Change Your Image
peter-schramm
1) Aria
2) The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
3) Somewhere in Time
4) Orlando
5) The Swimmer (Burt Lancaster film)
Reviews
A House in Berlin (2014)
Evocative, tantalising and thought provoking
A HOUSE IN BERLIN
Each and every film by Cynthia Beatt is like a cross between a wave swept "message in bottle" and Aladdin's lamp. This one is no exception, it's evocative, tantalising in design and it contains an inner dynamic hidden behind the narrative which is revealed like magic with a little thought.
A House in Berlin tells the story of a woman who inherits a dilapidated building in Berlin and along with it, intrigue, deception, family skeletons and a vocation.
At the start of the film, against a stormy sea backdrop we are told that the film charts the personal odyssey of the principal character, Stella. This is Jungian territory, where names are never accidental. Stella means "Star" in Latin and was first used as a personal name in the 16th Century by Sir Philip Sidney in his poem "Astrophel and Stella" which is worth quoting;
"Loving in truth, and fain in verse my love to show That the dear she might take some pleasure of my pain Pleasure might cause her read, reading might make her know Knowledge, might pity win and grace obtain"
This film's Stella is a university lecturer in English Literature and consequently she does a lot of reading, but instead of obtaining grace this has made her a prisoner of reflection because it has been done without true awareness of her inner condition, her soul, her unconscious, her Astrophel. Jung also said that when an inner factor does not become conscious, it produces itself externally in the form of destiny. Stella is also of Jewish descent, so rather like the biblical star of Bethlehem some sort of re-birth (in the Holy Land) seems to be her destiny.
Stella has two friends, both called Robert which derives from the Anglo-Saxon name Hrodebert meaning "Bright Fame" – another starry reference and they represent, psychologically, auxiliary parts of her psyche. Paired helpers (one a reflection of the other) are a common theme throughout the film.
Every odyssey has a set pattern. 1) The malaise 2) The call 3) The Journey 4) The test 5) The resolution
The call for Stella to go on her odyssey comes via a letter, which we see Stella reading in a café, with her reflection in a mirror behind. This reflection of Stella represents an unconscious neglected aspect and in films the "double" is usually the visualisation of a crises situation that is a prelude to inevitable change, its appearance always comes precisely when the desire for change is manifested Stella's journey to Berlin can be considered a journey to the underworld, a venturing into the world of shadows, of the images that populate the psyche. Stella's broken childhood is a form of shattered inwardness so this is a journey from inner fragmentation to inner reintegration. The beautiful scene of the swan on the fragmented ice correlates to this.
At the House she encounters a helpful pair of tenants, Lucas (Luke) an architect and Simon, who shed light on recent events involving the up and coming sale of the building. These biblically named disciples represent that part of a woman's unconscious psyche called the Animus, the faculty of spirit/logos. The chess game on the table represents their gifts of logical thinking.
With their help Stella realises that her shady solicitor (who represents that part of a woman's unconscious psyche called the "Shadow") is swindling her, she is determined to fight back. She seeks a second legal opinion which is provided by another pairing, this time a mother and daughter. Like Odysseus encounter with Circe & Polyphemus, Stella uses her ingenuity to outwit the corrupt solicitor. However, this does not resolve everything as the cost of renovating the dilapidated house is beyond her means financially. She is, however, led into researching Jewish\German history by yet another pair of helpers, two women recently returned from Palestine. This pair invites Stella to share their octopus salad. The octopus is a leitmotif of the unconscious and feasting upon would indicate that Stella is now in tune with it.
Finally her personal family tragedy is revealed by an old lady who has been a tenant since before the Second World War. This old lady is like the mythical Old Woman of the West who guards the entrance to the land of the dead – full of secrets and knowledge of people who have passed over. The scene where she comes to Stella's apartment in the middle of the night to deliver a vital piece of information and the background is suddenly plunged into darkness was, I have been told, unplanned and therefore a type of filmic fortuitousness Jung called Synchronicity.
In Homer's Odyssey, the ghost of Teiresias, in the land of the dead which the Greeks also called - the House of Hades, instructs Odysseus to set out again, on a mission to carry a ship's oar to a point so far in land that the people there would not recognise it as such and then Odysseus had to plant the oar in the ground, in honour of Poseidon. In Jungian terms this is the honouring of the unconscious after a mid-life crisis.
