Stream of the Week- Good Will Hunting

I struggle to stay awake in my Calc class, but there are some people who just see answers. It's too bad that we hardly ever give them the shot.

Will Hunting was a foster kid who had been in and out of jails and homes his entire life. He hung out with the "wrong" crowd and lived to never amount to more than his dead-end construction job. He had no plans for the future. But one night, Will was working as a janitor in the math and science building at MIT. He passed a chalkboard with a challenge problem on it and solved it with no difficulty. He had the professors in an uproar because no one knew who he was or how he did it. One professor decided to take him under his wing and attempt to learn from him. He wanted to get Will out of his crowd and into a business in which his skill could be useful. But, Will was too troublesome so they were forced to find him a therapist to help calm Will down. But after 5 different therapists, it didn't seem likely that anyone could handle Will. That was, of course, until Sean. With his sarcastic personality and no bs demeanor, Sean was able to converse with Will in a way which got him down to the deep parts of Will to help solve his issues. Will could do great things, but he doesn't think an expensive education and a fancy degree is any better than a steady job and common sense. There's no point in trying to get Will to change when he's got his mind set already.

The most important thing about this film, to me at least, is not the math or the story, but rather the underlying theme that education does not make you educated. There's a great bar scene where Will has a semi-debate with a Harvard kid in which he explains to he Harvard student that reciting from a book does not make you original. As a college student, that kid would believe anything in a book that was put in his hand by a professor, but when asked to have an original idea, he couldn't do it. Will had the upper hand because he didn't have to pay anything over the library late fees he owed to get that same information making him beholden to no one for his own opinions. Will would rather put his faith in the loyalty of the undesirables than the bank of an education. I respect that.

Capture of Culture- Mudbloods

I have never wanted to play a sport so badly in my life.

Quidditch. It's a thing. Not just a Harry Potter, slobber in your dreams kinda thing. It's a legitimate sport that has swept the college filled nation. With hundreds of teams from hundreds of schools, spanning over oceans and regions and college rivalries, Quidditch has officially taken over the college sports world. Founded at Middlebury College in 2005, Quidditch was an adaptation of the popular Hogwarts sport played by Harry Potter and friends in the ever popular J.K. Rowling books and Daniel Radcliff films. Since it's beginning, the game of Quidditch has expanded to now hold a World Cup every year in New York. Teams are popping up all over the place, including Finland. Mudbloods follows the tale of the UCLA team as they take the title of West Coast Champions and become a qualifying team at the World Cup.  Though Quidditch is referred to by some as the nerd sport, the team is intensely invested. They raise roughly ten thousand dollars just to enter the World Cup. They are the ultimate underdogs, but one game into the World Cup and they prove themselves to be tough competition. They even play the 5 time undefeated champions in what is later described as "just like the previous years' finals". There is nothing that takes down their spirit, and even when they're down and out over a loss they still love the game and live to play. There's something to be said about fandoms and their crossovers into the real world. They all find ways to communicate and illustrate the same ideas while still connecting in a non-threatening way.

The game is set up so that two teams face each other on teams of seven vs. seven. There is one other player/character who acts as the snitch. He has a tennis ball stuffed inside a sock and stuffed into his belt. He can run anywhere or do anything. As soon as the tennis ball is received from him, or stolen more like, the game is over and the team who gets it receives thirty points. The runners who go after the snitch are known as the seekers, Harry Potter. The other players are all designated by headbands. There are the chasers who take the volleyballs and try to throw them through the hoops. Each goal is worth ten points. Then there are the beaters who take red dodge balls and throw them at the opposing team to get their players out. And finally there are the keepers whose job is to protect the hoops. There are two of each player except for the seekers for each team. Oh and did I mention that they play this entire game while running with a broomstick between their legs? Yeah. It's intense. And Awesome, if I do say so myself. I almost wish I was athletic.

Stream of the Week- The 'Burbs

There are some days when I wish I had creepy neighbors.

