God in Ruins

Understanding Poverty

I read Ruby Payne's book A Framework for Understanding Poverty hoping that it would provide me with some compassionate understanding for people who I see everyday that are other from me (see post from 9/7/05).  Ruby Payne is an educator who married a husband from poverty and has worked in both affluent schools and impoverished schools.  Her book is an in-depth look at the invisible rules separating three cultures that exist simultaneously in America, but are unfortunately looked at as separated only by economic differences:  the poverty culture, the middle-class culture, and the affluent culture.

Payne's book popped up on my radar at the perfect time. I have neighbors who would be classified as in poverty. I want to feel compassion for them, but it's hard not to feel anything besides rage when I have to slam on my brakes to avoid hitting a kid who's parent is on the front porch sucking on a bottle of beer. But I want to understand because although it's harder to see a life in all of it's complexity, it's necessary to feel sympathy for somebody else; to see that there really is a connection between them and me.

Some points I found interesting in Payne's book (these are generalizations but help to put some structure around the intangible qualities of poverty, middle-class, and affluent cultures):

• Situational poverty or affluency is a present circumstance brought on by a change in events and is different from generational poverty or affluency, which has innate cultural rules.

• Living in poverty is quantified by living for the present moment (i.e. buying food for the day, paying only the bills that are being collected on, valuing a person who is entertaining because entertainment is relief from the struggle of the present)

• Middle-class living is often geared toward the future (i.e. buying food for the week, understanding 30 year mortgages and credit ratings, valuing a person's stability/consistency)

• Affluent living has a strong emphasis on the past (i.e. food is a process of refining tastes, family assets are to be maintained and cultivated, value on a person's lineage and status)

The point she made that I keep coming back to in my mind is that in order for a person to make the shift from one class to another, that person will need at least one of four things:

1) To be in a situation that is unbearable.
2) A gift or skill that propels them out of their class.
3) A strong belief in the promise of a better life down the road.
4) A guide/mentor to show them how to live in the new class.

Why is one of those things necessary to make a cultural shift? Because, as a concentration camp survivor once said, humans are capable of getting used to anything. So, even if I grow up in a home with an alcoholic, non-existent father and a mother working two jobs who dresses me in dirty clothes and leaves me to be abused by my cousins, it is the world I know. To leave the world I know and live a middle-class life centered around stability means that, for a year or two, this new life will feel awkward and uncomfortable.

I don't think the four things one needs to switch classes is exclusive to social class. In my experience, I needed two of those things (promise of a better life and a mentor) to make the break from a dysfunctional family into building healthy relationships with my wife and child (an ongoing process). Although it seems to defy logic, for somebody who grew up in chaos, stability and order feel wrong. My wife can testify that I've found myself in phases of stability trying to beat that stability with a bat because it feels wrong and strange.

I've met artists with similar talents, but wildly different abilities to cope with life. Some handle the lean and plenty lifestyle like they were made for it and others flog themselves throught the lean times. I wonder if the difference is a mentor. In my experience, a mentor is not one of those things adopted to suit our lifestyle, like eating organic or taking up yoga, but a mentor is a guide that leads me out of just surviving into a life that is worth living.

Soderbergh and the Cuban

(Also posted on SpoutBlog)

  So a lot of folks are feeling the sting of change with the upcoming release of Steven Soderbergh's new film Bubble, his first of six features he'll be making as part of Mark Cuban's plan for disrupting the movie industry. I think some of the outcry around releasing Bubble simultaneously in theaters, on DVD, and on the Internet is perfectly understandable. Change is always painful. Just ask those studio moguls who thought "Talkies" would never take off.

Soderbergh is quoted as saying, "Everything changes and evolves and we've got to get with it, embrace it and find a way to make it work."

Richard Johnson at Page 6 published an article yesterday to make the point that Soderbergh's track record of films that have not made money nullify him from being able to comment on the industry. The Reeler has justly rushed to the defense of those numbers to prove that Soderbergh has made more money than Page 6 claims, but I think an important point in this argument has been overlooked.

Soderbergh is an artist who knows that in order to make a film in the system that gives him the freedom to experiment (see Full Frontal), he has to do it on the cheap. Johnson throws out all of these big budgets that didn't make their weight back in the box-office to prove that Soderbergh doesn't have a mind for business. I would say he's got a mind for the business, but more importantly he has a mind for the art of making film.

