Now that I've seen 'Terminator: Salvation', some queries occur to me:
If I were a cyborg, why would I donate my heart to someone who has dedicated his life to killing my friends?
If I owned the rights to one of the most interesting mainstream dramatic movie ideas of the past three decades, what could I do to remove all sense of humanity and tension from it?
Is there any chance we might get a movie in which the world is saved without chunky guys shooting people to do it?
Once upon a time, as a graduate student. I spent three years studying people who believe the pope is the antichrist, a mythical figure referenced (with surprising infrequence) in the Bible, and who over the centuries has inspired some of the strangest speculation and religious behaviour. From the 12th Century mystic Joachim of Fiore who changed the date for the end of the world as often as his undershirt, through the fact that Isaac Newton believed that his discovery of logarithms would speed up the calculation of what the Number of the Beast meant, to apocalytpic frenzy at the time of the French Revolution, right up to more recent doomsayers such as Hal Lindsey (the bestselling ‘non’-fiction author of the 1970s), who may have felt rather conflicted when 1988 came and went without the earth being destroyed, and now Glenn Beck, who seems content to encourage eschatological surmising about President Obama. They’re all wrong, of course; and it’s obvious that end-times guessers have tended to be socially bigoted too. Certainly it’s the case for some that naming the antichrist has been, as one of its foremost students has said ‘an obsession’.
And now along comes Lars von Trier, a director whose work indicates for most critics either genius or madness; or he may be a court jester; or someone who is projecting his depression on screen. What I think is this: ‘Dogville’ was compelling but did not describe the world as I experience it; ‘Breaking the Waves’ grasped the horror of grief and suggested that life on earth is a stepping stone, a preparatory ground, a purgative moment before eternal grace takes over. I think if I re-watched either of them, my opinion might reverse itself. Last week, at Cannes, he added his name to the not-so-illustrious role of those who have appropriated ‘antichrist’ for themselves.
His film, imaginatively entitled ‘Antichrist’ has caused the kind of controversy not seen at the festival for some time. People are terrified, embarrassed for the actors, overwhelmed, distraught, disturbed, angry, entertained, unintentionally made to laugh, or provoked to think about the nature of existence. It seems that some reviewers both love and hate it at the same time. It’s not certain whether von Trier is using the title literally - if he really intends to comment on the notions that captured Joachim, Isaac, et Hal; but the word can’t be divorced from its history. ‘Dogville’ and ‘Breaking the Waves’ seemed to me to be produced by a person disagreeing with himself - putting Willem Dafoe, one of the most striking Jesuses on film in a movie called ‘Antichrist’ seems entirely in keeping with von Trier’s way of playing the audience. I’d like the film to be a serious exploration of grief and suffering - the accounts in so far suggest it is anything but; in fact, it may be the big screen equivalent of the kind of painting you sometimes see being done in a television documentary by one of the severely traumatised patients in a war veterans’ home (although he and his cast look happy enough in the photo above). On the basis of the words written about it already, and the track record of the director, I both can’t wait to see it, and am not sure that I will be able to watch it.
Three reviews below:
I heard Glenn Beck's talk radio show a couple of weeks ago; when a woman called in to suggest that because President Obama appears to be raising the tax rate to around the same as what it was under President Clinton, is exercising some accountability mechanisms with banks and car manufacturers, and has approached the nations of the world with humility, that he is a prime candidate for the Antichrist. Such absurd and offensive speculation has been around for nearly two thousand years; and, of course, there is a 100% failure record among those who would predict the time of the end of the world, along with the identity of the person who, dispensationalists allege, will lead us there. The general principle - that those who make eschatological guesses tend to be socially bigoted and give the appearance of suffering from religious neurosis - combines with the specific example - that some people are so outraged by Obama's election that they need to find a theological justification for their anger, and produces some of the most debased public conversation I've ever heard. Glenn Beck's response to this woman appeared to endorse her religious terror, with mysterious allusions to people he says he has met and talked to and heard things from that he isn't ready to tell us about yet.
The sum: I don't know what Glenn Beck actually believes about the Book of Revelation (for what it's worth, I happen to think it's an amazing book of metaphorical prose offering comfort to people being persecuted and naming the metaphysical core of the universe: that the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it, rather than a dimestore almanac of future events), but he's certainly happy not to challenge his listeners when they suggest that President Obama is in league with Satan. I know many of us feel like we say this every day: but we need a better conversation in this country.
In ‘Doctor Zhivago’, Boris Pasternak is at pains to develop the notion that human freedom is found in facing reality. This is not a new idea, of course; we need only remember ‘the truth will set you free’ to be aware that it didn’t originate with Russian novelists…But Pasternak adapts an old Chinese proverb, and announces his prophecy – in his case, of resistance to the death-dealing ways of Stalinist Russia, but really it could stand for anywhere, anytime, by stating that the beginning of wisdom is ‘to call everything by its right name’. He means that life is a journey through confusion to clarity. That wisdom, and healing, and growing up derive from seeing things as they really are.
