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news and the like

Updates are in order, but to start I thought I could take a stab at what is happening in the world once again.
Baseball is among us again, and what fun it brings to us all. Fans rejoice over their team's offseason aquisitions and signings, yet every year this seems much more dramatic at the time than it ends up becoming. For me, I always wonder what the Twin have in store, but by the trade deadline during the season I have a pretty good idea how they will end up, and in the past decade all of the opening day hype has been forgotten by that point which uually means the Twins have mustered a mediocre eason at best. This year looks like another one for the books, with almost an entirely new lineup and pitching staff. Thats not to say they won't compete, it just means that the team will take 1/3 of the season to adjust to each other, and the last 2/3's to make up for this. Look at the Timberwolves, they did that this season, they had the worst record in the league thirty games in and now they are lucky if they get a top five draft pick in the first round next season.
All this and the Vikes still have yet to impress me with their scouting skills. Sure, they have a few prospects and the names they did sign don't really carry much of a load behind them. In all honesty, if they sign Gus Ferrott from the Bears why not give Tarvaris Jackson half a season on the sidelines so he can build up his confidence level rather than start him with hopes of the best like they did last year.
And as some of you may know, I am going to China from May 18 through June 6 with my sister to study abroad, but the main focus in the news as of late has been China's connection to Tibet and the protests/riots that have ensued because of this. One thing I would like to know is what started these incidents? Is it the culmination of the Olympics, did the Dali Lama tell his followers to be active in their beliefs, were thee people provocked in some way and they want to be heard on a national scale now? Any way it is sliced, this trip could turn out to be much more adventerous than originally planned, but at the very least I will get to see the pre-game setups which will be quite amazing.
With that all behind me now, I have to say I don't think I have ever been quite as buy as I am now. The wedding planning is quite extreme, but that comes in spurts so I can't really weigh it down too much. Classes are going well, but the workload is picking up as finals appraoch for the end of April. Work is going well, I average three mornings per week and the occasional Saturday. The move out from our place into my parent's house went pretty well, not too much planning for this unfortunately but it went over without too many hitches. And the move to New York is setting itself up well, we are going there this coming weekend to look around and set our sights on the places we will frequent when we get there.
Thats about all that is on my plate right now, looking at it as a paragraph makes it seem quite small to me, but I don't think writing it down really conveys the message properly. Needless, you get the idea, so if I seem out of the loop for the next month you can refer to one of those listings as my excuse because I may not have the time to get back to you in an orderly fashion.
I did feel like there was more to say, but when I just write what I think the little things seem to slip away. I think that is a good thing, because after a while they can add up. I leave you this time with a photo I took at night in Tortola, the camera was on a banister but when I pushed the shutter button down the whole camera tilted with it and then napped back up which caused this image to appear the way it is.

Thoughts on the Caribbean

Almost a week here and I can't stop thinking about the rain or the wind. It nearly ruined our arrival and could possibly delay our departure if it keeps up this way. Nothing extreme, but no warnings and the constant flow that keeps the beach closed and us inside. I am so glad that March Madness is hapening or there would be nothing to do, books only bring you so far.
While here I have been pondering the differances of living here verses traveling here and think it is setup for travelers much better than residents. My reasoning comes from how many people talk about how great it is here, yet they seem so miserable when trying to describe the hardships that their land endures. Whereas travelers just show up for a week or less, spend their money, and leave. Without one the other wouldn't exist, yet the resident is more depndent on the traveler because there would be no income for those living and working here without travel.
Ok, I worded that oddly, but the idea is that people who live on an island have many things to worry about, such as bad weather and the storm seasons which will ruin their business if they don't plan for it properly. However, the traveler can just come and go as they please. They may get frustrated with the rising prices or bad phone reception, but they know they will be back in their element soon enough to catch themselves up on what they may have missed.
One of the things that struck me as odd is when we arrived here by plane and were walking towards baggage claim there were only two carousels which were completly surrounded from all angles. Is this how their airport does business or is it just really busy at the time we arrived? Either way, anyone could have walked into this area and taken any bag they wanted without any hesitation, which I think may have happened to Suzanne's brother who is still missing his bag and we are leaving tomorrow. Our bags were delayed as well though, well one was there but the rest aparently didn't make it to our plane when we took off so the airline sent them on the next flight and the airport put them on the ferry to Tortola for us which was nice but took a lot of work to track them down.
The Ferry is how people get from island to island here, I think there are a couple of bridges from one to the other but it seems rare because it would interupt the views, plus the waves would cause a hazzard in some parts. All the ferry's run on a set schedule, commonly known as island time, and they depart within the half hour of their designated posting. When we actually arrived at our destination our passports were stamped and we got a cab to our villa? Not sure what it is called, but this seems like a good fit for where we stayed.
The trps back and forth on the island are rough though. It is full of hills, I think this island is a volcano, and the roads follow the hills up and down the sleep slopes with narrow turns and rough terrain. In some areas people designing the roads probably thought it would be bad if some car just lost control and kept going down the road in the same direction, so turns of 180 degrees happen on these hills to prevent any major accidents.
But in the end, after all the heartache and bad moods mixed with the spontaneous weather I think things went well for me here. I really needed a break from school and work, which is what this place was designed for in my mind, and even though we the tough times were hard all I focused on was just sit back and relax, which is the second reason this place was invented. And what better thing to do when in the caribbean.

