Munich

—1. Overview
—2. Cast and Crew
—3. Photo Pages
—4. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—5. Posters (Eric Bana)
—6. Production Notes (pdf)
—7. Spiritual Connections
—8. Presentation Downloads

We live in a world filled with violence. It ranges from violence within homes and in our streets to global violence in the form of terrorism and war. It would be naïve to think that violence will end easily if at all. It may be that we should come to grips with the idea that violence is a part of our world. On the other hand, violence is often senseless and, it could be argued, inherently sinful, even if justifiable. How then should we respond to the violence in the world? Steven Spielberg’s film Munich is an examination of some of the issues involved in violence and our response.

enlargeIn 1972, a Palestinian terrorist group, Black September, took Israeli athletes hostage in the Olympic Village in Munich. The twenty-one hour ordeal was watched around the world. In the end, nearly all the terrorists and all the athletes were killed.

It has been rumored, but never officially acknowledged, that Israel sent assassination squads to kill those involved in the planning of the Munich attack. The decision (at least in the film) is made by Prime Minister Meir to show the world that Israel will not allow such terrorism. She says in the film, “Every civilization finds it necessary to negotiate compromises with its own values.� This is a very true statement. We do that negotiation day by day as to which of our values we will compromise. Often we will be able to stand by those values, but are there times when we do need to set our values aside for other values?

Avner is the leader of an assassin squad. To do this, he must leave Israel and his pregnant wife until his job is finished. For him this is a great sacrifice, not only because of his wife and coming child, but because he sees himself as a child of Israel. He is a Sabra (native Israeli) raised on a kibbutz. He is deeply committed to the nation, which is why he accepts this assignment. Along with four others, they seek eleven men identified by their superiors with involvement in the Munich attack. They don’t ask for evidence. There have been no trials. They trust their country.

All in the group believe in what they are doing. But even with that belief, there are times when their consciences ask questions. Karl is the one who usually asks hard questions – not so much because he has doubts, but because the questions need to be asked. The others would just as soon put the questions out of their minds; it is hard to do such work with doubts about its legitimacy.

They begin killing their targets, but in response, more terrorism is aimed at Israel. In time the assassins become targets as well. Israel, perhaps justifiably, chose to respond to Munich with violence. It is no surprise that when important Palestinians were killed, that Palestinian groups responded with violence as well. That is one of the dangers of violence and revenge – it begets itself. Mohandas Gandhi said, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.� Once we commit to revenge as the response to violence, it continues a cycle that can go on ad infinitum.

But a more important issue is not just what is right or wrong (or even if right and wrong are categories that can be considered), but what does taking part in violence do to those involved? At one point, as all the violence begins to wear on the agents, one of them, Robert, a bomb maker, begins to question if this is appropriate for Israel on the basis of righteousness. Through all the suffering that Jews had endured through the centuries, the one thing they were able to hold onto was being righteous. Was what they were doing now righteous, or did it destroy their righteousness? Were these assassins becoming what they were trying to destroy? Were they, because they had a possibly justifiable cause, better than those they killed?

Spielberg (along with writers Tony Kushner and Eric Roth) have crafted an historical fiction that not only sheds light on the events of that time, but also allow us to see the way these issues continue to be important in our world. Some will criticize this film because it calls into question Israel’s response to violence and also America’s response to violence in the post-9/11 world. To be sure, the issues of the film encourage us to ask questions of ourselves. Like Karl’s questioning, it may be what keeps us from falling into the same errors that drive terrorist to do the evil they do.

One of my questions going into the film was how fair it was to the various nations or peoples involved. The Israeli justification for their (alleged) use of assassin squads is given a good hearing, first among Meir and her advisers, and later in the mouths of some in the squad and in their handler, Ephraim. Israel lives in a hostile environment. Since the nation came into existence in 1948, its neighbors have tried to destroy the nation. In recent years Israel has come to an uneasy peace with some of its neighbors, but there are many forces still arrayed against them. Israel sees itself as fighting for its very existence.

Through the use of violence in response to violence, Israel not only hopes to eliminate those who have acted against them, but also deter those who might act against them. The question of deterrence is always unanswerable. One never knows how many chose not to act because of possible consequences. It is also hard to balance the unknown number deterred and the unknown number that choose to acts in response to the violence.

The film doesn’t make a judgment on Israel’s justification for the decision to use violence in this way. But it does ask us to consider the validity of that justification.

As we think of Israel’s justification, it also leads us to consider our own nation’s justification for our responses to violence. Are we justified in the things we are doing in the name of a war on terror? If we are justified, is it still the right path to take, or will it only add to the cycle of violence in our world leading in time to our total blindness? Are we qualitatively different from those who use violence against us?

