Sex and the City 2 (the movie)



There are several parts in this movie that attracted my attention most:

1. Carrie's so-called 'scandal' to kiss Aidan
2. Miranda's decision to quit from her job
3. the private conversation between Miranda and Charlotte
4. the way the scriptwriter ended the story

CARRIE'S kissing Aidan

I remember in one serial of SATC where Carrie and Big were not a couple, they had a date in California, when Carrie attended her first book reading. Big seemed so guilty toward Carrie when reading Carrie's first book entitled SEX AND THE CITY because reading one article to another article to another in fact made Big realize how he hurt Carrie's feeling. Carrie -- who had been horny since leaving New York and expecting to have sex with Big (Carrie chose to do it with her ex boyfriend rather than with any other guy, a stranger) -- thought that the book became her big obstacle to appease her lust. So when Big refused to do it because he was worried if he would hurt her more, Carrie said, "Oh come on, it it JUST SEX." Big responded, "But in your book you said, "it is NOT JUST sex ..."

I did not think that Carrie would be that troubled due to the kiss she had with Aidan, although she did it accidentally because they accidentally met each other in one traditional market in Abu Dhabi, more than 6000 miles away from New York, although their dinner was not done accidentally. Carrie could have refused the dinner invitation, but she did come to Aidan's hotel.

After the short 'accident' kiss, Carrie rushed back to her hotel and told her best girl friends. Miranda and Charlotte who were still having a heart-to-heart conversation about their being a mother, were just speechless, could not say a word. They were too shocked to hear it or to see Carrie's troubled facial expression after doing it? LOL. (joking ...) While Samantha who was still having relaxing bath to prepare herself before dating a hot Arab man, 'easily' said, "Don't tell Big! It is JUST A KISS." when Carrie said that she had to 'repent' by telling Big the truth because she did not want to have any secret between Big and her. It is sooo Samantha. LOL.

Carrie eventually told Big. And he was shocked.

MIRANDA's decision to quit from her job

Although I repetitively said (or wrote) in my blog about the definition of being a feminist is to have her own authority to make any decision -- for example to work professionally or to be a full housewife -- Miranda's decision surprised me.

I love Aidan's remark on Carrie, "You are anything but being traditional."

I think this remark was also appropriate for Miranda (as well as Samantha). I would not think that Miranda would quit to be able to attend a ceremony at Brady's school to make him happy.

MIRANDA AND CHARLOTTE's private conversation

This part is very feminist. LOL. or you can say humane. :) Both Miranda and Charlotte were mothers. So different from Carrie and Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte's days were full of taking care of babies. Miranda got Brady 'accidentally' because she did not plan to get pregnant. Charlotte was on the way around. Charlotte and Harry, her husband, tried hard to get a baby. They adopted their first baby, while the second one was their own.

"I really want to be a mother but then when having two babies sometimes I want to get rid of them. I need some private time to be on my own!" Charlotte said.

"That is very natural, don't feel guilty for that. I experience that too after I decided to quit from my job." Miranda agreed.

Absolutely I agree with these two good friends. Everyone is entitled to have some private time to be themselves, to do anything they want, such as to be with their good friends. In this case, it means I also agree with Big's idea to sometimes live separately from Carrie, although it does not necessarily mean they do it regularly, let's say like Big's idea, to live separately for two days EVERY WEEK.

One surprising thing from the private conversation was when Charlotte -- the most traditional one of the four -- said that she was even more worried to lose her nanny -- she was outstandingly a very good one, and her babies love her -- rather than Harry. Erin was illustrated as a very sexy woman with big boobs and never wore bra! Charlotte was somewhat offended when Samantha said that probably Harry would get attracted to Erin and cheat Charlotte. And Charlotte several times saw with her own eyes how Harry got stuck to look at Erin's boobs in several occasions.

THE ENDING

I must say that I was disappointed to see how the scriptwriter ended each problem, especially Charlotte's problem with her nanny, Erin. The writer made Erin as a lesbian so that she would not get attracted to Harry at all. Why that simple? :-( (So, what do you expect Nana? Just like one sinetron in Indonesia? Despite the hot temptation, as a pious (probably?) Jew, Harry tried hard not to get attracted by Erin? LOL. And he successfully passed it. LOL.

That Big forgave Carrie for kissing Aidan was not a surprise. It was JUST a kiss and both Big and Carrie were grown-ups. The silly thing (seemed like teenagers anyway for me) was when Big asked Carrie to vow, "I will not kiss any other man but my husband." LOL.

That Miranda then found another job was very predictable.

And Samantha got hot and wild sex with that Arab guy was not a surprise. Samantha seemed to always get the same role, a very hot one. I adore her because I am not sure if I can be as sexually open as she is. LOL.

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The Life Before Her Eyes

“The power of visualization can shape one’s own future.”

This movie – The Life Before Her Eyes – is based on the thesis above. Diana, Evan Rachel Wood, is imagining what her future life would be like after she listened to the speech given by one professor at her school, Paul McFee.

Diana is an imaginative, impetuous, wild teenager. After listening to McFee’s speech, Diana starts to visualize her future life. She is married to Professor Paul McFee, having one daughter, Emma, and she works as an art teacher. Contradictory from her life as a wild teenager, she visualizes her future life as a very ‘common’ woman in general, in a very common marriage life.

However, Diana cannot prove the thesis stated by the professor, that she can shape her own future by having strong visualization – that she would lead a very common life, like many other women on the globe. Diana is tragically killed in a Columbine-like shooting incident at her school. When the killing happens, Diana is in a restroom with her best friend, Maureen. After shooting many people around the school, Michael, the shooter, enters the restroom where Diana and Maureen tensely wait for their turn. Michael forces the two girls to choose which one to be killed. Maureen offers herself first. Michael then asks Diana why not her. She acquiesces and asks to be killed. She is then shot and dies; leaving Maureen shocked.

The interesting thing from the visualization, in my opinion, is that Diana visualizes herself as a very ‘common’ woman, a married woman, having a kid, working as a teacher, and her loving husband (eventually) is involved in an affair with a younger woman. Diana’s life as a teenager is different from Maureen who is depicted as a conservative girl. Diana exposes her curiosity in drugs and sex by having a relationship with a guy who likes her because she is a ‘courageous’ girl. The guy does not want to be responsible, though, after Diana gets pregnant, and let her solve the problem by going to the hospital herself to get abortion.

Nevertheless, Diana visualizes her daughter, Emma as having a personality trait like her. This makes herself feels very concerned.

Anyway, when finally Michael chooses to kill her, instead of Maureen, from her facial expression, one can see that Diana is depicted to die peacefully. She has saved her best friend’s life.

PT56 11.15 090510

The Pursuit of Happyness

“We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal that they are endowed by their Creator with inherent and inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, …”
(The Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson)

Obviously Chris Gardner, the main character in the movie entitled “The Pursuit of Happyness”, a film by Gabriele Muccino was really obsessed by what Jefferson wrote—that all men are endowed the right to pursue happiness. The movie inspired by a true story has Will Smith as Chris Gardner, Thandie Newton as Linda, and Jaden Christopher Syre Smith as Christopher, their son.

When watching the movie, I was touched by the big belief of Gardner that he was really endowed that right. Everybody deserves to be happy and everybody has their own way to pursue their happiness, no matter their color, the gender, the ethnic group, the religion, etc. Therefore, everybody must strive to reach it.

Linda also believes in it. When she thinks that her husband cannot make her happy in their marriage, she has her own way to pursue her own happiness—by leaving her husband whom she thinks impotent to look for money. She is tired of being poor, having to work hard—double shift—to pay the bills while in the beginning of their marriage, she is promised happiness by her husband; happiness that she thinks without financial constraint, without her having to work double shift.

