Take me to brunch and I'll order a small salad. Take me to fifth avenue and I'll be content to browse. But take me to Barnes and Noble and prepare for all hell to break loose. And Barnes and Noble is where I somehow ended up twice this weekend...so as you can probably figure, my book hoarding side came out to play. The first time was after seeing the Great Gatsby with my friend (awesome movie btw, I need to read the book so bad now) and being the awkward nerdy fashionista hipsters we are, we ended up spending an hour and a half in the isles of the book store, gushing over the classics and comparing cover designs (that's the publisher's daughter coming out in me).
My dog is camera shy ;) On my first trip I bought The Prince and Other Writings by Machiavelli. It's part of the Barnes and Noble classics line, which they sell for six dollars; it seems to be a pretty good deal to me, considering the quality is pretty nice. And I like cheap books better than pristine hardcovers; I'm a compulsive hiliter/stickynoter, and I decided to stick with cheapies after a frenzy of hiliting in my first-edition signed Mark Helprin book(ok it deserved it though, I honestly hate that guy's writing) I like the cover design too. They keep it simple but tasteful, and I have a weakness for sage green.
My second trip to Barnes and Noble was just a couple hours ago, when i was driving back from the Cape and Islands sailing tournament (I got a sunburn meh). I managed to lure my mother in with the promise of starbucks, then trapped her in the philosophy section.
(excuse the awkwardly placed pictures of my dog)
Anyways, she caved into buying me this adorable edition called Philosophy; A Graphic Guide to The History of Thinking by Dave Robinson and Judy Groves. It's basically a graphic novel of the history of philosophy, but it presents all the ideas and philosophers in a witty and matter-of-fact way, using speech bubbles to highlight (hi-lite?) main ideas. I wanted just a general guide for reference, which I didn't get with Thirty Second Philosophies by Barry Loewer.
The Essential Nietzche WHY IS HIS NAME SO HARD TO SPELL i less bought and more found on my shelf, but i'm excited to read it. I guess I've always been a philosophical person, and it probably just came off as childish curiosity before (Daddy, what if we're all in a dream of someone else?), but since I got into highschool I've defined my interest more, and am trying to read as much as I can on philosophy and religion. My school is definitely very supportive of philosophical thought; it's all about learning how to think, and in junior and senior year there's a mandatory philosophy class. I'll come back with book reviews in due time!
P.S. Something to be explored further in an independent post, but I really hate e-books and amazon. It annoys me to death when my mom says that "We can order that on Amazon for less." Yes, Barnes and Noble may be a giant corporation, but Borders' closing scared me, and I want to support this store as much as I can, because it encourages reading by being placed in spots like malls, where normal people might wander in and buy something. If Barnes and Noble were to close, I think that people, especially my age, would probably read a lot less, since they would be a lot less likely to seek out independent book stores or used book shops.
The Seventeen Magazine short story contest deadline is fast approaching(the 13th) so I figured it was prime time to whip up a little five hundred word confection. The link to the page where you can heart this is http://figment.com/books/539860-The-Scenic-Route A heart counts for a vote, so please heart heart heart away and get your friends to heart as well- I win quite a bit of moolah if I get the most votes :) BTW
Can I just say that shaving a story down to 500 words from 548 is the most frustrating process I have ever had to go through. I was literally about to throw my computer out the window. Along with my dog if she kept breathing on me. ANYHOO I titled it "The Scenic Route".
I was an overachiever: the worst kind. The kind that's forced into it. My mom wasn't; she played hooky during high school, opting for rides in rich boys' cars, outings with people now famous, and adventures that are the stuff of stories.
But that's all she has now, those stories. Those stories to tell at the dinner table, to guests on holidays. So I can understand; she wants me to have what she didn't after youth is gone. I want that too, but not like this. Not with the constant tightness in my chest reminding me I'm not good enough. I feel as a hiker would, climbing the steepest of mountains and being unable to see the peak. Do they keep ascending, never to reach their destination, or do they turn back and live with the regret of having given up on all their work? Neither option appeals to me.
And so now I look at the contest forms on the wall, the e-mails open in my inbox. I look to the pens and journals stacked under more important papers, the words, lyrics, verses in them drowned out by the concise statements of documents. I look to the dust-coated keys of my piano, not stroked for so long because the imperfect chords and melodies they sing have no place on my resume. And lastly I look to my pin board, and the pictures I displayed there. The verdant greens of forest trails, the muted blue seascapes. Quotes from poets long gone, their words still alive in my mind. Backwoods cottages tucked away in the moss.
These places I have never been, these people I have never met. But others have, which means these aren't dreams, but realities. They could be my reality, too, if I work for them. And I want to.
It's not that I don't want to achieve; I do. When I see an A on my paper, I can't help but be proud. I want to enter contests, I want to win. But so easily an A can turn into "not an A+", an entry can turn into "not good enough to win". What were positives in my eyes turn to negatives in those of my mother. She sees the empty space instead of what is there.
I don't know how to please her; I'm not sure I ever will. But I have figured out how to please myself. I neither want to continue climbing straight up the mountain or take the easy road back down. What I want is to take the scenic route. I want to forget about the peak and enjoy the mountain itself. I want to travel along those richly-hued forest paths, I want to look out and see the blue of the ocean. I want to come to understand those quotes I know by heart, and I want to be able to stay awhile at a little stone cottage amid the moss. I want to enjoy my life as I live it.
