Review of 'Rust and Bone' starring Marion Cotillard and Matthias Schoenarts . Directed by Jacques Audard.
Some people often complain about the violence in American films. But though some French flicks may not pile up as many dead bodies as your average American movie, the realism of some French films can really depress you . Take the recently released French movie 'Rust and Bone'. Here Marion Cotillard , a dolphin trainer meets a tough thug played by Matthew Schoenarts.
Then Cotillard gets attacked by a dolphin in the pool. Or at least that's what probably happens. And in an instant, Cotillard becomes a double amputee, a young woman who's lost both her legs. Meanwhile she meets Schoenart who pursues two careers, one as a security guard and management stoolie, the other as a sometimes mixed martial arts fighter.
He gets bloodied and then some. He also makes love to many women including Cotillard. Never before have I seen a double amputee have intercourse on the big screen. There has been at least one or two movies on handicapped wheelchair-bound people including 'Born On the Fourth of July' and "Coming Home'. Both films were about Vietnam vets.. But they were tame wish-fulfilled works compared to "Rust and Bone'.
Here's a film that shows poor or not so rich people struggling to survive. And its portrayal of the struggles of a handicapped Cotillard are unmatched by any other film I've ever seen on handicapped wheelchair bound people.
When the late Gore Vidal was once asked why he called one of his novels 'Hollywood' he replied, "Because that's all that America will be remembered for." Whether true or not, Hollywood is a dream factory whose stars look like gods and goddesses. They live in mansions, worlds away from the lives of us earth bound average people. Of course that's part of the reason why people love U.S. films.
'Rust and Bone' doesn't seem to exist in the same planet as your average American film. That's what appealed to me as it played on the screen. Its ending isn't a complete downer but it's not an upper either. As the French say, "Chacun a son gout," or "To each one's own taste." For a change of pace go watch "Rust and Bone'. It's an excellent film.
Saturday 29 December 2012
Friday 28 December 2012
In Love and Out of Canada
Leaving Home Again
Jane was astounded to see Tytherleigh. They made a date to meet that night. And in a few weeks they were enagaged to be married. In April 1962 they were married in an Anglican church in Fredericton.
"I could have married many other men," Jane told a friend of hers thirty years later. Then why did she marry John the friend asked. "Because he was there," Jane said as she gazed out of the living room of her small house on Vancouver's West side. "and I wanted to escape."
John had a job with a big engineering firm and was moving to Atlanta, Georgia. Once married, Jane could quit her dead-end job with the advertising firm. She could leave behind Atlantic Canada with its small town ways where everybody knew everyone else.She would move to a land where there was no snow and the sun shone endlessly. Jane maybe was not head over heels in love with John but she knew him and liked to make love to him. "He had a nice thin body back then," Jane recalled to her friend. "And he still seemed to love me."
Plus she could make love to this young man without fear of getting pregnant and having to get an abortion. Also being with John wiped out the memories of her ill-fated affair with Don McWilliam. Although she still felt guilty about her abortion she realized that she could never have brought up that child alone.
"She went to England to get another degree," the gossipers in Fredericton would have said. "But she came back with a child but no husband." And in the end she would have had to leave Fredericton anyway.
Now in her mid-twenties, Jane was launched into another country, the U.S. of A. Here was this great country just to the south, at one of its greatest moments in history..Its power was immense, its president young, handsome and intelligent, and married to a woman who looked like a movie star.
Don drove towards Maine in an old Ford car, a smile on his face. He and his wife were young and passionate about each other and hopeful about the future.As they drove towards the border between Maine and New Brunswick, Jane told her husband, "We're heading into a new world." She was right about that.
This is the end of Part One of 'The Life of Jane'. Part Two will start up agiain some time in the future.
Jane was astounded to see Tytherleigh. They made a date to meet that night. And in a few weeks they were enagaged to be married. In April 1962 they were married in an Anglican church in Fredericton.
"I could have married many other men," Jane told a friend of hers thirty years later. Then why did she marry John the friend asked. "Because he was there," Jane said as she gazed out of the living room of her small house on Vancouver's West side. "and I wanted to escape."
John had a job with a big engineering firm and was moving to Atlanta, Georgia. Once married, Jane could quit her dead-end job with the advertising firm. She could leave behind Atlantic Canada with its small town ways where everybody knew everyone else.She would move to a land where there was no snow and the sun shone endlessly. Jane maybe was not head over heels in love with John but she knew him and liked to make love to him. "He had a nice thin body back then," Jane recalled to her friend. "And he still seemed to love me."
Plus she could make love to this young man without fear of getting pregnant and having to get an abortion. Also being with John wiped out the memories of her ill-fated affair with Don McWilliam. Although she still felt guilty about her abortion she realized that she could never have brought up that child alone.
"She went to England to get another degree," the gossipers in Fredericton would have said. "But she came back with a child but no husband." And in the end she would have had to leave Fredericton anyway.
Now in her mid-twenties, Jane was launched into another country, the U.S. of A. Here was this great country just to the south, at one of its greatest moments in history..Its power was immense, its president young, handsome and intelligent, and married to a woman who looked like a movie star.
