Classics in Contemporary Culture

Yea, Though I Walk through the Shadow of Starz...

I shall fear no Latin...

I've been watching some episodes of this latest incarnation of the Spartacus story, the series put out by Starz, and in the latest one I've watched, the lanista Batiatus erected a statue in honor of Spartacus, with the following inscription:

Spartacus Baiulus Pluviae Qui Umbram Mortis Necat

The good news:  no spelling errors, the grammatical relations actually work...but it appears there was just a little too little hunting in the dictionary for the "mot juste."  The word baiulus would not be used in an honorific context, since it means a "porter" or "day-laborer" whose job is carrying things.  So it certainly could be translated as "bringer"--but the effect of using it would be like saying:  "Hail Spartacus, Rain's Busboy."

Solution:  I would suggest the term Imbrifer.

Deus ex machina vs. Anime

An essay on io9.com--disturbed over the use of God or other supernatural forces in bringing recent television series to a close (Lost, Battlestar Galactica)--compares Aeschylus' Oresteia and Aristotle to the experience of writing anime:

These stories come from an inherently conservative point of view: everyone has a place to stand and a part to play, and attempts to step outside those boundaries can only result in pain and suffering. You'll notice that stories about God commonly involve triumph over the self, not triumph over an oppressive regime - Arjuna never once thinks that he should share his riches with the lower castes, or that he'll unseat the monarchy once he wins the battle. Doing so would overturn the "natural" order of his environment. Arjuna's kingdom, once he wins it, will continue to rely on slavery to sustain itself - because that's how Krishna wants it. God's role in these stories is a conservator, one who might snip off poisoned buds or gently nudge humans in one direction or another in attempt to preserve that which is good and right, without radically altering anything. God conserves the status quo, and we're supposed to take comfort in that: a place for everyone, and everyone in their place.

Recent American television finales have embraced this logic. The endings of Avatar: The Last Airbender, Battlestar Galactica, and LOST all involve a divine figure returning balance to an earthly equation by repeating an ancient pattern. The Avatar achieves his final state and the four nations again live in harmony. Humans create Cylons, battle Cylons, and become Cylons. The Island calls people in need of personal change, gives it to them, then lets them go (to Heaven) before calling another group. All of this has happened before, and will happen again. The pattern doesn't change, it simply repeats.

Another word for "repetition" is "letdown."

As far back as Aristotle, critics and audiences have measured the quality of a story by (among other things) whether it has a discernible beginning, middle, and end. Things must change. The characters must be in a different place than before, and the audience must feel for them. Traditionally, this comes about as a result of the character making a choice or taking an action that has consequences, and then suffering through them. Agamemnon sacrifices Iphigenia so that his ships might sail to Troy, and Clytemnestra retaliates by murdering him. Hamlet refuses to kill Claudius when he has the chance, and he (and everyone else) dies. Rochester lies to Jane about his marriage, and loses her. Meursault kills the Arab, then awaits his execution. Consequences follow actions. Stories progress. Circumstances change. Characters grow.

But lately on American television, they haven't. Lately, all tension has been drained from their actions, and all opportunities for choice have been robbed from them by fate. Does it matter that humans created Cylons? Not really. They did it because God wanted them to. Does it matter that the Losties all had issues with their parents that they needed to overcome before they could be whole? Nah. They were all in Purgatory, anyhow. Does it matter that Aang had lost access to the Avatar State? No - apparently stray rocks can unblock his chakra. (That's right, kids: Aang works like the Millennium Falcon - a well-placed punch can bring his circuits back online.)

Late Antiquity in Film: Constantine and the Cross

The other day, I watched Constantine and the Cross (Costantino il Grande), a 1962 Italian screen version of the story of Constantine...Hmm...what to say about it?  As you might guess from the era, it's similar in some ways to the overdubbed, dime-a-dozen sword & sandal films about Hercules etc., but it does stand out as somewhat better.  The quality of the DVD was not particularly high, and there was the requisite "In Hoc Signo Vinces" moment--very much a traditionalist, pro-Constantine version of the story...No labarum that I saw, though.

Pro-Constantine:  For example, the plot accepts as fact the idea that Maximian tried to kill Constantine but was forestalled by the substitution of someone else in Constantine's bed--after which Maximian killed himself--rather than some more nefarious / ruthless construction of the rising leader's actions...

Not exactly the historical Constantine overall...but not pure fantasy either.  Some bending of history for dramatic purposes:  Constantine's first contact with Christians apparently is when he asks one of the Christians on trial some questions...and it turns out that the Christian in question is really his mother!  Eusebius, by contrast, reports that Constantine converted Helena to Christianity--but of course, Eusebius definitely has a dog in the fight...

From Philip Sawyer's online review of the movie--an excerpt:

As Italian epics go, this is diverting and occasionally thought-provoking. Some scenes are impressive, mainly because of the widescreen framing, but the direction by Lionello De Felice can only be described as serviceable. The sets are quite spectacular, and I would not be surprised if most of them were real historical locations rather than studio creations. The staging of the battle scenes is fairly ordinary and as a result not very exciting.

The script is relatively free of melodramatics as compared to similar American films of the time, and thankfully does not push the religious elements strongly.

And a conclusion:

A reasonably interesting epic from the early 1960s, this might be worth a rental if you are not deterred by poor quality prints.

