Serenade: how to film ballet

The New Neo Posted on by

Or how not to film ballet.

I admit it’s a very difficult task. Film flattens a three-dimensional highly spatial art into two dimensions of flatness. Dance’s impact can only really be made in space, which allows for perspective and weight. But without film dance is completely ephemeral. I have memories of transcendent performances, but I’m happy to have films – however inferior – to look at as well. For me, they spark memories. For those who didn’t see the originals, they give at least a glimpse of some of the greatness.

If a pas de deux – a dance for two people, a man and a woman – is being filmed, the task is somewhat easier. The camera can come in fairly close and it’s an approximation of the shapes the performance made in space, and the viewer can also see some facial expressions. Too close offers too much of the strain, but too far depersonalizes and threatens to turn the dancers into featureless dolls.

However, for an ensemble work, the challenge is much greater. The only way to see the patterns is to position the camera quite far away, as though the viewer is seated in the mezzanine or even balcony. But then the personalities and expressions are somewhat lost. So most filmmakers or videographers cut back and forth from far view to medium view to closeup, depending on what’s happening with the action. But making those choices is not easy and way too often the result, although well-intentioned, is a dizzying confusion that causes the viewer to lose sight of the ballet itself as a whole – which, after all, is the way it’s meant to be viewed.

Here’s a frustrating example. It features one of my very favorite ballets: Balanchine’s “Serenade,” which is a masterpiece. The music is Tchaikovsky’s exceptionally lovely “Serenade For Strings.” The performance is apparently from 1973 although the film is dated 1977, it’s Balanchine’s own New York City Ballet, and I’m very familiar with all the soloists. But even though I know and love the ballet, the camerawork is dizzying and disorienting. No sooner do you get an idea of what’s happening than it cuts to something else:

Here’s a video from a 2011 production by the Sacramento Ballet, a lesser although very good company. I think the director strikes a better compromise and most of the time you can see both the dancers and the shapes the group makes onstage, so important for this particular ballet:

Trump answers the charge of whether he’d use the military to move against his opponents

The New Neo Posted on by

In her Fox News interview with Bret Baier, Harris said this about Trump:

You and I both know that he has talked about turning the American military on the American people. He has talked about going after people who are engaged in peaceful protest. He has talked about locking people up because they disagree with him,” Harris told the Fox News host.

“This is a democracy, and in a democracy the president of the United States in the United States of America, should be willing to be able to handle criticism without saying he’d lock people up for doing it,” she said.

If you would like to read what Trump actually said rather than Harris’ spin on it, see this. I think it’s quite clear – although he could and should have made it more clear – that he’s talking about violent, disruptive, far left demonstrators, and mostly about calling on the National Guard if necessary to maintain order. There’s nothing really new or different about that, although many people on the NY Times staff got all upset when Tom Cotton mentioned something similar a while back.

For example, here’s one of Trump’s previous statements on the matter:

On Oct. 13, during an interview with Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo, Trump was asked if he is expecting chaos on Election Day. The former president said he was not anticipating mayhem from “the side that votes for Trump” but from what he called “the enemy from within.”

“I think the bigger problem is the enemy from within, not even the people that have come in and [are destroying] our country — I don’t think they’re the problem in terms of Election Day — I think the bigger problem are the people from within,” Trump said.

“We have some very bad people; we have some sick people, radical left lunatics. And it should be very easily handled, if necessary, by the National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military, because they can’t let that happen,” Trump added.

Here’s more recent clarification from Trump, from a WSJ interview:

Columnist Peggy Noonan, a longtime and sometimes severe critic of Mr. Trump, asks him to clarify [comments he made in an interview with Maria Bartiromo televised this past Sunday]: “If you were to reach the presidency again, would you of course rule out using the military to move against your enemies? That is, yours would not be a fascist-style government that would use its agencies, entities or military to move against your political foes because they have opposed you—is that correct?”

“Yeah,” Mr. Trump says, “but I never said I would. . . . First of all, Biden, who doesn’t know he is alive—Biden said that he expects there to be a lot of trouble if I win the election. That’s a very bad statement for him to make. He said that. That’s where this came from.” Mr. Trump digresses into his poll numbers and has to be brought back on topic.

Ms. Noonan: “But you would never do that?”

Mr. Trump: “Of course I wouldn’t. But now, if you’re talking about you’re going to have riots on the street, you would certainly bring the National Guard in. As an example, in Minneapolis while I was there”—meaning while he was in office—“they had riots, literal riots. That whole city was burning down. And Minnesota, the governor was supposed to—our favorite governor—the governor was supposed to do it. He wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t do it. And I said, ‘You got to get the National Guard.’ . . .

