Friday, June 06, 2003
High Society
Written by Ben Elton
Ben Elton’s brand of humor has always been a spoof or satire (depends on what you perceive) of societal observations. His stories are ludicrous reflections yet firmly entrenched in current social phenomenon.
In Inconceivable, the distraught childless couple is caught in knots. They try go to lengths, sometimes ridiculous, to conceive get the wife pregnant while the husband is concurrently facing a writer’s block. It is a micro - study of the double income no children syndrome plaguing modern society that is coming to grips with an ageing population through the eyes of married adults trying to climb the corporate ladder as well.
In Dead Famous, a murder occurs to one of the participants in a “Big Brother” competition. It’s a reality TV show where participants are locked in a house with other participants. Cameras capture every movement in the house which will be broadcasted on the Internet and interesting snippets are shown on TV. Audiences will be polled weekly on who they want to see out. Based on the immergence and popularity of “Reality TV” shows, Elton’s novel reveals the sinister manipulation of TV networks and media houses intent on creating “blockbuster programs” albeit, done in a badly tawdry taste that lingers even after the hype is over.
This Other Eden goes to the future and explores the calamity that humans could face of having planet earth die when pollution increases. The marketing of biospheres as a commodity – “little worlds” where people can lock themselves in when earth no longer supports human life; ties in with the dilemma of preservation efforts.
It is apparent that Elton’s novels have always involved the participation of the “media” party, whether as a writer for BBC in Inconceivable or the power of marketing in This Other Eden.
In High Society, Elton took a polarised debatable issue and created a story that is thought provoking and exciting. Peter Paget is a back bench MP who gets a chance to introduce a private bill. Getting his break finally at middle age, and with the support of his family, he calls for the “legalization” of all drugs. Peter argues that drugs creates social problems such as prostitution and “bent” police. He reasons that legalization and taxation of drugs will eliminate such problems as people will be able to “shoot up” in clean places. Revenue obtained from drugs can be used to finance the country in areas such as education.
The highs and lows of his debate is brought to media forefront while, at the same time, we read the confessions of an archetypal high profile rock star, Tommy Hanson, and his screwed up life. We also read the sombre accounts of Jessie, a homeless girl forced to sell her life for cocaine.
Elton’s novels always read like a screenplay or a movie. The action is fast paced. The dialogue is crisp and funny. We know what is happening even though it juggles between the different characters and their stories. It is a thrilling ride or a farce (depends on what you like to think) just to read High Society.
Maybe High Society doesn’t go deep into the drugs issue but that has always been Elton’s style. We know that he has always been more a writer of “issues” rather than developing characters. His characters are the actors of the issues that helps brings the novel together and gives us a societal perspective of how foible it operates.
We have the back biting journalist/ columnist who is intent on breaking down Peter Paget by trying to get his dirt. We get the parliament who agrees with Peter and laugh when they make him the Minister of Drugs when the media and people has rallied around him. We chuckle at Tommy Hanson’s confessions at Alcoholic’s Anonymous meetings because he acted out the superstar that we have come to expect.
I believe most critics do not think kindly of Elton’s novels and High Society is not exactly a kind of breakthrough of his earlier writing. I believe that there will come a time when people will appreciate his novels, for going all the way and telling us how irrational our society is.
Punch Drunk Love
Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Love can do miraculous things to people. Adam Sandler, a reclusive small business owner, who keeps to himself after work, has 7 sisters on his back all the time. When he meets Lena Leonard (Emily Watson) and falls in love with her, he decides he wants to be with her all the time.
This lovable and cute romance comedy is a modern fable that recaptures the sparks of what it means to fall in love and what it can do to people. Though it has a simple and almost sold to death storyline, the story keeps us glued to it because we are amused by Adam Sandler’s idiosyncratic behaviour.
When we first see Barry, he was making phone calls and trying to ascertain the validity of a certain promotion, which he calculates, could get him to fly for free for the rest of his life if he buys an enormous amount of Health Choice Products because they could be exchanged for frequent flier miles. It might not be a very capturing starting but from a distance, we feel that Barry has a plot. This is broken by a small interruption outside. A harmonium is deserted on the main road. Adam takes a few peeks, ensures no one is looking, before he runs to get it. This comical scurrying prepares us on how the story is developing. Barry is our strung up weirdo protagonist.