Classics on TV: Spartacus and the Wire

Just a bit late to the party...I just saw that the Starz network is going to air (in early 2010) a Spartacus series (300-style-animation?) with concurrent graphic novel publication...The article I saw?  At pridesource.com, an account of the upcoming series' gay interest:

A perfect storm of gay TV is on the horizon, thanks to ancient Rome and Xena. The upcoming Starz series "Spartacus: Blood and Sand" was already set to feature a "300"-style interpretation of the Spartacus legend, meaning that lots of muscular, barely-dressed men would be training or battling non-stop on your basic-cable system. We've also been promised queer characters. But now that the cast is fixed, lesbian audiences have a reason to tune in: Lucy Lawless. Yes, yes, it's a cliche, but it would appear that all lesbians everywhere on earth still love Lucy. Recently seen online interrogating former "L Word" cast members about the murder of Jenny, Lawless will star on "Spartacus" as the owner of the gladiator prison holding the rebel slave. That means she'll probably be somewhat wicked. And who doesn't like that? So while the warriors may be men, the princess returns to weekly TV in January of 2010. That gives you about eight months to plan the viewing party.

This led me to further consideration; here's the Monsters and Critics article, a fairly detailed description.  Unsurpisingly, the RogueClassicist was on it long ago; also, I discovered the Classics blog of Gustavus Adolphus college, and its post on the series.

And what do you know?  The next post was about the Greek tragic background of the now-defunct HBO series, "The Wire"...Also worth a read...

Classical Western

On the occasion of the Criterion Collection's release of The Furies, by Anthony Mann, some fanfare:

The 1950s were arguably the greatest years of the Western — the period in which cliches were sustained and destabilized through psychology, revisionism, high style, and the kind of grandeur that follows when the most durable cliches are reframed against classical paradigms. Consider "The Furies," in which a baggy reworking of the Oresteia is played out in an agora that stretches to the horizon, encompassing endless cattle pastures, mountainous outposts, a city strip with a saloon and bank, and communities of squatters. Yet ponderousness has no place on this Ponderosa. Anthony Mann was a director who knew his Aeschylus well enough to keep the story front and center, goading it with efficiency and brio, confining the poetry to visual effects that make the story memorable and, in two instances of sudden violence, awful — but in a good, Greek way.
...
"The Furies" is based on a novel by Niven Busch that Criterion includes with the DVD. A long-forgotten generational saga with a subtext of miscegenation that had to be laundered for the movie, it is a reminder that the themes of fratricide and patricide that haunt Mann's best films, as well as the infusion of Freudian motivations, were introduced to Westerns by Busch, as the novelist behind David O. Selznick's production of "Duel in the Sun" (1946) and as the author of the original screenplay for Raoul Walsh's "Pursued" (1947). Both of those films involve murdered fathers, fratricidal obsessions, and pasts that won't let go.
...
Here and in the four subsequent Mann-Stewart Westerns, as well as in Mann's 1958 Gary Cooper Western, "Man of the West," the furies are in the maddened eye of the protagonist. Generational slaughter is either a stain that fratricide expunges or a necessity to cleanse the son.

Lynch and Herzog Take on Sophocles

David Lynch and Werner Herzog are reported to be collaborating on a film this summer, entitled My Son, My Son, and drawing on the reservoir of classical drama...

My Son, My Son is based on the true story of a man who, based upon a play by Sophocles, kills his mother with a sword. Lynchian enough already, the film will tell the story in a flashback structure. Also following Lynch's style, it will be shot in DV rather than film.

I take it he has a sister?

UPDATE:  Ah, of course, the RogueClassicist picked this up back when the stories began circulating.

What to Do with a Classics Degree?

Describing the back-and-forth between two unions and their recent "break-up," Vanessa Juarez (Hollywood Insider blog) reveals that some radio or TV artist remembered Thucydides...

As for AFTRA and SAG, things are so tense that the Fall/Winter issue of AFTRA’s magazine used the Peloponnesian War as a metaphor to describe the tension between the two guilds, but Reardon remains  hopeful about an eventual resolution. “I got into this because I believe there should be one performer’s union and I still believe that," she said. "Certainly the trust has been severely damaged, but there are ways to rebuild that trust and we’ll have to see what happens

Troy: Petersen's Real Vision

At Monsters & Critics, Jeff Swindoll reviews the Director's Cut of Troy, about 30 minutes longer than the theatrical release. Better than the theatrical release, he thinks. And better than the extended version of Oliver Stone's Alexander. For what it's worth.

Oedipus Tex?

At the Aspen Art Museum, there is an exhibition (until Oct. 1) of work (especially dealing with the subject of psychiatry) by Venezuelan Javier Tellez--announced in Artdaily.com; the notice also mentions a classical angle...

As the first Distinguished Artist in Residence, Téllez collaborated with members of the Oasis Club House, a psychiatric facility in Grand Junction, to create a western film based on Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex. The film will be screened in the museum’s Upper Gallery, which Téllez used as a film production studio during the course of his residency.

The film is apparently (according to the caption of the still image) called Oedipus Marshal...Apologies will be issued, I'm sure, to P. D. Q. Bach...

Inverted Greek Tragedy?

Commenting on the new episode of the Sopranos:

And Uncle Junior's act, though clearly one of a man not in his right mind, recalls the inverse Oedipal ties of his and Tony's relationship. Junior and Tony's own mother, the late Livia, once plotted to kill Tony. When reminded of that by his shrink, Tony defended Junior and his mother, more guilt ridden over sending her to assisted living than outraged at her Medea-like turpitude.

It all sets Greek tragedy on its head. The tragic flaw for this mobster turns out to be a moral conscience. Soprano, who can strangle an enemy without pause, is too forgiving.

Umm...