The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey World Premiere - Live from the red carpet
It's finally here - the day of the world premiere of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
And we're bringing you the live footage from the red carpet today. Included in this will be a live performance by Neil Finn, who will sing "Song of the Lonely Mountain" from the official Hobbit soundtrack.
Key cast are expected on the carpet too - which all kicks off from 3.50pm NZT. In attendance will be Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett, Elijah Wood, Andy Serkis, the Company of Dwarves and Hobbit director Peter Jackson.
2) *Event timings:3:50 pm NZDT – Show Opening / Welcome4:00 pm NZDT – Neil Finn Performance (*set includes a performance of “Song of the Lonely Mountain” from the official soundtrack)4:30 pm NZDT – Talent arrivals, red carpet interviews & crowd interaction6:30 pm NZDT - Official Speeches7:00 pm NZDT – End of Show **PLEASE NOTE: These event timings are approximate. But, because, sometimes it takes a little longer to write these blog posts, I will be posting via Twitter - and you can keep up with my tweets from everything to do with the Hobbit premiere below -
So, join the world premiere for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey right here!
Cast: Charlotte Rampling, Gabriel Byrne, Hayley Atwell Director: Barnaby Southcombe
It's back to the noir world for this thriller with an older cast (something of a rarity these days). Charlotte Rampling stars as Anna Welles, an older woman whom we first meet making a phone call (how quaint - someone actually using a phonebox). It then shifts back to a grimy London and a speed dating singles night out for the older crowd.
Anna meets Ralph Brown's George before heading back to his tower block to take the relationship further. But we next glimpse Anna stumbling from the tower block and a murder investigation begins to unfold. Headed by Gabriel Byrne's DCI Bernie Reid, he's looking into the death of George....is Anna in someway implicated in this? Intrigued by their first brief meeting, Reid begins a romantic pursuit of Anna - but is his investigation crossing over some boundaries?
Grimy, murky, overcooked and overwrought, I Anna is a thriller which really only benefits from its lead actors. Rampling and Byrne make an affable pair and give credence to a story which takes its time to get going. As the layers of the narrative onion peel back, you may well be left crying - for good and bad reasons. While there are several claustrophobic shots and flashbacks which help tell the story, there's really little meat to these bones as the mystery unfolds. A weary looking Gabriel Byrne brings a dogged cynicism to his leading detective, while Rampling's nuanced and subtle performance hints at tragedy lurking in her past and potentially, her future.
All in all though, I, Anna is a bit of a muddled mystery; one which could have been more if the script had been a little deeper and engaging. Instead, what remains is a piece which looks murky and grainy with a cast whose excellence is barely tested.
Rating: PG Released by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
In this fourth outing for Diego the Sabretooth tiger, Manny the Mammoth and Sid the Sloth, as well as Scrat, the acorn lover, the world is changing forever for our trio – both literally and metaphorically. At the end of the last film, our trusty trio were settled with families and looking forward to a more quiet life.
That's all about to change in Ice Age: Continental Drift. When Scrat’s continual pursuit of the acorn sees him causing massive seismic schisms of the landmasses, the splitting of the continents divides Manny from his wife and daughter. Marooned on an iceberg, Manny’s sole desire is to get back to the family at whatever cost. However, this new quest for the trio turns into an adventure of the sea faring kind when their plans to get back to land force them into the path of the maniacal monkey Captain Gutt (Game of Thrones’ Peter Dinklage) and his motley pirate crew of animals, fleeing the splitting of the continents. Will Manny get back home? Ice Age: Continental Drift is really a case of if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it when it comes to the CGI film world. The madness and zaniness of the series is still there and the children in the audience will certainly love the fast paced silliness of the story – as well as the antics of Sid the Sloth and that most memorable of animated animals, Scrat. But this tale of the importance of family is really nothing new. At the end of the day, they’re all being forced to grow up in some form or other and learn a life lesson or two. Sid gains a grandma (voiced by Wanda Sykes) that none of the rest of the family want; Manny clashes with his young daughter Peaches because he’s over protective and she’s growing up and wants to hang with the cool kids; and all of them learn the lessons of being true to yourself. This series has been phenomenally popular and I get the sense that really, the creators are loathe to let it go – but even the most cynical and hard hearted may be won over by the pure nuttiness of what’s on the screen at times and won't be bothered by the weak plot and episodic feel of the action. Scrat’s antics alone serve as lunatic interludes to parts of the action – and he certainly gets a lot of laughs for doing very little and is a truly enduring cartoon character who has roots in the greatest Warner Bros cartoons. (I'm sure he'd use ACME to get that acorn if he could).
Elsewhere, the film belongs to Leguizamo’s Sid whose continual nonsensical outbursts bring the unexpected laughs. Plus some smart visual gags make it worth concentrating on. A lot of new characters and creatures emerge in this latest outing, which is formulaic at times and which occasionally feels a little cluttered with a lot of action unspooling in the first 10 minutes alone – it can be hard to keep up with this icy entourage but the kids (who it’s really aimed at) will love it for its zaniness and won’t care about the relatively thin plot. Extras: The story so far, singlong songs, Silent scrat movie
Rating: M Released by Roadshow Home Entertainment In the latest horror to emerge, it's back to Russia we go.
After The Darkest Hour, it seems the area is the new black for horror movies.
A group of four - 2 brothers and 2 girls - are backpacking around Europe when one of them books an extreme tourist trip, run by a former Soviet military guy.
The trip is to visit the deserted village near where Chernobyl melted down...only, when their van breaks down, it turns out it's not so deserted after all - and pretty soon they are all fighting for their lives.
The Chernobyl Diaries is from Oren Peli who brought us Paranormal Activity and while the initial scenes of eerie landscapes and empty buildings do much to build up some tension, everything which plays out after is as predictable as you'd expect.
