Movie Night at the Educational Center: Batman Begins.

"Batman Begins": Looking Back / Looking In

A Review by Tom Schulz

"Hidden things hinder wholeheartedness."
Cassian

I was a DC Kid. My friend Robby was a Marvel Kid. I embraced the epic struggles of Good and Evil, especially as portrayed through the Batman. Robby discovered kinship in tortuous transformations wrought by a Science run amok: Spiderman, The Hulk, The Fantastic Four. He declared me a simpering simpleton, overly concerned with issues of justice. I accused him of being a prima-donna elitist with no sympathy for the plight of the downtrodden masses. Yeah, we were the best of buddies. Good times.

Years later, as my son approached his teens, he introduced me to Frank Miller’s graphic novel series, Batman: the Dark Knight Returns. He would copy the magazine covers in loving detail for days on end and I devoured the stories after lights out. Here was a fractured soul, rolling the Sisyphean rock of guilt and vengefulness up the slippery slope of vendetta, with every intention of doing what was capital “R” Right. I was in. I could relate.

This was no longer a kid’s story.

In Batman Begins (2005), director Christopher Nolan maintains the spirit and look of Miller’s gritty graphics and eschews the cultural camp that had become attached to the Batman franchise. Taking place in the deteriorating Gotham City, Nolan owes as much to Dickens and Bronte as Homer. In fact, the city itself becomes a character in the film: flatulent and lost and sinking into the abyss of a striated social hell. The nature of our hero, Bruce Wayne (who interestingly enough was named after Scottish patriot Robert Bruce by Batman’s original creator, Bob Kane) is carefully revealed through an interconnected series of flashbacks. The young Bruce tumbles into the depths of an abandoned well on the family’s estate. Bats burst forth from the gaping maw of an adjoining cave, engulfing the panicked boy and rendering him helpless. That same helplessness is later embellished with guilt, when his parents are shot down in front of him during a robbery. Here are the seeds of fear and guilt planted. Here is where the desire for revenge takes root. Here grows the verdant field of obsession.

Heartsick and in despair, the adult Bruce Wayne (played with severity by Christian Bale) sets out to lose himself. His choice is to metaphorically tear down his heritage “brick by brick”. He delves into his own underworld. He makes himself physically impoverished so as to reflect his inner deprivation. He lays himself bare to the very foundations of self. It is only in this abject emptiness that he is able to manifest a new format of being – a symbol of being. And though he views this actualized symbolism as “incorruptible” he remains divided and at odds with himself.

The only major female character is Bruce’s childhood friend, Rachel Dawes (a doe-eyed Katie Holms). She has matured into an authentically concerned DA, and is appalled when she discovers that Wayne is seeking revenge on his parent’s murderer, outside of the law. And though her role receives short shrift, it is significant nonetheless. She plays both Penelope and Ariadne in our hero’s quest. Penelope in her ultimate steadfastness to her perception of Wayne’s character. And Ariadne in providing the mantra, “it’s what you do that defines you.” This one phrase gives both Wayne and his alter ego, Batman, the thread of reason that may lead him through the maze of divisiveness, anger, and fear.

Batman Begins is an origin story as mythically archetypal as Moses in the bulrushes. Sure it’s dripping with testosterone-laden action (Hello? The parting of the Red Sea isn’t?). But we the viewers can tumble into the lush darkness of the film and ask where these characters and situations and struggles reside in our lives. How do we unite our fractured selves? What is the authentic self that we ‘present’ in our relationships and social interactions? And what, what is the mask that we wear to protect our secret identity?

And that’s not kid stuff.

Movie Night, 7:00 PM, April 15th at The Educational Center

http://educationalcenter.org/

Movie Night at the Educational Center: Transamerica

A Review: Transamerica, 2005

"One is not born a woman, but rather becomes one."

