On The Road – After. Short Answers

So nine days ago, I finally saw the film of On The Road.  I had posted a list of things I would be looking for in the film.  I’m ready to talk.  First—my short answers on what I saw.  Second—in another post, my long questions about the film.  Here’s my original list, and the short answers about what I saw.

How much of the film is based on the scroll version rather than the finished book?  Some.  The scroll version is closer to the actual events—and so is the film.

An overall theme.  In the book, Sal and friends sense someone walking towards them.  At the end of the book, an old man with long white hair walks past Kerouac in a parking lot and says, “Go moan for man.”  Is anything like this included in the movie?  No.  The theme of the film seems to be Dean’s irresponsibility.

Is Dean Moriarty presented as a new American saint, an irresponsible sociopath, or…?  In keeping with what I just said, Dean is presented as almost completely irresponsible.  At a poetry reading last Thursday, in the wake of the film, I heard one poet sharply denounce Neal Cassady (ie. Dean).

The relationship between Mary Lou and Camille.  Kristen Stewart has suggested that her character (Mary Lou) is the pivot of the film.  But the novel exists in a tension between the two.  I can see why Kristen Stewart (“Luann”) felt she was the pivotal character; she appeared as Dean’s soul mate while Kirsten Dunst (“Camille”) was relegated to a minor role.

What is the role of Carlo Marx?   One film reviewer has said:  “Lose Carlo!”  Is Carlo a true prophet?  A true poet?  A bore?  Pretentious?  Carlo was portrayed as doting and clingy, following Dean around.  His prophetic voice has been removed.

How do they handle that brothel scene in Mexico…?  Superficially, like much else.

Speaking of Mexico—How does the film portray minorities in general?  More specifically, Mexicans and Blacks?  We seem impersonal, societal references:  A sign on a gas station that says “We serve whites only”—and a sign at a roadside grocery that says “We do not sell alcohol to Indians.”  That’s it.  Neither of those signs are in the book.

What about sexism?  Do men utterly run the show?  Pretty much, although Camille does seems pretty independent.  We see the women scrubbing Bull Lee’s floors.

How are the 1940s presented?  How well does the film represent the 1940s, and does it matter?  Though the book is set in 1947-51, most people associate it with the mid-to-late 1950s, when the book first appeared.   We hear bop and see weird jazz musicians.  We hear passing remarks about President Truman.  That’s it.

How homo- or bi-sexual is the book?  How sexual is the relationship between Sal and Dean?  Not very.  Can’t tell how Dean feels about Carlo.  Dean does try to get money out of a gay man by offering sex (That scene is in the scroll version).

 How does Old Bull Lee and family come across?  Funny??  Disturbing?  Simply weird?  Weird—but not nearly weird enough(!).

Does the film include Sal’s vision, in San Francisco, of reincarnation and nonlinear time?  Nope.

How does the film deal with Sal’s relationship to his mother?  Significant, but not significant enough.  But the family is French-Canadian, as in real life.

How is America presented?  America??

Does Dean care about anything besides sex and kicks?  He cares about his children, apparently.  Maybe.

How many people and events are cut out of the movie??  Oh…lots.  But then, the novel includes a lot of characters in very minor roles.

So.  Those are the short answers.  Stay tuned for the long questions!

Getting to Know Quentin

As I get further and further into watching films about Quentin Crisp, I realize the depth of the questions raised here.  
 

Now you may ask, “Why should any of us care about Quentin Crisp?”  For myself I can say that I was profoundly affected by watching The Naked Civil Servant.  And why was that?

It was that a man who was profoundly different—because homosexual and effeminate—chose to live openly and take the consequences.  He believed that people didn’t understand effeminate homosexuals and so feared them.  He was determined to show people that effeminate homosexuals were nothing to be afraid of.  

But here, already, we run into a quandary.  He was indeed no one to be afraid of.  He was beaten up by men, or gangs of men, on multiple occasions.  He always remained polite, considerate—and never hit back.  After release of the film The Naked Civil Servant he was asked, “So you never struck back because that would have reduced you to their level?” and he replied, “Oh no.  I never hit back because they would have killed me.”

Having grown up in the time of Martin Luther King, and having also been deeply affected by watching the film Gandhi, the idea of standing against oppression appealed to me.  The idea of non-violent resistance appealed to me.

But Quentin avoided “movements.”  He did not attempt political action.  He simply asserted who he was, and took the consequences.  This strikes me as much more problematical.  And yet this idea exerted a strong influence on me in the years after I learned about Quentin.  And yet:  Had any of his attackers actually killed Quentin, we would probably never have heard of him.

I’m currently rewatching the sequel to The Naked Civil Servant.  More on that shortly.

Postscript to The Naked Civil Servant

The Naked Civil Servant, the film based on the autobiography of Quentin Crisp, is lighthearted and inspiring.  It’s inspiring in part because it is lighthearted.  Crisp took a lot of heat for being who he was: An honest, open, "effeminate" homosexual, back in the 1930s in England, when homosexuality was a criminal offense. The way he tells his story, part of how he survived was through a lighthearted approach to his troubles—you don’t see much angst in this film.  He and his friend, the club-footed woman, do discuss suffering to some extent; but it’s brief.

It’s possible that the only way someone could survive the indignity of constant contempt was to be honest and whimsical.  This combination provides the charm to this film.

In preparing to watch the sequel, The Englishman in New York, it helps to consider a few questions implied by the first film.

What are the roles of sex, of love, of friendship, of compassion, in this film?

At several points in the film, Quentin professes never to have experienced love; of course, he’s speaking of conventional love:  Between man and woman.  But it’s not clear whether Quentin experiences love towards anyone.  His first sexual experiences are as a male prostitute.  He and his clients get sex, and he gets money.  What might a gay man expect to get at that time?

He has relationships with four men in the course of the film:  The first is a man known only as Thumbnails (his thumbnails are somehow misshaped).  But Crisp claims this love was never sexual.  The second is a civil servant.  This is sexual, but not terribly exciting.  The third is a large man known as Barn Door, who after knowing Quentin awhile, declares they should sleep together; then, after another while, declares they should stop.  The fourth is a Polish man who has spent some years in a mental institution and is “sexual, but impotent.”  Not a very fulfilling list.

He has platonic friendships with several women:  The club-footed woman, who eventually becomes a nun; the wife of the Pole; a ballet teacher who is his landlady for a while.  These connections seem deeper than the relationships with the men, though non-sexual.

Friendship runs deep in this film.  Quentin is a friend of the Pole long before they are lovers.  He is friends with both the Pole and his wife.  The Pole later divorces the wife and marries the club-footed woman.  Crisp remains friends with all of them.  He is loyal to them, and they are loyal to him.  At perhaps the climax of the film, when Crisp is arrested for soliciting (many years after giving up prostitution), his friends proclaim his good character in court and he is found not guilty.

Crisp is compassionate as well.  In his relationships with men, it is always the other man who initiates the connection.  When questioned about his relationship with the Pole, he declares:  “Love is never closing your hand, not even to the unlovable.”

Looking forward to the film’s sequel, one might also consider the role of fantasy and make-believe in Crisp’s life.  At the beginning of The Naked Civil Servant, Crisp suggests a central image might be him playing dress-up as a young boy.  Certainly part of his endurance came from his refusal to concede to anyone that he was doing anything wrong.

But how does a world of wit and fantasy confront the dark realities of AIDS?  This becomes a major theme of the sequel.