Of brutal architecture...

The Brutalists (2024)

https://www.cornellsun.com/article/2025/01/the-
brutalist-on-art-capitalism-and-the-immigrant-experience

Written, Directed: Brady Corbet

It serves as Hollywood's occasional reminder of the plight of Jews in Europe during World War II. Cast with Adrien Brody, who has a personal connection to the Holocaust, what does he get? Ten Oscar nominations and multiple accolades, including a second Best Actor Academy Award for Brody. 

If the plot evokes Brody's character in 'The Pianist' (2002), don't fret. He is also an Eastern European Jewish refugee here and a remarkably gifted individual displaced by the malevolence that humanity inflicts in the name of nationalism, race, and religion. 

A Hungarian Jew, László Tóth, an architect who designed significant buildings in Budapest, finds himself penniless and homeless in the United States. He reaches out to his friend and assists in his furniture business. Tóth becomes acquainted with a wealthy man when the friend is commissioned to build a personal library on the estate. 

J Edgar Hoover building

In summary, Tóth impresses the wealthy man enough to be entrusted with the honour of designing and constructing a massive community hall in the city. 

The remainder of the 3.5-hour story chronicles the ups and downs of their relationship, his troubled friendship with his former boss, how his wife is brought to America, the challenges Tóth faces in bringing his design to life, and ultimately witnessing his creation come to fruition, only to be celebrated some 50 years later. It is all rather predictable. The acting and cinematography are exemplary, nonetheless, deserving of their Oscar wins.

Ryugyong Hotel

The lesson I learnt from watching this movie is that the word 'brutalist' has another meaning. Brutalist architecture is an imposing building style, often characterised by unappealing construction, which became popular after the Second World War in major European and American cities. It is also characteristic of many Eastern Bloc countries, which were predominantly communist. It features raw, monochromatic concrete blocks, creating a linear, geometric appearance both outside and inside. This style is typically used for public institutions, such as courts, universities, libraries, and public works. 

The Brutalists employed linear, monolithic blocks in contrast to older architectural styles, which featured domes, curves, and sculptures. The free world regarded them as imposing and emphasised their grandiosity. The communists believed that their unimaginative design was anti-bourgeois, exactly what they aimed to present to the world. The liberal use of concrete, along with playful variations, somehow signified equality. 

Scottish Parliament, Edinburgh.

Over the years, people have frequently lamented their ugliness. Although these brutalist buildings were initially considered low-maintenance, this proved to be a misconception. The buildings became visually unappealing once moss began to grow. They attempted to circumvent this issue by integrating greenery into the structures. Rust stains around the steel reinforcing bars were also problematic. Three notorious brutalist buildings around the world have at one time or another been voted the ugliest. These are the Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang, the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington, and the Scottish Parliament Building in Edinburgh. Many are being rapidly demolished, but the aforementioned three have so far staved off the wrecking ball.

https://www.buildworld.co.uk/blog/archives/the-ugliest-buildings-in-the-world

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To learn, one has to listen.

Seven Years in Tibet (1997)
Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud

(Based on Heinrich Harrer's book with the same name)

Similar to the internment camps established in the USA for German and Japanese migrants during the First and Second World Wars, India had comparable camps. Numerous German workers and even alpine climbers from Austria were detained in various camps around Ahmedabad and Dehradun. One notable individual was Gustav Hermann Krimbiegel, an extraordinary gardener credited with creating royal gardens across India. Krimbiegel was a German botanist who migrated to Britain in 1888. He began his apprenticeship at Kew Gardens and was subsequently recommended to work in the garden of the Maharaja of Baroda. After witnessing his remarkable gardening skills, he was commissioned by other princely states. He is recognised for his development of Lalbagh in Bangalore, Brindavan in Mysore, and many others. In addition to his horticultural achievements, he is also known for introducing new seeds from abroad to India, along with innovative architectural designs, creating a distinctive Indian aesthetic for gardens.

When World War II broke out, Krimbiegel, due to his German origins, was confined to an internment camp as an enemy of the British Empire. With the assistance of King Baroda, who was at the time the wealthiest man in the world, special arrangements were made with the Empire for his release. Krimbiegel is credited with introducing innovative agricultural practices that enhanced irrigation, supported local economies, conducted tree censuses, and infused European techniques into traditional Indian gardening. 

