obviously the nature of a beast to be beastly. But who to believe…and about what? Some are very, very good at this sort of thing. But some are even better than that.

It’s a matter of figuring out what the con is, where the con began and how the con will end. And, of course, whether you approve it.

But here, well, let’s just say there is too much stuff we can only guess at.

trailer: youtu.be/E9l6-x9o36w

THE BUSINESS OF STRANGERS [2001]
Written and directed by Patrick Stettner

Julie [on phone]: That Paula person arrived 45 minutes late. I had to do the whole fucking show by myself without visuals. I made this perfectly clear. These are big game fund managers. We are not to fuck around. As far as I’m concerned, she’s fired.
Paula: Hey uberfrau. The pleasure was all mine, Bob. I hope we can do it again sometime.

You have to see it to appreciate it.

[b]Julie [on phone]: Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise. A very brilliant disguise.

…

Julie: I don’t have to go to Japan to get stepped on because I’ve got tits.

…

Julie: Listen, I was a bit harsh on you before. I lost my temper. You’re not really fired.
Paula: I don’t really care. It’s just a money job.
Julie: Let me buy you a drink.
Paula: OK.
[to waiter]
Paula: Martell XO supreme.
Waiter: That’s twenty dollars a glass.
Paula: I’ll have a double.
Julie [to waiter]: Same.

…

Paula: I’m a writer. Non-fiction.
Julie: What does that mean, biographies? Historical journalism?
Paula: No, short stories. Things that I experience. The whole fiction thing is too stupid. It’s too neat. I like the sloppiness of real life.

…

Julie: Everyone eats shit. It’s just a question of degrees.
Paula: Or how much you can take.

…

Paula: I dare you to touch it.
Julie: What?
Paula: His dick.

…

Paula: Biblical shit always freaks people out.

…

Julie [to Paula]: We’re here because you are a profoundly disturbed young woman.
Paula: Please. If you were a man, you’d see a dominatrix twice a week. All CEOs have one. But we’re women so we don’t do things like that. We express issues of doubt and control differently. You do have them don’t you?
Julie: What?
Paula: Control issues. You feel overwhelmed, unworthy, unable to keep things in order, so you punish yourself. You obsess over control and power and you have bad, even abusive relationships with men.
Julie: You know nothing about me or my relationships.
Paula: I’ve seen the way you run. You push yourself hard, really hard. I bet there’s some deep shit going on there. I bet you come from tough times. Little girl on the wrong side of the tracks. You’ve managed to work hard and pull yourself out. Now you’ve won everything but something just doesn’t feel right.
Julie: Fuck you.
Paula: Whatever you say, Duchess.
Julie: Fuck you, you privileged little brat. I’ve seen a thousand girls just like you; rich families, all the opportunities and you throw it all away. You put on this act, disaffected, obnoxious, talented but undiscovered. You know what? You all end up with your sensitive husbands, pregnant, coming back pleading for a job and making my coffee. It’s okay, Paula. Nobody ends up being what they really want - it’s part of life. It’s called growing up.[/b]

As Paula then points out, these mentialities thrive [and take their toll psychologically] in the “nasty, male dominated business world”.

[b]Paula: It’s your choice of pleasure, the humiliation of getting caught…or kissing me.

…

Julie: Go on, sing.[/b]

[iambiguous]

He lost his Mom to the L.I.E. Like Harry Chapin and Alan J. Pakula. And, unfortunately, his father is a dick.

Some kids lives are so fucked up you can’t even imagine the exit ramp. Or maybe one.

There must be millions of kids like these. And one way they come out that way is by watching movies like this. Another is by being completely bereft of “parental guidance”. But these kids aren’t exactly struggling to survive from day to day in the hood. They’re more the suburbia malaise sort. No KIDS here.

Especially Howie. Precocious in some ways, but every bit “the kid” in others.

It’s also about young boys exploring their sexuality. And about pedaphiles exploring it with them.

