Museum of the Moving Image curator David Schwartz interviewed movie director David Cronenberg at the museum on Jan. 21, 2012. Photo by Steve Herrig

“No humans were hurt during the filming of that last scene,” movie director David Cronenberg joked following the showing of the famous clip of the exploding head from his movie “Scanners” (1981).  Cronenberg flew in from Canada last Saturday to kick off the 19 film retrospective of his work that the Museum of the Moving Image, in Astoria, is having now through February 12.  Museum curator David Schwartz told the sold out house that it was the only time the museum has done a second retrospective of a living filmmaker.  The museum’s previous Cronenberg retrospective was in 1992.

In contrast to the exploding head in “Scanners” Cronenberg’s current film, “A Dangerous Method,” about Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, is clearly far afield from his early work.  Cronenberg talked about being typecast by his earlier, horror, “blood and guts” movies.  Cronenberg recalled that when he made “The Dead Zone” (1983) he was accused of, as well as lauded for, having gone mainstream.  He said that compared to his earlier movies like “Shivers” (1975), “Rabid” (1977) and “Videodrome” (1983), “The Dead Zone” was relatively tame, based on a novel by a respected author, Stephen King, and not too violent.  “But then right after that I did ‘The Fly’ (1986) which was pretty violent and gory and nasty,” Cronenberg pointed out.

“I’m a curious person and fairly literate, and there’s a lot of things that interest me,” he explained.  “If I made a thousand movies they wouldn’t all be like “Scanners,” obviously.  I think it’s a comfort thing.  There’s a security.  They expect the same thing from you,” Cronenberg said.  “I’ve done movies like “M. Butterfly” (1993) and even “Dead Ringers” (1988) and if you are only a fan of the first horror films, then those films seem strange.”

Cronenberg pointed out that it is not just some of his fans who long for his earlier films, but fellow filmmakers too.  “Guillermo del Toro (director and producer) who’s a really good friend said, ‘You’re making fantastic movies now but I really like the early, crazy stuff.’”   The story was told that when director Martin Scorsese first met Cronenberg he expected him to be a very scary person but was surprised to find him to be a perfectly nice guy.  “I said, Marty, you made ‘Taxi Driver’ and you’re afraid of me?” Cronenberg recalled, to much audience laughter.

On making his earlier, horror films Cronenberg remembered, “If you were a young, inexperienced director you could manage to get to direct a low budget horror film.  There was a built in audience for it and, if you were not very good at it or just learning how to make movies, you could have a bit of a success.”

He continued.  “I always thought that horror films are a wonderful arena for philosophical exploration.  As a filmmaker the thing that you film the most is the human body.  It’s not about landscapes.  For example in “The Fly,” which came out in the 1980s, people felt it was a metaphor for AIDS, with Jeff Goldblum’s character deteriorating.  For me it was about an accelerated aging, which is about coming to terms with your own mortality which is one of the basic core discussions you have in any philosophy or religion and one of the basic one’s of art as well.  So, for me it wasn’t a problem to be discussing these philosophical things in the context of a horror film.  I thought they fit quite well together.”

Concerning his approach to “A Dangerous Method” Cronenberg said, “I just don’t come to a movie with a pre-conceived idea of what I must do to be myself or impose an imprint on it that’s recognizable.  It’s as if I’ve never made another movie when I make a movie.  I just don’t think about the previous ones.  Each movie tells you what it wants, what it needs.  In this case the style of it came from the era, which was the early 1900s in Central Europe in what was the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a very formal, a very restrained, very repressed era.  They certainly thought of themselves as living in a classical European structure.  For me that’s where the style of the movie came from.  It came from the material itself, rather than some idea of what “Cronenbergizing” should be.

