Gee, You’re So Beautiful

Gee, You’re So Beautiful
That It’s Starting to Rain

Oh, Marcia,
I want your long blonde beauty
to be taught in high school,
so kids will learn that God
lives like music in the skin
and sounds like a sunshine harpsichord.
I want high school report cards
to look like this:

Playing with Gentle Glass Things
A

Computer Magic
A

Writing Letters to Those You Love
A

Finding out about Fish
A

Marcia’s Long Blonde Beauty
A+!

Richard Brautigan
from The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster, 1968

___

Avoid Eye Contact runs the following over the above:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
foreach $line (@geeyouresobeautiful) {
$line =~ s/Marcia/P\./gi;
}

The Road (2009)

The Road is a 2009 film directed by John Hillcoat, based on the Cormac McCarthy’s novel of the same name. The theme seems to be the main characters’ struggle to define and maintain their humanity in a world devastated by an unknown event.
When society and its rules crumble and the environment it is based on is destroyed, the people lose their values and their order. They are forced to rely solely on the most primal of instincts, that of survival. And this is exactly what animals do. When society is destroyed and the rules are abandoned, people turn to egotistical animals whose sole goal is their own survival
This is exactly what happens in The Road. While Father and Son walk through the devastated country, they encounter people who resemble animals focused only on their own survival. Cannibalism is the natural choice in those situations, as well the human farming. In this case, the strongest survive, and the weak literally become farmed animals. The main premise of the film is the characters’ struggle not to lose that idealized humanity, as it gradually turns into a more faded concept. Although it’s clear in the beginning who “the good guys” are, by the end, these labels become indistinct.
An interesting thing to note in the film is the missing thumbs by most characters. As far as I remember, this was never explained. It might suggest the loss of humanity, the complete surrender to the animal instincts that govern every character. The loss of the opposable thumb, which many people regard as our main difference from animals, removes their humanity and transforms them into animals.
This film is remarkably similar to the 1997 film The Cube when it comes to these themes. When in stressful, life and death situations, Man is nothing but an egotistical animal focused only in its own survival. Although The Road seems more positive than The Cube when it comes to the belief in humanity... Quite good!

Trailer

Film Poster

Romero Homage: Dawn of the Dead (1978)

It gets up and kills. The people it kills get up and kill.

This is the second installment of George Romero’s Dead series and, I believe, possibly the best. It was released in 1978.
The message of this film is quite obvious and strengthens the theme that passes through all of the films in the series. The characters barricade themselves in a shopping mall and live there for months, afraid to go out. The zombies that initially populate the mall clearly echo the people that spend most of their time trying to purchase useless things and live their lives worrying about what to buy next. It is even stated that they are drawn there due to some faint memory of a previous life.
After clearing the area in the mall, the characters claim it as their ground and become themselves zombie-like. The materialistic realm that they create, supposedly to shield themselves from the zombie threat, eventually transforms them in to useless creatures similar to the ones they’re trying to escape. By living in a materialistic environment, they lose their purpose in life and "zombify".
The biker invasion establishes the impossibility humans have to understand each other and their true egotistical and materialistic motivations. Their already shattered and fragile realm ends up being destroyed not by zombie pressure, but by human interference. And this is the theme that is common in every installment of the series: the humans are the real threat, not the zombies. This is why Romero’s zombies are not really scary or dangerous. In this universe, the real scary element is humanity.
In 2004, there was a remake directed by Zack Snyder. This film is loosely based on the original. It loses some of the message Romero tries to transmit and focuses more on the horror. Although a clear distinction from Romero, this remake is still worth watching and is, in my opinion, the best Romero remake to date.

Click here for the 2004 trailer and check the original below.

Trailer

Dawn of the Dead (1978), directed by George A. Romero

Film Poster

Lectori Salutem: Planisfério Pessoal

Happy New Year and all of that crap people usually say to one another when they’re out of other useless things to say. I wish you all an endless supply of angry drunken circus midgets for 2010. That's right, I said it. And trust me when I say that that is all that is required to keep a person happy...

That and the occasional absurd literary rambling. And if you wish to read the latest, please visit my idiotic twin blog here:

http://lectori-salutem.blogspot.com/

However, if, unlike everyone else, you actually use your brain, you’ll easily decide you’re better off simply by quenching your literary aspirations with a few cocktail drinks. That usually does the trick! :D

Classic Scene #2

This is a great scene from The Million Dollar Hotel. It’s one of my personal favorites. It is when Tom Tom finally gathers enough courage to go and talk to Eloise. He had been in love with her for a while, but could never find it in himself to start a conversation with her.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to embed it, so just click on the pictures below and you’ll be redirected to the scene.

Stills from The Million Dollar Hotel (2000), dir. by Wim Wenders.