Don drove towards Maine in an old Ford car, a smile on his face. He and his wife were young and passionate about each other and hopeful about the future.As they drove towards the border between Maine and New Brunswick, Jane told her husband, "We're heading into a new world." She was right about that.
This is the end of Part One of 'The Life of Jane'. Part Two will start up agiain some time in the future.
Thursday 13 December 2012
The Life of Jane continued
Down but not out in Halifax-
Jane had applied for jobs teaching English literature at Dalhousie University and at another smaller college nearby. But she had no luck with either place.
"We hire from all over the Maritimes," one of the Dalhousie English faculty heads told her. "but we don't need any young teachers now." Then this tall aloof grey-haired man smiled at her from behind his big desk and siad, "But we'll keep your application form on file and we'll certainly keep you in mind." Then Jane left the room with its tall book-lined walls. She never heard from Dalhousie again.
Another local college didn't even contact her after she left a job application form with them. After another few weeks of frantic job seeking, Jane was planning to leave town and head up to Montreal.
But then her aunt who still lived in Halifax contacted Jane. She told Jane about an opening in a small advertising firm that got contracts from the Nova Scotian government. Jane scuttled down to the firm's office and wonder of wonders, she got the job. She was a working lady. But on her wages she couldn't save a penny. If this was my future, she thought, what had been the point of taking all my degrees?
"Good heavens," Jane told herself as she looked at her watch that sat at 12:50. "I've got to get back to work." The office she worked at was at least a ten minute walk away. Jane grabbed the bill and got up to leave. And then came a familiar voice.
"Hi scooter. What are you doing here for God's sake?" John Tytherleigh was standing right in front of her.
Jane had applied for jobs teaching English literature at Dalhousie University and at another smaller college nearby. But she had no luck with either place.
"We hire from all over the Maritimes," one of the Dalhousie English faculty heads told her. "but we don't need any young teachers now." Then this tall aloof grey-haired man smiled at her from behind his big desk and siad, "But we'll keep your application form on file and we'll certainly keep you in mind." Then Jane left the room with its tall book-lined walls. She never heard from Dalhousie again.
Another local college didn't even contact her after she left a job application form with them. After another few weeks of frantic job seeking, Jane was planning to leave town and head up to Montreal.
But then her aunt who still lived in Halifax contacted Jane. She told Jane about an opening in a small advertising firm that got contracts from the Nova Scotian government. Jane scuttled down to the firm's office and wonder of wonders, she got the job. She was a working lady. But on her wages she couldn't save a penny. If this was my future, she thought, what had been the point of taking all my degrees?
"Good heavens," Jane told herself as she looked at her watch that sat at 12:50. "I've got to get back to work." The office she worked at was at least a ten minute walk away. Jane grabbed the bill and got up to leave. And then came a familiar voice.
"Hi scooter. What are you doing here for God's sake?" John Tytherleigh was standing right in front of her.
Wednesday 5 December 2012
The Life of Jane continued
Chapter Nine
Jane was sitting in a restaurant not far from the Citadel, the fort that was a signature of Halifax's past . Somewhere a radio played. "Moon River/ Wider than a mile/I'm crossing you in style some day," the crooner sang.
Jane tuned out the song. She only had a few minutes left on this November day to eat and get back to work. She now toiled away at an advertising firm in downtown Halifax and she hated the job. Every day she sat at a desk in a room with three other young people. Here under the watchful eye of a middle aged man named John Morissey, the quartet churned out advertising copy for the provincial government
A red faced cigar smoking Morissey clad usually in plaid sport jackets and black pants, would scrap most of Jane's prose. "Make it simple," he would,tell her in a hoarse voice. "Don't use big words like this 'rambunctious' you wrote here. What does the word mean in simple English?'
"'Rambunctious' means 'noisy'" Jane replied quietly., as she stood in front of Morissey who sat behind his desk. and shook her head. She was
"Then use 'noisy' not three syllable words that only university graduates can understand. Got it?"
"Yes, Mr. Morissey I've got it."
"Remember Jane we're writing for the masses, not the highbrows."
Jane was helping write an advertisement on the quiet touristy parts of Nova Scotia and getting nowhere with her task.
Jane went back to her desk after standing in front of Morissey's desk that dwarfed all the other desks in the room. She sat down in her wooden chair and shook her head. All she was getting paid was forty dollars a week and going nowhere.
Once again she was living in a rooming house that squatted in a scruffy area of Halifax. Although it was a little better than the bed sitting room she'd lived in in London, it was nothing special that's for sure. What had been the point, she wondered, while munching on a cocktail fruit dessert in the restaurant, of getting all this education, if she ended up just being an ill-paid ad writer. And to make things worse, she wasn't even a good ad writer.There had to be a better way to pass the day and earn more money than doing what she was doing now.
Jane was sitting in a restaurant not far from the Citadel, the fort that was a signature of Halifax's past . Somewhere a radio played. "Moon River/ Wider than a mile/I'm crossing you in style some day," the crooner sang.
