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‘The Taste of Things’: the Country Kitchen as Vermeer’s Studio

At last year’s Oscar time, I was a little surprised that the buzzy Anatomy of a Fall wasn’t selected as the official entry by France to enter the race for Best International Feature Film. Instead, it was The Taste of Things. Now that I have the chance to watch it, I can understand why it was the choice and I totally agree with it. That it did not win seems immaterial, for its aesthetic value and the honour of being chosen to represent France make it a worthy accolade.

The Taste of Things is a delectable feature, a celebration of French gastronomy and its historic, culinary traditions, an exquisite and aesthetically riveting period film set in a country house. Vol-au-vent, pot-au-feu, roast rack of veal with braised vegetables… To say it’s a delicious food movie is just lowering the level of enjoyment, like eating an ice cream cone compared to being served baked alaska prepared by a gourmet. The film is not just about the taste of food, but of love, beauty, sensuality, and human connection, offering a deeply gratifying viewing experience.

Directed by the Vietnamese-French filmmaker Anh Hung Tran––whose first film The Scent of Papaya won a César Award in 1994 as well as accolades at Cannes––The Taste of Things sent Tran to Cannes again in 2023 and this time a Palme d’Or nominee and winning Best Director.

Tran reunited Juliette Binoche with her ex Benoît Magimel for the film. The two were divorced twenty years ago. Maybe a past relationship had some bearings on stirring up fond memories, for the pair exudes admirable chemistry on screen. Magimel plays the fictional gourmet Dodin Bouffant, nickname ‘Napoleon of gastronomy’, who resides in a country house during the late 19th century. His cook for twenty years has been Eugénie, superbly portrayed by Binoche, ethereal even in a rustic kitchen.

While Babette’s Feast (1988 Oscar’s Best Foreign Language Film) comes to mind readily, it’s the visual memory of Girl with a Pearl Earring (2004) that enhances my appreciation of The Taste of Things. Indeed, Dodin’s kitchen is like Vermeer’s studio, large window allowing natural light to pour in, the colour scheme of period costume and set design (Tran’s wife Nu Yên-Khê Tran), the naturalistic capturing of characters and their movement make it an exquisite, artistic production.

Inspired by Marcel Rouff’s novel La vie et la passion de Dodin-Bouffant, Gourmet (The Life and Passion of Dodin-Bouffant, Gourmet), writer director Tran wrote the screenplay of The Taste of Things as a prequel to Rouff’s novel, imagining the bond of love between Dodin and his longtime cook Eugénie. Dodin has proposed marriage to Eugénie time and again but is turned down every time. The twist comes when Eugénie falls ill and the reversal of roles emerges. Dodin begins to cook for her––love expressed through the ingenuity of new dishes meticulously prepared and the enjoyment of watching her savour his handiwork.

It’s interesting to note that there’s no music in the whole film. Massenet’s Méditation in piano version comes on only when the end credits roll. With no soundtrack, the essence is in the ambient sounds of nature, bird songs outside the country kitchen, and inside, the sounds of cooking, the crackling of the fire, and the gentle conversations among the characters as they prepare meals. In an interview, Tran mentions that: “The sound is the flavour of the picture. The picture has the beauty; the flavour of it comes from the sound.”

Another crucial ingredient is the camerawork. Cinematography (Jonathan Ricquebourg) is the key in capturing the overall aesthetics and mood of the film. The camera is like a quiet observer, moving gently, often in long takes, following the characters in the kitchen, their movement like a choreographed sequence, smooth, seamless, serene and subtle. While the food preparation may seem complicated and time-pressed, the overall mood in the kitchen is always harmonious. The would-be apprentice, fourteen-year-old Pauline (Bonnie Chagneau-Ravoire) is particularly impressive. A tidbit: The French chef Pierre Gagnaire, owner and head chef of his eponymous restaurant, is the consultant for the movie. He himself has a role in there as well.

Overall, an artistic achievement to savour. Vermeer’s kitchen or Dodin’s studio? A fitting fusion of imaginary connections.

~ ~ ~ 1/2 Ripples

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Thanks to Words and Peace for hosting Paris in July 2024

Note: All posts on Ripple Effects written by Arti, the real person.

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Related Posts on Ripple Effects:

Anatomy of a Fall or how to dissect a marriage

Paris in July 2022: A Culinary Sojourn

Girl with a Pearl Earring: the painting, the novel, and the movie

Virginia Woolf’s The Years sparks some surprising associations… Downton Abbey?

“She wanted to see the owl before it got too dark. She was becoming more and more interested in birds. It was a sign of old age, she supposed.” –––– Virginia Woolf, The Years* (186)

Finally, I finish my other 1937 Club read hosted by Kaggsy and Simon that took place in April, two months late, and that’s Virginia Woolf’s The Years, published in 1937. It sure feels like years for me to finish this book. Better late than never, for I have full intention to see what Woolf had to say in her last novel published during her lifetime (Between the Acts was published shortly after her death in 1941), specifically, what was in her mind just a few years before she took her own life.

The book follows the children of Colonel Abel Pargiter’s family as they go through the years crossing the 19th century into the 20th. It’s a family saga through chapters titled for a specific year, beginning with 1880, 1891, then into the new century 1907, 1908 and to the First World War, and finally the “Present Day” which is the 1930’s. Within each chapter the narratives are episodic, characters appear without introductions; readers would have to piece together who’s who and how they relate to each other.

