cineaste magazine
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Magazine with film reviewsTRANSCRIPT
Vera Drake and Jennifer Abbott discuss The Corporation
Pedro Almadover and the New Politics of Spain.
The Legacy of Frank Capra
A Second Look: Touchez pas au grisbi
THE ART AND POLITICS OF CINEMA
THE TAQWACORES A IN DEPTH VIEW OF EYAD ZAHRA’S NEWEST FILM
I want my films to explode with Life: An
Interview with Mira Nair
The Power of Female Solidarity: An Interview
with Jennifer Abbott
Matters of Race: An Interview with Orlando Bagwell
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THE ART AND POLITICS OF CINEMA
FOUNDER AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEFGary Crowdus
EDITORSCynthia LuciaRichard Porton
CONSULTING EDITORDan Georgakas
ASSISTANT EDITORSMarc o CalavitaRahul Hamid
EDITORIAL INTERNSMelanie UnruhCraig Uhlin
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ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVEBarbara Saltz
CONTENTSArticles
4 Pedro Almodovar and the New Politics of Spain
by Geoff Pingree
16 The Legacy of Frank Capra
26 A Second Look: Touchez pas au grisbi by Martha Nochimson
39 The Taqwacores by Sascha Aktar
Interviews
10 I Want My Films to Explode with Life: An Interview with Mira Nair
by Karin Badt
20 The Power of Female Solidarity: An Interview with Ousmane Sembene
by Richard Porton
28 The Life and Times of the Corporation:An Interview with Jennifer Abbott
by Dennis West
34 Matters of Race: An Interview with Orlando Bagwell
by Barbara Abrash
Film Reviews
Vera Drake 43 reviewed by Leonard Quart
Maria Full of Grace 44 reviewed by Vojislava Filipcevic
The Manchurian Candidate 44 reviewed by Robert Sklar
Book Reviews
Sontag & Kael 60reviewed by Scott Foundas
Hollywood Italians 60reviewed by Marco Calavita
New Readings 60reviewed by Bill Krohn
Rites on Realism 61 reviewed by Leger Grindon
28
THE TAQWACORES A IN DEPTH VIEW OF EYAD ZAHRA’S NEWEST FILMA Rummani Fi lmwork s product ion; produced and directed by Eyad Zahra;
c inematography by JP Perry; edited by Joshue Rosemnfield; or iginal music by
Omar Fadel ; starr ing Bobby Naderi , Noureen Dewulf , Dominic Rains, Nav Mann
and Ian Tran.
39.
“ T h e r e w e r e m o m e n t s wh e n i c o u l d n t wat c h . A s c e n e
b e tw e e n J e h a n g i r a n d Y u s e f h a d m e b aw l i n g . . . "
- M i c h a e l M u h a mm e d K n i g h t
E yad Zahra’s The Taqwacores is
the product of a strange mixture
of fantasy and real i ty. I t is based on a
novel by Michael Muhammad Knight (who
co-wrote the screenplay) and depicts a
f ict i t ious hard-core punk Musl im scene. The
novel , which was or iginal ly self publ ished
and excerpted in underground zines,
actual ly inspired the formation of several
Is lamic punk bands, with names such as
Osama’s Tunnel Diggers, in some sense
creat ing fact out of f ict ion. The f i lm tel ls
the story of Yusef, a strai t laced Pakistani-
Musl im engineering student in search of
housing for the new term. He ends up at
a ver i table den of in iquit ies: the house
of a group of Musl im punk s in Buffalo,
New York . The f i lm centers around Yusefs
encounters with his housemates and their
di f ferent takes on Is lam and ident i ty.
41.
jihad“ THAT WAS MY
THE STRUGGLE BETWEENME AND BY NUTS“
C h i e f a m o n g t h e p u n k s i s J e h a n g i r (Dominic Rains), the f i lm’s ant ihero, spor t ing an
i m p re s s i v e M o h a w k d ye d i n b l o o d l i k e h u e s , a n d
of ten wearing a studded leather jacket (al though
he is inexpl icably shir t less for most of the f i lm).