“The very first film I ever made was called “Transfer,” and it was about a psychiatrist and his patient,” Cronenberg said.  “It was a short, seven minute long, film.  So obviously the idea of psychoanalysis and that very strange new relationship invented by Freud, the relationship between a patient and his therapist, a very complex one that had never existed before Freud, was a fascination to me right from the beginning of my film making career.  For those who say ‘This is so strange for you to make a film about Freud and Jung,’ it’s really coming full circle.”

The Museum of the Moving Image is located at 36-01 35 Avenue (at 37^th street) in Astoria.  For more information on the Cronenberg retrospective please go to www.movingimage.us.

Frederick Wiseman, director and editor of CRAZY HORSE. Courtesy of Zipporah Films.

“I don’t do any research in advance.  The shooting of the film is the research,” documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman told me recently.  I had the privilege of sitting down with Wiseman to discuss his large body of work, in particular his new documentary “Crazy Horse,” which opened at Film Forum on January 18.

We had a wide-ranging conversation that went from the current “Crazy Horse” back to Wiseman’s breakthrough 1967 documentary, “Titicut Follies.”  We discussed lighting (Wiseman does not use any), shooting digitally verses shooting on film (“Crazy Horse” is the first Wiseman “film” to be shot digitally) and the nature of “truth” in documentary filmmaking (Wiseman dismissed “cinema verite” – true cinema – as a “bullshit French phrase”).

Wiseman said that he typically shoots 100 hours for one of his documentaries.  As for the “truth” Wiseman explained, “I figure it out in the editing.  I don’t start with any theme or point of view.”  He went on to explain, “My films all have a point of view, but that is expressed through structure.  The model for me is more a novel or a play than it is a TV news documentary.  I think all of my films have a distinct point of view and a narrative structure, but it is expressed very indirectly.  I try to cut them in such a way that the viewer has enough information to understand what’s going on but has to make up his mind about what’s going on even though, if they want to think about the way I put the films together, they’ll see what my point of view is.”

“Crazy Horse” concerns the eponymous world famous Parisian nude dance revue.  “I’m interested in dance,” Wiseman said.  “If you count ‘Boxing Gym’ (2010), at least a film partially about dance, ‘Crazy Horse’ is the fourth film on dance I’ve done.”  The others are “La Danse” (2009) and “Ballet” (1995).   “When you’re making a movie about dance,” Wiseman continued, “you’re trying to tell the story through movement and not words,” as opposed to a film like Wiseman’s 2007 documentary “State Legislature,” which is more about words.

As for the “Crazy Horse” nude dancers, Wiseman explained that they are all professionals who did not mind being filmed.  “There’s a mythology that they’re all call girls,” Wiseman said.  “They’re all women who went to dance conservatoires and, for one reason or another, did not make the big dance companies.  They’re normal 20 -30 year olds with boyfriends or married or whatever.  They like to dance and they get paid well and they’re well protected by the Crazy from ‘Stage Door Johnnie’s.’”

Regarding the difference between French and American attitudes toward nudity Wiseman said, “This business about nudity is really strange because everybody knows.  You know from your childhood on, if you have brothers or sisters, what the same or other sex looks like.  What’s the big deal?  Janet Jackson’s nipple shows for a half a second at the Super Bowl and the network feels it’s going to lose its broadcast license.  It’s crazy.”

“A lot of my films have to do with the various uses to which the body is put,” Wiseman said.  “‘Domestic Violence’ (2001) is about violence to bodies, ‘Titicut Follies’ is about incarceration of bodies, “Near Death” (1989) is about the death of the body.”

We discussed “Titicut Follies,” Wiseman’s documentary about the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Bridgewater, in which mentally ill men were cared for in appalling circumstances.  I asked him why an institution that was abusing its patients would ever allow a film crew on the premises.  Wiseman explained that the institution did not see itself as being abusive.  “They had no idea.  That’s why you get to make these kinds of films.  I think it’s true of all of us.  We don’t necessarily see ourselves the way other people do.”