“And when you looked over the shoulder of that poor guy from CNN, that poor, stupid reporter who was standing there saying, ‘This seems to be a peaceful demonstration,’ then he gets hit on the leg with a rock, and behind him the whole city was burning. It looked like World War II in Berlin, and he’s trying to say that it’s peaceful. So I insisted that the National Guard—if I didn’t do that, I don’t think you would’ve had a city left. So I’m only talking about in cases like that where you need help. You can’t say, ‘I’ll never bring in everything,’ as the entire country is disappearing in bedlam. But certainly not against my opponents—it’s against civil unrest.”

But Harris would much rather imply that Trump will have some sort of policy of using the military to shoot his enemies and “the American people,” as well as locking up people who merely “disagree with him.” No, that last bit is solely the province of the party to which Harris belongs.

Drone targets Netanyahu’s house but no one’s home; Blinken and Biden have a plan

The New Neo Posted on by

Was Netanyahu’s house hit? It’s unclear from this article. The NY Times says the drone hit a nearby building. But either way, this particular drone didn’t set off any warning systems. That’s the danger of drone attacks, which sometimes activate such systems and sometimes do not.

At any rate, Netanyahu himself seems fine – although lame-duck Joe Biden has been saying that now that Sinwar is dead it’s time for a ceasefire. That’s the typical backwards logic of Biden; on the contrary, it’s actually time to press on and finish the job of defanging Iran’s proxies. Only then is it “the day after.” But Biden wants something to happen prior to the 2024 election, so he and Kamala can claim some sort of credit.

The article says there’s a plan:

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is considering a post-war plan for Gaza based on ideas developed by Israel and the United Arab Emirates that would be presented after the presidential election, U.S. officials say.

Why after the election?

More:

Several officials in the White House and State Department are concerned the plan would marginalize Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his government, which is what Israel and the UAE are pushing for in the immediate term.

They’re concerned about that? Abbas, who is now eighty-eight years old, to be turning eighty-nine in a month? That Abbas? The one who is weeping for Sinwar?:

The Palestine Liberation Organization, led by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and seen internationally as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people, expressed its condolences Friday on the “martyrdom” of Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar, calling him a “great national leader” and urging Palestinian national unity. …

Israel has long accused Abbas and the PA of backing terror by lionizing terrorists as “martyrs” and paying stipends to jailed terror operatives and families of slain terrorists.

It also accuses the PA of inciting to hatred of Israel in its education system. Fatah regularly lauds the actions of Palestinian terrorists and senior Fatah officials have at times expressed support for Hamas and its deadly attacks on Israelis.

Those are not just Israel’s accusations – not just Israel “pouncing.” I don’t think the accusations are disputed. More:

Abbas has indicated that the PA is willing to take control over the Gaza Strip after Hamas is removed from power there — on condition of the establishment of a Palestinian state along the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.

Big of Abbas. Is that consistent with Blinken/Biden/Harris’s plan?

The Idiocracy of Tim Walz

The New Neo Posted on by

The self-described knucklehead doesn’t even know what a venture capitalist is:

“Sen. Vance became a media darling. He wrote a book about the place he grew up. But the premise was trashing that place he grew up rather than lifting it up,” Walz said on Tuesday of the Republican vice presidential hopeful, adding, “This guy is a venture capitalist cosplaying as a cowboy or something.”

“I don’t even know what a venture capitalist does most of the time!” he then yelled.

Social media reacted with quips and astonishment to Walz’s comments about the term “venture capitalist,” which regards one who invests in a startup business venture.

“Tampon Tim be like ‘vote for me. JD Vance is smart and I’m an idiot,’” a social media user reacted on X.

Walz is going for the Idiocracy vote. Maybe it’s a rather large bloc these days, alas.

[NOTE: If you’re unfamiliar with the movie Idiocracy, you might want to take a look. It’s transgressively, offensively funny.]

More details on the ignominious death of Sinwar

The New Neo Posted on by

From the British press:

A unit from the IDF’s 828th Bislamach Brigade was patrolling Tal al-Sultan, an area of Rafah, on Wednesday morning, when it came across a group of three Hamas fighters in the street and engaged them in a firefight.

The terrorists were ‘on the run’ moving from house to house, the IDF said, and became split up.

