Starcrash

Evasive creative space pirates habitually manoeuvre to outwit the law (Caroline Munro and Marjoe Gortner), until one grievous inopportune day when they suddenly find themselves sentenced to life.

Fortunately for them, a courageous ship was sent out on a vital mission, to discover whether or not a powerful weapon exists, in the far off reaches of space.

As fate would have it, they were no match for the irate destructive colossus, yet three bold innovative cruisers escaped, their whereabouts heretofore unknown.

The space pirates, imaginatively engaged in improvised spur-of-the-moment shenanigans, soon find themselves tasked by the galactic Emperor (Christopher Plummer) to voyage to locate his forlorn son (David Hasselhoff [Hasselhoff does not show up in spellcheck!]).

They respond with innate gusto and are soon soaring throughout the heavens, following clues and appealing hyperbole wherever the seductive stars collide.

As the Emperor's rival the foul and cruel ignominious usurper known as Count Zarth Arn (Joe Spinell), plots to take over the galaxy with his formidable insufferable Lava Lamp. 

When the first two ships lead nowhere our reluctant heroes digress abandoned. 

But one cast-off vessel remains. 

Harbouring symphonic destiny. 

It's all in good fun unconcerned merrymaking inconclusively driving this campy space romp, through the spirited realms of theoretical melee to the upstanding spawn of illustrious bewilder.

Strange how Lucas found a way to make Star Wars seem so much more real, than his robust and ample competition there's no doubt it was a stroke of genius. 

Still though, when it doesn't work out why not add a robot programmed down south (Hamilton Camp as the voice of Elle, Judd Hamilton as Elle), to emphatically uphold intergalactic chivalry as starstruck maidens bravely prosper.

Perhaps space isn't the lofty officious spectacle it's pretentiously thought to be, perhaps horseplay and mischievous exaggeration at times do qualify its stately grandeur.

If not how would cultural propagation consistently redefine and reconstitute, throughout mutating in/animate continuums elaborately cascading in flagrant nadir?

When superlatives fail to provide what else awaits beside kitschy inexactitude? 

Netflix etc. have so much potential.

As does the old school compelling variety. 

Hud

Three generations of a ranching family actively live together in the American mid-west, father and son at ethical odds while the observant grandson comes of age.

Gramps (Melvyn Douglas) is an honourable man who takes responsibility for his actions. When it becomes apparent that his herd of cattle might have foot and mouth disease, he doesn't try to sell them for scandalous profits. 

His son Hud (Paul Newman) on the other hand only sees an enormous loss, and would have sold the cattle to his neighbours and spread the problem across the land.

He also cavorts around town with other men's wives out in the open, and routinely gets into fights and drinks too much and has a furious temper.

Thus, two visions of America irascibly compete home on the range, one steady and trusted and true the other only seeking crass self-fulfillment. 

They're consistently at venomous odds and don't freely beat around the bush, it's plenty awkward intergenerationally so, how do you progress in such heated circumstances?

The grandson (Brandon de Wilde) isn't sure what to do both the adults offering disputatious alternatives. 

The next generation of an adventurous country caught between competing undefined dreams. 

I reckon it's generally like this from one unique epoch to the original other, integral factors and intermediary zones cultivating community while self-obsessed visions tar with the same brush.

There isn't much ambiguity here it's clear to me Hud's quite the rapscallion, and there's nothing sublime or misunderstood about his way of life, he's just a first rate self-centred jerk.

There's something to be said for community building for playing a role big or small in such construction, perhaps not requiring mandatory parades or laudatory ubiquity, but still with a general sense of collective well-being (like you find in Québec).

There are thousands of chill roles to play and many aren't that bad if you show up and work, although things can be tricky from time to time, I try to keep quiet, unless my silence offends.

In one scene from Hud grandpappy relates how the munificent cow built so much of their culture, providing material for clothes and other things while also encouraging nourishment.

I immediately thought of the millions of bison who had historically resided on the plains. 

There was a built in network of ranching way back.

What a tragedy, how things unfolded.

*Not the Broncos win on Monday night versus Buffalo. That was amazing. 🏈

You've Got Mail

Well, it looks like way back when, when giant bookstores starting taking over, an adorable romantic comedy was made to help soften the corporate blow.

I remember the old school crisis and how it effected the local markets, not that independent bookstores disappeared entirely, but I certainly don't see them as much as I used to.

I suppose I don't really know who financed You've Got Mail, but it looks like a traditional piece of propaganda, that makes for a much more pleasant hostile takeover, complete with big business male conquering small business female.

I wonder how it was received at the time.

There's no doubt it's clever.

The internet was just starting up and people were just beginning to use email. 'Twas a fledgling monumental paradigm shift in the ways in which the entire world operates. The people at You've Got Mail clearly understood this, and went about crafting a related narrative.

Which was inherently endearing. 

If not ominously inevitable. 

I do rather like Chapters/Indigo, it is a cool place to look for books, each individual store having to pass the Proust and Dickens test, before definitively delineating its classical authenticity. 

Stick a Starbucks in there.

What a brilliant idea.

A Christmas bonus to whoever thought that one up.

It was a shame to see so many independents go under though, they had character and savvy and weren't quite so freakin' imposing.

My favourite bookstore will always be the local bookshop from my youth, a cool little place where I found my first volume of Proust (after watching Little Miss Sunshine) and many other cool books over the years, the owner used to even feature photos of raccoons in winter, and even took the mayor of Hamilton to court (and won if I'm not mistaken [long before Andrea Horwath who I imagine is doing a great job])!

25 years after the release of You've Got Mail I find myself dreading another paradigm shift, where Chapters/Indigo and bookstores everywhere go out of business, and one's forced to shop online.

That's all I've been doing since the pandemic hit and I have no idea how those stores have coped. All I know is that books used to feature prominently in the mainstream narrative (see You've Got Mail or The NeverEnding Story), and I never really see them mentioned anymore.

There should be money for prestige films that might win Oscars that focus on books. Obviously, I love film. But books and music still feature heavily in my life.

Perhaps I'm just being anxious, and nothing's really wrong, but I keep hearing bad restaurant tidings, and my laundry alarm went off while I was editing this sentence. 

I worry because I don't know many people who read books.

But I never really have come to think of it (outside of University).

Good thing Dad made sure I read as a child.

That was one thing he sincerely pushed. 

Honestly, when I was really young illiteracy still existed in the mainstream mind, and learning to read was regarded as a great thing, like we really had evolved. 

Another step in the wrong direction?

Getting my COVID booster soon. 

Good Morning, Miss Dove

The age old fascination with dependability and routine, as applied to flourishing bucolic life, through tranquil age and consistency, intergenerationally sustained. 

A clever recent University graduate travels home to see her Dad, who brags about her success and dreams of lucrative dividends. 

But he suddenly passes on and she soon soon finds he's been embezzling funds, and in order to avoid shock and scandal, agrees to gradually pay back the debt.

Thus, she refuses to marry a reliable brilliant eager suitor, and takes a job teaching geography at the local primary school, where she remains throughout her life.

It's the old world stiff-upper-lip resigned to duty and objective sacrifice, without flinching or even the  consideration of much more personally enriching paths.

She doesn't entertain regret or destructive bitterness or disastrous envy, and settles into a steady job she devotedly keeps for years to come.

As time passes, many local students must deal with her requisite tests, her level-headed impartiality encouraging widespread lifelong respect.

When she unexpectedly falls ill several ex-students visit her in the hospital. 

The dedication of an honourable lifetime abounding with reticent heartfelt allegiance. 

It's nice to see that dismal alternatives aren't generally focused on in Good Morning, Miss Dove, that the rewards of service and fidelity are angelically uplifted with enchanting charm.

Also nice to see the profession of teaching narratively celebrated and highly regarded, with the advent of new technologies breaking down timeless methods of instruction.

Do people dislike their fellow citizens so much is there that much social tension promoting A.I?, I honestly doubt it would ever replace teachers, but if I'm not mistaken, others disagree.

Then again the sale of CDs and cassette tapes has greatly decreased in recent memory, I hope artists still make comparable amounts from Apple Music etc. but I'm afraid I rather doubt it.

Professional movie making has been significantly challenged by online streaming and Netflix etc as well, my new remote even came with a Netflix button, I've never seen the like for CBC or CNN.

How else did artists used to make money and encourage independent thought, oh yes books!, is the younger generation reading? It's amazing how much you can learn from reading if you just put in a little time and effort.

Has the internet taken billions away from artistic endeavour as part of a plan to promote obedience, or was it just an unfortunate byproduct skilfully envisioned by pent up grouches?

At least schools are still prominently functioning and pandemic experiments proved infertile.