When leaving her husband, she takes Christopher with her. In America, children under 18 years old are to follow the mother when the parents are separated or divorced. However, when the following morning Chris takes Christopher from the day care, Linda doesn’t complain a lot. She does understand that Chris is a good father, only he is not really good in looking for money. That’s why when she leaves for New York to start a new life—her sister’s boyfriend opens a restaurant, Linda expects a better future there—she doesn’t mind leaving Christopher with his dad although she feels very unhappy.

Big determination of Chris to pursue his happiness—always remember what Jefferson writes in the Declaration of Independence—makes Chris do his best to reach his dream, not only for himself of course, but the more important thing is his only son. This is somewhat the reflection of his own life where he met his father for the first time when he was 28 years old. He feels very unhappy for that, and this makes him determined that if he has children, his children would know who their father is.

The story happened during the last two decades of the twentieth century. I am wondering whether Chris would get that position in the brokerage firm of Dean Witter—that miraculously changed his life—if the story had happened when Jim Crow Law still haunted America?

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Anne Frank

I just finished watching ANNE FRANK the movie. (Better late than never, do you agree?)
Some sentences and scenes of the movie were adapted from Anne Frank’s Diary. Some others, I think, were based on what happened in the reality of the second world war as well as the crazy troops of Nazi’s way to treat the Jewish. Some others, perhaps, were based on the imagination of the scriptwriter. You know, even though there is writing ‘based on the true story’ at the beginning of a movie, it cannot be avoided to include some imaginary parts.
People all know that Anne Frank died in one concentration camp due to typhus. This diseases attacked many ‘prisoners’ in the camp due to very limited food and drink as well as unhygienic condition and clothing.
Still my heart was broken when watching the parts when Margot, Anne’s sister, looked so terribly ill; when Anne’s food was stolen by another prisoner; when Anne was unhappy thinking that she would live all alone if Margot died. Before that, she heard that her dad died in the ‘gas room’, and her mom died too because of something else.
I even still expected that in the movie, Anne would survive.
Or at least, the movie would not have scenes where Anne died. I did not want to come to that part.
And the movie really did not show the part when Anne died. I felt a bit relieved. I did not need to be mourning uselessly.


However, I still felt blue after that. When reading Anne Frank’s diary I knew that her dad survived. He himself had his daughter’s diary published, to tell the world the cruelty as well as the inhumanity of Nazi. When I watched the scene of Otto Frank collapsed due to very deep sadness knowing his daughters died in the camp, I almost could feel the similar sadness.
If only Anne had known that her beloved Pim still survived, perhaps she would have tried hard to struggle to survive too.

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Into the Wild

This movie is based on Jon Krakauer’s book that tells us about the true story of Christopher Johnson MacCandless who was born on February 12, 1968 and died on August 18, 1992. Getting very disappointed by his own parents, Chris (Emile Hirsch) left them and his younger sister, Carine, (Jena Malone) as well after graduating from Emory College, where he studied only to make his parents happy, and not to pursue his own ideal. The disappointment to his parents was supported by his sickness to hypocrite society. This made him leave the crowd of people and go INTO THE WILD.
Some favorite scenes and conversations of mine in the movie are:

“Some people feel like they don’t deserve love. They walk away quietly to the empty space trying to close the gaps with the past.”

Apparently Chris talked about himself; he left his family since his parents’ problematic marriage and their trying to cover it from public as well as from the children made him label the parents big hypocrites. By saying the aforementioned statement, he realized that his parents loved him. However, his deep disappointment toward them made him feel he did not deserve the love. Therefore, he disappeared quietly from his parents’ life. He was pursuing his own happiness in the wild. He did not use the name his parents gave, and named himself as Alexander Supertramp; he even simply told some people he met during his journey that he did not have family.
Hypocrisy in society has been one mainstream topic in my blog. Examples: people who let themselves trapped in a loveless marriage only because they live in marriage-oriented society; many in that kind of marriage, women become the main victims (just like what is illustrated in this movie), then the children. People (mainly women) who think that they are luckier since they find men who are willing to marry them and feel sorry for single (moreover old maids) women, while in fact deep down in their hearts they envy those free women. People who have children not because they love having offspring but only for their own pride and selfishness.

“… get rid of this sick society. Why people, every fucking person is so bad to other people, so fucking awful. It doesn’t make sense to me; judgment, control, all that whole spectrum…”

What happened to Chris’ parents—to be hypocrites, Chris said—was also for the sake of judgment from society—to be considered happy and romantic family while in fact inside, Billie, the mother was bruised. (Why do women always become victims?)
Some people feel like they have full rights to make judgment to other people, to say what is good what is bad using their own eyes, without trying to view things from different point of view.

Saved!, Juno, Gilmore Girls

A coin has two sides.
Just like a movie has many interpretations, not only two.
I plan to watch JUNO with my students this Monday. I have watched this movie with another class before, around a month ago, and I think this movie is quite ‘safe’ to be watched by teenagers: there is no vulgar scene, although the story is about a sixteen-year old teenager who gets pregnant outside the wedlock. I opine that the script writer as well as the producer of this movie wanted to give an alternative to teenagers how to face unwanted pregnancy; and to parents a kind of suggestion how about to stand together with the pregnant kid, to be supportive with the kid’s choice, instead of just blaming her without showing any comforting response, without realizing that sometimes female teenagers get pregnant not merely due to their own mistakes—such as accusation to have low moral because having sex out of a wedlock—but can also be engendered by the parents who don’t give enough attention, or too much controlling.

Saved!, Juno, Gilmore Girls

In this article, I want to compare three movies that have similar cases: SAVED!, JUNO, and one serial GILMORE GIRLS. They all have the similar topic: a sixteen-year-old girl who got pregnant outside the wedlock. Nevertheless, the cause of the pregnancy is different. The way to handle the case is different too.
SAVED! was produced in 2003/2004. This movie has very strong Christian teachings as the background. Mary, the leading character, got pregnant because she wanted to “save” his boyfriend who admitted that he was a gay in a telling-secret-under-the-water game. Feeling shocked, and with her head crashed something hard when she was about to go out of the pool, Mary saw a vision of Jesus coming to her, telling her that she was chosen to ‘save’ Dean (from being sinfully homosexual). Being able to make Dean enjoy their lovemaking, Mary thought she was successful to “cure” his ‘psychological/mental disease’. Therefore, she was very disappointed when knowing that Dean’s parents still sent him to Mercy House, a kind of rehabilitation to ‘solve’ any kinds of problems; such as addiction to drugs, homosexuality, until girls getting pregnant outside the wedlock. She felt cheated by Jesus’ vision coming to her.
JUNO was produced in 2007. The cause of Juno to get pregnant was merely she was curious to know what sex was like. ‘Playing’ something she didn’t know with one good friend, Paulie Bleeker rewarded her unwanted pregnancy.
GILMORE GIRLS was produced in 2004/2005. Lorelai Gilmore got pregnant when she was 16 years old merely because she wanted to rebel her controlling parents, especially her mother, who never gave her freedom to be herself. She always felt strangled in her parents’ luxurious house. Meanwhile, her teenage boyfriend, Chris, did that to get rid of his parents’ obligation to continue his study at Yale because he didn’t feel sure to be able to do that.
The solution to face the unwanted pregnancy is different. Mary, at SAVED! kept it secret, trying to hide her pregnancy She even did not tell Dean about it, not to her mother either. With help of her two schoolmates, Cassandra and Roland, she tried her best to hide her swollen belly under some special clothes. In another word, it can be concluded that Mary decided to keep her baby, although at the very beginning she was thinking of abortion.
At Gilmore Girls—as people can easily guess, because this serial focuses on the very intimate, best-friend-like relation between the mother and daughter—Lorelai decided to keep her baby too, but by leaving her parents’ home and doing her best to survive, as well as raising her daughter. She refused Chris’ offer to marry him because she thought both of them were not ready yet to live together in a marriage, moreover she knew very well that Chris was not psychologically and financially mature yet. This would just make the marriage not work well that possibly would just ruin the relationship of three of them—Lorelai, Chris, and Rory, their daughter, especially Rory’s mental development.
At JUNO, a bit similar to SAVED!, Juno was thinking of terminating her pregnancy too. However, then, she got a very brilliant idea, to find a couple of husband and wife who wanted to have a baby very much. She got one. The difference from SAVED was that Juno didn’t try to hide her pregnancy from her parents as well as her schoolmates. Bleeker, the father of the baby-to-be knew too the result of their ‘playing game’.
None of the three movies gave solution to marry the sixteen-year-old girl with the boy with whom they had sex, or with any other guy who was willing to “save” the good name of the family, a typical solution that usually happens in Indonesia.

