X has been

put in a category with Midsommar (which I loved ) and The Blair Witch Project (which I hated) as a horror film for intellectuals. It is not. It is inexpressibly stupid and offensive. (But that can be said about most commercial films; X is certainly not in a category all its own.) At its squishy centre is something reviewers call real, psychological horror — the fear of aging. But fear of aging is not a universal human dilemma -- rather a problem peculiar to our contemporary youth-obsessed culture. As an aging gay man I am fully aware of what it’s like to be despised for my age -- and not necessarily by other gay men; thank God gay men have invented a category --  ‘bear’--  which is a kind of non-retirement home for sexual older men. I vaguely fit into that category (though I do not have quite enough body hair, but yes, there are hairless bears!) In other words gay culture — though it is often dismissed as ageist, is quite the opposite. (In fact young gays are sometimes dismissed as ‘dumb twinks’ and vilified as much as the old.) Don’t worry, I’m not bitter, and I get very well laid thank you. This is important to mention, as X seems to be under the impression that an aging body is horrific and that all old people run around desperately trying to get young people into bed. (Especially ‘cougars.’ This movie in fact should be retitled ‘Psycho-Cougar!!!!’ It would be even more popular and spawn even more sequels.) The plot— like most horror films, is not really scary, and is endlessly unoriginal. Horror films — like Marvel comic movies — are now a genre that have substituted self-reference for originality. (Apparently there are a lot of filmic in-jokes in X, I frankly couldn’t care less.) So yet again, it’s a bunch of sexy young'uns. But here, the women are very young, the men not so much — because obviously in a heterosexual film it is threatening for straight men to watch young bucks flopping around. But there are very young women, of course, who are invited to dangle their boobs in public. These sexual ne’er do wells rent a farm house (yawn) to make a porn film, and the house is owned by a decrepit old couple — incredibly wrinkled and ugly; they can barely talk or walk. Trouble ensues. Of course the film features lots of pornography (though nothing hardcore, sadly) before we get to the killing. Much of it is instigated by the old woman, who, unlike her husband, is intent on kissing and feeling up these infants — and even dallies with some lesbian action — climbing into bed with one of the girls. It’s so gross! (Just kidding. but that would be the reaction of youth today.) Remember Harold and Maude? None of you are old enough; it was the very opposite of X (and one of my favourite flics). In it, a teenage boy falls in love with an 80 year old woman (the incomparable Ruth Gordon). They have sex and yes, we see some of the action. (My favourite scene is the priest describing his horrifying vision of the two of them in bed: ‘his firm young flesh and her old wrinkled flesh co-mingling' -- making a face as if he’d just eaten bad tuna.) Such a film could not be made today. The mere thought of an older wrinkled lady trying to kiss a firm, hung, young stud sends today's young audiences into gales of laughter mixed with paroxysms of uncontrollable, panicked, screaming joy. (Ugh! puke!) X implies not only that the old are sexual predators because they are sexually frustrated (i.e. sex is over for them) but that they are bitter about it, and angry at the young for being young. This is nonsense. Has anyone ever diagnosed ageism as — not only woke narcissism — but a sociopathic illness? As I understand it a sociopath has no sympathy for others. The fact that we all get old is conveniently forgotten by today’s young; I’m sure it has always been so to some degree. But this romanticisation of physical youth and beauty has now become romanticisation of their ideas. Woke politics is fundamentally ageist. Though supposedly wokies fight the good fight: i.e. diversity for all self-identified minorities, lately they have focused on two relatively new categories -- trans and disabled folx -- while at the same time ignoring two very old categories — the old and the working class  -- as well as gays and lesbians. These are no longer included among the oppressed. (Note -- as my friend Allan Stratton mentions recently in Quillette — the destruction of the Alexander Wood statue on Church Street in Toronto). Whether you identify as old, gay, lesbian, or working class, your lack of privilege simply doesn’t count. Intersectionalism has become ‘age-exceptionism’. What we have learned from intersectionality is not that everyone has many intersecting points of privilege or lack therof, but that oppressed youth are much much more oppressed than anyone. Anyway, rest assured that most of us old folx are quite glad to say goodbye to the urgent erections and messy lubrications of the past. We get all the sex we want and need thank you. We may be wrinkled and repellent to you, but we sure love gettin' it on! And yes, along the way we have gained a little wisdom that (I know it’s sacrilege to suggest it) you might very well learn something from. 

So there.