Gustav Hermann Krimbiegel (1865-1956)
https://medium.com/@andrewabranches/
gustav-hermann-krumbiegel-b6bdb9ad28c0

'Seven Years in Tibet' is based on the life and times of Heinrich Harrer, an Austrian climber who spent seven years in Tibet between 1944 and 1951. Starting as a haughty and rash young man with an attitude leaves his fully pregnant wife to go hiking in the Himalayas in 1939. When WW2 started, Herrer and his friends were imprisoned as POWs. In 1944, he escaped from prison and ran to Tibet, hoping to eventually go back home.

What happened afterwards was a life-changing experience for Harrer and his fellow climber, Peter Aufschnaiter. After receiving divorce papers from his wife and a cold letter from a son he had never met, Harrer chose to stay in Tibet to embark on a journey of self-discovery. Coincidentally, he had a chance encounter with the young Dalai Lama in Lhasa, becoming the Dalai Lama's teacher and close confidante. 

The invaluable lesson that is taught to us from Harrer's life experience is this. Isolation opens our inner eye. Stranded in the middle of the gargantuan forces of Nature, one is humbled to come to terms with his vulnerability. Ego is crushed, and all he sees in front of him is his mortality and the life that passed him by. It is at this opportune time that one can make amends. By being respectful and curious, one can be a good student. Watching this film and viewing Zakir Naik's vile video, one can understand how wrong and close-minded Naik is in spreading his deluded 'wisdom'.

https://mindiafilms.com/the-maharajas-german-gardener-g-h-krumbiegel/

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Is space travel really a hoax?

Capricorn One (1977)

Director: Peter Hyams

With the confidence of singlehandedly defending the motherland against the German soldiers in Operation Barbarossa in 1941 and essentially stalemating Hitler in the Führerbunker, Russians knew they were no pushovers. Stalin's forced post-war industrialisation efforts skyrocketed the Soviet Union into space exploration.

The Americans, coming out of World War 2 smelling of roses, after being able to turn the war around after their participation, felt they had to be numero uno. After all, after the Second World War, the US of A was the wealthiest nation around. On top of it, the war forced the migration of top scientists from Europe to America.

The 1960s saw rabid competition between leaders of the free world and the communist bloc to outdo the other in space exploration. The race intensified when the Soviets sent their first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, to orbit the Earth in 1961. That spurred JFK to declare that America, the leader of the free world, would send a man to the moon by the decade's end. He asserted, 'We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.' in 1962.

After the disastrous 1967 Apollo I fire, which killed all three crew members, their ability to send a man to the moon and back became suspect. So in 1969, when the USA suddenly announced to the world, with photos and TV transmissions, many sceptics insisted that the Moon Landing was staged in a studio here back on Earth. Flying a man in a tin can, forcing themselves out of the g-forces of Earth, and exposing themselves to deathly ionising radiation that encapsulated the planet was not humanly possible, in their minds. So, when this movie came out, I guess the Moon Landing deniers must be telling everyone, "I told you so!"

Even with the American space programme, funding was always the problem. The Indians later showed they could do all the Americans did for a fraction of their budget. That is another story. Safety was another issue. With the lack of fall-back backup, no rocket would be approved in the 21st century. What they did back then can be termed space charlatans today, promising more than they actually could. 

Due to faulty supplies (as in the Apollo I mission), the life support system in Capricorn One was faulty. To avoid embarrassment, the Agency decided to fake their mission to Mars. The film shows, in a relatively poor execution of storytelling, direction, acting and script writing, how the world is hoodwinked into believing the journey is complete. In fact, the astronauts did not even leave the launch pad.

We see a relatively young James Brolin, Sam Waterson and O.J. Simpson in this 1977 film.

We have come a long way since the 1960s. Now, we are offering space tourism to the rich and high-heeled, just for the kick of it. If you do not mind burning a large hole in your wallet or the long waiting line, those interested should contact Elon Mask or Richard Branson.

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Serenity exemplified in Auschwitz!

