Werner Herzog: 'Encounters at the End of the World' (2007)

Another stellar documentary by Werner Herzog: Encounters at the End of the World (2007). In it, we are led to meet various workers and other denizens of Antarctica. 

After seeing this, when I think of Antarctica, I dream these and similar images, many of them haunting -- a very strange and compelling impact: why I dig Herzog.

Memorable footage includes people, equipment, research stations, stunning under-the-ice sweeps, seals, bizarre below surface seal communications, penguins, a volcano, and ice-caves created by volcanic fumaroles. 

Herzog always seems to find the strange wherever he goes. Here, Antarctic neophytes awkwardly train for whiteout conditions by wearing plastic boxes over their heads. 

And here, a lone penguin heads into exile. By free choice or through some kind of madness? Herzog wonders.  

Encounters at the End of the World delivers on the promise of its title. It's dedicated to film critic Roger Ebert (1942-2013). 

Today's Rune: The Self. 

Of "Tipping Points" and "Black Swan Events"

Started in on Nassim Nicholas Taleb's The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable (2007, 2010+) and am thinking how it seems to dovetail in some ways with Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (2000) and Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking (2005). Love this stuff. I'm not the only one by a long shot. In San Francisco, for example, had a fun discussion with a shrewd Filipino taxi driver about his favorite book -- Blink.

Initial response. A couple of recent watershed moments seem like the culmination of long slogging culminating in sudden shifts: LGBT marriage rights (in the USA and globally) and the removal of the Confederate battleflag from government buildings in the USA. These are the result of tipping points -- not complete shocks, but still surprising after seeing only incremental change  over many years.

Black Swan Events seem more "out of the blue." Two examples: one, the sudden plunge in gasoline/petrol prices in late 2014 from which such prices still have yet to "recover;" two, the sudden end to a depressing five year drought in Texas just this past May (2015). 

The drop in gas prices was wild. The follow-up question is, how did various people and groups respond to this change? 

The wild spike in rain in Texas was an even bigger surprise. True, climate change models have long suggested wild fluctuations in historical climate patterns, locally and regionally. However, no one to my knowledge could or did predict with any exactness what happened in the large area in and around Texas. Indeed, it was called a "one in two thousand year event" (when in fact, due to climate change, it may become a one in two year event -- maybe). 

Late spring flooding in Texas was a disaster for many, but overall, such heavy rains suddenly providing a dramatic reprieve to drought conditions is worth noting and remembering in the future. Here, it's generally better to have too much "fresh" water than not enough. There is some general prediction that California might also be rained out because of the formation of El Niño, which if it materializes would provide a tipping point against the current drought, if not (because of fairly detailed models) exactly a Black Swan Event. 

Cool to ponder. What other kinds of tipping points and Black Swan Events have people noticed lately?

Today's Rune: The Self. 

'Tamara de Lempicka, 1898-1980: Goddess of the Automobile Age'

Gilles Néret's Tamara de Lempicka, 1898-1980: Goddess of the Automobile Age (Cologne: Taschen, 2011; originally published in 2007) presents Lempicka -- the person and the artist -- catapulting through the 1920s and 1930s, then escaping to North America just ahead of the Second World War -- with a rich husband in tow. Exuding incredible chutzpah, she became an Ingres for the Auto Age -- that is, she painted in an Art Deco style inspired by French Neo-Classicist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867), with bold human forms and metallic trim.

Of Lempicka's persona, Néret observes that she "was a dandy, comparable to Beau Brummel or . . . Countess Greffulhe . . . model for Marcel Proust's Duchess de Guermantes. She had that certain something which made her manner so delicious . . . so assured that her distinguished superiority imposed itself without any prompting . . ." (page 14).  

Lempicka, Woman in a Yellow Dress, 1929

Chapter titles give a sense of the rest:

Cool, Disconcerting Beauty: this Woman is Free . . .
La Belle Polonaise
The Art of the Caesars
Bedtime Stories: the Beautiful Young Woman and the Ugly Old Dwarf*
Success: Money and Title
"She is such fun, and her pictures are so amusing"
*Infamous Italian poet, Gabriele D'Annunzio (1863-1938).

