Acephalous

What we don't know we know, aren't quite sure how we missed...

...and are disappointed that none of you lot pointed out. Namely, that when I wrote this post a month ago, it never occurred to me that I was unconsciously admitting to a desire to be bossed around by handsome bald black men:

But apparently I do. Regular posting to resume shortly, now that I've got the majority of the lesson-planning for my new course–which I'm currently teaching, so I'm scripting class-by-class instead of working from previously devised material–completed. 

Don't be surprised if this is the last time you see Lance Reddick on this blog either. (Or Benedict Cumberbatch or Hugh Laurie or Matt Smith for that matter.) 

Jews don't celebrate April Fool's ... what do you think the rest of the year's for?

It's come to my attention that the reason that I've been having difficulty sending and receiving attachments these past three quarters is that my students' Rhetoric-in-Practice projects are so large that I've exceded my allotted space requirements for my Gmail account. This has caused me no end of problems, for which I apologize. However, if you received a text, phone call, tweet, or email from me tonight apologizing for this indiscretion, know that it was sincere, and that I'll do my best to make amends, as best I can, in the coming months.

If you choose to believe otherwise–that my intent was malicious–all I can say is look at the life I've lived the past eight years, then stare into my eyes and declare that I've reason to have done this to myself.

The Ballad of Peter and Peggy, Redux, in "A Little Kiss"

(It goes without saying that this is another one of those posts.)

Poor self-defeating Pete, trying his best to become the very Draper whose misery's invisible to him. Remember when Pete had hope, and director John Slattery hammered the possibility of it home via reverse shots? How Pete saw Peggy longing for him:

Returned her implicit, medium long offer in kind:

And was returned in kind:

And again:

And again, an almost final invitaiton?

Of course, between them in each reverse shot is the not-insignificant–and increasingly significant, given the racial aspects entering the series in future episodes–glass door separating the firm from the world it claims to represent. As I wrote in the post linked above:

The viewer is looking at Peter looking at Peggy in the first medium close up in the scene.  (There is a slight unreality to this point of view shot: it zooms in on the pair in a way only cameras can.  The zooming seems to act as a cinematic proxy for attention or concentration.)  Slattery made sure the nearly invisible wall separating them remained visible, which creates a tension between the intimacy of the close up and the reality of the glass walls separating them.  That he chooses a more intimate when these two are in different rooms is, for obvious reasons, significant.  She sees him peering at her and, by its positioning, the camera acknowledges the bond that will remain despite the increasing distance between them: the baby they had together.

But now Peter's a father, only not of Peggy's baby, but of his own. Who's screen presence exists as such:

See the baby? The one he had so he could be more like Draper? It's sitting there, frame central, hovering invisible in that tacky chair he should've had the decency to replace if he'd had any sense of style. He's becoming Draper–disappearing into the life he mistakenly believed he wanted. No children to greet him, just cold dinner and a warm shot of whisky. Don't believe me? Let's rewrind to the first season and remind you of a similarly framed shot:

In this case, however, Betty's lying about going to the community center to watch them film the pool–she's off to watch pretty things die, as per the episode's title, for"Sport." But there's something more than sport to her deliberations. She wants to savor the experience of watching something die. First she feeds the children, then she does the laundry:

Then the camera acknowledges that she's had an idea and zooms into a close-up to reiterate that fact:

Note the joy on her face. Knowing that her idea is one that–whatever joy it might bring her, society would disapprove of, she ponders her decision for a moment:

Moments are fleeting:

Her decision has been made. Cut to exterior:

Relief. Betty's just a central figure staring at the sky in wonderment at all God's creations:

Look at those birds? The fact that they're incapable of being centrally staged only emphasizes their freedom. The frame can't constrain them! They're free! If only Betty had an equivalently symbolic emblem of relinquishing societal constraints:

She does. Her feelings of entrapment are nothing a healthy dose of nicotine can't cure. Except why has she shifted stage-left? She had occupied the central portion of the screen, but now it's as if she's making room for something else. Whatever could that be?

Of course, she being an American, the only thing she can do with her symbol of freedom is shoot it with ... another symbol of her freedom. I wasn't able to capture her aiming the gun, which is why the space on the right side of the frame had to be cleared, but that's why it was. Oddly, her cigarette still occupies the central portion of the frame, as if, like the nicotine it delivers into her blood, is calming her down, making her transgressive violence possible. Can't be sure. However, visually speaking, the indication is that Draper's created/creating a sociopath, and the implication is that Peter's following a similar path. He began his morning commutes in "A Little Kiss," you'll remember, alone and engrossed in a paper:

 

His loneliness is highlighted by both the empty chair beside him and the man with the solitaire board across from him. By episode's end, things seem a bit different, though:

Wonder why that might be? Couldn't have anything to do with, say, this:

Nothing at all there. Not between Peggy and Pete. Not with a viable baby hanging out right there in a carriage. 

The Dangers of Social Media

So, um, hello new friends, and welcome to Scott's second-worst Jewish nightmare. See, Scott's new phone only came with a car charger, so he had to drive somewhere and being an English teacher, decided to go to the library.

While there, some punk added all y'all while Scott refreshed his water at the Corona public bottle refilling stations, and though he remembers you all with great fondness, because of all the wonderful memories he shared with each and every one of you, he's not sure you want to listen to his each and every joyous exclamation or deadening complaint–of which there are very, very many–and so if you decide to decline 'his' invitation, he will be in no way offended.

In short, social media leaves no good ground for graceful exits, so here's Scott trying his best. (Yes, this is what that looks like.) That said, if you've a particularly good burn you'd like turned conflagration before declining his request, he'd love to hear/smell/asphyxiate because of it ... so long as you allow him (or his next of kin) to re-use it should a similar situation some day arrise.

Best,

Scott

P.S. More on Pete and Peggy, as promised, in "A Little Kiss," shortly. 

P.P.S. To those who said "At least it wasn't about that other thing," remember that earlier in the week it was. Only literally.

This Mad Men video won't execute itself, so guess who needs a technical editor?

I could've done this no problem on my now defunct computer, but on this new one, with these new programs, I'm basically incapable of doing anything that doesn't transform the Windows equivalent of this:

In a giant red X which resembles, well:

And when I see that, I basically see this:

And because I don't have a team of dirty Italians to help me take him down, I wonder whether I haven't acquired myself a video editor capable of making this short–and I must say inspired cultural connection–and teaching me how to make it work like it ought to. Because right now it looks like this:

 

Smooth up the transitions, make the words hit their marks, and we'll have ourselves a brand new meme, all the way back from olden times, before anyone was aware of Internet traditions. Eventually, I'll be competent again, but I need a little help with the hefty lifting–or, if you're a former student, my continued commitment to my open door policy. So technically, you'd earn nothing but good will, but karma's karma, no?

A Brief Appreciation

Watching last night's Barcelona-Inter Milan draw reminded me, that for many people on this planet, the most frightening sight in the world is a 5'4" Argentinian–born the year after the Mets won the '86 World Series–charging right at them:

See how his eyes are already looking at your feet? They're not. They're really on their way up to your belly-button, meaning your center-of-gravity's betrayed you and he knows what lies your feet have told. And that move he's making? It's calculated to humiliate you five seconds after you realize its purpose, so there's only one alternative, and given that Italians are famous for the volumptuousness of their gravity, they chose it with gusto:

You would think this tactic successful: share the Jovian gravitational force of 2.58 g that yanks Italian players to the pitch every time the wind considers blowing, but it's to no avail! The tiny Argentinian spits in the face of Italian-alien gravitational alliances, pauses to shoot a look of shame at his "competitors," then continues moving toward goal as if he's bounding over Martian fields. Having no resort, the Italians do what they can:

Which entails trying to rip his face off. Anyone who wants to complain about the dirtiness of Italian football is welcome to in this thread. Keep it clean, though, my friends, as some players know what best to do when there's nothing to be done:

"Keep your distance, lads," you can almost hear one of them say. "And hope an Italian shows up."

I believe in Him, whichever one He is, because why not?

Outside watering the plants this evening I came across an image of my new Savior:

As he appeared to be blowing soot at me, I took that volcanic plume emenating from his head to indicate that my new Savior was some sort of Fire Lord. Then it occurred to me that I might've been seeing my new Savior from the wrong angle, which it turns out was true:

Turns out my Savior is a poorly coiffed but vigorously bearded man who met an unfortunate end when someone put a bullet in his head.

This, my readers, is what students believe rhetoric teachers do in their classrooms. Fun as it may be to find meaning in a meaningless world, that's not actually what we do. That "man" I photographed above had evaporated before I returned from the kitchen with the water jug that'd created "him."

Filming the sausage being made is very, very expensive, my friends.

My promised follow up post about Peter's sad descent into the trappings of Draper's life is nearly half-complete, but I wanted to address something that's come up in the comments first, because I encounter variations of it every time I teach. Uncle Ebeneezer
March 27, 2012 wrote

On a tangent–a friend of mine read your post and remarked that they doubt that THAT much thought really goes into it. I disagree, but I’m sure you must hear that sort of sentiment all the time and I’m just curious how you usually respond.

He's correct in that I encounter this all the time–frequently as a back-handed compliment about me putting more thought into the show than the people who made it–but it's usually the person doing the slapping that has no clue what they're talking example. For example, in an interview I can't relocate, Christopher Nolan was discussing the logistics of using an IMAX camera to capture Christian Bale hanging off of a skyscraper in Hong Kong. The joke of it was that between the helicopter, its pilot, safety equipment, those equipped to use it, Nolan and Bale's salaries, the insurance policy on Bale, the rental cost of the IMAX camera and its crew, every single syllable was costing Warner Brothers $300,000, "so if everyone would quit fucking cursing they could fucking film this fucking shot for under three million dollars."