who am I

The timing of things has been quite off as of late. It seems like I am thinking of doing something well in advance, yet when the time comes I can't remember what I was going to do, or worse, I choose not to. From watching movies to reading articles for class, I don't seem to have the interest to keep up with my head anymore. That is a problem for me because my whole life I always thought of that as my weapon of choice. I could resort to other mroe agressive means, but my head always kept me afloat and on the go. It organizes my day, acts as an alarm clock, gives me reminders for specific dates/times, and never failed me when I needed it. Only now I can't seem to use it in the same context, or maybe it is just more advanced than my body.
I guess I don't know which applies here, but for the last two months I have felt in over my head on a number of occasions and the only thing that keeps me sane is the same thing that always did, movies.
Something new can remedy any situation I feel like I need to get out of, and the classics can bring me back to a time when I didn't need to worry about what I would be doing the next day. There is something about them that just gets inside of me and makes me forget all that was worriesome. I can't explain it, but if you have ever watched a movie with me you should know that I only talk when there are very funny play-on-words and the movie isn't put together well, and I never pause it to go to the bathroom because any interuptions bring me out of that state and I can't get back into it when I return.
Is that normal, does anyone else feel a connection to films that they can't explain aside from the desire to watch more. If I could I would watch movies all day and night just to register a directory for everything ever made. This is what I attempted in High School and that knowledge still resides in the back of my head. You can hear about it if you name a movie but can't remember the actor or the name of the character they played, or maybe you want to know other films that a director has made. That is the sort of stuff that I could rely on, but now my head has done something new and it is hard to adjust to this. I can't remember things without writing them down and I plan ahead for things yet forget about them or change my mind at the last minute.
Maybe I just don't understand how it works anymore, and maybe I just have been sick or had a recurring cold that won't die. Either way, by the end of this weekend this is all that I could think of.

I leave you with the lyrics by the Pipettes from the song "I love you"

There use to be a lot of things that I didn't know
And although they still exist I try not to let them show
But I think that now you see me for my true colors
Sure you recognize I'm more stupid than the others
But I love you, and I love you, and I really love you,
Till the day I die there will never be a time when we have to say goodbye
I seen you try to laugh at all of my bad jokes
And I've cooked you seven meals, six of them on which you choked
But it has taken me a while to get use to this good feeling
When I woke up with a smile how I nearly started screaming
That I love you, and I love you, and I really love you,
Till the day I die there will never be a time when we have to say goodbye because I love you

