The Movies of Nicole Holofcener versus 'Mad Men' by Dave Jaffe.
Despite the politics she displayed in the film she directed called 'Please Give' I still like the films of Nicole Holofcener.There's no smoking in her flicks which I think is wonderful.
Now let's compare her films to the very popular t.v. series 'Mad Men. It ran on t.v. from 2007 to 2015. Millions of viewers watched 'Mad Men' in the U.S. and Canada. 'Mad Men' said the Los Angeles Times created " a strange and lovey space between nostalgia and political correctness." This maybe true but from the series' first scene to its last take, people smoked and smoked and smoked.
'Mad Men ' is about an advertising agency named Sterling Cooper based in New York City of the 1960's. The program unfolds in upscale offices and many bedrooms. At the start of the series, the lead man, Don Draper played by Jon Hamm sits in a crowded bar and smokes 'Lucky Strike' cigarettes. He questions an African American waiter who prefers another brand of smokes why he prefers his type of cigarettes.
Nearly everybody in the bar is smoking. To be fair, in the 1960's over 70 per cent of Americans did smoke. Here, the series does reflect reality. The mysterious Draper's main job is to keep Sterling Cooper's biggest client which is a big cigarette company in good shape. This looks like a tough task since a recent article in 'Reader's Digest' has revealed that cigarette smoking endangers lives.
The actors in the series weren't smoking real tobacco. They smoked herbal cigarettes. "You don't want actors smoking real cigarettes," Mad Men's main writer Matthew Weiner told 'The New York Times'. "They get agitated and nervous." I felt good to hear this, but I wondered whether many young people watching the series started smoking after tuning into 'Mad Men'. For make no mistake about it: smoking tobacco endangers lives. Sources I've tracked down say somewhere between 15,000 and 25,000 Canadians die every year from smoking.
"100 Canadians die every day from smoking," said an even more alarmist web site. This puts the yearly total of deaths from smoking in Canada to about 35,000. Yet whatever the true figure of Canadian smokers is, many Canadians will die prematurely from heart attacks, lung cancer and strokes because they smoke tobacco every day.
Nicole Holofcener has complained that not many people know about the films she's scripted and directed. She goes to parties and tells people, "I direct movies." Yet most people, she says, have never heard of her films. This is too bad. The popularity of her films may never match that of 'Mad Men'. Yet so what? In her films, unlike the "Mad Men" series, nobody smokes. And that right now makes her my favourite film director.
Saturday, 13 April 2019
Thursday, 21 March 2019
The Films That Have No Smokers In Them: The Movies of Nicole Holofcener: Part Two by Dave Jaffe
The Films That Have No Smokers In Them: Part Two
It's great that nobody smokes cigarettes in the movies I've seen that are scripted and directed by Nicole Holofcener. Yet her politics don't turn me on.
Holofcener is not a progressive which is too bad. Her film 'Please Give' features Catherine Keener as a middle-aged mother who runs an antique and furniture store in New York City. Keener, like myself is a liberal who gives sometimes big sums of money to the poor and the homeless. I give fifty or thirty cents a time to panhandlers. Keener gives away sometimes twenty dollars a time.
Now in the film no one thanks Keener for helping people, and some like her teenage daughter just dump on her. An older neighbour throws the birthday present that Keener gives her into the garbage. An African-American man refuses part of a leftover meal that she offers him. He explains that he's waiting outside a restaurant to get a seat inside the place. Keener's daughter tries to stop her giving $20 to a homeless man.
"You never give me $20," she says to her mother and she grabs the $20 and keeps it.
At one point in the film Keener breaks down and cries when she sees mentally challenged teenagers playing basketball. Yet afterwards she doesn't volunteer to work with them. And at the movie's end everything turns out well, as Keener finally forks out $235 dollars to pay for her daughter's jeans. All of these events shouldn't surprise anyone.
"I don't think you'll find too many left leaning films coming out of Hollywood," one film critic told me years ago. How many American film makers lean consistently to the left? Maybe there's three or four. Oliver Stone, Spike Lee and John Sayles come to mind. In Britain there's the great Ken Loach. And that's about it.
