Without a vision – reflections on The Slap
Saturday, November 26, 2011 at 09:40PM This week, I want to write about The Slap. Loved the mini series, just finished on television last Thursday. Not a fan of the book, written by Christos Tsiolkas, published in 2008. In many ways, the series was a faithful adaption, and I’m trying to work out what made it so different from the original.
I know nothing about the technicalities of what makes great television. I can tell when acting is brilliant though, and of course much of The Slap’s sheer class is thanks to actors like Melissa George and Sophie Okonedo, who can go from ugly to beautiful and back again with a small tightening of a facial muscle.
I know a bit about what makes good writing though. A dearth of clichés. Characters who go somewhere between the start and the end of the story. They don’t necessarily have to become better people, whatever that means, they just have to develop somehow. Most of all, characters who are complex. Awful people who surprise us with an act of kindness. Decent people who are deeply flawed. Anything more simplistic is unsatisfactory.
Aside from it being a well written and filmed show, what made it so different from the book? Two things I reckon.
First, the characters in the show were nuanced in a way their counterparts in the book were not.
The two most repellent people in the story – Harry and Rosie – are disturbingly violent, one physically, the other verbally. But we are gifted with tiny insights into what made them this way. Even the minor characters – Ritchie’s dad, for example - are shown to be not solely what they first appear. Ritchie’s dad is a boozing sleeze, but is capable of moments of solidarity and harmony with his ex and care for his son.
Every episode was shocking in its own way, but each ended with a softer moment – most between a couple, one, in the case of Anouk, between her and her notebook, her writing dream. The last episode wound up with several tender vignettes of the main players. Even the despicable Harry and his battered wife Sandi are looking with wonder at the ultrasound of their fledgling baby. Maybe this was TV sanitising a tough story. But in my experience, people aren’t as unrelentingly awful as the ones in the book, so the show felt more real.
Secondly – in the series, a mirror was held up to middle Australia in what I felt was a prophetic way rather than a purely depressing and fatalistic one.
The book also revealed a materialistic, crass, utterly self-centred group of people, but seemed to impliy that this is just the way things are and there’s not much we can do about it.
The show didn’t feel like that. Without being moralistic, it felt to me like a thoroughly contemporary illustration of that great line in the book of Proverbs, ‘Without a vision, the people perish’.
Without a bigger narrative to live by, it doesn’t matter how much money, sex appeal, prime real estate or self-righteous anger you have – your life will ultimately be an unsatisfying one.
For me and for millions of others through the ages and in every continent, it is religious faith that provides the bigger narrative. There is abundant evidence of bad religion and always has been – religion that narrows the views and shrinks the heart – but good religion, that helps its adherents to be more compassionate, can be found everywhere too.
The vision doesn’t necessarily have to be a religious one. Something bigger than yourself can be found in devotion to art, to local community, to the environment, to serving people in a different country, to a project. To your own family only up to a point – the crew in The Slap were all devoted to their families. Family is really just an extension of yourself.
We need something though if we are not to be stuck in perpetual adolescence like Harry and Rosie and the rest. If The Slap can remind us of this, it will have given us a profound gift. As well as being riveting television.
Reader Comments (6)
Another thought provoking post Clare. I watched the series but didn't read the book. There was so much hoopla when it was released it put me off. A friend suggested I watch the series so I did and found it interesting.
One stand out moment for me was Aisha telling Harry (and this is my reflection, not an attempt to repeat the dialogue verbatim) she would put on a facade at family functions, but she would never forgive him. This small scene for me, spoke volumes about how many in our society live in a closet of pretence and we are less as a result of the lack of truth in our lives.
I am not religious, but have a personal philosophy that we are all here on the earth to make a contribution, and if we do this, the world in some small way, will be a little better for our having been here.
Keep 'em coming Clare. Hugs from the touchy feely me.
This is well said, Clare. Like you, I didn't read the book but loved the miniseries. Thanks for writing so well about it.
Until now I was the only person I knew who didn't really like the book. I didn't think it was real, that people just weren't like that. And yet I loved the miniseries. It was so well done. But until I read this I thought it was my reading of the book that was lacking - thanks for helping me understand!
Jane
I haven't watched the mini series, but that is mainly because the book put me off! I reacted in the same way - surely people aren't that awful, lacking in any redemptive qualities! In my (very limited) experience, there is something to like, admire and inspire in everyone.
I haven't watched the series. I haven't read the book either. Now, you made me interested in it.
Hi I agree. nearly didn't watch the tv stuff, but it somehow reflected the humanity more than the book.
Cheers!