The Qatsi Trilogy

As a crowning achievement of non-narrative film and cinematography, a technological and emotional marvel, and as a unique cinematic experience, the Qatsi trilogy continues to amaze viewers 25 years after the release of the first volume, and will continue to astound viewers for at least another 25. But as a vehicle for political philosophy, the trilogy is not only irresponsible, but dangerous.


'Koyaanisqatsi,' meaning "crazy life, life in turmoil, life out of balance, life disintegrating, a state of life that calls for another way of living," is the first film in the trilogy and sets the tone for the series. The film begins with majestic, sweeping shots of mountains, waterfalls, and clouds racing across with sky, eventually contrasting eternal, divine nature with the speed and chaos of the city. The suggestion is that man has divorced himself from his roots in the natural world and is careening towards disaster. The message is especially pertinent today, but is nonetheless a great simplification that overlooks the complex interplay between technology and nature that is required to move humanity forward in a healthy sustainable way. It's ironic that a film subtitled 'Life Out Of Balance' could portend such an unbalanced philosophy.


The third film, 'Naqoyqatsi: Life As War,' the worst of the trilogy, expands on the themes in 'Koyaanisqatsi.' Working from stock footage, 'Naqoyqatsi' is essentially an indictment of modern technology and science. The film suggests that humanity's hubris, our desire to totally dominate and control nature, will be our doom. Of course, one might be inclined to question the film's characterisation of science. As a socially constructed method of viewing the world, it might be argued that science is prone to the same prejudices and biases that muddle philosophy and the liberal arts. However, one may also be inclined to see science and technology not as monoliths, but as heterogenous practices that span many areas and disciplines, and mean very different things to different people, both practitioners and laymen. The film's universal condemnation of science may lead the viewer to question the trilogy's underlying philosophical basis: like scientology's assault on psychiatry, creationism's attack on evolution, and the general assault on reason and rationality coming from disparate bodies including conspiracy buffs, new age obscrurantists, and post-modern academics, the film's distrust of "progress" condemns modernity, while offering no realistic alternative. The Qatsi series' rejection of modernity is complete: instead of just raising legitimate and constructive questions about humanity's reliance on and use of technology, the film rejects the ideologies behind the modern age (liberalism, democracy, the scientific method). Unfortunately, if we turn our backs on progress and civilization - if we throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater - we will be left with, at best, vacuous nothingness, and at worst a return to barbarism, insular tribalism, and permanent war.


The most politically unsettling film in the series is 'Powaqqatsi,' meaning "parasitic way of life" or "life in transition." Like 'Koyaanisqatsi,' the film is a simple dialectic, pitting traditional ways of life against the intrusion of modernity. The film begins by painting an idealistic portrait of the 'Third World' (as it was still called then). The developing world is seen as a place of lost innocence where family, community, work and worship are all integrated into a harmonious whole. While the travellers of the 19th century may have been excused for such infantile - and frankly offensive - suggestions (though the Orientalists were of course seldom so facile in their accounts), the makers of the Qatsi trilogy have no such excuse. Still, in the first half of the film we're bombarded with magnificent images: for example, the shot of a peasant hauling grain on his back down a hillside path, against a bright sun, a shimmering field of wheat, and clouds billowing in the background, neglects the fact that such backbreaking labour will leave him permanently bent, his life a short, painful struggle. Later, a child is seen crushing grains with a long stick; he may be smiling, but this is still child labour and he will never go to school.


Of course we are denied images that might lead us to question the idyllic serenity of tradional ways of life, for example scenes of female genital mutilation; sati (the burning of Hindu women after their husbands' death); tribal warfare and religious strife; children infected with parasites, malaria, HIV or just plain starving to death. Instead, the modern world (in particular modern capitalism and industry, which have been shown over and over again to be the most realistic options for improving the lives and welfare of people on a large scale) is vilified, as if the lives of peasants and serfs were joyous and free prior to the introduction of free commerce and industrialisation. The suggestion is obscene, and its embrace (which is not confined to the Qatsi triology, and is in fact distressingly prevalent amongst anti-globalism crusaders, liberal arts academics, and innocuous anti-capitalist pretenders) effectively resigns the vast majority of the world's population to continued suffering and subjugation. Indeed, the film's message is as harmful as arguments advanced by free market globalists who would destroy cultural legacies in the name of globalized capitalism.


