The Spotlight

Spotlight

Now is the time before Oscars and my local cinema program is richer than usually. As the result, I have seen more films in the recent times than earlier.  I have seen The Danish Girl and my personal Oscar for the best actor goes to Eddie Redmayne. I am also rating costumes in Carol and The Danish Girl equal first.  

         

 esterday, I have seen The Spotlight and I am moved and even angry. I do not think that the film itself is artistically particularly significant, but the message is of great value, in my opinion. It is an eye opening message; I hope it opens those eyes that would prefer to be closed on what is happening in the Catholic Church.  I may be reacting to the film stronger than I normally do or maybe I should, but it touches my personal experience. No, I was not molested, but I was hurt in my feelings by the clergy and I was confused by evident hypocrisy when I was very young and forming my views on what is good and what not.

Rotten Tomatoes says : “SPOTLIGHT tells the riveting true story of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Boston Globe investigation that would rock the city and cause a crisis in one of the world's oldest and most trusted institutions. When the newspaper's tenacious "Spotlight" team of reporters delves into allegations of abuse in the Catholic Church, their year-long investigation uncovers a decades-long cover-up at the highest levels of Boston's religious, legal, and government establishment, touching off a wave of revelations around the world.”

The film shows bluntly that the church is guilty of crimes of molesting children, hiding it, condoning future crimes even by the same people, protecting the criminals and allowing them to continue preaching on morality. To me this is horrible and unfortunately, I do not think much will change in my life time.  So, I am angry. I hope many more people will get angry and maybe the situation will change eventually.

                                        

My personal experience turned me against the Catholic Church, but people need spirituality in their lives. I know, I do. So the disappointed, disillusioned and hurt ones need a new religion or at least a new belief. I found some affinity in Buddhism, but I was brought up as a catholic and it was rather painful to be forced to find an alternative. I was still lucky that I was excommunicated after a divorce and   was forced to find a new way. Otherwise I may have been as so many others shutting my eyes on the church hypocrisy and crimes. So many people defend themselves from losing their false spiritual support by doing that.  In my case I was literally thrown out of the church and humiliated in front of people who were at the time of my confession in the church. It was just horrible. What I still have problems with is that I was offered a “better deal” by a church representative in Sydney. Does that mean that rules change from country to country? In the same church? Or that they sometimes change over the years? The last eventuality may be acceptable. Anyhow, I have decided not to take a better offer as far communion after a divorce is concerned and now simply believe in honesty, kindness, integrity and few other things. Something like my personal religion and faith in goodness.

Back to movies, I rate Carol 6 out of 10, The Danish Girl 7 out of 10 and Spotlight 7 out of 10. 

P.S. I have read many positive reviews on The Spotlight since I wrote my original post.  The last Sunday the film received four Satellite Awards of International Press Academy including the best picture. Looks that my personal opinion does not agree with the general one and the film is nominated also for a number of Oscar awards including the best film, Mark Ruffalo as actor in supporting role, Rachel McAdams as actress in supporting role, directing, film editing and original screenplay. Even though I mainly focused on the subject of the film, I am happy that others have not been blinded as I possibly was.

My Bridge Adventure

This is not going to be about Sydney Harbour Bridge or any other construction but about the card game.  Quite coincidentally, a couple of years ago, I joined the local bridge club – Trumps. It was on recommendation of my neighbour who used the membership of the club to get cheaper travel insurance. Since I was about to travel I thought – why not… and I joined the club not intending to play. The insurance deal worked well.

As it sometimes happens, a coincidence may lead to something important. This is how it was this time. I used to play bridge when I was a student and then life happened. Marriage, changing countries, intensive work, setting a home, then setting another home… There was no time for bridge and nobody around me was interested in card games. I always loved cards so I played patience from time to time. And now I was a member of a bridge club and even got regular information on club activities. One day I thought, why not pay a visit to the club and find out what is going on there. I have been paying for being a member, after all.

I started to play as a beginner and realized that I do not know much about the game. It is not a rubber game that I knew years ago but something called duplicate bridge. The rules of play and behaviour are very different to the ones I remembered. But most of all bidding is done in a totally different way to the one I once practiced. It started as a confusing fun. For a year, I played once or twice a week not having a regular partner. My game was not to bad, I still remembered few things and using logic helped as well. For bidding I used my own convention called common sense and this of course is not type of bridge one plays in clubs. I did not know the language of bidding and I still know very little of it, but I am on my way to learn.

We stayed in Waldorf Leura Gardens. Nice old fashioned place.