NITRAM is a

miracle. It’s a new Australian movie that you will probably never see. It stars Judy Davis: I would climb mountains to see her ever since I saw her in Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows. (Woody Allen used her for awhile but now we are now told to hate Woody Allen.) In Nitram Davis plays the mother of a very violent man — I guess he is psychotic, it’s hard to tell exactly what’s wrong with him — though the acting by Caleb Landry Jones as the son is so scary, touching, and real that he’s already won several international awards. (Alas, no Oscars for this work of genius, as the film is not entirely politically correct and features no deaf people). Nitram (the leading character) appears to be ‘retarded’ (I think that term is used in the film) or slow -- but also deeply troubled, terminally lonely, a doomed outsider (there is something of the ‘incel’ about him). Writer Shaun Grant and director Justin Kurzel have  fashioned a deeply moving, hauntingly naturalistic portrait of a depressed murderer. And, fascinatingly, we identify with him — or at least feel his pain. He’s even charming and touching at times, despite his fascination with guns. None of this is acceptable to the powers-that-be these days; the film has been pretty much banned in Tasmania where it was made (no one will show it, it's how stuff disappears now: i.e. Louis C.K.'s I Love You, Daddy). I won't to give away the whole plot  -- but let’s just say Nitram  has very important things to say about bad gun laws. Don't get me wrong. I would never extol a movie that was merely dedicated to reminding us how lax gun laws are-- this movie is not a platform, it is a deeply human document. Nevertheless the Australian and Tasmanian governments have come out against it.The Tasmanian Police Union has complained that the mental health of its members may be ‘impacted' by Nitram.This is 'Woke Victim-speak’ for ‘cancel this film it’s hurting me!’ In fact a member of the Australian parliament has complained that Nitram made him ‘uncomfortable.’ (God forbid!) But art is now so dangerous we must be protected from it. At one pre-Covid play I saw they were offering a room suppled with crayons, where you could do ‘colouring,’ to calm you down. (I would posit that any adult who can actually be calmed down by a colouring book is already irretrievably nuts.) One theatre in Toronto now offers 'a facilitator who will be available to provide one-on-one emotional support.' So if you need to gather your senses after being assaulted by some hateful, hurtful piece of art, there will apparently be people there to comfort you. A somewhat unexpected side effect of COVID-19 -- has been the end of art. (I've been complaining about it for awhile now). No one will notice; art was always a hard sell anyway, and just a few hapless Canadian artists like me  ever bothered to stand up for it; no one ever listened. It seems quite clear that after COVID-19, art will just limp away as it did in the Dark Ages. People will forget that the the best plays and films and books should upset you. Just as in medieval  Europe -- where the unwashed masses were offered church windows and the occasional passion play that reaffirmed the story of Christ -- today we are given films like CODA to remind us of the plight of deaf people, endless appeals to save the environment, and trans hagiography, but, God forbid (!) -- nothing that might make us uncomfortable! This of course will lead to more crime, drug addiction, and suicides -- more unresolved human pain. Art, in case you hadn’t notice, can be a harmless drug. At the moment reruns of The Sopranos are kind of keeping me alive. Tony leads a much more stressful life than I do, which reassures me -- but I also love it  because I can experience madness, pain, and death in heavy doses, something we all need to be familiar with, because our lives will be touched by those things at one time or another -- and art is the only place where we can practice them  without ever actually going mad, or shooting up an elementary school, or dying. I will use this blog to say farewell to art, in hopes that someone, somewhere will remember. Okay, what about Judy Davis’ portray of Nitram's mother? She is sublime, understated, and, thank God, she smokes, (There is something about Judy Davis smoking a cigarette that drives me nuts.) She’s still amazingly beautiful, though alarmingly wrinkled. What makes the movie triply controversial is the handling of Davis's character; Nitram neither entirely blames nor entirely forgives her, we are left hanging in a disturbing zone of paradoxical tranquility (where art should leave us). She watches her son commit atrocity after atrocity and does nothing, because, you see, she loves him. She says ‘I gave birth to him’ with a savage force -- like Brecht’s Mother Courage she is at once admirable and contemptible. The final shot is her, smoking, looking off into the distance, listening to a TV news program that exploits her son’s crimes. Nitram is a work of art because it offers up a real anti-hero -- not some  sexy marvel pseudo-tortured joke like The Batman. But, hey -- incel as hero; there’s a real anti-hero for you.

