Interviewing Coppola

Over at The Film Talk, my genial co-host and I have posted a fascinating conversation with Francis Ford Coppola - who, at the age of 70, with 'Tetro' considers himself to have entered what he calls the 'second phase' of his career.  To have a first phase; or a second phase, or indeed any phase to a career might be enough for me - but talking to Coppola this morning ended up being more than a conversation about publicising his new film (although you really should do yourself a favour and go see it: it's gorgeous, moving and thoughtful), turning into a dialogue about the film-making process itself, Coppola's vision for what cinema can be, and what you or I should do if we want to make movies.

The real pleasure of the interview was rooted in a sense that Coppola is humble enough to see himself still as being a student of the art he's working in.  This guy may have made 'The Conversation' and 'The Godfather' and 'Apocalypse Now' and 'One from the Heart', but he knows he's still got a lot to learn; and is learning it while seeking to live a full life, at a time when many of us might be wanting to take it easy.  He wants to tell stories that have some depth - 'Tetro' is about family secrets and the process of growing up (like all of his films - in which men usually give something up for the sake of what they assume to be their family's best interests - think of Michael Corleone's integrity in 'The Godfather', Martin Sheen's morality in 'Apocalypse Now', Dracula's centuries-old self-protection, Gene Hackman's sanity in 'The Conversation').   I'm grateful he took the time to talk to us; and you can listen to the show here.

A Race Waiting to Be Born

'In an infinite and eternal universe, the point is, anything is possible'

- Stanley Kubrick

'2001: A Space Odyssey' is one of those films that leaves me wondering if there's any point.  To watching, I mean.  Well, to watching other films, really; because '2001' is such a rich cinematic and theological experience you can't imagine anything else coming close to its visual richness, aural shock, and emotional heft.

I spent this afternoon watching the Blu-Ray (the best advertisment for Hi-Def I've yet seen) with the sound LOUD; and found myself enveloped by a familiar experience that managed also to feel strange, as if I'd never actually seen it before.

Apes.  Monolith.  Bones.  Violence as a way of life.  Exploration.  Mutual suspicion among human beings.  Love between family members and friends.  Monolith.  Noise.  More exploration.  Bad computer.  Violence as a way of life.  Very bad computer.  Shut down.  More exploration.  Invitation.  Journey.  Shattered Glass.  Re-birth.  Everything.

When David Bowman (I think we can assume his name is supposed to evoke both primal humanity and the repentant warrior known in the Bible as 'friend of God')  allows himself to be transported into his race's future, he is dying in much the same way as a caterpillar dies.  It's inevitable.  It's inevitable.  It's inevitable.  He knows it.  But some Thing tells him it's going to be ok.  Now, I'm the first to admit that applying the work 'ok' to the re-birth of the human race that climaxes '2001' is, at the very least, an understatement (of the kind that Professor Floyd is faced with early in the movie when one of his colleagues expresses the hope that his speech - about the threatened imminent destruction of the human race - could have been a 'morale booster').  But I'm so overwhelmed by the experience of seeing the film again that it seems impossible to know what the right word would be.  Evolution?  Revolution?  Redemption?

These words are too small; or their meaning has been lost through over-use.  Same with the kind of superlatives that we like to use to describe movies we like a lot ('the greatest').  But my purpose in writing is not to encourage you to agree with me; or to be impressed with the fact that I can come up with nice words (or disappointed in my failure to do so).  I want you to watch the film  Or maybe I want to feel that my love for it is somehow connected to it; as if such a thing were possible, given that I wasn't even born when it was made.  I'm running out of ways to say what I want to.  So I'll stop.  Instead of wasting your time with a defense of what I feel, let me risk just reducing it to one statement:

I think that, in dealing with the most profound questions of our existence, '2001: A Space Odyssey' is the most optimistic film ever made.

You are, of course, free to make what you want of that statement.  But I'm so excited by what I've just seen, for the tenth or twentieth time, that I really had to tell someone.  Hope you have a great weekend.

Disappearance/Re-appearance

My friend Jamie Moffett is currently editing his new documentary about the legacy of the El Salvadoran civil war; it looks like his film is going to be a genuine work of discovery, rather than one of this non-fiction movies where everything seems decided in advance.  Philadelphia's City Paper printed a story today about one of the unexpected and tragic stories the film-makers want to bring to our attention: the murder of Gustavo Marcelo Rivera Moreno, a teacher and community activist, whose disapperance and horrific death are associated with the people's attempts at opposing the destruction of the land by mining operations. 'Return to El Salvador' asks why 700 Salvadorans leave their country every day; and aims to remind audiences why the fate of these people is intimately bound to the recent history of the United States and its people.  We'll be able to see the film in November.  For now, the hope is that US politicians will be willing to support an investigation into Rivera's death.  If you believe that we should take responsibility for the misdeeds of our predecessors, then it's clear that we owe the people of El Salvador something more than we've been prepared to grant before now.  But I imagine that most of us don't know much about this recent history; never mind what's happening in El Salvador today.  Disappearance doesn't just apply to the physical removal and killing of human beings; for we're very good at hiding from ourselves the truth about our own complicity in the suffering of others.

