Enter the Dragon feels to me the epitome of “globalization” when it comes to the kungfu genre. It’s a film that everyone knows about (or at least knew, I’m not sure how much the newer generations are aware of this film) and it made such a splash that every martial arts film released afterwards had to be compared to it. Basically, it set the bar pretty high by creating a new standard for martial arts films, as well as putting Bruce Lee on the map as more of a superstar. While great action stars like Jackie Chan would follow, Bruce Lee is still considered to be the most iconic and you can feel his influence way more in hip hop. There’s an odd quote about the transference of stardom between Lee and Chan that goes “The hero is dead, the clown is born”, which basically means that after Lee’s death, Chan’s approach to martial arts films were very different and I think purists might have been put off by his funny antics and Buster Keaton-styled stunts. That quote was probably said out of spite, but there is a degree of truth due to how different Chan went about his films. While “the Clown is born” when Chan entered the scene, films like Police Story, Drunken Master, and Jackie Chan’s First Strike (among so many others) demonstrate Chan’s abilities in martial arts and combat, and show that this “clown” is a force to be reckoned with. While I would take Chan’s crazy stunts and brutal but funny fighting scenes over Bruce Lee’s work (although I love that as well), there’s something so iconic about Bruce Lee’s work that no other martial artist/actor could touch, and it’s the image of the dragon which Lee embodied and thus created an image that influenced so many for years to come, across all different kinds of art.
Author Archives: Kevin
Music: More Deerhoof
Yes I decided to post some more Deerhoof tracks because this band is great and I’d like to show some variety in their sound. I’m still exploring their discography as they have many albums and, thanks to procrastination, it’s taken me years! The band itself is an acquired taste to be sure and I don’t expect everybody to get into Satomi’s vocal style. It took me a while to get into this band at first, and sometimes I still have to be in the mood for it, but once it clicked it really clicked. They are a bit of a weird band, but that’s what makes them great in my opinion. Deerhoof is a band that embodies different approaches to recording depending on the album at hand. Their early stuff was more “lo-fi” and felt like band in a room, playing the shit out these songs. An earlier record called Apple O, which introduced me to the band years ago, displays this rougher side. The song Dummy Discards a Heart is like a punch to the ears, but is one of the classic Deerhoof songs. The video I found of the song has some dude dancing in it, so look pass that. Instead you could watch a couple Japanese kids jam out to this song in a little room. It’s really up to you!
Deerhoof began to expand their sound with 2004′s Milk Man, but really became more studio-centric after 2007′s Friend Opportunity. I already posted The Perfect Me, but another track that demonstrates Deerhoof’s studio playfulness is a song called +81, which sounds so angular you can feel the crunch. Another favorite is The Galaxist, which recalls a drifting sound that reminded me of old 1970s prog bands. In 2011′s Deerhoof vs. Evil, the band took a poppier route, creating an album that was more accessible. They started moving steadily away from the simple guitar/bass/drums/vocals combo to pursue songs and ideas outside their usual make up. A song like Super Duper Rescue Heads is much catchier and immediate than past deerhoof material, but still feels like it’s from the same band. There’s also track on the record in which Satomi sings in spanish which makes it pretty unique and it’s just a great song – Qui Dorm, Nomes Somia. It this kind of cross cultural influence that makes Deerhoof pretty unique compared to their peers. There’s also a playfulness and experimentation that defines Deerhoof and reminds me of groups like Pavement in that they never make the same record twice. Hell, they have two songs named “Flower” and both sound completely different from one another. Compare the “Flower” (2003) from Apple O and the “Flower” (2012) from the most recent record Breakup Song – there are definite differences of course, being a decade gap, and you can see the evolution in the newer track. However, there’s still a common thread that still makes each song sound like Deerhoof – the sporadic drumming, angular guitar playing, Satomi’s unique vocal style, as well as the odd song structures bring it all under one banner. So I’ll end this post with another track from Deerhoof vs. Evil. It’s called Behold a Marvel in the Darkness and it’s a catchier song, not to mention a favorite of mine.
