flowers bloom
Dec. 9th, 2011 03:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
methrowrockIt is a sign of the holidays when the tendrils of thoughts have grown frail and flaccid. Brainwaves, that used to possess soaring crests you could surf upon endlessly, have become subdued, rolling onto the shore and nibbling at your toes like a meek puppy. Watching Taiwanese dramas, The Office, and the hilarious hijinks of Arashi have been heartening, but deadening. It makes one sit on the prickly fence between self-loathing and self-resignation. Then, once in a while, something like Half Nelson comes along, and finally, you are promoted to being an eating-and-drinking machine, to an eating-and-drinking being. Yay! Temporarily.
After a week of hearing Jia's effusive praise for Ryan Gosling and Half Nelson, I finally settled down to watch it last night. She was right: it was a really good film, that tugged ad twisted your heartstrings. Half Nelson chronicles the split lives of a middle-school teacher struggling with a cocaine addiction. Along the way, he forms an unlikely bond with a student, and the film shows how their lives overlap. Both Gosling and Shareeka Epps were stellar in this. I really liked the character Dan Dunne, how he was written and portrayed: a walking contradiction, filled with conflicting beliefs and actions. And how that contrasted with the stoic gait of Drey's, who had her head screwed on tight. I loved all the shaky hand-held shots and back-forth close-ups on expressions that interpellated viewers into feeling like you were one of the characters in that world, which reminded me of the cinematography in Blue Valentine, except that was more like a detached observer. Wish I could expound on it clearer, but gah, I don't know where to begin. Seeing is believing, so go watch it.
For some reason, I couldn't stop thinking of soci theories while watching the movie. Dunne, as a history teacher, emphasized that history was a study of change over time, and that, change was the collision of two opposing forces. Which reminded me of Marx and his theorizing of social change, that needed the structural preconditions of acute class polarization, class conflict and class consciousness. Indeed, the theory of dialectic was mentioned, which was the internal conflicts beneath an apparently-calm surface and tensions between the different interests of opposing forces. (Ok, I am a Marxist fangirl at heart.) But how much of history can be said to be the manifestation of purely the tipping point between two antagonistic segments? Although the oppressed class may have won out in that one paragraph in the textbooks, the terms and conditions of the changes may have been discreetly mediated by the interests of the dominant classes. In the long-term, when the dust settles and the glass shards are swept away, the micro-details of everyday life remain the same or are made invisible or insignificant when one compares it to the dramatic events described in history. Indeed, the scenes of the students narrating certain lesser-promulgated occurrences in the Civil Rights Movement led one to think about the richness, and sparseness, that history can offer us.
How should I say this? Hmm.. history is never apolitical. The construction of history, the espousing, the dissemination, all these steps are coloured with varying shades of authority and power. Everybody is part of "the machine", Dunne admitted with a head-scratch, but he also said how we could disagree with intentions and actions of it. Therein, lay why I liked it so much: because written history affects our lived history every single day, whether we are conscious or accepting of it. What has happened long before has reverberating repercussions on the actions we execute today, and the interaction between the past and present is something that we are able to witness and contend. Similarly, it is something that we wrestle with, and possibly, get lost in, as Dunne was. He was trapped between his educator role and his unsavoury drug habits, between his privileged background and his egalitarian beliefs, his well-meaning intentions and unfortunate actions. The anger, frustration, desolation, confusion, you could see all that in his eyes and actions. My favourite scene was that when he confronted Frank about staying away from Drey. Initially puffed up and assured of his role as the White Man Who Knows Best versus the "Bad" Black Drug-dealer, the glaring lacuna between their stereotypical roles and actual behaviour/actions eventually became obvious to Dunne himself, and he crumbled beneath the brutally honest fact that he absolutely had no idea on the right path. It was a punchy reversal, except that it wasn't, because nothing was resolved. He navigated the life-course that history had demarcated for him, all the while contending with it, and getting submerged during the struggling, and being aware of it. He knew that he was a roiling pot of ambiguities and dissonance, and the film left it at that. But of course, Dunne made you hope, Hollywood made you expect better of him, which was why the scene where Drey witnessed him deeper than he had ever been before had such an emotional pay-off. I was literally screaming "why the fuck are you doing that!?" and "WHAT ARE YOU THINKING", and a few disappointed and vexed tears made its entrance. It is stupid to be so involved, but that is the mark of a good film right? One that made you think and feel deeply. Yeah, so I really liked it, even though the rambling paragraphs probably did a bad job of showing why. Haha. Looking forward to more Gosling films. Lars is next!