He attempts to take Yusef under his wing as a
guide to enable him to navigate the al ien terr i tory
that is the house of the Taqwacores. A dark and
brooding character, Jehangir spouts verses from
the Koran in a phi losophical manner and exudes
a devi l ish char isma that every youth-f i lm hero
must have. Jehangir has an expansive vis ion of
Is lam, one that does not exclude his propensity for
a lcohol and women. “That was my j ihad,” he tel ls
Yusef at one point , “ the struggle between me and
my nuts.” He is revered by the other housemates,
and is for the most par t their spir i tual leader.
Jehangir ’s major antagonist and r ival for
Yusefs loyalt ies is Umar (Nav Mann), a pur ist , with
the letter X car ved onto the back of his hands. His
version of Is lam is closer to what Yusef knows. Umar
constant ly refers to a t ime “before,” when the house
was not in i ts current state of disarray, when things
were run dif ferent ly, due to the presence of a more
or thodox and “pious” man who has long since lef t .
We see Yusefs conf l ict as he gets caught between
Jehangir and Umar, the latter becoming more
vicious and violent as the f i lm progresses, and the
Taqwacores inf luence the house more and more. The
l iv ing room of ten ser ves as a mosque dur ing the day,
whi le rowdy punk s converge there to par ty through
the night.
There is a constant negotiat ion between
dif ferent versions of Is lam throughout the f i lm, which
leads to a f inal , brutal c lash of worlds. Yusef for the
most par t remains neutral and, despite being led
down paths of introspect ion and quest ioning what
he has always known, he ul t imately st ick s to his
core bel iefs. Perhaps the most f leshed out and, as
a result , interest ing character in the f i lm is Rabeya,
played by actress Noureen Dewulf , an unident i f ia lble
gir l sheathed head-to-toe in what is known
a”shult t lecock burka,” which is the garb of choice of
only the most or thodox of Musl ims, and which spor ts
a fabr ic mesh in f ront of the wear’s face in order for
them to breath, and i f they are lucky, to talk . Rabeya
is a walking paradox, with her r iot grrrrr l att i tude and
vei led body.
S h e c h a l l e n g e s a c c e p t e d
Musl im precepts. Of note is her att i tude towards
a notor ious Koranic verse, 4:34, which is of ten
interpreted in a way that gives men car te blanche to
beat their wives. Much to the consternat ion of Yusef,
Rabeya has simply blacked i t out in her copy of the
Holy Book . This is an act of blasphemy, of course,
as Musl ims bel ieve that the book must be venterated
and kept in pure, c lean place at a l l t imes. Rabeya
memorably announces, however, that she “ didn’ t
need that one anymore,” and, af ter much careful
thought, decided to “fuck i t . ”
N o b o d y k n o w s w h y s h e w e a r s
t h e b u r k h a , w h i c h s h e h a s a d o r n e d w i t h p u n k-
i n f l u e n c e d p a t c h e s . a n d i t i s a s u b j e c t o f m u c h
d e l i b e r a t i o n t h r o u g h o u t t h e f i l m . To w a r d s t h e
e n d , J e h a n g i r h a s a n e p i p h a n y , s a y i n g “ I k n o w
w h y Ra b e y a w e a r s a b u r k h a . . . f o r t h e s a m e
r e a s o n I h a v e t h i s , ” p o i n t i n g t o h i s m o h a w k .
J e h a n g i r ’ s e x p l a n a t i o n i s s u r p r i s i n g l y b a n a l .
H e h a s a p p e a r e a d t o b e a p r o p h e t f o r t h e
d i s e n f r a n c h i s e d a n d o n e l o n g s f o r h i m t o s a y
s o m e t h i n g m o r e c o m p l e x . Th i s i s a p r o b l e m f o r
t h e f i l m a s a w h o l e , w h i c h n e v e r f u l l y e x p l a i n s
i t s e l f o r a r t i c u l a t e s a c o h e r e r a n t p o i n t o f v i e w .
