WITH POLICE BRUTALITY ON MY MIND

WITH POLICE BRUTALITY ON MY MIND.

For a while I held a job where I could see you more often and in that job (boy it was a good one) I had a glassed in office where you could come in and I review your criminal background see if you had a drug problem and get you in a program where I could channel you some help. I did that and I was proud of you. Im not so proud when I see you with your pants all sagging and you walking looking so damn lost. I used to see you dressed better than my dreams. I stumbled fell scrapped my knees and while I was lost, I lost my dreams. But pride made me want to get my act together. I almost did and I passed my fortunes on to helping you. And I understand its hard to maintain. God knows I do. First the unskilled jobs we used to hold down went to China and other places we cant pronounce. Then police decided they would just as soon kill off those left unemployable.

Job application are jokes on line. On line schools are jokes too. Rip off academies for the poor and immobile. And the economy....whats that? CAPITALIST USED TO GENERATE JOBS NOW JOBS ARE THE POCKET CHANGE WALL STREET'ERS RATTLE TO MAKE HEADLINES. Who is the President talking to when he says job growth is climbing. Heck where is the ladder for you? Anyway, you need a hair cut. I used to like locks too but now they look foolish on you cause your pants are sagging and you smoke too much. And you need to stop going to church every time you get out of jail. Stop going to jail to find Jesus. I know its hard but if you don't believe in him, man up. Stop front-in just to please your mamma. Believe in yourself!!!!

I'm running out of time and you are running too. I hope I find myself and I hope I find you before its too late. For us all. Hey, by the way, stop rapping about killing 'niggas'. Rap about not being killed by each other, cops and the mess we are in. Hold your head up.

I'm lost and looking for my brothers.

I HAVE A SLEEPING DISORDER

I HAVE A SLEEPING DISORDER

A CRUMB SNATCHER AT 55

I AM 55 AND STILL PICKING UP CRUMBS

In a few hours perhaps one. I will enter the zone where I turn 55. Have i been on Facebook for a birthday before? Some of you may know that 15 years ago I created kevinis40@yahoo.com. I never changed the 40 to 41, 42 43,...and so on because creating web addresses motivates me more than being accurateness is not that I am ashamed of age, I hardly believe that they apply to our biological changes. I find it ludicrous that we actually invest in the notion that one changes based on his/her evolution around the sun. Its so preposterous that it even goes against biblical teachings. But I am not religious either.

I have kept a journal since I was 18. 55-18 = 37. For 37 years I have written about myself. I have noticed cyclical issues and if they are problems that should have been solved based on a 12 month calendar created back in the Roman era, then I am way off course. My Life is full of  cyclical unresolved problems. One problem I have escaped it that of worrying about how awful my existence as a problem in the UNITED STATES has been. Its a fact that we are not a democracy but rather a plutocracy . I used to fault myself for my short comings but no longer. its by and large poppy cock . At 55 I am where I was when I started. I am still watching wealth yet not have any. I am still looking at voting while not getting any more power. Finally I  still live in a colonizing nation that denies it is a colonizer. It will not change in my life time

Yet I now wish to focus on my contributions to truth and the search for information that leads me toward it, I may get  some wrong.But not much.  Using the internet and books, I will share what i can.

Finally I will not hide behind my age nor color and refuse to be held accountable for what I state, print or say. How many women out there proudly proclaim their ages and brandish them about? NONE? How many men can admit that they are lost in themselves? FEW////

i am 55 and lost......but i find that Hansel and Gretel did drop some crumbs...

Psywar : Full Documentary HQ

MIXING MY DREAM WITH SANDWICHES

This morning I awoke from a dream where I was in boot camp. Can you imagine me a 54 year old pacifist in somebody's boot camp? I know....But sure as Jack Nicholson's famous words.... YOU CANT HANDLE THE TRUTH , I was in military fatigues jogging to and fro.Needless to say when I messed up and lost track of someone in front of me, I was accused of giving our position away to the enemy.

Whose enemy....where are enemies when you need them?  A communist or a terrorist would have made me feel just miserable, just miserable enough to ask the sergeant in my Gomer Pile voice, please let me try ... let me try again. Instead I just flayed there half asleep wondering why I felt slighted by someone. Why I felt some other solider in my dream made me the butt in of a prank. I did not loose my step, I was tripped. Its always dreams that avoid revealing answers.. even more of a problem when you keep wanting logic to apply after you've awakened. When you are awake and keeping thinking like you are asleep....That's when you are suppose to realize it was a dream after all. Man when I realized the dream was over... suddenly I grew brave....

