A movie review of “The Revenant” and book review of “My Grandfather’s Gallery” – by Gary S. Smolker

This is a review of a book and of a review of movie which are both about the trials of marriage, survival and revenge of people who had bad karma.

The life stories told in “The Reverent” and told in “My Grandfather’s Gallery” are stories which are always intense and interesting.

They are the “true life” stories of two men who sought, and of all men who seek and/or have had to seek , consolation and oblivion in their work.

“MY GRANDFATHER’S GALLERY – A Family Memoir of Art and War”

I am currently reading “My Grandfather’s Gallery – A Family Memoir of Art and War” by Anne Sinclair.

“My Father’s Gallery” is principally about the life and times of Anne Sinclair’s grandfather Paul Rosenberg.

In the 1920’s and 1930’s Paul Rosenberg was among the most influential art dealers in Paris, among other things he was the exclusive art dealer for Picasso and Matisse.

In this book, Anne Sinclair quotes sections of a very harsh letter written by her grandfather intended to be read posthumously, as it was.

The letter was addressed to his wife and daughter and his son.

“It is a meditation on life, his life, on what he wanted for his family and on the pain he felt over not having brought happiness to his beloved wife.”

In this book Anne Sinclair quotes and comments on sections of that letter.

She then makes the following comments on the type of person her grandmother was and the type of person her grandfather was:

“My grandmother wanted to enjoy the carefree years between the wars.  She was undoubtedly more hedonistic, more intoxicated by glamour than her husband, who was preoccupied with the development of modern art.  She wanted to dance, to enjoy herself, to be loved.  He wanted only to work.” 

Anne Sinclair comments: “Apparently my grandmother got bored with the marriage.  Perhaps she was frivolous, responsive only to surface and luxury.”

Her grandfather would have liked to have found “…someone more profound, with whom [he] could have exchanged ideas, shared [his] aspirations, and talked about other than trivial matters.”

Her grandfather concluded in his letter describing his wife, “…your spirit and your mind are incompatible with the needs of a serious, loving and devoted man.”

Wow: I completely relate to what happened in that marriage.

“THE REVENANT”

I saw “The Revenant” this weekend.

While watching this movie I experienced two hours twenty minutes of uninterrupted dramatic tension.

This is a movie with very little dialog and very little music.

For the most part, the soundtrack of this movie is the sounds of nature — the whisper of the wind, the whistling of the wind, the sound of water rushing in a river, the sound of snow falling, the sound of a buffalo stampede, the sounds of wolfs attacking a buffalo, the sounds of a grizzly bear attacking Leonardo DiCaprio, the sound of a gun shot, the sounds of arrows flying, the sounds of Indian war cries.

If you want to see how obsessed a man can be, see this movie staring Leonardo DiCaprio as an obsessed wilderness explorer, wilderness guide, husband and father.

If you want to see how traitorous and treacherous a man can be, see this movie staring Tom Hardy as a man with an innovative spirit always trying to take a dishonest advantage of every situation and to justify the dishonorable things he has done.

This film was directed and co-written by renowned film maker and Academy Award winner Alejandro G. Inarritu.

 

Copyright © 2015 by Gary S. Smolker, All Rights Reserved