Whiplash. Wakefield. The Post. Fireflies in the Garden. The Wizard of Lies. Top of the Lake: China Girl. The Man in the High Castle. Waco.
"Whiplash" (2014), written and directed by Damien Chazelle, stars Miles Teller and J. K. Simmons. The film depicts the relationship between an ambitious jazz student (Teller) and an aggressive, abusive instructor (Simmons). You know by now that this movie is one of 2014's best. Simmons' ferocious delivery equals blood that drips down the kid's drum kit, magnified or accentuated in a most brutal way by the movie's dagger-like sound editing. It cuts deep. Okay. As a cinema, this is exemplary--but the movie's impact on me is its parallel vein with how I was trained/schooled as a journalist. It's personal.
I started out as a high school worker in the circulation department of a tiny newspaper that battled the Marcos dictatorship for years. Then I moved to proofreading, then translator (English features/news to the paper's Tagalog/Filipino counterpart). My mentor was the late Jose "Joe" Burgos. Those who know him, especially media colleagues, know how it was in his newsroom in those days. Although he didn't throw chairs or slapped staff (as did Fletcher, the instructor in "Whiplash"), his volcano wasn't calm either. Joe's temper would make Gordon Ramsey sound like Bobby Flay. Yet we respected him as the editor/publisher. He was all about journalism. Although I was there when the paper (We Forum) was raided by soldiers, it took my three or four years to earn my own byline albeit on page 16, 8 pts font. I had to earn a byline, in other words. I had to bleed for it.
Which brings me to today's journalism. Anyone can be a journalist, anyone can have not just a byline but an entire blog and site, and have their own stories out anytime. Few bleed for a story, all you need is a good albeit controversial/politically-incorrect quote. That'd be the headline. And if you can hack, you can just copy-paste infos. Boom! You are a journalist! I remember Joe howling each time, "Triple-check your facts!" It wasn't not how good a reporter was in the English language or how we structured the story--it is HOW we gathered the story that mattered to him. And that kind of wicked eye for facts guided my journalism through the years.
Yet the most valuable lesson that he taught me were these: resilience and courage. No matter what, we gotta keep on writing. And how was it during those years? The Philippines was listed by Amnesty International as number #1 in terms of journalists killed. I survived that era yet many didn't. Looking back, I can't help credit Joe how I survived the times. He pushed me, made me bleed, yet he strengthened me not just as a journalist, but most especially, as a human being.
"Wakefield" (2016), directed by Robin Swicord, stars Bryan Cranston and Jennifer Garner. The movie was based on the short story of same name by E. L. Doctorow. Doctorow's story, in turn, was inspired by the 1835 story of the same title by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Plot: Howard Wakefield (Cranston) had a successful job, beautiful family and house in the suburbs, until one day he simply vanishes. Unbeknownst to his wife (Garner), he is still at home, but is hiding in the attic above their separate garage. From his hiding place, he secretly studies the lives of his wife, his twin daughters, and their neighbors.
Howard Wakefield reminds me of a homeless man named George Washington (yes, that's actually his name, George William Washington) that I met in Central Park in New York (in the summer of 2000). George lived in the sewer where he built a makeshift office. He showed me several documents from his "past life." He was a former professor at Columbia Univ and freelanced as writer for several publications in New York. He decided to quit and leave his family because as he told me, "He's sick of the system" including the system that "Controls how he handles his family." Of course, there's more to that. Wakefield immediately brings me back to those days talking with Mr Washington.
Nathaniel Hawthorne's original "Wakefield" story also takes me to the parallel "surrealist humor" of Herman Melville's short story "Bartleby, the Scrivener." The 2001 movie version stars my favorite awkward actor, Crispin Glover.
"The Post," directed by Steven Spielberg, stars Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks. Set in the early 1970s, "The Post" depicts the true story of The Washington Post journalists and their attempts to publish the Pentagon Papers, classified documents regarding the 30-year involvement of the United States government in the Vietnam War. Before its US release, which is this week, "The Post" has been played up as an important movie that addresses current issues, with allusions to the presidencies of Richard Nixon and Donald Trump, as well as advocacy angling towards women leadership in a purportedly male-dominated profession (that time).
