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I really didn't think I'd ever find it. An entire film without a central conflict. Films are all about conflict - even the toy store-on-screen Transformers II had a central conflict (save the world from the aliens). But The Time Traveler's Wife (adapted from the bestselling book) has actually avoided any real point at all.

Yep, it's a lit blog. But sometimes I find myself in a movie theater and I say to myself, WTF? Why am I in a movie theater? Shouldn't I be doing something literary? And then I say to myself, "bite me" and I enjoy the movie anyway.  So here's some quick reviews of two films out in theaters at the moment. One has a personal connection, the other is based on a celebrated book.

The Great Debaters - Directed by Denzel Washington
I headed to this film because it portrays the world of competitive forensics (speech and debate, not dead bodies), and though it is a world apart from my own forensic experiences, the basic principles of the competition remained remarkably similar.  I competed in a slightly different form of debate to what is portrayed in this film (mine was Parliamentary Debate, aka Impromptu Debate; the film shows some sort of modified Lincoln-Douglas type debate). 

The cautionary note about this film is that while it is "based on true events", it is not a biographical piece. Some of the leading characters--whose names are changed from the real world--did not even meet in real life. The final debate, in which competitors from a small black college in Texas take down the Harvard debate team, was in real life a debate with the much more forensic-active University of Southern California.  It is unlikely that the detailed events of the storyline did take place in exactly the manner portrayed, but from my googling it does sound as if the basic spirit of the era was left very much intact, and the extraordinary accomplishments of the tiny college, which remained undefeated for ten years (unbelievable, but true) and was among the first to engage in integrated debates with predominently white colleges, were if anything more impressive than what was portrayed.  

There is a review somewhere on the internet criticizing the portrayal of whites in the film as "universally evil"; I didn't see that at all.  These were rough times in America, and perhaps still are. Frankly, the Harvard debaters were almost too "noble" to be believed.  In the end, it's the story of the Wiley College debaters, not the teams they went up against, and is told from their perspective. It's also the story of their coach, Tolson, a labor activist and later well-known poet, portrayed well by Washington. 

As for the realism of the debate itself--most competitive debates aren't nearly as soaring and inspirational as what is portrayed in the film. In addition, as players are randomly assigned "affirmative" or "negative" to a particular debate, they are often left defending unsympathetic positions. That's where the best debaters shine. The Wiley debaters, throughout the film, conveniently argued the most persuasive, sympathetic side (that colleges should be integrated, for example, or another debate in favor of the policies of the New Deal). They certainly didn't build their winning record with such softball positions in real life, and this should be remembered when considering the magnitude of their accomplishments.  Overall I'll give it 4 out of 5 for excellent performances and a compelling story, knocking it for a bit of unnecessary inaccuracy that left it open to criticism.

Atonement - Based on the Ian McEwen novel
Ok, decent book. A bit hard on the eyes in terms of POV switching and copious descriptive prose, but a decent book. The movie...well, it's a good  example of why not every book should be made into a film.

The novel relies on a rather complex point of view structure that works simply because a competent and generous author helps us from position to position in the partially imaginary world of Briony Tallis. McEwan ensures we have enough foreshadowing, in particular, not to get utterly lost. 

In the film, we lose most of the foreshadowing (Briony's success as an author later on is sprung almost as a surprise in the film; it's revealed early on in the book). We lose the chapter transitions that help us switch POVs. Instead we get sudden scene changes that make little sense to someone who has not read the book. The device of playing the same scene twice from different perspectives, key in the book, isn't easily understood by the uninitiated in the film, and doesn't happen consistently enough in the film for the viewer to trust what is happening and how.  As the POV switches got more complex toward the end, my moviegoing companion was completely lost.

The whole idea of using fiction to create a happy ending for those whom we have wronged and lost is beautiful and compelling; there is a moment of lucidity near the end of the film when we see this with an older Briony. As the film unfolds, though, we fail to see Briony's moment of truth, the transformation from a nearly evil child to a repentant adult.  This key transition is explained as nothing more than "growing up". In the hands of two very reserved actresses, this leaves Briony's character perpetually cold and the tragedies of the film feel pointless. Matched with music that several in the theater commented was "depressing,"  and the inevitably superficial portrayal of secondary characters that add a lot to the book, and I left thinking that this story belongs on the page, under the care of Ian McEwan's pen, and off the screen.

