two films by Welles
the second day of Christmas began with Orson Welles' The Third Man, which my yin and i had been falling asleep to for more than a week. this is in no way, however, a commentary on the film, which is everything one could expect (and more) from a post-War noir. rather, the somnolence was a side effect of the inter-holiday hubbub, those hectic weeks between Hanukkah and Christmas when everyone is engaged in the ritual consumptions sandwiched between gluttonies.
gluttony and consumption, of course, are never beside the point, and this was especially true on the day after Christmas, when i woke with a refrigerator full of sweets and a heaviness in my heart from unpleasant dreams the night before.
at least that was my story.
in fact, and in reaction, i regressed to the baccalaureate days of the late Nineties, watching films all day long in an attempt to find its source, knowing all along that it was beyond apprehension. i passed the morning searching for a reason that wasn't there, and it reminded me of The Third Man's beautiful, disorienting sequence in the labyrinth sewers of Vienna:
what danger lurks at the end of the tunnel?
what light illuminates its presence?
what light illuminates its presence?
i have never seen so many canted shots, so artfully rendered, in all my life. i saw the junkyard of Old Europe in those broken alleys, and the chiaroscuro streets served as harbingers of the world to come, the atmospheric foundations that would come to support the Berlin Wall a decade later:
rubble on the Soviet left, advertising on the Yankee right
i felt Welles looming over me as i marshaled my resources to go out and face the day. it's hard for me to watch him and not see Charles Foster Kane, impossible not see the bloated caricature that lie ahead. Welles' fate is the fate of us all:
handsome, dashing and youthful... this, too, shall pass
the day passed in this way, shuttling between bedrooms and movie houses, and i watched Aronofsky's Black Swan for lunch:
it impressed me, but probably only because i went with low expectations. the sex scenes were cliched; the masturbation scene was both patently absurd and absurdly patent; and the film's construction of gender was problematic, especially in its implication that feminine perfection can only be achieved by disfigurement and death.
perhaps this was done as a critique of our society's dominant beauty standards, but the visceral appeal of Aronofsky's images overpowers any such interpretation. nonetheless i enjoyed it, although i believe two semesters of feminist theory should be required along with a ticket stub.
next came a recommendation from my brother, Exit Through the Gift Shop:
what is the relationship between anonymity, sincerity and gimmick?
which is a documentary by Banksy and, perhaps, about a Frenchman cum videographer cum documentarian cum street artist cum overnight sensation. as the film progressed my yin and i were shocked to see familiar images emerging, and ultimately we realized that Mr. Brainwash, the (presumed) subject of the documentary, was also responsible for the flash gallery we stumbled into at this year's Art Basel. we called my brother to relay the news and ask him what he had to spray:
are Mr. Brainwash and Banksy the same person?
as dinner time approached, we decided to order in Chinese food (a first for us) and watch Woody Allen's Manhattan:
what is the meaning of all these silhouettes?
when he and Mariel Hemingway are shown eating take-out in bed, the appropriateness of our actions was confirmed, and this raised interesting questions as to who was whom: did my neuroses make me Allen, or was this trumped by my yin's Jew-ish-ness?
similarly, my own longing for Mariel's grandfather makes her an appealing metaphor, but my yin's overall comeliness indisputably makes her better suited for the part. obviously, this (imagined) conversation went nowhere.
next up was Jim Jarmusch's Broken Flowers:
Welles would have used a deeper focus
which was easily the most pleasant surprise of the day. its deliberate pacing and laconic shots of Murray setting on the couch captivated me, and it took all of my will power to shut it off when my yin began dozing off in my arms.
the night ended as the day began, with a film noir by Orson Welles,
The Lady From Shanghai:
ah yes, those reckless women...
i lasted only slightly longer than my yin, and my immediate reaction to his Irish accent wasn't positive. but then again, one doesn't watch Welles to listen –we watch him to learn how to see:
what is a mirror?
collapsing into sleep, i dreamed forgotten dreams and woke in the morning wondering how many films have been lost to the fog of memory, how many more will be lost before i find myself in the bloated company of Welles –
unforgotten, mirrored and fading.
thus concluded the second day of Christmas.
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