The Homecoming,
screenplay by Harold Pinter, based on his own play
10 out of
10
The Homecoming
has been included among The Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made, on the list compiled
by The New York Times (the site where you can check to see how many you have
seen) https://www.listchallenges.com/new-york-times-best-1000-movies-ever-made/list/10
-and one can be enthused or horrified to see how many similarities his life has
with fiction, as happened to this viewer, who must identify with the vicious
Sam, as portrayed by the excellent Paul Rogers, though none of the other
characters is really angelic, far from it, or at least listen to his spouse
explaining this role to him, eight days a week.
Max is the
father of three men and the paradigm of the pessimistic, negative main
character, who would play the role of the villain, if it were not for the
situation where all the others compete for the same position, there is no
positive personage here, though using a modern day lens, we might argue that
Ruth aka wonderful Vivien Merchant is the victim of this group of men and her acquiescence
to some appalling scenarios is just the reflection of the power of the family,
perhaps in the way that in some Nordic countries prostitution leads to the
prosecution of the men involved and not the sex workers, who are presumed to be
constrained by their limited means, traffickers and other circumstances…
Speaking of
archetypal negative individual, Max does offer surprises – though not in the
sense of paradigm change exposed in the wondrous Vernon God Little Booker Prize
Winner by the sacramental DBC Pierre, where this is the situation…your grandmother
has a man in the room with a finger up his ass and whereas you are aghast at
first, you experience a paradigm change once you learn that the individual is just
trying to save her from some pernicious, maybe deadly Wuhan virus or who knows
what…
Sam aka
great Cyril Cusack is the brother of the grumpy old man and he attracts once in
a while the wrath of Max, who is so menacing, repugnant with his attacks on his
sibling, offspring and everyone, reminding one of the quintessential evil
creature of this age, Trump, the one who has been acquitted some hours ago by a
Senate where we can again see the image of Max aka Trump repeated in the aisle
where republicans sit, with the notable exception of the brave Mormon, Mitt
Romney, who has called the thief by his name and admitted in spite of his
affiliation that the crime committed was not just High, but one of the most
serious one can get involved in, if not the Most serious.
Teddy aka
equally admirable Michael Jayston returns after nine years to his family, hence
The Homecoming, with his wife Ruth, after taking some vacation in Italy, they continue
to North London flat, where she has the chance to meet with the father,
brothers and uncle, before they return, supposedly in a couple of days, to
America where they have three sons – what a coincidence, or is it a symbol of
some godly intervention, or perhaps a representation of the way life repeats itself
with each new generation…
Teddy is a
philosophy professor in California, though this title appears to be if not
undeserved, at least assigned to him as a means to criticize maybe the intellectuals,
their despondency, lack of virility and the tendency to fall upon the easier
alternative when faced with challenges, or most likely even worse, he could
well expose the manner in which able minds – Clint Eastwood comes to mind and
his outrageous political stands…he might well be a Trump cheerleader now – endeavor
in such disgusting schemes as the professor would do …by the way, this is just
a rather short narrative and the idea of spoiler alerts cannot be the same as elsewhere,
for one cannot just restrain oneself to speaking about say fifteen or twenty
minutes and forget about the second half…
The encounter
between Ruth and Lenny aka marvelous Ian Holm announces some intriguing, if not
outrageous and overwhelming happenings, for the tow exchange some pleasantries,
but soon the pimp becomes very pushy and forward, while the sister –in- law is also
rather outré in her response, if not much more, inviting, soliciting and
provoking the brother, by saying ‘why not take you’, though using a MeToo
optic, we would surely arrive at the conclusion that first of all, that was the
age of male domination and women knew almost nothing else, we have hints that
Ruth had been through some difficult times and hence she is tormented by the
men that have dominated, tamed her, broke her spirit and much else…
One of the
points that has attracted the attention of the undersigned is the challenge addressed
to the Californian philosophy professor, who is asked about religion and God
and how can one revere, worship the Unknown, and the theme is not just
important in the film, but it is probably the most vital question we would all
ask…evidently, many, actually most people on earth have a clear answer to that,
seeing as most believe in Jesus, Allah, Buddha or another version of those,
although there is an increasing percentage of freethinkers, they are still a
minority and the idea of putting all their trust in that Unknown Entity is part
of the reason why they reject Jehovah or his alternatives…Nathaniel Branden
exposes in his luminescent The Psychological Effects of Religion the trauma,
the negative impact that most of the religious concepts have on people…think
only of the idea that we must not pay so much attention to this world, this
(only) life and consider the paradise that awaits – or not – the meek and the
believers…
With the
proposals made by the brothers, the play aka the movie descends into the absurd,
tough perhaps this is the new normal, in a world where lies do not matter
anymore, once the Lighthouse of democracies is now acquitting a crook and an
established extortionist, a con man and they are very likely to elect him
again, so what is ‘virtue and what is vice’…they seem to have traded places, so
why not work in the sex industry and forget about the three sons one has to
raise…
This viewer
has written another note on Homecoming, which was an adaptation for the BBC
Radio, with the glorious Michael Gambon in the role of the butcher, Max…
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