The Iron Claw

I've never really been that concerned. 

In The Iron Claw, the determined father employs strict uncompromising codes, to drive his children to pursue excellence and become prominent exceptional wrestlers.

They do experience a lot of success and the family becomes well-known and respected.

But the lack of compassion and blunt disappointment leads to habitual shock and dismay.

One brother, driven by high expectations, refuses to see a doctor when he becomes quite ill. He has to keep up appearances to become world champion. And unfortunately dies in his hotel room.

The 4 brothers love their father but he's a cold and stubborn man, who refuses to embrace even harmless emotions as he drives his children to become the best.

As they strive to superlatively improve they're totally reliant on his admiration, as well as each other and their mom but they seek his attention in the cloistered enclave.

But he judges seeking attention as weak which leads to genuine familial dysfunction. 

Two sons even take their own lives.

One still resiliently soldiers on.

My dad wasn't Mr. Affection but he wasn't a prick either. And he was proud of what I was doing. And let it show from time to time.

In regards to competition, I have to admit that I'm heavily influenced by Fish: The Surfboard Documentary. Within, a talented surfer loses a competition and points out that he felt awful because he lost, even though he had performed exceptionally well. He therefore stopped taking part in future competitions because they made him feel awful.

That makes a lot of sense to me and most likely millions of others.

The Iron Claw's a cool critical examination of sport.

In the end championing the human factor. 

Just gotta note if the strategy's working.

If it ain't, there's alternative options.

A Beautiful Life

A resilient fisherman makes a day-to-day living helping some friends down at the nearby docks, living on a sweet boat that his parents left him after they wound up in a tragic accident.

One of his mates likes to play music and he assists at his gigs around town, one night impressing a legendary widow with his exceptional singing and practical songwriting. 

She likes him so much that she invites him to patiently record at her in-house studio, with her daughter producing the songs, it's an incredible opportunity.

But he isn't ready at first the temperamental transition playing with his head, he still doubts his homegrown talent and trepidatiously remains hyper-critically unsure.

His songs are solid however and as he records them enthusiasm blossoms, and after the first release is met with applause self-assured belief tantalizingly manifests.

Moving from the wharf to superstardom in a couple of months still takes quite the heavy toll.

With newfound relationship responsibilities. 

Tantamount tension.

Consummate joy.

I suppose a lot of people are shy and it's difficult to prepare for mass observation, the overwhelming scrutiny of every micromovement generating controversy, buzz, and takeaway. 

I see the most ridiculous stuff in the For You news section on my cell (can someone hook me up with better articles?), it's like Malibu Stacy getting a new hat, I'm really just not that into it.

Nonetheless, I recognize that people are and that mundane trivialities build community, or through the relationships and fashionable choices of famous stars conversations matriculate.

I worry that fame can alter an otherwise innocent unique trajectory, that it's easy to filter out distractions when you aren't being meticulously criticized. 

If you can harness that tumultuous energy and use it to fuel your celebrated progression, I imagine that things would work out and that your outputs would consistently diversify. 

That's what the Beatles did anyways, they took that worldwide hysteria and responded impeccably. 

It's mind-boggling what they achieved from 1965 to 1970.

So many bands would deal with Satan for the albums Help! and Let it Be.

And for The Beatles, those aren't even the good ones.

Insanely good band.

Cool film too.

*Seriously, between 1965 and 1969 The Beatles released Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Magical Mystery Tour, The White Album (a crazy good double), and Abbey Road. With Yellow Submarine thrown in the mix too. Plus a bunch of hit singles that weren't on the LPs. It baffles the mind how anyone could have ever produced so much amazing pop in such a short period of time. I can't find anyone to compare them with. Plus their sound consistently changed throughout. How did they pull that off? They did stop touring early on. That may have played an instrumental role. 

Adventures of a Dentist

A mild-mannered unassuming young professional finds he has a gift on his nervous first day, he can pull teeth without causing pain to the delight of his anxious patients, his popularity soaring with each extracted tooth, his modesty unaware of his colleague's envy, exuberant dispatch cajoled disseminated, he does one heck of a job.

He proceeds unabashed, unerring, everyone seeking out his aid alone, but since no one wants to see the other doctors, they target his effortless skill.