Solution in Saved!, Juno, Gilmore Girls

SAVED! The failure of Mary to ‘cure’ Dean to me means that the producer as well as the script writer wants to tell the viewers that some people indeed were born to be homosexual, not because of the influence of wrong socialization. Before Dean told Mary about his secret—being a gay—he was involved in a Christian community, dedicated his life following Jesus’ steps. Any celestial religion will consider homosexuals sinful therefore they must be ‘saved’. In fact, Dean eventually had to give in his innate call.
Mary—who was involved in the same Christian community as Dean—was excited to be ‘chosen’ to help cure her boyfriend with the Jesus vision inside the pool. However, after she ‘sacrificed’ by having sex with Dean, Dean was still a gay. Furthermore, she seemed to be ‘punished’ by God to have sex outside the wedlock with the unwanted pregnancy. This ‘accident’ made her lose her strong belief that people would always find solution in religious teachings blindly, without using their common sense. Eventually, her mother accepted the fact that Mary got a baby; she did not need to send Mary to Mercy House because Mary was not a problematic teenager only because she was pregnant outside the wedlock. Mary needed the support of her mother to live her life much more strongly than to be sent to that kind of rehabilitation center which in fact did not really help the ‘victims’.
JUNO. Juno had decided to give away her baby to a couple when she told her parents about her pregnancy. Feeling shocked, but trying to hide it, the parents showed a strong support to Juno’s decision. The father—worried if Juno would be cheated because she was just a kid—accompanied Juno when meeting the couple who would adopt her baby. The mother protected Juno’s mental condition when people accused her a problematic teenager with her unwanted pregnancy. Juno expected that she would continue her life ‘normally’ (read  just like any other teenagers who didn’t get similar accidents) after she delivered her baby.
GILMORE GIRLS. Lorelai decided to run away from home, to deliver her baby, and to raise her using her own way—having intimate relationship with the baby, open communication, without ‘you’ve-got-to-listen-to-me-coz-I’m-your-mother’ trait toward Rory, a way to raise up a baby Lorelai believed would work much better than just controlling. By doing so, she believed that Rory would not end up getting unwanted pregnancy at a very young age.



Multi-interpretations

Especially the two movies above—Saved! and Juno—some people around me opined that the movies even encouraged teenagers to ‘play’ with sex because when they accidentally got pregnant, their parents would even support them and didn’t punish them anything, not even to scold them. (This reminded me of one article in a local newspaper stating that in the movie of BERBAGI SUAMI—LOVE FOR SHARE in English—Nia Dinata wanted to encourage men to be polygamous.)
I have never invited my students to watch SAVED! so that I don’t get any input yet from my teenage students. However, in JUNO, my teenage students could see the complicated things Juno had to undergo, the insecurity a teenage girl had to face in their daily life when getting unwanted pregnancy. This obviously will NOT encourage them to get similar problem, moreover if their parents punish them for embarrassing their ‘good name’ by getting pregnant outside the wedlock.

Conclusion

A movie indeed can be interpreted from different points of views. When showing a movie about teenagers’ life, we as parents/teachers are supposed to accompany the teenagers and then have a live and open discussion to come up to a beneficial interpretation for both sides.
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Freedom Writers 2

After writing the result of the discussion in my class on FREEDOM WRITERS, in this article I will write what I like most from this movie.
Erin Gruwell is always the most conspicuous character. She really did her very best for her students although being a teacher at Wilson High School didn’t give her much money. Her own father, Steve Gruwell, who inspired her to treat others as well as she could, without looking at the different ethnic groups (from Steve’s involvement in the civil right movement), praised his daughter as a gifted person. I do appreciate her willingness to do two other part time jobs to make her earn more money where she used the money to provide facilities her students needed, especially books, and some other experiences they got from the trips they did out of town. The trips as well as the books opened her student’s awareness that there was a different kind of life beyond their own hard life. She opined that assigning her students to read DIARY OF ANNE FRANK would make them realize that they were not the only one to suffer from racial discrimination. Living a life as a gang member would even make their life more chaotic.
Among Erin’s students (I noted down eight of them, Eva, Marcus, Andre, Jamal, Cindy, Tito, Gloria, and Ben), I was very interested in Eva and Marcus. Eva easily attracted my attention since her life was portrayed at the very beginning of the movie. Her father raised her to believe in “Don’t go against your own people, your own blood.” Since she was a kid, she already got to know the racial ‘principle’ in America that the Latino people “are less than the white”. She grew up hating the white since the white cops imprisoned her father although her father was innocent.
Eva amazingly controlled herself well (to show that she was a very careful person, she didn’t easily like other people, moreover if they were white) while her classmates already showed their attraction toward Erin. Her disappointment when finding out that Anne Frank died was resulted from her big dream that Anne Frank, as the symbol of resistance, had to survive. She viewed herself as in the same shoes as Anne in the past. When Anne died, would she have to die too?
Eventually, Eva made a big change when she showed her courage by telling the truth in the court. She decided to do this by herself in spite of the fact that her parents as well as her Latino community asked her to protect Paco. This “seemingly small” step was expected to open people’s eyes to tell the truth so that they would do the same thing.
Marcus also stole my attention. His rebellious character came to an end in Erin’s way of teaching. Erin successfully made him realize that education would really make a big change in his life. Going back to his family’s house showed his seriousness to alter his way of life besides studying seriously.
My favorite scene in the movie is the discussion between Erin and Scott, her husband, before he left the house. When Scott asked her to choose between the class and him, Erin came to her realization that what she was looking for in her life was to make her life meaningful by helping her students get rid of their hard life as gang members where they would oftentimes get involved in racial tensions. Her dedication to her job gave her a much greater satisfaction as well as happiness than to dedicate her life to her husband. ‘Helping’ more people to live decently gave her life more senses than just ‘helping’ one person—her husband.
This reminded me of one character in T.S. Eliot’s play “The Cocktail Party”, Celia. Celia who didn’t find what she was looking for in her relationship with Edward realized that she wanted to dedicate her life to human beings, not just one person, Edward, who happened to be married to Lavinia. This awareness—that what she was pursuing in her life was to dedicate her life to God by taking care of human beings—made her decide to go on a missionary.
Happiness in someone’s life—especially in women’s lives—is not necessarily always related to marriage life. When some women find deep happiness in dedicating their life to their husband and children, some other women possibly find it in different ways. Erin chose her students because that was her call. Btw, luckily Erin didn’t live in Indonesia where women get praised as “true and honorable women” only via marriage, especially by dedicating their life to their husband. Erin would get ‘bitch’ label since she ignored her husband, and chose her students instead. People would say that Erin just cared for her own happiness.
Another part of the conversation between Erin and Scott that attracted me was as follow:
“Why can’t you stand by me, and be a part of it, the way a wife supports her husband?” asked Erin to Scott.
“Because I cannot be your wife,” answered Scott.
The above exchange has always been my favorite dialog in the movie. Scott—or patriarchal men in general—would feel impotent when realizing that his wife was more successful than they were. This also apparently would hurt men’s ego.
Scott had shown his disappointment when Erin had the second part time job at Mariott hotel during weekend. “You even didn’t ask me,” was his first complaint. His second complaint was, “Everyone knows you can do anything!” He showed his being inferior in front of his smart wife since he lost his spirit to pursue his architect degree.
In patriarchal culture, men are always welcome to work hard, they even will get appreciation from society as good husbands. However, when women do that, they will even get mockery and they will be considered to oppose their destiny to be domestic creature, because they don’t do household chores as they “are created”. So, instead of getting appreciation because she had dedicated her life for her “unfortunate” students, Erin would get disapproval from society.
To end this writing, I want to cite my own idea of being a feminist: women are free to choose what kind of life they want. I do appreciate Erin’s choice to make her life more meaningful by dedicating her life to her job and deserting her marriage life. In our life we often come to time when we have to make a choice. Erin has absolutely made the best choice, to help more people (her students) than just one spoiled man (her husband).
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Freedom Writers 1