As disingenuous as the Qatsi trilogy may be, the films are worth watching. The images are splendid and more visceral than any travelogue; coupled with Philip Glass's scores, the films are undeniably powerful. Yet, in watching the Qatsi trilogy, a viewer is reminded of the films of Leni Riefenstahl, her beautiful, sweeping celebrations of Third Reich. While the Qatsi trilogy may be slightly more ideologically palatable, one must be just as careful to guard against the intoxicating effects of its beauty.

Werckmeister Harmonies

Like a dream, Janos walks into a pub. It's only ten o'clock and pub is closing, but the men there are long past sober. One patron is so drunk he rolls off his chair and can hardly regain his footing. The bartend yells at his customers to leave, but they urge him to let them stay to allow Janos to work his magic. The bartend reluctantly approves. Janos sets up one man in the middle of the room, his hands beaming like the sun. Janos leads others to their positions in orbit around the central orb, stumbling drunks rotating about one another in the dance of the cosmos. The camera weaves in and out of the fray, rotating through the characters as Janos waxes philosophical on the nature of the universe and our place in it. How perfect is this long, languid shot that opens 'The Werkmeister Harmonies' by the inimitable Bela Tarr?


The film is a maze of existential musings, deliberate vagueries and systematic ambiguity. Taking place in a small town in Hungary, 'Werkmeister Harmonies' is an examination of good v. evil. One night a mysterious side show sets up in the town square, offering morbid delights including a giant, stuffed whale and a mysterious entity known as the Prince. We slowly realize that something is wrong, but no one knows what. In fact, the town remains ignorant to the circus' effect: of the townspeople, only Janos and his relations are concerned. So too however, is the viewer for the safety of the naive and precocious Janos, and his strange brood. Contrast the playful game Janos leads in the first scene with the harsh thuggery he encounters not only from the men who keep the whale, but from his former friends now dwelling in the town square.


While Janos's family prefer to form citizen's committees and consider calling in the army, Janos investigates the evil, surreptitiously finding his way inside the container holding the whale in an attempt to uncover the whale's secret, the power behind its dark allure, and the nature of the Prince, he who incites crowds with his nihilistic incantations and seems to be the key, and the cause, to the manifest evils destroying the village. "No ordinary force can hold him," Janos hears the circus director speaking of the Prince, "He is an aberration." As the Prince's shadow is cast in sharp chiaroscuro behind the director, the viewer is reminded of the Red Room from Twin Peaks. And indeed, 'The Wreckmeister Harmonies' should appeal to fans of David Lynch. But while Lynch's ruminations are all abstract, surreal, non-linear metaphysics, Bela Tarr's concerns are more allegory, philosophy, and existential dread. 'The Wreckmeister Harmonies,' as a tale of good and evil, tells of how darkness is never far from the core. But is the strange circus the cause of the town's black descent, or simply the catalyst for unacknowledged evil in all of us and everywhere, ill intentions that latently await the perfect moment for release? And if so, how are we to uncover the source of evil, its reality, before it's too late? In fact, as his neighbors are drawn towards the town square, to the Prince and his dark allure, Janos runs away. "Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity." Something indeed is slouching towards Bethlahem to be born, possibly in the belly of the circus' rotting whale.


Long single shots are Tarr's modus operandi, and here the floating camera, following actors, somtimes trailing the action, becomes a character in itself, a strange, languid, totally subjective point of view. It navigates the darkness and the light, as a mediator, an observer, a journalist or documentarian. Consider the ransacking of a mental hospital. Cold and efficient in its brutality, the residents beat, their rooms uprooted and trashed, before they finally find an old man, virginal, bathed in white, fragile, like a child. The camera holds onto the image as the room clears of men, as if it too is shocked by the violence that has so suddenly been exposed for all its barbarity and sadism. Ultimately, the white light overpowers the darkness, but we are left to doubt whether the victory is complete: darkness is never far away, and it only takes a moment to overpower the best of man's intentions.


