Life of Pi 3D: First Viewing

Yesterday I finally got around to seeing LIFE OF PI. My high school buddy was visiting and we were killing time in the city while we waiting to meet a friend of hers for dinner. As a spur of the moment plan, we didn’t realize until we got to the theatre that the showing we were headed to would be in 3D. I tried not to grumble about shelling out the additional four bucks, especially once I learned that my companion had never seen a movie in 3D before. I had to concede, four dollars extra was well worth it to watch her experience it for the first time.

The last few movies I’ve been in 3D have been somewhat of a letdown. I think my expectations were raised unrealistically by the mastery of CORALINE and AVATAR, the first two movies I saw in 3D. Avatar was… well, it was what got everyone so hooked on the stuff in the first place, and it was pretty spectacular, but I’m convinced that the nature of the narrative sucked you in more than the detail of the 3D CGI. CORALINE, though, was really like art, turning the two dimensional animation into something almost tangible. As the story became darker, the 3D animation became closer, more real, and more menacing. It was so effective, it completely sold me on 3D movies, so much so that when a gang of friends went to see the latest RESIDENT EVIL flick, I tagged along, looking forward to the famously filmed-in-3D action sequences. It turned out to be an excellent example supporting the argument that, like CGI, 3D does not a great movie make (no matter what George Lucas says, or James Cameron). Not to be swayed, I tried INCEPTION in 3D, and HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON. The problem with the 3D in those films is that it was sorely underutilized; they simply hadn’t been directed or filmed with 3D in mind. This was my fear for LIFE OF PI, that I would leave feeling like I could have spent four less dollars for the same experience.

(At this point in the writing I experienced a marathon of awful, five days of flu leading up to the first week of school, followed by the inevitable two weeks of crippling January/February depression. During that period I watched a Downton Abbey in its entirety at least twice, and no reviews there, either, so in a way I’ve already broken my far from perfect record. Nevertheless, I made a promise that I would at least TRY this… resolution, so I’m going to try. I’m going to try.)

Where was I? Oh, yes, I wasn’t (as Zoe of Firefly would say) sanguine about the 3D experience in LIFE OF PI, and I was also a little worried about my friend’s reaction. Some people find that 3D films give them a headache, or (worse) vertigo, and some people’s brains just won’t accept the optical illusion, and they see the film as a blurry incoherent mess. Fortunately, in both instances my fears were wholly unfounded.

I had been told that LIFE OF PI was an exquisite film, but I didn’t really believe it. We Westerners have a tendency to gush over the beauty of a scene that is, in reality, simply exotic, sometimes highlighting this with a supersaturated palate. But LIFE OF PI was exquisite, and I saw immediately that the 3D was a big part of that. Unlike the 3Disappointments I had seen previously, the effect was used on a variety of different levels, not simply for the big action moments, but also highlighting little details that almost went unnoticed. The result was my immediate immersion into the world of the film. I can’t imagine the subtle layering of the opening credits sequence without the 3D effect. During the rainstorm sequences, I shivered and wanted to wipe droplets from my glasses. At least I wasn’t alone. When I thought to check on my friend sitting next to me, it was because I heard her squeal during one of Pi’s encounters with Richard Parker. I realized that perhaps it was unkind to take a 3D movie virgin to a film where a tiger is constantly leaping at your face.

Apart from the entertainment factor provided by my poor companion, I did greatly enjoy the movie. The shots were breathtaking, the special effects wholly believable, the acting excellent. But more than anything, it made me realize how long it has been since I read LIFE OF PI: nearly ten years. I should have reread it before seeing the movie, I thought barely a quarter of the way through. I wanted to pause the film and run home for my copy. It’s sitting on my shelf; I liked the book so much I’ve kept it through several moves. As usual, I took issue with the adaptation, but I had no way of knowing if my memory of what “really happened” in the book was accurate or not. There’s really only one solution: a reread of LIFE OF PI is in order. 

Django Unchained: First Viewing

I’m on my way back from Los Angeles, where I spent a couple of days in the first week of the new year.  Traveling so far south right after the annual Christmas/New Year’s Eve obstacle course, I completely forgot about my planned New Year’s Resolution until I was about to head back home. Sitting in the train station with my friend, talking about our plans for the coming year, conversation meandered around to music journalism, and I remembered suddenly my grand schemes to write up a review to every film I saw in 2013. At which point, I of course realized I had seen a film in Los Angeles and, while I had discussed it vigorously with my two friends, I hadn’t written down a word about it.

Way to put your best foot forward, Allegra.

So, a few days late, here are some thoughts about DJANGO UNCHAINED.

Somehow I didn’t hear anything about DJANGO until Christmas; no posters, no trailers, nothing. I wound up opting to see Les Mis on Christmas day instead, and when I got home from the holidays I had trouble at first finding someone to go with me. That kind of utraviolence is sometimes more than enough to put people off, and the film’s profligate use of racial slurs by then had been widely criticized. On top of that, my primary movie buddy had seen a trailer for DJANGO that gave the impression that the film would portray rape, or at least heavily imply it. That’s not a deal-breaker with me for films, but I’m not that interested in seeing depictions of rape on the big screen. I also haven’t seen Tarantino’s most recent offerings, being the GRINDHOUSE films and INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, so I had no way of knowing if Tarantino had become the Rape Guy while my back was turned.

