Book Review: "Woodrow Wilson", by John Milton Cooper

Woodrow Wilson (2009)

4.5 Stars out of 5

John Milton Cooper

Sometimes it seems like, nothing ever really changes. Americans in the last days of the Summer of 2015 are starting our quadrennial obsession with the presidential nominating process; something that in times past would not have started for another 6-9 months. What is similar, painfully so, to the election of 1912 and 1916 when Woodrow Wilson was nominated and then elected in the general election to become the 28^th President of the United States is the absolute intransigency of partisan politics. Now as then (at least in the 1916 election) the Republicans would do anything to frustrate the Democratic nominee/electee. Barack Obama has his Mitch McConnell; Woodrow Wilson had his Henry Cabot Lodge. The virulence of the opposition by Lodge as with his 21^st century confreres took on the passion of religious belief. John Milton Cooper’s 2009 biography “Woodrow Wilson” describes an era roughly a century ago where the details were different, but the endless party bickering was exactly the same.

Wilson’s biography by Cooper falls into the category of “definitive biography”. In other words, at least in the case of “Woodrow Wilson”, Cooper details the life of Wilson in numbing detail. This is a pity because in certain sections (especially the prolog, Chapters 8, 16, and 21-23) his attention to detail coupled with his analysis can be profoundly enlightening and the strongest aspects of this book. But at 702 pages, there are clearly sections that would benefit by some judicial pruning. That being said, Cooper’s excellent summary of Wilson’s achievements and various aspects of uniqueness as outlined in the prolog are worth reading as a standalone introduction to Wilson. Additionally, Cooper’s summation and analysis of the similarities and differences between Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt in Chapter 8 after the 1912 election is possibly the pinnacle of the book (at least in my opinion). Cooper does nearly as well in summarizing the election of 1916 in Chapter 16 and the endless battles that Wilson performed with respect to the League of Nations (as outlined in Chapters 21-23) are other major points in the book.

Woodrow Wilson was born 1856 and raised by his Presbyterian minister/father in the South. His father and the region Wilson grew up played major influences on the nature of Wilson the man and Wilson the politician. In his early adult life Wilson was trained in the law, but this was to be the one area of expertise where Wilson proved at the beginning of this professional career and much later at the end of that career where he would largely be a failure. Deciding that the law was not his love (far from it, actually), Wilson turned his attention to scholarship. He was heavily influenced by Walter Bagehot’s description of parliamentarianism. Thus, he chose to begin his scholarly career by writing on the topic of constitutional government versus parliamentarian styles (most especially the British system) in a book that remains in print to this day, “Congressional Government” (1885). Wilson’s devotion to the concept of an executive that could be removed by a vote of no confidence would guide his political thinking as he neared the end of his first presidential terms in 1916, and then again as his second term neared its conclusion in 1920.

Using his rising notoriety as a scholar, Wilson obtained various positions as a University lecturer while he finished his Ph.D. After several positions of increasing academic stature, he eventually found a professorial position at Princeton. Cooper spends a considerable amount of time detailing Wilson’s rise from Professor to the Presidency of that college and of the various battles he engaged in as he strove to change Princeton’s reputation of a school for the lazy rich into an academic institution capable of challenging Harvard and Yale for scholarly rigor. As he neared the end of this time at Princeton, Wilson found himself in a battle over the graduate school that involved politics that were so severe; Wilson felt he was well prepared for life in the world of non-academic politics. That next step was the Governorship of New Jersey. While he held this position for only two years (he progressed directly to the US presidency after those two years), Wilson spent considerable time and energy fighting the political machines that then ran the governments to be found in New York and New Jersey. More significantly, Wilson began his conversion from a staunch conservative to a vigorous Progressive.

His anti-machine actions and various attempts to pass Progressive acts while Governor of New Jersey, brought Wilson into contact with both Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft. Despite the fact that they were both Republicans and held very different attitudes towards regulation of the various Trusts, both beheld Wilson and his views with some fondness; at this point in time they beheld him with fondness, their views would most definitely change by the election of 1912 when all three would run against one another for the US Presidency. Roosevelt would go to his death despising Wilson and his foreign policies, while Taft would in fact come full circle to re-embrace Wilson and those very same policies, at least as they pertained to the League of Nations. The election of 1912 when Taft and Roosevelt split the Republican ticket to lose to Wilson and the Democrats would mark the beginning of one of the most significant periods in US history with respect to legislation.

During Wilson’s first four years, when he would hold Congress in session for 18 months (to this day the longest ever), Wilson and congress passed the Federal Reserve Act, the FTC act, the Clayton Anti-Trust Act, the Revenue Act (re-establishing an income tax and reducing the Tariff), and the Adamson Act (creating an 8 hour workday); this era would be the most active and progressive era in US history short of the years under the second Roosevelt and those under Lyndon Johnson. Other notable events during this first term would be Wilson’s re-institution of the State of the Union address (not used since 1801) and the Mexican insurrection in 1913 lead by V. Huerta; an insurrection that would pit the US against Huerta and his erstwhile opponents, the Constitutionalists led by V. Carranza. Then as now, the US found itself in the unenviable position of deciding on whether the US should engage in nation building. Wilson did authorize a military action in Vera Cruz after a provoking incident by the Mexicans. Did our invasion of Vera Cruz which resulted in the deaths of 19 American servicemen and 126 Mexicans (many of them adolescents from a local military academy) accomplish anything beyond alienating both sides in the Mexican civil war; do I really need to answer this question? There were some post-invasion events of note: Pancho Villa would later invade New Mexico in an attempt to draw the Americans into a more prolonged war, General John Pershing would chase Villa (never catching him), but would establish Pershing’s credentials as the commanding US general for the pending World War I, and Wilson would gain a campaign slogan – “he kept us out of war”. The irony of that campaign slogan would soon be made clear in WWI.