Updates and debates

Nearly a month, and as crazy as it sounds I can actually say it feels like a month has passed for me. By the last post I had just started classes, which have been occupying more time that I am alloting for them. On top of that my hours at work seem to be increasing, which is strange because it is no longer the busy season for kitchen utensils. And the wedding planning is speeding up due to my questionable move to New York this Fall.
All in all I am pretty exhausted to say the least, and what makes things even worse is that I can't remember the last film I saw in a theater let alone the last film I saw from begining to end in one sitting. It is strange for me to go on like this, but I am slowly getting a taste of the filmmaker's lifestyle. In short I can tell you that it entails a lot of time and scheduling, then tripple the time you estimated and rewrite your schedule to accomodate it. I can't say I am frustrated with what is coming out of this all, but I yearn for those days when I could lounge around the house watching movies while I cleaned or just walking to a coffee shop and sitting down with a book or y computer for a few hours to relax. I can't even find the time to work out lately, which is bad since Spring break is coming up in a month. All of this is on top of planing a move back to my parent's house for a month to save money before I head to China in May.
It feels overwhelming when I try to break it all down like that in bullet-point form, and I'm sure I forgot a thing or two in there but you get the idea.
Complaining aside, what I want to talk about today is my intro to film class. Every day I come very prepared and excited to show what I have learned only to leave feeling like I failed and have a lot of catching up to do. It all started when we actually had to turn what we were working on, coincidence? I guess talking about a project and filming a project are two different things, at least to the instructor.
Don't get me wrong, he is a greta guy and really understands filmmaking, along with the teaching assistants. The only problem is that he has a mindset of what making a film is suppose to look and feel like, and sadly nobody in the class has taken this for more than a lesson. Sure, we all take notes and come prepared to learn, but something is getting lost in translation from what he knows and what we should know. Granted, everyone learns how to do something their own way, but I really think that this clas is very unprepared for what's in store. However, at this moment I plan on changing my perspective to make what he is looking for instead of what I feel will get the point across because he has continually viewed my work and heard my ideas only to lower their potential. Thats not to say they are not creative, just not realistic for this class.
My problem has been my plan of attack, I always view the filmmaking process as a day-to-day thing. I may have a pitch, or storyboards, and I may not. Thats not to say I don't know what I want or when I will film it, it's just that I can't seem to find a way to express the ideas beforehand and I don't support them afterwards. This is all coming at a time when I am in the middle of a project that I don't know how to end, so I may take a hit on my first real grade for the class. But I plan on listening more that writing, asking questions, using office hours, and putting in the right amount of time a project requires. I only hope the rest of the class goes this route soon, because I fear for the grades of others that continue in their current ways.
The one thing that did work out in my favor is that I pitched an idea which he didn't particularly care for, and I showed a rough cut of the footage which he still tore apart, yet I finished the project and he laughed. Not just that, he clapped and said 'I like it' with no mention of what he didn't originally approve of. I guess it goes to show that when your heart is in the piece from the very begining it will show by the end. Or as Fritz Lang put it in Jean Luc Goddard's 'Contempt' "Always finish what you start" as he prepares to film Ulysses' return to Ithiaca.