I sat up stuck out my chest thinking. If I had my way, I would tell the sergeant to kiss off. I dared my dream to come again...let me at em.. that is what I wish I had said in the dream.

Life is like that for me, I work at a fast food restaurant and often I wish I had said, screw you to a rude customer or that demanding manager.  But I dont...I need that pay check; so I mumble some indiscernible unintelligent incomprehensible gibberish that me and co-worker can agree is telling em. That's right...!!! We gurgle as we wash our face and hands over loud running water.

Next time I have a dream where I mess up I will try that...I will act like I am at work and mutter something that even I don't understand. Then we will see who the enemy is.

 BTW , Jack you ordered Corporeal Santiago with extra mustard.... did'nt you did'nt you !!!!

ONE TWO THREE: HIT IT....BIOGRAPHIES ON MILES HENDRIX AND BROWN

Soon and very soon fans of two of three legendary hit makers will ques up to theaters to see here and watch them play. Lines not seen since the late 80's will be wrapped around a city block. Lines of well dressed couples waiting to see. Since we are talking musicians and since each of these three hit makes have gone on to that great band stage in the sky, quite naturally we are speaking metaphorically. We are talking movies, not live musical concerts. And if you are not as hip as this writer assumes you to be, lets let you in on a lil' secret: we are talking about James Brown, Jimi Hendrix and Miles Davis. While Get On Up (starring Cadwick Bossman as James Brown) is scheduled to be released August 1, 2014, the biopic on Jimi Hendrix (All Is By My Side) directed by John Ridley will first hit the festival circuit starting this fall at SXSW. Finally Don Cheadle's debut as both director and star as Miles Davis in Miles Ahead is still in its infancy: production recently shook its first leg in Cincinnati.

ITS A FAMILY AFFAIR

Word is that while Don Cheadle has the blessing of members of Davis' family, producers of (ALL IS BY MY SIDE on Jimi Hendrix) had the proverbial door slammed in their faces when they went knocking for the rights to reproduce some of Jimi's songs. That sucks, yet Darko Entertainment assure that their focus on the early years (in England) are just as important. Probably so, since there it was in Europe that Hendrix landed his first recording deal. And it was in Europe where legendary events along side Eric Clapton and The Who were suppose to have taken place. Most African American viewers who know that Jimi did initially play the 'chitlin circuit' along with the famed Isley Brothers have come to garnish a distaste of having bio told about other African Americans by mainstream teams. Did anybody ask Spike Lee what he though? I'm just asking. Of course I'm joking. But its no laughing matter when the purse come into play. Nonetheless, keep in mind that Andre Benjamin (oh, you know him as Andre 3000 of the famed Atlanta based OUTKAST) is scheduled to weld a heavy ax (the legendary trademark stratocaster) on the scene. Despite the drama and critiques sure to come, Hendrix belongs to the family of rock and roll just as much as any ethic group. Hendrix who died at 27 and became an honored member of 'the 27 club' described the sound of his first recorded album in this manner: "We don't want to be classed in any category ... If it must have a tag, I'd like it to be called, 'Free Feeling'. It's a mixture of rock, freak-out, rave and blues" .

THREE PART HARMONY

Universal or not, critic and audiences alike may be ready to toss musical bios as failed attempts to lump the lives of legend like these the way of musicals themselves. Biographical stories are but sketches of a musician's life. Movies (by in large) unlike lives lived are often told in three parts. Fans can barely tolerate a facsimile of Jimi Hendrix short rise to fame followed by an untimely demise, but imagine a reduction of Miles life from the monumental annals of Be Bop to Jazz Fusion being reduced to a two hour feature film. Don Cheadle seems wise to side step that trap. Word on the street is he, Steve Baigelman and others will focus this sketch on the five year period called “the silent years” while Miles took a break from production and performance. Beigelman shares writing credit with Jex Butterworth on Get On Up.