And it is WWI that is at the heart of Wilson’s legacy, not his progressive policies, not his political battles (though the League of Nations battle with Lodge is important), not his political beliefs (those his moral beliefs are critical); no it is his passionate and stubborn insistence on his vision of a world at peace that is the hallmark of Wilson’s legacy. Wilson believed that the horrors of war, most especially those of WWI where over 17 million people lost their lives (ca. 116,000 of them American combat deaths) was a human institution that had to be tamed and controlled. He felt that failing to do so would result within one generation a new war, one more terrible that the last would come to be; it was not his only incredible example of prescience. Wilson’s tool for preventing such a war was to create the League of Nations and to tie its formation to the peace treaty with Germany and the other Central Powers. Modern arguments against what Wilson hoped to accomplish with the League (and I would be one to use such arguments) would include that he was at best hopelessly idealistic that the signatories to the League document would fulfill their duties and obligations. Wilson’s contemporary opponents focused on Article 10 of the League document. Lodge et. al. felt this article obligated the US to respond to any request for military assistance anywhere in the world in order to put down any instance of war or war-like behavior. That Lodge and company felt this was an unwarranted intrusion on American sovereignty is understandable. Wilson made his argument based on a moral basis, not a legal one. He felt the US could always refuse on legal grounds any such request, but would in all likelihood respond on a moral basis, acting always on the side whereon the title of Right resided. That many felt Wilson stood on very firm moral grounds was justifiably shown by him being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919 for his efforts on the League treaty.

Historians have investigated this era in infinite detail. They argue (Cooper included) that Wilson missed many opportunities to find a compromise with Lodge, but he refused to do so and thus lost the League. The question that remains to me but not to Cooper is why. Cooper is quick to blame Wilson’s cabinet members for some of Wilson’s faults: his evident racism is allowing his Post-Master General Albert Burleson to permit and promote segregation within many government divisions, or his intolerance of dissenting political views by allowing his Attorney General Alexander Palmer to exercise his various Red Scares. Cooper also uses the severe ischemic stroke that Wilson suffered in late 1919 to explain away his mood swings and his own intransigence with respect to compromise on virtually any issue that arose in 1919-20, most especially the League treaty. Cooper spends a great amount time detailing just how forceful and single-minded Wilson was throughout his career; was he truly especially stubborn at the end of his career due to the stroke, or because he was isolated by his second wife, Edith following the stroke? This remains for me an unanswered question.

The book’s style is very similar to that of a college level text book, and for the reader to work his way through will require some dedication. That being said, reading this book is worth the time and effort for anyone interested in the era leading up to WWI. The contrast and similarities between TR and Wilson are the highlight of the book, and would be a great book in itself. The weakness of the book, if I were to choose one, is a weakness often found in biographies. The author often becomes enraptured with their subject. It seems at times as if Cooper does not use as un-jaundiced an eye as he should when discussing Wilson’s only barely latent racism and intolerance for dissenting views. This latter part is another potential rich vein to survey as regards Wilson. He was most tolerant with respect to allowing his cabinet members to run their department with little to no oversight from Wilson, but on the other hand, once Wilson staked out a position, especially a public position, he like TR was far from liberal in terms of hearing any truth in those opposing views. By the end of his fight for the League, it was strictly Wilson’s way, or you’re wrong. In the final analysis, Wilson’s internationalism, his moral fundamentals and his vision for world peace are hard to argue with as goals, but as always the devil is in the details; and while the US did finally drop the shroud of isolationism in WWII, the details to achieve world peace eluded Wilson as they continue to do so to 21^st century America.

 

Movie Review: Chappie

Chappie (2015)

R

2 Stars out of 5

Writer/Director                 Neill Blomkamp
Writer                                 Terri Tatchell
Cinematography               Trent Opaloch
Music                                   Hans Zimmer

Sharlto Copley                   Chappie
Dev Patel                             Deon Wilson
Ninja                                     Ninja
Yo-Landi Visser                  Yo-Landi Visser
Jose Pablo Cantillo            Amerika
Hugh Jackman                   Vincent Moore
Sigourney Weaver            Michelle Bradley
Brandon Auret                   Hippo
 

Neill Blomkamp wrote and directed his first film, “District 9” in 2009. This was Blomkamp’s first full length feature film. Co-written with this wife, Terri Tatchell and produced by Peter Jackson (“Hobbit” trilogy, and many others), "District 9" made use of Blomkamp’s background as an animator and his South African youth. He was able to create a visual treat that proved his technical competency with CGI but also allowed him to use Apartheid as a political subtext to what otherwise was an entertaining science fiction yarn. “District 9” was a seamless blend of the escapism style of movie-making with a story that had a level of social importance worth watching. Following “District 9”, Blomkamp and Tatchel created “Elysium” in 2013. “Elysium” was yet another science fiction film with a message: access to health care. “Elysium” was far less a commercial and critical success as the Oscar nominated (Best Picture) “District 9”. In 2014, Blomkamp/Tatchell have evidently decided to drop their previous efforts at sub-text and focus on escapism alone with their latest movie, “Chappie”. Unfortunately, they have also failed to deliver even this with the derivative, largely inane and illogical “Chappie”.

As with “District 9”, Blomkamp/Tatchell have created a full length film based on a short they did in the mid-2000’s. “Chappie” is based in a near future Johannesburg, South Africa that has recently switched from a human police force to a robot force. These robot police are referred to as scouts and were designed by Deon Wilson (Dev Patel) for a corporation run by Michelle Bradley (Sigourney Weaver). Deon has a corporate rival, Vincent Moore (Hugh Jackman) whose larger robot appears to be a cross between the warbots of the Empire of Star Wars and Robocop. The scout robot police force have reduced crime by such an extent that the local crime boss, Hippo (Brandon Auret) is failing to steal as much money as his ego demands. He therefore decides to threaten a minor criminal, Ninja (Ninja) to give him $20M. Ninja and his team/family of Yo-Landi (Yo-Landi, like Ninja from the South African rock group Die Antword) and Amerika (Jose Pablo Cantillo) decide to kidnap Deon and force him to help them overcome the robo-police; this would allow them to steal again, evidently. Deon in the meanwhile has been working on creating an Artificial Intelligence. At first he’s frustrated, but after staying up all night and drinking a Red Bull, he does it! Not only has he invented an AI, it all fits on a PC's hard drive – cool. (This will be super-ceded later in the movie when one of the characters figures out how to transfer a complete human consciousness and place it on a thumb drive - you really have to admire the characters' software skills in this movie. I guess its because they can type so fast?) Ninja and company eventually kidnap Deon and his makings of a scout with an AI. By daylight they have coerced him to finishing such a robot. Yo-Landi, soon to be known as Mommy, names the robot Chappie (Sharlto Copley). Let the excitement ensue.

