47. Dreadlock Holiday &...

Lyrics

I was walkin' down the street
Concentratin' on truckin' right
I heard a dark voice beside of me
And I looked round in a state of fright
I saw four faces one mad
A brother from the gutter
They looked me up and down a bit
And turned to each other

I say
I don't like cricket oh no
I love it
I don't like cricket oh no
I love it
Don't you walk thru my words
You got to show some respect
Don't you walk thru my words
'Cause you ain't heard me out yet

Well he looked down at my silver chain
He said I'll give you one dollar
I said you've got to be jokin' man
It was a present from me Mother
He said I like it I want it
I'll take it off your hands
And you'll be sorry you crossed me
You'd better understand that you're alone
A long way from home

And I say
I don't like reggae no no
I love it
I don't like reggae oh no
I love it
Don't you cramp me style
Don't you queer on me pitch
Don't you walk thru my words
'Cause you ain't heard me out yet

I hurried back to the swimming pool
Sinkin' pina coladas
I heard a dark voice beside me say
Would you like something harder
She said I've got it you want it
My harvest is the best
And if you try it you'll like it
And wallow in a Dreadlock Holiday

And I say
Don't like Jamaica oh no
I love her
Don't like Jamaica oh no
I love her oh yea
Don't you walk thru her words
You got to show some respect
Don't you walk thru her words
'Cause you ain't heard her out yet

I don't like cricket
I love it (Dreadlock Holiday)
I don't like reggae
I love it (Dreadlock Holiday)
Don't like Jamaica
I love her (Dreadlock Holiday)

I hurried back to the swimming pool 


10CC is one of the rare acclaimed rock/pop groups that injects quite some humor in their songs. Dreadlock Holiday is a good example of it, but so are I'm Not in Love and The Wall Street Shuffle. And I like their music too, though this is obviously their best song. I've linked the song to a movie about a holiday in Jamaica.

The Movie: Club Paradise (Harold Ramis, 1986)

Club Paradise is rated 4,5 on IMDB. Despite that I expected this to be a decent comedy, mostly because of director Harold Ramis. He made Groundhog Day after all. Well, my hopes for it were nearly crushed after an atrocious opening scene that's misguided in any possible way. It's also totally unnecessary. I could explain what happens, but that would take too long, besides it is just a reason to send Robin Williams' character to Jamaica. Anyway after this scene there is a long montage in which we see Williams live in Jamaica. This is is too unbelievably dull. Somehow though the movie recovers after these two scenes. It is pretty dumb and I wouldn't even call it a decent comedy, but I was entertained.

That's not because of the movie's main plot though. That is about Williams and Jimmy Cliff trying to run a holiday resort on the island of Jamaica, which for some reason is called St. Christopher in this movie. They have to overcome the fact that they are completely lousy at doing this and the fact that evil capitalists want to buy off their resort and put on a more luxurious resort. Which rationally would be the best for everyone involved. After all, at the end of the movie the problem of the capitalists is resolved. Williams and Cliff are still lousy at their job though. The movie kind of forgets about it. But silly plots aren't a problem in a comedy. The main problem is Robin Williams. He is often being accused of being too zany, but here he is half asleep. He seems bored out of his mind, which is not so surprising considering his dialogue. Jimmy Cliff has a bit more fun as he gets to sing a lot. And even when he is not singing on screen, we hear his songs on the soundtrack almost constantly. These songs in their music and lyrics express pretty serious ideas about (the spirit of) Jamaica. They are way too good for this movie and sometimes I was confused whether they were chosen, because the filmmakers felt that they were doing the same thing with this movie. They can't be so misguided though, can they?

Anyway while the main plot sucked, I had quite some fun with the small plots involving the guests on the island. Rick Moranis and Eugene Levy play two bro's (only that word wasn't invented yet then) who act cool, thinking that every woman will love them. Except, they are total losers, who are oblivious to how pathetic they are. These aren't original characters, but they get some good lines and Levy and Moranis play them to perfection. Their interactions are some of the best moments of the movie. So naturally the filmmakers choose to separate them, by letting Moranis go wind surfing and getting lost at see. Than there is a couple that is completely unfit for each other. The movie milks some laughs out of the contrast between the enormously energetic wife and her lazy husband. The movie is stolen though by Peter O'Toole who has the best lines of the movie, some of them genuinely satiric and funny. He plays the British ambassador on the island, who is mostly enjoying his easy life there, not doing much work. O'Toole has fun with his lines and his role. And why shouldn't he be? He is overqualified for this role and he gets millions of dollars to have some fun on a warm Jamaican island.

Still, the movie isn't very good. And it's a shame, because it is mostly out of laziness than out of a lack of talent. The movie could have been a really good comic satire on globalization politics. Peter O'Toole's lines show that the filmmakers really know how to say interesting stuff on this subject in a funny way. They show this in other cases too. They raise questions about whether globalization is a danger for national and traditional values and cultures. They show there a lot of different parties and nations, having an interest in the new luxurious resort. First we think it's the island's elite that needs this luxurious resort. Than we find out that the British are the ones in charge. And even later we find out that it are actually the Arabs who are the main stakeholders. Lastly it is interesting that the people of St. Christopher don't do anything directly to stop the luxurious resort. They just rebel against the mayor. While the Arabs and the Britons see the unrest from a ship fat at sea and leave. The movie explicitly states that foreign investors are scared away from investing in a nation, if there is unrest in that nation. These are all not only interesting ideas that show that the filmmakers are really knowledgeable on this subject. They just don't care to explore it any further, rather focusing on the stupid plot.

