Runaway Train, Dir: Andrey Konchalovskiy, 1985

Manny unprepared for the out of control cost of freedom.

Violence delicately represented.

Over the past several months my life has taken more dramatic turns. Perhaps only mature, adult things-finishing school, getting a job. (Although, I will admit that finishing graduate school and landing a faculty position at McMaster University is not 'just a thing I did'. I have been moving towards this excellent opportunity to teach for a long time). To get here,  I have been constantly on the move-and find myself resisting but going relentlessly forward, like Konchalovskiy's Runaway Train, its a machine in serious motion, the concluding tragectory seems to be implied but (in my case) unknown.

Both of these images above are of spectacular and delicate violence, taken from the powerful ending to Runaway Train which has forever burned into my memory. When I started this blog entry three months ago, it seemed a highly inappropriate image for the hot shiny simmering summer days spent in lush Victoria, BC, but a good fit to my feelings and emotional chafing against my (then) current situation.

In late May of this year I completed my Master's degree in Film Production from York University. It does look good and adds some tidy formality next to my name, and the three letters sound off nicely when spoken, 'Kyath Battie, MFA'.  I had a proper committee sign off on paper work saying so and my weird and literally dark film and thesis paper bound in red hard cover with gold lettering proving it.  To be sentimental I would say it was the best two years of my life, and to be cynical I would say that it was the best two years of my life. So it was 'best' but in certain and contrasting contexts-is that so unusual? Somehow I've collided these feelings together in my unexpected post-grad reality.  The image of Jon Voight (Manny Manheim) persistently emerged - standing defiantly on the icy locomotive, barely able to hold himself against the fierce wind, his body in a slight arc embracing the invetiable violent crash that in mere seconds will end his life, end it all.

In 1985 I was 14 years old. I know I saw this film in the theatre, and since then this final image has lasted, quietly sitting in brain cells waiting all these years to expose itself and be finally explained. I took the opportunity to watch this film again and must confess that I actually do not remember hardly anything at all except this ending. And it is a very 'serious' drama-which is what I generally deeply responded to when I was a teenager.  I had vague impressions of Jon Voight being quite good but his fiery boy-pal-fellow escapee (Eric Roberts) proved to be highly annoying. (And he is). Anyways, I will dispose of full exposition here, and mono-focus on the ending when Manny unlinks the connecting cars so boy pal, and girl hostage (Rebecca De Mornay) wont die with him - giving Manny anti-hero status. (The addition of the girl railway worker always annoyed me, but I am sure she was added for extra dramatic effect because, really, who would care about annoying boy-pal convict dying, but add a blue eyed vulnerable waif and well...)

However, Manny has special cargo stashed inside - the vindictive jail warden Ranken (John P. Ryan)  is trapped inside also awaiting to be impaled to bloody bits. Its good drama. I had no sympathy for the warden, and actually none for Manny, it just seemed like the right thing for Manny to do - he was not going back to prison.  The final scene filmed in extreme long shot, in steely monotones with Manny's figure sketched into the grey skyline, standing upon that evil engine slowly fading to black, was an excellent choice. I was struck by the symbolism: creative energy worn thin, illness fading you out, political outrage overrun by out of control right wing engine, (it was 1985 after all - the height of the Regan/Bush dynasty) or just defiant personal autonomy-a final fuck you to oppressive authority.

Manny's doomed trajectory is like all best intentions, its conceived with hope, desire, and unwavering belief that things are going to end well. And if they don't - then damn it all. The final climatic sequence could be the filmmakers cinematic through-line, and the final image could have been Atget impression.

Fast forward to the present. Within a few weeks of applying for a faculty position, I was formally awarded the job. I was thrilled. However, this new opportunity left me with under two weeks to compose an entire course syllabus from scratch, move to an unknown city, into an apartment I had never seen, and locate myself all within the motion and disorientation to perform as a confident citizen and teacher. Suddenly, I was Manny again, gripping the slippery front rails, speeding forward on that frozen solitary out-of-control train. Konchalovskiy's aesthetic choice to costume Voight in an  "incarceration orange" jumper worked.  The bright colour set against the pure yet visceral winter snow works as intended to create a strong emotional response from viewers, like a wound or gash slashed across the open screen.

