Foster Dickson's Blog, page 20

The End of an Era: Leaving BTW Magnet

It is bittersweet to do so, but after nineteen years of teaching Creative Writing at our local arts high schools, I’m moving on to the next big thing. The decision was complicated and difficult, but ultimately, taking a new position is the right thing to do. Come fall, I will join the English faculty of a small liberal arts college.

I’ve invested a lot of time and energy into the Creative Writing program and the school, and those efforts – along with having many wonderful students over the years – yielded significant results. Between fall 2003 and spring 2020, the students and I published seventeen issues of the annual literary magazine Graphophobia, held readings and performances in venues all over town, wrote a blog called newsprung, put on a sketch comedy show thirteen times, took innumerable field trips to destinations near and far, partnered with various groups and institutions, and published four grant-funded books. I couldn’t be prouder of them and of all we accomplished together. The unfortunate fact is: even good things must come to an end. 

Over the last year or so, there have been many polls and news articles about how and why teachers are quitting the profession. (I’ve even shared a few of those myself.) For me, the pandemic and its effects are only one aspect of the equation, and moreover, I’m not leaving the teaching profession. I still enjoy teaching and value education, and I always will. For me, this choice is more personal than sociological. When making any big decision, I always remember the lines in old William Wordsworth’s poem “Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey,” when he describes being “more like a man / Flying from something that he dreads, than one / Who sought the thing he loved.” Decisions that are driven by what we don’t want will not land us where we do want to be. For me, this is less about leaving where I have been and more about going where I will be.

This move to Huntingdon College fulfills a long-time goal of mine: to teach on the college level. While teaching composition as an adjunct at Auburn University at Montgomery from 2011 through 2013, I realized that my sensibility and teaching style really lend themselves to a post-secondary classroom. When I started at BTW Magnet in 2003 – with no training and no experience – I modeled my plans not after the state standards or sample lesson plans, but after the college professors who had taught me the most. More often than not, returning graduates tell me, “College is just like your class.” Ultimately, that’s what I was trying to do: prepare them for college, which can be the greatest learning experience of one’s life. Now, rather than paving the way to that great experience, I get to be a part of it.

I’m going to miss working at BTW Magnet. My relationship with the school began in 1990 as a student at the Carver Creative and Performing Arts Center, which was BTW’s part-day predecessor program. I then joined BTW Magnet’s faculty in 2003, eleven years after graduating from the program. Today, I’ve spent nineteen school years there. All in all, I’ve had some connection to the school for about twenty-one years— nearly half my life, and most of my adult life. Now, it is time to make a change, to see what the next decade or two will hold.

I’m thankful to everyone who helped to make those years good ones. Our principal and my fellow faculty members, custodians and lunchroom workers, a whole range of supporters and benefactors, lots of supportive parents, and of course, more students than I can count— too many to name! And partners at institutions all over the state, folks from a multitude of situations, programs, and projects, who thought enough of us to say yes when opportunities to work together arose. From the Harrison family at Hamburger King around the corner from our old campus to the Creative Writing faculty at George Mason University who once hosted us when another group in Washington DC cancelled at the last minute, the support, assistance, and cooperation that I’ve enjoyed have been so vigorous that I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t been there to see it myself. 

Yet, it’s time to look forward now. And I’ve got work to do— syllabi to write, readings to select, and plenty of other tasks, too!

Southern Movie 59: “Dead Man Walking” (1995)

When the film Dead Man Walking was released in 1995, it caused quite a stir. Its story is based on real events in Louisiana, as they had been told in a 1993 book by Sister Helen Prejean. A roman á clef of sorts, the film centers on a nun’s time with a Louisiana death row inmate during the last days before his execution, as well as her interaction with others who question her choice to provide aid or comfort to a man who committed brutal crimes. It was directed by Tim Robbins, who was in The Shawshank Redemption the year before, and stars Susan Sarandon as Sister Helen and Sean Penn as death row inmate Matthew Poncelet (who is based on convicted killer Robert Lee Willie.)

Dead Man Walking begins with a series of superimposed scenes showing a woman, who we will understand to be Sister Helen Prejean. At first we see her, she is driving, and we see only her placid expression. Then she strides through a bustling housing project, among children playing, and into a building whose sign reads “Hope House.”  Inside, people are busy with various tasks, the sister is shown a booklet that was recently printed, and a man stops her to say that a death row inmate at Angola has written to them again for assistance. Preoccupied, Sister Helen remarks that, yes, she will stop by later to get his information to write to him. Sister Helen does not appear to be a nun; she is wearing the clothes that any woman her age would. But interspersed among the current scenes are others from the past that show her younger self at her ordination.

As she is reading the letter that was described to her, we hear Matthew Poncelet’s voice speaking the words. The sister writes a reply, puts it in an envelope, and here we understand where she is going in the car. Poncelet’s reply to her reply gives some exposition about his situation and his personality.

After Sister Helen arrives at the gates of the Louisiana State Penitentiary then goes through security, we see her sitting in an office as the prison’s priest walks in and introduces himself. Though friendly, he is obviously wary of her presence there, and asks bluntly, “Have you ever been in a prison before?” No, she hasn’t. She shares a quick anecdote that is vaguely humorous, but the priest is unamused. He then wants to know where her habit is, and she explains that her order has not required a habit in twenty years. The priest is not pleased with that either and makes a backhanded remark about having her own interpretations of the rules.

Then, the priest reveals the core of his concern. Matthew Poncelet, along with another man, committed brutal murders against two teenagers who were parked on “lover’s lane.” They raped the girl then shot and stabbed the two multiple times. Sister Helen’s facial expression darkens as he speaks, and he tells her with no sugar-coating that prison inmates are con-men who will say anything to gain whatever they can. Why did she come, the priest wants to know. Because he wrote and asked me to, she replies. This priest lacks in a certain amount of compassion, but he also lacks the sister’s naivete.

As she enters the main part of the prison, the priest’s words continue as a voiceover. The men there rarely if ever see a woman, and her not wearing the habit of a nun may encourage them with her defiance of traditional authority. Also superimposed with the process of getting checked in are quick glimpses of Poncelet’s crime: a car in the dark, the barrel of a rifle, a dead man’s legs. We are slowly being initiated into what Sister Helen has involved herself in.

When Matthew Poncelet enters, they speak through dense metal mesh. The inmate is tense and cold, while the nun feigns a pleasant demeanor. She is open to listening or to discussing whatever he wants, but his responses are full of suspicion and bitterness. When they are told that their time is almost up, Poncelet’s eyes light up and he tells her that he has brought documents for an appeal. The prison officials are about to begin following through with a series of executions, and he believes that he will be one of those chosen. Poncelet doesn’t trust the staff of the prison and wants Sister Helen to carry the documents out for him, to ensure that they land where they should. She has now become an unwitting participant in a condemned man’s efforts to free himself from the penalties.

After their encounter, Sister Helen drives back to New Orleans, gets pulled over for speeding while daydreaming about an episode from her youth, then begins to dig into Poncelet’s story. We see TV footage of the trial, which includes bits of gruesome facts and the killer’s smug smirking. Sister Helen asks questions of the man who originally brought the letter to her, and he assures her that Poncelet will never walk free, only get his sentence reduced to life at best.

In the evening, Sister Helen is watching TV with another nun Sister Colleen, and the phone rings. It is Poncelet, who sounds frantic and angry, because they have set a date for his execution. He has tried to get a hearing with the pardons board, but he must have a lawyer to do that. He doesn’t have a lawyer, but Sister Helen has gotten the name of one already. Poncelet reminds forcefully that she is his only hope.

Back in the car on the way to Angola, Sister Helen talks to the lawyer, a man named Hilton Barber. He is older and jovial, and says that he’ll do his best. Once they arrive in the prison to talk with the condemned man, Barber’s tone changes, and he is all business. Poncelet maintains his innocence, but Barber reminds him that a hearing with the pardons board isn’t about that. It is stocked with the governor’s appointees, and they will want to see new evidence— something to change the sentence that has been handed down. Poncelet doesn’t like it, and his body language is shifty and resentful. Sister Helen sits there, unable to do a thing. Barber’s best idea is to present Poncelet as a human being, making it harder for them to go through with his killing, and suggests that having his mother to speak on his behalf is a good idea. Poncelet says no, that all she’ll do is burst out crying and be unable to talk. But Sister Helen chimes in and insists that a mother has the right to defend her child, no matter how she does it. Poncelet doesn’t like what she’s saying but says he’ll think about it.

After a brief transition that shows Sister Helen first reading a news article about the victim’s family then attending Mass at a vivacious service, we see her arrive at the Poncelet home. The home is simple and inauspicious, and a young man with long hair (Jack Black) is half-working on a car in the yard. He watches Sister Helen go to the door, then pretends to get back under the hood. When Sister Helen knocks on the door, Poncelet’s mother at first refuses to answer, thinking she is a TV news reporter. Inside, we see two other boys on the couch watching TV, and the two women sit at the kitchen table. Mrs. Poncelet wants to know what the sister wants and guesses that “Matty” probably sent her for cigarette money. No, Sister Helen explains, she is there to asks her to come to the hearing. Mrs. Poncelet doesn’t say no, but she tells Sister Helen about some of the family’s hardships. In addition to the normal ills of poverty, like having no money and too little food, they are known as the family of a brutal killer. People stare at her when she goes out in public, and her boys are bullied at school.

In the next scene, we see Sister Helen at dinner with her own family. This scene is very different. The family is clearly affluent and happy. Sister Helen talks about what she doing with them. They do not see it her way, encouraging her to help hard-working, honest people instead of a murderer-rapist.

Back at Angola, Sister Helen talks to Matthew Poncelet through the metal mesh again. When we see them, he is telling her about the first time he got drunk with his father, who died when young Matthew was fourteen. He then asks why she wanted to be nun, and moreover why she didn’t want any of the normal things a woman might have: family, sex. She is given pause by his questions, and Poncelet uses the opportunity to strike at being lascivious. She quickly rebukes him, however: “I’m not here for your . . . amusement.” Changing the tone, she tells him that his mother will be at the hearing.

Quickly, the scene changes to that hearing, and we see Mrs. Poncelet do exactly what her son said she would do. She gets a few words out before breaking down, then is escorted outside by Sister Helen. In their absence, Hilton Barber gives his speech about how Matthew Poncelet would not be on death row if he had had money for good legal representation, instead of having to settle for a court-appointed lawyer with no capital-case experience. This explanation of the realities for most death row inmates is juxtaposed with images of Sister Helen and Mrs. Poncelet thumbing through childhood pictures of Matthew outside. Barber’s talk is then followed by the prosecution’s lawyer, who tells another story, one of a man who heartlessly murdered two innocent teenagers and of two families will never see their children again. This time, instead of baby pictures, we see photos of slain corpses, face down and covered in blood.