When Adam makes a paid sex phone call, we are bemused at the conversation between him and the phone girl, Georgia. As she flirts with him, Barry continues to chat with a straight face. He doesn’t seem to want phone sex. He wants to talk.
Adam Sandler is a juggernaut in Punch Drunk Love. His Barry is a man who smashes windows to gain attention from his family party. Barry cries abruptly when he was in the midst of a conversation with his dentist brother-in-law. When he says he cries sometimes, he immediately broke out into tears. Such outbursts are nerve-wreckingly funny; but it tells us more about Barry too, at the same time. With other actors, they might have tried to put more emotions into it. Adam Sandler however, plays it with a straight face. He is the clown who doesn’t act like a clown and he does it so well we are left with no doubt that we believe in his character completely.
Paul Thomas Anderson uses different shades that melts and congeals, perhaps as a stylistic measure to hypnotize us into believing this is a drugged out experience. A music score, simu computer synthesized games bleeps and beeps will blare out all of a sudden to annoy and keep the tension high. When Barry meets Lena at Hawaii, we see the both of them from afar, like shadows, kissing while passerbys rattle pass. This scene seems to come out from a fairy tale and it has a dreamlike quality to it.
We love watching ideal romance bloom on screen. Punch Drunk Love surrealistic characters and settings is a fantasy that rarely has been relived anymore. I’m glad it has.
Written by Ben Elton
Ben Elton’s brand of humor has always been a spoof or satire (depends on what you perceive) of societal observations. His stories are ludicrous reflections yet firmly entrenched in current social phenomenon.
In Inconceivable, the distraught childless couple is caught in knots. They try go to lengths, sometimes ridiculous, to conceive get the wife pregnant while the husband is concurrently facing a writer’s block. It is a micro - study of the double income no children syndrome plaguing modern society that is coming to grips with an ageing population through the eyes of married adults trying to climb the corporate ladder as well.
In Dead Famous, a murder occurs to one of the participants in a “Big Brother” competition. It’s a reality TV show where participants are locked in a house with other participants. Cameras capture every movement in the house which will be broadcasted on the Internet and interesting snippets are shown on TV. Audiences will be polled weekly on who they want to see out. Based on the immergence and popularity of “Reality TV” shows, Elton’s novel reveals the sinister manipulation of TV networks and media houses intent on creating “blockbuster programs” albeit, done in a badly tawdry taste that lingers even after the hype is over.
This Other Eden goes to the future and explores the calamity that humans could face of having planet earth die when pollution increases. The marketing of biospheres as a commodity – “little worlds” where people can lock themselves in when earth no longer supports human life; ties in with the dilemma of preservation efforts.
It is apparent that Elton’s novels have always involved the participation of the “media” party, whether as a writer for BBC in Inconceivable or the power of marketing in This Other Eden.
In High Society, Elton took a polarised debatable issue and created a story that is thought provoking and exciting. Peter Paget is a back bench MP who gets a chance to introduce a private bill. Getting his break finally at middle age, and with the support of his family, he calls for the “legalization” of all drugs. Peter argues that drugs creates social problems such as prostitution and “bent” police. He reasons that legalization and taxation of drugs will eliminate such problems as people will be able to “shoot up” in clean places. Revenue obtained from drugs can be used to finance the country in areas such as education.
The highs and lows of his debate is brought to media forefront while, at the same time, we read the confessions of an archetypal high profile rock star, Tommy Hanson, and his screwed up life. We also read the sombre accounts of Jessie, a homeless girl forced to sell her life for cocaine.
Elton’s novels always read like a screenplay or a movie. The action is fast paced. The dialogue is crisp and funny. We know what is happening even though it juggles between the different characters and their stories. It is a thrilling ride or a farce (depends on what you like to think) just to read High Society.
