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Developing the front game is crucial without question. You then have to pray that your publishing teammates, if you will, are paying as much attention to their game as you are to yours. Whatever th... Continue
Added a reply Apr 11
I think virtually every word I’ve ever read by Martin Luther King, Jr., or heard him speak has had some kind of empowering impact on my life. But the passage from him that tends to resonate with me... Continue
Tagged: dr., king, social, world, luther
Added a post Apr 10
Congratulations on the publication of "The Tale of Karryn" and kudos for enduring the ups and downs of the publishing roller coaster. Those who've undergone the experience learn quickly enough that... Continue
Added a post Apr 10
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
 An Inspired Wonder Called "The Diving Bell and The Butterfly", After reading the former French Elle Magazine editor Jean-Dominique Bauby's memoir, THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY, when it was first published in 1997, I couldn't help wondering if it would be possible for anyone to make a decent movie out of it. After watching the film directed by Julian Schnabel, with a screenplay by Ronald Howard, I was awestruck to acknowledge that not only had they made a decent film, but a gorgeous and phenomenal one. It makes sense that The Diving Bell and the Butterfly should shine on the big screen like the huge glowing miracle that it is because the fact that Bauby even "wrote" his book at all was itself nothing less than a king-sized miracle. A major stroke in his brain stem left him paralyzed with locked-in syndrome, a condition in which he was fully conscious but unable to move any part of his body except his left eye. Whereas the shock of finding oneself in such a torturous state might have caused many to shut down completely, Bauby rose to the occasion within himself by the sheer power of will, spirit, and the loving compassion of others. His body, he noted, may have become like a heavy diving suit that weighed him down, but his mind became freedom personified, like a butterfly that floats at will through realms of intellect, memory, and imagination. Harnessing the resources at hand, he learned to dictate by indicating individual letters with the blink of an eye and managed to compose a small masterpiece Actor and director Mathieu Amalric plays Bauby with deeply attractive humanity. Viewers first meet him from inside his head, so to speak, as he begins to regain consciousness and doctors gather to explain what has happened. Once the unsettling fact of his paralysis is painfully established, we move with the stream of Bauby's consciousness back and forth through scenes of high-energy photo shoots at Elle Magazine, memories of shaving his father, the complications of a love affair, and fantasies of intimate encounters with his lovely female therapists. A particularly powerful element within this movie is the portrayal of Bauby's existential stubbornness. Ironically enough, prior to his stroke, he becomes angry with his lover when she insists they visit Lourdes, a place where divine healings reportedly often takes place. Still later, when in a wheelchair, a priest offers him communion and he signals to his therapist with a blink of his eye that he does not want it. Comically, his therapist ignores this and tells the priest he does. It is this determination to guard his sense of individual humanity that makes Bauby beautifully heroic, even though he would not describe himself as such. Actress Emmanuelle Seigner plays Bauby's estranged wife Celine with subtle intensity and one marvels at the quiet dignity she brings to the part. Equally engaging in their supporting roles are Max von Sydow as Bauby's father; Marie-Josée Croze as the therapist who teaches him to communicate with blinks of a single eye; and Isaach De Bankole as his visiting friend Laurent. Both as a book and as a film, The Diving Bell and The Butterfly is largely about the perspectives that we choose to apply to our lives. Though he suffered one of the worse fates imaginable, Bauby chose to believe his life was still a meaningful one and worked to produce a celebrated book that was published just 10 days before he died. Julian Schnabel's film is a work of cinematic poetry that honors both the man and the work through the very means that Bauby employed to live his final days: penetrating intelligence, inspired compassion, and luminous imagination. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of The American Poet Who Went Home Again and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
Beloved Prophet:the Love Letters of Kahlil Gibran and Mary Haskell, and Her Private Journal