Is it sad to admit that that was the most I have thought in a week of passivity? Haha. But it wasn't a bad week at all. Far from it. My parents left for a cruise on Sunday night till Wednesday night, so I was finally free from the ineluctable and excessive clutches of parental authority. Didn't do anything fancy though; in fact, I have not left the house since Monday afternoon. HAHA. So I am not the kind to paint the town red on last-minute basis, this is brand new information! It is an acquired taste, this type of fun. First, Saturday. Hauling myself out of the house before noon (achievement, high score!) for singing-time with Melins, Hubae, and Bilys. It was quite fun, belting out incoherent gibberish and doing coy imitations of kpop dance moves. Left with Hubae, which meant humming Jay Chou in the rain and laughing at her outbursts of shock and constant worrying. Rushed to Outram thinking that I was late in meeting my only friend, Chang Wookie's wife, and instead, being pleasantly surprised at my 'punctuality'. Haha. Went to visit SY, manually auto-tuning songs along the way, and met the two halves of two (soon-to-be?) couples in matching couple outfits there. Dimples came later, and it was nice, catching up on old times, laughing at the expressions and statements from one another, wiggling our eyebrows suggestively to wriggle out nuggets of information from the two whose spring-times have come. As always, splendid re-enactments from the resident screenwriter/director Em Ji. HAHA. Headed to Clementi Mall for dinner after exulting in the perfection that was the cupcakes Dimples baked. Sibeh naisuuu! Nice day too.
Sunday was a lazy late afternoon, followed by meeting Lax at night. By lazy, I meant that it took me two hours to get off the bed and get changed. Managed to convince XL, a fellow lazy cheena gardener into going, so it was an entertaining ride to Bugis. Leaning against the windows, looking at the interchanging faces of people sitting across from us, making off-the-cuff remarks and jokes at each other's expense, it has been a long time. Met up with QH, Mr **, Sam, and Goldfish at Iluma, while being on constant-vigilance mode! for a skulking and unwanted presence. Played L4D2 and Counterstrike for the first time ever. Damnnnn fun, and unsurprisingly, I was damn bad at it. Managed to tie with Mr ** for number of kills on one stage though, and made sure never to let him hear the end of it, hahaha. Rochor Road tauhwey afterwards and cabbed back with QH and XL, capping off the euphoria of staying out past midnight without feeling stressed. Simple joys, simple joys.
The rest of the days were a blur of shows, books, shows, and more shows. Finally started on "Everything is Illuminated". Okay, there were late-night text messages and conversations about Gosling's awesomeness, discussions about Glee, crowing in faces about the hilarity of Running Man as well, that lessens the patheticness right? Skyping with profdikool was a highlight too. By then, I had conquered the master-bed, and so, she had the honour of witnessing my celebratory rolls on it. HAHA. Even though the crackling static was constant and annoying, it was nice. Guffawing at bold (and unverified) statements, mishearing each other, countering a 'yesss' for every 'noo', laughing at her Ah Ma-ness in a sweet pink sweater + duvet + fluffy pillows, experimenting with emoticons, badgering and persisting in efforts to procure answers, verbalising buried thoughts with hemming-haws, listening to electric guitars spiral on at six-thirty in the morning, chipping away at the barrier between the logical brain and impulsive lips, laughing at laughing. It is fascinating how technology mediates the furthest and closest distances between people. Four hours, that's crazy. But I wouldn't have it another way. At least, we know better now haha.
