The big day is upon us. The masculine apocalypse is now. The horsemen will round the corner towards Westminster Abbey any moment, dragging their cargo of the merry middle class and nostalgic Eton boy politicians, right into our living rooms. Oh my god it’s not long until we get to see Kate’s dress!
Shoot me now. I am apprehensive, a little scared even, because I may have been advocating alternatives to the big day but I know I’m fighting an entity so vast that it will inevitably stray into my line of sight at some point. I won’t be able to flee the hordes living and breathing the ceremony like it was their own. It wouldn’t even do any good to flee abroad, if anything they’re more marriage mad than the most devout British Royalist. So I definitely cannot outrun this and in addition I have another problem. I can’t hide from it either, because I’ve already consumed the alternatives in order to point them out to all of you. Blokes, guys and lads everywhere, I hope you appreciate my sacrifice.
We’ve reached the final alternative step and its one I like to think of as the emergency measure. Thor at the cinema requires venturing out and United on iPlayer requires dangerous proximity to internet coverage, but these two films on DVD, available on the bargain shelves of any local high street, merely need a TV. I know, believe me I know, the wedding is on all the channels. But if you have an even more serious aversion to confetti and vows than me, just pull the aerial out and stick these two very manly films in to play, one after another.
Firstly then a film I’ve been meaning to see for a long while, the Scottish breakthrough piece for Danny Boyle, Trainspotting. Despite all the hype, from critics and friends alike, I really didn’t know what to expect from this exactly. I knew there was drug taking, in all likelihood sex, and an awful lot of accented foul language. I knew it starred an emaciated Ewan McGregor. I knew it would have both fun and filth. I knew Boyle’s playful style would scrawl a signature in every scene. I wasn’t expecting it to be quite so hilarious and true to life as it was.
Much of the humour comes from the characters of McGregor’s Mark Renton’s “so called mates”. Johnny Lee Miller, now starring fifteen years on in Boyle’s critically acclaimed Frankenstein opposite Benedict Cumberbatch in the theatre, plays a Sean Connery obsessed, seemingly streetwise fellow crack addict. His assessments of Connery’s performances as James Bond and his astonishing grasp of box office data, were particularly surreal for a fellow Bond fan like me, as he helped friends to inject heroin. He turns out to be far less clued up than he pretends to be though. Then there’s Spud, a guy who is very plainly clueless from the start, who lands up throwing his shit all over his girlfriend’s family at breakfast. Don’t ask how. Slapstick perhaps, but I laughed for several minutes.
There’s also Tommy, a guy McGregor’s surprisingly appealing narration informs us has the fault of being honest and not addicted to any banned substance. I assume the visceral poetry of Renton’s narration is so attractive because it is transplanted largely untouched from Irvine Walsh’s novel, which is infamous for its use of Scottish dialect. A scene where Tommy and Spud discuss the pitfalls of their respective women at a club, and the girlfriends do likewise about the boys in the toilets, presumably also has its roots in the book. But it’s wonderfully adapted by Boyle, with subtitles not quite necessary because of the noise and very capable comic acting depicting the darkly funny give and take realities of relationships.
Finally there’s a young Kelly Macdonald, who has since appeared in No Country For Old Men, in her first film. Renton catches sight of her in a club as she’s leaving, with his sex drive rapidly returning as he attempts to give up his habit. He follows her outside, as his narration tells us he’s fallen in love, and tries it on with her. She confidently shoots him down, only to snog his face off in the taxi and subsequently shag him rampantly in her room. In the morning Renton discovers she’s a schoolgirl, and the people he presumes to be flatmates are her parents. It’s the sort of cheeky scene present throughout the film but it centres on deeper, more disturbing truths about youths trapped in a certain limited form of existence.
Renton is undoubtedly trapped by his addiction and his school girl lover is trapped by her age, a desire to break free and be independent. We all know what it’s like to feel trapped; it’s a very human feeling, despite our supposed freedom. Whether you’re a nurse at a crowded hospital running a gauntlet of noses going off like shotguns of snot, a doctor watching patients with crash dummy heads and vacant eyes or one of thousands of the unemployed youths in this country retreading the same old paths, the same old trenches of memory through the earth, with no concept of a future. We can all get that feeling, and recognise it in others.
Ay na donne get all political pal? Keep it light! Ay?
Ah yes I forgot a character. Robert Carlyle plays Begbie, a moustachioed Scott whose job description reads thus: “playing pool and drinking at the bar, until a minor action by another customer causes him to lose his rag and beat everyone shitless”. Begbie’s probably trapped too, but to be honest his character never seemed much more than smashing entertainment. Literally.