And that's pre-production. So do I occasionally hazard into a situation in which I over-read some last minute practicality? No doubt. But should the wizards with the duct tape see my analysis and note that I missed their wizardry, don't you think they'd be proud that they'd done their job so well I couldn't imagine it having been done differently? But if your friends are still unconvinced–and if my students are any indication, many of them will be, send them to the "full credits" listing of a show like Mad Men. John Rogers—friend of the blog and showrunner of Leverage—can add to any of the many things I’ve forgotten, but keep in mind that all of the following people must be paid, eat, have their equipment plugged in and powered up, etc., and remember as your friend’s scrolling down that very, very long list, there are a number of unusual positions, such as:

1. hair stylist/background hair stylist
2. hair stylist/key hair stylist
3. hair department head
4. special effects makup artist
5. on-set dresser
6. art department coordinator
7. greensman
8. set decoration buyer
9. second assistant camera “a” cameria/ second assistant camera “b” camera
10. best boy rigging electrician
11. genny operator
12. post-post production assistant coordinator
13. colorist dailies
14. final colorist

I’ve chosen that list a little randomly, but it’s also a little representative of the collaborate work involved in any significant production. Odd as it may seem, the burden of proof that something isn’t in a particular scene should fall to the casual viewer, who thinks television is magic and all you need is a camera, some costumes, and a few pretty pictures to make it work. Granted, that’s true of some reality television — it wear its cheap production for all to see — but for quality, scripted television, each minute of which costs thousands to film, there’s a reason why certain mediocre actors are come to be called “character actors” as they age. It’s not that Benjamin Bratt — and I’m not picking on him — is a good actor, but there’s a reason why people want to work with him. To my knowledge, he’s polite, shows up on time, knows his lines, and is forgo having a potentially short or taller stand-in sit for him in the rehearsals and run-throughs. (That’s anecdotal evidence, but I trust the source, and if I’m wrong, there are a million others I could substitute for him.) Point being:

Shooting quality film/television is very expensive, so it’s all planned out in advance, then modified, script-color-change-by-script-color-change, then ideally handed to actors who behave professionally. In short, the implicit answer to why there aren’t more great television shows is sort of the same as why they aren’t more perfect storms.

 

Mad Men: Sally and Don in "A Little Kiss"

(It goes without saying that this is another one of those posts.)

First of all, let me begin with what I won't be talking about: race. It's clearly going to be an abiding issue this season–it bookends "A Little Kiss," first as an insensitive tragedy, later as an almost unmangeable farce–but the majority of what comes between these allusions to the Civil Rights movement concerns the demise of almost every relationship in the lives of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce's employees. For example, here's the sole appearance of the former Mrs. Draper:

It occurs during the "Previously on Mad Men" introduction, not within the body of the show itself. The current Mrs. Francis exists in this episode as a function of her children, whose own screen time is limited to the first fifteen minutes of the episode–their appearance is significant, however, and as good a place as any to begin looking at "A Little Kiss." Let's start with Sally:

She's alone and miserable in a bed that's not her own. The audience doesn't know that, so she merely seems like a child who should have, but hasn't, overcome her night terrors. (The therapy she began last season apparently either failed to take, was never followed up on, or became monopolized by Betty's problems to the extent that the therapist thought she could help Sally more by working through Betty's issues. Too soon to tell.) As I've remarked on multiple occasions–and even diagrammed–hallways are extremely significant on Mad Men, suggestive of the fact that these are shiftless people who are neither entirely sure where they're from anymore (Draper) or that they're trying to own the space between their amorphous origins and designated destinations. But as this episode makes clear on three occasions, this is nothing more than a convenient lie. Here is Draper owning a hallway in "The Suitcase":

Here's Sally, half asleep in an unfamiliar apartment, "owning" hers:

I don't think I need to draw all over this shot to demonstrate that, like the one above it, there's an operative symmetry to Jennifer Getzinger's direction–nor do I think it's unobvious that Getzinger directed both "The Suitcase" and "A Little Kiss." But in "A Little Kiss" Getzinger undermines the symmetry from "The Suitcase" by having Sally saunter down the hall without occupying the central area of the screen. She doesn't own this hall–she's exploring it. When she finally (and mistakenly) believes she's found her bearings:

She finds the bathroom door locked. Because it's not the bathroom door:

It's her father's bedroom, and despite Sally and Don being neatly framed between the door jambs, they still don't occupy the central area of the screen. Technically, nothing does, but scan down and the audience can see what Sally shortly will, only not from her perspective yet–the small of Megan's back and the curve of her hips. Something is coming between Draper and the only woman he loves unconditionally, and Sally can see that something's ass:

This is one of the rare moments in the episode when the audience is allowed into the head of a character, and I don't think it's a coincidence that it's Sally's head into which we're allowed entrance. I have a feeling–something more like an inchoate theory–that ten years from now this show will be remembered as having belonged to Sally, but I'll share that when I can muster up more evidence. For the moment the real matter of significance is that Sally perceives Megan as the single greatest impediment to developing the relationship she so desperately desires with her father. She recognizes, without truly understanding it, that there's a disconnect, and Getzinger highlights this not merely by showing the a vulnerably half-naked Megan, but by indicating that Sally can't tell whether it's the woman in the bedroom or the bedroom door that's frustrating her:

That door jamb is the visual equivalent of a poetic enjambment, uniting two lines in manner that foregrounds the fact that they ought not be united. A quick example from W.B. Yeats's "Sailing to Byzantium":

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress [...]

The enjambed "unless" functions as a redirected thought dangling off the edge of an unthinkable abyss–the moment when an "aged" Yeats decides unequivocably that this is "no country for old men," but despite the apparent abruptness of his decision, the tranistion from the enjambed "unless" and the "soul" which opens the next line creates a hope for some sort of continuity. Just read it aloud: "unless/Soul clap its hand and sing." Possibility abides despite the apparent disconnect. Unlike many other moments in this episode, the ostensible disconnect between this daughter and this father seems surmountable. She just doesn't know it yet.*

But she should: Draper concludes this conversation with an offer to cook her one of his patented witching hour omelets, a process which began when the dark was deep and the shadows long and ended right about here:

The implied elapse of time is clearly significant, as the two characters occupying the central frame have obviously been awake and ostensibly been conversing for quite some time. But their centrality isn't the item of significance in this frame: in the lower left corner of the shot is the footstool on which Draper will be sitting at the height of his humiliation, which will, of course, be brought about by:

The woman wearing the gawdy yellow top who's not only occupying the center of the screen, but is doing so by visually dividing Sally and Don. Sally's point-of-view shot earlier set this up, and it leads to a shot in which her worst fears are being realized. Getzinger cuts to Sally:

Although seemingly happy, it's what she's not that's significant: she's not sharing the frame with her father anymore. She's alone and off-center–and there's a good reason that the shot's off-kiltered. Look at what she sees:

Her father and Megan are one side of a walled-in nook, she and her siblings on the other. Moreover, whereas Megan and her attention-grabbing shirt are inching closer to a central position, Sally's almost being pushed off-frame. Don's not consciously aware of what he's losing, but losing her he is. Because this is such a long episode, I'll save my thoughts about Peter and Peggy and Joan for another post, but before I do, I just want to follow up on the significance of the aforementioned table. Here's Don at his "surprise" birthday party:

The nook is now off-camera and Don's literally dominating the shot: even the color of his shirt sets him apart from the dark dresses and suits of his guests. But with the footstool now center-stage, Draper is at his emptiest. He is alone and all eyes are upon him, uncomfortably astride a piece of furniture designed for feet, and he's miserable. He'll sleep alone tonight because he realizes that whatever it is he has with Megan, it's not enough–and the more she tries to convince him otherwise, the further he pushes her away.

*Before you ask: I can't believe I just wrote that much about a door jamb either.

Dan Riehl admits, openly and proudly, that he's a racist.

Not that we didn't know this already, as this is the man who once claimed that all black kids, even when they’re “pretty young [and] not that big,” are “technically thugs," but his latest statement welds the deal shut in such a way that no excuse or apology will ever be able to escape it:

As Media Reports Conflict, Why Was Trayvon Martin Photo Altered?

Among a few interesting items uncovered in trying to examine the facts behind the shooting of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin without drawing any conclusions, was that a widely viewed photograph of Martin appears to have been altered, somewhat.

Here is what appears to be the original via the Miami Herald.

The one below has been observed in the media and at forums such as Democracy Now. Clearly, it has been lightened, or softened, somehow. Along with other possible alterations, he looks far more, perhaps innocent is the right word, in the altered image.

Dan Riehl believes that if you "lighten" an image -- that is, if you contribute to the impression that there's a possibility that the person in the photograph may be white -- that person "looks far more ... innocent." So:

White people?

Innocent.

Darkies?

Guilty.

Just look at them. They're "technically thugs," and therefore deserve to be shot by gun-toting racists who've made 46 calls to 911 complaining about "suspicious" darkies engaging in activities such as walking in and out of their parents' open garages or playing soccer in the street.

I won't republish them here, but I exchanged a series of emails with Riehl -- who's more than welcome to republish my replies, if he so desires -- after I called him a racist for being afraid of seventh graders who were only "technically thugs." His defense was that I would've been afraid too, which tells you all you need to know about Dan Riehl. That he worked for and admired Andrew Brietbart and supports the political theater of James O'Keefe is entirely beside the point, except that it isn't. He's a racist parading his denial with all the subtlety of someone who dons a "GOD HATES FAGS" sign at a Marine's funeral.

And just as classy, too.

The top 15 English-language television shows of the post-network era?