When I landed in Hamilton and was helped into my new apartment though the kitchen window I was definitely holding onto that train in all its contrasting colours. (I have since taken another apartment that required no window entry or skanky Hess Village brawls to listen to on Saturday nights). And when I entered my classroom and met my students for the first time I was seriously gripping those icy bars. Driving a cargo van to get my 'stuff' from Toronto, North York, downtown and back to Hamilton on the insane 401/403 highway I was absolutely strangling that fucking train in an iron grip.

It's been a month since landing in Hamilton, being a professor at McMaster. I have met some wonderful people, faculty and students. I have entered my classroom several times with less visceral impact, my grip loosened. I no longer sleep on an air mattress and have a desk to sit at in my nice spacious apartment. I hope I do not see Manny again for a long time. I am fairly content now, quietly atop the fading icy train, but I don't plan to crash, just keep going.

 

Excellent Recent Discoveries

Totally compelling and weird--the stunning photography from The Hellstrom Chronicle  broke ground way before the BBC's Planet Earth--but be prepared to be equally captivated and creeped out!

A Serious Man, Dir: Ethan & Joel Coen, 2009
Tokyo Olympiad, Dir: Kon Ichikawa, 1965
A Chronicle of Summer, Dir: Edgar Morin & Jean Rouch, 1960
Cleo from 5 - 7, Dir: Agnes Varda, 1962
Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy, Dir: Tomas Alfredson, 2011 (The original BBC series with Alec Guiness is superior, but I could not resist this recent version)
The Hellstrom Chronicle, Dir: Walon Green & Ed Spiegel, 1971
Memories of Underdevelopment, Tomas Gutierrez Alea, 1968
Another Country, Dir: Marek Kanievska, 1984
Another Year, Dir: Mike Leigh, 2010
Brief Encounter, Dir: David Lean, 1945
Nothing But A Man, Dir: Michael Roemer, 1964

Memories of Underdevelopment, Dir: Tomas Gutierrez Alea, 1968

Sergio at a loss, in the beautiful and complex Memories of Underdevelopment

Once again I have neglected this blog, although running commentaries, witty declarations, accolades and many "important" things have been said in my head. The core feelings remain the same, but soon, the firm shell harboring these fantastic ideas turns into a dusty husk and well, like all best intentions -but delayed actions- I want to translate what was true then.


Over the past several months I've had two unexpected but fascinating opportunities to travel to places that have passed my mind as curiosities, but never committed to as vacation destinations: Mexico and Cuba. Thousands of Canadians travel to these exotic lands and I understand why, they are warm, colourful, and (somewhat) affordable. I will say that I found both places very interesting, although both trips were fundamentally different. What struck me the most was my experiences in Cuba -- people kept telling me I should go for 'the experience' and 'before Castro dies'. I actually went as part of a graduate teaching residency from York University. This in part added relief to my purpose of being there. I was supposed to help and do things, as opposed to just aimlessly wandering around and 'experience' things. Immediately upon arrival in Cuba I realized I would not 'experience' things as others do.


My destination started with Varadero, a place I will never go again, and fascinating Havana, which I would go again, I think. For most tourists, the beaches and sunny destinations are a magnet, for me it was surprisingly annoying. I cannot sit around on a beach in the bleating hot sun, blistering my skin, nor hours and hours of walking peeping into the homes of strangers. In Havana, the streets are so narrow that you cannot help yourself. Havana is truly compelling, and I could dedicate a whole entry on just the city alone. But I could not help thinking how I would feel if hoards of wealthy tourists were constantly strolling down my street, gawking with stupid grins on their faces. Just imagine it, every time you left your home there would be a tourist taking a photo of your front door or confidently striding past shouting out Hello! Good Morning! Hello! Thank You!