Unlike the wiser choice exemplified by Cheadle, and team, a gut reaction to the trailers we have seen of GET ON UP, director Taylor Tate seems ready to take a chance and die the death of over simplification. What the trailer seems to suggest is an all star constellation with Dan Akroyd, Octavia Spencer, Viola Davis, Jill Scott with Cadwick Bossman. One thinks of The Help and not to mention the formulaic Tyler Perry movies where comedy is often the favored sun in the center of the universe of an assembly of an all black cast. One white or two sprinkle in to become the foil of racial canned laughter. But surprises can happen. Can Cadwick Bossmanl pull from the script the legends of a man called the 'God Father of Soul', 'Mr Dynamite', 'Soul Brother Number 1' and a man who while he forbid the use of drugs in his bands, himself became a parody as a man ruled by cocaine, painkiller and a history of run ins with the law?

ITS A MAN'S WORLD

There is one troubling aspect that any film maker focusing on the life of musicians who become popular enough to make it to the hall of fame. That aspect is their relationship with women. As to Miles, author Peal Cleage wrote critical book entitled MAD AT MILES. In it she lambasted the iconic status bestowed on him. Cleage rather forceful injected into Miles' circles of praise the long documented aspects of spousal abuse Miles subjected Cicely Tyson to during their decade long marriage. One can be sure MILES AHEAD will not go without these reminders coming to the forefront. Such issues are among the cultural baggage that also resonate with James Brown latter years. Brown reputation as a self made man became tarnished with several arrests due to his domestic squabbles. Only Jimi Hendrix's short time on the pedestal of fame seems to be absent 'egg in the face'. Then again....we have yet to see if his first hit song HEY,JOE carried any autobiographical revelations..

Best Lesbian Movies (Top 10)

Directors who Paint/ Photographers who See

The camera often times accompanies me. Even when I do not have my camera with me, I am thinking in/of images.Objects seem to beckon the eye to come play. Seeing is a development that can be haunting.

 Matt Damon once stated that he was trying to persuade the director Steven Soderbergh to reconsider his decision to leave film making and pursue painting . Damon stated that in his efforts he referenced a director who although in his 70's rose with a gusto to make it to the set.  Soderberg is supposed to have replied, "yeah that would be Clint Eastwood and Clint is a story teller. I am not a story teller, I like form".

Despite the veracity of this story it is very telling  about film makers and art and form. I can hardly contain myself when I read that an acclaimed director offered such a revealing aspect about the passion and focus one must recognize about his motivations and how they differ from another's. I began to wonder what other movie directors pursued painting as well.

Alfred Hitchcock was an avid storyboard user. David Lynch wrote one book that I know of where he elaborate on his panting (see CATCHING THE BIG FISH: MEDITATION CONSCIOUSNESS AND CREATIVITY. I also know that Kathryn Bigelow of THE HURT LOCKER and ZERO DARK THIRTY was a sculpture before delving into film making. Did they find one pursuit informed the other?

Lynch states in CATCHING THE BIG FISH that film is a language and that it is different from words. Yep, I can see that. Because actors must say what they feel. We are watching images rather than imaging while reading. Still few accomplished actors can convey an idea with through facial expression. If we follow Damon's reasoning, he knows Sonderberg is a director who encourages him. They have worked on Ocean Eleven, Twelve and Thirteen. They also worked on together on the  BOURNE franchise. I guess what Damon  reveals about acting is that actors enjoy being the canvas of some directors.

I wonder if objects enjoy being looked upon by some photographers.

BEFORE THE FAT LADY SINGS

OLD TERMS REMAIN AS TWILIGHT APPROACHES

In approximately 17 days on August 1, will turn 55 years old. Its been a long road full of mistakes and hard-hotheadedness that I no more regret as I do query over. However one plaguing issue that keep me wondering is how do I make sure the last next 30 or so years are the best in my life.

This device this laptop is my best friend right now. many of you rely on your phones but for me, my constant companion is still my laptop. It stands to reason because whereas I once admonished myself for staying one step (perhaps two) behind the horde, I enjoy giving the market experts the middle finger for their planned obsolescence. ts a fact that most of us are suckered into "keeping up with the Jones".

KEEPING UP WITH THE JONES

While this expression no longer signals the drive one neighbor has to outdoor the next, it served those of use well back in the 1970 and beyond when credit card was the unrecognized evil of the working poor. Indeed working poor probable is out of date. Sociologist used to help us with monitor ourselves. Now wall street has us by our noses. So I enjoy being poor because it keeps me closer to knowledge. Many are duped to take their poverty to GOD. But he moved on to another galaxy and many American built that vessel for him. Israel helped. Together these two nations have destroyed God's home. The bosom of novice believers like me burst with contradictions we could no longer stomach. I stood for my last time on the church steps and while I will no longer shame his so-called house, I waved good-bye to the ship carrying him into a realm where my ignorance can not reach.

