Undefeated Triumph Of Tragedy
Jug Suraiya
On a recent visit to Sunaparanta, the stylish art gallery and cultural centre in Panaji, Goa, i took in a two-day festival of American noir films.
Noir means black in French, and the word has lent itself to a genre of film which largely uses dramatically contrasted black-and-white cinematography to create a suspenseful visual narrative in which the protagonist feels trapped in a vortex of physical danger and moral hazard.
One of the films which particularly struck me is called ‘The Set-up’, which was made in 1942 and was directed by Robert Wise.
It deals with an over-the-hill professional boxer who, after a string of lost fights, is determined to enter the ring once again in the hope of a last victory, much to the despair of his wife who fears that his already much-battered body might fatally succumb to another assault upon it.
The actual fight sequence – one of the most realistic ever depicted in any film – is a brutally bruising ordeal, not just for the protagonist but for the audience themselves, who are kept on the edges of their seats in empathetic tension.
Unknown to the boxer, his manager has made a deal with an underworld boss and the bout has been rigged so that the fighter will deliberately lose, ensuring those who have bet against him to make a killing with the bookies.
However, these plans are foiled when the boxer, bloodied and exhausted beyond endurance, refuses to yield to his much younger opponent.
In the end, broken in body but not in spirit, he emerges victorious on a plane that transcends his physical suffering.
The message of the film might be best summed up by Hemingway’s memorable line from The Old Man and The Sea: A man can be destroyed, but he can never be defeated.
There is a heroic resilience in the human spirit which enables it to rise above pain and anguish and loss and, against all odds, turn tragedy into triumph.
We don’t have to be shaped in the heroic mould, we don’t have to be characters in movies and books in order to achieve such victories.
Our common human condition is such that all of us must face, and overcome, our own dark nights of the soul, caused by the death of a loved one, or by crippling injury or illness, or by any other of the myriad slings and arrows of outrageous fortune mortal flesh is heir to.
Somehow, in some way, we must learn to cope with whatever the unknowable future may have in store for us.
Not just individuals, but entire nations have learnt to live through and exorcise the greatest of horrors. Japan suffered the unspeakable physical and psychic trauma of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to become one of the world’s most economically powerful and culturally advanced societies.
The problem of pain, why good people have to suffer, is an issue that crops up time and again in discussions of theology or moral philosophy.
If there is a Divine Being, why should such an omnipotent entity allow such cruelty and suffering in the world?
It could be argued, as Hemingway and director Robert Wise have done, that it is through the enduring of pain that we attain salvation, that beyond whatever tragedy befalls us there lies not defeat, but triumph.
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DISCLAIMER:
The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article.
Courtesy: The Times of India: The speaking tree: Aug 20, 2018
Undefeated Triumph Of Tragedy
Jug Suraiya
On a recent visit to Sunaparanta, the stylish art gallery and cultural centre in Panaji, Goa, i took in a two-day festival of American noir films.
Noir means black in French, and the word has lent itself to a genre of film which largely uses dramatically contrasted black-and-white cinematography to create a suspenseful visual narrative in which the protagonist feels trapped in a vortex of physical danger and moral hazard.
One of the films which particularly struck me is called ‘The Set-up’, which was made in 1942 and was directed by Robert Wise.
It deals with an over-the-hill professional boxer who, after a string of lost fights, is determined to enter the ring once again in the hope of a last victory, much to the despair of his wife who fears that his already much-battered body might fatally succumb to another assault upon it.
The actual fight sequence – one of the most realistic ever depicted in any film – is a brutally bruising ordeal, not just for the protagonist but for the audience themselves, who are kept on the edges of their seats in empathetic tension.
Unknown to the boxer, his manager has made a deal with an underworld boss and the bout has been rigged so that the fighter will deliberately lose, ensuring those who have bet against him to make a killing with the bookies.
However, these plans are foiled when the boxer, bloodied and exhausted beyond endurance, refuses to yield to his much younger opponent.
In the end, broken in body but not in spirit, he emerges victorious on a plane that transcends his physical suffering.
The message of the film might be best summed up by Hemingway’s memorable line from The Old Man and The Sea: A man can be destroyed, but he can never be defeated.
There is a heroic resilience in the human spirit which enables it to rise above pain and anguish and loss and, against all odds, turn tragedy into triumph.
We don’t have to be shaped in the heroic mould, we don’t have to be characters in movies and books in order to achieve such victories.
Our common human condition is such that all of us must face, and overcome, our own dark nights of the soul, caused by the death of a loved one, or by crippling injury or illness, or by any other of the myriad slings and arrows of outrageous fortune mortal flesh is heir to.
Somehow, in some way, we must learn to cope with whatever the unknowable future may have in store for us.
Not just individuals, but entire nations have learnt to live through and exorcise the greatest of horrors. Japan suffered the unspeakable physical and psychic trauma of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to become one of the world’s most economically powerful and culturally advanced societies.
The problem of pain, why good people have to suffer, is an issue that crops up time and again in discussions of theology or moral philosophy.
If there is a Divine Being, why should such an omnipotent entity allow such cruelty and suffering in the world?
It could be argued, as Hemingway and director Robert Wise have done, that it is through the enduring of pain that we attain salvation, that beyond whatever tragedy befalls us there lies not defeat, but triumph.
Post your comments at speakingtree.in
DISCLAIMER:
The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article.
Courtesy: The Times of India: The speaking tree: Aug 20, 2018