                                     

Few weeks ago I came across information about a bridge holiday in Blue Mountains and again I thought - why not… I asked the club director if my current bridge level will be sufficient and if a lack of a partner would make me unsuitable and I got re-assurance that I will be fine and welcome. He is a very kind man. When I started to assess my move I got cold feet but my shy tries to get out of the deal met with reassurance that I will be fine. So, last week I went to Leura being very nervous. The nervousness was fully justified and in fact it was harder than I had expected. I managed, but the feeling of inadequacy was overwhelming and justified. The gap between me and the rest of the players was enormous. I guess it was OK in a spinach type of way. It did not taste decent but it was good for me. I was aware that at times I did not understand what I was told (in the bidding language) and that my answers were often surprising and confusing. I had my better moments when my brain was not cooked to destruction, but they were not that frequent.

On positive side, being exhausted I slept very well each night.

Have I learned a lot of bridge in the process? Not really, but I have learned a lot of bridge etiquette and made a good plan how to keep learning. I also met a lot of great people and found out things about Australians and their life style. I especially liked people from the country. Old fashioned, in the best way, type of people. Kind, down to earth, straight forward, with great sense of humour and, I would imagine, honest and trustworthy.

This is how I spent four days. Hmm...

                                     

But the most positive outcome is being invited as a bridge partner. My club is divided into two rooms. One for beginners as myself and one for bridge grown ups. I have been playing in the kindergarten but now, to my delight,  once a week I will be paying with a very charming lady and a good bridge player as an intermediate. I am thrilled and very proud.

I have jumped into deep water but I have not sunk. This is some kind of achievement even if my ego was seriously bruised.

David Copperfield

I have been going a lot to movies lately and I even have a backlog in writing about the ones that I have seen and that made an impression on me. I would like to sort out my thinking by writing about the films. Writing brings clarity to my, at times, convoluted thoughts.

In addition to liking movies I love reading. I started the year with one of the books on lists of the greatest books ever.  My pick was The Personal History of David Copperfield. It was rather a strange choice as I had never been attracted to Dickens even if I know most of the stories but mainly from films. In Poland Dickens was not mandatory as school reading, so I missed it in my young years. Maybe I read Great Expectations early on, I do not quite remember. Obviously it did not make a memorable impression. So, I thought that it is time to catch up with English classics. There was a need to get a copy of the book and luckily I found a second hand shop run by a lovely lady and a little King Charles spaniel, Hugo. The shop is called Love Vintage Books and specializes in children literature. I just found that the shop has its Face Book presence https://www.facebook.com/LoveVintageBooks/. It looks that there are many interesting things going on in the shop. I will follow the shop in the future.

The book I bought was published by Oxford University Press and is lovely. The whole book s in one small volume, printed on over 800 very thin pages in a small print, almost too small to read comfortably. I love it! It has been my companion this month and I will be sad to part with it. This will happen today as I have only twenty or so pages to finish. After being lately exposed to so much violence and cruelty in films, the book has been a positive element bringing gentleness and high moral values to my days.

When I told my Polish friend, who happens to teach literature in a school near Warsaw, that I am reading David Copperfield he laughed and said – Oh, probity will mark now your life big way. And this is true, I love the feeling that all good people will at the end get their rewards and all bad ones will be punished for their wicked deeds. I realized that even if I did not read David Copperfield in my childhood, I read books with similar messages and I grew up believing in the world being good and honest. That made me perhaps a bit idealistic, or a lot?

I am very impressed by the book, it kept my attention on the story and I read all descriptions of landscapes, weather and divagations of Mr.Micawber with interest and without skipping a line.

In spite of the story happening in the XIXth century it is  current in psychological sense and life lessons still apply. It is a wise book. One pronouncement of an older wise person saying “There can not be disparity in marriage, like unsuitability of mind and purpose” made me stop and think for a while and it put new light on some events I observed and experienced. Poor Dora had to die for David’s “first mistaken impulse of and undisciplined heart” for the story to maintain integrity of David and happy end of the book. There was a great disparity of mind and purpose between the two lovers. Their hearts were still undisciplined.

                             

So what do I like best about the book? Of course, the integrity of the message, clarity of what is good and what is bad in human actions and motives, the story itself, the beautiful language, psychology of describing characters, their actions and motivation. Everything really.

I intend to continue with recommendations of the lists of the best books ever but may take a break for something more contemporary like Knausgaard or Donna Tartt. Then it will be Stendhal - The Red and the Black.  But first I will re-read Missing Out by Adam Phillips, the book recommended by Ramana whose comments motivate me to write my posts. This is not a book to read on a bus or in short bursts. I need to give it my full attention and quiet uninterrupted time. 