Lacking any real suspense and any real quality acting, its easy to see why this flick bypassed a cinema release.
While watchable enough, The Chernobyl diaries could have been more effective if it had been a little smarter on the script and a little less predictable on the frights.
It's finally here - the ending of the epic Batman franchise from Christopher Nolan. Eight years after the events of The Dark Knight and Batman's left Gotham after the death of D.A Harvey "Two Face" Dent. Hunted by the police and blamed for the golden boy's end, the Caped Crusader's become a myth and Bruce Wayne's not much better - a recluse living in Wayne Manor and never seen in public.
But when cat burglar Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) breaks into Wayne's safe and ends up on his radar and when a masked terrorist named Bane (Tom Hardy) threatens to take over the city, Bats has no choice but to come out of seclusion and save his beloved city.
There's more to the story but to be honest, revealing some of those intricacies, details and nuances of the script would veer into spoiler territory - and being frank, this Bat-threequel is best viewed unspoiled.
Christopher Nolan has crafted an epic ending to the series - and one which is reverential to the source mythology and one which has truly raised the bar for comic book films. It begins with an audacious piece of action and the thrills never let up until the end some 165 minutes later. Visually, the film offers so much, satiating both fanboys seeking the spine-tingling moments and the casual viewer wanting a great blockbuster. While the film's somewhat disappointing denouement may not stand up to repeated inspection and tearing apart thanks to its conventional story which is spread over a somewhat bloated middle part, two things need to be remembered - one, it's a comic book film (which is bound to have a MacGuffin or two on hand) and two, it's the performances which anchor this film from beginning to end. Christian Bale's vulnerable Batman is a flawed hero we can readily identify with; he's a tortured soul more than ever who's to be broken spiritually and physically by what's put in front of him; but Bale brings his A game to the performance, providing the emotional intensity during some quieter scenes needed to ground this film and bring a payoff which is rich and satisfying as he becomes the Batman who's an inspiration and a symbol to others. Likewise, when he's kicking ass as the Batman; this is a guy who's given a rounded and powerful performance to a character loved by many.
Gary Oldman's spot-on as a conflicted Commissioner Jim Gordon, a man who takes up the mantle of defending his beloved city; Morgan Freeman, is well, Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox - and Sir Michael Caine is venerable, vulnerable and humane as butler Alfred.
Of the newcomers to the cast, Tom Hardy's anarchist Bane (who sounds a little like your English mate trying to do a Sean Connery style impression through a Darth Vader mask) is impressive; the ferociously intelligence and physical presence are astounding and instantaneous, giving his baddie a commanding feel which doesn't let up until the end (and if you know your Bat mythology, you'll realise how important it was to get Bane so right.) The scenes when Bats and Bane go mano a mano are intense, but not in the over the top way that you may have expected. And it's a performance which is a physical one too, with the eyes conveying a lot of his emotions - Hardy's to be commended. Equally, Anne Hathaway is perfect as Catwoman (although she's never called such on screen); her Selina Kyle is a slinky, vampy, sly character which is given a few humorous lines to punch through the occasional pomposity which is prevalent. Marion Cotillard offers up some class as a member of the Wayne Enterprises board. But the real star of the cast is Joseph Gordon-Levitt, whose idealistic and very human policeman John Blake becomes a driving force for belief. His Blake has the belief which has become so jaded and lacking in both Batman and Commissioner Gordon - and his character's story arc is thrilling to behold. Gordon-Levitt continues to impress as an actor and seals his place as one of the best talents on offer with this copper. Sure, it's a fitting send off for the film and the franchise, and to concentrate on a few narrative misfires here and there seems a little unfair because overall, The Dark Knight Rises offers up much for the movie lover; this is a Batman movie which is a grand and satisfying end to an epic series; it's an unmissable event which lives upto its hype and offers a rich spectacle - even on the small screen. Extras: Over three hours - including the Batmobiles piece, a comprehensive look at how the film was made.
To contact us Click HERE If Karl Marx's CommunistManifesto were going to be made into a Hollywood story, it would be Cloud Atlas. As with otherliberal agendas, the film's own values propel it towardsa state of contradiction.Directly targeting specific “demographics” of voters(such as the elderly, homosexuals, blacks, professional women), Cloud Atlas (like other pro-socialist films) fails toshow a positive representation of socialismandinstead targets the "evils" of capitalism. I am not going rip Cloud Atlas because it falls apart like rotting flesh off a corpse (and if you think I'm being hard, the film didn't even gross $10 million its opening weekend). First,we must turn our attention to the most striking feature of the film: itsstructure.
The film opens with Tom Hanks in the character of an ... old tribesman,... who is from the future? His speech is so choppy and muttering it's nearly impossible to understand what is being said and that's part of the point. We have discussed "noise" as an artistic medium regarding both Contagion and The Dark Knight Rises, and "noise" as an artistic medium is named in Cloud Atlas when Robert Frobischer (Ben Whishaw) writes a letter to his "male lover" (or is Sixsmith just his best sex customer?) revealing that he can now hear the noise in between the silence. So what are we to take from this? Just as it was difficult to understand what the socialist Bane was saying in The Dark Knight Rises, so we can't understand everything the socialists say in Cloud Atlas, like what will really happen in a "state of revolution" and how many people will be imprisoned and put to death to force the United States of America into becoming a socialist state; how long it will take to overthrow all private and small business operations and put them in government's control and how long it will take the government to figure out how many rolls of toilet paper each city should be allowed to have for its citizens, how many quarts of milk, etc., then for those orders to be actually carried out, etc., or one can just look at history and see the constant shortage of supplies in the social history of the Soviet Union, in the famines of North Korea, the civil rights abuses of China or the stories of the boat people fleeing Cuba.But socialists will just look down at me and call me names for mentioning all these things, instead of letting it be consigned to the "noise in between the silences."
