{"id":57660,"date":"2012-06-02T15:00:29","date_gmt":"2012-06-02T19:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=57660"},"modified":"2012-06-01T17:57:30","modified_gmt":"2012-06-01T21:57:30","slug":"a-story-in-which-polyamory-is-just-one-part-of-the-plot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/polyamory\/a-story-in-which-polyamory-is-just-one-part-of-the-plot\/","title":{"rendered":"A Story In Which Polyamory Is Just One Part of the Plot"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Maria Padhila<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I love finding out about books and movies in popular culture with characters with polyamorous relationships. I really love it when said books and movies aren’t all about the relationship but treat it as just another element in a character. I really, really love it when there\u2019s a woman who loves two men. I really, really, really love it when it’s a crime genre \/ SoCal hardboiled \/ James Ellroy-influenced-with-flavoring-of-surf-noir novel.<\/p>\n

\"Poly
Poly Paradise at Burning Man. Photo by Eric.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I think I just lost 98 percent of the audience. Well, that\u2019s not something that stopped Don Winslow from writing Savages<\/em>. There are as many raves for it as there are complaints about its eccentric writing style (which borders on beatnik free verse in places) and ‘unbelievable’ characters or plot. Consider the sources of the raves: Stephen King called it \u201cButch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid on autoload.\u201d New York Times\u2019 Janet Maslin named it as a top 10 book of the year. And Oliver Stone\u2019s making a movie out of it, which is scheduled for release July 6.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s quite a case for going with your creative vision, no matter how odd people might tell you it is. Here\u2019s a plot breakdown: Ben and Chon have a lucrative, designer hydroponic weed business going, based in Laguna Beach, and O is their girlfriend. Between looking hot and playing volleyball, Ben goes off to “Third World” areas and helps dig wells and brings medical care and Chon does push ups (he\u2019s a former Navy SEAL and contract fighter). Between looking hot and loving both of them, O shops and deals with her mother, a real real housewife of Orange County. The Baja Cartel makes a hostile takeover of their business, and kidnaps O. Wheels turn.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know where to start with all the ways I like this book, but sex is always a good jumping-off point, isn\u2019t it? O likes sex. Unapologetically, just as she enjoys food without reservation (this is one of those sad ways that the characters are unbelievable. I would love to believe that there is a woman out there who enjoys sex and food without reservation or inhibition, but talk about your unicorns. Sigh.). When Ben asks her once, when they\u2019re together, \u201cHow does Chon feel about this,\u201d she replies: \u201cIt isn\u2019t his tongue, isn\u2019t his mouth.\u201d When they hang out at a coffee shop Chon calls Yummy Mummy Haven, she scouts eligible women for him. <\/p>\n

The guys are just as chill. On a morning after the three of them have sex together, Ben holds up his hand, his finger and thumb a millimeter apart, and declares: \u201cWe\u2019re this close to being gay.\u201d And they all fall out laughing, because, you know, they\u2019re like, not. Being gay is being gay, being bi is being bi, and while both those places are lovely to be, and I spend my time in the latter myself, having sex with the same woman does not \u201cturn you gay.\u201d It just means you had sex with the same woman. It\u2019s nice to read someone who gets it.<\/p>\n

\"Ben
Ben and Chon in Oliver stone's movie Savages, based on Don Winslow's book of the same name..<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The guys are OK with it not because (as some commenters and bloggers have said, based on the trailer for the movie alone) they\u2019re whipped or crazy or whatever, but because they\u2019re supremely confident. And because they all actually like each other. Winslow gets the woman character pretty well, her combination of sharp mind and willful, determined shallowness and affectless surface. The latter is common to people who\u2019ve grown up with betrayal and are determined not to be hurt. But I really love the way he captures the friendship between men. Both have flaws and vulnerabilities, both are damaged, but they\u2019re tough enough to work together and not be threatened by each other or constantly jockeying for position. Neither is their closeness based on excluding the wimmenfolk, all the old ball and chains (that fallback fake closeness many men settle for). <\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s politics. I\u2019m tempted to quote from this book all day long, but here\u2019s just two. <\/p>\n

Just a short while ago the Republicans were objects of fear and hatred — now they\u2019re just pathetic assholes. Barry took them to the paint and cut their throats. (O-BAM-a!) Now they walk around like white frat boys in Bed-Stuy, talking tough to show they aren\u2019t scared as the urine streams down their chinos into their cordovans. Obama has these dweebs so turned around all they can do is get behind some fat junkie DJ, a gibberish-spewing PchyoBimbette from the Far North, and a tele-dork who gives adrenaline-crazed, 1950s-style \u201cchalk talks\u201d (speaking of little white dicks) like some health-class instructor in a sex-offender unit.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And here, in two chapters, is how a very young woman sees her loves:<\/p>\n

27.
\nO is happy
\nthat Ben is coming back.
\nBen, her other bookend
\nThe two men — Ben and Chon —
\nwho mean something in her life.
\nThe only two who ever have.<\/p>\n

28.
\nBen is warm wood, Chon is cold metal
\nBen is caring, Chon indifferent
\nBen makes love, Chon fucks,
\nShe loves them both.
\nWhat to do, what to do?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