| The Real-World Paranormal Romance of "Beloved Prophet" Kahlil Gibran, The world's abundant treasury of art and literature would likely be a lot less abundant if not for those famed, or sometimes secret, patrons of the arts who assisted many of our most celebrated creative artists at crucial points in their lives--and sometimes throughout their lives. For visual artist Pablo Picasso, author and patron Gertrude Stein played a major role helping to launch his unparalleled career in twentieth century art. For the Harlem Renaissance writer Langston Hughes, the mysterious heiress Charlotte Osgood Mason supported him (as well as others associated with the Harlem Renaissance) in great style at the start of his literary career. In the case of the Lebanese poet and artist Kahlil Gibran, the crucial lifeline came from American schoolmistress Mary Haskell. Just how essential, passionate, and sacred that lifeline was comes through with deep intensity in the pages of BELOVED PROPHET. Editor Virginia Hilu worked her way though more than 600 letters and decades of journal entries to carefully compose a book that goes far beyond amusing or impressive anecdotes to give readers the softly thundering heart and soul of a man whose works continue to inspire millions and the woman who helped make that work possible. Before the world came to know him as the famed author of such titles as The Prophet and Jesus the Son of Man, Mary Haskell met Gibran at his first art exhibit in 1904 when he was 21 and she was 30. Four years later, she sponsored his trip to Paris, where he studied art for two years and began a correspondence with Haskell that would last the rest his life. Upon his return from Paris to New York City, he both wrote and visited Haskell, whose school was in Boston. Gibran's understandably deep attachment to the woman who would come to mean so much to his life and career is evident even in those early letters, such as when he wrote this in 1908: "When I am unhappy, dear Mary, I read your letters... They remind me of my true self. They make me overlook all that is not high and beautiful in life." More than a decade later, in 1922, he tells her, "We have become one, Mary. You have entered my being--and you can't cut off either of us without destroying the other." If Beloved Prophet was comprised of nothing more than letters, it would be a less powerful or significant book. However, the entries from Mary Haskell's journal provide a wealth of insights both into her relationship with the artist-poet and into her own passionate being. Through those entries we receive accounts of Gibran's family relationships, how such events as the early deaths of his mother, a brother, and a sister impacted his life. We also learn quite a bit about his creative processes and the role Haskell often played in it. While helping Gibran organize initial drafts for The Prophet, she noted, "How absolutely the Prophet is Kahlil, although Kahlil has several times said, `This is not I, but the Prophet.'" Upon receiving one of the first published copies of it, she predicted, "This book will be held as one of the treasures of English literature. And in our darkness we will open it to find ourselves again and the heaven and the earth within ourselves." Addressing one another as "Beloved," and with references to their "greater selves" and life-transforming connection, Beloved Prophet sometimes reads like an extraordinary paranormal romance made much more profound by its concrete reality. The degrees of intimacy between Gibran and Haskell varied over the years but the general integrity of their relationship remained intact. It survived Haskell's move to Savannah, Georgia, in 1924 and her marriage to Florance Minis in 1926. After Gibran's death in 1931, his biographer Barbara Young discovered the letters while Haskell was present and suggested they destroy them to avoid any misinterpretation of their contents. Haskell eventually rejected that suggestion, seemingly out of belief that the letters might help future readers more greatly appreciate the rarity of Gibran's spiritual genius and the noble beauty of his very real humanity. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of The American Poet Who Went Home Again and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
Stomp the Yard (Widescreen Edition)
| "Stomp the Yard" A Film of Life-Affirming Power and Beauty, Director Sylvain White's STOMP THE YARD may not strike many as an ideal movie for the family to gather around and watch during holidays or other special occasions but it actually is because holidays are about reaping the benefits of tradition and this movie is about that too. It's not so clear at the film's beginning whether we're watching a violent video game or a demonstration of directorial genius. The distinction, however, soon becomes obvious and the genius apparent. The mesmerizing opening dance scenes come across a lot like video gladiator battle sequences. These give way to the urban realism of a more brutal --and fatal-- L.A. gang clash after the not-so-lethal dance battle. DJ, played pitch perfectly by Columbus Short, loses his brother Duron (singer Chris Brown does an impressive job in this role) to a bullet in the clash and life as DJ knows it then comes to a screeching halt. After a brief time in jail, he leaves the West Coast for Georgia, where he moves in with his aunt and uncle, then enrolls in college. It seems like the perfect strategy for rebuilding your life but DJ has problems with the idea that he's living his brother's dream of going to college and that his own is not all that definite. Perhaps among the most under-appreciated gifted actors of his generation, Harry Lennix gives one of the strongest performances of his career as the no-nonsense-taking uncle who pulls DJ out of his self-pitying funk. Their relationship proves to be one of tough-love and mutual respect. It also provides a rare glimpse into how black male relatives often function as surrogate fathers to youth whose biological fathers for whatever reason are nowhere to be seen. The move from West Coast to Georgia