On shooting digitally Wiseman explained, “That’s because I can’t get the money to shoot on film.  For example you can shoot 48 minutes on HD (high definition video) for 40 dollars.  For the same 48 minutes on film, by the time you buy the film, process the negative, make a one light work print and sync it up, you have spent 1100 dollars. It’s a big difference.”

Returning to the theme of truth, for “Crazy Horse” Wiseman said he shot 150 hours and that the finished film is a little over two hours.  I asked Wiseman if, with such a large shooting ratio , 75:1, what we are seeing in the finished film is the truth.  “What’s the whole truth?” he replied.  “I make no claim that my films are the truth.  They’re my version of the truth.”

“Crazy Horse” will be at Film Forum, 209 West Houston Street, until February 7.  Please visit www.filmforum.org for show times.

For more information on Wiseman’s films, including purchase and rental, visit www.zipporah.com.

Albert Brooks, who appeared at the Film Society of Lincoln Center on January 8.

Albert Brooks, comedian, actor, writer and movie director appeared at the Film Society of Lincoln Center on Sunday, January 8 to discuss his career.  It was an evening of film clips, stories, anecdotes; an event that presented a varied and comprehensive look at Brooks’ work acting in the films of other directors, including Martin Scorsese, Sidney Lumet, Steven Soderbergh, James L. Brooks (no relation) and others. Brooks was interviewed by Scott Foundas, Associate Program Director for the Film Society.   The event took place at the Walter Reade Theatre.

Brooks explained that when he started out what he really wanted to do was act.  However, at the age of 20 he could not get any parts.  He joked that all the roles for 20 year olds were going to Richard Dreyfus. As a result Brooks developed comedy bits that he performed on TV variety shows, of which there were many, in the late 60s and early 70s.  His strategy was to use his talent as a comedian to get into acting, but it was tough going.  Brooks recalled having beer bottles and cans thrown at him when he opened for “Sly and the Family Stone” at a concert in Seattle. Brooks recalled that he had to stall a stadium full of impatient, stoned fans to cover a three-hour delay due to the fact that an equally stoned out Sly somehow wound up in Ohio and was flying in.  Brooks said he admonished the crowd that he would go on “Johnny Carson” and say that they were the meanest audience in the world.  He said the threat did not work and it was the last time he did stand up.

The conversation soon fast-forwarded to Brooks’ role as the campaign office worker whose affection for Sybil Shepherd is not returned in Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver.”  Brooks told the story of how Paul Schrader, the film’s screenwriter, thanked him for fleshing out the character.  Schrader told Brooks that, despite having written the “Taxi Driver” screenplay, Brooks’ character was the only one he really did not know.  An incredulous Brooks replied, “That’s the only guy in the movie who doesn’t kill 60 people.  How screwed up are you?  All he does is work in a store.”

The film clips shown over the course of the evening revealed Brooks to be an actor with quite a range. One clip showed Brooks playing an 80-year-old alcoholic doctor in Lumet’s little seen movie “Critical Care.”  “Six people saw it.  I don’t even think Sidney watched the final cut,” Brooks joked.  Clips were also shown from “The Scout,” “Twilight Zone the Movie,” “Private Benjamin,” “Out of Sight” and two movies for writer/director Brooks: “Broadcast News” and “I’ll Do Anything.”  In “I’ll do Anything” Brooks played a manic movie producer based on a real life producer who Brooks said, because of legal reasons, he could not identify.  Brooks however did allow, “I think he hated me for 14 years,” a  comment which drew laughs from the audience.  In “Out of Sight” Brooks played a nebbishy but wealthy prisoner, based on Michael Milken, who is being extorted by a fellow inmate played by Don Cheadle.