Mississippi Masala
I’m surprised I never saw this movie, but I found it to be very enjoyable especially after My Name is Khan which I didn’t really like at all. Mississippi Masala just felt more endearing and I enjoyed the message of the film. I like the pairing of African American and Indian American at the center of the film as it’s a romance hardly seen on the silver screen. Setting it in Mississippi as well, considering the history of racial tension, was a good choice for setting because it contrasts greatly with story of the film, creating conflict. Mississippi Masala shares a ton of similarities with other films we’ve watched and the themes it conveys are what we talk about often – identity crisis, generational conflict, etc. It seems to me that the conflict between parent and child is perhaps the strongest theme throughout all the films we watched. Both Demetrius and Mina are held back by their rigid family values, but ultimately decide to say “screw it” and make a life for themselves.
I also thought it was interesting how the film portrays racism but in a way you never see very often, in terms of it not being white/black or American/Japanese. The division between Mina’s father and Demetrius only emphasizes this aspect, which is why I like when Demetrius confronts Mina’s father about the color of his skin, basically saying that there’s really little difference between us, and that this categorization of skin color is superficial at best. His past history in Uganda and getting expelled from his home country gives him reason to feel as he does, but I’m glad that Demetrius and Mina decide to stay together despite the pasts of their families. Someone in our class said that they kept expecting something crazy to happen, and I have to agree considering some of the other films we’ve watched (Better Luck Tomorrow for example) have dipped into the darkness, so the fact that this did not happen in this film makes it more unique in my opinion – this is about other things.
A Tale for the Time Being: Communication
At the crux of the novel, it’s the communication between Nao and Ruth which carry the spirit of the story and, of course, give us something to read. Communication, or lack of, is a HUGE component of A Tale for the Time Being. There are many forms of communication throughout the story, such as the diary, talking or texting, but also more abstract forms of communication. For example, diaries are typically very personal things, but Nao’s is different – it’s inviting, mysterious and yearns to tell a story in itself. She is directly talking to whoever or whatever is in contact with her diary, be it the reader or the dustbin on the street. Nao is very determined to share her tragic point of view with anyone who is willing to read. It’s in my experience that depression or sadness often results in a “cry for help” even if it’s not apparent. It seems to me that due to the lack of communication between Nao and her parents, this diary is exactly that – a cry for help, a way to make sense of bad circumstances.
I view it almost as a psychological case-study, looking at an individual who suffers from bullying and neglect. I also find the visions Nao seems to have – such as Haruki #1′s ghost – to perhaps be extensions of this? Viewing it from another angle, Haruki’s ghost could be an extension of her feelings for her father considering she goes to great lengths to compare the two Harukis. And if it’s a real ghost, than perhaps communication from the afterlife is a valid answer. Ruth’s own memoir also serves a form of communication, as I interpret it as a much more “official” form Nao’s diary, albeit unfinished. Ruth’s dreams of Jiko, like Haruki’s ghost, serve as an otherworldly form of communication – perhaps it’s Ruth’s subconscious communicating with her. Maybe it’s Nao’s spirit making connection with Ruth? I mean if Nao’s fate is left unanswered, than we could theorize that perhaps Nao did die and maybe this is her way to reaching out to Ruth? I have no idea, but I like to speculate on these kinds of things.
A Tale for the Time Being: Time/Age
Other than life/death, I think the strongest theme in A Tale for the Time Being is the theme of time or age and how that can be interpreted in a number of different ways. Time plays a huge role, both in terms of the timeline difference between Ruth and Nao, but also how each character handles their time. Nao feels that at the age of 16, she has already wasted all her time. She feels as though she has accomplished nothing in her life, and fantasizes about ending her time on earth. She refers to herself as a Time Being, something Ruth embraces in the end as well. Ruth is lost in what could be described as writer’s block, and has felt as though she has wasted a lot of time not working on her memoir. Reflection and memory is a huge component of time, and the characters in this novel reflect upon the past a lot.
Nao is always thinking about the “happier” times – her life back in Sunnyvale, her old friends, her father’s happiness – and Ruth thinks about her life in New York as well as her mother before she died. Before long, Ruth begins to pour most of her time into this diary, and despite their difference of age, connects with Nao at a most personal level. At one point, Ruth refers to writing as the “opposite of suicide”, meaning that writing is “about immortality. Defeating death or at least forestalling it”. The theme of life and death are very much tied to time and age, and Nao’s diary preserves her 2001 teenage self as if she poured a bit of her soul into it (harry potter reference!), which lends to the idea that writing is a form of “time travel”.