GOD MOVED ON

I am going try a new faith were God is called on less and I spend more time calling mankind for his lies that kept me wanting in or a failed system. Systems are built but thy grow old. Take the education I received.The government I was taught existed, and the beauty of capitalism. Each one has cracks so large in them, that only a fool would try to ignore them. This does not mean toss the baby out with the bath water (another old term) however it does mean that a reexamination is due. I am running hand along the crevices and each crumb that falls I focus on. I am more like the crumb than the sum total of the whole. There I will focus my next 30. How do I exist in a failing system. There I can imagine myself. I can plot a course Before the fat lady signs.

WORDS BY JKSTEWART

TWO MEN RECORD LIES

One man said to the other, I cant run no further. 'When the air you breath is polluted with exhaust and your closets kin lies to worse than the man, where else can you run"? The man sat on his rickety porch and that was when his overalls caught a bit of the evening breeze. He had been living up north working for a factory. When that factory closed he went to another until that one moved to somewhere in China he could not pronounce.

He took a pinch of tobacco from his pouch, it was tightly rolled deep in his overalls pocket. He took it. squeezed it between fingers long and wrinkled from work, loaded up his corn cob pipe and as he reached down to strike a match. He remembered a lie his relatives told him. "They said I was welcomed home but that was another lie". He forgot someone was there sitting beside him with a tape recorder on.

Oh, son I drifted off....old man will do that..."

That's alright, sir.You were telling me about the air.

This man, the one with the recorded there had come from the EPA as part of a fact finding mission. The coal ash that has been dumped across the road was starting to cause a stink for the EPA back in Washington, DC and this guy..this young white guy had stopped by to ask some questions,

Where you when the county turned 'black'? he asked the old man with the corn cob pipe.

Oh, I was in Birmingham back then, had left these hills in search of work. That was before I pushed on up to Cleveland? Has caught the love bug following a pretty gal on up north. Yep, pretty lil' gurl named Ellen"

The county had always been black back in the early 1900s but that was when the soil was so fertile, it could turn a crop faster than the harvest could be loaded. After slavery, white moved on and left farming to the sharecroppers.

The old man pulled hard on the pipe and a yellowish glow rose from the inside. Just long enough to match the sunset that was low...

Sir, can I come back tomorrow, the white man with the tape recorder asked?

Sho....I aint going no where...families lies like that heap of coal ash. I cant turn back now, no where else left to run....he said.....smiling.

They both rose shook hands and the white man left. He and his tape recorder.

WHAT PRICE FOR YOUR LEGACY

ON BULL CONNER'S TANK: I recall the first time I learned of the HUMMER vehicle and that it was available in the UNITED STATES, I knew I had seen that type vehicle in images from South Africa. I then remember the media "black out" that the Apartheid government implemented. When we witness events that speak to us, our conditions as class conscious consumers render us slaves to products that demonstrate our disregard for our own cultural legacies.

As to the media Blackout, ( a subject worthy of study itself) I figured how could that be? The United States had taught me of freedom of the press even as ugly as images are; and I had grown up on television during the Vietnam War ear. Still I was ignorant of the ways mass media can aid in keeping me blind even as they show me images. Aside from that, and thinking of what a African at the hands of SOUTH AFRICAN POLICE meant to me, I once worked for a Jewish Judge who angst I saw over purchasing his first Mercedes-Benz. He knew that the company made German tanks during WWII. He felt he might betray his own cultural legacy. He had always driven FORDS. He ultimate relented to his wife's request. We never discussed why but he did look good in any sedan as he dressed so well. I was happy to work for such a man, despite his shenanigans.

Like my old Judge a Jewish man, African-Americans are guilty of abandoning there own cultural legacy in favor of style. But as you rise and time goes one.. See below BULL CONNER'S TANK AND THINK "WOULD YOU DRIVE ONE IT IT BECAME VOGUE"?

CLOSURE: A FEMINIST MOVIE

In watching CLOSURE I did not know what to expect. I was unfamiliar with both actors. The photo design on the front of case for the Sony release 2007 did suggest to me that the female would be sort of the lead and that assumption was substantiated. In fact I would venture to characterize this as a feminist character. Every thing about Alice says she is an independent woman solely focused on her climb withing the corporate structure. Since I do not fancy the term “chick flick” at the expense of reading as if I abhor feminism, (I do not) I did find such a character more in line with what I think a modern feminist to be.