A few unexpected mental associations came to me during my reading. The quote above at the beginning of this post is one of those surprises. A loud Whoa! when I read it: Interest in birds as a sign of ageing. It’s a thought in the mind of Eleanor, the eldest of the Partiger children, when she is fifty-five. She goes on to live past seventy when the book ends, and I’m sure has seen many more owls.

Another surprise for me in my reading experience of The Years is how it’s like watching an arthouse film, or any good movie for that matter. My first impression of that beginning chapter 1880 is that it reads like a script where the expressions and actions of the characters are highly nuanced and the subtext in their conversations speak volumes. Nothing much is happening but the seemingly uneventful narrative carries unsettling undercurrents.

Here’s an example. The Colonel, with his wife Rose on her death bed, is a troubled and temperamental man whom his seven children fear more than respect or love. He comes back home unexpectedly during supper time in the opening chapter and the way he drinks his tea while trying to strike up conversations in a surly manner with his children reflects his changing mood. A ready movie scene here. I’ve taken out the dialogues, but just the description of his tea-drinking actions reveal a lot about his character:

He stirred his sugar round and round in the cup as if to demolish it… ground the grains of sugar against the walls of his cup. [After some tense conversations with his children] Then he seemed to repent of his gruffness… He drank up his tea. Some drops fell on his little pointed beard. He took out his large silk handkerchief and wipe it impatiently… [Later] the Colonel took up his cup, saw there was nothing in it, and put it down firmly with a little chink. The ceremony of tea-drinking was over. (13-14)

Another surprise is that reading The Years makes me think of Downton Abbey, how a family goes through changes both in the larger socio milieu and in their personal lives through the years. The time-lapse is about the same as the six seasons of Downton, from horses to cars, from candles to electric lights, WWI and the changes it brings. The following line in Woolf’s novel makes me think of the Dowager Violet Crawley:

Then he looked at a car. It was odd how soon one got used to cars without horses, he thought. They used to look ridiculous. (215)

BTW, Edith Crawley, who breaks the mould and ventures out to live in London on her own and heads up a magazine she inherits from Michael Gregson and a London flat, has mentioned that she had met Virginia Woolf there, one of Michael’s Bloomsbury acquaintances. One can imagine the author just might have certain influence on her.

The Years is about lives lived, actions or non-actions, the regrets and the resignation of what had happened, the unchangeability of the past. Check out these lines, the introspection of Eleanor’s, just reminds me of Mary Crawley, who had uttered similar words thinking of her own past errors in judgment:

But once it’s done, there it is… How irrecoverable things are, she thought. We make our experiments, then they make theirs. (185)

Above all else, The Years is about the past and memories, and the meaning of it all. Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past comes to mind, no surprise. Both authors value the writing down of lives lived. But Woolf goes into a more depressed mode of seeing even the futility of it. As the chapters, ie, the years, move on, Woolf is more explicit about her view on life––I suppose that’s her perspective––through Eleanor’s point-of-view. Considering Woolf taking her own life just four years after this book was published, I paid attention to the reflections and internal search for existential meaning, or the failing of which, and find these passages particularly poignant. Short sentences like this: “Scenes passed over scenes; one obliterated another,” to reflection like the following, again, quite a cinematic moment:

Things can’t go on for ever, she thought. Things pass, things change, she thought, looking up at the ceiling. And where are we going? Where? Where?… The moths were dashing round the ceiling; the book slipped on to the floor. .. made an effort; turned round, and blew out the candle. Darkness reigned. (195)

to what seems like ultimate despair, take note that Woolf wrote this in the 1930’s:

But how can one be ‘happy’? she asked herself, in a world bursting with misery. On every placard at every street corner was Death; or worse––tyranny; brutality; torture; the fall of civilization; the end of freedom. (358)

I gave the book 3.5 out of 5 stars in my Goodreads review, an evaluation that’s based on my first reading, having had to figure out who’s who –– considering the Pargiters have seven children and some of them have their own children. And then there are extended family members, cousin, niece and nephew, and servants. I’m sure upon second reading, I’d be able to get a clearer picture of all the characters and would enjoy it more, for it really deserves more than one reading.

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* The edition that I used (photo above) is Vintage Classics, Penguin Random House UK, London. 401 pages. Introduction by Susan Hill. With this inscription before the Introduction:
“The text of this edition of The Years is based on that of the original Hogarth Press Edition, published by Leonard and Virginia Woolf on 15th March 1937.”

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Related Post on Ripple Effects:

In Praise of Austen: Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own

In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust: A Movie Reviewer’s Long Take

My other 1937 Club Posts:

Out of Africa by Karen Blixen from Book to Movie

Somerset Maugham’s Theatre and Screen Adaptation

Anna and Rufous in Richmond Nature Park

Whenever I visit Vancouver, I’d go to Richmond Nature Park to see my avian friends, the hummingbirds there. Anna’s I’d seen before but still not met Rufous yet. Feeders provide the essential food they need and the small sanctuary is their haven for frolicking fun. I wasn’t fast enough to capture them with my camera as they play tag, but I was able to catch them while they were feeding or staying put on a branch for a few seconds.

