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Cold War Revisited: “Red Dawn”

September 1, 2008 – 8:35 am

As certain factions speculate that the world is headed toward a new Cold War, Mark Farnsworth examines the artistic legacy of this phenomenon.

Director, screenwriter, and producer John Milius has always fancied himself as a latter day Hemingway, a warrior-poet on the board of directors of the NRA, fiercely opposed to gun control, and a consultant for the deceptively named military think tank - the Center for Creative Technology. A member of the 70s movie brats alongside Lucas, Spielberg, and Scorcese, Milius is the man responsible for the finer moments in “Jaws,” “Magnum Force,” and “Apocalypse Now.” His heroes are Patton, MacArthur, and Roosevelt; not your average right-wing American icons, but mavericks, tyrants, and visionary leaders.

The film critic David Thompson wrote of Milius as having, “earned and even provoked the press reputation of a strident, magnum-brandishing reactionary. But he is more than that. He is an anarchist, he is articulate, and he has an unshakable faith in human grandeur.” This would seem true from his directorial efforts, “Dillinger,” “Conan The Barbarian,” and “The Wind and the Lion.” Yet “Red Dawn” is a rather strange nut to crack.

“Red Dawn” is the ultimate ‘what if?’ movie. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Entertainment, europe, movies, north america, politics | Comments (0)

Cold War Revisited: “The Thing”

August 24, 2008 – 10:33 am

As certain factions speculate that the world is headed toward a new Cold War, Mark Farnsworth examines the artistic legacy of this phenomenon.

“The Thing” is the darkest film in the Kurt Russell trilogy of Carpenter’s science fiction films and the beginning of his “Apocalypse” cycle. It is a master class of pessimism nearly unrivalled in cinema and a bleak critique on the nature of humanity itself, inspired by the Reagan administration, Carpenter’s first foray into studio film making, and the escalation of the arms race with the Soviet Union.

The plot is more closely related to John W. Campbell’s novella; “Who Goes There?” than the earlier Hawks production of “The Thing from another World.” Special effects allow the shape-shifting alien to be realised in all its bloody glory, which in turn gives Carpenter the freedom to develop a claustrophobic atmosphere of mistrust, fear, and growing nihilism.

In the earlier movie the scientists and soldiers work together to destroy the visible threat of the thing, as they would do with communism. There is a unity mostly derived from the fact that they are white and embody a people fresh from the moral victory in WW2. America in the 1950s was still perceived as the ‘good guys’, the ‘land of the free and the home of the brave’.

With Carpenter’s creature everyone could be the thing and, as a consequence, an enemy. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Arts & Literature, Entertainment, movies, north america, politics | Comments (0)

Russia and Georgia: Darkness Falls

August 10, 2008 – 2:35 am

This is a special edition of this column.

Here are two things you ought to know about the conflict flaring up between Russia and Georgia:

First of all, Russia does not want Nato on its doorstep, and Georgia was getting ready to join Nato. Second of all, Georgia does not want to deal with the conflict that inevitably arises when certain parties, such as the South Ossetians, decide to break away.

I can understand where both sides are coming from. As much as I deplore Russia’s meddling in its neighbours’ affairs, I have to say that said meddling makes sense to the Kremlin. And as much as deplore Saakashvili’s government (have we already forgotten Georgia’s political crises?), I have to say that I understand not wanting to deal with the inevitable lawlessness that rebel regions such as South Ossetia create within and around themselves.

What horrifies is me is not just the violence, as if it isn’t bad enough, but the fact that being ethnically half-Russian and half-Ukrainian, I grew knowing that the Georgians are our friends. I grew up in a household in love with Georgian culture. To my Russian mother, Georgia was “the most beautiful place in the world,” and she wasn’t alone in this by far.

The people baying for blood on both sides, have they honestly forgotten our common ties? If the forgetting is this easy, perhaps we really ought to be worried about the future of Russia and Ukraine. The unthinkable is already happening before us, and history has entered a gloomy and bewildering chapter. This is the sort of thing that happens when empires fail; it’s bloody and vile. It reeks of gunpowder and rot and the dried-up glue that used to hold together our old, red memorial wreaths.

