Evil queen wears dreadlocks (and other observations on Narnia the movie)

C.S. Lewis was a close friend of J. R. R. Tolkien and one his staunchest defenders. When "Lord Of the Rings" was getting raked over the coals by the academic establishment for its supposed lack of literary merit (Edmund Wilson called it "balderdash" in a review and Harold Bloom added the choice words "inflated, over-written, tendentious, and moralistic in the extreme") Lewis came to the rescue: "Here are beauties which pierce like swords or burn like cold iron" he wrote in one glowing review, which to this day graces the back-cover of some paperback editions of the book, a relic from the days when book sales still needed a helping hand
such as a favorable New York Times review or a kind word or two from critics to persuade prospective buyers.
In that sense it may have been unfortunate that the movie adoptation of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, first book in the Chronicles series, has followed on the tailcoats of the immensely successfull LOTR movies by Peter Jackson. Unfortunate because LOTR set an extremely high standard in its adoptation of a fantasy novel using modern CGI techniques and Narnia is set up for failure when the inevitable comparisons come up. Before the movie came along, the only features in common were the authors' background, vaguely sharing the genre of medieval fantasy and publication in same decade. (The Ring trilogy was finished in 1949 but not published until 1954 in three volumes, languishing for five years in a dispute between Tolkien and publishing houses. First of the Narnia books was published in the same decade in 1950 and continued until 1956 with the Last Battle.) Along came the movie and it will inspire draw random observations comparing Narnia against LOTR:

• Invented language sounds much better than borrowed phrases from an "exotic" foreign language, especially when you can speak the foreign language in question. Aslan means "lion"in Turkish , and this author knew people who were named Aslan (or Arslan, as the alternative spelling goes) It certainly detracts from the charisma of the main character when the lion has a self-explanatory name such as "lion."By contrast Tolkien invented a whole language for dwarves and elves, complete with an alphabet of runes. This makes it less likely that a dwarf will be named "shorty" in Swahili or an elf go by the name "pointy-eared" in Vietnamese.
  
• Overly simplistic good-evil distinctions help cement the story. Heroes may exhibit character failures or even choke at critical moments, but only if they pay dearly with their life in an act of redemption. Hence Boromir's death trying to save Frodo after he attempted to forcefully take the ring at the end of the Fellowship. In Narnia, the younger brother makes the mistake of siding with the Queen and Aslan himself ends up on the sacrtifical altar after his rescue, only to be followed by a completely undistinguished battle record and no particular redeeming act to speak of. That makes for a very unsatisfactory story development for an audience condition to expect eye-for-an-eye Old Testatement morality.
• Likewise for character development. Frodo and his companions start out uncertain and timid. Owing to ample encouragement and stock-piles of shining weaponry (finest from the Middle Earth armory one can surmis) rise to the occasion and grow into fierce warriors. In Narnia the only thing Peter apparently learns is to brandish his sword at the slightest provacation and strike a comical posture pointing it towards the offending threat, like a parade leader wielding the twirling baton. In the crucial battle with the Queen he does not get the job done and is only saved by Aslan from becoming a frozen statue. That is not exactly the inspirational coming-of-age story that American audiences were looking for.
• CGI quality matters. Because the Queen's army of minions can be best described as second-string orcs who did not make the cut for LOTR and were exported by Sauron at bargain-basement prices to Narnia for a tax break.
• Tilda Swinton (probably the only recognizable name in the cast) as the queen looks an awful lot like Cate Blanchett playing Galadriel in her white dress and majestic appearance. Even the early mannerisms, before the caricaturized villainous behavior surfaces, are very similar between the Queen's deceptive welcome to Edmund coupled with her intimidating aloofness, and Galadriel addressing Frodo in the Elven forest. Compare this still from Fellowship and this one from Narnia.
  

