Unsolicited Recommendations 7

You might've imagined I've grown tired of cramming my opinions into blog posts but allow me to assure you I haven't. I've been busy with a couple of things both announced and unannounced that will be crammed into your eyeballs and earholes in the next month or two. That and the ever increasing crime rate in New York that means I have to dodge bullets in increasingly innovative ways says I have to treat each one of these as the last. No pressure.

One movie and one book-

Joshua Oppenheimer's The Act of Killing

I think there comes a point in any reasonable person's life where they wonder about the psychology behind an atrocity. What is it that such and such persons felt was sufficient cause to do such horrific things?

One of the closer, and truthfully more harrowing, analyses I've ever seen to try and answer that question is Joshua Oppenheimer's 2014 masterpiece, The Act of Killing. The documentary centers around the Indonesian Massacres of 65'-66' and the life of Anwar Congo. Anwar was a small time gangster in the city of Medan in north-west Indonesia. Small time gangster amounting to the selling of counterfeit movie tickets. Coincidence and circumstance conspired to place him at the head of one of the most ruthless and terrible death squads of that particular conflict.

I'm not going to delve further to not ruin the impact, but a more shocking example of the banality of evil you would be hard pressed to find. Anwar, being a part of the political group to come out on top in that particular conflict, was lauded and lionized for the many, many atrocities he committed, and he accepted that role.  That's where the journey starts.

It's not a happy or sanitary story, but much like Hannah Arendt's The Banality of Evil, it answers often unaddressed questions that make you grow as a person.

Umberto Eco - Baudolino

Umberto Eco's Baudolino is a book I've recently fallen in love with which doesn't get nearly the attention it merits. I imagine this is because it has to compete with its older brothers-The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum. Both of which require patience to get the best results (especially if you're looking to understand the underlying mysteries Eco references.)  Baudolino, standing at a hefty 528 unabridged pages, is also not a quick read.

However, it is a book that actually merits that overused word "epic." Why? Because, and I promised myself not to make a dick joke, it does a lot of things with that length. It's both one of the funniest and most profound books I've ever read. It does require you know a little bit more about both semiotics and medieval politics than is reasonable, but with same basing and googling, it is not hard to traverse.

The main character, Baudolino, comes across not as an archetype or someone you're meant to project upon but a flawed and lovable protagonist. Over the course of a journey to find the mythical Prestor John, we see Baudolino evolve and change. However it is never written in a boring clear cut "this is the character arc" kind of way. He's an honest liar, a cowardly brave man and a pacifist who's constantly getting caught in wars. He's funny and profound, jovial and scarred, and one of the best main characters I've had the chance to acquaint myself with. The cast he's surrounded with, both historical and fictional, are equally as charming and convincingly villainous.

So yes it's 528 pages, but you'll leave it both smiling and thinking.