As they wait on the decision of the board, Sister Helen and Hilton Barber are pacing around outside, when Barber is pulled aside to talk to another person. While Sister Helen stands alone, Walter Delacroix, the father of the boy who Poncelet killed, comes over and chastises Sister Helen. He is a Catholic, he explains, and to see her giving comfort to the killer while never having come to see the victims’ families is an insult. Sister Helen, new to this, is taken aback. The other victim’s parents also pass by, and when she attempts to say her condolences, they are cold and continue on. Trying to salvage the situation, Sister Helen offers her phone number to Delacroix, who calls her “arrogant” for thinking that he might reach out to her.

Inside, the board denies clemency to Matthew Poncelet and orders that the execution move forward as scheduled in one week. Poncelet looks irritated. His mother begins to weep outside, and Barber tells him that they have one more judge to try for an appeal.

By this point in the story, almost forty minutes into the two-hour runtime, we know that Matthew Poncelet will be executed, and the film has done a solid job of showing the complexities of the death penalty in Southern culture. Though the region’s culture is steeped in Christianity, this is an Old Testament kind of Christianity (an eye for an eye), not a New Testament kind (forgive people, don’t judge). That’s what Sister Helen is navigating. Even the killer’s family is shown no mercy in their daily lives, instead being seen as a likely source of a monster’s evil ways. At every turn, Sister Helen is met by people who can’t understand why she gives her time and energy to man who committed heinous crimes. Only a scant few characters, and all of them work with her in Hope House, even suggest that she should do what she can for Poncelet. The general sentiment is: kill him, he deserves it. This is the “tough on crime” rhetoric of the 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s in full effect.

As the various parties leave the board meeting, Sister Helen is apprised that her dealings with Poncelet should now turn to giving him comfort as his execution date looms. The time for hoping that his life will be spared is basically over. The sun goes down (literally and symbolically) as they board a bus to leave the prison grounds.

After a brief scene showing Sister Helen playing cards and checkers with some of the children from the housing project, she is back on the road, this time to see the Delacroix family at their home. She is clearly nervous and arrives unannounced. Walter Delacroix answers the door hesitantly and at first is cold to her.  However, he softens and lets her in, and they talk in the living room, which is littered with boxes. Walter Delacroix explains that his wife is having a very hard time with the situation, crying almost non-stop, and packing up their son’s clothes for Goodwill.  She used to be a lively woman, he explains, but not anymore. He then describes, in quiet terms, what it means to lose a child and to remember what was lost.

Back at the prison, the priest is skeptical of Sister Helen’s request to be Poncelet’s spiritual adviser for his remaining six days. He asks if she is up to the job, and she replies that she doesn’t know for sure. Her one job, he tells her, is to try to get him to take the sacraments of the Church – presumably, confession and communion – before he dies, in order to save his soul.  That’s the job, no side agendas, nothing else.

Face-to-face, Sister Helen and Poncelet begin to talk. His first request is not to be buried at the prison. He wants Sister Helen to talk to his mother, to arrange some other kind of funeral. She agrees. Turning the conversation, she asks if he reads the Bible. Some but not much, he replies, before quickly making a racist remark within a stray thought. Was your father a racist, she asks him. Poncelet becomes indignant, and the two spar over the validity of racist views. Poncelet makes broad assertions, commonly heard in the post-Civil Rights South, about disliking laziness and black victimhood, while Sister Helen tries to reign his ideas in with logic, turning them into principles to show their ironies. Poncelet is frustrated by this and asks, “Can’t we talk about something else?”

Outside the prison gates, pro- and anti-death penalty protestors make their presence known. (In the group of praying sisters shown here, a keen observer will notice that the real Sister Helen Prejean is standing to Susan Sarandon’s right.) TV crews are seen, and law enforcement officers contain or restrain people. Among the crowds, the female victim’s father Clyde Percy speaks to a news crew, proclaiming his opinion that this is the right thing to do his daughter’s killer.

In the next scene, Sister Helen is in this family’s home. Clyde and Mary Beth Percy speak to Sister Helen about their daughter Hope, who was raped then killed alongside her boyfriend. The two had been dating for a while, and Hope was slated to join the military. When the pair didn’t come home after a date one night, their parents thought that they might have eloped, but soon a missing-persons report was filed. After searches yielded nothing, some boys found Hope’s purse in the woods, then the bodies were found. The Percys were advised not to look at the body to identify their daughter, but insisted on it anyway. After describing what they had gone through, the parents want to know from Sister Helen what had changed her mind, what has led her to “come to our side.” A befuddled Sister Helen pauses before telling them she will still be Poncelet’s spiritual adviser, but has come there to offer comfort to them as well. At that point, they become angry and ask her to leave, remarking strongly that she can’t have it both ways.

After that setback, Sister Helen is then apprised that Poncelet has been interviewed on the news and has shared his racist beliefs and even his support for the Aryan Brotherhood. Trying to stand by his side gets more difficult for Sister Helen now, as people see her actions as standing by not only a rapist and a killer, but now also as a racist who endorses terrorism and denies the Holocaust. Sister Helen confronts him back at the prison, but Poncelet is his usual defiant self, shifting the discussion when it is made clear that he should answer for his behavior. He does agree that, if someone had done something like his crimes to one of his family members, he would want to see the killer dead, too. Yet, Poncelet still maintains his innocence, that the state has the wrong man.

Back at her small apartment, Sister Helen is confronted with the fact that the African-American children in her community know about Poncelet’s interview, see her absence, and combine those facts to mean that she is choosing him over them. Sister Colleen has a heart-to-heart with her about it and also shows her the suit that she’s found for Poncelet’s burial. They have arranged for him to be buried in their own graveyard, alongside the sisters.

Next we see her, Sister Helen is attending a group therapy session for the parents of murdered children with Walter Delacroix. Among the tales, Delacroix explains that his wife has filed for divorce. It’s not abnormal, he tells Sister Helen on the way out, 70% of couples split up after a child is killed.

Following that is an eerie scene that shows the nighttime murder of the two teenagers. In this version of the story, Poncelet is a scared bystander whose friend, an older and larger man, is the aggressor, while Poncelet is dismayed and flabbergasted by what is going on.  The scene is intercut with childhood pictures of the slain teenagers, and also with Sister Helen being driven into the prison, past inmates working in crop rows and past rows of inmates’ graves, as a spooky melody is sung over top.

Inside the prison, Matthew Poncelet is now in the holding area prior to his execution. He is brought out to speak to Sister Helen through a door that has a few holes in the plexiglass window. He is smirking and exhibits a dark kind of humor as he speaks, remarking sardonically that a guard stops by every fifteen minutes to make sure that he hasn’t killed himself. But there is plenty of quiet for reading the Bible, he says with a grin. Seizing on the opportunity, Sister Helen encourages him to read the parts about Jesus, especially the passages where Jesus is facing death. Poncelet doesn’t see the point, but Sister Helen tells him about how Jesus was a dangerous man because he made the lowest people in society understand that they have worth and dignity. So, they had to kill him, because people in power can’t have those kinds of sentiments being taught. Poncelet appears to understand this in vague terms, but also attempts to draw conclusions that are off the mark.

Their talk is interrupted by some procedural maneuver, which they will not divulge to Sister Helen. They rush in as a pack and take Poncelet away, refusing to tell her what is happening. She waits outside and for a moment speaks to one of the guard, who tries to explain away his role in the executions by saying that it isn’t easy but it’s part of the job. While she is waiting, the priest also comes to speak with her about her role in Poncelet’s final week. They debate the Old Testament versus New Testament way of looking at the death penalty, but that discussion is cut short when Sister Helen passes out. They will not allow any food in the “death house,” and her blood sugar got too low. Once she was back on her feet, the warden refused to let her return to Poncelet, sending her home instead.

The next time she sees Poncelet, he is furious. They had been measuring and weighing him, and when he returned, she was gone. The guards told Sister Helen that they would tell Poncelet what happened, but they didn’t. It is now the day before his execution, and Poncelet is clearly tense. Sister Helen tells him that the one federal appeal is still out there, and there’s still the governor who could grant clemency. Poncelet knows not to count on the governor and berates himself for saying those things about Hitler and terrorism. Sister’s good news is that she has found a man to do the lie detector test that he wants, but it probably won’t do much good since his stress level will be so high that an accurate reading probably won’t be possible. She then turns her efforts again to his death and salvation, urging him to look some more at his Bible and, ultimately, to admit his role in the murders.  Poncelet remains silent.

On the way into the governor’s office, Hilton Barber explains to Sister Helen that he has arranged for a private meeting, so as to convince the governor of Poncelet’s humanity. When they get inside, though, the room is chock-full of press and staff, and the governor gives a milquetoast speech about administering the laws as written and carrying out the will of the people. Barber is obviously chagrined at having been double-crossed and tells Sister Helen that there’s still the one court-related possibility left.

On the last night before the execution, Sister Helen sleeps at her mother’s home, but has a nightmare. She sees Poncelet at the dinner table with her family and remembers herself as the tormented little girl we saw in the beginning of the film. On waking, she has a heart-to-heart talk with her mother about what she is facing, then watches the sunrise on the porch.

At the prison, Matthew Poncelet says that he wants to face his execution head-on. He refuses to take the medicine they offered him to help him sleep. His family will come today, and though Sister Helen offers to leave him alone with them, to have his privacy, he would rather her be there. His mood then darkens and that snide humor from before is gone. With side-looking eyes, he asks questions out loud about the process of the execution: will he feel the effects when each shot is administered? will the first shot only disallow his body from responding to what he feels? After this, he is taken to the lie detector test, while Sister Helen is in the next room being questioned by a guard why she is helping him. His is yet another voice among the many, expressing the idea that someone who has done something so horrible deserves no mercy, no compassion, no sympathy, and no love.

In the visiting room, Poncelet gets to spend some time with his mother and brothers. They laugh and joke like a normal family, talking about old girlfriends, camping tents, and other mundane things. Guards stand around the room stoically, and Sister Helen sits nearby, smiling shyly at their antics. Things go well until his mother says out of the blue, “Back home, people are asking about your funeral, but I keep telling them that you’re not dead yet.” The mood sours quickly, and no one has anything else to say. After a time lapse, the visit is over. Poncelet refuses to allow goodbyes, saying his fight isn’t done. His mother waits until she is outside to break down.

Sister Helen tells Matthew Poncelet, when he is back in his cell, that he failed the lie detector test. He is surprised. With almost time left – the clock shows 8:30 PM and he will be executed at midnight – Sister Helen takes a very direct approach. She tells Poncelet that they need to talk about his actions, and he replies, “I don’t want to talk about that night.”

