Me and You and Everyone We Know

Me and You and Everyone We Know came out four years ago but I only got round to seeing it now. It was directed by Miranda July, who also plays the lead role. Her quirky character, Christine, provides taxi services for old people. She's also a video artist, and she tries to get her work exhibited in a museum. She falls in love with Richard, a shoes salesman who has just got divorced. He tries to raise his kids and connect with them, but in vain - to try to get their attention, he even sets his hand alight and waves at them.
And that's one of the main themes of the film : connecting in the age of the internet. This is mostly developed in the subplots involving Richard's two boys, two teenage schoolgirls and a curator of a museum of contemporary art. The boys' first experience of sex takes the form of a scatological online chat with a complete stranger. A middle-aged man flirts with two schoolgirls, but when things might actually get physical, he hides from them. The curator views Christine's video artwork, and at the end of the cassette is a kind of pre-recorded interview of Christine : another delayed, indirect and virtual exchange. And although the exhibition the curator is preparing is a reflexion about the alienation caused by virtual communication, she herself has no one in her life. What's interesting is that the film came out just before the boom of networking sites (Myspace, Facebook, et al), but it brings some interesting insights. Even though technology and the Internet make it much easier, cheaper and quicker to communicate, humans are unable to connect in the computer age. The computer screen has become a barrier - an actual screen, if we want to play with semantics - between people. There is a breakdown of intimacy - whether platonic or sexual. Intimacy is replaced by an unhealthy type of fantasy - fantasy has always existed, and there's nothing wrong with it in itself, but the division created by the screen means that it's never acted out, there is never any real contact or sharing or exchange.
The film has some uncomfortable moments in it (the scene where a 8 year old kid sex-chats online with a stranger without even knowing what sex is is quite disturbing) and might be too quirky for the taste of some people, but it's one of the best I've seen in a while. Miranda July and John Hawkes (Richard) are great performers, some of the lines are memorable, the strange music fits the film perfectly, and there's some beautiful camera shots (the film actually won the Caméra d'Or at Cannes in 2005). But again, I don't think it's a film which will speak to everyone. Some people might think it's too pretentious, or just not get it. But it's probably like a good red wine. If you swallow it too quickly, you'll only taste the vinegary bits. If you let your tongue savour all the flavours it has to offer, you'll most likely love it!

Carol Brown

This is probably my favourite song so far from the second season of Flight of the Conchords.

Fey Pride

This post may be a good deal more personal than usual, but it’s something that has been on my mind for quite some time now. So here goes.

This is the 21st century.
But if a guy doesn’t follow certain cultural conventions, supposed to be traditional masculine norms, he is depicted or perceived as being gay. (This is actually another stereotype. As if all gays were effeminate… But that’s another story, for another time.)
For example : traditionally, masculinity is associated with : being into sports (especially team sports), preferring beer or strong liquor to wine and cocktails, being aloof and reticent or reluctant to express one’s emotions, appreciating depictions of violence in literature, cinema, etc, being reluctant to commit or to start a family, being homosocial rather than heterosocial (ie preferring the company of men to the company of women, in a non-sexual way), being less sensitive, talkative, romantic and moody than women, caring less about one’s own outward appearance (though admittedly that is due to the fact that there is far more pressure on women to conform to certain norms of physical attractiveness ; however that is changing, as it has been reported that more and more men are starting to feel the pressure too.), being attracted to certain colours, not caring about interior design, not being interested in cooking or gastronomy, liking meat etc… This is just the tip of the iceberg. There are many, many such conventions. They may vary slightly from one country to another, but most of them are firmly engrained in Western culture.

But they just don’t reflect reality.