I’d only seen Anna’s Hummingbird there before. Each time I come back I learn something more. Here’s a little tidbit from Bird Note I found today: “Anna’s Hummingbird was named for Princess Anna de Belle Massena. John James Audubon himself was charmed by her, but it was actually naturalist René Primevère Lesson who named the bird in her honor.” Just learn too that Anna’s Hummingbird is Vancouver’s official City Bird. A couple photos of Anna’s:

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But it’s meeting Rufous for the first time that makes my trip memorable this time. At first, I thought Rufous was a namesake like Anna, but actually it refers to the bird’s colour, reddish brown:

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What caught my attention was its iridescent, bright orange neck plumage, called gorget (pronounced gor-jit, gorgeous indeed.) It shone like a metallic glare when I saw it, like a knight’s shining armour around the neck, something that these very inadequate photos can’t reflect:

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But it’s not always orange, with different angles of sunlight, it can be totally brown or even black:

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And I saw it change from black to yellow and then to orange almost at the same time as the bird moves its head ever so slightly, simply fascinating:

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And if you look carefully at the gorget, you can see all three colours here in this picture below, and no, it’s not being stabbed or hooked, just perching on a bar:

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Again, Mary Oliver’s line comes back to me:

“… I have always known you are present in the… wings of birds.”
–– from the poem ‘Six Recognitions of the Lord’

I can say it again, substituting ‘wings’ with ‘every single feather.’

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Related Post on Ripple Effects:

Anna’s Hummingbird: A Lesson in Smallness

And now there are four

The baby owl that fell out of a tree and taken away by wildlife staff has now returned home. Good to see all the members of the Owl Family are back together again. Hard to find a good camera angle when you’re way down on the ground, but here’s what I’ve captured.

The Owl Family. The two owlets in the middle, with mom and dad on each side of the young. Three of them on one branch, the other parent on another branch to the left:

Can you spot all four of them here?

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A closer look at three of them:

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Looks like Baby O. has fledged and learned to spread its wings. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Glad to see all’s well now with the Owl Family:

Soon the young ones will be gone. To where I don’t know. At least I’m glad I’ve a chance to see wings spread out and ready before they fly away. I’m sure Mama and Papa Owls feel the same.

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A Tribute to Canada’s Nobel Laureate Alice Munro: Munro and Movies

Alice Munro had died at the age of 92 on Monday, May 13, 2024, in Port Hope, Ontario. Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2013 and the Man Booker International Prize in 2009, Munro solidified her stature in literature with her mastery of the short story. As a tribute to her passing, I’m reposting something I wrote on the occasion of her Nobel Prize win back in 2013 in the following. In that article, I’d also included a short review of the film Away From Her, based on her short story “The Bear Came Over the Mountain”.

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On October 12, 2013, I wrote:

Thanks to the Swedish Academy, Alice Munro doesn’t need a blockbuster movie to raise awareness of her works. Described by The New York Times as ‘Master of the Intricacies of the Human Heart’, and with her story settings mostly in rural counties and small towns, the 82 year-old writer must have known how the small and intimate can have far-reaching effects.

The short story as a literary form too must have gained importance and legitimation overnight now that Munro is honored as Nobel Laureate. The novel isn’t the only peak of the mountain of literary pursuits. Readers too, can now be totally comfortable with reading ‘just a short story’.

Back to movies, with our contemporary mega, blockbuster culture, it sure looks like the general public needs to see a movie before knowing about a literary work. While I don’t like the idea, I’ve to admit that could well be the case nowadays. But for Munro, can anyone name a full feature movie that’s based on her short stories?

Right. Actually there are four* (see correction below). Edge of Madness (2002) is relatively unknown. Another one interestingly is an Iranian film, Canaan, which won the Audience Awards–Best Film at the Fajr International Film Festival in 2008. A better known adaptation is Away From Her (2006). It remains one of my all time favorite films. The most recent completed production is Hateship Loveship which premiered at TIFF13. I regret missing it when I was there in September. A film based on her story ‘Runaway’ is currently in development.

With Munro winning the Nobel, hopefully we’ll have the chance to see a general release of Hateship Loveship. So there you go, Munro could well be helping to reverse the trend: the writer promoting the film.

To celebrate Munro’s Nobel win, I’d like to repost in the following a review of Away From Her which I wrote in 2008. The film was directed by the young and talented Canadian actor/director Sarah Polley, who was nominated for an Oscar for her adapted screenplay based on Munro’s short story ‘The Bear Came Over the Mountain’. Julie Christie received an Oscar nomination for her role as Alzheimer’s afflicted Fiona.

You can read Munro’s story ‘The Bear Came Over the Mountain’ now online, thanks to a timely reprint by The New Yorker.

AWAY FROM HER: A Short Review

How can you turn a good short story into a full length movie without compromising its quality? By turning it into a screenplay written by an equally sensitive and passionate writer, and then, through her own talented, interpretive eye, re-creates it into a visual narrative. Along the way, throw in a few veteran actors who are so passionate about what the script is trying to convey that they themselves embody the message.

Sarah Polley has made her directorial debut with a most impressive and memorable feat that I’m sure things will go even better down her career path. What she has composed on screen speaks much more poignantly than words on a page, calling forth sentiments that we didn’t even know we had. As Alzheimer’s begins to take control over Fiona, what can a loving husband do? Julie Christie and Gordon Pinsent stir up thoughts in us that we’d rather bury: how much are we willing to give up for love? Or, how would we face the imminence of our loved ones’ and our own mental and physical demise?