Doesn't mean they won't try again.

Working on my vinyl collection. 

John Q

I'm happy that we have great health coverage in Canada and Québec, and I'm glad that everyone has access.

I'm glad my friends and family and neighbours can see a doctor or visit the hospital without having to pay out of pocket, and that the wide variety of services available continue to expand beyond limitation.

I know it's frustrating having to wait.

It would be nice if things moved more quickly.

But the services are still available and they're available across the board.

Watch Michael Moore's Sicko watch John Q check out the nightmare, awaiting the privatization of health services if there's less of an emphasis on public health.

Imagine you suddenly had to come up with over $200,000 to pay for medical bills, which the insurance plan you had paid into for your entire life wouldn't cover.

Imagine that if you couldn't come up with that money one of your loved ones would die.

Without public health this isn't a rare occurrence. 

Without universal health care it's par for the course.

Universal health care is a sign of enduring progress and practical community, a sustainable way to ensure widespread health at all times across the land.

If we can hire more doctors and invest in hospitals wait times should decrease, and more of our medical school graduates will find the jobs they've worked hard to get.

One of the big differences between private and public health care, as outlined in Maude Barlow's Too Close for Comfort, is that public health care workers put people before profits, while private health is more interested in money.

Thus, the private hospital sets a goal of profits to be earned in a specific month, and then sets about trying to earn them. If there's a shortfall come the 31st heads will roll and people will lose their jobs, hence services are cut for employment security's sake, as administrators with no medical knowledge try to save money. If they save money and produce higher profits the private board running the hospital is more impressed. Therefore, there's an impetus to be as cheap as possible while pretending to provide expert service.

In the public system people care about health and finding more efficient ways to take care of each other.

While providing access to all kinds of different specialists.

For a thriving culture.

It's a total win-win.

Person to Person

Hyper-obsessions with the omnipresent, the characteristic need to express thoughts and emotions, the honesty clarity genuinely beaming, the established difficulties perpetually stoking.

The potential scoop inertly resting within unconcerned inanimate shade, wholeheartedly uninterested in asking questions of an inconsiderate aggressive nature.

Trying to learn a new skill indubitably applicable to arts and crafts, yet unaccustomed to the invasive practices at times associated with acquiring information.

The incipient stages acrobatically wherein which versatile material may flexibly emerge, counterbalanced with awkward politesse and innate feelings of communal well-being.

The joy of life sincerely illuminating multifaceted random cause, as someone who vividly cares goes frolicking about with cheerful genuine stalwart integrity.

A scrutinizing look at urban communities interactively drawn towards communicative life, without much of a focus on automobiles or ye olde home ownership or raising a family.

The unmarried masses productively relating inhibitions cast off and merriment proclaimed, within a volatile spectrum reciprocally radiating instantaneous clash.

So much happening within the city so much free time to extract and chirp, who knows indeed what to imaginatively make of it, fun to lose yourself within the immersion.

I did have problems with observant delineations vocally defining social miscues, which unfortunately turned me into that guy even long after I had learned not to generally share them.

I eventually adapted and grew and slowly mutated into a traditional mode, but I was still prone to humorous outbursts which could at times lead to passionate scorn.

Nice to see the people in this film constructively givin' 'er nevertheless, a cool cast with creative narratives offering thoughtful insights into variable phenomena. 

Books and film and music and poetry there's ample room for a life of the mind.

It certainly never grows boring.

Especially with wildlife sightings. 

A River Runs Through It

Family first and foremost reciprocally resigned in pristine pastures, a sturdy minister and his adventurous sons tenderly taken care of by an adoring mom.

Strict but not overbearing the natural tendency to erupt in play, openly encouraged within temporal limits reasonably applied each and every day.

Fly fishing forges the backbone of glib inquisitive rural endeavours, local rivers and fields and forests ebulliently itemized in joyous caricature.

It's focused on several times and becomes something artistic if not spiritual, the youngest lad remarkably entertaining with paramount dexterous improvised brilliance. 

His older brother's somewhat more tried and true and spends six years away from home at school, learning the integral ways of literature to be creatively taught with bucolic industry.

The younger takes to the wild and emphatically learns the art of journalism, freely expressing his withering whimsy with a festive fair-hand and spry open-mind. 

But somewhat unsettled somewhat borderline reckless he pursues risk-fuelled gambling and drink beyond reason. 

Yet still never arrives late for fishing.

And always puts on quite a show. 

Narrated with old world omniscience as if oracled fate was clairvoyantly hewn, exciting moments and tragic expenditures objectively passing with sagacious sentiment.

I remembered so many exuberant hours curiously exploring throughout my youth, as I watched those rambunctious lads engage in resolute countryside quorums. 

Such a shame when disciplinary regulations counterintuitively produce wanton interludes, the legionary impetus of the pervasive patterns alternatively encouraging adventitious catalogues.

Such a shame when a lack of order counterintuitively begets despotism, through the unfortunate contemptuous dismissal of laidback chillin' and relaxed intuition.

What a consistent pain applying reason and logic to find realistic solutions.

Sport always seems to fend off carnage.

The arts unfortunately lacking commensurate mass appeal. 

Venom 2

I was going to forget about Halloween this year when I found myself looking for something to watch on Netflix. Old Dads didn't make the cut so I kept searching till I found Venom 2, which I had missed because of the pandemic. I didn't even clue into the fact that it's a monster movie until after I'd chosen it and settled in. Thus, even when I'm not seeking out Halloween films, they find me, this one's perfectly suited to the times.

When I imagine ye olde Odd Couple films I usually think of Walther Matthau and Jack Lemmon. Their cantankerous übergrumpy disputes were fun to watch in my observant youth.

But it was a different time, without the impressive rise of realistic special effects, when the master narrative still heavily relied on bourgeois scenarios and corresponding efficiencies. 

I figure that's why Star Wars: Episode IV was so overwhelmingly popular, not only was it a cool film to watch, but it was also the first science-fiction film to have realistic special effects.

I love the old '50s and '60s sci-fi due to its imaginative pioneering impetus, and there's no doubt the historical value's significant not to mention the resplendent kitsch factor.

But the special effects are pretty incredible these days with Star Wars having started it all, thus it's no wonder the old school Odd Couple paradigm now plays out with a journalist and a monster.

As times have habitually mutated and resonant tastes transformed and diversified, one member of the couple remains potentially stable, while the other is an overly ambitious carnivorous alien.

They routinely argue about many things as time quotidianly passes, both of them seeking lofty admiration for goals achieved and services rendered. 

Feelings are hurt and grievances aired as their mutually accommodating relationship briefly ends, and Venom heads off into the great unknown and even makes a brilliant showing at a local night club.

But this is Halloween of course and what would it be without psychotic love?, or a pair of lifelong criminals hoping to wed after they break out of prison.

With a chaotic wedding in tow Venom 2 is transported into the comedic realm, which accentuates the brandished horror, and makes for quite the mindf*&*#.

Not exactly what I remember from the grouchy Odd Couple or even Midnight Run.

But certainly a clever twist on a belovéd theme.

Perfect for any Halloween scenario.

*I didn't really like how special effects were used to alter the actor's appearances. Isn't it a slippery slope to using special effects to replace actors entirely? 😠 

Hustle

Hustle does a great job of pointing out how much solid work goes into crafting a professional sports team, just by focusing primarily on one gifted scout (Adam Sandler as Stanley Sugarman) who runs into problems when the owner's son takes over (Ben Foster as Vince Merrick). 

It's like a 24/7 job it's rare he ever stops concentrating on basketball, he consistently sacrifices so much for the team without much complaint or sharp contradiction.

He has an amazing job and gets to spend his time doing something he loves, and can concretely see his emphatic results each time a player he's chosen makes a cool play.

I saw him like a representative for what generally goes on behind the scenes in professional sports, for the tens of thousands of people diligently working to put a dynamic team together.

Even when that team isn't playing well the wheels are still in perpetual motion, making deals and calls and observations hopefully leading to that next championship.

When you think about how many thousands of people are habitually competing to build the next champion, it does seem like the odds against anyone ever winning are so astronomically high that victory's miraculous.

And then if you see your outstanding favourites lose the Super Bowl three times in your curious youth, and then come back to pick up back to back wins less than ten years later, with the same quarterback, you can't help but be thankful to the organization.

If you do actually win the championship it objectively validates every decision made that season, you can take a break and sit back and bask in heralded pseudo-divine contemplation.

Each step of the way not just the winner it's still better to get there than not make it at all, it's like every organization is fighting for each inch of ground at all times and never even considering coming up short.