But the film shifts to the events of that night. We see the teenagers making out in the car when Poncelet and his older friend walk up on them. They declare with sly grins that the teenagers are trespassing on private property and that they are under arrest. Scared, the teenagers comply and are walked through the woods, until the older man throws the girl on the ground.

The scene then cuts back to Poncelet’s cell. Two hours have passed, it is 10:30 PM. He is yelling about how he was under the influence of drugs and how it was his friend-accomplice’s fault, how “he went psycho on me.” Sister replies that he blames everyone and everything – including the government and black people – but will take no responsibility himself. Poncelet allows her remarks until she calls him a victim. “I ain’t no victim,” he replies coldly.

Just then the warden comes in and interrupts them. The federal appeals court has denied him. Poncelet is taken to the telephone to speak about the refusal, and Sister Helen is taken outside in the hall. Unable to take a nearby secretary’s incessant typing and the guards’ business-like manner, she removes herself to the bathroom and prays fervently.

There is just under a half-hour left in Dead Man Walking, but Matthew Poncelet’s time is short. They have shaved his leg and administered an antihistamine in case he has a reaction to the shot that will sedate him. Sister Helen sees his tattoos for the first time, and he acts embarrassed by them. Knowing that his time is almost up, he wants her to take his Bible. They are interrupted again, this time for his last telephone call. Unlike the parting with his family earlier, this conversation is tearful. This will be goodbye.

After the conversation is over and Sister Helen is back at his cell, a Matthew Poncelet with humble, downcast eyes admits what he did. He told his mother that she was right to want him away from that older man whose cruel, tough lead he followed, but he was too scared to defy the example and stand up to the bully. He calls himself a “victim,” and “yellow” at that. He then looks at Sister Helen and tells her that he killed the Delacroix boy. Urging him forward, Sister Helen asks if he raped the Percy girl. “Yes, ma’am,” he responds, choking back tears. Doing a complete one-eighty from his previous insistence that he was innocent, Poncelet takes his last chance to seek reconciliation by being honest about what he has done. Sister Helen consoles him by acknowledging that he has done “terrible things” but that he is still a “Son of God.” As perhaps the last aspect of becoming a changed man, Poncelet remarks that it is ironic how he had to die to be loved, and he thanks Sister Helen for loving him.

After singing a brief song that she had promised once to play for him, Sister Helen is told to step away from the cell and into the corridor. They both know what this means: Poncelet will be prepared for his execution. Sister Helen leaves the cell and sees Walter Delacroix and the Percys, who have come to witness the execution. Poncelet begins to shout at the guards who have shackled him and taken his boots, which he planned to wear for his last walk. Sister Helen then meets him in the hallway to remind him that he is loved, telling him to concentrate on her so the face of love is the last one he sees in his life. As they get moving, the guard shouts, “Dead man walking!”

With her hand on his shoulder, Sister Helen reads from the Bible to Poncelet as he walks to the chamber where he will be strapped down and put to death. She is stopped at the chamber door and the two share a last goodbye. In the witnesses’ room, Hilton Barber waits to sit with Sister Helen. The Percys give her a nasty look, and Walter Delacroix looks at her coldly.

The next scene shows Matthew Poncelet being strapped down and having an IV inserted into a vein in his arm. The scene is slow and methodical, and when they are finished, he is given a chance to say any last words. Poncelet asks for forgiveness from Walter Delacroix for taking his son away from him, then tells the Percys that he hopes hopes his death with give them some relief. He adds that he believes that killing is wrong, no matter who does it— him, them, the government. With that, he nods that he is finished speaking and is lowered back down. Flat on his back, he looks to Sister Helen and says, “I love you.” She mouths the words back and reaches her hand out to him. The prison priest is seen in the background, staring and bland, a subtle commentary from the filmmaker that, while this one nun may care about all life, the bureaucratic officials of the Church do not.

While Matthew Poncelet is being executed, as the machine administers the toxic substances, we alternately see scenes from his crimes. We are to assume that these were the actual events, not the events that a man claiming to be innocent described. Here, two men treat their victims brutally and with savagery. They taunt their victims and switch places when raping the girl. Seeing this man be executed, a viewer will not be allowed to perceive the condemned as free of blame or unjustly treated with disdain. His crime and punishment are shown together, in tandem, interwoven.

At Poncelet’s funeral, the family is there, along with a few assorted others. And standing at a distance is Walter Delacroix. Sister Helen goes over to speak to him, and he admits that he doesn’t know why he is there, that he still has a lot of hate. She offers for them to work through it together, but he doesn’t know whether that will do any good.

The movie ends, though, on two notes of hope. Sister Helen returns home one day to handmade cards created by the children of her neighborhood, telling her that they love her. We understand that she has been forgiven in her community. And finally, she meets Walter Delacroix at a small church, where they pray together alone.

Dead Man Walking is a powerful film that does not offer easy answers, either about the death penalty or about Southern culture. Many, many historians and critics of the South have remarked upon the region’s dual penchants for Christianity and violence, and the death penalty is a cultural feature that merges the two. It is common to hear its use justified by the Biblical admonition “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” Thus, do to the criminal what the criminal did to the victim. In this film, we hear that line of thinking expressed by every type of Southerner: the victims’ middle-class families, the working-class prison guards, even Sister Helen’s affluent family. However, one woman – a nun at that – refuses that rhetoric, acts in defiance of it, and replaces it with other Biblical admonitions: to forgive, to turn the other cheek, to help the powerless, and to visit those who are in prison.

As a document of the South, Dead Man Walking also covers other issues that are prevalent. We see a politician evade responsibility for tough decisions, while making stern proclamations about standing up for right and against wrong. We see the people working within unjust and inhumane systems absolve themselves by saying, “It’s just part of the job.” We hear a lecture from a defense lawyer about how people with the money for legal representation don’t end up facing the harshest penalties. We listen to a frustrated white Southern man express loathing for all African Americans based on his assumptions about their entitlement and victimhood. Finally, we are asked to consider how both the victim’s family and a killer’s family live with the legacy of crimes.

It cannot be ignored that Dead Man Walking was released the year after the landmark Crime Bill of 1994. This federal law, sponsored by a representative from Texas and signed by a president from Arkansas, was the fruition of “tough on crime” rhetoric, which flourished after the Civil Rights movement. Many of its modern opponents claim that this bill has led to mass incarceration in recent decades with its mandatory sentencing. Some critics include the fact that it has played a role in convincing the public that people convicted of crimes deserve no mercy. It should be noted that most of the states with the highest execution rates are in the South.

Finally, what also cannot be ignored are the dissimilarities between the film’s story and the actual events that the story is based on. Though we see Matthew Poncelet humanized, he is based on a death row inmate named Robert Lee Willie, who is sometimes described as a serial killer. The real Sister Helen was his spiritual adviser, but unlike the film’s version, she was asked by the prison priest to take on that role, because she had done that once before for another death row inmate. (The film instead portrays Poncelet’s case as her first and the prison priest as antagonistic.)  Also, in the real story, Willie’s father and grandfather were both alive when he was executed, and both condoned his execution in light of how horrible his crimes were. That’s quite different from the film, in which Poncelet’s father had been dead for many years. (By contrast, Willie’s mother really did make the “good boy” comments we hear in Poncelet’s hearing.) These kinds of facts, if the film had been faithful to them, would have changed the tenor of the story, and it is important to remember that feature films are not documentaries.

 

The Great Watchlist Purge of 2022 (Round two, that is.)

I love movies . . . especially ones that live obscure lives outside the mainstream. I grew up in the 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s during what many critics would call one of the heydays of filmmaking: Spielberg, Coppola, Lucas, Scorcese, et al. And I learned to appreciate good movies. I knew Bing Crosby singing “White Christmas” and Jimmy Stewart tumbling down Main Street screaming at the movie house just as well as I knew Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner fighting their way through the jungle. When I thought of toys, I pictured Tom Hanks in Big just like I pictured Jackie Gleason tormenting Richard Pryor. I watched in awe as Penelope Spheeris’ gang of punks walked in slow motion down the sidewalk, and I laughed at Spicoli having his pizza taken away by Mr. Hand. I liked “Savage” Steve Holland movies before The Big Bang Theory and James Spader before The Blacklist. (If you think Spader played an asshole in Pretty in Pink, watch Less than Zero.) And since most modern movies disappoint me, I have tended to reach back further into the archives to satiate my appetite for viewing. I couldn’t care less who plays Spiderman or Batman these days, I don’t care what back-story from Star Wars they’re developing, I get tired of Hollywood throwing remakes at us, and I’m not going to spend time watching the latest diversity-initiative cartoon musical. No, I pride myself on a love of movies, not on a set of prescribed consumption habits.

If you didn’t follow along with the first Great Watchlist Purge – in 2021 – you can go back and see, but here are the seventeen films that are still left after feeling done in August 2021 (not counting the ones I’ve found and watched since then):

Ravagers (1979)
Though I don’t know much about this movie, it sounds odd, but what caught my attention was that it was filmed in Alabama. There’s another film called The Ravagers from 1965, but this is not related to that one.

Haiku Tunnel (2001) 
This movie (and Mountain Cry) came up when I searched the term ‘haiku.’ It is an early 2000s indie comedy about doing temp work in an office. I remember it being one of the last GenX zeitgeist films, but coming out a bit too late. By the early 2000s, the very youngest Xers were in college and getting into the working world.

The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1929)
I had never heard of this animated movie before seeing a reference to it on Twitter from an account that was disputing Fantasia‘s designation as the first full-length animated feature film. The clip attached to the tweet was interesting, and I want to see the whole film.

The River Rat (1984)
I found this film when I was trying to figure out what Martha Plimpton had been in. I tend to think of Plimpton as the nerdy friend she played in Goonies, but this one, which is set in Louisiana and has Tommy Lee Jones playing her dad, puts her in a different role.

The Mephisto Waltz (1971)
I’ve read about this movie but never seen it. I must say, the title is great, and it doesn’t hurt that Jacqueline Bisset is beautiful.

Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1971)
This horror-thriller came up alongside Deep Red, which I watched last year, after I rated two recent horror films: the disturbing Hagazussa and the less-heavy but still creepy Make-Out with Violence. Deep Red was good, so I want to watch this one, too.

Born in Flames (1983)
This movie looks cool but is obscure. It’s an early ’80s dystopian film about life after a massive revolution. But it is difficult impossible to find. (Apple TV has it but I don’t have Apple TV.) I was surprised to see a story on NPR about it recently, so maybe it will show up.

