Reaction Shots: The Killing of Art and the Artist
Plus a review of Triangle of Sadness and the Noah Berlatsky Award for the Most Terrible Take
A Jihad Rehab for Stopping Oil
When I heard the news that two climate change activists vandalized Vincent Van Gogh’s Sunflowers at the National Gallery of London, there were several reminders. One of which was when Daily Wire host Michael Knowles, tweeted two paintings of Pablo Picasso: on the left is the expressionist Science and Charity, while on the right is the cubist Weeping Woman. It was provocative in that a conservative podcaster prefers the more traditional work of art, but can barely appreciate the deeper themes of suffering in the other effort that is more surreal. Can anyone blame him for having this opinion, however flawed, when there are some who set destructive motivations under their sleeves, as art continues to evolve and reluctantly accommodate to the causes that its ‘champions’ represent?
Sunflowers is one of Van Gogh’s most popular works of art. According to the National Gallery, it represented the sunny optimism during the time of painting, miles away from the poor mental health that has destroyed his life. “What is worth more?,” said the coloured hair girl representing Just Stop Oil. “Art or life?” The false dichotomy between the two concepts makes sense when you realize the time and effort put into the painting, was partly built through oil, which is in the name of the organisation. One can be thankful that Sunflowers only experienced minor damage to the frame, given that it is protected by glass, but I feel that it’s more likely to happen again, exemplifying the privilege of those who claim to care about the world but have the intention of destroying beauty as a necessary means. Thankfully, in spite of some rationalisations from those sympathetic to the act, there is the universal condemnation from people, left, right and centre, whether or not they believe in climate change, they all unite on their innocent love for paintings. This kind of reception is genuinely rare.
But the relativism that drives the discouraging trend of artists and critics of seeing art as a form of paternalism remains and it’s barely called out by people who call themselves pro-art. Dishonesty is the antithesis of what art is supposed to stand for, ignoring the mechanisms of the human condition and skewing towards pure emotions in order to protect someone that could potentially be damaged. The Guantanamo Bay documentary The Unredacted, also known as Jihad Rehab received plenty of coverage, not for what happened in the documentary, but when it received acclaim at Sundance, before being dropped by studios, backflipped by Walt Disney’s granddaughter Abigail S Disney, thanks to a petition signed by many within the documentarian community, even if it hadn’t been released or yet, make the effort to watch Jihad Rehab. The critique, according to POV magazine, an outlet on Canadian documentaries, implies that it was racist and the decision not to air it has little to do with censorship, but that it’s a learning experience and broadening the conversation.
Were any film critics talking about it? Some have. But did Richard Brody or Eric Kohn go to stick up for Meg Smaker and insist that the process is unethical and unfair before the documentary could be seen widely in the light of day? No, because Brody scoffed at the idea of cancel culture and identity politics in a review of Tar, while Kohn basically wrote a long column defending much of the criticisms, chastising these programmers for offending any of them. These responses have earned praise and defenders within the brethren of Cinephilia Inc as a nuanced exploration into a complicated issue. Give yourselves a pat on the back guys.
If you are not in the business of criticism, then you would automatically find the backlash very baffling. Sebastian Junger, a journalist who co-directed Restrepo, wrote a cover story for National Review about this controversy and the response is exactly what you would expect. Those who pride themselves on free expression and debate applauded the piece, but others have been very sceptical. Primarily Jason Bailey, who was formerly the film editor at the defunct Flavorwire. I do not think Bailey has reported or reviewed the documentary anywhere, and even if he did, I wonder what motivated him to chuck a tantrum, in which he berates a liberal journalist for sending a piece to another magazine, either because every other outlet has already covered it or refuse to run that very particular angle, in which a self-satisfied community of filmmakers have blocked Jihad Rehab from distribution. Is it because Junger doesn’t toe the ideological line of someone that seriously believes that Booksmart makes a compelling case for politically correct comedy?
Not only did Bailey fail to engage or read the piece, but he joined a bandwagon that’s deeply embedded in tribal groupthink at the drop of a hat. I used to follow a lot of film critics, there is a list on Letterboxd that I made of good movie writings (which I haven’t updated in years). One of those was a piece he wrote in 2015 about the discourse surrounding American Sniper, which has this remarkable graf:
Yet the most troubling aspect of these back-to-back controversies over serious movies by serious filmmakers is where they’re coming from. (If you’d like to know how upside down we are, here’s a sentence I never thought I’d type: Glenn Beck is — partially — right.) The Sniper and Selma slams come not from notoriously anti-art conservatives, forever trying to shut down the NEA and censor museums and blame gun violence on movies and video games, but from ostensibly progressive voices like Jezebel veteran West, Clinton ambassador Jett, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, and the assortment of LBJ sycophants who slammed Selma. We’re supposed to be the pro-art people… right?
The answer is no. You weren’t.
