Category: Five paragraph essay
03/07/10
I've seen most of the movies nominated for an Oscar. Avatar is probably the favorite. It deserves to win some kind of technical award. Without it's fancy 3-D cameras, it's as trite as Pocahontas. Inglorious Bastards is another technically- from a film-making point of view- brilliant movie that lingers in one's consciousness as long as the last Red Vine hangs around one's stomach. Blind Side is fine and more affecting than the previous two, but it's too close to a movie of the week. The first half of Up is all-time great. Unfortunately, the second half is just very good.
My choice would be Hurt Locker. My case:
1. Hurt Locker explores a theme not touched upon by standard war movies, which either focus on the absurdity of war, the righteousness of a particular cause, or individual character (bravery, etc.). War is only Hurt Locker's backdrop. The subject matter is a person's desire to engage in the popularly bad or undesirable. In this case, war.
The main character, William James, is a man who needs war. Indeed, he loves war. He's not a sadist or evil, however, like the colonel in Avatar. Perhaps James sees war as a realistic video game or maybe he's addicted to war adrenaline the way a rock climber seeks a rush from heights.
James never discusses the morality of either the Iraq war or of war itself. Frankly, he doesn't care: if the U.S. were at peace, James would be a mercenary.
The Hurt Locker subtly, brilliantly contrasts James with his team-mates, one of whom is obsessed with questions of morality and mortality and the other who's practical and conventional- he just wants to go home and raise a son.
2. Acting, brilliant.
3. The structure of the story is interesting as well. The Hurt Locker isn't a mission or defense or re-telling of history. The on-screen reminders of the remaining time in the soldiers' tour suggest that the antagonist is the war itself. James, Sanborn, and Eldridge just need to get to the end. Yet, the war can't be the heavy in this film because James seeks it. Hurt Locker is that deep.
The Hurt Locker is a series of engagements, each with its own climax, the longest and most fascinating of which is a desert sniper battle, followed closely by an unsuccessful search for the murderer of the only human part of the war for James, his friendship with a boy who sells pirated DVDs to the American soldiers.
4. Not that this should matter, but Hurt Locker shows that hundreds of millions of dollars can't make up for vision.
5. Like any good war movie, it makes you want to be in the military.
Overall, a brilliant movie.
Up (Four-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + BD Live) [Blu-ray]
), 09:48:41 pm, 476 words PermalinkCategories: Five paragraph essay, Netflix DVD Review :: Leave a comment »
02/02/10
I saw Avatar and concluded that its anti-American message and derivative story line would limit its popularity, at least in America. I was wrong.
My failure was in focusing on the political aspects of the movie instead of its potential religious appeal. According to a recent Pew poll, many Americans' spirituality has taken a heterodox turn; many of our fellow citizens mix and match beliefs to suit their needs, (often in ways that make no logical sense like combining Christian Heaven and reincarnation).
Avatar is the Passion of the Christ for the unconventionally religious.
Listen to some of the quotes from these Avatar viewers:
"That's all I have been doing as of late, searching the Internet for more info about 'Avatar.' I guess that helps. It's so hard I can't force myself to think that it's just a movie, and to get over it, that living like the Na'vi will never happen. I think I need a rebound movie,"
A user named Mike wrote on the fan Web site "Naviblue" that he contemplated suicide after seeing the movie.
"Ever since I went to see 'Avatar' I have been depressed. Watching the wonderful world of Pandora and all the Na'vi made me want to be one of them. I can't stop thinking about all the things that happened in the film and all of the tears and shivers I got from it," Mike posted. "I even contemplate suicide thinking that if I do it I will be rebirthed in a world similar to Pandora and the everything is the same as in 'Avatar.' "
Other fans have expressed feelings of disgust with the human race and disengagement with reality.
Give me some of that New Age religion:
Avatarianism is a pantheism that focuses on caring and protecting nature. I've mentioned earlier that Avatar and Star Wars both have a biological basis for their religion.
