The Perks of being an Author who writes his own Screenplay

We’ve all read good books that made terrible movies (“The Great Gatsby,” “The Bonfire of the Vanities,” and “Bee Season” come to mind), and some good books that made good movies whose final product bore little resemblance to the original (“The Shining,” “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”).  But what makes a good film based on a book?

Often, it comes down to the screenplay.  The new film, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, succeeds largely because of the continued involvement of Stephen Chbosky, who authored the 1999 epistolary novel, wrote the screenplay and directed the movie.  As such, the integrity of the material wasn’t compromised.  There are no Hollywood endings (Breakfast at Tiffany’s), no invented characters (Diary of a Wimpy Kid), no weird plot twists (what exactly was the point of the character Halloran in Stanley Kubrick’s version of The Shining?).  All the important plot points are there.  All the critical dialogue is there.  And since the book was only 170 pages or so, the novel didn’t need to be butchered to make it onscreen.  Yes, the Harry Potter movies are good, but so much material was relegated to the cutting room floor that some hardcore fans felt cheated.

I’d never heard of Chbosky’s novel before, but after reading a review of the movie, my daughters and I quickly read an ebook version of Perks and saw the movie to a mostly empty theater on a Thursday night.  Too bad, because the experience was moving and exhilarating, one of those rare examples of a film not only matching the book, but matching the absolute best in the genre of teenage coming-of-age movies.

Chbosky has written screenplays before, most notably the underwhelming film adaptation of the musical Rent, but the experience clearly paid off with the challenging task of adapting his own material.  The first ten minutes feel a little clumsy and forced as the characters and essential information is introduced, but once the characters are firmly established, the movie takes off.

Emma Watson of Harry Potter fame acts four years her junior in the movie, playing step-sister to Ezra Miller.  Together, the seniors befriend outcast freshman Logan Lerman, who’s struggling to find his place in the wake of personal difficulties, but he soon finds that his newfound friends have personal struggles of their own.  That Watson and Lerman would befriend a freshman so fully is perhaps a plot point that’s difficult to believe, but if you can suspend that bit of reality (and the reality that Lerman is actually a freshman – he’s twenty in real life), then you’re in for a beautiful ride.  It’ll be leaving theaters soon, but mark it down as a definite rental a few months from now.

On a side note, I must mention that Innocence Mission’s “Evensong” astonishingly made it onto the soundtrack of the movie.  I have no idea how this obscure track from an obscure album from an obscure band from 1991 made it into the film, but it was so good to hear.

The film Argo: Go See It!

I should first note that any movie that highlights Led Zeppelin’s “When the Levee Breaks” and The Rolling Stones’ “Little T&A” is bound to please me to a certain degree, no matter the acting or subject matter (Van Halen’s “Dance the Night Way” wasn’t too shabby either).  That “Argo” hits all the marks in a deftly executed historical thriller is more than just icing on the cake; it’s as close to perfection for the genre as any I’ve seen, and for me it’s the best film since 2007's “Michael Clayton.”

“Argo” tells the true story of six would-be American hostages who instead flee to the Canadian embassy.  How to get them out is the question, and CIA agent Ben Affleck has a plan: to pose with the six as Canadian film-makers scouting out locations in Iran for a science fiction movie called “Argo.”  Sound crazy?  It did to me, and still does. 

I was old enough to be very aware of the hostage crisis back in 1979, and I remember the blindfolded Americans being paraded through the streets of Tehran.  Affleck, both an understated lead and a capable director in this feature, manages to shift between real footage and fictionalized scenes seamlessly, taking viewers back to that time period in a flash.  I even had a touch of nostalgia watching younger versions of Tom Brokaw, Ted Koppel and Walter Cronkite grace the newscasts of yesteryear.

The opening scenes, in which the mobs of protestors storm the embassy, are chilling, especially in light of the Americans who lost their lives in Libya last month.  Sometimes history repeats itself.  Affleck does a good job of offering a quick tutorial for the uninformed at the film’s opening, summarizing the hostage crisis and what led to it (what led to it?  The actions of the U.S. Government twenty-five years prior.   History doesn’t just happen, folks.  History results from unintended consequences.).

Affleck pulls every suspense string he can clutch near the film’s conclusion, and although I knew exactly what he was doing and that I was being manipulated, I didn’t particularly care.  I just know I would never have been able to pull off the ruse of pretending to be a filmmaker while gunmen questioned me.  I was nervous enough as a viewer.  I would also like to read about actual events to see how much the screenplay was doctored up for the benefit of the film.  If things indeed happened as Argo depicts, then I think I can sum up my reaction in two words: Holy Crap!

Ben Affleck has followed the lead of co-producer George Clooney in smartly handling his Hollywood career, wisely taking on smaller projects that are perhaps a bit under the radar, but are sharp films that please critics and cult-audiences alike.  Take Clooney’s “Good Night and Good Luck,” a masterfully done historical thriller, multiply the intensity ten-fold, subtract the black and white, and you get “Argo,” including the cigarette smoke, this time inhaled by guys with cheesy mustaches instead of the suave look of the 50s.

John Goodman is also doing a nice job of managing his career, and after his mostly silent performance in “The Artist,” it’s great to see him and hear him in action, along with Alan Arkin, as Hollywood filmmakers.  There are a dozen other faces you’ll recognize, and all were wise to take bit roles in what is bound to be an Oscar contender.

Yes, you heard me right. 

Then again, “Michael Clayton” didn’t win best picture, and last year Roman Polanski’s “Ghost Writer” didn’t even get nominated.  So what the hell do I know?

Paul Auster's Winter Journal

If I was able to transform my writing to that of another author, few names would be placed higher than that of Paul Auster.  I was first introduced to Auster’s works by chance when I spotted The Brooklyn Follies on a library shelf, and have since devoured an additional dozen or so books of his, each as unconventional as the last, and each entirely compelling.   

Auster’s most recent book, Winter Journal, is a memoir, but not in the traditional sense (nothing Auster writes can be considered traditional), and the result is a great read, if for no other reason that it twists a tired genre into something odd and thought-provoking.

First and foremost, he makes the unusual choice to chronicle his life in second person.  The book begins:

You think it will never happen to you, that it cannot happen to you, that you are the only person in the world to whom none of these things will ever happen, and then, one by one, they all begin to happen to you, in the same way they happen to everyone else.

And it continues.  Throughout the book, the word “I” doesn’t appear except in direct quotations.  Using the second person is an interesting technique for an autobiography, but I was surprised at how natural it felt.  Auster’s wife is, in fact, not my wife, but when he writes “Your wife was calm, you remember...and even your little daughter was calm” it works somehow, maybe even better than if he’d used the first person, for it breaks down the normal barriers between author and reader.  Just as Auster inserted himself as a character in his novel, City of Glass, in Winter Journal, he’s inserted the reader.

The book forgoes the chronological expectation of a memoir, and instead describes a nonlinear history of Auster’s physical body: the injuries it sustained, the physical pleasures, the scars – both mental and physical – it endured.  At various points, Auster describes the different sensations and actions that his body (and all of our bodies) have experienced:

Your body in small rooms and large rooms, your body walking up and down stairs, your body swimming in ponds, lakes, rivers, and oceans, your body traipsing across muddy fields...

He spends 52 pages identifying the twenty-one permanent addresses his body has lived in, ten pages describing the plot of a movie he identifies with (and he does it so well that I feel I’ve already seen the 1950 film, D.O.A.), and a page and a half listing the countless activities of his hands (“brushing your teeth, drying your hair, folding towels, taking money out of your wallet, carrying bags of groceries...”).

Unconventional?  You bet.  But so much more interesting than a play-by-play of his life. 

As the title suggests, Winter Journal is from the viewpoint of a man who’s entered a new phase of his life, a man who recognizes the ever-nearing finish line and who devotes time to reflection.  We follow him along a car ride home when he takes a careless left hand turn that nearly kills him, his wife and his child.  We witness the aftermath of the deaths of his father and mother.  The prostitutes he patronized.  The failed first marriage.  The boy who dies from a lightning strike before his very eyes.   None of this is done linearly.  Auster writes in a stream of consciousness that has the potential to bewilder, but instead engrosses.

The most compelling pages occur midway through the memoir, when Auster describes the aftermath of his mother’s passing.  On page 124, he writes of a phone call from a cousin:

It is as if she has trained herself not to breathe while she talks, to spew forth entire paragraphs in a single, uninterrupted exhale, long outrushes of verbiage with no punctuation and no need to stop for an occasional intake of air.  Her lungs must be enormous, you think, the largest lungs in the world, and such stamina, such a burning compulsion to have the last word on every subject.

What follows is a heart-wrenching conversation, as his cousin trashes the memory of Auster’s mother, who died just two days earlier.  The episode highlights a good rule to those who are related to gifted writers: be careful what you say, because your Last Word on a subject is sure to be trumped in a more lasting (and more public) way.

If Auster’s techniques are unconventional, the language he uses is entirely accessible, writing very much as he speaks (check out this interview with Terry Gross on NPR’s “Fresh Air" - he's got a terrific voice).  The result is an interesting read from a man whose gifts are so far-reaching, it’s enough to lead an aspiring author to call it a day.

Ben Folds Five in Chicago

Ben Folds Five are twelve years older since their last tour, but the trio didn’t miss a beat on Sunday night at the Chicago Theater, filled to approximately 80 percent capacity (the band had just performed in Chicago last June).  Supporting their first album since 1999, the band leaned heavily on material from their first two albums, including several surprises that kept even the die-hard fans satisfied.

Occupying only half the stage, Ben Folds, Darren Jessee on drums, and Robert Sledge on bass, ripped through six songs from The Sound of the Life of the Mind, the most effect being “Erase Me” and “Draw a Crowd,” both of which fit in relatively well with the older material.  Folds admitted that they were in a sense rehearsing “Do it Anyway” for the next day’s performance on The Colbert Report, but despite this being the strongest song from the new album, it fell a bit flat live.

I tried prepping my three kids for the concert by playing songs I expected Ben Folds Five to play, but I couldn’t have foreseen “Missing the War,” “Selfless, Cold and Composed” and “Emaline,” and although the inclusion of these lesser known tracks might have made the show more difficult for the uninitiated, it was highly satisfying for long-time fans.  The most surprising inclusions were the Darren Jessee-penned “Magic,” a heartbreakingly beautiful song from The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner, and “Landed,” the only song the band performed from Ben Folds’s solo era.

The distinctive backing vocals that defined the band’s sound in the 90s were tight and on key, so much so that I wondered if some auto-tuning might have been employed at the mixing board.  Either that, or Jessee and Seldge they’ve gotten stronger as singers over the last decade.  It was a pleasure watching Jessee go about his business without fanfare on his minimalist set, though his cymbals were too loud and shrill in the mix, and Sledge, a bit more stocky than back in the day, looked especially happy to be back on stage with the band, and it was hard for the audience not to feed on the good vibes.

When someone from the audience requested “Rock this Bitch,” Ben began an impromptu composition that addressed the request, guiding his bandmates by announcing the chord changes.

The crowd-pleasing “Army” finished the regular set before the band returned with “Best Imitation of Myself” and “Underground,” two of the best tracks from their first album, and “1 Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces” ended the evening to a standing ovation. 

I am not a big fan of the new album, and I think the show highlighted how much stronger and more relatable their first two albums of material are than their second two.  Lyrically, little of the new album makes a lot of sense.  It’ll be interested to see if Ben revisits these songs with any regularity in the future either with the Five or as a solo artist, or if they’re relegated to a 2012 time capsule.

Joe Jackson Wows Milwaukee

In the liner notes of Joe Jackson’s  Live: 1980/86, Jackson reveals his philosophy of live performing: artists should play what keeps them excited because an audience will inevitably see through a half-hearted concert.  It’s a mindset that – for the four Jackson performances I’ve attended in years past – never failed to satisfy.  Currently promoting his tribute album to Duke Ellington, Joe Jackson once again wowed an appreciative audience on Saturday night at the Pabst Theater in Milwaukee, blending old and new seamlessly, often with surprising instrumentation and arrangements.

Beginning the evening with a solo performance of Ellington’s “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got that Swing)” before segueing into his own “Be My Number Two” (but only after a false start after pressing the wrong patch on his keyboard), Jackson then welcomed his stellar band, including violinist Regina Carter, long-time Jackson percussionist Sue Hadjopoulus, Nate Smith on Drums, guitarist Adam Rogers, Jesse Murphy on bass and Allison Cornell on keys, vocals and viola.  The result was a refreshing mix that effectively wove traditional and well-known with eclectic and obscure.

The audience, ranging in age from the very young (a 9 year-old sat in front of me) to moderately old, some of whom may have been there to simply check out a band playing Ellington tunes, were as appreciative of the lesser-known selections as they were of hit songs like “Steppin’ Out,” “You Can’t Get What You Want,” and “It’s Different for Girls.” The set list that spanned over a half a century never stalled, indicating that even alongside the classics of Ellington, Jackson’s catalogue contains examples of well-crafted songs.

The band looked to Regina Carter to tackle many of the improvised solos, though Jackson, sitting down at a keyboard and sporting a tan blazer, proved capable of handling intricate piano runs, especially during the Ellington pieces. His singing was also surprisingly strong, though he did briefly flub the lyrics to “Is She Really Going Out With Him” and “Real Men” before quickly getting back on track.  

Allison Cornell beautifully sang lead vocals on several songs, and bassist Jesse Murphy – taking place of Jackson’s usual bassist, Graham Maby – played upright and tuba on a few numbers.  The most surprising arrangement was the first encore, when Murphy stood alone with his tuba, leaving the audience to consider the possibilities.  Then he started the familiar opening line of “Is She Really Going Out With Him” with Jackson supplying the harmony on accordion, and the audience sang on cue as if they were hearing a traditional four-piece rock group.  There aren’t many artists who could get away with the dismantling of familiar arrangements with such well-received results.

The show’s highlights, which stirred the audience into a mild frenzy, were the tracks from 1982’s Night and Day, including “Another World,” “Target” and Jackson’s long-time ending number, “A Slow Song.”  Jackson nailed the high note on the latter perfectly, and at various points throughout the song, band members exited the stage, leaving Jackson to finish the concert the way he began – as a solo artist playing the piano.  During the final standing ovation, Jackson bowed and appeared to be genuinely moved, grateful to still be performing after so many years for such open-minded audiences.