Needless to say an hour long series of illogical decisions and actions by all involved take place. And who could have predicted it, there are lots of guns, explosions and people getting shot by both flying robots and robot's with Ninja skills at the movie’s climax. I won’t reveal the exact ending; oh, that’s right, it’s irrelevant. To Blomkamp’s credit, the CGI that depicts Chappie is remarkable. I grant him full credit on the technological achievement of bringing him to the screen. But the writing and acting by all surrounding this character is astonishingly bad: from Dev Patel who was charming in “Slum Dog Millionaire” (2008) but whose character Deon is utterly unbelievable in terms of acting and writing in this movie to Sigourney Weaver who must surely be the most stupid CEO character in the history of cinema. Perhaps Sigourney was just warming up for Blomkamp’s pending revival of the “Alien” series. And then there is Hugh Jackman (“Les Miserables”, 2012, one of my favorite musicals of all time) playing an ex-black ops kind of character (Vincent), one that wears a pistol on his belt to evidently remind us of his tough guy persona. There is little that is logical about Vincent as he ultimately decides to place the city and its inhabitants in peril of their lives in order that he might demo his competing robot. Really; is there some hidden universe out there in science fiction land where decisions like these (and plenty of others I am sparing you from) make sense to somebody? Is it really necessary to abandon all logic in order just to reach another pointless climax where a flying robot can shoot cluster bombs, etc., etc.?

Sadly, Blomkamp is failing to live up to his start with “District 9”. I fear he is falling into the category of one hit wonder from the music world. “Chappie” might well be renamed “Crappie” as my daughter mistyped when she first told me of this movie. It is really not worth watching for anything beyond the CGI of the robots, and that will only take 2-3 minutes of your time, not two hours. Two hours of my life, I want back.

Movie Review: Cake

Cake (2014)

R

2.5 Stars out of 5

Director                                Daniel Barnz

Writer                                   Patric Tobin

Cinematography              Rachel Morrison

Jennifer Anniston            Claire Bennett

Adrianna Barazza             Silvana

Anna Kendrick                   Nina Collins

Sam Worthington            Roy Collins

Chris Messina                    Jason Bennett

 

Like “Still Alice” and the performance of Alice Howland by Julianne Moore, “Cake” contains a powerful performance of a woman under duress; this one is by Jennifer Anniston. Unfortunately also like “Still Alice” there are serious problems with the writing. A story about someone suffering from chronic pain can be a compelling story to tell, and for actress as talented as Anniston proves herself to be in this movie, a challenge not to be ignored. And yet, writer Patric Tobin fatally chose to confuse the movie’s tone by introducing a ghost in order to help explicate and advance the character evolution of Anniston’s Claire Bennett.

The movie introduces Claire (Jennifer Aniston) as a member of a chronic pain support group that is recovering from the recent suicide of a former member, Nina Collins (Anna Kendrick). As the smarmy group leader Annette (Felicity Huffman) seeks closure for each member of the group she makes the mistake of calling on Claire to comment. Claire’s profane and bitter analysis of a suicide’s effects on the survivors they leave behind shocks the group; it also displays in graphic manner to the viewing audience the state of Claire’s personality. Has she always been this way or does it come from the pain she must daily endure? That Claire is in deep pain is vividly shown through Anniston’s acting. Her stiff movements, her inability to bend over to retrieve a fallen object, or the subtle signs flying across her face are all grim testament to her condition (and to Anniston’s careful portrayal).

There is some strength to the writing in the early stages of the movie, as writer Tobin and director Daniel Barnz slowly reveal Claire’s history. After hinting and then showing explicitly, the audience learns that Claire’s pain is more than physical; she is grieving, deeply so. She has suffered a terrible loss in a car accident, the same one that left her in such extreme pain. Her reaction to the accident and her losses have driven her inward. She has shut out and now seemingly hates her former husband. That he too is grieving appears to be of no concern to Claire. Her world has little room for anyone but her and her pain. Fortunately for Claire, her housemaid/cook Silvana (wonderfully played by Adrianna Barrazza) stays by her side. Silvana endures Claire’s verbal abuse, long hours and low pay out of a sense of duty and (more significantly) mourning for what has been lost from the Bennett household.

The movie loses its grip on the reality of the pain Claire is living by introducing a ghostly (imagined) Nina Collins (Anna Kendrick), the recent suicide from Claire’s CP support group. Like the over used voice over style of narrator used in far too many movies, Nina comes into the film in order to help explain Claire’s situation to Claire and the audience. Sure, as an imagined invisible antagonist/frenemy Nina helps Claire move on, but in bringing in this odd cinematic cliché, Tobin steals from the movie’s grief and angst to partially enter the realm of the mentally unsound. Is Claire going insane, is Nina a healthy way for Claire to deal with her problems or merely an unfortunate choice by the writer to explain the inner workings of Claire’s deteriorating mind? It was not a wise choice to make from controlling the pace and tone of the movie in my opinion.

Another poor choice from the aspect of believability is Nina’s surviving husband, Roy Collins (Sam Worthington). That he is handsome and the father of a small boy the same age as Claire’s is a little too convenient. That Claire is able to use her law school training to bully Annette into giving her Roy’s address is more than a little unbelievable. That Roy would receive and play along to Claire’s ruse when she arrives at Roy’s home ranges so far into the unbelievable, the movie should be re-classed as a fantasy. Once into Roy’s life, Claire and the movie continues down this unfortunate path of un-believability. Roy grows close to Claire, and Claire to some degree to Roy. Will they fall in love, will Roy be Claire’s salvation; do I really need answer these questions? Are Roy and his son only in the movie to provide a plot point that gets Claire to have a cake made to help Roy’s grieving son to survive his mother’s death. Maybe, maybe not, but the problem is that if you take a story rooted deeply in reality and start introducing multiple events that seem so improbable (don’t forget the highway worker that Claire finds and convinces to tell the story of how he witnessed Nina’s death), then the movie can and does lose its moorings. Is it a story of pain and recovery, or is it a poorly told tale designed to reach the point in the movie  that will display and emphasize the pain on Claire’s face as she views a returned photograph to her living room wall.

