Autership

Ingmar Bergman was he subject heavy praise and criticism. People have stated ha he would be more suited for stage than film, and that his over-the-toppery was simply too... shall we say, over the top? Some of his films have been described as difficult, or too slow, or simply impossible to endure. These faults described, and many more, can be read here. Still despite the negativity of many of his films, there is a great deal of praise assigned to a select few, usually The Seventh Seal or Wild Strawberries. Perhaps the point I'm trying to make here is that I did enjoy the films I watched, but at their core, I'm far too overwhelmed by 'information' these days to have been able to enjoy them. All the same, the elements that make his films both beautiful and utterly unwatchable are attributes of his own autership.

I don't know how much I can say about the cast's supposed poor performance, as it was in another language, an my cultural ineptitude prevented me from being able to discern that properly, but I did notice many of the actors between the three movies (Wild Strawberries, The Seventh Seal, and Smiles of a Summer Night) I watched repeated many of the same actors. Gunnar Björnstrand, Åke Fridell, Bibi Andersson appear in all three, with a number of people appearing in at least two. With his expansive film list (59 titles!), you can imagine how many actors are repeats. So this is another so-called element of his film making, I suppose.

He has tackled a number of different genres of film; from drama, to fantasy, to comedy (at least, considering the films I watched), so it looks like he's interested in experimenting. At the same time, I've noticed that they're all sort of introspectives, likely into his own life. This self-reflexiveness I think is also a common element of his films. He has discussed themes as personal as love and death, and done so with an approach that is distinctly his own. Naturally, this is where much of his criticism comes in, the all too personal element that Hollywood has, since it's inception, tried to hold back. Some people really love it, some really don't.

The two most acclaimed films of those I watched, The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries were for me the most enjoyable, and I think that's because the themes of these are more-or-less universal, exploring deep themes (particularly death) with some of the most intriguing characters. Wild Strawberries' protagonist, Dr. Isak Borg, is a very interesting lens to be cast through, as we recount with him his troubled past, alongside his current life. It presents us with a whole spectrum of morality, emptiness, and acceptance, which seem to be present themes in the other films I've seen. Take for example what must be the iconic scene in Seventh Seal, where Antonio Block plays chess with death. There is a strange hope/futility sort of dichotomy ever-present through the movie, but that seems to sum up Bergman's message made. As for Smiles of a Summer Night, well. Not my favorite film at all. I had seen it last, and it was just so... different than what little I had come to expect. Cynical sort-of romantic comedy. When surmising autership, someone unfamiliar with the director for these three might be surprised to find it's even his film. Or maybe I just saw his only 'dark' films, but I' be surprised. Interesting guy, to be assured.

How to Read a Book like a Film

I have read David Marnet's screenplay Glengarry Glen Ross. Some thoughts:

My ideal cast:

Shelly Levene is the most normal character in the book. He is a bit older and is sort of forced to steal in order to help his once mentioned sick daughter. Seeing as how this is a common use of the Heinz dilemma, Shelly should no less be played by the fictitious Heinz himself. It would be perfect. Or if you need somebody real, why not the psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg, famous for creating the scenario?

Ricky Roma, the dirty, sneaky, ambitious (and often victorious) salesman of the lot. He'll do anything to win, and he knows just how to hook an unsuspecting fish, so to speak. Because of his obvious talent in con-artistry, he should be played by George W. Bush pretty much any president Ronald A. Katz, inventor of automated call centers and those stupid automatic messages you're no doubt used to hearing. Hello, your call is important to us. Now, if you could please listen to this irritating music for 20 to 30 minutes, that'd be juuust super.

Dave Moss, the conspirator who plans to steal the client list that will get him and Levene rich. Loud-mouthed and obnoxious, selfish and cunning, he should be played by Canadian actor Robb Wells, who plays Ricky in the show Trailer Park Boys (a fantastic show about the moronic and violent life on a trailer park). The titular character is more or less the same person.

John Williamson, the manager of this agency, is a cruel and petty sort of tyrant. Playing the role of the greedy doctor in the Heinz dilemma, he should probably be played by Sam Walton, president and CEO of Wal-mart Stores, Inc. For those of you who haven't heard, he's kind of a despicable human being, and I use the latter term very generously. Much like Williamson, the characters of the screenplay would like nothing more than to see writhe in torment and agony for all eternity pass away peacefully in his sleep sooner rather than later.

George Aaronaw is passive, petty, aging, and filled with complaints in his life. He tries not to get caught up in any risky business, but despite his effortless attitude and fear that have him stuck as an incompetent salesman in the first place, he just might get caught up anyway. I can only see myself playing this character in the 40 years down the road. Maybe it would be a role suited for Stephanie Meyer or her diluted mirror image Bella Swan, if George were a girl.

Enough of them, I'm also going to suggest, in order to enrich the plot of this piece, that the plot be more... cruel than it already is. While it's magnificently written, I think that the biggest idea with this play is that cheaters always win, and winners always cheat better than losers. So, let's switch up the characters some.

