Not a post about Roxy Music… I’ve just been watching Ghost in the Shell director Mamoru Oshii’s rather stunning film Avalon on dvd. It’s effectively a live action anime – made in Poland in Polish using Polish actors for a Japanese and international audience, rather than for a domestic one.
I’ve found the user comments on IMDB quite interesting – and this actually sums the film up very neatly:
…this movie is what one could call a cyberpunk poem.
I typically go hunting down comments and reviews after I’ve seen a dvd – not sure why! Because Avalon didn’t get a theatrical release in the US, I wasn’t surprised not to find too many mainstream media reviews. You can get a little bit of a sense of what it’s about from this short notice in the Village Voice [and a lot more from Cyberpunkreview], and from the trailer and an excerpt beneath the fold. But I wasn’t too surprised to see this sort of thing – from Peter Bradshaw in the Graudian:
If Hungarian miserablist Bela Tarr ever remade The Matrix, it might look like this, but I don’t think Tarr would have made it quite so boring.
Maybe it’s a genre effect. Some similar comments were made at the time about Werner Herzog’s fabulous Nosferatu. Are science fiction or horror films compulsorily fast paced? Should mood and visual reference be subordinated to action, or to genre cliche? As some of the commenters on IMDB noted, there’s a distinct inability to understand anything that requires thought in the filmic medium these days, and I see the film as actually making an oblique (or not so oblique) comment on that – with the contrast between the hyperreal world of the game and the tedious and sepia every day world. Perhaps professional film critics have short attention spans. Also, the aesthetic – the recreation of a sort of steampunk anime world on the Expressionist streets of Wroclaw and Warsaw – is a huge part of the movie’s theme. As is the richness of the intertextual reference. Grrrr. We need more open source film reviews, I think!
As a postscript, just incidentally, I found this observation really fascinating sociologically. It’s apropos of some discussion about the lead character – Ash, who cops the whole “cold female” accusation, sometimes masked by comments about acting rather than characterisation. Would any game geeks (I know you’re out there!) care to comment as to its truth? It seems to me to gesture towards something broader about the dissociation of personality in modernity – a phenomenon particularly found among men with regard to work. But it’s interesting in all sorts of ways, I reckon.
The film uses a story-telling technique common in good literature but unfortunately under-used in film – that of intentional ambiguity. The best example of this is the main character – well played by Malgorzata Foremniak. You simply don’t know what to make of “Ash”. Though I found it easy to relate to this character, and I think I understand her, I am not sure most viewers will. In my opinion, Ash is best interpreted as a person with an iron-clad grip on reality, who nevertheless maintains a distance from the people around her, and prefers to keep her relationships “in-game”. This is not at all an uncommon personality type, especially among women and mature males in the real worlds of virtual reality and on-line gaming.
I think this movie was made before online gaming was popular, though maybe it was in Japan at the time, so I’m not sure the reviewers comment holds water – I don’t know if Mamoru Oshi would have understood the world referred to by the reviewer.
Possibly Ash’s behaviour represents the way Japanese people compartmentalise their lives (in Mamoru Oshi’s opinion, maybe). I doubt it though. I think it helps to have watched Oshii’s other films, particularly “Innocence”, to understand this. Somehow. Not that I do. Major Kusanagi in “The Ghost in The Shell” and the male character in “Innocence” have similar detachment and cynicism, I think. They probably just represent Mamoru Oshii’s feelings about life.
Also what’s with the dog? The male character in Innocence has the same dog in the same role. Something is going on there…
but I agree, great movie!
This is a beautiful film. Absolutely fantastic. Very cheap special effects, and they reuse footage a few times, but it makes the Matrix look like the obnoxious junk that it is. I don’t think I’ve seen a sci-fi film as good as this since the original Solaris (although the George Cloony remake is pretty good as well)
I first saw it last year and watched it two times straight through. Do yourself a favor, see it.
one of my faves
I liked it, but found it a little “hollow” feeling. Probably due to the main characters bloodlessness.