Personal Problems (1980)
This one is also pretty obscure – complicated African-American lives in the early ’80s – and came up as a suggestion since I liked Ganja and Hess. Though the script was written by Ishmael Reed – whose From Totems to Hip-Hop anthology I use in my classroom – the description says “partly improvised,” which means that the characters probably ramble a bit.

Little Fauss and Big Halsey (1970)
Paul Newman movies from the late ’60s and early ’70s are among my all-time favorites. This one came out about the same time as Sometimes A Great Notion. Despite having seen Cool Hand Luke, Hud, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Long, Hot Summer numerous times each, I’d never heard of this movie until a few years ago.

All the Right Noises (1970)
I found this story about a married theater manager who has an affair with a younger woman, when I looked up what movies Olivia Hussey had been in other than Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet. It looks a little like Fatal Attraction, like the relationship goes well until it doesn’t.

All the Colors of the Dark (1972)
I have memories of seeing this movie in the late 1980s when USA Network used to have a program called Saturday Nightmares, but every list that appears on the internet doesn’t include this movie as having been shown on that program. That weird old program turned me on 1960s and ’70s European horror movies, like Vampire Circus and The Devil’s Nightmare, and I could have sworn this one was on that show— but maybe not. No matter where I first saw it, I haven’t seen this movie in a long time and would like to re-watch it. However, the full movie was virtually impossible to find. One streaming service had it but said it was not available in my area, and one YouTuber has shared the original Italian-language movie . . . but I don’t speak Italian.

Deadlock (1970)
This western came up as a suggestion at the same time as Zachariah. It’s a German western, so we’ll see . . . Generally, it has been hard to find, with only the trailer appearing on most sites.

The Blood of a Poet (1930)
Jean Cocteau’s bohemian classic. I remember reading about this film in books that discussed Paris in the early twentieth century, but I never made any effort to watch it. I’m not as interested in European bohemians as I once was, but if the film is good, it won’t matter.

Landscape in the Mist (1988)
This Greek film about two orphans won high praise. I haven’t tried to find a subtitled version yet, it may be out of reach.

Phantom of the Paradise (1974)
I can’t tell what to make of this movie: Phantom of the Opera but with rock n roll in the mid-’70s?

Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb (1971)
As I’ve already shared, I just like ’70s horror movies. We’ll see if this one is any good.

White Star (1983)
This biopic has Dennis Hopper playing Westbrook. As a fan of rock journalism, I couldn’t not add it to the list!

The Strange Color of Your Body’s Tears (2013)
This French thriller, which came up as a suggestion from All the Colors of the Dark, caught my eye with the wonderful artwork on its cover image. The title is also compelling, and those two factors led me to see what it was. It didn’t hurt that the description contained the phrase “surreal kaleidoscope.”

Since closing out last watchlist purge in August 2021, I found and watched  few that were on it at the end. Since then, I’ve been less methodical about my movie-watching, but still deep in it. The Hunger (1983) was a lot better than I remembered, and A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014) was captivating in the same way as The Addiction and Let the Right One In. Among the older thrillers I’ve watched and liked have been Messiah of Evil (1973) and Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970), while I found Torso (1973) and Pieces (1982) less than stellar.  Here are few others from the list that I’ve watched, too:

Vivarium (2019)
This movie was slow and relatively disappointing since the main characters reminded me of the kind of Millennials I don’t like. But for a moment, near the end of the movie, it gets good. I don’t want to spoil it, but suddenly, the monotony breaks and a surreal twist rips the viewer from the droll monotony that is this story. Unfortunately, then it goes back to its slow, crawling pace and becomes disappointingly dull again. But if you’re willing to take the time that it would take to watch a movie like the original Amityville Horror, this one pays off in the same way.

The Damned (1969)
I thought I was going to like this epic German film, but man, it got uninteresting fast. Aside from its dialogue being very formal and the subject matter being success in a family business, the weird sexual aspects were a major turnoff. Having one of the brothers to be a transsexual who thought it was a good idea to do some cabaret at his father’s birthday— uh, no. Then there’s the incest stuff— uh, no. I’m actually kind of sorry that I watched this.

Begotten (1989)
One of the most abstract films I’ve ever seen. The whole thing is lacquered over with a grainy filtering effect, and the story is highly symbolic. Anyone who doesn’t love avant garde films will bail out within the first few scenes, but if you’re inclined toward art films and have the patience for visual symbolism, this one is worth taking in. Without wanting to spoil it, though, I will mention that a some of the film involves graphic sexual imagery, so if you don’t want to see that, skip this one and move on.

Satan’s Slave (1976)
Something in the ’70s made horror movie directors gravitate to the secret Satanic cult motif, and this was one of the weaker efforts at that. In this one, a young British woman is taken inexplicably by her father and mother to visit the father’s brother – her uncle, who she has never met – but they get in a fiery car crash in his driveway, and both her parents die. Somehow, that is made to be passé, something she should just get over like a stubbed toe or a skinned knee, and her fate falls into the hands of the small assemblage of family members in the wealthy manor, who embrace her quickly. Of course, there’s some historic Satanic mess going on, which is why her father avoided them all these years, and the naïve young woman has to deal with it. Overall, the story is pretty crummy.

Venus in Furs (1969)
This is a quite a good late-’60s avant garde film. There’s a white jazz trumpet player with a black girlfriend in Rio de Janeiro during Carnival, and he gets wrapped up in an affair with a white girl who he finds dead in the surf at the beach. Yes, that’s as weird as it sounds. The girlfriend is the grounding force, but the dead girl keeps showing back up, having sex with the trumpet player, and somehow reaping sexual revenge on the three people who killed her in a tryst. In the end, the trumpet player finds himself dead in the surf, and we’re left to wonder if the whole thing is cyclical, or if it even happened at all. But there’s good music and some Jean-Luc Godard-style cinematography to make the uncertainty an experience.

 And these are the thirty-five movies that have been added to the watchlist since then:

Cronos (1993)
A mid-1990s film by Mexican director Guillermo del Toro, who later made Pan’s Labyrinth, which is an incredibly beautiful film. (He also made The Shape of Water, which won an Oscar a few years ago.) I had never heard of this movie at the time, but found it when I went down the rabbit hole of seeing what else the director of Pan’s Labyrinth made. 

Da Sweet Blood of Jesus (2014)
Though I’ve seen most of Spike Lee’s movies, this one got past me. It doesn’t look at all like his classics Do the Right Thing or School Daze, so I’m curious to what it will be.

Rabid (1977)
I became familiar with David Cronenberg when I watched his 1990s adaptation of Naked Lunch as a teenager, then I saw Dead Ringers and Videodrome later, and actually saw Shivers only a few years ago. This film came out between Shivers and Videodrome. Though I’m not a big zombie-movie guy, I’d like to see what Cronenberg did with the motif in the late 1970s.

Valérie (1969)
Not to be confused with Valerie and Her Week of Wonders, this film is a Quebecois hippie film about a naïve girl who comes to the city to get involved in the modern goings-on. This one came up as related to Rabid, but only has 5.1 stars on IMDb— it may be a clunker, we’ll see . . . 

1900 (1976)
This one will be a challenge to watch, with a run time around five hours. But I’ve liked Bernardo Bertolucci ever since I saw Stealing Beauty. This stars are Robert De Niro and Gerard Depardieu, who make me feel confident that it will be good. 

Chronopolis (1982)
This film is partially animated and mixed Polish and French, but it’s less than an hour long and garnered a few award nominations. It could be a good, it could be bad. No matter which, it’ll be short.

The People Next Door (1970)
I’ve been a fan of this movie’s star Eli Wallach since seeing The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, but this film will certainly be nothing like that one. This movie is about a couple in New York whose daughter ends up being on drugs. The premise and title remind me of the ultra-depressing Ordinary People and also of one subplot in the more recent film Traffic. Some of the reviews reference TV movies and those short films that were meant to scare kids into not doing drugs. I hope this is better than either of those genres.

The Slums of Beverly Hills (1998)
I remember seeing this movie when it came out but not much about it. I do remember it being funny in kind of an off-color way. In short, I’d like to watch it again.

Saló, or 120 Days of Sodom (1975)
Back in my wilder days, I had a Grove Press volume of several of the Marquis de Sade’s books, and 120 Days of Sodom was in that volume. I remember reading some of it and thinking, “What is this crap?” but of course, de Sade has survived because he is utterly offensive— the term “sadism” being dubbed after him. Like The Decameron below, this adaptation was made by Pasolini, but rather than attempting something historically accurate, it is set in World War II Italy. I’d be curious to see what Pasolini did here.

Cat People (1982)
This is Natassja Kinski a few years before Paris, Texas. Early ’80s horror, but perhaps its redemption will come in its cast: Malcolm McDowell, Ed Begley, Jr., Ruby Dee, et al— a whole host of ’80s regulars. (Also John Heard, the jerky antagonist in Big, and John Larroquette from TV’s Night Court.) It’s possible that this movie won’t be good, but I’ll bet two hours on it and find out.

The Decameron (1971)
About ten years ago, I read The Decameron – the Penguin Classics translation into English – over the course of about a year, reading a story or segue each night. (Every year, I make a New Years resolution to read another one of the Western classics that I haven’t read, and this book was part of that annual tradition.) So, when I saw that Pasolini had done a film version, I was intrigued— how would anyone put 100 stories held within a frame narrative into a film? Well, he didn’t . . . He sampled from them. The Italian-language version is available on YouTube, but of course, I don’t know what they’re saying. I’d like to find this film with English subtitles.

Salt of the Earth (1954)
An early black-and-white, social justice film about the plight and lives of Mexican miners. I kind of expect this film to be dogmatic and a little slow on the draw, but considering the time, it’ll be interesting to hear what is said.

The Amorous Adventures of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza (1976)
This film caught my eye because Hy Pyke is in it. Sometimes “erotic” means porno, and sometimes it means that there are some gratuitously naked people. This movie was made in Spain, which is appropriate for Don Quixote. I seriously doubt if this one is up to par with Orson Welles’ version, but it should be good for a chuckle or two— if I can ever find it.

Tanya (1976)
Somebody, in the mid-1970s, made a sex comedy out of the basic plot line of Patty Hearst and the Symbionese Liberation Army. This movie is probably terrible, but it’s also hard to find. It appears that this was the only film for director Nate Rogers, who gave himself the pseudonym Duncan Fingersnarl, which is both creepy and gross. The young woman who stars in the movie was a topless dancer who also starred in one of Ed Wood’s movies. I serious doubt that Tanya is any good, but I have to admit that I’m curious . . . 