The lack of a supernatural being doesn't harm the attractiveness of Avatarian theology (and may even increase it amongst the "brights") because even a biological god fulfills one comforting aspect of religion: that of a greater intelligence guiding humanity, giving it purpose.** Eywa, the nature goddess in Avatar, semi-consciously urges the inhabitants of Pandora to preserve themselves while causing as little damage to other life as possible. It's similar to other reductionist philosophies from the likes of Asimov. It implies a disdain for manufacturing and advanced commerce like many sustainable living and back-to-the-primitive advocates.
It's a counter-factual, illogical religion because nature doesn't really care if everything or nothing survived (a series that causes one to ponder this question is the Life After People series on the greatest channel in history), but logic might not be a priority for some people.
**Marxism has this as well, with its theory of human progress climaxing in a perfectly equal society.
12/24/09
FernGully: The Last Rainforest (Family Fun Edition)
If he were to read the IMDB reviews, an astute reader would be able to divide the admirers of Avatar into those who believe in its message and those who like pretty pictures. I'd like to add a new category for myself, who enjoyed Avatar not as a movie, but as an anthropological experiment.
If James Cameron is correct and our planet "dies," and the dude next to me right now at the Norm's counter is right and advanced aliens exist, one can imagine the aliens coming back to earth and wanting to familiarize themselves with our society and its political factions, one of which is made up of those late-twentieth/early-twenty-first century creatures called "progressives."
The databases of Daily Kos and Huffington Post having long been gone, and the pages of the Nation having been burned for warmth after the disappearance of the carbon fuels; the aliens may come to rely solely on a copy of Avatar found in the vault of one of James Cameron's mansions.
What they would learn:
1. It's not good to encroach on other people's territory and change its culture or use its resources. The Earthlings in Avatar have made bad ecological decisions and attempt to steal the Na'vi's supply of unobtanium.
Earthlings shouldn't take unobtanium even if it's their only chance for survival, which seems to go against the natural Eywan law of survival (below). Cameron's going to have to work this one out.
Anyways, humans had their chance to elect Al Gore and they blew it. Now humanity can go lay in its apocalyptic bed.
2. War is justified to protect one's homeland. Similar to the traditional Christian Just War theory.
3. Religion is good, as are priestesses. It's appropriate to appreciate the source of balance on Pandora, the goddess Eywa; therefore, ceremonies are good. It's important to note that Eywa (the "Mother"- in your eye, patriarchists!) may just be some unconscious, material, biological phenomenon, like the microorganisms Midi-chlorians are responsible for the Force in Star Wars. This would seem to make the Eywa dances lively entertainments, but ultimately useless, unless achieving a trance-like state allows one to better "commune with Eywa."
Religion should represent reality so that if there really is a force that balances Pandora, and no authority above the planet, that force should be the one to follow. However, since Cameron made Pandora himself, one may assume that it's the kind of religion he prefers. That kind is a sort of pantheistic spiritual communion amongst bio-entities in which the ultimate good is that living things bother each other as minimally as possible. Gluttony is out, moderation evident in the svelte Na'vi physiques.
Even with that understanding, Pandora is still a pretty dangerous place where one wrong move in the dangerous forest, even in dealings with their fellow creatures, can lead to death for the Na'vi. Viciousness is natural, necessary to "maintain the balance." Eywa approves.
Interestingly, for being such a peaceful people, there sure are a lot of Na'vi warriors. Perhaps the different tribes war against each other.
4. Na'vi don't seem to care about improving their technology. It's implied that Earthlings destroyed their planet pursuing technology. The big robots seem especially grotesque next to the colorful Na'vi dragon steeds.
5. No discernible policy on out-of-wedlock sex. Small Na'vi villages tend to be conservative. Perhaps in the bigger villages, "if this leaf-hammock's a rockin', don't come a knockin'."
6. Gay marriage is out. At the appropriate age, a man chooses a woman, for "mating." That's the imprimatured way on earth.