This does not mean of course that we understand all things – that would make us into God. No, it just means that a key function of being human is the power - and responsibility - to discern – to distinguish between this thing and that, and that thing and this. The psychologist Carl Jung knew this – he could tell the difference between organized religion and what we call God. Desmond Tutu knows this – he can tell the difference between a religion of the superficial intellect and the spirit that gives rise to human revolution. The Irish mystic John O’Donohue knew this – he understood the difference between the frightened functionaries of fundamentalism, and the vast riches of the mystic tradition to which they think they hold the keys. Our task is to learn the difference between form and content. Our task is to learn the difference between what we believe, and how we believe it. Our task is to call everything by its right name. Our task is discernment.
Every day we are given the opportunity to find beauty in the face of other human beings. I come from a religious tradition that sometimes left its members unable to encounter other people without seeing them as missionary targets. We failed in discernment. Of course, those who harbour anti-religious sentiment are also often incapable of having a conversation with believers in which they treat their opinions with respect. They fail in discernment too. Yet if human beings really are made in the image of God; or even if we are better understood in other ways, then perhaps we might find it in ourselves also to learn that every encounter between you and me, or me and anyone, or you and anyone should be an opportunity for God, or whatever you want to name the ground of all being, to speak to both of us.
Now that I'm back from the wedding, the mind is a little frazzled at the prospect of everything that needs to get done over the next few days. Getting back into a routine this week; meanwhile, here's a 'Thought for the Day' I wrote recently for BBC Radio. It may not be the most elegant or profound thought, but it's helping me stay afloat in the zone of happiness that the temporary community brought together by the last week has provided. When I was four years old, it was the time of the Jimmy Carter administration, the end of disco, Patty Hearst gets out, Ayatollah Khomeni gets in, Israel and Egypt make nice, the Pope goes to Poland, Saddam takes over, China starts the one child policy, Mr Ed the talking horse goes to paddock heaven. Like I said, I’m four years old, so I don’t know any of this. Well, I might know that I’m four, but as for Patty and Saddam and the Pope and Mr Ed, I’m in the dark. I’m in Belfast, and not without precedent in the annals of childhood, am playing with my toy trucks. Life seems simple. All I have to do was play, eat, and sleep. And in September there’s this thing called ‘the big school’, for which sacrifice I’ll receive the monumental reward of a canvas lunch bag screen-printed with a picture of C3-PO and R2-D2.
What I don’t know is that my life is about to change forever. In December, I will go to the cinema for the first time. I will discover that the human imagination is capable of transporting people into the most amazing places. Places where love is true, where good triumphs over evil, where sometimes even the nerds get the girl. I’ll spend the next thirty years absorbing light dancing on a silver screen, being inspired, challenged, encouraged, and, sure, sometimes disappointed, by the movies. I’ll struggle to keep my own imagination alive, because the world in which we live so often seems to want to destroy it. The pace of life, the pressures of work, the delicate balancing act of being human frequently crowd out space for letting the imagination breathe.
The French philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote that all the problems of the world stem from our inability to sit still and think for ten minutes. The movies, or, actually, any art form allow us the space to do just that. I think we all know, somewhere deep inside, that Pascal was right. That if we are to be fully human, if we are to be at peace with ourselves and our neighbours, we need to nurture the imagination. We may feel that there just isn’t enough time, that we can’t afford art. And that’s understandable given the pressures many of us are under. But, think back to a time when you were moved by a work of art, maybe back to the time when you were as innocent and peaceable as a four year old; and ask yourself now: can I afford not to sit still, with a movie, or a book, or a piece of music, and think for ten minutes?
I find newspaper problem pages irresistible; and so when I came late to Cary Tennis of salon.com I felt like Alfred Molina in 'Chocolat' being locked into the shop window. The difference between Cary Tennis and the agony aunts/uncles I'm used to is twofold - he offers genuinely interesting advice, and he knows how to write. Try this one to start with:"Love is not a get-out-of-reality-free card. It does not suspend gravity or the rule of law. It can be a bit of an intoxicant, but it should be taken with food. So I would say: Think about it all you want; concoct elaborate schemes to your heart's content. It will remain essentially mysterious and beyond your control."
He talks about other things too - violence, relational conflict, politics, art, sex, kindness, salvation. But I'm getting married tomorrow, and wanted to say something about that. Cary Tennis is right: Love does not suspend gravity, but it is a rule of nature in itself. We can't live without it. And so I guess all I want to say today is that I'm grateful to be alive, to participate in what John O'Donohue called 'the fathomless mystery of a day', this day, every day. The interruption of my life by the appearance of the woman with whom I hope to spend the rest of it was unexpected; and it has taught me something that I suspect may be the most important lesson I'll ever learn:
Love needs to be shouted from the rooftops and declared with greater passion and commitment than we usually reserve for news headlines and gossip. There is almost limitless possibility in every moment; and even the darkest struggle shall eventually pass.
You may think I'm speaking from a space of heightened emotion, or relativising reality because I'm living slightly outside it this weekend; perhaps you're right. Or perhaps what we believe about love in our best moments and deepest aspirations happens to be true. Either way, I hope you have a beautiful day.
OK, enough of that. I've a wedding to get to. See you next week.