“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”Shakespeare thought so. Gogol Ganguli might disagree.
Gogol: So I’m two inches away from her. Her luscious lips part. Just as I’m about to kiss her, she looks at me and she says, “What’s your name?” Friend: Gogol Ganguli. Gogol: End of seduction 101.
In director Mira Nair’s film The Namesake, an adaptation of the novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jhumpa Lahiri, Gogol struggles to reconcile his American upbringing with his Indian heritage, as well as a name that represents neither and both at the same time.
Kal Penn, currently seen as one of the new fellows on House and best known as the stoner on a quest in Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, takes a serious turn in The Namesake while demonstrating the same considerable charm.
Though it’s his character referenced in the title of The Namesake, for the first part of the film Gogol is nothing more than the name of his father Ashoke’s favourite author, Russian oddball Nikolai Gogol. The movie’s core is really the love story between Ashoke (Irfann Khan) and Ashima (Tabu), whose quiet devotion acts later as a counterpoint to their American son’s more expressive romances.
Our first glimpse of Ashoke has him reading the collected stories of Gogol just as the train he’s riding in derails. Ashima we meet as a young woman trying on the newly recovered Ashoke’s shoes just before the meeting that will lead to her marrying and accompanying this unknown man to New York.
As they get to know each other, their love becomes obvious but unspoken, and we follow them through a span of about 25 years and two children. The Bengali family lives their lives in two countries and two cultures, returning often to the warmth and colour of Calcutta, and lamenting what they’ve lost in their new life as much as they appreciate what they’ve gained.
One of the most obvious losses is the gap between their more traditional ideals and their Americanized children’s, particularly when Gogol distances himself from his family to the point of rejecting the name that represents the life his father might never have had, after that train wreck. (“We all came out of Gogol’s Overcoat,” Ashoke quotes.)
His parents had given him the name Gogol as a baby while waiting for inspiration for his proper name, Nikhil. While a five-year-old Gogol decides to keep that nickname, a teenaged Gogol regrets it. So adult Gogol becomes Nick, and Nick becomes a stylish, successful young man becoming part of his rich white girlfriend’s parents before ever introducing her to his own.
He doesn’t so much want to turn his back on his family or heritage as to be recognized as someone other than simply the product of them. But small, telling moments show that he is not always wholly accepted as a product of the country he was born in, either, and because of that he is in fact a part of both and neither at the same time.
One of the movie’s biggest weaknesses is that it feels very much like an adaptation of a book. The story has an episodic feel to it, with some of those episodes getting short shrift. Particularly underdeveloped is Gogol’s later relationship with a sexy Bengali woman, Moushumi (Mo), who first appears to be more his match, and who has chosen a third culture, French, to embrace. It’s an interesting but largely unexplored theme, the identity that is created from coming from one place, living in another, and embracing the otherness of a third.
But Mira Nair (Mississippi Masala, Vanity Fair) is a filmmaker with a lush visual style, and The Namesake is full of scenes beautiful both for their artistry and for their affecting character moments. A scene of a mature Gogol trying on his father’s shoes echoes the earlier scene of a young Ashima, and airports become magical or heartbreaking gateways between two worlds. She makes us care about these characters even when their stories aren’t explored as much as they could be.
The DVD extras include a commentary with Nair, a few deleted scenes that give a bit more time to Mo, and a brief segment called “In Character with Kal Penn,” in which the actor is too erudite to be mistaken for Kumar as he insists that Gogol is comfortable with his identity but not the assumptions others make about it. (In a nice touch, given the themes of the movie, Penn is credited twice for The Namesake, under Kal Penn as Gogol, and under his birth name, Kalpen Modi, as Nikhil.)
In addition, “Anatomy of The Namesake” is a well-titled half-hour documentary dissecting the filmmaking process for a class at Columbia University. Director and producer Mira Nair is joined by others on her team to talk about everything from the vision of the film to financing to post-production. The detail is mind-numbing to a casual film fan like me who’s interested in behind the scenes machinations but can’t be bothered to understand exactly what a bond company is. Despite that, this is the kind of niche extra I think DVDs should do more often, in this case offering budding filmmakers a mini lesson.
The Namesake isn’t as tightly woven or ultimately satisfying a story as I’d have liked, but the warm, funny, touching film uses a specific immigrant experience to illuminate universal themes of family, identity, and loss, which made following its meandering path through the lives of these characters rewarding.
Nic Harcourt, music director of KCRW and host of the best-named music show ever, Morning Becomes Eclectic, as well as music supervisor of the short-lived but much-loved Love Monkey, released his top ten albums of 2007 (wait, is the year over already? What the hell happened to November?!)
One is Radiohead’s experiment in online distribution, In Rainbows (which looks like it will no longer be available for a pay-what-you-like download after Dec. 10). I’ll have to check out some of the other top nine I’ve never heard of, but #9 is Once, which I raved about earlier. Well, I raved about the movie, but I meant the album too. Check out a clip below, or see Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova sing Into the Mystic during their recent visit to Harcourt’s show.