A Tale for the Time Being: Death/Life
One of the strongest themes in A Tale for the Time Being is the theme of Life and Death and what this means for the character of Nao. For my money, I felt that both Ruth and Nao’s stories emphasized different sides of the same coin, meaning that I took the theme of death from Nao and the theme of life from Ruth. Nao is a girl who is obsessed with suicide, and speaks about it very casually through her diary. She almost glamorizes it to the point where it would seem like an honorable thing, but you can tell that the thought of her father’s suicide greatly disturbs her. Through her diary, we can see that death seems to loom over the life of her family. Her great uncle Haruki #1 was a suicide pilot, and Nao becomes enamored by his story to the point where she “unfairly” tries to compare him to her father. When it came to her father’s botched suicide attempts, Nao basically tells him “Man up like Haruki #1. If you’re gonna do it, do it properly”, which speaks more about her frustration with her father than her “words of encouragement”.
Even ghosts seem to make their way into this story, like when Haruki #1 returns in spectral form to Nao. Haruki’s letters contain a certain air of death, like storm clouds shrouding the country side, due to the nature of his position during the war. These letters reveal a deep personal shame of Haruki, and the darkness of his inevitable death resting in his mind. The truth that Haruki #1 chose to die on his own terms instead of taking the lives of others only strengthens this theme. Through all of this, Ruth becomes obsessed with Nao’s life and is taken by the idea that she needs to “save Nao”, possibly from death or from herself. Ruth’s own life has become bored and unproductive as she has been sitting on an unfinished memoir for years and I think Nao’s diary gives Ruth a much needed kick start in terms of getting her inquisitive mind going again – meaning something to focus on.
A Tale for the Time Being, pgs 1-108
While reading the first leg of the book, I found it fascinating the way Ozeki broke up the structure of the book, blending Ruth’s own close reading of the material with the POV of Nao’s diary. Through this, we get to be inside Nao’s head and also Ruth’s, and it gives us a chance to interpret Nao’s words before Ruth even gets there. What gives Ruth such a drive to discover the truth behind this diary? It seems to me that Ruth has found a strong connection with Nao – a certain, desolate familiarity perhaps?
Nao is a very depressed person who has felt like time has slipped completely from her. At the tender age of 16, we find a person who has already given up on life. She is separated from the life she loved (in Sunnyvale) and has become this invisible, anonymous person. I feel Ruth might sympathize with such feelings, as she too is cut off from the life she loved (in New York) for a place where it seems, at least to me, that she might be too settled in. Her own concept of time loss corresponds with Nao’s, but Ruth’s loss is symbolized in a memoir that seems determined to remain unfinished. I also found a sense of “burden” placed upon both women’s shoulders. In Nao’s case, her father is suicidal and bares much of the weight for what happened to the family, which obviously affects Nao because she deeply worries about her father. Ruth had her own parental “burden” with her mother having Alzheimer’s, but since her mother’s death, has felt like perhaps she has done nothing worthwhile with her life since that “burden” passed. I’m eager to see how this connection develops but so far this is my take on it.
My Name is Khan
I have to be honest, I wasn’t a huge fan of this film. There were definitely things about it that I enjoyed, but over all I found it be a very poorly executed story. BUT first let’s start off with the positives.
Liar, liar, bums on fire.
First of all, I thought the first hour of the film was great. It starts ominously with Khan being detained in an airport, but it quickly moves into his back-story and his relationship with his family. Seeing his early years, his mother’s love for him and his brother’s rejection of him was very interesting. I’ve never really met anyone with Aspergers before, so I cannot speak to the accuracy of his portrayal, but I found his performance to be very endearing. His relationship with Mandira plays out beautifully as they get to know each other and overall I enjoyed that aspect of the story very much. I also have to say that I love how this film also focused on the racism that exploded post 9/11 and how that affected the Khans because, much like the Japanese internment, it’s a part of American history that isn’t really represented on the silver screen very often. In that sense, this film serves a very important role in portraying a different side to the post-9/11 climate, and could do well to educate people that racism is still something that happens and needs to be dealt with. With a message as strong as this, you’d think it could be seen as a major victory. Here’s a hint: it isn’t.