The world appeared as a state run dismal affair, where everyones basic needs were met (the gruel dished up at the diner) and the online world the only legitimate outlet.
The beauty of it was, it could also be seen as a hyper capitalist world with the proles only being given the minimum.
I liked the way the details of the real world were left nebulous.
There are definitely common themes (and images – and dogs!) with Oshii’s other movies. I watched the extras bit, and he mentioned that he’d spent about two years of his life doing nothing other than gaming. I don’t know if he meant LAN games (since the movie was made in 99 and he appeared to be talking about some years before) but certainly RPG predated the online environment.
The other interesting thing was that the costume design apparently was based on Communist era Polish sf films. I didn’t know there were Communist era Polish sf films! Now I’m curious…
“I didn’t know there were Communist era Polish sf films! Now I’m curious…”
Hello, my name is Stanislaw Lem. You might remember me from such famous Polish sf works as… well, my entire oeuvre, really. Many of my stories were adapted by Eastern Bloc filmmakers, including Polish productions as well as Polish/East German, P/Russian, and P/Hungarian co-productions. Of course, then again, since Marxism bogusly claims to be an alleged ’science’ but is in fact of course ‘fiction,’ it could be argued that all Marxist-approved Social Realist films produced in Poland during the Communist era were a species of, well, science fiction!
Bye now! Have a great future!
Next you’ll be telling me the Pope was Polish, or something similarly improbable!
Speaking of Mamoru Oshii, tonight on free-to-air Japanese TV I saw a weird short cartoon using the 6-legged combat machines from “Ghost in the Shell – Stand Alone Complex”, standing in a little circle doing some kind of weird comedy routine. I swear, the world of Japanese anime will never make any sense to me.
Mark, here’s another thoughtful review:
http://sentientdevelopments.blogspot.com/2006/05/review-of-mamoru-oshiis-avalon-2001.html
Let’s not forget that the director Oshii was deeply into Polish cinema as he studied, including the work of Jerzy Kawalerowicz and Kazimierz Sumersk…makers of the 1951 film The Village Mill (Gromada).
I mention this because of the connection between the Avalon myth & the poem by Blake ‘And did those feet in ancient time’…which has the lines “And was Jerusalem builded here, Among these dark Satanic Mills?” (Industrial era mills?)…
Supposedly Oshii spent time at a Christian seminary for the priesthood but things didn’t turn out as he planned & was put off organised religion (mentioned on IMDB)…
perhaps Avalon is an expression of some of his underlying trauma…& search for alternative views of existence partially driven by said bad experiences. Who knows? Tho i imagine his time spent on-line provided a sense that he might eventually find TRUTH…by way of research &/or gaming…only to be disappointed by the hollowness of victories that led to only more levels of repitition & dislocation from the so called REAL (tangible family & friends world).
Seeing how Marx predicted that Capitalism was doomed due to its inherent contradictions, including the focus of power in few hands (monopolies…think of how drab Howard’s world was becoming & he was purported to be pro-business) i’d guess that Oshii, being well educated, saw both systems (Red Communism & Corporate capitalism) taking us to the same “sepia”, dreary existence…& that the answer lies in what you make of your own existence.
Avalon is quite possibly the film of a highly intelligent & culturally curious existentialist who has, understandably, reached a philosophical “dead end”. It’s all about how you play THE GAME (morality etc)…rather than what is THE GAME. Something like that.
I imagine our commentor above is right on about the Stanislaw Lem aspect too…particularly SOLARIS.
Hmm, interesting, I saw this when it first cam eout and really didn’t think much of it at all. I thought it was cheap, and showed, and the storyline didn’t really rock my world either (and I am a fan of Oshii). Now I’m wondering if I shouldn’t watch it again.
Thanks, nasking, that’s really interesting stuff.