Ray, Art, and Lt. Rumsfield have been neighbors for years. They have their off and on normal neighborly quarrels and patterns which they all adhere to. But, recently a new family has moved in next to Ray that has the whole block talking. They don't come out during the day, and they dig holes in the backyard at night. Their lawn has gone to waste and all the sudden there are these crows that start gathering in the neighborhood. At night, Ray hears strange noises coming from their basement and light being admitted from the bottom windows of their newly dilapidated house. They start with simple spying. Ray, Art, and Rumsfield camp out on their front yards and watch as the house lights up. Sometimes Ricky, the neighborhood teen hangs with them to get the scoop on his favorite spot in town, his street. One night they see one of the inhabitants take a large garbage bag to the curb and stuff it into the trash can with a large stick. They believe it is a body. Upon careful investigation, however, there is no body to be found. The team of three grow even more suspicious of their neighbors when they notice their one neighbor, elderly Walter, has gone missing. All of the sudden they start calling the new neighbors Satanists who sacrificed dear old Walter as part of a cult practice. The calm, level headed, wives of Rumsfield and Ray get together and force the men to stop their nonsense by visiting the new neighbors. They go into their home and attempt small talk with the newbies. But instead of convincing the men that the neighbors are innocent, the boys become even more determined to figure out where they are hiding the bodies.

As a suburbia dweller myself, I love a good old neighbor v. neighbor story. There also happens to be nothing that I love better than a Tom Hanks movie. So thank you Tom. This movie is just good fun and it makes me want to go out and find an adventure within my own town, though we don't have a beat up old house at the end of the lane. But as you know, any story where guys start acting like teens with crazy theories is bound to be entertaining.

Capture of Culture- Advanced Style

Age does not limit the ability to wear a hat.

After the success of a little New York blog, older women are becoming fashion icons. Their fashion is colorful, loud, and bright as it takes the New York City streets. Older women are making the sidewalks their runways, and people are beginning to notice. One photographer in particular, Ari Cohen, started photographing these older women. From the success of his blog, he compiled a book entitled Advanced Style that featured all his favorite grandma models. This book hit the shelves and became wildly popular. It made women of all ages, shapes, and sizes feel like they too could be fashion forward. With the success of the blog and book, the lovely ladies were becoming famous so they were booked for TV appearances, radio show interviews, and even modeling jobs. The documentary, Advanced Style, follows the lives of some of these aging beauties. Each of them youth and spry for their age, one by one we learn of their lives. Some of them were the first women in the fashion magazine industry, others were dancers on the stage. But all of them have in common the one factor that makes them unique- they each see clothing as their art.

I love a good fashion documentary, but it is true that the industry doesn't cater to the eccentric elders. These women create their own looks and find their own ways to express themselves. The industry would remain completely unchanged if it weren't for Ari and his blog. The popularity of his site brought the much needed attention to an undeveloped market in fashion. These women are changing the face of the fashion world as we know. You go girls!

Stream of the Week- Anastasia

Contrary to popular belief, Disney does not have the rights to every princess movie ever.

 

Anya grew up in an orphanage not remembering anything about her life before the age of eight. Every once in a while she gets fragments of her past, but never has she really known where she has come from. To find herself, Anya goes to St. Petersburg. While there, Anya runs into conman Dimitri whose latest scheme is to pass off a girl as the missing Dowager Empress's missing granddaughter, Anastasia Romanov. When Dimitri meets Anya for the first time, he realizes that she's perfect for the part. They start by teaching her the basic knowledge of Anastasia's past and family. But, along the way, old forces are stirred up in  the depths of Hell where Rasputin awaits to finish his revenge on the Romanov family. With one living family member in that of Anastasia, his curse cannot be completed. Between Rasputin's attempts on her life and the constant stream of information about the Romanov family, Anya starts to remember facts about her past which prove that she is indeed the missing Anastasia. In hopes of reuniting her with her family, Dimitri takes Anastasia to Paris to meet the Dowager Empress. While there the two must face off the family curse set by Rasputin and prove to the Empress that Anya is Anastasia.

Goodness knows that good animation is tricky. Films that looked awesome when I was a kid have become obsolete due to advancements in technology and animation production. However, Anastasia still looks and feels amazing. The story is more historical and requires a bit more prior knowledge to understand the full affect of the plot line. Anastasia's story is one that inspires people to do more research on the topic after seeing it, which is what a historical film should do. In conjunction with a historical background, Anastasia also has the one song that gets stuck in viewers heads maybe as much as "Part of Your World" from The Little Mermaid- "Once Upon a December." This song is haunting and is easily caught in any mind after watching. I mean, I'm humming it right now. 