Built upon a number of converging stories and characters—as in Traffic, Crash, The Red Violin—Cloud Atlasrelies upon chaos theory for its philosophical foundation (without the idea of history repeating itself, or Mandelbrot sets, such a story as Cloud Atlas would not be possible). Now, dear readers—especiallythose who have been bearing with me all summer and my talk about Darwin vs. Chaos theory, now is your reward!--because Cloud Atlas aligns itself with chaostheory yet aligns the villains (capitalists) with Darwin's “naturalorder” (there are anumber of philosophers who incorporate a form of “naturalorder” into theirsystem of thought yet the application of "natural order" in Cloud Atlas specificallytargets race and class relations but the point is, I told you this opposition between the two scientific paradigms was going to be important, and now we see how it's turned out) and it thoroughly demonizes "order" in society only to replace it with a new, unnatural natural order of its own making.
I am glad that the makers of Cloud Atlas chose to sexually unite a "fabricant" and a "pure blood." Why? Well, if you consider homosexuality a natural act which has been unnaturally suppressed throughout human history by laws and social disapprobation, or sex changes with men becoming women to be natural, then the point of the film would not be easily discerned apart from social bigotry. With Sonmi 351 (the female pictured above) and Hae-Joo Chang (the man holding her) "falling in love," the blurring of the line between a man-made robot/machine and a human being quickly reveals how confused socialists are about reality (this also happens in Ice Age 4 Continental Drift and the inter-mating of different species, not different races, but entirely different species). By definition, Sonmi 351 is a robot, yet the socialists bequeath to her the full-range of human emotions and sexuality, so no, she's not a robot,... oh, wait, she is because otherwise the whole plot fails, but she's not a robot because the socialists freed her, thereby creating a previous-robot who now has a philosophical consciousness that blows them all away,... but she's a robot, not a human, but she then claims to be human. Are you confused? You should be, because something which does not have life naturally cannot come to have life naturally just because someone wishes it so, likewise, just because we wish to have a utopian, just society where the government gives us everything we want, doesn't exist anymore than a fully-human, fully-robot. If you think I am reading "too much into this," please consider that "Lana" Wachowski, who was born "Larry," is a director and screenwriter, one of the creators of the mega-blockbuster hit The Matrix who recently underwent a sex change to become a woman. By socialist standards, the very act of calling Sonmi 351 a fabricant is an act of racism, even though--as I said--the film's whole plot depends upon her being a robot.
Slavery is a primary subject throughout the film, whether due to skin color or economic status, and those who have the advantage consistently cite "the natural order" as justification for their enslavement of others: according to the film, and the general ideas of "social Darwinism," certain people (read: rich, white people) validate the poverty and suppression of other people (read: all women, all blacks, all homo- and bisexuals, robots/machines and all non-human life-forms and anyone outside industrialized society or those within industrialized society in low-skill jobs) because those "on top" are "naturally" more talented and capable at success than those on the bottom; those at the top are destined to stay at the top and those on the bottom destined to stay on the bottom and that is the will of God. There is a problem with this, however.
In Neo-Seoul, 2044, there is a shortage of workers so they are mass produced (as humanoid robots called "fabricants") to labor in jobs such as this food-court; they wear collars keeping them in their location. Of all the places in the world, or all the places the imagination could invent (because there are imaginary places in the film) why would Seoul be chosen? In a different section of the story, Louise Rey's (Halle Berry) father had been in the Korean War (America's "forgotten war" which also was remembered in Battleship) and the history of Seoul is not only the battles of the Korean War, but of the Cold War and the successful stopping of the spread of communism the fight for Seoul was about (the whole of the TV series MASH was roughly based on the Korean War). Cloud Atlas presents to us a picture of utter failure: the "consumer world" is a world of sex enslavement and people who lack real identity; the problem with this, of course, is they fail to look a little way to the North where North Korea is under a communist dictator who prefers threatening America with nukes than feeding his people; why don't the socialists want to talk about him? To being that point up, of course, again meets with socialist ridicule yet the imperative fact remains that socialists do everything they can to destroy successful capitalist societies but pass over failed socialist societies in silence.
Liberals/socialists have a very selective, random memory of history, specifically, that it was the Democratic party who enslaved the blacks in the Old South pre-Civil War, incorporating the "natural order" into their party platform to justify it, but also the socialist party of Adolf Hitler employed natural order to justify his party's slaughter of the Jews, homosexuals and Catholics. Socialists argue that Hitler wasn't a socialist, he was a Nazi, but he was a socialistand his programs were socialist: in other words, the very un-natural natural order of which liberals and socialists accuse conservatives, capitalists and Republicans, is the unnaturalness inherent in their own party and has been practiced by them throughout history.
Hugo Weaving in one of many roles in Cloud Atlas, Old Georgie, the devil. Please note the top hat he wears is the signature of a gentleman of the upper-class, thus aligning him with the rich. It is the strategy of socialists to tell the middle-class that religion only serves the upper-class as a means of subjecting the lower-classes, but there are at least three, fundamental reasons why (at least) Christians should be against a socialist government: the government determines what is right and wrong, not moral teachers (such as Rabbis, Pastors or the Pope); secondly, "suffering" is evil and supposedly eradicated and, thirdly, the government becomes the author of the individual's life, not God. That a socialist revolution is taking place in America right now seems inconceivable, but the truth is, it's easier today than ever because we have no spiritual understanding to help us through the tough times socialists blame on capitalist greed: it's easy for socialists to employ the misery of those without of jobs and the increasingly high cost of living to their own advantage because we have lost the backbone to "suffer in faith" that God will use our suffering for our own good and the good of others; to socialists, any "suffering" is evil and must be done away with. Either we are slaves of Christ Jesus or we are slaves of the world, and the tempting of our weakened spirituality to rid ourselves of the "discipline of the Cross" has found a place of "hope" for many people supporting the government taking over their lives.