Werckmeister Harmonies - 9/10

Slumdog Millionaire

Finally. A movie that meets my expectations. 'Slumdog' is easily the best thing Danny Boyle has done in years, at least since 'Vacuuming Completely Nude In Paradise.' And it's one of the better things I've seen all year.

I have very little to say about the film that hasn't been said before - and plenty of ink has been spilled lately over this little movie that could. I wouldn't want to say too much anyway, as my objectivity can certainly be called into quesiton - the clutter, the colours, the bustling magic of the crowds brought memories of my own time in India roaring back, and I'm not too sure how easily I can separate the film from my fond (and disturbing and hilarious) recollections.

'Slumdog' had me from the earliest strains of 'O... Saya,' the opening song, as the camera pulls back to reveal the slums of Mumbai and then circles in on the chase therein. The film tells the story of Jamal, a street urchin straight out of Oliver Twist (or Rudyard Kiplin, or really any modern town or city in Hindustan), using all his wits to scrap by in the midst of India's great leap forward and ultimately vying for the hand of childhood love Latika, on the country's most popular game show. As implausible as the plot is, there's hardly a moment to doubt the string of coincidences that pulls Jamal towards his destiny. It's enough to simply enjoy the sights and sounds, the highs and lows, the brutality and the kindness, the terror and beauty...

Slumdog Millionaire: 9/10

Equilibrium... or, Why does dystopia have to be so depressing?

First of all, 'Equilibrium' was made before, it was called 'Farenheit 451,' and it was based on one of the most famous science fiction novels of all time. Second, just because they've coupled 'Farenheit 451' with 'The Matrix,' and 'Prozac Nation,' and 'Triumph of the Will,' and 'Brave New World,' and John Woo (And gun kata? Seriously? I thought bullet ballet was just supposed to be a cool sounding metaphore...), and every other dystopic, futuristic pseudo-fascist cliche, just confirms the fact that this muck is nothing more than a lame retread. And while I'm at it, 'Demolition Man' already did the "future = no sex" thing and even though the film was just about as bad as 'Judge Dredd,' the sex joke was hilarious. But the real question is, why is the future never any fun?

Many great dystopias have been brought to the big screen. 'Children of Men' is one of the latest, and certainly one of the greatest, and it's worth drawing attention to Michael Caine's hilarious turn as a sexagenarian stoner to demonstrate just how fun the post-apocalypse can be; 'Dark City' and 'The City of Lost Children' were underrated gems, meshing great concepts with masterful sets, finding beauty in the darkness; 'V For Vendetta,' against all odds, managed to mix the Wachowskis' (via Alan Moore) lame conspiracy politics with humour and daring swashbuckling; nothing more needs to be said about 'Blade Runner,' the 'Mad Max' series, or '12 Monkeys,' except to reiterate that it's entirely possible for fun to outlast the atomic bomb.

Not in 'Equilibrium' though. Instead, the film had me browsing the web within 15 minutes. It had me downloading new and more promising films to ease the pain, within the hour. I had to break in the middle for a few days just to get through it. And this from a film with one of the highest body count characters (Christian Bale's John Preston kills 118 people during the film according to http://moviebodycounts.com/). One would think that 118 kills in just under 2 hours - that over 1 kill a minute, for Bale alone - could hold one's attention. But body count alone does not make a good film (or even a terrible one, unfortunately, because I can watch two hours of trash if I'm laughing my ass off, but 'Equilibrium' commits the worst crime in cinema by simply being mediocre). Like all the characters in 'Equilibrium,' during the course of the film I was tempted to start shooting Prozac straight into my jugular (or Prozarium, or whatever ham-fisted name they came up with to hammer home the weak analogy). Unfortunately, this wasn't because the film was such a masterful work of genius that violent passions overcame my docile nature (or something... according to the film, the Mona Lisa led to the Third World War, and not, like, philistine Presidents and the military-industrial complex). Instead, I simply wanted to kill the drabness and boredom that matched the dull grey sets and the characters' expressionless faces.

So here's hoping the next time Hollywood tackles the apocalypse or the atom bomb (or political corruption, mental or physical disabilities, or even the Holocaust), they do so with a smile.

Equilibrium: 2/10

Mongol... or, Genghis Khan as a romantic lead?

