a.k.a, recent reading, as follows:
Victorian
Mary Elizabeth Braddon – Aurora Floyd (1862-3)
Classic Victorian sensation fiction – I actually enjoyed it more than the one for which Braddon is now best-remembered, Lady Audley's Secret. The plot centres around bigamy (it's also a canonical work in the 'Victorian bigamy novel') and so, as you can imagine, is of interest on all kinds of levels, but gender and sexuality especially.
Margaret Oliphant – Miss Marjoribanks (1866)
A delightful tale (part of the Chronicles of Carlingford) which bears resemblance to Trollope's slightly preceding Barsetshire Chronicles, of which I'm also a fan. Lucilla, our heroine, is determined to behave sensibly, and also to resolve the lives of everyone around her. Here there are echoes of Austen's Emma (1815), but unlike Emma Woodhouse, Lucilla's management is not wholly unsuccessful. Subversive to an interesting degree yet still moralistic in the classic Victorian mold. I must read the rest of the Carlingford novels.
George & Weedon Grossmith – Diary of a Nobody (1892)
For someone who's got a Victoriana obsession and also a research interest in the rise of the modern bourgeoisie, Diary of a Nobody is perfect. Of course, it's funny, and also a nice counterpoint to more 'serious' Victorian novels (see above) which are yours truly's usual diet.
Assorted Novels
Elizabeth Bowen – The Death of the Heart (1938)
These days I'm not much into 'writerly' writers but I'll gladly make an exception for Bowen, who I hadn't previously read. Her modernist prose makes you want to use clichés like 'crystalline,' and I'm also always a fan of the English novel of manners. In some ways she reminds me of Janet Malcolm (or vice versa) in that both have an exquisite sense of human frailty, but they also like to slyly slip the knife in.
Cornell Woolrich – Rendezvous In Black (1948)
Compared to Chandler and Hammett, Woolrich these days tends to be forgotten as an important noir figure, but the films based on his works are still remembered – Rear Window, The Bride Wore Black, Night Has A Thousand Eyes (one of my favourite titles) among others. Actually, though, his work is much darker, less procedural-driven and even more psychological than the aforementioned, full of dread. Rendezvous In Black is a revenge narrative following a man whose fiancée has been killed (bizarrely) in an accident with a low-flying plane and an empty liquor bottle. I have two other novels of his waiting, but I'm worried that it'll be too traumatic a reading experience…
Shirley Jackson – The Sundial (1958)
I'm a huge fan of Jackson's fiction, especially the stories other than 'The Lottery' (which is over-proscribed) - and of the great novels The Haunting of Hill House (1959) and We Have Always Lived In The Castle (1962). I've been slowly making my way through her lesser known work, which I find uneven. In The Sundial, as in We Have Always…, we find ourselves in a crumbling mansion on the outskirts of a village, both filled with eccentric characters. Aunt Fanny has a vision, delivered by her dead father, of an impending apocalypse, and preparations begin. I didn't warm to this novel though it was interesting, and in some ways could be seen as a test run for some of the themes of We Have Always… I wonder, too, if there is an influence on Stephen King's The Shining (King wrote about The Haunting of Hill House at length in Danse Macabre), particularly in scenes set in mazes.
J. G. Ballard – The Drowned World (1962)
It's impossible not to recognise in Ballard one of the twentieth century's great prophets – which is why I'll reiterate. The Drowned World, an early novella, tells the story of a dystopian Earth on which the ice caps have melted, the seas risen, and the entire planet become tropical. The slow impact of this on the psyche of the survivors – the opaque excursions into psycho-evolutionary biology – along with the tropical/aquatic gothic setting make this a fascinating and prescient piece, if not always compelling.
J. G. Ballard – Crash (1973)
Again, although Crash's reputation preceded it, it didn't do anything to dint the pleasure of reading the work. Like a lot of Cultural Studies and pop culture research people, I find that 'body horror' area/era particularly interesting in which the body-machine complex starts to be overtly represented in forms both erotic and monstrous (note to self: Men, Women and Chainsaws is still waiting to be read). Ballard, Burroughs, Cronenberg, Lynch, and so on. I'm ashamed to admit that Crash (and Dead Ringers) are the two Cronenberg films I've yet to see, but I'm glad to have read the book first – and, like a few other of the works I describe here, it is every bit as stunning as one has heard. And amazing to imagine that it was written in 1973. The blank erotics and stark futurity, the sharp vision of the city and technology, the mutual violation and traumatic inseparability of body and machine and body-as-machine… it's all there. See also Mark Seltzer (thanks again for the recommendation Dr Swan) and also, of course, Donna Haraway.
Lew McCreary – The Minus Man (1991)
I have a long-neglected sideline interest in serial killers, and Mark Seltzer's eponymous work brought a number of references to my attention, including this novel. Generally, I tend to find serial killers a tiresome subject for fiction (particularly as they are now so implicated in crime fiction and television, and don't require a motive, hence obviating the plot work that writers would otherwise have to put in), but The Minus Man (Lydia Lunch has also named a song on her most recent studio album after the phrase) is much more of a psychological work (and, unlike my favourite serial killer novel, Joyce Carol Oates' Zombie, or Dexter, that other tale of a killer hero, uninterested in satisfying gruesome voyeuristic fantasies). While the controversy around the novel (which was also filmed) centred around the sympathy that the reader feels for Vann Siegert, the serial killer from whose perspective the story is told, in fact this seems like a ridiculous over-simplification; in straightforward prose, McCreary sets out a cold but very human psychological study of the killer as a human inhabiting a lifeworld which happens to include the compulsion to destroy others. A work which, as Seltzer pointed out, is thought-provoking both in terms of its original approach to its content, and when considered as a symptom of the violence and trauma at – and reflexively considered to be at – the heart of the modern social-technological complex.
Assorted Non-Fiction
Jessica Mitford – The American Way of Death Revisited (1998)
As is evident elsewhere, although death has been an ongoing theme – as it is for all of us – my recent Death Studies sojourn has been the locus around which various reading has centred in recent times. Mitford's revised version of her classic work takes us through the usual hideous juxtaposition of the biological and the consumer banal (as well as the institutionalisation of capitalist profit-making on the backs of the bereaved). Little of the older material will be news to anyone who's read Waugh's classic, The Loved One – but what rankles and intrigues is the extent to which, despite her original revelation, the deeply cynical corporatisation of the funeral industry has continued unabated. As with any good piece of muckraking – and Mitford's up there with the best – the indignation and disgust flow unabated (to take just one of myriad examples, the fashion for expensive 'double coffins' in which the outer layer is intended to be impenetrable by the elements - causing a build-up of gas inside the coffin due to anaerobic bacterial decay and leading to explosions - the solution being 'burping coffins,' which vent the gas so as to avoid the former, and presumably greater, indignity).
Simon Reynolds – Retromania: Pop Culture's Addiction To Its Own Past (2011)
There's so much that could be said about this book, but that will have to await a more thorough review. I loved Reynolds' work on post-punk, Rip It Up and Start Again, but this one is a bit more personal, also more theoretical and coming from a position of critique, which is interesting but at times fails to gel or seems a little like a mid-life crisis. What I will note here, which others have before me, is that the irony is that Reynolds' thesis - that we now create music which does not attempt to be new, and that this is a bad thing - actually looks back to the time when music saw itself as new (Reynolds thinks '65 was the turning point) as an original golden age. Definitely worth reading - both enraging and engaging.
Scott Carney – The Red Market: On the Trail of the World's Organ Brokers, Bone Thieves, Blood Farmers and Child Traffickers (2011)
This book is as gruesome as the title sounds, but it's necessary reading for anyone interested in necro- or thanatocapitalism and the reification of the human body on the unequal playing field of the global 'free market' – while not being as heavy a read as any of that sounds (it's written in an easy journalistic style). Carney's interest in the area began when one of his students, on a group tour to India, committed suicide and he was in the position to supervise the treatment and return of the body. From that point, he explores the various areas mentioned in the subtitle, including the fascinating nexus between holy or ritual head-shaving and the hair industry. For those who enjoyed Mary Roach's Stiff, there are many more interesting explorations to be had into the 'afterlife' of the human – or human biological material. Particularly recommended for the Death Studies cohort (Tim and Pia – also Meredith, you may find this one interesting if you haven't seen it already).