The Zone of Interest (2023)
Director: Jonathan Glazer

Even though this is about something that happened more than 80 years ago, put in a similar situation, I foresee we humans do the exact thing that we did during World War 2 Nazi rule of Germany. We justify our actions and inaction through the dog-whistle call of the majority without taking a step back and asking ourselves, "Am I doing the right thing?"

Even during peacetime in Malaysia, a section of people is trying to steamroll their agenda to the rest of the country. Any sane person of reasonable intellectual capacity would understand this is not how democracy works. The majority chooses, and the rest would follow suit. Changes are made via constructive discourses at the appropriate forums. This renegade group is trying to change all these. The might of high decibels in the confines of an echo chamber cannot be underestimated.

Like Grobbels, who thought that the propaganda machines of the State could steer the thinking of the majority, small-minded fascists in this country are using mob power backed by their own interpretation of the scriptures to gain political power and to cow the minority into submission.

The thinking majority should be aware of this and not just that. They should also have the gumption to call the bluff. Otherwise, the outcome will be what we see in this movie—the country's machinery used to carry out a dastardly activity for future generations to curse us.

This movie won many accolades for its gruesome (not in graphic representation with gore, violence and blood) depiction of events that may have happened at Auschwitz concentration camp. All the violence, killings and death are only depicted in sounds and indirect visuals.

Serene living beside a concentration camp
in Auschwitz.

It tells the story of the Commandant of Auschwitz and his family as they live in a lovely double-storey bungalow immediately beside the camp. Amidst the background hum of the incinerator, screams of prisoners as they are led to their death and the occasional gunshots, the family leads a happy life. Oblivious to the happenings at the camp, the family grow attached to the bungalow, beautifying it and even refuses to move when the Commandant is transferred elsewhere. The air is filled with bellowing smoke of burning flesh. The river occasionally has fragments of bones discarded after incineration. The compound is strewn with ashes. Still, life goes on happily.

The irony is that the family lives without a care in the world. They conveniently overlook the carnage that happens behind the camp walls. They even have grand plans for the future.

This must be the true meaning of the word banality of evil that Hannah Arendt popularised after the 1948 Adolf Eichmann Trial in Jerusalem. People perform the cruellest of evils, not because they are sociopaths or inherently evil. They do it because the system expects them to behave in a particular way. For them, it is business as usual. It becomes the list of duties that must be completed to qualify for remunerations and promotions.

The mind shuts down. Mindfulness is lost. The higher thinking centres get bypassed. Everyone goes into zombie mode under the hypnosis of the supreme leader. 

(P.S. The director's acceptance speech at the Oscars ceremony has started a storm and could possibly be outcasted by Hollywood. His speech essentially can be interpreted as all that seen in the film was the effect of dehumanisation. His mention of the October 7th incident begs further clarification. Are the Jews, after surviving their aggressors, repeating the dehumanisation policy to the Gaza people? There is no easy answer. Remember, the state of Israel is located amongst neighbours who yearn for its annihilation. Can one practice no violence at the end of the barrel of a gun? 'We stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people,' he said.)

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Approaching the Inevitable Destruction?

Oppenheimer (2023)

Director: Chrsitopher Nolan

A few times in the Bhagavadgita, Krishna is said to have shown His true self, Vishvaroopam. He is said to have uttered the now-famous quote, “Now I become Death, the destroyer of worlds”.

J. Robert Oppenheimer, himself a Sanskriti scholar, upon witnessing the detonation of a successful nuclear explosion and seeing the highly explosive nature of his experimentation, is credited to have mentioned the same line.

Now that Oppenheimer’s experience is immortalised on the silver screen with Hollywood’s latest offering, this quote has been scrutinised extensively. One Hindu scholar even mentioned that he had never read such a line in the epic. Something close to the text in the scripture about the destruction of the worlds in Chapter 12, verse 11, is about Time. Time as being the destroyer of physical things. In other words, the scholar Devdutt Pattnaik says Oppenheimer had misinterpreted the text.

The movie apparently was released in two versions. One specific for the Indian and Middle Eastern audiences was released with a U certification, and another with an R rating for the rest of the world so as not to hurt the Hindu sentiments. Still, many are up in arms. The above-mentioned sacred quote is uttered during an intimate sex scene. As the scene had scant relevance to the flow of the story and the availability of two versions, naysayers feel it is a deliberate attempt at mischief.