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Intelligent litigation: court rejects teaching ID in classroom

Are science wars heating up again? A full decade after the skirmish between post-modernists and scientific community neatly captured by Alan Sokal's spoof article published in Social Text, another chapter begins, in the unlikely settting of the courtroom. For a change, the credibility of science survived intact this time. Concluding the year on a positive note for rationalists, a federal judge ruled unambiguously against Pennsylvania school district that voted to teach intelligent design theory along side evolution in classrooms.

"To be sure, Darwin's theory of evolution is imperfect. However, the fact that a scientific theory cannot yet render an explanation on every point should not be used as a pretext to thrust an untestable alternative hypothesis grounded in religion into the science classroom or to misrepresent well-established scientific propositions."

The lawsuit was brought up by concerned parents. Apparently the 135 page decision, concluding that ID violates first amendment because it is not science, included some choice words for the defendants.

"It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy."

Sanity prevailed in the short term, but this is unlikely to be the last word on the controversy. Last Sunday New York Times reviewed Chris Mooney's recent book which fires another salvo in the battle over the objectivity of science and its susceptibility to manipulation by stake-holders.
This prescient Onion headline says it all: next up is the battle over "intelligent falling" which attempts to explain the gaps in gravitation theory.

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Here's looking at you, MPAA

Slightly older vintage story, but still worth commenting on since we are now officially entering the season for "serious" movies that will be contending for the Oscars. (NYT's A. O. Scott has lamented this clustering of major pictures towards the end of the year to jockey for better position in the race for Oscars, but that is another story.)

Apprently MPAA is getting very meta about its rating system, which may have been inspired by Fight Club: "The first rule of MPAA ratings is, you don't talk about MPAA ratings."
One documentary which crossed that unspoken line by turning the camera on the system is being silenced-- using, of course the rating system itself. In principle the dreaded NC-17 rating means in plain terms that no one under 17 is admitted, according to MPAA website. In reality, getting slapped with NC-17 all but dooms the picture to a few small art-house theaters catering to confirmed independent movie fans only. Apparently larger chains will not carry NC-17 movies and video stores such as Blockbuster and Hollywood will not stock it. But that's partly because NC-17 designation is a euphemism coined relatively recently, explains this helpful article on the MPAA website:

"Second, we changed the name of the X category to NC-17:NO ONE 17 AND UNDER ADMITTED. The X rating over the years appeared to have taken on a surly meaning in the minds of many people, a meaning that was never intended when we created the system. Therefore, we chose to reaffirm the original intent of the design we installed on November 1, 1968, in which this "adults only" category explicitly describes a movie that most parents would want to have barred to viewing by their children. That was and is our goal, nothing more, nothing less."

And the author of these words reflecting the insider perspective? Why, none other than Mr. Jack Valenti himself who personally oversaw the rating wing of MPAA himself for many years during his tenure.

In all fairness there is a logic to this self-regulation scheme. Many other industries have faced a similar crisis at one point when angry politicians rattled their sabers, accusing an entire sector of corrupting the social fabric and threatening regulation. (Witness the steroid controversy for MLB.) Response to such accusations takes two forms. First there is the overt publicity campaign, with happy faces renewing their commitment to all apple pie issues. More subtle and effective is the second approach: using the lobbying arm for advocating a regime of self-regulation. This movie has a happy ending: self-governance rules are voluntarily adopted by the industry, enforcement beurocracy is created, stiffling innovation and restricting consumer choice. All parties declare victory and go home. Far reaching rhetoric notwithstanding, MPAA labelling system serves one objective: reducing the liability of movie studios against lawsuits and constant interference in business operations. Prominent disclaimers allow passing the blame. More than an informational label, the rating is a "caveat emptor" designed to indemnify the studios against any claim of damages (such as annihilation of the social fabric, whatever that means) resulting from movie attendance. From that perspective, the rating system is rational and probably successful. Decline in quality of the output and editorial meddling in artistic process are lower priorities.