Perhaps Brooks’ biggest dramatic role is that of mob boss Bernie Rose in the recent movie “Drive,” for which, just the day before, he won the National Society of Film Critics’ Best Supporting Actor award.  Brooks explained, “It took a Danish director to make that happen.  I know I have that side of me.  I wanted to play a villain.”  He went on to say that American directors would not cast him in a villain role for fear that audiences would laugh.  Brooks said he met with “Drive’s” director, Nicolas Winding Refn, to discuss the role.  Brooks said that before he left the meeting, he pinned the director up against the wall, grabbed his collar and started choking him.  “I said very quietly, ‘I’m physically a very strong man.  I just want you to know,’” Brooks described to uproarious laughter.  He continued, “Now the Danes are white to begin with.  He turned clear.”

For more information on Film Society of Lincoln Center events please visit www.filmlinc.com.

Rooney Mara in "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"

American filmmakers should stop remakes of foreign films.  Rarely does it work, especially when the originals were just fine.  Case in point, “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.” 

The version of “Dragon Tattoo,” currently in theatres, is the second time that the story has been filmed.  Though set in Sweden the characters all speak English and the film has been directed by an American director, David Fincher (“The Social Network”).  Both versions are based on the book of the same title by author Stieg Larsson.  The previous version, from 2009, was in Swedish with English subtitles.

For the most part the current version is a fairly engrossing mystery.  By film’s end, I understood the story, but only in a way that was general and not as satisfying as it could have been.  “Dragon Tattoo” does not provide the fun and sense of discovery that one usually associates with a good mystery.  For example there is an important sequence in the film where journalist Mikael Blomkvist, (Daniel Craig) is comparing photographs from a small town parade from many years before.  He keeps flipping from one photo to another on his computer.  He even manages to get photographs from a photographer who was taking pictures of the same parade from a different angle.  He compares the two sets of photographs.  I was reminded of the movie “Blow Up” (1966) in which a photographer finds clues to a possible murder as he enlarges some photographs he has taken in a park.  What works so well in “Blow Up” is that the audience makes the  discovery along with the main character.  In “Dragon Tattoo” there is no such “eureka” moment.  Blomkvist does see something of significance in the photographs but we only get it in a tangential way after he has taken action.  In general Fincher seems to want to make his version more convoluted than the Swedish version.  I prefer the more straight forward approach of the original.

Upon returning home from the film I watched the Swedish “Dragon Tattoo” on Netflix.  What a difference.  The Swedish version is simpler and clearer.  The film is less busy, not convoluted, with story points that are razor sharp.  The Swedish version also provides the fun of following the mystery along with the main character who, in this version, has more of a personal stake in the outcome.  In fact, now having seen the Swedish version it is blatantly obvious that Fincher copied many of its shots and scenes but, in the process, did not manage to bring off the story nearly as well.

As the reporter chasing a mystery for a wealthy client Craig is fine.  The real find here though is Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander, the body adorned title character.  Her performance is all the more striking when one considers that she played Mark Zuckerberg’s ex girlfriend in “The Social Network.”  I know it’s called “acting” but these two polar opposite roles demonstrate incredible versatility.

As for the over all movie, what a shame that all that money and hard work went into re-creating a feature film that largely tried to copy, but ultimately was not as good as, the original.  Why was it made?  My guess: For the dubious purposes of giving audiences a movie featuring a familiar leading man and to not be put through the inconvenience of having to read subtitles.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Director David Fincher, 2011, Columbia Pictures, 158 minutes, R

Tom Cruise in "Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol"

This morning I attended the 11:20 am screening of “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol” at the AMC Empire multiplex at 42^nd Street and 8th Avenue in Manhattan.  Now, I give a lot of my movie going dollars to the AMC movie theatre chain because all shows before noon are six dollars at all AMC theatres.  So, since 11:20 am is a full 40 minutes before noon my ticket should have been six dollars, right?  Well, not according to AMC.  You see the 11:20 showing of “Mission: Impossible” was presented in something called ETX, which stands for “Enhanced Theatre Experience” for which AMC charges ten dollars for the pre-noon show.  I asked the ticket seller what kind of “enhanced” experience I was going to get for this 67% mark up.  He explained that the theatre in which “Mission: Impossible” was playing had a very big screen and 150 speakers.

