Bad Lit’s Beautiful and Damned review!

The first review of The Beautiful and Damned and its a goody.

From Bad Lit. See here.

“The key to Richard Wolstencroft’s adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s sophomore novel The Beautiful and Damned comes during one of the early, numerous party scenes. In the scene, one of the party-goers announces to Anthony Patch (Ross Ditcham) that he knows exactly what the lower classes need, a nice strong fascist hand to whip them into shape. Then he bends his head over for another snort of cocaine.

Of course, the “lower classes” don’t really show up in The Beautiful & Damned, so why they need whipping who knows. But it’s clear who really needs the sharp stick of fascism in the eye: The rich and degenerate. The idea of “transcendental fascism” is one that Wolstencroft explores much in his theoretical writing. Yet, the film clearly addresses his favored subject by making it practically completely absent from his screenplay.

The plot follows the carefree exploits of trust fund baby Anthony Patch, who gets by in life by living off of an extravagant allowance given to him by his grandfather, Adam Patch (Norman Yemm). In order to get his money, Anthony must provide weekly status updates proving that he’s a productive member of society. However, he ends up just bullshitting his way through a cockamamie plan to write a nonfiction book about the young heroes of WWII. Grandpa knows he’s being bullshitted, but he never cuts off the funnel of money, probably thinking his grandson’s wanton ways are just a youthful phase.

However, Anthony’s has much more sinister ideas. Oh, he’s too much of a coward to kill the old man and receive his inheritance. But, figuring the old dude doesn’t have much longer to live, Anthony plans to live as decadently as he wants with his slutty wife, Gloria Gilbert (Kristen Condon), and just wait until Grandpa croaks to get his mitts on the family fortune.

None of these motivations or assumptions about the characters’ behavior is ever explicitly discussed through the dialogue. Instead, the film barrels along from one debauched scene after another.  But the real genius of the film is how it’s themes and subtext pop up through the casually tossed off line or action, knitting together scenes that race from their abrupt beginnings to their equally abrupt endings. The hyper-kinetic pacing ingeniously hides the more serious contemplations of the subject matter.

Also interestingly, Wolstencroft has taken the Jazz Age setting of Fitzgerald’s novel, which also took place in NYC, and has successfully updated it to a modern day Melbourne, Australia — Wolstencroft’s hometown. This speaks to Fitzgerald’s universal truths about the upper class, but at the same time instead of making the film completely modern, through the set design and costuming, particularly of the Patches, Wolstencroft does retain a Fitzgerald sense of style. It’s clear by the Patches’ old homesteads that their money is old money and that grandpa is trying to hold his grip on the illusion that the world is still like his simpler, less morally bankrupt “good ol’ days.” If he only knew what his grandson was really up to.

Actually, eventually grandpa does find out, which instigates the most dramatic portion of the film when the young Anthony faces the possibility of being cut out of the family will. With no skills to be of any use to society, Anthony becomes a very desperate man to regain his unearned fortune.

As a main character, Anthony goes beyond being a cipher and is a bit of a bland blank. Typically, this would work as a detriment to a film, but here the characterization works in his favor because we keep wishing he will eventually grow a pair and fight for something in his pathetically tragic life. There’s a brief glimmer of Anthony having a reasonable moral center during a hilarious and frightening scene where he encounters the director and star of rape videos, played by a terrifically menacing Wolstencroft himself. A life of fun and games is perfectly fine as long as nobody gets hurt, right?

But plenty of people get hurt in The Beautiful and Damned. Yes, physically, but mostly emotionally. However, the characters’ psychic scars and open wounds run so deep, they accept them as an everyday normalcy. To Anthony, he feels his “damnation” comes when he’s forced to live like an average commoner, yet he’s completely oblivious to the hell on Earth he aimlessly wanders through and, if he used his inheritance wisely, could have easily escaped from.

Without having read the original source material, as I have not, it’s impossible to tell how much Wolstencroft has changed and updated, except for the obvious, of course. For example, I doubt Fitzgerald wrote about rape videos. Yet, using that source material for his own vision of The Beautiful and Damned, Richard Wolstencroft has crafted an originally terrifying vision of rampant amorality among the so-called “upper” class.”

