Howl: Review of a Graphic Novel

To illuminate is to alight, to enlighten, -or figuratively, to explain- and Allen Ginsberg's poem, Howl, by text alone, has achieved those remarkable definitive actions of the verb illuminate inside of the minds of Americans for over 40 years. Howl, unlike any other poem of its time, dominates the conversations of San Francisco beat poetry, solidifying its place in literary history. Now, in 2010, Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman appear to have inscribed a space in Hollywood history for Ginsberg in producing a film that documents the process of the writing, speaking, and publishing of his infamous poem. And with the recent release of the film comes an accompanying graphic novel illustrated by Ginsberg's "Illuminated Poems" artist and friend, Eric Drooker.

"Howl: A Graphic Novel" resembles a more obscure graphic novel than the multitude of those sitting on the shelves at one's local bookstore. As Merriam Webster defines the standard graphic novel as "a fictional story that is presented in comic-strip format and published as a book," one immediately recalls that Ginsberg's Howl deviates from any formal ascribed meaning, let alone as a comic strip adaptation.

Drooker's interpretation of Howl lacks the ferocity of a poem so insubordinate as Ginsberg's masterpiece, capturing Howl's text inside of a standard, now consumerist literary form. A majority of the smooth images on the novel's satin pages resemble those early animations of a Pixar film, and complicates the poem's solemnity. Howl has always provoked discussion and reflection with its dismay. It's a poem that resembles a lit fuse, yet like all forms of art, the relationship between how a reader/audience perceives the work of art directly affects translation. Although Drooker's adaptation is no firecracker, it does uniquely interpret Ginsberg's masterpiece.

Playing upon the poem's title and the figurative (or perhaps literal) representation of those "angelheaded hipsters ... who howled on their knees in the subway and were dragged off the roof waving genitals and manuscripts," the novel's frontispiece depicts a man silhouetted by a full moon, on his knees leaning toward the stars as if howling like a werewolf. Associations between madness and bestial transformation date back to the middle ages when the "sick," or psychologically disordered were treated as sub-human, and in the broad scope of society, or Ginsberg's society for that matter, those associations have not changed. While some readers may perceive the frontispiece as a calling, or a cry for assistance, and others, a degeneration into disorder, the ambiguity exists in the title as well as the image Drooker chose to jacket the novel.

Throughout section one, Drooker's illustrations provide unique interpretative and literal representations of Ginsberg's stanzas. One of the more interesting illustrations Drooker incorporates in this first section pictures a man, presumably in one of Ginsberg's "paint hotels," emitting a tangled array of light out of the hotel room window. In the luminescence, Drooker includes paintings and pails of paint (or turpentine), yet what makes the relationship between the words and the image intriguing is the stanza on the right page. The stanza's lines "with dreams, with drugs, with waking nightmares, / alcohol and cock and endless balls" lists the overwhelming faculties of young adulthood, and Drooker's image provides an emission of excessive light, cluttered, yet as seemingly cathartic as pronouncing Ginsberg's lines.

In section two, Drooker's Moloch -an industrial building that transforms into a raging beast- embodies Ginsberg's sacrificial monster of industry. A mutation of the darkly shaded, thousand windowed "Moloch" that Allen Ginsberg points towards in Harry Redl's photograph, this Moloch appears more like a minotaur than the Semitic god. And although a transformed minotaur surrounded by fire and praising hands, with his cartoonish drawing, Moloch has the resemblance of Chernabog: Mickey Mouse's adversary in Disney's "Fantasia." This is where Drooker's glossy images fail to project the biting ferocity of Ginsberg's poetry. Rather than present wickedness, Moloch's glazed horns, firm shoulders, and defined torso suggest a figure prepared to campaign for California Governor -not conquer the United States.

