Clachnaben

Clahnaben from the Fettercairn to Banchory Road.

Kinnoull in the Snow

Film Notes: Ida

I've seen a few films recently, most of which were okay, some of which were overrated, none of which I thought were worthy of a review. Then yesterday I saw 'Ida'. I had bought the disk a long time ago, but somehow with time being short, it never made it to the top of the pile; until now. If I had known how good it was, I would have watched it an age ago.

The story (without too many plot-spoilers), concerns a young Polish girl who is about to take her vows and become a nun. Convent life has been all she has known, as she was an orphan, brought up by the sisters. The opening scenes see young Ida, at work in the practical and ceremonial rigours of the convent. The plot centres around Ida's farewell visit to her family - in this case her sole known relative, an aunt. The aunt is deeply opposed to Ida's religion, and in fact has been a member of the Stalinist hierarchy running postwar Poland. Her aunt's scepticism does not trouble Ida, so much as the discovery that she was orphaned because her parents were murdered during the Nazi occupation of Poland; and that she had a historic Jewish identity, to compete with her experienced Roman Catholic one. The story involves Ida's discovery of her past and navigating, (in the company of her disturbing aunt) the pleasures available outside the confines of the cloistered life; however it centres on her personal struggle to work out her identity. Central to this, is the decision she faces about whether to take her vows and "marry" Jesus, as a nun - or to become joined to the outside world.

The setting in the early Soviet-era in Poland are amazingly created, the gritty black and white filming adds a retro-feel which when combined leaves the viewer wondering if this is actually a recent film- or is in fact decades old. It is visually stunning. The other thing about the direction which is so striking is that it is never hurried, the characters are allowed to breathe, and the studies of the faces of the central protagonists are unnervingly powerful. In one scene for instance, the viewer is being asked to understand that while every other nun and novice is totally compliant; Ida is beginning to ask questions. This is conveyed not through an obvious-but-cheesy dialogue, but through a study of faces. Every head remains fixed in concentration in their prayer book; except Ida, who risks a brief glimpse up: a picture worth a thousand or more words. 

Agata Trzebuchowska is quite remarkable in her performance as the young Polish-Jewish-Catholic girl, for which she quite rightly garnered a host of awards. Amazingly it seems as if Ida has been her only film credit. Agata Kulesza plays the aunt, "Red Wanda", and is also first-rate too; as she plays a woman haunted by the past, lost in the present, and spiralling downwards into her future.

Together, the filming, directing and acting create a film which is gripping, moving, dark, and thoughtful.

Of course, the tension between what makes us who we are: nature or nurture, is in full view in this film. The protagonist here seems to have the final vote, and will have to chose between chapel and synagogue, priest and rabbi, nurture or nature. As neither a Catholic nor a Jew, I felt like a neutral, outside observer to this inner struggle. There is also though the added dynamic of secular hedonism adding a third option which adds a nice complexity to the story, which I could relate to in terms of its power to lure one away from identity and values 

The media seems to be fascinated today with the question of identity, found in programmes like Who Do You Think You Are? in which celebrities unearth their ancestry. Genealogy hunting and family-tree recording has never been more popular either. All the while geneticists and psychologists debate whose field most fully explains human behaviour. Some people find discovering their ancestry profoundly revealing, and they find a sense of place, and belonging. To others, it is an utter irrelevance, what matters to them is the present alone. The comedian Mark Steel has a wonderful stand-up show entitled "Who Do I Think I Am?", in which he speaks (with his customary wit and irreverence), about tracing his biological parents; and seeing if there are any traces of his genes in his personality; or whether who he had turned out to be is modelled more closely on his adoptive parents. The results are fascinating, and well worth a listen. The BBC iPlayer sometimes has this show on it, it is not up presently, but maybe again at some point. In short though, he seems very much the child of his adopted parents except for a few alarming traits which seems to have been, in part at least, genetic. He seems happy to acknowledge these, but on the question of identity, doesn't seem to rest on his genetic history at all - bizarre and surprising as it turned out to be (another spoiler I shall spare you).

In Ida, the film comes to a series of conclusions, ultimately Ida decides which of the paths before her is the right one. The ruins of the past are laid to rest, her sampling of the different options available to her is made, and she walks into her future.

Ida is an exceptionally thought-provoking film; and it is a thing of great beauty to watch too. The real test of a film, though, is whether the characterisation is strong enough that the viewer is drawn in enough to actually care what happens to them. Agata Trzebuchowska's Ida, is so well drawn that I for one, felt stirred by her plight, sorrow at the discoveries she makes, and the losses she endures - and fascinated by her choices. What lingers in my mind, are the striking black and white images of postwar Poland, of the Convent, the grave-side, the disintegrating Aunt, and the minimal but powerful expressions on Ida's face. 