46. With or Without You &...

Lyrics

See the stone set in your eyes
See the thorn twist in your side
I wait for you

Sleight of hand and twist of fate
On a bed of nails she makes me wait
And I wait without you

With or without you
With or without you

Through the storm we reach the shore
You give it all but I want more
And I'm waiting for you

With or without you
With or without you
I can't live
With or without you

And you give yourself away
And you give yourself away
And you give
And you give
And you give yourself away

My hands are tied
My body bruised, she's got me with
Nothing to win and
Nothing left to lose

And you give yourself away
And you give yourself away
And you give
And you give
And you give yourself away

With or without you
With or without you
I can't live
With or without you

With or without you
With or without you
I can't live
With or without you
With or without you


U2 proves here that they don't need to make some serious (political) statement to make a good song. This is a fairly simple love song, but it is one of their better songs. In fact it is so simple that I had quite some trouble finding a movie to link it to. So, um, I decided to seek out a movie involving SM, considering the lyrics 'my hands are tied my body bruised' and 'on a bed of nails she makes me wait.'

The Movie: Secretary  (Steven Shainberg, 2002)

I expected Secretary to be a slightly above the average romantic comedy with all the usual romantic comedy  cliches. I thought it would have some decent performances (Maggie Gyllenhaal got a Golden Globe nomination for it and James Spader is always fun) and that it would be about a couple who finds out about sadomasochism and has some awkward fun with it. I hoped the movie could perhaps milk some funny jokes out of this concept. Well, I couldn't have been more wrong. This is one of the most unusual movies I've ever seen. It is also one of the best movies of the last decade. It is flawlessly executed and it had to be. It took balls to make it. I can imagine that getting only one small thing wrong, could've made this a disgustingly sick disaster.

Why you ask? Well, this is a movie about a masochistic, shy woman, Lee (Gyllenhaal) who cuts herself since 7th grade. One time she accidentally cut herself too much in front of her mother, so she had to go to a mental institution. As the movie starts, she is just being released from this mental institution, trying to sort her life out. She attends a typing course, where she passes easily as the best in class. Turns out she is a damn good typist. Looking for a job, she finds an ad for a secretary to a lawyer, Edward (Spader) with a small office, specializing in paralegal cases. After one of the oddest job interviews ever, the lawyer gives her the job. The lawyer turns out to be a shy sadist, in the sexual sense. Meaning he gets of at hitting women in their ass and handcuffing them, not necessarily during sexual activities. He also enjoys bossing them around for no reason. Thus he has found a perfect secretary in Lee, who, considering she is a masochist, enjoys being hit and handcuffed and bossed around. The movie follows the development of their relationship and is totally uncompromising. In the end, they are in a relationship, without having changed. And the movie present this as an a totally unambiguously healthy and good relationship for this two people. And well, it has made us believe that this really is the case.

It is one thing for a movie to argue for SM. But this movie argues for the kind of SM in which the man is dominant and the woman is submissive, and willing to undergo the pain the man inflicts on her. It argues for something I and most (rational) people would claim is sexual and physical abuse of a woman. And in most cases we'd be right. But the movie manages to make us sure that in this case we wouldn't be right. I am kind of in awe by how this movie achieves this. And it is probably beyond my ability (I'll try anyway) as a writer to convey why this movie works and is so good. And how this movie can be so kind-hearted and such a simple joy to watch. But in the end maybe no written review of this movie can do that without seeming at least a bit ridiculous. I may have never seen a movie that is a better example of Roger Ebert's famous saying: It's not what's a movie is about, it's how it's about it.'

The soundtrack composed for this movie may be its most important asset. It is composed by Angelo Badalementi, who sounded familiar to me, but I didn't exactly know why. Turns out he is the composer of every David Lynch movie since Blue Velvet. He also scored The Comfort of Strangers, another movie about sexual abuse. It makes sense to choose him. The score very much adds to the Lynchian vibe this whole movie has. It takes its characters and their problems seriously, but has simultaneously a very light touch. It flows like a breeze and is often morbidly funny. It is also both simultaneously realistic and taking place in a hyper-stylized, slightly unreal seeming world. This is all held together by Badalamenti' score which is comforting, joyful, inviting and mysterious, often at the same time. It conveys that interesting and fun will happen in the movie and it assures us that we should relax and have fun. Nothing awful is gonna happen to this characters. I smiled from the opening credits and the opening scene which is a wonderful long take in which we follow Lee doing secretarial things, only she is in a weird SM-device (Yeah, I don't know how these things are called or how they work). All of it set to Badalamenti's score.

