Blowing down that old dusty road...

By that I mean travelling. I'm off. I may post on the road, but we'll see.

"[14] days on the road and I gotta see my baby tonight"

As things wind down here, I've been planning what to do with my two weeks of vacation before heading back to the US. I'll be flying to Cape Town next Friday and slowly making my way up the coast by bus, spending some time in Port Elizabeth and Durban. I'll finish it all off with a few days of safari in Kruger National Park before heading back to Pretoria for one more night. I fly back to the US on August 25th.

I know that at least some of you have been to South Africa before--anything I should make a point of seeing during the trip?

L'Avventura

L’Avventura (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960)

In Meditation XVII, John Donne mused that no man is an island, entire of itself. But what happens when a woman turns into one? The answer is, more or less, that the Italian upper class continues its hedonistic ways. This is a visually stunning and emotionally cold movie. Existentialism doesn't get any better than this. It follows a group of young, rich, beautiful Italians as they drift through life and a series of conflicts that they ultimately seem almost indifferent to.

At the office

Current goings-on of a summer resettlement clerk with the UN in South Africa...

-Yesterday I did an exclusion assessment (Article 1, §F) on a Rwandan Hutu man who wants resettlement. Our mandate doesn't allow us to assist anyone who has been involved in war crimes, crimes against humanity, etc. I interviewed him to make sure he wasn't involved in the genocide (looks like he probably was) and determine if he has a resettlement need (he definitely does not). Friendly guy, though.

-For the last two hours, an angry mob of Zimbabweans have been protesting outside of the UN building. No one at the office seems to understand why. Adding to our confusion, a group of them have been marching around the building carrying a coffin. A group of about twenty refugees have been living in the entryway to our building for months despite our protests and offers of shelter, and one of them--a Congolese man--recently died of exposure. The Congolese community has been on the warpath blaming the UN, and they've been threatening to bring his body to the office. What the Zimbabweans are doing with a coffin, though, is anyone's guess. Also, the coffin is tiny. We think/hope it's just symbolic. Of something. We're not sure what. In any event, I think I'll be enjoying my lunch inside the office today rather than going out.

-On my desk is an extremely high profile case--the son of the former dictator of a nearby country. The dictator was assassinated, and the son is in exile seeking resettlement. I'm investigating his claims to see how credible he is (so far it's not looking good for the guy).

My internship rocks.

Office Space

Office Space (Mike Judge, 1999)

Anyone who has held a blue collar job can relate to this movie. Whether the source of your torment is a boss, an obnoxious coworker, mindless bureaucracy, a demonic printer or all of the above, this movie probably speaks to your frustrations. It's kind of like Dilbert, but... you know... funny. I doubt there are many movies as relatable as this one, or as funny.

Fargo

Fargo (Joel Coen, 1996)

The Coens are at their best when they’re playing with moral shades of grey. They love to have a normal, mostly honest person making a seemingly innocent (or at least understandable) decision that ends up dragging them deeper and deeper into hell. You see this pattern again and again in their movies (and in their friend Sam Raimi’s movie from the same year, A Simple Plan). Nowhere is it this dynamic explored better than in Fargo. Maybe this is because of the setting they choose and the seemingly innocent, honest people that populate it.

The Rules of the Game

The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir, 1939)

The easiest modern comparison to make to Jean Renoir would definitely be Robert Altman. Gosford Park actually seems like a pretty conscious nod to this movie. Both directors are fond of ensemble casts, class issues, and fluid, sweeping camera work.

This is the story of a group of upper crust aristocrats (and their servants) during a hunting retreat to the countryside. Renoir shows us parties, affairs, and murders, all the while with a healthy dose of social commentary. My favorite part of the movie is during a big party scene. One character starts his mechanical musical machine, and the camera suddenly starts off swooping through the hallways, up and down stairs, through doors. As it does this, we see all sorts of crucial character interactions. This elegant scene perfectly encapsulates the whole movie.

The Gold Rush

The Gold Rush (Charlie Chaplin, 1925)

It's been said that Charlie Chaplin was once a more universally recognized image around the worldthan Christ. My friend from The Gambia swears this must be true. He grew up during the last gasp of the British Empire, and he told me about how the colonial government would round up the people in his village every week to give speeches and show them propaganda films in the local stadium. In order to convince people to come, they would start with a Chaplin movie. If they tried to show anything other than a Chaplin movie, there would practically be a riot. He told me about how the weekly dose of Chaplin was the highlight of the week for most of the villagers and how it would bring the community together.

For most people, there's nothing more dated than silent slapstick. As far as I'm concerned, there's nothing more universal. Chaplin may be my favorite director, and his ability to portray the plight of the lower class with heaps of pathos and sentiment is amazing. This movie has some of his best known gags and all of the humanism and sentimentality that you'd expect from Chaplin. I think everyone should give this one a shot, even if you're turned off by the ideal of silent comedy. You might be surprised.

JFK

JFK (Oliver Stone, 1991)

A lot of people get up in arms about the historical accuracy of this movie. I don't know how accurate it is, and, frankly, I don't care. On the level of entertainment, it works incredibly well. Besides, whatever it lacks in factual accuracy, it makes up for in psychological accuracy (if that makes any sense), and I think that's what Stone was really going for. It captures the hand-wringing, the obsession, the distrust of the government, and the desperation for the truth felt by the entire generation that saw their idealism shattered on November 22, 1963.

The movie doesn't offer any firm conclusions or even any tenuous ones. It heaps on theories and conjecture and leaves us just as confused as when it started. It does leave the viewer more cynical than when the movie began, though. This is, I think, the correct response to what happened that day.