At least that's what characters like Stanley make me think with their healthy attitudes that keep things focused, with some jobs you have to continuously adapt at any given time with inquisitive reflexes.

That was amazing when the Raptors won I never thought I'd see that happen.

I was pissed Dad didn't get to see the Leafs win again before he passed.

But honestly, he loved basketball so much more.

I'm so happy he got to see that.

Hustle's worth checking out.

King Richard

Sheer uncompromising confidence proactively proceeds with undaunted integrity, as a father is so sure his daughters are peerless, he ignores countless established conventions as they train.

The best in the business lay it down to haplessly explain the traditional course, if you want to excel in the world of tennis, you play what are called "juniors" to prepare for the pros.

They're a series of tournaments for tenacious young players who want to improve their skills through competition, and it's through their heuristic happenstance professional aptitude efficiently emerges.

But Mr. Williams thought differently it's really remarkable what he did, he found the junior circuit so demanding and overbearing that he decided to take his girls out of it.

He was so certain that they could turn pro without competing throughout their youth, he drove some of the most knowledgeable coaches nuts as he consistently refuted their industrious know-how.

I applaud his sublime logic, he wanted his girls to have a childhood and do well in school, he didn't want them to only have tennis to look back on by the time they retired should they turn pro.

Imagine ignoring so many tried and true methods while hoping to do something even the best find next to impossible.

And have everything work out.

Your unprecedented courage rewarded.

It's like a real-life Disney film where inherent miracles nurture impeccability, where a family's guts and raw determination overcome incredible odds to become the world's best.

A parenting team aware of their potential prowess never taking no for a definitive answer, even when dozens of people tell them it's simply impossible and constantly dismiss them with words of wisdom.

So devoted to their family so aware of their unmatched talent, they persevere above and beyond even the most daring unorthodox methods.

But at the same time they want their kids to have a childhood they can pleasantly remember, one where they still chilled out and did fun things while still training to redefine the superlative.

I have to admit, I like these parenting methods, they're very holistic and reasonably balanced.

And Venus and Serena Williams did go on to become the best in the world.

This story's outstanding.

The American dream. 

*Not to mention an Oscar for Will Smith!

Kaamelott: First Installment

Nice to see a familiar style of comedy still observantly elucidating, to the tune of ancient legend emphatically deconstructed in recalcitrant sheath.

Thus, extended less devout commentaries can be expediently relied upon, as the temptation to laze about disarmingly overwhelms protocolian spirits.

Indeed, should a situation arise inherently imploring trust thereupon, debate regarding the utility of action may argumentatively delay courageous concourse.

Was there ever ebulliently a time when innate fidelity preponderantly prospered, and allegiance shone forth across the land with impeccable practical superstitious brilliance?

Or were old school lands aggrieved equanimously equipped with parallel suspicions, and whole-heartedly abreast of postmodern cheek illustriously composed through disputation?

Would the rarefied pretensions of the day have taken note in their limited volumes, of imparticular ineptitude, or would their vellum have harmonized rhapsodic?

Still, within ye olde Kaamelott: First Installment heroic endeavour doth vouchsafe akin, as Arthur (Alexandre Astier) pulls the sword from the stone and lackadaisically assumes regal volatility.

Sensing little effort need be applied to potentially reap heraldic fortunes, other nobles ceremoniously sign-up for the sublime cause sans hesitation. 

Alas, it is nice to see a less shocking and violent mass-marketed comedy, which doesn't rely on racism or cruelty as you sometimes find in this day and age. 

If that's the evolution of comedy is it not regenerating a decadent phase, to be followed by meaningless emptiness so the old theory historically goes?

For so many centuries much brighter comedians have encouraged laughter without bigoted reckoning.

Without bellicose mean-spirits.

Manifest pejorative prosperity. 

Kaamelott has faith in its strengths and doesn't stoop to bombastic prejudice, doesn't infuriatingly apply blunt and crude generalized cultural dissonance. 

In the age of legend it industriously competes with magnanimous superheroes, to provide a thoughtful supplement should the master narrative prove overwhelming.

Asking the age old question, lead through trial and error or ornate pageantry?

They find an intermediate compromise.

Composed so long ago. 

BigBug

Dystopian yet familiar realities lugubriously haunt Jean-Pierre Jeunet's BigBug, as a future wherein which AI predominates officiously contends with the bourgeoisie.

I suppose there's the theory that what's presented on television or in film will be regarded as fact, or at least find an adoring audience, and that audience will proceed to advertise.

Thus, if the irate right was slowly replaced by cantankerous A.I, due to the bipolar resonance of the popular matrix unobservant citizens unconsciously consume, and the bizarro ways in which so many people trust disingenuous initiatives designed to cheat them, a manifest sadomasochistic uniformity could one day emerge and in the darkness bind them. 

Within BigBug, one of two major political parties has been replaced by octogenarian robots, who have slowly used advanced cybernetics to brutally suffocate a robust culture.

The bourgeoisie still attempts to flourish within the mechanized meticulous structure, having adapted to the ubiquitous rules and incumbent authoritarian connectivity. 

Additional robots not associated with politics worry they're becoming obsolete, and genuinely confer to find a way to consistently maintain their resolute use-value.

Thus, both The Terminator and ye olde Data find themselves concretely represented within, a potential future embraced through comedic horror alternatively critiquing cold-hearted lockdowns. 

Artists are lampooned and books are burned, it's like a blasé happy-go-lucky thrill ride through prognostic annihilation. 

Could reality television take on such extremes is it already that bad I never really got into it (I was planting trees in the forests of Northern Canada when Survivor came out), I've never been able to just watch people interact on television, I prefer old school creative storytelling and mockumentaries.

The ruthless sadist who seeks to control every aspect of postmodern life, with duplicitous totalitarian reckoning, is still sincerely critiqued within.

As are cultures that would turn their institutions over to robots to become more efficient, the human factor obliviously overlooked in the superlative practices, grandstanding bravado.

In an obtuse condescending way BigBug reminds its audience of the value of criticism, and that critical strategies should be taught in school to hold back the onslaught of pervasive credulity.

Robot politicians? Robot police? It doesn't have to happen, it's not inevitable.

Prefer the old school humanistic methodologies.

Round the campfire.

Settlin' in. 

The Dive

As two sisters congenially scuba-dive, turmoil and calamity audaciously challenge, one suddenly stuck beneath falling rocks, her air rapidly decreasing.

She's the bossier of the two who's grown gloomier as time has passed, the grim embrace of counterproductive cynicism having obscured life's lighthearted wonders.

Her sister is much less suspicious and still enjoys things like family and friends, and getting together for adventurous undertakings as the seasons change and interconnections fluctuate. 

She wants to chill with her older sis who over the years has grown distant and cold, too independent and radically dismissive, she can't comprehend the awkward tension.

It's as if May (Louisa Krause) has became an authoritarian who seeks to accomplish every task on her own, with no time for consultations or delegating, the strict lonely embrace of absolute disparity.

But when she finds herself trapped beneath the sea with no one to rely upon but a carefree worker, she finds she must once again enter the productive free world and engage in mutually beneficial dialogues.

Relaxation is key as the terrifying nature of their circumstances sets in, likelihood and probability hauntingly destabilizing hopeful psychologies at the desperate outset.

But as necessity is the mother of invention plucky Drew (Sophie Lowe) proves rather industrious, rapidly doing everything she can to facilitate a working solution.

Thus faced with overwhelming odds recklessly existing outside her comfort zone, the worker demonstrates intuitive dexterity and discovers essential requirements.

Not without the incumbent trial and error which accompanies improvised decision making, the perilous predicament begetting haste which in turn at times leads to computational dysfunction. 

Like Saint-Loup's admiration for the bakers and plumbers and other workers who heroically distinguished themselves in World War I (In Search of Lost Time), actions cut through class prejudice, her inspired dedicated resolute resiliency electrifying the pretentious/carefree dialectic.

But after her trials she's left unconscious due to the logistics of rapid ascent, management forced to react reciprocally to save the life of its valiant stalwart.

Not enough time expires in the end to know if the deconstructed cynicism held, and lighthearted takes on animate sweet nothings once again resurfaced with literal composure.

Erlenwein does a lot with The Dive and keeps things tense throughout. 

If you're thinking the plot doesn't have much to go on.

You may be pleasantly surprised. 

Wavelength

An artist facing the void seeks reanimate resuscitation, and discovers a curious lass seeking to hold back observant recon.

The two enjoy spirited fledgling manoeuvres while invoking inquisitive complimentary frolic, before an eerie mystery bewilderingly emerges which leads to experimental enthused investigation.

Voices-in-trouble are being transmitted telepathically from a secret location, the sleuthing of which leads to uncouth jail-time at the hands of the unamused military.