In this case the ratings were assigned without context. One would expect that a documentary on ratings would include examples drawn from other movies, demonstrating how a particular depiction of a subject influences the rating. Does not mean the documentary is "guilty by citation," automatically qualifying for the strictest label assigned to any of the snippets? To put that in perspective, this places an obscure documentary, scheduled to air on IFC channel on cable, in the same rarefied company as Bernardo Bertolucci's "Last Tango In Paris," Nagisa Oshima's "In the realm of the senses" and the B-horror movie cult classic "Evil Dead," not to mention adoptations of literary classics such as The Tropic of Cancer and Arabian Nights. MPAA offers a convenient search engine on their website to locate movies by title and ratings, with links to the IMDB entry. Crowning the irony is the title of the documentary, itself now ringing with renewed sarcasm about the rating system: "This film is not yet rated."
Well, it is rated now and we might add: "not coming to a theater near you (anytime soon.)"

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Publishing and movie production: tail wagging the dog

It used to be that successfull books created successful movies. Producers sought out successful #novels for adoption in the hope that some subset of readers would be drawn to the movie. Today the trend may have reversed and publishers now count on the movie to increase sales of the print version. First sign is that as soon as the movie begins screening in theaters, an updated version of the book hits the shelves, with more or less identical content but newly revised glossy cover showing a still from the movie, bearing the face of a celebrity actors/actress and subtitled "... now a major motion pictures from "

As for the more objective evidence, here is a peek at the New York Times best sellers list:
Memoirs of a Geisha is #2 on the paper-back fiction side, Jarhead is #4 among paper-back non-fiction, followed by an autobiography of Johnny Cash at #6 spot, no doubt enjoying new-found popularity on the coat-tails of Walk The Line and official illustrated companion to The Chronicles of Narnia movie at #11. (If we expand our scope to consider made-for-TV material, there is also the strange coincidence that the first volume of Bob Dylan's Chronicles occupying the 9th spot has made it into the list around the same time as the release of Martin Scorcese's documentary.) Hard-cover titles appear to be less influenced by the latest Hollywood extravaganza (surely "Our endangered values" by Jimmy Carter could make for an exciting comedy) but Dan Brown's runaway success Da Vinci Code could change that since the trailer for the movie due out in 2006 is already showing in theaters.

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Bird's eye view maps from WindowsLive

GasWorks park on Lake Union:
Permalink
(Permalink works but directly linking to the image from WindowsLive does not.)

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Walking the line

Long before Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith dressed up in black suits for the movie adoptation, before even Lowell Cunningham had a glimpse of creating the comics series Men In Black, there was The Man In Black, Johnny Cash.
Walk The Line is a great tribute to the man and his music, reminiscent of Ray. In fact there are striking parallels in the plot development: an early childhood turn-saw accident kills Cash's brother, marking him for life in much the same way as his brother's drowning would remain with Ray Charles. In both cases the life of the travelling musician takes its toll, miring each in drug addiction, associated denial and failing relationships.
Joaquin Phoenix as Cash and Reese Witherspoon as the object of his affections, June Carter, are remarkable-- both have performed all the vocals in the movie. Phoenix conveys the mannerisms of Cash with authenticity, but never crossing the line into becoming a Johnny Cash-impersonator straight out of Vegas. Meanwhile Witherspoon who grew up in Tenessee and played a member of the Carter family in a high-school play is in her element when playing the understated June and representing the contrast between her composed stage persona and emotional personal life, struggling under Cash's shadow as a musician even their multiple-year courtship continued on and off stage.
There is a quirk in the plot structure-- it starts out at the Folsom prison, the site of the legendary 1968 concern. Inmates are clapping away while the band plays their introduction on stage, Cash still waiting in the wood-working shop that doubles as backstage, staring at a turn-saw. Cut, rewind 30 years to the chronological beginning of the story: carefree childhood, grisly death of brother (favored son in the family,) enlisting in the air-force, passing the time playing the guitar while stationed in Germany, that critical audition where the producer asks what he would play if were lying in a ditch about to die and had only one song left. Along the way paths cross with other stars: Elvis sets an example for pill-popping but Cash is wise enough to recognize the up-and-coming talent in folk singer Dylan. After recovering from his drug addiction, Cash returns to the record company and defiantly announces his intention to record live at Folsom prison. That is where the threads in the movie converge, inexorably drawn to the prison where much of the fan mail originates for this artist who never quite shook off the guilt for that childhood accident, whose lyrics speak of outlaws doing time, aching for freedom. (Cash himself maintained a very clean record for the most part-- his stern father commented characteristically on the only time he was behind bars for a drug arrest: "At least he won't have to try so hard to convince people he was in jail.")
But the movie continues after a rousing performance of "Cocaine Blues," also on the sound-track album. Incidentally viewer are also treated to the strange inspiration behind title track: an infuriated June Carter throwing beer bottles at an intoxicated Cash and fellow musicians jamming before a performance as she says: "You can't even walk the line."