Sonmi 351 illustrates a popular liberal strategy:we, the viewers, are put into a position of unreality by this line of the plot, because it's a real human playing the part of a robot with artificial intelligence (computer code to simulate human thinking patterns and emotional reactions) so we "forget" that she's a fabricant because we see her emotionally respond to situations to which we ourselves are responding; her capitalist employers at the food court only treat her like a fabricant because she is a fabricant! People who treat robots like robots--by the film's reasoning--are intrinsically evil!
In this scene, Doona Bae, who portrays Sonmi 351, also portrays a white woman married to an American lawyer before the Civil War, suggesting that the fabricant has a soul which flies through time like the other re-incarnated beings. A socialist might make the case, that the case can be made in art that, being employed, Sonmi 351 is only a fabricant to her employer and that accurately reflects American capitalism; when she comes into contact with Hae Joo, who cares about her and provides for her, she "comes alive" and is no longer a fabricant, a slave of capitalism, but has her own will. Sure, you can make that case, but at best it's irresponsible screenwriting, at worst, it's philosophical inconsistency, and we all know that a logical, sane being will think consistently and logically, so, if philosophical inconsistencies don't bother you,...
To the viewer, and because of the inherent power of stories to grab the audience and compel us to identify with the characters, we believe that somehow the socialists who free Sonmi 351 endow her with human life, just as the slaves are endowed with freedom. This is impossible, but they promise it just the same, just like the sinking utopian island of Atlantis in Journey 2: Mysterious Island, and the ginger bread house made of candy in Hansel and Gretel Witch Hunters. The socialists employ our natural, human emotions and turn them against our brains. Let's examine what position Cloud Atlas takes on art.
This moment is a perfect example of how immoral the application of cinematic techniques is within Cloud Atlas. Vyvyan Ayrs (Jim Broadbent) is the greatest living composer of his day; Robert (Ben Whishaw) is a bi-sexual, young composer working on the Cloud Atlas Sextet he wants Vyvyan to sponsor. After playing the score for Vyvyan, Robert "comes onto" him at which Vyvyan scorns him and says that he has known all along that Robert was a thief and a homosexual prostitute and asks Robert if he thinks he would really allow someone in his home without doing a background check on him? Then, Robert says that he is leaving and Vyvyan says that he has to finish the Cloud Atlas Sextet which Vyvyan will take credit for and then he will release Robert. What has the film done to create the situation of having the viewer sympathize with Robert's plight? First, Robert gets rejected, and we have all experienced rejection in some form in our lives; secondly, he's been working on the Cloud Atlas composition and he fears having it ripped away from him and we can all identify with that fear. Robert, pursuing his dream of being a great composer, comes against a man who will take all Robert's work and claim it as his own, and to socialists, this is what all employers do, take the laborer's labor and the employer claims it as their own; this same situation came up in The Odd Life of Timothy Green (Joel Edgerton, Jennifer Gardner) when they invent a new pencil design and the owner of the factory claims the design as his own.
There is a consistent tattoo of a shooting comet upon several people throughout the story (those meant to do something important but not live long, shine brightly for awhile, but then expire). The "comet tattoo" appears on Robert which we see when Robert lies in bed with Rufus Sixsmith, and this "mark" and it reminds me of what was said of Edgar Allan Poe in The Raven, that Poe (John Cusack) had a great genius but God cursed him with misery. It's only misery, however, if you don't believe in God (and the last words of Poe in The Raven factually reflect Poe's real last words, God have mercy on my poor soul). To a Christian, suffering and misery is an allotment each person is given by God to aid them in fulfilling their destiny and preparing them for the glories of heaven; to socialists, suffering signifies a break down in the government and must be eradicated, unless, of course, that suffering comes from a socialist government, and then God help you if you criticize it.
The tagline reads, "Past. Present. Future. Everything is connected." I agree with this. This particular scene is Robert smoking his last cigarette and watching his last sunrise before blowing his head off. According to the story, Robert kills himself to become a record store worker who digs out an only copy of The Cloud Atlas Sextet for one of Halle Berry's characters, and he can't stop listening to it. In this part of the story above, however, Robert prepares to kill himself and this leads us to a fourth reason why Christians should always abhor a socialist state: there is no human soul. It's a contradiction in Cloud Atlas that the soul of each character re-incarnates time and again, but in reality, people are Darwin's animals, no soul, not the children of God, no destiny, just animals and suicide is perfectly legitimate if that is what you want to do. But it's not just suicide, it's any behavior which might contradict a "moral code," even if one is not particularly religious. The laws of a socialist government primarily are meant to protect it from the citizens, not protect the citizens from the government or other people.
In Cloud Atlas, artists are cursed with capitalists. The plot is clear that, had Robert not been compelled to go stay with Vyvyan, he could have worked on his art--with no worries about rent, food or theft of his ideas--if the state were sponsoring him,... we are not treated to an actual depiction of this grand idea, it's only hinted at as a better alternative to Robert foolishly shooting Vyvyan then later killing himself, BUT, had Robert had better surroundings, the film posits, the Cloud Atlas Sextet would have become a major work of art instead of being consigned to just a few copies in North America. But this is where socialism fails to understand art.