Who have encountered an alien craft and clandestinely moved its survivors accordingly, unable to communicate with the touristic humanoids who've been placed in pandemic style lockdown.

It becomes apparent that whoever contacts them soon suffers biological entropy, their bodies radiating inhospitibility, although they are able to cure corresponding ailments.

The couple desperately seeks their freedom just as the operation is sternly locked down.

But not without having provided emancipatory leeway.

For those involved to romantically break free.

It's classic low-budget sci-fi complete with narration and a romantic hermit, the hidden base in Los Angeles no less, having striven for ironic concealment. 

Perhaps the less prominent filmmakers were indirectly drawing attention, to a movie-making militaristic plot to control hearts and minds through mass produced film.

What percentage indeed of the various budgets of the diverse film companies a' reckoning over yonder, are factually spent on valourizing conflict with sincere hardboiled exceeding lament?

The novel imaginative aliens therefore generate unheralded song, the orthodox clique ensuring rehabilitation with no choice but to dynastically schism. 

Alas look to the ingenious French and other robust agile continental visionaries, who celebrate the diversity of their tribes with harmonious distinct eclectic inclusion.

Continuing to accelerate and zag they seek cultivation of genius as well, to salute nothing universally in particular, at times without resolute agenda.

The telepathic artists within ye olde Wavelength help the aliens escape beyond categorical compunction.

Hewn so long ago.

Manifold viewpoints, multilateral trajectories. 

Babysitter

If you're conservatively religious or not into gender-bending, I don't recommend this film. 

Even if it's one of the best films I've ever seen.

Too much inhibition and a freeform embrace of reckless honest indiscretion, lead to sociopolitical complications after a rowdy husband kisses a reporter.

The news spreads swiftly far and wide and reputation and occupation are soon jeopardized, the foolish manifestation of an adolescent prank thoroughly enveloped in critical ubiquity. 

He attempts to make amends by writing a book to wholeheartedly apologize, but still fails to understand the issue with passionate sincere conscious remorse. 

I don't know if it's supposed to be funny as he haplessly attempts to make things right, and struggles to understand what he's done wrong through the sudden immersion in advanced semantics.

Brilliant director Monia Chokri seems to be humorously illustrating the enormous gulf, between the rambunctious contemporary caveman and new developments in feminist theory.

His well-meaning brother makes things even worse as his good intentions are led astray, by improvised overwhelming waking dreams wherein which he reifies chivalric reconnaissance. 

Unfortunately, he's been somewhat unsuccessful regarding his relations with sustained pair-bonding, and his lack of traditional mutually concordant harmonies have transformed his hypotheses into nightmares.

They hire a babysitter to take care of the child while coming to terms with the media sensation. 

The wife so jaded every practical utterance suggestively radiating bitter irony.

It may be the most hilarious film I've ever seen made on Québecois soil, I haven't laughed this hard since I was a child, the intricate detail indubitably mesmerizing.

It's like every second was delicately crafted by a supportive team each sharing their gifts, a perfect synthesis of dialogue and sound productively edited with astounding precision. 

It's not just that she's taking on Xavier Dolan this film is better than so much of Godard and Truffaut, an incredible mélange of domestic politics internationally applicable to worldwide genius.

It made me think of ye olde Sedmikrásky (Daisies) or Le Tigre or Masseduction or Antisocialites, like an immaculate conglomerate of essences multilaterally matriculated matronly maelströms.

Sad the materialistic lack of voluble longlasting progressive initiatives, frustrating to see the march of history beguilingly devastating incumbent resonance. 

Perhaps a costume is appropriate something out of the ordinary beyond infatuation, dressing up and solemnizing oblivion like thoughtful exercise for terminal distress.

Babysitter still makes a play to significantly change the masculine world.

They say fortune favours the bold.

Who's bold enough for this masterpiece?

Viking

Hypotheses deemed reasonable fluidly facilitate relational replication, as a team is readily assembled which closely matches one sent to Mars.

As the astronauts were being chosen they had to pass a psychological test, during which they could freely respond to a variety of random potentially standardized questions.

Due to the length of the voyage, mission control thought it might be prudent, to duplicate their isolated conditions and place hearty surrogates within similar circumstances.

These volunteers have to take the same psych-evaluations and should their responses match those from a trooper, they'll be given the chance to function as their facsimile on a secluded base back home.

Hence, as drama and challenge coherently test the bona fide in space, their echoes residing on Earth produce the same social situations and generate theories.

Should their Earthen bound drama produce results considered highly applicable, the astronauts themselves can follow their advice and adapt their strategies in focused concordance. 

But what should happen if things become boring or resolute tensions claustrophobically arise?

And are they the only active team, currently reimagining solar schematics?

Imagine NASA with a hundredth the budget still valiantly spearheading courageous initiatives, and as they attempt to recruit concrete fascination, wind up with aggrieved personality (so 21st century).

Thus the mission occasionally lacks prominence in the hearts and minds of the locked-down duplicates, and rather than concentrating on the historical import, nitpicking irregularities steadfastly taunt them (😌).

In terms of a dry lackadaisical critique of bureaucratic function and hands-on theory, Stéphane Lafleur's tremendous Viking industriously lampoons think tanks and committees. 

The results of their disputatious endeavours as preponderantly quizzical as they are performative, needless to say issues endemically complicate throughout the bewildered parallel missions.

Of course space travel and space bureaucracy spiritedly functioning on a shoe string budget, may encounter resonant difficulties as binding conclusions hatch and spawn.

As for the comedic expenditure, the genuine inanity etherealizes throughout, with a structured lack of determinate goals sincerely generating realistic implosion.

Much more clever than relying on a monster to suddenly instigate space shenanigans. 

Keeping the mission in mind.

Great companion for Babysitter.

Au revoir le bonheur (Goodbye Happiness)

What to make of this film.

It concerns a well-to-do family whose father unfortunately passes, leaving his 4 sons to squabble in grief at their cherished home on the Magdalen Islands (which I'd like to visit). 

They own a rather large business which one of them manages somewhat ruthlessly, and even though they earn plenty of scrilla, he's still tightfisted regarding start-ups.

Another brother is a talented artist as regards brilliant culinary manifestation, yet he's somewhat hopeless in tune with everything else to do with commercial affairs.

I suppose it's a heartfelt look at a grieving disputatious family, but it has elements I just can't let slide, I'm not really that familiar with relationships or dating, but I believe Au revoir le bonheur (Goodbye Happiness) goes way over the top.

I don't think having children with 4 separate women all of whom were left for one reason or another (who all still secretly love him), while not paying child support even though your family's loaded, and eventually impregnating a 5th much younger girl by the end of the film, is a humorous subject, that goes way too far.

It's the kind of idea that occurs to you and you dismiss for being far too insensitive (there's a dark side to creativity), I'm not sure how this film was received in Québec, but it seems to have overlooked La révolution tranquille. 

I'm not exactly in touch with prevalent trends and cultural narratives (although I love wildlife and football), but this may be the most tone deaf film that's ever been presented as a merry bellwether. 

In the 1950s, or long ago when westerns dominated the market, in film and television and novel alike, perhaps Au revoir le bonheur would have been well-received.

When men and only men decided everything and the patriarchy adjudicated with irate prejudice. 

I know there are other things happening in the film, but trying to create a loveable endearing cad with absolutely no awareness of consequence or responsibility (even if such things are annoying), even after it's happened twice, three times, four times, who can't even remember his children's names and loses track of them when he's in charge, is a blind horrendous nauseous infantilism that isn't even fit for the worst trash comedy.

I liked Starbuck like many others but that wasn't nearly as definitively offensive. 

It's presented like a Disney movie with challenges and endemic daring.

I like a lot of oddball stuff.

Assuming there's still conscious sympathy. 

*The pandemic's produced worse. 

Arsenault & Fils (Arsenault & Sons)

The patriarchy's up to its old tricks again, this time in Rafaël Ouellet's Arsenault & Fils, wherein which a family of ruthless poachers is thoroughly and counterintuitively whitewashed.

Think of all the families who play by the rules to maintain healthy animal populations. The Arsenault's poach so much that sometimes nothing's left for their neighbours during hunting season. A lot of woodland people can save heavily on their winter grocery bills if they're able to harvest a deer or moose from such a population. But if some rogue family of jackasses shoots everything in the nearby forest (while claiming kinship with nature) including curious bears there's nothing left for thrifty locals to catch. The Arsenault's don't even keep the meat for themselves or distribute it to their community.

They sell it to far off restaurants. 

And when the heat's on they dump it in the forest.

It's basic math, well-meaning bright people have created a system to manage the hunt, and ensure it continues for generation after generation, just as long as you don't fucking kill everything.