On Saturday 17 May 2008 I invited my class to watch FREEDOM WRITERS. The class consisted of 15 students, 4 guys and 11 girls, and all of them are college students. Before watching the movie, I gave three questions to be discussed afterwards:
1. Which character attracts you most? Why?
2. Which scene in the movie attracts you most? Why?
3. What do you think of the moral lesson conveyed by the movie?
For the first question, since Erin Gruwell has always been chosen by my students (when I invited some other classes to watch this movie), I asked the students in this class to pay more attention to the students in Gruwell’s class.
In short, Freedom Writers portrays the struggle of the new teacher, Erin Gruwell, to make her students—that mostly have been involved in gang life, violence, killing, drugs, etc—realize that education is the most important aspect in their life if they want to make a change to their lives.
For the first question, 8 students chose Marcus to be the most attractive character. They had a similar reason for that: they considered Marcus the most successful to make a change in his life. He left his family to get involved in street life as gang member because he thought it was the only way to show ‘tolerance’ to other African American people who had always been marginalized. In one long discussion/debate between Erin and the class (spurred by one student’s cartoon to ridicule Black people), one can find out how Marcus viewed his life: he felt like a hero when he showed tolerance to the sufferings of other African American people who happened to live on the street. He opined that if he got killed in a racial discrimination, he would get respect from his ‘community’. “We live in a war everyday,” he said to Erin. However, after he got enlightened by Erin, he realized that living on the street by joining gang life to survive was not right. Therefore he decided to come home and show his family that he changed. He proved that by studying seriously and graduating from high school.
Meanwhile 6 students chose Eva Benita as someone who made a great change in her life. Eva was raised by a father who believed that the white always marginalized the other ethnic groups. No wonder if Eva hated Erin who happened to be white. However, eventually Eva realized that not all white people were like what her father described. Erin who introduced the students to the Holocaust disaster—as an analogy to the kind of life her students had—successfully made Eva break what her father always taught her, “Don’t go against your own people!” In the court, Eva told the judge the truth about one accident where she was the crime witness. Although Eva had to risk being hated by her own father and Latino community, Eva daringly did what she thought it was the right thing to do. She must have been inspired by what Mip Gies did, the woman who help hide Anne Frank during the Holocaust.
One student chose Ben Samuel, the only white student in Erin’s class. Outside the classroom, the white were the majority while inside the class, Ben was the minority. If at the very beginning Ben showed his restlessness to be in that class, felt very insecure among the Cambodian, Latino and Black students, eventually Ben stayed put in the class and behaved like one member of a big family consisting of various ethnic groups comfortably.
To discuss the three questions, I divided the class into four groups. For the second question, the first groups chose a scene when Erin did ‘line game’. She put a red line in the middle of the classroom. Afterwards, she asked some questions to her students. If the question applied to the students’ interest (or if the students answered ‘Yes’ to her Erin’s questions), the students were to stand close to the red line. The essence of the ‘game’ was that Erin wanted to make her students realize that they were all undergoing similar lives. When they had similar experiences in life, they were supposed to have one strong emotional tie among themselves and not to hate the other ethnic groups. Erin was successful to make her students aware that they did not need to show hostility to the others because in fact they faced the same problem. While for Ben, the only white in the class, Erin wanted to make him view life from other ethnic groups’ perspective—who happened to be the minority groups in America.
The second group chose a long debate—spurred by Tito’s cartoon on Black people, especially to ridicule Jamal—between Erin and her students. This debate made Erin know more what kind of problems her students faced. This also inspired her to broaden her students’ horizon that happened to know nothing about anything else but their own life. This resulted in Erin’s bigger dedication to her job. She did two other part time jobs to get more money to buy books for her students, also to take them on trips: to visit museums, to have dinner with ex Holocaust victims, etc. This “impractical” way of teaching of Erin’s proved to work well.
The third group chose the scene when Erin read her students’ journals. This made Erin realize how difficult her students’ lives were. That’s why they had bad behavior and didn’t pay serious attention to their studies. Writing to let go off their restlessness and anxiety seemed to help them release tensions in their daily life. Moreover at the same time their writings let the world know their sufferings. To know this would make people give sympathy.
The last group chose the scene when Erin started the first day in the sophomore year by having ‘a toast for change’ session. After making it till the end of their freshman year, the students were expected to have a new perspective in viewing their study. Erin was also successful to make her students feel like they were in one big family in a ‘warm home’ in their classroom, Room 203.
For the third question, the four groups agreed that the movie conveyed “No more racial discrimination, please!” It will be very lovely if, despite difference in ethnic groups, languages, customs (plus religions), people live together hand in hand peacefully as well as respect one another.
PT56 14.35 180508