An Open Letter on the State of the Australian Film Industry (preview)

The following is going into the MUFF X catalogue (with maybe minor alterations). We will then be inviting people to sign it online at: muff.com.au and then we will send it to the various Ministers and funding bodies, etc. Thoughts? Suggestions? You have to Sunday night to make them…

An Open Letter on the State of the Australian Film Industry
Drafted by Australian filmmakers, industry practitioners and cinema-lovers

August 1, 2009
As members of the Australian film industry we can no longer sit idly by and watch our nation’s cinema continue to slide into critical and commercial obscurity. The Australian Government’s bureaucratic infrastructure is failing the Australian film industry, and it is unaccountable to anyone for its failure. It invites feedback, but does not listen to it, and thereby proves itself unaccountable. Its lack of response to criticism when change is so obviously needed and should be actioned is symptomatic of this unaccountability. We need new ideas for innovation, rebirth and vitality in the Australian film industry. We need to stand together, and be counted, in support of real change in the local film industry and culture, and to bring new ideas to bear on a system that has been out of control for many years.
We demand change in the Australian film industry. The changes we suggest are canvassed below.
The current, perpetual crisis in Australian film has been well documented by the Australian media. Much coverage has been afforded to the crisis on network television and in the country’s newspapers, most notably in The Age, whose film critic, the courageous Jim Schembri, has tackled the debate head on.  The issue of industry failure has also been covered in alternative/grassroots venues and publications: the Melbourne and Sydney Underground Film Festivals, The Bazura Project on Melbourne’s Channel 31, the world-renowned cinema journal Senses of Cinema, and countless cinema blogs. Two independent documentary projects about the Australian film industry crisis are currently being produced: Into the Shadows and Nothing but the Struth. Last year, Film Victoria even held a summit on the crisis called Mindshift.
Needless to say, we have seen no actionable changes.
The industry crisis has also been the subject of much obloquy in private discussions, not only between filmmakers and industry insiders, but also among members of the general public; those people who, faced with the decision between seeing an American film at the cinema and an Australian one, will doubtless turn to their partner and say: “Better not risk it.” These people want change: they want a dynamic and exciting Australian film industry.
And we, the undersigned, think it is long overdue that we gave it to them.
Australian filmmakers, industry practitioners, cinema-goers, and the mainstream and underground media are all in agreement: there is major problem with our film industry that needs to be addressed at both state and federal levels.
The issues concerning what to do about the continuing failure of the Australian film industry have been hotly debated. From these debates a consensus for action has been forming over time, and its broad outline, and our demand that it be acknowledged and addressed, is the reason we have compiled this document.
We wish to outline twelve steps, like those of Alcoholic’s Anonymous or some other recovery program, to wean Australian filmmakers and the funding bodies off their addiction to unentertaining, uninteresting, unworthy movies.  We insist on change in the Australian film industry: even if only six of these twelve steps were to be actioned, it could well lead to a Renaissance once again in Australian cinema, and not a continued fall from grace out of the world cinema spotlight and increasingly towards critical insignificance.
We make these suggestions humbly, and with the hope that it open channels for real discussion and actioning of these matters, that can follow the tabling and publishing of this document. We wish only to encourage, foster and make possible change in the Australian film industry.
Our demanded agenda for change is as follows:
1.    Genre and Commercial Filmmaking. It is suggested that many, many more genre films be produced in this country; more, indeed, than sensitive, politically correct ‘art-house’ fare that has been force-fed to the public since the end of the 80’s. By genre we mean horror, action, sci-fi, crime, comedy and erotica. We believe that an embrace of genre filmmaking at the higher levels of film financing and government decision-making will see those who work within the Australia film industry embrace ideas of profitability and marketability, especially beyond our shores. We want a national and international cinema of genre that embraces commercial values and has distinct markets in mind for the product.
2.    Accountability. For to long in the Australian film industry the people who make the decisions for the yearly flops and failures are not in any way held accountable for their failures. There exists a professional class who somehow consider themselves beyond the failure or not of our film industry. Given that they purely exist at the behest of our national cinema, this situation should be promptly corrected. The names of board and committee members behind funding decisions should be added to the credits of government-funded films, listed there as either executive producers or, even better, precisely what they are: the persons responsible. That way, massive flops and errors can be publicly traced to their source. Similarly, ongoing reviews of the decision-making standards of the various boards and committees should be initiated. The same accountability should be applied to failed directors and producers who haven’t had a hit since the 80’s.
3.    Supporting the alternative industry. The most popular and successful Australian films are very often those that no one in Australia sees. They are privately funded and tend towards either low-budget Ozploitation filmmaking or difficult experimental, avant-garde and documentary work. These films are confronting, both locally and internationally. A new fund to support such already-established and emerging independent talent is required. It is necessary to reward that which is daring, confrontational and relevant. Rethinking and rebooting Indivision with a much more daring brief, state and federal funding bodies must combine in their efforts to establish a $5 million fund. This fund should make seven to ten $500,000-$1 million features per annum, selected by a regularly rotating board of Ozploitation, industry and genre luminaries. Australia could produce eight to ten new low-budget features yearly, with that number to expand as their commercial success becomes self-evident. The aim? To get new blood into the film industry each year. While not all of these films will work, many will. Not all will have to be Ozploitation. Indeed, some should be avant-garde works and more challenging art films than are currently produced. From The Horseman to The Ister, anything is possible. We must turn work around quickly and cheaply with an ear to being inventive and innovative.
4.    Reward talent and success. Any filmmaker who enjoys a commercial or critical hit should immediately receive funding for their next project, which is to be produced within twelve months. The budget for this second film must be significantly higher. The era of successful filmmakers languishing in development hell for a decade must end.
5.    More money invested in the promotion of Australian films. The establishment of an office within Screen Australia that will promote Australian films both locally and internationally is required.
6.    An end to political correctness and “Australian content” prerequisites and biases in both the industry and in funding bodies.
7.    A celebration of the diversity of techniques available to filmmakers. From low budget guerrilla films to large budget and special effects movies, all film forms musts be celebrated.
8.    A change in industry methodology. There needs to be a cultural shift within the funding bodies that sees them move away from their currently prescriptive role to one of discovery. Instead of imposing upon the industry their own prejudices and biases, both about cinema and otherwise, film finance bureaucrats must learn to search for new ideas, styles, marketing and distribution opportunities; learn to recognise innovation; learn to celebrate diversity by allowing for a slate of pictures than embrace all budgets, genres and approaches.
9.    Getting distributors involved in the process of selection and approval for new productions. This is key and would be greatly assisted by provisions making in necessary to devote part of a film’s budget to be spent on helping to promote Australian cinema more broadly.
Signed
Richard Wolstencroft