Based on the story by Alice Munro, ‘The Bear Came Over the Mountain’, Polley brings out the theme of unconditional love not with your typical Hollywood’s hot, young, and sexy on screen, but aging actors in their 60’s and 70’s. It may not be as pleasurable to watch wrinkled faces hugging and kissing, or a man and a woman in bed, bearing age spots and all, but such scenes effectively beg the question: why feel uncomfortable?

Why does love has to be synonymous with youth, beauty, and romance? It is even more agonizing to watch how far Grant is willing to go solely for love of Fiona. Lucky for us, both writers spare us the truly painful at the end. It is through persistent, selfless giving that one ultimately receives; however meager and fleeting that reward may seem, it is permanence in the eyes of love. And it is through the lucid vision of a youthful 28-year-old writer/director that such ageless love is vividly portrayed…. Oh, the paradoxes in life.

~ ~ ~ Ripples

* Correction: According to IMDb, there are 14 screen adaptations of Munro’s work, both in movies and TV. Runaway is in production currently.

Baby Kicks off Spring Birding

The arrival of a new owlet is when I’m energized for another year of birding. Like the bear, I hibernate in the winter. I wouldn’t want to fight the elements in -20C temperatures with not much to see but a blanket of white. After waiting patiently for the snow to be gone and rain to let up, today is the first fine day to begin my few months of nature hopping. I was richly rewarded.

This single Great Horned Owlet makes it all worth the wait. Other birders told me that there were two babies this year, but one fell off a tree and was taken away by wildlife staff, hopefully to mend injury and recuperate. So, leaving this one all the more precious. Can you find baby here?

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A close up for a better view of this adorable, downy ball:

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Check out this photo below, see anything special? Only the owl can do this feat where both the head and the tail face the same direction. That’s right, baby has turned his head 180° :

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Sure knows how to pose for the camera too:

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and the natural, without needing to pose:

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Mom is close by, but like all mothers, always in need of those precious 40 winks:

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A fine day to start another year of nature hopping. More photos coming up…

The 1937 Club: Maugham’s ‘Theatre’ from Book to Screen

To wrap up my week for The 1937 Club, I’m re-posting my review of W. Somerset Maugham’s Theatre published in 1937 which some of you have read. As I’m still reading Virginia Woolf’s The Years, haven’t time to reread Maugham’s book this time. I want to re-post my review mainly because I’d like to share my thoughts back in 2010 when I wrote it, and see how much our society has changed in terms of what is real, the main issue by which in Maugham’s book, the son Roger is so disturbed regarding his theatre actress mother Julia Lambert.

As for book turned into films, those familiar with Ripple Effects know that I see the literary and the visual as different art forms, therefore being ‘faithful’ isn’t the major qualifier for a good adaptation. However, in this case, I’m quite disappointed that the essence or, the main issue, as represented by Roger’s frustration with his mother has not been transposed onto the screen, downplaying the tension and conflict that’s so crucial in the book.

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Two pages into the book I knew right away I had seen it before. Of course, that’s the movie Being Julia (2004). Annette Bening got a Best Actress Oscar nom for her portrayal of Julia Lambert, a famous actress on the London stage in the 1930’s. The movie is a colourful account of how a successful stage actress deals with her mid-life crisis. Garnering fame, fortune, and achievement in bounty, what more could she ask for but… love and passion. And during the course, obstacles, jealousy, and betrayal are all overcome, and revenge carried out; on or off stage, no matter, it’s equally exciting for the glamorous Julia Lambert.

But not until I read this novel on which the movie was based did I realize that a most important passage had been left out. And oh what an omission! For the crux of the book rests on those few pages. And not only that, the screenwriter had chosen to alter a character to suit his fancy, rounding off the edges of conflicts and alleviating tensions in presenting a smooth and suave storyline.

In the movie, Julia’s son Roger is a young man fresh out of Eton and planning to attend Cambridge after the summer. That much is true to the book. Roger is shown to be a devoted son, lovingly supportive of his mother in her pursuits in career and love life. But this is not the case in the novel. Maugham has crafted Roger as a critical young man, offering the necessary tension to the story. In a crucial scene at the end of the book, he questions Julia’s behaviour and integrity. These challenges form the climatic confrontation between mother and son, projecting the meaning behind the very title of the novel.

Here is an excerpt from this scene that captures the essence of the whole book. Julia asks Roger:

“What is it you want?”
Once again he gave her his disconcerting stare. It was hard to know if he was serious, for his eyes faintly shimmered with amusement.
“Reality.”
“What do you mean?”
“You see, I’ve lived all my life in an atmosphere of make-believe…. You never stop acting. It’s second nature to you. You act when there’s a party here. You act to the servants, you act to Father, you act to me. To me you act the part of the fond, indulgent, celebrated mother. You don’t exist, you’re only the innumerable parts you’ve played. I’ve often wondered if there was ever a you or if you were never anything more than a vehicle for all these other people that you’ve pretended to be. When I’ve seen you go into an empty room I’ve sometimes wanted to open the door suddenly, but I’ve been afraid to in case I found nobody there.”