As the poem nears its end at page one hundred and sixty-seven, its dedicatee, Carl Solomon, finds his way into the lines. The illustrations in this section emphasize Solomon's solitude -both singular, and that which Ginsberg shares. Drooker's illustrations correspond to doctors' psychological experimentation on Solomon, and end with an explosion of the Solomon-self into an insubordinate coterie of spirits, colliding into the "coughing,"American, Moloch. Ginsberg's spirits, now transformed into the poem's "angelic bombs" have become sacrificial martyrs, failing to destroy Moloch, yet infuriating the industrial beast. However thrilling this climactic moment in the novel may be, it becomes excessively hyperbolic. Prior to the illustrations, this section of Howl as a poem on its own standing is over-dramatic, yet including the images, a reader's sensory response becomes overwhelmed: an inherent flaw in the propositioning of Howl into a graphic novel -the words generate enough sensation on their own.

In the "Footnote to Howl," Drooker's images relay the exaltations of "Everything is holy!". While the footnote descends into maundering, his images react with flames and chaos. The poems final breath: "Holy the supernatural extra brilliant intelligent kindness of the soul" precedes the departure of Drooker's birds on a telephone poll, furthering the concept of the empty solitude of the inanimate object: Ginsberg's sign for industry and democratic prosper. These are by far Drooker's brightest moments in the novel. His winding down of images allows for their easy disappearance. Constellations set in, and the book's final illustration is of our journeyer, staring out into the grey muck of the American world.

The interior jacket images to "Howl: a Graphic Novel" function as historical insight into the work shared by Drooker and Ginsberg while they collaborated on "Illuminated Poems". While both are captioned, their inclusion provides a unique look at Drooker and Ginsberg's relationship as artists, and contextualizes Drooker's credibility for taking on such a project. And although the graphic novel adaptation of quite possibly the most infamous poem of American history conveys all of the issues concerning interpretation, including the most complex issue in all of literature with show, don't tell, Eric Drooker provides a distinctive rendition of Allen Ginsberg's Howl, without ruining the beat.

Inception

The dream. One may not link to reality, yet may in some way reflect the culmination of thoughts and practices an individual endures over the course of their lives. Dreams may outline the psychoanalytical description of our inner character: one that may never visit the outer, physical shell of our bodily form. But what if we place the body inside of the mind? Or better yet: another mind inside of a mind? Christopher Nolan's latest film, Inception, rigorously challenges the boundaries of consciousness to a point of (timed) exponential limits.

The film begins with Dicaprio's character, Cobb washing up onto a shore, lying on his stomach in the sand. A man with a rifle (presumably a guard) pokes at Cobb and calls for other men to capture him. Next, we find Cobb inside of an elegant room, dinning in a soup bowl across from an older gentleman. As unsure of Cobb as is the guard, we the audience are unfamiliar with Nolan's introduction, which takes place during a time where Cobb is aged slightly, and ragged. We automatically assume this to be a "foreshadowing," yet before we can locate our thoughts, Nolan directs the film into a different scene, taking place in the same setting with new, and younger, characters. This scene introduces Mal (Cotillard), Arthur (Gordon-Levitt), and what appears to be a youthful Saito (Watanabe), dressed in delicate attire, discussing the aspects of dreamworld information insurance. After negotiations go awry, Nolan introduces the film's first action sequence, sending Cobb on a chase through the antique inner landscape of Saito's mind.

Another direction change occurs in which Nolan moves the scene into a small house down the road from a rioting mob, in what presumably is a third world country setting. What's fantastic is that Nolan doesn't end there. We learn that this setting is merely another dream created by a somewhat amateur dream architect, and ultimately Nolan pulls us from this dream, transporting to "real time" train scene where we find Cobb, Arthur, Saito, and Nash (Haas), all tied into a game console-looking box inside of a brief case. Is this the true reality?