  Conventional wisdom would say that a large budget for a film equals a happier director, but I think Soderbergh has learned that, in fact, less money often equals more freedom. A huge budget, for an artist, can make him feel like the Grinch's little pooch with an antler strapped to his head trying in vain to haul a sleigh overloaded with toys up the mountain, and all the while the Grinch is cracking a whip across his furry tail.

The numbers quoted in the Page 6 article just go to show me that Soderbergh is familiar with the sting of the lash and he is looking for the next evolution. The evolution when the war between business and art returns to a more healthy balance and frees him up to be less business executive and more artist.

Spout

This has been one busy week for this guy and I apologize for the lack of sharing on my part. For those of you who are curious about the elusive company I work for and what we've been working on, we've got a blog up so we can start chatting with the public. Take a gander: http://spoutblog.com

Time to Review

Karina Longworth has a review for Thumbsucker (opening tonight) on cinematical.com. She describes it has a thoroughly humorous, revealing, and an all around satisfying experience. I haven't seen the film, but just the first two paragraphs of her review got my thinking. She compares two recent independent films dealing with the frequently explored subject matter of suburban teenagers coming of age:

"[Mysterious Skin] was the story of suburban teenagers trying to figure out how to be sexual beings whilst hiding dark, terrible secrets; [Thumbsucker] is the story of suburban teenagers trying to figure out how to be sexual beings, when their desires alone feel like dark, terrible, secrets. It's not hard to turn tragedy into comedy; a stroke of the mundane is all it takes."

Isn't it great to see a few words bring such clarity to something so true? When was the last time you talked about junior high? Were you laughing or crying? Were you laughing so hard you were crying? Maybe you were crying so hard you had to laugh? Tragedy and comedy make love in strange positions.

In contrast, a giant color photograph covering Tuesday's Life Section of USA Today depicted Gwyneth Paltrow and Hope Davis striking a "sister, sister" pose. The article revolves around the film Proof, which also opens tonight. But what is the article about? Hope Davis and Gwyneth having a girl moment in the make-up room. Yesterday, my friend Dave showed me an article about how Hollywood movies premier in New York because the Press in NY turns out for the red carpet showcase and then, basically, they go home. The showing of the film is irrelevant.

Apparently, the thing to do now is show up in the make-up room before the celebs step onto the red carpet. That's where the scoop is. And what's the scoop? Two gorgeous women who seem to really like each other. They swap mom advice and how to feed babies a macrobiotic diet. In fact, they like each other so much it's as if they're really sisters, like they are in this film called Proof which is about something or other that is basically really deep.

I'm paraphrasing, obviously, but that actually is the gist of this article. Hope Davis is the seasoned, talented (truly talented: About Schmidt, The Secret Lives of Dentists) and Paltrow is the check-out aisle tabloid fixture who can put a baby product company into the black by pushing around their stroller. And these two are now friends. Top story.

Both articles are about a high profile art house film. They are just film reviews. But one took me somewhere genuine and one left me with the mental after-taste of a piece of Bubbilicious. I think they reveal to me the power of an individual voice and, in the case of Cinematical, the potential of blogging to set those voices free.

Some days it feels like even a film review is in desperate need of freedom.

Sentimental Sufjan

I went to see Sufjan Stevens play last night.  He is on his Come On Feel the Illinoise tour for his recent album, Illinois, an album devoted to the state of Illinois.  I left telling myself  I wouldn't write a post about it because it feels cliche to see a concert and blog about it right afterward.  Plus, most of what I took away from that concert I haven't really been able to put into words yet.  I got this intangible feeling that seemed to come from the clarity of sound emanating from the stage.  Yeah, that's the best description I've got right now.

I wouldn't be writing anything about this concert if it weren't for the Cassavetes book I've been nibbling on.  When we left last night's show my wife mentioned something about how our country feels ready for an album like Sufjan's.  She couldn't put it into words, but I think she wanted to say what John Cassavetes once said,

I wish we weren't so hard-boiled.  The human spirit is really at a dangerously low ebb.  We need to pump adrenaline into our sentimental values, which have become so badly depleted.

I love that phrase, "sentimental values."  It's not talking about patriotism, it's not about good deeds or shopping at Sears.  It says to me, "We may not be the coolest people in the world, but we have some genuine feelings and if a feeling is genuine, it has value.  Whether it's sentimental or not."