Oh! Historical epics that lay waste to concerns regarding historical accuracy... Oh! Swordplay, barbarian hordes, epic violence, and buckets of blood...

I'm a firm believer in balance, so if you're going to mess with history, you better give us entertainment. Hmm. Isn't that the modus operandi of TV news?

Not that veracity should be the foremost concern in biographical film-making (consider the liberties taken with Bob Dylan's story in 'I'm Not There' for example; or the "ecstatic truth" approach espoused by Werner Herzog). But one should hope for a little congruence. Genghis Khan as the modern male; as the fiery, passionate lead with beautiful, long black hair; as the self-assured lover; as the conquerer, as concerned with the promises he made to his woman as he is with the honour in battle, devotion to the Gods, and loyalty to the Khan. Can the viewer imagine a more dignified person to trample across mostw of the known world sowing death and, pilfering the great treasures of the ancients, raping, maiming and destroying anything in his path?


As for the film itself, the plot was repetitive, the dialogue trite, and the characters were undeveloped. But there was plenty of blood, gore, death, violence and brutality, and sometimes that's good enough, especially when taking place against the arid backdrop of the great Asiatic steppes.


On an unrelated note, I definitely want one of those wolf tail hats.

Mongol: 5/10

Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman)

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was an entire lifetime of possibilities compressed into the last minute of a dying man's life. It was life imitating art, imitating life, imitating art, imitating life, ad infinitum. It was Charlie Kaufman's directorial debut, and I wasn't sure what I thought of the movie upon leaving the theatre and still don't know what I think about it now.
So for now, four (4) simple observations:


1. 'Synecdoche, New York' makes all previous films written by Charlie Kaufman seem conventional and straightforward in comparison. There is simply nothing we ordinarily expect from a film (even a film with a Charlie Kaufman script) to grasp onto. The film is a schizophrenic (see: Cotard's syndrome) jigsaw puzzle of non-sensical vignettes. Occasionally someone cries. Even more rarely something wierd and cool happens. And yet it kept my attention somehow.


2. I laughed. I got a little teary. I almost fell asleep more than once. I didn't understand anything in the film, and yet found myself profoundly affected by its beautiful, little mysteries, its rare moments of poignancy and desperation.


3. This is a film for people who read Derrida, or who pretend to read Derrida, or who name drop Derrida without really knowing anything about him (like me).


4. 'Synecdoche, New York' is either the worst movie of the year, or the film of a lifetime. It's either our generation's 'Citizen Kane,' or a steaming heap of green poo (which is an allusion to an early episode in the film, not just lame scatology). Yeah, the film has poo. Twice.


Synecdoche, New York: 1/10
Synecdoche, New York: 10/10

Skateboard Movies: Ken Park, Wassup Rockers, Paranoid Park

Okay, so the actors play teens, they have sex with each other and anything else that moves, Larry Clark is a pedophile and he makes the same movie over and over again. In contrast Gus Van Sant is a genius, even though 80% of his movies are meandering, pretentious crap, and I'd give just about anything to get back all the time I've spent watching everything he's made since 'My Own Private Idaho.' I'd like to posit the reverse, and explore a realm where Larry Clark is the auteur director that all the film students want to emulate and Gus Van Sant is recognized as the chump Ed Wood of arthouse cinema. Let's test this hypothesis by contrasting how the two directors explore America's great slacker pasttime, skateboard culture.

Skateboard culture, and teen culture in general, is nothing new to Larry Clark. His photography explored outcasts, junkies and losers, and his first feature, 'Kids,' is a bonafide classic of independant cinema, focusing on a gang of teens who carouse the streets, smoke weed, skateboard, drink, and fuck. 'Another Day In Paradise' was a wild diversion, and it had a cameo by Clarence Carter whose performance of 'I'm Looking For A Fox' was a highlight of the film for me (although while we're on the topic of Clarence Carter, neglected soul great, I may have preferred something hilarious like 'Backdoor Santa,' 'I Got Caught (Makin' Love To Another Man's Wife),' or maybe even 'Strokin'). 'Bully' was another bleak teenage film, and 'Teenage Caveman' took Clark's schtick into science fiction territory. 'Ken Park' and 'Wassup Rockers,' on the other hand, bring him right back to his roots.