Like most film directors Holofcener's a conservative. The main message of 'Please Give' is: Give money to your loved ones and you'll do fine. It's a waste of time and money helping the poor and the homeless. Few powerful or wealthy people will disagree with this message. So though I like parts of Holofcener's films she's not my favourite film director.
I like the fact that no smokers pop up in her flicks. I just don't like her politics.
It's great that nobody smokes cigarettes in the movies I've seen that are scripted and directed by Nicole Holofcener. Yet her politics don't turn me on.
Holofcener is not a progressive which is too bad. Her film 'Please Give' features Catherine Keener as a middle-aged mother who runs an antique and furniture store in New York City. Keener, like myself is a liberal who gives sometimes big sums of money to the poor and the homeless. I give fifty or thirty cents a time to panhandlers. Keener gives away sometimes twenty dollars a time.
Now in the film no one thanks Keener for helping people, and some like her teenage daughter just dump on her. An older neighbour throws the birthday present that Keener gives her into the garbage. An African-American man refuses part of a leftover meal that she offers him. He explains that he's waiting outside a restaurant to get a seat inside the place. Keener's daughter tries to stop her giving $20 to a homeless man.
"You never give me $20," she says to her mother and she grabs the $20 and keeps it.
At one point in the film Keener breaks down and cries when she sees mentally challenged teenagers playing basketball. Yet afterwards she doesn't volunteer to work with them. And at the movie's end everything turns out well, as Keener finally forks out $235 dollars to pay for her daughter's jeans. All of these events shouldn't surprise anyone.
"I don't think you'll find too many left leaning films coming out of Hollywood," one film critic told me years ago. How many American film makers lean consistently to the left? Maybe there's three or four. Oliver Stone, Spike Lee and John Sayles come to mind. In Britain there's the great Ken Loach. And that's about it.
Like most film directors Holofcener's a conservative. The main message of 'Please Give' is: Give money to your loved ones and you'll do fine. It's a waste of time and money helping the poor and the homeless. Few powerful or wealthy people will disagree with this message. So though I like parts of Holofcener's films she's not my favourite film director.
I like the fact that no smokers pop up in her flicks. I just don't like her politics.
Tuesday, 19 March 2019
The Films That Have No Smokers In Them: The Movies of Nicole Holofcener by Dave Jaffe
The Movies of Nicole Holofcener: Part One.
Nicole Holofcener has become one of my favourite movie directors. Holofcener is in her late fifties, lives in southern California and sets some of her films in New York City. "She's a bit like Woody Allen," some people say about her films. I don't think so, though she knows Allen very well. After all, her mother's second husband was Charles H.Joffe who produced dozens of Allen's movies.
Hiolofcener's one of my favourite directors because so far in all the films I've seen that she scripted and directed, nobody smokes tobacco. People drink a bit in her flicks and in one of her films, namely 'Walking and Talking', two people smoke pot together. Sometimes they drink alcohol. yet they don't smoke cigarettes.
Now Holofcener may or may not be as great a director as say Orson Welles, Francois Truffaut, Martin Scorsese, Atom Egoyan, Lena Wertmuller or even Woody Allen. Yet in nearly all the films I've seen people smoke cigarettes. And smoking is dangerous. Every year 15,000 Canadians die from smoking. Smokers have strokes, or get cancer or their hearts just stop ticking. So they die often in their sixties or even earlier.
"Cigarettes are dangerous," one of my previous doctors told me. "Stay away from them." Holfcener's characters do.
That doesn't make Holfcener a great director for some critics. Her films are mostly about women interacting in families or friendships and sometimes they hate each other or hurt each other. "There's no story line," one woman told me after seeing the film 'Please Give'. This may be true but the interactions that women have are the story. Still, whatever the flaws or lack of action in this woman's films, her flicks don't show glamorous film stars smoking. That can turn young people onto this most dangerous activity.