Capture of Culture- The September Issue

In the world of fashion, which I'll be honest I am very uneducated in, there is one name that strikes fear into the hearts of designers and one face that gets all the pictures at the catwalks. That person is Anna Wintour.

As editor of Vogue, Anna has brought her fashion magazine to the head of the game, and the crown jewel of her fashion crown is the September Issue. Each year it gets bigger and bigger with massive spreads of decadent fashions and themes. The clothing shines through each of the magazine's 640 glossy pages. However, the issue may look simple and cohesive, but a behind the scenes look at this issue shows how difficult it can be to get one's work represented properly in the magazine and to get the pages for each project. Under Anna Wintour are dozens of contributing editors who all do shoots for the September issue. One of the most talented of these editors is former Vogue Model, Grace Coddington. Her fashion spreads are visionary and full of new ideas, however, due to difference in taste, often Grace's work gets tossed out or played with so that Anna's vision can come through clearly. It's a bit of office politics really. When push comes to shove, however, the job gets done and the magazine will be better than the year before. Guaranteed.

The important thing to remember about fashion is that it is always changing. Perhaps that is why the tensions flare so high in the documentary because each contributor has a different vision of where the industry is going. New designers are coming up, actors and actresses are getting more famous, and the clothing is constantly in flux. Trends and spreads may change, but each month a new revolutionary collection of pictures and articles must be released.

Stream of the Week- You've Got Mail

Is there anything more charming then books, New York in Spring, and romantic comedies?

Shopgirl and NY152 chat almost daily over the internet sharing their thoughts, plans, fears, and simple chatter. Their true characters, however, are Kathleen Kelly and Joe Fox. Kathleen runs a small children's bookstore called The Shop Around the Corner. Joe is the son of the man behind Fox Books, the big box bookstore that is coming to Kathleen's corner of New York to take over. Kathleen and Joe hate each other in real life based on their situations. Joe is going to run poor Kathleen out of business. But instead of telling everyone else about her thoughts and fears of losing her business, Kathleen goes online and emails NY152. NY152 responds while he drinks his morning coffee and reads the business reports for Fox books addressed to none other than Joe Fox. Unaware of who the other is, both chatters fall in love, slightly at first only finding solace in each other's comforting words and then more deeply as those words turn affectionate. They plan to meet at a local coffee shop and get to know each other in person. Kathleen sits at her table with her book and flower in hand and Joe approaches. Only then does he realize that Shopgirl is Kathleen. This information gives NY152 to the upper hand. Now he can play Kathleen both in real life as Joe Fox and behind the screen name of NY152. Joe finds that there is something wonderfully sweet and insightful behind Kathleen's mock hatred for him and his business. Together the two form a strange friendship in real life that begins to blend their realities.

There is no way to give this film it's due justice in a paragraph; it is simply too sweet to put into words. I have always loved Tom Hanks, but gosh darn it rom-com Tom Hanks is the best. And don't even get me started on how lovely Meg Ryan is in this movie. The two of them are simply adorable with their witty, sarcastic banter. They often reference Pride and Prejudice (!!!!!) in this film as one of Kathleen's favorite books, but their story truly matches in many ways to the Austen classic- the two adversaries that are unconsciously attracted to each other, but must first battle with their humor to find that together they just perfectly balance each other out.


This is the kind of film that requires a cup of coco and a night at home alone to enjoy. That's the kind of things girls like me enjoy. Take note gents.

Capture of Culture- The Video Game Movie

I have never been the gaming type, but goodness knows I enjoy documentaries that catalogue the history of modern technology.

Video games have been a huge part of history and culture for decades, slowly surpassing the sales of movies and music in the entertainment market. Between montages of video game graphics, Video Games the Movie gives the complete history of video games. It begins with the origins of electronic games and it's undetermined birth. Game designers and company owners all get together to nostalgically recount their childhoods raised on games. Video games have affected the way that modern generations think and interact by creating new formats and spaces for arts to engage users and connect people. Video games now tell stories while involving a player to be part of the story. The industry has changed from being full of programmers to now requiring the talents of artist, writers, programmers, and marketing companies. Each game takes a village to raise. It would be easy to say that gaming is for geeks, or that it is a waste of time. "Gaming is too violent" and "It doesn't teach kids anything" are easy phrases to say, but as we are finding as a culture they are becoming harder to back up. With a flooded market and a cult like following, gaming has taken a seat on the board of directors for entertainment media.

