Movies and Books

[Anonymous]

I stumbled across Murakami last year--
according to wikipedia, the movie Tony Takitani, directed by Jun Ichikawa and released just last summer in the US, is adapted from Murakami's short story with the same title. You can find out more about the movie at:
http://www.ritzfilmbill.com/editorial/synopses/tonytakitani.shtml

and about Murakami at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruki_Murakami.

Also, for a short introduction to Murakami's work, his 2002 collection of short stories, After the Quake, is a short (but excellent) read.

[Anonymous]

Over the break, I read Maxine Hong Kingston’s China Men, a weaving of legend and legacy into a fibrous nonfiction narrative. It wasn’t so much about what facts I could remember about China when I closed the book (although her chapter “The Laws” was written entirely as a march of Chinese legal history), but rather, that I was made to feel the entirety of Kingston’s history as I read—the confusions, the correlations, the Confucian. It made me remember something I heard back in undergrad about the Jewish diasporic experience as living in all one’s centuries at once, a feeling that Kingston, too, seems to struggle with.
Kingston’s cultural experience is in not only what she says, but how she says it. We’re confused about which generation, which legend, which father, she’s talking about because so is she. China Men’s murkiness is language art.
[Edit by="egant on Jan 13, 5:32:20 AM"][/Edit]

[Anonymous]

But more about what Kingston says, because that’s also important. In “The Making of More Americans,” Kingston remembers her cousins:

“The girl, who was older, pointed to her brother and muttered something, and he turned red. “What?” I asked. She said it again. It was his Chinese name, and we could hardly hear it. “Her name is Lucille,” he said. And Lucille was easy for him to say and easy to hear. He was proud to be able to give and American name though it wasn’t his. So, they’d already learned to be shamed by a Chinese name.”

I found this passage descriptive of the pressure to assimilate that forms part of the immigrant experience, and felt glad when I thought of my students singing the numbers in Chinese—that the challenge to this ignorance starts with a simple playground song.

[Anonymous]

I have just finished Anchee Min's Red Azalea, an autobiography detailing Min's experience growing up during the Cultural Revolution in China. When she turns seventeen, she is sent to work at Red Fire Farm--the work is backbreaking, endless; in addition, relationships with men are not allowed (they glorify personal desires over the group's needs). Min does develop an intimate relationship, however, with her fellow worker, Yan; this relationship causes both women trouble, especially with one of the leaders of the camp, Lu. To me, the story illustrates how it is not possible to regulate personal desire--despite the dire consequences attached to forging a personal relationship, the people in this story do it anyway! Ultimately, Min is selected to go to Beijing, to audition for Red Azalea, one of Jiang Qing's (Madame Mao's) "model operas". In addition to this autobiography, Min has written three fictional pieces: one is called Wild Ginger, a story seemingly very similar to her autobiography; the other two are companion pieces: Empress Orchid and Madame Mao, both of which detail the life of Jiang Qing--her rise to power as the wife of Mao; her "model operas"; her work in Chinese politics. I have not read these pieces of historical fiction, but based on my enjoyment of Min's autobiography, they sound interesting. Min's work is very sensual, pretty detailed in her descriptions of intimate encounters--I'm not sure it would be appropriate for students except at the very senior level. But it is good for teachers wanting more info about China under Mao--and for those looking for an intriguing story!

[Anonymous]

I don't know if any knows about the series on KOCE tonight. The series is titled "Japan: Memoirs of a Secret Empire". It is about Samurai from about 1500 to modern Japan (TV guide)

I am watching the first segment and finding it very informative.

[Anonymous]

I just finished Bette Bao Lord's Legacies: A Chinese Mosaic, a collection of Chinese voices covering the Cultural Revolution and its legacy, in particular, the protests at Tiananmen Square in the late 80s. Bao Lord was born in China, raised in America, and lived in Beijing in the 8os (her husband was an American ambassador)--so she has a unique perspective. She interviewed a diverse group of people: a scholar and a peasant; a cadre and a petitioner; a long marcher and a returned student. Each chapter begins with Lord's process in obtaining an interview with these various subjects (along with some tidbits about her own family's experience) and then the narrative moves into the voice of her interviewee. The text as a whole presents a culture's struggles--with its members not knowing what to do with their lives, not knowing which way the political system will turn next. In one chapter, one man (who she calls "The Catcher" because he was inspired by Catcher in the Rye's protagonist, Holden Caulfield, in his discontent with society) wants to buy a house, but he fears a possible change in government policy: will the policies governing private ownership change? Will he be able to buy it later if he waits, with the extreme inflation occuring? Lord's tracing of these ordinary Chinese lives show the Chinese people's struggles with tradition and struggles with change--both are difficult for them. A powerful piece of nonfiction, with a helpful Chronology in the front, covering Chinese history from 1839 to 1989. [Edit by="tsprague on Jan 23, 8:31:53 AM"][/Edit]

[Anonymous]

Very late notice, but in a few minutes there is a PBS documentary called:
1421: The Year China Discovered America?
PBS Jan 23 09:00pm
Limited Series/Documentary, 120 Mins.