Jon Ronson – The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry (2011)
I'd really enjoyed Jon Ronson's Them, and so I had high hopes for The Psychopath Test, particularly since, as you're now aware, it deals with a subject I have a deep interest in. But although, as always, Ronson uncovers various near-unbelievable histories and anecodotes, and employs his typical and typically entertaining strategic deployment of his own awkwardness and his unique style of reported dialogue, I found the book a little all over the place. Ronson isn't quite sure what he's interested in (Psychopathology itself, as a concept and as manifest? The 'madness industry' and its pernicious allies in other state and corporate institutions? Institutions and their impact on mental health?) and there is a particularly problematic chapter in which he interviews a former Tonton Macoute, trying to apply his new knowledge of psychopathy checklists – whereas those of us who know much about the area of organised mass violence know that it's precisely necessary not to employ sadists or psychopaths as violence workers because they're too unreliable and anti-systemic - you would think a book on psychopathy, even if not an academic work as such, might pay attention to this kind of thing. Still, all in all a lot of fun.
India
Rohinton Mistry – A Fine Balance (1996)
Just as good as I'd always heard it was – a Dickensian (I'm not always a huge fan of Dickens, but that's another conversation), addictive narrative set during the massive upheaval of Indira Gandhi's Emergency. In terms of other great recent English-language novels of India, I didn't love it as much as A Suitable Boy, but although Mistry's writing is less exquisitely fine-tuned than Vikram Seth's, the story itself grows powerful very early on.
Gita Mehta – Karma Cola (1979)
A good corrective to the neo-orientalist New Age view of India as a source of wisdom, particularly prevalent in the '60s and '70s – there are some great anecdotes of gurus and devotees, and the intermesh with capitalism, but I found Mehta's 'flip' style to be a bit casual and offputting.
William Dalrymple – The Age of Kali (1998)
Edward Luce – In Spite of the Gods: The Strange Rise of Modern India (2007)
I'd already read, and mostly enjoyed, Dalrymple's book on practitioners of different spiritual traditions in India, Nine Lives. But reading Western travel literature on India is difficult in that the writers often haven't caught up with post-colonialism, and that's unfortunately the case both for Dalrymple, who at times appears something of an imperialist nostalgic (I'm also finding that in the work of his I'm presently reading on Delhi, City of Djinns); and for Luce, bureau chief for the Financial Times in South Asia (and now Washington), who is too sympathetic to anti-statist freemarketism for my tastes (not saying that there aren't any problems with the Indian state as such). Nonetheless, Dalrymple's descriptions are gorgeous (and his encounters with Benazir Bhutto particularly stick in the memory), while Luce had access to some very interesting people and the anecdotes, situations and interviews he lays out are both hilarious and chilling, the latter particularly in relation to Partition and inter-communal violence (again, a theme of City of Djinns). I now intend to read some specific Partition histories, which I think may also be helpful for my mass violence research…
Showing posts with label crime. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crime. Show all posts
Friday, October 7, 2011
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Gus Van Sant - Elephant (2003)
In the heady days of my youth, I was a big true crime aficionado. But although I remained fascinated by perpetrator mentality, as my early twenties passed, I began to feel just a little too much empathy with the victims, and just a little too much of the uncomfortable voyeurism of the position of the true crime fan (in keeping with the pulpiness and sub-pop psychology of most of the writing, though not all), to keep pursuing this vein (having said which, interest in these things, I would argue, is an inherent part of human nature which a modern culture of sanitized medicinal miracles has – ironically – unhealthily shunted to one side).
So what was I to make of Elephant? This is the central film in Van Sant’s ‘Death Trilogy,’ (beginning with Gerry and closing with Last Days), each based on actual events and dealing with the eponymous event – though death is, of course, a major feature of virtually all of Van Sant’s films. In this case, the event in question is the infamous Columbine massacre, still perhaps the cultural paradigm for all the other mass shootings (including many in schools) to which the USA seems so tragically prone. While I’m not sure how I’d feel about such a work – released four years after the events – if I was personally connected to the tragedy, this work comes across as a thoughtful reflection rather than an exploitation, though there is always a certain question about purposefully creating a work of aesthetic beauty – which Elephant undoubtedly is – from such a subject.
In regard to Columbine, as was widely noted at the time of the film’s release, Van Sant offers no explanations (indeed, the killers as depicted here do not seem to fit any recognisable profile, for what such profiles are worth), and this is a strength of the film in that we are offered no pat explanations (nor resolutions), nor too-easy indictments of particular aspects of a society which produces such events. In any case, if we are to take Dave Cullen’s non-fiction work Columbine (2009) – which also uses fiction-style conventions (it’s been called a modern-day In Cold Blood) and has become the definitive work on the massacre – as a guide, most of what we think we know about these events is in fact mythical. So rather than watch analysis (and for that, after all, we have Bowling For Columbine), we drift in a leisurely way through the lives of various students in the period preceding the massacre, tension slowly building as we realize what is afoot. The film plays with time and perspective in Rashomon-esque fashion – scenes are presented numerous times as we follow different characters, and new aspects of each moment become apparent – although there are no secrets, no slowly unfolding narrative of truth or of revelation for the viewer – only a gradually mounting sense of unease which combines with an easy langurousness – slow, but never tedious – as we watch in extended tracking shots over the shoulders of the characters as their lives and social circumstances unfold.
The title itself comes from the (oft-misunderstood) Buddhist parable of the blind men and the elephant – Van Sant named the film thus in tribute to Alan Clarke’s BBC film of the same name (dealing with violence in Northern Ireland), as a reference to the way in which Clarke's and his own work explored one event as seen from different viewpoints – although he would later realize that Clarke’s title was in fact a reference to the phrase ‘the elephant in the room’ (and we may think here of the unexpected synchronicity of this denial with the incomprehensible US refusal to recognise the deadly consequences of the easy availability of guns).
Like many of Van Sant’s films – with the possible exception of Mala Noche – Elephant is somewhat imperfect – almost as if, as an artwork, it is realizing itself just a touch clumsily as it unfurls. This adds to the charms of Van Sant’s oeuvre, but keeps any one film from being a central masterpiece. Here, as well as occasionally unrealistic behavior in service of moments of drama, the addition of a homoerotic episode between the killers, despite making a stunning set-piece, seems a little too much like a rather queasy wish-fulfillment (the erotic object as embodiment of masculine violence), and sits uncomfortably with the real-life events on which the film is based, in which (as far as I’m aware) there was no suggestion of such a relationship between Eric Harris & Dylan Klebold, the actual killers – indeed, they seem rather to have been homophobic. In a similar vein, the scene in which they watch a television show on Nazism is unconvincing and indeed cliched and psychologically problematic - if watching material about 'evil' killers makes one a killer, then criticisms of Elephant itself would be grounded - though the connection with their actions is not laboured. The depiction of high school life is, if anything, somewhat idyllic (despite occasional moments of bullying), a too-vivid memory of a past full of promise in a way that is reflected in the gorgeous colours and languid cinematography – despite the troubled families and social ostracism, the pain of (some) teenagehood is elided in presenting a processual collage of the ‘ordinary’ which is contrasted to the murderous violence by which it will be shattered.
What this flaw reveals, though, is the way in which Van Sant’s work carves out a deliriously original territory which on the one hand is immersed in realism – the fragmentation, muttered dialogue, improvisation, lack of traditional narrative arcs, untutored actors, the naming of characters after the actors who portray them – and, on the other, a kind of hyper-real idealism expressed in the visual techniques he employs, the dramatic events he turns to and the stunning features of his male actors (in contrast to the everyday looks of female characters) – we might also think of his overt rejections of realism, as in the Shakespearian dialogue in My Own Private Idaho. In the character of John McFarland, indeed, we can see the germ of the way in which Paranoid Park – also dealing with death and teenagers – became virtually a paean to the features of Gabe Nevins. In refusing to reconcile these disparate tendencies – in its slipperiness, refusal to bow to emotional kitsch, low-key intensity and deeply memorable set-pieces – Van Sant’s work, of which Elephant is a stunning example, has a haunting quality of insinuating itself into the viewer’s consciousness.
So what was I to make of Elephant? This is the central film in Van Sant’s ‘Death Trilogy,’ (beginning with Gerry and closing with Last Days), each based on actual events and dealing with the eponymous event – though death is, of course, a major feature of virtually all of Van Sant’s films. In this case, the event in question is the infamous Columbine massacre, still perhaps the cultural paradigm for all the other mass shootings (including many in schools) to which the USA seems so tragically prone. While I’m not sure how I’d feel about such a work – released four years after the events – if I was personally connected to the tragedy, this work comes across as a thoughtful reflection rather than an exploitation, though there is always a certain question about purposefully creating a work of aesthetic beauty – which Elephant undoubtedly is – from such a subject.