The thing about this pedaphile? He is a lot more complex then most care to admit. They just want them portrayed as slime balls.

That the film received an NC-17 rating speaks volumes regarding just how fucked up our culture is when it comes to sex. Lines have to be drawn, sure. But not if people are portrayed as cartoon characters. Or stick figures.

But some might say the movie blinked at the end.

at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L.I.E.

scene from film: youtu.be/7zJVcmckMwo

[b]Note: some explicit dialog[/b]

L.I.E. [2001]
Written in part and directed by Michael Cuesta

[b]Howie: On the Long Island Expressway there are lanes going east, lanes going west…and lanes going straight to hell.

…

Kid: I’m just trying to say that if a brother and a sister make a baby, it can have two heads or something.
Kid: It’s in all the books.

…

Gary: I think Howie’s trying to say it’s not politically correct to fuck your sister.

…

Counselor: Just so you know, I know you’re different, okay.
Howie: Different?
Counselor: You’re not a nerd, you’re not a jock, you’re not a scholar or a romeo.
Howie: Or a gangsta.
Counselor: Or a clown.
Howie: So what am I then ?

…

Big John: You know Chagall?
Howie: Doesn’t everyone?

…

Scott: You should be ashamed of yourself.
Big John: Oh, I am. I am. I always am.

…

Kevin: Hey-hey, it’s Captain Kirk. Ever see that old Star Trek show where there’s a bad Captain Kirk and a good one? And Spock, and Dr. Phones…
Brian: You mean “Bones”?
Kevin: What? It’s Phones McCoy.
Brian: “Bones” is a nickname for doctor, idiot.
Kevin: No, it’s like get the doctor on the phone, like house calls.
Brian: It’s BONES.

…

Kevin [lying on the ground as a woman passes]: Her dress is so short, you can see her clint.
Brian: What?
Kevin: Her clint, it’s in her pussy.
Howie: You mean “clit.”
Kevin: Fuck you, I mean like… clintasaurus.
Howie: It’s clitoris, you fuckin’ idiot.
Kevin: It’s a CLINT.
Brian: Yeah, like you can see Clint Eastwood in her pussy.

…

Big John: And if I was a spy, what would you think of me then?
Howie: Well, I’d think that you are just like James Bond except James Bond doesn’t go around blowing boys.

…

Big John [talking with Howie about Gary]: You must be the only guy on Long Island who hasn’t fucked him. Such a slut. The only thing that hasn’t been used on him is his brain.

…

Big John [after Howie quotes Walt Whitman]: Are you trying to seduce me?

…

Howie [reading along one of Big John’s tattoos]: “KILL THEM ALL, LET GOD SORT THEM OUT”

…

Gary [visiting his father in jail]: Oh, and Dad, don’t ever fucking hit me again.[/b]

[iambiguous]

Based on an “autobiographical novel”. Fictional nonfiction as it were.

These things don’t happen very often: Jewish family flees pre-war Nazi Germany to run remote farm in Kenya.

Had the Nazis won the war though they might well be there today. And this story would never have been told.

That is the extraordinary magic of movies. Through them you can not only know of such things but watch them unfold. Even if only through the acting of others.

Imagine being in such a situation. You roll the dice: Stay with the devil you know in Germany or take a chance with the devil [if it is a devil] you don’t know in Kenya. Think of all those Jews who had a chance to get out but chose instead to stay.

But while some are able to make the best of a new [more difficult] situation, some are not. Some can’t let go of the past, some can’t let go of the future.

It goes full circle. Germany: leave or stay? Kenya: leave or stay?

trailer: youtu.be/Hep5_o–OEE

NOWHERE IN AFRICA [Nirgendwo in Afrika] 2001
Written and directed by Caroline Link

[b]Regina [narrating]: I couldn’t remember Germany. I only knew there’s snow and seasons. And that our family was there. Everyone, not just mum and dad. Everyone. And that I liked that. But I know as well that I was always afraid of something. Of the other children, of the people on the streets. I was even afraid of dogs. Germany is a dark place for me. Not so light and hot as Kenya.