The knowledge of uncertantity

Kind of misleading when I think of it now, but I never really was certain about knowledge in the first place. In the end it's all just time used well, but what does it get you at the end of the day? I guess I keep trying to figure this out, and I really commit to what I sign up for, but lately I have been wondering what would happen if I just stopped a while back. If I never went to college would I still be in Minnesota? Is it possible to be successful without an education? Will there ever be a time when people will stop questioning themselves? Probably not, but I have learned how to keep it all to myself with practice.
Things have been like this for the past month I guess, I have been on an emotional roller coaster dealing with jobs, money, marriage, school, pets, friends, family, even myself. I can't seem to make up my mind anymore, even for simple things like what I should do tonight with the three hours I have to myself. I watched the remains of a movie I never finished, nothing great, and I almost put in another but couldn't pick one. I have about ten I have not yet seen sitting on my shelf, and I rented three classics earlier today, but I couldn't choose which one deserves the slot. This is probably the only time for the next week that I will get the chance to sit down and watch a movie for the next week and I can't pick one to watch. This use to be my passion, watch movies to say that I did. I use to skip homework for this pleasure, even bad stuff like trilogy's that shouldn't have even got the money to start shooting in the first place and romance flicks that never change.
There was a time when I watched movies just because it felt good to watch them, I would see things that intrigued me and things that I thought I could do. It made me want to make movies, and the more I watched the more I wanted it to happen. Somewhere down the line of pursuing that I became very selective about them and now I am just to confused to actually pick. This doesn't mean I have not seen a number of movies lately, I think this last one made five this week, and I have been averaging about one a day for the last few months. It's just that I kind of lost out on the fun part of just watching a film to see what happens, because I immersed myself in the field I know all the backup stuff about the film beforehand. In most cases how it ends, but there has not been a movie that I have seen in the past year that I didn't have a detailed background about before I saw it. And lately I have been tagging along to see films, not that I don't choose what I want to see anymore, but I have been asking what other people want to see as a courtesy for their tastes. So I have seen films on other people's time and telling them more about the movie than they got from the actual screening.
It is pretty weird when I think about it that way, but it's true. I think this has led me to act so uncertain about what I want to see when it is just me choosing. Very strange when I break it down for myself like that, I'm sure it seemed obvious for you but sometimes I just need to talk to myself and figure things out. You were just lucky enough to share with me this time.
All that aside, things have been busy for me again. Not much work and not much writing but classes at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and spending large amounts of money to support those classes. My mood has been very up and down this past week, but I am glad I took the steps for this and am preparing the way I am because it will be great in the long run. That entails a masters in film production somewhere down the line and right now it is rumored to be somewhere in New York of all places. That is because Suzanne got accepted to dental school there and we both think it would a great place to spend a few years getting an education then returning to the places we know and love to show everyone what we have learned and how we have changed. Minnesota is still an option for us, if they ever get back to us, but we have been thinking a lot about New York lately since they said yes and we have been planning more and more about what we could do there each passing day.
So that's the compacted update as of now. I am still trying to write a few reviews, in particular 'There Will Be Blood' but I need to see it again so that I have some better notes. But when another Great one comes by you will be the first to hear of it.
adieu

'The Savages'

It's been a while since I did one of these things, but I guess I have felt that the surge for an award movies kind of left me out of breath with their quantity. There have been a few gems, but nothing that I really felt needed an article on here, with the exception to 'There Will Be Blood' which I am working on currently in long hand.
"The Savages" is quite a unique film about what happens when a middle-aged brother and sister come to terms with their estranged father in need of personal care. The first viewing hit pretty close to home on a few levels, and I felt that I should keep my thoughts to myself at first. But the more I did the more I realized the film tried to accomplish, and I recently saw it for a second time which sparked this excerpt. Phillip Seymour Hoffman does an exceptional job playing himself, I viewed his character as actual actor because it is played down to his gritty and honest level. His clothes, his style of speech, even his never ending stubble screams method acting, but not on the level of Robert De Niro or Al Pacino as they profess today. I am referring to the day when actors worked for a living and invested their life in their characters, big or small. What comes out from this performance is the best depiction of this style of acting I have seem in years. There are rough spots such as when he answers his phone in the middle of a lecture about the difference between plot and narrative to hear that his father went in a coma. But as a whole I have to say wow.
Laura Linney plays his quirky sister that is temping her way to a grant for her play about their childhood. She lies to gain affection from her peers and she feels guilty for putting her father into a nursing home when she is actually doing him a favor by taking care of him in the first place. Her character comes full circle when she is forced to care for her brother as well after a tennis incident that pins him to a wall with weights to balance his joints and relieve stress. It is at this moment that she picks him apart with jealousy about how he is semi-successful and she is 'portable' as her brother words it. In her defense she claims a Guggenheim grant, which he has been denied from a number of times, and all he can do is act amazed that she did something he has continued to fail at. It turns out that this is also a lie, which he discovers, and she boasts that even in her misery he finds a way to mock her ambition.
I guess ambition doesn't amount to much when people lie about their accomplishments, but it all works out in the end because she sells a script and her brother watches a stage call and cries from the realism. Overall, I enjoyed the personal touches and writing between the two, they really play off each-other very well as if they were brother and sister. Their styles of living are very different which makes for a great combo when they are forced together during this time, and the ending is uplifting on a few aspects that would probably be left untouched by conventional writers for purposes of the plot. See this movie when you can, you may not like it at first for the brutal truth that ensues, but after it's over and the days following will make you think about what will happen when you get in this situation. At the very least you will have some experience as to what should happen when you are in their shoes.