In regard to Columbine, as was widely noted at the time of the film’s release, Van Sant offers no explanations (indeed, the killers as depicted here do not seem to fit any recognisable profile, for what such profiles are worth), and this is a strength of the film in that we are offered no pat explanations (nor resolutions), nor too-easy indictments of particular aspects of a society which produces such events. In any case, if we are to take Dave Cullen’s non-fiction work Columbine (2009) – which also uses fiction-style conventions (it’s been called a modern-day In Cold Blood) and has become the definitive work on the massacre – as a guide, most of what we think we know about these events is in fact mythical. So rather than watch analysis (and for that, after all, we have Bowling For Columbine), we drift in a leisurely way through the lives of various students in the period preceding the massacre, tension slowly building as we realize what is afoot. The film plays with time and perspective in Rashomon-esque fashion – scenes are presented numerous times as we follow different characters, and new aspects of each moment become apparent – although there are no secrets, no slowly unfolding narrative of truth or of revelation for the viewer – only a gradually mounting sense of unease which combines with an easy langurousness – slow, but never tedious – as we watch in extended tracking shots over the shoulders of the characters as their lives and social circumstances unfold.
The title itself comes from the (oft-misunderstood) Buddhist parable of the blind men and the elephant – Van Sant named the film thus in tribute to Alan Clarke’s BBC film of the same name (dealing with violence in Northern Ireland), as a reference to the way in which Clarke's and his own work explored one event as seen from different viewpoints – although he would later realize that Clarke’s title was in fact a reference to the phrase ‘the elephant in the room’ (and we may think here of the unexpected synchronicity of this denial with the incomprehensible US refusal to recognise the deadly consequences of the easy availability of guns).
Like many of Van Sant’s films – with the possible exception of Mala Noche – Elephant is somewhat imperfect – almost as if, as an artwork, it is realizing itself just a touch clumsily as it unfurls. This adds to the charms of Van Sant’s oeuvre, but keeps any one film from being a central masterpiece. Here, as well as occasionally unrealistic behavior in service of moments of drama, the addition of a homoerotic episode between the killers, despite making a stunning set-piece, seems a little too much like a rather queasy wish-fulfillment (the erotic object as embodiment of masculine violence), and sits uncomfortably with the real-life events on which the film is based, in which (as far as I’m aware) there was no suggestion of such a relationship between Eric Harris & Dylan Klebold, the actual killers – indeed, they seem rather to have been homophobic. In a similar vein, the scene in which they watch a television show on Nazism is unconvincing and indeed cliched and psychologically problematic - if watching material about 'evil' killers makes one a killer, then criticisms of Elephant itself would be grounded - though the connection with their actions is not laboured. The depiction of high school life is, if anything, somewhat idyllic (despite occasional moments of bullying), a too-vivid memory of a past full of promise in a way that is reflected in the gorgeous colours and languid cinematography – despite the troubled families and social ostracism, the pain of (some) teenagehood is elided in presenting a processual collage of the ‘ordinary’ which is contrasted to the murderous violence by which it will be shattered.
What this flaw reveals, though, is the way in which Van Sant’s work carves out a deliriously original territory which on the one hand is immersed in realism – the fragmentation, muttered dialogue, improvisation, lack of traditional narrative arcs, untutored actors, the naming of characters after the actors who portray them – and, on the other, a kind of hyper-real idealism expressed in the visual techniques he employs, the dramatic events he turns to and the stunning features of his male actors (in contrast to the everyday looks of female characters) – we might also think of his overt rejections of realism, as in the Shakespearian dialogue in My Own Private Idaho. In the character of John McFarland, indeed, we can see the germ of the way in which Paranoid Park – also dealing with death and teenagers – became virtually a paean to the features of Gabe Nevins. In refusing to reconcile these disparate tendencies – in its slipperiness, refusal to bow to emotional kitsch, low-key intensity and deeply memorable set-pieces – Van Sant’s work, of which Elephant is a stunning example, has a haunting quality of insinuating itself into the viewer’s consciousness.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Matteo Garrone - Gomorra (2008)
This sleek and brutal film, like Roberto Saviano’s book on which it is based, is a work of docu-fiction, but it is only a light transposition of the everyday reality for Neapolitans and their ongoing relationship with the Camorra (while the Sicilian Mafia/Cosa Nostra are the best known, they are not the only Italian criminal organisation; others include the aforementioned, the Calabrian ‘Ndrangheta and the Apulian Sacra Corona Unita). The film traces a number of different individuals through their generally tragic trajectories through the poorer echelons of Neapolitan society (though while much of the ‘action on the ground’ happens on the streets, it shouldn’t be forgotten that the Camorra and other similar organizations exist at every level, including the highest, of Italian politics and commerce - in this film this is evident for the world of high fashion in particular, though in a way which can also be considered representative).
In this world of scummy, decaying concrete high-rise projects (Italian criminal organizations have a lengthy history with the construction industry, and concrete in particular), the Camorra are so deeply implicated at all levels of society that the attempt to remain disentangled, or worse, to disentangle oneself, may be impossible, except at the price of one’s life (not to mention the lives of one's family and friends). Rampant poverty and the standard social and economic alienation of urban underclasses only contribute to these patterns. While we are fairly familiar with this kind of narrative from films such as City of God or La Haine and television series like The Wire, it remains shocking to see the scabrous underbelly of an affluent European society revealed when the rest of us are more used to the Tuscany of tourist dreams and the Italian self-image as bella gente (although in Italy the social and racial tensions, sense of doomed inevitability, and corruption which permeate the society depicted here are equally apparent, and equally repellent, in politics and the media). The film itself is both violent and viscerally beautiful, a treat for aficionados of post-industrial decay and tawdry glamour, and anyone who has visited Naples will recognize, if not the scenery, the atmosphere greasy with fear, history and opportunity.
Italian criminal organisations in themselves are a fascinating subject – some of the books that I’d recommend on the topic include Peter Robb’s Midnight In Sicily, Toby Jones’ The Dark Heart of Italy and John Dickie’s indispensible Cosa Nostra, as well as the moving documentary Excellent Cadavers (based on the book of the same name), telling the story of heroic anti-Mafia judges and martyrs Giovanni Falcone & Paolo Borsellino - and I’m about to embark on David Lane’s Into The Heart of the Mafia – and they are important not only as interesting histories in their own right, but in any attempt to understand contemporary and historical Italy – not to mention all countries of Italian immigration, but in particular the USA and various South American nations.
The representation of the Mafia in documentary and fiction itself is worth considering, with all its connections with dietrologia (‘behind-ology,’ the Italian obsession with conspiracies and ulterior motivations for action, one which is hardly surprising given the history of moments and organizations such as the Calvi case, the P2 ‘shadow government,’ and the murderous intrigues of Rightist and Leftist terrorist groups during the anni di piombo, the ‘years of lead’). This sense of shadowy manipulation from behind the scenes is reflected in the Italian giallo (and, perhaps, deflected in the love for the Manichaean Western) – but there have also been (rare) Italian cultural figures (such as Dario Fo) who have more openly addressed the issue - in particular the Sicilian writer Leonardo Sciascia in works such as Il Giorno della Civetta ('Day of the Owl') and Il Contesto (published in English as 'Equal Danger'), which give a sense of the Borgesian, truth-defying mazes within mazes which are encountered when one delves into this subject. But the semi-fictionalised presentation given here - in the emerging Italian tradition of the Unidentified Narrative Object - is a novelty; one, however, which does not impede the seriousness of the topic at hand (Saviano himself has been subject to serious death threats and has been granted a permanent police escort).
Like the film itself, the present Italian situation can be seen as a tragedy garbed in beautiful raiments - particularly while a corrupt and well-connected Berlusconi continues to prosecute his war against the judiciary, the meaningful Left, and the independent media.