Well, I must say (after watching this movie), the above political prep/s are simply standard PR to stir up interest to the entire exercise, nothing more. There is no allusion to Nixon. This is Nixon. Or from Lyndon B. Johnson to Nixon via Watergate. Actually, the complicity springs back to past administrations. The Pentagon Papers, officially titled "United States – Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense," is a United States Department of Defense history of the United States' political-military involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967. The papers were released by Daniel Ellsberg, who had worked on the study; they were first brought to the attention of the public on the front page of The New York Times in 1971.
The Pentagon Papers and all the political brinkmanships and media vigilance at that time don't have anything to do with Trump's 13-month administration. Although politically, and in regards Pentagon/Washington, in re war policy, I don't think things really changed that much. So count all the presidents, including whoever is your favorite. Also you might want to google The Taguba Report (Bush W time) as well as additional reference. Or those that WikiLeaks leaked in 2006. Meantime, in 1971 Pentagon Papers timeline, Donald Trump was a real estate dude. To be precise, that was the year when he was promoted to president of his father's company Elizabeth Trump & Son, and consequently renamed it The Trump Organization. The Trump kick in promotional pitches is a hardsell. Have we read something of the Pentagon Papers/Taguba Report magnitude in Trump time? Or media muzzling either?
Overall, I find it hard to connect 70s (or yesterday's) journalism with today's internet media/social media. There is no correlation or even connection other than yes we all seek to report the truth. Meanwhile, the movie angling towards Katharine Graham, Post publisher, as the force behind the "expose" sort of weakens the role of the staff, the entire staff, especially executive editor Ben Bradlee (Hanks) and staffwriter Ben Bagdikian (Bob Odenkirk) who pursued the Ellsberg lead. It was staff work, men and women. Also I am intrigued here. The Post's (or NY Times) newsroom seemed dominated by men. Those years, 1970s were the years that I started my journalism career. As far as I remember, there's almost equal number of men and women in the staff; in fact, most of my first editors were women. Why push the woman issue when it is not. Washington Post was ran by editors and reporters, not the publisher. In fact I didn't think Streep's Graham characterization accentuates such a strength; it was the staff that relentlessly pursued the story irrelevant of her okay to print. More importantly, the full credit goes to The New York Times which broke the story first, from the same source, saying the Johnson Administration "systematically lied, not only to the public but also to Congress"
This is not Spielberg's best movie, despite being nominated in this year's Oscar for Best Picture and Best Actress for Streep. (It also received six major nominations at the 75th Golden Globe Awards, including Best Motion Picture – Drama.) Yet this is not bad cinema either. Just standard work given the genre. But I like "Spotlight" (2015) better. "Spotlight" follows The Boston Globe's "Spotlight" team, the oldest continuously operating newspaper investigative journalist unit in the United States.
On a personal note, "The Post" reminds me of my beginnings in newspapering. The linotypes, rollers where fresh papers are ushered, smoke-drenched newsroom, and journalists in one room conferring, arguing, debating, and of course the old school data gathering. This movie screams why I don't call Julian Assange a journalist (as he claims he is). Journalism isn't hacking or stealing data. There was a source, a person with documents. Not computers that were hacked. Journalists are no different with workers, doctors, teachers. We play by the rules and pursue our professional integrity within and around law's boundary and parameters. More importantly, journalists don't hide or run after a story is published like Mr Assange did. They stay put and carry on. Jailtime (if it happens) isn't the death of journalism. That is the ideal that is lost in these times' so called Media which the entire staff of 1970s' Washington Post and New York Times remind us via "The Post."
LITTLE MOVIES, Bad and Good. [1] "Fireflies in the Garden" (2008), comes with a stellar cast (Willem Dafoe, Ryan Reynolds, Amy Watson, and Julia Roberts) but also comes with stellar flaws. [2] "The Wizard of Lies" (2017), directed by Barry Levinson, based on the non-fiction book of the same name by Diana B. Henriques.
"Fireflies in the Garden," written and directed by Dennis Lee, is set in the present day, and revolves around three generations of a family, with flash-backs to their growing up. A major focus is on domineering father Charles and his strained relationships with son Michael, sister-in-law Jane and other family members. Should have been a fine plotline, right? But like Season 3 of family drama "Bloodline," this movie is haggard, dull, and just Dull. Remember how "Bloodline" started great with Season 1, and onto Season 2, and then went pointless in the final season? "Fireflies in the Garden" is the same. The point of the movie is--there is no point.