I think the ‘locked down’ gaming persona really depends on the game and the mileu which the person is participating in. In the guild I play an MMORPG with, there are people all throughout Oceania, male and female and there would be a range of openness but within the guild many people share information about themselves can be fairly emotional (usually positively). Guild members have had face-to-face meetings, shared addresses, facebook profiles etc. Dealing with other players outside of the guild or outside of the sphere of friends of guild members is a different matter though. I think here and in other gaming genres that are perceived as more masculine you’d see that type of persona mentioned, largely because there is an expectation that no one is interested (or has the time in many cases) in moving behind the surface persona you have adopted in order to communicate in the game.
Appreciate those insights too, dj!
Of course apart from game mechanics or an intrinsically asocial gaming culture, there is also an element of self-protection in maintaining such a persona. Much like this and other online places, unpleasant personalities are quite common and revealing one’s real self may not be a wise move.
you’re welcome Mark…this is an interesting site:
http://www.progressiveliving.org/william_blake_poetry_jerusalem.htm
and speaking of empires, the role of science/technology & the machinery of war…the anime ‘Steamboy’ also goes there. It’s directed by Katsuhiro Otomo, who also made ‘Akira’. Wide thinkers these Japanese anime types. Somewhat like the Polish/Soviet auteurs & their crews.
Not surprising considering the suffering of the Japanese Workers & enslavement to “superficial” messages & rampant consumption in another so called PROSPERITY ECONOMY. The promises of easier work lives & safety nets were often not lived up to. These films seem to an expression of the frustration w/ failure political economic systems of all types…not disimilar to the mutation we call “The Third Way”. I guess a life of toil for the companies to only end up w/ a robotic dog companion & home that you could fit in your closet…or even homelessness w/out familial piety obligations/family support mechanisms didn’t come across as overly appealing for some of these Japanese writers/directors.
In the long run it’s not surprising they deal w/ sci-fi that moves beyond the so called REAL & “corporeal’…& into areas like “mutability”, “neon genesis” etc.
Thanks for the link, nasking. I was just digging into a book I have lying around about Japanese sf (both literature and anime) and the point was made about the way its auteurs realise that they have both a Japanese and a world audience, and how that affects the themes and imagery. Perhaps it’s something that enables the layers of meaning and the richness that a lot of the best anime has.
Indeed Mark…the melding of financial determinants w/ the quest of the auteur…:)
And of course an attempt to spread the messages & layers of meaning into cultures you’ve caught the attention of by accessing their history, codes & conventions etc. Constructing meaningful bridges & in turn clarifying certain themes that may have seemed inaccesible to most “foreign” viewers who were unacquainted w/ the symbolism & experiences of a Japanese artist…& the world of the CYBER-PUNK. Setting, characters, plots become far more easily identifiable for the “other” viewer.
And from that interaction/collision/melding we get an explosion of a new message delivery system w/in a standard genre…a somewhat rough and yet tantalising experience based on the synthesis of diverse cultural codes & conventions. The use of pregnant pauses & temporal longevity of a scene is something many so called popcorn “Westerners” have a problem with…the use of long takes in American films is sometimes used to identify them as too “artsy fartsy” or self-indulgent (plenty of labelling going on there by the usual antagonists)…gawd forbid an audience takes time to OBSERVE the too often NEGLECTED during the SPEED of their fast-paced day.
Just a few thoughts. I’m sure Nabakov & others have plenty more to contribute…I haven’t applied my mind to this stuff, filmic analysis, for awhile. It’s been fun…:)
BTW, it might be interesting to investigate the simultaneous outburst of THIRD WAY politics & seemingly “dystopic cinema” that gazes at alternative pathways….including the focus on the “libertarian” explosion. In fact, you lot are so smart on here you’ve probably already done it…:) And i say that with all “respect” colors showing on my wings…:)
Haven’t thought about it, nasking, but it sounds like an interesting line of thought! I’d be grateful to hear more!
I was going to mention Solaris as well. What a tremendous film.
