Archive for the ‘Movies’ Category
2010
07.16
Tags: etymology, hookers, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, words
Posted in Jokes, Life, Movies, Music, Writing | No Comments »
Re: Is “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” a real word referring to Irish hookers?
“Supercali” = superbeautiful (Greek, super=over + kallos=beautiful)
“Fragilistic?” = the word “fragile” comes to mind, which is probably from Latin “frango?” which means “breakable”? Just making an inference here…
best regards,
super kal-el
Source: http://http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/msupercali.html
Is “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” a real word referring to irish hookers?
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2009
08.15
Tags: Da Vinci Code, Daniel Day-Lewis, Foucault's Pendulum, Indiana Jones, Jason Alexander, Jeanette Winterson, Lara Croft, Literary Criticism, Lord of the Rings, Michel Foucault, Milan Kundera, Mystery, Philosophy, Rosicrucians, Sacred Feminine, Seinfeld, Templar Knights, The Grail, The Passion, The Unbearable Lightness, Umberto Eco, Written on the Body
Posted in Art, Books, Education, Filipinos, Gender Issues, Life, Love, Movies, Philosophy, spirituality, Translation, Writing | No Comments »
I loved the Matrix and Moulin Rouge, despite their being hyped. On the other hand, I did watch Lord of the Rings 1 & 2, but stayed away from 3. Tried reading book 1, but just managed a few paragraphs, and then stopped… (Well, perhaps someday…)
Did “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” have that much hype? I love that novel, have read it twice, and think of it as the kind/type of novel I’d love to write if I ever get the chance of writing one. (Haven’t seen the film adaptation with Daniel Day-Lewis…)
As for “The Da Vinci Code,” if you find a copy lying around, it’s worth reading din naman. For one thing, I do subscribe to the recuperation/rehabilitation of the “sacred feminine.”
One other reason why I stayed away from Dan Brown’s novel is that I’ve read Umberto Eco’s “Foucault’s Pendulum” and from what I had heard about “The Da Vinci Code,” it seemed to me to be a “Foucault’s Pendulum”-wanna-be.
I’m currently re-reading Eco’s novel. (I read it years ago, mistakenly thinking that it’d help me write a paper on Michel Foucault. Wala palang connect. Ibang Foucault ‘to… Or, meron din, if one looks at the obsession for power and techniques of power…)
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2009
08.13
Tags: Books, Dan Brown, Eternal Recurrence, Filipinos, Foucault's Pendulum, Friedrich Nietzsche, Himala, Lila, Lullaby: 100 Years of Songs, Matter, Movies, Robert Pirsig, spirituality, The Da Vinci Code, The Matrix Trilogy, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Umberto Eco, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Posted in Art, Books, Education, Filipinos, Gender Issues, Life, Movies, Nietzsche, Philosophy, spirituality, Theater | No Comments »
Read “The Da Vinci Code” in 2005, after deliberately ignoring it for quite some time because of the hype. And then saw the movie later.
Well, the wealth of information (esp. regarding symbols) is generally sound. But it doesn’t hold a candle to the erudition of Umberto Eco’s “Foucalt’s Pendulum.” (I have yet to understand the elaborate explanation of how Foucault’s Pendulum works…)
One thing I liked in the novel is the rather sympathetic portrayal of the head of the Opus Dei, Bishop Aringarosa. (Not so in the movie.) I’ve heard a lot of negative publicity regarding the Opus Dei and their founder Jose Ma. Escriva. (From the late Larry Henares, in his TV show and Philippine Daily Inquirer column, as well as from a Filipino priest who studied in a university run by the Opus Dei…) Bishop Aringarosa may be ultra-conservative in his theology but in the end, when the time came for his faith to be tested, his heart proved to be ultimately in the right place.
Also, it had a more hopeful, happy ending than “Foucault’s Pendulum,” which was darker and more poignant. Eco’s novel bewails the lack of understanding that so-called believers/enlightened ones have. Parang si Elsa sa Himala: “Walang himala! Ang himala ay nasa puso ng tao!”
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2009
08.01
Tags: 2046, Faye Wong, In the Mood for Love, Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung, Wong Kar Wai, Zhang Ziyi
Posted in Filipinos, Life, Love, Movies, Philosophy, Psychology | 1 Comment »
“2046.”
If you fell in love with Mr. Chow (Tony Leung) and Mrs. Chan (Maggie Cheung) — who, along with Zhang Ziyi, was in Zhang Yimou’s “Hero” — in Wong Kar Wai’s “In the Mood for Love,” you shouldn’t miss this wonderful masterpiece of a sequel!
If you haven’t seen “In the Mood for Love,” you’d still appreciate the great film that is “2046″ (just like some people must have seen “Before Sunset” without seeing “Before Sunrise”). But I think the weight of our empathy with the travails of Mr. Chow stems from having known what he has gone through in the previous film.
It’s now a toss-up between Claude I-forgot-this-french-canadian’s-surname’s “Leolo” and Wong Kar Wai’s “2046″ as my favorite movie of all time.
