Stories We Read-Write
Unlike in some of his previous films,
it is not the Sex Pistols, Malcolm McLaren, the Clash, Joe Strummer, or Dr.
Feelgood that occupy the central aspect of Temple’s documentary London: The Modern Babylon. Rather, the
exhaustive survey of the historical magnitude of the city’s metamorphosis is
what justifies the approach in the movie celebrating testimonials of ordinary
people whose stories bring to the ear of the listener the colors of the eras
hardly imaginable without the narrative aid that bears witness to the
versatility of particular paths unified within the quirky oscillations between
fragility and resilience.
It is not a film about London music
scenes. It is not a story about the heroes of what created the sound of the
city so vibrant. It glorifies no specific voice. Elevates noone’s oeuvre in
particular. And yet, stories it does present. The experience of encountering
the echo of the tremor of the early Jewish immigrants’ years in the East End is
quite a distinct one. Unquestionable the fervor with which owners of small
businesses strive to sustain their day jobs. The world might not speak, as
Rorty suggests (Contingency, Irony, and
Solidarity 6), but the people, with whom interviews are featured in
Temple’s documentary, do.
Temple’s voice seems to be conspiring
with the angle from which his portrayal of the city is presented. It is articulate,
assertive, and unshakable. And yet, it invokes no traces of glamour, no
authorship grandeur, no inclination towards imposing a particular view on the
audience. At the same time, it lacks no attitude and is by no means divested of
the signature. It speaks. It speaks clearly, despite the occasionally hindered
flow in the communication channel. It conjures up a story constituted of
narrative increments to be perceived either as a succession of moments along
the historical linearity or a continuity of such miniature contributions to how
they converge in the intersection of the time axes.
It is from the past that some of them
bring to the light tales of suffering, tales of honor. It is from the future of
the past from which they speak that one can in the here and now simultaneously
acknowledge the vulnerability and praise the greatness of the human. Thus,
Temple’s vernacular might trick one to view his creation with a nostalgic eye.
However, the subtext of the narrative clearly indicates the persistent, awakening
reminder that there is nothing to be longed for or wished to be revamped in the
years that exposed humans to a variety of inhumanely designed systems,
policies, ideologies, social, and cultural patterns. Such an awareness, at the
same time, is in no way an invitation to an abandonment of what heritage
presents one with.
On the contrary, Julien Temple’s film
delivers the message in the manner constitutive of the vessel for the remix:
sometimes indisputably present, at times, however, if not absent, then
cunningly withdrawn, thereby merely providing room for other speakers, other
vessels. By so doing, not only is the voice being reinstated, but it also epitomizes
the periods of austerity, superseded by those of reintegration, reemergence
from the ruins of history, reawakening from nightmarish echoes. Not unlike the
remix engendering refacement : rebirth of the human face through alternating
cycles of noise and silence : endurance in hi-fi subtonic resistance against
the obstacles to the right to storytelling.
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