I like this woman's work. Her films aren't violent, bloody or physically brutal. People hurt each other but mostly through words. Holofcener's main star Catherine Keener never lights up a cigarette in any of the films I've seen her in. For that, I thank them both. And I also than Ariel Levy a writer for 'The New Yorker' who turned me on to this woman' work. Holofcener is I believe an advocate of not smoking. Her films are anyway.
Nicole Holofcener has become one of my favourite movie directors. Holofcener is in her late fifties, lives in southern California and sets some of her films in New York City. "She's a bit like Woody Allen," some people say about her films. I don't think so, though she knows Allen very well. After all, her mother's second husband was Charles H.Joffe who produced dozens of Allen's movies.
Hiolofcener's one of my favourite directors because so far in all the films I've seen that she scripted and directed, nobody smokes tobacco. People drink a bit in her flicks and in one of her films, namely 'Walking and Talking', two people smoke pot together. Sometimes they drink alcohol. yet they don't smoke cigarettes.
Now Holofcener may or may not be as great a director as say Orson Welles, Francois Truffaut, Martin Scorsese, Atom Egoyan, Lena Wertmuller or even Woody Allen. Yet in nearly all the films I've seen people smoke cigarettes. And smoking is dangerous. Every year 15,000 Canadians die from smoking. Smokers have strokes, or get cancer or their hearts just stop ticking. So they die often in their sixties or even earlier.
"Cigarettes are dangerous," one of my previous doctors told me. "Stay away from them." Holfcener's characters do.
That doesn't make Holfcener a great director for some critics. Her films are mostly about women interacting in families or friendships and sometimes they hate each other or hurt each other. "There's no story line," one woman told me after seeing the film 'Please Give'. This may be true but the interactions that women have are the story. Still, whatever the flaws or lack of action in this woman's films, her flicks don't show glamorous film stars smoking. That can turn young people onto this most dangerous activity.
I like this woman's work. Her films aren't violent, bloody or physically brutal. People hurt each other but mostly through words. Holofcener's main star Catherine Keener never lights up a cigarette in any of the films I've seen her in. For that, I thank them both. And I also than Ariel Levy a writer for 'The New Yorker' who turned me on to this woman' work. Holofcener is I believe an advocate of not smoking. Her films are anyway.
Wednesday, 13 March 2019
Inside Unity: A Poem by Dave Jaffe.
Inside Unity: A Poem by Dave Jaffe.
There's no kneeling
Only healing
Inside this church.
No talk here of the Gospels
Or Moses or much of Christ.
If there is a God
Who has trod
On this earth
This Creator's light
Splashes down on our faces
From a blue sky
That hovers way above the church's roof.
The words of the minister
Aren't sinister.
They stroke my scarred face
Stitch up the epidermal surface
Where a week ago
A surgeon's knives
Scraped cancer away
From the dark floor of my mind.
This minister talks of healing
Not sealing
Away stark memories of the past
In locked vaults of times gone by.
His words gently touch my skin.
"Life if good," he says.
To me this means
There is no sin.
Outside
The city clears its throat
From the mouths of a million cars.
I'm sorry.
I can't worry anymore about poisons
That scud around in the earth, the air and the water
Or the starving billions
Or those led to slaughter
In Syria or elsewhere.
For now I am healed.
No need to steal
Fragile moments of happiness
From the present of my life,
Or look in fright
Toward its end.
"In unity," someone said,
"there is strength."
In this Unity Church I have found happiness.
Just enough to return for another day.
There's no kneeling
Only healing
Inside this church.
No talk here of the Gospels
Or Moses or much of Christ.
If there is a God
Who has trod
On this earth
This Creator's light
Splashes down on our faces
From a blue sky
That hovers way above the church's roof.
The words of the minister
Aren't sinister.
They stroke my scarred face
Stitch up the epidermal surface
Where a week ago
A surgeon's knives
Scraped cancer away
From the dark floor of my mind.
This minister talks of healing
Not sealing
Away stark memories of the past
In locked vaults of times gone by.
His words gently touch my skin.
"Life if good," he says.
To me this means
There is no sin.
Outside
The city clears its throat
From the mouths of a million cars.
I'm sorry.
