Leigh(ward) Anarchy

Argentine revolutionary Jose de San Martin began crossing impassable mountains to Chile on January 18, 1817. His highly improvised, epic Andean effort with a frozen-to-the-bones army puts him in the same category as Hannibal...and Napoleon. By any standard.

But you’d never know it to live in this Pitiful Realm. I have Eduardo Galeano to thank for knowing better. [1]

For being able to see that when cinematographer Eric Gautier follows the frostbitten characters in Motocycle Diaries over the Patagonian Andes it’s of a different order than what occured on Martin’s trek. That regardless of the Walter Salles/Robert Redford accomplishment...the snowblown production shoots for much lower heights than anything resembling the Argentine’s passionate, obsessive goal in the 19th century.

I use this overly dramatic introduction as a preparation for...the lack of discrimination evident at the recent Golden Globe Awards ceremonies. Always the case these days. Where trash like Desperate Housewives is lauded, and a pedestrian Hillary Swank [2A] can punch her drunk colleagues into leaving the incomparable Imedla Staunton...in the cold, abandoned.

Imelda of Mike Leigh’s (no-script) Vera Drake [2B]. And of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts...when it still meant something very special.

Taste abandoned. Discriminatory powers lost forever? The wanton dissipation demonstrated by the selection of Swank over Staunton has a political parallel which must not be lost on activists. To wit, the violence inherent in Hillary’s character is something that the numbnuts crowd —emblematic of America (complaints of the Right notwithstanding)— can relate to much more easily than the principled, compassionate middle-class woman portrayed by Imelda. And the issue of abortion —anything truly controversial— is something they’d prefer to avoid having on the table.

We’re not talking about a performance like Charlize Theron’s of last year, a stunning representation of Aileen Wuornos (the prostitute and serial killer)...for which she had to undergo a physical transformation that far exceeded anything Swank had to endure for her sweet Boys Don’t Cry.

Charlize deserved the Golden Globe and Oscar awards lavished on her last year. What we have with the Swank victory this year is a defeat for Artistic Sensitivity. And I trust you all know what that means. Of course it’s a given that a fine performance like Staunton’s is often overlooked, like pearls before swine. Anyone who’s lived through as many decades of decadence in the Hollywood Hills as I have can’t miss that point.

What I’m putting forth here is that we’ve reached a Watershed.

All of the Industry Talk about how Michael Moore achieved this and that with his so-called breakthrough moneymaker is very dangerous. It has perpetuated the notion that now and then radical stuff gets through the cracks...when Moore’s politics are no more efficacious —provide no more opportunity for breaking through The Bastards’ Bastion— than Hillary Swank’s Missouri Maggie. In fact, when she intones lines such as "I might as well go back home and buy a used trailer and get a deep fryer and some Oreos," she’s...holding us back.

Perpetuating the notion that outlets/career choices such as boxing are the one way down-and-outers can escape waiting tables or driving a hack for the rest of their lives is downright deceptive...at best. Hoop Dreams mentality dealt with this way today is deadly.

But I don’t want to get into the merits or demerits associated with the movie. I want to denigrate the choice Pits above Pearls, Pitts over Perfection. [3A] There are moments for both Hillary and Brad that I wouldn’t trade for the world, BUT...they’re all beside the point here.

Staunton went over the Andes...naked. And survived with...a smile on our faces. She went deep through the Thespian Woods, while the other actress dwelled in the Dirty Eastwoods...coming away with all the acorns. Being The Product that her character is destined to be as per The Programmers. No one wants a miniature version of Dr. Larch to play with after the curtain goes down. [3B]

Such Cultural Catastrophe cannot be condoned any longer. This is not long ago —like around the Turn of the Millenium ’99— where we still had time (arguably) to tolerate Hollywood passing up _______________________ (fill-in for you here) or The Insider in choosing something on the order of American Beauty.

Someone’s getting their beauty sleep...during the day.

Hey, wake up American Make-Believer! You’re gonna have to tear down the Fourth Wall to risk telling (a) The Pitts they can’t earn more than $500,000 each (divorced or separated), b) Spielberg that he can’t make any more war movies without risking arson at his distributor’s outlets (and, possibly, at his homes...plural), c) HBO that their advocacy of sex and violence will produce massive boycotts (including the cutting off of personal relationships with those who sing Sopranos Hosannahs), and/or d) every drugstore/supermarket magazine cover publisher...that their product and personal lives are in danger. Something like that. The specifics are not really important here. The acknowledgement of what’s going on and the resolve to do something about it are. A Make-over.

And what can really be done? Well, let me go through the back door on this one.

On the back cover of 2005’s first issue of Z Magazine you’ll find a "Turn your back on Bush" ad. "Democracy belongs to the people, and one way we can express it is through direct action," it says. The organizers want "lots of people to attend the inauguration and, at a given signal," have everyone turn around. Well, that should really turn things around!

That’s kind of what NOT to be doing. The very thing that’s about as much in vogue now among activists as Hillary was immediately following her ’99 rise out of obscurity.

