Friday, April 11, 2008

“O, Captain, My, Captain”

A couple of weeks ago, during Anne and Martha’s visit from the United States, we had a wonderful opportunity one Tuesday evening at KA. We would be treated to a special screening of a movie, Captain Abu Raed, that had been flying on exceptional buzz around here in Jordan. The buzz went, “this is the first Jordanian feature film in 50 years!” I couldn’t figure out if that were true or not—some said 30 years—but I won’t quibble with a little hyperbole. The point was—this was a movie about Jordan, made by Jordanians, and it had been a long time a-comin’.

I might have written about the movie sooner on the blog, but I wanted to see how long the afterglow from this exceptional movie lingered—was it just a fun heartwarming, movie, or was there more to it? Did the movie haunt me—in all the ways a great film might—for days and days??

Since I had the rental car during Anne and Martha’s stay, we eschewed joining in the bus brigade as all 112 students and assorted faculty came to Amman to the Cinema at City Mall (just a hop and a skip from another mall with the I-swear-it’s-true-name of Mecca Mall) for the screening. I sit down with A&M on one side of me, and my friend Elizabeth on the other side. (By the way—I have a perfect digression: yesterday in Arabic class we learned the phrase khalil el culp, which means “friend of the heart.” That is a phrase I have treasured since reading Lillian Rubin’s book, Just Friends, 20 years ago about the kind of to-die-for-friend we all seek to find. FYI—Elizabeth is one of those lifelong khalil el culp people indeed.)

I didn’t know what to expect from the film, but from the opening scenes, meeting a tired, old airport janitor named Abu Raed, I was entranced. This guy, with a grizzled face of the likes of a Spencer Tracy or a Morgan Freeman, was a seeming n’er-do-well. In the trash bin on the job he discovers a discarded pilot’s hat and takes it home. The children in his poor neighborhood assume he is a pilot—a captain! Abu Raed insists he is not a captain, but they don’t believe him. The children beg him to share his stories of the world outside of Amman, Jordan. Each day he gathers up these children and spins his tales. Through the magical tales friendships form and they transcend their grim realities. I don’t want to tell you more of the plot. I want you to see this film! I want you to demand your local indie movie theater get this film. I will sum up in a vague-ish way the rest of the movie: Abu Raed takes it upon himself to make a difference in people’s lives.

As we watched the movie (in Arabic with English subtitles) Elizabeth, my khalil el culp, and I would turn and gasp at the Arabic—we know those words! We know those phrases! And on the other side A&M poked at me as the cinematographer took us around Amman—we were just there yesterday!—Anne whispered excitedly. I couldn’t believe how excited I was just to be seeing a movie stamped, “Made in Jordan.”

But there was more to this film. Scene after scene, the world of Abu Raed unfolded, revealing an obvious labor of love, and monumental effort, by a Jordanian writer-director and cast and crew. Elizabeth and I realized that we were seeing the film through kind-of Jordanian eyes. We not only recognized the settings, but we recognized the hard-hitting socio-economic struggles we ourselves saw working so near Amman and at KA. For the Jordanians in the audience, they loved seeing their people on the silver screen. There were the rich folks in Abdoun, where many of our students live, and there were these children’s faces from the hardscrabble parts of downtown Amman. The film felt Jordanian, and it confronts Jordanians with some of the issues of their time: the gap between rich and poor, social conformity, domestic violence, and child labor without sugar-coating. At the end of the film there is a scene of the Jordanian flag flying over the ancient Roman citadel high above downtown Amman and the audience burst into exuberant applause!

But it was so much more than just a kick to see sights around town. It is more than just a love letter to Amman. A&M thrilled to the story as well, caught up in the magic of this old man loving these children and opening up worlds to them. Is it trite to say the film must then be universal? All I know is that it was beautiful film-making, reminding me a little of Cinema Paradiso, a film I loved from 1990.

After the film we enjoyed a post-screening discussion with the producers and some of the actors in the film. We learned that the movie had been making the rounds of some of the international film festivals and our wizened and wise Captain had won Best Actor honors at the Dubai Film Festival, and the film itself won the “Audience Award” at Sundance. Wow. Sundance! We all know the cachet of that Robert-Redford labor of love.

During the discussion after the movie we learned that the writer-director and producers had used children, true stars in the movie, cast from local orphanages and from Amman’s refugee camps. Their faces have haunted me in these days since we screened the movie. Their performances felt so real—from their sense of wonder, sadness, loss of hope and anger, it added to the beauty and magic of the film.

As we left the film, Anne made a beeline for the producer to bend her ear about a film center in New York that she bets would love to show the film. As Anne talked with her, I spoke with another of the producers, and she asked me how they might work it so that some of the actors might be able to apply to KA as students. “They don’t have any advantages in life, and they have such a desire to learn, and the writer has kept in touch with them, hoping to help change their directions in life.”

This conversation has stayed with me for days as well. As beautiful as the film was, as reassuring as the message of the film is that we must work do good in the world, it wasn’t just a pat message for these filmmakers. They were living the message they just artistically created. They earnestly want to change the lives of the children they encountered in making this film. The glow of the Captain film just lingers on and on in a stirring way. I will keep you posted about if we have the chance to bring these students to our school.

We the saw this film on the evening that I had received some sad news. That morning, as I checked emails, I had a message from Denison friend Rick who wrote late the night before. He relayed that he had been watching ESPN (or something like it) and a sports commentator announced that he had just learned his favorite teacher in his life had died. Rick reported that the teacher had been from Hackley, and had changed this commentator’s life. Rick just wanted me to know that Walter Schneller had died, and since we were both from Hackley, I must have known him.

Indeed I knew Walter Schneller. He had hired me to teach at Hackley in the spring of 1996, and had been one of those kinds of legendary teachers about whom people will speak for decades. When I interviewed with Walter in his cluttered-with-a-lifetime-of-files-and-posters-and-books office it took me a little bit of time to get over his Venerable (with a capital V) air. from the looks of him I thought he might be caught up in the past of his career. But as I peered more closely at the piles of books, I noticed so many recent tomes about history, and saw so many posters for current art exhibits. I asked him what class had been his favorite over his 40 years at Hackley. He responded, “Well, John, isn’t it always your current class?” and his eyes twinkled. Over the course of that afternoon we talked of the glories of teaching. I told the new Upper School Head in our interview that I aimed to grow up to be like Walter Schneller.

Two years later, in 1998, Walter had an “anointing ceremony” in which he invested me with the sacred duty to run the History Department at Hackley. It had all the mock Venerable aura I had mistaken earlier as arrogance, cynicism and running on empty. Walter retired from teaching that year to write the history of Hackley School, and we saw him occasionally over the next few years. I wouldn’t say we were “friends of the heart,” but my admiration for a man who had inspired and compelled and worked on teaching as a labor of love for decades remains impregnable. That Fall when I took my place at the podium to announce the members of the History Department I quipped, “For the first time since the Eisenhower administration a new History department head introduces new faculty.” It took a few moments for the faculty to grasp the enormity, the legacy, the tenure of this historian.

As I watched Captain Abu Raed I couldn’t help but see the giant Walter Schneller as he worked his magic, piquing the curiosity of the young, imploring them to weather the storms and improve themselves, and remember the elegy from Walt Whitman, the ode to “O, Captain, My, Captain.” I exult in knowing both luminous captains.

1 comment:

Mary said...

Johnny,
another great blog! I can't wait to see the movie. I just hope I get a chance to. The Manor should definitely show it.
Hey!! When are you coming on Sun.? What time? We will have some visitors joining us so I need an approximate time. E-mail me.
Love you much and can't wait to hug you!!
Mary