There are two more things adding to the mysteriousness of the movie, making it seem slightly off. First of all is the design of the interior of Edward's office. It doesn't seem seem to align with the exterior. It feels much bigger and richer than it should be. There seem to be more rooms than expected. It feels very weird. About 80 percent of the movie takes place in that office. Thus when we are not in the office, in what you might call the ordinary world, that too feels weird. The second thing is Edward's behavior. We only gradually realize that this is a sadist who is ashamed of his sadism and would like to hide it, but can't control it. When we first meet him, his office is a mess and his previous secretary is leaving, slightly befuddled. During the first weeks he too is befuddled by Lee, who does anything he says to her, even the most demeaning tasks. We understand why she listens to him so compulsively, as the movie has established her character pretty good by then. But we don't understand why Edward behaves the way he is behaving, sometimes being nice, sometimes being amazingly rude to Lee. As both we and Lee realize what's going on, we come to realize that both of these people have serious problems, and that they might seriously be good for each other. And it is to Shainberg's enormous credit that his movie manages to look seriously at their problems, while keeping its style of a light comedy. This is one of the best fusions of comedy and drama I've ever seen. The substance is dramatic, while the style is comic. This shouldn't work, but it does here, seamlessly even. None of this would probably work if it wasn't for James Spader and Maggie Gyllenhaal, who give truly great performances, always conveying what is necessary, without giving away too much about their characters. They also manage to come over as very sympathetic and eventually normal people.

In the end I guess it's possible to make the argument that this movie is anti-feminist or something like that. Or you could make the argument that it is more feminist than ordinary romantic comedies, because it gives more power to its female characters. It is also possible to try to determine whether Edward is a good or a bad person and it is also possible to make the claim that at the end of the movie Lee made the wrong decision to stay with him, instead of her shy lover she was supposed to marry (I didn't even mention this hilarious subplot). But it would be pointless to make these arguments. The movie doesn't care about such things. It doesn't work on a rational level, nor does it really want to. You can't put the movie in the context of the wider world around us, when it is totally uninterested in the wider world around us. Shainberg only wants to tell this exact story, about these specific people in this particular style. He does it and it is a great movie

45. Another Brick in the Wall &...

Lyrics

Daddy's flown across the ocean
Leaving just a memory
Snapshot in the family album
Daddy what else did you leave for me?
Daddy, what'd'ja leave behind for me?!?
All in all it was just a brick in the wall.
All in all it was all just bricks in the wall. "You! Yes, you! Stand still laddy!

We don't need no education
We don't need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone!
All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.

We don't need no education
We don't need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone!
All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall. "Wrong, Do it again!"
"If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding. How can you
have any pudding if you don't eat yer meat?"
"You! Yes, you behind the bikesheds, stand still laddy!

"The Bulls are already out there"
Pink: "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrgh!"
"This Roman Meal bakery thought you'd like to know." I don't need no arms around me
And I don't need no drugs to calm me.
I have seen the writing on the wall.
Don't think I need anything at all.
No! Don't think I'll need anything at all.
All in all it was all just bricks in the wall.
All in all you were all just bricks in the wall.


I've once read that all music is contextual, meaning that whether you like a certain peace of music or not depends very much on the context you hear that particular peace of music in. I love that statement and it is certainly true in this case. I am not a big fan of this song, but it really works well in the movie Pink Floyd The Wall. (obviously, I've linked this song to that movie). And I can say the same thing about pretty much every Pink Floyd song that appears in the movie.

The Movie: Pink Floyd The Wall (Alan Parker, 1982)

This movie caught me by surprise. I was expecting to see a musical consisting of Pink Floyd songs. That's not what this movie really is. It is pretty much an experimental movie. It basically consists of 95 minutes of video clips of Pink Floyd songs, with at its center Another Brick in the Wall. There is a very loose narrative thread that holds all this clips together, but the best way to put it is that this is a slightly propagandist video essay about Roger Waters' ideas on society. It is one of the rare movies I've seen that relatively often employs the editing technique developed by the Soviets for their propaganda movies. In their movies they didn't always cut to drive the plot forward. But they cut to associate a certain thing with another thing. So they showed for example people exploiting the workers and then they cut to images of pigs, implying that the workers were treated like pigs. These cuts are not connected to each other chronologically. This movie does this very often too. At the beginning for example we see fans knocking at the door of Pink, the rock star protagonist (or antagonist) of this movie and nearly attacking him. Then we cut to a bunch of soldiers in the World War attacking the enemy. This association can be read in two ways. First of all it implies that Pink finds his idolization incredibly irritating, feeling as if he is being attacked by a war squad. Secondly it implies that the blind idolization of rock stars is as stupid as blindly trusting a government or loving a nation and going to war for it.

