Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #84: The Pianist (2002).

It's 1939, when promising young composer Wladyslaw Szpilman (Adrien Brody) is about to become famous in Poland. But when Hitler stages his invasion, starting World War II, Szpilman is separated from his Jewish family, some of whom are murdered, and thrust into the hell of the Warsaw Ghetto. So begins his six-year struggle for escape and survival from the Nazi regime, eventually with the help of an unexpectedly sympathetic German officer, Wilm Hosenfeld (Thomas Kretschmann).

Roman Polanski lived himself as a child in the Krakow Ghetto and lost his mother in Auschwitz. Decades later after becoming an established filmmaker, for this reason he declined Steven Spielberg's offer to direct Schindler's List. But in 2002 he finally chose to face his past, somewhat, with this masterful Holocaust epic of his own, for which (with or without his 1977 sexual assault of a minor) he won a richly deserved Best Director Oscar. On Schindler's List he stated "I could never have done as good a job as Spielberg because I couldn't have been as objective as he was," and yet his approach here, perhaps because it's somebody else's Holocaust experience, indeed shows unwavering objectivity. Unlike the mostly black-and-white Schindler's List, The Pianist is in colour except for the sepia opening credits, because of course that's how both Polanski and Szpilman saw it, and as well as confronting us with as much violence as necessary (and it's easily one of the most violent and disturbing movies I've ever seen), Polanski conveys the poverty, squalor and claustrophobia that also permeated the Ghetto more accurately than maybe any other director could. 

Adrien Brody, whose surprise Best Actor Oscar win here famously had him passionately kissing Halle Berry as he accepted it, makes a perfectly soulful and dignified hero even as he endures terror and near-fatal starvation (to prepare for the part he ate a very restricted diet and learned Polish and German) before his rescue at the end, and strong support comes from Kretschmann and Maureen Lipman as Wladyslaw Szpilman's mother Edwarda. It's also very emotively filmed and lucidly edited, but ultimately Roman Polanski is the key reason The Pianist is so good. Even over Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby, I think it's the film he was born to make. 

If I can just explain myself...

A few weeks ago, on Facebook I answered a question about the school class I hated the most. I replied that it was ancient history, but only because my teacher was an arsehole. A (now former) friend of mine commented that she found that answer offensive, citing how her son is an ancient history teacher very popular with his students. I immediately and sincerely apologised to her, but then explained what this man had been like, and frankly, he was an arsehole. Just for starters, he made one of my friends - a student of his - cry in class. He even insisted at the start of each year on showing teenagers how to use a ruler, like they had learned nothing at all over seven years of primary school. I then added that I had no way of knowing her son was an ancient history teacher (I've never even met him and I hadn't been told before), and that I wasn't trying to tar them all with the same brush. I heard nothing further back from her, and then yesterday I looked her back up and she's unfriended me.

Now, I never expected her to take my side over his; he's her son after all. But I don't think it was a huge ask for her to nonetheless at least try to hear me out. After a stint working for her in 2013 (that's how we met) from which I was deservedly fired, she told me in an assessment letter that several colleagues had found me to be very defensive when they tried to help me with feedback. And I take full responsibility for that, as I do for all content I post online (and come to think of it, I don't believe anybody can ever truly predict how such stuff will be received). But while defensiveness is often unjustified, with me it really is intrinsic now.

I don't want this to be manipulative or self-exonerating, but I grew up ostracised at home and school, in both cases because of factors beyond my control. I had to fight to be noticed, understood and even taken seriously. Even if I do ask this myself, just try to imagine yourself in that boat. Would you not eventually feel the need or desire to speak up for yourself? Hell, however little truth there may be in these things, I'm also a Cancer, and crabs cluster themselves in their shells for protection.

I do hope I can reconcile with Nicole (not her real name), and as I said, I can understand why she reacted how she did. I can see this incident from her perspective. I just wish she could've seen it in return from mine.

The recurring neurological barrier.

Let me regale you, at the risk of burdening you, with something rather existential that I experienced on Wednesday night. Now, I must stress it was nothing and nobody's fault; it just unfolded this way. And it came from my Asperger's. Life on the autistic spectrum, at least for me, sometimes presents this invisible neurological barrier in certain environments, particularly socially. It was at a political function (I've been active in local politics for several years) and despite knowing exactly what to expect and the function meeting those expectations, my mood there, while fully civil, was increasingly isolated and overwhelmed. It was so strange I still don't quite know what had come over me, especially as a friend who also has Asperger's but is less public about it had also been there. I usually attribute this feeling to having grown up as the youngest in my family, but here I knew it was more from my condition. Particularly as the others' conversations sounded surprisingly loud to me from across the room and in a pub. I went home feeling rather depressed and exposed, but that was very fleeting.

