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Life & Times Transcript
11/09/06 Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times -- Southern Californians know the consequences of arson all too well, but how do you catch the arsonist before the trail goes cold? Bob Reinhardt>> Normally, it's through a witness. Somebody seeing him, somebody getting a partial license plate number, usually that way. It's just very, very difficult to follow back through unless we get very lucky and get a device that does not operate the way it's supposed to. Val Zavala>> And then, new performances this weekend from two Oscar-winning actors, but are they worth the price of admission? It's all straight ahead on tonight's Life and Times. Announcer>> Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education. And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg. Val Zavala>> The man suspected of starting the deadly Esperanza wildfire was caught and arrested in fairly short order, but that's unusual. Experts will tell you that most of the time arsonists, especially when it comes to wildfires, get away with it. Philip Bruce takes a look at some past wildfires and the thick file of cases that remain unsolved. Reporter>> "We're just south of Laguna Canyon Road and we see some homes up on the ridge." Philip Bruce>> It started on a windy October day in the bone-dry chaparral that covered Laguna Canyon, a massive arson fire that destroyed nearly four hundred homes as it raced across the hills and toward the ocean. The flames caused a half billion dollars in property damage and shattered scores of lives. And a decade later, the fire still remains an unsolved mystery. Scott Brown>> Yeah, that hurts. You talk to any firefighter that was on the line, you talk to any of the families that lost their homes, I'm sure they'll give you the same response. Philip Bruce>> Scott Brown, now a chief for the Orange County Fire Authority, was one of the first firefighters on the line that day. A while back, he took us to the scene of the crime, a dusty cattle trail just off Laguna Canyon Road, the place where an arsonist sparked a disaster with a single match. Scott Brown>> There was a plume that went hundreds of feet in the air and it was obvious to us that we had a very significant fire. Philip Bruce>> Orange County authorities pursued hundreds of leads that mostly led nowhere. All the physical evidence, if there ever was any, burned to a crisp. Eventually, police did arrest a man who confessed to setting the fires, but that turned out to be just another dead end after investigators realized the man was far away in a Mexican jail the day the fire broke out. Now the trail is stone cold and firefighters bitterly admit that the arsonist got away with it. Scott Brown>> You know, I wouldn't begin to speculate on the person's, number one, his M.O. Obviously, he or she picked a day that was conducive for that type of fire to ensue. Philip Bruce>> The same is true for the costly Malibu fires from that same year. There are some theories on who did it, but not enough evidence to indict or convict. One of southern California's top arson investigators says that's par for the course when you're dealing with wildfires. They're the toughest kind of arson to solve. Bob Reinhardt>> Most of the time, it ends up either being a lighter or a match. It's quite simple to do. You know, pull off a freeway or a road, get out, start the brush and drive off. You're ten or fifteen miles down the road before anything happens and anybody gets on the scene. Philip Bruce>> When you found these people, in your experience, how have you found them? Bob Reinhardt>> Normally, it's through a witness. Somebody seeing him, somebody getting a partial license plate number, usually that way. It's just very, very difficult to follow back through unless we get very lucky and get a device that does not operate the way it's supposed to. He drops it off expecting it to go off in ten or fifteen minutes, giving him enough time to get down the road and, lo and behold, it does not ignite. Then we have a good fingerprint and we have something to work on at that point, and that happens. It tends to be a white male, usually in his twenties or thirties. That is probably the average that it ends up being. Women are very unlikely to use fire. It just doesn't happen very often at all. Especially with the young juveniles, male juveniles all the time, female juveniles very, very rare. Philip Bruce>> Even with a description to go on, finding the person who set this fire is still like looking for a needle in a burned up haystack. But Captain Reinhardt says that many arsonists fit a profile. Thrill-seekers who enjoy the rush of causing a disaster or, unfortunately, firefighters who turn bad. Now the person who set this blaze remains a mystery man. Bob Reinhardt>> What we hope for is that somebody close to that person is going to recognize that, yes, this is my friend, relative, neighbor, whatever he may be, and have enough of a conscience to understand that what he did was terribly wrong, that there are hundreds of people that are without a home now and a lot of wild-shed vegetation has gone because of this foolhardy act. Hopefully, they'll get that conscience going and turn him in. Philip Bruce>> If there's a bright side to this grim story, it may be the things that cities and counties are doing to stop fire starters before they can strike. In that war, they've enlisted a four-legged foot