Both of those readings aren't really an example of great intellectual thinking. In fact, one could call them pretty silly. Unfortunately the movie has quite a lot of such observations. During the Another Brick in the Wall song for example, through Soviet-style cutting, children going to school are associated with people going to concentration camps. As you can see from the lyrics of the song Pink Floyd doesn't have a high opinion of education. Education according to Pink Floyd is just another brick in the wall. And the wall is basically the whole of modern society that makes us conformist and incapable of critical thinking. Pink Floyd sees us as prisoners of that society. And this movie is a call to non-conformism and critical thinking, hoping that in doing so we'll be free. The movie does not really know what then it would mean to be free. It just knows that we now aren't free. I can sympathize to a certain extent with this kind of ideas, but this movie does push them a bit too far and it doesn't always present them very intelligently, to say the least. Having said that, I actually liked the movie very much. The movie is refreshingly earnest, it takes its ideas very seriously and it is fully committed to them. Besides that, this movie is pretty much perfectly edited. Not only does its Soviet-style editing work very well, the music also fits the images rather perfectly. It is pretty much a joy to listen to and watch this movie.

I once read a criticism of  Dead Poets Society saying that the movie is asking you to conform to non-conformism. That is kind of what many movies about non-conformism do, even better ones than Dead Poets Society. And only are they asking you that, but they aren't really following their own message. Many of these movies are made in a conventional style, conforming themselves to the familiar rules of narrative film making. That makes sense. That style works and there have been too many great movies made that way to abandon it. But by being such a weird, experimental movie Pink Floyd The Wall, it is a rare movie that not only propagates non-conformism, but also 'behaves' in a non-conformist way. It puts its money where its mouth is. It is also the rare movie that states that we should think critically and actually allows for criticism of that statement. Throughout the movie, we are being constantly bombed with messages that modern society is bad and that we should think and act as individual people with a critical mind and stuff like that. And it is always obvious that this is Pink Floyd's message. But than at the end of the movie protagonist Pink becomes a fascist dictator, with countless fans blindly following his message and hurting and killing people. The parallel is obvious and quite daring. These final scenes are what to me made the movie really good. Not many movies are willing to look so critically at itself and act upon it.

It is unfortunate that a movie like this won't be made any time soon. This movie truly is a product of its time when people seriously believed that rock music could present serious ideas about the world we live in, and maybe even change it. Three years after this movie came out Bob Geldof, who plays Pink here, organized Live Aid, hoping that through rock music something substantial could be done about the poverty in Africa. These ideas were/are of course quite silly and naive. And it is probably for the best that we don't think so pretentiously any more about rock music. But this change hasn't necessarily been good for the quality of rock music. You are probably much more likely to make great, original and daring music (or art) if you truly believe that what you are doing can be of some great importance to society. This movie (and the four Pink Floyd songs I've discussed as part of this blog) made me appreciate Pink Floyd much more. So it is quite unfortunate that I won't be discussing Pink Floyd much more here. After having four songs in the top 50, there are now only four more Pink Floyd songs left in the whole rest of this list. And it will be a long while before we meet them again.    

44. Papa &...

Lyrics

Ik heb dezelfde ogen

(I have the same eyes)

En ik krijg jouw trekken om mijn mond

(And I am getting your lines around my mouth)

Vroeger was ik driftig

(I used to be testy)

Vroeger was jij driftig

(You used to be testy)

Maar we hebben onze rust gevonden

(But we've found comfort in each other)

En we zitten naast elkaar

(And we are sitting next to each other)

En we zeggen niet zoveel

(And we aren't saying much)

Voor alles wat jij doet

(Everything you do)

Heb ik hetzelfde ritueel

(I do the same way)

Papa

(Daddy)

Ik lijk steeds meer op jou 

(I resemble you more and more)

Ik heb dezelfde handen

(I have the same hands)
En ik krijg jouw rimpels in mijn huid

(And I am getting your wrinkles in my skin)
Jij hebt jouw idee?n

(You have your ideas)
Ik heb mijn idee?n

(I have my ideas)
En we zwerven in gedachten

(And we roam in thoughts)
Maar we komen altijd thuis

(But we always come home)
De waarheid die je zocht

(The truth that you sought)
En die je nooit hebt gevonden

(And that you never found)
Ik zoek haar ook

(I seek her too)
En tevergeefs

(In vain)
Zolang ik leef

(As long as I live)
Want papa, ik lijk steeds meer op jou

(Because daddy, I resemble you more and more)

Vroeger kon je streng zijn

(You could be stern)
En ik heb je soms gehaat

(And sometimes I have hated you)
Maar jouw woorden

(But your words)
Ze liggen op mijn lippen

(They sit on my lips)
En ik praat nu

(And I speak now)
Zoals jij vroeger praatte

(The way you used to speak)
Ik heb een goddeloos geloof

(I have a godless religion)
En ik hou van elke vrouw

(And I lover every woman)
En misschien ben ik geworden

(And maybe I've become)
Wat jij helemaal niet wou

(What you didn't want at all)
Maar papa, ik lijk steeds meer op jou

(But daddy, I resemble you more and more)

Jij gelooft in God

(You believe in God)
Dus jij gaat naar de hemel

(So you'll go to heaven)
En ik geloof in niks

(And I believe in nothing)
Dus we komen elkaar na de dood

(So after death)
Na de dood nooit meer tegen

(After death, we'll meet no more)
Maar papa

(But daddy)
Ik hou steeds meer van jou

(I love you more and more)

So, this appears to be the most popular Dutch song about a relationship between a father and a son. I don't like Stef Bos' singing, but this is a good song with some very good lyrics. It is not the most popular or famous Dutch cultural object about a father-son relationship. That is probably Ferdinand Bordewijk's book Karakter, often considered to be one of the best Dutch books. The book was adapted into a movie in 1997. This movie is currently the last Dutch movie to win the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.