Memorable Australia Days

                               

One of the most significant days in my life was the Australia Day of 1979. I must confess that until this particular day I was not aware of the 26^th of January being a holiday. But on the day I and my husband landed at Mascot to start calling Australia home. We were tired after the 30 hours flight, a bit anxious about how this new life is going to be for us, but generally, very positive and happy. Definitely a good New Beginning! It was a cool day and we were expecting 40 degrees plus! Since we were coming from a very cold weather in Frankfurt, minus 20 or close to it, I had my marten coat with me and I even put it on to free my hands for luggage collection. It was the only time I had this coat on in Australia, but at the time I thought that some stories about the Australian weather are not all that accurate.

The natives were very friendly and took care of the couple of migrants warmly and well. As our prior arrangements did not work out as planned we took the offer of an migration officer who waited for us at the airport to take us to the Endeavour  Migrant Hostel at Coogee. It was great, we got our own little flat with a little kitchen, and we only needed to share the communal bathroom. A woman in a marten coat must have looked really strange in Sydney summer staying at the hostel for migrants. But, boy, what a happy day it was! I will always remember this Australia Day very fondly.

The second memorable Australia Day was in 1985. This was the day when I officially became an Australian. It took a very sad event for me to feel that my links with Poland are broken. My mother’s death. I was then free to change my country officially and in my heart. Australia welcomed me again.

The North Sydney council organized a ceremony for new Australians. It was a reception, pictures, certificates and souvenirs. I was moved.  For many, many years I felt exclusively Australian and did not think much about Poland. I did not meet Poles so I did not speak the language and I had very seldom contacts with family and friends in Poland.   

When I was asked about my nationality due to my “charming” accent, I was typically a bit irritated and my answer was: Australian, I only sound funny. Since then my contacts with Poland got much closer and now I have two home countries in my heart and two passports to show for it. At times I feel a bit confused about my identity.

The third Australia Day I remember well was in 2009. It was the thirties anniversary of me coming to live here. I thought that it would be good to visit Coogee on the day. I traveled a long time on a bus to get there, but I could not find the old hostel for migrants. It may not even exist any more; so many years have passed… 

I have not planned anything special for today except for small self indulgence of doing things I like. Reading, writing this post, watching tennis, planning etc. Agnieszka Radwanska gave me a little present with her victory and qualifying to the semifinal of the Australian Open. I have stuck a little Australian flag, complements of the local council, in my geranium pot and feel that I am a celebrating Australian.

The Hateful Eight

I have seen the film! And I am happy that I got courageous at the end. I perhaps made too much of a deal out of my little dilemma. The Revenant was  difficult for me to such an extent that I lost perspective for a while. Maybe it makes The Revenant a good film, definitely a powerful one, but I did not like it. Tarantino is different, maybe not everybody’s cup of tea and there is a lot of blood in his films but he is definitely my cup of tea, however strange it seems and  blood in his films does not seem real, so it does not bother me, strangely enough.

I have seen The Hateful Eight in the Ultra Panavision 70mm Roadshow. A lot about such screening is more technical than I would like to spend time on to fully understand, but the big screen made an impression on me. It seems strange that in the 1950s and 60s some films were made using this technique and then it was stopped. I also liked the musical overture to start the show, an intermission between the acts and a souvenir program. And no ads or shorts before screening. They are all features of an old fashion roadshow.

Since it is rather hot in Sydney those days, I chose a midday session to cool off in an air-conditioned cinema. The cinema was not full, but there were more people than usually at such an early time and the audience was somehow different to what can be seen other times. A number of young men who came on their own was rather unusual to see, but for some reason I liked it.

What about the film? Fantastic story with almost Agatha Christie suspension right up to the end.  Sense of humour that resonates with me. I only wished for subtitles as I missed some dialogues delivered in strong accents. The performance of all the actors was absolutely splendid; I cannot even pick who I liked best. Maybe Samuel L. Jackson? Really hateful. Or Jennifer Jason Leigh? Really awful. Or The Hangman – Kurt Russell?

              

                                                                                                         

I know that I may seem a bit strange to some and I understand it, but it looks that I am really converted to Tarantino’s ways. There was not a moment in the three hours of the screening that I would feel bored. And the music of Ennio Morricone! Brilliant.

During the credits displayed at the end of the film Tarantino teases us with Orbison’s song There Won’t be Many Coming Home and the song fits so well the ending of the film.

I have been thinking about the film quite a lot, it left a strong impression on me and a desire to see it again. Maybe even more than once. I also read some reviews, most of them very complimentary. Obviously Tarantino has many followers of his unusual talent even if film industry does not spoil him with awards.