soldier. [Film Clip] Philip Bruce>> With every mouthful, these goats in Glendale are taking a bite out of a potentially deadly crime. They're clearing the hills of brush and weeds and robbing would-be arsonists of an easy target. A professional herder stands watch as nature's eating machines do their work, clearing acres of hillsides in a way that hand crews couldn't. They even eat the cactus and the poison oak. Doug Nickles>> The best part about the goats is that they only eat to what they can reach, so they don't rip the root out. They just eat down to what they can reach. You can see the bamboo that they've eaten, but they don't rip out the root, so that's the best part. That's what holds up the hillside. When it's rainy time, these things can re-sprout, but the hillside is not going to come down because the roots are still in the dirt. Philip Bruce>> In Glendale, the goats are an experiment, but elsewhere in southern California, they've already got a proven track record. Remember the Laguna Beach fire? One year after flames swallowed these neighborhoods, the city started using goats to clear brush from the local canyons and hillsides. It now costs the city of Laguna Beach two hundred thousand dollars a year to keep the goats, but considering the cost of a big fire, it's a bargain. And considering how quickly the trail can turn cold, it's a lot easier to prevent a major fire than it is to catch the person who sets one. Announcer>> Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, plus transcripts and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most interesting features. Just go to kcet.org, scroll down the page and click on "Life and Times". Val Zavala>> It was nearly cut out of the bible, but instead, the Book of Revelation survived and has gone on to influence western civilization and even present-day politics. But why this obsession with catastrophe and the Apocalypse? Saul Gonzalez talked with Jonathan Kirsch, author of the best-selling book, "A History of the End of the World". Saul Gonzalez>> Jonathan Kirsch, I'm talking to you here in Woodlawn Cemetery in Santa Monica, perhaps an appropriate place for this conversation. You've written a book about the Book of Revelation, the last book of the New Testament that deals with the fate of both the living and the dead. Set it up for us. For those who aren't familiar with their bible, what is the Book of Revelation? Jonathan Kirsch>> The Book of Revelation, which I call the single, spookiest book in scripture, tells the story of the end time, what's going to happen when the world comes to a final end. Among the things that will happen, we're told, is that Jesus will return to the earth. He'll fight a cataclysmic war against Satan at the Battle of Armageddon. He will reign over an earthly kingdom for a thousand years and, at the very end of time, there'll be a Judgment Day. At that moment, the graves will give up their dead. According to the imagination of its author, we're invited to see gravestones toppling over and souls rising up to be judged by King Jesus. According to that judgment, every person who ever lived will be judged either worthy of life in the new heaven and the new earth for eternity, or to be condemned to burn in the lake of fire for the rest of time. Saul Gonzalez>> Who wrote this book? What person or people are responsible for the text? Jonathan Kirsch>> It's intriguing that we can surmise a lot about the man who wrote the Book of Revelation, more than we know about many of the other biblical authors. He was born and raised a Jew, but he was one of the first Jewish Christians. He embraced the idea that Jesus was the Jewish Messiah and he gave a sermon to a congregation, probably a tiny little house church congregation gathered in secret in some city or maybe several cities of Asia Minor. That sermon was reduced to writing and is now known to us as the Book of Revelation. Saul Gonzalez>> What kind of effect has this book had on shaping civilization as we know it, our society as we know it, over the centuries? Jonathan Kirsch: Revelation has imprinted itself on the way human beings, men and women, for twenty centuries have understood the world and the destiny of the world. Saul Gonzalez>> It's kind of in our cultural genetic code, right? Jonathan Kirsch>> It really is. I say that there's a kind of a cultural DNA that's been passed from Judaism to Christianity and has become part of western civilization. We are trained by our culture to think of history as having a beginning, a middle and an end. We're tantalized by the idea that how the world will end is encoded in the bible if only we have the insight to extract the hidden meanings of the bible. And we are told that it will end in cataclysm, in plagues, afflictions, persecutions and oppression, a final cataclysmic war, the Battle of Armageddon, and then the destruction of the earth. Saul Gonzalez>> Jonathan, why does a book that predicts so much pain, suffering and torment for humanity, along with the end of the world, why has that been so seductive to so many people over the centuries where they not only expect it, but they want it to happen? Jonathan Kirsch>> The function of the Book of Revelation is to console people who are suffering, confused and frightened. It performed that function in antiquity when it was first composed and it performs that function today in the twenty-first century. If a real flesh and blood man or woman is frightened of disease or pestilence