Mistah Kurtz he dead

A teacher of mine once said that psychology students tend to be unsatisfied with themselves, political science students with their societies. Anthropology students on the other hand, with both themselves and their societies.

My academic move has gone from political science to middle eastern studies with a focus on religious history/sociology. What does that imply?

A dissatisfaction with my (Swedish) society and a loss of faith in secular Utopias which has lead to a search in eastern traditions instead. Perhaps. It's not that far fetched.

For the last two years I've been studying the middle east from books in every possible perspective: Geography, literature, religion, media, politics & economy, ethnology... In a month I touch down on Egyptian soil in order to try and convert all those books into real knowledge.

Two years in Qena will definitely have an impact on me and my family who are traveling with me but in what way, I have no idea. We're going up the river into the heart of what?

Why Qena?

I have more questions than answers at this stage, but I think Malinowski that old Triobrand anthropologist has the answer for my designated geographical area of research. The question as to why I choose to do an ethnographical study...well I guess this blog is how I figure that one out.

"Proper conditions for ethnographic work...consist mainly in cutting oneself off from the company of other white men..."
-Malinowski

Silent hope

In 1920 when the theatre on Birger Jarlsgatan opened it was called Olympia. It's not called so anymore. Someone changed it. Olympia is now just another name on the tombstones of yesteryear's cultural bastions of modernity. Palladium, Apollo, Arcadia, Roxy, Garbio, Rialto, Astoria, Riviera...

The foyer is perfectly tremendous. A giant ceiling, like that of a cathedral (and isn't that befitting of a theatre) with a huge staircase under which a little café is nested. The café haphazardly serves excellent Swedish coffee and a delightful little grilled sandwich with Brie, sardines and fresh rosemary. With all due respect to popcorn and fizzy drinks, why do we persist in having children's food in cinemas? It is symptomatic of our childish minds, I'm sure, and the range of select films in our movie complexes signifies this childishness too.

Yet every once in a blue moon a film comes along to the Swedish monopolised industry of theatres (sic!) that is outside of the norm. The formula seems to me to consist of an American hero who breaks rules and thus saves the world from aliens or horrible brown people (sometimes they are synonymous) so that we can all rest assured that the world is once again safe. Yet o how liberating it is when something other that that is played.

I am not going to present the plot of the film, nay the masterpiece, The Artist. What I do want to write about is my urge to applaud the movie when the end credit started to roll.

Sure, I have seen silent movies before. I have seen them on video, that is. To see one in a theatre, a proper old theatre with all its trimmings was truly an amazing experience. To begin with, I was shocked to find out that dialogue can be an obstacle for the drama. If anything the film proves the point that it is music that creates the entire experience of film. Surely it is nostalgia of a time I never experienced which makes me shudder with anticipation just by seeing the typography of the opening credit.

It is a promise from the director of the film. It is the promise of an illusion to experience film the way my grandfather's father would have and I am sold from the very beginning. I love this movie. I love that someone loves films so much that they would make a film like this. It's technically perfect, beautifully shot and the music is superb. If cinema still has a soul, this movie manages that heritage. Needless to say, it is of course a French production (although set in Hollywood).

There is still hope for this form of art, is what I sense at the end of the film. That magic place called cinema is still out there but it has become painfully obvious that it has slipped through the hands of the Americans, save but a very small number of directors. And that's why I wanna stand up and applaude the director. He managed to redeem a whole art form with The Artist. That may also be the reason it was nominated for ten Oscars.

It's not the plot that makes it great. It's the mere fact that it got made which makes it so special.

"Cinema is still a very young art form with extraordinary techniques and very impressive special effects but sometimes it seems the soul has been taken out of things."(Catherine Deneuve)

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Battered wife syndrome

Every writer has a complex relationship with his hometown they say...

...What if your hometown is the equivalent of an abusive spouse?