Since 1) I have nothing better to do on a Saturday afternoon besides grade 170 essays and 2) we've been talking about trolls and trolling of late, I thought, "Scott, you should troll your own blog!" So here goes:

After watching last night's episode of Fringe and consulting the deep recesses of my nerdy soul, I'm going to declare that Fringe is very close to eclipsing The Wire as the best English-language television show I've ever watched. That final conditional means I'm not going to include shows from the dark days of network television, because I've seen more silent films than I have episodes of Hill Street Blues or Airwolf. Now, I know you're going to complain that Fringe opened as an X-Files clone and didn't evolve into anything interesting until midway through its second season -- when, threatened with cancellation, the writers decided that if they were going to be cancelled, they may as well do so on their own terms -- whereas The Wire's first season was a well-orchestrated slow-burn, and I'm not going to disagree. But what I appreciate about Fringe is that it's become what it is despite itself. Or maybe I'm just being unduly presentist. Either way, here's my list:

1. Fringe (technically 1a)
2. The Wire (technically 1b)
3. Deadwood
4. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
5. Mad Men
6. The first season of Twin Peaks
7. The only season of Firefly
8. Seinfeld
9. Every episode except the series finale of Battlestar Galactica
10. Doctor Who
11. The first and second seasons of Homicide, as well as that episode with Vincent D'Onofrio
12. The UK version of Prime Suspect
13. The first season of the American version of In Treatment
14. The second and final seasons of Angel
15. The UK version of Life on Mars
16. UPDATE: Shows some idiot neglected to include on this list include: Arrested Development; the second, third and fourth seasons of Babylon 5; Breaking Bad; the UK version of The Office; Freaks and Geeks; Leverage; and ...
    

Plus all the ones I forgot or couldn't stomach including, like the Michael Moriarty episodes of Law & Order, which have been retroactively ruined by his crazy Canadian racism. I imagine I've forgotten quite a few, but I'm just as (if not more) interested in discovering and/or being reminded of items not included above.

He must've thought they only allowed the really deadly ones on board.

SEK is standing in the security line at George Bush Intercontinental Airport. Behind him are three young men with shave heads and many muscles.

MARINE #1: Yo! Marines?

MARINE #2: ARE AWESOME!

MARINE #3: Every member of the other armed forces is a giant weeping vagina compared to–

ALL THREE: MARINES!

SEK ascertains that these strapping young men must be Marines. He proceeds through the checkpoint with no problem, so too do the first two MARINES.

TSA AGENT: (to the third MARINE) Sir, can I ask you to step aside?

MARINE #3: (looking perplexed) Me?

TSA AGENT: Yes sir.

The TSA AGENT pulls a Paul Hogan “Now THIS is a knife” from the third MARINE’s carry-on.

MARINE #3: You can’t take that! It’s my graduation blade!

SEK would tell you what happened next, but loitering around security checkpoints while sporting a beard is a bad idea even if you’re a Jew.

 

The words-next-to-each-other argument hops to a new low.

Ben Shapiro's fully embracing the words-close-to-each-other mode of argument, but he's doing so without any indication that it's not actually a serious mode of argumentation. Let me break it down for Ben: when Scott and I make that "argument," we're actually mocking the person making it. For example, you write:

We can see the clear footprint of CRT [Critical Race Theory] all over the Obama Administration.

That's an admirable job of putting the words "Critical Race Theory" and "Obama Administration" in the same sentence, but your Cheney-esque decision to hire yourself as your own editor fails you on two fronts here. First, there are words between yours words. Did Jonah Goldberg write "Liberals are all over fascism"? Of course he didn't: he wanted nothing to interfere with the backward flow of negativity from "Fascism" to "Liberal." Which brings me to my second point:

Not only do you add pointless words between your words, your filler is in the service of a metaphor that doesn't mean what you think it does. You're saying that CRT's mark upon the Obama Administration is a "clear footprint," one which can only have been left by an invisible one-legged giant. Are you claiming that CRT is an invisible one-legged giant which hopped -- one and one time only -- on the Obama Administration? At the very least, you want that thing in the plural and the present tense. You want your readers to imagine themselves being unable to see a one-legged giant hopping on the White House forever -- an animated gif which in its infinite loop resembles nothing so much as a static image of the White House.

Because that's the reality of it. The invisible one-legged giant?

That's all in your head.

The New Conservative Orwell is, Finally, Consonant with Conservative Values

I’ve decided to get out of the academia game while the going’s so abysmal there's a chance that hope might peak behind a horizon, and like many a former liberal turned charlatan, I’ve decided to leave academia an albatross trove of intellectual history that’ll include “so many enigmas and puzzles that it will keep the professors busy for centuries arguing over what I meant.”

The first component of my donated library of significant foretelling is a study in modesty, entitled simply Dinner Party One. The book consists of the first time its hostess, Laura Stoddard, embellished her “lovely hand lettered type” with charming watercolors that depicted Laura’s own unique brand of humor. No stockpile, no matter how fanciful it’d rather now be, could survive a nuclear winter without the cards and invitations outline in Dinner Party One.

Now that everyone is inclined to be excessively polite despite the caffeine coursing through our theirs veins, it is time to turn to more serious matters. Back in 150, W. Bernard King was us of the dangers of Chemistry, elementary (The New Littlefield college outlines), but did we listen? Not only didn’t we listen, we refused to read its slim 216 pages despite the fact they were in English. The fact that not a single “intelligent” “liberal” bothered to read any of the forty books he read says all you need to know about what goes on in those colleges your so-called betters want your children to attend.

That time can be better spent reading Alphonse Daudet–not the crank who wrote all those awful French novels–but the English author who’s Letters to my mill, to which are added Letters to an absent one. Some men are capitalists, and as such should be applauded for their obvious commitment to our cause. But there are others who send today’s mill a bouquet of her beloved peonies while lining absent’s deck with lavender enough to mind the headwinds of a whorehouse.

But perhaps no single book in my new library belongs as much as in yours as Richard M. Fenker’s Where Rainbows Wait for Rain: The Big Bend Country. As the saying goes, possession of this chestnut makes one healthy, wealthy, and more able to forgive a national debt than most countries in human history. It is a must have for anyone who’s every been afraid of anything.

Now, I want everyone to line up behind those links and Do The Reynolds!

Da Da Da!

Click Click Click!

Da Da Da!

Smith Smith Smith!

Hey! Don’t be naughty Glenn, your rainbows won’t be waiting for my rain much longer … so long as that colorful brat from Big Bender Country keeps her distance.

Shake your meaning-maker

So I've mentioned before that the final project in my class is a creative one in which students must occupy the position they've been analyzing all quarter–that of the meaning-making rhetor communicating something or other to a particular audience. Because I'm working with graphic novels, one of the ways I get them to think like a meaning-maker is ask them to find a song that epitomizes a particular book they've read. This exercise is far more difficult than it sounds, because it forces them to reflect upon (likely for the first time) what the lyric of their proposed song means and how that lyric relates to a book whose rhetorical and thematic complexity we've been discussing for weeks. It's the perfect exercise:

It starts simple then turns fractal.

This quarter, I went with Craig Thompson's Blankets as inspiration, which means the song needs to include equal parts evangelical Christianity, teenage infatuation, Künstlerroman, etc. No single song will perfectly reflect either Craig Thompson's understanding of his own development or any of my students' relation to that understanding, but the act of thinking through that mess will help them discover how they'd like their final projects to resonate with their intended audience.

All of which is merely a preface to my declaration that the song I thought best epitomized Thompson's intent–in both lyrical intent and its relation to traditional form–was this one. (The lyrics can be found here.) I'm obviously playing a rigged game, what with me being the teacher and all, but the point is that I can make a very strong argument about how the thematic elements of that song communicate something very similar to the message of Thompson's novel ... and that I dare any of my students to proffer another case for a different song that's stronger than the one they think I'll make for mine. (Which means they'll have to anticipate a critical response and plan their feints and parries in advance.)

Game on?

 

On notebooks–and the thirty seconds of narrative time I can squeeze into them. (On Doctor Who, "The Impossible Astronaut.")

(I hadn't planned on writing another rhetorical analysis of Doctor Who until next quarter, but my Wednesday night class is composed of nerds and whiners who insist we keep on pushing through the Sixth Season even though the quarter's nearly over. Adding to the difficulty is the fact that the Sixth Season is infinitely more complicated than its fairy-tale precursor. In short, imagine an English seminar full of committed Jamesians who demand to read late-James even though every sane person knows that–outside of the hilariously foreshortened "year" you spent preparing for qualifying exams–it's damn well impossible to do anything with The Golden Bowl, The Wings of the Dove, and The Ambassadors in two weeks. That's what this feels like.)

First let me tell you about how the sausage is made: I watch a film or an episode and I either enjoy it or I don't. If I enjoy a film, I'll watch it again to figure out what I enjoyed it. If I enjoy an episode, I'll usually wait for the next episode and then enjoy the season once it comes on DVD. I typically don't have the depth and complexity–such as they are–evident in these visual rhetoric posts when I'm watching them for the first time. Unless some detail is particularly compelling or some technical mistake particularly galling, I watch like a normal human being. It's only on those second watchings that I pull out the notebook and begin to figure out what I don't know. So what don't I know? 

