Revisiting Our (American) Roots DJANGO :UNCHAINED

Finally got up the nreve to see it at the Cinema Rialto in the rue de Rivoli in Nice:

What did I think of it ?

Ridiculous.  But then so was Jackie Browne, Kill Bill 2 & 1.  So was Pulp Fiction. So was Killing Zoe.  So you see….I’ve been a fan of the ridiculous for quite some time.  In my opinion, Quentin Tarrentino has a unique way of blending the serious with the ridiculous which I enjoy and admire.

Writer and director ,Quentin Tarantino

The movie was way too long…but then, that’s probably his point.  Some things just go on way too long.

Filmmaker Spike Lee, Upset about something as usual; ajnd Jamie Fox

Historical accuracy?  Who cares.  Maybe there was no slavery. No European Holocaust.  No Bubonic Plague wagons. No Crusades.  Just a long history of loving warm populations all over the world inspiring one another toward greatness.  Cumbaya and all that.

Jamie Fox and Leonardo DiCaprio

In other words, I would highly recommend this movie to people …adult people…with strong stomachs AND a twisted sense of humor.

Leonardo with the fabulous Samuel L. Jackson

I would also say that this is his best movie so far.

DIVIDE AND RULE

(google images)



So, today I rand across this headline:

"CANNES FILM FESTIVAL SLAMMED BY FEMINIST GROUP LA BARBE FOR EXCLUDING WOMEN DIRECTORS"



The feminist group La Barbe which started several years ago in response to the sexist media treatment of Segolene Royal in her race against Nicholas Sarkozy, has taken on one of the most sexist film establishments, the Cannes Film Festival for its exclusion of female directors from this year's competition. They are kind of like the Guerilla Girls in that they dress up in beards and as they say "crash high level meetings to protest male supremacy.")

This is my assessment of the situation:

Divide and Rule:

In politics and sociology, divide and rule (derived from Latin divide et impera) also known as divide and conquer is a combination of political, military and economic strategy of gaining and maintaining power by breaking up larger concentrations of power into chunks that individually have less power than the one implementing the strategy. The concept refers to a strategy that breaks up existing power structures and prevents smaller power groups from linking up.

Elements of this technique involve:

creating or encouraging divisions among the subjects in order to prevent alliances that could challenge the sovereign

• aiding and promoting those who are willing to cooperate with the sovereign
• fostering distrust and enmity between local rulers
• encouraging meaningless expenditures that reduce the capability for political and military spending

Historically this strategy was used in many different ways by empires seeking to expand their territories.

As a Black American let me give you Mother Africa as an example:

art by Ben Heine

The divide and conquer strategy was used by foreign countries in Africa during the colonial and post-colonial period.

Germany and Belgium ruled Rwanda and Burundi in a colonial capacity. Germany used the strategy of divide and conquer by placing members of the Tutsi minority in positions of power. When Belgium took over colonial rule in 1916, the Tutsi and Hutu groups were rearranged according to race instead of occupation. Belgium defined "Tutsi" as anyone with more than ten cows or a long nose, while "Hutu" meant someone with less than ten cows and a broad nose. The socioeconomic divide between Tutsis and Hutus continued after independence and was a major factor in the Rwandan Genocide.

Another example:

During British rule of Nigeria from 1900 to 1960, different regions were frequently reclassified for administrative purposes. The conflict between the Igbo and Hausa made it easier for the British to consolidate their power in the region.

• Regional, ethnic, and religious splits remain a barrier to uniting Nigeria, today.

So, you see, my analysis of the Cannes film festival situation and the film industry in general is this: perhaps if we women weren’t so bogged down in ideological wars between Lesbians and Straights, none of this kind of thing would be happening... on such an international level, no less!.

Afterall, women are a majority group, right?

Talk to you later...

AN EXPAT BOOK REVIEW

Recently, I met an American expat who also lives in the South of France.  She has begun a blog which reviews books written about American women living abroad.  Her review of a novel, called Blackgammon had me in stitches.  I have permerssion from her to share it with you on my blog.



TWO FRIENDS AND A TALE OF TWO COUNTRIES:

BLACKGAMMON by Heather Neff

“Understand this, Michael : There’s no such thing as a sanctuary. “

Believe me when I say that the pessimistic opening line of this intriguing novel belies the apparent optimism of the writer’s vision.  At least this is what I concluded after reading this story which chronicles friendship of two women from two different generations whose destinies were to work, live and try to love in Europe.