The voice that is given only a passing hearing in the film is that of the Palestinians. To be sure, there is not adequate justification for the killing of innocents as happened at Munich. That does not mean that the Palestinian people do not have legitimate grievances that need to be addressed. There is a brief encounter in the film with a group of PLO operatives that allows their perspective to be mentioned, but only serves to emphasize their dedication to their struggle with Israel.

Munich is both timely and timeless as it deals with issues of violence and revenge. It doesn’t attempt to give any easy answers. It does makes us ask questions though – not only in a theoretical sense, but also to apply those questions to the world and nation in which we live. Munich will certainly be toward the top of my favorites list this year.

— Overview

Brokeback Mountain

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—7. Posters (Heath Ledger)
—8. Production Notes (pdf)
—9. Spiritual Connections
—10. Presentation Downloads

I expect you already know that this is “the gay cowboy movie.� For some people, that is all they need to know to decide not to see it. Pity, because if you only look at the film at that narrow perspective, you miss one of the most engaging films of the year.

It is the story of two men who fall in love while spending a summer up on the mountain taking care of sheep. They continue, even after they each marry and begin families, to meet and continue their love affair for over twenty years.

The film slowly watches the relationship develop. First as co-workers, eventually as friends, only after all this groundwork do they become lovers. It’s important to the understanding of this film to know that the film really cares very little about the sexual relationship between them. It acknowledges it, and even briefly shows it, but that is not the real focus of the film.

This is a love story. A story of star-crossed lovers, much as Romeo and Juliet, who couldn’t overcome their families’ animosity , or, more recently, Cathy and Raymond, who couldn’t overcome the racial boundaries of their day in Far From Heaven. In another time and another place, they would have been freer to live out their relationship in different ways. But in the 60s and 70s and in the rural west, their love was something that had to remain hidden. Perhaps it shouldn’t be known as “the gay cowboy movie.� It might better be known as a cowboy love story.

It is not a gentle love story. It includes a great deal of struggle, especially for Ennis. Jack seems to begin the film knowing of his sexuality. Ennis, on the other hand, has absolutely no social tools. After having been orphaned, he was raised by his brother and sister. At one point, Ennis’s wife, Alma, refers to the way he was raised as “all that loneliness.� That loneliness is where Ennis feels comfortable. It is that lack of social ability that is already undermining his marriage before Jack returns and their affair renews. Ennis is happy to live alone, away from everyone else. But in Jack he has found the one person he connects to in a meaningful way. While still getting to know each other, Ennis tells about his family and upbringing. Jack says, “That's more words than you've spoken in the last two weeks.� Ennis replies, “That's more words than I've spoken in the last two years.� Something in their developing relationship allows Ennis to share himself as he does to no one else. It is that relationship for which Ennis has a passion.

Ennis struggles with the physical aspect of their relationship as well. It is important, but not as important as the connection they have together. But he is concerned about how others would think of them (or more important, what others would do to them) if their secret came out. When the difficulties of keeping their relationship secret build, Ennis’s only outlet is violence. He stuffs his feelings for great periods, and suddenly explodes in rage at any convenient object or person.

Jack is more interested in the physical relationship. He is clearly gay or bisexual. It is he who initiates the sexual relationship and reinitiates it after a few years apart. While he is in this primarily for the sex, it comes as something of a surprise to him that the relationship matters to him as well. As the years go on, their times together come to be the times they build their lives around. The time apart is only marking time until they can rekindle their passions.

This is a film where all the aspects of a good film come together. The story, based on a short story by Annie Proulx and worked into a screenplay by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, is told with appropriate pacing and with respect for the characters. Director Ang Lee and Cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto make full use of the beautiful landscapes of the mountains as well as the confining nature of the lives the men lead in their every day lives. The performances by Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal are believable and allow the characters to grow through the film.

Usually when I review a film that involves homosexuality, I may mention it, but say little about it otherwise. That is because I do not consider homosexuality to be deviant or sinful. It is, as I have come to see it, a vital expression of God’s gift of sexuality. I’m tempted to just let it pass by in this review as well. But since the idea of gay cowboys (what could be more manly than a cowboy?) is so central to the way people are seeing this film, I’ll address the issue more fully.

To be sure, same sex sexuality is central to this story. It is what creates the conflict in the lives of the two protagonists. If it were a man and a woman we might comment about the lack of fidelity in their marriages, but people wouldn’t be as upset as some no doubt are about this film. This film does not glorify gay sexuality. Rather it places it in the context of a loving relationship. It shows that gays, lesbians and bisexuals can have such meaningful relationships. It also shows the struggle that such people often face in trying to live with those relationships in hostile settings – sometimes even when the hostility comes from themselves.