I’ll readily admit this movie can pull your heartstrings in that near final scene in the living room. And it boggles the mind that Anniston failed to earn at least an Oscar nomination for her brilliant but carefully restrained performance. She is simply outstanding. The movie has its moments, especially in the opening sequences where Claire’s situation is slowly unfolded for the viewer. However, by endlessly mixing in Nina the Ghost, the movie’s tone is sacrificed, its pacing is disrupted and by bringing in poor old Roy in the manner done in this movie, the film comes completely off the rails. I acknowledge and laud Anniston, but almost nothing else in this movie makes it a worthwhile venture to take the time it takes to watch.

Book Review: "Under the Skin", by Michel Faber

Under the Skin (2000)

4 Stars out of 5

Michel Faber

Michel Faber has created a very ambitious first book with “Under the Skin”. This Scottish national with the German name has written a complex tale that comes in three parts; three parts that could almost stand on their own; certainly the first third of the book is a kind of clever puzzle with a nice twist that I will try to conceal in this review. However, the book’s two other parts also tell tales worth reading; tales from which one can learn something meaningful. The book will fall into the science fiction genre just the like the movie made in 2013 based on the book. Yet, the book just like the movie has much deeper depths than the superficial story of a young female. To be sure, Isserley’s story is a painful one, both physically and psychically, but beneath the skin of the book’s basic story line lies a deeper moral tale; one well worth reading and thinking about long after one has finished the almost too short novel (304 pages).

The opening third of the novel introduces the reader to the protagonist, Isserley. She is a troubled individual, wracked with physical pain. Each morning upon waking in her decrepit cottage, she performs exercises that somewhat reduce her constant bone pain. Her pain is not limited to the physical, though. She works with a group of males that she perceives find her disgusting in appearance and in typical male pattern behavior treat her as a second class citizen; one barely, if at all a human deserving the respect and rights they abrogate to themselves. Or so Isserley believes. As the book progresses forward though, the reader might be forgiven for thinking Isserley may well be misinterpreting at least part of the environment she lives in.

Besides the men she works with on Ablach Farm in Northern Scotland, much of Isserley’s life includes driving the A9 expressway in the vicinity of Glasgow. Indeed, as we come to know more of Isserley, we realize that her driving is in fact her job. With her generous bosom and fair features, she drives the A9 seeking young, physically fit male hitch hikers. What she does after she finds such a desirable hitch hiker plays a big role in the novel’s message and Isserley’s malaise. As she searches for her perfect “hitcher”, someone she refers to as a Vodsel, we learn more of her and her underlying mental state. A useful technique in Faber’s storytelling is that once Isserley has a hitcher in her car, he switches from 1^st person Isserley to 1^st person Hitcher. Thus, we learn of her worries and fears, and the near constant lustful thoughts of her Hitchers; almost all see her only as “prey”; a woman to be taken for their own purposes.

As the first third of the book ends, the reader is made more fully aware of Isserley’s true job. Having seen the movie before reading the book, I knew of her secret and yet it actually helped me enjoy all the more the technique Faber employs in setting the scenery (so to speak) for the remaining parts of the novel. Throughout the book Faber employs a succinct style of writing that tells his tale but does so in a knowing manner in terms of the limitations of the English language. However, as the reader progresses into the second part of the novel, such a reader starts to realize that Faber’s apparent obfuscations actually served a dual purpose: firstly they sketch out the story, but more to the point they vividly illustrate how form and language can do more than confuse the reader or viewer; they can just as easily form the bedrock of a person’s value system. Going back to the definition of Human Being, for example, one can use this as a descriptive term or use it as a restrictive term. That is to say, if one is not a Human Being, can all the rules set up by society to govern behavior can be dropped? Consider the treatment of such advanced animals as Orcas (or almost any marine mammal) in a Marine Zoo. Are their personal needs seen to in the same manner as any being accorded the right and name of “Human Being”? Quite obviously not, but should they, and again if not, how close to Human rights should Orca (or any caged animal) rights be?

This theme is explored in the second part of the book. Isserley’s nature plus that of her fellow farm workers are revealed through their actions and thoughts. But just like the manner in which Gabriela Cowperthwaite’s “Black Fish” (2013) exposed the obscenity of corralling Orcas, there is a character in the book to take on the role of protector for oppressed animals. He is a CEO’s son, the very corporation that runs Isserley’s farm. Amliss Vess comes from the ultra-elite of Isserley’s society. His father is to Amliss not only the CEO of Vess Industries but also an animate form of Joseph Conrad’s metaphorical “Heart of Darkness”. As they get to learn of and from one another, Isserley is able to show Amliss the beauty of Scotland and Amliss is able to open Isserley’s eyes (just a little) to the moral nature of her occupation. Amliss will depart from Isserley as determined as ever to stop the activities on Ablach Farm. He will leave Isserley both pining for Amliss as a lover and despising him for his opinions. She struggles to find reconciliation between her job and her newly expanded views regarding its morality. Faber never makes too terribly clear just where Isserley finally places the metaphorical fulcrum that balances her sense of duty to work versus an ethical statement on right and wrong.

Sadly, the book quite frankly fails to reach a satisfactory conclusion. Throughout parts one and two, the reader is treated to cleverness in storytelling satire reminiscent of Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal"; satire told with Joseph Conrad-like prose. A satire that has a thought provoking manner of discussing gender and animal versus human rights; and even asking indirectly whether the two should be different, but if so, strongly arguing that a carefully thought out ethical premise must be used to define those rights. Having done such a nice job, especially for a first time novelist, Faber reaches for but fails to grasp a conclusion that measures up to the early parts of the novel. Leaving the Big Picture, he instead focuses on the disintegration of the internal Isserley. Following Amliss’ departure, she goes back to work, but does so in a very troubled state of mind. She picks up her penultimate hitcher. As before, the reader is allowed to listen in on her thoughts and those of a red-haired father of two. Unlike her previous hitchers, this man will be missed and as such is not a good candidate for Isserley’s ministrations by her own rules of the road. Even more to the point though, as we listen in, we find this red-haired man cares and worries deeply for Isserley, based solely on her appearance. In the overall satirical nature of the book, this example of irony is hard to ignore. Nevertheless, she takes him and thus precipitates her ultimate fate; a fate that is finally set into motion by yet another hitcher equally disinterested in her feminine charms.