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Dropping 60 degrees in one day

One of the few occasion for accomplishing this is flying from Orlando, FL to Chicago IL on Thanksgiving day. Farewell to Florida on a sunny afternoon with temperatures reaching into the upper 70s. Hello Chicago, a chilly 20 degrees, windy and lows forecast in the mid-teens.

New wireless spot discovery: Cafe Ambrosia, in Evanston near Northwestern University. Two story place, spacious with plenty of room between tables, comfortable couches around a fireplace and an extended counter space against the window. Hits all the right notes, very respectable espresso and open until midnight. In short, the perfect alternative for a college town-- Unicorn and Kaffeine are not the only game in town any longer.

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Verizon's war against free wireless hotspots

In an attempt to promote its broadband internet access over cellular network, Verizon Wireless is next taking on free hotspots. (First target, far more controversial, was free access provided by municipalities which also competes with their land-based broadband business.)
An inane TV commercial features an unfortunate soul attempting to work at a cafe with his laptop, hounded alternately by careless waiters bumping into his shoulder, curious patrons at next table attempting to shoulder-surf his monitor and tin-eared musician/troubadour singing . All this adds up to less than a "hot spot," Verizon informs us. Instead we are all encouraged to join the career which bills itself as the best wireless network in the nation, break free of the tyranny of independent cafes and use mobile phones for access. Never mind that the bandwidth is not even close, battery lifetime on the phone will suffer, incoming calls may not be supported during that time and it counts towards plan minutes.

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Westgate cafe expands wireless access options for Chicago

Another addition to the small list of cafes in Chicago offering Internet access by wireless: Westgate Cafe, at the intersetion Madison and Sangamon St in the Westgate neighborhood.
About a dozen tables for two, plus one large work area and two comfortable leather sofas for camping out. Child friendly space, and board games available.
At a time when other establishments are going to strange time constrained or per-purchase access control for metering Internet usage, it is good to see this business model continue to thrive.

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Someone comes to town

The protagonist in Cory Doctorow's "Eastern Standard Tribe" starts out the novel committed to an asylum. As the gripping plot development shows, he is not crazy: his institutionalization only proves once again the conspiracy of DSM-IV wielding psychiatrists adopting the definition of mental illness to suppress creative dissent in society, enforce uniformity of opinion etc. (One imagines that every literary critique of this science-fiction work must include some favorite reference to Cuckoo's Nest, Blue/Orange or any other story exploring the socially constructed nature of mental ilness.) On the other hand, the hero in his new book "Someone comes to town, someone leaves town" starts out freely roaming the streets of Toronto and renovating a new house when he is certifiably insane and in need of clozapine. Alan's strange concept of family includes a mountain for father, washing-machine for mother and nested Russian-dolls for siblings. Story telling alternates between these strange flashbacks to an unusual childhood and realistic depiction of events from contemporary life, complete with gadget references. (Setting up wireless network is one of Alan's first tasks in the new dwelling.) Having only read first 50 pages, it is not clear where this schizophrenic narrative will go and whether it will soon resolve itself into Freudian metaphors, but the reading is becoming difficult as the past gets tangled with the present and Alan's neighbour turns out to have wings coming out of her back, quite literally.

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