Chris Knipp
12-04-2014, 08:18 PM
Amir Bar-Lev: HAPPY VALLEY (2014)
http://www.chrisknipp.com/newpictures/te.jpg
Tyler Estright, Penn State Class of 2013 in Happy Valley]
American ways of scandal and sport
Happy Valley is a documentary about collective feeling and atmosphere. In 2012, Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was convicted for sexually assaulting young boys and sentenced to 60 years in jail. There were vast repercussions. The media circus that came and the virulent reactions of the tight little community of State College, Pennsylvania, where Penn State University is located, arose not merely from Sandusky's acts but from the wave of damage his exposure caused, by implicating others. The president of the university was forced to resign. More notably, the legendary long-time heed football coach, Joe Paterno, was fired, both men, and others, implicated in a prior cover-up. It even seemed that football at Penn State, the university, and the town would never be the same.
These waves of damage are a major concern of this well-made documentary. Its primary interests are not so much the hard information about Sandusky's crimes or how he was shielded (though it reviews these things) as two other subjects: America's way of dealing with problems, and the role of team sport in the country. This wide perspective is a strength but also a certain limitation. Bar-Lev's picture is dramatic and thought-provoking, but while it's pop sociology, perhaps even good journalism, it's not profound investigative reporting.
State College is a kind of bubble (with the telling nickname "Happy Valley"), and one where the American worship of football particularly flourishes, though in this it is typical, rather than unique. Football on Saturday is a compulsory and passionate ritual. The film provides many glimpses of this, along with an interview with rah-rah Penn State senior Tyler Estright, displeased with the disruption the scandal causes, and unwilling (like many others) to accept the tarnishing of Joe Paterno's image. In this world, Paterno was and is looked on as a kind of god. A prominent mural than in progress even put a halo over his head: the artist, Michael Pilato, painted that out. The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) enacted a draconian series of punishments on the Penn State football team and on Paterno's legacy. To a dispassionate observer, these NCAA measures appear to be collective punishment. The gutting of 13 years of team victories under Paterno, the $60 million fine, and other penalties seems cruel to athletes and fans who previously knew nothing of Sandusky's villainy. The Stalinist-style erasure of Paterno's record seems the more excessive in the light of Paterno's diagnosis with advanced lung cancer immediately after his ouster and his death two months later. He and his wife refer to how his long career was abruptly ended in a five-minute phone call.
The president and Paterno may have been disgraced in undue haste, without an opportunity to defend themselves. But evidence given in the film does point to their complicity in covering up knowledge of Sandusky's sexual assaults on boys, and over more than a decade, or acting too mildly, passing on a report to superiors but not to the police. And all this shows the priorities in a world where football reigns.
Fans in State College, Pannsylvania reject the report headed by Clinton-era FBI director Louis Freeh commissioned by the university, which found that not only Paterno and Spanier but also athletic director Tim Curley and vice president Gary Schultz know of allegations of child abuse by Sandusky as far back as 1998.
A key spokesman in the film providing insight into the crimes themselves is the brave Matt Sandusky, the convicted coach's adopted son. At first he said nothing, keeping his abuser's secrets. But Matt recounts how after attending the first day of the trial he could not attend more. He had to acknowledge, and did, that what the first witness reported had happened to him too. Jerry Sandusky rescued Matt from dire poverty and life in a crowded vermin-infested house. He made him eternally grateful, covered him with affection, put him in his Second Mile program, brought him into his house and adopted him -- and then sexually abused him, assuming his gratitude would keep him quiet. Matt's coming out on this has cut him off from the Sandusky family. Luckily, he has a family and four children of his own and, we're told, still lives in State College. He is brave but not alone.
This on screen testimony from Matt is valuable, but Bar-Lev's main focus is on the school and the community. They seem schizophrenic. At first they are most of all enraged by the presence of the media, which they accuse of causing the problem, chanting obscene slogans at them, overturning a TV truck and trying to set fire to it. At heart some of them, perhaps many, would apparently have liked to smooth over and cover up, as "Joe Pa" (their Pa, their Paternal Paterno), President Graham Spanier and the others appear to have wanted to do.
But then, for a while a protective piety begins to reign. Statements by footballers and fans are prefaced by regret for the suffering of the kids. There's even a group prayer for them before a game. Aggressive finger-pointing, however, is rejected. A stubborn little man with a small sign in front of a sculpture honoring Paterno ("Pedophile Enabler") is menaced by macho Paterno-supporters. In the end nonetheless the sculpture and all signs of it are removed. Finally, as the film draws to a close, despite the Penn State football's emasculation by the NCAA, we see the crowd turning out again for a game, back in its default mood of jubilant support and celebration. It would seem the American Way is initial overreaction, followed by a rapid clearing away. Do NCAA's draconian actions satisfy sports officials and avoid looking further? Allusions to events in the film as involving "guilt" and "redemption" seem unsupported by events: it all goes by too fast for either. Has anything changed? Bar-Lev leaves us to ponder these issues on our own.