We've been very good at 'disappearing' the murky parts of our own history; but denying the fact of the role played by the Reagan administration and others in destabilising Central American nations will not get us any closer to preventing the disappearance of more people like Gustavo Marcelo Rivera Moreno; nor in honouring the people he was trying to help. Hopefully 'Return to El Salvador' will contribute to a renewed engagement with these questions; questions that should never go away until they are answered.

(If you want to read more, Walter Lafeber's 'Inevitable Revolutions' is a good way in to understanding how and some of the reasons why successive US administrations have kept Central America in a state of dependency; and Don Shriver's extraordinary 'Honest Patriots' cuts to the heart of how we should face our own country's past.)

Skins

From Meister Eckhart: “A human being has so many skins inside, covering the depths of the heart. We know so many things, but we don't know ourselves! Why, thirty or forty skins or hides, as thick and hard as an ox's or bear's, cover the soul.  Go into your own ground and learn to know yourself there. God expects but one thing of you, and that is that you should come out of yourself in so far as you are a created being made and let God be God in you. Do exactly what you would do if you felt most secure. God is at home, it's we who have gone out for a walk."

Caution: we shouldn't assume we know what Meister Eckhart meant by 'God' - John Caputo evokes this in referring to God as 'the event'; but all language about God, we must assume, is inadequate.  So, at the risk of editing Meister Eckhart for my own purposes, let me say that I'm not sure what he meant either, but I'm pretty sure he's right when he says that we have wandered from where things work better.  And I know I have several skins that need to be shed.

Someone with a long history of courageous spiritual activism, mystical presence, and religious discipline once said to me that 'the spiritual journey with Jesus is a motherf*****'.  She's a person who knows.  Shedding the skins that cover who I really am, or really want to be (and bearing in mind that sometimes my interpretation of who I really want to be is pretty well hidden under one of my many skins), is a battle not unlike the pain of growing teeth for the first time.  Moving into a new space means leaving an old one behind; opening oneself to the possibility of change for the sake of becoming more human isn't a walk in the park.  The spiritual walk with anyone is a motherf*****.

I've got to head out in a couple of minutes and am trying to find a way to end this post - I'm in two minds about even putting it up, but something in me tells me I should.  The need for caveats and clarifications has the potential to overwhelm the desire to write something meaningful - gotta explain what I mean by 'God', or what I mean by 'skin', or what I mean by 'motherf*****'... And I can't.  I'm not sure how much good it would do if I could - because anyone reading is going to bring their own interpretation to all of this anyway.  So let me just say this: whatever you think about God's Being or otherwise, the notion that Meister Eckhart advanced that we should 'do what we do if we were most secure in love' probably isn't a bad lens through which to view your life today.  I'm in LA right now; and so am about to step out the door into a city of busy traffic, rampant commercialism, and some of the most oppressive opportunities to compare oneself unfavourably to everyone you meet.  I'm not feeling particularly secure.  But in my imagination, something else is possible.

This Week

I've had a lot of feedback about my Naked post; and am happy that it has provoked some conversation.  I'll write more on this theme in the future - please feel free to post comments with suggestions or questions for what you'd like me to explore.  I'm particularly interested in writing about the interaction between spirituality and sexuality; along with the kinds of questions Michael Pollan and others are asking about our relationship to food and psychology. This week I'm in LA til mid-week, speaking yesterday at All Saints Beverly Hills and Risenchurch Santa Monica.  We had some fun talking about spirituality and the body; and today I'm trying to get some writing done before seeing 'The Hurt Locker'.  Kathryn Bigelow's film is being cited as her best  (which is seductive, given that 'Point Break' does what it's trying to do better than most other films of its kind; and that 'Strange Days' took cybertechnology and crime seriously before it became the cliched trope of a hundred bad movies), and one of the tensest experience you could have a in a cinema (which is why I've avoided seeing it yet, not being sure that I'm in the right headspace for a war film whose reputation is built on being the most realistic depiction of combat horror realised for the screen).  But I plan to see it this afternoon; and I'll post about it here; we'll talk about it on The Film Talk soon.