One of them, since identified as Sinwar, ‘ran alone into one of the buildings’. He went up to the second floor, and troops responded by firing a tank shell in his direction.

So – if that account is correct – it explains how Sinwar was originally identified as a terrorist, and why he ended up alone in the building where he ultimately died. Apparently he and the other two had been on the move.

Grenades were thrown at the IDF troops (it’s not clear from where), and then they decided to send a drone into the building into which the man later identified as Sinwar had gone. That’s how we got that amazing drone footage of him sitting in a chair, with a hand wounded from the gun battle in the street, looking at the drone and throwing something at it that appeared to be a stick.

And then:

Two 120mm tank shells slammed into the building, as well as a surface-to-surface Matador missile, according to Israeli reports, with shrapnel scything across the upper floors and killing Sinwar.

Unaware they had taken out Israel’s prime target, the soldiers did not return to the site until Thursday morning, when soldiers from the 450th Infantry Battalion were sent in to get a closer look.

So there was a delay, and then a different unit was the one that uncovered the body and recognized that it could be Sinwar. Also:

He was found with a weapon, a flak jacket and 40,000 shekels (£8,250).

‘Yahya Sinouar had a lot of cash and fake passports on him, he was ready to flee,’ Israeli army spokesman Colonel Olivier Rafowicz told French outlet CNEWS this morning.

He claimed that the items Sinwar had on him, which allegedly also included a card from UNRWA, the UN aid for Palestinian refugees, ‘may show that he was ready to flee and leave Gaza and his men behind.’

During his many years in Israeli prisons, Sinwar learned to speak fluent Hebrew. He could have fled to Israel, perhaps, and organized something horrific there. There are other possibilities as well, of course – Iran or Qatar come immediately to mind. But the shekels are interesting.

The details of Sinwar’s death are sordid and ignominious, far from glorious. That makes it harder for Hamas to present him as some sort of hero. I continue to wonder what percentage of Gaza’s population is rejoicing at the news. Israel has offered evidence that at least some people were happy. And then there’s this:

An opinion poll published in mid-September by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR), a think tank based in Ramallah and funded by Western donors, showed for the first time the majority of Gazans opposed the decision to attack Israel on October 7.

The poll, conducted in early September, found that 57% of people surveyed in the Gaza Strip said the decision to launch the offensive was incorrect, while just 39% said it was correct – down sharply from the previous poll in June.

Hamas has long been accused of crushing dissent in Gaza with beatings or worse. But recent months have seen some rare public displays of dissent.

This isn’t evidence of any newfound love of Israel. But it’s still an important thing if most Gazans come to think that the war against Israel was a bad move, and that it is they who have suffered a result, and will suffer from any future such aggression on their part.

The Democrats are trying to say Trump is the cognitively challenged one

The New Neo Posted on by

It seems a bizarre approach to me, but they must be getting feedback that their base loves it. Because I think that, for most other people, all it does is remind them of how the Democrats tried for so long to cover up Biden’s decline. After all, the fact that they could no longer keep up the pretense is the reason Kamala Harris is the Democrats’ candidate today, and everyone knows it.

And yet in her Fox interview, Kamala Harris continued to deny there was anything wrong with Biden. It’s such brazen gaslighting it deserves some sort of award. Plus, does it fool anyone?

Meanwhile, Trump has coherent long-form interviews with all sorts of people, and although he includes his trademark eccentricities such as what he calls “the weave,” he seems quite with it to me. That doesn’t stop the Democrats from claiming he’s exhibiting cognitive problems. They read it into this town hall meeting – interrupted by medical emergencies for two spectators and overwhelming heat, that then turned into a musical interlude – into some sort of evidence of mental lapses on Trump’s part.

And now there’s Trump’s appearance last night at a Catholic charity event, in which he seems to have been unusually entertaining and funny. You can read an account here and watch some clips. And yet Harris-Walz 2024 Rapid Response Director Ammar Moussa put out this statement about it:

Donald Trump struggled to read scripted notes written by his handlers, repeatedly complaining that he couldn’t use a teleprompter. He stumbled over his words and lashed out when the crowd wouldn’t laugh with him. The rare moments he was off script, he went on long incomprehensible rambles, reminding Americans how unstable he’s become. And of course he made it all about himself. He may refuse to release his medical records, but every day he makes it clear to the American people that he is not up to the job.

To me it seems a weird approach, for the aforementioned reason that Trump isn’t generally perceived that way but Biden was. In addition, Kamala isn’t sounding like the sharpest knife in the drawer. And “every day it’s she who makes it clear to the American people that she is not up to the job.”