Okay, this has been obscenely long. Unfortunately, it is true that I talk better when typing. Training in seven hours, wowhee! No sleep tonight, which means more shows tonight. Haha. This won't do, this won't do. I must wake up my idea soon.
After a week of hearing Jia's effusive praise for Ryan Gosling and Half Nelson, I finally settled down to watch it last night. She was right: it was a really good film, that tugged ad twisted your heartstrings. Half Nelson chronicles the split lives of a middle-school teacher struggling with a cocaine addiction. Along the way, he forms an unlikely bond with a student, and the film shows how their lives overlap. Both Gosling and Shareeka Epps were stellar in this. I really liked the character Dan Dunne, how he was written and portrayed: a walking contradiction, filled with conflicting beliefs and actions. And how that contrasted with the stoic gait of Drey's, who had her head screwed on tight. I loved all the shaky hand-held shots and back-forth close-ups on expressions that interpellated viewers into feeling like you were one of the characters in that world, which reminded me of the cinematography in Blue Valentine, except that was more like a detached observer. Wish I could expound on it clearer, but gah, I don't know where to begin. Seeing is believing, so go watch it.
For some reason, I couldn't stop thinking of soci theories while watching the movie. Dunne, as a history teacher, emphasized that history was a study of change over time, and that, change was the collision of two opposing forces. Which reminded me of Marx and his theorizing of social change, that needed the structural preconditions of acute class polarization, class conflict and class consciousness. Indeed, the theory of dialectic was mentioned, which was the internal conflicts beneath an apparently-calm surface and tensions between the different interests of opposing forces. (Ok, I am a Marxist fangirl at heart.) But how much of history can be said to be the manifestation of purely the tipping point between two antagonistic segments? Although the oppressed class may have won out in that one paragraph in the textbooks, the terms and conditions of the changes may have been discreetly mediated by the interests of the dominant classes. In the long-term, when the dust settles and the glass shards are swept away, the micro-details of everyday life remain the same or are made invisible or insignificant when one compares it to the dramatic events described in history. Indeed, the scenes of the students narrating certain lesser-promulgated occurrences in the Civil Rights Movement led one to think about the richness, and sparseness, that history can offer us.
How should I say this? Hmm.. history is never apolitical. The construction of history, the espousing, the dissemination, all these steps are coloured with varying shades of authority and power. Everybody is part of "the machine", Dunne admitted with a head-scratch, but he also said how we could disagree with intentions and actions of it. Therein, lay why I liked it so much: because written history affects our lived history every single day, whether we are conscious or accepting of it. What has happened long before has reverberating repercussions on the actions we execute today, and the interaction between the past and present is something that we are able to witness and contend. Similarly, it is something that we wrestle with, and possibly, get lost in, as Dunne was. He was trapped between his educator role and his unsavoury drug habits, between his privileged background and his egalitarian beliefs, his well-meaning intentions and unfortunate actions. The anger, frustration, desolation, confusion, you could see all that in his eyes and actions. My favourite scene was that when he confronted Frank about staying away from Drey. Initially puffed up and assured of his role as the White Man Who Knows Best versus the "Bad" Black Drug-dealer, the glaring lacuna between their stereotypical roles and actual behaviour/actions eventually became obvious to Dunne himself, and he crumbled beneath the brutally honest fact that he absolutely had no idea on the right path. It was a punchy reversal, except that it wasn't, because nothing was resolved. He navigated the life-course that history had demarcated for him, all the while contending with it, and getting submerged during the struggling, and being aware of it. He knew that he was a roiling pot of ambiguities and dissonance, and the film left it at that. But of course, Dunne made you hope, Hollywood made you expect better of him, which was why the scene where Drey witnessed him deeper than he had ever been before had such an emotional pay-off. I was literally screaming "why the fuck are you doing that!?" and "WHAT ARE YOU THINKING", and a few disappointed and vexed tears made its entrance. It is stupid to be so involved, but that is the mark of a good film right? One that made you think and feel deeply. Yeah, so I really liked it, even though the rambling paragraphs probably did a bad job of showing why. Haha. Looking forward to more Gosling films. Lars is next!