Incidentally, doesn’t Tony Leung bear an uncanny resemblance to the late R.J. Leyran?
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Non Sequitur (A Reflection on Wong Kar Wai’s “2046″ and “In the Mood for Love”)
by Michael Ian Lomongo
(For the late R.J. Leyran, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Tony Leung)
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I do think that “2046″ is a very worthy sequel to “In the Mood for Love.” At first, it doesn’t appear to be that way. The only connection with the latter film seemed to be that it was the same Mr. Chow (the erstwhile writer of martial arts stories but moved on to writing sci-fi…) and his adventures in love and loving after the ill-fated affair with Mrs. Chan (Maggie Cheung).
After seeing “2046,” I’ve reached these conclusions:
2046 is the number of the room that Mr. Chow and Mrs. Chan stayed in the night she didn’t want to go home. This scene wasn’t shown in both films but Mr. Chow mentioned it in “2046.”
Mrs. Chan probably separated with her husband. The child she was with when she moved to the apartment that used to be occupied by her landlady was the fruit of that one night tryst with Mr. Chow. She went back with the vain of hope of somehow meeting up with Mr. Chow again. When she called up the office of Mr. Chow when he was in Singapore, it was because she was with child. But she couldn’t bear to speak because she didn’t want to be a “bother” to Mr. Chow.
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2009
06.14
Tags: Movies
Posted in Art, Filipinos, Life, Love, Movies, Music, Nietzsche, Philosophy, Psychology, spirituality, Writing | No Comments »
I remember this film I saw in one of the French Spring Film Festivals, “Chance or Coincidence” about an “eventologist” (or someething) whose “other” job is to find connections/meanings in the chance occurences of life. I don’t remember the details of the story, it’s a love story (I think). I liked it, and also this Nat King Cole song in it, with the words “For all we know/care…?” Ala lang, baka lang alam n’yo. Am being whimsical here. It might have some meaning in the greater scheme of things. Hehehe.
Was also fascinated by “Sliders” (the TV series with Jerry O’Connell?) and “Sliding Doors” (with Gwyneth Paltrow).
In the TV series (based on a scientific theory, the “many-possible worlds” theory), the character played by Jerry, with his friends and professor (John Rhys-Davies), travel through a wormhole that leads to a parallel universe. Same time, different world. In some episodes, they even get to meet their alter-egos.
The movie “Sliding Doors” is premised on this one triviality: whether Gwyneth’s character is able to get on the subway on her way home or not. And the two parallel lives of Gwyneth play themselves out, each radically different from the other — all because of missing/not-missing a train ride. The movie however makes this intriguing, though perhaps unwarranted, conceit. The two Gwyneths (almost meet physically in an elevator) become “reconciled” during this scene by having only one singular experience, implying that the events which would follow from now on would be the same, even if they diverged earlier. Perhaps her inner reconciliation brought about the reconciliation of two divergent worlds? Perhaps she is owned by a destiny that’s greater than all the numerous happenstance of her life?
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2009
06.05
Tags: Body, Buddhism, Catholicism, Christianity, D.H. Lawrence, Filipinos, Kierkegaard, Love, Matter, Morality, Movies, Nietzsche, Philippines, Philosophy, Platonism, religion, Sex, Soteriology, spirituality
Posted in Books, Education, Filipinos, Gender Issues, Life, Love, Movies, Nietzsche, Philosophy, Psychology, spirituality | No Comments »
Some people say that Christianity has been misunderstood. It looks to me more like it is Christianity which has misunderstood! The world, perhaps even Christ!
I’m not associating Christ with Christianity. When Nietzsche wrote “Der Anti-Christ” (usually translated as “The Anti-Christ”), his polemics was directed more to Paul and Christendom/Christianity, (a note in the translation says that it is probably more fitting to translate it as “The Anti-Christian.”) The same with Kierkegaard, his beef was with Christendom (the bureaucracy of Christianity). Christianity, as we know it today, is according to biblical scholarship, largely the work of Paul the Apostle.
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2009
04.21
Tags: Conrad de Quiros, Elizabeth Chionglo, Graham Greene, Masada, Philippine Daily Inquirer, Vegetarianism
Posted in Books, Filipinos, Life, Movies, Philosophy, spirituality | No Comments »
wrote this circa 2004…
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I think the better version of that witticism is “I’m a vegetarian not because I love animals. It’s because I hate plants.”
The anecdote might have been simply a hyperbole to convey what I think is a very wise teaching: should it ever come to a point when one’s uncompromising principles lead to the possible loss of compassion, better relax and compromise. I think the head-monk ate the meat not so much because he didn’t want to refuse the host but because his fellow-monks were berating the hotel staff.
Likewise, the “animal-loving misanthropist” bit simply referred to the abundant cases of eccentrics who get featured in the media who shun human society and spend millions of dollars for the upkeep of their pet cats/dogs.
I wasn’t all that concerned with vegetarianism per se.