…

Walter [in a letter to Jettel]: “You can’t trust anybody, even those people who were our best friends.”

…

Max [to Jettel]: One person always loves more. That’s what makes it so difficult. And the one who loves more is vulnerable.

…

Regina [narrating]: I had to think about chocolate. But mum explained to me that from this point on we were poor. And there’s no chocolate for poor kids. I promised to be brave.

…

Walter: You didn’t bring the refrigerator right? Jettel?
Jettel: No I didn’t. There was no space left in the boxes. You know, we were allowed to have just …
Walter: But there was space left for this crap! What did you do with all the money?
Jettel: I bought this.
Walter: You bought an evening gown?!
Jettel: Yes I did.

…

Jettel: I can’t stand it anymore.
Walter: That’s what you always say.
Jettel: But I want to go back and live with people, whose language I can understand! You don’t earn a single cent here. Every day we eat eggs and semi-solid food! How could Regina go to school?
Walter [in a burst of anger]: Dammit, we are alive!!
Jettel: Yeah we are alive! And why? All day long we’re hoping for rain for cows that don’t even belong to us. My God, I feel like I’m dead…and sometimes I wish I were.
Walter: We just got out in the nick of time!
Jettel: What are you talking about?
Walter: Yesterday the Nazis burned down all the synagogues in Germany and pillaged all the Jewish shops. They smashed everything to pieces. People, houses, shops, everything.
Jettel: How did you find that out on this goddamn farm?
Walter: From a Swiss radio station this morning.

…

Walter [to Jettel]: You treat me like I’m a leper! As a lawyer I was your favourite panty remover! And now? Sweat-stained and unshaved I don’t even exist for you!

…

Walter [petting a stray dog Regina wants to keep]: We’ll call him Rummler, like the Nazi chairman in Leobschutz. Everyday we can say “Rummler, you bastard”, and nobody will arrest us!

…

Regina [narrating]: Suddenly we were no longer refugees but enemies of the state. We didn’t even know why the British were locking us up. We were Germans and Germany was in war with Great Britain. But we were Jews as well and obviously not on Hitler’s side.

…

Regina: Letters with those stamps always bring tears.

…

A letter from Walter’s father in Germany: "My dear son, It’s nice to hear that you had luck with your 2nd farm. Emigrating has become impossible. Pretty soon Hitler will close the borders. There’s nothing left we could sell anyway. People say that the Jews will be banned in ghettos, Walter, for the first time in my life I am afraid. Afraid.

…

Regina: No I won’t undress myself. I’m not a little child anymore.
Friend: You are stupid if you dirty your school clothes.
Regina: I’m not a child anymore. You must not see my breasts.
Friend: Your breasts aren’t different from other women’s breasts.
Regina: Of course. A Mzungus breasts are different than black women’s breasts. You must not show them.
Friend: Mzungus’ schools teach strange stuff.

…

A letter from Jettel’s family: “My dear loved ones, we are very afraid. We are being sent to Poland to work. Don’t forget us. Mother and Kathe.”
Regina: What does it mean?
Walter: They weren’t allowed to write more than 20 words. They gave away one.

…

Jettel: Perhaps they want to try to escape through Poland. Maybe they found a way out.
[Walter just walks away]
Jettel: Say something, Walter, finally! Please talk to me!
Walter: Your mother wanted you to know it. She wouldn’t have written if not. Poland means death.
Jettel [striking him]: No!
Walter: Shall I tell you something? Sometimes I envy you this letter! Now you can be certain! I have to ask myself every day, if my father is okay. Where he is. Where my sister is.