The book is well worth reading by anyone interested in science fiction but especially so by anyone interested in what lies beneath the skin. How does each of us measure and assess one another: by our words, by our actions, or by our physical appearance. Are we male or female, fit or fat, light or dark; do we speak with an accent or maybe not speak your language at all? Some of these criteria might be indirect indicators of who we are, or they might like the red-haired hitcher’s sweater be quite deceiving. It is so obviously a lesson that Isserley and indeed every Human Being should learn, that it is painful to even consider. At this cynical age in humanity's life cycle, I can only shake my head and hope; hope without much conviction for an optimistic future where we each assess one another based on our actions and not our appearance.

Book Review: "Underworld" by Don DeLillo

Underworld (1997)

5 Stars out of 5

Don DeLillo

Don DeLillo has constructed a modern masterpiece with his novel, "Underworld", a novel about American life in the second half of the twentieth century. This very ambitious and very long (827 pages) novel begins with a beautifully written prolog that describes “the shot heard around the world”, that is the 1951 play-off game between the NY Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers. This prolog is a marvelous introduction to the novel as it sets into play one of the sub-plots within the book, uses spot on dialog that is key to the era and the characters, but even more importantly, as it introduces the reader to the consummate literary skill that DeLillo employs throughout the entire novel.

“Underworld” as a title seems to suggest something sinister, but in fact refers to a metaphorical burying of things best left in the past. The primary protagonist, Nick Shay commits a murder while still a youth, spends some time in detention, but grows to adulthood where he finds a career as an executive for a waste management company; a career that is unmistakably consistent with the title and theme of the novel. The book’s storyline that involves Nick’s middle-age describes a man with a failing marriage; a troubled man worried about himself, his marriage, and the concept of literally burying trash as well as his attempt to metaphorically bury his own dark secret. DeLillo does not take the reader straight from the baseball game in 1951 to Nick’s twilight years in a linear fashion. Rather, he sets the 1950’s scene in the prolog and then jumps to the early twenty-first century and Nick. He then works backward, almost decade by decade, back to the early fifties to when Nick commits his crime. The reader learns of Nick’s consequences long before his crime is made clear. The reader knows there has been a crime, knows Nick is broken in some manner, but lacks the details and must decipher the clues as a normal person would when meeting someone for the first time. The story is told in the third person omniscient, but the narrator keeps some of his secrets to the book’s ending.

DeLillo’s use of time sequencing for “Underworld” is a challenge to the reader. It is very easy due to DeLillo’s marvelous storytelling and dialog to lose oneself in any of the vignettes that make up “Underworld”. But then as a certain pace is built within one of the sub-stories, a certain dramatic tension created, DeLillo concludes the chapter and storyline in question and quickly jumps to another character within the novel, or possibly jumps to an earlier decade entirely, maybe with the same character from the previous chapter, perhaps with a completely new character. This is a challenge to the reader in a manner that kept me thinking of James Joyce’s “Ulysses” or Thomas Pynchon’s “Gravity’s Rainbow”. DeLillo doesn’t use Joyce’s almost hallucinogenic style of prose wherein seemingly nearly random thoughts frequently penetrate the storyline (see also Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” for more of this style). Instead DeLillo uses a complex series of sub-stories (not hallucinogenic but definitely complex) to tell a tale of remarkable character complexity; so complex a set of stories and characters, that dedicated attention is required of the reader to make sense of the overall story. “Underworld” surely was far from easy to write, it is quite necessarily difficult to read.

A casual reader though could still take great pleasure in merely reading short sections of the book. Such a reader could (as noted above) enjoy the crisp prose and dialog, or find interest in some of the stories embedded in the overall novel. Consider the opening prolog wherein DeLillo describes in careful detail how Ralph Branca pitching for the Dodgers gave up a winning homerun to the Giants’ Bobby Thompson. By itself a riveting and dramatic story the way DeLillo tells it. But he also manages to include a strange little sub-story within that includes J. Edgar Hoover and his fascination with a painting by Bruegel, some wisecracking by Jackie Gleason, and a somewhat tension filled walk home by a young African American man that obtained the winning fly ball. Other stories that stand by themselves include one from the early sixties that describes the terror that filled the air as America and the Soviet Union appeared to be on a one-way street to nuclear oblivion; and incredibly, DeLillo uses Lenny Bruce as a contemporary comedian to use his acerbic humor as the narrator of those fears. Another excellent story, this one from the seventies involves an older married woman from Nick’s past, one with whom he had sexual relations as a teen, she is now a mature artist; an artist directing the artistic  painting of retired US Air Force bombers; bombers that were once part of America’s nuclear deterrent in the sixties.

“Underworld” does have an overall arc, one told in an inverse time order. Besides the story of Nick’s adult life and how he got there, it also tells the story of the winning fly ball and the various people that seek to own it. But mostly DeLillo is creating a picture of America in the last half of the twentieth century. And he is using a writing style that might be compared to a painting style such as pointillism, or even more accurately as an artform such as a kind of “mosaicism”; a kind of mosaic where each part of the mosaic is made up of an individual picture. The reader/ viewer can look at each piece of the mosaic and enjoy it for its own sake, or step back, so to speak, and enjoy the overall picture.  And this big picture is America at a certain contented/fraught time in its history. A time filled with kids opening fire hydrants to play in during the summer heat, a different time where one might drive through the back woods while simultaneously worrying about nuclear destruction and participating in the hedonistic lifestyle of the hippy era, or yet another time, this one that includes the encroaching internet, a time where one never feels alone and disconnected, maybe when one never feels at peace.

These nostalgic and bittersweet views of American life coupled with the real terror of the Cold War and the possibly equally terrifying loss of privacy era we now live in are done by DeLillo in a manner that allows the reader to dip into this majestic book and enjoy. Enjoy it for a brief swim through one of these eras for nostalgic sake, for a historical perspective, or if the reader is too young to have lived in these eras, for an educational lesson. In some ways, this novel is like a magnum of fine wine; one could try to drink it down all at once, but why do so? Sip it, and take pleasure in the work of one of America’s best novelists from the late twentieth century.

