drawing chalk stars, on the blackboard

Anti-Imperialism in Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now.

sarcasmmonster — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 04:03:11 GMT

This is an essay. God, why do I always post my essays here? It's due Monday and I have the sneaking suspicion that it sucks and I'll fail. The essay is supposed to be six parallels between Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now that demonstrate anti-imperialism. It's been a rather difficult thing, the 'finding the parallels and anti-imperialist message' part. Still fun to write, though, despite its difficulty.

Note: If you see any glaring mistakes, please let me know. I'd hate to hand it in when it's full of mistakes. Thanks!

Since ancient times to the modern era, humanity has always sought a way to expand its empire. It began long ago, when the first humans left the African region to find new homes on all other corners of the globe. It only continued in the future, with the Romans assimilating the bulk of Western Europe, with the European countries seeking the riches held in Africa and the Americas and promptly declaring them to be under European rule. Of course, Europeans weren’t the only ones gallivanting about and taking control of other nations; Genghis Khan had taken more than his fair share of Asia. The thought of imperialism seems far off to think of now, but it had been a massive part of the world and society not so long ago. The idea of imperialism and its downfalls are explored in both the novella Heart of Darkness and the film Apocalypse Now. Imperialism is a primal, harmful thing that doesn't only hurt those who invade or those who defend, but those who wait on the sidelines as well.

King Leopold II of Belgium, seeing the successful colonization of the new countries by other, more powerful European countries, sought to find a way to expand his empire. He found his solution in the south of Africa, in a nation called Congo. He bought the land and forced all the indigenous peoples of the land to work, first in the ivory trade, then in the rubber trade. Those who worked under the rule of the King saw the most horrible of things, whether they are forced into work, or were mercenaries willingly working for the King. The novella Heart of Darkness explores both the river of madness that many who worked on behalf of the King traveled, and the suffering of those who were forced into labour. Throughout the novel, Marlow, the protagonist, becomes steadily more unhinged by his surroundings. It is, after all, the darkest part of Africa, and it is controlled by the most brutal of men. In fact, the only thing that keeps Marlow’s sanity mostly intact is maintaining and staying in the boat. However, the madness surrounds the company, and Marlow and his crew come off as unsettled and plunging into darkness. In Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now, Willard and his escorts begin to lose their minds during their travels, seeing and, in some cases doing, some very terrible things on their way. The theme of madness remains dominant in both forms of media, Kurtz being the obvious poster boy, with protagonists Marlow and Willard, respectively, not straying far behind. Of course, taking place in the deepest, darkest, most unpopulated regions of both settings, it is easy to see why one would go mad. The invaded land does not take kindly to those who try to possess it. Insanity grabs those who attempt to control the land they've stolen.

Over the course of time, Europe has taken control of many new and different lands. For every 'new' land the Europeans have called their own, there have been indigenous peoples thoughtlessly murdered in order to completely control the new world. For every colony made, many had died. The invaders of both Apocalypse Now and Heart of Darkness vastly out power those they are trying to control. Whether it be muskets and cannons, or napalm and helicopters, the invaded only fight with what they can, from arrows and spears to makeshift bombs, demonstrating how very tipped the scale is. For both versions of Kurtz, his violent nature and new found madness are threatening to put a large stain on the reputations of the Company and the United States Army, respectively. Both stories show a mad, white man in control of the native population, the people seeing him as some sort of god, and allowing him to continue with his cruel acts without punishment. However, the fact that Kurtz becomes mad and his control is shown in a very negative light speaks of Conrad and Coppola's intentions. Kurtz shows a distinct lack of empathy, telling both Marlow and Willard to destroy what he had done in the heart of the jungle. His power and control over the indigenous people lead him to a crazed state in which he believes himself to be inherently superior to his 'people', which was the idea shared by most of Western civilization, and, to be frank, the idea still circulating in limited circles.

The effect of the darkest areas of the world have on the protagonists, and, indeed, their families also speaks of how imperialism affects even those not directly involved. In Apocalypse Now, Kurtz shows a desire to have his son know the entire story of Kurtz's downfall, hinting that he either believes that he doesn't feel he can tell his son himself, if only for his madness and knowledge of what Willard's intentions are. Or, he could be estranged from his family, as he is definitely the sort to put his work before his family, and so needs a third party to tell his son the truth. Willard ends up divorced and unable to cope with life in America after his first tour in Vietnam. Willard essentially destroys his life and his future, as he only lives to work, detaching himself from the reality of the war eventually ending and the fact he may not have a reason to be there any longer. The Kurtz of the novella has his 'intended', who is shown to be mourning a year after Kurtz's death and barely able to function without him. The fact that it's not only the main character's minds affected, but their families and friends' as well, shows the destruction that imperialism can lead to.

Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now rely heavily on their shared themes. From madness and darkness, to anti-imperialism, both stories tell the same tale in a different setting, with different characters, reacting to a very different time. However, the themes and the ideas, of the insanity that war and the savagery of man, all caused by situations that are beyond the average person, remain. Imperialism, in its truest form, is simply the act of dominating another country. In a way, it's a primal force at work, attempting to control or destroy another in order to gain their riches. Both stories are well aware of that fact, and they show it all in its pure, primeval, unaltered form.

The Secret of Kells- Review

sarcasmmonster — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 23:04:33 GMT

I know I said I would maybe do a review on Scott Pilgrim, but then I remembered that I have recently watched The Secret of Kells and, hell, if I'm going to do a review on anything, why don't I get the bigger, more serious film out of the way first.

The Secret of Kells is another joint effort between Belgium and France (known for such gems as Les Triplettes de Belleville, and Persepolis) however, Ireland is thrown into the mix this time. The plot of the film is inspired, of course, by Irish mythology and the real Book of Kells, which is a gospel written by Irish monks far back in the Medieval Period. From what the film portrays it as, I can only assume that the book is a sight, a beautiful, perhaps awe-inspiring sight, to behold. The film portrays the book as colourful and vivid, and, after doing a small amount of research (read: Google) I was able to see some photographs of the book itself. And it is marvelous to behold.

However, my rambling is not the point at hand here, at least, I don't believe it is. No, the point at hand is the film, isn't it? Of course it is, this may be a non-professional review, but it is a review nonetheless.

(Trailer for those who are interested:)

The film's protagonist is a young boy, I would assume something between 9 - 12 years old. His name is Brendan, and he is a monk in the settlement of Kells. His family has been killed and all he had left is his uncle (voiced by Brendan Gleeson) and his duties as a monk. However, his uncle does not like the time Brenden spends with the other monks, learning and writing, when he could be helping to build the wall that is being made to keep the Northmen, otherwise known as Vikings, out. This creates a fair bit of tension between the Uncle and Brendan, especially when a new monk named Brother Aidan (and his cat, Pangur Ban) comes to Kells, intent on continuing his portion of the Book itself. When Brendan is recruited by the elderly monk to be his assistant, Brendan's uncle is firmly against it. There's no time, he says, to go off chasing stories when the Vikings are so close and the wall is only half done.

Against his uncle's wishes, Brendan bravely ventures into the woods, at the request of Brother Aidan to find some sort of but that produces the emerald green ink needed to complete the book. It can only be found in the forest. There, he meets the faerie girl, Aisling, who soon becomes his ally. The rest of the plot is yours to find out. (I will say it makes great use of its setting and of Irish/Celtic mythology and stories, but that is to be expected, isn't it?)

Brendan is a clever sort of boy, he obviously has a wide understanding of the world, and he hits me as someone who is wise beyond his years. However, he is kept from being too, frightfully mature by having a child-like side, one full of wonder, curiosity and fun. He's hard-working and fairly honest (we'll disregard the fact that he lied to his Uncle to go into the forest) but that side that is so firmly a child hangs there, for the audience to see. When complicated things happens, he does as an average child does; he seeks the aid of an adult, or one older than he. All in all, he is a completely normal, creative child. He also happily subverts our current typical young character, meaning one that is an outcast and such, in fact, Brendan seems quite well-adjusted, if only a little solemn at points.

Aisling, the heroine and faerie girl, is not a rare sort of character. You know, she's something of a guide, and she's energetic and playful (her constant 'This is my forest' suggests she may be possessive, but it is understandable as she appears to have lost her family) and she comes off as a rather regular little girl. She goes from tolerating Brendan and showing him the way to the plant he needs, to inviting him back again, as most characters of the opposite sex tend to do in stories with child protagonists. I feel as if Aisling is a lonely, ageless girl. She has the animals, yes, and the forest itself, but she seems to crave a more stimulating companion, you know, one she can actually talk to. She's cheery, but she has this unfathomable powerful side, and she gives off this eerie feeling that I can't really put into words.

