Brick Lane hits the Big Screen
Monica Ali’s controversial novel Brick Lane hits the big screen today (Friday, 26 October) with a gala screening at the Times BFI London Film Festival”, three weeks in advance of the national release (Friday, 16 November).
With Sarah Gavron directing, the screen adaptation of Brick Lane stars Tannishtha Chatterjee, Satish Kaushik and Christopher Simpson. About London’s East End Asian community, Ali’s novel sparked outrage among members of the Bangladeshi community, and left others calling her the new Zadie Smith.
Regarding the controversy, Abdus Salique, chair of the Brick Lane Trader’s Association, told The Guardian, “she is not one of us, she has not lived with us, she knows nothing about us, but she has insulted us.”
Meanwhile, Monica Ali defends the novel and the film, writing that the “controversy” was over-exaggerated – and possibly cooked-up – by an overzealous media.
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For more on the London Film Festival
Also: catch the film and a conversation with Monica Ali, November 9 at the ICA, and the film and a Q&A with director Sarah Gavron, November 15 at Curzon Soho.
Also, see the Asians in the Media, which publishes “news and commentary on Asians in British media and how the industry relates to minority-ethnic communities”
Dirty Dancing Everywhere!: More from the world of adaptation
Recycling is rarely frowned upon in this ever-green age; but then recycling is rarely coupled with the repeat-commercialization and making of multi-million dollar profits. Have we gone too far with adaptations, stretching single ideas to their limit with the release of slight variations on the same commodified image or thought?
To what extent do adaptations provide new ways of looking at a popular story (Example: A film adaptation of Beowulf, the Old English epic poem from around 1000 AD hits the screen in the UK on November 16).
Or to what extent are adaptations commercial marketing schemes concocted to continuously resell the same idea in slightly different packaging, providing only the illusion of change, innovation, and variation? (Example: this October sees the nationwide UK release of Dirty Dancing: The Video Game, to celebrate the film’s 20th anniversary.
Released in 1987, Dirty Dancing has sold over 10 million DVDs. A stage adaptation of the film is currently on at the Aldwych Theatre in London, and WE TV are responsible for “Dirty Dancing: The Reality Series”).
Al Gore: Nobel Prize Winner and Trend Setter?
Al Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize came as a disappointment to many as his recent environmental fervour beat out the revolutionary protests by Burmese monks for the title and $1.5 million (£737,000) prize.
Perhaps Gore needed something to throw his energy into post-election-failure, and sought green as therapy? There is no shortage of cynics who are sceptical of his commitment to the environment.
But regardless of the motivations, politician after politician (first Al Gore, then John Kerry, and now Newt Gingrich) is coming out in support of the environment, publishing books, making documentaries, and holding public debates on environmental protection and the hazards of climate change.
This Thursday, 1 November, former US Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (famous for overseeing the 1990s “Republican Revolution in the House) will release his A Contract with the Earth, an environmental manifesto for the Green Capitalists, stressing the need for bipartisan environmental strategy and showing the way forward for environmental entrepreneurship and the creation of incentives for businesses to be more environmentally friendly.
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Al Gore started the trend with An Inconvenient Truth, the 2006 film and book
Senator John Kerry came out with This Moment on Earth March 26, 2007.
See a 2007 PBS Interview with Newt Gingrich
The Times on “nine inconvenient untruths” in Gore’s 2006 documentary
Leonardo DiCaprio’s 11th Hour documentary on rapid environmental degradation
James Harding writes on green capitalism and the “green rush” in New Statesman
Battle of Ideas vs. Anarchist Bookfair
Class divisions in London’s radical intellectual communities will be mapped geographically this weekend as those who can cough up £75 will head to the Institute of Idea’s Battle of Ideas at the Royal College of Art and those who are hungry for more than just debate will head to the 27th annual Anarchist Bookfair at Queen Mary & Westfield College in London’s East End.
Both events have been in the works for months, hence their overlap is likely not a lapse in judgement but is rather indicative of the demographics of the contemporary political left.
The dramatically well-funded Pfizer-sponsored Battle of Ideas is a “two-day festival of high-level, thought-provoking debate” featuring everything from discussions on academic freedom to talks on the lack of student radicalism to conversations on “Will Ethical Shopping Save the World?”
Meanwhile, the Anarchist Bookfair is free and open to the public, boasting a range of meetings, film screenings, discussions and workshops dedicated to radical political thought and activity. Events include a discussions on housing and worker cooperatives, “men and feminism,” and documentaries on workers in the London Underground and women in the Spanish civil war.
Visit the Institute of Ideas website for full program details
See the Anarchist Bookfair website for more information
Modern Art Cabbies: Bringing Art to the Masses or Innovative Marketing Strategy?
Two of Liverpool’s cabbies are now driving around the “Capital of Culture” charged with gabbing about the 2007 Turner Prize (while video-taped, mind you) with their customers. The Tate Liverpool’s Taxi Project, initiated in June 2007, gave taxi drivers intensive courses on contemporary art, the history of the Turner Prize and the exhibit’s controversies. The conversations will be screened alongside the Prize nominations, with the Tate’s hope that they “offer a snap shot of opinion and feeling in the city about the Prize and about art and life in general.”
But is the project really an attempt to bring art to the masses? Or is it part and parcel with a larger marketing strategy and a growing tendency to employ “casual advertisers” who infiltrate social gatherings and put their gift of gab to use on behalf of commercial companies. (Recall the controversies over student product promoters on American university campuses, who are paid to strike up conversations with their fellow students about the newest Apple computer or the health benefits of various soft drinks).
The Taxi Project and the 2007 Turner Prize are sponsored by Metquarter”, “Liverpool’s premier shopping destination. With 40 top stores…[it] is home to leading fashion and lifestyle brands including M.A.C, BOSS Hugo Boss and Flannels” and by Arts & Business, an independent organization which has recognized “the importance of brand building [and] innovation” and helps companies achieve their objectives by developing unique connections between business and the arts.
Jennina O’Neil, Metquarter’s Marketing Manager explains their sponsorship of the exhibition and Taxi Project because: “we liked the idea that our customers could enjoy the shopping experience here [at Metquarter] and then jump in a cab and talk about art on their way to a gallery.” Similarly, Janet Dunnet of Arts and Business lauds Metquarter’s sponsorship as an innovative and exciting reflection of “their brand and their way of doing business.”
So, when art is commodity, and when art exhibitions have eager corporate sponsors, can art education be separated from marketing?
Related
The Times on the taxi-driving Tate promoters
Liverpool as the 2008 European Capital of Culture
“Do corporate sponsorships compromise theatres?” in The Guardian
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