Now, call me unreasonable but I thought a major reason people go to see movies in movie theatres is to see them on a big screen.  A big screen should go with the territory and not involve an “enhanced” charge.  As for the 150 speakers, who needs them?  Since most movies are mixed in Dolby 5.1 which utilizes six speakers, 150 speakers are 144 speakers too many.

I will admit though that the ETX screening of “Mission Impossible” was shown in the Empire’s Theatre 6, which is indeed a huge theatre with a very big screen.  I used earplugs, a “multiplex necessity” these days, to protect my hearing from the 150 speakers which created seat rattling vibrations.

As home video, pay per view and other challenges to the movie going experience bring competition, movie theatres need to be on top of their game and they should not be passing the cost of keeping their business afloat to their loyal customers.  It is bad enough theatres charge extra for presentations in IMAX and 3-D.   By the way, Film Forum, 209 West Houston Street, never charges extra when it shows a movie in 3-D.

As for “Mission Impossible” itself, I have to say it was a pretty good film.  The movie dispatches one maguffin after another as Tom Cruise and company try to save the world from a Russian induced Armageddon.  I thought the Cold War was over, but never mind.  “Mission Impossible” has lots of action, suspense, interesting characters and it even goes for some laughs.  Simon Pegg proves to be a comical addition to the MI team, as a computer nebbish eager for the big time of working with Cruise’s Ethan Hunt.  Paula Patton is the team’s dangerous beauty.  Most important, the story more or less made sense, which lately has not been the case with some of the movies I have been reviewing.

In conclusion “Mission: Impossible” is a fun, suspenseful roller coaster ride of a movie, but the AMC chain needs to rethink its pricing policy.

Mission: Impossible, Director Brad Bird, 2011, Paramount Pictures, 133 minutes, PG-13

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 25,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 9 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Many will groan when I mention “3-D,” a term which has, by now, become a cliché as well as a negative, pop-cultural punch line.  In its defense I will point out that “Pina” uses 3-D in a manner that is intelligent, justified and brilliantly artistic.  In fact the only other recent 3-D films (of which there have been many) to which “Pina” can be compared, for its innovative use of the format, is Werner Herzog’s documentary “Cave of Forgotten Dreams” and Martin Scorsese’s “Hugo.”  Granted the three films, in terms of their respective subject matters and techniques, are wildly different.  However it is interesting to note that all three directors, Wenders, Herzog and Scorsese are in their mid to late sixties and have all embraced the format making their first 3-D features.  While one could also add Steven Spielberg to the list, “The Adventures of Tin Tin,” while ground breaking in terms of its animation, is not as innovative in its use of 3-D.   But back to “Pina.”

As I know next to nothing about dance, or choreographers, the best I could do was watch the highly original dance pieces as presented by the dancers who worked with Pina.  Her work, to me, seems to be a cross between ballet and modern dance with interesting innovations thrown in. For example, in “Café Muller” the dancers interact with chairs and tables.  In “Rite of Spring” the stage floor is completely covered in earth.  The dance pieces have been beautifully staged for film.  Many of them take place outdoors, in parks and, in one case, even on a moving tram.  They have been gorgeously shot, employing deep focus cinematography, which compliments the 3-D technology.

In addition to performing Pina’s choreography, her dancers are interviewed in a very unique manner.  We never see the interviewees speak.  We see them, sitting silently, perhaps waiting for Wenders to ask them questions.  We hear their comments, recollections and appreciations over shots of them sitting silently, lips not moving.   It is very effective and contributes to the film’s ethereal quality.  Their remembrances of Pina are enhanced by the dances themselves: “Meeting Pina gave me a vocabulary,” “Life without Pina.  I don’t know what it is.”  Pina is quoted as having advised, “You just have to get crazier.”

The experience of seeing “Pina” is tantamount to being lost in a dream.  As for writing anything more penetrating or critical about dance I am afraid I am at a loss.  In my defense though I will simply quote Pina herself, who perhaps put it best: “Dance, dance, otherwise we are lost.”