Author Gavin Menzies claims Chinese explorer Zheng He reached America before Columbus.

Original Airdate: July 21, 2004.
NOTE: Future Airings:
1421, KLCS Jan 28 01:00am

[Anonymous]

I drove out to Riverside to see my parents after class on Tues. night. Clayton had mentioned a new book on Mao during his lecture that evening. When I walked in the door, I saw a copy of Mao, by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday (is this the one you were talking about?). My dad said he had enjoyed it--found it in Singapore last summer--not a very flattering portrayal of Mao. He gave it to me to read. He also told me that a friend of my grandpas was used as a source in the book. They grew up in Waco, Texas together. I remember my father telling me that he learned to eat w/ chopstix from the Emporer of Chinas private pilot when I was a kid.
I guess he, (Royal Lenard) was Changs personal pilot. In the book he was a source of info. on the head general for Northern China.

[Anonymous]

There has been a very nice series about Japan on PBS, with just a couple more episodes to air:
Japanland - The Final Test, KLCS Jan 27 12:00am
Japanland - Mountain Gods and Businessmen, KCET Feb 02 09:00pm
The better news is the DVD and companion book can be ordered here:
http://secure.goldenromonline.com/shopping/karinmuller/order.htm

[Anonymous]

I saw the american version of this movie with Jennifer Lopez and Richard Gere with my dance class. I didn't think that this remake was nearly as effective as its Japanese counterpart. The Japanese version (english sub-titles), draws you in. Anyone who has ever taken a dance class--is sympathetic. It is funny as well as sensitive. I did enjoy this movie.

[Anonymous]

Definitely Japan's most famous film, possibly it's greatest film, The Seven Samurai (Akira Kurosawa, 1954) has been analyzed, explained, and discussed by many in the last half century. It would seem almost redundantly redundant to attempt such an appreciation today. And yet, as an experiment in discussion boardery, (and in order to fulfill the requirements of the course!) my mother and I will venture such a feat right now.

Enjoy.

The film takes place in and around a small village in medieval Japan. It is a time of decentralized authority when warlords ruled the countryside. One of the villagers overhears a group of bandits planning to attack and loot the town. He and the rest of the village decide to hire some down on their luck samurai to defend them, and three and a half hours later. . . well maybe you haven't seen it. The plot should sound familiar as it was the inspiration for The Magnificent Seven. But there's so much more to Kurosawa than the plot.

It's the way he tells the story. It's true that Japan's film system was freer in a way than the American one at the time, allowing him to really be the true auteur, but he also had such attention to every detail of the film. Each bird noise was orchestrated, the amplified hoofbeats. When the movie begins, it is dawn. You can tell that every shot is completely planned.

One of the earliest shots that stick out at me is the first time you see the villagers it's a direct close-up of two female behinds. One woman is sobbing and moaning, the other is trying to console her. I think it's a perfect example of Kurosawa's ability to make films that are both hilarious and emotionally dramatic, often simultaneously.

Mom?

-m@x

[Anonymous]

Well, I think you're oversimplifying. Yes, the movie is very funny and also very moving, but I think that that's because of the director's mixture of pity and contempt for his characters. And remember this isn't the first time we see any villagers. The first one is when Monzo pops out of the weeds a la Bugs Bunny. Are we supposed to laugh at these huddling hunched-over weaklings? Or are we supposed to feel bad for their plight? I think Kurosawa does both.

And you're right about the shot-planning. Just look at all the deep focus composition shots. (that's when both the foreground and the background are in focus) Always with the principal speaker up front, and the response coming from behind. Beautiful.

Right away I see ways to use this in the classroom. Because Kurosawa was so fascinated with this "Unsettled Period" there are many cultural details you can use the film to illustrate. For example, every man in the movie wears his hair in a topknot. This is a samurai style (I've heard it was supposed to make the helmet fit better) and some of the men have shaved part of their head, some haven't. The ones with completely shaved heads are the priests, they have renounced society. When we first meet one of the two main characters of the film, his first action is to cut off his topknot, which would have been shocking in the period, and resonant with 50's Japanese audiences. To show the kids what a big deal it is, direct their attention to the faces in the crowd (all in focus of course) all around him. Then a priest comes and shaves his head.