Nolan's daring introduction for Inception takes the audience through four different settings and time spaces in a matter of fifteen minutes or less. And upon the first time watching this film, I believe that the magnitude of those opening sequences are nearly unrecoverable. This is the only issue that audiences may experience with the film while watching it for the first time. The layers of setting are so obscure and abrupt that an audience may never come to grasp what mental and real states the characters (or even themselves) are in throughout the film. Ultimately, one comes to rely on Nolan's extended time spent on the operations and preparations for the inception that is requested of Cobb in exchange for him to see his family. These moments in the film where a majority of the "dream-team" are together plotting their mission (Hardy as Eames, Rao as Yusuf, and Page as Ariadne) are the strongest scenes of actual viewer connection and comprehension. Specifically, Ariadne's scenes in the film further enhance the connection between Cobb's subconsciousness and the reality of what is occurring for audience, both literally and within the story.

Without Ariadne, none of the inception partners quite fully understands the heft and consequential danger they are in with Cobb's subconscious creation of Mal. And in all truth, the film feels flat without Ellen Page's charm and quarks. The sheer youth in appearance and energy that she brings to the film is just enough to counterbalance the amount of testosterone and mid-life crisis that occurs with the other, male characters. And Mal is just as bad as the males in the film. Her desire to sabotage the team's missions, including her immense psychosis only adds layers of confusion and aggravation to the story.

On a lighter note, Nolan's action sequences are just as stellar as they have always been. The rotational room fight scene, van and car chase over the bridge in the rain, snow prowls, and gun fights in the military center are all precise and polished, leaving no room for flaw or question concerning their importance.

Finally, the plot and ultimate ending to the film are what deliver the knockout punch for Inception. Nolan's plot, as well as what the entire spectacle involving the inception Cobb needs to place inside of someone's mind concentrates on Robert Fischer's (Murphy) relationship with his father, played by Postlethwaite. The great length of intervening with Fischer's fatherly relationship relies on a business concern that Saito has with the Fischer family's enterprise. Rather than allow Robert Fischer to monopolize his father's industry, Saito needs an intervention to occur, in order to make Robert come to the (false) realization that his father wanted him to start his own franchise, and not continue in the family name. Nolan's plot is brilliant, and pushes the business aspect of "dream insurance" to levels that society would ultimately expect, and considering that the audience has just been acquainted with intrusion into a dream scape, Nolan pulls off his plot remarkably well, which ultimately makes clear and coherent sense.

Open or closed, Inception's ending draws response in gasping faction. Quite possibly the most wonderful element of the film is this final scene, leaving audiences pondering whether or not Cobb's desired goal has been achieved. And ultimately, the conversations that will take place after the film has ended and people have begun walking to their cars, discussing dreams, will continue and will never disappear.

Inception runs for 148 minutes and is rated PG-13.

Toys

Director, Lee Unkrich, and writers, John Lasseter and Andrew Stanton's third installment of the critically acclaimed Toy Story movie series performs as a most skilled sword swallower: with depth. The movie begins with a renovated introduction of the first Toy Story where Andy creates a scene of dramatic story telling with Sheriff Woody (Hanks) taking on the evil, money-hungry "One-eyed Bart" (Mr. Potato Head voiced by Don Rickles). The scene quickly moves forward to introduce newly acquainted characters, Jessie (Joan Cusack) and Bullseye, yet omits some original characters in the piece, such as Woody's crush, Bo Peep.

Later on we come to find that there are plenty of toys that have been left out of the Toy Story 3 -not due to the writers' negligence, but to Andy's (Morris) riddance of his toys brought on by his entrance into young-adult years: cell phones, posters, computers, and college have become his new fantasy. This is the point of the movie that brutally reminds the audience that we have been following a movie series based on toys: it makes perfect sense that Andy doesn't play with them, but we still disagree with his choice to quit on them, so to speak.

Let's get this straight: the movie doesn't ask (or appear to at least) its audience to go home, dig up all of their childhood toys, and play with them one last time, but it does bring up an interesting stance on the verb, to share.