 

Movie Review: "Transcendence"

Transcendence (2014)

PG-13

2.5 Stars out of 5

Director                                Wally Pfister
Writer                                   Jack Paglen
Cinematography                Jess Hall
Music                                    Mychael Danna

Johnny Depp                      Will Caster
Rebecca Hall                       Evelyn Caster
Paul Bettany                       Max Waters
Cillian Murphy                   Agent Buchanan
Kate Mara                           Bree
Morgan Freeman             Joseph Tagger

 

Science Fiction can be such a wonderful canvas on which to paint visual forms of ideas that conventional drama can touch only lightly, or maybe not at all. Consider what “Under the Skin" worked so successfully to demonstrate: that our modern definition of human is truly skin deep; or consider what the failed 2014 version of Robocop tried to illustrate: a person’s basic humanity can triumph over evil and soulless technology; and now consider the almost equally failed “Transcendence”: when does helping someone (no matter your intentions) cross the line between helping and enslaving. “Transcendence” tries to cover other territory, too: the border between human and machine, or the border between Man and God. These are lofty questions and topics, and when done right, can be entertaining and thought provoking, but when done poorly, the viewer’s reaction might range from dismay to something far less than transcendence.

“Transcendence” is a story that is rooted in the concept of Artificial Intelligence and how that AI will interact with mankind. The film begins with an introduction to an AI researcher played by Johnny Depp, Will Caster and his equally brilliant wife, Evelyn Caster (Rebecca Hall). Will is assaulted by a team of neo-Luddites (the movie’s term, though for Luddites they seem awfully comfortable with technology). As his condition worsens, his wife Evelyn decides to make a copy of Will’s mind and transfer it into a computer. She enlists the help of Will’s co-worker Max Waters (Paul Bettany). As leader of the neo-Luddites, Bree (Kate Mara) strives to prevent Evelyn from allowing virtual Will to reach the internet; but to no avail. Once there, virtual Will begins to amass power and abilities that ultimately alienates all of his former colleagues, even Evelyn. There is (small surprise) a concluding battle between Will and a remarkably small sample of the US Army, Bree and Will’s college crowd. The final scenes show a somewhat remorseful Max musing over whether or not Will has found a way to overcome his adversities and unite in some manner with Evelyn.

The problems with this movie are symptomatic of bad science fiction films: over-reach in terms of the protagonist’s abilities and ironically, a ridiculous always present Achilles Heel (think the nonsense of the vent on the Death Star that Luke uses to destroy it). Virtual Will is confronted with multiple examples of people indirectly verbally classing him with God; mostly in the context of his virtual existence, but indirectly foreshadowing his God-like abilities to come. And his abilities do come: he masters the Stock Market in minutes, he invents nano-robots that can repair and improve Humans in months, he defies gravity, and yet, and yet – darn those pesky viruses. He can wreak havoc with logic and science but just like those omnipotent aliens in “Independence Day”, and unlike the Aliens, he knows the attack is coming and the nature of the attack, and yet he too is powerless to defend against the virus.

Bad science, bad logic, and a pointless focus on a modern equivalent of the villagers in “Frankenstein” storming Victor’s castle is the approach taken by first-time Director, Wally Pfister. Was it because it was Cinematographer Pfister’s first time out as a Director that led to such a flaccid story? With the truly brilliant writer/director Christopher Nolan acting in the role of executive Producer on the team, one really has to wonder, did no one see the weak and uninspired film that came out of this effort. Imagine a story that took the movie’s opening premise of downloading a mind, and perhaps even include the second premise of how that mind might expand when allowed to function at internet speeds and in connection with internet-sized mountains of data. Could there not have been a Stanley Kubrick visionary view of this concept similar to “2001”? Is there no other storyline but the one used by Mary Shelly over a century ago in the original Frankenstein?

Arthur C Clarke wrote in the mid-twentieth century about how any science sufficiently advanced would appear indistinguishable from magic; or to paraphrase him, from God. Clarke explored this idea in the book form of "2001", and Kubrick led the viewer right up to that point where a God-like Dave floated, poised above the Earth, pondering. Would Clarke or Kubrick have turned the next scene into a raging battle with tanks and jets, and I’m sure, a car chase or two (yes, I know a fleet of rockets were sent skyward, but what then happened, any explosions?). Or is there some more subtle next step that might have occurred; something that might demonstrate or at least define what being Human and what being God-like might be? Is there a better way to explore the subjects noted above in the first paragraph that doesn’t involve explosions? The answer is yes; go back and watch “Under the Skin” a second time, and you will see some hope for intelligent and nuanced explorations of these subjects.

 

Movie Review: Under the Skin

Under the Skin (2014 – US release)

R

4.5 Stars out of 5

Director/Writer                 Jonathan Glazer

Writer                                 Walter Campbell

    Michel Faber (novel’s author)

Cinematography              Daniel Landin

Music                                  Mica Levi

Scarlett Johansson          Woman

Jeremy McWilliams         Motorcyclist
Joe Szula                            First Victim
Kryštof Hádek                   Swimmer
Paul Brannigan                 Second Victim
Adam Pearson                  Disfigured Man
Michael Moreland           Highlands Man

 Under the Skin is not an easy movie to watch, and the reason is because it is so clever and so capably told that it is really two stories being told simultaneously. But it also is less a motion picture than a series of images told with motion. This “movie” can be thought of a series of images, each helping to tell the overall tale, but also able to stand alone to tell a single tale; a movie that could be thought of as iconic for its potential importance in film history that uses icons to tell its story.

The superficial story begins by borrowing from Stanley Kubrick’s “2001” with a long view of a circle of light. The camera holds this image for an uncomfortable length of time. The viewer is essentially warned right at the beginning, this is not a standard science fiction story. The white light expands in time, gains color and perspective, and a “sense” of space or other-worldliness is created. We move to Earth where we see an individual (Jeremy McWilliams, a professional motorcyclist in real life) is riding his motorcycle at high speed towards a van. With never a word in the entire movie, we quickly learn of the motorcyclist’s energy and purposefulness. In this scene, he carries a seemingly unconscious woman from the roadside to the van. Within the van, we see only a nude woman (Scarlett Johansson) strip the clothing from the “unconscious” woman and don her clothing. There is a moment when the now stripped woman sheds a tear and her face looks remarkably like that of Johansson’s. The scene is done against a complete background of white; no other images but the two (one?) women exchanging clothing can be seen.

