In the United States, memories are prone to dim fast, with such recent pieces of history as the savings and loans crisis, the rise of “revolutionary” Republican leadership in Congress and numerous scandals of the past 10 years already fading into obscurity.

Recollections of other decades are similarly dim. Judging from recent movies and TV shows set in the 1970s, viewers remember the hair styles, strange clothing fads and disco music of the time, but they have forgotten anything else about the unremarkable period of Gerald Ford’s presidency from 1974-76.

It is no surpise then that the past year has found several movies indulging in a fond nostalgia for the mid-1980s, a period that is just one decade old.

The movie ‘The Wedding Singer’, written by Tom Herlihy and directed by Frank Coraci that opened nationwide last week has attracted large audiences. Its backers are so confident of the revivalist mood that the film is advertised as “a story that took place before the Internet, cellular phones or rollerblades!”

The plot nominally features the romance between Robbie (Adam Sandler), a young romantic who sings at weddings and other ceremonies, and Julia (Drew Barrymore), a caterer at many of the same functions. Much of its comedy satems from the mood of instant nostalgia.

In fact, ‘The Wedding Singer’ pays very little attention to the real issues of the 1980s, opting instead to focus on the images of the decade gleaned largely from TV and pop music. Characters dress like Boy George and Madonna, drive cars like the DeLorean (which was a flop among car-buyers at the time) – and villains identify themselves by taking up the quintessential job of the ‘Greed Decade’, selling high-yield ‘junk’ bonds.

Such an overload of reference to the ’80’s – as in two 1997 films, ‘Grosse Point Blank’ and ‘Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion’ – are designed to contrast the presumed innocence of the previous decade with the more sceptical 1990s.

When Robbie tells a former girlfriend to take off his Van Halen shirt “before you jinx the group and they break up,” the joke lies in knowing that, in fact, his beloved rock stars will part ways before the decade ends. Most of the other characters similarly embrace now-dated fads with an enthusiasm that seems naive, as when one person shows up at a party wearing a single glove, in homage to Michael Jackson.

Beneath the surface of such jokes is a story as ingenuous as any of the fads the film’s mock-nostalgic attitude skewers. Robbie, heartbroken after being abandoned at the altar, helps Julia plan her own wedding to an unfaithful lout, even though he obviously is falling in love with her.

As far as plots go, it’s pretty thin stuff, padded by (of course) a soundtrack of songs from the 1980s, and Sandler’s own, vaguely deranged musical efforts. The wittiest moments actually stem from Sandler’s display of post-breakup misery by singing songs like ‘Love Stinks’ with gusto while almost weeping through a pathetic rendition of Madonna’s ‘Holiday’.

Sandler, a former comedian on the television show ‘Saturday Night Live’, also revisits his old routine of composing intentionally bad songs, including one self-pitying love song which combines sweet expressions of longing with wails of “Put a bullet through my head!”

As with much of the 1980s itself, a little of ‘The Wedding Singer’ goes a long way, and by the time ’80’s icon Billy Idol appears to assist the hero, the nostalgic mood has worn off.

Still, after a year in which the events and styles of the 1970s were captured in films as diverse as Ang Lee’s ‘The Ice Storm’ and Paul Thomas Anderson’s ‘Boogie Nights’, the filmmakers behind ‘The Wedding Singer’ may have discerned the next big trend.

The only questions are: Can nostalgia for the early 1990s be far behind – and will President Bill Clinton be able to capitalise on fond memories of the ‘innocence’ of his earlier years?

By IPS Correspondents
LONDON, Feb 17 1998 (IPS)

One of the best known photographs stemming from World War II is of a furious woman pointing out a trembling secret police informant while a group of concentration camp inmates watch in dazed confusion.

As an image, taken almost within hours of the end of the Nazi era, it captures a defining moment of historic change with stark clarity.

As a photograph, it is the signature of on the 20th century’s giants of photography, Henri Cartier-Bresson, arguably the man who developed photo-journalism to its most literate form.

If one picture is worth 1,000 thousand words, as the saying goes, Cartier-Bresson’s photos added that extra perception to a story that words never could convey; an artistic sensibility for sure, but above all a sense of the moment. he had the natural ability to capture and freeze life in time.

This year marks the 90th anniversary of Cartier-Bresson’s birth and London’s Hayward Gallery is mounting one of the most comprehensive exhibitions of his work ever held in England.

Titled ‘The Europeans’ it carries some the most memorable images of the 20th century. They are distilled moments stolen from the annals of time. Like the portrait of a radiant nun watching the enthronement of Pope John XXII in 1958 or the almost mediaeval grace of a black clad middle-aged couple walking through the stone streets of Italy in 1951.

These images preserve a pre-technological Europe, still gripped by religion and poverty and slowly, painfully pulling itself out of the trauma of war. Most intriguingly, and also importantly, given the current debate over the professional standards of press photographers in the wake of the death of Princess Diana, his pictures are intimate without being intrusive.

Cartier-Bresson acknowledges this ability by describing himself as a pickpocket – but one who does no harm. “A good pick pocket takes the money and slips away,” he says.

Born in 1908 to a middle-class French family Cartier-Bresson was blessed by what actually was an old Chinese curse “may you live in interesting times.” His pictures demonstrate his extraordinary ability to recognise the moments which define us.

“For me the camera is a sketch book, an instrument of intuition and spontaneity the master of the instant which in visual terms questions and decides,” he says.

Be it a 1960’s photo of children playing at the foot of the Berlin Wall or the men of the once mighty Army of the Soviet Union marching through Red Square, or a Serb and Muslim caught in a friendly conversation in the former Yugoslavia. Or the elegantly clad students at Britain’s prestigious Eton boys’ school, whose stances alone breathe money and privilege. The nuns captured gliding through the streets of Ireland.

How is it done? “To take photos is to hold one’s breath, when all faculties converge in the face of a fleeting reality. It is the moment that mastering an image becomes a great physical and intellectual joy,” he says.

But it’s more than just intuition; it does involve work. “In order to give meaning to the world one has to feel involved in what he frames through the viewfinder. This attitude requires concentration, a disciplined mind, sensitivity and a sense of geometry.”

After the war Cartier-Bresson and acclaimed photographers Robert Capa, David Seymour and George Rodger formed the Magnum photo agency, a loosely structured cooperative that gave its members carte blanche to shoot what they liked and then to keep the copyright. Artistic integrity is jealously guarded; editors are strictly ordered to use the photo as delivered, without cropping.

Though not much more than a distribution network for the work of a club of photographic geniuses, Magnum was an eye opening training ground for the lucky talented few allowed admittance.

Eve Arnold, the first woman photographer to join the agency, once recalled how Cartier-Bresson came to photograph the famous French actress Jean Moreau, who had just moved to a new apartment in Paris.

“He came, in greeted her and took one snap and left,” she wrote. “With many photographers it’s a case of ‘just one more.’ But not him.”

Bresson’s life can imitate his art. He rarely gives interviews and almost never speaks in public, preferring to keep his expressions for his work.

At the party to mark the opening of the Hayward Gallery show, his choice of public statement was to casually walk to the front of the room and lift a glass in tribute to his late friend and contemporary, Francis Bacon, the greatest British artist of the 20th century.

“To Francis,” he said, sipped once and silently, simply, returned to his seat. The moment was pure Cartier-Bresson.

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