Maybe High Society doesn’t go deep into the drugs issue but that has always been Elton’s style. We know that he has always been more a writer of “issues” rather than developing characters. His characters are the actors of the issues that helps brings the novel together and gives us a societal perspective of how foible it operates.
We have the back biting journalist/ columnist who is intent on breaking down Peter Paget by trying to get his dirt. We get the parliament who agrees with Peter and laugh when they make him the Minister of Drugs when the media and people has rallied around him. We chuckle at Tommy Hanson’s confessions at Alcoholic’s Anonymous meetings because he acted out the superstar that we have come to expect.
I believe most critics do not think kindly of Elton’s novels and High Society is not exactly a kind of breakthrough of his earlier writing. I believe that there will come a time when people will appreciate his novels, for going all the way and telling us how irrational our society is.
Punch Drunk Love
Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Love can do miraculous things to people. Adam Sandler, a reclusive small business owner, who keeps to himself after work, has 7 sisters on his back all the time. When he meets Lena Leonard (Emily Watson) and falls in love with her, he decides he wants to be with her all the time.
This lovable and cute romance comedy is a modern fable that recaptures the sparks of what it means to fall in love and what it can do to people. Though it has a simple and almost sold to death storyline, the story keeps us glued to it because we are amused by Adam Sandler’s idiosyncratic behaviour.
When we first see Barry, he was making phone calls and trying to ascertain the validity of a certain promotion, which he calculates, could get him to fly for free for the rest of his life if he buys an enormous amount of Health Choice Products because they could be exchanged for frequent flier miles. It might not be a very capturing starting but from a distance, we feel that Barry has a plot. This is broken by a small interruption outside. A harmonium is deserted on the main road. Adam takes a few peeks, ensures no one is looking, before he runs to get it. This comical scurrying prepares us on how the story is developing. Barry is our strung up weirdo protagonist.
When Adam makes a paid sex phone call, we are bemused at the conversation between him and the phone girl, Georgia. As she flirts with him, Barry continues to chat with a straight face. He doesn’t seem to want phone sex. He wants to talk.
Adam Sandler is a juggernaut in Punch Drunk Love. His Barry is a man who smashes windows to gain attention from his family party. Barry cries abruptly when he was in the midst of a conversation with his dentist brother-in-law. When he says he cries sometimes, he immediately broke out into tears. Such outbursts are nerve-wreckingly funny; but it tells us more about Barry too, at the same time. With other actors, they might have tried to put more emotions into it. Adam Sandler however, plays it with a straight face. He is the clown who doesn’t act like a clown and he does it so well we are left with no doubt that we believe in his character completely.
Paul Thomas Anderson uses different shades that melts and congeals, perhaps as a stylistic measure to hypnotize us into believing this is a drugged out experience. A music score, simu computer synthesized games bleeps and beeps will blare out all of a sudden to annoy and keep the tension high. When Barry meets Lena at Hawaii, we see the both of them from afar, like shadows, kissing while passerbys rattle pass. This scene seems to come out from a fairy tale and it has a dreamlike quality to it.
We love watching ideal romance bloom on screen. Punch Drunk Love surrealistic characters and settings is a fantasy that rarely has been relived anymore. I’m glad it has.
Thursday, June 05, 2003
The Majestic
Directed by Frank Darabont
The Majestic is a movie about a long lost gone by era of Hollywood where real movies are made and the theatre is a place where people come to experience the “magic”. Going to the pictures is a community activity. The Majestic is also about America and its values.
Jim Carrey is Peter Appleton, a B movie screenwriter, whose career, advancing towards the A list, is stopped, when he was blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee for under suspicion as a “Red “ or “Commie”, because he attended a left-wing political meeting to pick up a girl when he was in college.
Distressed, he drove away from Hollywood, which he calls “home” and has an accident. He lost his memory and landed in a small town. He was identified as Luke, Harry Trimble's (Martin Landau) son who was missing during the war. Upon acknowledging his son, Harry reopened the old movie house he used to own, “The Majestic”.