By turning Roger into a complacent and docile young man, the screenwriter had failed to present the necessary tension in the story. Further, by avoiding the character foil between the successful actress mother and her meaning-pursuing, idealistic son, the movie fails to deliver the essential subtext, despite an impressive performance by Annette Bening.

Further, the best is yet to come in the book… such is the ingenuity of Maugham. After a superb, revengeful performance, overarching her rival, the young and beautiful Avice Crichton, and drawing everyone’s admiration back to herself, Julia celebrates on her own with a nice meal and mulls over a gratifying notion, on the very last page:

“Roger says we don’t exist. Why, it’s only we who do exist. They are the shadows and we give them substance. We are the symbols of all this confused, aimless struggling that they call life, and it’s only the symbol which is real. They say acting is only make-believe. That make-believe is the only reality.”

This is ever so relevant for us today. With all the online personae we can create and project, all behind the guard of anonymity, Roger’s quest for what’s real remains a valid search.

Sherry Turkle, the acclaimed ‘anthropologist of cyberspace’, has observed the liminal reality in our postmodern world and stated her own quest:

“I’m interested in how the virtual impinges on what we’ve always called the real, and how the real impinges on the virtual.”

Let’s just hope that the advancement of technology would not get the better of us, blurring the lines of fact and fiction, offering shields for fraud and deceits. Behind the liminal existence, let’s hope too that we still care what’s real and what’s not, and that our humanity will still be valued and not be compromised or lost in the vast abyss of bits and bytes.

The upcoming Academy Awards too, is another platform to showcase such a duality. I always find the acceptance speeches of award winners intriguing: what’s genuine and what’s fake in their thank you’s. Are they presenting their real self or merely acting? Outside of their roles, which part of them is authentic? Or, do they ever get out of their roles?

It’s interesting too to explore the influence of movies nowadays. Again, the postmodern emphasis is on the narrative, multiples of them, and storytelling the vehicle of meaning. Does the notion of Maugham’s character Julia mirror our world… that movies have become the symbols of what we call life? That make-believe has sometimes been merged with reality? Can we still tell them apart? Or, should we even try? Considering the pervasive effects of pop culture in our life today, considering a single movie can command a worldwide box office sale of $2.4 billion, and counting… Maugham was prophetic indeed.

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Again, I thank Simon and Karen for hosting. Looking forward to the next year club in the coming months.

The 1937 Club: ‘Out of Africa’ Book to Movie

Twice a year, Simon at Stuck in a Book and Karen at Kaggsy’s Bookish Ramblings host an interesting reading event, the year club. We read books published in that year indicated by the number and write our reviews. This time, from April 15-21, we are doing the year 1937.

Many fine titles were published in 1937, but for me, it’s an easy choice: Out of Africa, the memoir of Danish author and baroness Karen Blixen (1985-1962). Interesting to note that she had several pen names. In the English speaking countries, she was Isak Dinesen.

Ever since watching the 1985 movie Out of Africa, I’ve always wanted to read the source material, Blixen’s autobiography about her seventeen years (1914-1931) living in Kenya operating a coffee farm. In a way, I want to cast aside the image from the movie, however romantic, of Meryl Streep and Robert Redford sitting in green pastures picnicking, with Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto coming out from a gramophone, the music sweeping serenely across the pristine African landscape.

Blixen’s life in Kenya was no small venture: a pioneer woman operating a coffee farm situated in the six thousand acres of her land at the foothills of the Ngong Mountains. She rode horses, went on safaris, shot lions to defend her oxen, herself and others. When in the capital, Nairobi, she was a business woman; when on her farm, she was doctor to those lined up to see her with their sickness and ailments. She sent those that she couldn’t handle to the hospital and visited them, seeing to their recovery.

Blixen’s chronicles of her life in Africa intertwine objective observations and intimate thoughts. When describing the different ethnic groups in the land, the Natives Kikuyu, or her neighbours the Masai, or the immigrants the Somali… her writing is like an astute anthropologist, always with admiration. When referring to the Somali women, she writes:

There was no ignorance in their innocence. They had all assisted at childbirths and death-beds… Sometimes to entertain me, they would relate fairy tales in the style of the Arabian Nights, mostly in the comical genre, which treated love with much frankness. It was a trait common to all these tales that the heroine, chaste or not, would get the better of the male characters and come out of the tale triumphant… I felt the presence of a great ideal… the idea of a Millennium when women were to reign supreme in the world. (131)

Considering the above was noted earlier than 1931 (the year she left) in Africa, was Blixen a visionary ahead of her times, or… was it the Somali women?

When describing those close to her, like her invaluable assistant Farah, she presents a character study with free flowing, deep feelings of love and respect. In the essay collection at the back of this book, Shadow on the Grass, she has a whole chapter on Farah, of whom she describes a special relationship of Unity, that of Master and Servant, in no subordinate sense but an indispensable bond of loyalty and mutual respect. Blixen gives a few examples of such Unity, like Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. For contemporary readers like us, maybe the Downton relationship between Robert Crawley and John Bates would be a more visible example.