"The Wizard of Lies" deals with Bernie Madoff, who pleaded guilty to a Ponzi scheme that he operated for years until his arrest in 2008. His crime is considered the largest financial fraud in U.S. history. Prosecutors estimated the size of the fraud to be $64.8 billion, based on the amounts in the accounts of Madoff's 4,800 clients as of Nov 2008. Questions, of course, pervade. Where's the loot now? Only a fraction was recovered via sale of a number of Madoff properties etc. Also, how did this escape government's eye, considering that in 1999, financial analyst Harry Markopolos had already informed the SEC about the possible illegitimacy of Madoff's success? I will write more later...
TV SERIES FIX. Two that I quit and one that I enjoyed. [1] “Top of the Lake: China Girl.” Hulu. [2] “The Man in the High Castle.” Amazon Prime. [3] "Waco." Paramount Network regular TV programming.
“Top of the Lake: China Girl.” The first season, created/co-written and co-directed by the usually outstanding Jane Campion and starring Elisabeth Moss as Detective Robin Griffin, was outstanding. Season 1 deals with Griffin's investigation of the disappearance of a pregnant 12-year-old girl in New Zealand. Season 2 is set in Sydney four years later, as Griffin digs into the death of an unidentified Asian girl. Jane Campion et al returned for Season 2. However, I am inclined to quit watching. Disappointing. It added Nicole Kidman in the fray but to no avail. Interesting characters but incongruent and oblique it is too preposterous or idiotic to believe them. Dialogue are corny etcetera.
“The Man in the High Castle.” Based on the 1962 novel of the same name by Philip K. Dick. In the series' alternate version of 1962 America, the Axis powers have won World War II and divided the United States into two puppet states: the Greater Nazi Reich and the Japanese Pacific States. The series follows characters whose destinies intertwine after coming into contact with a series of propaganda films that show a vastly different history from that of their own. Uhh. Intriguing. I am not really a huge fan of Mr Dick but I do like historical dalliances. Yet I didn't go past Episode 2. Just too knotty or jumbled for me to sift through. Not my thing.
"Waco" shudders. Based on the tragic siege of 1993 that claimed 76 (82 total) lives, 25 children, in a 51-day standoff that culminated in a teargas attack by the FBI that fueled a deadly fire. Can't help bring back memory of the Feb 1986 revolt in the Philippines albeit on a contrasting outcome.
In Manila that time, fighter planes hovered in the sky and tanks and machineguns surrounded millions of rallying people against the dictatorship. I was there. No bomb dropped, no bullets flew, and no teargas was fired at the people with Bibles and flowers on their hand. What stopped the carnage? Prayers. Civilians and soldiers alike who believed in prayers. Soldiers ignored orders and joined the people in peace. A line in "Waco" strikes deep amidst all the hatred these days: "When did we start seeing each other as the enemy?"
I started out as a high school worker in the circulation department of a tiny newspaper that battled the Marcos dictatorship for years. Then I moved to proofreading, then translator (English features/news to the paper's Tagalog/Filipino counterpart). My mentor was the late Jose "Joe" Burgos. Those who know him, especially media colleagues, know how it was in his newsroom in those days. Although he didn't throw chairs or slapped staff (as did Fletcher, the instructor in "Whiplash"), his volcano wasn't calm either. Joe's temper would make Gordon Ramsey sound like Bobby Flay. Yet we respected him as the editor/publisher. He was all about journalism. Although I was there when the paper (We Forum) was raided by soldiers, it took my three or four years to earn my own byline albeit on page 16, 8 pts font. I had to earn a byline, in other words. I had to bleed for it.
Which brings me to today's journalism. Anyone can be a journalist, anyone can have not just a byline but an entire blog and site, and have their own stories out anytime. Few bleed for a story, all you need is a good albeit controversial/politically-incorrect quote. That'd be the headline. And if you can hack, you can just copy-paste infos. Boom! You are a journalist! I remember Joe howling each time, "Triple-check your facts!" It wasn't not how good a reporter was in the English language or how we structured the story--it is HOW we gathered the story that mattered to him. And that kind of wicked eye for facts guided my journalism through the years.
Yet the most valuable lesson that he taught me were these: resilience and courage. No matter what, we gotta keep on writing. And how was it during those years? The Philippines was listed by Amnesty International as number #1 in terms of journalists killed. I survived that era yet many didn't. Looking back, I can't help credit Joe how I survived the times. He pushed me, made me bleed, yet he strengthened me not just as a journalist, but most especially, as a human being.