The thing about Renton is that he thinks he’s beaten the rest of us buggers trapped in the game of life, chasing after fat televisions and fancy cars. He thinks that by choosing drugs he’s chosen nothingness and some sort of purer, pleasure filled existence. But like every revolutionary he comes to realise he is as trapped by the system as those embracing it. He needs money for his hits, friends for his sanity. Or maybe not friends, as you’ll see if you watch the film.
Trainspotting is a damn good ride through the monotony of modern existence, with eccentric but hilarious and extremely likeable tour guides. It’s more than your average tourist experience because at times it really gets you to think. And as an exploration of drug culture, Boyle’s direction is suitably dirty, bizarre and haunting, but also responsible and not over the top. You’ll flinch at some of the filth, the needles and most of all McGregor screaming his lungs out at a hallucination of a baby. Trainspotting is not simply a mash-up of visual clichés about getting high though, perhaps because it has such a strong grounding in character.
And so we come to The Wrestler, directed by Darren Aronofsky. Now Darren, as I like to call him, is someone I have a love/hate relationship with. First came the love, as I fell head over heels for the sensuality of Black Swan (https://mrtsblog.wordpress.com/2011/01/24/black-swan/) and then came the hate, when I followed this up with his earlier much praised work, Requiem for a Dream (https://mrtsblog.wordpress.com/2011/02/06/an-open-letter-to-darren-aronofsky/).
One of the reasons I found Trainspotting so refreshing was that whilst it dealt with drugs and it had its strange and psychedelic scenes of intoxication; it did not become the pretentious exercise in filmmaking that was Requiem for a Dream. I will probably be slated for saying it, and it may merely have been the context in which I first saw it (see link), but I really didn’t like that film. I did not see the point to it. Trainspotting seemed to say something far truer about addiction, despite its tongue often being firmly in cheek.
I only bring this up because it all meant that I didn’t know what I was going to get from The Wrestler; dazzling Darren or dopey Darren. The critical buzz around Mickey Rourke’s resurrected corpse meant not a jot, because some of them hated Black Swan and some of them loved Requiem.
I would not go as far as the five star quotes plastered over the cover. I would not call it the “ultimate man film” as FHM did. But it’s undoubtedly a film about a man and ageing, whereas Trainspotting, with hindsight, was a film for boys. Rourke’s Randy “The Ram” Robinson is someone trapped by his past, the legacy of his prime, and the mistakes he made during that ripe period of life.
Perhaps Rourke put in such a praiseworthy performance because he could really inhabit his character. He has been there, more or less. Rather than playing a caricature or a gun toting gangster, Rourke is simply a person here; a human being in decline, or as he says in one moving speech “a broken down piece of meat”. At first I didn’t see what all the fuss about his performance was, but then after a few emotional scenes with a potential lover and ageing stripper (Marisa Tomei) and particularly some heartbreaking confrontations with his daughter (Evan Rachel Wood), Rourke brings Randy to life.
There’s always the danger of melodramatic sentimentality, but the film manages to avoid it, primarily because of the masculine restraint of Rourke’s portrayal. Aside from some brutal wrestling scenes and one careless fuck, this is rather pedestrian territory for Darren after the frenzied, frenetic highs of Requiem and the disorientating dash for beautiful perfection in Black Swan. The Wrestler certainly didn’t grab me and it didn’t inspire the extremes of emotion that Darren’s two other efforts did. It has sporting parallels with Black Swan but lacks the wow factor of that film.
I don’t think there’s necessarily anything that wrong with The Wrestler. In some ways it is refreshing to see a film that shows so many sides of a man’s ordinary life, making his escape from that routine via his passion all the more meaningful. There’s no doubt that performing as a wrestler requires a certain level of very manly commitment to the drama. This film will offset any feminine activities like dusting icing sugar on cupcakes or fashioning paper chains with ease. But it’s so realistic, so dreary and so grim, that this antidote might lead to a dangerous and depressing overdose.
If you watch these back to back, watch Trainspotting last. It’s fun as well as not for the faint hearted. Either film is preferable to pointless precessions though, I’m sure you’ll agree. Never mind God Save the Queen, God save male souls everywhere and best of luck!
Is Chivalry Dead?
In a word – yes. Certainly the chivalry of old perished long ago. I’m not saying it died with the knights, although an early form of noble gallantry may well have done. I’m talking about being a gentleman. And it’s been many years since it was normal for every single bloke to be “courteous and considerate” towards the womenfolk and indeed each other. Or at least since we were expected to be.
A certain type of classically dressed chap, who is both suave and selfless, reliable and romantic, is now nothing but a fictional character. He may have always been so, in reality. A combination of factors conspired to kill off his desirability though, many of them good things, like greater gender equality. But some of them not so good.
I think a form of chivalry, an evolved romance and respect for women, still has a place in modern life. In the past I’ve been shot down and put in my place for expressing some sort of view on chivalry by female friends and I would not dare to raise the subject with male ones. In recent days I’ve been reminded of the conflict and decided to turn to blogging to try to articulate my thoughts.