Michael…that’s right her name is Michael…lives in the academic environment of England, as professor of…predictably…African American literature with her husband a brilliant English scholar of ….you guessed it…African literature.

Cloe Emmnauel is a….. painter.  Well, at least she not a Naomi Campbell clone or an  aspiring chocolate Hemmingway squandering her days away playing with the green fairly in the squalor of bohemian Paris.  I’ll get to those books later.

Nevertheless, the two women met by chance in an American museum.  The older woman, planning to flee to Paris after  a disastrous romance with an Black-Canadian immigrant (yes, you read that correctly) and the other a quasi-orphan with dreams of living abroad, meet, become fast friends and  vowed to keep in touch.

They kept their vow throughout the novel through letters and occasional visits involving heart wrenching revelations..

Cloë the painter struggles with domestic violence issues from her past while trying to negotiate some equilibrium between her increasingly successful and demanding career and her challengingly peculiar love life.  The cultural and ethnic dynamics of her personal relationships with the men in her life will  definitely baffle any female reader who has lived abroad for any length of time, yet despite the implausibility of her mates you will probably gladly follow the story to its conclusion because of the vivid images of the cosmopolitan lifestyle of these two friends.

Black American women living abroad will obviously react  to the relationship configurations of these two women with a certain degree of scepticism.  More than a touch of mendacity and hints of multi-cultural treason prevail in this tragic-comic novel of the search for identity, love and, professional success.

The problem I find with novels written about American women abroad is that there is a stereotypical quality to the life choices of these women.  It places limits on the perceptions of the black American experience abroad, which limits the kind of novels we can expect  to be disseminated through the mainstream publishing industry.

Despite what probably feels like a negative review of Blackgammon, I actually thoroughly enjoyed it on many levels.

Next I will review, Andrea Lee’s LOST HEARTS IN ITALY

Thanks Maxwell...you're a "hoot"!!!

Running Late!

Google Images



View from Windows on the World Restaurant

  I realize that this is October 11th…an entire month after most expats have posted their remembrance of 9/11. Finally here is mine.

So sorry about running late!

We had already been living in France, in Villefranche Sur Mer, for over two years on that fateful day when we were running late for an appointment in Nice.

My husband called me into our Den, pointed to the TV screen and said, “Look at this! What do you think of this?”

We both stared… horrified… at the image of a blazing tower of the World Trade Center. The news announcer had said that a plane had flown into the building.

Realizing that, as native New Yorkers, many of our friends and relatives were still living in the New York City Metropolitan area and that it appeared that they were now under attack, we looked at one another…speechless…and frightened in a manner we had never experienced in our entire adult life.

"Perhaps those N.Y.U. film students are up to their old shenanigans again…seizing the TV stations...or something...,” I quipped, in a misguided attempt at adding levity to our state of confusion..

What one earth was going on?



Should we call home?



We did. All the lines were busy.



We were running late for our appointment in Nice.



We turned off the TV got in our car and immediately turned on the news on Riviera Radio, just in time too hear the announcer state quite flatly that ‘the Twin Towers were no more!”

Impossible!



That massive structure… the Titanic of Manhattan (I had prophetically called it for years), could not possibly be gone! Transforming from a flaming inferno of death and destruction... to now toxic rubble. After all, we had just had dinner with friends at its restaurant, Windows on the World, a couple of years earlier for my birthday!

Impossible! Ridiculous!

Those film school students should be flogged, I thought again, just not wanting to believe.

We went though the rest of the day, after our appointment, running errands and buying newspapers. Not a single person we encountered in our local French Riviera towns seemed to us to have heard or read anything, despite the screaming headlines. Not one person broached the subject. Not a twit or tweet…so to speak.

Anyway when we finally got through to various friends and relatives in New York City, over the next few days, this is what we heard:

“I was running late…looked out my window and saw a plane flying into one of the towers…”

Another:

“I was running late, I turned on the TV to see that a second plane had already flown into the World Trade Center building. I realized I would not be going to work!”

Another:

“I was running late. My view from Jersey faces lower Manhattan. When I looked out my window, I saw smoke. I put on my binoculars to see what was happening. There was no way I was going to work that day!”