"Wakefield" (2016), directed by Robin Swicord, stars Bryan Cranston and Jennifer Garner. The movie was based on the short story of same name by E. L. Doctorow. Doctorow's story, in turn, was inspired by the 1835 story of the same title by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Plot: Howard Wakefield (Cranston) had a successful job, beautiful family and house in the suburbs, until one day he simply vanishes. Unbeknownst to his wife (Garner), he is still at home, but is hiding in the attic above their separate garage. From his hiding place, he secretly studies the lives of his wife, his twin daughters, and their neighbors.
Howard Wakefield reminds me of a homeless man named George Washington (yes, that's actually his name, George William Washington) that I met in Central Park in New York (in the summer of 2000). George lived in the sewer where he built a makeshift office. He showed me several documents from his "past life." He was a former professor at Columbia Univ and freelanced as writer for several publications in New York. He decided to quit and leave his family because as he told me, "He's sick of the system" including the system that "Controls how he handles his family." Of course, there's more to that. Wakefield immediately brings me back to those days talking with Mr Washington.
Nathaniel Hawthorne's original "Wakefield" story also takes me to the parallel "surrealist humor" of Herman Melville's short story "Bartleby, the Scrivener." The 2001 movie version stars my favorite awkward actor, Crispin Glover.
"The Post," directed by Steven Spielberg, stars Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks. Set in the early 1970s, "The Post" depicts the true story of The Washington Post journalists and their attempts to publish the Pentagon Papers, classified documents regarding the 30-year involvement of the United States government in the Vietnam War. Before its US release, which is this week, "The Post" has been played up as an important movie that addresses current issues, with allusions to the presidencies of Richard Nixon and Donald Trump, as well as advocacy angling towards women leadership in a purportedly male-dominated profession (that time).
Well, I must say (after watching this movie), the above political prep/s are simply standard PR to stir up interest to the entire exercise, nothing more. There is no allusion to Nixon. This is Nixon. Or from Lyndon B. Johnson to Nixon via Watergate. Actually, the complicity springs back to past administrations. The Pentagon Papers, officially titled "United States – Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense," is a United States Department of Defense history of the United States' political-military involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967. The papers were released by Daniel Ellsberg, who had worked on the study; they were first brought to the attention of the public on the front page of The New York Times in 1971.
The Pentagon Papers and all the political brinkmanships and media vigilance at that time don't have anything to do with Trump's 13-month administration. Although politically, and in regards Pentagon/Washington, in re war policy, I don't think things really changed that much. So count all the presidents, including whoever is your favorite. Also you might want to google The Taguba Report (Bush W time) as well as additional reference. Or those that WikiLeaks leaked in 2006. Meantime, in 1971 Pentagon Papers timeline, Donald Trump was a real estate dude. To be precise, that was the year when he was promoted to president of his father's company Elizabeth Trump & Son, and consequently renamed it The Trump Organization. The Trump kick in promotional pitches is a hardsell. Have we read something of the Pentagon Papers/Taguba Report magnitude in Trump time? Or media muzzling either?
Overall, I find it hard to connect 70s (or yesterday's) journalism with today's internet media/social media. There is no correlation or even connection other than yes we all seek to report the truth. Meanwhile, the movie angling towards Katharine Graham, Post publisher, as the force behind the "expose" sort of weakens the role of the staff, the entire staff, especially executive editor Ben Bradlee (Hanks) and staffwriter Ben Bagdikian (Bob Odenkirk) who pursued the Ellsberg lead. It was staff work, men and women. Also I am intrigued here. The Post's (or NY Times) newsroom seemed dominated by men. Those years, 1970s were the years that I started my journalism career. As far as I remember, there's almost equal number of men and women in the staff; in fact, most of my first editors were women. Why push the woman issue when it is not. Washington Post was ran by editors and reporters, not the publisher. In fact I didn't think Streep's Graham characterization accentuates such a strength; it was the staff that relentlessly pursued the story irrelevant of her okay to print. More importantly, the full credit goes to The New York Times which broke the story first, from the same source, saying the Johnson Administration "systematically lied, not only to the public but also to Congress"
This is not Spielberg's best movie, despite being nominated in this year's Oscar for Best Picture and Best Actress for Streep. (It also received six major nominations at the 75th Golden Globe Awards, including Best Motion Picture – Drama.) Yet this is not bad cinema either. Just standard work given the genre. But I like "Spotlight" (2015) better. "Spotlight" follows The Boston Globe's "Spotlight" team, the oldest continuously operating newspaper investigative journalist unit in the United States.
