A Movie Anniversary worth Celebrating

I’m not normally one to mark anniversaries or watch a movie more than once, so blame the hayfever medication for the current outbreak of sentimentality (promise it won’t last more than one blog post).  This year marks the 10^th anniversary of The Matrix. 

[Warning: Spoiler!  But you should have seen the movie by now.]  The movie that started with the perception that the everyday world was real, until Neo, a software engineer by day and computer hacker at night who takes his landlady’s trash out, discovers the world is actually an elaborate deception and he has to help save humans from their enslavement by machines.  A cyber thriller with bullet time and CGI-effects that made geeks look cool.  Total Film called it “The Action Movie of the Millennium”.

The Matrix spawned discussion, had scenes referenced in other movies, paved the way for more spectacular special effects (how credible would Crouching Tiger, Sleeping Dragon have been otherwise?) and proved philosophers make lousy film critics – check out The Matrix and Philosophy: Welcome to the Desert of the Real, which I’ll review if a notable number of comments request it.

Aside from special effects, superb soundtrack and plot, The Matrix was also remarkable for Trinity.  Trinity is a believable female character who is intelligent, just as good a soldier as any man and careful about who she falls in love with.

But it’s not really down to the hayfever medication.  I will be reading at the Polyverse Poetry Festival in July and was thinking about what to read.  The time I’ll be reading for it just right to fit in my “Fanfare” sequence, based on The Matrix and fanfiction.  I’ve also been reading Not a Muse international poetry anthology which features my poem “Still Life with a Static Matrix Screensaver”.  Happy 10^th anniversary and one worth celebrating.

ACE Funding: the Small Print

The Bishop of Leicester’s plea for artists to run Leicester’s new Performing Arts Centre was timely in view of the recent Arts Council of England’s funding report. Reactions to ACE’s recent decisions, the vote of no-confidence from actors and on-line petition to support Dedalus books highlight the usual weaknesses of arts funding in the UK, namely that it’s bureaucratic, arbitrary and, if ACE decides to stop funding, it stops suddenly and finally. There’s no gradual decline and no time to find alternative sources of funding so ACE funding was never reliable.For all its social inclusiveness targets and promotions, ACE always treated arts practitioners (ie artists and arts organisations) with a one size fits all approach. Whichever grant you were applying for, everyone had to complete the same form. Sounds fair until you consider a small poetry society run solely by volunteers in their free time squashed around day jobs, family and their own artistic endeavours, were completing the same forms as regional or national touring companies with full-time administrators who were completing the same forms in their working day.

One form ran to 13 pages. In the middle of a working day I had a phone call from ACE’s then regional literature officer suggesting that the literature group merely sat round talking to each other. I pointed out that 3% of our audience were asylum seekers, that 22% of our membership lived in areas identified by the city council as being “priority areas of need” and spent twenty minutes giving the officer reasons for justifying us having a grant. That call finished ten minutes before the officer was due to go into the meeting to discuss whether or not the literature group would get the grant. If I didn’t have a good memory or didn’t have the literature group’s paperwork with me, the group would have never have received the grant.

But why was it so significant that 3% of the audience were asylum seekers, that 22% lived in areas of “priority need”? Why was it not enough that the group was bringing established, award-winning, contemporary poets to read in Leicester and promoting those readings to as wide an audience as possible? Because ACE insisted the arts were a vehicle for social inclusion. Though how inclusive it is to fund an arts organisation targeting a specifically focused, socially excluded group without any plans to integrate the group within the mainstream (eventually) completely eludes me. All I could see were ghettos where it was more important to label the artist by their socially-exclusive group than it was to focus on the art being produced.

Hence the very welcome small print stating that ACE should focus on funding excellence in arts. Finally! OK it’s going to raise even more debate about how excellence is defined and who does the defining. But if it enables the Bishop of Leicester to request that Leicester’s Performing Arts Centre includes artists on its board, then maybe ACE have finally realised they’re there to fund the arts. Now, if only it would also reconsider some of its funding cuts…

1408

Director Mikael Håfström, John Cusack (Mike Enslin), Mary McCormack (Lily Enslin), Samuel L Jackson (Gerald Olin, hotel manager).  Rating: US PG-13 / UK 15

Mike Enslin told his wife he was “goin’ out for some cigarettes”. He didn’t come back. Instead he gave up smoking and embarked on a book, “Ten Nights in Ten Haunted Hotel Rooms”, beginning each night by placing an unlit cigarette in the ashtray before rendering another dull night in sparklingly cynical prose. So a hotel room that’s seen 56 paranormally-induced deaths since 1912 – excluding deaths from natural causes, ie strokes and heart attacks – sounds like an ideal final chapter.

