I hope you had a merry christmas. While we were at target last week the person who was checking our stuff out said, "Happy Holiday" to us. I really liked that she said it in the singular form. I realize that it may not have been on purpose, but I dug it. It's less pluralistic maybe or just different. Why is New Year's a holiday anyway? I mean, I don't mind having the days near it off, but it's just a new month starting right? Am I jaded?
I'm very fascinated by memory. Reading all those blogs this morning reminded me of things that I haven't thought about in quite some time. Even the way I wrote suggested that I did almost everything alone, even though I can remember some of the things I wrote about, and I remember what we did less that who I was with. It's like reading a novel when you only know about the main character's feelings or thoughts. Not really though. The memories, sometimes are even shaped by the blogs themselves. Which is weird. For example, I vividly remember one of Jon M's comments on my early blogs. I don't really even remember what I wrote, but when I re-read it, I knew exactly what he commented--so a memory about the memory. Now will I remember this, memory about the memory? The layers are getting murky!
Christmas was good. We didn't do anything but watch movies. I guess we did do other things like eat food, walk dogs, and watch movies. Dog Day Afternoon and City of God. City of God was really good. It was quite violent, but it all supported the story. Sometimes it gets in the way, this wasn't one of those times.
Okay this is a major rabbit trail to follow me down, so feel free to skip this paragraph. When I was at Dordt, I occasionally wrote for the Diamond (school newspaper). It wasn't very often, but I felt like it needed to be well respected, so I often talked about what could be done to make it better. In that light, I offered to write movie reviews for the paper. One of my reviews, of which there were few, on Kill Bill vol. 1 stirred up a little raucous with an unnamed (to you on this public forum, not to me) English professor. He wrote the editor and me a letter explaining what he saw wrong with my review. The review basically said, I liked it, you may not. The violence was the main issue. The movie is really violent. At times, it gets kind of crazy. I am pretty jaded to such things, so I didn't mind watching it, and I felt like it was worth seeing, but I published this saying that the violence may be a problem for some viewers. His main issue with the review was that it was too wishywashy, in that basically I said, I liked it, you may not. What kind of review is that? Well, it's not very good, that's for sure. But the larger issue, the fact that I was okay with the violence, and other members of the community may not be was hard for me to deal with--on many levels. Looking back on it, I think the major issue is does the violence support the story? The underlying question also is, do you have an issue with violence? More broadly, maybe, does violence ruin your movie going experience? It may be a queasy thing, or it may just be a love of human life. If the answer to the initial question, in the review is, yes, the violence supports the story and that story is a story worth hearing and watching, then as a reviewer I can support and suggest that others go view that movie. But as a reader, if you have an issue with violence, I want to let it be known that this movie is violent. If you have that issue, then that should be the grain of salt you eat the review with. Don't willy nilly just obey a reviewer. If you know that violence will ruin the experience, then don't got see it. If you know that unnecessary violence hurts the experience, be knowing if the violence in said movie works for the story, or against it.
This is getting muddy. But the biggest problem with Kill Bill vol. 1 is that I don't know if the violence supported the story. It must have, it's a story about contract killers, but how much violence was necessary? Anyway, all this really is to say that City of God, although it is very violent, it is filmed very economically, and the violent supports the story, in a heartbreaking sort of way.
If you were skipping, you can pick it back up here, if you haven't given up on me already. I hope your time off from work is fantastic, I hope your holiday is good, and I hope your days in between are even better. Merry Christmas and a happy month changing day.
Posted by jack. | | Email post 
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good post. i think you are a very responsible viewer.
i'm sure that we are all jaded in varying degrees and it seems like we(or at least I) are comfortable mostly with those people. i mean those people closest to our degree of jaded are who we relate to and really let it all out with. Maybe our condition is something we chose or something that was thrust on us by tragic situations, but the minds ability to handle violence seems to be very important. at least important to consider before watching movies. i've come to terms with my inability to watch any scary movie, while I can watch some of the most violent movies. sorry, now i'm rambling on YOUR blog, but i'm too self-important to delete it.
merry christmas.
~Oo°~
dog day afternoon on christmas? man. i guess it's better than requiem for a dream or sumthin'.
~Oo°~
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