I kept waiting for the M. Night Shyamalan twist. I kept thinking of psychological experiments or religious nonsense. But it never came. This may be the most straight across the board movie I have ever seen. The premise of the movie was clear and it executed to a T. There were no shocks, no revelations, no mysteries. Everything happened exactly how you knew it was going to. It ended exactly how you knew it would. While maybe an interesting story. And maybe the idea of being faced with the ultimate decision of who to sacrifice tp save the world is something to ponder on… this movie was the American Cheese of the cheese world. It tastes how you expect, it melts how you expect, there is no depth or complexity.
So… I am going to start out by saying that I am sorry I spent money to go see this… Now, don’t get me wrong, Episode VI is my favorite, but this was not what I grew up with. Return of the Jedi was originally released a few years before I was born, so I did not have the pleasure of seeing it in theaters in all it’s glory. I grew up watching it over and over on VHS. Full trilogy pack, baby. What I DID get to see in theaters was a travesty! Some gawd awful added special effects and garbage. This, an attempt to reignite the passion, I am sure. I was 11, and I can still remember finding it horrible. A 40th anniversary only comes once, and yet I just spent some ten or so dollars to see the version that came out 25 years ago… I will say that in my disappointment I got up and did something I can honestly say I have never done… I left the theater and bought some popcorn…
(Also take note of the fact that it was rereleased AFTER it’s actual anniversary, and will be leaving BEFORE national Star Wars Day.)
Okay, but in reality… all you young men who think Episode III is the greatest episode of all time. (Yes, I am talking to You.) Becauae it was the first rated PG-13 episode. Who cares?! You think the iconic Leia costume didn’t get 12 year olds a little hot in the pants? And how can you hate on one of the greatest creatures ever created, the Ewoks? Okay, yes, they had a spin off movie that nobody remembers… except apparently me. (Dude with a magic stick?) But Episode VI has everything. A reasonable love story that doesn’t make you want to puke in your mouth a little. Lightsaber action scene with lost limbs. Speaking of “loss,” loss. Epic characters like Lando, who was such a hero to me, in my refrigerator box space ship, I answered to Commando Lando. (Don’t mock, I didn’t yet know what “commando” meant.) And literally every character is a strong character (except Jabba, who was killed by a woman in a sexy outfit.)
Episode VI is the culmination of everything. It is the ultimate Good vs Evil show down, that ends in death, explosions, and dancing. What, I ask you, can be better than this?
(Except Rogue One. But we have a few years more before it reaches 40.)
There are people in this world who decide not to watch anime, for whatever reason. They don’t want to read subtitles, they think they are kid’s shows, they are afraid to have their eyes opened. And then there are the people who have had their eyes opened… Anime doesn’t have to be some Naruto, Pokemon fad following. What I love about anime is its ability to create and bring life to stories no amount of CGI can bring. The breadth of world building and character creating, the attention to detail and the emotional evocation… Suzume no Tojimari, brought to you by Makoto Shinkai, the same man who brought us Your Name, does all of that. The very first scene, with it’s strange and ominous music, reminicient to me of the first time I saw the beginning of Princess Mononoke, or the opening sequemce of Beauty and the Beast. Breath-taking. Suzume is a movie about a young woman who begins a journey to fix a world destroying problem she inadvertently started. The array of characters, while perhaps stock and seen before in animes of similar style. The drunken karaoke singers. The suspicious toddlers. The trouble-making cat. The aloof young man who walks the world alone, until he meets someone worth walking it with. Suzume is a movie about a young woman who begins a journey and eventually falls in love. There is no mystery about that. It is about what happens in between. This movie exercises its power to make us feel confused, feel angry, to laugh, and to cry. And in the end, you realize everything has come full circle. When that strange music begins to play again and the credits roll, suddenly you feel the that door close softly behind you.