(But to think of it, I have experienced this in a way--growing up in Victoria, BC, before the city was overtaken by Calgary-Kitsalano Yuppies, hoards of American tourists would flood the city from cruise ships, all acting as if Canadians were strange and exotic people with obscure accents and funny money. I hated them all as they waddled through our beautiful cobblestone streets...anyways--I will not digress into a rant about my lovely Victoria, another time).


I think my issues are really about contrivances. I do not like to feel I must participate in overly contrived environments, hence my distaste for shopping malls, mega-cineplexes, all-inclusive resorts, extended family gatherings. I realize now its because if you try to be 'yourself' you either end up exerting so much energy being grateful and nice (or in some cases a total asshole), that retreating to a cool darkened private room is all you can think about. In Cuba, I was often looking forward to a cool darkened room. However, there is nothing cool, dark or private about Cuba, and for this I was very curious, but deeply uncomfortable. I never felt I could truly rest or be myself, I could never collect my thoughts or feel I had gathered enough solitary time to endure in what would become endless, exhausting, overly sexualized gender roles. (Again this is another issue to discuss at length).


However, and more to my point, before I had left for Cuba I felt it was my duty to try and watch as much Cuban cinema as possible (to somehow make me different that other tourists) but to also prepare me for my residency at the film school. While watching Memories of Underdevelopment, I was deeply affected by its intelligent and personal cinematic realism. The film follows Sergio, a wealthy aspiring writer who stays in Cuba after his family and wife flee to Miami following the botched Bay of Pigs invasion. He goes on to have several girlfriends - some of who are represented as hysterical, dumb, doe-like, captivating conquests - but his running commentary about them is thoughtful and tender. It is not my intent to fully unpack this complex and sophisticated film, only to try and relate to it, and in one particular sequence I was quite struck. After driving around with his friend Pablo and watching his wife leave (most likely forever) Sergio quietly comments:

All the time I drove around with Pablo I felt like puking, throwing up all my family, my business; the mediocrity of my whole class that had been rammed into my stomach.

These private comments are made as he watches his wife walk to the America-bound plane through a thick pane of glass (in well done symbolic framing) - and from here he sinks into a malaise through a series of unsatisfying relationships, (and one lost love), which seem to drive him down into a cultural and personal kind of drudgery. His profound sense of loss (and to some degree great relief), manifest themselves in confusion and lack of clarity to his life's purpose-severely limiting his ability to write. This creative castration of sorts, the inability to develop further, is in part the theme of the film, and to me most effective. I think many of us have wanted to expunge (or in Sergio's words 'throw up') some deep rooted cultural, familial, personal or class conscious burdens.


I keep making great strides to 'improve' and change my life for long term benefits. This often takes me far away from those I care for, but in the end it is the memories, the burdens of all things keeping me motivated that I'd like to expel. Can I keep starting over again?  I live in a country of opportunity, I am not faced with 'underdevelopment' in the way that Sergio was affected. But I feel as though I need to keep restarting my life, dramatically changing things, radical shifts. I am more than ready to be forever relieved of things rammed into my stomach (and heart and mind). As I prepare for graduation - (my thesis written and film is complete) - I now feel as though I am observing through that pane of glass.

Gertrud, Dir: Carl Th. Dreyer, 1964

Gertrud says goodbye.

Axel's exit.

I've been meaning to post this for a while. In the meantime the intention of what was written has been overridden by other intentions and interests. So this entry is long and a little outdated... but here goes.