and…

Uncut “15 seconds” Interview from If magazine

I was interviewed by Simon De Bruyn of If Magazine for their section “15 seconds” recently. Here is the uncut text of the interview, too long, or controversial, to publish. Enjoy! Thanks to Simon for being a MUFF supporting guy at IF.

1. The biggest issue facing the Australian film industry is…
Becoming relevant, becoming more financially viable in its returns, overthrowing and replacing some of the tried and worn out people currently running it, recognising new young talent, halting giving most of the funding money to failures (some from 20 years ago), enacting a new low budget fund to make 10 to 20 new half million to a million dollar Indy features each year – selected from the best talent from all fests including MUFF, SUFF and Revelation, fostering the new wave of Ozploitation by further pursuing edgy genre filmmaking, stop making  so many political correct and mandated Aussie content movies (…that no one really wants to see anyway!) that are better suited as Sunday afternoon ABC TV movies (Black Balloon, Somersault, Esther Blue Burger, September, My Year Without Sex, etc.)…
2. Favourite film of all time:
Impossible, I love to many, it’s a religion with me…see MUFF, or my blog Idea Fix …recent recommended viewing of old and new Huston’s Wise Blood, Martyrs, Bret Ellis’ The Informers (directed by Gregor Jordan), Wings Hauser in Vice Squad, Ellie Parker with Naomi Watts, Atomised – Michel Houellebecq adaptation, Baader Meinhof Complex.
3. Classics I would like to remake:
I don’t like remakes. At a push Salo (- De Sade’s novel The 120 days of Sodom) or American Psycho, to do it properly…
4. Biggest break:
Starting MUFF and discovering so much talent we have in Australia. How did MUFF end up being the first fest in the world playing the films of James Wan, Greg McClean, The Speirig Brothers, Scott Ryan, Steven Kastrissios, Stuart Simpson, Kel Dolen, David Nerlish and Andrew Traucki? We did it by simply looking for talent regardless of budget and having a welcoming attitude to genre and daring filmmaker that sometimes included violence, sexuality and controversy.  And there are many more where those names above came from. I think this is a real achievement that MUFF has helped foster an alternative voice and vision in the Australian Film Industry, against the odds and dull mediocrity of the mainstream local Industry…
5. Biggest mistake
Some would say the David Irving attempted screening. But I’m proud to have fought for unpopular speech… and am even more proud of MUFF’s uncompromising anti-censorship platform. Censorship is a most onerous and insulting practice to any intelligent and cultured human being.
6. Worst filmmaking experience:
Seeing our film industry controlled by a group of selfish and short sighted mandarins dolling out the majority of Film Finance funding to a bunch of sycophantic and at best untalented TV directors. Being hated sometimes for simply standing up and speaking out, from a love of our film industry, about the real lack of diversity in subject matter, innovation and film style to be seen on display in our national cinema. Being sick and tired of seeing its resources and potential abused by incompetents and dilettantes…etc., I could on, and on…
7. If a film about your life were made, who would play you?
Quentin Tarantino, Charlie Brooker or Colin Firth.
8. If money were no object, what would your next film be?
A project I have had in my head since I was a kid…a kind of post apocalyptic Mad Max type of thing…that is quite different, aggressive and original I dare say …but it seems we don’t really make those kind of films anymore in this country? And you wonder, why the fuck not?
9. Unsung Aussie film hero/heroine:
Jon Hewitt, Antony I Ginnane, Frank Howson, Jamie Leonander, Mark Savage, most of the more talented MUFF discoveries.
10. If I weren’t in the film industry, I’d be:
A Dictator on a Island in the Pacific …
11. I’d spend my last $20 on:
Bullets.