[Spoiler Warning here] Unlike the movie, Blixen mentions her friend Denys Finch-Hatton (Robert Redford in the movie) only sporadically in the first half of the book. Towards the end she devotes a few chapters on him upon his tragic plane crash. The two chapter titles are indicative of his character: ‘The Noble Pioneer’ and ‘Wings.’ Denys had almost become a Native himself, knowing the people of the land thoroughly, having had spent decades there, his love for them is reciprocal. His bi-plane is an apt metaphor for his courage and unbound spirit of exploration. His gramophone is an object of desire as the music it plays is a shared joy between him and Blixen, as well as a novel attraction mesmerizing all those on the farm. Of Denys, Blixen writes:

What they really remembered in him was his absolute lack of self-consciousness, or self-interest, and unconditional truthfulness which outside of him I had only met in idiots. (247)

Kudos to film director Sydney Pollack, the movie shows what’s unsaid between the lines. Blixen had deep feelings for Denys, but from the text, she’s restrained and devoid of sentimentality. That’s what makes the final chapters so poignant. Unlike the movie, there’s no romance depicted, just friendship and mutual admiration. There are letters and other writings of Blixen’s which I’m sure the filmmakers had researched on, and thus the more intimate dramatization of them as lovers in the movie. Furthermore, the aerial shots of Deny’s bi-plane over the African landscape, hills and valleys, plains and waters, spurring flocks of shore birds to soar to the sky, our reading imagination visualized; John Barry’s heart-stirring, expansive score complements the mesmerizing cinematography. And yet, I’ve fully enjoyed Blixen’s writing as well, intimate and poignant.

The farm eventually failed financially and Blixen had to move back to Denmark. Selling it out and bidding farewell is like leaving her soul there. She describes her last safari at dusk:

The plains with the thorn-trees on them were already quite dark, but the air was filled with clarity – and over our heads, to the west, a single star which was to grow big and radiant in the course of the night was now just visible, like a silver point in the sky of citrine topaz. The air was cold to the lungs, the long grass dripping wet, and the herbs on it gave out their spiced astringent scent. In a little while on all sides the cicadas would begin to sing. The grass was me, and the air, the distant invisible mountains were me, the tired oxen were me. I breathed with the slight night-wind in the thorn-trees. (191)

This is one of those books that will linger in my heart long after I finish and to which I know I will return.

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Related Post on Ripple Effects:

‘Flappers and Philosophers’ by F. Scott Fitzgerald: My entry into the 1920 Club

Easter Thoughts from Madeleine L’Engle

“Easter, which turns a terrible Friday into Good Friday. It is almost too brilliant for me to contemplate; it is like looking directly into the sun; I am burned and blinded by life.

There are times when I feel that He has withdrawn from me… but Easter is always the answer to My God, my God, why has thou forsaken me!

Easter is the most brilliant of all blessings.

–––––– Madeleine L’Engle, The Irrational Season

The following excerpt doesn’t directly refer to Easter, but its inherent meaning does:

I am encouraged as I look at some of those who have listened to their “different drum”: Einstein was hopeless at school math and commented wryly on his inadequacy in human relations, Winston Churchill was an abysmal failure in his early school years… Byron had to compensate for a club foot; Demosthenes for a stutter; and Homer was blind… Socrates infuriated his countrymen.
And what about Jesus, if we need an ultimate example of failure with one’s peers?
Or an ultimate example of love?

______ Madeleine L’Engle, A Circle of Quiet

And in a lighter mode:

Pride is heavy.
It weighs.
It is a fatness of spirit,
an overindulgence in self.
This gluttony is earthbound,
cannot be lifted up.
Help me to fast,
to lose this weight.
Otherwise, O Light one,
how can I rejoice in your
Ascension?

(Photos taken by Arti at Lake Ontario shore, Sept. 2022.)

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To those who celebrate this life transforming, historical event, Happy Easter to you all!

The Zone of Interest and the Banality of Evil

How does a German family spend their summer holidays? Imagine this one with mom and dad and their five children in a country house. Family picnic by the river, dad fishing, mom admiring her large and impressive garden, children splashing in the pool. Dad got a surprise birthday present, a canoe, which he takes to the quiet stream with two of his older children surrounded by bird songs. Dad not only loves his family, but his horse, his dog, and those lilac bushes.

A picture of an idyllic and peaceful family life. Zoom out a bit, the country house is right adjacent to the Auschwitz concentration camp, separated by just a wall, barbed wire on top. We can only see the top of the prison buildings. Yes, we also see heavy smoke shooting out from tall chimneys.

This is an actual, historic setting. The master of the household is Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), commandant of the Auschwitz concentration camp. He rides to work on his beloved horse, doesn’t have far to go, only next door. An idyllic family life and the horrors of genocide co-exist side by side, the Garden of Eden and Hell separated by just one wall. As for the wall, Rudolf’s wife Hedwig (Sandra Hüller) is thinking of growing some vine to cover it, making it disappear altogether.