So far John Cusack plays to type, selfish, wisecracking loser, but then the alarm clock radio bursts into The Carpenters’ “We’ve only just begun” and starts counting down from 60 minutes. “No guest lasts more than an hour,” Mike Enslin helpfully repeats the hotel manager’s warning. The tension racks up as escape routes are closed off and we’re left with the claustrophobic room of Mike Enslin’s headspace. If you prefer blood and gore, wait for Rob Zombie’s remake of “Hallowe’en”. If you like being scared, check into room 1408. John Cusack makes it watchable as he moves from cynicism, being startled, scared, grief-stricken to almost relief as the hour counts down towards its close (of course there’s a twist, but I’m giving it away). The horrors aren’t random. Mike Enslin thoughtfully packs a night-vision Luma-lite which reveals blood-splatters from previous guests and we get to see how some of them used the “express check out service”. But we also learn why he left his wife. Anyone familiar with Stephen King’s work may guess the ending, but John Cusack makes you root for him as 1408 imposes its final choice.

The tension does dissipate as Mikael Håfström takes us out of the room on a red herring, conveniently signalled by the colour red. But John Cusack, who once commented that a good film stays with him “like a fever dream for a long time afterwards”, would be justified in feeling that fever dream. A welcome addition to the horror oeuvre.

Long Live Fanfic

A quick definition: fanfiction (fanfic) is definitely not plagiarism. Proper fanfic authors make it clear that the author(s) of the canon (the original source material) deserve the credit and fanfic writers don’t get paid (unless a publisher commissions them for the offical “based on the TV series/film” books). Fanfic provides prequels, sequels and fill in the missing scenes (the ones left out because they held up the plot or time/word count pressures squeezed them out) or explore alternative universes (what if character A didn’t resort to plan B, what if C made the opposite decision).

So why do they write it? Fanfic’s been around since stories began, but the internet has helped by providing an easy, convenient way of sharing and distributing such stories. Anyone who’s re-interpreted a Biblical story, a fairytale or a myth has strayed into fanfic. Anyone who thinks that raiding the myth kitty is somehow superior to someone writing an alternative episode of “Star Trek” is fooling only themselves. What both myth kitty raiders and fanfic writers share is that they take original characters from other’s story and create their own story from them. The former do it because it’s a convenient shorthand to refer to Penelope rather than describe some long-suffering wife’s patient wait for her husband’s return. The latter do it for very similar reasons: you can write stories where your readers already know your characters. In both cases it avoids having to fill in the backstory or having to explain why your characters are behaving as they do, because your reader already knows. Leonard Cohen recently complained he couldn’t mention minor Biblical characters in his songs because no one knew who they were. He was mourning the loss of a common, cultural reference point. Fanfic authors have been successfully shifting common, cultural reference points beyond a generally Western, generally white, generally male culture to stories that genuinely cross boundaries.

Novelist and poet Sheenagh Pugh refers to fanfic as “the democratic genre”. A fanfic story can be written and posted on-line and receive feedback, which is generally positive and constructive, within hours. An original story has to be posted to editors who, snowed under with submissions, take months to respond and often do so with a standard rejection letter which doesn’t offer any feedback on the story. The fanfic world is definitely a friendlier and quicker way of getting reviewed by your peers. But don’t think the criticism is kinder. Fanfic reviewers will put your characterisation and plotting under a microscope. The worst crime a fanfic author can commit is letting a character stray out of character, and fanfic readers do not hesitate to condemn. It’s a good way of flexing fictional muscle and useful experience for writers learning character development and how to write character-driven plot. Fanfic is a starting point for most writers. Many fanfic forums and communities have their fair share of professional writers who also write fanfic and will take the time to review and constructively criticise a story with potential. It’s an incredibily useful way for newer writers to cut their literary teeth or for existing writers to re-discover the excitement of writing.

