On Not Getting It versus Insight

Two recent examples of this phenomenon crossed my view stream recently, and I wanted to comment upon them.

The phenomenon, visible all around you (especially if you look at Republicans and Democrats these days) is that of people who stubbornly, blindly, furiously, simply DON'T GET IT. You tell them or give them the information, and they do not or cannot see it. They persist in their stubbornness in seeing only their way, the right way. They blather on about their way, having totally and completely missed the actual point.

BLACK SWAN SPOILER BELOW

The two glaring examples of this that crossed my desk have to do with some (male) reviewers watching my favorite film of the year, "Black Swan," and a female reporter interviewing John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

Let's examine "Black Swan" first. I acknowledge that all art is subjective. People see what they want to see, based on their own set of experiences and life paths. The problem in the translation of "Black Swan," IMHO, has to do with the maleness versus the femaleness.

My perception of "Black Swan" is very much encased in the female mindset. I see it as a dream. Nina dreams of being the best ballerina ever. She shares this with her mother (who perhaps at one time had similar dreams). She sees the path to this dream resting in her ability to conquer perfection. So she studies technique, and becomes the best technical ballerina she can be.

But her male director tells her, NO! To really conquer the "Black Swan"/dark side of your personality/shadow side, you have to release the perfection. You have to be willing to risk, to feel, to experience life, in all its imperfection.

I think everyone is pretty much down with the story through these parts (male and female). But increasingly toward the end, the movie takes on flights of fancy/dream sequences/explorations of the creative mind. This is where many male reviewers seem to fall off. They resort to trying to take this movie literally.

Oh my God, she's turning into a swan. Oh my God, she kills herself at the end! Well, yes and no.

The way I saw it, from the middle of the movie on, she is still a little girl with dreams, trying to experience her own dark side. She is still trying to attain the perfection that she started out trying to attain. And if the director tells her she must be more sexual, she endeavors to do that.

Is it really a "lesbian sex scene" with Mila Kunis as one male reviewer crassly puts it? Or is it actually the bubbling of her subconscious? Her femaleness laid bare in trying to conquer her own sexuality? Did the experience with Kunis really happen? The director leaves you to wondering. THAT is the beauty of it.

Was she, in the end, enticed by Kunis? Enraptured by her? Wanting to sleep with her? Or was Kunis just the free spirit part of herself that she was trying to catch? Was she then, in essence, sleeping with herself, as the director had instructed her to do? Capturing through fantasy what she perhaps couldn't really capture?

And the end of the movie, that so horrified several male critics, who again WRONGLY take it literally, isn't really her dying. At least, that's not how I see it. It was the ballerina on the music box falling off. It was the end of "Swan Lake," as it's supposed to be. It was the grand spectacle of "la petit mort" writ large. Orgasm, the finale, "it was perfect." The end.

And it had to end in a big bloody spectacle, because life is imperfect, and bloody and messy. Life and love and passion and creativity. That's what I saw there.

So what that tells me is that the "Black Swan" haters need to have more orgasms and connect to their passions.

In the other subject, I confess, when I was younger, I was swayed by the tenor of the times, and my father. John Lennon and Yoko Ono were just wacky and crazy with this "Bed In" thing and preaching about peace. Nuts. Off their rockers.

I saw this in the frustrated questioning of the (I think BBC) reporter. She seemed to be perceiving Lennon and Ono as either complete nutcases, or fantasists wasting her time. She kept arguing about the seriousness of people dying in various wars, and they kept talking about how if people really thought about peace, peace could happen.

Yoko made quite an eloquent argument about "how can you shoot someone when you're smiling?" She was actually arguing quite complex spiritual principles. If you embody love, you cannot simultaneously embody hate. Hate is what causes killing. Hatred and fear. So if you choose love, if you choose peace, consciously, we would have no more war.

I understand that now. I sure didn't understand that then. Neither did the frustrated BBC reporter, who actually got up and stormed off at this point. She reacted as though Yoko were completely wasting her time, when in fact, they were both just trying to get her to understand.