Surprisingly, DJANGO UNCHAINED almost completely sidesteps the subject of rape, which is all but astonishing in a film so centered on slavery in the American South. I kept expecting it to come up, but, spoiler alert: there’s no rape in this movie. It’s barely even alluded to. However, the film more than makes up for this by going the extra mile to make the viewer uncomfortable in practically every other way possible. This film is not for the faint of heart. I guess that should go without saying, but it really bears mentioning: the violence in DJANGO is both gratuitous and casual, as is the use of racial slurs—oh, who am I kidding? The n-bomb is so ubiquitous in this film that by about halfway through, I found myself almost entirely desensitized to it. Having experienced a constant string of jarring moments throughout the film, the knowledge that that discomfort had become normalized for me lent another, more lasting discomfort that lingered throughout the rest of the viewing.

How easily the intolerable becomes everyday, how easily human beings will accept the unacceptable: this theme of the narrative was mirrored by my own experience of becoming used to the environment seeped in violence and dehumanization in the film. Just as I ultimately stopped flinching when an n-bomb dropped or some mook died in a spray of plasma, so were the slaves in the film completely resigned to their status as sub-human—with a few notable exceptions. I surely wasn’t expecting such a violent movie to have an uplifting, even hopeful, message, but that’s really the feeling I was left with: that people are capable of fighting back against a status quo that is just plain wrong, fight back and win.

After I saw this movie I couldn’t really talk about anything else for the better part of three hours, so there’s plenty more to say, about exquisite use of landscape and color, the constant gritty humor, it’s undeniable Western-ness, but it’s been too long and the details are scattered. I do want to see DJANGO again, so on the second viewing I’ll have to take the time to jot down those other thoughts. For now, this will have to do.

Thinking Great Thoughts

I've been on the road for over a week now--hard to remember, since the first day of my trip was spent in a sleep-deprived daze. I had a two-layover red-eye that got me into BDL at 11 AM last Wednesday. I spent the weekend in Boston hanging out with Berklee students and a high school buddy who now works at a corporate consulting firm, alternately, for the most part. It got me thinking a lot about college.

I never finished college. Explaining why would be long, tedious, circular, and ultimately irrelevant. It isn't a decision I regret an iota. Recently, I have been considering going back to school next fall, largely because next fall I will be 24, and thus (hopefully) eligible for more reasonable student aid. But also because I have things I want to study: music theory, bookkeeping, philosophy, anthropology. I don't have a degree in mind, which was the one mistake I made that I do regret in my going to college the first time around; I just want to learn abundantly.

My attempts to understand this burgeoning desire for schooling has led to a lot of thinking back on previous iterations of myself, their dreams, habits, and ambitions. I landed upon a memory of me at age twelve, when I discovered Joseph Campbell. I was completely inspired by his year of hermitage, locked in a cabin with thousands of books. Such isolation now would be, not impossible, exactly, but hardly desirable. The world is a much faster-paced one than Campbell had to cope with. I haven't returned to that dream for almost a decade; I more or less lost it with the cynicism of the beginning of high school.

I had many things to overcome in the intervening years. I had to face my privilege and live outside it for a time, to reject my parents completely so that I could return knowing what I appreciated about what they had to offer. I had to dismiss the loathing I had been taught for my body and my gender, not just with panicked defensiveness but with steel-cold self-assuredness. I had to care for others so much that I lost myself entirely in order to find myself again completely: Myself, Me, not an extension of anyone else, not an anonymous face in a crowd.

Now I am perhaps ready to become a thinker of great thoughts.

Introductions are in order

This morning I ran across Cara M.'s blog, quite by accident. It is a brand-new blog, raw, without a groove or a theme or a voice beyond its simple manifesto. The rough edges grated on me, but something she said, for whatever reason, really struck home: "Being an aspiring novelist and having a blog seems to be par for the course these days." And isn't that right? So here I am.

I've been trying to get back into writing for years. I say, "get back," but that's somewhat misleading; I feel like I never got into writing properly in the first place. When I was about ten I boldly scribbled out opening scenes before losing interest: a retelling of Mary Reade's story, an Oz-esque tale of a girl who gets lost down a laundry chute, things like that. These ideas never would have gone far; they were careless piles of imagination, without any finesse or research. My attention span also left something to be desired. As I matured, I wrote more, but always collaboratively, mostly in pbp RPGs online. I was too insecure to begin or complete a project of my own. I fully fell out of the habit of writing when I moved into a dorm, in high school; I think the culture shock of moving away from home combined with the sudden lack of privacy to give me a killer case of writer's block.

By the time I dropped out of college a year and a half in, I wasn't even reading anymore. I had a rough outline for a massive urban fantasy novel with four main characters, half a dozen separate races, and  more than its fair share inconsistencies and plot holes. I spent a few years trying to resurrect that story before finally shelving it. This summer, the clouds parted on a number of issues in my life, and with that came a whole new story: a new setting, new characters, and a new tone. It was simpler, more original, and on a smaller scale, the perfect combination of more promising and less ambitious. I leapt on it like a starving cat. I even did some writing longhand, something I hadn't tried since those early days of stories about pirates and fairy-land.

As summer drew to a close, I started to lose momentum; work was picking up, travel was ending, and I was sinking back into the depression that had plagued me before. Examining this trend, I realized that, for writing at least, the honey-moon was over. If I wanted this story to happen, I was going to have to do some actual work.

That meant writing again, something I hadn't done deliberately since leaving school. I'm amazed at how difficult a habit it is to return to. I've tried various tricks--morning pages, NaNoWriMo, keeping a journal--but no dice; I couldn't stick with it. Finally, it occurred to me that I might be suffering from a lack of an audience. All those tactics felt totally masturbatory, and my self-disgust fueled my much-diminished writer's block. I don't know why, since no one is going to read this blog right away, but it feels somehow different. And it must be, a little, seeing as how I just hammered out 500+ words of coherent discussion. I even managed some semblance of the 5-paragraph format I learned in school. Gods help me, I can't escape. I guess we'll see how this goes.