I can't worry anymore about poisons
That scud around in the earth, the air and the water
Or the starving billions
Or those led to slaughter
In Syria or elsewhere.
For now I am healed.
No need to steal
Fragile moments of happiness
From the present of my life,
Or look in fright
Toward its end.
"In unity," someone said,
"there is strength."
In this Unity Church I have found happiness.
Just enough to return for another day.
Tuesday, 26 February 2019
The Elites: A Poem by Dave Jaffe.
The Elites by Dave Jaffe
The elites
They don't sleep in the streets.
They run the world
They weren't hurled
Into the harsh universe of to-day
To struggle from pay cheque to pay cheque.
Their eyes rest calmly
On the huge landscapes they own.
They want to cut
Social programs to the bone.
And they do.
They run the world.
Men and women
Armed with endless bank accounts
And countless stocks and shares
They proudly climb society's stairs
That lead to the top
Of the block.
They're the elites.
They love to meet
At Davos Bohemian Grove
And other retreats.
Here these few thousand few
Plan how to subdue
And rule the world forever
They usually do
They're the elites..
The elites
They don't sleep in the streets.
They run the world
They weren't hurled
Into the harsh universe of to-day
To struggle from pay cheque to pay cheque.
Their eyes rest calmly
On the huge landscapes they own.
They want to cut
Social programs to the bone.
And they do.
They run the world.
Men and women
Armed with endless bank accounts
And countless stocks and shares
They proudly climb society's stairs
That lead to the top
Of the block.
They're the elites.
They love to meet
At Davos Bohemian Grove
And other retreats.
Here these few thousand few
Plan how to subdue
And rule the world forever
They usually do
They're the elites..
Thursday, 21 February 2019
They Are The Young; A Poem by Dave Jaffe
They Are The Young.
They are the young,
I am the old
An irritable aging scold.
They are the young
Their hopes aren't hung
From dying branches
Or wrapped in brown leaves
That scuttle in the wind on the cold cold ground
Their energetic noise
Pushes against playground walls,
Flies through upscale malls.
Delights itself
Worries teachers, tense sales staff
And preachers.
They don't moan or cry
Over the crimes of Stalin or Hitler
Or the deaths at My Lai.
They know nothing about these things.
Or anything thank God
About the sod beneath the grass in Vietnam.
Where unexploded bombs,
Some made in Canada
Still lie and wait to explode
In innocent human hands.
They clutch cell phones
Text messages of joy and sometimes hate.
See pornography on the web
Have names like Seb
Melissa, Ariana Caleb and Eden.
They don't worry
About shrinking social programs in Sweden
Or elsewhere.
They are the young
Immersed ion fun
In sports, noise
And toys
And other girls and boys.
They are the young
Forever moving.
.
They are the young,
I am the old
An irritable aging scold.
They are the young
Their hopes aren't hung
From dying branches
Or wrapped in brown leaves
That scuttle in the wind on the cold cold ground
Their energetic noise
Pushes against playground walls,
Flies through upscale malls.
Delights itself
Worries teachers, tense sales staff
And preachers.
They don't moan or cry
Over the crimes of Stalin or Hitler
Or the deaths at My Lai.
They know nothing about these things.
Or anything thank God
About the sod beneath the grass in Vietnam.
Where unexploded bombs,
Some made in Canada
Still lie and wait to explode
In innocent human hands.
They clutch cell phones
Text messages of joy and sometimes hate.
See pornography on the web
Have names like Seb
Melissa, Ariana Caleb and Eden.
They don't worry
About shrinking social programs in Sweden
Or elsewhere.
They are the young
Immersed ion fun
In sports, noise
And toys
And other girls and boys.
They are the young
Forever moving.
.
Saturday, 2 February 2019
Ends and Odds: The Ravings Of An Old Man by Dave Jaffe. Review Of An Old Movie
Review Of An Old Film "Goodfellas': "Crime Doesn't Pay'
'Goodfellas' by now is an ancient film. It came out in 1990, nearly thirty years ago. Yet I bought a DVD version of the film from a video store about a week ago.( I am lucky. This video store called 'Black Dog Video' is one of only two or three video stores left in Vancouver.)