The reason why I say this is because this film has a whole other racist issue, in which we meet a black community in Georgia which, for some reason, seem to live in a village straight out of the colonial days. When the film shifts into Forrest Gump mode (another problem I have with it haha), Khan finds himself in the care of a black woman named Mama Jenny in this strange town, and boy does this character feel like a Mammy/Aunt Jemima stereotype ripped right from the early 1900s. Despite this film making a big deal about Obama being the first black president, it didn’t really do a good job of portraying African Americans. The whole hurricane molly bit felt very forced, as if they were trying to hit me over the head with the theme, and I think they could have dropped that whole subplot. The film would have precious minutes shaved off its running time and we would have a much more cohesive film. So beyond that, the film had pacing issues, felt too bloated for its own good, and had some major continuity issues which I’ll address now. Okay so maybe “continuity” is not the right word, but this film handled the passage of time very poorly. It’s supposed to cover 2001-2008/09, but it never really feels like there’s any growth or difference with the characters. Mandira’s son and his friend seem to never age, despite being kids during 9/11 and apparently during high school as well. That part is more of a minor nitpick, but I felt like it the timeline was sort of cobbled together. All to all, My Name is Khan has the best intentions but it was just poorly executed. The only bright spots in this film were the two main characters as I thought their relationship was beautifully played out, but Mandira is sort of shuffled to the background during the second half of the film, which kind of sucks considering how much she brings to the film.
Overall, I give this film 2 1/2 bums out of 5.
From Kung Fu to Hip Hop, pgs. 171-207
The connections between hip hop and martial arts really came into full focus through our class discussions and reading. I like the similarity between Jeet Kune Do and Hip Hop, specifically looking at the concept of sampling and how different elements can be brought together to make something new. We deal with this concept a lot in class in terms of “hermit crabbing”, as putting yourself in the mindset of another time period allows you to learn from the past in order to better understand the subject at hand. With Jeet Kune Do, Bruce Lee placed enormous importance on the “flow”, stating that a martial artist cannot predict combat and instead must be fluid “like water”. The unpredictability of Jeet Kune Do gave the “style without style” an edge over the opponent, favoring quick footwork (like Muhammad Ali) and a strong offense over a calculated martial arts style. Hip Hop, and sampling in general, utilizes the method of bringing all kinds of sounds to the mix and creating something new as its foundation.
Looking at a more recent example, in Kanye West’s work we find a huge selection of sampling that pulled from different bands and genres to create something new. Back in 2007 when Kanye West released “Stronger“, he used Daft Punk’s hit “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” as its foundation and through that created something different. The music video could also be seen as a form of “sampling” or perhaps “hermit crabbing”, as it’s massively influenced by the seminal anime film Akira. Another example is from his 2010 album My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, in which he sampled King Crimson’s “21st Century Schizoid Man” for the song “Power” and made it work in a way that was completely different than before. I don’t think it’s very often that rappers or hip hop artists sample 1970s prog bands, but it’s the union of two different eras and styles that makes for a pretty interesting song. It is these influences that made Kanye feel a bit fresh compared to the “bitches n’ hoes” attitude that invaded much of hip hop through the early 21st Century – although I have to say Kanye West can definitely be guilty of that as well. All to all, I wasn’t a huge fan of this book but it did get me to reexamine and acknowledge icons in our pup culture who are closely related in ways I never realized, and the similarities in approaches (such as sampling) are undeniable. There is a spirit of resistance found within these methods which help cross barriers and allow people of different backgrounds, gender and ethnicity to tap that same power and utilize it for themselves.
Music: Blonde Redhead
Another band I really like is Blonde Redhead, a 3-piece from New York which features singer/guitarist Kazu Makino along with brothers Amedeo and Simone Pace. Blonde Redhead specialize in alternative rock, wielding influences in noise rock, shoegaze, dream pop and others into their own sound. They’ve been around over 20 years now and have become an indie staple of sorts. Kazu Makino was born in Kyoto, Japan before immigrating to the United States at a young age. She attended art school in New York where she met the two brothers (in an Italian restaurant no less), and the three would form the backbone for Blonde Redhead for years to come. While the band released a bunch of records in the 90s that earned them a strong following, it wasn’t until 2004′s Misery is a Butterfly (the first album they released on indie titan 4AD records, a label best known for it’s artist repertoire like Pixies, Cocteau Twins and Throwing Muses) that the band was able to reach a larger audience. The song I’m posting here is a favorite from the following album 23, released in 2007 on 4AD records.