(Her song, however, is freaking beautiful. When you translate the Gaelic to English, it says that the world in ancient and old, and we are only here for a short time. This is what, of everything, suggest to me that Aisling is ancient.)

Strikingly, the film doesn't really have an antagonist. It has the vikings, who are evil brutes that pillage and burn everything in their path, and there's a monster that has one eye that couldn't help but remind me of The Legend of Zelda. (The eye is always the weak point, isn't it?) Despite these antagonists, the film mostly surrounds Brendan and the book, plain and simple. It's all about the creativity, about the art and majesty of said book. The vikings offer a reason for conflict, the monster offers a cool, artistic battle and a thing to defeat, but mostly, the film is about Brendan. Just plain and simply Brendan.

Truly, with just this, it flourishes.

Now, to talk about the art. As you could probably gather from the trailer, the style the film is drawn in is heavily stylized, and very bright and colourful. Some characters are boxy and angular, while others are string beans, and then some are simply round. The film uses its beautiful, unique style fully to its advantage. Though it is decidedly two dimensional, this only seems to enhance the experience. Your suspension of disbelief is completely gone, the film has drawn you into a marvelous, dark but colourful world full of simple wonder. This is one film that would simply not be the same if it were made in CGI or any other type of style. This film needed that unique feel to it, to go along with the unique beauty it offered.

Now, the music is lovely. I'm a fan of Celtic music, from the eerie voice of Loreena McKinnett to Ashley MacIssac to Great Big Sea's pop-y tunes, it's a lovely genre and it only makes me wish that I could play the fiddle, jamming away in the Maritimes or maybe even Ireland or Scotland. The music in the Secret of Kells (produced by Bruno Coulais of Coraline fame) is very beautiful. Quiet in some moments, loud in others, but it fits the mood of the film to a perfect t. And it completely retains that gorgeous Celtic sound to it, with the fiddle and all the other subtle noises to be heard. (It reminds me of the How to Train Your Dragon soundtrack, which was completely gorgeous.)

All in all, I would definitely recommend The Secret of Kells, though I must say it was too short. There are flaws in the film, and sometimes you wonder how something could have happened, or how 'x' makes sense, but it's all lost in the end by that feeling of having watched something awesome.

Dude!

sarcasmmonster — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 01:29:15 GMT

So, that's pretty much every major Canadian government official now-ish. Which is why Canada is awesome. (This is ancient, but I thought I would share why Rick Mercer+Canadian Government is awesome. They might not be the best of governments, but damn, they're fun.)

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, a Review.

sarcasmmonster — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 22:44:38 GMT

As you may already know, I'm a bookworm. I love all sorts of books, provided that they're good and engaging in my eyes. I've been reading for a very, very long time first in French then in English, and I read everything from children's novels to graphic novels to beloved classics. I just love to read stories and adventures, whether fiction or not.

So, here I am, writing a book review on a novel by Stieg Larsson, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo or Men Who Hate Women.

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a genre buster, I do believe. It's essentially a mystery novel, but it dives into other genres at its leisure. At one moment it's this horror filled tale that could make grown men shake in their boots, in the next, there's people talking about feelings. However, despite its changing moods, it flows perfectly from one moment to another, and it never has a dull moment to speak of.

The novel centres on a investigative journalist named Blomkvist, who co-owns a financial magazine called Millennium (which explains why the trilogy is so named) things had been going well enough for the small time magazine, until Blomkvist is convicted of libel against a powerful business man,Wennerstrom, it earns him three months in jail and throws his magazine into the depths. However, a retired, once powerful CEO of a company has a job for Blomkvist; this CEO's beloved niece, Harriet Vanger, had gone missing in 1966 at sixteen some forty years ago and the case has remained unsolved for that time. To add insult to injury, the CEO, Henrik Vanger of the Vanger Corporation, has received a pressed flower in a frame every year since 1967, which is exactly the gift his niece had given him since she was eight. He believes that this is the killer of Harriet is mocking him with these flowers.

Blomkvist is hired to discover what truly happened to Harriet. In return, he will be paid a few million kronor for his services and Vanger will give him information that could bring down Wennestrom and restore hope for Millennium.

In the meantime, another character has her story. Lisbeth Salander is a brilliant, anti-social twenty five year old woman who is mentally unstable. She's short, thin with black short cropped hair and numerous piercings and tattoos. Most distance themselves from her. Lisbeth is extremely anti-social to the point that her employer thinks it's a feat when she smiles at something. She works for an security company and does private investigations for multiple people. She discovers dark secrets and terrible memories as a part of her job.