Lempicka, The Musician, 1929

Lempicka was an exemplar of the 1920s and 1930s in her creations of colorful, exciting artworks that people immediately wanted to acquire and display. In this context: "The whole era bears the stamp of the post-cubism of the Twenties and the neo-classicism of the Thirties . . . Tamara's women fit perfectly into their epoch, an epoch of luxury and ease for the rich, and of extreme distress for the rest" (page 31). 

Lempicka, Young Ladies, 1927

Today's Rune: Protection. 

Wong Kar-wai: My Blueberry Nights

Wong Kar-wai's My Blueberry Nights (2007) takes us on a zen-fueled journey across the USA with Elizabeth-Lizzie-Beth (Norah Jones), from intersections with characters played by Jude Law, Rachel Weisz, Frankie Faison, David Strathaim and Natalie Portman. 

In My Blueberry Nights, Norah Jones takes the pensive role while Rachel Weisz and Natalie Portman enjoy the fun parts.

A lovely indie-style adventure about identity and social awareness through "the mythical American landscape" -- I liked it.  

Today's Rune: Journey. 

Annie Leibovitz: Life Through a Lens

Annie Leibovitz: Life Through a Lens (2006-2008) is an excellent, rewarding documentary written and directed by Barbara Leibovitz; it previously aired as part of the PBS American Masters series. This one bears repeat viewing, because behind the lustre of star power, there's a lot to absorb about the Leibovitz family milieu, Annie's intense relationship with Susan Sontag (1933-2004), and interesting tips about photography and music. Annie Leibovitz has not just found herself in the right place at the right time -- she deploys herself, positions and places herself, finds her way into the action with great initiative and skill. 

A lot to learn, indeed, but on the first run, I thoroughly enjoyed the footage involving Rolling Stone, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Hunter S. Thompson, The Rolling Stones, Patti Smith, Chris Rock, and even the cover of The Jim Carroll Band's Catholic Boy. Everything's connected -- I loved it, right down to the weaving in of "2000 Man," a lesser known gem penned by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards that was released by The Stones in 1967 -- and also used in Wes Anderson's sly film Bottle Rocket (1996).  

Today's Rune: Wholeness.  

Breakfast at the Exit Café: Take 2

In Breakfast at the Exit Café: Travels Through America (Vancouver, B.C.: Greystone Books, 2010, 2011), Wayne Grady and Merilyn Simonds take their readers across the USA in the months spanning 2006 and 2007. Their West-to-East road trip was so eerily similar to one I'd taken in my twenties that reading it brought me great joy. Here were two Canadians looking at some of the same highways and byways, but with an international slant. I'm still learning much from their perspective, even when wanting to set the record straight from time to time.

For starters, let's take up distinctions between Canadian English and American English: they are sometimes subtle but always there. This I find fascinating. For example, after a restaurant meal, Wayne goes to "the cash," which had me wonder, what do Americans call that motion? "I'm going up to pay," "I'll settle the bill," "I'll be up at the cash register," "Check, please"?  Cash register sounds so ancient, maybe because it goes back to the 1870s, if not earlier.

Another example. The authors describe traveling along highways like "the I-40;" most Americans, I think, would call it taking or driving on "I-40," dropping the article. 

And another observation. Grady and Simonds note how signs and actual latter day names for places in the USA tend to have dropped little things like apostrophes. I first noticed this phenomenon myself at Harpers Ferry -- formerly Harper's Ferry -- West Virginia.

On the other hand, sometimes they go too far, as in remarking that Americans call all sodas "Cokes." While it's true that some do call sodas Coke, it's equally true that some call soda soda, and some call it pop, and some call it soft drink. Another thing they're mistaken about: regional dialects are not being effaced by TV and radio. There is still plenty of variation and, if one listens carefully enough, you can usually figure out where a person hails from, has lived, or even where their parents came from (depending on age and time of arrival to new geographic point). Philadelphia speak is distinct from Boston speak, Atlanta speak is distinct from Charleston, South Carolina speak. And so on. Maybe not as distinct as, say, between French-speaking Québec and an English as first language neighborhood in Toronto, but certainly variations endure and evolve. 