I think that by celebrating the state of Illinois and its people, Sufjan has done something to free us up.  He has allowed our sentimentality for country and one another to no longer feel like the geek in our soul standing by the punch-bowl, wanting badly to need to pee so he can leave the dance floor.  My sentimental geek can bust an ass-clenchingly sweet move on the dance floor if he wants to.

Head in my ass.

Looking back, I suspect I may have had my head up my own ass in that last post.  In a dark moment, I wondered in my last post if I am making a difference.  Of course I'm making a difference!  Geez, I'm so ridiculous.

Every once in a while I meet a young person, usually a filmmaker, who's aspirations go beyond making film into "changing the world."  Quite often as I dig a little deeper in conversation, I start to realize that this person is completely wrapped up in changing the world, but has done next to nothing when it comes to changing his or her self.  I am suddenly reminded of a description about a guy I met from one of our mutual acquaintances, "he loves revolution, but not relationships."

I have come to believe that setting out to change the world is signing up for disappointment.  The world is vast and its systems have evolved over millions of years of humans interacting with it.  I don't go out and just "change the world."  But in changing myself, I can not help but change those I interact with.  It's like yanking on a chain link fence.  I may only have the ability to grab one link, but when I yank on it the whole fence reverberates.  In changing myself, in pushing toward a life filled with vitality, I change the world.

In fact, I'm constantly changing the world.  To think that nothing I do makes a difference is one of the most deceitful illusions I can fall victim to.  I am always effecting the world around me for better or for worse.  One of the most selfish things I can do is get caught up spinning around in my own mind wondering if I make a difference or not, and thus rob the people around me of myself.  I get so stuck on revoltuion I forget that all I have are relationships.

What got me thinking about this?  None other than old Kieslowski.  Watch the end of episode 7 of The Decalogue and you will see a much better illustration of what I'm talking about than I can write here.

The Seer

I am continuing through The Decalogue and in doing so I think it is fair to say that Kieslowski is revealing more to me than I signed up for.

Each of the 10 episodes has its own two or three central characters.  Sometimes these characters pop up briefly in other episodes.  These appearances are sometimes pivotal to the story and other times they are not.  Contrary to what I'd expect, the appearances that are not pivotal are most haunting to me.  Because I know from other episodes what has happened to a character, when that past character simply gets on an elevator during the current story and then gets off, I have an intimate sense of the weight that character is carrying around.

The reality of the central apartment complex in The Decalogue is that all of the various characters cross paths without ever knowing each other's suffering going on behind closed doors.  The reality of that world and the reality of my world are overlapping in ways that make me squirm. 

I live on a pleasant street in a pleasant house.  Down the street is an unpleasant family.  There are two little kids in this family and two parents.  Grandma owns the house but doesn't live there.  So her son and daughter-in-law live there rent free with their kids.  The kids raise themselves.  Mom and Dad never really come out.  In two years they've never looked at me or said, "hi," even though their two kids play on my porch all of the time.  It is rumored that a lot of drugs are used in the house and, to be honest, it would be a shock if the rumors weren't true.  It is also rumored that the father married the mother when he was 25 and she was 15.  The implications that may have for his daughter is something the whole neighborhood wonders about.  It is also rumored that this grandma (who may be the true villain of this situation) works at Child Protective Services and has intercepted past calls concerning her grandchildren.  I could go on about how the kids are never bathed or that many times we've seen them on the sidewalk well after dark and they still haven't eaten.  But listing all of the details would make for a really long post.

I may never have thought twice about how life on my little block overlaps with Kieslowski's apartment complex but for the most mysterious character in the series, the only one to appear in almost every episode.  He appears in different guises, but he never says anything.  For him the rules of time and space do not apply.  Much debate has happened around this character.  Is he God?  Is he a conscience?  Is he the physical manifestation of their emotional core?  For me, he is the only character who can see past the surface and into the suffering of everybody else's life.  I believe this "Seer" character is me because he and I (the audience) are the only ones seeing omnisciently what goes on in the lives on screen.

But when the episodes end, the Seer is gone.  And I'm left with my life the way it was before I pressed "play" on my remote control.  I'm again one of those other characters who can not see into the secret lives surrounding him.

So I try playing with the kids down the street.  We go on walks, my wife gives them snacks.  I want to fucking rise above this body and mind and see if anything I do is making a difference for these kids because it really doesn't feel like it.  I envy this Seer character because he can see and I can not.  But I'll be honest, in the same token I don't want to be the Seer in my neighborhood because it makes my life so much easier to never know what goes on in that house down the street.

Man.  I can think of no clean way to end this post.