Pophistory: music, movies, history, and life.
Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis, Ed Helms and Will Forte fill in for Mumford & Sons in the band’s latest video for the song “Hopeless Wanderer.” The funnymen capture everything Mumfordy about the group, also showing the band has a nice sense of humor. Check it out.
I like the song too.
What is your favorite part of the video? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
How you react to Margaret (2011) may depend on whether or not you enjoy imperfect movies that are challenging and ambitious. I spent much of the movie wondering where it was going to go as it continuously surprised me. While at times the movie made me uncomfortable with all of its flawed characters, I ultimately realized that I will be thinking about this one for a long time.
Margaret centers around Lisa Cohen, a teenager played by Anna Paquin, who witnesses and is indirectly partly responsible for a bus accident that kills a woman who dies in Lisa’s arms. Lisa is severely affected by the accident, beginning with her decision about whether or not she should tell the police that the bus driver was distracted and ran a red light. From there, the teen alternates between struggling with her decisions and acting out in various ways. Her parents are divorced, and her actress mother is distracted by a play and dating while her father is far away. Her teachers at school — including ones played by Matt Damon and Matthew Broderick — have their own flaws, as does everyone in the movie. Those flaws help make Margaret portray the messiness of real life.
Margaret has a number of stars in non-starring roles. In addition to Damon and Broderick, Jean Reno plays the love interest of Lisa’s mother and Mark Ruffalo plays the bus driver. J. Smith-Cameron plays Lisa’s mother.
The movie, directed by Ken Lonergan, was actually made in 2005 and scheduled for release in 2007 but it only finally made it to a limited number of theaters in 2011 and was released on DVD last year. A number of issues contributed to the long delay, including that Lonergan reportedly struggled with editing the movie as the studio wanted him to cut his nearly three-hour movie to under 150 minutes, leading to lawsuits. Martin Scorsese and Thelma Schoonmaker were called in to create an edit, and although Lonergan approved their edit, his longer version is available on the new Blu-ray/DVD release. I watched the edited version on HBO. This “short” 150-minute version had a number of long lingering shots that some may or may not like, but I am curious about the longer one. David Edelstein at NPR has written how he thought the short version was flawed but he loved the extended cut
Others have noted that what makes the 2005 shooting interesting is that it places the making of the film and the film’s setting nearer to 9/11. Not only do Lisa and her classmates debate terrorism, the movie touches on post 9/11 themes like blame, guilt, and how one act can touch so many people. Paquin, who played a young girl in 2002’s 25th Hour (one of the best movies that featured 9/11’s effects) and is in True Blood, does an excellent job.
Paquin plays someone we completely empathize with at the beginning but who is an annoying teenager at times. But that is part of the point, as Lonergan captures how we feel things more passionately as teenagers before we become cynical adults. If you understand why someone acts the way they do, can you still empathize with them even when they are less than perfect? That is one of the questions of civilization, and Lonergan asks us to ask ourselves that question as he illustrates how humans fail to connect with each other.
Conclusion? Not everyone will like Margaret. But if you are in the mood for a challenging movie raising moral, ethical, and human issues, you might enjoy this one. Or at least you will be thinking about it for a long time and looking up Gerard Manley Hopkins’s poem “Spring and Fall,” about a young girl encountering death, to help you figure out why a movie named “Margaret” does not have anyone with that name.
Other Reviews Because Why Should You Trust Me?: The split between critics (71%) and audience members (49%) on Rotten Tomatoes shows how viewers may be divided between loving and hating Margaret. Peter Travers at Rolling Stone gives Margaret three and half out of four stars, acknowledging its flaws while concluding it is a “film of rare beauty and shocking gravity.” By contrast, Amy Curtis at We Got This Covered calls Margaret “pointless” and disorganized.
{Missed Movies is our continuing series on good films you might have missed because they did not receive the recognition they deserved when released.}
What did you think of Margaret? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
On August 3 in 1492, Christopher Columbus set sail from the port of Palos in Spain. On that date, he hoped to find a western passageway that would take him to China and India. By the end of the year, he found land and landed in the Bahamas, but he did not realize he had discovered a New World.
Every school child knows the year he sailed and the names of his ships, the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria. During the journey, the largest ship and the only one with a deck, the Santa Maria, ran aground and was destroyed. The Pinta disappeared for a period after a storm, but later joined the Nina in returning to Spain. Columbus returned on the Nina.
Kentucky singer-songwriter Chris Knight sings about a different kind of boat in “Send a Boat,” from his excellent 2006 album A Pretty Good Guy
As in a lot of Knight’s songs, the characters are facing hard times. Each verse features a different setting. The first verse is about a lonely woman left behind by her children. The second verse features a lonely old man with a bottle. The final verse is about a hungry and abused child. They could be from the same family at different times, or they could be anyone. Knight foresees the tragic results of our neglect of our fellow humans when, after describing the abused child, he notes, “If he ever grows up, he’ll get him a gun.”