might appear coincidental but in fact it is crucial to this film because DJ's move takes him out of a region of the country where historically black institutions like Clark University and Tuskegee Institute do not exist, and into one where their presence and legacy remains strong. The move to Georgia turns into an inner journey to his ancestral beginnings where ultimately he discovers the strength and integrity needed to cope with the grief over his brother's death and move forward with a vision for his own life. Once he becomes a student at Truth University, DJ initially demonstrates the same kind of arrogance and self-absorption that got him into conflicts back in L.A. But he also discovers the world of stepping, both a new form of dance for him and a cultural tradition going back to the establishment of the first black Greek Letter fraternities and sororities in the early 1900s during the Harlem Renaissance. He becomes determined to help his chosen fraternity, Theta Nu Theta, end a seven-year long losing streak against their rivals Mu Gamma Xi, and to win the heart of co-ed April Palmer (played beautifully by Megan Good). His efforts take him through an inspiring rites of passage during which he learns a great deal about his ancestral legacies and the advantages of sometimes working as part of a team rather than thinking only of himself. The culminating dance competitions in Stomp the Yard have to be seen to be believed and rank among the best in cinema history. Ultimately, this film is one that stands alongside "You've Been Served," "Drumline," and others that accentuate the life-affirming power and beauty of many African-American college traditions. In the process, it confirms and celebrates that same potential in all human beings. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of The Bridge of Silver Wings (Songs of the Angelic Gaze) and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
All About Love: Favorite Selections from In The Spirit on Living Fearlessly
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
Taylor's "All About Love" Provides Harvest of Empowering Inspiration , A collection of more than 80 empowering editorials and three bonus dialogues, "All About Love" is all about life as we know, live, dread, treasure, and live it. Unlike too many book collections of short essays or creative nonfiction, this is not one aimed at demonstrating the intellectual profundity or virtuosity of the author. These are the observations, emotions, realizations and affirmations by which generations of women--and sometimes men--have mapped out the course of their daily lives and established purpose for their existence. They address such down-to-earth considerations as "Family Affairs" and "Living Abundantly," but also tackle more elevated yet essential meditations on subjects like "Being Peace," and "Self-love and Social Action." Ever a fearless witness to her life and times, Taylor notes in the introduction, "A Bridge of Light," that, "Human beings have made every corner of the planet a disaster zone, and human beings have the power and responsibility to clear and clean it up, set the Earth back on its axis. We are not small or powerless. We have the ability to transform our world. Our personal and collective pain, the disorder all around us, are calls to get up and get moving!!!" Especially noteworthy in "All About Love" are the three "conversations" that comprise its closing epilogue. One is Taylor in dialogue with Oscar-nominated actress Ruby Dee; another with educator and activist Cornel West; and the third with the late master musician and spiritual instructor Alice Coltrane. Each subject combines the articulated light of her or his illuminated spirit with that of Taylor's to produce flashes of useful insight that expand into waves of applicable principles and awareness. Take, for example, Cornel West's response to Taylor when she asks him about the need for men to become more emotionally honest, intimate, and self-loving: "Most would rather languish in conformity, complacency and even cowardice. But what is life for but to learn to love and be free and courageous?" At the end of February 2008, Taylor left her almost four-decade position as the creative passion behind Essence® Magazine to head the National Cares Mentoring Movement, an organization she founded as Essence Cares to help at-risk youth. As she journeyed from 1970 to 2008 toward that noble crossroad of change in her illustrious career, she became in 1999 the first African-American woman to receive the Magazine Publishers of America's Henry Johnson Fisher Award. In 2002, she won induction into the American Society of Magazine Editors' Hall of Fame. In many ways, "All About Love" is another kind of award, an eloquent summation of a triumphant career in one of the most demanding professions around. In another possibly more significant way, it is an open letter of uninhibited love and intentional compassion addressed to the denizens of the world from the heart and soul of one of the great women of our new millennial times. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of The American Poet Who Went Home Again and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
Gabriel
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
 Astounding Angels of the Wingless Kind, Are there any who fall, when they fall, quite so hard as angels do? Going by the scenario in Australian director Shane Abbess' extraordinary noir metaphysical drama, GABRIEL, the answer would have to be a loud "No!" As they battle in human form for control over the middle earth region of Purgatory, where human souls dwell in limbo before descending to hell or ascending to heaven, these angels use the f-word in more ways than one, revel in rebellion and debauchery by the ton, and fire blazing automatics with more deadly intent than a. S.W.A.T. team or gang bangers looped on crack. And yet the independent filmmaker's skillful balance between Purgatory mayhem and heavenly transcendence is a finely rendered one. As he drops dreamlike from heaven to non-heaven, the archangel Gabriel ponders the fact that he is on his way to do battle in a spiritual war zone where six fellow archangels have already dared to tread but apparently failed. He is a last chance, hoping to succeed where even the mighty angel-warrior Michael has not. Newcomer Andy Whitfield does a more than competent job as Gabriel and makes it easy to empathize with his divine anguish as he adjusts to his mortal form, seeks out his wounded angelic comrades, and launches full force into martial arts and handgun combat. Dwayne Stevenson as the manically rebellious Sammael, and one-time mentor of Gabriel, provides a powerful villainous contrast. The film progresses between scenes of healing and reunion, to those of explosive one-on-one clashes reminiscent of the most enthralling gangster-film gun battle sequences. The ending is not only unpredictable in regard to a painful choice that Gabriel makes--it is also for some viewers disturbing and controversial. Considering the obstacles that Shane Abbess and company had to overcome to make this amazing independent film, you have to give the production team and cast credit for getting it done at all. When looking, however, at the small miracle they achieved while working with so little, it becomes difficult not to imagine how much they might have accomplished working with more. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of "The Bridge of Silver Wings" and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
Ararat
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
Ararat Tells Devastating Story with Power and Style, In its opening scenes, Ararat gives you the impression that the primary story is likely to involve a turgid family drama in which a fiercely intelligent woman named Ani (portrayed by the brilliant Arsinèe Khanjian), her son Raffi, and step daughter Celia are struggling to cope with the death of her husband. Ani moves forward with her life as an art historian giving lectures on her latest book and working as a consultant on a film about the Armenian massacre of 1915. However, the step-siblings Raffi (played by David Alpay) and Celia (Marie-Josèe Croze) seem less well adjusted and start a disturbing romantic relationship at the same time that Celia begins to sabotage Ani's lectures with disruptive personal questions about her father. On one level, Ararat is an extremely sophisticated movie about the painful lessons of history and the healing beauty of art. On another level, it is a kind of ghost story about the life and legacy of the great painter Arshile Gorky (1904?-1948). Haunted himself by the atrocious reported massacre of Armenians in 1915, the spirit of Gorky, as portrayed in Ararat, takes the form of different things for different people following his suicide in 1948. In what we call the real world, Gorky emerged as a leading artist of the twentieth century. Along with such geniuses as Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, and Mark Rothko, his work helped define the art movements known as Surrealism and Abstract Expressionism. For the director character within the movie Ararat, the painter is an inspirational cultural icon whose personal story embodies the larger tragic history of his people. To Ani, he is the fascinating subject of her latest book. To Ani's stepdaughter Celia, he is a painful reminder of her father's questionable death; and to Raffi he is an important piece to the puzzle of his own identity. (Director Egoyan's own deep respect for Gorky may be noted by the fact that his son is named after the painter.) The story of one character in the movie takes us inside the stories of others as Raffi, returning from a journey, is interrogated at length by a customs official named David (Christopher Plummer). Unknown to either of them, the official's son happens to be a guard at the museum where Ani gives a lecture; and his son's lover is an actor in a film on which Raffi worked as a production assistant. The sequences involving the making of a movie--about the Armenian massacre and Gorky's narrow escape from it--within this extraordinary movie are among the most exceptional in the film. At times, it is uncertain whether you're watching scenes from the film in production or whether the film Ararat itself is now in a flashback mode depicting the terror of murder, rapes, and forced migration that characterized the massacre. The answer seems to be both but even that conclusion becomes questionable when the actors shooting the movie break character for various reasons. At moments such as those we realize just what a superb filmmaker Atom Egoyan truly is. This stylish report on the Armenian genocide, which some still deny ever happened, is told with mesmerizing cinematic eloquence using an astoundingly brilliant cast that, in addition to those already mentioned, includes: Elias Koteas, Raoul Bhaneja, and Bruce Greenwood. The adult Arshile Gorky is brought broodingly to life by Simon Abkarian, and Garen Boyajian does an admirable job as the adolescent Gorky. For those whose lives are not defined or daily obliterated by the horrific butchery that characterizes existence in such places as modern-day Darfur or World War II Nazi Germany, the word "genocide" comes across as a sociopolitical contradiction almost too insane to contemplate. The movie Ararat not only forces viewers to confront the insanity of that contradiction but to take full measure of the brutalities, abuses, and corruption that can destroy lives for decades when allowed to go unchecked. From that perspective, the political, spiritual, and simple human importance of Egoyan's film can hardly be overlooked. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of "The Bridge of Silver Wings" and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
Days of Grace
| A Lasting Legacy of Grace and Greatness, In this invitingly intimate and yet stoically objective memoir, Ashe grapples with the issues of sports, racism, and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) which he contracted while receiving a blood transfusion after his second heart bypass operation in 1983. DAYS OF GRACE reveals different sides to a man many described as "cold" while he lived. The view from within does not support this description. Some very warm snapshots are provided of Ashe as a man who never stopped being an obedient son, as a fervent patriot, lover of art, serious intellectual, mystical seeker, generous philanthropist, devoted husband, and loving father. Ashe's tendency to gloss over such feats as writing a landmark three-volume history of black athletes, his historic 1970 win at the Australian Tennis Open and 1975 victory at Wimbledon; or his association with people like Nelson Mandela and Jesse Jackson, rings true to an exceptional character whose many parts added up to a truly noble and memorable sum. As tragically as he may have died, DAYS OF GRACE provides an amazing portrait of just how heroically he lived. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of "The Bridge of Silver Wings" and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
The Life of Langston Hughes: Volume I: 1902-1941, I, Too, Sing America (Life of Langston Hughes, 1902-1941)
| The Man That Poetry Made: Celebrating Langston Hughes (Feb 1, 1902-May 22, 1967), The man that poetry made stands luminous on the broken corners of history's suicidal cravings, he watches splashing in the street birds cleaning their feathers inside the crystal flow of words he gave them, he is a vintage wine now, traveling with ease over the tongues of other people's intentions, he is a quilt made of one billion black hands spread like guarantees from a single living God over the heads of the misbegotten. The man that poetry made wonders on which day will he finally recite his soul. Ask him who his mother is and he will sing for you memories of bosom-heavy haikus filling his mouth with the milk and nectar of joy neverdying. Ask about his father and he will boast about a ballad that thundered all the way from Spain to Zaire bouncing him like a sack full of sonnets upon his broad whistling shoulders. This man that poetry made stumbles barefoot through the city, a huge blue ribbon wrapped around one big toe, a small pink one tied to the other, ragged jeans loose upon free-verse hips, fluorescent eyes blinking surrealistic kisses of negritude revisited-- To the woman confused by his lust for peace he begs "forgive me lovely genius I was not born as you were born, my blood was written by a different kind of coupling." To the man frustrated by his lack of animalia he sang, "Beauty is a thing finer than exalted fears of actual love." The man that poetry made sometimes blows himself to pieces with bombs made from metaphors, he enjoys watching the words that shape his life scatter like golden ashes of imagination then one by one float back down to earth covering him with forms and meanings he never knew existed. People passing the corner where he stands luminous and throbbing rarely see a man at all. They look at the man that poetry made and see a public toilet or a burning bush flaming in the most unlikely place. Sometimes they see him as a rare jewel and snatch him up before anyone else can look. He is always curious riding along inside the pockets of strangers wondering how they shall react when they see him for what he is, and he reveals, with love lighting up his every cell exactly who they are. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of I Made My Boy Out of Poetry and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
Modigliani
| Modigliani: A Passionate Cinematic Ode to One Madly Passionate Artist, Director and writer Mick Davis, in a disclaimer at the beginning of the film MODIGLIANI, cautions viewers that it is a fictional work based loosely on the lives of its historical characters. What the disclaimer does not point out is how brilliantly the film captures the ironies of artistic achievement and the agonies of human failings that characterized the challenging lives of those same historical personages. At the smoldering core of Modigliani is a love affair between the Jewish-Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani and the French Catholic art student Jeanne Hébuterne. Andy Garcia, who has had many fine hours as an actor, pulls out all the stops in his portrayal of Modigliani as an artist who lives for nothing so much as he does for art and love. Actress Elsa Zylberstein proves his chemistry-stirring match in one compelling scene after another. Their story unfolds in the community of Montparnasse, Paris, France, just as World War I is coming to an end in 1919. The place and time were remarkable for the sheer concentrated genius of its creative inhabitants, including these artists: Pablo Picasso, Jean Cocteau, Diego Rivera, Chaim Soutine, Maurice Utrillo, and Modigliani himself. All of them would leave their indelible imprints upon 20th century art through individual works and their stylistic inventions of Surrealism, Dadaism, Fauvism, and Cubism. Likewise, one of their renowned American patrons, Gertrude Stein, would leave hers upon the era's literature. As the film Modigliani illustrates, these artists were as famed for their ability to endure devastating poverty as they were for their talent and are generally considered, for better or for worse, the quintessential bohemians of their time. Two things made their lives bearable and worth celebrating: one was their passion for their art, and the second was their passion for each other. They painted on anything and everything: doors, napkins, tabletops, menus, walls, themselves, and even other paintings. Their passions at times could be as devastating as they were inspiring. The depth and intensity of Jeanne's passion for Modigliani is evident from the film's beginning when she poses the question, "Have you ever loved so deeply that you would condemn yourself to an eternity in hell?" A kind of hell is precisely what viewers watch her go through when she's torn between her father's condemnation of Modigliani and her love for the artist. Rather than give up Modigliani--or "Modi" as he asks to be called--she walks away from her parents and the child she has with Modi to share his life in pursuit of his muse, fame, and fortune. For his part, in an attempt to create a life conducive to maintaining a family, Modi makes a concerted effort to produce paintings worthy of exhibiting and selling. He meets with some success when his agent Leopold Zborowski--who once described Modigliani as "A child of the stars for whom reality did not exist"--arranges a one-man show for him and introduces the world to the artist's series of now famous nudes. Virtually every scene in this film could be paused at any point and framed as a work of art itself. There is Modi performing his bear dance around a statue; Utrillo chained up in an asylum smoking hashish with Modi; a furious Picasso holding a gun to his friend Modi's head then switching hats and joking with him; and softly glowing blue snowflakes falling in the dark of night. Some of the most extraordinary images come toward the end when the artists are hard at work preparing new paintings for a grand competition. The frenzy, stress, and excitement of the competition, which carries a prize of 5,000 francs, are driven by a powerful soundtrack and the hope that Modigliani will triumph. More than one reviewer has noted the difference between the end of director Davis' film and the historical account of Modigliani's death. For the sake of those who have yet to see the movie, that ending will not be revealed here. Nevertheless, I will suggest that those who view the film (and perhaps those who already have as well) consider that Davis' ending was never intended to represent factual history but serves as a symbolic representation of what many gifted artists tend to experience in societies where their labors are more valued upon their deaths than while they live. If that statement sounds like exaggerated drama, we might further consider this: while Modigliani struggled through poverty and illness all his life, his paintings in recent years have sold in excess of $10 million for a single canvas, including a sale of $31.3 million for his portrait of Jeanne Hébuterne. Guy Farley contributes an energetically mesmerizing score that magnifies and punctuates the emotive and spiritual substance of Modigliani. In the spirit of the artists of Montparnasse's creative daring, Davis fuses musical styles of the era along with later and modern compositions to create an absorbing and complementary soundscape. In addition to Farley's music are: "La Vie en Rose," by the late French diva Edith Piaf; along with "Ode to Innocence" and "Angeli," both by Sasha Lazard. The one major disappointment in the film for this reviewer was its lack of representation of the influential poets of Montparnasse--the multi-talented Jean Cocteau notwithstanding. Such a representation would have been wholly appropriate considering that the works of literary artists such as Guillaume Apollinaire, Blaise Cendrars, and André Breton often enhanced, informed, and promoted the works of their visual artist peers. Still, film as an art form is designed for viewing and utilizes essential literary and musical elements for its overall composition. With that in mind, it becomes a pleasure to recognize Modigliani as a triumphant and passionate cinematic ode to one madly passionate artist. by Author-Poet Aberjhani author of "The Bridge of Silver Wings" and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
Author-Poet Aberjhani reviewed:
The Great Debaters