Mating is for life. Another orthodox belief.
7. It's not necessary to love one's enemies. In fact, Avatar is full of hate. First, Earthlings towards the Na'vi. Then, the Na'vi right back. After stripping Earthlings of their capacity to harm, the Na'vi probably could have worked something out with the defeated remnants. Nope. "Go home to your dead world" (not just Detroit, either- all of Earth).
8. Free health care. It seems like the medicine shaman is on call and doesn't require payment. Could be single-payer, which would make them far superior to us.
9. Fashion should allow for the maximum freedom of movement.
10. Slight Xenophobia. Outsiders are not welcome, unless they're willing to completely assimilate.
11. The Na'vi are the ideal people: perfectly in balance; peaceful, yet retaining the ability to wage war.
If this movie is an allegory, then the most noble population group on earth are either Native Americans or Africans. My friends and I argued about this. I kept an eye out for a loincloth malfunction to decide the matter. Alas, none. Fortunately, Stephen Lang settles the issue. They're "Indians":
12. Americans are bad. When anti-American film-makers want to present a fighting force for good, they either internationalize a group like in GI Joe, downplay its Americanism like in Superman, or make it explicitly anti-American like in the Bourne Identity.
The Bourne Trilogy (The Bourne Identity | The Bourne Supremacy | The Bourne Ultimatum) [Blu-ray]
In Avatar, all of the bad guys are Americans.
(This is a financial decision. Only half of a Hollywood release's revenue comes from within Yankee shores. Studios figure they can more than make up for offended patriots- who probably don't go to movies much anyways- by appealing to foreign anti-Americans while getting a majority of the Huffington Post crowd, keeping in my mind that most Americans probably won't understand what's going on. In its first weekend, Avatar's overseas business was much greater than domestic revenue.)
13. Marines are good on Earth where they fight for freedom (Cameron makes a point of saying this, so it's not really fair to say that he's anti-military), but bad on Pandora because of point #1. Context is everything.
14. Marines are just the muscle for corporations, which makes corporations the real heavies for their pursuit of profit above peaceful peoples.
Tags: anti-christian, avatar theology, theology of avatar ), 06:54:35 pm, 982 words PermalinkCategories: Now playing at a theater near you, Five paragraph essay :: 8 comments »
12/11/09
Description of The Lovely Bones, from Wiki:
In 1973, Susie Salmon (Ronan) is murdered by a neighbor, George Harvey (Stanley Tucci), a serial killer of young girls and women. She finds herself in 'the in-between' a Heaven-like place, observing her family as they grieve for her. She also watches her killer who, having covered his tracks successfully, is preparing to murder again. Susie struggles to balance her desire for vengeance on Harvey and her desire to have her family recover from their loss.
The name for that "in-between" is "Purgatory."* I haven't seen the movie, but if Susie watches in agony, then her experience in the description can be a kind of spiritual cleansing ("burning anger," perhaps).
Reading the description got me to thinking about how Hollywood sometimes fudges afterlife orthodoxy for cinematic effect.
First, let's get the orthodoxy correct: According to traditional Christian teaching- and without talking about what people have to do to get to heaven- people die, are judged by our Lord, and then either condemned to Hell or experience eternal bliss in Heaven.
According to Hollywood:
1. People die and then go to Heaven where, after doing a good deed, they become angels (It's a Wonderful Life).
Wrong: God created angels before men. They're purely spiritual beings who were never people and will never become people. Neither will any people ever become angels. Lucifer, the guy on your left shoulder who told you to download Wolverine, is a fallen angel.
Right: There's an angel right next to you right now, guarding.
2. Mortals can condemn people to Hell (Drag Me to Hell).
Wrong: God makes that decision.
Right: Your Black Sabbath-loving roommate can set you on the path to Hell, or your crazy aunt brings a Ouija board and convinces you to invite demons who tell you to do wicked stuff which buys you a one-way ticket. So, indirectly, OK.