(Continued on pages 45-46)
FILM REVIEWS
Produced by: Simon Channing Williams
Directed by and written by: Mike Leigh
Starring: ImeIda Staunton, Phil Davis, Peter Wight, Daniel Mays, Alex Kelly, Eddie Marsan, Heather Craney, Adrian Scarborough, Sally Hawkins, and Ruth Sheen.Color 125 mins
With Vera Drake, Mike Leigh has made a painful ly honest social t ragedy,
eschewing sat i re and styl izat ion for a straightfoward, restrained and utter ly t rue
evocat ion of working class characters and their mi l ieu. In the f i lm, Leigh focouses on
a warm, happy working-class Cockney family (far f rom the norm of his work) , l iv ing
in an austere, c lean f lat in the ear ly Fi f t ies Hor th London. The family ’s l i fe is turned
upside down when the mother and wife Vera is arrested.
The f i lm’s eponymous Vera ( Imelda Staunton in a revet ing per formance)
is a shor t , cheery, ordinary woman, who cleans the houses of upper-middle- and
upper-class famil ies-people who barely recognize her existence. She tends to her
bedridden,aged mother and an inval id neighbor with sol ic i tude and hot cups of tea.
And for tweenty years, she has gent ly “helped
out young gir ls in t rouble,” her euphemist ic way
of saying that she secret ly per forms i l legal
abor t ions ( abor t ion only becoming legal in
England and Wales in 1967).
Vera is a seeming innocent who
per forms abor t ions free of charge, seeing them
as acts of compassion. She is also not the sor t
of woman who would por vide a social or moral
just i f icat ion for her act ions--- i l legal acts that
are v iewed by much of the publ ic as murder.
But Vera, a woman seemingly without a dark
s ide, is just innately kind and car ing, and that is
the only explanat ion that the f i lm offers for her
behavior. Leigh never uses her pl ight to indulge
in a direct cr i t iqua of ant iabor t ion laws, but
rather conveys to us how few options women
of Vera’s class have when confronted with an
unwanted pregnancy.
-Leonard Quard
CHOICE
LIFE
VERADRAKE
43. VERA (IMEIDA STAUTON) IS ARRESTED FOR
PERFORMING ILLEGAL ABORTIONS IN MIKE LEIGH’S VERA DRAKE.
Produced by: Becky Glupczynski
Directed by and written by: Joshua Marston
Starring: Catalina Sandino Moreno, Guilied Lopez, Yenny Paola Vega, Patricia Rae, Osvaldo Plasencia, Orlando Tobon, and John Alex Toro.Color 125 mins.
mar
ia
fullof grace
THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE
Produced by: Tina Sinatra, Scott Rudin, Jonathan Demme, IIona Herzberg, and Scott Aversano
Directed by: Jonathan DemmeScreenplay by: Daniel Pyne and Dean Geogaris.
Starring: Catalina Sandino Moreno, Guilied Lopez, Yenny Paola Vega, Patricia Rae, Osvaldo Plasencia, Orlando Tobon, and John Alex Toro.Color 125 mins.
Joshua Marston’s f i rst feature fol lows Maria Alvarez (Catal ina Sandino
Moreno), a young, pregnant, recently dismissed factory worker in Columbia, as she
impulsively embraces the oppor tunity to become a New York-bound drug ‘mule. ’
Al though the f i lm presents a narrat ive of the drug trade from a female smuggler ’s point
of v iew, a perspect ive absent f rom mainstream poducts l ike Steven Soderbergh’s
Traff ic (2000), Maria Ful l of Grace is largely the story of an immigrant ’s pi lgr image.
The journey of seventeen-year-old Maria is real ly an escape from unemployment, an
exploitat ive family, and the prospect of a loveless marr iage.
-Vojislava Fil ipcevic
The f i rst Manchurian Candidate movie, as you’ l l
recal l , centered--along with many delectable s idebars--on
a convoluted communist plot , through brainwashing and
assassinat ion to take over the United States presidency.