As the saying goes, one family poaching for scraps is negligible.

5 million poachers will destroy a forest.

Look at Britain.

What a catastrophe. 

Although a lot of people are bringin' it back.

When we aren't supposed to be falling for the loveable family that's trying to change, while killing innocent bears and moose with high-tech weapons outside of hunting season!, a beautiful lass infiltrates the unit with hopes of bringing them down.

Undercover and at one time conscious of the adorable 4-legged residents of the forest, she witnesses several transgressions and compiles enough evidence to put them away.

But it's classic patriarchy.

In the short amount of time she's spent chillin' with the family, she's unconsciously fallen for them, especially the one who cares little for his appearance (the true patriarch needn't do anything to attract devoted beautiful mates), and she even cares for his nutjob brother.

Worried that they'll die in a confrontation with the cops, she blows her cover and ruins everything.

The writers suggesting she couldn't overcome.

Her natural dependence on lawless men.

I was so angry while watching the production team try to cultivate sympathy for such a way of life, that I thought committing myself to the animal protection squad may just be a great way to live.

I have lots of ideas like that though and I don't know if I'm ruthless enough for the job.

It'd be nice to save animal lives though.

Wish the UN paid more attention.  

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3

Geez Louise.

The spirit of the '90s lives on.

It hasn't been replaced by some mad bigoted dysfunctional totalitarian complex.

Writers and directors still seeking a reasonable balance amongst the levels harmoniously sustained with heartfelt respect.

Racist discrimination isn't dominating.

Neither is elitist pretension. 

In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, posthaste, which holds a coveted place within the mass market, and is theoretically quite influential in terms of meaningful intergalactic liberty.

Within an ingenious megalomaniac seeks to reinvent ye olde planet Earth, with genetically modified animals, but the results are not utopian (Chukwudi Iwuji as The High Evolutionary). 

He's such a piece of shit that he doesn't try to fix the ailing society he's created, instead since it isn't ideal, he decides to utterly annihilate it.

He can't accept that the creation of a world has too many variables to cohesively caress, and that manifold multivariable mutations naturally challenge strategic planning.

You can't just destroy tens of thousands of lives if your perfect world lacks ornate distinction, that's tens of thousands of murders on your hands, if you create life, it happens to be living.

That's what he does though, that motherfucker, the Guardians fighting him along the way, while offering glimpses into Rocket's (Bradley Cooper) past, the Evolutionary's most gifted creation.

A ship is self-destructing, everyone must flee and move quickly to avoid oblivion, a voice shouts out to save the higher lifeforms at which point I thought elitism had won the day.

But an alternative voice rich with multilateral concordance soulfully contradicts it with compassionate equipoise. 

And the animals locked down upon the vessel are also freed and led to safety.

In the end, there's an awesome party which looks like it must have been fun to attend, different species from different walks of life exchanging observations and jokes and memories.

We were taught long ago way back when to value life in all its form, and not to condescendingly judge those whose grades lacked brilliant correspondence. 

Not to let them run the show but certainly to give them a salient voice, not everyone fluent in microbiology, but generally aware of ways and means.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 cherishes life and celebrates community, regardless of I.Q or test scores, or biological resiliency.

In a wild unpredictable way that isn't preachy or overwrought.

I may have to pick up a copy.

Along with Avatar: The Way of Water.

🦝🐘🐻🦏🦛🦑🐄

Jules au pays d'Asha (Adventures in the Land of Asha)

It's a shame there has to be so much conflict as different groups try to inhabit the same space, mad insensitive aggrieved prejudice spoiling what could have been mutually beneficial otherwise.

Latent curiosity and shapeshifting definition steering clear of volatile absolutes, can lead to less authoritarian conviction as so many others have noted.

Less authoritarian conviction leads to less violent prescription as possibility proves multivalent and choice radiates concurrently. 

Thus, to be curious about secular orders and different faiths leads to fascination, through noteworthy respectful chronicles inquisitively investigating difference.

It's fun to imagine the divine touch illuminating each distinctive viewpoint, through natural immaterial observances characterizing piece of mind.

The traditions can be appealing as they provide industrious links, stretching thousands of years into the past, direct connections to extant history.

Applicability to cultural mutations and newfound initiatives scientifically spearheaded, perhaps lead to doctrinal adjustments which celebrate difference and transformation.

You wonder why books stopped being added to sacred texts as if the ancient world had monopolized spirituality, suspicious how divine inspiration has been sharply dismissed forever after since then.

Scientific observations of the heating planet do rationally suggest, that sustainable stewardship of global environments will lead to a less disastrous future.

Perhaps thousands of years ago when technology was rather primitive, and the wild was still imposing and seemed like a limitless potent hostility, the desire to cultivate and criticize it predominantly spread across the land, especially noting habitual plagues and many frustrating incurable ailments, nature must have seemed at times quite daunting to ancient researchers. 

Yet there were also thousands of years when people around the world lived harmoniously with nature, and reciprocal symbiosis drove renewable extents!

I suppose if the fossil fuel age comes to a sudden end and no alternative technologies emerge to replace it, the likelihood of an embrace of nature will be nautically necessitated. 

Perhaps with adaptations and a much less wild and reckless impetus, the loss of such a multidimensional society enough to humble even the most self-serving autocrat.

Back to travelling by boat, ye olde steam engines, bikes, and blacksmiths. 

Things are so expensive in Canada and Québec nowadays it's not like there's much opportunity to travel interprovincially anyways.

Cool film.

*It's not just groceries. Let's look at gas that hasn't gone back down to pre-pandemic levels either. 

Blackberry

Don't really know what to make of this film.

I know it was awesome when blackberries were huge and a Canadian company was performing exceptionally well internationally. I know we excel with minerals and potash and maple syrup and wheat, but a huge tech sensation, that was something new for me (more so than the Canadarm). 

I imagine there are thousands of new innovations being made in Canada every year by crafty individuals, blackberry just generated more media attention, and took on companies like Apple.

Could you have had the iPhone without Research in Motion?

Probably. I imagine someone would have invented something similar around the same time regardless, but trying to make something even more impressive than the Blackberry may have driven dynamic creative iPhone progenitors.

The film closely follows the paths of RIM's ambitious CEOs, Mike Lazaridis (Jay Baruchel) who spearheaded the design, and Jim Balsillie (Glenn Howerton) who was able to market it.

As their prominence grows they both become consumed by power, Lazaridis losing his relatable cool (and cancelling Movie Night!), Mr. Balsillie transforming into a megalomaniac. 

The co-founder who questioned Balsillie's methods gets away with a lucrative sum (Matt Johnson [who also directed] as Doug), and he's right, when you're working insane hours it's things like Taco Tuesday or Movie Night that make the job worthwhile. I don't know how many books and articles have to be written about the subject, it's pizza and jazz that make jobs fun.

And they make you want to work harder, make me want to work harder anyways, it's like working in Montréal, you work super hard during the day to build up the economy, and then prosper after hours with the amazing night life.

I liked how Blackberry the film suggests that sending RIM's manufacturing jobs to China ruined the company. I don't know if that's just something that made the truth based story more coherent, but the more jobs we keep in Canada and Québec the better.

I've heard about companies wanting to set up shop in Canada and Québec precisely because our population's so educated. With mass education you create a bright people that can handle complex tasks and intricate interactions.

Were Balsillie and Lazaridis that brutal, did all power corrupt, perhaps, who am I to say?, the pressures they were under as presented in the film were extraordinary, but that's no excuse for alienating and abandoning your workforce.

I don't like how the film seems to be severely critiquing the company and poking fun about how they're not around anymore, however (I love the CBC, but blackberries didn't have government funding).

I've heard it's 10 times harder to live the American dream in Canada.

For a short time period, RIM made it happen.

Wish Blackberry was still around. Those were cool times.

The more jobs kept in Canada and Québec the better!  

*Heard they had AC/DC at their Christmas party one year. I don't know if that's true. But imagine that. AC/DC at a private party in Kitchener/Waterloo. I wouldn't have believed that could happen in the 1980s. 

Drinkwater

Note: I know they're fun to make fun of, but teachers have an incredibly difficult job.

They may have some time off in the summer, at Christmas, and during Spring Break, but the rest of their time is spent locked-down in a 24/7 hyper-panopticon, where they're under a communal microscope imposed by students, parents, and co-workers alike (having exponentially expanded with social media).

Most jobs have supervisors who monitor your performance, and fellow workers might say something if you have no excuse for having a really bad day, but the scrutiny teachers have to deal with is extreme, and criticisms can be difficult to shake off if ubiquitously intensified.