Another:

“My husband and I were running late on the Long Island Railroad. When we arrived at Grand Central there was pandemonium. Everyone screaming about a terrorist attack in lower Manhattan. I realized, then that I had no physical courage.”

And another:

“I was running late. When I arrived at the lobby of my apartment building, my Doorman said that there had been an attack on the World Trade building. Obviously I wasn’t exacting going to go to work. All I know is that I better get paid this month!”

And finally…

"I was running late to my job at the World Trade Center.. If I had arrived minutes earlier, I would not be here talking to you at this very moment because I would have been in the building's elevator when the first plane hit the building!”

My conclusion is that, as my Mom would say, I am "truly blessed” to have had tardy friends and relatives!

For the record though, despite surviving the worst catastrophe in North American history committed on North American soil, the general fall- out resulted in a certain amount of alienation from friends Stateside.. An alienation which generally grows between those who have physically survived a holocaust and those who only experienced one in theory or by distance.


Those survivors in New York had to continue to work and breath in contaminated air. All had to work, in various ways, through posttraumatic stress disorders and a lingering and haunting fear that there had not yet been closure in the assault.

Nevertheless we all still live…except one friend who I lost three years ago to the long-term effects of having to continue to work at her office near Ground Zero.


She had been running late that day as well.

Graffiti in Monte Carlo? Yo Man....That's ***Whack!!!

L'Art du Graffiti, Monaco

***Whack: an event, action, or thing which makes no sense or is contrary to a logical course of action; something entirely disagreable or undesirable; A non-sequitor;

ie: "That's whack! "

 No way.  It's not whack, people...actually it's ***dope!

***dope: adj. cool, nice, awesome

Okay...enough.  Since I'm closer to the Woodstock Generation than the Hip Hop, allow me to step into someone else's generational lingo and tell you about my relationship with Grafitti.

Let me tell you that back in the early eighties, Graffiti saved my bacon!

Tags

Three weeks before the inauguration of my gallery..the first to specialize in the artwork created by children... two of my artists got "cold feet" and cancelled. There was major press coverage planned, a vernissage (gallery opening party), the invitations (fortunately) were still sitting on my desk and I was faced with  20' X 20'  of blank wall space!

A real ***"bummer"...right?

***Bummer: A situation in which no desirable result can occur.

No way.  Wrong, again!

The phone rings and a teacher from a prestigious arts high school was asking me if I would consider one of their students for a future show at my gallery.

Hmmm...

The next morning, in walks a cute dark-eyed Hispanic kid,  clad in ***Girbauds and ***Reeboks, accompanied by his ***homie.

***Girbauds: Jeans that anybody can wear but mostly black people. (Girbaud has straps on it that says M+FG. M+FG is a name that stands for Marthé et François. Most of the girbauds r sold in the city. "The best f_cking pants or shorts you can have. Also apparently the most expensive too. The real ones have straps on both legs: 1 on each side for shorts and 2 on each side for pants. On the straps, the real ones, it says M+FGIRBAUD and it keeps saying that. If your sh_t says Girbaud in cursive your sh_t is fake. They can come in different colors for the pants and straps. And some stupid ass ni_gas be spelling them all wrong and sh_t cuz it's that's French sh_t." )

***Reeboks: Gangster shoes to wear with your girbauds.

***Homie: Shortened version of homeboy, homeboy being your close friend. 

ie: Friends ask you to write down your number. Homies have you on speed dial

The artist sat down and with dramatic flourish placed a small ***Black Book on my desk. I looked from my vacant 20' X 20' wall to the relatively teensy tiny black book and silently freaked out! You see, I had no idea of the significance of this small black book, having not yet been introduced to what had come to be called the ***Hip Hop Cutlure.

***Black Book: grafitti book used for sketching plans for large urban mural projects.

***Hip Hop: name for the 4 elements of the late 70's New York City renaissance which includes break dancing, emceeing, (rapping) graffiti, and turntablism.

The three of of stared at one another in silence.  A real....long... transgenerational moment...let me tell you.

Ramellzee et Basquiat

Realizing that yours truly was absoultely clueless as I looked through the intriguing extra-terrestrial-looking sketches, the author of the black book and his homie gave me a history lesson on the Graffiti movement and the urban Hip Hop Culture.

Until that day, the only impression I had of graffiti was an often vaguely annoying presence of various ***tag names on subway cars passing by in ever increasing frequency.

