W2 - Wendy to the Second Power

New Zealander Jane Campion is one of the most intriguing women making movies. She's fought the male Hollywood bias to make independent films with fascinating topics. I don't love all of them -- like SWEETIE, which Russ liked and I found weird to the point of nauseating. But certainly THE PIANO and PORTRAIT OF A LADY (Campion does Henry James!).

It was fun to hear that her latest, BRIGHT STAR, was already such a hit at Cannes. It's on a topic interesting to me, mostly because it's an era that Tim Powers covers so well in his wonderfully researched fantasy books: the romantic poets. And it's told from the POV of the historical character most people consider a cipher, or a rampant siren, in the life of the much-more-famous John Keats.

There's a lot to like in BRIGHT STAR, and one big thing to love. The big thing to love: it's about a relationship that ends, one would think, with the death by tuberculosis of Keats, but Campion doesn't write towards that. I've gotten so tired of the movies lately who make a major character's long-expected death the big climax of the movie. That's lazy, built-in melodrama. But Campion has the characters last parting be the main climax, with all its pain and confusion, and bittersweet pretending of a future. And she has the actual announcement of Keats' death create a sort of shift in the relationship and respect of the two other major characters.

The period feels wonderfully real; the muddy back doors into the clotheslines, the rustic kitchens where people hang out when they're relaxing and the parlour is too prim. The dark, cold, awful, rented rooms people with little to no money must live in. What a huge burst of arterial blood coughed up onto sheets looks like. The compotes and other dishes of the day, especially on holidays. Fanny's costumes are both part of her characterization and an indication of the few channels for creativity allowed to a woman in that culture. Oh, they were gorgeous! Unusual and sometimes too idiosyncratic, which, yeah, a woman trying to carve her own niche would do.

Abby Cornish is wonderful as Fanny Brawne. She has to be smart and smart-aleck, pretty enough to have a dozen suitors. Descriptions of the historical person vary, but she was a fashionista for her time, designs and productions of her own hand, and she was considered a popular girl. By her own admission she did not enjoy or understand poetry, which was such a boys' club anyway, but she came to admire and understand it from her relationship with Keats. Cornish is not perfect; sometimes her stiff and clumsy way of moving made me think "21st century girl in a corset." She did too much tucking back of her severe hairdo's, which is a modern girl thing too. But she played the part with no makeup, and she was intelligent and plausibly emotional.

Ben Whishaw is a wonderful actor who is homelier than he needs to be. He's only mid-20's, but even in his teenage years looked like a gnome in making. He's craggy already, with his heavy Neanderthal brow, and he never gets to shave completely in this part. He's been convincing as the murderous savant peasant in PARFUME, then fragile and sad as Sebastian in BRIDESHEAD REVISITED.

He plays a poet just fine because he's such a smart guy (and, if his personal interviews are a clue, extremely soft spoken and probably gay), but is less convincing to me as the potential lover of the robust Cornish. He's so thin and short that once the dramatic challenge of his health arises, he plays a TB patient very convincingly, though. He's famous for an alternate Hamlet he did on the London stage while still only 19-20 years old, so his voice is wonderful for reciting Keats poetry.

In fact, the movie is worth the price of admission to hear both Whishaw and Cornish speak several stanzas of Keats verse; you don't think recitations could take your breath away, but Campion sets up every quoting as something emotion and special. The final credits are done over Whishaw speaking "Ode to a Nightingale" and what you might remember as purple prose from high school English is wonderful.

Paul Schneider as Charles Brown, Keats' friend and jealous protector, is amazing. Hate the guy, but have to empathize with him too. And I defy you to hear his good Scottish brogue and recall that he was born and bred in South Carolina! Kerry Fox as Fanny's quiet, mostly supportive mother really grounds the story, as does Thomas Sangster as Fanny's watchful teenage brother. And her little sister Toots is given several touching moments, and familiar sisterly fighting moments, that little round-eyed, red-haired Edie Martin makes indelible.

While at the HWC, I, along with the ballroomful of attendees on the first day of the conference, was blown away by the opening ceremonies. The Kanaka'ole family (grandmother, daughter, grandson) did an incredible opening chant and dance, then Kaumakaiwa, the grandson, sort of emcee'd the rest of the event. The whole family is composed of scholars, PhDs, experts in Hawaiian myth, and they've taught a Pele-oriented form of hula for the past 400 years. This is during the time when (white male settlers from America made it so) doing so was illegal. They also did a presentation about their chants and songs the following day that I really enjoyed.