Not only do you have to show up and work from around 8:30am to 4, after work and on weekends you have to prepare your classes and grade tests and assignments.

All while simultaneously trying in many cases to raise a family and hold a marriage together.

In any given class, you have a variety of learners chillin' out with the A, B, and C's, you can't teach a lesson that's crazy hard, you don't want to make things ridiculously easy, and no matter what you do no matter how skilfully you level the playing field, some people will earnestly complain, but extra work for ambitious students, and compassion for those who have to take things they don't excel at in high school, can go a long instructive way, and is somewhat of an art that takes time to develop.

You also have to be A+ and recognize that you're a role model each and every day, even when you're sick or fatigued, it's an incredibly difficult job.

Easier for extroverts I imagine but not by that much.

If you're raising kids and don't teach I imagine having just one is demanding.

Some teachers are responsible for over 150 (not including their own families).

The gym coach (Alex Zahara as Mr. Babcock) in Drinkwater is presented fairly as he tries to reason with exuberant teens, but the only African American character in the film isn't, when you have limited black characters and you treat them that way, it's racist.

The main character isn't even that appealing, still around three-quarters of the way into the film I wasn't cheering for him, he finally gets it near the end and things improve, but couldn't he have had more amusing uncanny idiosyncrasies?

Sigh.

When the film isn't catering to what the production team assumes is a stock-jock scientific sympathetic market (smart writers dumbing it down by having nerdy characters obsess about beautiful women [for so much of the film]), there are moments of enticing brilliance, especially the credits, and they could make a classic film the next time out if the in-depth contemplations were the main focus of the narrative.

I imagine classic rock staples aren't that expensive to pick up for soundtracks anymore (Drinkwater plays a ton). I freakin' love classic rock and I know it still flourishes outside of Canadian cities (I don't know about the Québecois countryside). Still, there are a lot of cool contemporary Canadian and Québecois musicians as well. The Sheepdogs for instance. 

Is contemporary Canadian and Québecois music that expensive?

*Cool shout out for Penticton, B.C, anyways.

Avatar: The Way of Water

When Avatar: The Way of Water began I was initially confused.

It looked like it was going to focus primarily on revenge and reconstruct the devastating antagonisms that dominated the first film.

Of course these films are cinematic endeavours not nature documentaries, and I have to remind myself to concentrate on the difference at times to avoid sounding even more antiquated.

I was hoping the second film would expand the world presented in the original nevertheless (I didn't know anything about this film going in), and provide more insights into Pandora itself, and I was happy to see that that's what happened, as Jake (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) and their family go into hiding.

They hide amongst people of the water or a tribe as knowledgeable of the sea as they are of the forest (the Metkayina), just writing that reminds me of how cool these films are, and how amazing it is that blockbusters are genuinely championing nature (I swear there's a dialogue here between Avatar and Ghibli, Kaze no tani no Naushika (Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind) anyways[wish I could write that essay]).

The water people are super intense and highly critical and dismissive of those who don't know their ways, the gauntlet immediate and challenging and demanding as the new recruits adjust to their newfound codes.

The Way of Water may not be a nature documentary but it does excel as it examines tulkan and human relations, the tulkan closely resembling whales back home, I couldn't make it to Tadoussac again this summer, this film went a long ways to compensate. 

It primarily concerns a rogue tulkan who made the forbidden decision to fight back against his hunters, his kind absolutely devoted to peace and unconditionally opposed to taking a life.

Extreme hardship drove him to fight back however and members of his pod were killed in the battle, he survived but was banished forthwith for having fought back against his oppressors. 

He forms a tight bond with Jake and Neytiri's son Lo'ak (Britain Dalton) who also has trouble following rules, and who brings his case to the Metkayina who are none too fond of the outcast.

Later in the film, it's like the coolest moment ever presented in blockbuster cinema, Payakan (the outcast tulkan) joins the concluding battle between the inhabitants of Pandora and the colonizers, and makes a definitive impact.

It isn't over in 30 seconds either, it keeps going and going and going. Scene after scene of nature fighting back. So much thought, time, and care sincerely went into it.

I tell people that the best possible world would be one where there is no war and violence (what people were fighting for for most of my life before Trump), where our social structures are so cohesive that someone like Putin would never arise.

But Hitler's rise in the 1930s makes me worry about such possibilities, i.e, if someone like that does arise and no country has an army to fight them, they could effectively blitzkrieg most of Europe, and leave civilization in bitter ruins.

Thus, I advocate for the creation of potent defensive armies and their continual existence in case of such a development, Putin having proven their unfortunate need, to be kept out of the hands of bloodthirsty tyrants.

Democracy prevailed for many a decade and kept the despotic autocrats at bay.

The rise of the internet has seen them prosper again nonetheless.

These are difficult times.

I suppose that without a defensive army you could wager assimilation might eventually win back your country, like the Chinese used to do with the Mongols (Sinicization), although it takes a lot of frustration and generations to possibly work, and, imagine having to listen to those people for generations (not the Chinese, the fascist colonizers).

Geez Louise, this became far too heavy, note that I really loved Avatar: The Way of Water.

It's a really cool universe and I'm glad it's popular.

Can't wait for my next whale watching excursion. 

*It would be cool to see an Avatar film that was focused primarily on the different interrelations between the inhabitants of Pandora, like an Olympics or something, with less of a focus on colonization. 😎

John Wick: Chapter 4

The world constantly mutating as unforeseen predicaments arise and challenge, the longed for permanent uniform consistency only a computational strategic plan away.

The sure and steady undeniably preferable to intermittent chaos and flagrant eruption, if you value life and inherent stability replete with potential and equal opportunity.

Should the sure and steady contain a flexible matrix designed to multidimensionally incorporate, manifold intricate wide-ranging disciplines, civil society may indeed emerge.

Should there be stimulating opportunities to earn a disposable income and freely spend it, the intense longing for the unattainable will surely fade into jealous oblivion. 

It's difficult to say where things are headed with the rise of the autocrats and the pandemic having changed things, attempts to re-establish a steady routine fraught with haunting manufactured doubts.

Nevertheless, unhinged contemplation remains emancipated within film and books, the freeform embrace of uncanny narrative hopefully still resolute and daunting.

I suppose in my mind there's a distinction between artistic independence and the political, whereas a book that revels in unorthodox imagination doesn't risk economic turmoil.

When I champion alternatives and divergent ways and means of doing things, I'm generally referring to the artistic world where innate novelty exhilarates. 

With politics the provision of affordable food and steady employment seem of the utmost import, variety no doubt a driving force in the playful unpredictability of a diverse culture.

People at work and people at play the harmless facilitation of curious ways, when people routinely introduce chaos to the political scene because they find dynamic variety threatening, it's indeed most unfortunate, the results playing out in various stages.

It's like John Wick (Keanu Reeves) fights for respect the unwritten codes many people abide by, having been sincerely disrespected himself he introduces the chaotic element.

He just wanted to be left alone and enjoy his retirement in genuine peace.

But he possessed incomparable skill.

Worth too much to far too many.

A king without a kingdom a CEO with no business plan, just pure impeccable authentic resiliency flourishing within a democracy.

In a democracy you can disagree without being sent to prison or a re-education camp.

Respect dutifully leading to traditional argument.

Totally love this franchise.

Along with Clancy Brown cameos.

The Locksmith

The paramount temptation to freely secure fast endurable easy money, fuelling stock exotic daydreams universally across the land.

So many things to buy so many dreams so many relentless advertisements, the tantalizing independence driving meticulous freeform stacked endeavours.

We learned about advertising in school and through communal discussions way back when, and it seemed like its inherent trickery was generally acknowledged by the critical populace.

And that knowledge was leading to prudent decision making or less rash impulsive purchases, as illuminating logic cut through the uproar and exposed the dispossessing illusion.

It does seem puzzling nevertheless that ads seem to hold more sway now than ever, that even with so much education the fascinating allure can't be seen through.

Therefore, is it education's responsibility to provide a more compelling entertaining alternative, that offers a more appealing cultural collective thoroughly enhanced by constructive minds?

Entertainment has indeed been highly sought after throughout the multifarious ages, whether through discus or sculpture or car racing people have striven to find distraction.

But do they find distraction within the established narratives spearheading impossibility, or within well-reasoned objective impeti cleverly crafted through a sense of fair play?

Rationality can broker enlightenment should cynicism or sarcasm be put down, and a bonafide chill embrace of equality effectively resonate within a community.

But does rationality create more jobs and lead to a more productive impacting workforce, or is it indubitably ludicrous sweet nothings that efficiently devise economic stratagems? 

