3 posts from October 2008

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Dystopia. Drug-laced milk. Menagé a trois. Fashionably coordinating hoodlums, classical music, and ultraviolence. Stanley Kubrick’s darkly marvelous A Clockwork Orange may not be everyone’s favorite, but it will always hold great appeal for us quirky, hip young things. We get an attractive, charismatic antihero in Alex DeLarge, unforgettably portrayed by young Malcolm McDowell, a smirking deviant who spouts highly quotable Russo-Cockney slang and who has a penchant for Beethoven. He and his droogs, dressed to the nines and hopped up on narcotics, have a malicious itch to scratch, a soulless thirst for depravity and destruction. They slake that thirst with ultraviolence, which includes gang rumbles, assault on the elderly, theft, rape, and murder. In essence, we delight in all the elements which shocked and outraged the generations before us, and if we didn’t watch it in defiance of their moral values, we’d watch it simply because, from script to sets to costumes to soundtrack, it’s so damn stylish.
   
Children of a desensitized and over-psychoanalyzed age, we empathize with Little Alex as he goes from thrill-seeking reprobate to convicted murderer to insincerely reformed prisoner who, in an effort to trick the system and gain early release, agrees to undergo experimental psychological treatment. The Ludovico Method “cures” Alex by conditioning him to be physically ill at the contemplation of violence or, as a cruel side-effect, upon hearing his beloved Ludwig Van. With his dearly-bought freedom he finds he is disenfranchised, displaced, and disillusioned. Deprived of all that once gave him joy, he is victimized and brutalized by the world he once had on a blood-soaked string. But never fear, O my brothers. In the manner of any good story about essential badness, all’s miraculously well that ends well for our Little Alex.
   
There’s moral issues in there somewhere, about the nature of goodness and freewill and blah blah blah. The book is much better for all that. The appeal of the film is the mirror we fancy it holds up to us: cultured, intelligent youth with a devil-may-care attitude and a lust for extreme overindulgence, punished by society for defying its laws yet ultimately glorified by it for doing so. A Clockwork Orange will always be adored by we vain young intellectuals. So here’s to violence, sex, drugs, and Beethoven rolling back over. Horrorshow.

(This review to appear, edited by Jim Ridley, in a forthcoming issue of the Nashville Scene! Keep your eyes peeled, true believers!)

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When I asked my father if he'd like to see this movie with me, he replied, "Well, I don't much like the man" (meaning humorist Bill Maher) "and I don't much care for his opinions, either. So, no, I don't think I'll enjoy it much." He went on to say that he has no time for those who make fun of others simply for having faith, which is, I admit, the main point of the documentary. As a loving daughter and one who had a charismatic Christian upbringing, I would be inclined to agree; I was taught to believe that the exploration of other religions was dangerous (I had to enjoy "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" on the sly as a child due to the fear that it would indoctrinate me with "Eastern philosophies") and that the questioning, let alone the mocking, of the faith in which I had been brought up was downright sinful. However, as an intelligent and inquisitive young woman who has long since thrown off the shackles of ignorance, and as a modern-day Marco Polo of religious exploration, I was obviously intrigued by the concept of Religulous. Maher and director Larry Charles scoured the earth and found the excessively, obsessively devout to ask them for an explanation. Why do they, how can they, believe all the things they believe? And if they can even begin to provide such an explanation, how can they possibly justify all the hatred, intolerance, oppression, misery, and bloodshed spawned by religious adherence?

Maher and Charles set out with two goals: to expose the ridiculous in modern (and almost exclusively Western) religion, and to create a call to arms to the non-religious among us. They succeeded on both accounts.

As a documentary, it is masterfully entertaining, and, for those mercifully lacking in delicate sensibilities, laugh-out-loud hilarious nearly throughout. Bill Maher, host (is that the correct title for the "star" of a documentary? Maybe film school would have been a good idea after all) and credited writer, takes the stance of the sardonic agnostic; when asked to define his faith, he repeatedly states, "I don't know". But he does manage to stifle the sarcasm enough (when he's not interviewing) to convey his genuine incredulity that anyone can claim to know anything as far as faith is concerned, much less practice all the absurdity and injustice carried out in its name. In his interviews, however, sarcastic disbelief prevails, as he almost seems to be conspiratorially nudging some of the interviewees, saying, "C'mon, now, you can tell me, you don't really believe this nonsense, do you?" However, while his questions are definitely leading, rather than directly poke fun at his subjects, he lets them make themselves ridiculous with their responses. (My personal favorite is Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor's entire  segment. He drops some of the most Dubbya-esque abuses of both intelligence and the English language I've heard since, well... Dubbya.) Not all the subjects make fools out of themselves, however, the most refreshing of these being the two Vatican priests who consent to talk to him. (He's been on the Vatican's shit list for a while now, as evidenced by their forcible ejection from the Holy City by the Swiss Guard.) Both make such thoroughly sensible yet unapologetic arguments that even Maher is taken by pleasant surprise.

Larry Charles, whose most recent, most famous, and most controversial work (until now?) was 2006's Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, brought the same chuckling irreverence from that mockumentary to this film, although obviously toned down a bit by the presence of a non-fictional host. Religulous is well-paced and engaging, mostly due to Charles' comedic directoral magic. He leaves in all the right details to highlight the opposition they face and their bold defiance of spiritual "authority", such as pointing out the infidel status of the entire crew, himself (a Jew) and Maher (50% Catholic, 50% Jewish) included, that was being allowed to film inside the Dome of the Rock, where Jews are strictly forbidden entrance. Charles' sly wit behind the scenes makes the documentary into a genuinely diverting experience and not just another pedantic bore.

Although the film held few surprises for me as far as the ludicrous extents to which people take their religious fanaticism, it could prove quite enlightening for anyone who hasn't necessarily been exposed to this unconventional flipside and who is willing to take the opportunity to rethink some things. The documentary makes the quite relevant point that for something so fundamentally mythic and subjective, we sure do let religion make quite a mess of things. As Maher points out, the Non-Religious are this country's largest minority, and he calls out for them to wise up, rise up, and make some much-needed change in a world gone higher power-mad. One can only hope that there are enough people willing to give over two hours of their life to Religulous to be enormously entertained, to have their thoughts provoked, to hear the call and decide for themselves how best to heed it.