Tag: a personal signature, usually vandalism with spraypaint, but can be any graffitti.

This was different. Reminiscent of ***Diego Rivera and Expressionism!

Diego Rivera: (December 8, 1886 – November 24, 1957)a prominent Mexican painter and muralist.

"Don't look scared, Ms. T" he said, laughing as my eyes again looked again from the teensy tiny black book to the naked wall space.  "These are just sketches of what I have in my studio."

Then the author promised to deliver to my gallery the following day 3 of his huge, powerful grafitti pieces on strteched linen canvases!

Lee

He delivered the pieces and I sent out the newly designed invitations.

To make a long story short...as they say...I opened this inaugural show which featured this 17-year old Grafitti artist from the Bronx. Not only was it a major media event but this artist received a large commission to paint a mural in Queens.

I and many others agreed that the show was ***Fresh!

***Fresh: Of great quality; new; original 

Intrigued by the popularity of this art form, I exhibited a number of other Graffiti artists. During this period, due to the success of the gallery and the influence of the Hip Hop culture, I ironically discovered the South of France, and eventually moved here.

And as they say... the rest is history.

Walking through this exhibit in Monaco remindend me that Graffiti not only saved my bacon, it actually, in its own way, altered the course of my life.

Homage to Ramellzee

NOW FOR ANOTHER KIND OF ZEN ACROSS THE WAY:

The Japanese Gardens, Monaco



   

déjeuner

BLIND CRITICISM

J’en ai marre !!!!!

The tourist season has officially begun here on the French Riviera. What always arrives with the hordes is the inevitable and harsh criticism of French driving habits.


I’d like to intercept a bit with this blog before the Anglophones really start getting flagrant down here!

Everyone knows that anyone’s life can be irrevocably destroyed by an intoxicated or mentally disturbed driver on the road in any country by a driver of any nationality. My question is why have the French, in particular, been given such a bad rap as drivers?

I have been recipient many times of French driving hospitality. What I have found is that my French friends and acquaintances have displayed skill and grace at ever turn…so to speak. It’s no wonder, I later learned, considering what they have to go though in order to earn the privilege to drive in their country.

How may of you who have criticized the French actually studied for the French Permis de Conduire?


Too scared, right?


And I’m willing to bet…too broke!



Then, that means you don’t know bupkis about anything French.

Want to know how I came to this conclusion? Because it is expensive, difficult and studying for it would actually result in an evolution of thinking that would cause you to realise that you had no prior knowledge of what it takes to understand of the Gallic approach to manoeuvring safely through life in France. My philosophy is in order to criticize the French you should have been educated in France and taught by the French. How else can one understand the cultural nuances of a country which has the power to seduce millions of people through its doors, whether they be rich or poor, yellow green or blue, to a place which is probably the most complicated in all of Europe? Even people from rich and powerful countries are willing to test their fate in a country which for years will render them functional illiterates!


Years ago I took the driving school plunge…so I know of what I write.


I can’t overstate the fact that the pursuit of the French Permis de Conduire is an expensive, lengthy but profoundly informative study of the psychology of the French population. Believe me, studying this will enhance one’s relationships with the French people you encounter, do business with or with whom one becomes intimately involved. It will even enable one to distinguish a foreign driver from a French one.


Imagine that!


Case in point:

One sunny afternoon, a fellow student, who is also an American, and I left another gruelling session of La Code de la Route to stop at a corner café. As we approached the curb, a car came screeching towards us in a completely misguided attempt to park in a no parking zone.

Mr. America, hisses, ., “Look at that. After they get their permits, all rules fly out the window. How typically French!


My response was, “What makes you think the driver is French?”


He pointed to the French License plate on the Italian Fiat, and said, “Look… 06 (the code for the Alpes Maritimes)!”

As if on cue, two men emerge from the car, sharing a typically boisterous conversation in Italian!

Typically French, right?

So, this is the advice from yours truly…the Expat Curmudgeon Writer on the Côte d’Azur…to American drivers in France. Stop criticizing…stay alert and either take your bigotry and pack it in your little back packs and go back home… or just get off the road and take the friggin’n bus!

Domestic Quarrels



July 21, 1926- April 13, 2001
Josephine Premice 






"Never let a man tell you 'You look so beautiful stiring the soup' "
~Josephine Premice