The uncertain need for ridiculous knick-knacks ephemerally available to be freely disposed of, seems rather insufficient considering, but are they more appealing to the austere alternative?

Perhaps an inquiry should be led to decide the question for ever after, does the cultivation of spontaneous shenanigans outweigh judicious practical life?

Don't countries wherein which life is much more practical and strictly governed, with less nonsense and much more reasonability, have less robust economies?

Is it possible to stop global heating while engaging in carefree initiatives?

Questions for a later hour.

Such a shame to be so serious.

Omohide poro poro (Only Yesterday)

Childhood memories of elementary school mischievously haunt Taeko's adult life, even if she's rather well adjusted to the industrious working world.

Notably daunting math tests which caused sincere social and familial distress, many others rather patronizing in their evaluations of her natural difficulties by the numbers.

Young romance confused and startled as an innocent lad accidentally declared his affections, and her classmates erupted with furor and the two really had no idea what to do.

Now she's in her late twenties and the marriage police are moving in, friends and family wondering why she's still single in a city full of millions of people.

Her characteristic independence habitually dismisses their domestic appeals, and she continues to earnestly authenticate by harmoniously proceeding with novel planning.

Which includes working trips to the country where she helps out on versatile farms, taking part in the daily labour while enjoying village life at night.

Soon an amorous lad shyly falls for her big city ways.

Others noting they get along well.

Taeko taking to the ways of the country. 

Omohide poro poro (Only Yesterday) presents alternatives to urban trajectories, as bucolic pride historically enraptures through inquisitive endeavour and cross-cultural daring.

Few films provide such an affectionate road map to countryside life through animate accords, complete with clear explanations regarding age old farming practices and the steady cultivation of the surrounding landscape.

Farming is often overlooked in the hyper-reactive accelerated narrative, but it always will be evidently necessary as long as we require tasty nourishing food.

You wonder why it isn't more respectfully regarded when multivariably compared with other professions, farming actually provides something durable when presented alongside abstract calculations. 

It's a shame how such abstractions at times drive a wedge between practical people, why is it preferable to have no relation to nature and pretend we can exist immaterially zoned?

A healthy environment ensures the multigenerational matriculation of posterity through fecund diversity, the more polluted the environment becomes the less likely crops will attentively flourish.

Perhaps it will never come to that although the dismissive outcome seems highly unlikely.

Working vacations can be fun in countryside regardless, may be worth checking out sometime. 

Gedo senki (Tales from Earthsea)

It's fun to throw around terms like immortality or magic at times, to take part in mythological shenanigans as reputedly envisaged in fermenting fashion.

But if reality needs be materialistically applied, I've never been interested in living forever, it seems like it would be incredibly dull in fact, and if you kept growing older, an encumbering plight. 

Vampires apparently don't age but who would want to live forever without the sun?, that would be an extremely unfortunate predicament certainly not to be genuinely envied.

I do believe in life after death perhaps sustained through the potent dreamworld, your dreams persisting perhaps like purgatory until you reach some form of nirvana. 

The belief in life after death does solve several concrete problems, and leaves you less burdened by temporal considerations throughout the rapid progression of time.

Make sure you're not too much of a prick and worries of damnation fade as well, the congenial afterlife even animal heaven I imagine sustained by decent people across the land.

I don't think repenting on your death bed or absolution late in life prevents the onset of hell for the truly wicked.

They're punished ruthlessly post-mortality.

Somewhat like Jacob Marley.

But I don't think the punishment is indefinite the chance to rise again indeed enlightening, I've always intuitively believed in reincarnation (as I've mentioned before) for which I was reprimanded at a young age.

Perhaps there is nothing else perhaps just the dirt and ashes follow, after a fertile robust life inquisitively lived through cultural sleuthing.

I find it much less depressing and much more constructive to think otherwise however, there really is no way to determine the answer, and a future filled with multiple lives and multiverses leads to more pleasant thoughts throughout mortal life.

I don't mean for such thoughts to influence government spending or tax-based initiatives, practical reality indeed paramount when trying to spend hard-earned vital incomes.

With competing ideologies in the democratic realm unfortunately the phrase practical realities becomes more abstract, but it's still less corrupt than a one-party system and at least you can still critique and disagree.

Imagine immortality during an ice age, who knows, perhaps that's how we survived!

Like many others, I believe death's a natural part of life.

Not that it means I want to stop living.

Cool film. 

Kokuriko-zaka kara (From Up on Poppy Hill)

The intense painful longing for an adored absent loved one, objectively expressed through ritualistic candour, every morning by the vibrant sea the message sent unseen unanswered, a family waiting observant on shore, yet still caught up in the world around them.

Umi's mother is off to study in the unfamiliar metropoli of North America, leaving her alone to manage their business, a task she accomplishes with inherent skill.

Meanwhile, Shun grows increasingly frustrated as it becomes apparent his clubhouse will be shut down, many of the other studious individuals in agreement, yet at a loss as to how to proceed.

As fate would have it, he's noticed Umi's signals and written a poem about them in his newsletter, which she notices one startling morning, before venturing forth to discover its author.

The two strike up a friendship although working relationship may be more apt, male and female soon gathered together to renovate the clubhouse for the first time in years.

But there may be even more to it after they learn they both have copies . . .

. . . of the same mysterious photo!

Taken of their fathers ages ago.

Toil and hard work and prudent planning industriously drives Kokuriko-zaka kara (From Up on Poppy Hill), which diligently enlivens through microcosm to innovatively excel and creatively encapsulate.

Japan having struggled in recent times through disastrous wars for which they can't be forgiven, the youth who grew up in the aftermath nevertheless, provided with the choice to make amends.

They have their traditions and customs which they resolutely honour through resilient sacrifice, taking care of their responsibilities with adamant gusto, while persevering through hearty resolve.

But a brilliant survivor of the ruthless war who recognizes that it's time to change the old ways, presents a newfound contemporary alternative which follows a reconciliatory postmodern path.

Imagine a world where people really were chill and there was no need for consistent higher-up apologies, where sustained evolving international endeavours led to food to eat and employment for billions.

Why are goodwill and camaraderie so counterintuitively maligned?

Exacting standards.

Commensurate will.

So many variables.  

Aces high.

Kaze no tani no Naushika (Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind)

My thoughts regarding the resilience of nature as pertaining to a post-pandemic environment, find rational contradiction within Ghibli's Kaze no tani no Naushika (Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind).

Within a toxic environment has pesitferously emerged after an apocalypse, most forests having become so polluted that they can no longer sustain human life.

Human life as we know it the forests and the giant insects who reside within them, have no tolerance for extant humanity, being fully aware that we destroyed the planet.

Thus, rather than habitual resiliency which sees the abundant return of cherished plants and animals, the forests still grow but have become infected with inherent anatomies hostile to humans.

Such a development corresponds to the theory that microplastics herald our doom, and will perhaps one day make food sources unsustainable as our population expands.

The literary irony within the minuscule components which once ruled the land with colossal magnitude, as fitting as the end of a Victorian novel as applied to the fossil fuel age.

You would think we would simply take steps to gradually transition away from fossil fuels, but that doesn't seem to be happening anywhere, this film was made in 1984.

You would think the consistent stewardship of a robust environment hospitable to our needs, would indeed be of the utmost importance considering the maintenance of posterity. 

It really isn't though, rather the chaotic clash of market based dogma rules the millennia, and should prudent planning screw up a sale fury will vociferously tantrum incarnate.

Such facts aren't lost on Kaze no tani no Naushika which sees the world still fighting suicidal wars, hellbent on annihilating our species 1,000 years later, ignoring science and ecologial rhythms. 

Nausicaä herself reveals the value of study and the just rewards of patient duty, as her innate wonder and curiosity find working solutions to age old problems.

Don't we have working solutions now to fossil fuel issues and environmental bedlam?

Isn't it best to employ them through a gradual transition?

Like sustainable economics.

Just a little less so. 

Omoide no Marnie (When Marnie was There)

Troubled times pejorative loneliness habitual cheeky maladjusted disproportion, leads to isolated age old initiatives far away from any urban centre.

The village disseminates flavour characteristically concocting historical narratives, multilaterally nuanced through subjective barter, contradiction generationally resounding.

The family with whom she stays offer peaceful counsel and generous goodwill, a robust hearty unassuming caricature oft employed to generate cohesion.

But she still has trouble socializing as many do at different times, her critical mistrust and acerbic evaluations leading to unamused accusations of severity.

Fortunately, patience abounds, and people are forgiving, sympathetic, and understanding, not to mention at times aloof which gives her ample time to wander.

While exploring far afield in search of nothing in particular in turn, she accidentally encounters a curious youth hoping to make friends with stories to tell.