I won’t go into the significant differences here between The Plan that I’ve laid out in public [4]...aiming at turning things around and this monstrous waste of heartbeats (moving us backwards). I will, however, point out that the planning and logistics suggested by the announcement lead one to believe that no one involved in the Feeble Futility has a clue about The Glue That Keeps Bush In Office.

I mean, where is the commentary digging into the simple complaint that an incumbent doesn’t need an inauguration at all? When a tenant signs a new lease, he/she doesn’t get another set of housewarming gifts from the neighbors, yes? No? From whence comes the justification for all the hoopla, the cost...the risks? Answer: It’s in Their Interests.

When Director Mike Leigh turned leeward, facing the direction toward which the winds were blowing in the eighties, he did quite a different turn than what was afforded by his contemporaries’ windward stances.

His political allegory Meantime (1984) viewed Thatcherism through the lens of an East End dole queue in London. And the cactus called Thatcher —which is "a pain in the arse" in 1988’s High Hopes— made some leftist strides. At least he tried to warn people about what was coming, what eventually culminated in his All or Nothing (2002). [5]

That kind of attitudinal set is dead today in Hollywood, and destined to become just so much dead wood as time goes on. Your job is to say you see through it, know how serious it is and to do something about it...victory or no victory in the end.

This is a matter of principle. Like with the Imelda Staunton character in Verna Drake. The stakes cannot be any higher. And the activist who takes breaks with movies —without making distinctions of the sort touched upon above— is...contributing to our demise.

Hillary Swank and George Bush both look as if someone’s operating The Mouth...like with the Senor Wences act. And both may blotch, but never pass up...a good line. Another thing that neither one of them is going to pass up is The Buck$...or anything that serves Career Advancement. Ditto for those propping them up, working them as Product. This is NOT true of Imelda Staunton. And that’s who you want to hang with in person...and in the 3 o’clock in the morning of your soul.

Remember, none of this is by way of recommending the new Mike Leigh film as a film. That’s another issue. What’s at issue here is your next steps.

Heather Gray, in a recent article on misconceptions respecting Martin Luther King’s method’s for change wrote:

"Another misconception is that complaints can be made without concrete demands for change. Those who seek change should always develop the solutions because you don’t want to leave that in the hands of your so-called "adversary" - otherwise you’ve wasted your time. King also called for a fair hearing from the adversaries and to listen to them, as there might be some wisdom to gain from that experience. However, if you don’t like what politicians or others do, you certainly don’t want them to be the chief architects in resolving problems. So don’t just engage in a "feel good" march in front of the White House, Congress, State House or the WTO and assume that you have completed your mission, made your statement. If you haven’t developed your solutions to the problems you’re addressing, you’ve only done a quarter or less of what is necessary." [6]

I disagree, to put it mildly, that we can learn much from our adversaries in the White House and on The Hill. But I acknowledge that too many of my readers are stuck in not being able to get past the notion that one doesn’t have to have something to replace what you want to tear down, Arundhati Roy’s logic notwithstanding. So let’s work with that.

Let’s return to something I threw out a long time ago in an article titled "The Party’s Over Party." [7] We should be demanding change virtually overnight on the issue of Health Care. That should be of interest to over 90% of the country. Health Care on the order of, say, what the Iraqis had prior to our abominations. For everyone, documented and undocumented. Corporations could pay at least what they paid the last time out...when they did pay taxes; double now in many cases. And roughtly the top 2% of our population could chip in to foot the remainder of the bill...on an individual basis. Simultaneously, a huge percentage of that 90% noted above could receive a cut in taxes...with no sweat off of anyone’s brow except the Selfish Sisters cited here.

Admittedly, that’s the broadest of outlines. But the point is that there is a basis for overthrowing The Order without angsting about what’ll replace the status quo. You can pick anything you like from PARECON to the multiple solutions suggested by Mark Zepezauer [8] to insert just before the phrase "in lieu of." But what you can’t be is a do-nothing talktalking about how this or that historic change always took generations of patience to bring about. Such rationalization can be the basis for putting off necessary confrontation indefinitely.

A comfort to cowards and/or a Program for Professional Procrastination.

Some things take ages to work on, yes. But some things CAN be accomplished overnight. And as a check on all I’ve suggested here, why don’t you just ask yourself how many issues you can remember being discussed of late that fall under the latter category?

When asked recently by Total Film’s Simon Cook whether or not his work embodied a socialist view, Mike Leigh retorted:

"I don’t know. I mean, all these labels all over everything... Obviously, there’s a streak of anarchy in all these films and obviously you can talk about some of my films in terms of the tension between socialist possibility and anarchy. It’s there in High Hopes, Life Is Sweet, Secrets & Lies and Career Girls. And it’s definitely there in Naked." [9]

I say we take the leeward way over the mountains, and let windward wannabes dwell in the depths below, rutted and rotting in the ravines ruled by Hollywood Royalty.

You must be The Star of this scenario...with no (completed) script in hand.