I am struck by what seems to be a lack of masculine energy that is life-giving rather than destructive in our culture.  I am also struck by the lack of films that address male individuation.  We have plenty of hero myths played out in film but the transformation is external, not internal.  The hero changes the world around him by defeating evil but remains unchanged.  The recent exception to that may be the latest James Bond film, “Skyfall”, but we suspect that any softening of Bond will mean his demise and the end of a franchise.  So it took a woman to write a story of male individuation with a Bond-like character.  In contrast, several very good films have portrayed individuation in young women in recent years.  Some of these we have presented at our Movie Night at the Evanston Jung Center, such as Black Swan, Winter’s Bone, An Education, True Grit and others.  Over the summer Jackie Mattfeld, a board member of the C.G. Jung Center, suggested I view the film “The Hunter” and perhaps present it at the Center.  On January 4^th we will do just that.  In preparation for that I will discuss some aspects of the film here. Continue reading The Hunter: A Film Analysis by Daniel Ross →

This Friday we will be showing a film by Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s and starring Javier Bardem. It is González Iñárritu’s first feature since Babel and fourth overall, and his first film in his native Spanish language. The title Biutiful refers to the orthographical spelling in Spanish of the English word beautiful as it would sound to native Spanish speakers.  The spelling of the word sets the tone of the film which grounds us in the senses, not in the intellect. This is a story that has to be felt deeply and it is a rough road.  The director teaches us we are accustomed to films (particularly American) taking a stance in which good and evil is personified in characters and the good always prevails. This film asks us to see the complexity in people and that right and wrong and good and evil are part of the same whole.  This is a Jungian view of the world. Continue reading Biutiful: Movie Night and Film Analysis by Daniel Ross →

Those Winter Sundays
by Robert Hayden

Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blue black cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him. Continue reading Men’s Journey through Poetry →