In this film, Stella, after discovering the fate not only of her own dispossessed family but also of the disposed people of Palestine finds her vocation. Like Odysseus she travels to a faraway land and bears witness to her own newly discovered truths. In doing so, she becomes the Architect of her own life.
The conclusion of the film is conveyed to us by the narrator as Stella herself has vanished from the film. She has passed through the "House of Hades" to her new Elysium, where we who have not yet transformed are not allowed to follow.
Anyone suffering from mid-life lethargy or depression can follow in Stella's footsteps if they listen to the messages and cues from the unconscious and start a dialogue with the soul.
The Limits of Control (2009)
A sublime synthesis of art, psychology and cool.
Jim Jarmusch has been described as America's coolest director and as America's most iconic art-house film maker and "The Limits of Control" is indeed a sublime synthesis of art, psychology and cool.
Isaach De Bankole plays an inscrutable but stylish hit man following a trail of instructions that lead inexorably to his target played by a dapper Bill Murray, The instructions are delivered vignette style by an equally cool and eclectic supporting cast that includes Tilda Swinton and John Hurt whose last film together was Don Boyd's "Aria" and who both lend this film considerable art-house kudos not to mention a little cinematic magic. Tilda Swinton's delivery of the word suspicion makes the heart skip a beat. The narrative is uncluttered and unfolds at a leisurely but pleasing pace allowing you to absorb and appreciate the artistic motivation. This film is heavy on artistic motivation, the landscapes are art, the townscapes are art, the interior design is art, the soundtrack is art, the people are art, the art is
art ! However the icing on the cake is the way Jarmusch subliminally takes us on an excursion through the human psyche and makes us realise that we don't have all the time in the world to find the precious things life has in store.
He uses post modern art with its fractured and fragmented forms to reflect modern man's own fragmented mind. Bill Murray's character represents a very egotistical Ego whilst all the other characters, including Isaach De Bankole's hit man represent archetypal manifestations of the unconscious i.e shadow, anima, senex and self to name the main ones. The film is packed with too many Jungian clues for this to be passed off as mere artistic flourish, but let me point out two key scenes where Jarmusch makes this obvious. The first follows the flamenco club when from the balcony of his hotel room the hit man watches the Nude turn around and vanish into thin air. The second is the kidnapping of the Blonde. Both girls represent a man's archetypal and unconscious femininity – the anima. The Nude is a negative aspect that leads men astray and the Blonde is a positive aspect that is a man's muse and his soul. In the film one is naked whilst the other is excessively clothed – they are opposites of the very same coin. The American has the Blonde kidnapped because he has sold his soul in a Faustian pact with capitalism and consumerism. This subtext gives the film substance to go alongside the style.
In many respects this is a trademark Jarmush film and another rung on the ladder to Auteur-ship. However, it is also his most overtly psychological film to date and a great example of symbolic cinema. It will appeal most to those who appreciate that an artist's work represents a path from inner fragmentation to reintegration.
Cycling the Frame (1988)
An inspiring example of prophetic film making
Conservatively tagged as a documentary film and cautiously described as "an interesting document" Cynthia Beatt's film really deserves to be trumpeted from the rooftops as an inspiring example of prophetic film making.
In January 1989 East Germany's leader Erich Honecker boasted that the Berlin Wall would stand for another hundred years, whilst at the same time Cynthia Beatt was making a film which like a prophetic dream was predicting its imminent fall and Honecker's imminent demise, by forces in the collective unconscious of the German people which had reached a critical mass.
The East German government was a rigid, authoritarian and repressive regime that walled in its own citizens to stop them from leaving. Psychologically it was a one-sided, over-rational and paranoid mind that built a wall of solitude around its own suffering, becoming in effect a prisoner of its own fears.
Sombre stuff, but surprisingly this exploratory film is anything but sombre, its light and airy, deceptively simple and hypnotic in a palliative way because although fragmentary it has a flowing style which is quite addictive. Yep, I love this film and after I've played it once I just go back to the beginning and play it again.