3. Overzealous angels wrongly take dead souls to Heaven. Cremated bodies cannot be restored (Heaven Can Wait).
Wrong: I'm pretty sure that Angels have stringent quality control measures about this stuff. It's true that anti-clerical forces during the Enlightenment encouraged cremation to explicitly deny the Christian belief in a bodily resurrection. It's also the case that those proto-Christophobes were wrong in thinking that the physical body needed to be preserved for resurrection to occur. Joe Pendleton (Warren Beatty) needn't have gone through the trouble.
Tags: "accurate christian movies", "bad theology in movies", "fake christian", "realistic christian movies", "review lovely bones"11/30/07
The large computer generated battle in the trailer portends Lord of the Rings derivative cliche', but The Golden Compass looks fantastic and could very well be a great movie.
Like TGC, The Chronicles of Narnia climaxes in one of those CG showcases. In addition, both movies have child leads, are set in a fantastic alternate reality that snuggles against our own, and are based on a children's book series that allegorizes an ultimate philosophy (Christianity for TCON and atheism for TGC). The producers of TGC hope that their movie mirrors TCON in another way: TCON pulled in an unGodly amount of money. At least part of TCON's success had to do with churches and peripherally pro-Christian institutions (talk radio) encouraging its members to view the movie. Parents entered the movie confident that they'd get two hours of "positive values."
How will TGC' underlying anti-religion affect it's box office? Most people either won't know about it or won't care, but the controversy will have a negative effect on ticket sales.
First, non-nominal believers won't take their children to see the movie. From what I've heard, the film-makers snipped TGC's overt anti-religious bits (offended tens upon tens of American atheists) For many religious people, however, the film's mere association with the source material is enough to sway their ticket-purchasing decision. Religious parents don't want their kids coming home from the movie and asking them for the box set of Phillip Pullman's “His Dark Materials” series.
Can secularists overcome the loss of religious Americans? Unlikely. All declared secular people, atheist and agnostic, in the United States number 20,000,000 (about eight per cent). Atheists also tend to lack much TGC's target demographic, children.
Finally, for those secularists that do have children, I don't see them using TGC as a teaching moment like Christians did with TCON. I'm inclined to think that most secular parents would feel something inherently wrong in explicitly teaching their six-year-old the dispiriting lesson that life is metaphysically worthless.
The Chronicles of Narnia - The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Widescreen Edition)
The Chronicles of Narnia Boxed Set
His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass) (His Dark Materials) by Philip Pullman
), 06:05:07 pm, 373 words PermalinkCategories: Now playing at a theater near you, Art, Five paragraph essay :: 7 comments »
09/02/07
In this post, I was curious if Americans can be so stupid that they would find this ha..not even, one-100,000th truth (about 500,000 troops have served in Iraq) movie by Brian DePalma of any consequence in their decision to support the United States against Al Qaeda and Hazbollah.
Apparently Ray Bennett is that stupid. He thinks this movie will be "a ferocious argument against the engagement in Iraq for what it is doing to everyone involved," yet he acknowledges that most of it is made up. That's his standard? That's how he makes decisions? Whoever makes the best movie?
Does Ray Bennett realize that Redacted is trying to say that the men entrusted with the security of his nation aren't capable of handling war without turning into emotional cripples and homicidal maniacs? Does he realize that the people who protect his ability to bang away on his Macbook are being called either blithering fools or pathetic and worthy of sympathy from movie critics?
Read his astonishing review:
), 10:01:16 pm, 777 words PermalinkCategories: Now playing at a theater near you, Five paragraph essay :: Leave a comment »
Let's pretend we wanted to make a point about nursing or teaching or unions or illegal aliens or the history of blacks and you chose film as your medium. Would you make one focusing on Donald Harvey, the "Angel of Death," Mary Kay Letourneau, Jimmy Hoffa, Eddie Carbajal, or O.J. Simpson? I mean, you might make it, but would it be suitable to use those people to make a larger point either about the professions or any issue confronting that line of work?
XML Feeds
