jürgen fauth’s muckworld

Marcy and I will be editing the Spring issue of the Mississippi Review Web. Here’s the call for submissions. Please feel free to forward this to any and all interested parties, and to post wherever appropriate.

24 Words Per Second: The Movies Issue
We are writers who watch a lot of movies. Maybe it’s no surprise that the films we see have a way of seeping back into our fiction: plots that echo silent film, narrative gimmicks borrowed from the French New Wave, characters who spend too much time at the multiplex or model their lives after movie stars. For the MRW Spring issue, we are looking for short stories with a cinematic bend. What that means, exactly, is up to you. Perhaps your story references Aki Kaurismäki, moves like a screwball comedy, or features cinemaniacs trying to kick the habit. Maybe it’s narrated from the perspective of Natalie Wood’s ghost. As long as it’s inspired by the movies, we’re interested.

The deadline is March 15. Send submissions (3000 words max) to mississippireview.movieissue@gmail.com.

Ah, lists! Like all fans, film aficionados are collectors, and every now and then, all collectors enjoy sifting through their stash to trot out their favorite baubles, arranged one way or another, to show them off to the world. Look! I’ve got three of the ultra-rare green kind, and oh, how that marbled one catches the sunlight just so! Toying with the objects of our affection in this way makes us feel happy and safe. In the world of movies, that’s what we call a list.

The movies we’ve seen (and can remember) are our stash and currency, and the best and shiniest of them will have to bear the scrutiny of any passers-by. As members of NYFCO, Marcy and I do this once a year, and recently, I’ve been asked, along with a number of bloggers and critics, to help put together a list of best films made in a language other than English before 2002. The list of nominations is out now at Edward Copeland’s site, and it’s a good one. You can go vote on your favorites, and a final tally will be published soon.

For the goal-oriented, that should be the end of the story, but I always find that democracy and criticism make an uneasy fit, and to me, the final result is somewhat beside the point. Instead, you might be happier taking a look at the individual ballots (or adding your own) here, at Jim Emerson’s site, at the House Next Door, or on your own damn blog. The fun is in the arranging of the marbles, the weighing of their comparative beauty, the debates over which ones have been overlooked or could be traded in for shinier ones. (It’s also a terrific way to fatten up your Netflix queue.) For the avid collector, the list is never an end in itself — it’s just a way to spend a little bit more time with some of our favorite things.

So here’s the snapshot of movies I considered worthy of inclusion according to this particular set of parameters on this particular day–culled from a much longer list of close contenders while LH 182, after three hours delay, finally began its initial descent on Berlin-Tegel, a fact I mention only because it may help explain the heavy Teutonic emphasis: I literally found myself in the Himmel über Berlin. Feel free to add your 25 favorites in the comments, and don’t forget to vote at Edward Copeland’s site. In alphabetical order:

8 1/2 Federico Fellini, 1963
Aguirre, The Wrath of God Werner Herzog, 1972
Akira Katsuhiro Otomo, 1988
Au Hasard Balthazar Robert Bresson, 1966
Band of Outsiders Jean-Luc Godard, 1964
Black Orpheus Marcel Camus, 1959
City of God Fernando Meirelles, 2002
Day for Night Francois Truffaut, 1973
M Fritz Lang, 1931
Nights of Cabiria Federico Fellini, 1957
Run Lola Run Tom Tykwer, 1998
Seven Samurai Akira Kurosawa, 1954
Solaris Andrei Tarkovsky, 1972
Spirited Away Hayao Miyazaki, 2001
Stolen Kisses Francois Truffaut, 1968
The Lovers on the Bridge Leos Carax, 1991
The Man Without a Past Aki Kaurismaki, 2002
The Rules of the Game Jean Renoir, 1939
The Seventh Seal Ingmar Bergman, 1957
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg Jacques Demy, 1964
The Wages of Fear Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1953
Wings of Desire Wim Wenders, 1987
Y Tu Mama Tambien Alfonso Cuaron, 2001
Yojimbo Akira Kurosawa, 1961
Zur Sache, Schätzchen May Spils, 1968

Aki Kaursmäki’s Leningrad Cowboys Go America is the reason that for the last 18 years, I have not been able to buy a bag of onions without smiling. The mock heroic road movie was a formative film for me, but it’s not available on DVD in the U.S. Thanks to the wonders of the Internet, I was finally able to revisit the story of the exuberantly coiffed band “from the tundra” and their tyrannical manager (Matti Pellonpää). Back in 1989, the combination of absurd sight gags and sparse Down By Law aesthetic was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. Come to think of it, there hasn’t been anything quite like it since.