I feel the same way about Solaris as I do about Yevgeny Zamyatin’s novel We. A much better, and more deeply disconcerting novel than its more renowned genre buddies 1984 and Brave New World.
Oldy or newy, Lefty E?
I really can’t get into Tarkovsky, I’m afraid. I didn’t mind the recent one.
I was thinking oldy. Havent seen the newie.
Haven’t thought much about it myself Mark. Just wondered if TV shows & movies, not to mention sci-fi novels, had contributed to the sense of “alienation” from the major Parties, particularly the Left, during the 90s, early 2000s…and whether not the THIRD WAY movement (some Soc Dems) had attempted to counter the cultural backlash & mischevious campaigns that came w/ the “bragging rights” from the collapse of so called “Communist States”…but were sucked into a Corporate void.
The rise of the Libertarian voice (Alex Jones etc) that understandably (?) despised &/or mistrusted mainstream parties and their connection to lobby groups & those of wealth & influence might not have just been spawned from conspiracy novels, & the “American Colonial militia” (defend the Constition & your Rights from GOVT & the War Machine whilst at WAR) attitudes…but also the growth of the internet that led to a mass of conflicting, contradictory propaganda & so called TRUISMS.
Lot of sh*t to wade thru…:) But such is life…from such pools new life explodes forth…:)
Anyway, add to that sci-fi that is fairly dystopic…often relying on characters who survive on their wits, TRUST no govt…work as a diverse team w/ flexible morals…well, you get the gist. The governments are generally portrayed as “untrustworthy” and politicians narcissistic, corrupt & self-interested…w/ only the occasional special patriotic military-based teams that keep themselves at a distance from authority being identified as “real heroes” or worth believing in.
Hey, I luv my “survivalism” & “beat the bad guys at all costs” sci-fi…but i sometimes wonder if the addicted/fan isn’t sometimes voting against their own self-interests once the themes & messages feed into their behaviour & sub-conscious? Particularly if they can’t afford health-care, education costs etc…but don’t VOTE out of this suspicion of any mainstream Party….& refuse to take a chance w/ the alternative to the Busheviks etc….those who generally shift the cream back into the coffee of the well off.
Don’t get me wrong, I can empathise w/ the Libertarians & other independents/govt haters & skeptics at times. When I see wealthy, hypocritical celebrities & CEOs and such supporting “fair-go” promoting parties & candidates I get the overwhelming feeling that i shouldn’t bother voting…that we’ve been “sold out”.
Then all that over-powering sense of “powerlessness” & frustration can temporarily diminish my more pragmatic aspects (particularly when drinking, which i was i generally gave it up…the paranoia can be intrusive)…so yes, the anger i feel towards politicians at times can lead to desire for some “transformation” in me or the population (think Jap anime…can have quite self-destructive characters)…perhaps to become a non-corporeal being…or a super being that can right wrongs (whatever the heck they are…lol)…or alien intervention – as in compassionate aliens who empower us rather than the types who deliver horrendous pathogens or eggs in yer belly (some look to God)…
considering that my generation has spent gawd knows how many hours in front of the tele absorbing every kind of sci-fi idea/theme known to man/woman in an edible package…it’s not surprising we can be “fickle” voters. Add the books & games to that…phew! Have fun pollies…;)
“I was thinking oldy.”
and me…but the newie has grown on me.
Grew on me too – wasn’t that fussed first time I watched it.
I’ll have a think about all that, nasking, when I’m feeling somewhat brighter. Right now, I’m watching a bit of Ghost in the Shell in honour of this interesting chat!
Enjoy! I’m feeling the need to rewatch all those films again too. Enjoyed the chat.
Cheers…time to extinguish the candle flame for the night…:)
Nasking, thinking a little more about your comments, I’m sure that you’re right about the basic political significance of the Third Way. It’s a bit harder to get a grip on the question of culture and politics – there no doubt are political themes in popular culture, but it’s a bit of a chicken and egg argument – do they reflect or influence prevailing attitudes? Or both?