Y Fascism

People reading this blog might wonder why all the talk of Fascism or a Transcendental Fascism? Back from the USA and refreshed it seems I owe a brief explanation…

I clearly see the question of Fascism or fascism (big F or little, I use them both at random, as I write quick and in a flurry, and often don’t pay attention to such details, though big F should be historical Fascism, both past, present and future, and small f for the generic category or concept)  as being one of the main intellectual issues of the 21st century. As Michael Haneke’s fascist parable The White Ribbon wins the Palme D’Or and Tarantino’s fascist ode Inglorious Basterds wins Best actor with the character of the Nazi Jew Hunter played by Cristoph Wirth… what better time to hold forth on THE political philosophy of the 21st century? It seems it was the fascist Cannes, so the question arises, as Susan Sontag once observed… what is so fascinating about F/fascism?

Firstly, I’d say Fascism is to a certain extent a utopian and romantic political philosophy… but in a vastly different respect to Capitalism or Socialism/ Communism in many ways. Facism tells it like it is rather than how we’d like it to be. One of the great interesting characteristics about fascism is that it perfectly reflects nature and the structure and Being of the Universe. Boyd Rice’s famous essay “Nature’s Eternal Fascism” is a good textual example to support this thesis. Indeed, this nature/fascism topic seems  to be the subject matter of the new Lars Von Trier film AntiChrist (another Cannes winner)…

A lot of pomo wankers will insist on the importance of irony, undecidability and deconstruction in an interpretation of a work of art, but as we all know those tools are a poor man’s hermeneutic… and that true art is like a lightning bolt from Being itself. It is not ironic, it is simply what it ‘is’. Bare and pure in its nakedness. It is purely ontological and given. A gift.

But is this how fascism is treated and discussed in our society? No. Consider the way fascism as topic is treated in today’s discourse. This ought to be a perfect guide to its hidden power, relevance and true significance to humanities future. Essentially, fascism, as an open political discussion point is completely forbidden. If fascists are portrayed or discussed in the media, it is generally in terms of documentaries about bottom of the barrel Neo Nazi’s, with a grade two education, espousing some crude racism or in Hollywood fiction crazed Nazi’s killing everyone on screen for kicks. This is 90% of the image of fascism that capitalism’s media machine would like you to receive. Of course it is very far from the truth of the matter…

But many artists some mentioned above (…and below) have taken fascism and understood it in its deepest most intellectual sense as a core issue for humanity, one that they either support subversively, or engage with intellectually with caution, or as a caveat.