There are brief references to the church throughout the film. Jack’s mother was Pentecostal; Ennis’s family was Methodist. But the church is not brought into the film in a way to be judgmental on these men, nor is the church held up to judgment. The one person who acts in the most loving way is one who is identified as Christian and is framed in one shot directly under a cross. I suspect that this is a message that Christians should consider. Whether we approve of same sex relationships or not, our responsibility is to love the people God brings into our lives.

—Overview

Syriana

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—6. Posters (George Clooney)
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—9. Presentation Downloads

At a press Q&A about Syriana, George Clooney said, “We’re [Hollywood] not good at supplying answers. We’re pretty good, at time, at raising debate and opening questions up.�

Syriana is definitely not about answers. It looks at the interaction of oil and espionage and business and oil and geopolitics and oil and terrorism and domestic politics and oil. The film is a fictionalized account based on Robert Baer’s memoir as a CIA operative in the Middle East, See No Evil. The film looks at a very complex problem. It doesn’t try to simplify it. It sets it out in all its complexity to tease our minds into serious consideration of the many factors that make up this ongoing problem in our world. In the end, things are not neatly brought together.

Most viewers will leave the theater a bit confused. The film is made up of several plotlines, some of which intertwine or bump up against each other. Two oil companies are seeking to merge, after the smaller one was awarded a contract to produce oil in Kazakhstan. There may be legal problems with the merger and Bennett Holiday is assigned the task of finding the problems and fixing them so that the merger can go through. Oil broker Bryan Woodman, working out of Geneva, becomes involved with Prince Nasir Al-Subaai who is in a struggle younger brother over who will succeed their aging father as Emir. Nasir wants to westernize and democratize his country, which would not be beneficial to Western oil interests. Meanwhile, CIA operative Bob Barnes is assigned to get rid of Nasir, but botches the job, leading his CIA handler to distance themselves from him.

Everything that goes on revolves around the West’s appetite for oil and the money that can be made off of it. In time, scapegoats are found and obstacles are eliminated (with extreme prejudice) so that the business of bringing us oil can go on unimpeded. But through it all, we are never quite clear who is working for whom or what goals each person is seeking. The confusion is intentional on the part of the filmmakers. They don’t so much give us a complete story as a collage that gives us a taste of the convolution of issues that contribute to the problems in the Middle East.

In a world where accusations are made that our nation has gone to war over oil (regardless of whether the accusations are true or not), it is clear that this issue needs to be discussed. Many people are willing to accept easy, simple answers. H. L. Mencken wrote, “For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.� That maxim certainly applies here. It is easy to blame the price of gas or the war in Iraq on big oil companies and their influence in government. There could well be a generous portion of truth in that idea. But there is much more going on that also needs to be understood. Syriana, through the way it shows us small pieces of the puzzle, encourages us to seek even more pieces to fill in the gaps and in so doing have a more accurate understanding of this complex question.

At one point, when Holiday has created one of the scapegoats to clear the way for the merger, the man who will be taking the fall, Danny Daulton has a great soliloquy about the importance of corruption:

Corruption is government intrusion in the market efficiencies in the form of regulation. That’s Milton Friedman. He got a goddamn Nobel Prize. We have laws against it precisely so we can get away with it. Corruption is our protection. Corruption keeps us safe and warm. Corruption is why you and I are prancing around in here instead of fighting over scraps of meat out in the street. Corruption … is why we win.

It is reminiscent of the “Greed is good� speech in Wall Street. It seeks to rationalize that which we know is wrong, yet which we assume goes on all the time. We turn a blind eye to the corruption of business or government until it is convenient to expose and condemn it.

The irony in that scene is that corruption plays a part in every storyline. It isn’t just the way business is done. It is involved in the governmental investigation and the scapegoating of some to clear the way for the merger. The CIA is corrupt in its dealings with Barnes. There is corruption in the internal politics of the Emirate. Perhaps Daulton is right that corruption is integral to the way the world operates. What are we to make of such an assertion?

That is only one of the questions that Syriana opens for us. There are many more besides. But don’t go looking for answers – or even for a complete picture. This is not “dumbed down� movie making. It expects viewers to be willing to think about what they are watching and continue thinking long after they leave the theater.

—Overview
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Shopgirl

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—2. Overview Basic (dial up speed)
—3. Reviews and Blogs
—4. Cast and Crew
—5. Photo Pages
—6. Trailers, Clips, DVDs, Books, Soundtrack
—7. Posters (Steve Martin)
—8. Production Notes (pdf)
—9. Spiritual Connections
—10. Presentation Downloads

In Shopgirl we see a young woman hungry to be loved. Mirabelle is living in the isolation of Los Angeles – surrounded by people, but in contact with no one. Even her job provides little contact, working at the glove section of Saks Fifth Avenue, where no one ever stops; who wears gloves anymore?