Throughout the entire film, the characters (toys included) are asked to dividend some type of bearing load, whether it be compromising for the sake of being together as the toys do by jumping into the Sunnyside box, the forced compromise Lotso (Strawberry Bear, voiced by Ned Beatty) inflicts upon Chuckles (Luckey) and Baby Molly, or the decision Andy makes to share all of his toys with Bonnie. There are plenty of sharing moments that occur throughout the film, but I'll stop there for the sake of exposing more of the story.

My only complaint about the film, and the series in general, is the exclusion of multicultural toys. We finally get a more gendered division of toys, but there are no black toys, nor are there black people in Toy Story 3. I'm quite appalled by this exclusion and wonder whether Lasseter or Unkrich could have possibly forgotten that daycare and toys have become increasingly diverse over the last fifteen years since the first Toy Story came to theaters. Sure, with the introduction of Spanish Buzz (Pena), Lasseter adds exoticism to Allen's Buzz Lightyear, but is that enough? Whoopi Goldberg is added in to voice Stretch, the slimy, gambling Octopus, but the buck (no pun intended) stops there.

Or does my ignorance of toys besiege me? Is it that all human-like toys are made of white skin and I haven't noticed? I remember having a Lando Calrissian action figure to go along with my Han Solo and Luke Skywalker Star Wars toy set.

Regardless of whether the toys are white, black, brown, yellow, red, or purple, Toy Story 3 provides a dramatic, endearing, and climactic (possible) conclusion (or refurbishment) to Pixar's Toy Story movie series. The film runs for one hundred and forty-nine minutes, and keeps you frantically glued to the screen for each second. The short film, Day & Night, that precedes Toy Story 3 is enjoyable, cute, and witty, and shouldn't be missed. The 3-D option for viewing Toy Story 3 contributes to a unique and delicate experience that's not overdone, yet supplies the film with depth beyond its story, as if it ever needed more.

Toy Story 3 is rated G.

The Companion & The Self

Inaction through action, or action through inaction? The black typeface responding to the white pages, and Vintage International's black and white exploding-stripe jacket design shelters the mundane contrast of character at work in Albert Camus' The Stranger -only, who is the stranger?

It seems as though Camus expects his readers to assume that the main character who tells most of the story in first person narrative (elsewhere other characters speak, signaling free indirect discourse) becomes a stranger to himself, loosing his sense of identity in the world, drawing from Descartes' "I think therefore I am," or "Je pense, donc je suis," or silipsism, or what many people now refer to as existentialism. Call it what you would like, or call it Hamlet.

Shakespeare wrote this type of work well before Camus churned out The Stranger. Hamlet's soliloquies exemplify the "out of body" experience much more sportingly than what the narrator in The Stranger can accomplish with his murder, conviction, and subsequent rant occurring in the book's final chapter. At one point it felt like reading the end of Sinclair Lewis' The Jungle; the end turns into napalm, scolding the reader with pronounced politic consideration.

In the end, however active The Stranger becomes, there are times where the story cannot release its grasp upon the reader, much like how Hamlet's monologue does not allow the audience to sit beyond the play. The scene where the narrator unloads half of a pistol's magazine clip into a Arab on the beach demands each bullet to echo inside the reader's imagination like a chamber of thunder. Or even the book's grim, opening lines "Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don't know" echo in the monotonous telegram notifications that follow: "Mother deceased." These lines are incredibly active, drawing the reader into their storytelling simplicity, yet disturb reader moral, constantly overwhelming the senses with jarring events that funnel into a humdrum disintegrator. But these events described are not ordinary. They are much more serious that the narrator makes them seem and with this, Camus has crafted a companion in the narrator: not a stranger. The narrator functions as an opposite to the reader, opposing the seriousness of each situation, passing time as if it were nothingness: "[d]eep down I knew perfectly well that it doesn't much matter whether you die at thirty or at seventy, since in either case other men and women will naturally go on living -and for thousands of years. (114)" The narrator's ruminations are as active inside his mind as are his actions in worldly situations where his nerves tremble. His physical self and psychological self are paired, harmoniously and precisely as the book comes to its end. The result: a companion, a self -only stranger.