Judith Butler Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, 1990

The mark of a good story is that it keeps your attention, urging on your interest in the characters. The plot entrances you. Turning each page in anticipation or inching towards the edge of your seat. A great story allows unlimited access to your own story. The movie Transamerica (directed by Duncan Tucker, 2005) is such a story. Ostensibly a tale of a transsexual woman on the brink of her final physical conversion into her idealized concept of the Female, the plot soon shifts abruptly and sets the stage for a multi-faceted quest after a completed self. The movie begins with Bree Osbourne (played with amazing nuance by Golden Globe winner Felicity Huffman) molding and shaping….literally sculpting herself into an identity she cherishes.

Her very foundation is garmented. She practices modulating her voice. She tucks the remaining vestiges of the Stanly Shupak that she was and has despised between her legs. She is transformed, but still lacking. In the same way that we do not know when tragedy, joy, love, or an act of volatile Nature may instantly alter the path of our life, so the phone rings. Answering, Bree finds out that she has a son. A seventeen-year old son in a New York City Jail. It is just one week until to her vangioplasty. When Bree offhandedly mentions the fact that she ‘may’ have a son, Bree’s therapist, Margaret (Elizabeth Pena) withholds the envelope that contains permission for the surgery. In this act, she challenges Bree to face this potential for maintaining a divided self. She offers Bree an opportunity to unite her Feminine and Masculine selves. In one fascinating scene, Bree (a study in pink) makes arrangements to go see her son Toby (a haunting performance by Kevin Zegers). Resigned to making the journey, she sits adrift beneath an M. Tamplough print entitled “Crepuscule en Egypt”.

Crepuscular speaks of twilight – that transitional period of each day that holds both the light and the dark. It is that time of change. This is the moment that signifies Bree’s empowerment – evidenced in her (often tentative) involvement with her self-quest. All of the characters in this movie have secrets. Many of them from the underbelly of being. Secrets kept from others. And secrets kept from one’s self in the form of a fabricated and highly edited personal narrative. And certainly as Bree and Toby traverse the continent, the standard of what is normal becomes a strategic point of supposition. The essential question becomes: do we as individuals possess a core sense of self, or are we each an entire society of authentic selves? Are we born predisposed to a particular and genetically scripted way of being, or are we hammered and annealed into shape by our environment? And is a well-performed authenticity a significantly creative strategy of participating fully in the active and constant creation of self?

It is written that “Transsexual adults often request hormone and surgical treatments to suppress their biological sex characteristics and acquire those of the opposite sex. A team of health professionals, including the treating psychologist or psychiatrist, medical doctors, and several surgical specialists, oversee this transitioning process. Because of the irreversible nature of the surgery, candidates for sex-change surgery are evaluated extensively and are often required to spend a period of time integrating themselves into the cross-gender role before the procedure begins. Counseling and peer support are also invaluable to transsexual individuals.” http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Gender+Dysphoric

Theodore Adorno said that we may only know ourselves through knowing our fractured self. Trasamerica asks to consider that we may only know ourselves by embracing our integrated self.

"What had reached me, so powerfully cast from a human body, was Beauty: there was a face with all the mystery prescribed and preserved on it; I was before it, I sensed that there was a beyond, to which I did not have access, an unlimited place ... a desire was seeking its home."

Hélène Cixous Coming to Writing and Other Essays, 1991

Tomschulzartist

Movie Night, March 18th at The Educational Center
http://educationalcenter.org/

"The God and The Universe Conversations" Movie Series

Empathinc. and the Educational Center are partnering to conduct a five movie film series. The winter/spring theme is "Living Authentically. We will be exploring the spiritual costs and promises of living what Parker Palmer calls the "undivided life".