Zabriskie Point (1970)
I know nothing about this director or either of the stars, but the description is intriguing: a hippie revolutionary and an anthropology student hiding out in Death Valley. IMDb says that it’s an American film, but the director is Italian and the release date is for The Netherlands. The trivia bit at the bottom also says that the female lead Daria Halprin was married to Dennis Hopper and was a pioneer in dance and art therapy. The male lead Mark Frechette only made two movies, then he was arrested for a bank robbery and was killed in prison. I don’t know what any of that has to do with the movie, but these eclectic facts add up to pique my interest.

Simple Men (1992)
Likewise with this film, I know nothing about the director or either of the stars, but it appears to be a GenX indie film. 

The Beautiful Troublemaker (1991)
I’ve learned that you’ve got to recognize what’s possible when a four-hour French film’s description says, “Questions about truth, life, and artistic limits are explored.” It could mean sitting through some seriously long-winded rambling about very abstract existential topics . . . which often makes for really dull cinema. (Think Madrid, 1987.)  In this film, we’ve got an artist in love with beautiful woman, and though I’m leery that I’ll end up wallowing in 250 minutes of overly calm personal angst, wondering why I’ve done it to myself, I’ll probably watch this one and see where it goes.

The Lobster (2015)
I had to add this movie to the watchlist. The director made Killing of a Sacred Deer, which was infuriatingly tense, and Dogtooth, which was disturbing, and Colin Farrell was great in In Bruges. So, add it all up into a dark comedy, and I want to see it.

The Dreamers (2003)
Another Bertolucci film, this one set in 1968 in Paris during the time of student riots. The star here, Michael Pitt, I recognized from supporting roles in Finding Forrester in the mid-1990s and The Village in the early 2000s. 

Burning Moon (1992)
What fan of strange horror films could resist this description of a German film made in the 1990s: “A young drug addict reads his little sister two macabre bedtime stories, one about a serial killer on a blind date, the other about a psychotic priest terrorizing his village.” The information on it says that it is really gory, which doesn’t interest me as much as tension and suspense do, but I’d like to see this for the same reason that I wanted to see House before.

The Double Life of Veronique (1991)
This film is French and Polish, and follows two women leading parallel lives. Though the film may be nothing like it, the premise reminded me of Sliding Doors, but this film preceded Sliding Doors by seven years. It gets high marks in IMDb, so it should be good.

Lamb (2021)
This came up as a suggestion on Prime, then it went to Rent or Buy status, and I should’ve watched it when it was available. I’ll probably bite the bullet and rent it sometime.

The Order of Myths (2008)
This documentary about the krewes involved in Mobile’s Mardi Gras was recommended by a friend who is a folklorist. I’ve written a good bit on the culture of Alabama, which is my home state, and I understand that this documentary caused some controversy when it was released.

40 Years on The Farm (2012)
It has always been interesting to me that such an infamous hippie commune would exist in Tennessee of all places. I’ve never been there, and am not as interested in hippies as I once was, but this documentary seems worthy of some time. 

Images (1972)
Robert Altman directed M*A*S*H, of course, and this film came out between it and 1975’s Nashville. What I saw in the trailer reminds me of Play It as It Lays. 

Eddie and the Cruisers (1983)
I remember this being a really good movie. I like early 1980s Michael Paré generally – mainly from Streets of Fire – and the Springsteen-esque main song from the soundtrack was really good: “On the Dark Side” by John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band. But this movie is virtually absent from streaming services. 

The Spirit of the Beehive (1973)
An early ’70s Spanish drama set in 1940 about a seven-year-old girl who goes into her own fantasy world after being traumatized by watching a film adaptation of Frankenstein. I had never heard of the director Victor Erice, but browsing his other films, I’m excited to see what he does.

Wrong Turn (2003), Burnt Offerings  (1976), and Session 9 (2001)
All three of these made it onto the watchlist from a documentary called The 50 Best Horror Movies You’ve Never Seen. I’d seen more than half of them, but these three I had not. They were numbers 39, 30, and 19, respectively. 

Fascination (1979)
The only Jean Rollin movie I’ve ever seen is Shiver of the Vampires, which was hippie-weird and kind of hokey. I thought I’d add this one to the watchlist, and if it’s any good, I’ll look into more of Rollin’s films.

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1993)
Based on the Tom Robbins novel, this film was one I remember watching when I was college-age. But I haven’t seen it in a long time, and now, it’s rather hard to find. Sadly, the movie gets low ratings on sites like IMDb, but I remember Uma Thurman being good in it. Right after this, she was in Pulp Fiction then Beautiful Girls, which were easily better movies, but I still don’t think this one was bad at all. I’d like to re-watch it.

Three Women (1977)
I actually ran across this one on one of the movie-themed Twitter accounts I follow. The description on IMDb says, “Two roommates/physical therapists, one a vain woman and the other an awkward teenager, share an increasingly bizarre relationship.” Sissy Spacek and Shelley Duvall star.

Shadow of the Vampire (2000)
Two of the most unique actors around, John Malkovich and Willem Dafoe, star in this story about the filming of 1922’s Nosferatu.  

Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)
Last, but certainly not least: I remember watching this movie as a boy. Jason Robards stars as an older father whose son is enthralled with a carnival that has come to town, but the carnival is a front for a sinister group of evildoers. Now, this movie is very hard to find. It’s not on any of the major streaming services, and a general search on Roku yields nothing. 

A Moveable Feast: A Revival, a Donation . . . and a New Start?

*This post is one in a series, and the background story can be found here.

Though it seemed in 2021 that the school garden was done for, a handful of students surprised me that fall with their interest to rebuild it. By the time we returned from more than a year of virtual learning – from March 2020 until August 2021 – Mother Nature had reclaimed the two long in-ground beds, and school system had put a new padlock on the water hookup after would-be thieves cut mine. Those factors and the idea that we would be leaving the campus at the end of the school year disinclined me from renewing old efforts. 

But in the fall, I had a senior come to me and ask if I would sponsor the school’s Interact Club. She had been elected the club’s president, but the other sponsor had left our school. One reason she was asking me was: she wanted the school garden to be the club’s service project. I was so happy to hear it! Interact Club is a youth service organization operated by the Rotary Club, so we got underway after we had a few initial meetings to gather new members.

However, the goal this time was different. With the approval of the club’s membership, I asked our school and system administrators if we could re-establish the garden and hand it over to the next occupants of our school building. The higher-ups coordinated, and they all said yes. Working only on our meeting days every other Wednesday afternoon, it would take most of the school year to uncover the beds, refill them with good soil, and prepare for the new owners to plant. Of course, there is a water spigot nearby. So, all they would need would be seeds or starters and some shovels and trowels. 

Now, it’s early May, and the work is done. The two long tracts are tilled and replenished. I had the students in the club working away for several months with the hand tools we already owned. Then, in winter, I realized that the effort would need a boost, so I bought a small Honda tiller with my classroom money. Between the little gas-powered machine and the student-powered shovels and rakes, we got it done. 

As for the future of the Moveable Feast, we don’t have a move-in date for our new campus yet, but the garden is primed and ready, Since I’d like to see it used, I think we’ll plant a few things here at the very end. But what we will do about a garden for ourselves in the future— we’ll have to wait and see. Maybe the Moveable Feast will have a third incarnation in yet another part of town in 2023.

Twelve Years of Unapologetically Eclectic Pack Mule-ing

It’s hard to believe that it has been twelve years since I put up that first post. I had just finished a Surdna Foundation Arts Teacher Fellowship, which I used for the Patchwork project, and had been blogging that year about modern life in Alabama. So, with a phrase from I made up in the mid-2000s – “cultural worker” – I started my own blog. This picture was taken in May 2010, a few weeks after that first post, when I had just gotten back from my last research trip for Patchwork. 

The previous year, 2009, had seen three of my books published, as well as a state teacher of the year award and a grant-funded student publication, so a website/blog seemed like a good idea. People might want to know more about me and what I do, I thought. But it didn’t make much sense to just blabber about “Look at me! Look at me!” so I started thinking about what else I could post. By that time, ten years into a career, I had lost patience with submitting unsolicited articles, essays, and poems to magazines, lit mags, and the like, since editors often neglect those works. I had also been trying to establish myself as a writer during the period when newspapers and magazines were declining, so all un-agented independents like me had more competition for fewer opportunities. (The Recession in 2009, ’10, and ’11 didn’t help that situation any.) However, on the hopeful side, the internet had opened up new options for writers. Adding up the facts, it made more sense for me to write what I wanted to write and put it out there myself. 

One other thing that urged me in this direction was what I’ve learned from studying and writing about the South: it can be an exclusive game, where parties protect their investments. For most of fifty years, lots and lots of entrepreneurial types have built on either the post-Civil Rights or Sunbelt/Southern Living model: Look at this user-friendly version of the South we’ve packaged for you! Those institutions, publications, TV shows, university programs, chambers of commerce, and marketing schemes are steadily entrenching their own narratives about the South, ones that can drive subscriptions, syndication, fundraising, gift shops, and tourism. And while those entities usually showcase diversity and inclusion, and while they’ll let anybody send money or sit in the audience, they don’t let just anybody onto the dais. In more recent years, I’ve accepted that, to these folks, I’m apparently not one of the cool kids. 

But choosing such an autonomous route hasn’t gone badly at all. In addition to putting up more than a thousand posts, Children of the Changing South was published in 2011, followed by Closed Ranks in 2018. I also joined the board of the Fitzgerald Museum in 2018 and revamped their Literary Contest, which just finished its fourth year. At school, the oral history project that became Sketches of Newtown began in 2019 and culminated in 2021. And in 2020, I created both level:deepsouth and Nobody’s Home. Those projects and the historical book about Montgomery Catholic Preparatory School keep me busy these days, not to mention that I’m about to complete my nineteenth year in the classroom.

While some things about me have changed over the last dozen years, what I’m interested in remains constant: neglected and untold aspects of Southern culture, education, school gardens, sustainability, poetry, and Generation X. I still enjoy craft beers and good food, I regularly jot down the haiku and other poems that pop into my head, and I will always make time for music and movies. And since people seem to like them, I plan to keep up the now-nine-year tradition of writing the Southern Movies posts. (Among the forthcoming posts will be one in August to mark the fiftieth anniversary of Deliverance.)

What also hasn’t changed is my belief that grassroots effort can make a difference. Experience tells me that the “leaders” don’t have the answers to today’s problems – lots of folks talk unity, but no one seems able to achieve it – so we’ve got to decide to do better for ourselves by taking action. Here, I’m talking about teachers, principals, custodians, lunchroom workers, students, and parents making each school the cleanest, safest, and most hospitable it can be. I’m talking about patronizing small businesses, eating local and seasonal food, and learning our local and state histories. I’m talking about composting, recycling, grasscycling, and refusing to use chemical fertilizers or herbicides. I’m talking about putting down our phones, getting off social media, and knowing our neighbors. I’m talking about parents locking up guns where troubled kids can’t get to them, and friends talking friends out of shooting somebody over petty mess. I’m talking about less narcissistic self-improvement and more getting involved in the work of community improvement.