You see what I mean about the writing style? It changes to serve what needs to be served. I read this and I hear Chandler (my idol) in his ethical distinctions, John D. MacDonald\u2019s environmental awareness, Kem Nunn\u2019s sense of California\u2019s shadows, Ellroy\u2019s understanding of the connections between men and how friendship and loyalty are expressed (oh and also the verbal pyrotechnics). I won\u2019t go on with all this because I can\u2019t assume everyone else is a crime\/detective genre fanatic like I am, but I\u2019ll just throw out how I\u2019d be happy to blab with you in the comments if you are. There were a couple of decades there where you couldn\u2019t get out of film school without noir becoming your foundational philosophy on life and your guiding aesthetic, and I am of that age. <\/p>\n

Which brings us to Oliver Stone. Most people hear Stone, think conspiracies and shit, and check out. I don\u2019t — there\u2019s your film school influence again. His wild facility with styles and techniques and unerring ability to cut and collage different looks and tones make him a natural with the way the book is written, but then there\u2019s a lot of scripting that has to evolve in between, so one will have to see. Tarantino\u2019s probably the best filmmaker in America now, but none of them — absolutely none — can combine Stone\u2019s grasp of the basics with his experimental, technical virtuosity, both in sound and visuals. He can make a classical American story, as rounded and sweet as an ear of corn, if he wants to. Or something that challenges that ideal at every switchback. What I\u2019m hoping for is “Natural Born Killers” tightened up like a spaghetti western and given a heart transplant. <\/p>\n

[Alert: If you have a blanket policy against violence in your fictional depictions, you\u2019ll want to get off at this stop. The book deals with drug cartels, Afghanistan and Darfur. Lots of violence there. If you can make it go away in real life, that kind of might be the place to direct your energy first, instead of censoring books and films.]<\/p>\n

I’m having that phenomenon I’d always managed to avoid as a reviewer hit me, the ‘that’s not what they’re supposed to look like\/be like’ thing. The girl in this case is played by Blake Lively, who has been in a popular network TV show, “Gossip Girl,” that I\u2019ve never seen. I liked her in “The Town,” and her work in this video<\/a> is stunning. But I thought of someone younger, tougher, more anime\/gamine in the part. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s interesting is she\u2019s starting to get called a slut on a regular basis because of taking this role. People complained that the character in the book is \u201cunlikeable,\u201d and the character is also a woman who unapologetically enjoys sex. Coincidence?<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what Lively said about her character in an interview in Bullet<\/em> magazine: <\/p>\n

“I think it\u2019s really hard for people to digest that these privileged kids are in a three-way relationship,” the actress said of her character. “Your heroes are all sleeping with each other, but they\u2019re also in love. It\u2019s very easy to dislike them, so when my character gets kidnapped, it\u2019s like, \u2018Well, good riddance!\u2019 My greatest challenge was to make her life worthy of saving, to find the heart in this story.\u201d<\/p>\n

Don’t like the role of Ophelia? It turns out Blake Lively doesn’t much care. “I\u2019m not in the business of trying to win the approval of my cast members, my director or my audience,” she went on to say. “If I were, I\u2019d be so beaten down by insecurity that I\u2019d never be able to perform. The only person I\u2019m trying to prove something to is myself.”
\nI haven\u2019t found any interviews with the boys detailing how they feel about the roles. One reason I\u2019m hoping the movie does well is so that there will be a lot of interviews and some comments about the characters\u2019 relationships will come out. The more talk, the better.<\/p>\n

But to me, the actors look like they’re just breaking out of Nickelodeon, when their characters are supposed to have been around the block a few times. They’ve got to be past quarterlife for all they’ve experienced. (Of course my dream double team, Viggo Mortensen and Idris Elba, would be a little too old.) <\/p>\n

The former Navy SEAL character is played by an actor who was acclaimed in the TV series Friday Night Lights, about football players, so I asked Issac about him, since those sorts of issues are pretty much in his wheelhouse. I text: “Is Taylor Kitsch any good?” Back: \u201cYou\u2019d have to be the judge of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The other is played by Aaron Johnson, who will next be playing Count Vronsky in another film with a love triangle. In real life he’s about 21 and a new father, with his 44-year-old filmmaker partner (who’s been made a member of the OBE by Prince Charles). He posed with her nude during her pregnancy, in a shoot for German Vogue. I quite like the sound of this young man. And now I’m starting to feel like Gossip Girl. <\/p>\n

But one more point before my mic\u2019s cut off: Judging from the movie trailer, O seems to spend a lot of time being tortured. Judging would be the operative word — you must pay for your pleasure, correct? In the book, her kidnappers treated her well for kidnappers; she was a business pawn, and there was no profit in fucking around with her or damaging the goods. This was a scenario that makes sense; abuse of a blonde girl is just SOP for movies and a failure of imagination for this one. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Maria Padhila I love finding out about books and movies in popular culture with characters with polyamorous relationships. I really love it when said books and movies aren’t all about the relationship but treat it as just another element in a character. I really, really love it when there\u2019s a woman who loves two … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7221,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[207],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57660"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7221"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57660\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}