'concrete island' . 'in america' . 'ka'. 'the garden'

in j. g. ballards ‘concrete island’ an architect finds himself stranded in a wasteland forgotten in the middle of a maze of highways. i love the way he is able ot look at the world around and be able to extrapolate it to its logical dystopic conclusion. moral tales all of them can be seen as- cautionary tales about humanity at the ends of civilization. on the island the only company maitland the architect has is a drunk half mad trapeze artist and a runaway young prostitute living in the basement of an abandoned theater.

‘in america’ is susan sontag’s vast epic drama about a stage actress in the 1800s immigrating to america from poland to set up a commune inspired by fourier. her troupe of admirers and acolytes follows her there. the journey is from a country where identity is inextricably linked with collective suffering to the promised land where the possibilities for freedom are boundless.

‘ka’ was italian roberto calassos poetic dream like narrative of stories from hindu mythology. i would have been indignant about the book if it were not so beautifully written.

and what can i say about ‘the garden’. a black house that stands in a barren landscape where the sky seems endless and the rhythms of the sea like the beat of drum, memories of a childhood as an outcast, parallels drawn hesitatingly and boldly between biblical images and the persecution of homosexual love. i cant say i understood the film. i cant say that i did not. incredibly beautiful to watch and listen to, the movie was like a hallucinatory dream of a dying man (mukul tells me he fell very ill due to complications resulting from aids while making the film). and yet the beauty was never one of treated sunsets and soft focus prettiness. even as clouds move in slow motion across the screen they suddenly turn into mere projections on a screen, the insufferable torture sequence of a loving couple is played out as parody- as if to mock himself for feeling the need to portray in such a crass fashion the victimization of love (such a trite idea!?) by a dogmatic society. brilliant, strange and incredibly moving.