Writer-director Jonathan Glazer’s Zone of Interest is a macabre juxtaposition of normality and atrocity, a cinematic representation of what the political thinker and philosopher Hannah Arendt calls the banality of evil. It doesn’t take a monster to commit monstrous acts. Ordinary people had committed them without questioning, as Judith Butler wrote about Arendt’s book on the trial of Adolf Eichmann, one of the organizers of the Holocaust:

In a sense, by calling a crime against humanity ‘banal’, [Arendt] was trying to point to the way in which the crime had become for the criminals accepted, routinised, and implemented without moral revulsion and political indignation and resistance.
The Guardian, Aug. 29, 2011

Glazer’s ingenuity in depicting the ‘horror next door’ is by not showing us visually but audibly. While we see the Höss family going about their daily life, we can hear constant gunshots, dogs barking, guards yelling, furnace rumbling, and anguished cries. Indeed, the whole Höss family have learned to ignore such ‘disturbances.’ Their callousness is chilling. When Rudolf received the order to transfer from Auschwitz to Oranienburg, Hedwig tells him that she wants to stay right there with the children while Rudolf can attend his new post alone. Their rationale: “The life we enjoy is very much worth the sacrifice.” Hedwig adds in, “this is the way Hitler would want us to live.” Here is their dream home.

If such a normal family can be complicit to evil without questioning, Arendt’s implication is that we who consider ourselves ordinary folks can also be susceptible to commit criminal wrongdoings out of the desire for group conformity or self-interest. It doesn’t take a villainous monster to commit atrocious acts, we all have the propensity for evil. That wall separating the garden and hell could be the metaphoric, thin line between good and evil within ourselves. Another chilling thought, this time much closer in our own backyard.

Two-time Oscar nominated cinematographer Lukasz Zal (Cold War, 2019; Ida, 2015) placed cameras in and outside of the house unobtrusively to capture the actors in their natural way. Shot in natural lighting, with no camera people on set, the film is a raw depiction of the behavior of a family in their mundane mode of living, a heartless picture of irony to what’s taking place on the other side of the wall.

Two scenes particularly stand out for me. Hedwig tries on a long fur coat––loot from the prisoners next door––looking into a full-length mirror, clutching the collars and posing from side to side as if trying it in a boutique shop. Another scene is one of the older boys using his flashlight to examine something while in bed at night. An insert shot shows what he’s studying: teeth with gold trims; not hard to figure out where they come from.

Any relief from such insensitivity? Glazer has inserted some fairytale-like sequences in reverse black and white of a girl hiding food in the bushes, for the prisoners we presume, that’s when we hear the voice-over of Rudolf reading to his children the story of Hansel and Gretel in their bed. Fairytale or dream sequence, or for real, is that one of the Höss girls? No matter, that’s the humanity we seek.

Loosely based on Martin Amis’ novel, Zone of Interest is an ‘arthouse’ style of filmmaking that offers a unique perspective of the Holocaust without showing any of the prisoners, except the one that works in the Höss garden. Sounds elicit unseen implications. The film starts and ends with a long, eerie cacophony of anguish and squeals with the screen a blurry mass of grey. The effects evoked are none less haunting than actual shots of the concentration camp. The ending scene comes back to today and the way the camera captures the people there is most effective in wrapping up this retelling of history.

With its one hour and forty-five minutes duration, the film is succinct, well-paced and edited, naturalistic in its styling, and leaves viewers with haunting ponderings after. Winner of four Cannes Prizes, The Zone of Interested is nominated in five categories in this coming Academy Awards on March 10: Best Picture, Best International Feature Film, Director, Adapted Screenplay, and Sound. Hope it could get some worthy recognition on this side of the Atlantic.

~ ~ ~ ~ Ripples

Related Ripple Reviews:

Anatomy of a Fall

Ida’s Choice: Thoughts on Pawlikowski’s Ida

Japanese Literature Challenge 17: Keigo Higashino’s Latest, ‘The Final Curtain’

Keigo Higashino is a prolific writer, more than sixty novels published and not only in the mystery genre, yet only thirteen have been translated into English. The Final Curtain is his latest, albeit it was published in Japan in 2014. English version by Giles Murray in 2023.

Thanks to Bellezza for hosting Japanese Literature Challenge for the seventeenth year, I get the chance to read this book with her. Yes, she has been my read-along pal all through my blogging years, dating way back to Midnight’s Children in 2012, and later Anna Karenina, Middlemarch, just to name a few.

Now, to Higashino. In The Final Curtain, something hits home for Detective Kaga, for it involves the death of his mother, who had deserted his father and him when he was a teenager. We learn that years ago Kaga knows of his mother’s mysterious death in the city of Sendai from an unknown woman who opens a bar there. That begins the rich and multi-layered story. As it turns out, the person that secretly releases the information to the bar owner is tied to at least two deaths in Tokyo in present day, weaving up a complex net of stories and family relations.

Yes, it’s sometimes confusing trying to figure out which character is which, for the names can be hard to distinguish. Be glad that the translator has a list of characters in the first page of the book where you can always turn to refresh your memory. The middle part could make a reader feel sluggish somewhat, but don’t get bogged down by it because this part sets the stage for a page-turning last section. Beginning with Chapter 22, there’s a dramatic switch in character description and perspective, you’ll be hooked to find out what had happened years ago that had led to the present day behaviour and demeanor of the characters.

Once again, Kaga comes through as a deep thinking, rational, and very clever young man. I don’t think of him as “A modern-day Poirot” as the description says on the book cover. Why, Kaga is a broad shouldered man with an impressive physique and in this book, a notable point and a crucial thread to the mystery is that Kaga is a kendo (Japanese sword) champion.

Every time I read Higashino I’m not only intrigued by the interwoven plot and the connections of characters, but the cultural aspects he presents during his storytelling. One notable point here is the importance of early school life has on the characters, and how readily old school mates are able to recall past events of students and teachers. People do have great memory power in Higashino’s novels.