From the outset, Alice is presented to be superior to Adam. While he complains about a failed date, she is spit polished and clean headed to work in a business suit. Her first words to him are, “you're late”. Then upon her return home we see her sneer at him as a guy would. He is a victim captured in her cage. She spies him lounging on her deck. Cigarette about to burn his fingers. This scene suggest he is a louse. Later we see that he is as he in turn spies on her in a manner that would get any handy man terminated. Yet she is the portrayed as the hunter her. Later when she becomes the victim, it is Adams, whose whimpering we hear as he leans on her in the woods. Notice she does not embrace him then.

One could consider that as shock, yet one month later we see see her returning to work. Adams is impotent and headed down a road of self absorbed pity. Yet Alice has no time to grieve, her father has died and she has more business to attend. She is constantly the leader and the hunter. She knows the gun and upon finding it, (having already been keen enough to follow her rapist home) Adam want to “call the police”. While this is the so-called civilized thing to do, our movie is a revenge movie. Yet it is Alice who reminds Adam “that did not work”. In most movies the genders are assigned the traditional roles and actions are dictated by those genders. When they are flipped as they are here, something else gives rise to that flippancy. LOL What else is there other than to label this as a feminist film?

There is one scene that served to remind us that none of the men in the film are to be liked. The rapist are hunters and they can not even catch a prey that roams around crossing the road repeatedly. Yet in Heffer's home we see ribbons on the wall for some prize catch. Perhaps his daughter owns them. Nonetheless, how shallow all the men are portrayed, Adam while trying to escape Heffer's home attempts to steal a kiss form the daughter, Sophia. While one could argue he is deranged, he is a man his bestiality comes out at the most importuned times. Sophia the only other female character is so traumatized that she can do nothing other than flee. Adam is nothing but another one of her father's friends. We know their intent.

In the final scene (a rather fantastical one) both women are in the car. Sophia asks, “where are we going'? To which Alice answers, “someplace safe”. Someplace is away from all these men. The women are portrayed as nature like the deer. They arise early and go. Meanwhile back in the world of men, Adam is assuming his new role as a MAD MAN. He was unable to control the savagery that Alice was able to reel in. His only saving grace is he did not hear Heffer's tale. Maybe he will.....I doubt it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0480011/

JKSTEWART

GOING TO THE FIELDS

I had not heard the term “going to the fields” for a long time. I was fifteen years old and newly transplanted from St Louis to Starkville, Mississippi. There where my aunt born in 1910, still used terms she had learned so long ago. Most Mississippians did. My relatives used it and guys standing about the high school yard used it when telling of their weekend excursions beyond the Starkville city limits. Some would have gone to the fields to pick corn, peanuts or sweet potatoes. Some to till the ground for new crop. The agricultural south had not entirely died. Generations for this or that farmer pulled cousins to the fields still. I was to to learn of the back breaking work that going to the fields was when my cousin a proud farmer to my great old aunt (who was proud to have a son who still farmed) came round to 'fetch us up to help out'.

It was just recently in May of this year that I heard “go to the fields” again. Pearl Black, who was born and raised in Arkansas but who had made Chicago her home since 1952 had come down come to partake in the Pigee's weekend retreat at Lake Nixon. We were sitting around trading great migration stories and in talking about the lack of opportunities for African-Americans in the south “back then”, she mention gong to the fields. Those lack of opportunities are back again. Indeed for me at age 15 it was one of those rare occasions when my cousin Cliff (everybody called him “Uncle Cliff”) would come get every boy regardless of his employment. In harvest season you went or suffered the consequences: you may not eat any of the fresh and oh so sweet vegetables that were “canned” by the women folk and cooked all winter long.

I always suffered a mix bag of anxiety over work details that I did not volunteer for. Having to learn how to walk behind a wagon that trailed behind a combine baling hay was not my idea of a weekend. Nor was digging for peanuts and sweet potatoes. Yet I was often surprised to go and then find myself day dreaming here and there. Something about the unfamiliar smell of freshly tilled earth (some dry clumps to throw at a unsuspecting girl in a row over) and in the distance an older relatives yelling at the younger ones beyond the trees. This all would instilled in me a quietude like none other.

