Sebastian Speaks

Today’s Tocqueville Tidbit

POSTED 17-06-2009

Good essay here:

http://web.austin.utexas.edu/chenry/civil/resources/PittsAPSA.htm

A lot of great men have really bad ideas. Tocqueville was remarkable for his time in that he was a vocal supporter of American Indian rights and was justly horrified at American colonial expansion and Southern slavery. But even he wasn’t immune from the appeal of empire building, specifically in regards to France’s incursion into Northern Africa. At a time when bread was becoming the necessary worker food for the exploding factory culture of Europe and Northern America, empires of wheat were replacing empires of spice. America was the world’s breadbasket but Tocqueville thought Algeria could be turned into France’s breadbasket; that with a little bit of inventive agriculture this corner of the Maghreb could be transformed into a stretch of grain to rival the American midwest. To do this, Tocqueville had no problem in calling for the ruthless suppression/extinction of the native Arabs.
Remember, World War 2 and Hitler’s wars of conquest were basically European colonialism turned in on itself. The genocide and oppression generated by the European scramble for Africa, both northern and Sub-Saharan, was ruthless and with little precedent.

leo live

POSTED 16-06-2009

the good old boys from Brazil

POSTED 16-06-2009

I was reading some track notes on a Mutantes cd recently and was reminded about the family history of Rita Lee. She was descended from a family of ex-Confederates who had emigrated to Brazil from the South after the Civil War. There were actually several thousand Southerners who left for Brazil in the post war years, remembered in the country as “Confederados”. Some came because of Brazil’s tolerant policy towards slavery, hoping that they could continue an antebellum lifestyle in the southern hemisphere. Others came simply to avoid being a part of the reunited United States. They were given generous tax breaks as immigrants, in part because Brazil had an eye towards recruiting experienced cotton planters.
Though they were a fairly small group they left a mark on Brazilian culture. One of Jimmy Carter’s relatives was a Confederado in fact. There is still a town in Sao Paulo called “Americana”, though Confederado descendants are a minority now.

Today’s Tocqueville Tidbit

POSTED 21-05-2009

“A native of the United States clings to the world’s goods as if he were certain never to die; and he is so hasty at grasping at all within his reach, that one would suppose he was constantly afraid of not living long enough to enjoy them. He clutches everything, he holds nothing fast, but soon loosens his grasp to pursue fresh gratifications.”

david shire and the cinema of paranoia

POSTED 13-05-2009

One of my favorite composers of the seventies is David Shire, specifically for three films, “The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3″, “All the President’s Men”, and “The Conversation”. One of the more intriguing stylistic features of the so called “cinema of paranoia” era was a minimal soundtrack. Rather than creating tension through music the way old Hollywood films always had, many directors in the seventies chose to create tension by lack of music. I think of it as akin to taking a laugh track away from a comedy. It’s treating your audience with more intelligence, allowing them to be guided by their own feelings pertaining to the action onscreen, rather than having to be forced into a certain mood due to the music in the background. Anyone doubting the effectiveness of this tactic should go back and watch recent flicks like “No Country For Old Men” or “Children of Men”. As Kubrick figured out pretty early on, probably with “Strangelove”, the strategic use of music rather than the constant need for it in a soundtrack elevates films above the fairly lazy studio templates employed for so long. It had been done in Europe for some time but its appearance in American cinema was one of the aspects of the late sixties sea change. Think about it: for all of the fame attached to the soundtrack in “Easy Rider”, how much of the film’s duration is occupied by music? Or “Five Easy Pieces”?
“The Conversation”, documenting the activities of a surveillance expert played by Gene Hackman, used a fairly avant garde piano score to mirror the insular paranoia of the lead character. Strange sound effects drift in and out, and the mood reminds me a bit of the work Oskar Sala did on “The Birds”. “All the President’s Men” is supremely minimal, with only a couple of somber themes that reoccur with hypnotic familiarity.
Then of course, the soundtrack for “Taking of Pelham 1-2-3″ has received a lot of attention. It’s denser, with the gritty mid seventies edge; symphonic jazz with a nod to funk, the kind of thing Lalo Schifrin had perfected.
I also have to remember to mention “Taxi Driver” and its magnificent, supremely creepy jazz score by Bernard Hermann, his last. It’s the aural equivalent of an expressionist painting, with tones and textures gathering strength deep underground, bursting forth suddenly with atonal violence, and retreating into dark, sullen beauty again.