Book Notes: Living With the Living Dead - The Wisdom of the Zombie Apocalypse by Greg Garrett

When Oxford University Press sent me a review copy of Greg Garrett's book, Living With The Living Dead, which claims amongst other things to demonstrate the cultural and theological importance of the Zombie Movie genre; I was sceptical. In the course of over two-hundred pages of analysis, Garrett removed some - but not all of my initial prejudice against his project! 

Garrett writes from a broadly Christian perspective, and yet is an enormous fan of Zombie movies, which he seems to remember in dreadful detail. This will be a struggle for many Christians from the outset. I once knew a man who literally had the words of Philippians 4:8 stuck across the top of his television. Anything which failed to pass 'St' Paul's injunction to restrict ones' thought-life to "whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy"; would be summarily switched off. The Zombies would be stopped in their tracks.. While few Christians would be that overt in their self-censorship, millions would quietly avoid (18) certificate films in general, and horror in particular. When we read that one film in Garrett's analysis is "like taking a bath in every monstrous thing humans could do if they could" (p196); it's not hard to see why that would be the case. While the opposite error might be to simply glory in the naive, the trite, the banal and the kitsch; what are we to do with a book that asks us to take seriously, and learn from the foul, gross, menacing and repulsive? Perhaps we should initially be concerned that in order to watch as many of these films as this author has done; a degree of desensitisation must have occurred, simply to cope with the repulsion, and distance himself from it. That alone might be cause enough problems to offset the positives which Garrett is keen to examine in these movies.

Garrett argues that the Zombie Apocalypse movie isn't simply gratuitous in its horror, but clever in that it is an extrapolation from  genuine fears and worries in an insecure world. As such, it might be over the top in comparison with real life - but yet resonates with its audience in a deeper way than simply scaring them like a celluloid roller-coaster. As such, he seems to speak in terms of the almost cathartic nature of watching films which expose our deepest fears and process them; the best of which  (he says), do so with nobility, hope, goodness, community and triumph. In an enormous number of case-studies (and frankly the book was too long!), Garrett shows the way in which the surviving characters have to make moral choices in the face of impending doom at the hands of Zombies, Night-Walkers or Rampaging Viruses - all of which are physical embodiments of evil. Many are faced with dilemmas which play the need for personal survival against caring for and preserving others - and are therefore explorations of the basic moral dilemma; against the most extreme of backdrops. Likewise, bands of non-Zombies, whose humanity remains intact, in many movies struggle to work together, but yet find identity and meaning in their community - themes which have obvious resonance with Christian anthropology. Indeed Garrett spends a good amount of time in a major diversion into discussing the Christian understanding of community stretching back to the monastic tradition. Some Zombie movies go even further, he argues, and demonstrate the essence of love, to give 'ones life for ones friends', and that even in the face of monstrous evil and complete breakdown of society. This is all reasonable enough, well argued, and painstakingly illustrated from Zombie (and other apocalyptic) films, books, TV series and comics.

What is less persuasive is his tentative efforts to draw parallels between the apocalyptic nature of these contemporary cultural phenomena and the biblical apocalyptic texts. Some of the alarming apocalyptic writings in the prophets, the gospels and of course in The Revelation, make us see the world as we know it as rather fragile, transient even. That this has a secular parallel in the zombie apocalypse, is a point well made. Likewise his point that a contemporary youth on Netflicks, imagining a dehumanising viral plague sweeping across Europe; is not a world away from a youngster of a previous era quaking while trying to imagine what the 'abomination that causes desolation', or the 'great beast' might mean; is well put. So too, are there parallels between the post-apocalyptic re-birth of the world in some of the more hopeful Zombie stories, and some forms of end-times tribulation theories. However the links drawn here are only suggested, not fully explored; and troublingly, I suspect for Garrett, would work better if he subscribed to the more extreme 'end-timer' dispensationalist theology. 'Left Behind' might be theologically suspect, but it might suggest some further cultural links to explore around his subject.

What I found most interesting about the book through, and most persuasive, was the opening section. Here, Garrett examines the explosion of Zombie Apocalyptic products, and their consumption in contemporary Western Society. He states, for example, that the 'Zombie Apocalypse has become the dominant nightmare image of our day', (p16), with unimaginable numbers of film purchases every day, and tens of thousands of separate Zombie related product lines on Amazon alone. He presents a battery of evidence to support his claim too. What's interesting is why he thinks there is such a widespread, and deep fascination with something as horrible as the everyday story of your friends, neighbours and loved ones becoming deranged monsters intent upon the consumption of human flesh! 

His answers are many, and nuanced, but well worth a read. He notes, for example, that after 9/11 there was a huge surge in the consumption of Zombie related stories and products. Zombie narratives then feed, on insecurity, social upheaval and threats to the social order. In fact, they are a good barometer of insecurity, and fear. Consumption of Zombie narratives also - and this is rather troubling - seem to spike when a population receives significant numbers of incoming migrants. The incessant march of the Zombie, the wave after wave of the living dead, wrecking all in their path, must reveal (albeit in exaggerated form) a deep level of fear about the cultural threat of 'foreigners', Foreigners, or 'aliens' are of course, human  - but not like us. They don't speak like 'us', dress like 'us', or share our cultural norms. To some, they apparently arrive in waves of faceless invaders; and a loss of power, control and security to the native population.

