Film Blog Post #3 (To Kill A Mocking Bird)

I love black and white movies, I always have. So when this movie was first put on, I knew that I would like it. (Total side note, but if you've never seen The Uninvited, you really should. Very old, very good.) Something big I noticed in the movie right from the start, was how gender roles were extremely prevalent in the film. Take Scout for example; she clearly had short hair and dressed in boys clothes because she did not have her mother around as an influence, so she took to her father and her brother. BUT, Scout can dress however she damn well pleases, because that is her decision to make. And it was SUCH a big deal when she wore a dress for her first day of school, because that was the "norm". Rude af if you ask me. And the way she was treated, by her brother and their friend, also rude af. They tried to get her to leave sometimes because "she's a girl" and "she's too scared". That's a load of bullshit. The likes and levels of fear and tolerance are not determined by what you have under your skit nor in your pants.
Aside from the annoyance I felt surrounding that, this movie was great. It played devils advocate, having a white man willingly and wholeheartedly defending a black man for an awful (and untrue) accusation. Having everyone watching the movie, if they were the jury, believing that man to be innocent, but he is then guilty as charged, simply because of the pigmentation of his skin. Shits wild and unjust, but it has happened before, and to be quite honest it still happens today, as screwed up as that is. But this movie was so good, with a few stories going on that all managed to intertwine together, I loved it. Totally recommend it for anyone.
Side note (that is actually related): I have never read the book To Kill A Mocking Bird, but I sure as hell believe it's a good one after seeing this movie. I wonder how accurate the movie to book ratio is.

Film Blog Post #2 (Precious)

Okay, so to be entirely honest, I definitely thought that I wouldn't like the movie Precious. I figured it out (before watching of course) to be this movie about self pity and mutilation, bullying and all those other cruel things in life. Although it was technically about that stuff, that is not what the movie was. This movie was a story, a story of hardship and struggle with self worth and the views of others. This movie was about abuse, sexual and mental, and the results that come with them. Precious faced way too many difficulties for such a young girl, and basically everything that happened to her were forces that she could not control without support. She had no support, until she decided to make a change and go to a school that was focused on her success, not just the words in a text book.
This movie involved her journey into understanding how to achieve goals in ones life, and to turn ones disadvantages into advantages. Precious learned how to read and write, how to express herself, and create her own reality, rather than just the scenarios she created in her head when the people who were supposed to support and guide her tore her down. Precious was a revolutionary movie, a revealing movie, and I don't think that it could have been projected any better. And I'd like to give Gabourey Sidibe hella props for playing this role so exceptionally. She gave it her all and conveyed the messages like no other could.

Film Blog Post #1 (Holy Grail)

I loved this movie. The first time I ever "watched" it was back in my freshman year during my history class and advisory class. Since it was the end of the school year, I had absolutely no intention of paying attention to anything. I think I was downing pixie sticks with my friends, bad idea. 

BUT ANYWAY, rewatching this movie was definitely a good idea. Thanks Bavs. I enjoyed the parody effect of it, going towards the lives of Sir Lancelot and King Arthur. It made history entertaining to say the least. I have to admit that I have extremely little to no knowledge about King Arthur and his journeys, or whether or not they're actually real. But his journey to find the "Holy Grail" was quite amusing. I liked the quick wit and snarky comments that each of the Knights of the Round Table made, so there wasn't just one central comedian in the mix. I laughed quite a lot through the duration of watching this movie, and that's great. 

If it ever came down to it, I would most definitely recommend this movie to anyone. Unless for some odd reason they're not amused but cheesy jokes and chumpy humor, then I might question their life. I'd like to give this movie props too considering the fact that it kept my attention the entire time. I'm a senior and I'm graduating in about 33 days, so keeping my mind on lock is such a difficult task. Bravo. 

Blog #10: Reflecting upon, "To My Dear and Loving Husband" by Anne Bradstreet

If ever two were one, then surely we.

If ever man were loved by wife, then thee.

If ever wife was happy in a man,

Compare with me, ye women, if you can.

I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold,

Or all the riches that the East doth hold.

My love is such that rivers cannot quench,

Nor ought but love from thee give recompense.

Thy love is such I can no way repay;

The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray.

Then while we live, in love let’s so persever,

That when we live no more, we may live ever.

I really enjoyed reading this poem. It was filled with sentiment and reading it felt real. I believe in this wife's love for her husband, and I surely hope he feels the same way towards her. It reminds me of a Sonnet written by Shakespeare where he (satirically) expressed his love for the woman he was writing about. Clearly this poem expresses no satire, it is the complete opposite. BUT, it clearly represents a woman's love for her husband, as Shakespeare expressed his love. 