So I do think it is possible to still aspire to be a gentleman, even admirable to do so. But it’s become ridiculously taboo to hold such a good natured view. Try an act of classic chivalry and you’re liable to criticism or it’s assumed you’re a fake using it as a means to a very predictable end. Try to criticise a man for being an arse by saying he’s not living up to gentlemanly standards and duties and you’re being sexist. The last bastions of chivalrous behaviour are under attack not just from the loutish disrespect of some men, which are ever present opponents, but also from feminists who seem to view what was once common decency as a slippery slope back to women being tethered like livestock to the kitchen sink.
I do not mean to sound pompous and arrogant. Of course everyone is entitled to their view. I admit I am entranced by a nostalgia for the past and eras I was never a part of, eager to taste and preserve attributes of times that seemed more honest and honourable, with more to discover and greater purpose to existence. I can be something of a hopeless and foolish romantic at times. I don’t see what is wrong with that; indeed I think it’s refreshing, given that mostly I’m realistic and pessimistic like the world around me.
People striving to capture the essence and best intentions of aspects of the past should not be ostracised. Just because the historical balance of power between men and women has been grossly unfair, does not mean that all the elements of the way women were once treated were wrong. In fact some of the things incorrectly lumped together with the tools of male oppression ought to make a comeback.
If it seems like I am struggling to make my point it’s because I am. The problem is that I can’t really explain or argue my point of view persuasively because it’s something vague I just instinctively feel is right. I don’t have masses of evidence to call upon, just a sense of moral conviction.
I can understand why women might feel patronised by certain gentlemanly acts. I tried to rationalise this by saying to myself that I reserve most of my chivalrous compassion for those women that earn it. This is what I’d say to the feminists, I thought. I am simply considerate and caring to good friends, people I know to be nice or those that I love. That is not solely down to gender.
But then I thought, I’d still hold the door open for a female stranger. I might turn my head a little more if they were attractive but that wouldn’t be the reason. Monster or model, most of the time, if I had the opportunity, I’d hold the door. And I’ve done it for men too, more than most people, but there’s no question I’d be more aware of the ladies and they’d take priority. For example if it was busy and at some point I’d have to pass through the door myself, I’d cut in front of a man far more willingly. Why?
For those of you familiar with Friends, Phoebe’s claim that there’s no such thing as a selfless act will spring to mind, when I say that doing something needlessly kind like holding the door for a stranger, makes me feel good. Regardless of whether the pretty girl flashes me a smile or the less pretty one looks grateful, I’ll feel better about my day. To an extent though this would be true if I was holding the door for a 60 year old chap.
Perhaps that goes someway to answering the issue; being a gentleman now can mean being kind and thoughtful to anybody, not just women. The fact remains though that I still feel an inexplicable duty towards “the fairer sex“, an outdated term which could have petrol bombs and bricks flying through my windows. And I still feel passionately that I shouldn’t be made to feel guilty about that.
If I’m really scraping the barrel for reasons behind my vague, fluffy and inconsistent philosophy, I’ll resort to my ignorant grasp of science. Could it not be said that it’s simply a natural part of humanity, an evolutionary trait, for the man to be protective? We may have rightly moved beyond the idea of the man being the breadwinner but physical differences alone show he can still be a protector.
Women ought to be the equals of men in everything that matters but they’re still held back by a glass ceiling. Cracks might start appearing in that barrier if we admitted that whilst the sexes are unquestionably equal, they still have undeniable differences.
This isn’t really an aspect of the argument I’m all that convinced by though, I hate the overuse of scientific theory and the constant linking of everything to evolution. I am aware I’m treading on controversial ground and I just needed something concrete to say. I come back to the fact that I just feel strongly about this. Probably all because of misplaced and naive romanticism.
I’ve had conversations with friends about relationships, in which I said something like that the girl shouldn’t have to bother herself with extravagant gifts and presents for her chap. I was met with fierce disagreement, unanimously against me. I see the weaknesses of my position, believe me. I know relationships are two-way and as I said earlier I wouldn’t dream of telling anyone what is right for them. I feel very irrational at times holding the view that I do; but nevertheless I hold it.
I think for me it boils down to the fact that I enjoy being romantic and even in friendship I enjoy being supportive and helping out however I can. I like to actively care for people I give a shit about. Shoot me if this is wrong. I know I haven’t put forward any compelling arguments in favour of chivalrous behaviour. But if people are willing to do it and get satisfaction from it too, I don’t see what is so bad about what is essentially kindness and respect.
In an increasingly self-involved culture I think that the ideals of chivalry and the symbolic figure of the gentleman are very British and very necessary influences, that should not be destroyed by misguided taboos.
P.S. I do apologise for such preachy, waffly and poorly expressed writing. I’ll try to deliver something manly and thought through soon-ish
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