I consider it a strong case of the neurological divide between Aspies and neurotypicals. Now this is where I could alienate some of you, and that isn't always present - far from it - but when it is, it can feel like a force-field. You want to jump in and have your two cents but you mightn't know how to, when or even if you should. I can assure you I'd already become welcome anywhere with those I knew at this event, and I can be ambiverted and free-spirited, but this detachment there was so unexpected it knocked the wind right out of my sails.

But I digress; that's the end of the sob story part. If you're not on the spectrum and you're socialising with somebody who is but they're acting withdrawn, encourage but never force them to open up. If it's vice versa, opening up is your choice alone and that barrier is hard, but never impenetrable.

Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #83: Zombeavers (2014).

Three girlfriends, Mary (Rachel Melvin), Zoe (Courtney Palm) and Jenn (Lexi Atkins), take a road trip to a local lake retreat for a relaxing weekend in the forest where they're free of their parents and the stresses of college life. They're also free of pesky boys, until it emerges that Zoe knew three of them were coming: Sam (Hutch Dano), Buck (Peter Gilroy) and Tommy (Jake Weary). Mary and Jenn are quite bemused when they arrive, but they have heaps more than the males to worry about. Shortly before this sojourn, two truck drivers delivering a load of toxic chemicals across the country accidentally hit a deer and subsequently lost one of their canisters, which opened and spilled into the lake where numerous beavers lived. After fatally ingesting the chemicals, the beavers were mutated into bloodthirsty fiends. Now, the girls and boys (and one of the girls' pet dog) must band together to avoid becoming beaver food - and still satisfy their uncontrollable sex drives.

Obviously, Zombeavers is a very naughty little movie; in fact, you could even call it an exploitation film. But I love it because it consciously tries to infuse and invert two different comedy subgenres (the horror comedy and the sex comedy) and succeeds with both without ever feeling forced. Since Scream and American Pie respectively launched and reignited those comedy brands, too many of their successors have derivatively stuck to the same formulas and gradually worn them very thin. Here, director Jordan Rubin and his fellow writers Al and Jonathan Kaplan have hit upon a really fresh and intentionally ridiculous premise which is executed with vibrancy and insatiable energy. Best of all for such a movie, there is no comprise on the raciness (which, of course, goes right down to "beaver" also being slang for vagina), profanity or violence. The young cast also evidently relished their work here, particularly Palm as the sassy Zoe and Dano in a huge departure from his breakout role on the Disney Channel sitcom Zeke & Luther. It's definitely not for the prudish, and it may make you think twice before dipping into a forest lake again, but you could never call it timid or clichéd. Zombeavers is a horror/sex comedy as entertaining as they come.

Facebook and Cambridge Analytica.

As a very frequent Facebook user (though I've been having a sojourn from it this week) and a news junkie, I've formed several opinions on the current scandal it's embroiled in with the data research company Cambridge Analytica. Now, I'm no IT specialist or demographist (a real term), but social media has come to define my fellow Millennials and I more than any other demographic and again I use it myself (albeit only Facebook), so that's why this scandal matters to me.

I don't know yet if I was one of the roughly 350 000 Australian Facebook users whose data was given to Cambridge Analytica. (I definitely do know I've posted things on there which have landed me in trouble or which I'd just rather nobody saw now if they were from several years ago.) But I frequently see ads or particularly memes in my feed related to things I've posted about a lot and which, thus, the site's administrators evidently know I love. I suppose that's better than them trying to sway me into embracing other stuff, but this can be bait to keep users returning there, and Internet addiction would exist even without social media (for that reason I always have at least one net-free day a week). It's also presumptuous of such sites' administrators to generalise their ads and memes to any whole demographic (i.e. gardening and kitchen products for elderly women), whatever their users' activity might suggest they enjoy.

Then there's the accusations of CA using this information hall with Facebook's approval for political donation. Everybody associated with both companies can have and express their politics, but all I can think of to say about this aspect of it is that professionally, they should at least try be bipartisan, or simply stress they are just stating their own views. If Facebook, like all its competition, can let politicians and candidates of all stripes sign up, surely they shouldn't associate with companies that donate to just one side, if these allegations are indeed true. However, while social media sites could and should do more to safeguard users' privacy, I liken it to eating out and having an allergic reaction to the meal: ultimately, the decision to post anything at all comes down to the user.

Now, despite all its drawbacks I still like (no pun intended) and use Facebook regularly. But I hope it learns and grows from this debacle, as do all its rivals.

Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #82: Kisschasy.