The movie is a gripping one, depicting a time when the Western world was developing its physical sciences by leaps and bounds. A time when quantum sciences was in its infancy and molecular science was beyond atoms, protons and electrons. We are discussing when Heisenberg, Bohr and Einstein could fit into the same narrative. With the development of science, the trust in the entity of God to take care of His subject diminished. Increasingly, people believed that aristocracy, theocracy and capitalism would not save mankind. Human malady had to be held by its horns, and the socialist and communist rule would spread wealth and justice justly. Leftist ideology was spreading worldwide, especially after witnessing the 1928 stock market crash and the two world wars that ensued.

Father of Atomic Bomb

As it is now, academics have always been leftist in their mindset. Added to Oppenheimer’s liaisons and the era of McCarthyism, Robert Oppenheimer became a scapegoat for allegations of leftist activities. In a gist, this set the storyline. As the enquiry goes on, we get the backstory of his early life, his affair, his wife, his appointment to head the Los Alamos project, the successful Manhattan project, his subsequent regret of unleashing the nuclear beast and his animosity with his working colleagues.

Back in 1980, BBC released a 7-part miniseries on Oppenheimer, starring a young Sam Waterston. Oppenheimer’s predicaments were expressed in a more unrushed manner covering his story in depth as if it was a miniseries.

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A re-look at history?

Asia Reborn

(A Continent Rises from the Ravages of Colonialism and War to a New Dynamism)

Author: Prasenjit K Basu

The 21st century, especially the second half, is considered an Asian century. Still, no single nation is said to have successfully challenged the Pax Americana of the late 20th and early 21st century. A continent ravaged by events from the 18th through the 20th century, Asia is making a comeback.

As they say, time is cyclical. From the Common Era (C.E.) to the 1600s, when Europe and the Middle East were pretty much in the dark ages, more than half of the world's GDP came from India and China. Both these countries were the world's superpowers and ruled the greatest oceans. Suddenly, there were either domesticated or decided to close their doors. The European and Arabic powers, who all these while were running around like headless chickens, morphed into a force to be reckoned with. They ushered in mercantilism, slavery and colonialism. They embraced Industrial Revolution while the rest of the world was napping.

In the prophetic words of Ibn Khaldun, history is a cyclical process in which sovereign powers come into existence, get stronger, lose their strengths and are conquered by other sovereign powers over time. More precisely, every community is uncivilised initially and tries to acquire power through its inborn fighting and kinsmanship. The generation after that, after living in the cushy life of their conquest, slowly loses their killer instinct and becomes 'civilised'. The subsequent generations will be like the occupants their ancestors had conquered, cultured but weak and without prowess. Barring exceptions, he estimated that a dynasty would last about 120 years. The Ottoman Empire is said to be an exception. It lasted 624 years. The reason for its longevity is the realisation of this edict, the necessary motivation infused by extraordinary leaders, solid traditions and morals, and wise decisions. Even then, the mighty Caliph soon became the sick man of Europe and crumpled on its weight.

As the Europeans ventured out on their voyages to the East, they quickly usurped all the wealth available along the way they went. Kingdoms after kingdom tumbled with their shenanigans and their meddling in local politics. Close to 200 years, it was the rule of the European race over the colonised Asiatic lands.

The turning point came around with Commodore Matthew Perry's legendary stop of his battalion at Kyodo port in 1868. The Japanese woke up to the fact that the world had wised up while they practised a closed-door policy. The Meiji Restoration was an effort to sponge all knowledge from the maestros and improve their own capability. Their efforts proved fruitful when the Japanese defeated their arch-enemy in the north, the Russians, in 1905.

Industrialisation required raw materials, coal, steel and petroleum. Their neighbouring lands, like Manchuria, Sakhalin Islands, and other parts, were run over for this purpose. When the Western powers decided to place a trade embargo on Japan, they had to source their raw material beyond their comfort zone. The Japanese monarch, conforming to the increasing nationalistic wave, decided to follow in the footsteps of the Western imperialist power. That was the Eastern Front of World War 2.