Thus, begins a series of events involving Johansson as she (now dressed in human clothing and as we will learn later, human skin) begins a series of abductions of human males. She starts to troll Glasgow Scotland for young, unattached men. Each of her victims acknowledges Johansson’s beauty and each is clearly interested in Johansson as a woman. In an early foreshadowing of other events to come, we see Johansson’s character respond as a young flattered woman might respond to compliments. But keep in mind, all the compliments are to her physical beauty. As she captures her victims with her allure, she takes them to a run-down building, where all the physical signs are there to warn the suitors off. They are not warned though, their passions and hopes run too high, and they follow Johansson into the building and to their doom. Their final moments are like the scene wherein Johansson took her doppelganger’s clothing; though in these scenes, rather than framed in white, each of the young men’s final moments are framed in black. We watch Johansson walk across a pitch black floor as she slowly disrobes; her victims do the same as far as the disrobing goes. But unlike Johansson, each male slowly and seemingly in complete ignorance of their situation, slowly sinks into the floor. Beneath the floor we learn their fate as they finally become aware of their danger, and in time pass into little more than their skin – costumes perhaps for future alien visitors.

The science fiction angle of this movie is far and away the lesser part. Just as this movie’s science fiction tale of alien invasion of Earth is superficial, so the deeper aspects of this story are focused on the superficial aspects of human life. Johansson is simply to her human male counterparts a thing, one draped in a lovely costume of skin. She might as well be alien wearing a Scarlett Johansson suit; they aren’t looking past the surface. Her “humanness” is not an issue to them in their pursuit of her. Or so the first part of the movie would lead a viewer to believe. As Johansson’s character carries out her duties of abduction, it becomes slowly clear that she is beginning to find fault in her situation. When she first begins her abductions, we see her casually kill a swimmer that had vainly tried to save a husband and wife from drowning, we see her take him as lightly as a hunter would his elk, and we watch her uncaringly leave that lost couple’s toddler alone by the sea. She is an alien, and these creatures mean nothing to her. She reacts with the same indifference to the child as to the mother or the father – just bags of skin waiting to be harvested. And yet, in time, and the movie takes pains to illustrate the time, she starts to sense a something in her prey that affects her. At one point, she is helped to her feet by passing strangers and at multiple points in the movie, there are humans inquiring as to her state – is she okay? She starts to wonder herself: is she okay? After abducting one last victim, a poor disfigured soul, she stops to stare at a mirror. In my opinion, this moment in front of the mirror is the highlight of the film. Who is she; what is she doing, what lies beneath her surface – that the mirror is dirty and difficult to view a reflection in, is precisely the point.

That moment in front of the mirror is a turning point in the science fiction story and in the deeper story. Johansson’s character now leaves her life of abduction, flees into the Highlands of north Scotland, and indeed flees whatever she once was beneath her surface. That she was not repulsed by the disfigured man was an early mark of her “alikeness”, her “otherness is starting fade; and what an ironic mark it is. She reacts with more human compassion to the disfigured man by not reacting to his disfigurement than likely almost anyone in that man’s history. It wasn’t her freeing him that was noteworthy; it was her acknowledgement of his humanness, not his otherness in how she spoke to him when they first met. This happens again in the Highlands. She meets a man at a bus stop who is apparently only concerned about her needs, and not his. As they grow closer (from his point of view) they attempt to make love but must stop as she realizes, she cannot physically do this act. She has “gone native” in the science fiction narrative of this movie, but she cannot go so far as to truly become and function as a human. She runs again, this time from her new situation. She runs into the forest where she meets an all too common human – one that takes. Now we see an all too common emotion human emotion on her face, fear.

We learn what her physical nature is; an inky black form within the human form. Her body is a figure that is stripped bare of clothing, of hair, of almost all human facial expression. And in yet in an iconic scene where the camera catches her looking down at the Johansson face, now removed from her own face, there are things that are there to see. There is a kind of compassion as she stares down at the suit she has been wearing, the former human Johansson person now reduced to a bag of skin. This skin still seems human, still seems to emote, to feel something as it stares back at the alien that once wore her. The film ends with a camera pan from a smoky black fire to a pure white snow fall. Fade to white. Thus ends the science fiction tale.

This movie has haunted me to the point where I will now read the book to see if I can get another perspective on the story. The movie though is a profound one of surfaces, of seeing past surfaces, of what is human and what is alien. It could be criticized as being too artsy: there is a near constant stream of music that is intended presumably to give the listener a sense of the alien; there is a frequent use of editing that forces the viewer to make quick, then slow leaps through time and movie sequence, and there is an opening and closing sequence that employ extended times for the scene in question – all of these techniques disrupt the viewer from their normal viewing mode, that disrupts their complacency as viewers. This movie speaks eloquently of superficiality, of humanness, of otherness. How do we as humans view members of the other gender, how do we view disfigurement, do we treat one another as more than a bag of skin in our interactions? The first part of the movie would say no, but the second part of the movie would say there is room for hope. That some people would give up their life to save a dog, their wife, or would offer help to a stranger in need, even an alien. Yes, this movie is artsy in tone, but it is very human in content. The tone may be too much for most people (it failed at the box office), but its content, if you take the time and have the interest, is a message of hope.

 

Movie Review: Still Alice

Still Alice (2014)

PG-13

3.5 Stars out of 5

Writer/Directors               Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland

Writing                               Lisa Genova (novel’s author)

Cinematography              Denis Lenoir

Julianne Moore                Alice Howland

Alec Baldwin                      John Howland

Kate Bosworth                  Anna Howland-Jones

Hunter Parrish                   Tom Howland

Kristen Stewart                 Lydia Howland

 

With the Baby Boomer generation well into their sixties by 2015, the issue of three million cases in the US of Alzheimer’s Disease each year will be increasingly a topic of conversation for Hollywood and the average Baby Boomer. Writer/Directors Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland have chosen to take Lisa Genova’s book and turn it into a heartfelt but somewhat disappointing movie. Perhaps, Richard Glatzer’s diagnosis with ALS four years ago has influenced some of his writing and directing decisions, but the movie very clearly belongs to Julianne Moore’s exceptional performance of someone whose very essence is slipping away day by day.