One of the things that is often annoying about the portrayal of fascism in the media is, as mentioned above, its portrayal of uneducated Neo-nazi’s and also the consistent and on going portrayal of Nazi’s on screen as pathologically insane maniacs… and that they are somehow not part of Western Civilisation, and her History. Again, nothing could be further from the truth…

Nazism is in many senses the most extreme, far reaching and intense manifestation and representation of Western Civilisation ever to be made factical. Some historians even equate fascism and modernism together (see Roger Griffin’s recent work). Which, by the way, I believe, and is why I bought my “Modernist” T shirt recently in LA. I love modernism and modernist artists and authors, and generally dislike and hate post modernism as an utterly repellent sophistry and completely decadent discourse; the sly supplement and ally of later day Capitalism (see Jameson). Enough with fucking Deleuze already! He was a suicidal confused buffoon with a few clever ideas and takes on Nietzsche, Von Sacher Masoch, cinema and Sade… but over all made no cohesive sense…his schizo philosophy was exactly that!

But I digress, Nazism, as mentioned, was simply a too intense and destructive form of Modernism for its own damn good! I have always felt, along with the futurists, that fascism is in many senses The Future. Many sci fi writers are in full agreement… and the fascist dystopia is Legion as sci fi motif. What excites me though, about say, footage of Nazi rallies, its architecture, or political philosophy of the era, is its vast futuristic character. A cold and logical paradigm shift in human development had taken place under Mussolini and Hitler and its full intensity proved too much for the bourgeois allies, and the monstrous ‘dread leveler’ best represented by Stalin. Of course, I have stated that Nazism is full of errors of intensity, nuance and velocity, the main being the aforementioned choice of Jew as internal enemy, when clearly Jews are a most superior people, who should be allied to the cause of Western civilisation, rather than recast as its enemies and victims. This mistaking of Jews as enemies rather than allies, I suspect and have said elsewhere, probably cost Hitler the war! As, for example, he lost Jewish intellectuals and scientists who could have steered The Reich to new strategies and Super weapons like the A bomb very early in ww2, putting an end to Western Capitalism once and for all, etc. But instead due to this mistake, Germany lost many of its brightest and finest due to a retrograde anti-semitic prejudice of some of the top Nazi’s. Things could have been very different… and should have been. But this century presents problems even more pressing and potent than the last for Western Civilisation, and its important this time the Jewish people stand with us at the bastions of Western culture, and fight hand to hand with us, in what could be the last great battle for the planetary harmony and survival…indeed recent neo-cons, and even their supplement Obama understand this…hence the undying support for Israel, which I support, by the way…

Due to this Jewish mistake, can F/fascism, or Nazism for that matter, be dismissed intellectually and out of hand as purely Evil? I think not. Like Heidegger said, where the danger is, also lies the saving power. As a hermeneutic strategy I recommend bracketing out the Jewish holocaust all together intellectually (ala Husserl’s famous phenomenological reduction), put it out of your head, after acknowledging its error of course, as a vast form of foolish collateral damage, to borrow a modern term. A Bataillean Accursed Share, an unaccountable excess of the Nazi matrix. Once you have acknowledged it, then put aside the Nazi Jewish t/error of ww2,  then one can move onto the waters of fascism easily, with a clear conscience and unhindered. Like an adventurous sojourner setting forth on a calm quest on the quite sea of the eternal Now…

This of course is the essential strategy of most holocaust deniers, essentially, but one need not deny the Jewish holocaust to redeem fascism. This seems excessive and  unnecessary. There are other ways forward, ‘always forward, over the dead bodies’ as Albert Speer once said, of which I suggest just one, above…

The intellectual pedigree of fascism as Giuseppi Botai described in 1924 is “exquisitely intellectual” and that it represents “a revolution of the intellectuals” and an “intellectual revolution”.  Israeli historian Zev Sternhell feels the same way, in his post war histories of the intellectual back grounds of fascism. Sternhell claims fascism has a fully functional intellectual apparatus and ideology to rival that of even the Left and Marxism. This, too, I strongly concur with. And to find it out you have to really study the texts hidden away in libraries and research the topic, as its a secret history, like that of a Dan Brown conspiracy novel…

Next time you see some idiot on TV espousing a crude biological racism, think perhaps on some of the following thinkers as a riposte to this common misrepresentation:

Martin Heidegger’s ontological fascism, Nietzsche’s hierarchical nihilist immorality, Ezra Pound’s masterful cantos of mythic/structural fascism and his adhorence of usury, TS Eliot’s social critique of Western Civilisation as ‘waste land’ filled with ‘hollow men’ and his call for conservative renewal, DH Lawrence’s sexual, frenetic and animalistic ‘fascism without bullying’, F.Scott Fitzgerald’s critique of the bourgeois, and call for a new Romantic elite, Wydham Lewis’s vortex of forces and iconoclastic outsider fascist modernism, Yeats mythic nationalist poetry, geared theory of history and fascist visions, Celine’s masterful misanthropy and avant garde literary agression, Curzio Malaparte’s literary complexity and his architectual interests, Yukio Mishima’s Japanese vision of fascism with Emperor worship and a new military elitism, Knut Hamsun’s pastoral, green and proletariat fascism, the eugenic theories of Sir Francis Galton, the Social Darwinism of Herbert Spencer, the scientific monism and artwork of Ernst Haeckel, the focus on the purifying and fertilising power of Violence to be found in Sorel, Oswald Spengler’s Hegelian/Historical synthesis and warning of the Decline of the West, and lastly warrior poet Gabrielle D’Annunzio’s first synthesis of the fascist minimum during the taking of Fiume. I can go on, and on, like this. Further figures like Ernst Junger, Carl Jung, Luigi Pirandello, Richard Strauss, Richard Wagner, Arno Breker, Timothy Findlay, Mario Sironi, Charles Peguy, Ernest Renan, Paul de Lagarde, Charles Darwin, Rene Guenon, Julius Evola, Vincenzo Cardarelli, Maurice Barres, Giovanni Papini, Mircea Eliade, Georges Dumezil, Jose Antonio Primo De Rivera, Oswald Mosley, Leni Riefenstahl, Arnold Fanck, Moeller Van Den Bruck, Francis Parker Yockey, Miguel Serrano, Savitri Devi, Salvador Dali, Jean Cocteau, Robert Brassilach, Pierre Drieu La Rochelle, JG Ballard, Max Nordau, Otto Weininger, Michael Moynihan, Bret Easton Ellis, Alain De Benoist and even early Blanchot and Paul De Man…all testify to a fascism that is far from an unintellectual and unartistic movement. In fact Fascism is, par excellence, the product of the finest minds of the 19th and 20th centuries. This hidden intellectual pedigree of fascism, i.e. the fact that it is essentially hidden, is one of the great intellectual scandals of the last 100 years. I call these authors and artists above, ‘the Other’ canon, representing a completely different vision of humanity and society. Many books deal individually with these artists, thinkers and writers (above) engagement in or with fascism, but few join the collective dots… and outline a vision for a new Fascist International, that can be drawn from this vast resource…

Well, here at Idea Fix, we will do our bit to get you thinking and talking about F/fascism, whether you agree with it, or not. We reject the curiously censorious ‘verboten’ attitude to its discussion and believe the list of Nazi crimes is not enough to relegate the concept to the dust bins of history. Indeed, Communism’s crimes far exceed fascist ones, and yet its discussion is de riguer at Universities. Why not fascism? This state of affairs exist because the Left is, lets face it, no real threat to later day Capitalism and it acts really as just a fashion statement or hipster strategy for most students. Fascism is, of course, totally another matter…Do people really only see the media stereotype of it? …and not believe it has other possible manifestations, or potentials?

Engage, think, discuss and debate the issue/s here at Idea Fix. As these thinkers (above) demonstrate, disagreements and open discussion is as welcome in fascist/rightist circles… as it is, in any other. And while you study and reflect, remember to think and consider the full weight of what these thinkers thoughts may actually portend… What do they have to say about humanity as a whole, and its manifest destiny, on our small and imperiled planet?

I discuss this often at some personal pain, as I know F/fascism is not a popular issue with some people. But like any writer or artist of modernist era and before, I feel compelled to speak the truth as I see it. And also I find it scandalous that no one else (or very few) are cohesively assembling such thoughts and that the majority of humanity appear duped on the topic of fascism. For better or worse, I hope to make my own humble contribution to the topic and subject matter. I wish to pursue the idea that a regenerated fascism need not be Evil or destructive, and that a ‘good’ fascism could indeed exist in the future.

I hope you, mein lecteur…”hypocrite lecteur!—mon semblable,—mon frère”, will have the patience to endure the content of my thoughts, and perhaps dare to think in dangerous waters with me, for the saving power, if you so desire…”the future is that mountain”…

Vale JG Ballard…long live the Metro Centre!