I know heterosexual women who love beer, team sports, gory horror films, who are reticent, heterosocial and decidedly unromantic. But they’re still heterosexual and they’re still women.
I myself don’t eat meat, I can't stand graphically violent or gory films and am nonplussed by action films, I actually like some “chick flicks” (of the “intelligent” kind), I’m not into team sports (mostly because I hate competition ; playing for “funsies” is okay), I like the colours pink and purple, I hate confrontation, I’m over-sensitive (nooot a good thing), I think cooking is fun, I’m a bit mushy (in a tasteful manner, I like to think. Inasmuch as mushy can be tasteful), I think most beer is overrated (I did say most), I like things fey, I’d like to have kids someday… okay I’m not going to type out all my likes and dislikes and characteristics, and I’m not submitting them to anyone’s moral judgement. I’m just trying to prove a point here. These attributes are rarely considered ‘masculine’ in mainstream Western culture, yet last time I checked I was still a man, and to quote Stuart Murdoch “I’m straight to the point of boring myself” – “even when I feel like a girl”. And by the way, my mannerisms aren’t considered to be effeminate, as far as I know.

I don’t want to be seen as overreacting or as whining – it’s just that such stereotyping can be annoying on the long term. I have more or less come to terms with this ‘altermasculinity’ now, but it took time. Interestingly it’s usually not something that women have a problem with. Women have other battles to fight, they are probably aware of the dangers of stereotyping as they themselves are constantly subjected to stereotyping in this patriarchal society. And not all men are guilty of this reactionary behaviour. (I’ve had mates who felt more or less the same way as I did.) But many are. Religious people, and in my experience conservative Christians, are among the worst, and often tend to misapply misinterpreted verses from Scripture .

I have in the past tried to conform to more traditional, conventional masculine gender roles, but on most occasions it was an absolute disaster. (I actually enrolled in a football club and practised every week for a year in 1998, because I thought that was the thing boys were meant to do. I was so bad at it that I wasn’t even allowed to play one single game for the team. I’ve tried to watch gory movies but was either bored to death or just disgusted. And I’m not even going to talk about my short and disastrous experience with the boy scouts…)

It’s an issue which has sometimes been addressed in ‘out-of-the-mainstream’ literature, music and cinema, but very little in popular culture. There are, however, signs that things are slowly changing. A character like “JD” (Zach Braff) in the TV show Scrubs, while not always being depicted in an altogether positive light, allows the idea that a man can flout certain perceived masculine norms without necessarily being gay. This is also the case, but to a lesser extent, with character Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) in sitcom How I Met your Mother. It’s nice to see main characters like that on mainstream, widely popular, prime-time TV shows. It wouldn’t surprise me if there were many men out there who feel forced to conform to norms of conventional masculinity.

Now I’m not suggesting that all conventional masculine norms be traded for feminine ones or unconventional ones. Everyone is different. It’s just that people should cut us some slack and let us be who we are.

End of rant.

I heart France

I just noticed that whenever I blog about France or the French, the post usually takes the form of an ugly rant. That's probably because I only post about France when something about the country has just cheesed me off (pun intented). My apologies. I actually really love living here. Since I don't want to give the wrong impression, here's a list of some of the things I love about this country and its people (no order of preference):

• France has many beautiful and very diverse landscapes
• France has a fascinating history
  
• the French are rarely superficial
• the French are less materialistic than people in anglo-saxon countries (no matter what people say)
  
• France is a republic. We have no useless monarch. (But plenty of useless politicians).
• the French language is beautiful (when spoken properly)
• France hasn't fallen for the extreme political correctness of some anglo-saxon countries (though sadly that's changing)
• France has had some great poets, writers and artists
  
• the French are always ready to question the authorities and stand up for their rights
• the wine (no further comment needed!)
• the food, especially the many different salads and cheeses
  
• the weather (in general)
• the urban French usually have a good dress sense
• the French have a cute accent when they speak English
• in France it isn't embarassing or socially abnormal for a man to cook or be interested in gastronomy
  
• ordinary French people are interested in politics
• it's a secular state ; no link between church and state
• many French people are pacifists and are anti-war
• the French kiss to greet one another (how better can it get?)
• the French use their hands when they speak
• in France, you can put your hands on the table when you eat
• French markets aren't only full of hip bourgeois people
• the French dig the Irish
• José Bové (I don't know whether it's his moustache or his alter-globalism which I like best)
• the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
• the French are almost as cynical as I am
• the French are into home-made cooking rather than ready-made meals
• in cases of emergencies, men can pee in women's loos, without being shot down (mentally) by the muttawa
• junk food is considered uncool
• on a religious note (sorry peeps, I had to get this one out), French Christians generally don't give in to the Christian Right-type nonsense about politics and end-times theology that you often find in the US and in Norn Iron
  

(Dedicated to Camille)

Of Bread and Frogs

Turning vegetarian - that was unforgivable for our French friends. Refusing to eat "le" meat ? How could we be such philistines ? (Yes, meat-eating is considered an art in France). Then it was choosing to get around on bikes.