There’s also obviously a left wing strand in science fiction – particularly British sf – but it probably also tends towards anti-statism. It would be interesting to tease that out further.
Before I’d make any specific comments about the way government and the state are regarded in Japanese sf, I’d want to know much more about Japanese political culture – a topic on which, unfortunately, I’m completely ignorant.
We have to keep these sf threads going, methinks! They produce some really interesting discussions.
On Avalon, Ghost in the Shell, etc, can I recommend Ergo Proxy as an anime series that is really nicely composed artistically and deals with similar themes? I’m not sure if it’s been on Oz tv. But it’s in the dvd shops.
Wiki entry: (spoilers)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergo_Proxy
Image:
YouTube excerpt:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2nLRzYY-gk&feature=related
That’s a mash up and the soundtrack is added by the person who made it, not part of the series soundtrack.
It’s worth bearing in mind that to the Japanese audience, a lot of these movies and tv shows are actually aimed at adolescents, and in some cases adolescent boys. “Neon genesis evangelion” and “Full Metal Alchemist” are 2 examples. The latter is an excellent, nuanced and very sad story, but adult Japanese laugh at me for liking it, since to them it’s a kid show. I don’t know what to take from that, but there you go.
Also Nasking, I would shy away from or reconsider any analysis of Japanese authors which relies on the notion that Japanese people are enslaved to consumer culture or live in houses the size of shoeboxes. Neither of these claims are as true, in my experience, as people in the west want to think they are (but I agree generally with that comment at 17).
Oh Avalon was nice to look if rather ochre and umber at but really the plot was written with crayons. In kanji.
Unlike this Metal Hurlant/Enki Bilal screen expedition where the script was apparently tattooed on the art director’s derriere but still vaguely readable by the rest of the above the line talent.
It has some great set pieces, piss elegant gallic art direction, Charlotte Rampling doing her grave yet mystic MILF number, shape shifting Egyptian gods (Bilal owes Zelzany a big thank you there), a Stalker type zone in the Bois de Boulogne (which is a seriously strange place anyway) and scarlet flying killer squid sharks. It’s like “The Fifth Element” with better acting and art direction but less money and joie de vivre. And an even more inscrutably gallic storyline.
Definitely worth four bucks at the movie shop.
OK, a linkfuck moment.
Try this instead
http://www.immortel-lefilm.com
I liked it, but “better acting”? They’re all bloody awful apart from Charlotte. Really. The standard of the acting ruined it for me.
“The standard of the acting ruined it for me.”
You try emoting with a green screen for a hawk’s head where your own should be.
But now I think about it, I kinda take back some of the acting thang vis a vis “The Fifth Element”. Gary Oldman was a brilliantly hammy villain, Milla Jovovich wasn’t too shabby at all, Ian Holm was Mr Reliable and Bruce Willis entered into the spirit of the piece with the kinda gusto he does best.
It was a B-Grade movie with A-Grade talent. A SF Raiders Of The Lost Ark with additional sexy.
Whereas Immortel was driven by a high concept idea, superb art direction but fell apart at the end because they didn’t properly sell the back story necessary to keep you engaged with the narrative.
Apparently they’re now planning a remake of ‘Barbarella’. I’m awaiting that one with distinctly unbated breath.
Meanwhile, Jeff Hawke, the comic strip about a suave sixties British astronaut/diplomat outfoxing alien criminal masterminds just goes begging.
SG said “Neither of these claims are as true, in my experience, as people in the west want to think they are”
I’m sure SG…i’m w/ you on not reducing a diverse society into a western-centric box…but perceptions can echo & I was wondering if the focus on homeless ex-workers/businessman, the recession, the plight of the aged w/out caring relatives news stories, even if they were a “beat-up” had secured themselves in Oshii’s consciousness at the time. Furthermore, the project (released in 2000 Japan /2001 overseas) may have been in early stages during the bursting of the Dot-Com bubble. That could have affected his view of the cyber-world, Capitalism and so on.