Pina, Director Win Wenders, 2011, Han Way Films, 106 minutes, PG

Ryan O'Neal and Marisa Berenson in "Barry Lyndon."

On December 30 at 7:00 and January 1 at 6:00 the Museum of the Moving Image, in Astoria, will present a restored 35mm print of Stanley Kubrick’s 1975  film “Barry Lyndon.”  The presentation is part of “See it Big,” the museum’s screening series of movies meant to be seen on a big screen.

I am often asked to name my favorite movie, a formidable question considering how many movies I have seen.  I always come up with the same answer, “Barry Lyndon.”  I first saw “Barry Lyndon” at the age of 13 when my parents took me to see it during its opening week at the Ziegfeld Theatre in Manhattan.  The Ziegfeld, along with the Paris, is now the last of the city’s great single screen movie theatres.  I had never seen a movie like “Barry Lyndon” before and I certainly had never seen a movie theatre like the Ziegfeld.  If you have not seen a movie there, go.

I have always maintained that “Barry Lyndon” is the period piece that ruined period pieces for me.  Kubrick’s attention to detail (he was know for his incredible perfectionism) make “Barry Lyndon” look as if cast and crew got into a time machine and traveled back to 18th century Europe.  The film is based on the novel by William Makepeace Thackeray and concerns the life and adventures of an Irish rogue.  The story was filmed on location in Germany, Ireland, England and Scotland.  In comparison to “Barry Lyndon” all other period pieces, to me, simply look like modern actors in costume.

Since that 1975 Ziegfeld showing I have seen “Barry Lyndon” many times, in movie theatres, on television and home video.  I own it on both VHS and DVD but, for the past several years, the only time I have seen  “Barry Lyndon” is on the rare occasions when it plays in movie theatres, as I do with most of the great films that I have on DVD.  I still get lost in the story and hang on its every detail.  I am still struck by the film’s use of music, which, over time has a stronger and stronger emotional grip on me.

“Barry Lyndon” was impeccably photographed by John Alcott.  Kubrick’s idea was to capture the look of 18^th century paintings, which were lit either by sunlight or candlelight.  To this end he designed a lens fast enough to shoot by candlelight.  By today’s standards, with faster lenses and film stocks, this is not as much of an accomplishment as it was then, but the results are still stunning.  The movie is a painting come to life.

The stellar cast includes Ryan O’Neal, in the title role, Marisa Berenson and Leon Vitale.  I read that Kubrick decided to cast O’Neal based largely on his perfomance in Peter Bogdanovich’s screwball comedy ‘What’s Up Doc?” (1972), another favorite movie of mine.  What Kubrick was able to see in an actor in a modern screwball comedy that would work for the stately “Barry Lyndon” is a testament to his genius.

“Barry Lyndon” was nominated for seven Oscars, including Best Picture.  It won three, for cinematography, art direction and costume design.  I can still remember watching the 1975 Oscars in utter disbelief when “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” won for Best Picture.  It was a choice that, to this day, still defies logic and reason.

Each time I see “Barry Lyndon” I am swept up in its look, performances, music and story.  What I am looking for most though is how the movie looked when I first saw it, which may be impossible.   I think it was the combinati0n of a great movie and movie theatre plus the type of perception one can only have at the age of 13.  I keep trying to recapture that first screening experience and, in so doing, “Barry Lyndon” keeps me coming back, revealing more and more each time.

Museum of the Moving Image is located at 35 Avnue at 37^th Street in Astoria.  For more information visit www.movingimage.us.

Barry Lyndon, Director Stanely Kubrick, 1975, Warner Brothers, 184 minutes, PG

At the first class I conducted a video interview with each student who was willing.  The interview was strictly voluntary, but it is a good way for me to get to know students and learn their names.  It is also an effective icebreaker that generates a friendly atmosphere.  From these interviews I discovered that the students attending class at this late hour worked full time and then managed to go to school.  In other words these were people who worked harder than I did, and yet they were coming to me to learn something.  This revelation filled me with humility and a stronger than usual sense of responsibility and commitment.