The film's focus is on the compensatory factor that the neurotic ego (East Germany) refuses to acknowledge, namely the unconscious feminine (the cyclist) which circumnavigates its defences (the wall) trying to penetrate and end its self inflicted alienation. The girl represents everything that East Germany's government lacked – a pure heart, innocence, a feeling for nature, freethinking, inquisitiveness and most importantly openness. The girl is played by none other than Tilda Swinton who is one of those special few that John Beebe is describing in his article, The Anima in Film*, when he says they "transform from person into image and move the film past the personal and into the archetypal realm of psychological experience". As the film progresses it becomes more and more apparent that the truncated, dead end, streets indicate that all links to the unconscious and the feminine sphere have been cut. The check points are closed, the gates are locked and there is no reaction in the mute far off faces of the border guards that the cyclist waves to. Her comment "its completely mad, this place" is in fact the psyche's fatal diagnosis and summary judgement.
If the human ego will not respond to the psyche's attempt to heal it, then eventually the psyche will pull the plug which is what promptly happened to the East German Government in October 1989. This amazing film tells us that if we want to avoid going down the plug hole we must relate to our own unconscious which, just like the cyclist, is waiting patiently to be acknowledged so that the healing process can begin.
*Quoted article is from the book 'Jung & Film'and'Gender and Soul in Psychotherapy'
The Invisible Frame (2009)
Cynthia Beatts mesmerising film invites us to look inside ourselves for a truth which can guide us through the existential void.
The Invisible Frame unfolds as a cycle journey along the line of the former Berlin Wall but this film is artful and philosophical rather than nostalgic. It's a stream of images meandering through that "end of the day" atmosphere – dreamy, contemplative, a touch wistful, occasionally soliloquised into prose, emotion turned into words - at other times it swirls along with ethereal sounds which echo around inside you, sounds turned into emotion. Yet half submerged within its flowing imagery resides a poignant philosophical question.
Berlin with its absurd wall, its Nazi past, its ideological split into east and west is an example par excellence of that existential stumbling block upon which some of the best existential thinkers have founded:- what can we do to make life endurable if the universe really has neither god, purpose, values or meaning ? Heidegger chose Nazi-ism and Sartre Marxism but both they and Berlin now lie testament to the failure of those answers. However this film's interplay of art and philosophy really does produce some quite interesting propositions. The hallmark of a good film is its capacity to trigger an encounter with your own soul and the Invisible Frame does just that.
The street musician at the beginning is a "Pied Piper" motif, heralding the passage from our everyday standpoint to an inner or psychic standpoint i.e the underworld. The enigmatic and beguiling cyclist, Tilda Swinton (Oscarwinner 2008),leads us through a suitably chthonic and labyrinthine landscape, transforming every scene into a tantalising question. She meditates on life, reads a book called "Alone in Berlin" and never asks for directions underlining that this is an inner journey from collective opinions towards individual insight. At the centre of this filmic labyrinth she finds a birds nest which is a Gnostic\Kabala symbol of our transpersonal centre or "higher self" which will come on occasion to the assistance of solitary individuals. This experience of the numinous brings about a synthesis of the conscious and conscious psyche and with it an awareness that we have a reason to exist. The red star monument reinforces this symbolism as the minotaur in Greek legend was called Asterion which means "star" and coins excavated at Knossos on Crete where the legend is set show a star at the centre of the labyrinth. Now the person with whom she has most contact, is a child with a bow and arrow. This lost son of Hamelin (like all the children you see)represents our curiosity, joy, openness and spontaneity which can be used to overcome self-deception, conventionality and fear. It rubs off on the cyclist because later she etches an arrow, rune-like, into the dirt. The arrow is a very old symbol whose meaning has survived through to our day in its use to depict North on maps – it points to the North star which never sets but remains above the horizon for travellers to orientate themselves – it is our guiding star. Like the picture of Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci, which she stops by, the cyclist has, through her journey, squared the circle and found a new psychological orientation. Her closing words "open sesame" bring her back out of the underworld and into our everyday world where she began, just like the circuit of the wall has brought her back to her starting point.
You may frown at my interpretation and the film's texts do literally speak for themselves but for me the film scores in its ability to coax you to turn inward and retrieve from the depths of your own being a reply to the absurdity of existence.