In a Midnight Eye interview relating to the film “Innocence” Oshii mentions his adoration for Eastern European architecture, respect for Blade Runner as a “foundation film” for the genre, his preference for dogs as companions (perhaps a similar form of disillusionment with & mistrust of humanity we observe in Ripley’s character in Alien???)…and his liking for such Tarkovsky films as Solaris & Stalker.
http://www.midnighteye.com/interviews/mamoru_oshii.shtml
There’s also a review on Avalon if you do a SEARCH.
Oshii makes this interesting assessment of his state of being: “Since people are all starting to lose part of or all of their ‘bodies’, they need to associate themselves with something else to identify themselves. It could be dogs like myself, or it could be cats or other animals. It does not need to be living things.”
I haven’t seen the film The Golden Compass but doesn’t it use human characters whose souls reside in animals or such? Just a thought.
As for the relationship between politics & culture Mark, I agree that it can be a murky “chicken & the egg” area to delve into. Tho plenty of governments/leaders have used art & other forms of expression to construct symbolism & promote their belief systems.
The Fifth Element grew on me…but so did the taste for Gatorade…:)
I wonder if those movies’ economic themes are a response to the bubble economy and its subsequent collapse. I’m interested by what people like Mamoru Oshii and Masumune Shirow are saying about the relationship between Japanese people and their government when they write stories with such blatantly dictatorial, secretive leaderships. There is always a secret military, coups in the works, etc. Are they trying to tell us something about their view of Japanese government? Or are they just reenacting the dramas of the pre-war era?
And why does he use the exact same dog in both movies?
Ewww. Gatorade?
I’m quite fond of the 5th Element. I watched it again recently. It’s all hammy acting – even Mila. But it’s the aesthetics, and the anarchistic energy that drives it.
Nabs, that dude couldn’t act with or without a hawk’s head superimposed.
“There is always a secret military, coups in the works, etc”
yea, well i guess when you’ve had a government in as long as they have (tho a few changes recently) you can get pretty paranoid & dispirited…and rebellious. At least thru yer art. I doubt tho these auteurs are thinking along the lines of Mishima tho…:)
as for the dog…don’t some directors like to insert some symbol/act that represents themselves?…constructing continuity by way of a recurrent motif thru a number of their projects? Hitchcock’s intrusive moments being the most obvious example.
“Ewww. Gatorade?”
I originally found both to be commercially “in your face” & lacking most redeeming features of a desirably consumeable product. But in the long run they both lured me in…:) I’m a sucker for playing the “particular slob”. That’s why Homer in The Simpsons appealed to me for so many years. Whilst not at WAR I tend to look the other way more often than not…except when it comes to animal cruelty. The last 5 years have been one long headache, I can tell ya.
nasking, I think it actually is Oshii’s dog. Sure I read that somewhere.
The discussion about characterisation brings to mind a comment by film scholar (and my fellow cyborg!) Vivian Sobchack that the dystopian future of cyberpunk (really a certain present we’re in, of course) tends to flatten out perception with a surfeit of images and possible moves – so it becomes like a game and it also flattens out emotion and affect too.
Kim, Oshii is living vicariously thru his dog. “It’s a dog’s life”…:)
“so it becomes like a game and it also flattens out emotion and affect too.”
Sobchack obviously hasn’t played computer games w/ some of my old mates…emotions heightened, fists clenched, adrenal glands working overtime, heads almost at SCANNERS’ explosion level…:)
Still, interesting point. Granted, those reactions were primarily in the early stages of gaming. Those pesky Space Invaders & PACMEN could be really irritating…:)
And I’m sure ‘Diablo’ was created to put up our collective blood pressure.