You could use this scene as an introduction to the period, and then lead into a discussion of what a samurai was, how they were always in the employ of a lord, how important honor was to them, etc. Then you could go into the time period, and how lords were dying and leaving samurai to find work any way they could.

[Anonymous]

Totally. In fact, this would have been the first time in film samurai were shown as hungry and seeking employment! Japanese audiences would have reacted to this, as I'm sure American ones did as our cowboy myths started eroding in modern westerns. And I'm talking about Clint Eastwood and Sergio Leone, not Brokeback Mountain or Deadwood. (speaking of which, just what kind of analogy would you draw to today's kids? Maybe a gangsta rapper coming out of the closet? but I digress)

You can use the difficulty the peasants have in hiring the samurai (the way they are treated, either the samurai is insulted and thrashes them or he's pathetic and useless) to illustrate how profound this shift in social hierarchy was at the time. Also, throughout the film, the hairstyles are all chosen to reflect social position. This was an era with a regimented caste system, and it's difficult to make our students understand that concept.

You mentioned the crowd. Did you notice how the second samurai just slips in? He's one of the crowd, then the other actors in the shot one by one leave until he is alone in the frame. Just to make sure you noticed him.

It's a fairly tired cliché to use European medieval knights to explain samurai to children, and furthermore not too many of our students grow up with stories of Lancelot and Guinevere anyway. I think a movie like this, that so clearly shows (in acting, costume, and hair) the day to day life of a period in time can be valuable for students.

But you can't show it all. Maybe we should just pick and choose snippets we could use in the classroom.

tag you're it,
m@x[Edit by="gmzarou on Jan 28, 6:43:37 PM"][/Edit]

[Anonymous]

That's fine with me, but if you're going to keep pointing out the cinematography, I'm going to have to respond. You're not the only one who's taken a class you know.

Kambei refers to himself as a "ronin" which literally means "wave-man" or "one who rides the waves" but which figuratively means, as we all know from the Robert DeNiro movie, a lord-less samurai, forced to work. Hearing a character say it puts an associated image in the child's mind with the vocabulary word.

I also think they might be interested in the boarding-house scenes, with their wooden beds, leaky roofs, and communal fires. It serves, to some extent, to show how the cities of Japan were in this era. The other (always shirtless) residents are coolies, laborers in the city, and the contrast between them and the "country-mouse" rural peasants could be useful. Finally, the crux of the first act, when Kambei is convinced that he will help the farmers, occurs when one of the coolies points out that the peasants are paying the samurai in bowls of rice, but they themselves are eating the inferior millet. A nice illustration of different crops popular in Japan to an audience unfamiliar with millet. Wretched as they are, they are giving their best and taking the worst themselves. Not only does this illustrate something about Japanese cultural values, but it adds more fuel to the pity/contempt question. Kambei's opinion of the villagers is clearly changed, but is Kurosawa's? The very next scene shows Manzo back in the village, fretting about his daughter when the samurai come to town.

Anyways, I was thinking that if you could figure out a way to show all the different classes represented in this movie without throwing out your lesson plans for a week, then you could break the class into groups to write and perform skits where students were laborers, farmers, samurai, etc. explaining each's social position, lifestyle, clothing, etc.

[Anonymous]

Another favor Kurosawa does us in the boarding-house scenes is give us a sense of how dark it must have been. Of course, he does that with many giant expensive lights, but nevertheless we are transported back to a world lit by fire. Even during daylight (if it isn't raining) there is very little light inside the wooden house, and at night the only light source they have is burning oil in a brazier. This might bring the era to life for students.

Another scene that does that, while explaining a lot about samurai culture, is the one that begins with two samurai (we can tell because of the costumes) who seem to be angrily gardening. It turns out they're using their swords to make fake swords out of bamboo for a mock duel. There is very little dialogue as the two men size each other up, and it seems fairly faithful to how much posing and little actual swordplay made up a medieval Japanese duel. Anyway the two men strike (what would have been) fatal blows at the same time.

Or do they? One of the men is certain he has won, for even though he wasn't the first to strike, his was more powerful because his opponent had led with his arm. The better samurai spotted this, and was able to wait and hit much harder. Since it was a fake duel, he could afford to be hit. You can replay the action the DVD and see that this is actually what happened, albeit in the blink of an eye. Anyways, the loser is unconvinced and demands satisfaction. In a real duel, he is killed. And here, just as he did earlier with Kambei's killing of the thief, all of a sudden Kurosawa puts the action in slow motion as the body falls to the ground.

I think our students, especially the boys, will have their interests piqued by this scene, and it once again accurately portrays aspects of samurai. Honor, skill over style, the sin of pride, etc.

akira my mastah,
m@x

[Author]

Posts