Likewise, the Zombie narrative asks us to question what it means to truly be human. Can the essence of humanity be lost, or is it inherent to anyone carrying human DNA? Can a robot ever be considered to be part human, if it is programmed to look, feel and sound like a human - or might it march Zombie like through our culture? The dilemma of whether the surviving human can legitimately kill the Zombified loved-one, who is recognisable but not what they were, opens up all kinds of fascinating ethical debates from the history of slavery in the USA where slaves at one time counted as 'three-fifths of a person' in population census's; to the status of a person with advanced dementia who looks the same, but yet is not what they were. It doesn't give answers to these questions, and doesn't actually offer much of a framework for getting to an answer - but the questions raised are important nevertheless.

Most profoundly of all however, there is the lurking fear that in the middle of mindless Western consumption, it is not the other who is being Zombified, and having its humanity diminished, but oneself. While the consumer of a Zombie film will instinctively identify with the survivor character, perhaps, suggests Garrett, we have a greater fear that in our consumption-at-all-costs lifestyle, our trampling on each other in the market economy, and radical individualism, we have actively depleted our own humanity; or at least failed to embrace its fullness. Several movies explore this by having Zombies in all their blank, empty, hollowness, shopping in shiny American Malls, unable to think, only to consume. Again it begs deep-seated questions about the purpose of life. If the ancient answer that the chief end of man was to glorify God and enjoy Him forever, gave way to 'I think therefore I am', if what we have now is just 'I consume therefore I am'; then we are just as well to be scared at the sight of the hollow, empty stare of the Zombie, which looks uncomfortably mirror-like. Likewise the Marxist concept of Alienation has some resonances here, with the way in which technology has made so many jobs de-skilled and repetitive; we fear the Zombie, because he is un-creative and mindlessly programmed to act. Again, contemporary life uncomfortably mirrors horror.

Garrett finally sees the good moral message of the Zombie Apocalypse as being one in which, despite the real and often unspeakable horrors of the world-gone-wrong in which we live, where cultural, environmental, nuclear, political or viral catastrophes threaten; we still have agency, still have humanity, and can still chose to fight for the good. (212). That's fine, but I couldn't help wondering if what was needed next was an explanation of how the Christian message offers hope, meaning, vitality and life-affirming wholeness to the alienated, the insecure, the bleak and the worried. That would have been a more robust and compelling conclusion - especially for the millions of consumers of these stories he identified.

Did Garrett succeed in turning me into an appreciator of gory, horror apocalyptic movies, TV-series, and the like? Absolutely not. I still think they are ghastly, and if I never see another one, I won't be one bit sorry!

Ben Gulabin

Ben Gulabin is a great little hill, a charming Perthshire Corbett. It does look enormous and rather daunting when it fills the horizon for Northbound drivers on the Perth-to-Braemar A93. In fact, the high starting point, a mile or so beyond the snow-gates at the Spittal of Glenshee, and its relatively low height, make it a pretty straightforward outing - even in Winter conditions. 

The starting point is at an obvious gate, where a track forks away from the main road, and ascends the a little of the lower slopes of Ben Gulabin, while curving between the main mountain and the adjacent Creagan Bheithe. 

The track continues between the two hills and out towards Carn a Gheoidh, and the route to the summit involves a 90' turn to the left from the track, and into the hill. Without snow, there is probably a path; today under snow cover there was just the feint clue of some faded boot prints to indicate the best route up. The OS map has a ruin by the path marked, which would give a clue as to where to turn, but as this ruin is now flat with the ground, it is not actually visible from the track. The key thing is to ensure that you walk beyond the steep gully in the hillside before starting the ascent. 

The ascent up the side of the hill is a bit steep, and in snow and ice crampons were a necessity. The track seems to terminate at the low point on the ridge between the two tops. The lower one to the left, would have been worth visiting on a clear day - however as I had walked up into the clouds I turned right along the broad ridge, and picked my way over some bouldery outcrops, trying to avoid the worst depths of the snow, to the summit. The only other walkers I saw all day, on the lower reaches of the track, were in snow-shoes, and there were times when I envied their ability to stay on top of the soggy stuff! My only other company was a series of enormous mountain hares, leaping about on the hillside, in their white fur.

I took the opportunity to try out my new Winter jacket, (which my family had bought be for my birthday last week). It was SO good that on the climb I cooked inside its thermal layers! It was only when I stopped on the top that I realised just how cold the air temperature actually was, and layered up for the descent  - following my footsteps back down the mountain to the waiting car - and home.

iPhone photos!