In this world of scummy, decaying concrete high-rise projects (Italian criminal organizations have a lengthy history with the construction industry, and concrete in particular), the Camorra are so deeply implicated at all levels of society that the attempt to remain disentangled, or worse, to disentangle oneself, may be impossible, except at the price of one’s life (not to mention the lives of one's family and friends). Rampant poverty and the standard social and economic alienation of urban underclasses only contribute to these patterns. While we are fairly familiar with this kind of narrative from films such as City of God or La Haine and television series like The Wire, it remains shocking to see the scabrous underbelly of an affluent European society revealed when the rest of us are more used to the Tuscany of tourist dreams and the Italian self-image as bella gente (although in Italy the social and racial tensions, sense of doomed inevitability, and corruption which permeate the society depicted here are equally apparent, and equally repellent, in politics and the media). The film itself is both violent and viscerally beautiful, a treat for aficionados of post-industrial decay and tawdry glamour, and anyone who has visited Naples will recognize, if not the scenery, the atmosphere greasy with fear, history and opportunity.
Italian criminal organisations in themselves are a fascinating subject – some of the books that I’d recommend on the topic include Peter Robb’s Midnight In Sicily, Toby Jones’ The Dark Heart of Italy and John Dickie’s indispensible Cosa Nostra, as well as the moving documentary Excellent Cadavers (based on the book of the same name), telling the story of heroic anti-Mafia judges and martyrs Giovanni Falcone & Paolo Borsellino - and I’m about to embark on David Lane’s Into The Heart of the Mafia – and they are important not only as interesting histories in their own right, but in any attempt to understand contemporary and historical Italy – not to mention all countries of Italian immigration, but in particular the USA and various South American nations.
The representation of the Mafia in documentary and fiction itself is worth considering, with all its connections with dietrologia (‘behind-ology,’ the Italian obsession with conspiracies and ulterior motivations for action, one which is hardly surprising given the history of moments and organizations such as the Calvi case, the P2 ‘shadow government,’ and the murderous intrigues of Rightist and Leftist terrorist groups during the anni di piombo, the ‘years of lead’). This sense of shadowy manipulation from behind the scenes is reflected in the Italian giallo (and, perhaps, deflected in the love for the Manichaean Western) – but there have also been (rare) Italian cultural figures (such as Dario Fo) who have more openly addressed the issue - in particular the Sicilian writer Leonardo Sciascia in works such as Il Giorno della Civetta ('Day of the Owl') and Il Contesto (published in English as 'Equal Danger'), which give a sense of the Borgesian, truth-defying mazes within mazes which are encountered when one delves into this subject. But the semi-fictionalised presentation given here - in the emerging Italian tradition of the Unidentified Narrative Object - is a novelty; one, however, which does not impede the seriousness of the topic at hand (Saviano himself has been subject to serious death threats and has been granted a permanent police escort).
Like the film itself, the present Italian situation can be seen as a tragedy garbed in beautiful raiments - particularly while a corrupt and well-connected Berlusconi continues to prosecute his war against the judiciary, the meaningful Left, and the independent media.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Argentriptychation
Suspiria (1977)
Profondo Rosso ('Deep Red', 1975)
Tenebrae (1982)
There’s probably little new to add to the vast reams of commentary on Argento’s work – but here am I, here you are - or, to put it another way, Dario where all men have gone before... I must admit, to my chagrin, that I’ve started watching Dario Argento films a number of times on DVD and turned them off. But I thought that a big screen festival might present the perfect setting to challenge my déclassé tendencies (not that all culturally acclaimed works are deserving of their status – Radiohead, Animal Collective, oh and Stephen Sondheim, I’m looking at you). And it was. The two great strengths of Argento’s classic films – visual and sonic aesthetics – mean that they demand to be appreciated in an immersive environment to have their full impact – while the faults of the less realized aspects of his work, plot and character, fade into the background.
In balancing these elements, Tenebrae was the most impressive of this trilogy (having already mis-spent some time with it, I gave the unfortunate Phenomena/Creepers a miss, despite the involvement of the divine Jennifer Connelly), inasmuch as the dialogue achieves a depth of B-grade camp which contributes to the perfervid atmosphere – my favourite line being that delivered by the conflicted femme fatale: ‘I feel so … sleazy.’ While the decadent fin-de-siecle atmosphere of Suspiria (the first in Argento’s ‘Three Mother Trilogy’) is beautifully achieved, it savoured just a little too much of the flocked wallpaper and overstuffed furniture so redolent of less iconic ‘70s B movies – whereas the modernist chic of Tenebrae, combined with Goblin’s synth soundtrack which, for my taste at least (I am a diehard fan of the synthesizers of the 80s), hit the spot just a little more closely than the admitted masterpiece produced by Goblin for Suspiria, and worked more perfectly with the overall aesthetic. Indeed, Argento himself intended the film as a ‘step into the world of tomorrow,’ set in a futuristic city a few years in the future, and while this isn’t clear from the film itself, the mood that this intention has created is clearly apparent.
Suspiria is renowned for its set pieces, which are indeed the strongest of this trilogy, but Deep Red, a strange mix of horror and comedy (but not quite a horror-comedy) which is otherwise the weakest of the three (though dealing with some interesting social issues – the artist through a Marxist lens, and homosexuality, even if the plot workings related to the aforementioned ultimately plays to homophobic stereotypes) also has some deeply memorable, and deeply creepy, tableaux: while the evil puppet is a masterful moment, for me it is perhaps the ‘eye in the wardrobe’ which is the most memorable and arresting scene in a film very much concerned with the gaze, the close-up as an inquisitorial device, one which transforms the everyday into the sinister and mysterious. Indeed, the relationship between the gaze (directed at the fictional text), and the film itself as an object, is one which is made manifest in both Tenebrae, where the murders follow those described by a thriller writer, and in Deep Red’s obsession with the ocular. A flaw in the latter is the language, however, which jumps from English to Italian (and even German) from sentence to sentence - at least in the print I watched - a device which never quite gels.
Of course, we should perhaps consider Deep Red and Tenebrae separately, as examples of gialli as opposed to Suspiria’s horror supernaturalism, but this distinction is somewhat nebulous given the supernaturalism which sets the plot of Tenebrae in motion, and the horrific deaths which are central to all three. Argento, as has often been noted, knew how to give his audience grue without making this the defining characteristic of his work – but, although the majority of victims are female, to my mind charges of misogyny are unjustified, except in the context of the comparison between the gender politics of the times and our own, as well as the masculinist themes of the hard-boiled detective, as embodied in the unsuccessfully comedic ‘sex war’ between Deep Red’s protagonists.
Apart from the audio qualities of Argento’s films – which includes not only Goblin’s soundtrack work but also, in particular, the precise employment of cuts between diegetic and exegetic sound – the colour is perhaps the most impressive achievement, drenching the works in lurid and glistening sheens which are not only deeply beautiful, but which are a highly effective tool, in creating the film as a self-contained world, another facet which tends to detract from their flaws (apparently this is a result of the use of imbibition Technicolor, if that means anything to you, gentle reader – to me it conjures only visions of overindulging film technicians).
While we may have Argento to thank for the unfortunate rise of the slasher flick, the present works, for all their flaws, are not only hugely influential and enjoyable – to return to my original point, they remain paradigmatic embodiments of the cinematic (in all senses) in film, a timely reminder in an age in which, as far as the cult film is concerned, we have traded the embodied experience represented by the arthouse cinema for the widespread choice and availability offered by DVD and the internet – a process with elements of the democratization of taste which I certainly wouldn’t want to sniff at, but nonetheless in some ways a pyrrhic triumph of the market.
Profondo Rosso ('Deep Red', 1975)
Tenebrae (1982)
There’s probably little new to add to the vast reams of commentary on Argento’s work – but here am I, here you are - or, to put it another way, Dario where all men have gone before... I must admit, to my chagrin, that I’ve started watching Dario Argento films a number of times on DVD and turned them off. But I thought that a big screen festival might present the perfect setting to challenge my déclassé tendencies (not that all culturally acclaimed works are deserving of their status – Radiohead, Animal Collective, oh and Stephen Sondheim, I’m looking at you). And it was. The two great strengths of Argento’s classic films – visual and sonic aesthetics – mean that they demand to be appreciated in an immersive environment to have their full impact – while the faults of the less realized aspects of his work, plot and character, fade into the background.