Time for a laugh

The New Neo Posted on by

The Fox interview: how do you solve a problem like Kamala?

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve seen many clips of last night’s interview on Fox News with Kamala Harris, read excerpts and reactions, but haven’t been able to bring myself to watch the entire thing. I’m sure Harris’ fans have good things to say about her performance: she’s so feisty and brave, and that sort of thing. And those who have no intention of ever voting for her say it was a train wreck, which I think it was. More to the point, of course, is what that tiny but oh-so-important group of undecideds in the middle might think, if they’re even paying attention. From what I’ve read and seen, though, I can’t imagine it won many of those people over.

Bret Baier seemed surprisingly tough and also well-prepared. The critique from the left was, predictably, He was so mean he interrupted her! And even, from some, How dare a white man do that to a black woman! Those who say those things don’t seem to understand that you can’t claim to be strong and not be able to take challenging question and/or interruptions. But then again, Kamala Harris is accustomed to dealing with an obsequious press.

One thing I can say for Harris, however: she had a game plan and she stuck with it. The game plan was and is rather simple: don’t get pinned down in any actual answers except Trump BAD! Over and over and over.

There were some extraordinary exchanges. For example:

BAIER: Your campaign slogan is a new way forward and it’s time to turn the page. You’ve been vice president for three and a half years. So what, are you turning the page from.

HARRIS: Well, first of all, turning the page from the last decade in which we have been burdened with the kind of rhetoric coming from Donald Trump that has been designed and implemented to divide our country and have Americans literally point fingers at each other. Rhetoric and an approach to leadership that suggests that the strength of a leader is based on who you beat down instead of what we all know the strength of leadership is based on who you lift up. The strength of an American president, which is one who understands that the vast majority of us have more in common than what separates us.

BAIER: More 70% of people…

HARRIS: That is about turning the page on rhetoric that people are frankly exhausted…

BAIER: …more than 70% of people tell pollsters the country is on the wrong track, they say the country is on the wrong track. If it’s on the wrong track, that track follows three and a half years of you being vice president and President Biden being president. That is what they’re saying. 79% of them. Why are they saying that? If you’re turning the page, you’ve been in office for three and a half years.

HARRIS: And Donald Trump has been running for office…

BAIER: But you’ve been the person in the office. Madam Vice President…

HARRIS: …both know what I’m talking about. You and I both know what I’m talking about.

BAIER: I actually don’t. What are you talking about?

Well he might ask. What she’s talking about is the only thing she feels comfortable talking about, which is that Trump is evil. Trumpety Trump Trump Trumpa-dump. Meanwhile, of course, as she goes on and on about the awfulness of Trump, she seems not to notice that it is she who thinks her own “strength as a leader is based on beating down Trump,” – or contnually attempting to do so.

Her next statement to Baier was this:

HARRIS: What I’m talking about is that over the last decade, people have…but listen, over the last decade, it is clear to me and certainly the Republicans who are on stage with me. The former chief of staff to the president, Donald Trump, former defense secretaries, national security advisor, and his vice president, one that he is unfit to serve…that he is unstable, that he is dangerous, and that people are exhausted with someone who professes to be a leader who spends full time demeaning and engaging in personal grievances and it being about him.

There’s that irony again: does she not understand that she has become the “someone who professes to be a leader who spends full time demeaning and engaging in personal grievances and it being about Trump”? Does she not even hear herself?

And then:

BAIER: Your campaign slogan is A New Way Forward and It’s Time To Turn The Page. You’ve been Vice President for 3.5 years. What are you turning the page from?

HARRIS: The last decade of Donald Trump.

Decade? He’s been in power for a decade? Who knew? He started in 2014? He’s been in power during the entire Biden/Harris administration? If he’s been so powerful for so very long, including during the nearly four years that Harris has been VP, why would he disappear if she were to be elected?

As time goes on and I hear more from Harris, I become more worried about what kind of president she actually would be if, heaven forbid, she won the election. Someone on some comment thread wrote, “She makes Hillary Clinton look like Dinah Shore.” And I have to add that she makes Biden look competent. Even in his addled state, he can draw on decades and decades of maneuvering in the political arena. The guy was never especially smart, but he had something on the ball – some sort of wily ability. I don’t know what Kamala has, and I don’t think she knows either, except identity politics and the demonization of Donald Trump. I certainly hope it won’t be enough to get her into the White House.