2012.  There was something less foreboding about the numbers of 2011, the anti-climatic follow up to the well deformed and imposing '2010'. This new year begins and ends with the number 2, the sharp curve and pointed tips really give this years numerals advantage over last years svelte and delicate 1's. I can feel a sharpness in the air. All the students are back on campus. When I walked in the back and quieter entrance to the film building there was a young woman sitting on a bench, hunched over clutching a freshly opened box of tissue, tears streaming down her face. Later, I came across a loud and very pissed off student yelling in her cell phone giving her friend serious hell for "constantly crying and then getting back together with that loser!" She reminded me of me when I was around 21 and how good it felt to get that angry (of course to only to feel very bad later).  And then only a few minutes later walking across the commons, another young student with blood shot and puffy eyes, tears falling in solid streams, clutching her cell quietly murmuring soft words to it. These personal moments exposed in public are reminders that we share pain, that simple things can cause outrage or sorrow, regret. Its the New Year and it's not all fresh starts and fireworks.


I've been meaning to write more. But in fact I have written more in my life this past year than in many. Most recently I have written many emails to friends and family, however, to my surprise I only heard back from my brother. He is well but overworked running a successful landscaping business with his wife (and father of two). He rarely ever writes me personally and I was very happy to hear from him. However, there is a lingering odd feeling of disappointment that others have not taken the time to write me back. I manifest reasons, mostly, I imagine because all my friends have children or full time jobs or really, possibly, do not have or want to say anything. Perhaps it was my overly contrived and upbeat account of my lovely trip to Mexico that I just returned from. How did I expect my friends to follow up on that? Polite "good for you's" or "fuck you's"? I would gladly take either but this leaves me curious about how and why we try to stay connected, what are the best things to say, should we really bother at all? Why do so many take comfort in Facebook when its really just a forum for pandering, self promotion and posturing. Although, I do enjoy the rare self loathing one liners from a small handful of 'friends'.


Over the past several days I have continued to check myself for unwanted anxieties (which have become my specialty - although I blame my addiction to very strong coffee and often feel like Shannon Wheelers Too Much Coffee Man!) But I am taking on the new year with determination. I feel like I have a lot riding on my thesis film and the serious amount of time and choices I've made to be here.Today it was humorously highlighted in a lecture screening of Agnes Varda's The Gleaners & I, when in one scene she follows a former Teaching Assistant and Masters student as he lives out his unemployed life, selling magazines on the street corner, living in a homeless shelter and gleaning vegetables at outdoor markets for leftovers. I was sitting next to my fellow TA  and we both had to repress nervous laughter but a 'knowing-look'. Few things can compete with a shared-known-look. This form of wordless communication is abject in its precision. It lacks for nothing and only lasts an instant, but those experiencing 'it', know all. I'd like to experience more of them.


The looks in Carl Dreyer's Gertrud are not shared but precise. In fact for most of the film, the lengthy monologues are spoken by deeply pained characters facing away from each other. I found the contrite framing and lengthy monologues both intriguing and exasperating. The lead character Gertrud suffers constantly. She is convinced that she will never acquire shared passionate love, even by former lovers who have returned and profess their devotion to her - they also suffer greatly because of her constant but tender rejections. Everyone is in pain! But Gertrud's pain is most consuming and in one stunning moment, she is framed in the icy glare of a gilded mirror, her body disconnected from the frame of the room only to be held captive by her self absorbed reflection. I wonder if that may have been part of Dreyer's point, or implied meaning behind this famous shot. The whole film has her constantly reflecting on her life and it seems solves nothing.


I can't say that I liked this film. But the very final scene was so interesting for its design and effectiveness. The final goodbye's between now aged Gertrud and old friend Axel are tender in its soft focus lighting and quiet gestures. But when Axel finally leaves and the camera cuts to his departure, the set and framing for this shot is unlike anything else in the film. The whole frame is like a gutted skeleton and detritus of time - the remains of faded youth and love lost. I was captivated by this brief sequence. It visually captured the feelings I have had when I know I am saying a final goodbye to someone I love. This feeling has only happened to me a few times. It is a searing and  lonely feeling. Space seems to narrow and objects become undefined shapes as you focus on the physical body of the one you love. And in Gertrud, Dreyer has done it without tears and sentimentality. He has done it with careful design and framing, which like any memorable passing, is at once simple and complex.