Now comes, The Manchurian Candidate remake,
based, according to the credits, on George Axelrod’s 1962
screenplay and the or iginal novel by Richard Condon. In
a f l inch at the hear t of this remake, and i t carr ies over to
every aspect of the movie. Looking back at the 1962 f i lm
af ter seeing the new version, you real ize that i ts pulsat ing
narrat ive dr ive leaves unexplained a lot of extremely crucial
behavior. What compels Mrs. Isel in, Angela Lansbury’s
character, to betray her country and become l inchpin of a
communist coup. Overal l , the remake almost completely
lack s the verbal wit and visual comedy that played with and
against the terrors of the 1962 f i lm.
-Robert Sklar
MARIA (CATALINA SANDINO) WASHING DRUG FILLED CAPSULES IN JOSHUA MARTSTON’S MARIA FULL OF GRACE.
RAYMOND (LIEV SCHREIBER) ANSWERS A OMINIOUS PHONE CALL FROM A STRANGER IN JONATHAN DEMME’S MANCHURIAN CANIDATE
45.
anymore
ineed
didn’tthat one
“
”
anymore
ineed
didn’tthat one
“
”
Rabeya seems to be typical ly rebel l ious American teenager. Pakistanis and Indians use the term “ABCD”---meaning American Born Confused Desi---to dispar ingly refer to such types, with the word desi commonly meaning “ nat ive” or “one of us.” Rabeya and several of the other characters in the f i lm seem per fect i l lust ions of the ABCD concept. The novel on which the f i lm is based does provide more complexity than the f i lm on this and other issues, and i t is impossible to evaluate the f i lm without also discussing the book . The author Michael “Muhammed” Knight is a white American Musl im conver t f rom upstate New York . Knight had an inf ini tely t roubled chi ldhood that is of ten ci ted as the reason he came to Is lam at the age of s ixteen. At this t ime two events t ranspired simultaneously; he read The Autobiography of Malcolm X and then met his father for the f i rst t ime. His father was a raging white supremacist who disparged his son’s newly found bel iefs. At t ime, feel ing rebel l ious towards his abusive father, Knight saw Is lam “ as a correct ion of everything wrong in America,” and in his
own l i fe. In his zeal , he traveled to the Shah Faisal Mosque in Is lamabad, Pakistan, to learn more; he
also very near ly missed going off to Chechnya to f ight a holy war or j ihad.
Instead of going to war, Knight found himself increasingly disenchanted with the or thodoxies of the version of Is lam to which hew was exposed, and penned The Taqwacores in 2002 as a bi t ter farwel l to the rel igion. Knight ’s sensat ional and simple-minded approach reveals i tself even in the t i t le, which combines a reduct ive translat ion for the Arab word taqwa, meaning “piety,” and then adding “core” (shor t for hard-core). In Engl ish,
vaious translat ions that approach the Is lamic spir i t of taqwa are “pious God-fear ing,” “God fear ing piety,” “devout upr ightness,” and “holy fear.” The detour into the definit ion of Taqwa i l lustrates Knight’s one-dimensional understanding. His characters are f ighting too hard against things that don’t necessari ly exist except in one version of Islam. The plain fact is that hard-core Musl ims, nay hard-core zeolots of any kind, of any rel igion, are downright scary. Soprt ing a Mohawk does not make them cool. Punk was and always has been about dissing everything, and that includes God. Knight’s novel ult imately ser ves of Islam that give r ise to such a bigoted proposals as “Burn a Koran Day.” Offense aside, the Taqwacore story cannot make any sor t of meaningful statement about Is lam, or any organized rel igion, to anyone deeply engaged in fai th, largely because i t ’s appeal resides in i ts shock value. The baff l ing par t of a l l th is is that the imaginary world created by Knight actual ly inspired (or with i ts sheer brute force brainwashed) i ts unsuspect ing dupes to create a “real” scene. How far the honest-to-goodness Taqwacores can go to actual ly provoke thought and affect change remains debatable. The Taqwacores, however, is f inal ly not about Musl ims, and i t ’s not about South Asians, but i t is very much, and more impor tant ly, a fascinat ing case study of the great experiment that is America.
-Sascha Akhtar