Judging by the number of notebooks I've burned through since Christmas, the empirical answer would be that I don't know a damn thing. That I'm constantly confused by everything in the world and have begun to hoard the finer points of other peoples' narratives on the off chance they or I forget them. The obvious stuff is obvious and mentioned just in case its obviousness becomes important subsequently. Consider the opening sequence of the premier episode of the Sixth Season of Doctor Who ("The Impossible Astronaut"), in which director Toby Haynes begins by showing the audience some paint:

Paint can be important in this series, I think to myself, so I scribble "H. op w/ c-u paint & brushes." (That's "Haynes opens with a close-up of paint and brushes" for those who can't read my ideoletic shorthand.) I pause here because I want to remember what could be at play. Clearly there is a reason Haynes introduces the Sixth Season via the artistic tools the audience most closely associates with Vincent Van Gogh, but given that Gogh met his beastly death shortly after drawing an exploding TARDIS in the penultimate episode of Season Five ("The Pandorica Opens"), this likely has nothing to do with him. Then it occurs to me that Haynes directed and Steven Moffat wrote "The Pandorica Opens," "The Big Bang," and "The Impossible Astronaut," so the presence of meaningful continuity–even if that's not what I spy here–is more likely than not. I take a note to remind myself to take similar notes later and move on to the next frame:

Look who was wrong? That painting there has as much to do with Vincent's narrative as his style. It's the Doctor, which I could've imagined Vincent getting around to, but it's the Doctor in the nude. There's nothing wrong with a nude painting of a man–or wouldn't be a few decades later after Charles II dies and England rejoices by stripping off the gloom of their imported Flemish masters and then their clothes. (To be followed quickly by a intense desire to live in a world in which flat surfaces and solid colors were anathema.) Point being:

Mathilda's painting of the Doctor is too Rococo for its time–because it's not of its time. He's encouraged her to paint not in the departing style of the Flemish Masters, nor in the coming style of French Baroque or endemic Neoclassicism, and why would he? He doesn't need live time in order, and Mathilda, his companion at the moment, is herself learning a little morality lesson about the knowledge the Time Lord grants: more often than not the world isn't ready for it. Not that she minds:

She looks quite please with her anachronistic creation. Her benefactor seems less so:

Note that even though the shots of Mathilda and King Charles II are both medium long shots, she and the image of her Doctor are both bathed in natural light, as if they belong to the world beyond the window's grilles. King Charles II and his men are exactly where they ought to be: the King in the middle and lackeys at both flanks. They have come for the Doctor for reasons unknown–but their tone implies that whatever those reasons may be, the Doctor needs a grand entrance and the sooner the better.

Perhaps not that soon. Appearing from beneath the swaths of Mathilda's skirts suggests that King Charles's haste and j'accuse-face may be warranted. The high angle of framing here is completely warranted. The Doctor may not be physically powerless, but his given that his moral code only seems to allow him to significantly alter history when its in need of a significant alteration, the consequence of him having lost his social stature which much more likely lead to lots and lots of running. Which is exactly what Haynes has him do in the opening bits–and they are comedic "bits" in no uncertain terms–they establish both that he's no longer traveling with Amy and Rory but that he's no longer done with them (even when they fail to see him):

 

 

That's Rory's head you can't see failing to notice the Doctor trying to catch his attention. As I started watching these first few minutes–and keeping in mind I've seen the entire Sixth Season–I found it difficult not to see these as the Season's narrative arc written small. Bear with me: 

1. The Doctor's there, like the Silence, but Amy and Rory can't see him.
2. The Doctor's always been there, like the Silence, but nobody can see them.
3. The Doctor's happy not because he's alive–though I've little doubt that pleases him–but because his plan to redeem himself worked. Perhaps not in full, but fully enough for him to embark, alone, on a series of adventures through human time seemingly designed to taunt Amy and Rory. (The last time the Doctor went on walkabout the results were far darker, so much so I contend that the darkness left in the Tenth's wake is what the Eleventh's had to deal with throughout Season Six.)
4. The Doctor's no longer afraid of what he'll do, because he can't do any more damage to the universe than gambling that he could extinguish it back to life would somehow work. 
5. That it did is what allows him not only accept, but to crave the attention and flattery in oil of the otherwise insignificant Mathilda. Her ability to stand there, insignificantly, is a direct result of his actions, so whatever pleasure he gains from their interaction is because she exists, not because she exists in any particularly pleasing way. 
6. Other stuff you can suss out in the comments while I cook my wife and I dinner.

I could go, but as aforementioned, it's dinner time and much as I would like sharing my notebook with you, I need food. Also, I wonder whether some of you wouldn't rather toss my notebook at me, in which case, slinking away to make some hash is still a solid idea.

It’s now impossible to tell the diary of a warrior from that of a gamer.

Citizens of the civilized galaxy, on this day we mark a transition. For a thousand years, Our Republic stood as the crowning achievement of civilized beings. But there were those who would set us against one another, and we took arms to defend of way of life against the Democrats. In doing so, we never suspected that the greatest threat came from within.

The Democrat Party, and some within our own Senate, had conspired to create the shadow of racial animus using one of their own as the enemy’s leader. They had hoped to grind the Our Grand Republic into ruin. But the hatred in their hearts could not be hidden forever. As last, there came a day when our enemies showed their true natures.

The Democrat Party hoped to unleash their destructive power against the Our Republic by assassinating the head of shadow government – Breitbart – and acquiring control of the reserve forces But the aims of the would-be tyrants were valiantly opposed by those without elitist, dangerous powers, who never went to school. Our loyal know-nothing troopers contained the insurrection within the Jefferson Memorial and quelled uprisings across the planet.

The remaining Democrat conspirators will be hunted down and defeated. Any collaborators will suffer the same fate. These have been trying times, but we have passed the test.

The attempt on my life has left me scarred and deformed, but I assure you my resolve has never been stronger. The war is over. The Sepratist Democrats have been defeated, and the Decmocrat rebellion has been foiled. We stand on the threshold of a new beginning.

In order to ensure the security and continuing stability, the Republic will be reorganized into the first Global Empire, for a safe and secure society, which I assure you will last for 10,000 years. An Empire that will be continue to be ruled by this august body and a sovereign ruler chosen for life. An Empire ruled by the majority, ruled by a New Constitution.

By bringing the entire galaxy under one law, one language, and the enlightened guidance of one individual, the corruption that plagued the Republic in its later years will never take root. Regional governors will eliminate the bureaucracy that allowed the Democract movement to grow unchecked. A strong and growing military will ensure the rule of law.

Under the Empire’s New Order, our most cherished beliefs will be safeguarded. We will defend our ideals by force of arms. We will give no ground to our enemies and we will stand together against attacks from with or without. Let the enemies of the Empire take heed: Those who challenge Imperial resolve will be crushed.

We have taken on a task that will be difficult, but the people of the Empire are ready for the challenge. Because of our efforts, the galaxy has traded war for peace and anarchy for stability. Billions of beings now look forward to a secure future. The Empire will grow as more planets feel the call, from the Rim to the wilds of unknown space.

Imperial citizens must do their part. Join our grand star fleet. Become the eyes of the Empire by reportingsuspected insurrectionists. Travel to the corners of the galaxy to spread the principles of the New Order to barbarians. Build monuments and technical wonders that will speak of our glory for generations to come.

The clone troopers, and proudly wearing the name of Imperial stormtroopers, have tackled the dangerous work of fighting our enemies on the front lines. Many have died in their devotion to the Empire. Imperial citizens would do well to remember their example.

The New Order of peace has triumphed over the shadowy secrecy of shamful magicians. The direction of our course is clear. I will lead the Empire to glories beyond imagination

I’m 90 percent sure that’s a video game, but am going to buy some extra water tonight just in case

 

Pay attention or I'll **** you up, you little ****.

Though I suppose this would get me fired in Arizona, I’ll admit that I strategically punctuate my lesson plans with profanity. That guy in the back of the class who thinks he failed his engineering midterm yesterday and spent all night fretting about it instead of sleeping? He’s drifting off — and would be, no matter what time it was or class he was attending. How can I keep him awake?

Profanity.

Don’t believe me? Ask science:

The unique emotional power of taboo language reflects properties that affect cognitive processes like memory and attention. Cursing is unlike other forms of speech; it is more physically arousing, as evidenced through physiological responses such as skin conductance or neural activity such as amygdala activation (Jay, 2003; Jay, Harris, & King, in press).

The image accompanying that post also caught my attention, as it reminded me of something I wrote a few years back but feel all the more strongly about now: the language of Deadwood. I’ll put it below the fold, though, as this is a family blog, but I’ll note that the best part about what I wrote may well be one of the comments. So:

“I believe the essay you asked me to write is beneath what I have been trained to expect to believe you would have expected from me, and I feel ashamed for you.”

(This doesn’t quite rise to the level of the most epic student email ever, and in truth more likely belongs to my series on how to write an academic essay, but as it hovers somewhere between one awful mode and another, I thought I’d leave it up to you to decide. Have—shall we call it fun?)

If I begin my essay with a rhetorical question, I contradict the Great French Thinker Montaigne, who believed I should not, because as he wrote, a “mind could not find a firm footing, [therefore he] should not be making essays, but coming to conclusions.” Those conclusions, which were important, are sadly lost to history, but the fact that Montaigne’s name remains reminds those who remember it that his failure was reason enough to memorialize it. My professor said that we should not write in the style of Montaigne, presumably because the stench of his insufficient success might sour my prose, but I believe the best essays are the ones that I write, and if my Professor thinks differently, he can take it up with Montaigne.

First, my professor told me to write a paragraph like a hamburger. Can you believe that? That is not a rhetorical question: my college professor told me that the best paragraphs are structured like a hamburger. But I must follow my muse, Montaigne, and insist that I am not interesting in stabilizing my subject, however slight, in a structure of such déclassé fare, or that if I were, mine would tower above that base alternative in direct proportion to the extent of my genius. My paragraphs will, instead, inform my audience about the manner of their composition, paying special attention not to structure or transitions but to the brilliance that I mustered to tame into interest material others might find trite.

By “others,” I refer explicitly to my Professor, whose ability to mix a metaphor is nearly as impressive as his encyclopedic knowledge of all things which will never make him money. He claims that an essay is like the relationship he’s clearly never had: it begin with a witty conversation, an introduction, if you will, in which impress upon your reader the timeliness and worthiness of your subject. For those who fail to recognize the universal validity of Foucault, this could be an issue, but Montaigne and I know that so long as we only speak engagingly about ourselves and Foucault, the right kind of people will recognize our brilliance and gravitate to the empty table we have saved for them.

My professor then proceeds to argue that the remaining paragraphs in an essay constitute an evolving relationship between the writer and reader not unlike the one initiated in the introduction. “Just as a relationship explodes with initial insight in those first heady weeks,” he says, “so too should a first paragraph make good on the promise of its introduction.” Which is simply wrong — the purpose of an introduction is convince your future reader or paramour that you are to their moon like the heavens above. Moons are wonderful, albeit limited, objects who cannot escape the gravitational conventions of the Earth without an intervention by the likes of myself or Montaigne. Any conversation in which I deign to speak of moon matters is one which is inherently beneath me and an insult Montaigne. An introduction should present a reader with an  incomprehensible possibility that may, in the presence of a sufficient genius, become a comprehensible plausibility that only someone unworthy of their humanity would deny.