or famine or war or revolution, if there's some figure in world history that casts a long shadow in our time such as Osama bin Laden, in ancient times, Saladin or Napoleon or Lenin or Hitler, the Book of Revelation offers us a very simple and convenient way to understand these forces and phenomena of history. We can console ourselves with the idea that it is all the playing out of God's will for the end of the world and, above all, the Book of Revelation, as spooky and scary as it is, it's quite a frightening text, it has a happy ending for some people because, at the end of time on Judgment Day, some people at least are promised that they'll go to the perfect celestial paradise for eternity. Saul Gonzalez>> One of the most interesting chapters in the book for me was toward the end when you talk about the idea of a revelation arriving on the shores of America with the European colonists. How does America change the idea of revelation and the Last Judgment and the ultimate battle between good and evil? What changes about us here on this soil? Jonathan Kirsch>> This is one of the great ironies of the Book of Revelation. It begins in the eastern edge of Christendom in Asia Minor, but it always moves west. It always finds its most ardent readers to the west. Finally, it makes the jump across the Atlantic with Christopher Columbus, who was himself an ardent reader of Revelation. So in America among the founding fathers and among Christian denominations of various kinds, the idea was embraced that we can make the new heaven and the new earth in America in our own lives. This is an idealistic -- Saul Gonzalez>> -- we Americanized Revelation. Jonathan Kirsch>> We Americanized it and we made it a positive text, a can-do text, and that's how it has been understood by the mainstream churches in America. But there are millions of Americans, many millions who vote, who believe that Revelation must be understood literally. Ronald Reagan was one of them. In his administration, he said, "We may be the generation that sees Armageddon." As I argue in my book, that's a pretty unnerving thought to fall from the lips of the man who is followed everywhere he goes by an officer with the launch code to the American nuclear deterrent. Saul Gonzalez>> One thing that strikes me when I read your book is how every generation expects the end time to come when they're inhabiting the earth and, of course, the end of the world doesn't happen. Jonathan Kirsch>> The Book of Revelation promises to reveal the things which must shortly come to pass, things which its author believed would happen in his lifetime. He would never have entertained the idea that he was uttering prophecy that wasn't going to come true for twenty centuries. He thought he would see the end of the world. He didn't. It's a book of failed prophecies. It's a history of the end of time, but time refuses to end. Saul Gonzalez>> So why do people keep the faith in it? Jonathan Kirsch>> Well, there's something deep in our nature, deep in our culture, that allows each generation to dismiss the previous failures of prophecy and embrace the idea that in their generation it will come true. This has never been more true than it is today. There are men and women in America today as we speak with each other who are absolutely convinced that, when they pick up the morning paper, when they turn on the news, they're seeing headlines that are signs of the end time. If it's an assassination, a natural disaster, a war, any phenomenon of politics or history, they can put it in the context of biblical prophecy and it doesn't discourage them. This is the irony. It doesn't discourage them that these prophecies have so far failed again and again and again. Saul Gonzalez>> Jonathan Kirsch, author of "The History of the End of the World", I want to thank you for your time and your thoughts. Jonathan Kirsch>> Thank you. It's been my pleasure. Announcer>> To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us by mail at this address: Life and Times 4401 Sunset Blvd. Los Angeles, California 90027 You can also call our viewer comment line (323) 953-5555) or contact us the fast way by e-mail at kcet.org. Larry Mantle>> Welcome to FilmWeek on Life and Times. I'm Larry Mantle of 89.3 KPCC. First up this week is the comedy, "Stranger Than Fiction". It stars Will Ferrell as a mild-mannered IRS agent and Emma Thompson as a novelist. [Film Clip] Larry Mantle>> I'm joined this week by critics Peter Rainer of the Christian Science Monitor, and Ella Taylor of the L.A. Weekly. Ella, what did you think of "Stranger Than Fiction"? Ella Taylor>> This is a fairly charming film which is directed by Marc Forster who also made "Finding Neverland" and "Monster's Ball" from a very post-modern script by a young screenwriter named Zack Helm, maybe not so young. It's about an IRS auditor who wakes up one morning to discover that he is a character in a novel written by Emma Thompson. It's sweet. It could be very, very precious, but Will Ferrell gives a really terrific performance. He has this really lonely feel to him. It's the first time he's really impressed himself on me as an actor rather than a cut-up. He's the one who really makes the movie. Larry Mantle>> Peter, what did you think? Peter Rainer>> I was not so high on it. It's a very good concept for a film, very much a Charlie Kaufman-esque kind of story line. But the whole, you know, meta-fiction aspects of the film begins to sort of wear after a while