Every month, I go on the Turner Classic Movies website and browse the schedule for the month, paying close attention to the monthly Martin Scorsese monthly column in which he comments about some of the upcoming titles, the TCM-selected star of the month, the newly-premiering titles. I try to pick out 3-6 films I'm interested in seeing, some of which I've already seen before. In this blog, I'll try to give a terse, brief account of anything interesting I see.
Albert Finney gives arguably the greatest performance as a drunk in the history of cinema in John Huston's 1984 adaptation of Malcolm Lowry's staggeringly great 1947 novel Under the Volcano. Finney is Geoffrey Fermin, an ex-British consul tripping and blabbering sozzledly across Cuernavaca, Mexico during the Day of the Dead, waiting for his ex-wife (played tenderly by Jacqueline Bisset) to return. It's a dense, incredibly challenging novel, all but unfilmable, but Huston and screenwriter Guy Gallo do a fine job with it. Good film.
When the Spanish Conquistadors landed in Mexico more than half a millenium ago, they found the natives practicing strange death-celebrating rituals.
This celebration still goes on today in Mexico, many Latin American countries, and even in southwestern parts of the U.S. During the Aztecs time, the celebration went on for a month. Once the Spanish arrived, however, the celebration was more or less incorporated with the Catholic All Saints' Day and Day of the Dead now officially takes place on November 2, thought it is celebrated from October 31 to the 2nd of November. It is said that the spirits of dead children arrive on the 31st and then leave the next day; the adult spirits come on the 1st and leave on the 2nd.
Why celebrate it? And what is it? First of all, it's a remembrance of those that have died. The celebrating cultures acknowledge death as but one stage of life and that the dead must pass on to the next stage, wherever that might be. In the days before the Day of the Dead, the spirits of the dead are believed to be amongst the people, amongst their loved ones, but on the Day of the Dead, they depart, pass on. The holiday is festive, joyous, with dancing, parades, graveside reunions and gatherings. In homes the following can be seen:
- candles, flowers, pan de muertos (Bread of the Dead) in the shape of skulls and skeletons, papel picado (perforated tissue paper cut-outs), silk flowers, wreaths, votive lights, marigolds, candy skulls.
It is believed that the spirits of the dead make a temporary visit to their former homes. A hardy meal will provide them repast, substance for their next journey. The person's favorite foods when he or she was alive might be served, along with breads, beer/tequila, corn gruel, mole sauce, rice, etc.
The graves are, of course, decorated too, with lights often lining the way from the gravesites to the home, so that the spirits can find their way.
What else this Friday? I finished Frank Deford's Bliss, Remembered , a fine fictional account of a love story during the 1936 Berlin Olympics. I went on to NPR, where Deford has a weekly column, "Sweetness and Light," and found among the archived articles this interesting one:
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/21/140591732/no-respect-for-the-women-on-the-sidelines
He's right. I guess subconsciously I had noticed this before, but I never really ruminated on it to any extent.
Speaking of NPR, here's another interesting article for the weekend:
http://www.npr.org/2012/02/02/146288063/painting-sheds-new-light-on-the-mona-lisa
Finally, since I won't be back until Monday, here's my Super Bowl forecast.
I think it's going to be very hard for Eli Manning, despite the fact that I think his Giants are the better all-around team, to beat Tom Brady three times in a row.
New England 34, New York 27.
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