As for the rest of my Professor’s foolishness? That the third paragraph should, like any “good” relationship, continue to develop the feelings fostered by having made good on the promise of the introduction? This line of thought strongly suggests that relationships continue to develop after protestations of genius have made and accepted, which clearly falls under the aegis of facts not in evidence. Once proof of inferiority is established, the mendicant mind has no choice but to reel, twirling by half, then again, as if shielding itself from a light so bright it penetrates directly into its tiny brain.

Because knowing what it knows now, it will never know peace. It will only know humiliation. For there are no limits on the number of Grade Change forms I can request, or if there are, I plan to collect them like an ignorant naturalist on a well-trodden shore and submit them in perpetuity.

Scott Eric Kaufman's Visual Rhetoric Compendium (as of 3/26/2012)

By request, below are the links to all of the visual rhetoric exegeses (a.k.a. McCloud or Bordwell-inspired "lecture notes") I've produced in the past few years.  I would say I'm surprised there aren't more of them, but then I remember 1) how labor-intensive they are to compose and 2) the number of drafts I've deemed insufficient for public consumption that linger unfinished in assorted folders.  So here goes:

Films:

• Batman Begins (classic horror) - Christopher Nolan 
• Blow-Up (I) - Michelangelo Antonioni 
• Blow-Up (II)- Michelangelo Antonioni
• The Dark Knight (I) - Christopher Nolan
• The Dark Knight (II) - Christopher Nolan
• Fight Club - David Fincher
• Fight Club (II) - David Fincher
• Fight Club (III) - David Fincher
• Ghost World - Terry Zwigof
• Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind - Hayao Miyazaki
• Superman - Richard Donner
• Superman Returns - Bryan Singer
• 30 Days of Night - David Slade

Television Shows:

• Avatar: The Last Airbender - "The Ember Island Players" 
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer - "Hush"
• Doctor Who - "Time of Angels"
• Doctor Who - "Time of Angels" - Buckling the Frame
• Doctor Who - "The Eleventh Hour"
• Doctor Who - "Amy's Choice"
• Doctor Who - "Vincent and the Doctor" 
• Doctor Who - "The Pandorica Opens"
• Doctor Who - "The Big Bang"
• Doctor Who - "The Impossible Astronaut"
• Leverage - "The Van Gogh Job"
• Mad Men - "Don and Sally in 'A Little Kiss'"
• Mad Men - "The Ballad of Peggy and Pete, Redux, in 'A Little Kiss'"
• Mad Men - "The Grown-Ups"
• Mad Men - "Shut the Door.  Have a seat."
• Mad Men (I) - "The Rejected"
• Mad Men (II) - "The Rejected"
• Mad Men (I) - "The Chrysanthemum and the Sword"
• Mad Men (II) - "The Chrysanthemum and the Sword"
• Mad Men (I) - "The Suitcase"
• Mad Men (II) - "The Suitcase"
• The Walking Dead - "Days Gone Bye"

Comics:

• American Born Chinese - Gene Luen Yang
• Blankets - Craig Thompson
• Fun Home - Alison Bechdel
• Ghost World - Daniel Clowes
• Kick-Ass (I) - Mark Millar
• Kick-Ass (II) - Mark Millar
• Planetary/Batman: Night on Earth - Warren Ellis
• 30 Days of Night - Steve Niles
• The Walking Dead (word-specific panels)
• The Walking Dead (picture-specific panels) - Robert Kirkman
• Watchmen (panel construction) (I) - Alan Moore
• Watchmen (panel construction) (II) - Alan Moore
• Watchmen (responsible film criticism) - Anthony Lane
• Watchmen (unfilmable film filmed) - Zak Snyder vs. Alan Moore
• Watchmen (students as murderers) - Alan Moore
• Watchmen (Dr. Manhattan as a figure of the reader) - Alan Moore

 Themes:

• On Poorly Executed Claustrophobia in Film and Television
• On Effectively Executed Claustrophobia in Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot

 

Time can be rewritten. And will be. Try to keep up.

(This will be the second-to-last Who-related visual rhetoric posts for a bit. It concerns the complicated conclusion of the fifth season, which is why it's the second-to-last. It's also a sequel of sorts to this post, though I reserve the right to introduce new material and present spoilers so inscrutable to the casual fans that unless you've watched the series three times through they won't even register as such.)

At the conclusion of "The Pandorica Opens" we learned that all of the Doctor's old enemies had formed a committee and decided the Doctor was responsible for the universe unwriting itself. They weren't wrong. As I noted in the post on "Vampires of Venice," the Doctor tells Rosanna:

He may have even wanted to believe this at the time, but he changed his mind in the next episode, "Amy's Choice," after vicariously experiencing the death of Rory Williams through Amy Pond, who asked him quite the cutting question. If you can't go back and change time,  

At the time, the only answer he could provide was that he someone becoming accustomed to either causing mass extinctions or standing idly by while entire species are wiped from existence. The former may be a more morally reprehensible action, but the passivity of the latter brings him no glory. In order to redeem himself—and I'm going to insist that this season is, among other things, a redemption narrative—he needs to rethink his relation to universe he tends. Which is precisely what happens in the episode "The Big Bang." He discovers that the point of him is that he can change time, so writer and showrunner Steven Moffatt and director Toby Haynes proceed to do exactly that. "The Big Bang" opens with a repetition of the slow tracking shot from the first episode of the season, "The Eleventh Hour": 

Pat Buchanan’s not a racist, unless you ask Pat Buchanan, who thinks otherwise.

Victor Davis Hanson should be celebrated for writing an entire post without mentioning that he taught Classics to poor people. But he shouldn’t be celebrated for writing what he wrote:

[W]e all must deplore that [Pat] Buchanan was booted from MSNBC, and recognize why it happened now.

Must we?  Buchanan begins the book with a lament that “[b]y 2020, deaths among white Americans will exceed births, while mass immigration is altering forever the face of America” (2).  He later opens a chapter entitled “The End of White America” with an analysis of Tom Buchanan—no blood relation, just the ideological one—discussing the novel’s fictional version of Lothrop Stoddard’s The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy.

“Well, it’s a fine book and everybody ought to read it. The idea is that if we don’t look out the white race will be—will be utterly submerged. It’s all scientific stuff; it’s been proved.” (123)

Instead of dismissing his namesake’s approval of unscientific racism, Buchanan hems and haws about Margaret Sanger and eugenics as a liberal science and Stoddard being an Ivy League-educated racist who predicted

Japan’s rise to power, its war with the United States, a second European war, the fall of the Western empires, mass migration of peoples of color to the West, and the rise of Islam as a threat to Western civilization. (124)

He can’t decide whether to condemn Stoddard for being a typical academic liberal or praise him for being a prophet. So does neither. Or possibly both.

What Tom Buchanan and [Stoddard] feared [some clearly non-white academic writing in the Atlantic named] Professor Hsu welcomes: “The End of White America is a cultural and demographic inevitability.” (124)

Both Tom and Pat Buchanan align themselves with Stoddard and against Hsu, which is odd considering that Stoddard and Hsu are making essentially the same argument: white America is on the decline. The only difference between any of them is that the Buchanan boys share Stoddard’s “unashamedly racialist” assumption that the death of white America should be mourned. Did Buchanan forget he condemned Stoddard for being a racist when he joined him in mourning? Or does he simply not care about the contradiction? It’s genuinely difficult to tell. He’ll acknowledge that

The Tea Party and town hall protests of 2009 were almost wholly white affairs. (126)

But its impossible to parse that sentence. Is the attempt by white people to organize white affairs to defeat racial and cultural assaults on white America a good thing? Given his assessment of Stoddard, the answer would seem to be clear. But a few pages later he’ll be complaining about the very fact he just he conceded:

CNN, NPR, and USA Today all zeroes in on the racial composition of the crowd [at Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally] as “predominantly,” “overwhelmingly,” or “almost all white.” The media’s unsubtle message: the Tea Party is a protest movement of, by, and for white people. (131)

You know who would agree with that assessment? The Pat Buchanan who admitted as much five pages previous. His argument is that the media accurately portrayed the Tea Party movement and should be condemned for doing so. Why? Because America is becoming more racially and culturally diverse and accurate portrayals of white anger about that fact should be avoided—despite the fact that according to Buchanan himself the demographic shift is inevitable and the white anger real. So let me modify my reply to Victor Davis Hanson:

Why exactly must we “deplore” the exit of an inconsistent and incoherent thinker like Buchanan from the ranks of professional political commentators? I’m having problems seeing what value his nostalgia for a whiter America brings to the table—especially when he only acknowledges the anger of white Americas when complaining about media coverage of them. Davis Hanson doesn’t say. Instead, he claims Buchanan had to be pushed out because

Now that there is no Bush to criticize, and given that Obama did not turn out to be a left-wing version of a Ron Paul isolationist, anything Buchanan might say about foreign policy will be critical of Obama—and he will probably say it well and often, given that he is better read, sincere in his convictions, and more informed than the other guests. The Obama agenda at home is the antithesis of everything Buchanan has ever said or written. In the network’s view, the days of Buchanan as a useful idiot are over; and now, in a changed climate, he offers no utility at all.

Let me see if I have this right: because Obama was elected nearly four years agoBuchanan had to be fired last week. I can see why Davis Hanson’s upset. It’s not like he can just change the channel and find a new brother-in-nonsense to embrace.

 

Conservative women are more than just "hotties in tube tops." (But hopefully, they're that too.)