Many years after those days when I would stand before a wide open field or near a gurgling stream, I would recall that in those moments gone to the field it was then that I would wonder where my mother ghost was. I would wonder did she fit in with all this before she migrated north. I would want to respect my cousins Cliff and I would wonder how would she want me to behave. I figured she would want me to, “be a good boy do as you are told'. I graduated. Many years later on the Ole Miss campus, I would remember these day dream sessions again and told my professors. Standing under oaks upon some fraternity row of fine homes, I would find myself romanticizing over the southern landscape and wondering why I could picture confederate soldiers as noble men close to the soil.

Boys from the delta figured me sold. They considered me foolish cause I could feel white guys who would not speak even as we walked on the same soil and streets. I was becoming romantic and could still hear the grinding of my cousin's horses teeth while we plowed the fields. I could still taste the raw unsalted taste of a peanut from the ground. A northern transplant with a camera. Few knew what concrete urine and glass smelled like after the rain. But I pressed my shutters and moved on. Years later I would be out on photography excursion. I would hear rebel yells and feel threatened. I would see the past and feel certain I had caught something urgent and beautiful. From behind the curtain of political struggle, an artists eye remained untroubled.

Today I wondered not why working class southern guys who pledged to the southern cause, fail to realize we all worked the soil when we were young. The drenched ground from Carolina to Arkansas has my folk as well as General Lee or Stone Wall Jackson their southern boys who fell. I wonder still if they ever know how I want to remain as true to my mother's ghost as they do their vanquished cause? My shutter still clicks as my prostate narrows the channels of my youth. Fewer girls no more film and yet the same youthful innocence guides me over here over there. I continued to day dream. I still 'go to the fields' minus the command of my Uncle Cliff and less frightened by rebel yells.

A WARM DAY IN JANUARY

This day was a beautiful day. Despite the overcast I was able to see clearly. I saw both clearly outward and inwardly. I saw how bright I was when I did not recoil at givng advice, nor did I shy away from showing affection. I held my niece when she came near and did not get insulted when she told me, Uncle. Kevin, you need help. It was warmth I felt even as the temperature outside dropped so low that I dreaded the wind when it did blow.

Today was a good day when I excused the women around me for what seemed like a den full fo hormonally imbalanced lunatics running the work place. I simply carried on until the heat flashes passed and normalcy returned. I graced the customers who came before me not with a confrontational stare but a semblance of comfort for I stood like a fortress behind a wall of assurance. Nothing made me give into anger. I took pause to relieve myself when the time came and I returned to my station ready to complete my shift.

When I moved about, the cold outside did not blast my warmth away. I zipped my coat and smiled as my niece drove me home. I entered my home removed work cloths and heated a big bowl of soup. I drank it down. On the internet I learned so much about crowd sourcing that I look forward to learning more. It was a warm day and most of all I spoke my mind and laid bear truths that I knew to be without hot air.

Now I prepared for bed knowing my dreams are assured to keep me sound for warm was my soul and warm I shall be when I awaken tomorrow.   

MOVIES AND VIETNAM

What is it about Indo-China during the time the French began to loose its war against the communist? I have seen two movies THE LOVER & THE QUIET AMERICAN that while centering the subject of the movie on forbidden romances, positions those “lovers” involved in the romance to be surrounded by a foreboding presence of change. Was Vietnam once the pearl of the orient created by the French where romances bloomed. Was it some kind of lush tropical paradise where romances clashed with colonial interest at the time when Vietnam itself yearned to throw off the yoke of the French domination? Or are western movies inclined to depict it that way?

Albeit both the movies are based upon books written by European writers, both movie adaptations choose Saigon as their setting and more importantly Saigon before the French have reach a treaty with Ho Chi Men. Amid the war class stratification or darn one state a caste system, is almost as stifling at the heat index. Both movies shed light on the snobbery of all: British toward American in THE QUIET AMERICAN while in THE LOVER, its Chinese who snub the French. Indeed such a setting isolates the loves into a cocoon like existence. But this again seems more fantastical than historical.

By the time the United States began to depict Viet Nam in movies, the US had already stepped up its military presence. The domino theory had already taken hole thus like Fidel Castor or the Russian during the Cold War, American films tend to depict these places as “the enemy”. The enemy rather than mercantilism and colonialism were responsible for war-torn place that Viet Nam had become. Almost as vile as as cesspool, it was depicted not as a place of romance but merelyline of demarcation on the world map. Nothing more than the North Viet Nam posing a threat to the Southern Vietnamese people and Premier Diem. Yet this depiction as well may be the offspring of a western imagination. What then is Veit Nam?