FREEDOM WRITERS

When doing small researches to write a paper I entitled “America – A Dream that Has Not Come True” in African American Literature Class and another paper I entitled “’Salad Bowl’ and ‘Anti Semitism’ in Elmer Rice’s Street Scene” in Modern American Literature class in 2003, I was wondering if racial prejudice portrayed in “Street Scene” and racial discrimination illustrated in Langston Hughes’ poem—Will V-Day Be Me-Day Too?—can still be easily found in America at the end of the twentieth century and in the beginning of the twenty first century.
When watching FREEDOM WRITERS, a movie inspired by a real event in Long Beach California that happened at the last decade of the twentieth century, I got the answer of that question of mine. Racial prejudice, racial violence, racial discrimination, or whatever people call it, still exists in the land Langston Hughes mentioned as a dream country for million immigrants with various color skins in his poem “Freedom’s Plow”. The movie starts with live news on TV showing gang violence and racial tension causing more than 120 people killed, following the Rodney King riots. It is followed by a depiction of how a Latino father raises his daughter—Eva Benita, one central character in the movie—to be the next generation of a gangster. The marginalized communities living in Long Beach—say Latino, Asians, and Black—believe that they have to fight each other for territory, kill each other over race, pride, and respect. In short, I can say that Long Beach is the “modern” area of the cheap tenement portrayed by Elmer Rice in his realistic play STREET SCENE (1929). What I mean “modern” here is people using more advanced ‘media’ to show their prejudice and hatred against different races, such as guns. In Long Beach, people are divided into some separate sections, depending on tribes. The Latinos get along with their own tribe, so do the Asians and Blacks. They openly show their hatred to each other. However, they can become united when facing the mainstream of America—the Whites.
For the marginalized tribes’ hatred toward the Whites, Eva said, “White people always want to be respected as if they deserve to get it for free. It is all about colors. It is all about people deciding what you deserve; about people wanting what they don’t deserve; about white people thinking they can get anything … no matter what.”
The amazing aspect from the movie is the way Erin Gruwell, one white English teacher working for Woodrow Wilson High School chosen by the government to be reform school with voluntary integration program to win her students’ hearts—many of them are just out of juvenile prison due to gang fights—to make them want an education and believe that the education will better their future. Failing to get her students’ attention on the first day, slowly Erin succeeds making them united to be hostile to her due to her white complexion. Later on Erin can get their attention and make them interested to read the books she buys for them, although it means she has to have an extra job to get money to buy the books. After making them interested to read the books she provides, Erin eventually succeeds making them realize that education will really change their future to be better. Nevertheless, her hard work and much time she dedicates for her students result in divorce because her husband—feeling neglected—does not agree with her way of living. Besides, Erin realizes that her happiness is gathered when she can help her students aware the meaning of their lives, and not just as a wife of a man.
This amazing movie is produced by Double Feature Films Production. Hilary Swank plays as Erin Gruwell, Patrick Dempsey as Scott Casey, Erin’s husband, Scott Glenn as her father, who always supports anything Erin does for her students, and April Lee Hernandez as Eva Benita.
PT56 13.20 161007

P.S.: You can view my post at http://afeministblog.blogspot.com/2007/10/america-dream.html for my paper "America - A Dream that Has Not Come True Yet" and my other post at http://afeministblog.blogspot.com/2007/10/salad-bowl-versus-melting-pot.html for my paper on STREET SCENE

Denias Senandung di Atas Awan

“Denias Senandung di Atas Awan” (“Denias humming from above the cloud”) is one of good movies produced by Indonesian producers. It is produced by Alenia Pictures. The story-based one a true story-is about one boy named Denias living in Papua, one quite big island in Indonesia, located in the eastern part of the archipelago. The island has one so-called biggest gold mining company in the world, the Freeport. However, it doesn’t mean that the native people there live wealthily. Denias used to live in one poor village located in inland and the villagers still practice the ritual ceremonies from their ancestors.
There are five interesting things that I noted when watching it.
Mourning ritual ceremony
When Denias mother died in an accident, because a torch used fell down and burnt the house made of wood, his father had to undergo the mourning ritual ceremony, his left forefinger was cut. While for the other family members, they had to bath in mud.
For the first ritual, the forefinger is cut to show the mourning, I, as one stranger of one ethnic group in the Papuan culture, am of opinion that this practice is really not humane. The husband will get double pain, the mental and the physical. Although I must say that when I get psychologically troubled, sometimes I want to injure my body so that I will get injured not only inside but also outside. (I always suspect myself as suffering from sado-masochism.)
This ritual reminds me of the practice of suttee in India in the previous century. When a husband died, the wife had to throw herself into the blaze burning the corpse of the body. This is much more inhumane because a woman deserved life no longer when her husband died. Mary Daly stated that suttee was legally banned in 1829. I am wondering if in this era there is still one ethnic group in India still carries out this inhumane practice?
Discriminative treatment toward other people
One scene in the movie shows this discrimination when the Board of School refuses to accept Denias as one student there, with reason, “Denias does not come from the surrounding area. This school is especially for children from ethnic groups living around here.” Sam Koibur, one teacher in the school tries her best in order that Denias can study there because she sees good potential in Denias. This is what she says toward the Board of School:
“When the first time I came to this place, I heard a lot about the discriminative treatment toward other people. At first I thought that the discriminative treatment was only done by the newcomers; but in fact the native people here also can do the unfair treatment toward their fellow inhabitants.”
The situation is absolutely different from the one in Java, the most densely populated island in Indonesia. In Semarang, my hometown located in Central Java province, the government needs to issue regulation of ‘regionalization’ where students are to study in the school located in the same region where they dwell. If not, smart students will flood the most favorite state schools downtown, and the schools located in the suburb will only get the less intelligent students. This creates gap among state schools.
Papua is an island where the native people have dark skin with kinky hair. There are many ethnic groups there with different local languages that make them not able to communicate well if there is no national language-Bahasa Indonesia. Once I met a Papuan person that told me in the past people from those different ethnic groups often fought to each other because of misunderstanding, miscommunication, and different habits. This reminded me of the beginning story of slavery in the United States where many dark skinned people were brought from Africa to America to be slaves. (I refer to AMISTAD movie.) On the ship they could not communicate because they spoke different languages. In America they were treated very badly by the whites, such as being whipped when they were considered to be slow to work, or to do some mistakes. Unconsciously this way to treat other people was stuck on their mind. Consequently, they did the same thing when other people did mistakes, or just to take revenge. In the short story “Sweat” written by Zola Neale Hurston, Hurston wrote how Sykes treated his wife, Delia. It was the same way how the whites treated the black people. Considered to be under the black men, the black women had to get that severe treatment: as a revenge of the black men because they were considered lower than the whites?
The native of Papua have been treated unfairly by the new comers to that island. Feeling inferior, they do not protest. Unfortunately, then they ‘take revenge’ to their fellow native Papuan.
Papua is one of the richest island in Indonesia-with its gold mining company, the Freeport-but most of the native people live poorly.
The land is rich with gold and copper. However the native don’t know how to mine ores containing gold. Therefore they cannot do anything but just become workers after the mining company was established there some decades ago. Who gets the most profit from this mining company? Not the native people of course.
Denias comes from a poor family with an uneducated father. However, one volunteer teacher says that he is smart and suggests him to pursue his dream by studying until he can reach the cloud, to see the world from above. By the end of the story Denias is accepted to study in one elementary school in the town nearby. After the movie is over, it is stated that now Denias is studying in Darwin Australia, with the scholarship he got from the Freeport company.
Studying in formal school
Since Denias’ father is uneducated, he doesn’t realize the importance of studying in a formal school. He is angry when he finds out that Denias is studying (in a makeshift hut used as temporary school) while he needs Denias’ help to do something. Pay attention to the following short dialogs between Maleo (one army member sent to the area. he was willing to teach Denias and his friends simple arithmetic, how to read and write, geography, etc) and Samuel, Denias’ father.
Maleo: I need your help to make Denias able to study again.
Samuel: Don’t interfere my affair. That is not your duty.
Maleo: I know this is not my duty but your duty.
Samuel: This is not Java. All sons have to help their parents. You don’t understand that.
Maleo: I understand that. That’s why Denias has to study. If he studies, he will be able to help you a lot later.
Samuel: That’s it. You only can say later later and later. What I need is now now and now.
From the above conversation we can conclude that process of acculturation between the culture of the native and the culture of the comers really need handling carefully and wisely so that none feels cornered and marginalized. The comers are not supposed to feel more civilized than the native, while the native are wiser to adapt with the new things. It is understandable if the native didn’t find it necessary to study arithmetic, reading, writing, etc in the old time. However now with more and more people move to Papua, it is advisable that the native study the same thing as the comers: to protect Papua their native land from the greed of the comers.
“Koteka”, traditional clothes in Papua.
To find out more about koteka, check this site: http://www.answers.com/topic/koteka
People in Papua wore ‘koteka’ in the old times. This ‘cloth’ is only to cover the genital organ of both men and women. Papuan women in the past were topless and breasts were not considered to be covered. In the beginning of the movie, there is a ritual traditional ceremony called “Wearing Koteka”. The ceremony is done in a religious way that means ‘koteka’ can be categorized something sacred because only to wear that, they need to hold a special ceremony.
This reminded me of one experience of one of my Professors at college. Several years ago he was among some other experts in culture involved to carry out some acculturation process in Papua. One of them was: “To make our brothers in Papua wear more proper and decent clothes. We are already civilized here. How can we let our brothers there stay naked and not well cultured?”
If you were the native of Papua, would you consider these strangers more civilized only because they covered up their bodies? Or would you consider them as colonizers?
Not knowing what he would do in Papua at the beginning, my Professor protested after finding out the intention of a group of so-called expert in culture from Java.
“Denias Senandung di Atas Awan” is indeed worth watching with so many moral lessons behind. The casts are: Albert Fakdawer as Denias, Ari Sihasale as Maleo, Michael Jakarimilena as Samuel, Marcella Zalianty as Sam Koibur, one teacher who helps Denias accepted in the school in the town nearby.
PT56 12.21 100807