Sent to New York by a communist functionary on the logic that “in America, they like crap,” the Cowboys head off to CBGBs on tractors, pointy shoes gleaming and monstrous duck tails bopping in the breeze. When they get there, it turns out they have never even heard of rock ‘n roll–Madison Square Garden is out, but would they like to play at a wedding in Mexico? Undaunted, the band buys a car from Jim Jarmusch, straps their frozen bass player to the roof, and heads south. Their musical education culminates in a tuba-and-accordion version of “Born to Be Wild” that would make Borat Sagdiyev jump with joy. Marcy’s verdict? “Quite possibly the silliest movie ever made.”

Leningrad Cowboys Go America. Aki Kaurismäki, 1989. ****

• Kaurismäki’s Lights in the Dusk opens in the U.S. next week. The perfect Kaurismäki film is still The Man Without a Past.

After the movie, the Leningrad Cowboys took on a life of their own: I saw them play the KUZ in Mainz, there was a sequel, Leningrad Cowboys Meet Moses, and a concert film, Total Balalaika Show. The official site lists 2007 summer dates. There is no shortage of YouTube clips, including “Born to Be Wild” from the movie and “My Way” with the Red Army Ensemble and Ballet:

The Finns in Aki Kaurismäki’s movies are a dour lot: they rarely smile, never say more than what’s absolutely necessary, and even when they want to signify agreement, they confine themselves to a single, decisive nod of the head. When heartbroken (and they are usually heartbroken), they sit alone drinking vodka and listen to maudlin folks songs until they pass out with burning cigarettes dangling from their lips. After Drifting Clouds and The Man Without a Past, Lights in the Dusk, an official selection at last year’s Cannes festival, completes the “Loser Trilogy” — but then again, as far back as Ariel (1988) and The Match Factory Girl (1990), Kaurismäki’s films have always been concerned with the unlikely redemption of sad underachievers at the edges of society.

Koistinen (Janne Hyytiäinen) is a typical Kaurismäki hero. A security guard working night shifts in a particularly desolate neighborhood of Helsinki, he is routinely snubbed and ridiculed by his co-workers. The only person who will talk to him is sausage vendor Aila (Maria Heiskanen.) We don’t see him laugh or crack a smile until a solid hour into the movie. Kind Koistinen stoically accepts beatings from neglectful dog owners, and like the nameless Man Without a Past, he becomes the victim of a crime. In that film, a good samaritan helped with his recovery, but here, it is a cold-hearted dame (Maria Järvenhelmi) who gets the lonesome hero into trouble.

With his trademark understatement and a pleasing palette composed of cold blue hues with red highlights, Kaurismäki once again hints at oceans of emotion underneath the minimalist surface. The miracle of his films is that the laconic tone never becomes depressing, and the glimmers of hope and humor found in the misery are all the more radiant for it. The villain of Lights in the Dusk proudly proclaims that he takes everything to its logical conclusion, and so Kaurismäki doesn’t have to. Instead, he ends the film with a lovely image that is reward enough. Lights in the Dusk opens at the IFC Center on June 13; other cities will follow.

Laitakaupungin valot. Aki Kaurismäki, 2006. ****

• By pure coincidence, most of my family is currently in Finland, where my cousin Elina is celebrating her high school graduation. I’m sad I couldn’t be there to pass out with burning cigarettes dangling from my lips, so instead, the Internet will have to do. Congratulations, Elina!
• A scene from Lights in the Dusk:

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkMiTzYV7-U