Barton Fink and the Common Man

Barton Fink is, I think, the Coen brothers' most interesting, most trying, most confounding film. It's quite ambitious, even though there are things about it that open it up to the same criticism often made of the Coens, that there work is stylish but empty, deeply unwilling or unable to mean anything.

I think people who approach it this way have a particular sort of viewing experience in mind. I think there's something to be said, as both artist and audience, for being able to walk and chew gum. The film's coolness, and its evident self consiousness (the arty mirrored images and language, particularly the ending which recapitulates the Hotel picture, the story within a story, the surrealist touches), aren't mere special effects. Without being paricularly indigestible formally, the film communicates a number of compelling ideas.

For the moment I want to speak to what is among the most obvious themes of the film, that of empathy and representation. In some significant way these are dealt with through questions simply aren't asked in the same way today. There isn't much of a question, at least posed as this film does, how one should represent the common or mass man. In part because that creature is no longer part of our vocabulary.

The Common Man of Barton Fink, and this is part of the point, is for Barton an exotic. He is today, still, but a different sort. David Brooks, for example, writing about Patio Man, might as well be writing about Peking Man. Barton doesn't listen to Charlie, is utterly irritated by him most of the time, even though he is at least superficially the perfect abstract Common Man that is Barton's subject. The film is about listening, and refusing to listen. It is a cautionary tale about using people as a means to a personal end, rather than as ends in themselves.

Every time I see the film, the line that jumps out at me is uttered by Judy Davis: 'Empathy requires understanding, Barton.' Understanding in this film appears far more elusive than Barton's ersatz understanding. The world is mad, and fickle, and unfair. That is, people are. Understanding requires pain, the pain of dealing with real, messy people. Barton's idealism is the idealism of those escaping the real world, those constructing a better world inside their heads. This is a profoundly pessimistic film, even moreso, I think, than the similarly darkhearted Miller's Crossing.

One of the reasons I like this film so much is that it genuinely confuses me. Sure, it does this with its ripe, complicated symbolism, but it also confuses with its ideas. Does this film try to prove that this life is, for all intents and purposes, hell? Is it calling the artist an arrogant, self-deluded fool? Is the artist's only choice building a levee, as Bill Mayhew has? Do people want or need a fruity story about suffering, or is a story of a big man in tights all the audience deserves?

It's wrong to confuse confusion with sloppiness. This is a fantastically well made film. Its construction shows care and thoughtfulness. Although this film can be clever in the pejorative sense, it is nonetheless, if not a plumbing of the depths of the human condition, then one of the most compelling and provocative explorations of the artist's role and responsibility I know of.

Hit

Reuters has a history of being a little overly politically correct in the terminology it uses. The right wingers had a problem when it refused to call terrorists terrorists, instead opting for "militants" or what have you. But seriously- they have an article up called "Man hit by Cheney to leave hospital".

Not "shot by Cheney". Not "shot in the face by Cheney". "hit by Cheney". Unbelieveable. Admittedly, they refer to it as a shooting in the text of the article, but it really does matter how you headline a story.

Also, the story shows Whittington (the injured party, the one who was "sprayed", or "peppered" with birdsho and who subsequently had a heart attack) apologizing to Cheney and family for all they've had to endure. (!) I have to apologize to Cheney myself. Mr. Vice President, I'm sorry you've had to suffer the indignity of bad press after getting liquored up, shooting a man in face and neck, and pretending it hadn't happened for 24 hours.

Photo Op

The Abramoff story has a newish wrinkle, namely a number of suppressed photographs that show Abraamoff shaking hands with the president. This has a certain potency for the story because the Bush administration has been trying to distance itself as much as possible, and images have a power that should not be underestimated. Pictures can run in newspapers, on television, etc.

One of the things the photo wrinkle of the story has brought out is the position of Reflections Photography as sort of court photographer for political Washington. Greg at Talent Show has a few wonderful and fascinating posts about this. Do look, it shows how very strange, and impersonal, and image obsessed Washington is. Particularly of interest is the post discussing the Glory Wall and the way in which photos continue to serve talismanic purpose.

Uncle Hazim's Neighborhood

Via BagNewsNotes, one of my favorite blogs, I found a story that provides an interesting bookend to the previous post.

First, a word about bagnewsnotes. it's a blog run by Michael Shaw, a psychotherapist and MFA in creative writing candidate. The blog interrogates images that appear in the media, most often in newspapers and newsmagazines. It's a good, thought-provoking site.

Back to the matter at hand. BagNewsNotes links to a New York Times article about a children's show run by Hamas. Hamas is, in fact, following the lead of Hizbollah, which runs Al Manar TV, a station that is viewed throughout the Middle East and, if I understand correctly, has been broadcast selectively in the US.

Most Americans understand Hamas as a terrorist group, but it is not only that. Like Hizbollah, it is a political and social movement. The fact that it isn't just a wrecking ball organization makes it harder to destroy, more a part of the permanent landscape of Palestine.

It's hard to know exactly how to read the development of Hamas as a media organization- is this a stab at respectability? Merely an attempt to indoctrinate? I don't know enough about Hamas to say, but it certainly is interesting.

Mao Tse-Tung hour

Check out Billmon's fascinating look at the state of the Iraqi insurgency, in particular its propaganda apparatus.

Billmon argues that the fact that various components of the insurgency, including the group set up by Zarqawi, have established a sophisticated televisual propaganda apparatus, including themed talk shows and grisly confession/execution videos, tells us that the insurgency is developing into a sophisticated enterprise similar to the Sinn Fein, mixing legitimate and illegitimate components.

Billmon makes reference to the film Network, which you should see if you haven't already. It's a sharp and engrossing satire about the media from 1976, and touches on issues ranging from the corporate ownership of the press, televisual spectacle, the rubbernecking compulsion of television audiences toward the violent and profane, the insoluble confusion and alienation of modern (or perhaps postmodern) life, and radical chic. It stars Peter Finch, who won an academy award postumously for his role here as Howard Beale, as well as Faye Dunaway, William Holden, and Ned beatty in a supremely creepy role.

Aside from the fact that Network is relevant to television shows that make suicide bombing and assasination appear legitimate by wrapping them in the banality of daytime TV, there's something of Network in our times in a more general way. There's a lack of trust in institutions like government or press, one I feel is well earned.

Times are hard for people. Health care and energy spiral in cost. GM, once the measure of America's economic success, has fallen on hard times, but Product Chief Bob Lutz claims it would be a terrible mistake to cut or continue a freeze in executive pay. Lutz made roughly $4.4 million in 2004. Nothing makes sense. The rich get richer. The congress is full of crooks- more than that, politics has become a criminal enterprise.

And TV deals with the chaos with Celebrity Fit Club, and similar pointless absurdities. Oh Well.

We don't want a broken patty

That's a guarantee!

Check out thisWendy's training video from 1989. Apparently rap is the key to efficiency in the fast food business. That or singing beef patties.

A video of mine

It's called "Painting it Black".