But now we've given them another reason to label us as crazy arrogant foreign hipsters. We bought a bread machine. Now, our French friends don't know this yet. But I can already imagine their reaction. "What ? You don't like baguettes ? Food snobs !" Well, I guess baguette is okay now and then as a novelty, but it gets boring when you eat it 365 days a year - as many French people still do. Plus it isn't even healthy. There's no wholegrain in it. And if you drink water with it, it makes you bloat. Yes, like frogs.

It's part of a wider move. We're trying to buy less pre-packaged, processed and ready-made food, and cook/bake more ourselves. It takes much more time, but it's cheaper (no matter what people say), it's healthier, it's yummier, and it's more ethical.

So who cares what the French think ? I'd rather be arrogant and healthy any day than cynical and bloated.

PS. Don't miss the Age of Stupid drama-docu film about climate change when it comes out this Spring.

Wrapped Up in Books

I've no time to update my blog these days. I'm really busy — and not in a trendy, livin' the vida loca, out-every-night way. In a monastic, nose between the pages, dreaming about words kind of way. I'm wrapped up in books.
And that's cool with me.

Duct Tape Christ

Yesterday we went to Paris to meet up with friends we hadn't seen for a while, and we decided to go to the National Museum of Modern Art in the Centre Georges Pompidou. I didn't really know what to expect because I know very little about 20th century art. I was afraid of it being very arrogant, filled with paintings that any three-year old could make and which are only considered art because their creators are famous. There was some of that, but not too much, and I actually really enjoyed our visit.

There was an exhibition of works by Jacques Villeglé, a French artist I'd never heard of, who has been making pictures out of lacerated and ripped posters he found on walls in French cities since the 1950s : political posters, adverstisement posters and band posters. To quote the museum's website, "Villeglé's work is a tremendous seismograph of our "collective realities" such as they are distilled by urban space and whose stories are recreated for us via the unusual reality of its walls. It reveals to what extent what we see is conditioned by this everyday visual environment and reactivates our memory in a critical, but also enjoyable, way."
Villeglé is also famous for his "alphabet socio-politique" in which he uses political and religious symbols. The exhibition was fascinating, and would definitely be very interesting for semioticians.

There was also an exhibition about futurism. I didn't know much about the movement, but one of our friends has studied it during the year so she was able to explain quite a bit. The futurists focussed on machines, speed and the industrial world, and believed that technology would change the world for good. Unsuprisingly, a lot of them were fascists. I didn't really like the paintings, but they revealed the way in which the futurists perceived the world at that time, which was very interesting. With today's environmental crisis it's hard to understand how naïve they could be about technology.

Finally we visited the main gallery. Some of the more contemporary works were very pretentious (a white canvas with a line or two brushed across : it might have been original 30 years ago but it's a bit cliché now. Time to move on?). But they were some really thought-provoking works. One was a video : an artist went to Yemen to film kids carrying placards he had made and on which were written in arabic the names of famous Western "heroes" (Minnie Mouse, Picasso, Zorro, Santa Claus, James Bond...) to show how capitalism finds a way into poor societies and undermines centuries of local tradition and culture.

Another interesting work was a red and white duct-taped crucifix. Unfortunately I can't remember the name of the artist, but she or he was South African, and wanted to represent the way religion is used to justify the most terrible things. I think it's a very powerful work, and it could be applied to the situation in Northern Ireland or the way God was used to justify the war in Iraq.


I'll finish by posting a picture of the Parisian skyline. The view at the top of the Pompidou centre is breath-taking. When you see Paris from the top, you understand why so many people think it's one of the most beautiful cities in the world.