If somebody were to ask me at this late date, why should I read your blog? For an independent perspective. I’m a liberally conservative moderate and a Southern Christian who isn’t Protestant. I am also among a distinct minority of Southerners with a graduate-level education. All in all, I’m a whole lot more likely write things you haven’t read everywhere else. That may not be the thing for folks who like simplified platforms and agendas that rely on heuristics and stereotypes, but it’s the only way that works for me. 

I’ve appreciated everyone who has stopped by to read what’s here. I’ve tried to have something worthwhile to say, and I’ll continue to try in the days, months, and years to come. And since I did a “before” picture up top, here’s one of me now. Lots of changes, man . . . lots of changes.

Read More: Books • On Life & Education • Poetry • Nobody’s Home 

Short Essay: “Happy, Happy”

This essay was originally written for the Poetry Unites essay competition in 2021. The essay didn’t win, and it will probably never appear in a literary journal because . . . I don’t submit to them anymore. In the essay, I tried to answer the prompt: “write a two-page (or 600-word) piece about [your] favorite poem and about its importance in [your] lives.

Happy, Happy

Ryōkan’s “First days of spring— the sky” came into my life when I was about twenty years old, a college English major who had come to a love of literature through the Beats. Growing up in Montgomery, Alabama in the 1980s, I loved books, as well as movies and music, which stood in stark contrast to the heavy emphasis for boys on sports and the outdoors. I was also raised Baptist in a humble, down-to-earth church. So to encounter these wild writers – Ginsberg, Kerouac, Snyder, and others – who equated literature with a search for meaning was revelatory for me. Those writers caused me look deeper, to go down poetry’s rabbit hole: from Snyder to Rexroth then Pound and on to the Asian poets they translated, who I’d never heard of in high school. 

But it was Ryōkan who interested me most, and I came to him through Stephen Mitchell’s Enlightened Heart anthology. Other Asian writers appear earlier in the pages, since they lived sooner, including Tu Fu (who always makes me think of Charles Wright and the dwarf orchard). Nearer the end of the book, Ryōkan, who lived from 1758 to 1831, was wedged between William Blake and Kobayashi Issa, and Mitchell included three of his poems. “First days of spring— the sky” is the first of the three.

The mid-’90s was not only the time period when I discovered the Beats, it was not a good time in my life: going to school full-time, working full-time, and living at home with my mother, with virtually everyone around me saying that being an English major was unwise. Most of my friends had left town for college, I stayed home out of financial necessity, and between work and school, had almost no free time for fun. Considering what most folks that age want from life, it’s fair to say that I was unhappy. And Ryōkan seemed like the happiest person I could imagine, mainly because he didn’t give a flip about the things most people value or expect.

The poem begins on a gorgeous spring day: blue sky, warm sun, the oncoming green. The speaker is walking into town to beg, then a group of children see him and insist that he play with them. He does, shamelessly. But people walk past him, jeering, asking, “Why do you act like such a fool?” Ryōkan writes,

I nod my head and don’t answer.
I could say something, but why? 

What matters, he then tells us, is what he is doing right now, though it is nothing anybody else would recognize as valuable. I was raised to understand that a “fool” is someone who knows something is wrongheaded but does it anyway. Ryōkan is not being a fool here. He is being happy, and that’s what passersby won’t abide. They’re too busy judging him, expressing their opposition, and focusing on their disapproval to be happy themselves. 

Do I think that Ryōkan was telling me to just go play with kids, then I’ll be happy? No. He was saying that people are so busy following the ways of the world to achieve happiness that most don’t even recognize happiness when they see it. When they do see it unaccompanied by the features they expect, they call it foolishness. But the poet knows better. That meant a lot to me as a twenty-year-old English major who was told regularly that a “more practical” pursuit would be better. 

Today, I’m a writer and writing teacher in the same city where people told me that I shouldn’t waste my time on literature. When I was younger, I used to get angry about it. Today, “I nod my head and don’t answer. / I could say something, but why?” 

The Open Submissions Period for “Nobody’s Home”

Starting tomorrow and ending June 15, I will be reading submissions of creative nonfiction to expand the Nobody’s Home anthology. All submitting writers should read the guidelines thoroughly, then send a query and wait for a response about whether to send the work. I am particularly interested in works about or set in the states of Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky, South Carolina, and Texas, as they are currently underrepresented in the anthology. Works accepted during this time will be published in August 2022. 

Submissions of reviews and interviews will continue to be accepted during this time. Again, anyone considering a submission should read the guidelines thoroughly before sending a query.

Nobody’s Home: Modern Southern Folklore is an online anthology of nonfiction works about beliefs, myths, and narratives in Southern culture over the last fifty years, in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.  The project, which was created in 2020, collects personal essays, memoirs, short articles, opinion pieces, and contemplative works about the ideas, experiences, and assumptions that have shaped life below the old Mason-Dixon Line since 1970. 

 

Southern Movie 58: “The Chamber” (1996)

1996’s The Chamber is one of the few once-popular Southern movies you’ll rarely (or never) find when you search your favorite streaming service’s listings. (Others include 1982’s Six Pack, 1983’s Stroker Ace, and 1984’s Tank.) A member of the John Grisham cadre of films from the 1990s, this one has a young Chicago lawyer heading to Mississippi to argue the appeal for a Klansman who firebombed a local lawyer and his two children in the 1960s. The twist is that the modern-day defense lawyer is the Klansman’s grandson, long removed from their ancestral heritage in the South. Directed by James Foley (who spent most of the ’80s on Madonna’s music videos and movies) and starring Chris O’Donnell and Gene Hackman, the film pits family member versus family member, North versus South, liberal versus racist, and Yankee versus Southerner, all while asking questions about justice and forgiveness, and exploring how poor and working-class whites could be pawns in larger, more sinister conspiracies.

The Chamber begins in Indianola, Mississippi in 1967. A couple are in bed, about to start their day. The husband offers to take the kids to school, and his wife, still in her nightgown, happily accepts. When they leave, he is dressed in a suit and carrying a briefcase. They load into the car, leaving their white-columned, two-story home and heading into the small town’s business district. Everything is friendly enough, with the husband-father waving to people in the streets, and then they pull up to a brick building whose sign announces “Marvin B. Kramer, Attorney at Law.” His young sons have now made their way upstairs and are leaning out the windows shouting at each other— when a bomb blows the front out of the building! Both boys are certainly killed, and as we view the settling smoke, we are seeing the scene from the backside of a Confederate historical marker.

The scene then shifts to Chicago in 1996, where we see a young man (O’Donnell)  on his bed, watching and rewinding news footage from that day, then from the funeral, then from an angry scene outside the courthouse where we see the man arrested for the crime: Sam Cayhall (Hackman). The killer, with his heavy moustache and thick sideburns, is grimacing and serves here as the face of hate. Screaming wildly at him is the father of the boys, who we now understand to be Jewish, as others hold him back.

Next we see our young hero Adam Hall, he is in a suit and sitting in his boss’s corner office at a prestigious law firm. Adam is asking to take the case of Sam Cayhall, but the elder lawyer is against it. Not to be deterred, Adam cites fact after fact about the man and his case, but can’t wear his boss down. Until he confesses that he is Cayhall’s grandson. His name is difference because his parents changed their last name after the killings. His boss is surprised, but not yet convinced. We then learn that Adam’s afther committed suicide the same year as Cayhall’s sentencing. After a bit more coaxing, he reluctantly relents to allow the young lawyer to take on the hopeless death penalty case of an obviously guilty man. He tells Adam, “Don’t say thank you. I haven’t done you a favor.”

In Jackson, Adam arrives at a brick mansion, where two African American valets park his car and an African American maid lets him in the front door. This is the home of his Aunt Lee (Faye Dunaway), who is his only remaining relative in the city, and she is hosting a cocktail party in the middle of the day. Spewing syrupy charm, she wants him to join the party ASAP, since she has procured the last twelve virgins in town to meet him. Adam politely declines, saying that he is there for work and that he will be staying in a hotel. She guesses that he’s there to sue some wealthy fat cat. No, he tells her, he is there to defend her father. Aunt Lee’s demeanor changes drastically into something like silent hysteria, and she hisses at him that he doesn’t understand anything. Further, she insists, he should not breathe a word of his business to anyone.

Once the people (and presumably the dozen virgins) are gone, Aunt Lee and her husband close the door and both glare at Adam, who is standing at the top of the stairs.  Aunt Lee is glaring for personal reasons, and her husband is glaring for his own. Once, Adam and Lee are seated, she intimates that they have little interest in each other beyond social appearances. That’ll all change, “when the world finds out I’m Hitler’s daughter,” she says, mostly to herself. Adam half-heartedly questions the arrangement, inserting a slight against the money and social connections, but she easily brushes him aside. Aunt Lee left home at thirteen, eloped with her husband, and told people that her father was dead, a lie that will soon be true. Adam is offended by the apathy toward his grandfather, so she also warns him that dealing with Sam Cayhall means dealing with a man who “destroyed absolutely everyone who made the mistake of getting close to him.” 

After a very Southern warning about the dangers of unearthing the past, Adam is off to Parchman Prison.  He drives through green field and up to the tall fences and towers. After brief pat-down by Sergeant Clyde Packer, played by Auburn football and baseball great Bo Jackson, Adam is led into the prison, through a series of doors, and into a long, thin room where he will speak to Sam through a wire barrier. When the door unlatches for Sam to enter, everyone jumps, including the inmate mopping the floor. While the unshackling is done, Sam begins, “Who the hell are you?” Adam explains, and Sam makes a surly comment about the Jewish law firm. Adam, who is now facing the man he has pondered for so long, tries to combat his grandfather’s mean commentary, by claiming that they are an Equal Opportunity employer. But the quip is no match for Sam, who rips it apart with a line of questioning about how many women and blacks are partners there. Clearly rattled by losing that round of intellectual sparring and by being forced to admit that this is his first death penalty case, Adam attempts to get to work.

But that first brief ass-kicking was nothing compared to what comes next. As he attempts to lay some groundwork, Sam starts asking him questions about himself and quickly surmises who he is. Adam is dumbstruck, and Sam gnaws on him a bit, calling him out as “the son of a man who blew his brains out.” Sam writes him off and gets up to leave. Flustered by his thwarted attempt at a secret in-road, Adam then goes all out, telling Sam that he’s the only person in the world who cares. Without Adam’s intervention, Sam will be dead in twenty-eight days. This catches Sam’s attention. He turns around and chuckle wryly. 