Happy Valley, 97 mins., debuted at Sundance January 2014, showing thereafter at a dozen other US festivals with theatrical release in NYC 19 November, VOD 21 November. It opens opens Friday, 5 December at the Roxie Theatre in San Francisco.
http://www.chrisknipp.com/newpictures/te.jpg
Tyler Estright, Penn State Class of 2013 in Happy Valley]
American ways of scandal and sport
Happy Valley is a documentary about collective feeling and atmosphere. In 2012, Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was convicted for sexually assaulting young boys and sentenced to 60 years in jail. There were vast repercussions. The media circus that came and the virulent reactions of the tight little community of State College, Pennsylvania, where Penn State University is located, arose not merely from Sandusky's acts but from the wave of damage his exposure caused, by implicating others. The president of the university was forced to resign. More notably, the legendary long-time heed football coach, Joe Paterno, was fired, both men, and others, implicated in a prior cover-up. It even seemed that football at Penn State, the university, and the town would never be the same.
These waves of damage are a major concern of this well-made documentary. Its primary interests are not so much the hard information about Sandusky's crimes or how he was shielded (though it reviews these things) as two other subjects: America's way of dealing with problems, and the role of team sport in the country. This wide perspective is a strength but also a certain limitation. Bar-Lev's picture is dramatic and thought-provoking, but while it's pop sociology, perhaps even good journalism, it's not profound investigative reporting.
State College is a kind of bubble (with the telling nickname "Happy Valley"), and one where the American worship of football particularly flourishes, though in this it is typical, rather than unique. Football on Saturday is a compulsory and passionate ritual. The film provides many glimpses of this, along with an interview with rah-rah Penn State senior Tyler Estright, displeased with the disruption the scandal causes, and unwilling (like many others) to accept the tarnishing of Joe Paterno's image. In this world, Paterno was and is looked on as a kind of god. A prominent mural than in progress even put a halo over his head: the artist, Michael Pilato, painted that out. The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) enacted a draconian series of punishments on the Penn State football team and on Paterno's legacy. To a dispassionate observer, these NCAA measures appear to be collective punishment. The gutting of 13 years of team victories under Paterno, the $60 million fine, and other penalties seems cruel to athletes and fans who previously knew nothing of Sandusky's villainy. The Stalinist-style erasure of Paterno's record seems the more excessive in the light of Paterno's diagnosis with advanced lung cancer immediately after his ouster and his death two months later. He and his wife refer to how his long career was abruptly ended in a five-minute phone call.
The president and Paterno may have been disgraced in undue haste, without an opportunity to defend themselves. But evidence given in the film does point to their complicity in covering up knowledge of Sandusky's sexual assaults on boys, and over more than a decade, or acting too mildly, passing on a report to superiors but not to the police. And all this shows the priorities in a world where football reigns.
Fans in State College, Pannsylvania reject the report headed by Clinton-era FBI director Louis Freeh commissioned by the university, which found that not only Paterno and Spanier but also athletic director Tim Curley and vice president Gary Schultz know of allegations of child abuse by Sandusky as far back as 1998.
A key spokesman in the film providing insight into the crimes themselves is the brave Matt Sandusky, the convicted coach's adopted son. At first he said nothing, keeping his abuser's secrets. But Matt recounts how after attending the first day of the trial he could not attend more. He had to acknowledge, and did, that what the first witness reported had happened to him too. Jerry Sandusky rescued Matt from dire poverty and life in a crowded vermin-infested house. He made him eternally grateful, covered him with affection, put him in his Second Mile program, brought him into his house and adopted him -- and then sexually abused him, assuming his gratitude would keep him quiet. Matt's coming out on this has cut him off from the Sandusky family. Luckily, he has a family and four children of his own and, we're told, still lives in State College. He is brave but not alone.
This on screen testimony from Matt is valuable, but Bar-Lev's main focus is on the school and the community. They seem schizophrenic. At first they are most of all enraged by the presence of the media, which they accuse of causing the problem, chanting obscene slogans at them, overturning a TV truck and trying to set fire to it. At heart some of them, perhaps many, would apparently have liked to smooth over and cover up, as "Joe Pa" (their Pa, their Paternal Paterno), President Graham Spanier and the others appear to have wanted to do.
But then, for a while a protective piety begins to reign. Statements by footballers and fans are prefaced by regret for the suffering of the kids. There's even a group prayer for them before a game. Aggressive finger-pointing, however, is rejected. A stubborn little man with a small sign in front of a sculpture honoring Paterno ("Pedophile Enabler") is menaced by macho Paterno-supporters. In the end nonetheless the sculpture and all signs of it are removed. Finally, as the film draws to a close, despite the Penn State football's emasculation by the NCAA, we see the crowd turning out again for a game, back in its default mood of jubilant support and celebration. It would seem the American Way is initial overreaction, followed by a rapid clearing away. Do NCAA's draconian actions satisfy sports officials and avoid looking further? Allusions to events in the film as involving "guilt" and "redemption" seem unsupported by events: it all goes by too fast for either. Has anything changed? Bar-Lev leaves us to ponder these issues on our own.
Happy Valley, 97 mins., debuted at Sundance January 2014, showing thereafter at a dozen other US festivals with theatrical release in NYC 19 November, VOD 21 November. It opens opens Friday, 5 December at the Roxie Theatre in San Francisco.