Curse of the Golden Flower

This Zhang Yimou’s colossal movie is starred by Gong Li as the Empress and Chow Yun Fat as the Emperor. The setting is the tenth century in Tang Dynasty (923-936AD), a time of corruption, dictatorship, and warfare.
The Empress is the daughter of the previous Emperor, Liang. She married the Chief Commander of her (late) Emperor father due to the trick the Commander did. He successfully persuaded Emperor Liang to marry him to the Emperor’s daughter. To get the crown, he threw away his first wife (or his secret lover?), by imprisoning her, but then telling lies to everybody that she died. However, he already got one son from her.
Apparently the patriarchal culture in China at that time made the Commander the following Emperor with all power and might. He even had bigger power than the Empress, the legal heiress from the previous Emperor. He also made his first son from the first wife the Crown Prince!
Feeling unloved and treated unfairly (since the Emperor kept the picture of the first wife in a special holy place, and appointed the first son that didn’t have blood relationship with her as the Crown Prince), the Empress took revenge by flirting the first son, Wan. She expected to be able to persuade him to give the crown to Prince Jai, her own son?
Knowing the illicit liaison between his second wife and his son from the first wife, and feeling worried that he would no longer become the mightiest person in the country, the Emperor wanted to kill the Empress slowly, by putting a poisonous substance into the medicine the Empress drank every two hours everyday. He secretly asked the Imperial doctor to prepare the special medicine.
Feeling suspicious that there was a new substance added into the concoction of her medicine, the Empress asked the wife of the Imperial doctor to investigate it. After finding it, the doctor’s wife told her that it was black fungus from Persia. If it was consumed 2 grams daily, it could make the consumer lose his/her insanity in some months. It saddened the Empress very deeply. However, as a woman, she didn’t have power as much as her husband. She still had to obey her husband’s order—to drink the medicine. For a woman, obeying a husband’s order was the same as obeying the natural law. A husband—moreover an Emperor—was considered as mighty as the Omnipotent, the One who created the nature. Whether the man was a real good husband or a murderous devil, it didn’t matter much. A husband still had to be respected and obeyed. In this situation, women were portrayed weak and helpless.
One scene for the above example was when the Empress didn’t drink all the medicine one time, she left one or two gulps of the concoction. She already felt suspicious with it but she didn’t find out about the fact yet. The doctor reported it to the Emperor. In the occasion to welcome Prince Jai from the boundaries, where all were seated together in the terrace, the Emperor forced the Empress to drink the rest. The Empress wanted to rebel, but everybody forced her to obey the Emperor, except Prince Jai. This made her give in. Because trying to refuse to drink it, she was considered to violate the natural law, by the Emperor.
Why did Prince Jay not force her to drink it like all the rest? His experience to get involved in battles, to know the outside world for three years made him more open and broad-minded, that even a woman had right to say no and she was also supposed to be listened to. Unfortunately because he was the only one, he couldn’t really help his mother.
Meanwhile, feeling worried that she would die soon, because she didn’t have any courage to refuse the poisonous medicine, the Empress told Prince Jai about it. She realized that her effort to persuade Crown Prince Wan (by flirting him) failed because she found out that Wan even fell in love with the doctor’s daughter and had secret relationship with her, the Empress planned a coup d’etat, with the help of Jai. She didn’t want Wan to be the next Emperor, she wanted her own son to get that royal crown.
This made Jai in dilemma because he had to choose between his father or mother. He didn’t want to fight his own father because that violated the natural law. However, he didn’t have a heart either to see his father killing his mother slowly with the poisonous medicine.
Meanwhile …
The first appearance of the doctor’s wife at the thirty-fifth minute of the first disk easily caught the audience’s attention because despite the fact that she secretly helped investigate to find out what kind of new substance added into the Empress’ medicine, she refused when the Empress was about to pay her. She said she had her own grudge to the evil Emperor. This made the Empress suspicious about the relationship she had with her husband. Her suspicion grew bigger when she heard that the woman who came to the palace secretly was caught by Prince Wan and taken to the Emperor. The Emperor even released her. She must have had a very special relationship with the Emperor long time ago.
When the Emperor sent the doctor and the family away from the palace—with a very tricky reason: by appointing him to be a governor at Suzhou—the Empress saw it as a sign that the Emperor would kill the whole family of the doctor. The Empress sent secret help because she hoped that the past secret relationship between the Emperor and the doctor’s wife would be useful for her to force the Emperor to step down from the throne. She did not want the key of the Emperor’s past life to be murdered.
It means the Empress had two plans: bloody coup d’etat headed by Jai, and the shameful past background’s disclosure of the Emperor.
Did the Empress’ plan work well and did her favorite son Jai get the throne?
Watch the movie by yourself, pals. :)
PT56 21.05 030607

THE HOURS

Have you watched the movie entitled “The Hours”? It was starred by three actresses: Nicole Kidman, Julianne Moore and Meryl Streep. Each of them represented a character from three different eras. Nicole Kidman starred as Virginia Woolf, a feminist writer from England who lived from 1882 until 1941. The scene illustrated here was 1921 Richmond, England. Julianne Moore starred as Laura Brown, an ordinary housewife living in Los Angeles around 1950s. Meryl Streep starred as Clarissa Vaughn who lived in New York City around 2000s.

I want to talk about Laura Brown, the ordinary housewife who lived around 1950s America. Around that time, many American women thought that they were the happiest women in the world. The most coveted and adorable “profession” for women at that time was to be a housewife. A married woman, with good-looking, understanding, loving and rich husband, a luxurious house and car, modern household equipment, and happy and good children è those were the reasons why “housewife” became the most respectable “profession” for women in 1950s America. Many women from other countries didn’t have what American married women had, not many women had modern household equipment, a luxurious house and car because other countries were not as rich as America at that time.

Laura had those “things”, a husband, house, car, modern household equipment, a kid, and she was expecting her second baby. People must think that she was happy. However, who can guarantee of someone’s happiness (readàa woman) only coz of those “things”? Was it as simple as that?