Somehow I missed the fact that a group of C-List conservative bloggers turned on themselves over the issue of propriety at CPAC. At the same event in which this high-minded little event took place, it was reported that the female attendees “looked like two-bit whores.” That’s according to Dr. Melissa Clouthier, who feels the need to remind everyone she’s a doctor, presumably because her elevated diction might convince folks otherwise. Dr. Clouthier continues:

I was at another service-oriented gathering of young women where the girls were in tight bandeau-skirts — you know, the kind of tube-top skirts that hookers wear on street corners.

I’m fairly certain I know what she means here: conservative women shouldn’t dress in ways that make them look like “hookers … on street corners.” However, that point was contested by Dan Riehl—last spotted cowering in fear from some black toddlers who were “technically thugs”—who declared that he did, in fact, want to see conservative women dress like “hookers on the street”:

In my opinion, CPAC is about politics, not parenting. If it takes hundreds of new folks with perhaps more libertarian, than traditional, leanings to infuse a more powerful right in America, I’ll take it. And if some number of them are hotties in tube tops, I’ll find a way to endure because I love America just that much.

The more “hotties in tube tops,” Riehl argues, the more powerful the right will become, because nothing builds a stronger coalition more quickly than objectifying and diminishing half the people who might want to join it. To use the conservatives objection to gay marriage as a model of argumentation, first conservative women will be allowed to dress like hookers; then they’ll be required to dress like hookers; then they’ll be required to be hookers.

And as Robert Stacy McCain—the man most likely to declare himself the winner of a Hunter S. Thompson prose-alike contest—pointed out, this process has already started:

Gauntlet thrown!

I don't anticipate a response, but who knows? Maybe we can muster up a President's Day miracle!

The Poulos Hoax?

Far be it for me, a lowly adjunct so depressed by the market he let his MLA membership lapse, to criticize Michael Bérubé, the current President of the MLA, but his summary of James Poulos’ definition of what women are for fails to account for the fact that Poulos has forwarded a very serious, thoughtful, argument that has never been made  in such detail or with such care. Thankfully for all involved, Poulos decided to respond to critics of his original post with wit and aplomb. Contrary to Bérubé’s claim that Poulos thinks “tennis football running cycling swimming flying floating riding gliding conating camogie skating tennis of all kinds dying flying sports of all sorts autumn summer winter winter tennis of all kinds hockey of all sorts penicillin,” all the founding editor of The Postmodern Conservative meant to say was that:

Those who would restrict officially recognized marriages to one man and one woman are seen by many gay marriage advocates as using the power of the law to atavistically reverse the partly organic, partly hard-fought progress of civilization.

Civilization, you see, is composed of one part “organic” and one part “hard-fought.” Those who support gay marriage want to use the “power of law” to reverse the “progress of civilization” by employing an atavism, which we all know refers to the reemergence of an ancestral trait in a modern species. This reemergence can be genetic—like when babies are born monkeys—or it can be social—like when Buck remembered that dogs are wolves and heeded the call of his wild. According to Poulos, the desire of the gays to revert to a state of nature by finding female bodies disturbing is a social manifestation of a genetic trend, because the gays are atavisms—throwbacks to the early human societies in which partly organic men fought hard against progress by refusing to procreate with women. How they survived has long stumped evolutionary theorists, what with success typically defined in terms of how many half-genes an individual loosed upon the EEA, but Poulos is right to claim that

a column that points out that a society which rejects the premise of a question about sex, gender, and natural purposes might very well have achieved a great leap forward in the progress of human civilization.

That he happened to be the author of this great leaping achievement is immaterial, because “philosophers from Plato to Rousseau to Heidegger” are famous people whose names he knows.

 

Happy Birthday, Acephalous.

Sure, I forgot to celebrate your seventh birthday, but baby, I still love you. We've been through a lot, and things have changed, I admit, but don't worry, baby, I've got this covered. It's just you and me, babe. You ... and the very, very creepy version of me who's writing this post. 

Vincent and the Doctor, Together Alone

(This be another one of those posts in which I “[feign] some kind of cultural superiority … even though [my] opinions and tastes are largely shite of the first water [that force most commenters to] make an effort to shaddup when [I] want to wax long and philosophical about some mainstream film [I'm] content to call art.”)

I covered the palette of "Vincent and the Doctor" in my post about the Leverage episode "The Van Gogh Job," so I'll save some time and just say the wheat:

The wheat: 

The wheat: 

The wheat may not seem that important—though damn do I love it—but it calls to mind Woody Allen's famous parody of Ingmar Bergman in Love & Death, which is relevant because "Vincent and the Doctor" is an episode devoted to the consequences of loneliness (felt or otherwise). The Doctor's alone because he's the Doctor; Amy's alone because (unbeknownst to her) Rory's been unwritten from existence; Vincent's alone because Vincent's always been alone; and the Krafayis is alone because it's been abandoned by its fellows. This is a story that's fundamentally about lonely people "coming together," only director Jonny Campbell doesn't shoot it that way. I bring up the visual punning on the wheat because the shots it parodies are relevant. To wit:

The Horrors of Parenting!

(Ben Shapiro stands atop a greased hill. He is surrounded by happy children.)

BEN: Follow me! I’m one of you!

THE CHILDREN: (Wander hither and thither without any clear plan like kids do.)

BEN: Do you not see? THIS HILL! IS GREASED!

THE CHILDREN: (Frolic and ignore THE YELLING MAN.)

BEN THE YELLING MAN: I WILL SAVE YOU!

THE CHILDREN: (Look at BEN THE YELLING MAN, then remember what Britney Baxter did last week and start screaming and kicking.)

BEN THE YELLING MAN: BUT I’M TRYING TO SAVE YOU FROM YOUR PARENTS!

THE CHILDREN: (Start running near the edge of the greased hill and, one by one, begin sliding down it.)

BEN THE YELLING MAN: NO!  (To his left.) YOU GOT THE GAY!  (To his right.) NOW YOU’RE A MAN!  (Falls to his knees and weeps.) AN IRANIAN? I COULD’VE SAVED YOU!

JESUS: (Descends from Heaven with lights and music and shit.) My child.

BEN THE YELLING MAN: (Too busy yelling.)

JESUS: Ben?

BEN THE YELLING MAN: (Too busy yelling.)

JESUS: BEN!

BEN THE YELLING MAN: (Shuts up. Turns around.) THIS IS YOUR FAULT HIPPIE!

(Pushes Jesus down the slippery slope and turns him into a gay. Transgenders him too. Because that’ll teach Him to love all His children.)

THE END

 

LEAVE TUCKER ALONE!

Lemieux claims that Tucker Carlson’s investigation into MMFA found no evidence worthy of being called such, but he is wrong. For example:

During the 2008 presidential campaign, for example, author Jerome Corsi wrote a highly critical book about the Democratic candidate, titled “The Obama Nation.” The Obama campaign responded immediately with a detailed memo. The title of that memo, “Unfit For Publication” (a play on Corsi’s 2004 book, “Unfit for Command,” about then-presidential candidate Senator John Kerry), was the same title used by Media Matters just weeks before in a similar memo about the same book.

Does Lemieux expect us to believe that two people both came up with the sameobvious pun? Take it from a professional literary scholar: the odds of two people both choosing to pun on the title of an author’s forthcoming book by referencing the last one he or she published are a million billion to none. Only a vast liberal conspiracy can account for such coordinated punning. Or, for that matter, this:

The atmosphere in the office was considerably more tolerant on non-editorial matters. “There were these two folks who got caught [having sex] in the communications war room on the weekend,” said one employee.

“People came in, and lo and behold there were two of their colleagues doing the nasty on a desk.” Neither one was fired.

Take it from a professional witness of illicit office shenanigans: in the absence of a vast liberal conspiracy, it is impossible for colleagues to do “the nasty on a desk.” The laws of science forbid it.  The rest of Carlson’s exposé is of a similarly high quality: revelations about left-leaning groups leaning left and anonymous sources saying terrible things about former employers.

 

Do celebrities deserve their own Kaddish?

Joseph Kugelmass’ thoughtful response to my Whitney Houston post is instructive:

Most celebrity deaths are not emotional events for me. I cared a lot more about Amy Winehouse’s death than I do about Whitney Houston’s death, for two simple reasons. I like a lot of Amy Winehouse’s songs; I like exactly one Whitney Houston song (“I Will Always Love You”). I thought Winehouse was maybe going to produce a lot more good music; Whitney’s career seemed over. While it may seem callous to calibrate my level of mourning according to what is, or isn’t, in my iTunes library, I would argue that when it comes to celebrities, there’s no other reasonable standard. That’s what it means to make your living as an entertainer.

Nonetheless, like everyone else, I was deluged with blips on my social networks, expressing deep grief over Whitney’s passing. Most of this grief, if not in fact phony, was at least greatly exaggerated. Like so many other things that people do in relation to popular culture, it was a weird, projective emotional performance, designed to convince oneself and others that one has the right emotions in the right amounts.

The performative aspect of compulsory mourning is what bothered me as I half-listened to the television yesterday morning. The depthlessness of the mandatory praise heaped upon her bothers me for the same reason Patrick Bateman’s encomiums to popular culture do: they’re necessarily rote and necessarily reductive. Joe’s right to point out the different etiologies of “fake emotions and real emotionlessness,” but the fact that they produce the same result should be troubling. But far from being troubling—or even acknowledged—anyone who points this sad fact out is attacked for not taking advantage of death to draw attention to problems of race and sexism in America today.* Because that is a far more respectful way to treat the dead.

That said, I encourage you to read Joe’s post to learn his Five Rules About Celebrity Deaths, as his general plan is far better than listing who you’re allowed to mourn before-the-fact.

*It goes without saying, but it’s worth saying again: there’s no one post to rule them all. This blog will be one thing at one moment and another in another. In point of fact, I’m about to “[feign] some kind of cultural superiority … even though [my] opinions and tastes are largely shite of the first water [that force most commenters to] make an effort to shaddup when [I] want to wax long and philosophical about some mainstream film [I'm] content to call art.” If you’d like to take me to task for that, by all means, go at me with gusto. Just try to make your criticism coherent.