It can be awkward for writers of open canons (ie a series where more books/episodes are planned) to encourage fanfic as the writer doesn’t want to be swayed by any ideas in the fanfics. I think fanfic writers have to accept they are playing in someone else’s sandpit and if someone else wants to take the sandpit away, they have the right to do so. Although some writers, eg Anne Rice, have geniune reasons for not wanting their work turning up in fanfic, generally attempts to stop fanfic or sue the fanfic writer are like trying to bolt the stable door after the horse has bolted. Once a story is in the public arena, it is public. Having said that, fanfic writers do have a responsibility to keep canon characters in character and not abuse the original with poor fanfic. Ultimately if a book/movie/TV series attracts fanfic, the original’s done its job: it’s created a memorable story with characters that people want to continue living long after the original’s finished. Fanfic’s a compliment. Long live fanfic.

The Lake House

Director: Alejandro Agresti, starring Sandra Bullock (as Kate) and Keanu Reeves (as Alex).

The key is Kate’s casual mention that her favourite book is “Persuasion”. Jane Austen’s plot has young Anne Elliott persuaded to break off her engagement to a man with few apparent prospects. Years later their paths cross. He is now a successful man. She is still single and taking a chief role in nursing sick friends and soothing familial troubles. Both still carry a flame for each other, but can they be persuaded to rekindle their romance?

Kate moves out of the Lake House having transferred in her job to a new hospital, leaving a note for the next tenant. Alex moves in, being the architect overseeing a new local housing development. He finds Kate’s references to non existent paw prints and a box in the attic that’s not there baffling. Kate’s forwarding address is a building site. He’s living in 2004 but Kate’s letter is dated 2006.

Alex sticks a reply in the mail box and gets a reply from Kate, who’s driven out to an empty Lake House to check the mail box. Thus begins a correspondence. Kate follows Alex’s instructions for a tour of the key architectural features of their town. Alex begins reading Kate’s favourite books (Jane Austen’s Anne Elliott also makes literary recommendations). Kate confides to her mother and co-worker she’s corresponding to a boyfriend to ward off pressure not to be single. Alex confides to his brother that Kate feels more real to him than any other woman he’s been with.

Eventually they figure they had met before. Kate’s then boyfriend threw a party attended by Alex. Kate and Alex shared a kiss but went their separate ways. Both had met the right person but at the wrong time. Now’s the right time, but can they find a way of getting together?

The film relies heavily on its charm. The correspondence device seems quaint. Kate’s reading and letter writing in contrast to her hectic hospital work are credible. But Alex is more a Blackberry man yet beguiled by her letters. The film feels lengthy as the pacing is slow, yet, after most over-long films it’s clear which scenes should have been cut, but here it’s difficult to decide. It’s strange then that the only hurried section is the crucial scenes where Kate and Alex finally work out how to get together as if the director doesn’t quite trust the plot.

Otherwise each scene fits seamlessly with the others. The film’s a slow-burner: a contrast with the ‘notice me’ demands of a star vehicle or a technology budget greater than the actors’ salaries. Hence guaranteed to draw a mixed reaction from critics who focused on reinforcing their prejudices of the actors.

But the film’s charm is Jane Austen’s. She lets her characters meander around their daily lives. Anne Elliott’s resignation and jadedness is captured well in Sandra Bullock’s moody mid-distance stares and wan face. Pity she doesn’t reanimate as Anne Elliott did when around her ex-fiancé. Keanu Reeves does all the work here, chasing, rekindling, fanning the flames of a slow burning fire. Read “Persuasion” and watch “The Lake House” again.

Vending Machine Poetry

Smoking has been banned in England in enclosed spaces, including pubs. There’s an opportunity to use the cigarette vending machines to vend… poetry?

M-m, I can see the logic and generally I’m in favour of innovative ways of getting poems to audiences, but I’m uneasy about this.

1. Who reads in pubs?

I do, but I don’t drink or smoke and have more books than friends, so it’s safe to assume I’m the exception rather than the rule. Pubs are for socialising, chatting with friends or tolerating a monologue from the loner at the end of the bar. Yep, sit in a pub long enough and someone will talk to you. Hardly the environment to inspire ‘could do with something to read, oh, look I’m in luck a poetry vending machine!’ type thoughts.

2. Small Print.

Cigarette packets are the ideal size for haiku and related verse forms, triolets, limericks and government health warnings. Anything sonnet-sized is longer isn’t going to fit. Unless the print is miniaturised or the paper is folded. Folds are weaknesses: several re-readings later the poems will have disintegrated, the buyer will feel robbed and will never buy a vending machine poem again. Layout is vitally important in a poem. Readers need to see where the line end and stanza breaks are.

I don’t see the fag-packet format lasting.