Friends, if you watch that movie, you can conclude that Laura was not happy with what she had. In one scene, her husband said, “Life is in a marriage. To be happy is to be in a marriage too.” Laura—who was in the restroom—was crying when she heard her husband say so, but she didn’t say a word. Why? It was because she was not happy in the marriage. She didn’t feel alive in her marriage. She felt dying instead. “There was a time when you don’t belong, and you wanna kill yourself,” that’s what she said to Clarissa at the end of the movie. She felt that she didn’t belong to the community where the people thought that the ultimate goal in this life was being married. That’s why in one scene in the movie, we can see Laura who was about to commit suicide. Laura felt that she didn’t belong to the community of America at that time coz other women thought that “American women were the happiest women in the world, with a husband, luxurious car and house, modern household equipment and happy children.”

Laura didn’t commit suicide, she left her children and husband instead. She moved to Canada, got a profession as a librarian and survived alone. Why did she do that? She felt more alive when she lived alone, not committed in a marriage. By the end of the movie, we can see she survived while the other members of the family had died. She chose life, that’s why she abandoned the family. If she chose death, she would go on living with the family, and died little by little.

Friends, why do you think I talk about all this? I just wanna show you that in this patriarchal society, women also have their own way of thinking—not to get married, for example. Getting married or not is only a matter of making a choice. Get married if you are sure that it will give you happiness. Don’t get married if it is only to conform with the society while you are not sure with that. Be confident with your choice.

Not all women are happy to live in a marriage. Appreciate them who think that way. Respect their choice.

Love for Share

"Berbagi Suami" is a movie produced by one young female movie director from Indonesia, Nia Dinata. In English, it is entitled "Love for Share".
In short, the movie illustrates problems and daily routines of three different families with different background where the three husbands there practiced polygamy. The first family portrays a quite high-class social family. The wife is a doctor, an obstetrician, I suppose. No matter how high her education is, she does not complain openly when she finds out her husband has the second wife without her permission. She doesn't complain for long but her bitter reaction when she found out about the second wife for the first time. After that, she showed ignorance, as a result of her repressing her feeling. Her only son who didn't like to see his mother treated unfairly by the father always provoked her to rebel. But he didn't succeed. As a result, he grows up as a cynical guy toward love. The first wife's ignorance toward anything her husband does makes her not give a damn when she finds out the third and fourth wife of the husband. Besides ignorance, there is another possibility why she doesn't rebel openly. She is blinded by her interpretation of Islamic teaching that a man can have more than one wife.
The second family illustrates middle to lower class society. The man works only as a chauffeer or a movie producer. Different from the first man whose wife lives in different houses, the second man lives together with his three wives, and later on the fourth wife. The three wives seem to love one another so that they live together peacefully. Is it really true? If they do feel happy, by the end of the movie, the second and third wives do not need to run away from the house. They run away secretly to live together. Apparently both of these women get involved in lesbianism. They find more satisfaction and true love between both of them, rather than from their husband.
The third family illustrates Chinese family. The man and the woman have food stall and manage it together. The man then secretly marries one of the waitresses there. After some time, the first wife comes to where the secret wife lives and scolds her together with her two teenage daughters. They together almost do violence to the young wife. Trickily, the young wife pretends to be unconscious.
Obviously Nia Dinata produced such a movie to criticize the practice of polygamy in Indonesia, and not on the way around, to support people to practice it. However, many people read it wrongly.

Things You Can Tell Just By Looking At Her

Are you of opinion that people can read other people just by looking at them? Once I read somewhere, “Don’t think too much of what other people say about you. They don’t do it very often.” 
THINGS YOU CAN TELL JUST BY LOOKING AT HER is not a new movie, but quite interesting to watch and contemplate in our lives. The film has five short episodes that have respective main characters and stories although inevitably some characters also appear in another episode.
The first episode is entitled “This Is Dr. Keener”. Elaine Keener—the main character of this episode—is played by Glenn Close. Keener is an obstetrician who lives only with her elderly mother who already could not do anything except with the help of the nurse. One day she invited a fortune teller that then “read” her using cards. The fortune teller read Elaine as a lonely woman, secretive, aloof, no friend coz she was difficult to trust people, but she was tough with her being alone and lonely, bla bla bla... She had a crush on a younger workmate but he did not seem to respond her feeling.
A fortune-teller is absolutely believed that he/she can read other people. But relating it to the title of the movie, can other people “read” Keener exactly as what the fortune-teller “saw in the cards”: a lonely woman, secretive, aloof, no friend, but tough in her loneliness.
The second episode is entitled “Fantasies About Rebecca”. This is the most interesting and complicated one in my opinion. Rebecca played by Holly Hunter. She was illustrated as 39 years old She was single, had a boyfriend—another woman’s husband. Their secret relationship had been for three years. She was illustrated as six-week pregnant coz she forgot to protect herself when one day she had sex with him. She had decided to terminate her pregnancy before telling her boyfriend. When she told him about her pregnancy, he said the same thing—to terminate it.
I saw her as a very tough woman, almost without any feeling. However, perhaps she was disappointed when her boyfriend supported her to terminate her pregnancy. After telling him that she was pregnant and he told her to terminate the pregnancy, she was illustrated to go to a bar where she found one of her subworker—Walter, a man. Rebecca worked as a bank manager. After meeting at the bar, Walter and Rebecca ended that night by sleeping together. The following morning, Rebecca left Walter’ house when he was still sleeping. I interpreted it as perhaps Rebecca needed sex while her boyfriend went back to his house. Or she did that coz in fact she got disappointed by her boyfriend? Or she did that coz she thought that her body is hers so she was free to do anything she wanted to do with it—whether to have sex only with her boyfriend, or with anybody else as long as she felt okay with that, and her boyfriend didnt have any right to interfere.
Going back to Rebecca and Walter. When they met in the office the following morning, Walter kissed Rebecca in her cheeks and neck. Rebecca seemed awkward with that so that she looked so cold. When Walter said something intimate to her, Rebecca said, “If you think that this will be a regular romance, you are wrong.” Walter seemed dumbfounded to hear that, a little broken-hearted perhaps.
Background before she ended that night with her subworker. A bum “read” her as a bitch because she became a Bank Manager while she was a woman. Her male subworkers must not like to be under a woman, the bum said. (The conversation happened when Rebecca was smoking outside her office, leaning against her car because smoking was not allowed inside.) Nancy—the name of the bum—suspected Rebecca to do “bitchy” things to reach the top position.
Apparently what Nancy said a bit bothered Rebecca. That afternoon, she left early from the office because she wanted to check her pregnancy. Before leaving, she asked Walter to take care of the bank on behalf of her. Before she left, she asked Walter coolly, “Do you think male employees here have sexual fantasy about me?” Walter, smiling surprisedly, answered, “Maybe...”
After she underwent the process to terminate her pregnancy, though, she cried. Was she disappointed? What made her disappointed? That she had to lose her baby disappointed her? Or the fact that her boyfriend asked her to terminate the pregnancy disappointed her? However, before she told her boyfriend about her pregnancy, she already decided to stop the pregnancy. She said to her friend who happened to be the assistant of the obstetrician, “His wife will not like it if I have his baby.”
By the end of this episode, Rebecca was illustrated to refuse her boyfriend’s coming to her house. Did she start to realize that he in fact did not really love her. If he really loved her, he would let her keep the pregnancy, wouldn’t he? In Indonesia, having a baby is one of the main goals from a relationship, as the proof of the deep love between the couple. Perhaps it is like this too in many other areas in the world.
The end of the episode made me draw a conclusion that Rebecca wanted to stay away from her boyfriend realizing that he did not really love her, the proof is when he did not seem happy with Rebecca’s pregnancy. Her decision to terminate the pregnancy was not for herself but only to make her boyfriend happy that could mean she did not want to lose him.
The third episode is “Someone for Rose”. Rose—played by Kathy Baker—was a single mother with a teenaged son. She worked as a writer—a lonely profession—this was what her new neighbor said. Albert, a bachelor, moved back to the house left by his late mother. The house was located across from Rose’s. Rose saw Albert when moving in and quite interested in it because she had a new neighbor. On the same day she met Albert in the supermarket when shopping and then offered him for a lift on their way home. Only from this “short” encounter, they could “read” each other that they were both lonely and would enjoy the relationship together.
The fourth episode entitled “Good Night, Lilly, Good Night, Christine” illustrated a short episode of a lesbian couple. Lilly was terribly sick that would kill her soon. They met for the first time in a party, where Lilly arrived with another girl, Vicki. However, since the first time Lilly saw Christine, she already had a crush on her. After introducing to each other, soon they became very intimate and involved in an interesting talk. This made a woman ask Lilly, “Are you couple?” Christine was blushed to hear that, while Lilly answered, “I have a crush on her, yes.”
How easy or difficult to “read” people as homosexual? In Indonesia, this is not that easy. Many girls have good friends and they become very intimate but it does not mean that they are lesbians. However, this is perhaps because people are still not confident to open up their sexual orientation. Nevertheless, it is still difficult to find out two girls are lesbian couple only by looking at their intimacy. Probably because I am not one so I do not know. 