Another aspect of Japanese culture I specifically look for is what the characters eat and drink. I’ve always had my eyes peeled to note Higashino’s description of Japanese food. Kaga and his detective cousin Matsumiya like to exchange info over beer. And what goes with it? “Matsumiya popped a few beans into his mouth and took a swig of beer as he contemplated his cousin.” And Kaga “shoveled some simmered burdock into his mouth with his chopsticks.” I admit I’ve to Google what burdock is. Other culinary delights mentioned are sashimi, grilled fish, tofu and rolled omelet.

I’d rate The Final Curtain to be one of my favourite Higashino mysteries, together with The Devotion of Suspect X. While it reveals the causes of the three major deaths in Tokyo, the ending of The Final Curtain gives me a feeling of ‘to be continued’, as the mystery of Kaga’s mother still lingers in my mind. I look forward eagerly to more Higanshino to be translated soon.

~ ~ ~ Ripples

Other Keigo Higashino Ripple reviews:

JLC16: The Swan and The Bat

The Devotion of Suspect X

Newcomer

Ripples from the 2024 Oscar Nominations

The 96th Academy Awards nominations were announced on January 23. To Oscar watchers, the Best Picture list is no surprise. All the ten movies have been garnering praises all along in the past year. Here are some ripples from Arti’s Pond. My views may not reflect yours, so, you’re welcome to throw in your two pebbles to generate yours.

This year the nominations are voted by members of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences from 93 countries, over 9,400 eligible voters. Here are the ten Best Picture nominees with links to my full review and others a capsule review here.

Here are the Best Picture Nominees for the 96th Academy Awards:

American Fiction –– My favourite of all the nominees that I have watched on this list. Clever, funny, and superbly performed. While I haven’t read the literary source Percival Everett’s 2001 novel Erasure, I find the movie in itself thought-provoking, well-edited, and with a relevant, hilarious twist at the end. A heartfelt description of family relations while presenting an acerbic satire on racial stereotyping in the publishing industry, extending to the general American society. Winner of TIFF’s People’s Choice Awards last September, a choice, I suppose, is easier for us unhindered outsiders to make. 5 Oscar noms.

Anatomy of a Fall –– My full review here. 5 Oscar noms.

Barbie –– While Greta Gerwig is one of my favourite film writers, directors, and actors, I’m afraid I don’t share the enthusiasm of the populist. Is it that hard to imagine a girl growing up just might not like dolls and least of all a Barbie, and who averts anything pink? Exactly, it’s hard for me to embrace the movie that is a sensory overload of objects I’m apathetic about. Nevertheless, I must say, Greta, your dealing with existential issues of being and nothingness using a doll is ingenious. Above all, you’re bold to laugh at Mattel, Man and Money. Biggest irony is, in laughing at the three M’s you’re raking in billions of box office sales. 8 Oscar noms

The Holdovers –– My full review here. 5 Oscar noms.

Killers of the Flower Moon –– A typical Martin Scorsese film with in-depth storytelling using his trump cards, strong character actors Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro. How the discovery of oil brings not only wealth to the Osage people but grief and heartbreak is a chapter in early FBI history. But the movie doesn’t focus so much on the FBI investigation but the dubious marriage relationship between Earnest (DiCaprio) and Molly (Lily Gladstone). As I watched, I was thinking if I were the editor, I’d cut out an hour of its 3 hours 26 mins length and it can still run smoothly. A breakout performance for Gladstone. I first saw her in Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women and later in First Cow, but Scorsese has brought out the strong actress in her. 10 Oscar noms

Maestro –– As a Leonard Bernstein fan since my college days, still have his book The Joy of Music on my shelf, his LP box album of the complete Beethoven’s Nine Symphonies with the NY Philharmonic in my LP collections, I’m disappointed that Bradley Cooper chooses to depict the side of the iconic composer, conductor, pianist, educator and writer that is the most disturbing and least admirable, i.e. his betrayal of his devoted wife. Of course, it makes sensational movie materials. Cooper’s portrayal comes off as flippant and cocky. Yes, Carey Mulligan deserves an Oscar nom after putting up with all those smoking and having had to inhale constantly as well. 7 Oscar noms.

Oppenheimer –– You might be surprised, but I still haven’t watched this Oscar frontrunner with 13 noms and for some reasons, have a weak desire to. Go ahead, psychoanalyze me.

Past Lives –– My full review here. 2 Oscar noms.

Poor Things –– It’s all good with fantastic set design and art rendering, fresh and meaningful storyline touching on existential issues behind its comic veneer. An adult behaving like a child isn’t anything new, we see these bodies almost everyday, but Emma Stone as Bella makes it entertaining, enlightening and thought-provoking. Mark Ruffalo deserves an Oscar nom. Brilliant LOL scene where he tries to pair with Bella’s crazy dance moves to deflect her oddity on the dance floor. All good except one section that I feel is gratuitous on the part of director Yorgos Lanthimos and that’s the Paris chapter where Bella works as a prostitute to earn money. No need to repeat her act with man after man after man. 11 Oscar noms.

The Zone of Interest –– On the top of my TBW list. 5 Oscar noms.

The 96th Academy Awards will take place Sunday, March 10, at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles.