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Best Films of 2008 Hamptons Int’l Film Festival

Another year, another great Hamptons International Film Festival.  Many different films show us how the world looks thru many different eyes and lenses in 2008.  And these films come to us, if we are able to visit the cinemas hosting this terrific festival.

‘Song of Sparrows’ – might as well start at the top.  Best film of the festival in my eyes.  Fantastic cinematography.  Maybe best I have ever seen complementing the story of a blue collar father portrayed by ?Reza Naji trying to survive.  It all starts on an ostrich farm, and that is different.  Ever watch ostriches move, and run?  Unique!  And the director, Majid Majidi, has to be one of the best directors alive.  Or even dead!  It turns out he also was the director for my two favorite films: ‘The Color of Paradise’ and ‘Children of Heaven.’

Now I have seen all three of his monumental films at the Hamptons International Film Festival (HIFF)  over the years!  What a credit to this festival!

Karim is the character for whom life does not flow smoothly, yet he can fix anything, has the confidence to do almost anything.  The colors in this movie make the viewing of it a visual/mental orgasm, along with all the perspectives and scenes you are blessed to see.  Whenever this movie comes close to you, go see it, along with Majidi’s other movies I mentioned above.  You will not regret it.  Remember, these are Iranian movies, so explicit political commentary would not be wise to make.  Poetic plot and visuals is the way the director has chosen to work.

Next great film:

‘Taking Root:  The Vision Of Wangari Maathai’ took the prize for me as the best documentary.  Wangari Maathai is perhaps the most important individual in modern Kenyan history.  After the English
colonialists came in and tried to make an England out of Kenya,
cutting down so many of the land’s trees, laying railroad tracks and roads, subjugating the people with the unction of missionary religion, there came two dictators, Kenyatta and Moi, who further subjugated the people.  Ms. Maathai noted how important trees were to the survival of the country, combating soil erosion and drought.  This caused her to start a tree planting movement in 1977.  This led to a confrontation with President Moi who wanted to build a towering skyscraper and a very tall statue of himself on the last piece of public parkland in Nairobi.  If this occurred there would be no place for the common citizen to freely sit and/or gather in the capital city.  Moi made fun of Maathai, in a typical man-rules macho manner.  Then the women who had had their sons arrested for various political reasons by Moi’s henchmen decided to call a hunger strike and sit in the still existing park.  After a few days, Moi tired of the embarrassment and had his forces destroy their little tent, beating the women and anyone else who tried to fight back.  Maathai was beaten unconscious, ending up in a
hospital for several days.  The world press picked up on the story.  Naturally, the Moi project had been backed by the World Bank, but with the adverse press, the Bank withdraw its approval of the project.  Maathai had won a victory, which led to Moi’s downfall after two decades.  Much of this was captured on film, which the producers Lisa Merton and Alan Dater, beautifully displayed,.  The colonial footage was particularly stunning as was one particular statistic: 100,000 Kenyans
were killed as a result of the English incursion, with only ~350 English dying.  This is almost the exact ratio we see in Iraq today: 1,000,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the Bush administration incursion there, with about 3500 American soldiers dying.  As time passed, Maathai was elected to parliament, and was the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize.  Her wisdom and determination are in evidence as we hear her talk and act, starting with her Green Belt
Movement, along with many other women.  Planting trees to combat erosion and drought, leading to a political movement freeing the nation from dictatorship and the entrails of colonial thought.  Religion however remains to erase much of Kenya’s native culture unfortunately, as has occurred in so many African countries, and other colonially demeaned lands.

‘Slumdog Millionaire’ also played during the festival.  I confess I did not see it, for I heard it had already been picked up and would be shown in the USA commercially.  Subsequently I did indeed see it, and reckon that it is one of the best films of the twenty-first century.  The scene in the outhouse on the boardwalk with the younger protagonist brother has to be one of the most classic scenes ever filmed, especially in terms of comedy.  The director, Danny Boyle, is not an Indian.  He also made ‘Trainspotting’ which I had to exit from within the first ten minutes due to its graphic sensationalism of injecting heroin, the lover spitting on the needle before inserting it.  Those who dislike Slumdog object to its Boyle-istic sensationalism, and lack of Indian involvement.  However, the original creation was written by an Indian.  The colors in this movie are unbelievable, as is the cinematography.  {But not to surpass that in ‘Song of Sparrows.}  The story is very current, with plenty of tension, and some real purty faces.  Go see it is all I can say.  Despite any detractions, still, the movie overall is great. 

More comments on films will follow in the forthcoming weeks, as time permits…….

Rickie Lee Jones Performs Fantastically At the Talkhouse Summer 2008

Rickie Lee Jones, the ‘legend’ as it says on the plastic paste-on to her 2003 release
‘The Evening Of My Best Day,’ visited the Stephen Talkhouse for the first time on the
first full day of summer, June 21 2008. She used to be gay and cool, actually gave
herself the title ‘Duchess of Coolsville’ for her triple Rhino CD compilation, but this
nite she was very diva. Very strict. Someone talked in the front row and she commented on
it in the middle of one of her songs very acidly. That was in the middle of the show.
When she was at the piano playing a song she said she seldom does in concert ‘Pirates’ some
bobo’s cellphone went off several times in a row. She didn’t say anything because she
was too into singing lyrics like “I’m just tryin to have some fun/until the Pirates come/and
take me//and I won’t need a pilot/got a pirate who might sail/somewhere I heard far away/
you answer me/so I’m holding on/to your rainbow sleeves//well, goodbye boys, oh my buddy
boys/oh my sad-eyed Sinatras/it’s a a cold globe around the sea/you keep the shirt that I
bought ya/and I know you’ll get the chance to make it/and nothin’s gonna stop you/you just
reach out and take it/You say – So Long, Lonely Avenue/So Long, Lonely Avenue.”

(Rickie Lee probably loved and repeatedly listened to David ‘Fathead’ Newman’s great jazz
version of ‘Lonely Avenue’ released in 1972, of which its composer, Doc Pomus, said
“‘Lonely Avenue’ has been recorded many many times, but I can’t think of a version that
I find more satisfying.” ‘Pirates’ is actually the title cut of Ms. Jones’ 1981 Warner Bros.
release.)

Yes! The Duchess, the legend, expects to be treated appropriate to her talent, which is immense and amazing. Thaint no one on this Earth that can sing, or would sing like Rickie Lee. She can purr and raise her voice to the rafters and still hit every note. She does this continuous sustaining of her voice, especially near the end of songs, where other bands might be doing an electric guitar or maybe a flute solo. On one song she used the pocket and curve and flexion and opening of her right hand to change the flow of her vocal sounds to the microphone.

This was an experience of a lifetime to see where she has progressed to in the
performance and composition of her music. Especially sitting about nine feet away from
her, in the fantastic Talkhouse, where I’ve been lucky enough to see musicians from
Buddy Guy to Diblo Dibala to Jesse Colin Young to a super-hot Los Lobos one magic
night several years ago.

Ms. Jones’ music can be very jazzy, innocent, rocky (as in rock and roll), feminine,
slinky, sunny, funky, full of the grandeur of falling in love, or the pain of a life
lived for celebration, but sometimes falling into deep holes. She says in her latest
release (2006) liner notes that the inspiration for its songs came from a book
called ‘The Words’ by Lee Cantelon, which she states is “a modern rendering of the
words of Christ.” She did the song ‘Nobody Know My Name’ from that CD amidst a very
clean guitar framework, building and stalwart, around her incredible vocal. When
you heard a song start this night, the beat, the rhythm, the melody, might seem
one way, but then, when Rickie Lee came in…who knew it could go in this direction that
she was taking it. By the way, the CD, the latest one, is called ‘The Sermon On
Exposition Boulevard.’ Just checking it out actually, but all the vocals are
wondrous.

Rickie Lee was telling us that these last eight years have been terrible. She went to
say how you couldn’t write straight plain songs about the Bush administration’s
mal-doings because then you might not be able to get a job. But, with a devilish smile,
she revealed that she had created ‘Ugly Man,’ obviously about our current and
worst president evah. It’s a sort of jazzy sad tune, where she does mention his father.
It’s the first cut on her 2003 CD, by the way, where she also has a tune
called ‘Tell Somebody (Repeal The Patriot Act)’ so don’t think Rickie Lee has
gone totally inner and indulgent in her middle age.

And her guitar playing led the way, including a very unique wah-wah solo on a song
called ‘Scary Chinese Movie’ which sounded totally different from her recorded version,
and at least a thousand times more interesting and rocky and searing.

Seeing her in person again, and understanding the lyrics, allowed some songs to be
appreciated in a different way. Here, I would give you ‘The Horses’ as one example,
where she is singing about her daughter going through heroin problems, as she had,
but she can listen, hoping her daughter will talk to her about it all, and she’d
‘Pick You Up, Pick You Up, Pick You Up….if you fall.’ Of course, that verse is
what stands out when you listen to ‘The Horses.’ But, with different listenings
different words can be heard, as when we were present this night at the Talkhouse.
But basically she is trying to be there for her daughter and singing to us “Don’t
you worry ’bout a thing little girl/Because I was young myself not so long ago/
And when I was young/And when I was young, oh I was a wild, wild one.”
(‘The Horses’ is from a 1989 release ‘Flying Cowboys.’)

Rickie Lee sang one of her more haunting ballads, probably one every Rickie Lee
Jones fan loves: ‘The Last Chance Texaco’ off her 1979 self-titled first vinyl album.
It has California based/placed lyrics like “A long stretch of headlights/Bends into
I-9/Tiptoe into truck stops/And sleepy diesel eyes/Volcanoes rumble in the taxi/
And glow in the dark/Camels in the driver’s seat/A slow, easy mark…Well, he
tried to be Standard/He tried to be Mobil/He tried living in a World/And in a
Shell/There was this block-busted blonde/He lover her – – free parts and
labor/But she broke down and died/And threw all the rods he gave her/But
this one ain’t fuel-injected/Her plug’s disconnected/She gets scared and she
stalls/She just needs a man, that’s all.”

That was her solution back then, when she was young and bouncy and beautiful
and wild and crazy. Her audience has aged with her. It is always interesting to
see the crowd any performer draws into the Talkhouse. This one was semi-hippie,
not too many folk under 40, everyone very respectful, except for a few talkers that
Rickie reprimanded. But then they must’ve been a bit dipsy-doodled too, as the one
feller who called out in request “Play Last Chance Texaco” about five songs after
she had already done it. Many of us reminded him how out of it he was, though,
it should be said that most songs were performed in unusual styles and arrangements
as compared to their recorded, commonly expected versions.

For her first encore Rickie Lee happily did ‘Chuck E.’s In Love’ which was very
popular for her back in 1979. That was the very first cut on side one (vinyl albums
have two sides for you too young to know) of ‘Rickie Lee Jones.’ The lyrics are
very jivey, like: “He sure has acquired a cool and inspired sorta jazz when he
walk/Where’s his jacket and his old blue jeans?/If this ain’t healthy it is some kinda
clean?…I think that Chuck E.’s in love/Chuck E.’s in love/With the little girl who’s
singin’ this song….”

There’s a lot of joy and mischief and poetry in Ms. Jones’ music. Lately, add religion
to the mix, or maybe spirituality. She’s not had it easy with problems with cocaine and
heroin and who knows what else. But she still can sing and perform with the
best of our living musicians today. I am very grateful to have seen her again, in
still top form and irascible as she is. By the way, she did apologize to the audience
as she finally walked off the stage saying “I hope I didn’t scare you too much.”
Rickie Lee…Rickie Lee….

Ray LaMontagne Tenderly Troubadors In Westhampton May 30, 2008

Ray LaMontagne at the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center…a very visceral
experience. Ray a quiet fellow, not liking to talk between songs. Playing with
his quartet, the electric/lead/pedal steel guitarist the finest of the musicians;
a supple feline bassist, reminiscent of Rick Danko of The Band in her demonstrativeness
as she delved out each note and/or riff; the drummer very tasteful and restrained, except
when he played ‘Three More Days’ and ‘Trouble.’

Ray reminds me of what I would have expected in performance from the late reticent Englishman Nick Drake, who died at 26 back in the 1970’s…Feeling each song so very deeply. His hoarse seductive voice a lonely one, a loving one. Calling for his momma in his second encore, unlike other songs I’ve heard call the maternal one, panging and soulful.

Prettiest song of all though was the first encore, from his new album recently recorded
to be released on September 2nd, 2008. ‘Winter Birds’ had a beautiful intro, Ray all by
himself for the only song tonight, just him and his guitar, finger picking it to make
Mississippi John Hurt proud. But even prettier and more complex than what I’ve heard from the great finger-picking pioneer. The lyrics about the winter birds coming back, the days shorter, the nights getting longer….

Though as he broke into the vocal it came out wrong, and he had to stop himself, and start
all over again. Regardless, a lovely tune. One to look forward to hearing again and
again in September….

Perhaps his most terrific song lyrically and emotion-wise has these
powerful lines (from ‘Empty,’ from his second and most recent album
‘Till The Sun Turns Black’):

“I looked my demons in the eyes
They’d bear my chest
Said do your best
To destroyyyy me

You see, I been to hell and back so many times
I must admit
You kind of bore me

There’s a lot of things that can kill a man
There’s a lot of ways to die
Yes and some already did
And walked beside me

There’s a lot of things I don’t understand
Why so many people lie
It’s the hurt I hide
That fuels the fire inside me

Will I always feel this way??….”

For the rest of the short show, less than an hour, Ray was the rhythm master, getting each ong going, just playing chords, never having to retune his guitar – – he doesn’t play it
hard or fiercely enough. The music jazzy, folky, misty, unique.

The crowd was all white, very appreciative, knowing many of the works Ray performed from his quiet searching heart. He is a very serious man, about 30 or so, who works through each song. He’s a songsmith, with the spirit of a blue collar blacksmith without the big hard muscles or the soot. He sports a full beard and appears very Christlike as he fragilely begifts the audience a part of his soul with each song sung.

Recording his songs he especially takes seriously after he has he let them take flight out of him in their composition. “I always, always end up recording the songs that I feel are
important to me to work through.” he is quoted in the program guide.

Many of those in the audience expressed their love for Mr. LaMontagne in between songs, and he managed to return the emotion, tho in a taciturn manner. His performing seems to be not an entertainer’s joy, but more a sacred evolution of himself and his inner feelings and intelligence.

‘Gone Away For Me’ had me in tears as I thought of my late beloved wife, as did the following song about sheltering each other.

It was a beautiful tender tho intermittently sad evening that makes one feel mortal and fortunate for having whatever love one is fortunate enough to have, or have had. I thought of my own love, which is usually wild and ecstatic, and Ray’s quiet lovemaking, as he expressed it in one song.

As he was about to begin one song, the light was getting to him as he plaintively said “I feel so exposed.” The lights were turned down, and he thanked whomever was responsible, before commencing another stellar performance of another grand but simple song.

Inda Eaton Shares Her Music At The Talkhouse 4 5 2008

Inda Eaton performed at the Stephen Talkhouse Saturday night
April 5, 2008.  The crowd was small and intimate.  Inda was
tall and cool and bright and unperturbable and ultra-professional.
She plays her guitar (acoustic) so well, it always sounds good;
the beat’s in her head, she rouses out her lyrics, talks to the
audience through her songs, is great fun, very attractive, her
hair always falls back into place, her skin is smooth and healthy,
though she keeps talkin’ about drink up, no sense in being half
drunk.

Well, she is from Casper, Wyoming.  Y’ever see anybody from
Casper with her special view of the world?  pronouncing
Waldbaum’s ‘Waldbamms’ – at least the first few times she bespoke
it this night.  Projecting about doing a tour with her music (I guess)
performing at them.  She says she used to be a bartender for the
military.  Worked in the Alps.  Where the troops are few, and the
snow is waiting.  Though she apparently had her hip fixed recently, but
is now able to sit on a stool while she is sharing her music with
her lucky audience.

The song ‘Love Is A Road’ she explained she put together by
conversing with various Casperians and others who were gonna go on
down to Mexico via train to get their thyroid medicine because it is too
expensive in America.  She must enjoy some tequila at times.  The lyrics
have “Tequila. Cantina. You’re my lover. Now you are my friend.” But
the first words of the song are  “Just as soon as I’m sober, just as
soon as I am well, gonna pack up a truck and drive…There is beauty
and danger every time…”  Dunno what happened to the train that
somehow wends its way thru ?Colorado and New Mexico to get to that
south-of-the-Rio-Grande pharmacy.  Where I remember hearing this
little Mexican woman answer a television interviewer posing the
question why folks came to her country to buy steroids, and she
smiled and laughed saying “Americans like to be BEEEEG!”

“All Cracked Up” she said she has high hopes for, I reckon, in the
commercial world of music and popularity.  She said she wrote it for
her ?drummer’s father.  It’s about a Vietnam Vet.  Lyrics go like this:
“The young boy on the farm,
You get yourself to Vietnam
You come back a little cracked up
And you take a wife
Help raise those precious kids
Get on
And come to find out where you stand
It’s just another day
The sun that burns in distant lands
The sun that burns us all anyway

We’re all cracked up
Walkin’ down past the cup?(?cut?)
Feel it comin’ down
Sky above
Miles to light
I can feel it
I can’t figure why
I…….

Every day it’s still a fight
From the office to those soccer fields
Come to find out where you stand
It’s Just another day

Some days it comes from the bottom of the cup…”

Yes, I love it.  The guitar just trickles and drives
through the song. At the Talkhouse she did the song
acoustically, but on her ‘Live in Casper!’ CD 2007
her band really fills the song out.

‘Casper’ Inda describes as a “boom or bust song” about
driving back into her home town on highway 25, and she
told us about Wyoming, and plucked the lapels of her black
western cowgirl shirt introducing the tune Saturday night.  The song
unrolling as she is “looking for a lover in the middle of the night…and
I thought that I would find you in the miles/the arms of my home town/ I’m too tired
to call you, strung out from the road/’cause I’ve
lost my pride/I’ve lost my drive/and now it’s time to crawl/into the
arms of my home town for a while/Down by the river/At the old
Ramada Inn/my grandma worked two shifts waitressing to raise up both those kids/
and my other grandad worked the oil fields/had a
business out of town/He was renting cars/and both worked hard/to find
redemption/and a passage out of town.”  I don’t know if they ever found it: the
redemption.  Or the passage out of town.  Living in those small towns.  She
compared how small Amagansett is, to little Casper and its one main street.
And how she was grateful to be able to perform at the Talkhouse, because there
are so few venues out this way for musicians.

She said she’s been living out here for four years, but by 15 years she’ll be
considered a ‘native.’  So SHE got out of town, Casper.  She apparently prefers
living in the Hamptons to residing in Wyoming, where they dig the coal out of the hills
with gigantic shovels and drop it into huge trucks; then ship it by train
to Georgia [terrific description of this in John McPhee’s award-winning, and
my favorite non-fiction book of 2006 called ‘Uncommon Carriers,” in the
chapter on ‘Coal Trains’ – which I think is the book’s best chapter] or
some other state/locale/power plant.

The Inda song that tugs at me and my heartstrings is ‘Be So Lucky’ –
to find true love. With me losing my wife recently, my soulmate,
my baby, my protector, my receptive elegant strong luscious ultra-essential
lover, my sharer of thoughts and poems and creativity and experiences with
passion and ecstasy, “it feels so good to be next to you”
Inda sings, to find peace. Yeah, as you go through life
you may not realize how fortunate you could be to find someone
that is the yin to your yang, the pieces of your puzzle just
fit together perfectly, with love, that love that you may only
find just once as you go through day after day.  Or, as many of
us know, you may NEVER find true love for whatever
reasons or whims of the universe. Sing it tenderly, dear Inda:

“Be so lucky
To find true love
Be so lucky
To find my way
Be the first
Be the rock(?)
Be the hope
Be tomorrow
Be so lucky to fiiiiiiiind
True Love

And the tide is heavy
It’s good to be alive
Oh, it feels good to be next to you

I broke a hundred dollar bill
To get some nickels
I was drunk at the campsite
And I was searching for clues
Walked to town with a walkman
On the tail of a blizzard
Only to find peace to be next to you
Should be so lucky to find true love….”

