In your hands, the cities; in my world, the marching
Of nobler feet than walk down a road
Deep with the corpses of every sane and beautiful thing.
—Kenneth Patchen
Greetings from the far left coast.
I have not enjoyed writing about events in Israel and Gaza, yet am compelled to speak. One more installment in what has inadvertently become a series is envisioned, if I can bring myself to it. The subject will be Netanyahu, Hamas, and the West Bank. This excerpt from an article in The Times of Israel provides a glimpse of what I have in mind:
For years, the various governments led by Benjamin Netanyahu took an approach that divided power between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank—bringing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to his knees while making moves that propped up the Hamas terror group.
The idea was to prevent Abbas—or anyone else in the Palestinian Authority’s West Bank government—from advancing toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Thus, amid this bid to impair Abbas, Hamas was upgraded from a mere terror group to an organization with which Israel held indirect negotiations via Egypt, and one that was allowed to receive infusions of cash from abroad. (Tal Schneider, For years, Netanyahu propped up Hamas. Now it’s blown up in our faces, October 8, 2023)
Memo from the cinema desk. Last week I had the pleasure of watching Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011) by Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan (b. 1959). My introduction to Ceylan came at the 2019 Portland International Film Festival with The WIld Pear Tree (2018). (If you are interested, see my capsule summary at PIFF 42: Take 4.) The films are long. Once Upon a Time checks in at 157 minutes, The Wild Pear Tree an even heftier 188 minutes (both available at Kanopy). The pace is slow. Maybe not for everyone. I found them near magnificent.
Once Upon a Time opens with police chief Naci, a prosecutor, a doctor, several policemen, two guys with shovels, and two murder suspects on a dreary trek through the Turkish countryside at night in search of the grave where the victim was buried. Kenan, the primary suspect, cannot remember the exact location because the suspects and the victim had been drinking. There was a tree nearby, on a hillside, maybe. Naci becomes increasingly agitated as the night wears on and one spot after another turns up no body. And they have to keep stopping so the prosecutor can urinate. Eventually Naci loses his temper and slaps Kenan. The prosectuor puts a halt to it. Naci remains agitated.
In the middle of the night they take a break to get something to eat in a village where Naci, or maybe it is Arab Ali, the driver of the lead car in the procession of three vehicles, knows the mayor, who gives them a warm welcome, his wife prepares a meal, their beautiful daughter serves tea. The daughter's beauty prompts the prosecutor to tell the doctor about the mysterious death of a gorgeous woman married to a friend. It does not take long to wonder if the friend might be the prosecutor himself.
It is morning by the time they at last find the body in a shallow grave, hogtied because that was the only way the suspects could stuff the corpse into the trunk of their car to drive somewhere to dispose of it. A problem arises when it is time to transport the body back to town for an autopsy. Somebody forgot to pack a body bag. In a mildly comedic sequence they bicker about who is to blame, and the corpse is inflicted with more indignity as they figure out how best to cram it into another car trunk.
The doctor and the prosecutor, never named, always referred to as Doctor and Mr. Prosecutor, are men of profound sadness and, perhaps, weary resignation. The prosecutor bears the weight of his wife's death, which may have been self-inflicted to punish him for a single act of unfaithfulness one time when he was drunk. The doctor sitting in his office at the hospital gazes with heartache and longing at the image of a beautiful woman. Is it a photograph? Or a memory? What were they to each other? Is she alive and living apart from him? Or dead, like the prosectuor's wife?
Naci's burden comes to light when he asks the doctor to write a prescription to refill his son's medication for an unnamed medical condition we are left to infer is a of a serious nature. Kenan, the primary murder suspect, reveals that he is the father of the boy the murder victim thought was his son and asks Naci to see that the boy is looked after while he is in prison. Does the revelation imply that this had something to do with the killing? Maybe. It is mentioned almost in passing when Naci tells the doctor and the prosecutor what Kenan told him. So, maybe.
