Sometimes The Juice Is Worth The Squeeze

Ever wonder if something is worth the effort? Of course you have, you wouldn't be alive otherwise.

I've been dealing with a few varied things lately--a pretty girl, my thesis, writing Mind & Machine, undue stresses at work. I told myself yesterday that I had to find a way to relax before Monday or I would absolutely go insane. My way of accomplishing this: watching the movie The Girl Next Door.

Surprisingly great movie. It's got some of the most absurd laughs ever in a movie. More than that, it has a serious dark side that lets to story grow in ways that a coming-of-age comedy usually wouldn't have. It's also a really good modern example of the Joseph Campbell's Cycle of the Hero. And it's a story about a guy who has big dreams finds the right girl, even though he has to confront "moral fiber" in order to be with her; a character I can obviously relate to.

Other news, I found a good beat to write on for Mind & Machine. I've been wanting to explore the tension of Commander and Kathryn's mental interaction in a physical scene (rather than trying to describe a dreamscape or an astral plane). I realized one of the key weaknesses Kathryn has in this story is her relationship with a man named James. I wanted to give her a good man to date, someone who would make the world a better place, if only by example. Kathryn, in the new scene, has just seen James' picture for the first time after going through her book-long ordeal and comes to understand not only what she's lost, but one of the causes for that loss.

Tomorrow should be fun. I gave myself two options. Option one is to ask the previously-mentioned pretty girl to go to lunch with me sometime. Option two is to have someone beat the shit out of me. Hopefully, I'll choose option one. After all, I think the juice is worth the squeeze. (If you've seen The Girl Next Door, you'll understand that line.)

Generations and Inspiration

A couple of days ago, I got a call from my sister. She had some interesting news to impart to me, simply the fact that she's pregnant. I haven't quite gotten used to this fact, although my brother-in-law says he has. There are a lot of implications this has toward me--a reminder that I am aging, as I want to deny it; there will soon be another person that I will undoubtedly know is genetically related to me; a reason to remember my lack of experience on many of the maturity fronts.

I could give a stack of reasons that would be odd or unique to me, but one simple fact remains: I'm going to be an uncle and I'm weirded out by that. What I mean is--this is a link between me and the next generation. This will be a person I will share 25% of my genes with, the single greatest level of anyone outside of my sister. (I'm playing biologist for the sake of this arguement.)

Only in the past year, have I really started to understand the link between this generation and any generation to come. Here's how I came to think about that link in the first place:

When I first saw the theatrical preview for Children of Men, I couldn't completely fathom the consequence of there not being another generation of humanity. The idea that all humanity's accomplishments would have absolutely no meaning whatsoever inside of a few decades... it was a chilling thought when it first struck my mind.

I didn't know then that I would be so inspired by this film. I didn't know that I would be so moved by readically different world created by the alteration of a single biological principle. I knew, back in January when I first saw Children of Men, that it put my mind in certain mode, ready to explore my creative mind in new, wondrous ways.

But I think I'll discuss this more later...

Visual Storytelling

Not too long ago, I had a chance to see this movie. An early example of the use of digital sets (much like Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow) Casshern in a lot of ways, is a live-action anime. Literally. It's based on an anime from the 1970s (called Casshan in the US), even maintaining the mech designs for the robots that appear in the film.

The version of Casshern I watched was the recent DreamWorks DVD release. It's full of over-simplified subtitles, and missing twenty minutes of footage. But what I saw was something incredible. Full of life and color, even when depicting drab death. It's full of imagery concerning revenge, hate, bioethics--everything typically found in seinen anime, such as RahXephon or Gundam Wing. It's very smooth and epic, yet still maintaining a very personal form of storytelling.

I knew I really was enjoying this film when it ended. The final sequence shows a very dreamlike resolution for each character, a resolution involving no words, only two and a half minutes of visuals involving the various characters.

I would hope that any story that tries to balance the line between action and emotion would learn from the example Casshern makes. Highly recommended.