…

Jettel: Sometimes I don’t see you a day…and a night. Where are you then?
Owuor: I’m visiting my wives and my children. I have 3 wives and six children. At the lake. Near Kisumu.
Jettel: They don’t see you often.
Owuor: They understand that I can’t leave Memsaab alone.
Jettel: But your wife is always alone.
Owuor: That’s something different. White women are helpless, black women aren’t.

…

Regina: Mamma… why are the Jews so hated? You and dad, you are not really Jewish. You eat meat. And you don’t pray right? In school they told us that the Jews killed God’s son.
Jettel: For me and dad, Judaism has never been as important. We thought we were as much German as possible. The German culture, the language. That was our home.
Regina: Maybe we Jews are really different?
Jettel: Aunt Ruth and uncle Salommon were different. They obey the Jewish rules. Tolerance doesn’t mean that everyone is the same. That’d be stupid. What I’ve learned here is how valuable differences are. Differences are good. And intelligent people will never hold it against you.

…

Regina: If we have to go back to Germany…can Owuor join us?
Walter: No, not this time.

…

Jettel: I’m not going back to Germany.
Walter: What about us?
Jettel: How can you still believe in that country?
Walter: I’m a lawyer, and I love my job. Perhaps you’ll laugh at me but I feel I could be useful in a new Germany.
Jettel: You’re such a damn idealist! Do you think the Nazis suddenly disappeared? We’d have to deal with our parents’ murderers!
Walter: I’m proud to be an idealist because it shows that I believe in mankind. That may sound naive but every other belief will lead to destruction.[/b]

In the end, they go back. But it’s extraordinary how their positions reversed.

[iambiguous]

This film revolves around people who revolve around music understood and played on a level of sophistication well beyond my capacity to grasp. Thank god you don’t have to understand it that far up there in order to enjoy listening to it. Although, obviously, if you did, you’d enjoy it that much more. But that’s life. The gap between the creator, the performer and the spectator will always be there.

The two in love here are well into their middle age. How does that change things? Not much. As with most people in love, it’s always never nothing. In this case, he is losing his mind.

I am losing mine too so this is particularly fascinating.

One diagnosis and everything changes. And here is a man who is particularly dependent on a brilliant [and fully functioning] mind. He composes and then conducts his own music. Not only is his mind now less reliable but he finds himself becoming more and more fixated on it. To the detriment of everyone else. Who is she married to now? Increasingly she spends more and more time trying to communicate the most basic things. It’s like dealing with an infant.

An object lesson in how not to treat someone who is losing his mind. The last thing he wants to be reminded of is the loss.

A SONG FOR MARTIN [En Sång För Martin] 2001
Written and directed by Bille August

[b]Martin: It was as though something fell in my head. Just fell and fell and disappeared.

…

Martin: Mozart was sick when he wrote The Magic Flute. He felt the touch of death on his own body. In a moment of despair he cries out: O, Eternal Night, when will you disappear? Then will I find light in the darkness? And the chorus answers clearly: Soon, soon, or no more. The dying Mozart hurls a question into the darknes and answers his own question.

…

Martin [to Barbara]: Don’t sit there destroying my music!

…

Barbara: Look what I found in the trash can. All the choral parts. Ruined! Darling, three days work wasted. I know you didn’t throw them away on purpose but we worked night and day to finish these.[/b]

But he is diseased. And he did not throw them away on purpose. The whole relationship now seems to revolve around this one way or another. And they know it is only going to get worse.

[b]Barbara [on the phone with publisher]: Actually, no, things aren’t fine. To be honest, they are very bad. Martin is in no fit state to finish the opera.What we all feared has happened. The disaster is a fact.
[pause]
Barbara: Can’t we let Martin believe that his opera will be performed? His world will cave in completely if we take his dream aways from him.

…

Barbara: Remember that passionaite speech you made, all about friendship? Martin doesn’t understand why you never come to see him anymore.
Biederman: Okay, I’ll tell you why. I can’t stand to see Martin like this. The man that I admired, worshipped even, is no more. I don’t know how to relate to him, what to say or do.