The series starts January 21st. We will begin at 6:30. Discussion after viewing. Snacks provided. Suggested donation of ten dollars per person. Reservations suggested. Call Mellisa Thomas Meyer @ 704-375-1171

Our first film is:

“Imitation of Life”
Directed by Douglas Sirk, 1959

“All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem.”
Martin Luther King Jr.
Strength to Love 1963

It may be considered the height of audacity to remark that Dr. King’s brilliant observation on the linearity of problem solving might be the ultimate template for a Soap Opera. But in watching Douglas Sirk’s 1959 movie, “Imitation of Life”, it seems incredibly appropriate. At its release, Sirk’s movie was critically panned as another weepy “woman’s movie”, even though it was wildly popular and garnished two Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress for Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner. And yet, in a daring and timely turn, Sirk was able to reckon with powerful social maladies while still maintaining the interest of the mainstream audience. In part, what makes this movie so fascinating are the strategies and choices that Sirk employed to achieve this seamless connection of scathing critique and popular culture.
Essentially, this is a narrative concerning the ambiguous nature of being authentic in a world that is delineated in terms of black and white. Based in an American culture that is racially segregated, this tale dares to explore the very meanings of what it is to be Black and what it is to be White. While this conflict is depicted in grand sweepings of caricature, simplified dialogue and explosive color, Sirk still manages to capture a depth of anguish and turmoil as our characters struggle with issues of Being. Being clear and strong with their convictions. Being clear and strong within themselves and in their inter-personal relationships. And being clear and strong with their specific desires and life goals. It rarely goes well, these struggles.
Virtually everything we will later come to understand in depth is depicted in the first scene of the movie. Coney Island, 1947. A cacophony of sound and sight. Strategic reds create a composition of swirling passion – swimming trunks, umbrellas, signs. The frivolity of a holiday that sets the mood for the dichotomy of celebration as an Imitation of Reality – for reality is confined to the shadows. Our heroine, Lora Meredith (Lana Turner) has lost her child in the crowd. Within three minutes, Sirk sets up the theme of loss and narcissism that will weave throughout the plot. Bumping into strange men as she seeks assistance, Lora’s pattern of looking for and ignoring masculine guidance will reverberate time and again. A roving photographer (Steve Archer, played by John Gavin with cardboard good will and earnestness) records Lora’s panic in a series of still shots. Steve and the police escort Lora beneath the boardwalk where the errant daughter, Susie (played later as a teen by the doe-eyed Sandra Dee) is found enfolded in the nurturing care of Annie Johnson (Oscar nominee Juanita Moore). Susie has found a new friend in Annie’s daughter Sarah Jane (with Susan Kohner vamping through this part as a young adult). Sarah Jane is light skinned (like her Daddy – “He was practically White”). Her mother Annie is Black. Immediately assumptions are made about Annie’s relationship as Lora asks, “How long have you been taking care of her?” Annie blithely replies, “Why, all her life.”
Both women are single parents. Annie is homeless. Soon the two women enter into an arrangement, and Annie becomes the angelic helpmate that assists behind the scenes as the determined Lora doggedly pursues her goal of being a famous actress. Together they migrate over time and success from a cold-water flat to a series of ever more elegant homes.
But as Dr. King predicts, their progress is precarious. The patterns of Being so succinctly set up in the opening scene, collapse one problem into another, like errant Tinker Toys on a three-legged card table. We the viewer watch helplessly as any one problem solved yields no real solutions. And with no sustainable solutions, the string of linked problems then becomes maintained and even nurtured by habitual and rehearsed responses.
Sirk makes sure we “get it” with broad strokes. The orchestration cajoles and waltzes us into the proper emotions. Mirrors and glass reflect gestures so that we are sure to understand the duplicity and complexities of each character’s struggle with their identities. And the costumes! High couture defines sophistication. Capri pants and a perm signify maturity. Sequins and garters the uniform of the troubled harlot. And Mink becomes a bookend manifestation of temptation and successful frugality.
At movie’s end, it is the stalwart character of Annie that is rewarded with release from her exhausting burden. Beneath the cloak of her culturally imposed invisibility is not the visage of an angel, but rather, the authentically human compilation that is friend, benefactor and participating member of the larger community. Her model – but more significantly – her release, may be the one thing that may offer redemption to the damaged family that she had gathered around her.
Director Douglas Sirk was able provide this Holy, uncommon ground for his characters to potentially resolve the crippling divisions that tormented them. Perhaps, his vision as an artist may give us cause to consider our particular lineage of problem reaction. To ponder our stance on our own Holy, uncommon ground. And to remove our collective shoes, as is required.