because, to me, they didn't really accelerate into anything terribly interesting. It just became more complicated. You don't really find out especially what kind of novelist Emma Thompson is beyond the fact that she's, you know, an oblique novelist with unhappy endings to all her books. I thought that Will Ferrell, although he is touching, he does seem a little hollowed out for me whenever he plays serious roles. Not that he's done it that often, but in "Winter Passing", I sort of felt the same way, that there's something that's not there about Will Ferrell when he's trying to be a serious actor. Although, to some extent, that fits in with the conception of the role here, I think it's too much. Larry Mantle>> Second up this week is "A Good Year" starring Russell Crowe. The film is set in beautiful Provence and directed by Ridley Scott. [Film Clip] Larry Mantle>> Peter, what did you think of "A Good Year"? Peter Rainer>> Well, this is a kind of movie that it looks beautiful because it's shot in Provence for the most part. On a travelogue level, it works just fine. On every other level, it's pretty second-rate. Russell Crowe, to show that he's not the usual action icon, has his hair straightened, it's parted in the middle and he wears kind of, you know, dorky glasses and the spokesuits and he just sort of is trying to be someone other than who he really is in the movies. He seems terribly uncomfortable. Overall, it seems like the kind of film that was made because a lot of people said, "Hey, let's make a movie in the south of France" (laughter). Ridley Scott is really, you know, not suited for this type of clunky comedy, which is supposed to be a fable really. It's supposed to be a Jacques Tati film and there are numerous references to Tati movies in the film, but Tati films are wonderfully light-fingered. This is sort of muscular and clunky. Larry Mantle>> Actress Joey Lauren Adams directs the film, "Come Early Morning", which apparently is quite a personal story for her. Ashley Judd stars. [Film Clip] Larry Mantle>> Ella, "Come Early Morning"? Ella Taylor>> The actress, Joey Lauren Adams, who was very wonderful in Kevin Smith's "Chasing Amy", has not had much acting work recently and it turns out to be a good thing because she's directed this very nice little chamber piece about the southern upbringing starring Ashley Judd. She's really very good as this southern construction worker who's trying to dig herself out of a very messy family and a nice guy comes along. There's no new narrative ground that's broken, but the pacing is ugly. Tim Orr's cinematography is really, really beautiful and Judd's performance helps you see the distinction between a woman with a very reactive temperament and also her genuine independence. Larry Mantle>> Is this like the Judd of "Ruby in Paradise" and back more to that sort of -- Ella Taylor>> -- very much back towards that, and all for the good because she's very, very good at those roles. A very intelligent performance. Larry Mantle>> Peter? Peter Rainer>> Yeah, I enjoyed the film. I think it's a sensitive piece of work. It's well shot. She has a good eye, or somebody has a good eye. You know, it really has a nice feeling for southern mores and for this woman's plight as someone who really kind of sees where her life is going and is somewhat helpless to do anything about it. When she does try to do something about it, you know, in some ways gets into trouble even further. But it's a very good performance. It's nice to see Ashley Judd in a movie, for a change, where she's not, you know, being terrorized in some thriller with Morgan Freeman (laughter). I mean, it's a good showcase for her as an actress and a nice debut for Joey Lauren Adams. Larry Mantle>> And finally this week, we have "Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus". Nicole Kidman plays Arbus in a kind of riff on Arbus' real-life background, but not a real-life story. [Film Clip] Larry Mantle>> Peter, what did you think of "Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus"? Peter Rainer>> Well, I didn't like this movie. It's a shame that it's a great subject for films. Diane Arbus is a wonderful character for a film. She had a very interesting life. It deserves much better than this. It reminded me a bit of the biography of Reagan which became sort of an imaginary biography. Nicole Kidman is icier than even usual for her in this role. Robert Downey, Jr., however, is quite good as the kind of elephant man character who lives upstairs. He's touching and is much better than this film deserves. But what you learn about her as an artist, what you learn about her as a human being, all of that has completely gone haywire in this fantasia falderal that leads nowhere. A missed opportunity. Larry Mantle>> Well, that's it for another FilmWeek on Life and Times. I'm Larry Mantle of 89.3 KPCC joined by critics Ella Taylor of the L.A. Weekly, and Peter Rainer of the Christian Science Monitor. We look forward to being with you again a week from today for the next FilmWeek on Life and Times. Val Zavala>> KPCC radio broadcasts an hour version of FilmWeek Fridays at eleven a.m. And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks for watching. We'll see you next time. Announcer>> Life and Times was made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education. And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg. Sponsored in part by:  | |
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