The Majestic harks back to a nostalgic era best summed by Roger Ebert in the same movie review,
“I imagine every single review of "The Majestic" will compare it to the works of Frank Capra, and that's as it should be. Frank Darabont has deliberately tried to make the kind of movie Capra made, about decent small-town folks standing up for traditional American values. In an age of Rambo patriotism, it is good to be reminded of Capra patriotism--to remember that America is not just about fighting and winning, but about defending our freedoms. If we defeat the enemy at the cost of our own principles, who has won?”
The Majestic that is a movie about movies and makes you feel like you are watching one feels surreal most of the time. There is the scene where Luke was first found by an old man with a dog. They were walking into town which is so quiet, without anyone walking or car driving past, in broad daylight, that makes you wonder if it is real. When the town queue up for the reopening of The Majestic, it looks made up. Luke sitting behind the box office selling tickets and dropping the tinkling coins when a couple comes up to him, looks artificial and funny.
The characters are cardboard caricatures of what we expect. Jim Carrey who undertakes a more dramatic role this time, as Peter or Luke exposes his “acting” skills or the lack of. His face remains in “still plastic” mode most of the time and we only feel with him when he is beside Harry on his deathbed. Jim does not evoke emotions when he plays it straight or “underplay”. Instead, I suspect audiences prefer him to be exaggerating in his previous movies. That was at least silly – funny. Not that it is Jim’s fault by any chance, I’m not sure if any other actors would be able to pull it off.
Adele Stanton (Laurie Holden) who has a striking resemblance to Gwyneth Paltrow, and is Luke’s girlfriend, despite her hiccups when she is nervous, is a likeable character on screen. Martin Landau who is the old man of Luke, doesn’t have much to offer, as he tries to be the understanding father. The movie, at times, tries to tell a little story about the couple who owned the cafe but we are unsure of their relationship and why the man has an intent dislike for Luke; and why he changed his views towards the end.
Even when The Majestic tries to be nostalgic, portraying his characters as people settled in a town community who enjoys communal activities and; playing black and white movies on The Majestic screen, it does not relive “the magic” which it promise. Is it because I was watching this on small screen?
For two and a half hours, I was hoping for something that will make this worthwhile but it is disappointing to feel bland afterwards. You try to empathise with Luke or Adele when they realise that Peter is not Luke but the shock never gets through. I almost thought the scene where Peter saw the movie which he wrote and subsequently recovered from his amnesia, more deadpan than alarming. Jim looks as if he has seen a ghost!
The opening scene is an ironic statement to the hyperbole of writing for movies. As Jim sits in his desk and allows faceless people with businesslike voices change his script; converting the story of a boy with a disease to become a smart dog who will ring the bell at the lighthouse; one cannot help smirk at the idiocy of their storyline. If you were Peter, you would have made the same choice too towards the end of the movie. Nostalgia and melodrama is at least better than corniness.
X2
Directed by Bryan Singer
You do not need to be a comic fan to like superheroes such as Spiderman or Xmen which has recently been made into movies, that for its best, extol age old values that are easy and distinctive and black and white : good versus evil. Make Love and Peace not war. Justice reigns over evil towards the end of the day.
This sci fi action blockbuster is a sequel to the first where two separated groups of mutants fight each other because they have different stance on how mutants should revolve their conflicts with humans. Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) who leads the "good" side and thinks mutants and humans can co-exist, opens a school to train
young mutants to be responsible earthlings. He disagrees with Eric/Magneto (Ian McKellen), who controls "metal" and bent on eliminating the human race. Their battle is about Charles preventing Magento from doing harm to humans.
For a start, X2 is a Hollywood movie catered generally for "family entertainment". That means the movie is inoffensive and the sexual tones are trimmed and dimmed so dull you wonder why they were there in the first place. There is a scene where Dr. Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) enters Wolverine's tent to seduce him. He responds but pulls
back when he realises it was Mystique (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) who has the ability to change her appearance and voice to become anyone. The romance endeavours never spark off. Dr. Jean Grey and Scott/Cyclops (James Marsden) seems to be in love but it was never explicitly mentioned if Jean holds a torch for Wolverine as well. Rogue (Anna Paquin) who was rescued by Wolverine in the first episode has a new boyfriend in school, Bobby/Iceman (Shawn Ashmore). the latter feels threatened by Wolverine whom he thinks has the hots for her girl too. It sounds confusing on writing but really stupid on screen because such "fillers" never contributes to the movie plot, character development or even make any point.