 

An iterative algorithm is implemented to make this say what we all know to be true.

According to the always reliable John J. Miller, “[a] study says that black students take easier courses than white students at Duke University.” He offers the following as his pull-quote:

Although black and white students enter college with similar academic interests, 68 percent of black students eventually chose to study humanities and social sciences. According to the study, this is because “natural science, engineering, and economics courses are more difficult, associated with higher study times, and are more harshly graded than their humanities and social science counterparts.”

The pull-quote is fairly incendiary, I admit, but not nearly as offensive as Miller’s summary of the study with its implication of genteel agreement. Miller’s sentence suggests that this study informs his audience of what it already knows, i.e. that their prejudices are informed by science. But the real problem with Miller’s post is right there in the citation from the study: “natural science, engineering, and economics courses are more difficult … than their humanities and social science counterparts.”

I know what you’re thinking: “But Scott, isn’t economics a social science?” It is. But it occupies its own special space next to the hard sciences because it does. Two of the study’s authors (Peter Arcidiacono and Esteban Aucejo) are economists, but the other (Ken Spenner) is a sociologist. Which means that if the special dispensation of economics is revoked, all three of the authors of this study are as dumb as black students.

Such is the logic of Miller’s implied argument.

But that’s not the logic he intended to use. He wanted to wink at Charles Murray and nudge his fellow-travelers. Miller certainly didn’t want people reading the actual study, either, which indicates that there’s another group of students just as dumb as the black ones:

Legacies at Duke start out behind their white non-legacy counterparts (though not as far back as blacks) with 65% of the gap removed by the end of the senior year. Similar major-switching patterns occur for legacies as well, with large shifts away from the natural sciences, engineering, and economics towards humanities and social sciences. The divergent grading standards across courses legacies and blacks take, coupled with the tighter variances on the grade distributions of upper year courses, accounts for their catch up to their white non-legacy counterparts.

I wonder why Miller didn’t include that in his pithy remark about black students? It’s almost as if the claim “a study says that black students and most of my colleagues at the National Review take easier courses than white students at Duke University” wouldn’t have been well-received at the National Review.

Remembering Whitney Houston

Whitney Houston burst onto the music scene in 1985 with her self-titled LP which had four number one hit singles on it, including “The Greatest Love of All,” “You Give Good Love” and “Saving All My Love for You,” plus it won a Grammy Award for best pop vocal performance by a female and two American Music Awards, one for best rhythm and blues single and another for best rhythm and blues video. She was also cited as best new artist of the year by Billboard and by Rolling Stone magazine. With all this hype one might expect the album to be an anticlimatic, lackluster affair, but the surprise was that Whitney Houston (Arista) was one of the warmest, most complex and altogether satisfying rhythm and blues records of the 1980s and Whitney herself had a voice that defies belief. From the elegant, beautiful photo of her on the cover of the album (in a gown by Giovanne De Maura) and its fairly sexy counterpart on the back (in a bathing suit by Norma Kamali) one knows that this wasn’t going to be a blandly professional affair; the record was smooth but intense and Whitney’s voice leaped across so many boundaries and was so versatile (though she was mainly a jazz singer) that it’s hard to take in the album on a first listening.

“The Greatest Love of All” was one of the best, most powerful songs ever written about self-preservation and dignity. From the first line (Michael Masser and Linda Creed are credited as the writers) to the last, it was a state-of-the-art ballad about believing in yourself. It was a powerful statement and on that Whitney sung with a grandeur that approached sublime. Its universal message crossed all boundaries and instilled one with the hope that it’s not too late for us to better ourself, to act kinder. Since it’s impossible in the world we live in to empathize with others, we can always empathize with ourselves. It was an important message, crucial really, and it was beautifully stated on this album.

To the list of items which are always excellent ideas...

...I suggest we add "conservatives rapping":

After all, there's nothing wrong with a "knicker" joke among a room of wealthy white Republicans and that one black guy.

UPDATE: Also.

UPDATE II: For the sake of comparison, here's your modern conservative movement in two images. First, immediately before (1:49) the "knicker" joke:

Second, here's immediately after (1:57) the "knicker" joke:

That's where this "rapper" is asking that one black guy "What? I can't say 'knickers'?" I'd be indignant too, I suppose, if I wasn't allowed to proudly be the provocative asshole I am.

Foreshadowing and Genocide and Quite a Bit More, Actually, in "Amy's Choice"

(Another one of those now-more-conveniently-located posts.)

One of the core assumptions of the way I teach visual rhetoric is that directors often know more than they know (or are letting on). This is because shooting schedules often don't track with air dates—for example, the episode I'm going to be discussing today, "Amy's Choice," was the seventh aired, but last one filmed in Series Five of Doctor Who, meaning that writer Gareth Roberts and director Catherine Morshead already knew what would happen in the four episodes that would follow it. The result is a kind of foreknowledge masquerading as foreshadowing: the audience experiences the latter because the writer and director possess the former. 

Sound obvious? That's because that's how we think foreshadowing works. Only one problem: foreshadowing doesn't require authorial intent to be visible in a work. The Jews didn't sit around writing a book foreshadowing the eventual arrival of some guy named Jesus—they wrote a book that a bunch of Christians later interpreted to contain a number of moments when the coming of some guy named Jesus was foretold. Foreshadowing, in other words, often functions as an interpretation used to bolster the authority of a particular reader. ("What do you mean you didn't see Jesus's coming foretold in the Hebrew Bible? What are they teaching at the monastery these days?") Whereas foreshadowing was once largely a matter of readerly interpretation, thanks to some technological innovations I haven't the time nor the space to get into here—it starts with books and evolves into lending libraries and marches forward—foreshadowing is now considered to be more a matter of authorial (or directorial) intervention.

More succinctly, material that used to be wrenched from variably willing texts is now forcibly inserted into them. The classic example of the latter would be the medical drama in which someone suddenly feels a sharp pain in his or her head. The cause? Some writer forcibly inserted a tumor into it as a cheaps means of "foreshadowing" death. It's about as subtle as: 

Scott Eric Kaufman's Visual Rhetoric Compendium Now Easier than Ever to Find!

It's a permanent fixture in the right sidebar now, and I'll continue to update it regularly. 

Now if you'll excuse me, I have a terrible cold to attend to. (Stupid midterms wreaking havoc with stupid students' stupid immune systems ...)

The face of malevolence moments after discovering it's dead inside.

My wife claims that because I pay so little attention to lips when watching television—the deaf love nothing more than a tolerant spouse and a volume button—I end up pausing faces in the most awkwardly hilariously positions. Over the course of an evening my ring finger can lay waste to thousands of dollars of cosmetic surgery and three-point lighting and those bricks Tom Cruise's costars are contractually obligated to ignore. So she thought it'd be a hoot for me take this talent to the masses and try it out on some politicians. Unfortunately, the results have been entirely awkward without being the least bit hilarious. Consider Mitt Romney:

There's quite a bit to be said about Romney's reaction to this bit of self-inflicted political theater, but the obvious message seems to me much more primal. As Darwin wrote inThe Expressions of the Emotions in Man and Animal (1872), Romney's "expression of misery [as almost] ludicrous caricature" is typical

with respect to infants when doubtfully beginning to cry, or endeavouring to stop crying; for they then generally command all the other facial muscles more effectually than they do the depressors of the corners of the mouth. Two excellent observers who had no theory on the subject, one of them a surgeon, carefully watched for me some older children and women as with some opposed struggling they very gradually approached the point of bursting out into tears; and both observers felt sure that the depressors began to act before any of the other muscles. Now as the depressors have been repeatedly brought into strong action during infancy in many generations, nerve-force will tend to flow, on the principle of long associated habit, to these muscles as well as to various other facial muscles, whenever in after life even a slight feeling of distress is experienced. But as the depressors are somewhat less under the control of the will than most of the other muscles, we might expect that they would often slightly contract, whilst the others remained passive. It is remarkable how small a depression of the corners of the mouth gives to the countenance an expression of low spirits or dejection, so that an extremely slight contraction of these muscles would be sufficient to betray this state of mind. (193)

In short, Romney's desire to not be "bursting into tears" at all times has, "on the principle of long habit," created a situation in which his hang-dog muscles "are somewhat less under the control of [his] will." Meaning, of course, that any debate with Obama has the possibility of witnessing theatrics more grandiose than anything seen this side of a playpen.

 

Buckling the frame

(This isn't only one of them posts, it's the bastard child of this and this one.)

I feel this post nips too obviously at the heels of previous ones, as I'm not going to be discussing anything I haven't discussed before. Creating a claustrophobic environment is a technical accomplishment that can be done irrespective of the environs in which one shoots a scene. Cramped quarters help, obviously, but they're not necessary. That said, the quarters in the second half of the Doctor Who episode "Time of Angels" are quite cramped, so the fact that director Adam Smith chose the default shots of his principles to be medium- and medium close-ups exacerbates what would've been a feature of every frame anyway. To wit:

That's the Doctor discussing the impending arrival of the Angels with the soldier-clerics assigned to assist him. Important here isn't merely the framing—though compositionally, the soldier-clerics bookending the Doctor can't be considered insignificant—but the tightness of it. The shallow focus leaves only those three in focus—although Amy's still visible by virtue of her ginger dress, not unlike a certain someone else—but the shot's overstuffed with folks in a way that completely obscures the background. Given that that the imminent threat isn't any of these three shot-stuffers, obscuring the background denies the audience access to whatever it is that might be lurking in the dark.