In balancing these elements, Tenebrae was the most impressive of this trilogy (having already mis-spent some time with it, I gave the unfortunate Phenomena/Creepers a miss, despite the involvement of the divine Jennifer Connelly), inasmuch as the dialogue achieves a depth of B-grade camp which contributes to the perfervid atmosphere – my favourite line being that delivered by the conflicted femme fatale: ‘I feel so … sleazy.’ While the decadent fin-de-siecle atmosphere of Suspiria (the first in Argento’s ‘Three Mother Trilogy’) is beautifully achieved, it savoured just a little too much of the flocked wallpaper and overstuffed furniture so redolent of less iconic ‘70s B movies – whereas the modernist chic of Tenebrae, combined with Goblin’s synth soundtrack which, for my taste at least (I am a diehard fan of the synthesizers of the 80s), hit the spot just a little more closely than the admitted masterpiece produced by Goblin for Suspiria, and worked more perfectly with the overall aesthetic. Indeed, Argento himself intended the film as a ‘step into the world of tomorrow,’ set in a futuristic city a few years in the future, and while this isn’t clear from the film itself, the mood that this intention has created is clearly apparent.
Suspiria is renowned for its set pieces, which are indeed the strongest of this trilogy, but Deep Red, a strange mix of horror and comedy (but not quite a horror-comedy) which is otherwise the weakest of the three (though dealing with some interesting social issues – the artist through a Marxist lens, and homosexuality, even if the plot workings related to the aforementioned ultimately plays to homophobic stereotypes) also has some deeply memorable, and deeply creepy, tableaux: while the evil puppet is a masterful moment, for me it is perhaps the ‘eye in the wardrobe’ which is the most memorable and arresting scene in a film very much concerned with the gaze, the close-up as an inquisitorial device, one which transforms the everyday into the sinister and mysterious. Indeed, the relationship between the gaze (directed at the fictional text), and the film itself as an object, is one which is made manifest in both Tenebrae, where the murders follow those described by a thriller writer, and in Deep Red’s obsession with the ocular. A flaw in the latter is the language, however, which jumps from English to Italian (and even German) from sentence to sentence - at least in the print I watched - a device which never quite gels.
Of course, we should perhaps consider Deep Red and Tenebrae separately, as examples of gialli as opposed to Suspiria’s horror supernaturalism, but this distinction is somewhat nebulous given the supernaturalism which sets the plot of Tenebrae in motion, and the horrific deaths which are central to all three. Argento, as has often been noted, knew how to give his audience grue without making this the defining characteristic of his work – but, although the majority of victims are female, to my mind charges of misogyny are unjustified, except in the context of the comparison between the gender politics of the times and our own, as well as the masculinist themes of the hard-boiled detective, as embodied in the unsuccessfully comedic ‘sex war’ between Deep Red’s protagonists.
Apart from the audio qualities of Argento’s films – which includes not only Goblin’s soundtrack work but also, in particular, the precise employment of cuts between diegetic and exegetic sound – the colour is perhaps the most impressive achievement, drenching the works in lurid and glistening sheens which are not only deeply beautiful, but which are a highly effective tool, in creating the film as a self-contained world, another facet which tends to detract from their flaws (apparently this is a result of the use of imbibition Technicolor, if that means anything to you, gentle reader – to me it conjures only visions of overindulging film technicians).
While we may have Argento to thank for the unfortunate rise of the slasher flick, the present works, for all their flaws, are not only hugely influential and enjoyable – to return to my original point, they remain paradigmatic embodiments of the cinematic (in all senses) in film, a timely reminder in an age in which, as far as the cult film is concerned, we have traded the embodied experience represented by the arthouse cinema for the widespread choice and availability offered by DVD and the internet – a process with elements of the democratization of taste which I certainly wouldn’t want to sniff at, but nonetheless in some ways a pyrrhic triumph of the market.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
P. D. James - A Certain Justice (1997)
I don't read crime very much, and almost never anything published after the 1960s (with the exception of C. J. Sansom's wonderful historical Matthew Shardlake series). But, having neglected to take sufficient holiday reading, I was thrown back on limited resources, and so I found myself reading P. D. James, who I've always heard spoken highly of - although in the fields of genre writing (or indeed other fields) this isn't necessarily any guarantee). My opinion after reading one work, though, is very much in agreement.
The plot concerns the murder of Venetia Aldridge, a high-flying lawyer who (as is so often the case) has provided various acquaintances with numerous reasons to wish for her death. One of the quotes on the book characterised James' work as 'Dickensian,' and, while the humorous and satirical aspect of Dickens' writing isn't to be found here, the atmosphere James creates around Chancery and the Inns of the Court (a legalistic atmosphere which might appear the driest possible setting) reminded me favourably of the only work of Dickens' that I have much time for, Bleak House. James' writing is sharp, clean, and observant, while the murder itself and the question of whodunnit, particularly in the early part of the book, takes a back seat to, or provides a vehicle for, characterisation and psychological observation. Adam Dalgliesh, James' well-known investigator, doesn't even appear until a good third of the way through the book.
While the plot itself isn't quite as 'realist' as every other aspect of the novel, and I found aspects of the denouement unsatisfactory (and thus perhaps more realist than most crime novels), overall I greatly enjoyed this work both from the perspective of a genre crime piece, and that of a work of literature. I'll definitely be reading more P. D. James.
The plot concerns the murder of Venetia Aldridge, a high-flying lawyer who (as is so often the case) has provided various acquaintances with numerous reasons to wish for her death. One of the quotes on the book characterised James' work as 'Dickensian,' and, while the humorous and satirical aspect of Dickens' writing isn't to be found here, the atmosphere James creates around Chancery and the Inns of the Court (a legalistic atmosphere which might appear the driest possible setting) reminded me favourably of the only work of Dickens' that I have much time for, Bleak House. James' writing is sharp, clean, and observant, while the murder itself and the question of whodunnit, particularly in the early part of the book, takes a back seat to, or provides a vehicle for, characterisation and psychological observation. Adam Dalgliesh, James' well-known investigator, doesn't even appear until a good third of the way through the book.
While the plot itself isn't quite as 'realist' as every other aspect of the novel, and I found aspects of the denouement unsatisfactory (and thus perhaps more realist than most crime novels), overall I greatly enjoyed this work both from the perspective of a genre crime piece, and that of a work of literature. I'll definitely be reading more P. D. James.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
John Dickie - Cosa Nostra: A History of the Sicilian Mafia
When you're interested in the Mafia, there's a lot of sensationalist non-fiction to be avoided. I've been looking for a while for a decent history, and this work definitely fits the bill. Cosa Nostra is compulsively readable and never dry, but also a work of serious history, written by a senior lecturer in Italian history and exhaustively sourced.
The book follows the history of Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian Mafia (as opposed to other Mafia-like groups such as the Neapolitan Camorra and the Calabrian 'Ndrangheta), from its roots in the nineteenth century through to the present day, including a new chapter bringing us up to the present-day Berlusconi period and the 2006 arrest of Bernardo Provenzano, the 'boss of bosses'. Dickie also deals with the connections with the American Mafia, and the significant differences between the two organisations. In the process, some myths are squashed (such as that of a 'golden age' of Mafia honour preceding the bloody, drug-drenched second half of the twentieth century) and other beliefs are confirmed (the role of the post-WWII American occupation in entrenching the Mafia as a consequence of their anti-communism).
Issues which Dickie turns his attention to include the ambience of Italian secret societies (such as the Carbonari and Freemasons) in which the Mafia emerged, and which continue to be seen in shadowy groups such as Propaganda Due, implicated in attempts to bring down and reform the state in the '70s and '80s;
the entrenched links between the Mafia and Italian politics, and therefore of the whole political destiny of Italy itself;
following from this, the reasons for the tolerance by the Italian people of Mafia involvement in and corruption of public affairs, which at times can seem inexplicable, and the practice of 'behind-ology,' the common reading of shadowy nefarious interests into the surface of public actions, which has so much basis in fact and yet can create gauzy layers of complication and paranoia which serve to divert action;
the way in which the very landscape of Italy has been shaped (chiefly in terms of the destruction of historical buildings and the erection of hideous and unsafe concrete monstrosities) through Mafia control of the construction and concrete industries;
the often vexed relationship between Palermo (Sicily's capital) and the rural areas, as well as the continuities and discontinuities between Northern and Southern Italy;
the decision of the Mafia to 'go public' in the '60s, as internecine wars exploded and the phenomenon of 'pentiti', Mafia stool pigeons who broke the code of silence, emerged, while at the same time unprecedented killings of judges, politicians, priests and others whose actions ran contrary to Mafia interests;
and the connection between Mafia, religion and the Catholic church.