Every once in a while, I see a lovely little movie that makes me happy every time I think of it. Nothing mind blowing, just a perfectly charming film that captivates me. Onceis one of those movies.
I knew next to nothing about it before watching it, other than it was a Sundance success and told a love story through music (though it’s a musical in The Commitments sense, not in the Chicago sense where people burst into song for no apparent reason). The plot unfolds in unsurprising but also unconventional ways, so I won’t ruin it for anyone else by saying much more than that.
Written and directed by John Carney, Once pairs Glen Hansard — one of The Commitments and part of the real-life band The Frames — with Czech singer-songwriter Markéta Irglová in her first acting role. He’s character-actor attractive, but if I’d only seen a picture of her, I would have thought she was plain but pleasant looking. In motion, full of personality, she’s gorgeous. Her voice is hauntingly beautiful, as is the music she and Hansard co-wrote for the film, complementing his rougher tone. Entertainment Weekly says they are/were a real-life item, and as you can tell, I might be a little in love with both of them, too.
I had to go to iTunes to get the soundtrack after seeing Once, though the music is not the only thing to recommend it. These are characters you know, you care about, in a tale that feels fresh and true. Still, for a taste of what I’m talking about, here’s some live performances of music from the film:
Falling Slowly, performed on Letterman:
If You Want Me (my favourite track, but this has terrible video – good audio, though)
For a behind-the-scenes geek like me, The TV Set is a fun movie about the process of making television … and sucking the creative spirit out of a show before it gets to air.
As the opening credits state, networks commission hundreds of scripts each year, only a small fraction of which are produced as pilots. Of that small fraction, only a quarter are picked up for the fall season. The TV Set is the story of one such pilot.
Written and directed by Jake Kasdan (Orange County), it’s executive produced by his dad Lawrence Kasdan (The Big Chill) as well as Judd Apatow (Freaks and Geeks, Undeclared, Knocked Up), a man who knows something about the struggle to make quality television.
David Duchovny plays Mike Klein, the writer of what I presume is supposed to be a drama with comedic overtones. In his original script, a young man and woman reconnect when he returns home for the funeral of his brother, who committed suicide. The network head, a deliciously horrible Sigourney Weaver, whose favoured child is the reality show Slut Wars, pushes for a broadly comedic lead actor, fears the audience will think suicide is depressing, and complains the character’s mother comes across as too sad. About her dead son.
Klein finds his soul and his show chipped away at bit by bit, as he moans “I’m making the world more mediocre” to his very pregnant wife (Justine Bateman), who is supportive with limits. Her bulging belly makes him acutely aware that taking a bold creative stand won’t support his family. Judy Greer, Ioan Gruffudd, and Lucy Davis are among the other familiar faces in the cast.
The TV Set is the fictional story of one script’s journey through the pilot process, and I happened to see it just as we’re seeing the successes and failures — mostly failures, it looks like — of the current crop of pilots-become-series, and just as I’ve become aware of the first news about pilots for the next television season.
One such announcement shocks me as much as it thrills me. John Doyle of the Globe and Mail breaks the news that Intelligence is being remade as a pilot for FOX, co-produced by Canada’s own Haddock Entertainment and John Wells Productions (yes, the John Wells who broke my beloved West Wing, but even I can’t deny his track record).
Since Intelligence was a surprise second-season renewal after suffering from low ratings even for a CBC series, and is more akin to The Wire, a critically acclaimed show that hasn’t been a ratings blockbuster for Showtime, than to 24, I would never have guessed Kevin Reilly would see it the potential for success on his network. But since it will have to be retooled drastically for an American viewpoint anyway, I’m sure it will end up bearing little resemblance to The Wire and more to, say, a John Wells production. And all 17 Canadians who watched Intelligence here can feel superior that we embraced the original, more intelligent version.
However, bearing in mind the lesson of The TV Set, the fact that a pilot has been ordered is a far different thing from a guarantee that the show will wind up on the FOX schedule.
The second announcement should probably make me happier than it does. It seems the USA network is turning Thank You For Smoking into a series. According to the annoyingly written Variety:
TV take — which will likely go by a different title — will pick up where the 2006 feature left off. Nick Naylor, having kicked some of his more evil lobbyist habits, will use his rhetorical skills to help people more deserving of aid. … “He’ll live somewhere between the morally ambiguous character of the movie and Robin Hood,” said USA programming chief Jeff Wachtel.
I loved Thank You For Smoking, but it was a brilliantly complete film, I thought. A lesson I learned from my childhood obsession with Anne of Green Gables is that a great work is not improved on by going back to the well over and over again, and by the time you get to Rilla of Ingleside, the magic has been sucked out.
More importantly, I don’t want to see Nick Naylor as Robin Hood. And after watching The TV Set, it’s hard to have faith that the show will end up being faithful to the vision of the original creator. That is, if the idea makes it to script, and then to pilot, and then to series, so it’s a little early to be worrying about it now.