…

Barbara: That’s why I’ve given up my job. So I can stay here and look after you night and day. See? I’m washing off your shit. I hate doing it, but I do it all the same because you’re a poor helpless soul who is dependent on me.

…

Martin [of his family singing him a birthday song]: Who are all these people?

…

Barbara [in a restaurant celebrating Martin’s birthday]: You can’t pee here, where people sit eating.

…

Doctor [to Barbara]: It would be best for you to accept that he’s no longer your husband. He is no longer the man you married.[/b]

Finally, she gets it. She lets go. She puts it all in God’s capable hands.

[iambiguous]

Ballet and the working class. In England no less. Enough said?

Not quite: It’s the young lad who is enthused. At the very least, a poof. And born and bred in a family of miners no less.

Given how many men do in fact pursue dancing as a career, it can’t always be this bad. One thing for sure, if you are the only boy in the class it can only increase your chance of getting the girl. Well, if you’re straight.

As for miner’s strike, we know how that turned out. In a word, Margaret Thatcher. Workers of the world unite? But at least we do know whose side the pigs cops are on.

And a scab is a scab. Even if your wee boy is a “fucking genius”. But it’s also easy to see how the world can turn you inside out. It all depends on how “your situation” is or is not the same as the guy next to you. For the working class money can be everything. And it’s obscene how this can pummel some really, really talented children. The one’s who don’t have “the script” to fall back on.

at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Elliot

trailer: youtu.be/gZVB2GpiLDs

BILLY ELLIOT [2000]
Directed by Stephen Daldry

[b]George: Jesus Christ, Billy Elliot! You’re a disgrace to them gloves, your father, and the traditions of this boxing hall!

…

Billy: Tony, do you ever think about death?
Tony: FUCK OFF!

…

Mrs. Wilkinson: Balance! Balance! Balance! Balance!
Striking miners: Scab! Scab! Scab! Scab!

…

Dad: Listen, have you noticed anything weird about our Billy lately?
Tony: What are you after like, a list?

…

Billy: What’s wrong with ballet?
Dad: What’s “wrong” with ballet?
Billy: It’s perfectly normal.
Dad: “Perfectly normal”?
Grandma: I used to go to ballet.
Billy: See?
Dad: Aye, for your nanna. For girls, not for lads, Billy. Lads do football, or boxing, or wrestling. Not frigging ballet!

…

Dad: I’m bustin’ my ass for those 50 pences and you’re - look, from now on, you stay here and look out for your Nana. Got that? Good.
Grandma: They used to say I could have been a professional dancer if I’d had the trainin’!
Dad: WILL YOU SHUT UP?!

…

Tom: If it was up to me, I’d shut them all down tomorrow.
Mrs. Wilkinson: For God’s sake.
Billy: What do you do, Mr. Wilkinson?
Debbie: He’s been made redundant.

…

Billy: Miss, what have I blown not coming to the classes?
Mrs. Wilkinson: This’ll sound strange, Billy, but for some time now I’ve been thinkin’ of the Royal Ballet School.
Billy: Aren’t you a bit old, miss?
Mrs. Wilkinson: No, not me…you! I’m the bloody teacher!

…

Billy: So, we could do it private like?
Mrs. Wilkinson: Just you and me.
Billy: Miss, you don’t fancy me, do you?
Mrs. Wilkinson: No, Billy. Funnily enough, I don’t. Now, piss off.

…

Billy: I don’t want to do your stupid, fucking audition. You only want me to do it for your own benefit!
Mrs. Wilkinson: Look, Billy…
Billy: Because you’re a failure!
Mrs. Wilkinson: Don’t you dare talk to me like that!
Billy: You don’t even have a proper dancing school. You’re stuck in some crummy boxing hall! Don’t pick on me because you fucked up your own life!
[she slaps him]

…

Debbie: Billy, do you not fancy us, like?
Billy: Don’t know. Never really thought about it.
Debbie: If you want, I’ll show you me fanny.