On a personal note, "The Post" reminds me of my beginnings in newspapering. The linotypes, rollers where fresh papers are ushered, smoke-drenched newsroom, and journalists in one room conferring, arguing, debating, and of course the old school data gathering. This movie screams why I don't call Julian Assange a journalist (as he claims he is). Journalism isn't hacking or stealing data. There was a source, a person with documents. Not computers that were hacked. Journalists are no different with workers, doctors, teachers. We play by the rules and pursue our professional integrity within and around law's boundary and parameters. More importantly, journalists don't hide or run after a story is published like Mr Assange did. They stay put and carry on. Jailtime (if it happens) isn't the death of journalism. That is the ideal that is lost in these times' so called Media which the entire staff of 1970s' Washington Post and New York Times remind us via "The Post."
LITTLE MOVIES, Bad and Good. [1] "Fireflies in the Garden" (2008), comes with a stellar cast (Willem Dafoe, Ryan Reynolds, Amy Watson, and Julia Roberts) but also comes with stellar flaws. [2] "The Wizard of Lies" (2017), directed by Barry Levinson, based on the non-fiction book of the same name by Diana B. Henriques.
"Fireflies in the Garden," written and directed by Dennis Lee, is set in the present day, and revolves around three generations of a family, with flash-backs to their growing up. A major focus is on domineering father Charles and his strained relationships with son Michael, sister-in-law Jane and other family members. Should have been a fine plotline, right? But like Season 3 of family drama "Bloodline," this movie is haggard, dull, and just Dull. Remember how "Bloodline" started great with Season 1, and onto Season 2, and then went pointless in the final season? "Fireflies in the Garden" is the same. The point of the movie is--there is no point.
"The Wizard of Lies" deals with Bernie Madoff, who pleaded guilty to a Ponzi scheme that he operated for years until his arrest in 2008. His crime is considered the largest financial fraud in U.S. history. Prosecutors estimated the size of the fraud to be $64.8 billion, based on the amounts in the accounts of Madoff's 4,800 clients as of Nov 2008. Questions, of course, pervade. Where's the loot now? Only a fraction was recovered via sale of a number of Madoff properties etc. Also, how did this escape government's eye, considering that in 1999, financial analyst Harry Markopolos had already informed the SEC about the possible illegitimacy of Madoff's success? I will write more later...
TV SERIES FIX. Two that I quit and one that I enjoyed. [1] “Top of the Lake: China Girl.” Hulu. [2] “The Man in the High Castle.” Amazon Prime. [3] "Waco." Paramount Network regular TV programming.
“Top of the Lake: China Girl.” The first season, created/co-written and co-directed by the usually outstanding Jane Campion and starring Elisabeth Moss as Detective Robin Griffin, was outstanding. Season 1 deals with Griffin's investigation of the disappearance of a pregnant 12-year-old girl in New Zealand. Season 2 is set in Sydney four years later, as Griffin digs into the death of an unidentified Asian girl. Jane Campion et al returned for Season 2. However, I am inclined to quit watching. Disappointing. It added Nicole Kidman in the fray but to no avail. Interesting characters but incongruent and oblique it is too preposterous or idiotic to believe them. Dialogue are corny etcetera.
"Waco" shudders. Based on the tragic siege of 1993 that claimed 76 (82 total) lives, 25 children, in a 51-day standoff that culminated in a teargas attack by the FBI that fueled a deadly fire. Can't help bring back memory of the Feb 1986 revolt in the Philippines albeit on a contrasting outcome.
In Manila that time, fighter planes hovered in the sky and tanks and machineguns surrounded millions of rallying people against the dictatorship. I was there. No bomb dropped, no bullets flew, and no teargas was fired at the people with Bibles and flowers on their hand. What stopped the carnage? Prayers. Civilians and soldiers alike who believed in prayers. Soldiers ignored orders and joined the people in peace. A line in "Waco" strikes deep amidst all the hatred these days: "When did we start seeing each other as the enemy?"
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