Part of the film is a journey taken by a lawyer to a slave colony and he writes of his adventure and publishes it, which Robert happens to find, reads, and then can't find the second half of the book; why? The book was torn in two and the second half used to prop up the bed post, a fact we discover only when the empty casing shell from Robert shooting Vyvyan lands beside the book Robert had desperately been searching for/ why does this happen? Vyvyan obviously was the one who tore the book in two and regulated this "great story" to a utilitarian function (propping up the bed) so instead of "propping up great art" (Robert's Cloud Atlas Sextet) Vyvyan props up his material and luxury goods instead; therefore, Vyvyan deserves to die (the casing landing beside the lost book after Robert shoots Vyvyan). Capitalists know nothing about art, even if they are artists themselves.
There is an example of an artist under a socialist system, Soviet writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn,whom the film cites (by name two times) as being a great writer, and who also was writing against the socialist system which imprisoned and exiled him. Trying to understand the devastation the October Socialist Revolution caused Russia which became the Soviet Union, Solzhenitsyn wrote:
"Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: "Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened." Since then I have spent well-nigh 50 years working on the history of our revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: "Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened (Wikipedia)."
The film, while simultaneously holding up socialism and Solzhenitsyn, doesn't seem to realize how critical of socialism/communism Solzhenitsyn was and why. It's difficult to name great artists (of whatever medium) who have emerged from socialist states, but Solzhenitsyn was the writer most critical of the state imprisoning him, not glorifying socialism, and the makers of Cloud Atlasreally don't seem to get that. Here's a perfect example.
A part where Jim Broadbent, as Timothy Cavendish, has "returned to his first love," Ursula (Sarandon) and writing his own works instead of publishing others' works. This scenario of returning to the first love, and especially how it plays out in the film, is meant to remind people who have perhaps been successful in capitalist markets that when they were young and innocent, and probably supported socialism, they can still do that today because our first love was always our greatest love,... or so they want us to believe.
Timothy Cavendish is another character in the story and his book publishing perfectly deconstructs what socialism doesn't want us to know. Cavendish plays a publisher to Dermot "Duster" Hoggins (Tom Hanks) and we are supposed to be picking up the "hog" in Hoggins' character. Hoggins wrote a terrible book called Knuckle Sandwich (perhaps a reference to "brass knuckle tactics" we see in the anti-capitalist film Lawless), which was reviewed by a critic; Hoggins then throws the critic over the apartment railing, killing him on the street below. Even though Hoggins hasn't an ounce of talent, the infamy of the murder makes him famous and his book sells out, meaning that Cavendish also makes a tidy sum. Enter socialism.
Tom Hanks as one of the many villains he portrays throughout the film which is supposed to symbolize the history of the US in all of our faults and "missteps." Hoggins has no talent, but he makes a lot of money and gets famous because of his brutality. This association of art with fame and money is supposed to illustrate how art and capitalism do not mix. The first question is, does Hoggins fit the general understanding of what a writer is? He's neither Hemingway nor Stephen King, or Sylvia Plath or Poe, so the film takes a thug who would never be a writer in reality and makes him into a writer for their argument. They want you to think that only the homosexual Robert Forbischer (Whishaw) can be a real artist. Next, the film criticizes American consumer behavior (after murdering the critic, everyone wants to read the book) and I do agree with that; we all know about consumer appetites and exploiters such as the Kardashians, but, then again, would anyone call the Kardashians artists (outside of "con-artists")? No, and Cloud Atlas wants us to believe that capitalism makes people this way and socialism will magically redeem us and turn us into perfect human beings. Herein lies the fifth reason for Christians not to buy into socialism: a socialist government basically denies Original Sin, which is the reason Christ came to save us and redeem us; the government wants us to believe that only a socialist government can save us; it can only alter our behavior--regardless of how bad it is--by holding guns to our heads and threatening to haul us off to detention camps.
As Cavendish enjoys his wealth from the sell of Knuckle Sandwich, three thugs come to Cavendish claiming they are friends of Hoggins' and they want Cavendish to give them $50,000. The thugs accidentally symbolize socialism, because whenever someone succeeds, a socialist government is thee to "drag them back down" to the equalized mediocrity the government artificially creates throughout society, so the thugs are not an accurate reflection of capitalism, rather, of socialism. Now enter nationalized health care.
Cavendish gets "tricked" into signing himself into a retirement home he doesn't want to be in by his older brother. In this scene, Cavendish and Mr. Meeks (left) engineer their escape from Nurse Nokes (Hugo Weaving, yes, the men play a number of women in the film, supposedly to make capitalism look "unnatural" but it really only makes socialism look unnatural). Mr. Meeks doesn't say anything except, "I know, I know." Which begs the question: what is it that Mr. Meeks knows? Four of the group have escaped the nursing home but Mr. Meeks has gotten left behind, so they risk their own escape to go back and get him (this is a jab that, "In America, you're on your own," because the capitalist government won't help you, only the socialist government will, and we saw this in Ice Age 4). They then go to a pub and have a drink when the pursuers from the nursing home catch up with them. Mr. Meeks stands up and, recognizing the Scottish makeup of the pub, incites the crowd to defend him because the English are taking advantage of him and disregarding his human rights and liberties; the Scottish being Scottish, immediately seize upon the English and beat them to a bloody pulp with the refugees from the nursing home escaping once again (please note that my mother's maiden name is McAlpin, the name of the first dynasty of Scottish kings, so I am very Scottish myself). This moment, and what happens and why, is imperative because of the tumultuous relationship of Scotland and England (and, because, it's very probable that this will come up in Skyfall, because the film is named for the Bond home in Scotland and is the scene of the major fight sequence of the film). Because the union of Scotland and England was achieved through the Treaty of Union, which came about as the resulting failure of the Darien scheme (a failed capitalist venture Scotland undertook which bankrupted them), and there are all those terrible, and bloody wars for Independence between the two countries, there still lingers some hostility which flares up occasionally. Socialists artificially employ the "take over" of Scotland by England as an anti-imperialist argument against capitalism, i.e., only capitalists are imperialists because capitalism (being Darwinistic and therefore unnatural) naturally seeks to enslave everyone; both Italy and Germany sought to take over African countries in World War II, the Soviets gobbled up all their neighbors behind the Iron Curtain, North Korea is still officially at a state of war with South Korea, etc. (there is literally too many examples to name here, however, I do discuss it in An Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini and the Vietnam War, how that song reflects America's policies in stopping the spread of communism). Cloud Atlas utilizes this bit of history to make the audience believe that everyone has more freedom under a socialist government than a capitalist government, however, socialist governments are historically the world's worst violators of human rights (China, the Soviet Union, North Korea, Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, the Warsaw Pact countries, etc.).