And what will it take, as we have an insane stonewalling Congress on the horizon, for people to put down their arms and their stubbornness and finally listen and hear?

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This Year's Oscarcast Makes History

Every year they try it. Most years, they fail. This year, they failed (this hot new producer duo of Shankman and Mechanic), but produced some good moments.

It's not easy trying to juggle many potentially time-consuming things. How to make an Oscarcast fit within three hours? Here's what they tried: telling all nominees that speeches had to be 45 seconds long. That they would have a chance to thank every last person with the webcam that was backstage. Into this webcam, they could ramble and thank every last teacher they've ever had. At least, that was the working theory.

They also decided, early on, to cut the traditional Best Song performance. After all, Peter Gabriel had been angered the previous year when they asked him to perform only 45 seconds of his nominated song. (Can you blame him?) This year, they got rid of it altogether.

However, in some quarters, Best Song nominees and rambling incoherent acceptance speeches are why we watch the Oscars. So, what else you got, new golden boy directors?

Well, their idea seemed to be to court the youth vote. Get the youngsters to watch the Oscars by having Miley Cyrus and the kids from Twilight present. (A colossally bad idea, as it turned out.)

Then there were the hosts. Plural. Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin had been enlisted this year. As Oscar hosts go, they weren't quite Letterman bad, and not nearly Jackman good. The opening banter that reeked of "Oprah-Uma"ville, was pained and awkward. Their own jabs at each other were stagey and mostly unfunny. Although the concept of them descending from the ceiling (wasn't this stolen from the MTV awards?) mostly worked well.

There were other ouch moments. Neil Patrick Harris (who should've been hosting) appeared in an opening dance number that seemed apropos of nothing. Although the fan dancers were... um, colorful.

Their Snow White moment came when they chose to honor film icon John Hughes (who passed last year) with a film montage. And several of his featured actors onstage, each saying a few words (some of which had just been in the montage). Judd Nelson looked scary sick. Macauley Culkin has seen better days. We get it. John Hughes created some great, memorable movies. We miss him. But the endless homage to him was out of place.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, apparently Lauren Bacall and Roger Corman had been given honorary Oscars. All they got was a smile and a wave. Oh, and a standing ovation.

There was also a horror movie montage, apropos of nothing, except to chastize the Academy for not choosing more horror films. (Um, ok...) Inexplicably, it wasn't at all tied in to Roger Corman's award.

Although there were no Best Song performances, they did grace us with an interpretive dance segment to the Best Score nominees. Draw your own conclusions, but I think this is the moment most people chose to go to the bathroom or refill on snacks.

Those were the travesties, now let's talk about what they did right.

Camerawork was stellar (other than one too many closeup on George Clooney). The stagecraft was state-of-the-art. Lights and stage worked well, and proved interesting. And best of all, when the winners wanted to talk for a bit, they let them. They were only pushed off with music if their speech had gotten boring. So Jeff Bridges was able to thank those he wanted and needed to thank, and Lloyd Bridges is smiling down in gratitude.

The best Oscar moment for me this year came when Barbra Streisand came out to announce Best Director. She herself had memorably been nominated once. Up to that moment, no woman had ever won before. No African-American had ever won before. It was a proud, tearful moment when, as she opened the envelope, she paused and said, "It's finally time. Kathryn Bigelow. Hurt Locker." It was the most powerful moment of the evening.

Oh yeah, The Hurt Locker won Best Picture, and six of its nine nominations. Avatar won three. Precious, Up and Crazy Heart all took two. Inglorious Basterds, The Young Victoria, Star Trek and the Blind Side all took one.

That was another powerful moment. All awards season long, statues had alternated between Meryl Streep and Sandra Bullock. On this night, it was Ms. Bullock's name that was finally called. She offered her Oscar up to her mother, and cried in the process. It was beautiful.

Another really moving choice from previous years that thankfully they kept was the tradition of actors commenting on the nominees. They did this for both Best Actor and Best Actress. It was joyous to see each nominee tear up as the person onstage spoke directly to them. And that felt like a win for everyone.

This year's Oscarcast? Nearly three and a half hours. Maybe next year, they'll do it better.