 

The most important thing I learned from this documentary is more about the formatting of this film then the content. Though the information is important on the subject, I was more interested in the fact that it was set up like a grad paper. Here is what I am proving, and here is how I'm proving it. The transitions are the selections of gaming images between each new topic. the paragraphs are the different questions and aspects discussed. The sources? Well they are the people interviewed and the conclusion is the "feel good" ending statements made by all those involved. Documentaries all have purposes, and though this one is less focused in that regard, I think it does a fine job of telling a modern and exciting tale about the modernization of gaming entertainment.



Stream of the Week- Liberal Arts

Sometimes films don't even have plots or conflicts; they're just collection of interesting elements and characters spun into a commentary on life in general. That's what this movie is to me. It doesn't make sense, but it's a fun thing to be confused about.

Jesse Fisher is 35 and maybe more confused about his life than the 19 year old college students he gets to meet on this adventure. An old teacher calls him up to speak at his retirement dinner so Jesse gets to go back to his college town. While he is there Jesse runs into a student there who is full of life, energy, and promise named Zibby. She's fun and romantic and wildly imaginative so the two of them form a friendship perpetuated by the hand written letters they start to exchange and the classical music that they have a shared fascination for. The mutual attraction is too strong to be ignored so Jesse rolls back into town to spend some time with Zibby romantically. At first it seems  perfect, it's sweet and interesting, but there are quickly too many pressures on them to work out. Jesse finds he is at a very different age level than Zibby and it's more of an issue than he thought. Zibby also asks a lot of Jesse when she makes advances of a more serious nature that Jesse is unprepared to respond to. The two fall apart as those types of relationships tend to do which forces Jesse into a bit of a tailspin when he ends up spending the night with one of his former professors and finds that she no longer deserves the respect he gave her as a student. It's all very confusing for Jesse and for Zibby, so Jesse runs back to NYC to figure things out. It's about growing up and not having the answers. Just because he and Zibby didn't turn into a reality doesn't mean he didn't learn an infinite amount about himself.

The characters in this film are very real people. Jesse is the lost, but semi-successful middle aged guy going through an attraction to a younger female. Zibby is the excited youth full of promise. There are other students too, like Dean for example. Dean is the depressed, way too absorbed in physiological novels type.  He's prone to mental break downs, and he doesn't know how to deal with his emotions. Then of course there's my favorite character, Nat. Nat has a total of five minutes worth of screen time, but he is charmingly wonderful. He's the crazy existential college student who has these crazy metaphors for life who always appears as though he's phased out and high, but never really is. It also helps that he's played by the adorably crazy charmer Zac Efron. This movie is about people, and maybe that's why not everyone gets it, but in my mind there is nothing more realistic than people interacting with each other.

The Red of Red

I recently watched Red and Red 2. I then proceeded to screen shot every single red object in the film. I know, I have a problem. Here they are collected and named-

Red 1

Airport Red

Chicago Red

 

China Town Red

 

Cool Haired Cooper Tried to Kill Me Red

 

Defense Contractor Red

 

Dirty Old Man Red

 

Eagle's Nest Red

 

Extra Credit Red

 

Guns Galore Red

 

I Just Broke into the CIA Red

 

I Know Where You Live Red

 

In the Car Red

 

I've Been Shot Red

 

Kansas City Red

 

LSD Induced Red

 

Merry Christmas CIA Red

 

Office Romance Red

 

Old Man Red

 

R.E.D Red

 

Russian Red

 

Trying to Fit in Red

 

VP (Very Presidential) Red

 

We Kidnapped the VP Red

 

We Took the Girl Red

 

Red 2

 

Can You Shoot Red

 

Everyone is Trying to Kill Us Red

 

Extra Credit Red

 

From Russia With Love Red

 

Han is Solo Red

 

Hopkins Got A Gun Red

 

Iran into Danger Red

 

Kremlin, No Problem Red

 

Le Frog Red

 

Life is Mundane Red

 

 

Nutty Professor Red

 

Opening Credits Red

 

Operation London Red

 

Paris When it Sizzles Red

 

The Bad Guys Red

 

The Yankees White Went Red Red

 

Transitions Red

 

We Have the Key Red

 

We're Getting the Band Back Together Red