I have a habit of reading books and watching movies that overwhem me. Sometimes I’m terrified (in a fit of sheer stupidity I read The Hot Zone, The Coming Plague, and The Perfect Storm in the space of about ten days, and I was somewhat reluctant to leave my house at the end of it all), and sometimes I’m angered or saddened or horrified at what we humans are capable of (this is how I felt after watching The Killing Fields and Boys Don’t Cry).
More than one person has suggested that I should perhaps back away from books and movies that leave me feeling this way, but I believe that art is not necessarily meant simply to entertain. Enjoyment can be the purpose of a work of art, but sometimes I think it’s good to be exposed to something provocative, something that makes me think, makes me want to learn more. Makes me more aware of the world around me.
A couple of weeks ago I watched a movie called Osama. The story is set in Kabul during the reign of the Taliban, and was filmed in Kabul by Iranian filmmakers in the immediate aftermath of the ousting of the Taliban. That the movie was filmed at all in such conditions is astounding; the director and cinematographer created a sense of spare immediacy that pulled me right into the story.
The story is simple: Under the Taliban, women were not allowed to work, or even to leave their homes without a male escort. However, the Soviet invasion and occupation of the 1980s followed by the Soviet withdrawal and civil war of the 1990s and 2000s left a number of female-only households – families whose fathers and grandfathers were “martyrs” in the struggles of those 20+ years. How were these families to survive when the mere act of going outside could result in arrest?
Osama is the story of such a family: a young girl, her mother, and her grandmother are at the mercy of an extended network of family and friends, and when that network cannot provide them with the most basic necessities, the grandmother cuts off her granddaughter’s hair and turns her into a boy, Osama, who can get a job and support the family. Unfortunately, Osama is rounded up, along with the other young boys, and taken to be “educated” by the Taliban. Things soon go from bad to worse.
Although this is a movie with a clear message, that message is not delivered in the angry, over-the-top, “let me orate and show you the error of your ways” manner that characterizes a lot of American films. Instead, the story unfolds without anger, without rancor, but with a bone-deep sorrow. I couldn’t even talk about the movie after I saw it because I would have broken down into tears. For me, that increases the power of Osama: anger is an emotion that for me is easily dissipated because there’s so much of it in the American media. But this movie made me stop and think, and even now I’m still thankful to the filmmakers for telling this story.
I can’t recommend Osama as entertainment because it’s so difficult to watch. But as art, I think it’s amazing.
The Twilight of the Golds (movie) took me a few trys to watch because of about the same reasons — it quite upset me. Infuriated me.
But I agree that art should also make you think and feel, educate you and make you think about things beyond your realm of existence.
(I should put in that I especially love watching some movies with Stacia because she can often put things into historical/political perspective for me. Also it’s nice that we often both want to know more about some particulars of a given thing.)
I agree with how too many American movies are all telly and lecturey. That’s really not so interesting. I’ve always held that you can reach people much better through entertainment (my plays were always political and I think the Detroit News once quoted me as saying something like, “If you can sneak in the back door of people’s minds to make them think while they’re laughing, you might really start to make some change.”)
I have to be in just the right mood to watch something like that. If I am in the right frame of mind when I watch them, then I do enjoy watching that kind of movie. And that certainly sounds like something I would watch…when I’m in the right frame of mind.
I watch quite a few documentaries on the History Channel and the International History Channel that explores man’s inhumanity to man. Shows like that, even “Schindler’s List” fill me with a deep sorrow.
Normally I keep the doors to my darker and/or sadder emotions solidly locked. So I will go out of my way to avoid emotional, sappy, supposedly feel good movies . But I do watch some of the more fact based movies and especially documentaries. Fortunately Vicki’s a big history buff and can usually keep me clear on fact & fiction. (I love when the History Channel shows a movie like “Braveheart” and then has real historians discussing its merits and accuracy (or inaccuracy) during the commercial breaks.)
I still haven’t seen “Boys Don’t Cry,” although I have read the book. Sometimes I will know I’m ready to watch a show like that. It took me a few years to watch “Schindler’s List,” even though we owned it. Then one weekend, I was in the right frame of mind and asked Vicki if she wanted to watch it.
When I read (other than for purposes of escapism) I generally read non-fiction books, or fiction books based on fact. Often when I see a movie or read a book, Vicki and I both develop the need to know more and start researching it on the internet.
I watch documentaries and read nonfiction too – I think partly in reaction to editing so much fiction! Luckily I’d been warned about this movie’s content by the person who told me about it. I went to see Boys Don’t Cry on its opening weekend based on a local movie review (in DC, no less) that called it a comedy. Apparently others did too – about half the people in the theater walked out. But I was very glad I went.
Other arty/politico movies newly out that you might enjoy, The Kite Runner and Lust,Caution.
Evecho
All I can say is thank God for Netflix! My queue is maxed out with movies most of my friends have never heard of
Happy Holidays!