Point being, it's not just that this shot is claustrophobic, but that the claustrophobia it elicits is deliberately obfuscatory: by focusing, shallowly, on these three, the dangerous statues currently spooky-fishing* their way towards them are perforce crushed from the frame. They'll be revealed in shot/reverse shot sequences shortly thereafter, but the tight framing here makes the situation in which the Doctor et al. find themselves seem all the more hopeless. Consider: 

This is the Doctor coming up with one of his patented plans, but the framing still indicates that whatever trap he's in still possesses the upper hand. It's entrapping him, not the other way around. Of course, this entrapment is but a preface to a spectacular escape, and the way in which Smith films this desperation is but a means to increase the glory that said escape entails, but the heightening of this effect is a significant moment in this season.

Rarely do the Doctor's plans include genocide, no matter how malevolent the species he's dealing with. Daleks and Cybermen he traps in other universes or the empty space between them, but this Doctor? He disappears his enemies like a Chilean dictator—erasing them from history—or outright murders the last of them if they pose a threat to Earth.** There's much more to say, but for now I'm focusing on the abreaction of Doctor and audience to the claustrophobia he and it encounter. It's cathartic, most certainly, but there's purging and then there's purging, and only one of them is just and healthy.

*I can't directly link because Comedy Central is a ... but the relevant material's at 3:58.

**As in "The Vampires of Venice," which I'm also teaching today. Stupid three hour classes.

They can (mostly) hear those whistles blowing. (Mostly.)

Juan Williams wrote a column on conservative dog-whistles in which he points out the obvious:

The language of GOP racial politics is heavy on euphemisms that allow the speaker to deny any responsibility for the racial content of his message. The code words in this game are “entitlement society” — as used by Mitt Romney—and “poor work ethic” and “food stamp president”—as used by Newt Gingrich. References to a lack of respect for the “Founding Fathers” and the “Constitution” also make certain ears perk up by demonizing anyone supposedly threatening core “old-fashioned American values.”

Conservatives are pouncing on the idea that “Founding Fathers” could be what Williams calls a “racial code word,” and admittedly, it’s his weakest example. (Though you need not be a Constitutional scholar to understand that everyone who signed that document was not only white but that many of them owned slaves.) The dog-whistle status of the public fellation of  source texts is questionable, but Gingrich’s refrain about Obama being a “food stamp President” certainly isn’t. Because not only is it a dog-whistle, it’s a dog-whistle whose etiology is a matter of public record.

According to a source of unquestionable integrity, on January 5, 2012 Newt Gingrich told an audience in Plymouth, N.H. that if he were invited to speak at the NAACP’s annual convention, he would accept and “talk about why the African-American community should demand paychecks and not be satisfied with food stamps.” Far from being an idiopathic charge arising from some haze of liberal thought, the connection between blacks and food stamps is present right there in the very words Gingrich said:

NAACP + Food Stamps = Dog-Whistle

This isn’t that complicated: Gingrich created a rhetorical situation in which any invocation of food stamps would signal to his intended audience that he was talking about black people. The fact that he dispels this notion is belied by the undercurrent of thought that gave rise to the equation in the first place. If he didn’t associate black people with food stamps, mentioning the NAACP wouldn’t have triggered a canned statement about food stamps.

Conservatives may wish this weren’t the case—that is, they may want to talk about the rise in food stamp consumption under the Obama administration—but Gingrich has made it impossible for them to do so without invoking the racist undertones of his statement.

 

Claustrophobia, as Wolfgang Petersen recognizes, is a cumulative effect.

(The continuation of the previous post which, like this one, is yet another one of those posts.)

I was going to jump right into the episode of Doctor Who I'm teaching tomorrow, but due to a non-Whovian coup, I'm going to prove my point differently first. To that end, I asked my however many Facebook friends I have the following:

Please name the five most claustrophobic films and/or episodes of a television show you've ever seen. If your nominee is chosen, I'll honor you by naming you by name in the post I'm going to write this afternoon. (Not much of an honor, but hey, it's better than nothing.)

Patrick Slaven, Kyler Kuehn, Carrie Shanafelt and Gary Farber all recommended Das Boot, and since I own a copy of said film, Das Boot it is. Short plot summary: back when Wolfgang Petersen had talent, he directed a film about a German U-boat and its discontents, and because the majority of the film took place on the boat, it had plenty of shots that approximate the "coffin shots" I discussed yesterday. (Being stuck in a metal tube leagues and leagues below the sea is roughly equivalent to being buried alive.) But unlike the frames discussed yesterday—in particular, the awkward image of Reynolds in his coffin—Petersen relies on standard scaled shots to create a claustrophobic atmosphere for his audience. So long as the audience grants him the conceit that the men in his film live precariously in a long metal cylinder, he need not 1) employ conventional "coffin shots" nor 2) improve upon convention or go whole hog (as Rodrigo Cortés did in Buried).

Petersen's audience knows that these men are confined behind a brittle shell of metal and will miles below the sea, so the enclosed atmosphere of the film is implicit. But that's not enough. As I mentioned yesterday, audiences key in to conventions in ways that subvert their effectiveness. A director can put a person in a closed coffin, but because so many have done so previously, the effect is merely communicative. The simple fact of being entrapped comes across, but the sympathetic feeling of entrapment doesn't. Das Boot is different. It lacks any of the obviously constricted shots and opts instead for a directorial ethos of tight framing (much as I discussed in my counterfactual Bones yesterday): 

That'd be a typical dinner shot. It lacks the ostentation of Reynolds in a coffin, but by framing this medium close-up as he did, Petersen's use of shallow focus indicates that there's little more to the room than what's seen here. Typically, shallow focus emphasizes a face (or faces) and blurs the unimportant background into a hazy nothing; here, however, the shallow focus reveals that the walls behind these folks abut them so closely that they can't be excluded from the shot. There's simply no way for them to be in focus and the walls around them not, which an audience will realize (even if it doesn't consciously understand) means that these men are very close to their walls. (Or vice versa.) It's not a "coffin shot," merely a medium close-up with a depth of field that reveals, in its entirety, how little there is to see. Stack a few hundred similar shots together and the claustrophobic intent of every director who's ever buried an actor for effect can actually be realized. Just to prove my point, here are some other shots from the film:

That shot of the living quarters need not be perfectly centered in such a way as to create a frame whose composition is so damn mathematical as to be oppressive, but Petersen's got an agenda. Also: 

There are many ways to depict a man amongst his crew, but framing his head as Petersen has (in a close-up) and situating it in the composition against many other similarly framed heads limits the scope of the frame to this head and these other ones. The face, again, is in shallow focus and yet because every other head's within the depth of field the constricted effect is only heightened. Imagine watching a film composed thus for 209 minutes (if you spring for the director's cut): the knowledge of the predicament of the crew is augmented, visually and viscerally, by the manner in which Petersen frames them.

All of which is only to say that a claustrophobic effect isn't bound to a claustrophobic situation. Certainly, both coffins and U-boats lend themselves to a claustrophobic treatment, but the reason Das Boot succeeds where yesterday's episodes and films failed has nothing to do with the narrative situation. It's all about the mechanics of how such a situation is filmed.

Tomorrow, I promise, I'll address this within the dictates of my class and discuss Andrew Gunn's direction of "The Victory of the Daleks."

Claustrophobia is a cumulative effect.

(Yet another one of those posts.)

Representing claustrophobic situations on screen should be simple enough: you take a person, put them in a confined space, and then you bury them alive. Doesn't matter if they're Buffy (in "Bargaining"):

Or Bones (in "Aliens in a Spaceship"):

Or some character played by Ryan Reynolds (in a dull film I wish I hadn't seen): 

Each of those cramped shots communicates to the audience that, like Everett in O Brother, Where Art Thou, someone's in a tight spot. But that's the problem: it communicates the narrow confines in which the characters find themselves, but because the "coffin shot" has become so clichéd, it does so the same way that a sequence of reverse shots inside a car communicates that the participants of a given conversation are driving. Only the oblique angle of the shot of Reynolds comes close to doing what a "coffin shot" is intended to do: duplicate in the audience the claustrophobia felt by the character. (And it only does so because of the odd angle. Most the film uses more conventional "coffin angles" and is as enervated as the other shots above.) Point being: filmmakers are quite proficient at representing people in enclosed spaces and communicating that said people are feeling claustrophobic, but they're not nearly as accomplished at making the audience feel the confinement represented the on screen. 

From the examples above, it's obvious that two techniques don't work: 1) placing characters in an enclosed space for a short duration and 2) placing characters in an enclosed space for a long duration. The first falls victim to convention, whereas the second flirts dangerously with boredom. (I disagree vehemently with Ebert on the effectiveness of Buried.) But if acclimation to convention has vitiated the tools with which a director could cajole claustrophobia from the audience (and if said director's not interested in making a tedious stunt of a film), how can an episode or a film be claustrophobic? 

The answer is: holistically. By which I mean, burying characters for X-amount-of-claustrophobic-time won't cut it, because that still leaves Y-amount-of-non-claustrophobic-time acting as an atmospheric counterweight. The entire episode or film must be shot with claustrophobia in mind. To use the episode of Bones as an example, too many shots in the episode are scaled too long: 

Does this long shot feel claustrophobic to you? Of course not. It's a brightly lit long shot: the lighting (and depth of field) allows the audience to observe details in the fore-, mid- and background, while the scale assures the audience that there's plenty to observe in all those grounds. To think counterfactually for a moment, it's not that shot couldn't be made more claustrophobic. Had the director cropped out some unnecessary visual information:

Still a long shot, but by focusing more narrowly on Agent Booth and the lab technician, the space on-screen seems more cramped. If those officers in the back were to scoot a few feet to the left, the composition of the shot would be more structured, creating an impression in the audience that the characters are bookended or boxed in. Tweak every shot in the episode thus and it'd be possible to create an atmosphere that would inspire claustophobic identification in the audience. ("Sympathetic identification with characters feeling claustrophobic" sounded like too much of a mouthful, but that's essentially what I mean here.)

All of which I write as preface to a post about Andrew Gunn's direction of the Doctor Who episode "Victory of the Daleks," because unlike the above, Gunn seems to understand that claustrophobia is a cumulative effect. More on that in the next post.