The Movie: Character (Karakter) (Mike van Diem, 1997)

Well, of course this movie won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. How could it not? If this movie was set in USA, its' hero Katadreuffe would be basically considered as the embodiment of the American Dream. In fact it is almost surprising that there hasn't been an American remake yet. Americans love this kind of stories and films. They also know how to make them interesting and exciting. Something that unfortunately cannot really be said of this movie. It is competently told and there is nothing really wrong with the acting and cinematography either. The movie is just not very interesting and a bit dull. Part of the problem may be that the book focuses much more on the relationship between Katadreuffe and his father, while the movie is a bit more interested in portraying the sociopolitical realities of the time. Only it is quite politically muddled. 

The movie follows Jakob Willem Katadreuffe, a bastard son of one of the most dreaded Rotterdam bailiffs, Dreverhaven. Dreverhaven had a one night stand once with his housemaid Coba. When she learned of her pregnancy she immediately left Dreverhaven in order to care for her son as a single mother. She was a stubborn woman, who didn't want to depend on anyone. So she raised her son Katadreuffe in poverty, barely earning enough money to keep them both alive. This despite the fact that Dreverhaven repeatedly sent her letters offering her to marry him. Thus life for little Katadreuffe wasn't easy. Non only did he live in poverty, he was also bullied because he was a bastard. His mother didn't tell him who his father was, but she didn't tell him much anyway. She was a silent woman who talked as little as possible. The movie makes very clear that Katadreuffe is a self-taught man, who is on his own in this world. At the end of the movie he manages to become a defense attorney, after a lot of successes and failures. He is presented as the epitome of a self made man.  Many of this failures are a direct consequence of Dreverhaven's actions (who knows Katadreuffe is his son, and Katadreuffe eventually learns this too). In the end Katadreuffe confronts Dreverhaven with his actions. The dialogue that follows is one of the most famous dialogue from Dutch literature. Katadreuffe asks Dreverhaven: "Why did you work your whole life against me?" To which Dreverhaven responds: "Or for you?", implying that everything he did was intended to make Katadreuffe a stronger man, so he could be better equipped to make something out of his life. 

I am not really a fan of writing such thorough plot summaries as in the previous paragraph, but in this case it is necessary to explain why the movie isn't so interesting and why it is so politically muddled. The main problem with the movie may be that Katadreuffe is a very dull character. He doesn't really have any interesting ideas or convictions. He just wants to be successful. And the movie simply follows him and completely supports him in his quest. There isn't really much conflict or emotion. Bad things happen to him, and then he works hard to make things better for him. And for a movie that is so much about working hard, it never really manages to evoke how hard it really is for Katadreuffe to succeed. There is no sense of urgency or suffering. It all seems to come relatively easy to him. Many American movies would have an obligatory and unnecessary romance between all this. After watching this movie, one realizes that these romances aren't that obligatory and unnecessary. This movie needs an unnecessary romance, if only to shake things up a bit. To make matters worse, this movie not only doesn't have a romance, it actively avoids having one (though to be fair, that is faithful to the book).       

Both the movie and the book are often compared to the works of Charles Dickens. I am not that familiar with Dickens, but as far as I know, he was firmly on the side of the poor and the working class. He may not have been a socialist (I don't know), but the politics of his works were. I think that this movie wants to be socialist and even truly believes it is. The problem is that not only isn't it socialist, but it is in fact one of the most unabashedly catipalism-loving movies I've ever seen. When Katadreuffe gives a speech about how anyone can make it in this world, if he only knows exactly what he wants and works his ass of to get it, the movie seems to wholeheartedly agree with him. It does present that speech as pretty boneheaded, but not because of what he says, but because of what he doesn't say, namely that he loves his female colleague. And while the movie presents him as a man who has to make it on his own in this world, it doesn't sympathize with this fact. It truly seems to believe that this is how the world is and should be. 

The movie has sympathy for Coba who doesn't want to be helped by Dreverhaven and wants to make it on her own. And when Dreverhaven tries to help her, he is presented as a huge fool. On the other hand Dreverhaven is presented as a hugely intelligent man when he makes a family leave their house, because they haven't payed their rent. This family is presented as a bunch of lying parasites (the mother pretends to be deadly sick and asks Dreverhaven if they can stay just a bit longer in their house) and Dreverhaven, the hero, sees right through their lies. And that final dialogue between Dreverhaven and Katadreuffe is actually favoring Dreverhaven. While it doesn't completely unambiguously say that Dreverhaven did the right by working against Katadreuffe, it does have sympathy for that viewpoint, and actually sees Katadreuffe as a bit of an idiot for not seeing that Dreverhaven did what is best for him. And let's not start about the representation of the company where Katadreuffe works. It is basically a heavenly place where good, interesting people work in harmony. It is the place that makes dreams come true. To work for it is not only to succeed in life, but it is to live a good life. Lastly it is worth noting that Katadreuffe's best friend is a communist. His main purpose in the movie is to be laughed at.  All of this wouldn't be such a problem if a) the movie intended to have such politics and b) the movie was more exciting