Particularly moving are the stories of Giovanni Falcone, Paolo Borsellino and the other assassinated anti-Mafia judges and campaigners of the later decades of the twentieth century, who went courageously to their deaths in the attempt to 'clean up' their country.
This is an impressive, compelling and often chilling work, which makes a good companion piece to others such as Peter Robb's Midnight In Sicily (1996) or Marco Turco's documentary film Excellent Cadavers (1995). It'll make you think twice about glamourised or humorous depictions of the Mafia in popular culture, as well as providing a counter- or shadow-history of modern Italy and to ponder the culture. Finally, caught by the behind-ology bug, I started to wonder whether non-Italian readers can comfortably relegate these Mafia tales to 'another country' or whether we should also be wondering about what similar things might be going on behind closed doors closer to home.
The book follows the history of Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian Mafia (as opposed to other Mafia-like groups such as the Neapolitan Camorra and the Calabrian 'Ndrangheta), from its roots in the nineteenth century through to the present day, including a new chapter bringing us up to the present-day Berlusconi period and the 2006 arrest of Bernardo Provenzano, the 'boss of bosses'. Dickie also deals with the connections with the American Mafia, and the significant differences between the two organisations. In the process, some myths are squashed (such as that of a 'golden age' of Mafia honour preceding the bloody, drug-drenched second half of the twentieth century) and other beliefs are confirmed (the role of the post-WWII American occupation in entrenching the Mafia as a consequence of their anti-communism).
Issues which Dickie turns his attention to include the ambience of Italian secret societies (such as the Carbonari and Freemasons) in which the Mafia emerged, and which continue to be seen in shadowy groups such as Propaganda Due, implicated in attempts to bring down and reform the state in the '70s and '80s;
the entrenched links between the Mafia and Italian politics, and therefore of the whole political destiny of Italy itself;
following from this, the reasons for the tolerance by the Italian people of Mafia involvement in and corruption of public affairs, which at times can seem inexplicable, and the practice of 'behind-ology,' the common reading of shadowy nefarious interests into the surface of public actions, which has so much basis in fact and yet can create gauzy layers of complication and paranoia which serve to divert action;
the way in which the very landscape of Italy has been shaped (chiefly in terms of the destruction of historical buildings and the erection of hideous and unsafe concrete monstrosities) through Mafia control of the construction and concrete industries;
the often vexed relationship between Palermo (Sicily's capital) and the rural areas, as well as the continuities and discontinuities between Northern and Southern Italy;
the decision of the Mafia to 'go public' in the '60s, as internecine wars exploded and the phenomenon of 'pentiti', Mafia stool pigeons who broke the code of silence, emerged, while at the same time unprecedented killings of judges, politicians, priests and others whose actions ran contrary to Mafia interests;
and the connection between Mafia, religion and the Catholic church.
Particularly moving are the stories of Giovanni Falcone, Paolo Borsellino and the other assassinated anti-Mafia judges and campaigners of the later decades of the twentieth century, who went courageously to their deaths in the attempt to 'clean up' their country.
This is an impressive, compelling and often chilling work, which makes a good companion piece to others such as Peter Robb's Midnight In Sicily (1996) or Marco Turco's documentary film Excellent Cadavers (1995). It'll make you think twice about glamourised or humorous depictions of the Mafia in popular culture, as well as providing a counter- or shadow-history of modern Italy and to ponder the culture. Finally, caught by the behind-ology bug, I started to wonder whether non-Italian readers can comfortably relegate these Mafia tales to 'another country' or whether we should also be wondering about what similar things might be going on behind closed doors closer to home.
Friday, July 4, 2008
Timothy J. Gilfoyle - A Pickpocket's Tale: The Underworld of 19th-Century New York (2006)
A Pickpocket's Tale is a non-fiction account of the life of George Appo (1858-1930), a small-time pickpocket, opium addict, and confidence man. The tale of Appo's life gives a fascinating picture of the changes which took place between a Victorian and proto-contemporary criminal underworlds, and the changing understanding of and approach taken by the authorities to the 'problem' of 'crime' over this period.
Appo was in many ways an unlikely and atypical character, which may be part of the reason why records of his life (including his autobiography) survive in enough detail for Gilfoyle to produce a book such as this. His father was a Chinese immigrant, who was at first very successful, but would later be imprisoned for murder (Appo and his father would meet for the last time in prison). Appo himself, despite periods of contact with the licit and illicit areas of Chinese culture, would find a home as a 'good fellow,' a crook who practiced by skill rather than through violence and pre-emptive brutality (both of which Appo was often a victim of), and who took prison time rather than betraying even an enemy to the official forces of policing. Finally, however, Appo would be rejected, unjustly (according to the author) by this world after testifying before the Lexow Committee on police corruption, and would attempt, with little success, to 'go straight' in conjunction with various organisation and individuals working for the purpose of reforming criminals.
Gilfoyle weaves a fascinating story. Appo's experience evokes a New York which in part is more familiar through English Victorian imagery, but from which at the same time can be seen the emergence of a more particular American, noir-ish world of corruption.
Appo's experiences chart the 'evolution' of penitentiaries, from Houses of Refuge for boys, to prison ships designed to instil a working ethic into young male criminals, on which same-sex sexual activity was more or less taken for granted; from the festering conditions, murderous brutality and casual torture of Sing Sing, where the lines between the external world and the prison were always highly nebulous, to Eastern Penitentiary where total isolation was practised, intended to reform the prisoner by allowing them to do nothing but reflect upon their wrongdoing.
Gilfoyle's book contains so many interesting facets that it's hard to list them; for example, the emergence of bohemian culture and the way it brought the middle and upper classes into the ambit of crime (though many bohemian opium dens strictly forbade clientele of Asian origin); common confidence tricks, particularly the highly profitable and highly bureaucratised 'green goods game' in which the con man offered to sell forged currency to the mark, before substituting the cash-filled bag; or the casual, monumental inequity of the 'justice' system throughout the period, and the often naive or counter-productive efforts of organised reformers. A particularly memorable episode is Appo's period on the stage, as sensational plays depicting the criminal underworld became huge popular successes.
In terms of flaws, Gilfoyle becomes perhaps a little too sympathetic to his subject, despite the hideous injustices of his life and the fact that, given his social circumstances and the nature of society at that time, he had little opportunity to become anything else. Due to the nature of the sources, gender relations in the period are little explored. Finally, Appo's testimony is more or less accepted as fact by the author (though he notes that it is substantially corroborated wherever other records exist; but this, of course, applies only to major events). Overall, though, this book is a depiction of a fascinating individual, as well as casting light on the nature of criminal subculture and its interactions with the 'licit' social world, the practices of criminal justice and policing, penitentiary systems, illegality and popular culture, as well as giving an engrossing cultural and social portrayal of life in New York for the underclasses, whether criminal or working, in a period of massive social change.
Appo was in many ways an unlikely and atypical character, which may be part of the reason why records of his life (including his autobiography) survive in enough detail for Gilfoyle to produce a book such as this. His father was a Chinese immigrant, who was at first very successful, but would later be imprisoned for murder (Appo and his father would meet for the last time in prison). Appo himself, despite periods of contact with the licit and illicit areas of Chinese culture, would find a home as a 'good fellow,' a crook who practiced by skill rather than through violence and pre-emptive brutality (both of which Appo was often a victim of), and who took prison time rather than betraying even an enemy to the official forces of policing. Finally, however, Appo would be rejected, unjustly (according to the author) by this world after testifying before the Lexow Committee on police corruption, and would attempt, with little success, to 'go straight' in conjunction with various organisation and individuals working for the purpose of reforming criminals.
Gilfoyle weaves a fascinating story. Appo's experience evokes a New York which in part is more familiar through English Victorian imagery, but from which at the same time can be seen the emergence of a more particular American, noir-ish world of corruption.
Appo's experiences chart the 'evolution' of penitentiaries, from Houses of Refuge for boys, to prison ships designed to instil a working ethic into young male criminals, on which same-sex sexual activity was more or less taken for granted; from the festering conditions, murderous brutality and casual torture of Sing Sing, where the lines between the external world and the prison were always highly nebulous, to Eastern Penitentiary where total isolation was practised, intended to reform the prisoner by allowing them to do nothing but reflect upon their wrongdoing.