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2009
01.15
Tags: Batman, Ethics, Freedom, Movies, Philosophy, Power, Responsibility, The Dark Knight, truth
Posted in Life, Movies, Philosophy, Psychology | 2 Comments »
Good thing I posted the whole thing in a forum… powtah. Eto, re-posting…
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The Prom(ethean) Knight: Thoughts on the “Dark Knight”
By Michael Ian Lomongo
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In Greek Mythology, Prometheus is the Titan who stole fire from the Gods and was then punished by being chained to the mountains of Caucasus, where a vulture came every knight to feed on his liver. He is cast by different authors either as the benefactor of mankind or as the one responsible for the evils besetting mankind.
Yes, since childhood, we have known Batman as a comic superhero. Perhaps the most plausible among the superheroes, since he has no known superpowers. He’s just an extremely wealthy guy with superb fighting skills. Plus the machinery and gadgets to supplement those skills.
But he is, in fact, a masked vigilante. A “freak.” Even if his intentions are noble, in essence, he operates outside, or at least within the fringes, of society’s laws.
Bruce Wayne himself recognizes this. He too dreams of a Gotham City without Batman. A time when superheroes and masked vigilantes would be unnecessary. A world wherein justice truly works. Where he would simply be Bruce Wayne.
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2008
07.04
Tags: , Achilles, Agon, Greek Mythology, Nietzsche, Trojan War, Troy
Posted in Education, Life, Love, Movies, Nietzsche, Philosophy | No Comments »
Thoughts on “Troy,” May 25, 2004…
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“I’ll tell you a secret… The gods envy us. Because we are mortal. You will never be as beautiful as you are now. We will not be here again.”
– Achilles, to the mugged, bruised Briseias, in “Troy”
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Saw Troy last Sunday. Liked it. Even with the abundant use of CGI (as my friend Jojo points out.)
It can be retitled “Achilles.” Or the “The Life and Times of Achilles.”
I’m fascinated by the film because:
1) No matter what his critics say, Brad Pitt is just undaunted by taking on Herculean challenges. (A female teacher of mine once said that Pitt will never become a good actor because of his good looks.)
2) The scriptwriter did his research! He had a good grasp of Greek culture and philosophy (the love for spectacle, “agon” or contest, “arete” or excellence, immortality through the preservation of one’s name, and the sense of piety vis-a-vis the sense of pride in human achievements that easily becomes prey to “hubris”) and mythology. (You have a tight scene in Phtia because here we discover several things: the cunning of Odysseus, the martial expertise of Achilles, the brashness of Patroclus, and the almost paternal love of Achilles for Patroclus.) Plus, the writer demythologized the mythology. I’d like to read The Iliad just to see how many changes and adaptations he did in the screenplay. (For instance, Agamemnon was killed by Clytemnestra, his wife. Was the Briseias (Perseias?) character/love-interest of Achilles an invention? I’ve a suspicion too that the Agamemnon-Achilles spat was cooked up by the writer. Of course, I’m not that well-acquainted with greek mythology. Haven’t read Iliad yet.)
3) You have a well-thought out, very human(ized) characterization of Achilles. (My good friend Paolo comments that Achilles and Paris are two sides of the same coin. They both earn their redemption towards the end. Paris, by developing his courage; Achilles, by developing his compassion. Paris though is not as sympathetic as Achilles. (Is this due to a failure of acting or script-writing? Uh-oh, I can almost hear the shouts of protest by all those women Legolas-fans.) He also says that the contrast between Hector and Achilles should have been greatly emphasized. Hector is the noblest character in the story, even nobler than the gods. The inner struggle between his sense of duty and fraternal love should have been more apparent. (It’s either a problem of acting, writing, or direction… Well, after all, this is Achilles’s film.)
4) Great choreography, especially in the Achilles-Hector showdown!
5) Laughed out really loud at that scene where Achilles throws the towel at Briseias’s face in exasperation.
6) At first, I didn’t find Diane Kruger (Helen) that beautiful. As I gazed at her face, I slowly did find her beautiful. Classic beauty. Of course, the film tells us that, in all probability, even if Helen were not that beautiful, ships would still be launched to retrieve her because of the wounded machismo of Menelaus and the unbridled ambition of Agamemnon.
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2008
05.26
Tags: Friendship, Gender Issues, Love, When Harry Met Sally
Posted in Gender Issues, Life, Love, Movies, Philosophy, Psychology | 3 Comments »
“Can men and women be friends?”
What made the film “When Harry Met Sally” memorable for me — aside from the “orgasm” of Sally (Meg Ryan) at the diner — was this intriguing question, provoked by Harry’s premise/presupposition that men and women cannot be simply friends because sex almost always enters the equation.
(In another movie, I think “All of Me,” Steve Martin gets confronted by his wife — “I faked all my orgasms!” — who proceeded to demonstrate this by having “one” right in front of him in his very office. Steve Martin, humiliated, replies, “Well, so did I!”)
Of course, as Harry (Billy Crystal) grows and matures in the course of the years, he revises and modifies his theory but basically retains the core of his presupposition.
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