Performances: James McAvoy is wonderful as usual. Keira Nightly overacts severely, also as usual. 3 out of 5.

Just saw Stardust, the film adaptation of Neil Gaiman's illustrated book of the same name. Lots of fun, certain to be the sort of film people buy for their DVD collections and watch on cold winter days. I haven't read the book, though the film was intriguing enough that I might give it a go. A sweet, satisfying story, with good performances and nice production design.

With Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and most of Grimm's Fairy Tales fully claimed by the film industry, newer tales like Gaiman's are Hollywood's only chance to bring fantasy fables to the big screen.  Stardust doesn't lend itself to sequels, so new stories must be found.  The best of these newer fairy tales for many years was the horrific "Pan's Labyrinth", but Pan aside, the pickings, I fear, are slim. I'd like to see an art-film version of "A Brief History of the Dead" (one of my favorite recent books),  but it's unlikely to be blockbuster material, and IMDB shows no current plans for such a film.  Instead, it appears, we are faced with the tiger in the inflatable raft.  I must confess, I have not read the book about the tiger in the inflatable raft. I'm not sure I ever will. But a full-length feature film? Gimme a lifejacket, I'll swim from here...

A big fantasy narrative is hard to pull off without borrowing from the past; Gaiman is no different.  The hero-falls in love-with a star-in human form-is an old construction. C.S. Lewis uses it in his best book of the Narnia series, "The Voyage of the Dawn Treader", in which Caspian meets the daughter of a star at the end of the world and eventually marries her.  Other details in Stardust are openly borrowed from a variety of ancient tales. 

Years ago I wrote a juvenile fiction novel, which for various reasons I have not yet attempted to publish, that takes place in a fantasy realm. Throughout the writing process I was acutely aware of how difficult--perhaps impossible--it is to write fantasy that doesn't pull from many of these earlier epic and fairy tales but also has a compelling narrative and a sense of a larger story. If you don't use the fantasy symbols and archetypes so well established throughout western literature, you have to build from scratch, and that's tough going.

Anyhow, that's enough musing for tonight. Enjoy the frog. 

I'm leaning back in my sofa, watching and listening to an episode of Austin City Limits on our local PBS HD channel here in Minneapolis, and the band--if you can define them as such, or at all--is Polyphonic Spree.  They must have fifty people on stage, all in various brightly colored smocks. They have a horn section, a large chorus, wind instruments scattered throughout, a harpist, and a handsome lead singer.  Their music has a distinct 60's flavor with a large-scale optimism hard to find in popular music these days. They don't have "dancers", but every musician on the stage is constantly moving around, some to loose choreography. At one point a French Horn player desperately dodges the lead singer and several others in an attempt to just find a spot to play his part--which he does, beautifully.  The music is inspirational in feel, and you can see the entiire Spree getting onboard that feeling. With some bands, such intensity feels contrived, but these guys do it right.

Just watching this performance makes me feel like writing, makes my mind wander off into the last place I left a certain character, staring across a river from the bare lot of her former home.  The music contains strong emotional hooks, and those hooks awakened the experience of the character, Rachael, in my head. I scribble down some notes and get into the "mood" that will take me through Rachaels next trial and certain rebellion against the forces that have taken her home. 

A couple of years ago I watched Hiyao Miyazaki's "Spirited Away"--one of my favorite movies that inspires me to write--and on the DVD they had a special feature of The Making Of, as DVDs often do. Miyazaki talked about how he and his animators at Studio Ghibli had spent the ENTIRE production--years--listening, over and over, to only one song, by a Japanese singer and included in the credits on the film. It's a haunting, sad song,  and the film has a very similar tone.  As to me that film is Miyazki's greatest so far, the role played by that song intrigues me.  Music can certainly elicit emotion, but it seems that this song, repeated endlessly, was able to contain the emotional spectrum of the art being created around it.