WW2 was an eye-opener to the sleeping giants of Asia. Each was embroiled in its own struggle with the Western colonial yoke. India was caught deep in self-rule efforts. China was trapped in failed dynastic rule and internal squabbles. Smaller nations were manipulated to serve their seemingly caring masters.

Asians, for the first time, saw an Eastern power stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Western and oust them. The manner in which the Brit scooted off at the news of the Japanese invasion left a bad aftertaste amongst their subjects in Malaya. Their new masters, they realised, were worse off than their predecessors, igniting the question of self-rule in the hearts of many South East Asian nations.

The Japanese did one right thing, though. They left a nidus on all the lands upon which the newly independent countries prospered later. The Japanese set up many industries to keep up with the needs of the Japanese Military Industrial Complex and the pressures of WW2. The Japanese model of financing and running industries were emulated in Korea, Taiwan and Manchuria. In fact, after the war, Koreans working in Manchuria returned home to develop their own homegrown businesses.

History suggests that all the colonial masters left their colonies bare. Amongst the various colonial masters, the British are said to be the gentlest of the lot. The Belgians, Spanish, Portuguese, Germans and French were notorious for inflicting brutal scars upon their subjects. Even though the British are known to have left their conquests with functioning governmental machinery, infrastructure and contended society, of late, they are mostly praised for their diplomatic behaviour and geopolitical manipulations. A sample of their calculated meddling was in China. In the name of wanting with the reluctant Chinese, and ended up turning the whole nation into opium addicts. For their effort, the British were gifted with a lease on Hong Kong and areas around it for 100 years. 

This voluminous book is an excellent go-to book to help join the dots to all the history topics we learned during our school days. History was taught to us as if events on the world stage happened in isolation. With age, we realise that every event is linked to each other. The underlying basic themes are geopolitical control, economic dominance and painting a positive narrative of the oppressors. Living true to the age-old adage, money does make the world go round.

The author, P Basu, is an economist by day and a history buff by night. His two decades of nerdy research into the history of Asia helped connect the dots between each and every colonial power's move from unproductive to the rice shores of natives who ushered them in with reverence. In return, the colonialists usurped their happiness, overstayed their welcome and made a slave out of their hosts. They destroyed the natives' civilisation and philosophical wisdom to propagate foreign materialistic self-centred ideology. A new world economic module that emphasised capitalistic mercantilism over humanism prevailed worldwide.

In the epilogue of the book, Basu explains how the Japanese invasion of Asia helped Asians to re-discover themselves to emerge as a force to be reckoned with. The Japanese business module of financing, learning from the Masters and encouraging tertiary education amongst its citizens has shown positive results in Korea and Taiwan. Even though Malaysians, under the premiership of Dr Mahathir Mohammad, were 'Looking East' towards the Japanese, they failed miserably. Starting on a better footing than South Koreans, they fared poorly. They emphasised racist policies and never shed their rent-seeking attitudes. The strive to excel through sheer hard work was never on their plates.

(P.S. The book is strife with many trivia that would excite many a nerd. With the weakening of the Qing dynasty, the wreckage of the Opium Wars and the Boxer Rebellion, China was carved up by many European powers. They controlled many geo-strategic areas and ports. The Germans acquired a German base port in Shandong District. German settlers started a brewery in the Tsingtao area to quench the thirst of many weary Europeans in China. This, of course, is now the famous Tsingtao Beer from China.)

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History is kind to Victors!

Churchill's Secret Wars (2010)

(The British Empire and the Ravaging of India during WW2)
Author: Madhusree Mukerjee

In 1952, Nehru appeared on BBC TV in his first ever TV appearance. He was invited to the UK to partake in the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. As the head of a former colony of the Crown, Nehru was there, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Winston Churchill, gracing the event. By that time, Churchill had descended from his intense contempt for all races except whites. Churchill must have been brimming from ear to ear as India and many other former colonies had consented to stay under the umbrage of the Crown under the title of the Commonwealth. If two hundred years of looting of wealth from India was insufficient, now their subjects have agreed to make their wealth common! 