JG Ballard passed away on the weekend. An amazing literary talent has left us, one whose later works were, in my humble opinion, sheer genius.

Best source for stories about his death is ballardian.com here. Its a great site run by Simon Sellers. Its a little bit of a pomo wankfest, but informative, detailed and sincere.

I wrote this post below Sellers obit, comments and tributes are welcome there:

“A genius, who saw the future. He didn’t write science fiction in his later years he wrote science fact. His prescience about a new form of fascism being the only legitimate form of resistance to later day Capitalism, in his last novels, could not be closer to the truth. Viva The Metro Centre, James! Something is coming, you won’t live to see it, JG…but many will…”

I think it says all I need to say…

Here is a visual tribute to one of Ballard’s last books, the masterful career ending Kingdom Come, with its Metro Centre, a mall that acts as a site of a people’s uprising. The mock Metro Centre website is here. I love these photos, a guy looking in a rubbish bin with a light emanating from it, a guy depressed in a shipping department with headline “Sale Now On”, other ads promoting losing it and going completely crazy, and the last chestnut, “The Wait is almost over”. This is an advertising campaign supposedly designed by and featuring character David Cruise from “Kingdom Come”, that was created to publicise said novel. Its intentions are to unsettle and unhinge people with the utter and complete emptiness of capitalism, thereby fostering some form of new fascist revolution. Indeed, that is the purpose of the book, also. Don’t believe me? Read the book… tell me if I wrong…

Lars Von Trier does Anti Christ

Lars. New film. Nature is Evil. New Trailer. Von Trier. Anti Christ. Nature’s Revenge. Dafoe. The Universe off its Axis. Enough said.

The Comedian was a fascist

I liked Zach Snyder’s film version of Watchmen. I mean its such strong material, its hard to go wrong? You had to truncate it for a feature. I enjoyed it a lot, and don’t get the disappointment some have expressed about it…

Jon Hewitt gave the comic to me back in 1990 during the making of Bloodlust and said, “You must read this”. I always hated comics but trusted his immaculate taste. Suffice to say I loved it then, and thought, “Wow this really turns super hero’s on their head…”. Its taken 18 years since then until someone made it for the big screen. Its mood is right, its tone correct. Its similar to the mood and feel of the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight Batman film. We are seeing scarier and more realistic super heros, which is good, as its a boring genre if the envelope is not pushed…

Of course I liked the tragic Comedian best, who dies at the start of Watchmen, the tough fascist who discovers his conscience when he gets wind of Ozymandias radical ’scorched earth’ plan to destroy part of humanity, in order to save it. The Comedian’s character is complex, he is a rapist, and murders someone he describes as a ‘chink’ in Vietnam, who he got pregnant. But, The Comedian has another, softer side, that of a tortured soul burdened by his realism, nihilism and cynicism. This Yin and Yang makes for a great character. The mixture of humour as a fascist trait, is a very clever addition from Alan Moore. It recalls a dark Nietzschean laughter. Many fascists are of course the worlds greatest pranksters, trouble makers and jokers… and faced with the universe as it is, and the human predicament as it stands, can you blame them?  What else can one do, eventually, but laugh?

A great performance from Jeffrey Dean Morgan as the smiley face badge carrying fascist super hero/psycho, lit up his scenes. Rorschach is no slouch of a character either, his intense 1950’s style driven revenge machine is dynamic in the film. So, too the hot latex outfit of the Silk Spectre for other reasons. In fact they’re all pretty cool characters, in their way.

Anyway, Watchmen is out on the big screen infecting the young and impressionable minds of the new generations with its dystopian message of purge, and renewal…Hahhahahahhaha

You’ve been Baader Meinhofed, bitch

I like the Baader Meinhof (or Red Army Faction – RAF), a group of Left wing terrorist radicals and nutters who took it to ‘the man’ in the late 60’s and 70’s. Until it all ended in tears in a hail of bullets and blood shed at the hands of the Capitalist stooges. Either that, or remaining members died in jail, or rotted there. There was something truly revolutionary about the RAF. There was a sly Godardesque romanticism and Reichian sexual revolutionary cool about them all, too.