Weirdly, the last Indian film I watched starred Ajay Devgn. This film was nothing extraordinary, in the sense of unseen. Ajay, who played the title role of Bholaa, is merely seeking to find his daughter. But, he is roped into a confusing drug crime and we learn a bit more about his brooding self’s past. Ajay is like the Tom Cruise of Indian films. Action packed, extraordinary stunts, and 3D worthy special effects. All while wearing a sensible pair of sketchers. Majority of the film, admittedly, confuses me. He, a short dorky guy, and a stern, by the book, cop lady, drive a bus desperately to town, hauling some 40 drugged cops. It is like the film Speed, only Indian. Along the way various bad guys set to foil their journey. Perhaps the best group, a group of shirtless, Samoan beachy haired guys, wearing basketball shorts. All the while, a group of bad guys sets upon an impenetrable police station. It becomes the scene out of the bad Resident Evil movie. You know the one. Where Leon, the new recruit, finds himself locking the station down against a zombie onslaught. Only, this recruit is 55, and the zombies are mindless henchmen. And, being an Indian film, you can’t forget the Bollywood music and dance. Unfortunately, only one scene, and not super impressive. Save for the lead bad guy, a goth Javier Bardem look-a-like Bollywood dancing while killing some failure. And, the romcom montage scene of him falling in love with the beautiful doctor and attempting to change his ways… This is all not to say that the film was bad. Indian films have been stepping their game up and I was happy to spend money to see this one. Films like this give you a taste of everything. Musical, romantic, funny, and slightly ridiculous Tom Cruise action scenes. It also cheritably provided an intermission. Actually, the second theater outing with an intermission I have experienced within a year. Running at some 2.5 hours, they are being generous. Here in America, 2.5 hours is child’s play compared to the Marvel films or the Lord of the Rings. You will hold your pee or risk missing the MOST critical scene of the entire film.
Today the rain fell. After turning my skin the shade of baked ham, and staring at teal blue waters, and counting all the different cactus breeds… the rain fell.
Since the moment we had arrived the roar of jet planes would thunder overhead every few hours. Like that niggling feeling in the back of your mind. Like that sensation that this is simply a looking glass world. Backwards. And bright, and carefree, and so so distant.
And then the rain we left behind finally catches up. Falling down, soaking into our clothes like cold, ghostly hands trying to pull us back.
To what..
I had felt like a leaf, floating on the surface of the water. Free. Unburdened of all the weight, and the pain, and the loneliness on the otherside of the glass.
A mortal dancing in the Spring Court, finally being called back to the real world.
And as the rain falls, it drags the color from the world and washes it away, down the sidewalk. The weight grips my shoulders as the damp creeps in…
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Tonight is the New Moon. A time for new beginnings.
Maybe I will walk off the plane and I will be new.
Maybe I will have a heart, full and open.
Maybe I will step back through the looking glass and
Not the kind of rain we get up North. But this was rain enough to wet my chair, bring steam up from the hot tub, darken the cement, and slow time down.
We all woke early, sipped coffee, gathered in the livingroom to have quiet, coffee, and reading.
I did not read. I ate toast and sipped on coffee. There was no jam, nor any real butter. And stared out the window at the bright, but wet morning. Missing my cat…
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The day called for homework, and so homework I did.
I did homework while the rest of the family went off to explore the town.
I did homework while the sky threatened to brighten.
I did homework…
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By the time the family had returned the sun was in full form. The clouds, sharp puffs from the heavens, seemed to have dusted off their dancing shoes as they moved out of the way.
So we went to a movie.
A movie that marries the very epitome of Ridiculous, with all the glory of Amazing. It was disgusting, and beautiful. Confusing, and meaningful.
“That was magical…” someone breathed in the darkened theater as the credits rolled.
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With the homework set aside, and still swirling on a movie hangover, we decided to go find some food.
I had missed lunch.
So I ordered a half a roast chicken.
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It was disgusting.
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There was more homework to be done. But it was quickly finished.
And topped the night off with my toes in the hot tub..