Tho I did find MediEvil & the early Final Fantasy’s relaxing. As for the likes of ‘Grand Theft Auto’ & ‘World of Warcraft’…i reckon they’re too violent & loud for this sober soul…i’d prefer to find some game where you can journey to the land of Avalon and hear the twittering of birds & shuffling of wee mammals in the autumn lit hedges…and indulge in an imaginary sip of some sweet nectar…before grabbing a magical sword…& slicing & dicing the neanderthals who constructed Dick Cheney out of poisonous play doe…:)
I think Sobchack was referring more to life in general and the game metaphor wasn’t meant to parallel gaming, nasking, if that makes any sense. Unfortunately I can’t put my finger on the book and I’m paraphrasing from memory…
“Whilst not at WAR I tend to look the other way more often than not”
I might add, I am referring to the media of course…i try not to examine the media in too much depth if i don’t think it is aiding & abetting govts. in “constructing” wars & promoting invasions. But if i saw signs of animal cruelty then i’d feel the need to express it.
I must admit tho, i’m finding some of the media campaigns today using irresponsible labelling, manipulative & disturbing. Regardless of what some may think, these are political & profit-oriented propaganda campaigns…creating MORAL PANIC & linking fairly unrelated incidences in order to gain readership/viewership. The news media is quite right to focus on cases such as this “freak” confining his own daughter in Austria…but to define Austrian society as “the look away” society…a society of “concealment” is just plain BS. Particularly when you link that view to pasting Soc Dems as hiding NAZIS. One wonders about this need to paint the LEFT of late as being the refuge & motivation for NAZISM…let’s look at some facts:
To be sure, the problem is not specific to the SPÖ and also affects the conservative People’s Party (ÖVP). Maria Rauch-Kallat, the general secretary of the ÖVP, described Gusenbauer’s move as “an important step” for the SPÖ and added that, unlike the Social Democrats, her party had already dealt with and overcome its Nazi past and in 1980 created the Karl Vogelsang Institute for this purpose
As Herbert Lackner explains in an article for the magazine Profil, the ÖVP has long described Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss (murdered by the Nazis in 1934) as “the first victim of National Socialism” [5] and emphasised its distinct ideological roots and the fight of “Austrofascism” with National Socialism in the 1930s.
Yet, the ÖVP also has problematic relations with the past, as evidenced, for instance, by its approval of former Wehrmacht officer Kurt Waldheim’s candidacy (and victory) in the 1986 presidential elections or its appointment of former Nazi Hans Kamitz as finance minister in the 1950s.
(Brown Stains, Magali Perrault: ce-review .org, Vol 2, No 15
17 April 2000)
So yes, Soc Dems in Austria contributed to the “national amnesia” but so did Righties. But this was not mentioned in the Times reporters comments on last night’s LATELINE interview. Biased stuff.
I lived in Austria & the major worrying thing I saw was the occasional lack of respect for some of the hard working Turks there. I met one, old Hitler apologist…but the youth I knew were all to the LEFT & roundly condemned his views. I sometimes wonder if these reporters have an original idea in their head, that isn’t part of some campaign to “hook-in” audiences based on reductionist, generalised & moral panic inciting comments. If the mainstream media is so concerned about “concealment” pehaps they need to look into their own backyards…that includes their own organisations & governments (particularly the Americans).
And just maybe that’s what Oshii is reflecting, a distrust of both forms of politics…in the end it might be better to “take your own path”…& make your own REALITY (Tho, not like the abusive creep in Austria obviously). In the fighting between the mainstream, old hat, systems (as portrayed by so much of today’s “non-independent” thinking media) the society & individual gains little…they are often pawns in a chess game…too often victimised, exploited or used to make an example of, to gain ratings, to make a political/ideological point. The GOTYA media have alot to answer for. As do their “campaign managers”. The imaginative & curious filmmakers that Oshii refers to in his films & interviews often got it.
The GAME…the journey…the brutality of naked “survivalism”…& the beauty constructed by the merging of imagination & aspects of reality.