I'm still mulling over my reponses to Disgrace, the film of the book by J M Coetzee. It was a most disturbing movie on several levels. Malkovich plays a South African professor, David Lurie, who seduces an unwilling student and loses his job as a consequence. He performs an apology to the university committee and later to her family but does not at any stage repent his actual action.
Malkovich's Lurie invites no empathy. He maintains his right to fulfil his desire even if he must dominate women and force his way. When he retreats to his daughter's farm in the hills he doesn't recognise the mirror image predicament she falls into while he is there.
The daughter Lucy has a farm hand come business partner, played by Eriq Ebouaney, who is gradually acquiring land from her, building a house and taking a wife. She falls pregnant to three young black men who rape her in an attack on the farm. One of the attackers turns out to be the partner's simple nephew and Ebouaney's character offers to marry her and afford her and the baby his protection. In return she gives him all her land as long as she can remain in her house and continue her market garden. Lurie thinks he has set the situation up so that one way or another he can fully acquire the farm.
Her desire to remain in her land forces the marriage on her. In a sinister turn she must submit to male desire and dominance to maintain her place in her world. The partner fulfils his desire for land by forcing her to either leave or accept his protection.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Post war Germany
There seems to be a surge in interest in post war Germany - or perhaps I am just sensitised to it at the moment. I saw The Reader a few months ago, then this week enjoyed Karen Schaupp's one woman show, Lotte's Gift, about her grandmother in post war Germany (broken by her virtuosic guitar performances).
By accident I also picked up a novel on war time/ post war German experiences,"The Dark Room" by Rachel Seiffert, a few nights ago. The writing is spare and the subjects of the three stories bleak but compelling. We are created by the cultural forces around us. Our understandings of our contemporary situation formed by the discourse around us is probably even more pervasive now than then. A man in 1997 Germany in the final story struggles to reconcile his memory of a loving grandfather with what the grandfather almost certainly did as an SS soldier in Belorussia in the war. The young man comes to a tentative acceptance of his grandparents at the end but doesn't seem to understand the multiple and fragmented nature of each and every individual. Who is to say that he/ I wouldn't have been capable of the same actions as the grandfather under pressure of the military and racial discourses of the time and place?
By accident I also picked up a novel on war time/ post war German experiences,"The Dark Room" by Rachel Seiffert, a few nights ago. The writing is spare and the subjects of the three stories bleak but compelling. We are created by the cultural forces around us. Our understandings of our contemporary situation formed by the discourse around us is probably even more pervasive now than then. A man in 1997 Germany in the final story struggles to reconcile his memory of a loving grandfather with what the grandfather almost certainly did as an SS soldier in Belorussia in the war. The young man comes to a tentative acceptance of his grandparents at the end but doesn't seem to understand the multiple and fragmented nature of each and every individual. Who is to say that he/ I wouldn't have been capable of the same actions as the grandfather under pressure of the military and racial discourses of the time and place?
Monday, June 8, 2009
Ransom
In the tradition of Imaginary Life Malouf has taken a tangent from an ancient tale and spun a mesmerising story. I can only describe the writing as poetic prose, simple but evocative. A short journey allows Priam whose life has been a performance of being king to discover his human side as father, sensate being and interactive man. It is an interlude in a war and it changes Priam's attitude to his life but not the grisly outcome.
Should we all take regular interludes from our daily lives to discover ourselves apart from our performances as mother, professional, citizen? I think this is what happens when we travel and are far from the places and people in which we are forced to perform certain roles. At least we become aware of them and are more sensitive to what is required of us and what can profitably be discarded.
Should we all take regular interludes from our daily lives to discover ourselves apart from our performances as mother, professional, citizen? I think this is what happens when we travel and are far from the places and people in which we are forced to perform certain roles. At least we become aware of them and are more sensitive to what is required of us and what can profitably be discarded.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Memory and place, scent and music
I spent last weekend in another place significant to memory and self. The Sunshine Coast certainly triggers many holiday memories and memories of my grandmother and happy times with her. But it isn't just place that triggers memories... The tropically scented garden of the house I was staying in reminded me of a friend long gone. I had walked with her among heavily fragrant flowers not long before she died. Her thin face and slow words returned as soon as the aroma hit me on Sunday.
Music is also a potent memory trigger. The Carpenters were featured on the radio this morning. Before I had even recognised the music I was wallowing in an infatuation of my youth, sighing along with We've only just begun. Many of the hits from that time recall my emotional state when they became significant to me.
Music is also a potent memory trigger. The Carpenters were featured on the radio this morning. Before I had even recognised the music I was wallowing in an infatuation of my youth, sighing along with We've only just begun. Many of the hits from that time recall my emotional state when they became significant to me.
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