Jane tuned out the song. She only had a few minutes left on this November day to eat and get back to work. She now toiled away at an advertising firm in downtown Halifax and she hated the job. Every day she sat at a desk in a room with three other young people. Here under the watchful eye of a middle aged man named John Morissey, the quartet churned out advertising copy for the provincial government
A red faced cigar smoking Morissey clad usually in plaid sport jackets and black pants, would scrap most of Jane's prose. "Make it simple," he would,tell her in a hoarse voice. "Don't use big words like this 'rambunctious' you wrote here. What does the word mean in simple English?'
"'Rambunctious' means 'noisy'" Jane replied quietly., as she stood in front of Morissey who sat behind his desk. and shook her head. She was
"Then use 'noisy' not three syllable words that only university graduates can understand. Got it?"
"Yes, Mr. Morissey I've got it."
"Remember Jane we're writing for the masses, not the highbrows."
Jane was helping write an advertisement on the quiet touristy parts of Nova Scotia and getting nowhere with her task.
Jane went back to her desk after standing in front of Morissey's desk that dwarfed all the other desks in the room. She sat down in her wooden chair and shook her head. All she was getting paid was forty dollars a week and going nowhere.
Once again she was living in a rooming house that squatted in a scruffy area of Halifax. Although it was a little better than the bed sitting room she'd lived in in London, it was nothing special that's for sure. What had been the point, she wondered, while munching on a cocktail fruit dessert in the restaurant, of getting all this education, if she ended up just being an ill-paid ad writer. And to make things worse, she wasn't even a good ad writer.There had to be a better way to pass the day and earn more money than doing what she was doing now.
Tuesday 4 December 2012
The Life of Jane continued
Coming Home and then Leaving continued
Jane could see the passage of time right before her eyes. Her father's blonde hair was thinning and turning grey. So was her mother's. Her sister lived in Baltimore and worked for a big drug company. Her brother was on his way to getting a medical degree at the University of Toronto. "He's going to come back to here or maybe Nova Scotia," Jane's mother said. "Plenty of people need a doctor."
Jane's father faced new challenges. The new premier of New Brunswick Louis Robichaud was making sweeping changes to the health and education systems. "I'm all in favour of equality," Doctor Sinclair told Jane one afternoon after he came home from work. "But Robichaud's going too fast. He's trying to give the Acadians in New Brunswick all the chances we English speaking people already have."
But the doctor told Jane that it would take years to do this. "He's trying to do it in one fell swoop. And it's making my job a lot more difficult."
There were no jobs for Jane in Fredericton unless she wanted to be a substitute teacher in the local high school. Jane didn't want to do that sort of job. So after a few weeks Jane was bored to tears.She'd had enough of her home town but where could she go to? Then it came to her. First she'd go off to Halifax. It wasn't far away, that's for sure. And if things didn't work out there, there was always Montreal or even Toronto.
And so on one mild September day Jane Sinclair got back on a bus and headed down the road again to Halifax, Nova Scotia. "Fredericton's too small for me mum," she told her mother just before leaving. There's no jobs for me here. And besides, I've seen the big wide world. I can't live here anymore. I got to go."
Then gripping one big suitcase and a small brown handbag she got on a intercity bus and was gone. Once again she was headed into another world of adventure. As the bus headed away from Fredericton, Jane felt anxious about what might lie ahead. But she felt happy too.
She was leaving her home town which she sure couldn't live in anymore.
Jane could see the passage of time right before her eyes. Her father's blonde hair was thinning and turning grey. So was her mother's. Her sister lived in Baltimore and worked for a big drug company. Her brother was on his way to getting a medical degree at the University of Toronto. "He's going to come back to here or maybe Nova Scotia," Jane's mother said. "Plenty of people need a doctor."
Jane's father faced new challenges. The new premier of New Brunswick Louis Robichaud was making sweeping changes to the health and education systems. "I'm all in favour of equality," Doctor Sinclair told Jane one afternoon after he came home from work. "But Robichaud's going too fast. He's trying to give the Acadians in New Brunswick all the chances we English speaking people already have."
But the doctor told Jane that it would take years to do this. "He's trying to do it in one fell swoop. And it's making my job a lot more difficult."
There were no jobs for Jane in Fredericton unless she wanted to be a substitute teacher in the local high school. Jane didn't want to do that sort of job. So after a few weeks Jane was bored to tears.She'd had enough of her home town but where could she go to? Then it came to her. First she'd go off to Halifax. It wasn't far away, that's for sure. And if things didn't work out there, there was always Montreal or even Toronto.
And so on one mild September day Jane Sinclair got back on a bus and headed down the road again to Halifax, Nova Scotia. "Fredericton's too small for me mum," she told her mother just before leaving. There's no jobs for me here. And besides, I've seen the big wide world. I can't live here anymore. I got to go."
Then gripping one big suitcase and a small brown handbag she got on a intercity bus and was gone. Once again she was headed into another world of adventure. As the bus headed away from Fredericton, Jane felt anxious about what might lie ahead. But she felt happy too.
She was leaving her home town which she sure couldn't live in anymore.
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