Gilfoyle's book contains so many interesting facets that it's hard to list them; for example, the emergence of bohemian culture and the way it brought the middle and upper classes into the ambit of crime (though many bohemian opium dens strictly forbade clientele of Asian origin); common confidence tricks, particularly the highly profitable and highly bureaucratised 'green goods game' in which the con man offered to sell forged currency to the mark, before substituting the cash-filled bag; or the casual, monumental inequity of the 'justice' system throughout the period, and the often naive or counter-productive efforts of organised reformers. A particularly memorable episode is Appo's period on the stage, as sensational plays depicting the criminal underworld became huge popular successes.
In terms of flaws, Gilfoyle becomes perhaps a little too sympathetic to his subject, despite the hideous injustices of his life and the fact that, given his social circumstances and the nature of society at that time, he had little opportunity to become anything else. Due to the nature of the sources, gender relations in the period are little explored. Finally, Appo's testimony is more or less accepted as fact by the author (though he notes that it is substantially corroborated wherever other records exist; but this, of course, applies only to major events). Overall, though, this book is a depiction of a fascinating individual, as well as casting light on the nature of criminal subculture and its interactions with the 'licit' social world, the practices of criminal justice and policing, penitentiary systems, illegality and popular culture, as well as giving an engrossing cultural and social portrayal of life in New York for the underclasses, whether criminal or working, in a period of massive social change.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Patricia Wentworth - The Gazebo (1958)
I had this novel sitting on my shelf for quite a while, having not read any Wentworth and being unsure that the writing would be up to scratch - but once I opened it up, I enjoyed it a lot as a straightforward little whodunnit of the English old school. Wentworth's 'detective' is Miss Maud Silver, who bears a more than passing resemblance to Miss Marple (Marple's first appearance was in 1927 and Silver's in 1928; so I won't draw any conclusions about the coincidence or otherwise of this resemblance).
The story has all the ingredients of which I'm very fond in crime: an English village setting, a strong period atmosphere (contemporary, of course, at the time of writing), a heavy lashing of understated but cutting manners and cultural elitism, and a little old lady who's a lot sharper than she seems. The story begins with the unexpected return of Nicholas Carey, Althea's old beau; Althea's controlling, hypochondriac mother prevented their marriage five years previously, and Nicholas is determined not to let it happen again. At the same time, there are two mysteriously high offers on the house Althea's father left to her, where she lives with her mother... The murder itself doesn't occur until about a third of the way into the book, and I also appreciated the establishment of setting and character in the intervening period.
The writing itself is by no means outstanding, but Wentworth's modest style sits nicely with her modest ambitions and carries us along into her lace-curtain-concealed intrigues. The gender and class politics are, as they tend to be in this type of work, problematic, but certainly not to an extent which caused me personally any irritation or difficulty with the work overall. Characterisation, again, tended to the shallow at times, particularly in regard to the characters' emotional responses to the events of the story, but no-one expects deep psychological characterisation to be a strength of this type of work.
To a certain extent, I'd see this as a sub-Marple work, but nonetheless as a piece of classic English crime escapism I very much enjoyed it, and I'll definitely be reading more of Wentworth's Miss Silver stories.
The story has all the ingredients of which I'm very fond in crime: an English village setting, a strong period atmosphere (contemporary, of course, at the time of writing), a heavy lashing of understated but cutting manners and cultural elitism, and a little old lady who's a lot sharper than she seems. The story begins with the unexpected return of Nicholas Carey, Althea's old beau; Althea's controlling, hypochondriac mother prevented their marriage five years previously, and Nicholas is determined not to let it happen again. At the same time, there are two mysteriously high offers on the house Althea's father left to her, where she lives with her mother... The murder itself doesn't occur until about a third of the way into the book, and I also appreciated the establishment of setting and character in the intervening period.
The writing itself is by no means outstanding, but Wentworth's modest style sits nicely with her modest ambitions and carries us along into her lace-curtain-concealed intrigues. The gender and class politics are, as they tend to be in this type of work, problematic, but certainly not to an extent which caused me personally any irritation or difficulty with the work overall. Characterisation, again, tended to the shallow at times, particularly in regard to the characters' emotional responses to the events of the story, but no-one expects deep psychological characterisation to be a strength of this type of work.
To a certain extent, I'd see this as a sub-Marple work, but nonetheless as a piece of classic English crime escapism I very much enjoyed it, and I'll definitely be reading more of Wentworth's Miss Silver stories.
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Philip Carlo - The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer (2006)
When I was younger I used to be an avid true-crime fan (interested particularly in serial killers, rather than organised crime), but over time I started to feel too much empathy for the victims, and also to get frustrated with the near-universal (despite some honourable exceptions) poor quality of writing and shallow pop-psychological explanations. So what brought me to this work, and was the return to the genre worthwhile?
TIM is essentially a biography of Richard Kuklinski, both a serial killer on his own time, as it were, and also a Mafia contract killer, who was imprisoned, after hundreds of murders (by his account), in 1986. Though I hadn't heard of him before (and here I thought I was familiar with all the major names in serial killing), the case is apparently notorious, and a number of high-rating HBO documentaries have been made on Kuklinski. The book is based on the author's extensive (over 240 hours, by his account) prison interviews with his subject. Carlo also claims that, where possible, all the crimes Kuklinski discussed were factually verified. I picked it up, firstly because it looked like a cut above the usual true-crime B-grade standard (in which I was partially, but not wholly, mistaken); and also because, from a browse, Kuklinski seemed like a very unusual figure in the pantheon of serial killers.
Carlo's writing is by no means impressive - I often found his 'downhomey' language and style, and the lack of originality in expression, irritating. This does, however, make the book a quick and easy read, 'light' except inasmuch as the hideous acts it describes - which is what I was in the market for. For the most part he avoids the lengthy pop-psychological opining which (as mentioned above) spoils so many works of true crime, leaving Kuklinski to give his own opinions as to how came to be able to commit the cruellest acts (and I'm not kidding about this) with absolute equanimity. The usual voyeuristic material is provided about Kuklinski's crimes, which ranged from impersonal, instant mob-style 'hits' to very 'personalised' episodes of lengthy torture, and I won't pretend that this voyeurism doesn't have a pull - which, however, I'd argue is an often-suppressed part of the human psyche that one shouldn't apologise for, as long as it doesn't mean an idolisation of the perpetrator or a lack of empathy for the victims. A note of warning should be sounded, however, in the fact that all of this material is provided by Kuklinski himself, and none of it is referenced, so its 'facticity' may be doubted - although the picture that emerges is not one of a pathological liar or a man who has an interest in excusing or blaming others for his actions.
The reason to read this work, really, is the contradictory personality of Kuklinski himself, who, unlike some serial killers, is a genuinely articulate and fascinating personality. In general, there is a very clear divide between mob hitmen (no matter how much they take sadistic pleasure in their work) and serial killers - but Kuklinski straddled this divide in a very unusual way. His background seems like that of a serial killer - early, unplanned killings, and murder as a 'leisure activity' rather than a career into which one is inducted - but some of his attitudes are very unlike serial killers - notably, his refusal (by his own account) to kill women or children (despite his terrible ongoing physical and mental abuse of his family), his empathy with children, and a sense, however, terribly skewed, of justice (which is not to say that he was not prepared to kill utterly randomly, as long as the victim was male). As well as killing for his own entertainment and for the Mafia and private individuals, Kuklinski would also kill those who he encountered who he considered 'deserved it' according to this sense of 'justice' - particularly those who abused young children. Kuklinski also seems, unlike most serial kilers, not to have taken a sexualised pleasure in the act of killing, although he emphasises his enjoyment of the planning and execution of a 'hit' over the actual act of killing itself.
Overall, then, while I've certainly read better works on killers (Brian Masters' Killing For Company, on Dennis Nilsen, or Tony Parker's Life After Life come to mind - though I'm not such a fan of 'classic literary' works of true crime such as Capote's In Cold Blood or Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil), this book, while by no means free of the typical flaws of most true crime, was above all a fascinating character study and a work which I wouldn't dismiss with the run-of-the-mill, pulp-by-numbers, Anne Rule-style true crime.
TIM is essentially a biography of Richard Kuklinski, both a serial killer on his own time, as it were, and also a Mafia contract killer, who was imprisoned, after hundreds of murders (by his account), in 1986. Though I hadn't heard of him before (and here I thought I was familiar with all the major names in serial killing), the case is apparently notorious, and a number of high-rating HBO documentaries have been made on Kuklinski. The book is based on the author's extensive (over 240 hours, by his account) prison interviews with his subject. Carlo also claims that, where possible, all the crimes Kuklinski discussed were factually verified. I picked it up, firstly because it looked like a cut above the usual true-crime B-grade standard (in which I was partially, but not wholly, mistaken); and also because, from a browse, Kuklinski seemed like a very unusual figure in the pantheon of serial killers.