The last episode is also very interesting. It is entitled “Love Waits For Kathy”. The most interesting thing from this episode is the strong sisterhood between Kathy (played by Amy Brenneman) and Carol (played by Cameron Diaz). They live together. Kathy worked as a detective while Carol worked as a teacher teaching to read using Braille. Carol herself was blind. Therefore, she depended on Kathy in some cases. Carol taught a little girl named June whose father asked Carol for a date several times. June said, “I know my dad likes you from the tone he is using when talking about you. However, I believe that he still loves mom.” Later that night, Walter—June’s father—didn’t show up in Carol’s house although he had promised her to have dinner out together.
An interesting dialog between Carol and June:
June, “Do you live alone?”
Carol, “No, I live with my sister.”
June, “Where does she work?”
Carol, “She is a detective.”
June, “That’s cool. Is she single like you?”
Carol, “Yes.”
June, “She is not blind of course. Why isn’t she married?”
Carol, “I think she just hasn’t found the right man yet.”
June, “I think she just doesn’t want to leave you all alone.”
Blind people will get difficulty to get life partner? Because other people do not want to be bothered by an invalid? It seems that what June said was quite right. Kathy possibly loved Carol very much so that she did not want to leave her. By the end of the story, Kathy was going out to have dinner together with a forensic doctor who helped her handle a murder or a suicide case. She did not tell Carol the truth that she was going with a guy. Instead, she said that she went out with her female friend. She did not want to hurt Carol? Coincidently at the same time Carol was waiting for her date, June’s father, who even went to a bar.
PT56 15.35 310307

THE BREAK UP

“In choosing an artistic work to buy, make sure that you really love it and appreciate it. Just like in choosing a life partner with whom you will spend your entire life.”
This is what Brooke said to one of her customer.
THE BREAK UP is a movie illustrating how misunderstanding between a couple can ruin the relationship. Vince Vaughn played as Gary Grobowski and Jennifer Aniston as Brooke Meyers, Gary’s girlfriend. The misunderstanding is triggered by Gary’s underestimation to domestic chores Brooke does. Brooke who works for Marilyn Dean Gallery is also responsible to do the household chores after she goes home from work, to tidy up and clean their condo, cook for dinner, etc. Gary who thinks that he already works hard to support their life together feels that he doesn’t need to do any household chores. He also thinks it right to be spoilt by Brooke. Gary represents a man who still views man-woman relationship as public and domestic spheres. Below is one short conversation when they quarrel:
Gary : I work hard to be the best tourist guide in Chicago, to support our life together so that one day you don’t need to work.
Brooke : I WANT to work!
(the emphasis is from me. )
From her response above, it can be clearly seen that Brooke represents a woman who doesn’t want to be categorized as domestic creature. However, her care for her relationship with Gary, and I think also the common (patriarchal) idea that doing household chores belong to women, make her do those chores willingly, hoping that Gary will appreciate her. Therefore when Gary doesn’t show any appreciation to what she has done, Brooke feels very disappointed.
Another thing to point out is that when having a problem, confiding in someone who doesn’t really know the core of the problem will even make it worse. The suggestions expected to better the relationship even makes it end more quickly. An example depicted in the movie is when Gary confides in a bartender about her quarrel with Brooke. (He goes to a bar after quarrelling with Brooke.) The bartender easily says, “She must have slept with another man. Find out about him.” ups … 
Quarrelling because of misunderstanding also can make two people who actually love each other hurt each other. Brooke invites her dates to pick her up at home to show Gary that “many other men find her attractive”, while for “revenge”, Gary invites his friends and has orgy in the condo.
What Brooke says is correct, when choosing a life partner, make sure that he/she appreciates us. Appreciation will make us feel loved and cared, and this is very important to make a relationship work well.
PT56 12.15 140307

Failure to Launch

What is a single person—who is over thirty, financially secured—called when he/she still lives with his/her parents? A SINGLE PARASITE. This is what Ayu Utami said about herself in her book entitled SI PARASIT LAJANG; she only quoted from her Japanese feminist friend. These are some reasons why this kind of person is called a single parasite  living with the parents, no need to pay the bills, mother who does the household chores, father who is always willing to help, having fun in the morning, working in the afternoon, writing in the evening, no need to think of feeding the pets or cleaning the car.
This is partly illustrated in the movie entitled FAILURE TO LAUNCH. Matthew McConoughey played as Tripp, a thirty-five –year old bachelor, a quite spoilt guy who enjoys living together with his parents; a loving mother who always does his laundry, cooks for him, and does other household chores, and a father who makes the house livelier. The joy living with his parents makes him avoid getting a steady relationship with a girl. The father who wants to see the only son an independent adult by living all alone and separated from the parents makes him hire an expert to “teach Tripp to be more mature and independent”. This expert—Paula—is played by Sarah Jessica Parker. The mother in fact is not really ready to live without her only son. It is revealed when by the end of the movie, Tripp leaves the home. She says that she is already accustomed to Tripp’s presence there so that she is not sure whether she is ready to live without him. She is worried if her husband no longer loves her. Meanwhile, in another scene, it illustrates the mother’s joy to spoil Tripp by preparing him breakfast, milk, some refreshment to bring to his office, etc. The father seems jealous to see it. I am of opinion that he thinks it is time for his wife to spoil him (again) now that the son is already thirty-five years old. It is time for both of them to enjoy each other’s company again.
In Indonesia, these past two decades, nuclear families have been getting more and more preferred rather than extended family. However, it is still a common thing to find single people who are around thirty live together with their parents. For guys, probably they can still enjoy their life as bachelor, without any responsibility to take care of their own family. The mother still does the laundry and cooks for him, (two chores that are usually exclusively related to women) and no complaint from the father so that he does not need to feel necessary to hire an expert “to get rid of the child’s presence at home”.  For girls, of course it is not a big deal, she even can help do the household chores.
Going back to the movie, by the end of the movie it is illustrated that in fact, Tripp is not sure to be ready to have a serious relationship with a girl because he is still traumatic with his ex girlfriend who died six years ago when they planned to get married. Paula herself once failed with her relationship because her ex boyfriend chose to live with her parents. This failure even encouraged her to “cure” other guys who “suffer from less self-confidence” to start a new life.
PT56 22.45 100307