Now, for all the understandable grief surrounding the loss of life, I have found something to be bitterly amused about: Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Current Affairs, europe, politics | Comments (8)

The Deaths That Bind Us: Solzhenitsyn, Pugovkin, Mordyukova

August 4, 2008 – 11:36 am

It feels instinctive to say that the death of Alexander Solzhenitsyn marks an end of an era. Which era, though?

Solzhenitsyn’s life spanned many eras: WWII, the gulag, the Khrushchev years, stagnation, the last gasps of the Cold War, and, most recently, the strange and wondrous and bewildering reality of post-Soviet Russia. Solzhenitsyn’s legacy is crystal clear if one is looking at it from an outsider’s perspective. His legacy among his people and the people who love and study Russian literature and culture, however, is a much more complicated phenomenon.

In the West, Solzhenitsyn is most readily regarded as a symbol of All That Stalin Did Wrong. In today’s Russia and other post-Soviet countries he is a public figure whose function was and is debated, whose artistic achievements are criticized with gruffness rarely found elsewhere, and whose insistence on criticizing liberal democracy has earned him respect for the searing honesty with which he presented his views.

Living in the U.S., I have repeatedly run up against the sentiment that today Solzhenitsyn is intellectual Russia’s beloved grandmaster, a kindly, fatherly figure. The truth is, most people I know responded more emotionally when the likes of Nonna Mordyukova and Mikhail Pugovkin passed on earlier this summer - old school Soviet actors whose movies also serve as reminders of a time and a place gone forever.

The deaths of Mordyukova and Pugovkin did not, for the most part, make international headlines. But these figures were no less important in a cultural and historical context. Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Arts & Literature, europe, obituary, politics | Comments (3)

Today, The Washington Post Made Me Gnash My Teeth

January 30, 2008 – 6:12 am

Sweet Baby Jesus, Anne Applebaum, stereotype much?

Of course there were many very famous “sultry” women in the USSR - things did not begin, and end, with Stalin and Liubov Orlova (an actress from the 1930’s). Where on earth do people get such ideas in the first place? Just because nobody was wearing Chanel does not, somehow, mean that there was no beauty, no style, no sensuality.

And no, not everyone in the USSR wore polyester. But thanks for checking with actual people who lived under the regime.

Why is it OK to assume that before the introduction of Vogue, an entire country couldn’t possibly understand what beauty and style is all about? Sure, consumer goods were practically nonexistent. Sure, looking “different” may have garnered you some unwanted attention. Yet, the Soviets had their own pop culture, they had their own sirens - whether sauntering across the theater stage or walking home from the bus stop. Because the Soviets, amazingly enough, were human beings, with or without Western influence.

While I appreciate the fact that Anne Applebaum isn’t screeching about them evil Russians and, instead, finding something she deems positive, her outlook also completely disregards the thousands of women who have been trafficked from the Soviet Union following its dissolution. Those gorgeous women she sees hanging out with the older men in the posh restaurants? I sincerely hope that 100% of them are there of their own volition, enjoying their time, having a blast.

However, as someone who has actually done research, I’m not entirely sure that my hopes correspond with reality.

I’m not against beauty culture. I do think it’s been, and continues to be, unfairly used against women - especially those who have no interest in participating. Applebaum’s piece has reminded me of the fact that beauty culture can also obscure the issues of traffickers and other exploiters.

I understand the sort of piece that Applebaum was trying to write. She was having fun. I like to have fun too - and get very irritated when pious wailing about Oppressors and Oppressed overwhelms me, because, not every single damn piece of writing has to be incredibly serious and somber and grave. If it was, we’d all shoot ourselves in the head and let the cockroaches take over.

Yet, if you’re going to rely on ridiculous generalizations, your piece is no longer fun. It’s merely tacky. And, quite possibly, damaging.

Before, it used to be “evil Russians.” Now, it’s “attractive Russians” (with an occasional smattering of “evil” - I should also note that people use the word “Russian” to refer to practically all of us who came out of the USSR, but that’s a whole other conversation).