Of course, we watch X2 for its supposedly "visual excitement and sound enhancements" plus the powers that these mutants possess, which basically keeps us fascinated. Jean's power to deflect missiles keeps you propped up alongside Storm's (Hale Berry) ability to generate thunderstorms while they were pursued by enemy airplanes. Bobby
creates a layer of ice between Wolverine and his captors looks surreal but fun while Pyro (Aaron Stanford) creates a chaotic arson towards the police cars simply with a lighter. We also have a one to one combat scene between Wolverine and Deathstrike (Kelly Hu) that resembles a cut out from a comic book.
I suppose X2 follows the successful Hollywood formula which explains why it keeps most of us riveted – its a no brainer. Put in some suggestions of romance, flirtations with sex, lots of action, awesome spectacular effects, pumped up dance music to accompany the fighting, and an ending that everyone can agree with.
Directed by Frank Darabont
The Majestic is a movie about a long lost gone by era of Hollywood where real movies are made and the theatre is a place where people come to experience the “magic”. Going to the pictures is a community activity. The Majestic is also about America and its values.
Jim Carrey is Peter Appleton, a B movie screenwriter, whose career, advancing towards the A list, is stopped, when he was blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee for under suspicion as a “Red “ or “Commie”, because he attended a left-wing political meeting to pick up a girl when he was in college.
Distressed, he drove away from Hollywood, which he calls “home” and has an accident. He lost his memory and landed in a small town. He was identified as Luke, Harry Trimble's (Martin Landau) son who was missing during the war. Upon acknowledging his son, Harry reopened the old movie house he used to own, “The Majestic”.
The Majestic harks back to a nostalgic era best summed by Roger Ebert in the same movie review,
“I imagine every single review of "The Majestic" will compare it to the works of Frank Capra, and that's as it should be. Frank Darabont has deliberately tried to make the kind of movie Capra made, about decent small-town folks standing up for traditional American values. In an age of Rambo patriotism, it is good to be reminded of Capra patriotism--to remember that America is not just about fighting and winning, but about defending our freedoms. If we defeat the enemy at the cost of our own principles, who has won?”
The Majestic that is a movie about movies and makes you feel like you are watching one feels surreal most of the time. There is the scene where Luke was first found by an old man with a dog. They were walking into town which is so quiet, without anyone walking or car driving past, in broad daylight, that makes you wonder if it is real. When the town queue up for the reopening of The Majestic, it looks made up. Luke sitting behind the box office selling tickets and dropping the tinkling coins when a couple comes up to him, looks artificial and funny.
The characters are cardboard caricatures of what we expect. Jim Carrey who undertakes a more dramatic role this time, as Peter or Luke exposes his “acting” skills or the lack of. His face remains in “still plastic” mode most of the time and we only feel with him when he is beside Harry on his deathbed. Jim does not evoke emotions when he plays it straight or “underplay”. Instead, I suspect audiences prefer him to be exaggerating in his previous movies. That was at least silly – funny. Not that it is Jim’s fault by any chance, I’m not sure if any other actors would be able to pull it off.
Adele Stanton (Laurie Holden) who has a striking resemblance to Gwyneth Paltrow, and is Luke’s girlfriend, despite her hiccups when she is nervous, is a likeable character on screen. Martin Landau who is the old man of Luke, doesn’t have much to offer, as he tries to be the understanding father. The movie, at times, tries to tell a little story about the couple who owned the cafe but we are unsure of their relationship and why the man has an intent dislike for Luke; and why he changed his views towards the end.
Even when The Majestic tries to be nostalgic, portraying his characters as people settled in a town community who enjoys communal activities and; playing black and white movies on The Majestic screen, it does not relive “the magic” which it promise. Is it because I was watching this on small screen?