In addition to Tarantino’s special sense of humour, great acting, fantastic story to the last scene full of surprises, music and photography the film carries also a profound message. Using terms from some of the reviews it places a mirror in front of America. Hateful Eight represent hateful characteristic of American people. This must be difficult to take. I felt really uncomfortable watching the scene of the Confederate General Sandy Smithers expressing his conviction and views on Yankees. The n word was flying high and often. I could hardly believe I was hearing it right. One of The Confederate quote is : “ According to the Yankees, it’s a free country”. Well, Gone with the Wind does not look that pretty any more.

                                           
                                       
My very subjective rating 10 out of 10. 

To see or not to see

My little Hamletish divagations concern only the issue of going to movies to see The Hateful Eight or not. The Revenant used my patience and tolerance for watching violence. It is going to be more of it in the Tarantino’s new film. After all there are eight hateful people being heroes of the film. And Tarantino likes blood dripping from the screen.

Yet, I am hesitating. I have two or three days to make my decision as if I see the film I want it to be the 70mm version. I do not fully understand what the plus of such version is, but I understand some and want the whole intended effect.

                         

The reason for me considering such a trivial issue is my introduction to Tarantino’s films. It was more than 10 years ago when I was making a significant change in my life. Moving to Poland, becoming a part of a new family. All together one of my favourite concept of a new beginning. This typically brings new hopes, new dreams and temporary distortion of reality. For me it was also going back to my intellectual Polish roots after a lifetime of corporate and personal achievements. Even before I landed in Gdansk with my earthly goods and my little dog Kiki, I was told that I will need to see Pulp Fiction, the best film ever. I obviously had a lot to catch up with as I had never heard the name Tarantino before. So, soon after my arrival I was set in front of TV set (no popcorns, but a glass of sweet, herbal vodka confusingly called bitter) with father and son watching my reactions and expecting my elation. Frankly I was not that much impressed but seeing things through pink glasses at that time, I really gave the film a go. It was not that bad. Not quite the type of film I would choose myself, but there is always a value of opening one’s horizons to add new. I must say that by now I have seen the film few times and it has been growing up in my opinion considerably. I am thankful for the introduction.

Then The Kill Bill came along and the young man was very impressed. I respected his views but he said – Blooood all over the place! Even his father was not that keen to go to movies and see it. So that was it until one night in Gdansk when I could not sleep. I have a small TV set in the kitchen, so sleepily I wondered there and put the TV on. The scene took my interest and I stood and watched for a while. It was the part of choosing the Hattori Hanzo’s sword. After a short time I was transfixed and watched the film to the end still standing up. I may have made some herbal tea during that time, but I have not stopped watching for a second. Yes, it was a lot of blood, but it was so stylized that I was not repulsed by it at all. Just the opposite I was watching the bloody scenes admiring choreography and the sense of humour.  I have seen the film many times since this memorable night, so I am hesitating now about The Hateful Eight. Should I buy myself three hours of stress or be respectful to my health and time? Any advice?

I have also seen Django Unchained on one of my long trips from Sydney to Europe and I found it again funny in spite of being cruel and gory. For me with Tarantino it is just a convention and cruel scenes do not have the same effect as scenes of The Revenant meant to scare and repulse. It is still difficult watching so my decision is still to be made…

The Revenant

 Just a brief note about my impressions on The Revenant. I did not intend to see the film until the news about the Golden Globes:  the best motion picture, the best director, the best actor. Since I am interested in films, I thought that I should see it even if I knew it was not my type of a film.

Well, I spent big parts of the films under my seat (a metaphor of course). The violence and the cruelty were much too much for me. Was it art? Not in my mind. Has Di Caprio showing disgust in eating a still warm liver of a freshly killed animal, displayed his prowess as an actor?   I would say that he did not have to use any acting skills at all. Putting actors though ordeals does not deserve acting awards in my opinion. If Di Caprio gets an Oscar this year it will be mainly for his perseverance in jumping through director's hoops. He waited a long time for his Oscar, in my opinion if you work  in your profession with dedication for a long time, you deserve a superannuation. But Oscar? Hmmm...

The story is simple if not simplistic and not even believable. I have been told in one of the comments that the story is actually based on true events. Well... it shows that real life is sometimes unbelievably strange. I thank kvd for the information.  

There was one thing about the film I liked, the photography.

I do not dare to rank the film, I started to wonder if I know anything about films at all.

I was planning to see The Hateful Eight, strangely enough I like Tarantino, but I will think it over. I used all my resistance to violence and cruelty watching The Revenant.