After getting set up in a downtown office, where he finds out that his presence has made the front page of The Clarion-Ledger, Adam is back in long, divided room with Sam. The elder man is a mixture of blunt honesty, crude racism, and thinly veiled sarcasm. With his unshaven face, squinting eyes, and yellow teeth, he is imposing and in some ways frightening. In their interactions over the basics of the case, Adam is peppered with his grandfather’s complete willingness to take him off guard, intermittently answering his questions and making statements that give him pause. We learn that Sam was tried twice and had two hung juries, but was re-indicted after twelve years and convicted by the man who later became governor. Sam also talks about their generational membership in the Klan, but ultimately, what frazzles Adam is Sam’s insistence that he face his own inner racism. Adam packs up to leave in frustration, and Sam goads him with an example of being cut off in traffic by a black driver. “You don’t think, ‘Well, you darn African-American . . .,” Sam tells him. Quickly, Adam is out the door.

Back in town, Adam is approached in the office by Nora Stark, an aide to the governor— the one who got the conviction against Sam originally. He meets her going into a meeting with the judge about Sam’s case. During the meeting, we find a very John Grisham scenario, where the one-man, good-guy team is outgunned by a whole team on the other side and where the judge is a tad self-righteous and more than a little snarky. So things get set up there, and Adam is led to meet the governor, who is young and energetic. Nora sits with him during the two men’s brief conversation, during which the governor tells Adam that he believes Sam did not act alone. Adam is taken aback by the suggestion, but is given no evidence to support the idea. After a scant few minutes, the governor is called away by other obligations. Adam, confused by the vagaries, has to have it spelled out for him by Nora: the governor could be willing to consider clemency but needs some new evidence that would allow him to dodge any political consequences.

And speaking of consequences, when Adam returns to his hotel room, he hears something. walking across the small room to investigate, he opens a pair of french doors to his bathroom— and there’s a bomb! 4, 3, 2, 1 . . . and a balloon explodes, revealing a note: Welcome to Dixie. Please try and leave everything as you found it. 

At Parchman in the divided room, Adam is livid and scared and is asking Sam what he should do. Sam replies that his mind has been on dying in the gas chamber, not on Adam’s problems, which brings Adam back down to Earth. The two then discuss the legal aspects of the case, and we see once again that Sam is a smart man, not some ignorant redneck. Yet, Adam brings back up the issue of his father, whose suicide affected his life. Sam deflects the efforts at first but then yields, saying that he never laid a hand on Adam’s father as a boy, that he was always weak and sensitive. Then Sam lets something slip: a name, Quince, the black boy that Adam’s father used to play with. Adam latches on, but Sam is having none of it and soon becomes angry, demanding to leave. We’re left to wonder, why is this important, and who was this Quince?

After this tense exchange, Adam is woken up in his hotel room by his boss in Chicago, telling him that his initial motions will be denied. This leads him to contact Nora to ask for help, and their first place to go is meeting an FBI agent who worked the bombing. The agent talks to them as he drives his boat down a lonely river. He is surly and clearly bitter, and he shows little enthusiasm for helping Adam and Nora. Adam wants to know all the facts, but it won’t be so simple.  The main thing that he learns is: Marvin Kramer always came to work at 8:00 AM sharp, and the timer on the bomb was set for 8:00 AM. 

At the bar later, Adam pushes Nora for more information. She first tries to veil her lack of assistance as the way it is in Mississippi, but Adam pushes, including by asking her whether she was assigned to spy on him. Somewhat indignant, Nora asks if he has ever heard of the Sovereignty Commission. He has not. She begins to explain and when she gets to the White Citizens Councils, Adam asks, “What are those?” (I realize that the screenwriters had to do this so the audience cold learn about it, but the idea that Adam knew every detail of Sam’s case, had studied it for years, but didn’t know about either of these of the organizations . . . is absurd.) Nora’s brief historical lesson tells Adam that Sam wasn’t acting alone and that he was likely doing the dirty work for someone else’s decisions. 

So, Adam had to ask Sam to sign a document that would open the files of Sovereignty Commission, which are sealed. Sam says no, that politicians like the governor are just using the two of them to get at those files. Maybe, agrees Adam, but Sam will be executed in twenty days if they can’t win a stay. Sam’s reply is that it won’t happen the way Adam wants, because the people in power just want to go after “my people.” Adam is offended again, saying, “I’m your people.” Sam replies, no, “you ain’t my people. You ain’t never met my real people.”

After this exchange, Adam is back in town, reading another headline, this one about his father’s suicide back when Sam was convicted. He calls his Aunt Lee, who of course wanted all this kept quiet. For whatever reasons, she tells him that if wants to know about the past, then she’ll take him and he’s going to know. Next we see, the pair are in a car going down a rural dirt road that is flanked by farms. Lee is smoking in an agitated way. Adam watches her intently. Then, they arrive at a white farmhouse, where Lee tells the story. They had been children, in the early 1950s, and Adam’s father had a friend named Quince, whose father also did odd jobs around their farm. One day, the two boys started fighting, and Lee saw the whole thing from a tree she liked to climb. During the fight, Sam came out and ran Quince off, but Quince came back with his father. The two men then began to argue, which led to a fight, and Sam beat him with metal rake. Quince’s father called out to get his shotgun, so Sam told Adam’s father to get his. They were at the Cayhall home, so Sam got his gun sooner, and he shot the black man point-blank. Adam asks what they were fighting about. A toy soldier that he thought Quince had stolen, Lee says, but Adam’s father had found it later under his bed. Of course, Sam was not even arrested for killing a man in cold blood. Lee closes out her story by saying that she was responsible for the man’s death too, having not cried out for her father to stop.

Armed with several bits of  new information, Adam returns to the prison to work on Sam’s last minute appeal. As Packer brings Sam into the library where they’ll now meet, he asks Sam about his last meal. Sam says calmly that he wants Eskimo Pies and French Market coffee. Inside the library, Adam wants Sam to share the details to the executions, which happened with Sam close by on death row. Sam tells an awful and vivid story of a fellow inmate being put to death in the gas chamber, with both men realizing that he describing what will soon happen to him as well. After he done, Adam asks how the lever that activated the gas worked. Sam wrinkles his face and says, “How the hell would I know?” He taken Adam’s bait. The young lawyer remarks that Sam has no aptitude for mechanical things, a fact he learned from Lee’s explanation earlier. Sam blows him off; making a bomb isn’t that hard, he says. But Adam keeps on, asking about the placement of the bomb and the length of the fuse . . . he is driving at a point: Sam couldn’t have made the bomb that killed the Kramer children, since — the FBI agent told him — it had a timer. Having the truth fully uncovered, Sam looks back coldly and says, “You have no idea what you’re doing.”

At the capitol, Adam wants help from Nora to get into the Sovereignty Commission files, but it’s no go. So, he ends up back in the prison library with Sam, where he tells his grandfather about their next effort: to plead insanity, based on Sam’s long family history of racism and Klan involvement. At this point, Sam gets angry. He sees it as admitting he’s crazy because he sees the world differently than his liberal son and grandson. Adam tells him that he’ll be dead in fourteen days if they don’t win on some legal point, so Sam agrees. In the next scene, he sits with a psychologist who asks him about whether he feels guilty or has apologized to his victims. Sam says coldly that he doesn’t feel guilt and sees no point in apologizing.

Later, in the hallway, Sam tries to speak to Sergeant Packer about the fact that he speaks so hatefully about black people, but stops short of making a point. Packer quietly says, “I hear ya, Sam.” We see then Packer is letting Sam outside into the yard, and we find out shortly that he wanted to see the sunrise one last time. 

This fact will end up hurting him in court. After Adam has his psychologist to testify that same is “not in touch with reality,” Packer contradicts the claim when questioned by the state. He gives examples of Sam’s humanity and conscience. Though Packer seems to have a fondness for Sam, his honesty about the inmate dooms this appeal.

At this point, The Chamber is about halfway through. Adam is running out of options, and the governor is getting itchy to know what’s happening. After hearing an update from the state’s attorney, he stops Nora in a hallway and wants to know what Adam has been doing. Nora says little, so he pushes, asking if she is sleeping with Adam. No, she replies indignantly. Then what is Adam up to, he wants to know. She conveys that he is trying anything because he is desperate, to which the governor tells her to stay close to him. Maybe you ought to be sleeping with him, he even suggests . . . Now Nora is mad. She has a private conversation with Adam about the Sovereignty Commission files, then coerces a middle-aged man with the keys to the locked storage where the files are. Adam joins her at the elevator, and they set about their mission.

In the records room, they find shelves full of old boxes, then the reach the restricted area. Nora fumbles with the keys so Adam jumps the fence. Among the Sovereignty Commission files, they find notes from Indianola and among the proceedings are Marvin Kramer’s initials, Sam Cayhall’s initials, and the initials RW. Back at Parchman, Adam questions Sam with great directness about who RW is, inserting a lecture about protecting the “cowards” who aren’t there for him in his time of need. Sam then gets really angry, berates Adam as a “loser” like his father, then goes in a tirade against the suicide. He is so wild that the guards come and take him away.

But Adam won’t give up so easily. He goes to see Aunt Lee, who is drinking again, and he finds her stone-drunk on her balcony. She mumbles and fumbles but takes him inside and shows him a picture in a book. It is a lynching, one boy’s face is circled in red with “Daddy” written underneath. Lee screams at Adam, “Go home!” and leaves the room.

He then takes this new knowledge back to Parchman and launches into a now-sullen Sam about not giving up. Sam is ready to give up, though. Adam needs him to talk, and though we don’t get to hear what he says, we next see Adam in court pontificating about “mitigating circumstances” in Sam’s life. Sam was raised to be a Klansman and had no other choice in the world where he existed. The judge listens pensively.

Adam’s next move is surprising. He knocks on an apartment door, and it is answered by Marvin Kramer’s wife. She is much older now. She invites him in, and they talk about the situation with Sam. Both inject their own sentimental anecdotes — hers about her children, who would be about Adam’s age, and his about finding his father after the suicide — but ultimately Mrs Kramer will not yield to Adam’s request that she ask the court for mercy for Sam. No, he must die, she tells him.

Disconsolate, Adam heads back to his little office and is sitting in the dark, when he hears a voice. The light snaps on, and waiting for him is the previously unhelpful FBI agent. He laughs at his shenanigans, getting in, then offers to help Adam. RW is a man named Raleigh Wedge, who has always evaded being charged with his crimes. The agent says that they always knew he was involved, but always managed to shake loose of facing consequences. If Adam wants to find him, the Klan is having a pre-execution rally since they have gathered for Sam’s final days.