Finally, is it fair or accurate to make this statement, as Wayne does? "Americans don't seem all that interested in anything but themselves" (page 313). This may be true of some, even many, but certainly not all or even most Americans. To be fair in turn, he says this to Merilyn after hurtfully noting also near the end of their two-month journey across the USA: "I can't remember anyone who asked us about Canada."

Today's Rune: Protection.   

Amy Winehouse: Back to Black

Fare thee well, Amy Winehouse -- the real deal. A great talent. Prayers for Norway, as well. RIP.




Today's Rune: Possessions.

Inside Job

I thought this would be a drag, but Charles H. Ferguson's Inside Job (2010) turns out to be exciting and even riveting in its unfolding. I was surprised by the strength of its visuals (main cinematography by Svetlana Cvetko and Kalyanee Mam, editing by Chad Beck and Adam Bolt) and prologue set in Iceland (with stunning, beautiful footage from the 2009 Icelandic film Draumalandið), and the clarity of the narrative, setting up as it does the 2008 global financial meltdown and its immediate aftermath into 2010. 

Before I make any further observations, I'd love to hear from anyone else who has seen this fine documentary.

Today's Rune: Fertility.   

Smoke Signals

Above shot: poster for a 2007 screening of Chris Eyre's Smoke Signals (1998), based on parts of Sherman Alexie's interconnected short story collection The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven (1993).  My sister Linda was among the panelists discussing it. Seeing this on a tour of her office at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro recently thrilled me, not only because I like the movie and the book, but also because I've included both in Macomb College English classes -- yeah, synchronicity! Ideal for class discussions and response essays. Highly recommended.

Another good indie film with overlapping themes is Jonathan Wacks' Powwow Highway (1989), based on David Seals' novel The Powwow Highway (1979). Seals also wrote a sequel to the novel and movie, Sweet Medicine (1992).

Today's Rune: Wholeness.     

The White Stripes: Under Great White Northern Lights

Emmett Malloy's The White Stripes Under Great White Northern Lights (2009/2010) catches The White Stripes Canadian Tour of 2007, covering "every province and territory in Canada," as Jack White notes early on in the film. What one glimpses through an artful mix of red, black & white and full color scenes is how the duo relates to each other and to other people. Jack White, never at a loss for words, usually has something big to say; by contrast, every word muttered softly by Meg White usually renders a quiet revelation. They are like a Slim Harpo song made flesh: "Strange love . . . You remind me of something / That I have seen in a dream" ("Strange Love," 1957). For some reason, Jack still makes it seem as if Meg is his sister, rather than his ex-wife.

The tour scenes blend "side shows" in smaller offbeat venues with somewhat larger ones, mostly with a retro look and feel. There's some first generation style heavy metal a la Led Zeppelin, some sonic blues, some odd little ballads, some thrashing drums and some anarchic jangling guitar chords. It's all there, and best absorbed at a high volume with surround sound.

In the film, three songs best represent the band and the White-White relationship, I think: their covers of Dolly Parton's "Jolene" (1973) and Son House's "Death Letter Blues" (1930/1960) and finally, their own "White Moon" from Get Behind Me Satan (2005).

It does not come as a shock that The White Stripes broke up just days ago. Since the movie was shot, Meg White married Patti and Sonic Smith's son, Jackson; two years before the movie was shot, Jack White married Karen Elson in Brazil. Presumably, Jack and Meg remain "siblings" even if no longer halves of the same band.  

The White Stripes Under Great White Northern Lights takes us on a kind of backdoor tour of Canada, showing more good will between Americans and Canadians than I've seen in any other format. The music on this tour is almost as sprawling and daunting to absorb as Exile on Main Street (The Rolling Stones, 1972) and Physical Graffiti (Led Zeppelin, 1975). As Michael Angelo Tata puts it regarding Andy Warhol, so it is probably true of The White Stripes: "Consuming Warhol is an impossibility. There is always more Andy."*  There will always be more of The White Stripes, too, I suspect.

*Andy Warhol: Sublime Superficiality (intertheory press, 2010), p. 7.



Today's Rune: Flow.