The Pope’s apology

 is at best fatuous, referring to (if not directly speaking about) ‘bad apples.’ The best I can suggest is that Indigenous people should hang him upside down and shake him for as much as he’s got; he owes it to them, as does the Catholic Church (don’t get me started on that). But what I really wanted to talk about was a revelation that came from the mouth of Kaluhyanu:wes Michelle Schenandoah, of the Oneida Nation. She said: “Because we didn't have souls, that gave the right for these explorers to do whatever they wanted with Indigenous Peoples — murder, rape, enslave.” This is a very profound and tragic -- but also beautiful -- idea. It’s also true. And it’s also nice to hear someone speak of ‘the soul.' Do we, in fact, have souls? One isn’t so sure as ever more frequently the transhumanists go on at length about how computers can write poetry. and we can download our personalities onto them. But computers will never replace people, thank God — though they may try to. (It happened to me recently -- twice -- at the bank. My debit and credit cards were both denied. When I complained they said — “We don’t know quite why the computer did it.” When I questioned one woman further, she said: “It was probably due to an algorithm.” It occurred to me, naturally, that the algorithm had something against me, but that’s what’s supposed to make algorithms so wonderful — that they couldn't, possibly. An algorithm has no soul, and if it makes a booboo it’s merely a booboo, there is no malice behind it. But, I must insist that a booboo is still a booboo; it still smacks you in the eye and makes you bleed, malice or not.) No. Humans have something called ‘the soul’ and no amount of bad computer poetry is going to convince me otherwise. There is something magical about truly bad poetry, truly bad art, and truly bad thought, because it comes from that glorious imperfection we call humanity. It’s as if God didn’t finish us. She/they didn’t get something completely right. The neoplatonists did not believe that; they believed that God intentionally bequeathed us with all his dreaminess, craziness and poetry, that there are various levels of reality. At the top is God. Then comes angels, then pure soul, then the human spirit, and then the material world. (I may have missed some levels — I’m imperfect, due to my soul, sorry.) The point is that most of us are pretty much always floundering around somewhere between the material world (the body) and the soul (spirit). What I love about neoplatonism is they’re actually not too bad on sex; they realize the body is necessary, and that people do need to get off -- a little more than occasionally (whew!). But they also believe that the kind of union we really need with other people is spiritual, which can only be achieved through love, And love is also the same as beauty. (Which is the really good part.) Lord in heaven (to coin a phrase) why am I telling you all this? Because I’m old, and will be dead in no time at all I’m sure. As I write this I can feel my spirit very leaving my body, ever so slowly. It’s a good thing. I don’t mean I am ascending to heaven (or hell, for that matter…) but my the body is becoming less and less useful, I experience less desire, less physical joy — and loads more physical pain — as my body gradually disintegrates with age.  I will not be sad to see my body go (my body and I always had issues). And I will still be there, but in some unrecognizable form — which I know is not reassuring. I may come back as a beetle, or a cock (not a penis, but a chicken, unfortunately, and not that kind of chicken unfortunately, maybe even -- a hen). I won’t bore you with any more of this, but I wanted you to know why I find the soul so interesting right now, because mine is definitely going somewhere else, soon. So my ears perked up when I heard the word ‘soul’ from the mouth of  Kaluhyanu:wes Michelle Schenandoah — it struck me that what she talks about here is the essence of human evil. It’s a principle also articulated by Hannah Arendt in her various studies of The Holocaust. Arendt theorized that the Nazis rationalized exterminating the Jews by dehumanizing them, compared them to animals -- to rats and pigs. As they were not human, they necessarily had no souls, and one could dispose of them. This kind of dehumanizing is central to genocide; unless you are a psychopath (or Donald Trump) you will identify with other human beings, but not with soul-less animals (we’ll leave animal rights activism aside in this analogy, as it is left out by Arendt). Therefore, you cannot and will not kill them because they are human and have souls. But here comes a difficult concept; try and get your mind around it. Everyone has a soul. Every human being. (How do you know you are human? Well if you are reading this and you are not a computer, then you are human). Yes, that means Hitler and yes, even The Pope, and Stalin and Putin and that guy who won’t wear a mask in the elevator (and is an anti-vaxer), and racists, and sexists, and homophobes -- they are all human.  Ergo, therefore, as angry as we get about other people we should not kill them. And it might be advisable not to even wish them dead. Living, you see, is not something some souls deserve and others don’t. Living just is, well, a thing. And for all our theorizing, we are not entirely sure, yet, what.