The nursing home Cavendish gets tricked into entering is partly owned by his brother Dennis (Hugh Grant), and Dennis does it to get rid of his brother borrowing money all the time and in part for revenge against his brother for having an affair with his wife Georgette (Ben Whishaw, yes, he plays a woman). The guilt of Cavendish's affair with his sister-in-law is overlooked (probably a symbolic reference to Cavendish "coveting his brother's wife," and possessions, i.e., he wants to be as rich as his brother and sleeping with Georgette is a way to do that). What Cloud Atlas focuses on is that, because the nursing home is privately owned, it is being used by the rich to "imprison" the elderly who are "no longer wanted" by their relations except to get their final will. So, the logic is, by nationalizing all nursing homes, your relatives can't punish you for sins you have committed by locking you up because they won't be able to use their wealth against you,... that's the logic. And you won't get into trouble for sleeping with you sister-in-law because "marriage" is only a religious institution that will be done away with because sex, too, will be nationalized and you can sleep with anyone you want.
Isaac Sachs, also portrayed by Tom Hanks, upholds Obamacare as well. The doctor robs Adam while he supposedly treats him for his illnesses, because Adam has a chest of gold the doctor wants, so, instead of treating him, the doctor poisons him. Yes, we should read this for what it is, that doctors who practice privately are rotten to the core, but, when Obamacare takes effect, all that will disappear and doctors will become good people who will give you the greatest care possible for absolutely no compensation (because they will all go broke under nationalized health care).
In a work of art, a “highpoint” references amoment, detail, plot twist, character, etc., that is the interpretative "vantagepoint" from whence to interpret the film because of that singular element in the art, thereis no other way to understand the encoded message/agenda but through that sutureof the highpoint revealing the message beneath the art's surface, i.e., the art breaks its own encoding. Every scene of Cloud Atlasis a highpoint, leading to a break-down of all its encoding in every scene and revealing apolitical manifesto in its place, in every scene, with no or little encoding, making it tedious to watch in addition to being a call for socialist revolutionaries to unite and overthrow capitalists.Eat Your Art Out, The Fine Art Diner P.S.--I am considerably upset about the attack Cloud Atlas makes on Seoul; here is the full episode of Peter and Dan Snow's 20th Century Battlefieldspecial on the Korean War; if you know nothing about that period of the Cold War, this is the show for you!
To contact us Click HERE Why does Wreck It Ralph say, "I'm going to wreck it"? That's the choice of voters tomorrow, whether or not to "wreck" the system of capitalism built up since the country's beginning. Disney's newest film is theoretically advanced on a number of levels (it's proving to be a chore deciding what to write and skip) and thoroughly enjoyable; understanding the film is imperative given the nearly $50 million opening weekend pre-election day! To be honest, however, if I had children, (and this is a decision every parent has to make) I don't know that I would let them see it. There is some language and name-calling I would not want my 5 year-old repeating; additionally, there were a great number of children in the audience (as you can imagine) who seemed restless; the story line maybe too much for smaller children; adults, on the other hand, seemed to greatly enjoy the film and that's because, ultimately, it's an affirmation of the power of the voter and the belief in the American Dream. It's a good film, but I think many in Hollywood are shocked by the overwhelming opening it has enjoyed (rather like Taken 2's opening weekend) and that may be because of the validation of the American Way which is dominant throughout the film causing audiences to head to the movie! I am working on the full review!
To contact us Click HERE (This post was written before I saw Skyfall; my review of the film, including the artwork, is Last Rat Standing: Skyfall & the Question Of Free Will). Skyfall will probably be the best Bond film ever; why? Meticulous care has been taken by expert film makers to build up the character of Bond for the audience to dive into; Bond has been re-made into an icon--not only of action heroes--but of metaphysical and cultural identity reflecting the dramatic changes in global events and norms. It's because Bond has become human, then risen above his human boundaries, that we both believe everything he does and willingly suspend our disbelief to believe everything he does, and this is character success when the audience wants them to succeed and identifies with them in their pain.
Judi Dench as M in Skyfall. Please note, in this shot, how her stance reflects the image of the little English bull dog on (our) left, atop her desk. Any and every detail about M we can gather in the film will be imperative to understanding what has happened and why.
Having said all this, you now know what it costs me to say that I think Skyfall will be pro-socialist. There are a couple of reasons for this, but most center upon the relationship between M (Judi Dench) and Silva (Javier Bardem). I think Skyfall is really casting M as the villain because she gave birth to Silva as a terrorist. Before it was advertised on Yahoo! that Wikipedia had posted the complete plot of the film, I had found it and was considering the ins and outs (of which there are many). IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS IN THE FILM, STOP READING NOW! REPEAT, THE REST OF THE POST HAS SPOILERS, SO STOP READING IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS. I am seeing the film this afternoon, will be posting my initial responses via Twitter, then working through the night to get the complete review up! If you want to know what happens in the film before seeing it, the complete synopsis is here!