'Ken Park' is about a group of young friends, their relationships with one another, and their dysfunctional homes, where beatings are commonplace, and ever more terrible things are always a possibility. Unfortunately, the film was almost universally maligned by critics and condemned by censors for its graphic depictions of teenage sex. Not surprinsingly, those blinded by righteous outrage missed the sensitive, amateurish beauty of teenage lust as depicted in the film. 'Wassup Rockers,' while exploring similar territory, is a pseudo-doc featuring a group of Guatemalan skate-punks in LA, outcasts in their own neighborhood due to their tight pants and taste for hardcore punk, but outright aliens in posh Rodeo. The film chronicles a day in the lives of the Velasquez brothers with humour and realism, punctuated by disturbing scenes of racism and the innocence of young lovers.

Clark's characters, for all their confusion, their faults and insecurities, their misdirected anger and childishness, are real, three dimensional. Jonathan Velasquez's opening monologue ('and then... and then... and then...') in 'Wassup Rockers' is almost absurd in its sheer banality. Then we realize that even though the boys are growing up hard in a rough neighborhood, their concerns are as real and insignificant as those of the kids who live in every mall in America. Jonathan's desires are simple and universal: girls, bros, skateboards, music. In 'Ken Park', the character's desires are even more base - they want to fuck - but their concerns are in many ways bigger and more desperate. These kids are escaping domestic cruelty and abuse the only way they know how to: the base joy of sex is their coping mechanism, their therapeutic release. But their sexuality is pure. There's nothing degrading or dirty about the teens fooling around with each other (except for their scruffy clothes and greasy hair), even when one of the young boys eats out his girlfriend's mother (!). Like 'Citrus,' or just about any other song The Hold Steady have ever written, the viewer easily finds "Jesus in the clumsiness of (these) young and awkward lovers." If the sex is in anyway offensive or shocking, it's because we know that at the end of the day they must return to homes as hard and violent as their lovemaking is delicate and kind. Perhaps Ken Park, the ghost character whose demise hangs over the entire movie, was forced to his unlikely demise because for the first time, his teenage sexual fantasies resulted in adult consequences.

What truly separates Clark from his contemporaries, and especially Van Sant, is the verisimilitude of his works. Clark may be a pervert, but he doesn't pervert (!sorry!) his characters' true selves. In 'Ken Park' and 'Wassup Rockers' the dialogue feels easy and improvised, and Clark's stories are always loose, messy, inconclusive. In contrast to the mass of staid and tepid teenage melodramas, Clark recognizes that hyperbole and polish (clean scripts, nice sets, and polished actors are not to be found in his films) mask the true nature of adolescence. Instead, Clark gives us dirty streets, awkward sex, and scruffy, stinky non-actors, as if to say "pay heed -this is where the true drama of youth and its greatest tales are to be found."

'Paranoid Park,' on the other hand, is a crime against celluloid and adolescence. The repetitive structure of the film is interesting at first, and is probably meant to evoke the obsessive, confusing, circular reasoning of the teenage mind, but is ultimately neither illuminating nor terribly interesting. In contrast to Clark's non-actors, Van Sant's crew are outfitted in brand name clothing, spiffy haircuts and decals of cool. One similarity to Clark's films however, is the fact that Van Sant's kids can't act - which is not a compliment here. Mirroring the general trend of indie art, rock and style being absorbed into the mainstream, Van Sant's film, like 'Elephant' before it, is more cool than it is real. Sure, the narrative is non-traditional, but like skateboarding, non-linear narratives are no longer a crime.

And though the cinematography is at times striking, it seems as if Van Sant, rather than letting his characters simply live and breath, has surrounded them in artifice. The film's one saving grace are Van Sant's beautiful, slow-motion shots of skaters riding around bowls and ramps and zigzaging down in full pipes. Contrast these images with the Velasquez brothers crusing through gritty South Central locales, or wiping out on stairs outside a posh high school. No, beauty does not equal youth; and though Van Sant shows us a security guard diced in half on a train track, his main character's movement towards understanding seems contrived, too pretty, too complete.

Ken Park (Larry Clark): 8.5/10

Wassup Rockers (Larry Clark): 7.5/10

Paranoid Park (Gus Van Sant): 3/10