I want Levene to be lying about his sick daughter. And I want him to ham up the lie as much as possible (dead wife, unsupportive parents, behind on mortgage too, etc). I think that the company should be larger in scale. Much larger. Have it be a chain or realtors, and have Williamson at the top. Dissociate his character some more from the employees, make him really hungry for money, and make him have it. Ricky Roma could be next in line for the top spot at this branch, and that would make the plot even more competitive and dirty. By the end of this all, have the guys who attempted to steal the leads get arrested (as they have) and have them be replaced by a few up-and-comers shortly thereafter. Roma could be expanded upon if he were already the boss of his sect, and could be gunning for Williamson's job, but this is probably pretty needless. I want to get the sense in there that this business is like the womb of a tiger shark. That's sort of how it is in real life!

Literary Fiction

I had my girlfriend read this book with me as I knew she would enjoy it as much as I had been at the time. When we finished, we took ample time to talk about it. Quotes were pulled from popular resources, but remain as relevant as any piece of text in the book.

Constantly fought about, banned in three countries for some lengths of time, and questionable though legal, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita is no stranger to controversy, even from the very first word of the very first paragraph ("Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins."). Nabokov uses this piece as to deconstruct preconceptions about your average sex offender by putting you in the very shoes of one, and through copious amounts of pervasive language and mental exploration, Humbert Humbert manages to find some endearment beneath his tortured and monstrous shell. Of course, he is ultimately dissonant with us, though not for lack of effort, but I think this odd relationship we have with such an unlikely and despicable man is the true reason for this books controversy. Every thought of Humbert's is candid, and though disturbed, his outlook on an otherwise dismal reality without Lo is deliberately beautiful, rife with language and shakespearian eloquence.

All at once we were madly, clumsily, shamelessly, agonizingly in love with each other; hopelessly, I should add, because that frenzy of mutual possession might have been assuaged only by our actually imbibing and assimilating every particle of each other's soul and flesh; but there we were, unable even to mate as slum children would have so easily found an opportunity to do so.”

Mmm. Tragic like Shakespeare, too.

Humbert is, himself, a very fascinating character. As he's written, we are supposed to make him out to be very attractive, well built, well-to-do, intelligent, and worldly. His only real flaw is warped view on sexuality, which he manages to explain as pervasively as possible in the beginning of the novel. We can, to some degree, understand why he is stuck in the limbo that he is. We can applaud for him when he does show constraint, and given the onslaught of characters that are made to be hated (particularly Charlotte, I think) the world in which he lives truly concerns itself with just H. H. and Lo. We read with intensity when he doesn't show constraint. We want him to be happy. And we want Lolita to be happy too, which she seems to be from the beginning, though she does get caught up in a world over her head. Either way, these characters are very engaging and dangerously agreeable. Without Quilty, there would be little offset to the truly neurotic nature of the writing. Acting as the tails to heads, they are irrevocably two sides of the same coin, much to Humbert's chagrin.

We fell to wrestling again. We rolled all over the floor, in each other's arms, like two huge helpless children. He was naked and goatish under his robe, and I felt suffocated as he rolled over me. I rolled over him. We rolled over me. They rolled over him. We rolled over us.

Here is perhaps the best example of how Humbert understands his relationship with the dentist. Every negative statement about Quilty is immediately a part of Humbert's own life, and this reflection is a saving grace of sorts for this dangerous novel (apart from the completely necessary foreword). Though the language is beautiful and the content is as subdued as can possibly be, this will always be to most (and superficially to all) a book about a pedophile, and as unfortunate as that is, it does manage to hold its own against critics, and over fifty years after it's been written, it's still used as an example of important (or in this case integral) literature in schools and colleges the world over.

Pulp Fiction and the Organization of Genre

Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon can be quickly defined through presupposed genre labels: Mystery, crime, detective fiction, and according to Wikipedia, the film version of this book can be labeled as the first film noir production, which would likely make this book an early example of text noir, I guess. It is, in fact, an awesome piece of mystery literature, coaxing the reader to try to figure out what is going on before Sam Spade does. Whether you do or not, it is fantastically engaging, which is important for any mystery novel.

As a crime novel, differing slightly from the mystery marker, it involves the perspective of a slightly crooked cop who is unafraid to get his hands dirty. Another genre marker that is derived from this is the hard-boiled crime fiction marker, often involved with police. And that's exactly what we are given: a hard-boiled cop! It's probably not a stretch to assume it is an early pioneer of this marker too, especially after a confirming Wikipedia entry. Even if it isn't the first, it is certainly one of the most influential hard-boiled books on the market.

As with any good book (or film), it's important to note the use of sub-genres that further help to define this within the realm of literature. It's use of the objective point-of-view could arguably be a marker of its genre, and the varying character archetypes (the femme fetale, a traitorous and conniving Brigid, as well as the overly flamboyant Joel Cairo) could also be markers of the overall genre. Spade's relationship with his late partner Archer's wife, Iva, and later his dangerous relationship with Brigid, gives this an air of both romance and thrill(er), supporting themes that are never far from Hammett's mind. The rather unseen (and quite dead) Archer is himself a unique marker for this story, serving until the very end as a consciousness for Sam, allowing him to end both of his reckless relationships throughout the novel. He could be considered the voice of reason to the viewer as well, which would make him something of a genre marker, I think.

"You're a damn good man, sister," he said and went out.