Pocket reviews of recent recreational views and reads:
Paramour (in previews)
The high-flying acrobatics of the Canadian troupe Cirque du
Soleil have been wowing international audiences for decades, but on two
previous occasions failed to secure a lasting purchase on Broadway. Things look
more promising this time around with the musical play Paramour at the Lyric Theatre. As a present (thanks Michelle) I
attended a preview on April 18. (One doesn’t normally comment on a play before
its formal opening, but I’m not a professional critic so I will anyway.)
Just as movies with Fred and Ginger had plots only as
excuses for them to dance, Paramour’s
script exists to provide an excuse for the Cirque performers to astonish the
audience. That said, it’s a fully adequate excuse with a storyline set in the
Golden Age of Hollywood; it is a classic love triangle involving a movie
director, the young woman he wants to make a star, and her song-writing
boyfriend. Despite a final modest twist to the plot, don’t expect anything deep or
original from the script, but do expect Broadway-class song and dance,
extraordinary sets, and spectacular feats (mostly as metaphors for events in
the play) by the Cirque performers. In short, go for the stagecraft.
Judging by ticket sales so far, Paramour should be around for quite some time.
Thumbs Up
**** ****
Irrational Man (2015)
If you’ve seen any of the more thoughtful Woody Allen movies
you already know what themes you will encounter here. Following atheistic Nietzsche
and the French existentialists, he views the world as random and devoid of any
inherent meaning or purpose. The prescription of those philosophers is to imbue
life with your own purposes. Not everyone who shares this worldview is
successful at that, and they can find life to be somewhat blank. This is the
state of renowned philosopher Abe Lucas (Joaquin Phoenix) who takes a job at a
Rhode Island university. His conviction that nothing really matters has led him
to abandon his earlier activism and to sink into clinical depression. The
attentions of student Jill (Emma Stone) and colleague Rita (Parker Posey), both
of whom find him interesting, don’t help.
(Partial *spoiler* follows.) By pure chance Abe and Jill
overhear a desperate woman in a neighboring booth at a diner say she is about
to lose her children in family court because of a corrupt judge. Abe decides
that, while he can’t make a difference in the world at large, he at least can
make a difference in this woman’s life by killing the judge. Since there is
nothing to connect him with the judge he believes he can commit the perfect
murder. Suddenly, his life has renewed meaning. He commits the act. In a
reversal of Crime and Punishment, the
crime revitalizes him. Problems arise when Jill suspects he is the killer. Will
he kill again to protect himself? After all, ethics in his view are subjective.
Thumbs Up: in part for Woody not talking down to his
audience.
**** ****
The Air I Breathe (2007)
Jieho Lee’s film consists of four interlaced vignettes based
on the four basic emotions of a Chinese proverb: Happiness, Pleasure, Sorrow,
and Love. The connecting thread is provided by the gangster nicknamed “Fingers”
(Garcia) who is key to the plot of each.
There is a superb cast including Forest Whitaker, Brendan
Fraser, Andy Garcia, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Emile Hirsch, Kevin Bacon, and Julie
Delpy. There are some clever counterintuitive evocations of the four emotions. One
man (Whitaker) finds happiness when he has no more options. Another (Fraser)
finds pleasure when he is brutally beaten – it would be a spoiler to explain
why. The sorrow of a rising pop star (Gellar) is not counterintuitive, but the
love of Kevin Bacon is directed toward the happily married wife of his best
friend. Fraser gets to play against type as a hitman/enforcer and there is an especially
strong performance by Gellar.
Nonetheless, the whole thing comes across as contrived, melodramatic,
and depressing. Sad films can be enjoyable, but this doesn’t have the heart to
be sad. It’s just dispiriting. Audiences generally agreed: the film did a
miserable box office.
Thumbs Down, despite some worthy elements.
**** ****
Carthage Must Be Destroyed (2011) by Richard Miles
Viking Press
Viking Press
The title, of course, is the relentless exhortation of Roman
senator Marcus Portius Cato (“Carthago
delenda est”) who felt that two desperate wars with Carthage (aka Punic
Wars) were enough and that Rome should attack while it still had the upper
hand. He eventually got his way and the Romans captured and razed the city in
146 BC. They re-founded it a century later, but very much as a Roman city.
The history of Carthage was fully intertwined with the history
of the ancient Mediterranean and beyond. Also, the Punic Wars made Rome into the
dominant imperial power it became. Since the heritage of Rome is central to
modern Western civilization, Carthage still indirectly impacts us all. History
is written by victors, however, and accordingly nearly all our ancient literary
sources are Greek and Roman – and they discuss Carthage from adversarial
perspectives. Little survives from Carthage itself beyond what is dug up by
archaeologists.
Nonetheless, Richard Miles does what he can to use the
available literary and archeological sources to give us an account of
Carthaginian civilization from its foundation (traditionally in 814 BC as a
colony of the Phoenician city of Tyre) to its destruction. In doing so he
provides a perspective we too seldom get.
Thumbs Up: informative and readable.
Trailer Irrational Man