Carlo's writing is by no means impressive - I often found his 'downhomey' language and style, and the lack of originality in expression, irritating. This does, however, make the book a quick and easy read, 'light' except inasmuch as the hideous acts it describes - which is what I was in the market for. For the most part he avoids the lengthy pop-psychological opining which (as mentioned above) spoils so many works of true crime, leaving Kuklinski to give his own opinions as to how came to be able to commit the cruellest acts (and I'm not kidding about this) with absolute equanimity. The usual voyeuristic material is provided about Kuklinski's crimes, which ranged from impersonal, instant mob-style 'hits' to very 'personalised' episodes of lengthy torture, and I won't pretend that this voyeurism doesn't have a pull - which, however, I'd argue is an often-suppressed part of the human psyche that one shouldn't apologise for, as long as it doesn't mean an idolisation of the perpetrator or a lack of empathy for the victims. A note of warning should be sounded, however, in the fact that all of this material is provided by Kuklinski himself, and none of it is referenced, so its 'facticity' may be doubted - although the picture that emerges is not one of a pathological liar or a man who has an interest in excusing or blaming others for his actions.
The reason to read this work, really, is the contradictory personality of Kuklinski himself, who, unlike some serial killers, is a genuinely articulate and fascinating personality. In general, there is a very clear divide between mob hitmen (no matter how much they take sadistic pleasure in their work) and serial killers - but Kuklinski straddled this divide in a very unusual way. His background seems like that of a serial killer - early, unplanned killings, and murder as a 'leisure activity' rather than a career into which one is inducted - but some of his attitudes are very unlike serial killers - notably, his refusal (by his own account) to kill women or children (despite his terrible ongoing physical and mental abuse of his family), his empathy with children, and a sense, however, terribly skewed, of justice (which is not to say that he was not prepared to kill utterly randomly, as long as the victim was male). As well as killing for his own entertainment and for the Mafia and private individuals, Kuklinski would also kill those who he encountered who he considered 'deserved it' according to this sense of 'justice' - particularly those who abused young children. Kuklinski also seems, unlike most serial kilers, not to have taken a sexualised pleasure in the act of killing, although he emphasises his enjoyment of the planning and execution of a 'hit' over the actual act of killing itself.
Overall, then, while I've certainly read better works on killers (Brian Masters' Killing For Company, on Dennis Nilsen, or Tony Parker's Life After Life come to mind - though I'm not such a fan of 'classic literary' works of true crime such as Capote's In Cold Blood or Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil), this book, while by no means free of the typical flaws of most true crime, was above all a fascinating character study and a work which I wouldn't dismiss with the run-of-the-mill, pulp-by-numbers, Anne Rule-style true crime.
Friday, November 2, 2007
David Cronenberg - Eastern Promises (2007)
While David Cronenberg's works tend, in my opinion, to be flawed gems, I always approach a new Cronenberg feature with excitement and expectation. This was particularly so with EP because the preceding film, A History Of Violence, is one of my favourite Cronenberg films, and, like EP, stars Viggo Mortensen; it also features Naomi Watts, who's a favourite of mine. However, I found EP quite disappointing.
The film, set in London, follows the story of Anna (Watts), a woman of Russian ancestry, who works in a maternity ward. When a Russian girl of fourteen is brought in miscarrying, and dies in giving birth, Anna determines to use her diary to find the baby's family (Anna herself, we are told, has recently suffered a miscarriage). Her search takes her to a Russian restaurant, where she soon finds herself ever more deeply and dangerously entangled with the Russian criminal underworld, the vory y zakone, specifically Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl), his flaky and unstable son Kirill (Vincent Cassel), and Nikolai Luzhin (Viggo Mortensen), to whom we are introduced as Semyon's chauffeur.
Though I like Cassell (his rather two-dimensional character here gives him little to work with), and Mueller-Stahl is excellent as Semyon, the Russian accents, to my ears, sound more like caricatures. Mortensen is also good as the enigmatic Nikolai; however, one of my favourite aspects of his character in AHOV was the way in which his rugged all-american-ness played into the deceptive layers of the film, and there is no shadow of this to be found in EP. The film is beautifully made, and, as all the critics have noted, there is a breathtaking fight scene in which a naked, heavily tattooed Mortensen is pitted against two thugs - this scene conveys both the vulnerability, the grace and the human-ness of the male body in a way which is incredibly rare in film.
However, the negative aspects of the film heavily overshadow its strengths. The plot is essentially preposterous, and the narrative veers sketchily into the didactic (explanations of Russian prison tattoos, for example, which is a fascinating subject in itself - I recommend the work Russian Criminal Tattoo Encyclopedia II, introduced by Anne Applebaum, author of the also-excellent Gulag: A History), and into emotional appeals to cliche, while the characters' motivations are so blindingly obvious as to make the work heavy-handed in the extreme. Anna's naivete, in particular, is difficult to believe, and seems to exist merely to set up a moral contrast between the (good, blond, Westernised) heroine and the dark masculine world of the Russians. I was also troubled by the morality of the work, the Orientalist use of Russia (and the European East) as a place and a symbol of dark barbarism (despite Anna's Russian background), and the way in which we are led to sympathise with the character of Nikolai. Finally, the ending is not only highly unbelievable, but is nothing short of embarrassing - some critics have suggested that this is a purposeful slap in the viewer's face and to the expectations aroused, but if so, it's a failure, at least in this viewer's opinion.
I wouldn't say it isn't a film worth seeing, particularly for Cronenberg fans - the stunning visuals and exploration of human viscerality and malleable identity, themes which run through all his works, are evident in spades - but in toto I expected more from a director with Cronenberg's record of complex, transgressive and thought-provoking works.
The film, set in London, follows the story of Anna (Watts), a woman of Russian ancestry, who works in a maternity ward. When a Russian girl of fourteen is brought in miscarrying, and dies in giving birth, Anna determines to use her diary to find the baby's family (Anna herself, we are told, has recently suffered a miscarriage). Her search takes her to a Russian restaurant, where she soon finds herself ever more deeply and dangerously entangled with the Russian criminal underworld, the vory y zakone, specifically Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl), his flaky and unstable son Kirill (Vincent Cassel), and Nikolai Luzhin (Viggo Mortensen), to whom we are introduced as Semyon's chauffeur.
Though I like Cassell (his rather two-dimensional character here gives him little to work with), and Mueller-Stahl is excellent as Semyon, the Russian accents, to my ears, sound more like caricatures. Mortensen is also good as the enigmatic Nikolai; however, one of my favourite aspects of his character in AHOV was the way in which his rugged all-american-ness played into the deceptive layers of the film, and there is no shadow of this to be found in EP. The film is beautifully made, and, as all the critics have noted, there is a breathtaking fight scene in which a naked, heavily tattooed Mortensen is pitted against two thugs - this scene conveys both the vulnerability, the grace and the human-ness of the male body in a way which is incredibly rare in film.
However, the negative aspects of the film heavily overshadow its strengths. The plot is essentially preposterous, and the narrative veers sketchily into the didactic (explanations of Russian prison tattoos, for example, which is a fascinating subject in itself - I recommend the work Russian Criminal Tattoo Encyclopedia II, introduced by Anne Applebaum, author of the also-excellent Gulag: A History), and into emotional appeals to cliche, while the characters' motivations are so blindingly obvious as to make the work heavy-handed in the extreme. Anna's naivete, in particular, is difficult to believe, and seems to exist merely to set up a moral contrast between the (good, blond, Westernised) heroine and the dark masculine world of the Russians. I was also troubled by the morality of the work, the Orientalist use of Russia (and the European East) as a place and a symbol of dark barbarism (despite Anna's Russian background), and the way in which we are led to sympathise with the character of Nikolai. Finally, the ending is not only highly unbelievable, but is nothing short of embarrassing - some critics have suggested that this is a purposeful slap in the viewer's face and to the expectations aroused, but if so, it's a failure, at least in this viewer's opinion.
I wouldn't say it isn't a film worth seeing, particularly for Cronenberg fans - the stunning visuals and exploration of human viscerality and malleable identity, themes which run through all his works, are evident in spades - but in toto I expected more from a director with Cronenberg's record of complex, transgressive and thought-provoking works.
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