Is it sad to admit that that was the most I have thought in a week of passivity? Haha. But it wasn't a bad week at all. Far from it. My parents left for a cruise on Sunday night till Wednesday night, so I was finally free from the ineluctable and excessive clutches of parental authority. Didn't do anything fancy though; in fact, I have not left the house since Monday afternoon. HAHA. So I am not the kind to paint the town red on last-minute basis, this is brand new information! It is an acquired taste, this type of fun. First, Saturday. Hauling myself out of the house before noon (achievement, high score!) for singing-time with Melins, Hubae, and Bilys. It was quite fun, belting out incoherent gibberish and doing coy imitations of kpop dance moves. Left with Hubae, which meant humming Jay Chou in the rain and laughing at her outbursts of shock and constant worrying. Rushed to Outram thinking that I was late in meeting my only friend, Chang Wookie's wife, and instead, being pleasantly surprised at my 'punctuality'. Haha. Went to visit SY, manually auto-tuning songs along the way, and met the two halves of two (soon-to-be?) couples in matching couple outfits there. Dimples came later, and it was nice, catching up on old times, laughing at the expressions and statements from one another, wiggling our eyebrows suggestively to wriggle out nuggets of information from the two whose spring-times have come. As always, splendid re-enactments from the resident screenwriter/director Em Ji. HAHA. Headed to Clementi Mall for dinner after exulting in the perfection that was the cupcakes Dimples baked. Sibeh naisuuu! Nice day too.
Sunday was a lazy late afternoon, followed by meeting Lax at night. By lazy, I meant that it took me two hours to get off the bed and get changed. Managed to convince XL, a fellow lazy cheena gardener into going, so it was an entertaining ride to Bugis. Leaning against the windows, looking at the interchanging faces of people sitting across from us, making off-the-cuff remarks and jokes at each other's expense, it has been a long time. Met up with QH, Mr **, Sam, and Goldfish at Iluma, while being on constant-vigilance mode! for a skulking and unwanted presence. Played L4D2 and Counterstrike for the first time ever. Damnnnn fun, and unsurprisingly, I was damn bad at it. Managed to tie with Mr ** for number of kills on one stage though, and made sure never to let him hear the end of it, hahaha. Rochor Road tauhwey afterwards and cabbed back with QH and XL, capping off the euphoria of staying out past midnight without feeling stressed. Simple joys, simple joys.
The rest of the days were a blur of shows, books, shows, and more shows. Finally started on "Everything is Illuminated". Okay, there were late-night text messages and conversations about Gosling's awesomeness, discussions about Glee, crowing in faces about the hilarity of Running Man as well, that lessens the patheticness right? Skyping with profdikool was a highlight too. By then, I had conquered the master-bed, and so, she had the honour of witnessing my celebratory rolls on it. HAHA. Even though the crackling static was constant and annoying, it was nice. Guffawing at bold (and unverified) statements, mishearing each other, countering a 'yesss' for every 'noo', laughing at her Ah Ma-ness in a sweet pink sweater + duvet + fluffy pillows, experimenting with emoticons, badgering and persisting in efforts to procure answers, verbalising buried thoughts with hemming-haws, listening to electric guitars spiral on at six-thirty in the morning, chipping away at the barrier between the logical brain and impulsive lips, laughing at laughing. It is fascinating how technology mediates the furthest and closest distances between people. Four hours, that's crazy. But I wouldn't have it another way. At least, we know better now haha.
Okay, this has been obscenely long. Unfortunately, it is true that I talk better when typing. Training in seven hours, wowhee! No sleep tonight, which means more shows tonight. Haha. This won't do, this won't do. I must wake up my idea soon.
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Date: 2011-12-09 02:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-19 10:06 pm (UTC)