Perhaps too boldly, Adam goes to the Klan rally, whose entrance is marked by a Confederate flag. He clearly thinks that his whiteness will serve as cover, but all of a sudden, a group of skinheads grab him. They take him outside and beat him up a little bit, then Raleigh Wedge walks up. Adam at first thinks he has been saved, then realizes who it is. Raleigh puts a gun in his face, but Adam attempts to speak forcefully about honor and truth, so the old racist fires a round off right next to his head. To clear things up, Raleigh picks Adam up, pins him against a wall, and speaks directly about the situation right in Adam’s face. Sam will die soon, and Adam should always be watching his back from now on. When he’s done, Raleigh and the skinheads walk away chuckling.

As The Chamber enters its final quarter, the prison and its staff are preparing for Sam’s execution. He will die in 16 hours as the scene begins. After a quick scene about the prison’s preparations, We see that Lee has come to visit him. They are both very emotional, and she tells him that he has forgiven him for what he did to her and to Adam’s father. She also asks whether he would have shot Joe Lincoln, Quince’s father, if she had called out to stop . . . He says, Yes, that he would have. Lee weeps at being absolved of the responsibility that her brother had told her she bore.

As Sam’s time grows shirt, we see a television news story about his appeals being exhausted, with the exception of the Supreme Court and the governor, who is watching as he eats. At Parchman, Adam goes to Sam’s cell and tells him smugly that he met Raleigh Wedge. Adams bruised face is evident. Sam is silent, so Adam leaves the paperwork to open the Sovereignty Commission files then leaves. Everything remains up in the air.

Within a moment, we see Raleigh Wedge signing into the prison log as “Donnie Cayhall.” It turns out that Raleigh Wedge is a pseudonym for Sam’s brother. They come face to face in the long, divided room where Adam and Sam were first meeting. Sam stalks back and forth on his side, while Donnie/Raleigh lets out a slow, calm rant about the righteousness of bigotry, how Sam has done the right thing. Sam takes it mostly silently, remarking only that they were never supposed to kill anyone, especially not any kids. Then Donnie/Raleigh mentions Adam and his father, calling them weak, and Sam lights up with anger, throws a chair against the divider, and screams at his brother.  We see a change in Sam here.

Back in his cell, Sam is sad and silent when Adam arrives again. Sam gives Adam two letters to deliver: one for Quince Lincoln and one for Mrs. Kramer. Adam is surprised but also disappointed that the paperwork sits where he left it. Then Sam tells him, “There’s one more thing.” Adams looks, and he did sign the paperwork. Adam grabs the phone nearby and gets on his business.

However, this won’t be as simple as Adam might like. He rushes around, and we hear an announcement that a judge is looking at new evidence in Sam’s case. A crowd of neo-Confederates at an outdoor rally cheers. Then, Nora rushes into a meeting that the governor is having with the state’s attorney to tell them the news. The governor tries to brush her off, but she stays and tells them he may want to know whose names will be revealed in the Sovereignty Commission files . . . Once again, the machinations of “justice” work against Sam, as the governor calls his friends in the legislature to concoct a plan.

So, the warden brings Sam his dress clothes and instructs him to be changed within thirty minutes.  Adam and Sam look at each other knowingly, and the governor arrives via helicopter outside. Back inside, Sam says goodbye to some of his fellow inmates, while the governor announces to an assembled crowd that the Supreme Court has rejected all appeals. While he talks, explaining that Sam Cayhall is guilty and will thus receive no clemency. Meanwhile, we see Donnie/Raleigh get arrested in a convenience store. 

During the last scenes, where the procedural portion of the death penalty is shown, Sam and Adam make their peace. Sam tells Adam that he finally feels as though he has done something good in the world, having now known his grandson. They hug briefly then Same is put to death in the gas chamber. Adam does not stay for the execution, but instead is seen running out of the prison down a long gravel road. Outside the prison, the crowds are dispersing, and the governor flies away in his helicopter. As Adam looks around, Aunt Lee is there, waiting. They hug and share a pensive word about a future in the wake of Sam’s death.

At the time of the film’s release, in October 1996, The Clarion-Ledger‘s Billy Watkins shared that the film “was shunned by author John Grisham who sold the movie rights way back when without gaining control over cast and script. His clash with [director] Foley goes back to the original script, which Grisham trashed as not being anything similar to the novel.” My guess would be that more people saw the movie than read the book. That’s kind of how it goes these days.

As a document of the South, this adaptation of The Chamber raises issues within the post-Civil Rights South as the culture moved slowly away from the era of Jim Crow and toward the 21st century. Sam Cayhall is representative of a dying breed of mid-century reactionaries, and his latter-day criminal conviction bears similarities to real cases like Byron de la Beckwith in 1994. The story explores what happens in the wake of these violent incidents, when the racists’ family members try to move on, when societal norms change, and when an irreconcilable past bubbles back to the surface. In The Chamber, we look on the scars of the movement era— but not on those of the victims, where we would normally focus our attention; instead, on the descendants who try to live with the legacy of the perpetrator’s crimes. Sam Cayhall was a destructive force, and the survivors struggle to live with the destruction.

The Chamber also delves into social class issues for poor and working-class whites. Nora’s explanation of the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission and the White Citizens Council alludes to the real ways that the affluent and middle-class whites, who benefited most from segregation, used lower-class whites to do the “dirty work.” Sam’s character and his belief in “my people” also represents this scenario. It was Sam who helped to plant the bombs, it was he who stayed quiet, and it was he who ended up on death row, all while other collaborators went free from both recognition and punishment. And when the time comes when their names may be revealed, the pawn must be sacrificed to protect them. 

Finally, of course, The Chamber is about the death penalty. The urgency in the plot is driven by Sam’s limited time before being taken to the gas chamber. If there were years for these events to occur, the tension wouldn’t be as . . . well, tense. 

Reading: “Sky Above, Great Wind” by Kazuaki Tanahashi

Sky Above, Great Wind: The Life and Poetry of Zen Master Ryokan
by Kazuaki Tanahashi
My rating: 5 out of 5 stars

I have liked Ryokan since I first read “First days of spring— the sky” in Stephen Mitchell’s anthology The Enlightened Heart when I was in college in the mid-1990s.  So I was glad to get this biography and accompanying poetry collection recently, after more than twenty years of general familiarity. Because Ryokan was not a court poet, eschewed attention and fame, and was so poor as to often not have ink and paper, less is known about him than about other poets. Though, the biographer here, who is a calligrapher, does a good job of bringing the anecdotes and other ephemera into a cohesive narrative that introduces the collection.

I hadn’t known much about Ryokan – the man who wrote one of my favorite poems – in part because there isn’t much to know. Like many brilliant creatives, he had an opportunity at a normal kind of success early in life, but found himself unsuited for it. So, thus, he went into a life of austerity that allowed him the freedom to be himself, to be a Zen fool. Some of the stories are bittersweet, showing a man who starved and froze in a hut on a mountainside but who also accepted those discomforts as part of the life he wanted to lead. The first half of the book reads more like literary criticism than biography, but that nonlinear form, along with a substantial array of poems in the latter half, does a good job in bringing the poet to life.

 

Congratulations to the Winners of the Fitzgerald Museum’s Literary Contest: “The Radiant Hour”

Congratulations to this year’s winners and honorable mentions in the F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum’s fourth annual Literary Contest and to our second winner of the Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald Young Writers Award!

Grades 9 – 10:
Arim Lee, “Inheritance”

Grades 9 – 10 Honorable Mention:
Natalie Jiang, “feeling lost in the crowd”

Grades 11 – 12:
Avery Gendler, “A Playlist, or a Sonnet Crown”

Grades 11 – 12 Honorable Mention:
Samantha Hsiung, “chinatown pt. 2”

Undergraduate:
Ria Dhingra, “A Modern-Day Manual to the Midwest”

Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald Young Writers Award
Kathleen Doyle, LAMP High School in Montgomery

The theme for 2021 – 2022 was “The Radiant Hour” to honor the centennial of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Beautiful and the Damned. The Fitzgeralds’ literary and artistic works from the 1920s and 1930s are still regarded as groundbreaking, and The Fitzgerald Museum is pleased to honor these young writers as daring and revolutionary writers of their generation. Thank you to Jason McCall for judging the high school entries and to Pat Reeves for judging the undergraduate category.

About the two high school winners, judge Jason McCall had these remarks:

Lee’s “Inheritance” presents the definition of the word as only poetry can. This haunting poem grips readers with movement, imagery, and cutting diction to show how the beauty and weight of family and tradition live on in the body, mind, and spirit.

Gendler’s “A Playlist, or a Sonnet Crown” shows how even the most traditional forms can be revived and made fresh by the mind of a modern writer. Part formal masterclass in formalism, part masterclass in narrative, the poem shines a brilliant light on how moments and emotions can be immortalized in verse.

About the undergraduate winner Ria Dhingra, judge Pat Reeves had these remarks:

“A Modern-Day Manual to the Midwest” by Ria Dhingra seems initially to take the form of advice given to a newcomer to the Midwestern United States, but eventually pivots toward a personal meditation. [ . . .] The beauty of this piece is not in any single line, but in the accumulation of images, the vignettes that make up a typical day, that move us into adulthood, and finally, that weave into a whole that is a life. The rhythm and cadence of the short sentences begins to have a dreamlike effect that, even when the images are jolting, echoes the boredom of the day-to-day.

In its four years, the contest, which is open to high school students and college undergraduates, has received submissions from around the United States and overseas. This year’s honorees attend schools and colleges in Massachusetts, Michigan, California, and Wisconsin. The three grade-level winners will receive a monetary prize, and all honorees will have their works published on the Fitzgerald Museum’s website.

This year was the second year for the Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald Young Writers Award. Montgomery, Alabama native Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald was daring and revolutionary in her life, art, and writing, and award that bears her name seeks to identify and honor Alabama’s high school students who share her talent and spirit.

About winner Kathleen Doyle’s portfolio, judge Kerry Madden-Lunsford said:

From her moving and funny piece “Lonesome George” about Pinta tortoise on a trip to Galapagos with her frail grandfather to her literary narratives on the work of Hemingway and Gatsby to the modern gothic world of the aptly-named “Renfroe’s Foodland,” (I kept thinking of Renfield running the grocery store somewhere in the Deep South) to her sparkling Yelp reviews, Kathleen shows her range as a writer of creative nonfiction with a keen eye for detail and a wonderful sense of humor and timing. She has a tremendous ability to paint a world with her words with her bright cinematic descriptions and deep empathy for her subjects, and I found myself wanting to linger in the places she created.

For more information about the contest, visit the contest webpage on the Fitzgerald Museum website. Guidelines for next year’s contest will be posted in August 2022.

For information on the winners of past year’s contests, click the year:
2019  •  2020  •  2021