The two strike up a mutually accommodating freewheelin' compassionate empathetic union, which leads to what's oft referred to as friendship as tides ebb and munificently flow.

But just who is this mysterious girl who disappears as quickly as she energetically arrives?

Is there a syndicating secret synergizing soulful sentiment?

In time honoured traditional supernatural soroarity?

If you happen to have an independent daughter prone to legend and zealous storytelling, who at times confuses the other children and has difficulties understanding why?, Omoide no Marnie (When Marnie was There) may prove materially providential in regards to constructive sociocultural life, a film like none other concerning bonds forged between like-hearted spirits adventurously aligned one fateful summer.

Difficult to fight off the haunting doubts inconsiderately disrupting calm and tranquil trajectories, while consistently engaged with inhospitable alliances generally unconcerned with practical well-being.

It's odd how frequently you hear collegial messages expressing warmth and kindness, and how sporadically they apply while directly engaged with unfavourable distress.

The love of family hopefully can challenge the cynical uptight grim brinkspersonship.

Along with friends books music and film.

Neverending possibilities at the local library.

📚♮📽😎

Neko no ongaeshi (The Cat Returns)

Simple acts of genuine kindness at times cultivate appreciation and respect, the unsuspecting recipients flush with reciprocity should time's passage munificently flow.

Thus, in Neko no ongaeshi (The Cat Returns), the Kingdom of Cats regards Haru with admiration, for having generously gone out of her way while altruistically assuming death-defying risks.

She's rather mild-mannered yet inquisitive and enjoys sleeping in with no time for breakfast, teachers critical of her habitual tardiness yet still sympathetic to the studious cause.

Having naturally developed an intuitive love for animals she notices one legendary day, that a cat may be run over by a fearsome passing truck, which encourages genuine distress.

She quickly scoots into traffic and boldly saves the unobservant feline, who, as fate would have ceremoniously have it, happens to be the Prince of Cats.

Cat kind responds in turn with abundant gifts freely delivered, and even if Haru doesn't know what to do with the mice, she's still taken aback from all the attention.

But soon she's taken away to the exotic otherworldly mythological chillaxed cat kingdom.

Where she's betrothed to the very same Prince.

As she starts to transform into a cat!

Imagine a less self-obsessed world where sincere kindness and warmth played a role, and people looked out for one another like the Québecois while structuring their cultural and communal relations.

I don't hear it mentioned often anymore but the Pay it Forward movement was a very cool thing, I don't know what it transformed into but hopefully the thought behind it's the same. 

The movement as I recall sought to reward acts of kindness, self-sacrificingly shared between conscious individuals, conscientiously aware of the tender exchange.

If someone was kind enough to do someone a favour or help someone out without having been called upon, then the person who received the aid would then help someone else in the near future, or Pay it Forward.

Marrying the King of Cat's son and transforming into a cat may have taken things too far, but had there been a courtship ritual involved, perhaps the results would have been somewhat different.

An appealing idea nonetheless which effortlessly radiates cohesive collegiality. 

It exists in so many forms.

Constructively mutating across the land.  

Tenkû no shiro Rapyuta (Castle in the Sky)

A largely unknown mythical heritage gracefully envelopes young aloof Sheeta, who would rather just be left alone than frenetically chased by an irate military.

Pazu has found work and community when he suddenly finds her one fortuitous day, and helps her feverishly escape when her former captors defiantly threaten.

Pirates also emerge in search of legendary boundless treasure, to which they believe Sheeta holds the key unlocking mad abundant riches.

They search for an ancient legend solemnly floating in the sky, where once a race of international influencers secretly advanced global sociocultural reckoning.

They also hypothetically accumulated mass resourceful mineral commodities, how to infiltrate and escape with such embroidered booty remaining a compelling infinite challenge.

The military naturally thinks the fortress could be used as an invincible weapon, and seeks to somehow control it with no prior knowledge of the structure whatsoever. 

A descendent of the race who once dwelt there seeks the same thing but possesses access codes, and could theoretically wield its power should he acquire Sheeta's magic talisman.

She's much more modern however and adamantly agrees with her mystical forebears.

Isn't it more exciting to live on the surface?

Away from lofty sequestered disparities.

I imagine it's fun to live everywhere perhaps even under the ocean in a secret sea fortress, which could furtively move undetected alongside pods of whales and ebullient dolphins (wrote this before I saw Ponyo). 

The tale still presents a classic narrative style congenially bent on less stratified collectives, wherein which mutual prosperity guides communal initiatives with fluent understanding.

I'm surprised a live action version of this story has yet to be made, it's the best fantasy film I've seen in years and has so many thrilling adventurous elements. 

The magical ties to ancient ways still potentially producing postmodern peculiarities. 

Is this just something people have always assumed?

Still fun to have (harmless) origin myths at times. 

Gake no ue no Ponyo (Ponyo)

An eccentric caretaker vigilantly monitors and looks after oceanic depths, consistently attempting to facilitate harmony beneath the temperamental seas.

He's rather tightly attuned to rhythmic supernatural submersion, and even cares for aquatic wonders too young to freely roam. 

But his most spirited daughter suddenly escapes one propitious morn, and eventually finds herself on land in the adoring company of a human.

The child is on his way to school when he accidentally cuts himself, his wound soon licked by the curious goldfish and instantly healed through nascent magic.

She's named "Ponyo" by little Sôsuke who becomes deeply enamoured with his friend, but her father remains distraught and soon reacquires her through immortal counsel. 

We learn that he is collecting unique transformative elixirs, which he hopes to use to change the world one epoch transfigurative day. 

But little Ponyo makes an escape during which she chaotically disrupts his plans.

The ocean erupting in imaginative fury.

Ponyo finding Sôsuke once more. 

Imagine the ocean 10,000 years ago, abounding with the practically uninterrupted fecundity of thousands upon thousands of transformative millennia!

Whales everywhere to be seen coral reefs extending far past fathomable limits, manatees and dugongs flourishing unabashed, crab and lobster expertly radiating. 

No wonder legendary tales consistently emerged with divine hyperbole, as a lack of knowledge inspired courageous deeds and habitual curiosity envisaged remonstration.

Ghibli suggests that even with our technology and the ways we've adapted to oceanic resilience, we've lost something by moving beyond legend into a much more practical repartee.

Too much of an emphasis on fact can tether daring adventurous spirits, to wayward predictable trajectories lacking variability and versatile imagination (we clearly still need to clean the oceans up). 

Not that a practical focus isn't particularly requisite in traditional commerce.

It's just at times it doesn't make recreational sense.

And for thousands of years there was nothing to do.

*Figures not precise estimates.

**That's the first time I've ballparked civilization's history.

Heisei tanuki gassen ponpoko (Pom Poko)

Further information regarding the ways of raccoon kind is generously provided in Ghibli's Heisei tanuki gassen ponpoko (Pom Poko), which examines the complex nature of intricate underscored raccoon relations.

Sometimes I achieve success when attempting to photograph laidback turtles, for at times they remain somewhat docile and let you shutterbug away.

But at others testosterone abounds and there's no diplomatic impetus, harmonizing interspecial congeniality, them turtles right freakin' pissed!

Having seen such behaviour in different animals I was led to theorize that animal kind, including robust philosophizing humans, has reps no species quite knows how to deal with.

For instance, in Heisei tanuki gassen ponpoko one bellicose raccoon takes on risks which may lead to a cull, his leadership rivals employing other means to stop the development within their homeland.

Said rivals take a more artful approach and utilize superstition as opposed to violence, with remarkably mythological results eventually dismissed as carefree play.

I didn't know that raccoons were renowned indeed vigorous legendary transformers, and if threatened could materially shapeshift regardless of weight equivalencies. 

In an age when the old ways have been forgotten many repudiate appeals to folklore, which references age old artists who once thoroughly concentrated on raccoon kind.

They discovered their transformative initiatives and swiftly celebrated them in poem and song, but fad and trend inevitably obscured their realistic spiritual reckonings.

The people who adhere to the past and even actively witness it at large at times, are subsequently and summarily lampooned for having overlooked contemporary biases.

The raccoons benefit from such developments but their belovéd home is still threatened by urbanization, grand mutating masters arriving from far off islands in a last ditch effort to preserve the wilderness.

It's plain as day that other peeps observe raccoons wide-eyed with wonder, as they go about their intuitive days rambunctiously securing food and shelter.

To those in the know there's indubitably indeed really nothing else quite like them, they remind me of people who want to focus but at the end of the day remain habitually distracted.

Perhaps they never will become domesticated like trusty dogs and impetuous cats.

But they're still close by monitoring the scene.

Sometimes envious, at others highly critical. 🦝