43. Bridge Over Troubled Water &...

Lyrics

When you're weary
Feeling small
When tears are in your eyes
I will dry them all

I'm on your side
When times get rough
And friends just can't be found
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down

When you're down and out
When you're on the street
When evening falls so hard
I will comfort you

I'll take your part
When darkness comes
And pain is all around
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down

Sail on Silver Girl,
Sail on by
Your time has come to shine
All your dreams are on their way

See how they shine
If you need a friend
I'm sailing right behind
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will ease your mind
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will ease your mind


I am a huge fan of Paul Simon. He is a really great musician, who has written some of my favorite songs. I am not such a big fan though of his early career with Art Garfunkel. I like some of their songs, but I find many of them to be a bit bland, like this one. The song is considered to be one of the best songs about friendship, so the movie I chose is a movie about a friendship between two men. It is often considered to be not only the greatest movie about friendship, but one of the greatest movies ever made. It is admittedly not a very inspired or original choice.

The Movie: The Shawshank Redemption (Frank Darabont, 1994)

The Shawshank Redemption, the seemingly perpetual number 1 movie on IMDB's list of the 250 best movies, is not the best movie ever made. It's also not the best movie of 1994. In fact, it is the fourth best movie of the Best Picture nominees that year. All of this shouldn't be seen as a knock on The Shawshank Redemption. It is very good. 1994 was simply a very strong year. I mean Speed, the best action movie ever made, isn't even in my top 5 of 1994. That doesn't mean that I am not surprised by it's enormous popularity. It's not so much that I am surprised that it is considered better than movies like Pulp Fiction or The Godfather part 2. I like those movies more, but I can easily understand why someone would prefer The Shawshank Redemption over those movies. No, I am surprised by how much more popular it seems to be than other similar movies that came out around that period, which I also would consider very good. By similar I mean movies about good people who try (and often improbably manage) to overcome the enormously dire situation they've found themselves in. Why, in other words, is The Shawshank Redemption so much more beloved than movies like Apollo 13, Forrest Gump or In The Name of the Father?

I don't know the answer to that question, but if I had to guess, it is because of the great empathy and understanding it has for its characters. I dislike using the phrase 'There, but for the grace of God, go I/we'. But I think that phrase does explain the popularity of the movie. The movie makes unambiguously clear that most of the people in this prison are guilty of a crime. But it understands that not everyone who is guilty of a crime is necessarily a bad, evil person. Good, decent people we can easily identify with can, for some reason, commit a horrendous crime that could ruin their (and other peoples') lives forever. That doesn't mean that we should treat them inhumanely. There is, I think, a very crucial scene at the beginning in which a warden beats up a prisoner to death. The movie asks us to be sorry and feel empathy for the killed prisoner. We don't know him much and we don't know what he did to end up in prison. But I think that's the point. It doesn't matter whether he was rightfully in prison or not, or whether he committed a serious or a small crime. He is a human being and he does not deserve to die. I have read once or twice that this is a pretty unrealistic representation of a prison. And that there are actually many bad people in prison. Such criticism is stupid. The movie doesn't want to present a realistic view of a prison. It's more a metaphor. Besides it is an adaptation of a Stephen King book. I am not very familiar with his books, but I am pretty sure realism isn't their main concern.

What I also like about this movie is that while it asks us to believe that Andy is innocent, it is left relatively ambiguous whether he really is. At the beginning we see him sitting in a car holding a gun, looking as if he is planning to do something with it. We don't see what he does next and we cut to the courthouse where he is on trial for murdering his wife and her lover. The attorney does make a pretty compelling case for Andy's guilt. Later on a fellow prisoner tells a story about how he was in prison with another man who seemingly committed the crime Andy is imprisoned for. This seems a pretty huge coincidence, and the warden's doubt that the prisoner may have made up that story is actually pretty reasonable, and very much in accordance with the character of the prisoner. This ambiguity is not only interesting because it adds a layer to Andy and the movie, but also because it is very much connected to the point I've raised in the previous paragraph. The movie wants us to have empathy for people and to believe in their goodness. The only real reason we have to believe that Andy is innocent is the fact that he says so and that he seems to be (and acts like) a very decent, good person. But he has a motive, no real alibi and he certainly is capable of doing unthinkable, improbable acts. After all, not many people would manage to escape from a heavily-guarded prison by cracking through the walls for 20 years with a small rock hammer, and then crawling through stinking mud. The scene in which he escapes, by the way, is a great scene, not so much because we are so happy for him, but because of the ingenuity and the sheer guts of the escape.