When he simply works without psychological constraints he cheerfully nurtures perfection, but he's too timid to dismiss potent jealousy, and it soon effects his miraculous work.

He makes a mistake which is soon discovered and unfortunately it's rather serious, his nerve collapsing in the critical aftermath, he can no longer assist those in pain.

His family attempts to soothe him but his depression overwhelms his pride, leaving him inert, distracted, unable to advance his career.

Perhaps he should have been cloistered far away from angst and bitterness, for he can't accept that his prospects were ruined precisely because he was doing so well.

Adventures of a Dentist satirically chides the status quo while immersing competence in tragedy, to critique conformist pretensions, and age old incumbent rivalry. 

Chesnokov (Andrey Myagkov) isn't subversive, he's likely not even familiar with the concept, he just simply can't underachieve, and this threatens his professional prospects.

I'm not saying I'm particularly gifted although I think I craft a cool sentence at times, and I like some of the rhymes I come up with, but I'm not that concerned with superlatives.

I never understood wanting to be the best or manipulating circumstances to appear as if you're the best, I just understood trying to do your best as I learned from Captain Picard.

Adventures of a Dentist isn't all gloom and doom it's just absurd uncanny bizarro, as Chesnokov follows a distressed coworker attempting to appease her, for instance, and they wind up on a carousel, or his singer songwriter love interest bursts forth in song, while her father cautiously narrates.

She can impersonate any animal.

And writes with soulful prescription.

It's a shame how professional jealousies disrupt the provision of resolute service, or desires to control or be recognized disillusion blossoming talent.

You would hope that in dentistry and medicine the best possible service would be readily provided, that patients would receive the best possible care, since it's their well being that's literally paramount.

Not rank or position or influence, nor internal esoteric power struggles, but the health of manifold patients, peeps hoping to swiftly recover. 

Colette

Lavish living, routinely enjoying the most sumptuous victuals to play the role your standing traditionally authenticates, variable inspired expenses infusing a literary aura with the carefree bravado of limitless production, malleability, ceremonial constants, presumed ostentation auriferously manifesting guilds, assumed impeccability unerringly suspecting intrigue, lashed foibles pronounced yet overlooked inasmuch as they characterize, at home amidst scandal and rumour, brash confidence supposed, instinctually attuned to grasped levitational predicament, brazen yet steadfast, polished yoke adjourned.

Suddenly married.

To a partner less docile than anticipated.

Eventually comprehending her worth, her value to the Parisian imagination, she challenges her freewheeling worldly spouse, who's become dependent on her novel individualism.

Wondering if the art's progress solely by chance or accident?

It seems that many well read erudite professionals reasonably publish that which they believe will profitably sustain them, their understanding of the arts being generally more reliable than a gambler's knowledge of cards or horse racing, and by reading public tastes or those of private audiences thereby, a cultural continuum emerges within which it's possible to earn a living.

Thus Willy (Dominic West) initially dismisses Colette's (Keira Knightley) first novel, thinking it won't tastefully fit the literate French spirit as he distills it, but as bills pile up and nothing appealing conveniently presents itself, he eventually pursues its publication, and it's an immediate success.

Who knows really?

J. K. Rowling, rejected.

Proust, rejected.

You can't assume novelty and experimentation will cultivate financial freedoms without worry, perhaps there are publishing houses who can with whom I'm unfamiliar, but regardless every so often that magical narrative seductively hits the shelves and its unique unbridled perfectly fitting plots, ideas, characters, and settings, impassion stoic readers who have otherwise succumbed to the piquant yet predictable.

Colette's novels sell with the unmitigated fury of an exclamatory tempest, generating revenues most sound for her foolish spendthrift husband.

She puts up with it for quite some time before finally bidding adieu and heading out on her own.

The film critiques M. Gauthier-Villars but not too severely, preferring to dis/harmoniously celebrate the times during which they excelled together to dwelling upon their inevitable break.

How could you go that far?

Such betrayal.

For a miserly pittance.

A lively entertaining clever examination of a voice which slowly learns to independently express itself, complete with a critical yet unpretentious account of conjugal versatility, straddling the upper stratosphere, agitating deals, drafts, dogmas.

Indoctrinations.

Mischievous celebratory circumnavigation afloat.

Disenchanting yet enticing.

Love Keira Knightley's outrage.