So here are our protagonists, Lisbeth and Blomkvist. Both are wonderfully flawed, mostly regular people who work hard and have very distinct personalities. While Blomkvist is a known womanizer, Lisbeth detests being touched. Lisbeth can is an experienced, frighteningly good hacker, while Blomkvist is simply a regular journalist, though he is well known. They are polar opposites, and this is why they are perfect partners later on in the book.

The novel was called Men Who Hate Women originally for a reason. The book shows violent act after violent act against women, from rape to grotesque murders (in most cases, both.) It even goes back to Leviticus with the origin of the violence in the murders we are told about. showing that people will use any excuse to harm a woman, by masking it with religious fanaticism, they can pretend like they were doing 'good' which is, of course, beyond disturbing and digusting. It makes a very big point of why such violence is terrible, and how it affects the lives of the victims and their families. In fact, every separate 'part' begins with a statistic of how many women are sexually assaulted or harassed every year in Sweden, and then some statistics on what they do about it.

The book is intricate, details are important and little things you thought were one thing turn out to be the exact opposite. You learn things as the characters do, and so you can't accurately guess what is happening because it's prone to change. And that, in a mystery novel, is awesome.

Suspenseful is probably the best word to describe the novel. You'll devour its 800+ pages in no time at all, finding yourself inexplicably at the end when you wanted it to go on. It's that good. You'll find the characters sympathetic and very human, you'll enjoy learning about their lives and how they handle themselves, and it never really breaks your suspension of disbelief. The writing flows easily and perfectly; it's simple and almost reporter-like, but it fits the tone of the novel very, very well.

I'd definitely recommend it to any book lover, and I'd also urge you to see the film. It's wonderful, and the actors hit their characters to a T.

I look forward to reading The Girl Who Played With Fire very soon.

How to Train Your Dragon: A Review

sarcasmmonster — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 05:29:47 GMT

Be warned: I am long-winded and I did this purely to have some fun. In addition, it's spoiler free.

The movie starts with our protagonist and somewhat narrator, Hiccup, informing us about his home in Berk. It's cold there, everything is bland and every person is a tough and gritty viking. And then he informs us of the most exciting, and of course, the most deadly trivia about his village: it's at war with dragons. Not just one kind of dragon either, there's a variety, you see. There are dragons that are stubby and small, there are two headed dragons, there are dragons that can set themselves on fire and then there's the most dangerous one of all: the Night Fury, which is blindingly fast and never misses when it shoots fireballs.

Hiccup is the kind of protagonist you'll usually find in a film or book aimed at ten year olds. He's a teen, fifteen or sixteen I'd say, thin, clever and no matter what he does he doesn't fit in. Especially as a viking, since vikings are usually, you know, big blokes with full beards and funny hats. And, to add that little extra bit of shame for him, his father is the leader of their village Typically, at least, what I've seen from such fiction, heroes in children's fiction are these types. Not vikings of course, that would be...a strange thing, but rather the out-casted children, those kids who sit around and think about things, the ones who read, who write, who draw. They're skinny and awkward and no one knows nor wants to deal with them. Sometimes, such as the case in this film, they have a lack of communication with their parents or guardians, leading to the child to feel a little more alone. And deep down, almost every child knows what that is like. Especially when they're twelve year olds, when their worlds are shifting and changing all around them and they, they just want to be kids for a tiny bit longer. Their social lives could be collapsing, popularity and what's cool start to take root and sooner or later the kid feels completely left out. We know these kids, hell, we could have been these kids. Maybe that's why a character like Hiccup is so easy to relate to and like; he's that kid we all were at some point.

With a viking chief as his father, Hiccup has a lot to live up to, and has no chance in hell to be able to. He's searching desperately for way to belong, and, as dragonslaying is the way vikings become respected, he resolves to kill a dragon. Not just any dragon, the Night Fury.

Which no one has ever really seen. Bit of a damper on that idea.

This whole introduction takes place during a dragon raid, in which Hiccup is repeatedly told to stay out of. To his general amazement, he actually hits the Night Fury and it goes crashing into the forest. Of course, he goes looking for it, finds it and thinks about killing it for ultimate glory or something. But, Hiccup being a kind sort of person, he lets it free. It roars in his face and runs off. And of course, he comes back later to try to find it. And he does, marveling at what it simply looks like and realising half of its tail -what it needs to properly fly- is missing. On top of that, his father finally allows him to go to Dragonslaying School, where he will learn to kill and not be killed by dragons.