There are many other great scenes. The fate of the institutionalized Brooks who can't live anymore out of prison is quite poignant. The opera scene is pretty great too of course. And I love the fact that the not guilty Andy commits his first actual crime in prison, whitewashing money for the warden. Lastly, and I'd almost say naturally, the portrayal of the friendship of Red and Andy is genuinely moving and wonderful. We really believe that they are friends who need and care deeply about each other. But all of this wouldn't work without the great actors. This is actually Morgan Freeman's best performance I believe. And Tim Robbins had a pretty great and versatile 1994. Besides being great in this drama, he also acted in the screwball comedies I.Q. and The Hudsucker Proxy. The only thing that doesn't really work is their reunion at the end. I am glad that the movie choose to reunite them. They deserved a happy ending. It just felt a bit contrived. Red has to basically solve some sort of elaborate puzzle to find out where Andy is. Their reunion would have worked better I believe if the movie didn't make Red's search for Andy so complicated.

42. Het Dorp &...

Lyrics

Thuis heb ik nog een ansichtkaart

(I still have a postcard at home)
Waarop een kerk een kar met paard

(With on it a church and horse carriage)
Een slagerij J. van der Ven

(A butchery J. van der Ven)
Een kroeg, een juffrouw op de fiets

(A tavern, a lady on a bike)
Het zegt u hoogstwaarschijnlijk niets

(It most probably doesn't mean a thing to you)
Maar het is waar ik geboren ben

(But this is where I am born)
Dit dorp, ik weet nog hoe het was

(This village, I still remember the way it was)
De boerenkind'ren in de klas

(The farmers' children in the class)
Een kar die ratelt op de keien

(A carriage, rattling on the boulders)
Het raadhuis met een pomp ervoor

(The town house with a pump in front)
Een zandweg tussen koren door

(A sandy road through the corn)
Het vee, de boerderijen

(The cattle, the farms)

En langs het tuinpad van m'n vader

(And along my father's garden path)
Zag ik de hoge bomen staan

(I saw the high trees standing tall)
Ik was een kind en wist niet beter

(I was a child and didn't know better)
Dan dat 't nooit voorbij zou gaan

(Thinking this would never end)

Wat leefden ze eenvoudig toen

(They lived so simple back then)
In simp'le huizen tussen groen

(In simple houses surrounded by green)
Met boerenbloemen en een heg

(With farmer flowers and a hedge)
Maar blijkbaar leefden ze verkeerd

(But they apparently lived wrongly)
Het dorp is gemoderniseerd

(The village is modernised)
En nou zijn ze op de goede weg

(And now they are on the road ahead)
Want ziet, hoe rijk het leven is

(Because, see how wonderful life is)
Ze zien de televisiequiz

(They see the television quiz)
En wonen in betonnen dozen

(And live in concrete boxes)
Met flink veel glas, dan kun je zien

(With lots of glass, so you can see)
Hoe of het bankstel staat bij Mien

(How Mien's couch fits in)
En d'r dressoir met plastic rozen

(And her dresser with plastic roses)

En langs het tuinpad van m'n vader

(And along my father's garden path)
Zag ik de hoge bomen staan

(I saw the high trees standing tall)
Ik was een kind en wist niet beter

(I was a child and didn't know better)
Dan dat 't nooit voorbij zou gaan

(Thinking this would never end)


De dorpsjeugd klit wat bij elkaar

(The village youths hang around together)
In minirok en beatle-haar

(In short dresses and Beatle-hair)
En joelt wat mee met beat-muziek

(And shouts some beat-music)
Ik weet wel het is hun goeie recht

(I know, they have every right to)
De nieuwe tijd, net wat u zegt

(Modern times, as you say)
Maar het maakt me wat meancholiek

(But it makes me a bit melancholic)
Ik heb hun vaders nog gekend

(I used to know their fathers)
Ze kochten zoethout voor een cent

(They bought licorice for a cent)
Ik zag hun moeders touwtjespringen

(I saw their mothers jumping rope)
Dat dorp van toen, het is voorbij

(The village from those times, it's gone)
Dit is al wat er bleef voor mij

(This is all that's left for me)
Een ansicht en herinneringen

(A postcard and memories)
Toen ik langs het tuinpad van m'n vader

(When I saw along my father's garden path)
De hoge bomen nog zag staan

(The high trees standing tall)
Ik was een kind, hoe kon ik weten

(I was a child, how could I know)
Dat dat voorgoed voorbij zou gaan

(It would all end forever)


It is quite astonishing, for both good and bad reasons, that this song is placed so high in the top 2000. Hell, I am surprised it is placed at all in the list. The movie I chose to correspond with this song is the first Dutch movie ever to be nominated for an Oscar for best foreign-language film.
  