For two and a half hours, I was hoping for something that will make this worthwhile but it is disappointing to feel bland afterwards. You try to empathise with Luke or Adele when they realise that Peter is not Luke but the shock never gets through. I almost thought the scene where Peter saw the movie which he wrote and subsequently recovered from his amnesia, more deadpan than alarming. Jim looks as if he has seen a ghost!
The opening scene is an ironic statement to the hyperbole of writing for movies. As Jim sits in his desk and allows faceless people with businesslike voices change his script; converting the story of a boy with a disease to become a smart dog who will ring the bell at the lighthouse; one cannot help smirk at the idiocy of their storyline. If you were Peter, you would have made the same choice too towards the end of the movie. Nostalgia and melodrama is at least better than corniness.
X2
Directed by Bryan Singer
You do not need to be a comic fan to like superheroes such as Spiderman or Xmen which has recently been made into movies, that for its best, extol age old values that are easy and distinctive and black and white : good versus evil. Make Love and Peace not war. Justice reigns over evil towards the end of the day.
This sci fi action blockbuster is a sequel to the first where two separated groups of mutants fight each other because they have different stance on how mutants should revolve their conflicts with humans. Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) who leads the "good" side and thinks mutants and humans can co-exist, opens a school to train
young mutants to be responsible earthlings. He disagrees with Eric/Magneto (Ian McKellen), who controls "metal" and bent on eliminating the human race. Their battle is about Charles preventing Magento from doing harm to humans.
For a start, X2 is a Hollywood movie catered generally for "family entertainment". That means the movie is inoffensive and the sexual tones are trimmed and dimmed so dull you wonder why they were there in the first place. There is a scene where Dr. Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) enters Wolverine's tent to seduce him. He responds but pulls
back when he realises it was Mystique (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos) who has the ability to change her appearance and voice to become anyone. The romance endeavours never spark off. Dr. Jean Grey and Scott/Cyclops (James Marsden) seems to be in love but it was never explicitly mentioned if Jean holds a torch for Wolverine as well. Rogue (Anna Paquin) who was rescued by Wolverine in the first episode has a new boyfriend in school, Bobby/Iceman (Shawn Ashmore). the latter feels threatened by Wolverine whom he thinks has the hots for her girl too. It sounds confusing on writing but really stupid on screen because such "fillers" never contributes to the movie plot, character development or even make any point.
Of course, we watch X2 for its supposedly "visual excitement and sound enhancements" plus the powers that these mutants possess, which basically keeps us fascinated. Jean's power to deflect missiles keeps you propped up alongside Storm's (Hale Berry) ability to generate thunderstorms while they were pursued by enemy airplanes. Bobby
creates a layer of ice between Wolverine and his captors looks surreal but fun while Pyro (Aaron Stanford) creates a chaotic arson towards the police cars simply with a lighter. We also have a one to one combat scene between Wolverine and Deathstrike (Kelly Hu) that resembles a cut out from a comic book.
I suppose X2 follows the successful Hollywood formula which explains why it keeps most of us riveted – its a no brainer. Put in some suggestions of romance, flirtations with sex, lots of action, awesome spectacular effects, pumped up dance music to accompany the fighting, and an ending that everyone can agree with.
Sunday, June 01, 2003
One Man’s Bible
Written by Gao Xingjian
Translated by Mabel Lee
I am disappointed with One Man’s Bible’s poor translation which has many grammatical errors. It could either be Lee’s deliberation to stylize Gao’s prose and hence to convey the “meanings” as closely as possible. And then, of course, it could be slip shot work.
Syntax aside, One Man’s Bible is the “close to” life memoir of a Chinese playwright, an unnamed man, one suspects, is the writer himself, who decides to write a novel about himself, after his amorous encounter with a Jewish woman. The chapters fleets between his present life, which Xingjian like to call it the “moment”. These chapters are full of intimate details delving into his sexual habits. In the other chapters that deals with his past, the protagonist divulges more “demons”. He chronicles a life unbearable during the Cultural revolution which reads like a spy novel at times where he basically says one needs to be on guard all the time because Chinese at that time, act like animals. In fact, he compares humans to animals quite frequently especially when it comes to sex. Whether it is due to repression or the overtly libertine period that he enjoys now, what he calls “freedom”.