Knight hints at the solution in the chorus: “While we try to stay afloat./ If you would, Lord, send a boat.” But from the sound of the dark song, it does not seem there are enough boats like the Nina and the Pinta to get everyone home safely.
What is your favorite Chris Knight song? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
Harry Chapin, who passed away in a car crash in July 1981, had his biggest hits with songs that are sad. In “Cat’s in the Cradle,” he sings about a father’s regrets. In “Taxi,” he sings about a lover’s regrets. And in “The Shortest Story,” he sings one of the world’s most depressing songs about a newborn baby starving to death. Chapin, though, worked to make the world a better place by fighting against world hunger with his Harry Chapin Foundation, which continues his work.
I think the contrast with the sad themes in his catalog is what makes me especially love one of his lesser-known songs, “Corey’s Coming.” The song first appeared on Chapin’s album On the Road to Kingdom Come (1976).
Although I see the song as one of Chapin’s happier songs, one might point out that the song still has a death and a funeral. But from the start, the music tells us this song is not going to leave us sad and alone. Yes, the old man dies, but his friend and Corey manage to find a happy ending.
I have friends who named their daughter “Corey” after the song. I thought it was a cool choice, and Wikipedia also reports that a number of fans have named their children “Corey” because they love the wonderful song.
But the song itself is somewhat unclear about “Corey.” In the first part of the song, the people who knew the old man think he is referring to a former wife or lover (“his life-long love”).
But by the end of the song, I always thought that the Corey who showed up must be John Joseph’s daughter (“a beautiful young woman”). At the end of the funeral near the end of the song, Corey herself only says, “You could say I’m just a friend.”
They put the cold dirt over him and left me on my own;
And when at last I looked up I saw I was not alone;
So I said, If you’re a relative, he had a peaceful end;
That’s when she said, My name is Corey you can say I’m just a friend.
Some listeners wonder if the townspeople were right and that Corey was just an imaginary figure (“reality is only just a word”). Others surmise that Corey might be an angel of death.
For me, though, the music helps answer the question even if the words are unclear. The key of the song and the melody are too uplifting not to take the singer literally at the end about the arrival of Corey.
Also, Chapin’s songwriting usually was literal and straightforward, which also supports the interpretation with the happy ending of the narrator meeting Corey. After the meeting, the narrator implies that the reason he works in the railroad yard is because he now lives there with Corey (although again, others might instead interpret it as the young man waiting for death).
Can’t you see my Corey’s coming, no more sad stories coming;
My midnight-moonlight-morning-glory’s coming aren’t you girl?
And like he told me, when she holds me she enfolds me in her world.
Chapin’s brother Tom Chapin has explained that Harry got the idea for the song from a songwriter named John Joseph. And Harry then used “John Joseph” for the name for the old man in the song.
Harry Chapin apparently never explained the ending as far as I know. But the name “Corey” had positive connotations for him. When Chapin was starting out and did not have much money, a couple took him in when he was on the road.
The woman’s name was Corey.
What do you think “Corey’s Coming” is about? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
Tonight, Marty Brown sang Shania Twain’s “You’re Still the One” on America’s Got Talent. I thought it was a good choice to go with a band this time around on the large stage. The song is not one of my favorites, but the song selected by America’s Got Talent (not the performer) had the benefit that a lot of people know it.
Brown was a little choked up at the beginning of the song after seeing his father on the lead-in video and calling out a dedication to his father. But on watching the segment a second time, one may see Brown recovers pretty well. The judges were still tough on him, though mostly respectful. Howard Stern genuinely seemed to be rooting for Brown. Mel B mistakenly called Brown “Dave” and told the audience not to beat her up for it. But she showed less mercy for Brown, Tweeting a few minutes after the performance, “Ok.ok. I got his name wrong!! He blew it anyways, so what!!”
But it was Mel B who made the biggest mistake. Yeah, Brown’s voice faltered at the start of his song, but he showed something rare by giving the audience real emotion in a performance. The radio and Internet are full of Auto-Tune and perfect sounding meaningless lyrics.
What Brown did tonight was better than most “perfect” performances on these competition shows. With his heart on his sleeve, he showed how he felt after decades of struggle to finally be on stage in New York, thinking of his ailing father in Kentucky, his mom in the audience, and his wife dancing in her seat. The song’s words “looks like we made it” clearly had meaning for him at that moment. He gave real heart to the song, and that’s what we want out of our music. No matter what happens with the votes, Marty Brown is still the one.
Check out our post on how to vote in “America’s Got Talent.”
[Update: For a post on Brown’s entire run on America’s Got Talent, check out our post on The Great AGT Rebirth of Marty Brown.] How did you vote on America’s Got Talent? Leave your two cents in the comments.
(Some related Chimesfreedom posts.)
