Strictly Ballroom 1992

Due to illness and CNY holidays, I was unable to write past 2 weeks. However, lets get back in full swing of blog writing with the 1992 Strictly Ballroom

The usage of conformity, compliance and obedience is prominently seen throughout the entire movie. From the literal dancers leading and following, dancing the carefully crafted ADF (Australian Dance Federation) steps, to trickery and foul play. The directors of this movie were no stranger to the uses of conformity, compliance and obedience. 

What I would like to talk about however, is not necessarily where Scott, Fran, Shirley or even Barrey may have used conformity, compliance or obedience or even the subjugation of it. What I do applaud this movie for was the portrayal of characters and the choices the took in the face of such influence and subjugation. Better yet as Fran had said:

What struck me with this is regarding how each of these characters when faced with against the odds. Or in the other words, being force to conform, comply and obey. Is the astounding fact that majority of times, our beloved characters had complied and obeyed due to fear.

Shirley,when she didn't dance with Doug at their Pan Pacific due to Barry's insufferable ability to play with their fear. Fran, during the backstage, requested to go back by the group in order to not jeopardize Scott's chance of winning. Scott when Barry lied about the reason why Doug stopped dancing and what happened in the paste. All of them willing complied in those few moments due to the fact of fear.

 A life lived in fear

They will need to take a stand against their own fear, with the help of friends such as Fran with Scott. Or when the truth was revealed to Scott by Doug and what happened all those years ago. The decision to take action against their fears. If anything, during the finally competition, where Scott and Fran finally muster the courage to dance their steps.

To be willing enough to face and overcome your own fear. Catharsis, freedom to decide, to chase your desires and dreams. Personally, I am not able to do it yet, hopefully I'll gather the passion that Scott and Fran did during the Pan Pacific and do just the same.

Running On Empty 1988

This week on Kai Hung writes a Movie Blog, we have the 1988 movie Running On Empty

NO NOT THIS 

(even with the lowering gas prices)

But this one =D 

My immediate interest and take from the movie is revolving around our two love birds

Danny & Lorna 

What struck me as interesting is considering how their relationship grew and progress. As would any relationship, a certain degree of self disclosure is required between two people in order for trust to be built according to Routledge (n.d). However as our dear Danny and Lorna first met, it was almost chemistry. Subtle sparks that flare as they speak, yet an interest grew in one another. As their relationship progress and Danny learns more and more about Lorna as she willing shares in hopes that maybe Danny boy would too. Yet as Lorna shares, Danny did not reciprocate this self-disclose between the both of them. In a sense, the level of closeness or intimacy between the two hitting a stale point in which as Lorna has this to say:

"You don't transmit too much information"

However, how are you in heavens name going to disclose any form of information to the person you are slowly growing feelings for or in other words how does Danny tell Lorna "Hey, my parents are the ones on the run from the FBI, I'm sorry I can't talk about a lot of things, and I've been doing this since I was 2"

Yet that was exactly what Danny did, and this is what he had to add to it.

My take a way from this is vulnerability. To be vulnerable with the person you love or as I like to put it "Giving them the gun and hoping they don't pull the trigger on you"

Ah emotions, what a wonderful thing

Given the degree of trust and vulnerability Danny had shown to Lorna, this really does put into consideration what some people are willing to risk for others for love. Not only jeopardizing his family's safety but Lorna's as well. Should love be heartless and cold, where in which you do not allow yourself the room to be emotionally involved, to be indestructible, unable to be hurt. Yet from what we saw, that is not what love is actually about. Yes some argue the course of action taken by Danny is that of a selfish and foolish boy, yet a boy struck by love.

Can you blame him?

 Romantic relationships are not my forte, I for one am learning as I go. Vulnerability was not something that came easy to me, yet something that I had to learn as the pasting time. To be vulnerable is to love.

or as C.S Lewis said

"To Love At All Is To Be Vulnerable" 

Reference:

Routledge (n.d). Affective interdependence: Intimacy and commitment. Retrieved from: http://documents.routledge-interactive.s3.amazonaws.com/9781848728943/student/CHAP%2012%20SUMMARY.pdf

Awakenings 1990

-We are but fools chasing sunsets-

If you are reading this, you either have to or find my writing some what interesting so welcome back to this week with the 1990 movie Awakenings.