I don’t mind the “attractive” in principle. I get equally tired of condescending Western women who roll their eyes at the poor foreign dears - wearing that make-up! Balancing on those heels! The Feminist Revolution will save you, my darlings, each and every one! Just shut up and don’t speak for yourself!

I merely want there to be a balance. Is that too much to ask for, in this day and age? Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Columnist, Society, central asia, europe, women | Comments (15)

The Oil and the Glory: A Review

December 26, 2007 – 3:00 am

This is a review of Steve LeVine’s The Oil and the Glory: The Pursuit of Empire and Fortune on the Caspian Sea. Random House. 2007.

Steve LeVine has worked as a freelance journalist for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Financial Times, and Newsweek - in places such as the former Soviet Union, Pakistan, and the Philippines. Drawing on his considerable journalistic experience, he sets out to chronicle the history of the Caspian Sea.

Different characters intersect in the book: Nobel family of Sweden, American middlemen acting on behalf of the Soviet Union to make deals with American and British petroleum companies, oil executives begging their government to pressure Soviet leaders to allow drilling, and Central Asian leaders resisting pressure from Moscow to allow Moscow-supported companies to open the oil fields.

However, the central character of the book is oil. It is, perhaps, the only thing (after changes in regimes in ex-Soviet Union republics) that makes Moscow so determined to reclaim its influence in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, even threatening the destructions of oil drilling sites in these countries if they do not seek the opinion of Moscow before signing deals with Western companies.

LeVine describes Russia as a troublemaker, which has tried to use pipelines built in the Soviet era as leverage to force its former colonies to submit to the former master. However, the Russian attempt to rebuild influence is contained by the Clinton administration, whose policy on Caspian Sea and oil in Central Asia was shaped by Rosemarie Forsythe - who served as the Director of Russian, Ukrainian and Eurasian Affairs of the National Security Council, and Bill White- the Deputy Secretary of Energy.

The struggle between Russia and the United States for more influence in Central Asia is familiarized by the invocation of the struggle between Britain and Russia in the nineteenth century, when both sides were lobbying Iran, Armenia and Azerbaijan to consolidate the supply of oil to the West or to the Russian empire. The competition between two superpowers is a re-play of an old game. It is only natural for Russia to struggle to secure its backyards against the ex-colonies, who are full of hatred on Moscow due to forced abandonment of nomadic lives and migration imposed by Stalin and subsequent leaders and are therefore siding with another major power in the world, LeVine argues.

LeVine questions whether the United States is genuinely interested in bringing freedom and democracy to the region, and whether it is interested in actually monitoring the business practices of American oil firms in Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. He believes that the United States helped mobilize support for pro-Western politicians to launch the “color revolutions” in Ukraine and Georgia to overthrow pro-Russia governments. However, when it comes to pro-America allies in Central Asia, the commitment to expanding freedom and democracy becomes secondary to strategic interests, LeVine argues. The book exposes the common practice of paying bribes to despotic leaders in the newly independent republics. Yet the book also urges readers to re-examine what constitutes corruption: Should lobbying of American oil companies such as Chevron and Exxon and Mobil in the Congress and Senate on behalf of Azerbaijan or Kazakhstan be considered as offering bribes to Baku and Almaty?

The book relies on several hundred interviews conducted between 1992 and 2007, as well as autobiographical writings of key political players from the United States, the Soviet Union and ex-Soviet republics. The combination of these primary sources provides first-hand views of officials and businessmen going about their deals, and offering their opinions of the future of the Caspian Sea. However, the lack of sources originating in Russian and Central Asian languages greatly limits LeVine’s scope.

On the whole, the book illustrates the history and importance of Caspian Sea through a series of dramas whose character include oilmen, dictatorial leaders of ex-Soviet republics, Russian politicians who have tried to maintain their influence among their neighbors, and government officials of the United States who have worked to expand their influence in the region since the collapse of the communist party in Moscow. The result is the fascinating account of the region, a region which will continue to become increasingly crucial when it comes to the global supply of oil.