Here are two videos made after the interview. The first is from Baier:

The second is Ben Shapiro’s reaction:

Sinwar dead: can it be?

The New Neo Posted on by

I was astounded when I read the news that the IDF had killed Sinwar, and also somewhat disbelieving. But when I read that they had announced that DNA testing had confirmed his identity, I became convinced that Sinwar has finally met his end.

The circumstances are amazing in the sense that we had read he was always surrounded by twenty-or-so hostages. But that’s not how the scenario went:

Sinwar, architect of the October 7 Hamas invasion and slaughter in southern Israel, was shot dead along with two other terrorists in a firefight in Rafah, in southern Gaza, on Wednesday, the Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet security agency announced.

He was not being directly targeted, and troops only realized that one of the three dead terrorists was apparently Sinwar when they inspected the scene of the firefight on Thursday morning. …

Part of Sinwar’s finger was removed for expedited testing as the location was booby-trapped. His body was extracted and brought to Israel later Thursday.

In a joint statement, the IDF and Shin Bet said Israel’s military activities gradually constricted Sinwar’s area of operations, ultimately leading to his death.

There was some intelligence that Hamas “senior officials” were hiding in the area, but it seems pretty clear that the troops didn’t know they had zeroed in on Sinwar until after he was dead. More intelligence afterwards – “indications from Gaza” – also let them know that Sinwar might have died.

I sometimes wonder how it is that Israel has enough DNA information on these terrorists to identify their bodies, but there are several ways it could happen. The first is through relatives. But for Sinwar, there’s another obvious method, which is that he was in Israeli prisons for many years and only released in the Shalit deal. While in Israel he had major medical treatment for cancer. I strongly suspect that Israel is very familiar with his DNA for that reason.

And this is especially interesting, if true:

According to an unsourced report on Channel 12, Sinwar had previously been hiding with the six hostages who were executed by their Hamas captors on August 29 and whose bodies were recovered by the IDF on August 31 — Hersh Goldberg-Polin, 23, Eden Yerushalmi, 24, Ori Danino, 25, Alex Lobanov, 32, Carmel Gat, 40, and Almog Sarusi, 27.

It said Sinwar likely gave the order to kill the six as he fled.

It said the firefight on Wednesday took place in the same area as the six hostages were held and killed.

It also said that the IDF had checked when the six hostages’ bodies were recovered whether terrorists killed in the area had included Sinwar. This was found not to be the case, but indications, including DNA evidence, were found at the time that Sinwar had been in the area.

I remember that reports of the killing of the six hostages included the note that the area was checked for the DNA of terrorists.

Not only was the area where Sinwar was killed boody-trapped, but he was wearing a military vest with grenades.

And remember all the shrieking a while back from the Biden administration and much of the world that the Israelis shouldn’t go into Rafah? Fortunately Israel didn’t listen.

I think it goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: Sinwar was the architect of October 7 and the political leader of Hamas. I hope his death will serve to deeply demoralize remaining Hamas forces and those Gazans who have supported Hamas.

Various world leaders have used the opportunity of Sinwar’s death to renew calls for a ceasefire; I kid you not. And Biden has done some bragging, saying the Israelis did it with the help of his administration:

Biden says he will soon speak to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders “to congratulate them, to discuss the pathway for bringing the hostages home to their families, and for ending this war once and for all, which has caused so much devastation to innocent people.”

Actually, it’s an opportunity to end this war by finishing the job in the military sense.

From Netanyahu:

Turning to the hostage families, Netanyahu says this is “an important moment” in the war. “We will continue with all our strength until the return of all of your loved ones, who are our loved ones.”

Netanyahu then turns to Gazan civilians: “Sinwar ruined your life. He told you he was a lion, but in reality he was hiding in a dark den. And he was killed when he fled in a panic from our soldiers.”

“To the Hamas terrorists I say: your leaders are fleeing and they will be eliminated,” he continues.

He says that anyone holding hostages will be allowed to live if they lay down their weapons and release their captives.

“And at the same time I say, whoever harms our hostages, his blood will be on his head,” says Netanyahu. ” We will come to a reckoning with him.” …

Addressing the people of the Middle East, Netanyahu says there is “a great opportunity to stop the axis of evil and create a different future.”

Netanyahu says that Sinwar’s killing makes clear to critics in Israel and abroad why his government insisted on continuing the war.

I think it’s always been clear. Problem is, Israel’s “critics” don’t want Israel to win this war.

Nevertheless, this is a day of great hope.