The Movie: Village by the River (Dorp aan de rivier) (Fons Rademakers, 1958)

While watching this movie, the thought that Wim Sonneveld's song was inspired by this movie seriously crossed my mind. I can't find if this is true, but if it is, Sonneveld slightly misunderstood the movie. Yes, the movie has a lot of love for the villagers and the village life in probably the 1930's, but this is not a purely nostalgic movie. There is a cynicism buried beneath the love. And while it gives a relatively rosy view of life in the village, it understands that this life can't and shouldn't last. Changes are inevitable and that's probably for the better. I thought it was really very good,

The movie really have a plot. It basically consists of a series of vignettes, most of them revolving around the village doctor. Which is fitting. It is after all set in a time in which doctors were considered heroes and the most important people in the community. They were highly respected and their opinion was seen as the absolute truth. If the doctor told you to do something, you'd do it. While the movie doesn't show the doctor as absolutely good/moral man, it does show that he is highly knowledgeable and doesn't make a big deal out of it when he doesn't act really nicely, even forgives him. Besides, he is presented as the best person living in the village. He is the only one to posses integrity, courage and intelligence. During a cold winter storm for example he crosses courageously (when no one else wants to help him) the river to help a woman give birth. And in his first scene we see that he knows exactly how much time he has to read his morning paper before helping another woman give birth. He is a real family man and the only one to live in a beautiful sophisticated house. While the movie loves the other villagers a lot, it presents them unambiguously as dumb, except for the mayor. But he is presented as evil and corrupt.

As I mentioned, Rademakers doesn't present a pretty rosy view of life in the village, in fact he is sometimes very cynical. But he somehow combines that with a simultaneously very warm view of the village and its people. It is very clear that he has much love for the relaxed, slow and sometimes dull life in the village. While the movie only lasts about 90 minutes, he shoots his scenes in a pretty meandering, patient way. He tries to avoid cutting as much as possible and he loves to zoom in or zoom out during the shot when he wants to go from a long shot to a close-up or the other way around. This little cutting means that the movie is 'moving' on leisurely pace. He never seems to rush anything, mirroring life in the village. In creating sympathy for most villagers he is helped a lot by his actors, who manage to convey a lot of sympathy and regret for things gone wrong. In other words Rademakers manages to convey a lot of sympathy and love for characters he doesn't really agree with. He understands them, even if he knows the life they live cannot (and should not) be sustained. Few movies do this really.

And it's quite clear that Rademakers' view of the village isn't rosy. The men seem to be utterly afraid of women and are often seen as enormous fools, who are of no help to anyone. One man even kills himself because his wife is bullying him. It's not known what that bullying entails, but the other men agree that this is a big problem in the village. Apparently lots of men are bullied by their wives and this is seen as a logical reason for suicide. And in the aforementioned scene in which the doctor reads his newspaper before helping a woman give birth, the woman is in a lot of pain, but she is constantly telling very sternly to her husband what he should do and how he should make the doctor feel at home. The terrified husband sheepishly obliges her every time, but he is so clumsy he constantly screws up even his simplest tasks. 

And when the men try to act 'masculine' their actions are either so incredibly stupid that they fail or they are exposed as cowards, whose actions don't align with their big mouth. For example, in an absurdly and darkly funny scene we see four men gathered around the corpse of the man who killed himself because he was bullied by his wife. They drink alcohol and make stupid jokes about their toughness and masculinity. Rademakers constantly underlines the pathetic nature of these jokes. There is no truth to them, these are deeply insecure men, who make these jokes to (unsuccessfully) hide their insecurity. Anyway after some joking one of them claim that he is the biggest man (or something like that) and he'll show this by taking the scarf of the face of a sickly old woman, living just out of the village (I did not get what her sickness is. I assume it was/is common knowledge that a woman hiding her face with a scarf has a certain disease. I have no idea what this disease could have possibly been). Anyway, the next day the man goes there and does take her scarf away. We don't see him do this. We just see the house of the woman from the outside and hear some screaming. And then we see the woman getting out of the house screaming some more. We see that all of this is being watched by the woman's son. In the next scene we hear that the man taking her scarf away was killed. By not showing any of this Rademakers gives even less credence to this stupid use of masculinity. And in another, much lighter and funnier scene a man hunts animals where that's prohibited so the police comes looking for him. He hides everywhere, not having the guts to confront the police. Eventually he hides under the toilet. He is not lucky. Not only does the police find him, the police finds him, because a policeman inadvertently shat on him.
 

Most actions in the village are actually represented as being only for decorum. Actions here rarely have the intended effect. They usually don't even have bad consequences, but no consequences at all. They are completely meaningless. The same can be said of the village traditions. During one scene for example a man meets a (incredibly stereotypically presented) gypsy woman. She comes into his house, hoping to get some food. The man gives her to it, hoping to have sex or at least develop a friendship. No such luck. He falls asleep and when he wakes it turns out that the gypsy woman has not only swindled him, but she also has a husband and after taking some food she leaves the village. And the good doctor can help many people, but his wife dies of a simple cold. After she dies he secretly moves her body to his birthplace. The funeral is a big, but rather meaningless ceremony, considering the coffin is empty. Another meaningless ceremony is the   'retirement party'. It's a forced retirement, because the mayor hates the doctor and sacks him. We hear the mayor saying all kinds of bad things about the doctor in a closed session with his cabinet. But when he has to talk in front of the whole village at the doctor's retirement party he says all kinds of things about how great the doctor is and how sad it is that he has to retire. It is a very cynical and great scene in a movie that surprised me a lot.