…

Tony: Audition?
Mrs. Wilkinson: For the Royal Ballet School. It’s where they teach the ballet.
Dad: You’ve got to be joking, love.
Mrs. Wilkinson: No, I’m perfectly serious.
Tony: Have you any idea what we’re going through? I’ve been in a fucking cell, all night…and you come around here, talking shite.
[he turns to Billy]
Tony: And you…Fucking ballet!
[back to Mrs. Wilkinson]
What are you trying to do, make him a fuckin skirt for the rest of his life? Look at him. He’s only 11 for fuck’s sake.

…

Tony: What about giving him a childhood?!
Billy: I don’t want a childhood. I want to be a ballet dancer.

…

Tony [grabbing Billy and putting him up on the kitchen table]: Go on, then. Let’s see this fucking dancing.
Mrs. Wilkinson: This is ridiculous!
Tony: If you’re a fucking ballet dancer, then let’s be having you.
Mrs. Wilkinson: Don’t you dare!
Tony: What sort of a teacher are you? He’s got the chance to dance. Now, you’re fucking telling him not to. Dance, you little twat! No? So, piss off. He’s not doing any more ballet! If you go near him again, I’ll smack you, you middle-class cow.

…

Billy: So, what’s it like?
Dad: What’s what like?
Billy: London.
Dad: I don’t know, son. I never made it past Durham.
Billy: Have you never been?
Dad: Why would I want to go to London?
Billy: It’s the capital city!
Dad: Well, there are no mines in London.
Billy: Jesus Christ, is that all you think about?[/b]

Yeah, if that’s how you put bread on the table and pay the fucking rent.

[b]NCB Official: Well was there any particular aspect of the ballet which caught your imagination?
Billy: The dancin’?

…

Tutor: Before you go, may I ask you one last question. What does it feel like when you’re dancing?
Billy: Don’t know. Sorta feels good. Sorta stiff and that, but once I get going…then I like, forget everything. And sorta disappear. Sorta disappear. Like I feel a change in my whole body. And I’ve got this fire in my body. I’m just there. Flyin’ like a bird. Like electricity. Yeah, like electricity.

…

Dad [at the Union Hall]: He did it! He fucking did it!
Miner: Jackie, have you not heard, man? We’re going back. Strike’s over. The union caved in yesterday.

…

Billy: I think I’m scared, Dad.
Dad: That’s okay, son. We’re all scared.
Billy: Well…if I don’t like it, can I still come back?
Dad: Are you kidding? We’ve let out your room.
[straight face then laughter][/b]

[iambiguous]

The Leary family. You gotta love 'em. At least I do. Every single one of them embody the sort of oddball eccentricity I seek out in others.

Muriel Pritcherd too.

Of course they can also drive you up the wall. So it’s more just a nice place to visit than anything else.

And then there is loss. The loss of a child in particular. There is no right way to deal with it. But many will argue there are wrong ways.

The film also brings out all the mangled thinking that goes on about “class” in America. It’s not as brazen as in other cultures but in other respects it is even more despicable. The film was shot in Baltimore. That’s the home of Anne Tyler, the author of the book the film is based on. I live in Baltimore too. And here there is a world of difference between Roland Park and East 21st Street.

But I don’t pretend it doesn’t include me. As regarding so many things, I find myself being tugged in all different directions.

trailer: youtu.be/bQPonAjdU8g

THE ACCIDENTAL TOURIST [1988]
Directed by Lawrence Kasdan

[b]Macon [voiceover]: The business traveler should bring only what fits in a carry-on bag. Checking your luggage is asking for trouble. Add several travel-size packets of detergent so you won’t fall into the hands of unfamiliar laundries. There are very few necessities in this world which do not come in travel-size packets. One suit is plenty, if you take along travel-size packets of spot remover. The suit should be medium gray. Gray not only hides the dirt but is handy for sudden funerals. Always bring a book as protection against strangers. Magazines don’t last, and newspapers from elsewhere remind you you don’t belong. But don’t take more than one book. It is a common mistake to overestimate one’s potential free time, and consequently over-pack. In travel, as in most of life, less is invariably more. And most importantly, never take along anything on your journey so valuable or dear that its loss would devastate you.