There was a time when Indy Terrorist’s also came from Western countries. What has happened to so emasculate youth that they can’t imagine or act to envision a society outside their Capitalist slave masters, who are the mainstream terrorists anyway?  How come all today’s terrorists come from Arab countries? Ipods and Western comfort, I imagine play a part. But the cause is more deep rooted in the putting to sleep of European Humanity through Western Liberalism and the media. I think its time some Westerners stood back up to the plate, and started to look to the RAF and similar groups for inspiration. After all the West leads in the terror trade. Ever heard of this small thing called Western Civilisation? All founded on wonderful acts of terror.

The RAF were a little politically misguided and naive, but they had a romantic passion and propensity for intellectual and real violence that was refreshing. So we say, Heil RAF! Heil Baader Meinhof!, here at Idea Fix and look forward to a return of their passion, zeal and idealism to The Political.

The Left must talk to the Right. The Left have many interesting social plans, but the Right have the leadership notions, elites and military style discipline to achieve them. Together they would be an unstoppable force…I have always hated the way the Left and Right fight, and its long overdue for a Hegelian synthesis based on mutual respect for what works…

Here are two trailers to a new film about the RAF called The Baader Meinhof Complex, from Producer Bernd Eichinger, who gave us a human and nuanced Fuhrer in Downfall. Eichinger and director Uli Edel here give us a sexy and revolutionary vision of the Baader Meinhof. The historical revisionism in Germany continues afoot as the German Volk reclaim their past for themselves, which is their right after all?

John Safran is crucified

As part of what must be the closing stunt of his new ABC TV show Race Relations, Australian media and religious critic, prankster and trouble maker John Safran has had himself crucified in the Philippines. Yes, with real nails, through hands and feet. Like JC. Ouch!

Crazy? Out there? Masochistic? Self hating? Jesus trip???

Whatever it is…it takes guts, I give him that.

Father Bob is quoted online saying he would have done it as part of his investigation and interest in religion as being at the centre of the Universe. Other Catholic representatives have scolded Safran who has been known to mock religion in the past. It is and will certainly get him a lot of publicity. I’d like to see The Chaser crew top that?

He is listed online in some articles as being 33 (the age Jesus had a run in at Golgotha), but John is 36.

I was wondering how he’d top the Bob Larsen exorcism at the end of John Safran vs God when I heard about Race Relations, and, dare I say it, I think he has!

Safran the crucified, it even has Nietzshean overtones.

Many online think its a brave stunt, which it is, it takes balls.

But maybe its more than a stunt. John, who I know from the film industry and a few social occasions, is, I think, deeply religious under his sarcastic public persona. I’ve always thought the real him has more in common with a middle aged conservative Rabbi. He is into Judaism (…I thought?), but very tempted by Christianity (…I assummed due his obsession with it, and his promotion of Catholicism at JJJ with Father Bob). This act is a resounding endorsement of faith in Jesus, if its meant that way. One that most true Christians would balk at, perhaps, with good reason.

There is also mention online in some news articles that John Safran did it this for his ailing Mother (?!), as miracles have been known to happen after people perform this ritual. If this is true, it adds a whole ‘other’ dimension to the act…

Kenneth Anger’s Will

Underground Film genius Kenneth Anger has a new film out, Ich Will. A collection of altered found footage of the Hitler Youth movement and its links to the  Wonder Vogel movement. I wonder what Anger would think of the Hitler Youthesque Heimattreue Deutsche Jugend, spoken of below and recently outlawed in Germany? Anger further develops his notion that the 20th century’s most notable two images are Mickey Mouse and the Swastika. This film obviously deals with the later. While Mouse Heaven deals with the former.

I had the pleasure to meet Kenneth Anger when he spoke at my Hellfire club in the mid 90’s. He was a likeable, polite and unusual presence with lets just say a strange aura in person, he seemed to like the S&M vibe of my club, and we hung out a bit before and after his talk. I have a photo of the two of us somewhere, that I should dig up. It appeared in Misanthrope magazine. While he was in country, I attended a great lecture he gave at the old Carlton Movie House, he wore a jumper with pictures of the Universe on it, and called himself a pantheist. He played his classic film works.

This decade has seen a resurgence of activity for Ken, with new films, new tours and a doco about the man. The latest of Kenneth’s own work is Ich Will. I hope to see it down under, sooner than later.

Kenneth was going to appear alongside Boyd Rice in Pearls Before Swine for a while. But sadly that was not to be.

Kenneth, Idea Fix salutes you!

Interesting article on Anger below.