On her album she talks about positive energy and the movie
‘Smokey and the Bandit’ – whose moral she says is getting the beer
from Texarkana, forget about ‘The Secret’ – this is
all you need.  “Splendor in the Sun” is the song about “all
that drivin’ and all that positive energy;
drivin’ that 18-wheeler…

“We got a long way to go
And such a short time to get there
We gonna do what they say can’t be done

Splendor in the sun
I found my friends
And we drank all day
I broke my heel
And I talked to Jesus

There’s all this time
And all this love..”

Inda has an energetic positive infective spirit, and even if
some of the Talkhouse faithful yapped and blerbled while she
was sangin’, she didn’t acknowledge it, just got on, none of
that stuck in Lodi again that John Fogerty sung us about
unforgettably, if we were around to hear it. [Credence Clearwater
Revival is the name of Mr. Fogerty’s group for you young ‘uns
and memory-wanked stoners that might’ve fo-got…(Oh, how COULD
you? – – if you wish to search for some of his fine early music.]

In ‘Touched Down’ Ms. Eaton sings about being down, and feeling so
incomplete, but then she repeats “Rise Up Rise Up Rise Up
and Move On Move On Move On, My Friend.”  This is a rocking song.
In which she realizes “the answers won’t come today, may not
come at all, no time for honesty today…”  So, she’ll “walk to
the end where the air is so fair…” Breathe in knowing you are
breathing in; breathe out knowing you are breathing out.  Repeat
that a few times, folks, and you will be in the moment.  Conrad’s
recommended short effective easy-to-do meditation to make life
most worthwhile.  You’re only here for a brief walk, so smell
the roses and the gardenias, and touch down to Earth, and listen
to Inda whenever you can.

For the second half of the performance, Inda had three local Hamptons
musicians come up to the stage and embellish several tunes.  Jim Turner
opened up his case of harmonicas or mouth-harps or “harps” as some
will say.  And Inda kept wondering if he would be OK, as she just met
him two hours ago, but she kept stating as he played in the key she
specified that he was NY Board of Education certified, and Jim was great.
He did plenty of solos, while Jim Lawler played drums and Michael Kanes
shook his Portuguese maracas, but not into any microphone.  Inda took
the extra energy and made it amplify the fun and satisfaction of the
evening.

If she ever comes by you, go see her.  Just hope that her palesse doesn’t
show up to introduce her, tho Inda seemed to like it.  Donna was sort of
funny, but rather plainly uncosmic.  Like she asked what was the difference
between a psychic and an intuitive psychic?  “Two hundred fifty dollars!!”
she excitedly told us, extending her ample arms and shaking her bumsie
and well rounded body.  Her best joke was “I used to be a medium.  But
now I’m a large.”  OK, that was funny.  But get off the stage, love. Inda
was who we came to see. Why cheapen the evening?  And I highly recommend
that new CD: ‘Inda LIVE in Casper!’ 13 songs.  All good. The cool, the
charming, the crisp, the syncopative, evanescent Inda Eaton!

Dave Alvin Great American Music and Fantastic Electric Guitar

Dave Alvin, ex-Blaster, guitarist, songwriter, producer, music purveyor, played an explosive dynamic set of rocking bluesy other-side-of-life tunes with his band, The Guilty Men, at the Stephen Talkhouse Sunday July 9, 2006. Everything from “Out of Control” to “Surfer Girl” blessed the ears of the eastern Long Island audience with the touch of Mr. Alvin’s guitar expertise.
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