How I will be approaching this movie will be my general take away from it and what I found of interest which is:

.Time.

Most of us at any given point in our lives would have felt the sensation that time has passed by unnoticed (like how most weekends goes sadly) or the "Where did all the time go". In the movie Awakenings it too faces this phenomena but sadly not in the way that we may have commonly face before. In the movie Awakenings, the way this phenomena was demonstrated was when the survivors of encephalitis epidemic finally had awaken thanks to the help of our dear Dr. Sayer through the usage of a new experimental drug.

 yes you aren't asleep anymore Leonard and it is because of 

.

 this guy right here ( awww look at the good doc =3 )

What has occurred to the victims of these disease that is they have shown similar affects to that of Parkinson's but also with what appears to be the lost of conscious awareness. If you were to think of time as a common video bar, now imagine what a bar worth of 30 years of content would look like. Now imagine that this was your life, that your memories are what those 30 years of content is. But in the case of the victim of this disease, it is waking up and realizing that someone had skipped forward that very same bar.

I guess you really can say time is relative.

However it isn't exactly that simple, cause according to Leonard in the movie, those 30 years were similar to dreaming. The only time he knew it wasn't a dream was when Leonard talked and Dr Sayer understood him. Yet as would any person, should they experience something such as this, would have every right to feel angry, scared and the injustice that life has swindled them and taken that in which should be theirs. But instead, the man has this to say:-

Yet life is but a harsh teacher in which the test is given but without the lesson before it. As time progresses, either the drug had lost its miracle magic or the awaken had begun to habituate to it. Which is to say, it is hard to tell. As they began the slow spiral, as they did before, slowly slipping, and slowly losing their consciousness once again. In a sense submerging and reemerging periods between the bar instead of experiencing it as would any other.

Our consciousness is in my opinion the very entity of our being, our soul, that which gives will to our bodies. We are the universe experiencing itself and it is hard to tell when this finite amount of time we have in this supposed existence runs out. Yet this time we are given, would hold no significant meaning other than a scale of measurement should we as humans not be able to appreciate and experience that in which has been given to us. Or as the good doc put it:-

-To enjoy the simplest things in life-

Life in which it gives,
It is life in which it takes.

Cinema Paradiso

Before we begin, Viewer Discretion is Advise, I will be covering certain interests which will display nudity while making a mockery of everything. With that lets get into the swing of things.

Cinema Paradiso

Some would consider this  rather obscene,

(Due to the obvious display of luscious boobs...

I mean the female mammary glands or breast)

While compared to this

(A passionate lovely kiss)

Not as much huh? 

Obscenity and censorship, now this brings up a rather interesting string of ideas. To begin, in the very early stages of the movie Cinema Paradiso, at the cinema we see our little Toto, the village priest and our dear Alfredo doing something rather peculiar.

Our dear priest and his mighty bell

Signaling Alfredo to remove pieces in which he deems inappropriate while little Toto stares on. 

Now who is it, who are these individuals that can consider themselves morally superior to their fellow man that they can set the standards to which they deem morally correct and appreciate for viewing?

The answer is,

NO ONE

Even in our modern day society, it takes the collective effort of a board of directives to censor appropriately according to our current movie rating system. As such, we are but human with ever growing and changing societies. We but grow with time. Earlier on our priest was signaling Alfredo about particular snippets to be removed from the film, this we can safely assume it is because the Father considered it immoral or sinful to be viewed at all. As later seen in the movie in the newly rebuilt cinema after the fire, the priest got up in an outrage stating that he will not watch pornography. Although the images shown in the cinema were that of passionate kissing and to some degree soft core porn, which he has previously been censoring, is it really as morally wrong as our dear Father believes?

Given the era in which this was set, during a time when movie censorship and regulation were not as tightly lip as now. My main question is, should a priest, a man with religious affiliations be allowed to decide what can be publicly displayed for viewing according to his own sense of morality? Assuming that the father does not have the vision and imaginary powers of director, will his act of censorship ruin a these pieces of work or the message that is being attempted to portray by the directors. In my opinion, pretty sure it did as we show too how the the audience were in a cheer when they finally saw their first kissing scene on the big screen.