I liked the way Anne Bradstreet set all of this up. It's like she gives us something to think about, and then gives us a take away relating to her life. I feel like putting your feelings out there in that way shows vulnerability, and not necessarily "child-like" expression but a young aura. 

It seems to me, that the narrator, whether it be Bradstreet or someone else, sees more value in this love than in anything else. "I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold,

Or all the riches that the East doth hold." I, personally, think that it'd be quite amazing to have gold, and seemingly endless riches, but I do wonder. I wonder what it is like to love someone so much, that they are your riches. They are the gold and the silver, they are the 50's and the 100's. They are your worth. 

Blog #9: Reflecting Upon, "This World Is Too Much With Us" by William Wordsworth

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

The winds that will be howling at all hours,

And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

For this, for everything, we are out of tune;

It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be

A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;

Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.

The first time I read this, I started out thinking I knew what was going on. By the time I reached the end of it, I had decided that I had no idea what was happening. My first thoughts were like, maybe this poem was about how the human race has all of these beautiful things within nature, and we are wasting our chances and abilities to take advantage of them and their grace. But then, I was thinking that perhaps it is about the beauty of the world, and how things could amaze us, though there are aspects of nature that setter is, that make us wish that the world were as we dream or think. Considering we do not live in the time of the ancient Greeks, nor it's mythology, I don't expect Proteus to burst out from the sea with his Tridant. Nor will we hear Triton blow his horn, especially since I have never heard of Proteus or Triton (at least not in relation to this piece of writing.)

I'm still a bit confused about what's going on in this poem. I've read it in silence and I've read it aloud. And neither time do I really catch the essence of what is trying to be presented to the reader. I will acknowledge the wonderful use of imagery. I imagine laying like flowers and I imagine (even though I do not know what he is supposed to look like) Proteus rising from the water, and Triton with his horn. It has just little detail, but it's just enough for me to know, or to see what is going on. Even though I feel lost while reading. 

Blog #8: Reflecting Upon, "This Is Just To Say" by William Carlos Williams

So when I read this the first time, I felt nothing. I really thought of absolutely nothing. After I read it, I was kind of just like, "Okay? You ate someone else's food? Rude, but okay." I guess what I can take from the poem is that it's maybe a note. Or one of those conversations you have in your subconscious. I imagine this to be between a man and wife or boyfriend and girlfriend or just some sort of home companions (roommates, suitemates etc.). I find it very difficult to say much else about the poem. But maybe that was the intention of William Carlos Williams. Since it is indeed, 'just to say', maybe that is all the poem is. Something to say.
Since William Carlos Williams is indeed a poet, I hardly think that he wrote the poem just to say. So let me pretend to be a poet, let me allow myself to think at an abstract of my own blatant and plain ideas. The poem was written about forgiving the ones we love. Whomever the narrator is, has taken a bite of a 'forbidden' fruit, and it was good, but it was cold. They're seeking forgiveness, but maybe they won't get it.
(Isn't 'forbidden fruit' a religious thing? I wouldn't know, but I think it might be.)
I do appreciate the way the poem is set up. How the pieces are sectioned, I feel like they're set up in how I would say it. But I believe that we were talking about something in class recently, that once you hear or see something said/done that way, it can alter the way you approach it yourself. I'm still unsure of the truth behind that, but it's possible.

Blog #6: Reflecting Upon, "Those Winter Sundays" by Robert Hayden

Those Winter Sundays, seems to be a poem of sadness of the narrator, and the anger that flows through their home. Hayden presented readers with a time frame, only to the extent of a day in the week. But while reading the poem, I was able to imagine their father, with his dry and callused hands, getting dressed in the chill of morning. With such limited detail I can imagine, maybe, what his work place looks like. It is not a happy place, and as mentioned, it is not a profession that receives much praise from the people that benefit from the results of the job. The narrator comes off to me as young, and afraid. They are afraid of the tensions of the house, probably between the parents, maybe due to long work hours, difficulty making payments etc., but that's way too much for all of this. 

Once you get to the final piece of the poem, you can tell it is lovers quarrels. "Speaking indifferently to him," I think here is where the wife comes in strongly. She and her husband are having an argument, and the narrator, their child, isn't quite understanding it. The child sees their father as a good man, a caring man. He cleans their shoes, and warms their homes as well as others homes, he is a good man, why would he be getting in trouble? But this was all in the past, each Sunday. Since the narrator was young, they felt they knew nothing of love's difficulties, and the lonely moments that came with marriage.