In the movie Love Actually, Hugh Grant speaks knowingly about Love while the screen plays a montage of happy scenes of love…
All taking place in Airports.
I would like to think it was Love that was going through my head the entire hour it took me to get through airport security. Love that moved me forwards when the TSA agents snapped and barked orders at us. Love that drew my lips up when the child in his mother’s arms leaned over and screamed in my ear…
Love Actually came out two decades ago. It came out after 9/11, and yet I maintain that airports are quite possibly the least loving places I can think of.
People with their phones glued to their noses. People gathered around the outlet stations like cavemen around fire. People power walking with the intensity of a marathon runner and the spacial awareness of an elephant. Has anyone ever heard the words, “sorry,” or “excuse me,” uttered in an airport?
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The whole point of the ungodly slog through hell, to be barked at to go back because you didn’t take your belt off, and then barked at again because you didn’t take your computer out of your bag, and then be barked at to keep moving because you’re holding up the line… is in effect, for our safety.
And who doesn’t feel extraordinarily safe at the airport?
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This sign was on the wall, in the ramp, where you are past the point of no return. If you have come this far and you suspect someone is trafficking another someone, by this point, they have already made it to freedom.
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This was another encouraging sight. To know that should this giant tanker of gas decide to explode, there is at least a fire extinguisher..
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And then my favorite…
So much happiness in these pictoral guides to what to do if the plane is going down.
And the lavatory.
A: Why are you in the loo while the plane is going down?
B: Are they subtly making assumptions as to why you are in the loo by providing 2 oxygen masks?
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Airplane travel skepticism, never more succinctly explained than by Jack Whitehall…
What was meant to be an easy night before hitting the skies towards better times, became something much, much different.
We drove in from the rain, to this lonely, darkened hotel.
The long, dark hallways leaving us half expecting a boy on a plastic tricycle to come racing towards us.
We stand outside the locked door. Access denied to us. Cold, tired, and eager to be out of the hall. But unsure of what might be lingering in this room, barring us from entry.
Across the hall the news blaring through the door, the Do Not Disturb sign dangling from the handle. Who was in there? Was the blaring TV some sort of deterrent from what was inside? Was that the faint odor of rotting flesh?
Our door is never opened. The door across the hall is never opened. The news blares on, and the body inside remains undisturbed.
We are given another room.
The elevator points down, ready to take us… to Hell? The walls are covered in some sort of blood splatter, plastic protector. The door remains open despite repeated button pushing. I swear I hear someone limping down the hall dragging a hatchet with them. I slam my finger on the “door close” button and it immediately starts a high pitched wail, like the scream of prior elevator victims.
To our relief, the doors close.
When we finally enter a room, safe from whatever moved up and down the dark hallway, we breathe a sigh of relief once the door chain is in place. Father jokingly says we can place a chair infront of it for added protection.
Protection from what? Protection from whatever prowled the halls.
But maybe the danger was already in the room with us…
So here’s the thing, has anyone legitimately seen and Irish movie that wasn’t somehow heartbreaking. And don’t say Leap Year, because I mean a proper Irish movie. Previously, in 2008, these two actors, Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell had been in a movie together. A comedy. This movie did not have the sort of American humor that slaps you in the face. This movie had the UK humor that is just so clever. But, this film was not a comedy, so don’t go into it expecting to have a good laugh. This film revolves around two men, the moody Colm, played by Gleeson, and the confused Pádraic, played by Farrell. Once best friends, Colm suddenly wakes up one morning and decides and doesn’t like Pádraic anymore. His reasoning, while sound, is also abrupt and not very nice. But the question is: what do you do when a person is not serving any purpose in your life. Living on the small Irish island of Inisherin, Colm realizes he has done nothing with his life to leave behind. His fear is doing nothing to be remembered by. The film questions the meaning of friendship and kindness. And despair that spirals so deep, you wonder if it is possible to come out. The lengths one will take to cut someone from their life just to be able to find themselves.
Ma Vie en Rose 