That is basically one of the other problems with this novel. It reads like an effort to “intellectualize” issues such as sex and freedom.
Consider this excerpt, “Life in itself is an inexplicable miracle and to be alive is a manifestation of this miracle. Is it not enough that a conscious physical body is able to perceive the pains and joys of life? What else is there to be sought?”
Such thoughts read more like “generalizations” rather than truths thought over and convoluted into intelligent thought provoking expressions.
One selling point (depending on what you think is good taste or corny writing) is the man’s lust. His affairs with women are rather torrid which implies he has never quite liked any one of them and yet to have fallen in “love”. The reader is almost forced to believed if he could be a closeted gay man. Because of that, the women in his novel are forgettable “sex objects” and lacks depth.
What is more unforgiving with the novel is its confusing background. Besides the profusion of juggling between using “he” and “you” to denote the whether its a past or present, our leading protagonist travels across time and spatial zones, without an apparent link to immediate chapters. The details of the man’s life during the Cultural Revolution reads too hastily to provoke the reader to react.
Perhaps it’s got to do with the fact that our playwright is reluctant to recall a haunting past. Either that or he simply has forgotten the details.
You cringe when he rattles on about “spirituality” or “freedom” and how he perceives such topics has little to do with one’s socio - political climate that one is subjected to.
Give me the traumatic and soapy Wild Swans or Life and Death in Shanghai which does not try to impress or “intellectualize”. Both books at least recalls a more truthful and bare it all look on the political turmoil that was fraudulent in China.
Written by Gao Xingjian
Translated by Mabel Lee
I am disappointed with One Man’s Bible’s poor translation which has many grammatical errors. It could either be Lee’s deliberation to stylize Gao’s prose and hence to convey the “meanings” as closely as possible. And then, of course, it could be slip shot work.
Syntax aside, One Man’s Bible is the “close to” life memoir of a Chinese playwright, an unnamed man, one suspects, is the writer himself, who decides to write a novel about himself, after his amorous encounter with a Jewish woman. The chapters fleets between his present life, which Xingjian like to call it the “moment”. These chapters are full of intimate details delving into his sexual habits. In the other chapters that deals with his past, the protagonist divulges more “demons”. He chronicles a life unbearable during the Cultural revolution which reads like a spy novel at times where he basically says one needs to be on guard all the time because Chinese at that time, act like animals. In fact, he compares humans to animals quite frequently especially when it comes to sex. Whether it is due to repression or the overtly libertine period that he enjoys now, what he calls “freedom”.
That is basically one of the other problems with this novel. It reads like an effort to “intellectualize” issues such as sex and freedom.
Consider this excerpt, “Life in itself is an inexplicable miracle and to be alive is a manifestation of this miracle. Is it not enough that a conscious physical body is able to perceive the pains and joys of life? What else is there to be sought?”
Such thoughts read more like “generalizations” rather than truths thought over and convoluted into intelligent thought provoking expressions.
One selling point (depending on what you think is good taste or corny writing) is the man’s lust. His affairs with women are rather torrid which implies he has never quite liked any one of them and yet to have fallen in “love”. The reader is almost forced to believed if he could be a closeted gay man. Because of that, the women in his novel are forgettable “sex objects” and lacks depth.
What is more unforgiving with the novel is its confusing background. Besides the profusion of juggling between using “he” and “you” to denote the whether its a past or present, our leading protagonist travels across time and spatial zones, without an apparent link to immediate chapters. The details of the man’s life during the Cultural Revolution reads too hastily to provoke the reader to react.
Perhaps it’s got to do with the fact that our playwright is reluctant to recall a haunting past. Either that or he simply has forgotten the details.
You cringe when he rattles on about “spirituality” or “freedom” and how he perceives such topics has little to do with one’s socio - political climate that one is subjected to.
Give me the traumatic and soapy Wild Swans or Life and Death in Shanghai which does not try to impress or “intellectualize”. Both books at least recalls a more truthful and bare it all look on the political turmoil that was fraudulent in China.