By Jonathan Mok | Posted in Arts & Literature, book reviews, central asia | Comments (1)

Slave to Fate and desperate men

November 19, 2007 – 5:00 pm

On July 1, 2002 a Bashkirian Airlines passenger plane and a DHL cargo jet collided over the German countryside. Eyewitnesses reported seeing fire in the sky, a noise like thunder stirred the sleeping in their beds, and any desperate hopes for survivors were quickly abandoned. Seventy-one people lost their lives, most of them Russian children on a UNESCO-sponsored trip to Barcelona. Architect Vitaly Kaloev, a Russian citizen then living in Spain, lost his entire family: wife Svetlana, and two children, Diana, four, and Konstantin, ten (do NOT Google pictures of that family if you value your composure, the children are so… so… Well, you know how it goes).

In 2004, Kaloyev traveled to Switzerland, demanding a personal apology from Skyguide, the air traffic control company that admitted responsibility for the crash. Unsuccessful in his attempt to meet with then-Skyguide bigwig Alain Rossier (how dare some guy who lost his entire family ask for an audience with His Holiness the CEO? - That’s the way the world works, it seems), Kaloyev traveled to the home of Peter Nielsen, the only man on air traffic control duty at the time of the crash (Nielsen’s partner had gone on break). An altercation ensued, and Nielsen was stabbed to death in front of his family.

Although convicted of murder, Vitaly Kaloyev was recently released by Switzerland’s highest court. His sentence was shortened, and he was then cited as having completed two-thirds of it already. Last week, Kaloyev got a raucous welcome in Moscow’s Domodedovo airport. People who had never met him held up signs reading “You’re a real human being!” Kaloyev’s first order of business was to visit the family graves.

The Russian press has called what happened in 2002 “murder.” I don’t quite agree. Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Columnist, Current Affairs | Comments (3)

The Big Dreary

September 17, 2007 – 9:23 pm

I must be stuck in some dark-humoured comedy sketch. Everywhere I go in Kyiv, the same exact conversation follows me (well, perhaps I’m fudging a little, one conversation I overheard involved two university professors, gossiping about another university professor who may or may not be sleeping with a student) – and the gist of it is this: the much-vaunted election does not matter. If some element of life in Ukraine gets better following September 30, another element will probably get much worse. Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Columnist, Current Affairs, europe, humor, politics | Comments (0)

The ‘Path’ to Freedom: The Struggle Against Human trafficking

October 3, 2005 – 6:35 pm

An Interview with La Strada’s Tetyana Mityura, a leading activist that has spent over five years on the front lines of Ukraine’s war against human trafficking and sexual slavery.

There is something about Tetyana Mityura’s calm manner that inspires hope. She is a long-time associate of La Strada , an NGO for the prevention of trafficking in persons, and one gets the impression that in her line of work, she has seen it all. Mityura is a person that has known both victory and defeat; has saved lives and watched lives go to waste; has faced stereotypes and did not let them deter her.

Throughout our conversation on August of 16th of this year, she stressed to me the importance of obtaining knowledge and educating oneself in the face of the ongoing problem of trafficking, because ignorance is the slave trade’s greatest ally. Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Columnist, Society | Comments (0)

Natasha From Russia

May 16, 2005 – 8:11 am

When you’re privileged enough to attend a top-tier American university such as Duke, losing sight of the fact that your fate may have been different often comes with the package. Strutting to class in a pair of pricey high heels to hear well-paid professors talk and relaxing afterwards with a glass of pinot grigio at night, many girls at Duke and schools like Duke never entertain a serious thought about the less fortunate members of their sex, the ones who service twenty so-called clients a day on a dirty mattress in a room with bars on the windows. For some, it’s even acceptable to poke a little fun at the “‘whores,” especially the ones who are imported from foreign countries.

There are a number of “isms” I could direct at my fellow students for this: racism, classism, over-privileged-idiocy-ism, but I’ve grown to believe that in order for criticism to work, it must be constructive. I grew up with mummy and daddy who sent me to private school instead of a brothel; it would be hypocritical of me to act like some kind of self-righteous Mother Theresa out to instruct the less-informed members of her gender on how to combat the plight of trafficked women worldwide. The truth is, a few years ago trafficking in humans barely registered on my radar.