11.18.06
Must see…
I don’t think I have ever seen a movie that lived up to the expectations created by the trailer. Not that movies always fall short but fundamentally trailers are flawed in that it it impossible to sum up a movie experience in two minutes. Some trailers are down right deceptive. They take a drama and make it look funny. They take a comedy and make it look funny. Sometimes you wait through an entire movie for a particular scene and the when the movie is over you realize you’ve been conned. The great clip was from an outtake. Outrageous.
Monster House lived up to the hype, a self-generated hype in my case. I saw the trailer and loved the characters. For those of you who don’t know, Monster House is a 3D animated film produced by Steven Spielberg. If you remember The Goonies (also by Spielberg) it has a similar quality, but I enjoyed this much more. Unlike other 3d movies that try to wow you with great animation or spoofing other films this movie focused on the characters to drive the story. Everyone down to the peripheral boyfriend of the babysitter is hilariously stereotypical in the best way possible. The voices were so well chosen that I only recognized one by the end of the movie even though most were famous people I knew. Instead of trying to further describe why the movie is so great I will simply recommend it to you.
Warning: I cannot guarantee your enjoyment of this film if you don’t have a Chrissy watching it with you.
Last night I began a journey into Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment. I can already tell I will not escape this book without significant contemplation. All his characters are well drawn and captivating, and he has a way of making your heart break for them. In several instances, already, he has shown or signaled the end of a matter and then proceeds to walk through it entirely. As you see the end coming in the distance you plead with the character to change, but the deed is already done. It is not unlike knowing someone who is about to ruin their lives by their foolishness and, because you know the person, you sense it’s inevitability. It hurts much worse than hearing about it after the fact because your pain is renewed with each step towards the fatal end.
Eragon is pure fantasy entertainment. It has just enough of all the right elements to keep you engaged, not enough to bog you down. Great taste and less filling. The back story is simple but adequate and each character’s past is full of intrigue. The fighting is satisfying. I especially enjoy his ideas about magic. Everything in the world has a true name and the name holds power of that thing. I would like to see this developed further.
So, I just started the “#1 Bestseller” Eragon by Christopher Paolini. On the back of the flap I read that he started this book when he was 15 and he finished by 19. When I started I was suspicious that the entire book would be written in text speak. I am happy to report this is not the case. I am still getting introduced to the characters but it reads like someone who just finished studying for their SATs. I am coming across words like taciturn, incredulous, convoluted. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with a hefty vocabulary, I just can’t forget the images on the flashcards I used to learn these words myself. If I hadn’t read that he was so young I would have passed over these without a thought.
I recently finished “1984″, a terrifying anti-utopia that pushed Stalin’s communist ideology to extremes. At least that’s what I am told. In this world of perfected totalitarian communism the government is sponsoring the creation of a new language to render rebellion impossible. They believe that thought cannot take place without words, so by controlling language you can control what people think. Eliminate all words that refer to a specific concept, like freedom or rights, and the concept cannot be discussed or even considered. We can see the truth of this in science and philosophy. When something new is discovered it must be named. Without a name there is nothing to discuss. Only when something has been given a name, its own word, can that word, or the idea the word is meant to express, be given meaning. Eliminate all scientific language and you eliminate science itself. Destroy the language of liberty, and freedom will become impossible to pursue or even think about.