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
A Forgotten Poet Gets His Due, When reading about what may be described as the lesser celebrated heroic figures of the Harlem Renaissance, we rarely get a definitive look at just how complicated and sometimes dangerous their everyday lives were. In fact, until the past ten years, many defined the period primarily by its well-known literary, musical, and artistic elements while overlooking the fact there was any political component to it at all. THE GREAT DEBATERS corrects both oversights by giving us an extraordinary portrait of poet and educator Melvin B. Tolson (1898-1966) portrayed with convincing restraint by Denzel Washington, who also directed the movie. At the same time, it delivers an exciting story filled with the creative intellectual genius that characterized the Harlem Renaissance, the thrill of youthful romance, and the painful loss of innocence. Tolson, historically, is known largely as the celebrated author-poet of "Rendezvous with America" (1944); "Libretto for the Republic of Liberia" (1953); and "Harlem Gallery" (1965). But we meet him in The Great Debaters, prior to his literary fame, as a professor of English at Wiley College in Marshall, Texas. By day he teaches and guides his students through the passion-filled topics of the era: labor rights, race relations, public welfare policies, and personal ethics. By night he is a labor organizer who runs the risk of imprisonment or getting lynched when he meets with Whites and Blacks to convince them to organize unions to protect their rights as workers. His efforts cause him to become branded as a communist, and therefore distrusted as a threat not merely to labor laws (or the lack of any significant ones at the time) but to American democracy. Nate Parker as Henry Lowe, Jurnee Smollett as Samantha Brooke, and Denzel Whitaker as 14-year-old James Farmer, Jr. all give inspired performances in their roles as Tolson's brilliant student debaters who endure challenge after challenge before earning an invitation to debate the team at Harvard. With the odds stacked solidly against them, they nevertheless pull off an historical win. Just as significant as the final team's triumph, is the footnote identifying these students as future community leaders and history-makers in their own right. Henry Lowe would go on to become an influential minister, Samantha Brooke a lawyer, and Farmer a founder of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). Much has been made of the fact that The Great Debaters is the first major film project on which media empress Oprah Winfrey (one of the film's producers) and two-time Oscar-winner Denzel Washington have worked together. Of equal significance, if not greater, is the fact that in addition to Washington the movie features powerhouse Oscar-winning actor Forest Whitaker as Dr. James Farmer, Sr. How many movies are there, after all, in which two Academy Award-winning African-American actors play characters of historical consequence like Tolson and Farmer? More important than the novelty is the contrast between the two, somewhat like the classic divergence noted later between Martin Luther King Jr.'s political philosophies and those initially espoused by Malcolm X. The differences between Tolson and Farmer, however, appear more subtle and that very likely is due to Robert Eisele's amazing screenplay. The hype and buzz surrounding The Great Debate sometimes comes across as a bit over the top. Despite that, the movie is actually far more excellent than anything you've likely heard about it. By Author-Poet Aberjhani author of "The Bridge of Silver Wings" and Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts on File Library of American History) |
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Congratulations to Keith B. on his new book cover!
Thanks to Chester Elmore for this amazing artwork.
Thanks to Slain for this glorious add— One Love indeed!!! 
Thanks to Gary Williams for this great book cover! Nice job!!!
America, don't blow this rebate! There is an interesting article online regarding those tax rebate checks the government is sending to all of us who have filed our taxes already this month. Please... Continue
Tagged: stimulus-package, government, government-checks, taxes, us
Started by Marlive Harris. Last reply by wizthom May 8.
Did you know it is Wil Derksen Day here at TPL?! You didn't?! Well, that's quite all right because you still have plenty of time to stop by Wil's Lounge Space and show him some mad (((((((LOVE)))))... Continue
Tagged: tpl-founder, tpl-radio, wil-derksen
Started by Marlive Harris. Last reply by Wil Apr 17.
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Like the music of individual bells
That ring together as one
Understanding each other
And where they are coming from
Like the keys of a piano
Black and White
And all the shades are just right
This one important time
This colorful life
No reason to fight
Just emit our unique chimes
In concert we'll find
Our connection.
My love flows
deep from within
to your soul
Please check "It is Finished" again...
I've added more and want to know if it
still has a flow...if not, maybe you can help?
love,
Sis Eahoue
NubianGraphics.com
You are an inspiration, I could spend all day in your lounge, but one must work.
Peace
Art Abounds— Haiti, circa 2007 | By Wil
... stay-tuned!
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