Chris has an Internet show filled with kitties and puppies and cuteness and snark. Yes, all coexisting peacefully. He’s on a mission to make viewer Craig and his lookalike kitty an Internet sensation. This is Craig:
This is Chris:
Rilo Kiley
You can listen to Rilo Kiley’s new album free on MySpace right now and read a Q&A with singer/songwriter Jenny Lewis by the LA Times.
Kitty Haiku
My brother found this kitty haiku which is eerily similar to my kitty’s evolution. He was always affectionate, but fairly wild when he first adopted me 15 years ago. He’d come screaming around the corner with all 24 claws and however many teeth exposed to attack. Once that was over and your arms were shredded, he’d be ready for cuddles. Now, he’s just a giant ball of mush.
Musicovery
This is cool. Discover new music depending on your mood and preferences.
Siskel and Ebert
The Balcony Archive is now online. Watch them bicker like an old married couple. Ah, the good old days of the two thumbs.
Friend of the blog Denis McGrath over at Dead Things on Sticks recently posted a couple of links to articles that both use 9/11 as a dividing line in the entertainment world, two articles that, like matter and anti-matter, cannot coexist in the same space without causing complete annihilation — at least, of the grey matter in my brain.
If you believe journalist Kate Taylor, who writes about discovering Seinfeld recently, post-9/11 we’ve been awakened and aren’t as able to process anything that focuses on trivial minutia (“You can also observe that these are people who can afford to worry about pizza cooks who don’t wash their hands because they aren’t worrying about terrorist attacks”). So I guess that’s why now, important movies such as I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry and The Simpsons Movie are blockbusters, and the top TV programs are American Idol and Dancing with the Stars.
If you believe filmmaker Tom DiCillo, who talks about how his movies are too important for the unwashed masses, yadda yadda yadda, post-9/11 we’ve been numbed and aren’t able to process anything meaningful or emotional (“Look at the movies people are watching. They’re about nothing. You invest nothing. People can’t invest real emotion because it’s too terrifying”). So I guess that’s why post-9/11, we watch silly movies like The Passion of the Christ and A Beautiful Mind, while pre-9/11, important movies such as Titanic and Home Alone were king. Not to mention that World War II must have been a walk in the park, which is why Americans could emotionally engage with the war-related themes of The Best Years of Our Lives in 1946, enough to propel it onto the top 100 all-time American movie box office earners.
I have two words for both: Hog and wash.
This kind of thinking is part of a trend: grasping for trends where there are none, or, more accurately, where there are multiple, mutually exclusive possibilities that each could make a plausible trend. Trend stories are popular because they seem to make sense. They’re interesting. They make us feel smarter for reading them. But they’re all too often pseudo-analysis, making connections between events seem likely because they present an unsubstantiated opinion and exclude all contrary arguments.
9/11 has changed the audience’s appetite? Show me the information that would suggest that’s true, data that would not hold up if you made the same argument for any random year being the year everything changed.
Immediately post-9/11, things did change, as Americans and Hollywood tried to regain their footing. Movie images of the twin towers were digitally removed from skylines. There were suggestions the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie Collateral Damage would never be released because the public couldn’t stomach the terrorism theme. When it was, mere months later, it seemed more likely we couldn’t stomach another lousy movie.
Today, that same public laps up 24’s terrorist themes every week. We watch dumb movies and TV. We watch clever movies and TV. Just as we did on Sept. 10, 2001, except now, very occasionally, those stories try to make sense of the aftermath of the day after that.
What does it mean, to say a movie or a show isn’t about anything, anyway? Even The Simpsons Movie has at its core a message not just about Spiderpigs, but about family and community. Does a movie have to have pretensions to greatness or obscurity to be meaningful?
Seinfeld famously called itself a show about nothing, but it was really a show about everything that makes us the neurotic human beings we are. In our daily lives, even post-9/11, most of us don’t walk around talking about the impact of world events on our psyches and politicoeconomic systems. We don’t face situations like being stranded on a tropical island. We talk about bad customer service and make snotty comments about other people. We search endlessly for a good parking space.
I never imagined I’d compare Jane Austen to Seinfeld, but it reminds me of the usual criticism of Austen: that her works are Harlequin romances in the literature section. Those critics miss her ironic commentary on society because she’s writing about the small scale of a particular social class’s domestic life rather than large scale of political or social unrest. She wrote about the only places where the women in that society existed. That’s hardly trivial. Seinfeld wrote about the small scale of people’s inner lives, in all their messy, selfish, trivial glory. That’s no small achievement, either.
Can you really say that Seinfeld wouldn’t work post-9/11 because it focuses on pizza makers not washing their hands, when we have more important things to worry about now? How about when you introduce the fact that the fart- and sex-joke filled Two and a Half Men is the top sitcom today?
Can you really say that movies used to be more meaningful pre-9/11, when we’re talking about Star Wars: The Phantom Menace and Jurassic Park versus Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest?
If you really think you can, excuse me while the remainder of my brain explodes on you.