…

Sarah: Macon, ever since Ethan died, I’ve had to admit that people are basically bad. Evil, Macon. They’re so evil they’d take our 12-year-old boy and shoot him through the skull for no reason. There have been times I haven’t been sure I…Haven’t been sure I could live in this kind of world anymore.
Macon: It’s true what you say about human beings. I’m not trying to argue.Tell me, Sarah, why would that cause you to leave me?
Sarah: Because I knew you wouldn’t try and argue. You believed all along they were evil. This whole past year I’ve felt myself withdrawing from people just like you do, Macon. I’ve felt myself becoming a Leary.
Macon: Well, there are worse disasters than that, I guess.
Sarah: Not for me. Macon, I know you loved Ethan. And I know you mourn him, but there’s something so…What do you call it? Muffled about the way you experience things. It’s like you’re trying to slip through life unchanged.
Macon: Sarah, I’m not muffled. I endure. I’m holding steady.
Sarah: I know you think that, but I think you’re fooling yourself. It’s not by chance you write books telling people how to make trips without a jolt so they can travel to wonderful, exotic places and never be touched by them. Never feel they’ve left home. That traveling armchair isn’t just your logo. It’s you.

…

Muriel: Or just call for no reason. Call and talk.
Macon: Talk?
Muriel: Sure. Just pick up the phone and talk. Talk about anything. Don’t you ever get the urge to do that?
Macon: No, not really.

…

Julian: The Macon Leary 9 x 12 envelope crisis.

…

Rose: Or maybe we could send him to obedience school.

…

Julian: What do you do for a living, Charles?
Charles: I make bottle caps.
Julian: Bottle caps? Is that a fact.
Charles: Well, it’s not half as exciting as it sounds, really.

…

Macon: Is this the Thanksgiving we all die?

…

Macon: He’s younger you know.
Rose: Two years.
Macon: But he’s got a younger lifestyle. Singles apartments and so on.
Rose: He’s tired of all that.
[pause]
Rose: Don’t try to spoil this, Macon.
Macon: Sweetheart, I only want to protect you. It’s wrong, you know, what you said at Thanksgiving. Love is not what it’s all about. There are all kinds of other issues.
Rose: He ate my turkey and didn’t get sick. Two big helpings.

…

Macon [to Muriel]: Last year, I exp…I lost…I experienced a loss. I lost… I lost my son. He was just… he went into a hamburger joint and someone came, a hold-up man, and shot him. I can’t go to dinner with people. I can’t…can’t talk to their little boys. You have to stop asking me. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but I’m just not up to this. Do you hear? Every day, I tell myself it’s time to be getting over this - I know that people expect it of me. But if anything I’m getting worse. The first year was like a bad dream; I was there at his bedroom door in the morning before I’d remember he wasn’t there to be wakened. The second year is real. I’ve stopped going to his door. I’ve sometimes let a whole day go by without thinking about him. I believe Sarah thinks I could have prevented what happened somehow - she’s so used to my arranging her life. Now I’m far from everyone. I don’t have any friends anymore. And everyone looks trivial and foolish, and not related to me.

…

Porter: Can you tell me one unique thing about her? I mean, one really special quality, Macon, not something sloppy like “she appreciates me”?
Macon: I’m not such a bargain myself, in case you haven’t noticed. When it comes right down to it, somebody ought to warn her away from me.

…

Minister at Rose’s wedding: In turbulent, troubling times, a good marriage can be the one safe place we know we can go. Once we’ve been to that place, known that peace, we can never forget it.