My hard working students range in age from early twenties to grandparents.  Over the past four months we discussed how media frames our perception of the world.  Since the class is part of the Sociology Department I related media issues to sociology.

The second half of each class involved screening a narrative film or documentary, mostly documentaries, that illustrated a media topic.  There were also at home screening and writing assignments.  I did not require my students to buy expensive textbooks but I did require a Netflix membership.  We watched a lot of films.  I used mass media to teach mass media.

My class received a varied education on media issues and on how media has affected their lives and the lives of others.  We screened the movie “They Wont Forget” (1937), a fictionalized account of the Leo Frank case of 1913.  The film, plus a consideration of the actual facts of the case, provided a way of examining media manipulation, southern prejudice and politics in the early twentieth century.  We also looked at how these issues were portrayed by media on screen.  We screened and discussed “The Tillman Story” which concerned the government’s cover-up and media manipulation in the death of Pat Tillman in Afghanistan.  We compared Daniel Ellsberg and his use of media in exposing the Pentagon Papers (“The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers”) during the Vietnam War with the current media work of Julian Assange and wikileaks (“Julian Assange: A Modern Day Hero?”).  We examined the federal prosecutions of stoner comedian Tommy Chong (“a/k/a Tommy Chong”) and porn star Harry Reems (“Inside Deep Throat”).  We looked at how these men had their first amendment rights trampled upon in the government’s zeal to prosecute their use of media.  We screened the movie “Lenny” and discussed how comedian Lenny Bruce was prosecuted in the 1950s and 1960s for “obscene” humor that today would have gotten him his own HBO special.  We discussed the ideas of Noam Chomsky (“Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media”) and even managed to touch on Aristophane’s ancient Greek play “Lysistrata.”

A teacher friend told me that the relationship between a teacher and his students is formed within the first 20 minutes of the first class.  That being the case it was apparent from the start that fate had given both teacher and students a fine match.

From Ancient Greece to Wikileaks we cut a wide swath through the human experience and had a lot of laughs along the way. Since it was my first time teaching this course I did not have the luxury of simply relying on what I had done in the past.  There was no auto pilot on which to fall back.  I had to work just as hard as my students to keep up and even, hopefully, stay ahead of them. Oh yeah, and they also learned a lot.

Gary Oldman in "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"

I am probably not the one to be writing about “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.” I remember making two attempts at the novel “TTSS,” by John le Carre, and not understanding it past the first chapter.  I am afraid that my reaction to the new movie version is not much different but, at the same time, I do not blame the film.  The problem is with me.  Maybe there is something about darkened, smoke filled atmospheric rooms with world weary characters exchanging large amounts of expositional dialogue that just throws an “off” switch in the part of my brain that enables me to follow movie plots.  I do not do well with espionage pictures.  To be fair, the friend with whom I saw “TTSS” enjoyed it, as did many in the audience at the AMC Loews Village 7 at 11 Street and Third Avenue. 

Despite my numbed perception I could still tell that “TTSS” is a film with high production values.  It has been beautifully photographed and produced.  It boasts a fine cast that includes Gary Oldman, John Hurt and Colin Firth.  The film has a studied sense of atmosphere as it portrays the downside of the English spy business in 1973.  There are no lavish casinos and tuxedos and other 007 amenities for these spys.  They are tired and worn out.  There are lots of hushed conversations and double dealings.  Documents are stolen, loyalties are betrayed.  Secret terms like “Circus,” “Witchcraft” and “Reptile Fund” abound.

Those who appreciate and enjoy this type of story telling should definitely see “TTSS.”  Then maybe they can send me an email explaining what the movie was about.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Director Tomas Alfredson, 2011, Focus Features, 127 minutes, rated R