The point of the film at which this scene takes place will be important for Bond's character because bathing/swimming/raining, etc., is usually sacramental for a rebirth so that they are cleansed of previous wounds (emotions and physical) so they can complete their task, fulfill their destiny. Don't believe me? Remember, Silva has Bond captured and Bond says, "Everyone needs a hobby." Silva asks, "What's yours?" and Bond replies, "Resurrection." The swimming scene pictured above may be the actual moment of psychological resurrection for Bond or this may be one of the "minor" moments of resurrection, as every day of our lives we have to validate decisions we have made or decide to alter our lives. Up to the point of this "resurrection" scene, Bond is depleted and needs rejuvenation; what has depleted him? The scene following this swimming scene will probably be the key to Bond's entire being, i.e., what makes James Bond James Bond, because whatever he does after he swims (the significant action) will be his inner-most motivation, what he sees as his purpose in life.
M dies. Whenever a character dies, it is a metaphysical/cultural judgment upon whatever that character represented/symbolized. Being an older woman, M symbolizes Great Britain, specifically, the "old order" of Great Britain and the way things have been done, the values the UK has stood for and fought for; what changes all that? That has to be seen in the film, but my thesis going into Skyfall is that the film makers are critical of the enemies England has fought in the past mistaking the enemies for the friends, and the friends for enemies (China and communism).
These are the shots that make my heart swoon! Light and darkness will be major characters in Skyfall (as we can tell from the shot above) and probably any other dichotomy (inside & outside, man & woman, light & dark, evil & good, etc.). In this clip, the darkness covers Bond but his eyes are illuminated, meaning that his world is dark (something has happened and he's confused or the world is no longer the place he thought it was) but his inner eyes, that is, his wisdom and experience, are "lighting" the way for him to track the real enemy, so he's still able to "see" through the darkness that is symbolic of whatever is going on within this scene.
This delectable morsel from Skyfall, when James Bond meets his new Quartermaster, Q, is too delicious for us not to spend some considerable time on it and get an idea of what to look for in Skyfall before we see it this weekend: Where are they and what are they looking at? We know by the paintings in the room they are in London, the National Gallery, specifically in Room 34, south end, facing the west wall (being an art history major has finally paid off,...); let us now compare those specific coordinates of Bond's exact location to this clip when M (Judi Dench) tries to "locate" Bond: Why would his boss (a long acquaintance) have little knowledge of Bond's location, yet Q (who Bond has just met) knows 007's exact location? Such a grand, polemical comparison in Bond's relationship to M and Q will be constant throughout the film and this is only one of several dichotomies upon which the characterizations will hinge. Why should we care about that? Because if the characters demonstrate such highly dramatized polarizations, the villain and the hero will exhibit ever greater diametrical opposition--that vastness in-between good and evil--and identifying those poles will not only be the key to understanding what the film wants to say and why it needs to say it, but where we enter into that discussion.The reason this scene in the museum is so important is because this is the scene wherein Bond gets the gun that fits to the palm of his hand, so only he can fire it: a work of technological art within a setting of cultural art.
Ben Whishaw as Q.
There's something unusual about this scene in the National Gallery,... the seat. Yes, it's the bench that is so odd, because there are no "benches" in Room 34 of the National Gallery, there are individual leather seats, all together in a row, one row at one end of the room, another row at the opposite end. So why a bench? Q and Bond "share the same space," or are in "the same position" (you can, if you want, stop the film at 0:02 and compare how they are mirror images of each other in that pose, their arms, their legs, their suits, and the similarities only heighten their differences; more on that below). So they occupy that same sort of space; so what? Well, the long black bench the leather chairs have replaced puts them "on equal footing" within their relationship (they "balance" each other, if you will, like two children on either end of the see-saw) and, because the very painting they look at reflects them more than they reflect upon it, it's time to "turn" (as in Turner) our attention to it.
The Fighting TemeraireTugged To Her Last Berth To Be Broken Up, 1838, by JMW Turner, 1839, National Gallery of Art, London. Please, click upon the image and open it at full viewing capacity because that will bring the painting into an entirely different perspective for you. Turner is one of the best known--and best loved--English painters of all time, so it's not the least bit surprising that a painting by the Royal Academy member would be included in the ultimate film about the ultimate British superhero; what is surprising is the choice of painting. I mean, why not go with one of the far more abstract ones, or one of the more intimate ones? One of the more famous ones? (Simon Schama has a fab part on Turner in his Power Of Art series, which is available through Netfilix). This one was chosen for a reason, this one over other possibilities within Room 34 of the NG, or any other painting in that enormous museum (or the Tate, or the Grosvenor Gallery, for that matter).
J.M.W. Turner's The Fighting Temeraire borders on the academic painting Turner's contemporaries valued so highly (real-to-life imagery in a painting, verisimiltude) and the total abstraction later modern artists would worship him for (the blurring of the colors in the sunset, for example). Why is this formal analysis important? It reflects the differences between Bond and Q: Q lingers in the dream world of pajamas and computer codes like the blurred sky, while Bond exerts himself within the hardened battles of "kill or be killed" symbolized by the warship. Q reflecting on the death and inevitability of time he sees in the old battle ship, now being towed off for scrap, reflects what he sees in Bond: the old agent being towed off for scrap, the past, the dead... Bond. The painting relays an actual event: the great war ship is being towed by a dark, little towboat to be junked and used for spare parts, and in this simplicity, we now understand their roles: Bond--as the big, bloody ship--and Q seeing Bond as the big, bloody war ship that is now facing death and a "new way" of doing the bloody work of war, via bloodless computer codes. Or is it?