But to answer the other question; I’ll choose life anytime, but only because art wouldn’t exist without it. Still, the round lens won’t fit in your square-shaped hole, no matter how much you try to jam it. That would cause chaos, something a lot of people would disapprove. And they will leave elsewhere, after a long period of tolerating this sort of bullshit.
Review: Triangle of Sadness
Triangle of Sadness, which took this year’s Palme D’Or, has three films in one: a battle between the sexes, a cruise going awry, and the aftermath. All of this is wrapped into a class critique, beginning with an influencer couple, Carl and Yaya (Harris Dickinson and Charlbi Dean, who sadly passed away), when the man could not become decisive and often compromises with the girlfriend. The centrepiece, predates on the glamorous image of these two, compared to the yacht’s other patrons, one of whom makes a fortune on fertiliser (Zlatko Burić), who went on a shouting match against a drunk American captain (Woody Harrelson) who just converted into Marxism. If the film is worth anything, it’s that hilarious middle act that will automatically make it a crowdpleaser. Also worth mentioning is Dolly De Leon, who plays a cruise worker and earns a round of applause for asserting her power against the stranded passengers.
One criticism that is alleged at Ruben Ostlund, is that his films are smug from the result of lampooning two kinds of people: in The Square, it was the artless and the artful and with Triangle of Sadness, it’s vapid and the rich. But these targets blur to make a critique of consumerism in the modern age. Much of it is pretty funny, either working on a shameless kind of gross-out humour or the cringe that’s enclosed in this exclusive environment. The issue for Ostlund’s detractors is that almost every character doesn’t escape from any lampooning, so for them, it’s not clear who and why deserves this level of treatment, compared to the rest.
However, it’s clear that Triangle of Sadness has a pacing issue, and that is due to the attempt in connecting the thematic dots of its three acts. The middle act, which I mentioned, eschews Carl and Yaya, but emphasizes them again, right afterwards. The title refers to a term used in the fashion industry that denotes the stoic-seeming facial expression, whenever the models walked onto the stage. Then, social justice buzzwords are loudly emitted during the runway. For a second, I thought this was going to disparage corporate wokeness, but that is not what Ostlund is interested in. These themes are hinted at but are blown away via whiplash for this one overriding concept of haves and pseudo-haves. Still, I had fun and so did the crowd who saw it at the Sydney Film Festival, who enjoyed it much more than I did. More importantly, they prefer for this wave of class-conscious cinema to stay for as long as it entertains them.
You Must Watch This: The House That Jack Built (2018)
With Lars Von Trier having been diagnosed with Parkinson’s, The House That Jack Built would have been his swan song. It is a meditative introspection of the director’s own catalogue that masquerade as a violent slasher. The central protagonist is male, rather than the usual female, and it is the avatar of Trier’s confronting mindset going against his own consciousness, embodied by Bruno Ganz. It is bleakly hilarious, as Jack navigates his own art, often through the neuroticism of its owner. But there is a moral compass that pushes the boundaries of provocation further, where the artist positions himself in the fashion trends of the industry. Equally helpful is Matt Dillon giving the performance of a lifetime as the bumbling serial killer that’s densely layered with his strengths and weaknesses.
ICYMI:
My Film Club conversation with Jasmine Hu-Hollingshead is up, in which we discuss the issues with exploring mental health in popular culture and why The Wedding Banquet is one of Ang Lee’s great films. We both had a blast, so you should read it. Here’s an excerpt:
There's a normative mantra I've heard about art which is that it's supposed to be a mere reflection of society, rather than a way of practising new ways in exercising your own psyche. When you explore the reactions to Turning Red and Everything Everywhere All At Once, it feels like they are memories that are very precious to the viewer and there's a profound emotion of having your experiences overlap and match with the artist’s. But as you've written in that essay, there's a lack of humility that would allow some to overcome many obstacles.
There’s definitely a natural sense of nostalgia animating both: as my generation of Asian Americans reaches adulthood, they’re reflecting on their childhoods.
But if you look at the way these films treat personal memory, it’s always simplified and smoothed over in a way that aligns with the dominant American identity discourse. There’s a hyper-individualist, hyper-verbal focus on acceptance, acknowledgement, and validation that doesn’t grasp the complexity of human relations. The moms always end up giving heartfelt, very verbal apologies. Actual Asian parents would rather die than say this stuff, just to spite you. It’s part of their charm! And their strength as parents— I’d bet these filmmakers wouldn’t be the successes they are today if their parents were like permissive, huggy kissy white boomer parents.
Even little details like the boy band in Turning Red clearly being based on the Backstreet Boys or N*Sync, but they’re instead turned into a racially diverse group with K-pop-type members. It’s taking something that would feel real and lodged in memory and sanitizing it into something that never existed because they’re uncomfortable with something as innocuous as Asian-American tween girls having crushes on white boys. As a result, it can’t really resonate as personal or real to anyone. The 90s Toronto setting in Turning Red feels totally synthetic; everyone’s styled like TikTok zoomers referencing the 90s, not actual 90s kids.’