What is 'Goodfellas' about? Mostly crime. It's full of violence murder and bloodshed done by gangsters. Some of these men are Italian-Americans: some aren't. They live in New York City from the 1950's to the 1970's. What the film proves simply is that crime doesn't pay. "Any new criminal starting out on a life of crime," writes the American sociologist Randall Collins, "has a lot to,learn and many connections to make."
In this sense the young Henry Hill (Ray Liotto) is lucky. Growing up in Brooklyn in the early 1950's, he learns a lot and makes connections as a young adolescent. He runs messages for criminals, survives beatings by his father, and by his early 20's is a full fledged criminal. Now he has made friends with Tommy De Vito(Joe Pesci) and Jimmy "The Gent" Conway (Robert De Niro). These three and others do horrible things. They extort money, sell stolen goods, brutalize other people and in the case of Conway and De Vito kill quite a few people.
As a very young man Hill admires the Mafia don played by Paul Sorvino. Near the film's end he denounces him and Conway to the police. Tommy De Vito is by now dead, killed by another gangster.
The film directed by Martin Scorsese and scripted by Scorsese and Nicolas Pileggi is based on Pileggi's book called "Wiseguy: Life In A Mafia Family'.The movie is told in a semi-documentary style by Hill and his wife Karen (Lorraine Bracio). 'Goodfellas' is full of scenes of meals which serve up delicious food, visits to night clubs and robberies and murder. Yet the old adage "Crime doesn't pay" comes true. Nearly all the criminals end up killed or behind bars. Hill survives but only be turning state's evidence. "Never rat on your friends," Conway tells Hill near the film's beginning. Hill breaks this rule and survives.
Scorsese's film is one of the finest gangster films I've seen. Yet it's not for the faint of heart. These 'Goodfellas' are anything but good. They're mostly killers who end up dead or in prison. And its's in prison where they belong.
'Goodfellas' by now is an ancient film. It came out in 1990, nearly thirty years ago. Yet I bought a DVD version of the film from a video store about a week ago.( I am lucky. This video store called 'Black Dog Video' is one of only two or three video stores left in Vancouver.)
What is 'Goodfellas' about? Mostly crime. It's full of violence murder and bloodshed done by gangsters. Some of these men are Italian-Americans: some aren't. They live in New York City from the 1950's to the 1970's. What the film proves simply is that crime doesn't pay. "Any new criminal starting out on a life of crime," writes the American sociologist Randall Collins, "has a lot to,learn and many connections to make."
In this sense the young Henry Hill (Ray Liotto) is lucky. Growing up in Brooklyn in the early 1950's, he learns a lot and makes connections as a young adolescent. He runs messages for criminals, survives beatings by his father, and by his early 20's is a full fledged criminal. Now he has made friends with Tommy De Vito(Joe Pesci) and Jimmy "The Gent" Conway (Robert De Niro). These three and others do horrible things. They extort money, sell stolen goods, brutalize other people and in the case of Conway and De Vito kill quite a few people.
As a very young man Hill admires the Mafia don played by Paul Sorvino. Near the film's end he denounces him and Conway to the police. Tommy De Vito is by now dead, killed by another gangster.
The film directed by Martin Scorsese and scripted by Scorsese and Nicolas Pileggi is based on Pileggi's book called "Wiseguy: Life In A Mafia Family'.The movie is told in a semi-documentary style by Hill and his wife Karen (Lorraine Bracio). 'Goodfellas' is full of scenes of meals which serve up delicious food, visits to night clubs and robberies and murder. Yet the old adage "Crime doesn't pay" comes true. Nearly all the criminals end up killed or behind bars. Hill survives but only be turning state's evidence. "Never rat on your friends," Conway tells Hill near the film's beginning. Hill breaks this rule and survives.
Scorsese's film is one of the finest gangster films I've seen. Yet it's not for the faint of heart. These 'Goodfellas' are anything but good. They're mostly killers who end up dead or in prison. And its's in prison where they belong.
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