Moore plays Columbia linguistics professor Alice Howland. We join her in the opening sequences of the movie as she celebrates her fiftieth birthday with husband John (Alex Baldwin), eldest daughter Anna (Kate Bosworth), middle child Tom (Hunter Parrish), and late to the party and movie cliché difficult child Lydia (Kristen Stewart). All the Howlands are clearly very intelligent and with the exception of misfit Lydia well accomplished in their respective fields. We quickly learn the family dynamics as lawyer and married Anna asserts her evident disapproval of her younger, unmarried and aspiring actress sister Lydia. Both men and largely Alice too check out of the ongoing feud between the two sisters, though throughout the movie, Alice makes her disapproval of Lydia’s career choice abundantly clear.

The movie proceeds at a stately pace in the beginning showing several obvious and a few less obvious examples of Alice’s progressing disease: she forgets dates and names, even that she was introduced to Tom’s new girlfriend, gets lost running on the Columbia campus, and on at least one occasion flies into a rage when John fails to properly respond to Alice’s expression of her fears as regards her condition. That something is wrong is evident to Alice and she begins to be tested by a neurologist. His preliminary diagnosis of Alzheimer ’s disease is rejected by medical researcher John, and we begin to see in Alice’s fury both the early signs of Alzheimer’s effect on the patient’s emotional control, but also of Moore’s exquisite ability to convey both the subtle signs of Alzheimer’s and also the more flagrant ones as well. As Alice’s condition begins to accelerate and the signs and symptoms become more and more obvious to Alice and those around her, the sense of desperation that Moore is able to convey with her eyes alone is breathtaking. While it is all to true that the Best Actor/Actress Oscars award often goes to actors portraying someone suffering from something, in this case, Moore’s win for Best Actress in 2015 is one of those cases where it really was an earned award. The movie also does a reasonably good job of showing how each of the family members around Alice react to her disease; that the misfit is the one to take the most care of Alice should come as no surprise. Though, I will admit that I found Kristen Stewart’s portrayal of the misfit child to be surprisingly effective. (The Twilight movies apparently did not have a permanent effect on her.)

Alice and John learn from her doctor that her type of Alzheimer’s disease is a familial version, one likely inherited from her father and most likely passed to one or more of her children. An ensuing telephone discussion with the child that has indeed inherited the gene that gives the disease is one of the most painful scenes in the movie. The look that passes over Alice’s face as she is forced to confront not only her own desperate situation, but that she also now believes that she is “responsible” for giving it to her offspring is a heartbreaking moment.  The movie then engages in something that I struggle to believe could have occurred: Alice is asked to give a speech to an Alzheimer’s meeting. Is this a meeting for the lay or the researchers working on the problem? It is far from clear. Alice’s speech is incredibly moving and erudite; it is hard to believe someone who must underline each line of the speech as she gives it to help her remember that she has already spoken that line, could have written the speech that Alice gives. It is a beautiful speech, and in many ways, the highlight for me in the movie. I am bothered by what feels too much like Hollywood writing in the construction and delivery of the speech.

Indeed, the writing in this movie is often a problem for me. Consider the intended but far from subtle irony of a linguistics professor getting Alzheimer’s disease. Someone, whose complete academic career has been spent using and understanding words, but now must watch those words (watch to some degree) slip irretrievably away, never to be regained. Another irony in the writing and one I actually found far more intriguing is the concept that the more intelligent the Alzheimer’s patient is, the more rapid the decline the effects of Alzheimer’s can seem to be to the patient. The movie offers up a fascinating idea and develops it nicely with the Alice character: intelligent sufferers of this disease start to create clever behaviors to compensate for the disease’s effects. They fool themselves and those around them into believing there is no problem. Alice for example creates clues for herself with her iPhone and gives herself memory tests as she cooks. She knows there is a problem but suffers as many do with serious problems with both the disease and a case of denial; or maybe its hope, hope that they will be the one to outsmart whatever the disease that afflicts them. Thus, the intelligent may be able to ignore the disease longer than the less gifted, and as a result once it hits, it seems to hit faster; when in truth it is just further along than might be otherwise thought.

The directing and cinematography were often used to great effect. In a movie where the protagonist is slowly losing their identity as they lose their memories, and in a movie where those effects are so well portrayed in the face of Julianne Moore, the director’s decision to provide a series of framing shots where Alice’s face takes up 2/3’s of the screen while the background often fades out of focus was I thought a brilliant technique. They use it as well when Alice gets lost after jogging on campus. She comes to a stop and looks around herself. The sounds of those around her continue on, almost as a distraction, but in the meanwhile the buildings and quads that she has walked for years are now out of focus to the viewer and presumably in some sense to her as well. It is a clever technique to show the disorientation and confusion likely felt by the early stage Alzheimer’s patient.

As I note above, the speech by Alice is both a high point and low point in the movie for me. If I just drop the unlikelihood of the speech and just focus on the speech, there is so much to marvel at in that speech. What it boils down to for me is the question, who are we but our memories? Each of us can recall to some degree many life events in our lives, both good and bad. If we think about ourselves and ponder how we came to be whoever each of us has come to be, what would be left as our memories are slowly seeping away? We would forget events in our lives, how to drive or write, the names, the faces of our loved ones; maybe any sense of who we are, including perhaps our own name. Think about what defines a human from the other animals on our planet. Think about how we frame almost all of our thoughts about anything based on what we’ve learned earlier in our life; our politics, our abilities, our passions. Strip those away and what is left? The move suggests love at the very ending of the film, and that’s fine from an artistic point of view, but is it really left, once our memories have fled? Is there any more painful disease afflicting humankind than any of the various forms of senility? Alice herself wishes for cancer rather than Alzheimer’s; it is hard to argue the point.

This is a good movie about Alzheimer’s. I recommend it primarily for Julianne Moore’s performance and for the speech scene. However, I much more strongly urge you to see Amour (2012). It is a similar topic, but a much better movie; the acting is superb, the directing and writing unsurpassed. And it’s kind of nice to see such veterans of the screen as Jean-Louis Trentignant and Emmanuelle Riva acting so remarkably well in their mid-eighties. Despite the subject material, it gives one hope for the one’s own future.