This week I felt rather than give an appreciation with this series of another movie or TV show, I should toss a curved ball. I'm also a great music lover, so I've decided to write about one of my favourite indie bands.

Australia's Kisschasy formed in 2002 on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula. Vocalist and rhythm guitarist Darren Cordeux (green shirt), lead axeman Sean Thomas (right), bassist Joel Vanderuit (second from left) and drummer Karl Ammitzboll (left) were schoolmates with a shared love of rock music who started jamming together and off they went, naming themselves after the children's playground game. After signing with the ironically named Below Par Records, in 2005 they released their debut album, United Paper People, which went gold domestically. Its lead single Do-Do's and Whoa-Oh's earned them an ARIA nomination for Breakthrough Artist - Single, and in '06 they were nominated for Channel V's Brand Spankin' New Artist Award.

In 2007 their sophomore effort, Hymns for the Nonbeliever, also went gold and spawned three radio hit singles: Opinions Won't Keep You Warm at Night (whose accompanying video is hilarious, if maybe dated now; it's an overt political satire), Spray-On Pants and Strings and Drums. Their national tour for this album included them opening several shows for Good Charlotte, one of which I was lucky enough to see in Sydney. It was flawless.

Their third and best album, Seizures, followed in 2009. An endlessly sprightly and compact effort, it also spawned three successful singles: Generation Why, the lilting ballad Dinosaur and my favourite of their songs, Turnaround. I hold it as the best album of '09. After an extensive tour supporting Seizures, Kisschasy amicably called it quits in 2015, citing their belief their belief that too many bands had kept at it too long. But they'd already made a permanent mark on Aussie contemporary music; for example, Spray-On Pants and Dinosaur are featured in the entertaining 2016 film Spin-Out, which was distributed internationally.

But about the music itself now. United Paper People is unmistakably an album by young rockers still honing their craft and has strong pop-punk echoes which they outgrew, but even by this stage they showed a good grasp of melody and hooks. Cordeux also sings with versatility, his phrasing being gritty in the punchier numbers and airy and vulnerable in the more tender tunes. Perhaps inevitably, Hymns for the Nonbeliever is considerably more confident and daring, with its stronger language and themes. Cordeux came into his own as a lyricist with this one, and the instrumentation from all four is also more experienced. But again, I consider Seizures their finest hour. It's just more cohesive, dynamic, danceable and consistent than both its predecessors combined. They certainly bowed out on the right disc. And they never lost interest in that scratchy, vinyl-record indie rock vibe which I find just irresistible.

If indie rock and pop punk are both heaven to your ears (as they are to mine), I doubt you'll hear a band do them better than Australia's own Kisschasy. Thanks for the tunes and memories, fellas.

Something Cult, Foreign-Language or Indie #81: Before Sunrise (1995).

On a train somewhere between Germany and Austria, American Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Frenchwoman Celine (Julie Delpy) meet and instantly strike up a conversation. After that quickly sparks a connection between them, he persuades her to disembark the train with him and spend the night exploring Vienna together. Romance blossoms between them, but in just one day they must part, potentially forever. Thus, they learn as much about each other as possible while navigating a mutually unusual city, pouring personal truths and feelings into every second together. In the process, how they both ended up on the train is also covered and they also grow to understand just why they were bound to so immediately and profoundly click.

The first of a trilogy (followed by Before Sunset (2004) and Before Midnight (2013)),1995's Before Sunrise wasn't Richard Linklater's first effort - that was 1991's Slacker - but it certainly was his directorial breakthrough, and 23 years later it has aged scarcely, if at all. Romances are very hit-and-miss for me, mainly because they're usually so formulaic and one-sided, but this one is just heartrending. With my description the plot may seem very boring, and it is fully dialogue-driven, but Linklater and co-writer Kim Krizan have crafted a story that will hold your interest throughout not just because you know all along it's a doomed (if that's the right word) relationship, but since Celine and Jesse are such realistic characters: cynical, abrasive, erudite but nonetheless idealistic and sensitive. They are also played with delicate brilliance, and the chemistry between Hawke and Delpy is simply unquestionable. (I should also state here that Celine reminds me of my ex-girlfriend, although she's Australian.) There's also a soundtrack which hypnotically combines Fred Frith's beautifully understated score and some well-chosen indie rock tracks of the era.

I actually found Before Sunset something of a buzzkill (I haven't seen Midnight for that reason), although it was praised as much as this. But regardless, Before Sunrise holds up perfectly and can still stand fully on its own as arguably the textbook on how to get a bittersweet, youthful romance exactly right in any medium. I also first saw it as a TV midday movie, so there's something to be said for that phenomenon. Cinema just doesn't come much more disarming or enchanting.