Back in town an angry crowd gathers as Kenan is led away to the police station. The boy and his mother stand at the back of the mob. Her face is beautiful, impassive, as she stares at Kenan. The boy throws a stone that strikes Kenan on the side of his face. Unable to turn away from the boy's angry glare or the mother's opaque, intense look, Kenan weeps.
The film closes with the doctor gazing out the window of the hospital as the woman and her son make their way past a playground where children kick a soccer ball around.
What I wrote about The Wild Pear Tree four-and-a-half years ago holds for Once Upon a Time in Anatolia: Visually striking. I was almost entranced…not much action yet quite a lot happens, and I liked it a lot.
In the October 19, 2023, issue of The New York Review, Adam Kirsch celebrates Krzysztof Kieślowski’s “Three Colors” trilogy, Blue, White, and Red (colors of the French flag), on the thirtieth anniversary of the films' release in 1993 (Intolerable Freedoms). The films took up the ideals of the French Revolution, liberty in Blue, equality in White, fraternity in Red, and "darkly anticipated some of the central conflicts of the post–cold war period."
Kirsch allows that some viewers have found the films "cold and programmatic."
When Red lost the Palme d'Or to Pulp Fiction at Cannes in 1994, it was widely seen as a victory for American pop energy over European artiness. Not everyone was pleased: when the prize was announced, a woman in the audience shouted, “Kieślowski! Kieślowski! Pulp Fiction is shit!”
I would not go as far as the woman. Pulp Fiction is a good enough entertainment. Blue, White, and Red are of another order altogether. I would welcome the opportunity to see them again.
At the close of his review Kirsch argues for Kieślowski’s continued relevance in a present-day Europe drifting hard to the right.
Kieślowski’s understanding of the inadequacies of secular liberalism seems prophetic today, when nationalists and populists have gained power across Europe by promising an antidote to neoliberal rootlessness. In addition to all its formal beauties, “Three Colors” offers a beautiful reminder that artists often intuit more about the direction of history than the statesmen and experts who claim to be steering it.
Memo from the sports desk. My Phillies advanced to the National League Championship series by making short work of the Miami Marlins and upending a fine Atlanta Braves team that racked up the most wins (104) in baseball this year. Throughout a season filled with injuries, frustrating at times, this has been an easy team to like. Check out this story about rightfielder Nick Castellanos and his ten-year-old son Liam: Castellanos and son take postseason ride together.
It has been a good ride. The baseball gods willing, it could get even better. However it falls out, I like this team, one of my favorites in 62 years of Phillies phanaticism.
I will also be cheering on former University of South Carolina star A'ja Wilson and the Las Vegas Aces this afternoon in game 3 of the WNBA finals. The Aces are up 2–0 after dominating the first two games in the best of five series. The New York Liberty is a better team than they have shown so far. It is too early to celebrate. But it would be sweet to close it out today.
New at Portable Bohemia Substack:
House Dysfunction Moves into Uncharted Territory, October 5, 2023. Patrick McHenry’s first act as speaker pro tem of the House was to order Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer to vacate their Capitol offices. Axios reported that an email to Pelosi’s staff on Tuesday “asked” (quotation marks mine) them to “vacate by tomorrow”…read more>>
October 7 Was Not an Act of Resistance, October 9, 2023. Hamas conducted a well planned and orchestrated massacre of Israeli civilians on Saturday. These courageous so-called resistance fighters assaulted a music festival…read more>>
Factions on the Left Set Up Camp in the Abyss, October 11, 2023. I began the morning with research for an article about Netanyahu, Hamas, and the West Bank. That project was sidetracked for the time being by the words and actions of what others are calling the pro-Hamas left, and I do not have a better name for it, whose members appear to be in competition to outdo one anther in juvenile expressions of solidarity…read more>>
This Is Not Self-Defense. October 13, 2023. Events overtake us. On October 7 and October 8 and October 9 my tears were for victims of Hamas. My heart was with them. Like many others I recoiled in revulsion and despair…read more>>
Keep the faith
Stand with Ukraine.
yr obdt svt