It is ironic that Nehru and the bulk of the Congress leaders spent crouched in jail all through the most pivotal years before Indian independence, during World War 2. It was the time all the wheeling and dealing of talk of carving the country was in progress. In 1953, barely ten years after the ugly Partition, there was its leader chummy with their brutal colonial masters. Nehru says no offence in the interview when asked about the 18 years he spent behind bars fighting for India's independence. What the interviewer did not mention was the systematic philandering of India's wealth over 200 years, which saw India spiral down from a country which allegedly possessed over 20% of the world's GDP in mid 18th century to become the sixth poorest country in the world when the British left India.

No wonder the current generation of Indians want to re-evaluate and re-write their history, not from the viewpoint of the conquerors but the conquered. As the African proverb goes, "Until the lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter."

The events surrounding the systemic state-sponsored persecution and mass murder are constantly reminded to the world. The word 'Holocaust' is almost synonymous with the killing of six million Jews by Nazis during WW2. The world has not been fed about the repeated famine-related deaths that the Jewel in the Crown of the British Raj had to endure to enrich its colonial masters and his countrymen were well fed.

In 1950, Winston Churchill embarked on a journey to write the history of the perilous times of the 20th century. He wanted to ink his legacy of how he defended his tiny island nation and shouldered the burden of her mighty empire. His six-volume just conveniently forgot to mention Bengal's 1943 famine which engulfed nearly 700,000 lives by modest colonial estimates and up to 5 million, according to village scribes and academics.

It was a heartless inhumane strategy to sacrifice the perceived lesser human race to safeguard and feed the Europeans. When Churchill was repeatedly told about Bengal's humanitarian crises, he blamed the malady squarely on the Indians for breeding like rabbits. 

In reality, it was the British's elaborate plan to impoverish and weaken the Indians. It constituted part of its strategy to defeat the enemies of the Allied Forces. Just as there was the threat of the Japanese from India's eastern borders, the British scorched all the rice fields. The produce, however, was shipped off to feed the Allied soldiers. Then there was the subsequent smuggling, hoarding and spiralling of food prices. Farmers who fed the nation instead died of hunger. There was no plan whatsoever on the part of the British to rectify this. In fact, the efforts by the local British representatives were thwarted by Churchill. To Churchill, it was imperative to feed hungry Europeans than some brown people. In Churchill, rationing of food to the British was unthinkable. At no time during WW2 did the UK have any food shortage. Famine was endemic in India all through the British Raj rule. Approximately 15 million died from 1850 to 1899 in 24 major famines.

Mother Nature had not been to the Bengal region. Before this famine, there was a devastating monsoon. Then there was the heavy taxation. And the British scorched the fields to prevent the Japanese from getting their food supply. Shipments of food supply from the US, Canada and Australia scheduled to arrive in India never made it.

"I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits." -Winston Churchill

Churchill always tries to put the narrative that Hindus are an uncouth race. The enlightened followers of the Abrahamic faith stand to be oppressed in an Independent India if India was a free nation. With the increasing debt accumulated because of WW2 and lopsided trade practices that impoverished the Empire, Britain had let go of its colonies. The India that Britain encountered 200 years previously was submissive and easily conquerable. It was like that no more. Initially, Gandhi and his passive resistance to demanding self-rule worked just fine. It was India's death wish, and the British easily thumped their boots on the resisting freedom fighters. The coup de grâce came as a mutiny of the British Indian Navy after the trial of captured Indian National Army prisoners of war in Delhi.

Jinnah and his band of born-again Muslims decided to play their victim card that people of the Muslim-dominated areas in India would be treated as second-class citizens in an independent India. They started demanding a piece of land to be carved out of India to call their own, a new true blue Islamic country named Pakistan. The British thought it was a jolly good idea too. The rest is history.

This book results from years of meticulous research into many de-classified British documents. It concentrates mainly on Churchill's mishandling of the 1943 Bengal famine and eventual Partition. The author's point is that he intensely disliked the non-white race. His actions indicate that he was stuck in his Victorian mindset. He felt that the white race was superior and it was the white man's burden to civilise and govern over the rest. Churchill's handling of the famine can border on negligence or criminal by today's standard. Despite all these, the world puts Churchill on a pedestal, hailing him as a true statesman and a great leader.  

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