This is complex. Bond has just seen a man fall to his death while a woman in yonder window has just seen Bond send a man to his death. Here are the important dichotomies again: the darkness of the night (where Bond is) and the light of the room (where the woman is); the vertical space of where the man has just fallen to his death and the horizontal space between Bond and the woman; Bond is outside, the woman is inside. Note how nearly everything in this shot is vertical or horizontal: the buildings all going up , and the tidy, neat lines going across the apartment as window frames, like a grid. This order may reflect the order within Bond at this moment of action, but it might also serve to heighten the disorder within him, we will have to see, but it's one more thing to look for in the film.
In the Wikipedia entry for Turner's painting, Bond being the old warship led away to the scrap yard is how it has been interpreted. I disagree with this. Bond doesn't die in the film, M does, and because the Fighting Temeraire was Britain's famous warship that battled England's Catholic enemies, the Spanish and French, I think the boat far better symbolizes for us how M is being retired to the scrap heap while the black tugboat is Silva: dark because of his wounds and hatred, but also because his motivations are dark and greedy. It's difficult to say, at this point, if Q is thinking of Bond as he gives his melancholy interpretation of the inevitable, and if Bond is thinking of himself or M as he sighs about a big, bloody ship, but there is another key element to this scene.
Mr and Mrs Hallet (The Morning Walk) by Gainsborough.
If you note in the art museum clip, this is the painting behind Bond (it's the actual paining in Room 34 at that position). I took time to point out the changed seating in the room because I wanted to demonstrate how this painting could have been edited out of the shots but they wanted to include it in. Gainsborough's portrait of the young, married couple suggests a new beginning. As they walk on the path, it's the path of life, and the white dog symbolizes loyalty and fidelity. Since the painting shows up behind Bond during this clip, we can see it relating to him, that even though Silva will take away the old Britain from him in the person of M, a new, young bride awaits him (symbolically); so the question is, who is this new bride?
Another fabulous shot; why? There's darkness, but it's being illuminated by "false lights," the neon and florescent, which will make for an interesting mirror of what Bond is going through at this point in the film. Please note the beard Bond wears, which is unusual for him. It means either one, he has given into his appetites (facial hair usually symbolizes the base appetites because civilized man shaves his face, that is, he disciplines his appetites because hair makes us like the animals, I'm just explaining the logic of the symbol) OR it means the exact opposite: Bond has been an ascetic. Holy men who would go off into the desert would grow long beards because they were taming the inner-passions and appetites, leaving the world behind in favor of the inner-world of the spirit, so that, too, will make for an interesting insight into Bond's struggles and weaknesses at this point of the story.
Because the camera focuses on The Fighting Termeraire we should, too. The whole title is, The Fighting Termeraire, tugged to her last berth to be broken up, 1838. Just as art today reflects our culture and what is going on, expressing approval or disapproval, so art did then, too. What else was going on in 1838 that might have drawn Turner's attention to this particular event as a reflection of larger social or moral issues? The People's Charter was passed, a movement of socialism. While the Charter was a wonderful advancement in civil rights, some, such as Turner himself, could have seen the workers of England toting off the grand old British Crown like a heap of scraps at the mercy of the "work boat" (the tug boat as the workers' movement). Therefore, it's possible that the "new bride" of Bond will be socialism, which is devastating given that Bond has always fought socialism throughout his career. Is this the side that Skyfall takes?
"Mommy was very bad," Silva tells Bond, and why would such a big bad villain refer to M as "Mommy?" Because she is. She symbolizes the order and the state which gave birth to both Silva and Bond. The question is, what does Silva symbolize? We know he dresses up like a cop and in that guise tries to attack M while she is on trial for her letting the drive with British spies on it be stolen. So Silva is a "false arm" of the law accusing her, meaning that there is both legitimate accusations against her and illegitimate accusations. Silva will represent a class or a theory and what he represents will be the ill-borne fruit of Great Britain's past that must pass away with Great Britain.
There are two secrets revealed about Bond in the synopsis. First, he's Scottish and a member of the upper-class (you might recall that, in Casino Royale, Vesper suggested he was an orphan and he didn't deny it). Secondly, he comes from a line of Catholics. We know this because Bond takes M to his childhood home in Scotland, Skyfall Lodge (which only the upper-class would have) and at one point in the final battle, they escape through a priest hole. These revelations rather complicate Bond so I want to draw your attention to them now but I am going to wait to say anything further until after the film. Again, I have no doubt that Skyfall (the name of Bond's childhood home being given the title of the film alerts us that the whole film is geared towards what happens at Skyfall Lodge) will be the best Bond film ever, maybe even the best film of the year. I am off to see it now and will be tweeting my initial response and working on this post to get it up asap because it's so important! Go see the film and enjoy it and we'll discuss it! Eat Your Art Out, The Fine Art Diner
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Why does Wreck It Ralph say, "I'm going to wreck it"?
(This post was written before I saw Skyfall; my review of the film, including the artwork, is Last Rat Standing: Skyfall & the Question Of Free Will). Skyfall will probably be the best Bond film ever; why? Meticulous care has been taken by expert film makers to build up the character of Bond for the audience to dive into; Bond has been re-made into an icon--not only of action heroes--but of metaphysical and cultural identity reflecting the dramatic changes in global events and norms. It's because Bond has become human, then risen above his human boundaries, that we both believe everything he does and willingly suspend our disbelief to believe everything he does, and this is character success when the audience wants them to succeed and identifies with them in their pain.
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Again, I have no doubt that Skyfall (the name of Bond's childhood home being given the title of the film alerts us that the whole film is geared towards what happens at Skyfall Lodge) will be the best Bond film ever, maybe even the best film of the year. I am off to see it now and will be tweeting my initial response and working on this post to get it up asap because it's so important! Go see the film and enjoy it and we'll discuss it!