First Scene of Movie: fascinating choreography!

The series continues on the 3rd Friday of the month with: Far From Heaven (February). TransAmerica (March), Batman Begins (April) and The Secret Life of Bees (May). Please join us! Out of town? Don't worry - we are creating a prototype to be shared on the World Wide Web! (WWW!). Talk to us, comment, eavesdrop, stop by, wave, honk, drop off intriguing packages!
Tom Schulz and Sheila Ennis

Links:
Intrigue
Context
ART

All art and writing by Tom Schulz unless otherwise noted, or unless it is so cool
he will try to get away with claiming it as his own.

"The God and The Universe Conversations". Week Six.

“To be surprised, to wonder, is to begin to understand.”
José Ortega y Gasset

The God and The Universe Conversations. Week Six.

“Complex Unity (Delno Ennis)”

“It would appear", started up The Universe, "that Abstractions are useless to The Universe. Maybe The Universe is an either/or proposition. Everything is either real (or maybe even hyper-real), or it cannot yet exist. So it doesn't Matter if something is unreal."
"Yeah, but that is the flaw in Absolute Binaries", retorted God. "They leave out the Mediating Agencies!"
"Do what?", replied the beleaguered The Universe.
God responded, "Them furrows don't get plowed without somebody leading the mules."

"Got it", chuckled The Universe.

“Pondering Woman” (detail)

“Y'know what God?, muttered The Universe, "The Universe doesn't know if God has noticed, but The Universe gets pretty caught up in all this Creation business, and sometimes gets a little carried away."
"(A little?)", thought God to God's self.
"But isn't that what The Universe is supposed to do - bring things into Being?"

"Actually", replied God in all kindness, "God is just as interested in the Becoming."

“It Was Rocket Science”© 2009

“So let me see if The Universe can get this straight", fumed an exasperated The Universe. Does God mean that the process is as important as the results?"
"Not as important", explained God, "but rather inseparable. Any entity as it currently exists is an element in the process of all becoming. For example, The Universe may experience a shift in identity as it is impacted by any series of becomings."
"Oh God! That sounds so complicated!”, cried out The Universe.

"Well, it ain't exactly rocket science", laughed God.

“Dry Land and Streets”© 2010 Video Sketch

“The Universe is believing that The Universe is catching on", said The Universe. "Becoming and Being aren't in conflict. Becoming and Being are aspects of a total process".
"Something like that", replied God with a noncommittal tone.
The Universe jumped in, "Let's just say that like, in the Beginning there was this Godness and the Godness created all the isness and then turned it over to The Universe and stuff started Becoming out of that partnership and then Entities began all their Becoming. Does God control all of this?"

"God prefers not to micro-manage", God answered.

“There is that sphere of being where there is no earth, no water, no fire, nor wind; no experience of infinity of space, of infinity of consciousness, of no-thingness, or even of neither-perception-nor-non-perception; there is neither this world nor another world, neither moon nor sun; this sphere of being I call neither a coming nor a going nor a staying still, neither a dying nor a reappearance; it has no basis, no evolution, and no support: it is the end of suffering.”
Udāna Sutta 8.1


Special Bonus Feature:
"Participating in the Conversation"

Installation View, Town Outpost - North Carolina Educational Center, New Bern, NC.

Photo by Daniel de Wit

As an artist, I spend a lot of time on my knees. And concentrating on the task at hand. Often, there is an intrusive bedlam as projects are being completed all around me. I find myself entering into a separate zone of being. But not separated - for I still must remain cognizant of my surroundings. So I actualize within one particular reality without disappearing from the other. It is in this osmotic state of exchange that I most clearly participate in The God and The Universe Conversations.

This concludes Week Six of
"The God and The Universe Conversations".

All art and writing by Tom Schulz unless otherwise noted, or unless it is so cool
he will try to get away with claiming it as his own.