Kaumakaiwa ("Lopako") has a very feminine side to him, sort of flamboyant and swishy, but so cute as he talks and giggles. His hulas were also very graceful and feminine even though he's almost six feet tall. Then his soaring songs just tear your heart out with the emotion in them, but his chants are very visceral and guttural. Fascinating! Here he is talking about how/why he writes songs. Here's his record label page with a nice musical clip from him. I talked with him about the Mythic Journeys, Joseph Campell conferences (which, alas, seem no more), which is part of his background too. So I got the handshake when I greeted him, but then after talking, I got the full body hug with the nose rub --!

They also brought in the fabulous guitarist Makana, who's buddies with Lopako, so they sang/played and Welo danced. Makana was ranked one of the top 3 guitarists in the world, and his melodies on the slack string guitar often mimic the rain or the natural environment around him. He was GREAT! He also had percussion and bass guitar, with a well-known female hula dancer who traveled with him. The combination of guitar/strings and unusual percussion was very stirring -- reminded me a LOT of going to a Clandestine performance. That same sublime blending of tones and melody that can often make you weep.

Even the long-time Hawaiian residents were blown away and crying. They told me THIS was the authentic dance and music, and going to a pre-fab luau was nothing like this. Everybody talked about it for days.

Then they brought out the famous Hawaiian slam poet, Kealoha, aka Steven Wong. He had some interesting pieces that he performed somewhat acrobatically. I get bored with slam poetry easily (it seems like meaning and word play is subsumed to rhythm too often) but this guy was a great example of the good stuff. He seemed like a thin, young guy with his long flowing hair too. But reading about him and seeing him close-up later, he's probably in his early to mid-30s, and has a degree in nuclear physics from MIT. Plus he taught surfing for a while and must have some muscles under that too-large t-shirt he wore...

My buddy J4 and I went to Cape Cod last week, staying in a darling little community called Craigville, which is near the Centerville Beach, one of the nicest beaches on the Cape, I learned.

Ironically, the beach was not a big draw once we got there. Go figure! It just didn't feel or smell much like being at the beaches I was used to. No fishy seaweed smell. No ozone in the air. The sand was composed of ground-down oyster shells, so the walking was actually sharp to the feet. J4 never goes barefoot, even in her house, so she only walked through the sand once and never again. I visited the ocean-- actually, Nantucket Sound -- more than she did. I even went late to one of my classes so I could take a quick dip and say I'd swum on that coast. It was a popular family beach, lots of folks, and also neat that it was a private beach for Craigville people with a nice Craigville Beach Center. But it wasn't very tidal, cooler than I expected, and it got deep fast!


The people enjoying a sunny afternoon on Craigville beach.

The Craigville community, composed mostly of cute little or impressively huge summer homes with lush flowers interspersed with the more "rustic" (read: not upgraded with AC or planted with flowerbeds) cottages and buildings owned by the Christian Church folks who owned the Craigville Conference Center, was quiet and sleepy and felt very safe. We slept with windows open, said "hi" to all the folks we passed on the street, etc. There were no stores and it was a drive to get to Hyannis (6 miles) or Centerville (3 miles) and we didn't rent a car. So we spent most of the week hanging out on the breezy porch of our cottage or hiking the streets up and down to go to class or get our meals in the Craigville Inn.

Imagine: a week with no AC, no TV, no radio, no email/Web browsing, no snacks, no sodas, and no driving. It was like living on planet Mars! But first, we had to get from Boston in a tiny Cessna, like a VW bus with wings! ( Read More and See Photos... )

I wrote this years ago and never did anything with it except print it in AUSTIN WRITER, the Writer League's monthly newsletter. Going through old docs now to polish a story for SlugTribe tonite and found it.


Brain Food
a poem by Wendy Wheeler

I keep books in the pantry like food
A cupboard of words
Shelves of sentences
Stacked and rowed provisions of plot and story line
Jars of metaphor and simile glowing with subtlety
Tall, teetering piles of character and motivation
Well-jelled themes
Floating in their own juice
Those necessary, nourishing staples:
Grammar and syntax

On cheerless days, my peckish brain
Lights upon a choice morsel
The spicy bite of irony
A satisfying crunch of emotion
Until a fullness grows within my head
And softly I belch a feeling of rapport