…

Muriel: Don’t leave me, Macon.

…

Sarah: Macon, come home. Let’s try again.

…

Sarah: The trouble with you is, you don’t believe in people opening up. You think everyone should stay in their own little sealed package.
Macon: Okay. Let’s say that that’s true. Let’s say for now that you do know what the trouble with me is, that nothing that I might feel could surprise you. And that the reason I don’t want to hear about this thing is that I can’t open up! If we agree on all that, can we drop it?!

…

Macon [to Sarah]: I’m beginning to think that maybe it’s not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you’re with them.

…

Macon [to Sarah]: It’s wrong to think we can plan everything. As though it were a business trip. I don’t believe that anymore. Things just happen.

…

Macon [to Sarah]: When I saw you at Rose’s wedding I knew that somehow you had recovered, that you’d gone on with your life after Ethan. Well, I’d tried, but I couldn’t do it on my own. This woman, this odd woman, helped me. She’s given me another chance to decide who I am. To step out of the Leary groove and stay out. You don’t need me anymore. We both know that. But I need her.[/b]

[iambiguous]

No body, no crime?

The plot is diabolical. But only two of them know why. Or [maybe] three.

The husband could hardly be more despicable but the wife was brought up to believe that divorce is a deadly sin.

But maybe not murder?

Here the wife and the mistress not only know of each other but interact from day to day to day. How does that work? Let’s start with agendas. Then with what each thinks the other’s is.

It’s nothing short of ingenious really.

And you can’t help but wonder: Just how far back in human history does this sort of plotting go? All the way back to the caves? Are we hardwired to seek all advantages in our lives? Then the rest is nurture?

The ending? Perfectly ambiguous.

IMDb

When director Henri-Georges Clouzot bought the film rights to the original novel, he reportedly beat Alfred Hitchcock by only a matter of hours.

Still, I can’t imagine even Hitchcock topping this.

at wiki: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Diaboliques_(film

trailer: youtu.be/BzbGtjtfZwA

DIABOLIQUE [Les Diaboliques] 1955
Directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot

[b]M.Drain: I may be reactionary, but this is absolutely astounding - the legal wife consoling the mistress! No, no, and no!

…

Christina: Don’t you believe in Hell?
Nicole: Not since I was seven.
Christina: I do.

…

Christina: You can wish someone’s death, but to actually kill him…You must have wished my death, didn’t you?
Nicole: I didn’t. But he did. He would say to me, “Don’t worry. With her heart condition it won’t take long. After she dies, we’ll share the school.”

…

Nicole: As you wish. But I must warn you. If you miss your chance he won’t miss his. Not after your phone call demanding a divorce.

…

Plantiveau: Watch out, ma’am. That’s the deep part where you are.
Christina: There is no danger. I can swim.
Plantiveau: That don’t mean a thing. It’s always the ones who know how that get drowned. The ones who can’t, don’t go near the pool.

…

Nicole: He was really dead, wasn’t he?
Christina: You’re the one who should know.
Nicole: Why are you saying that?
Christina: You killed him, didn’t you?
Nicole: Me?!
Christina: You are the one who planned the whole thing!
Nicole: No,we planned the whole thing.

…

Fichet: To commit suicide in the Seine, one doesn’t need to undress.

…

Christina: So it’s a coincidence?
Nicole: A coincidence, yes.
Christina: And Fichet. Was his being at the morgue a coincidence? And the suit. And the hotel. And now the children! Is it a coincidence that it’s getting closer and closer?!

…

Fichet: I found him. He’ll be here very shortly.
Christina: It’s wrong and you know it. You know he can’t come back.
Fichet: Why?
Christina: Because I killed him!

…

Michel: We’re rich. Just by selling the school we’ll get…
Fichet: …between 15 and 20 years in jail. It depends on the judge.

…

Moinet: I saw her. I know that I saw her.[/b]