She meets Jeremy, a slacker her own age, at a laundromat. They end up on what may be the worst date in history. But out of desperation, Mirabelle calls him up to get together again.

Soon, Ray Porter, a well to do (very well to do) older man, begins to court Mirabelle. He sends gifts, invites her to trendy restaurants and charms her. Soon, Mirabelle has fallen for Ray and is beginning to think of a future with him.

In some ways, Shopgirl seeks to fall somewhere between a fantasy and a fairy tale. Visually, we are shown bright stars over LA, one of which is a window into Mirabelle’s bedroom. Also, when the wind blows, it’s not leaves blowing around, it’s rose petals. But that sense of fantasy never quite takes hold. The story stays a bit too grounded in reality to really be the kind of fantasy it wants to be. But to appreciate the film, you need to have that sense of fantasy.

Mirabelle finds herself between the two poles of Ray and Jeremy. Ray is wealthy, sophisticated, experienced and has life (and himself) under control. Jeremy is broke, uncouth, ignorant about life and goes along with whatever happens to him. There is an interesting visual comparison of these men as the camera switches back and forth between the two of them as they each eat their dinner alone at home using chopsticks. Ray masterfully eats his take out from Spago, while Jeremy uses his chopstick to stab his fries from McDonalds.

enlargeAs the film plays out, we discover that Ray, as controlled as he is, keeps his emotions in check. He does not love Mirabelle the same way she loves him. In fact, it’s hinted that he’s really emotionally unable to let himself love. He substitutes expensive and very thoughtful gifts for that which is truly valuable.

Jeremy, on the other hand, has nothing to offer to Mirabelle (other than being someone to break her desperate loneliness.) Certainly he can’t buy her anything (although he offers to name a font after her.) He also doesn’t have much personally to offer. He has loser written all over him. He has no dreams, no self-confidence, and apparently not much future.

The film offers a look at what it is that makes up the way we share our love. Mirabelle, when she has sex with Jeremy early on is doing it not out of love, but out of desperation. She just wants arms that will hold her afterwards. With Ray, she gives herself fully out of love. But she understands her giving of her body as a gift far more valuable than Ray understands it to be. Ray tries to substitute things for love. Since he can’t love, he’ll buy things.

But the story of Shopgirl is eventually about growth and change. Through her encounter with Ray, Mirabelle learns a great deal about the world and about herself. She gains confidence. She even progresses in her art. (The creation of her artwork through the film is a very interesting visual experience. It never seems to be anything at all. It is until we see the finished product that we recognize what she’s been doing.)

At the same time, Jeremy is undergoing a transformation. He doesn’t plan it. Somebody just sticks a meditation CD in the player. He goes with whatever happens, so he soaks that in. Through a variety of self-help lessons that others are doing, he manages to begin to become the kind of man that could well fill the void in Mirabelle’s life. He is as free with sharing himself as Ray is of sharing money.

The tragedy of the film is Ray. He doesn’t manage to grow through all of this. At best, he realizes how much he has lost by not being able give his love. For all the trappings of wealth that fill his life, we see him as truly poor.

The film has its faults. As I mentioned above, the sense of fantasy is not effectively established. Also, the storyline of Jeremy’s metamorphosis is somewhat underdeveloped. The film really doesn’t try to plumb the depths of the issues that come into play.

But in spite of its faults, Shopgirl was an enjoyable film that has kept me thinking about it afterwards. The visuals really play an important part in the story, from the blowing rose petals to the strange stairs going to her apartment which show us just how isolated she is.

The film gives us a chance to consider a bit of the nature of love. We see it is more than just availability and companionship (Mirabelle and Jeremy early on). It is more than pleasant, mutually enjoyable sex (Mirabelle and Ray throughout their time together). It is more than things that can be given (as close as Ray is able to come). The bond that two people share through love is much harder to understand. At the end of the film, we have hope that such a bond will come to be. We also have the sorrow of knowing that Ray may never find that bond.

—Overview

November viewing log

11-3-05 - Bread and Chocolate
11-4-05 - The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
11-5-05 - The King Is Alive
11-11-05 - Shane
11-13-05 - Paradise Now
11-16-05 - Pieces of April
11-18-05 - Microcosmos
11-19-05 - The Chumscrbber
11-19-05 - Lackawanna Blues
11-24-05 - Winter Solistice
11-25-05 - Bee Season
11-26-05 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire favorite of the month