And so our real story begins.

The middle of the movie is essentially Hiccup and the dragon (Toothless) becoming friends, Hiccup keeping the existence of Toothless a secret, fashioning a way to ride the dragon, and, most of all, learning things about dragons from Toothless.

The film has incredible energy, gorgeous visuals and a good boasting of cleverness. My expectations for DreamWorks Animation have been lacking in the last few years, they released good movies, yes, but I couldn't seem to escape the feeling that some of their films (most noticeably Shark Tale and Shrek 3) seemed to just throw numerous pop culture references together and then toss the movie out for cinemas. That, and the the sequels, there are too many sequels. I know they are money hooks, but it bothers me that, instead of releasing new things, they rehash the old ones. And I was beginning to wonder what had happened with that same DreamWorks that had released Chicken Run and El Dorado, along with the much more recent Kung-Fu Panda. You know, the ones that had heart in them?

Not going to lie, I think I found it in this movie. At the very least, I found a part of it I missed.

How to Train Your Dragon is critically acclaimed for a reason; it's got this incredible amount of energy, these fun, interesting characters, a good premise and a lot of quirkiness. It was directed by Chris Sanders, whom you may remember as the guy who directed Lilo and Stitch. And it shows, he's definitely got some ideas and interesting ones, at that. Yeah, I think he's just a quirky guy by nature too.

The visuals, let me say, are gorgeous. I saw it in regular, good old fashioned 2-D, so I can't speak for the 3-D experience, but those visuals were just stunning. I know it may sound strange for me to have noticed such a thing, but you could see the hair on the vikings arms. Yeah, and the vikings' beards? They bounced. Think about it, there was some guy sitting at a computer screen animating the bounce in the vikings's beards. The dragon flying itself is, in a few words, really, really freakin' cool.

Oh yeah, and the music? Celtic dude. Celtic, allow me to say that I was incredibly happy with that. I happen to be fond of Celtic music, maybe because we have one too many Ashley MacIassac and Loreena McKinnett CDs in our humble abode, but it's one of those things that I could just sit there listening to for a long, long time. I fully intend on getting my hands on the soundtrack and listening to it as often as possible, because really, this kind of music is both perfect for the movie and inspiring for a girl like me who wants to write a children's book.

On another, sound related note, the acting was great. Most of the characters had these big, almost burly sounding (I kid you not. They Large Ham-ed it up here) Scottish accents. I just go by the feeling that the actors took their natural Scottish accent and ramped it up to eleven. The teen characters all had American voice actors, or, in the protoganist's case, Canadian, which begs the question of why all the adults have thick, Scottish accents while the children do not. Maybe it's some kind of genetic things that takes twenty years and then boom, you have yourself a Scottish accent. I don't know, I'll just roll with it.

Characters are strong and easy to like, for whatever reason you find yourself liking them. You'll find yourself taken aback by how much is communicated by simple gestures rather than words. Things like Hiccup and Toothless communicating through actions and on-off speaking on Hiccup's end. The simple things that make the characters feel real, like Astrid flipping her hair out of her eyes and the characters that don't mean anything standing in the background visible breathing. The little stumbles the characters have over words, and the expressions they made that simply fit perfectly. Hiccup is the master of this expressions game. The viewer is able to read so much from Hiccup by looking at his face. Not only that, but he's an incredibly fun, witty character that you can't help but like.

One thing I'll add to it is that; the only movie theatre with multiple screens within a four hour driving range is our previously mentioned ghetto theatre, and trust me, compared to the big seats in Galaxy theatres, ours are really uncomfortable. As such, I can usually be found tossing in my seat, and trying to get comfortable when the movie is slightly boring. Guess what? I barely fidgetted once during this movie. Usually, when that happens, I take it as a sign of 'good movie'. Yes, you will have to rely on my comfort level in my theatre to see if a movie is good. No, I'm not serious.

Hell, I think, if Toy Story 3 isn't received as well (Seriously, 98% on Rotten Tomatoes. That is freakin' high) that How to Train Your Dragon could be a shoe in for Best Animated Feature.

(In a non-review, more gushing note: Jay Baruchel is awesome because he has a tatoo of a maple leaf on his chest. And, David Tennant was in this movie yay.)

I'm talking odd socks on my toes, toes

sarcasmmonster — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 22:58:56 GMT