I recently watched the movie The Fall directed by Tarsem and starring Lee Pace and Cantinca Untaru. I can honestly say that this movie is now settled solidly up on my favorite movies list. It premiered in 2006, and mainly fell under the radar, which was quite a shame. I personally found it at the end of a long journey of Lee Pace fangirling that led me through Breaking Dawn and Pushing Daisies, and deposited me at this movie.
This movie is really what I would call a work of art in all aspects of the phrase. The costume design, the music, the landscapes, the character development, I thought everything was right on point. The story takes place in 1915 in Los Angeles, the era of silent movies. The main character is a stuntman name Roy (Lee Pace) who winds up in the hospital after breaking both his legs while doing a stunt. Alexandria (Cantinca Untaru) is a five year old immigrant who broke her arm when she fell picking oranges, and therefore winds up in the same hospital as Roy. The two meet by chance and Roy forges a fake friendship with her, designed to manipulate her to attain pills for him so he can go through with suicide; he's heartbroken after losing his girlfriend to the star of the movie. As incentive Roy offers to tell her a story, and here is where the other dimension of the movie is introduced. Roy weaves a grandiose tale of five bandits, all seeking revenge against the invidious Governor Odious, who wronged all of them. As Roy tells the story Alexandria envisions it, drawing on familiar faces and objects to create the fantasy world. The movie switches back and forth between the epic story and the mundane hospital, and as the movie goes on, these two dimensions become more and more entwined and bleed into each other.
A strong point of the film was how the subtle feelings and relationships in the hospital were played out more obviously in the story Roy was telling, the strongest case for this being the relationship between Alexandria and Roy. The attitudes of the characters towards each other in the beginning seem disinterested; they're both stuck in the hospital and likely bored out of their minds. Roy soon begins to see her as a tool to get pills, but you realize very soon that Alexandria is beginning to see him as a father figure; she tells Roy that her father is dead. There is a moment in the movie where she asks Roy why he narrates the Red Bandit in an accent, and he informs her that it's supposed to be her father. She tells Roy that she wants the Bandit to speak like him, and shortly after the bandit removes his mask and you see that she envisions him as Roy. Although throughout quite a bit of the movie Roy seems to see her only for what she can do for him, Alexandria's view of Roy grows, coming a time in the movie where she tells Roy that she is his daughter in the story. After Alexandria falls and hurts her head trying to get morphine for Roy, he comes to her room drunk and finishes the story, having all the characters die. He is about to make the Red Bandit die, but Alexandria protests, and this is the scene where Roy seems to accept Alexandria's view of him; he tells her that the Red Bandit isn't really her father, and she tells him simply that she loves him. This love seems to heal his broken heart, and he gives up on suicide. What I found out after I watched the movie amazed me: almost all of Alexandria's parts were unscripted. To me it made the whole movie that much more sincere.
I may have died a little at this.
The costume design in the movie was done by Eiko Ishioka, one of Japan's most well-known graphic designers. The saturated colors and eye-catching designs of the outfits in the fantasy story are a sharp contrast to the dull and plain outfits in the hospital, and they contribute a great deal to the artistic quality of the film, as well as to the personalities of the characters themselves. I kept noticing throughout the film how well the palettes of each of the character's outfits went so well together, and how they complemented each other.
The outfits of Nurse Evelyn never ceased to amaze me. They are completely fitting to the story Roy is painting and Alexandria imagining; over-the-top in the most elegant and beautiful way. I also love the fact that they call attention to themselves; so often in movies the outfits are supposed to go subtly unnoticed, simply blending with the scene and not getting in the way of anything that is happening. The costumes' roles in this movie were to add to the visual beauty, not to go unnoticed, and I loved that.
A fun fact I noticed only the second time I watched the film- the armor of Odius's men is the same as the gear of the man working the X-Ray room in the hospital. This is a perfect example of what I love about this movie; ideas taken from real life are swirled around in a five-year old's head and spit into this story she's imagining in the way she really feels about them. She was afraid of the X-ray operator, and so that fear was amplified in the story. This happened with the feelings of both characters, enabling you to really feel like you could understand their feelings so much better because you were seeing them portrayed through a different medium.
I would just like to quickly say that I thought the music selections for this movie were perfect. There doesn't seem to be an official sound track for the movie that I can find, but I do know that the theme song was Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 in Allegretto. It seemed an odd choice to use Beethoven as a movie soundtrack, but it fits into the movie so perfectly; it adds to the grandiose air of the story. I would also like to note this scene:
The way the music kicked in, echoing what Nurse Evelyn was saying almost as if she was singing the lyrics, was just a gorgeous touch. I loved how the music in the movie really interacted with what was going on, and I love how the camera zooms out a few times. I'd like to note that Tarsem is a music video director, and I thought that he really brought that aspect to the movie in an interesting way.
I could honestly go on and on about this movie for hours and hours and pages and pages, but I would just like to reiterate that it really is one of my favorite movies. I went online after I watched it, and read reviews about, and I was honestly so surprised because people were, like, HATING on this film. That's why I wanted to write this review in the first place- I wanted to contribute my positive thoughts on the movie. It's obviously not a typical movie: it's not supposed to be. I feel like to watch it you have to relax your view of what a movie is; like I said before, I consider this art. The costumes, the settings, the actors, the music, it's all coming together to create something beautiful and stunning, not to just support a story line. I felt like the movie was equally about those things. To me, it seemed like something made out of love, something that didn't want to be mass marketed, something that was created for the sake of bringing something beautiful into being, and I completely respect that. Because of these things, I felt a sort of sincerity from the film that I don't feel from other works. I could feel Tarsem in every single aspect of the piece, and I didn't mind that in the least.
