Groundhog Day, Again

Groundhog Day -- A Movie for All Time

We started a new tradition tonight I hope. Watching "Ground Hog Day" on Ground Hog Day. This is always my favorite scene ... "Don't Drive Angry!".

NRO has a tradition of running the same Jonah Goldberg column every Ground Hog Day, and I think it is an excellent tradition.

I was raised Baptist, but one of the things now dear to me in the Lutheran Church is the Church Year and the various elements of the liturgy. The Bible says to not use "meaningless repetition" and somehow the Baptists applied that to the liturgy, but fortunately not to Christmas or Easter (they do those every year!).

Matt 6:7 "And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words."

As an Elder, I will be taking Communion to a dear shut-in woman with Alzheimers in February, and one of the lovely things is that she still remembers the Communion prayers and creeds -- not perfectly, but significantly. She tends to always say "I like that the whole church says and does these things ... I don't know why, it just feels right ..." The definition of "meaningless" doesn't include Christ instructing us on how to pray -- but we never did the Lord's Prayer in church when I grew up.

My cynical summary of Baptist theology was "If the Catholics do it, we don't".

BTW, I am NOT "anti-baptist, or even anti-dentite" ... like all human religion, Baptists have flaws, Lutherans have flaws, and mooses are the sum of all flaws!

You may not think of  the movie "Ground Hog Day" as a religious or philosophical movie, but I agree with Goldberg, it definitely is. Read the review, and if you get a chance, watch it ... again.

Perhaps when we "get it", then this life is taken from us -- and loving that it goes is part of loving it.

“The curse is lifted when Bill Murray blesses the day he has just lived. And his reward is that the day is taken from him. Loving life includes loving the fact that it goes.”

I hope you bless this Ground Hog Day!

'via Blog this'

Avatar: "Dances With Ewoks"

First of all, I went to see the movie with the family last night in 3D and it was great, a real trip -- immersive, enjoyable, beautiful, exciting and a lot of fun, go see it. I pretty much checked my brain at the door and just thought of it as an amusement park theme thrill ride, and it did extremely well at that level.

The blog title is a mostly tongue in cheek joke -- someone else on FB had mentioned the "Dances With Wolves" connection and when they were in the forest retreating, the Ewoks came to mind. There is some truth to the pangs of it being a really good ride, but it IS quite long for the volume of  insanely shallow plot while trotting out new effects. I think it leaves an "ontological hangover".

This isn't a movie that I'd worry about "spoilers" -- it is the all formula all the time, good vs evil, princess kisses frog, earth mother vs war god father, buddy bonding, technology vs nature, etc. with a blatant attempt at being a "Wizard of Oz" (color), Star Wars" (special effects), Toy Story (all computer generated imagery), etc  blockbuster that changes the industry for the digital / 3D technology. It may, but it seems a bit "tarted up" in trying.

My stream of consciousness:

• Must we ALWAYS suspend tactical awareness in odd ways? Humans can't breath the air on the planet. Your forces have to break off close contact with the core human base because of strong difference of operational objectives/outlook. You are willing to "go native". You have a group of "natives" at your disposal. Take control of the air supply in some innovative way for gods sake! You only have to put up with pompous ass old marines for a max of 4 min if they won't negotiate on air issues!
• I think "We're not in Kansas anymore" is a bit too much of a wishful reference to Wizard of Oz being the first film of the color eara -- 3D was interesting, but I think it is "always" going to be a high stakes tech two edged sword on the border of "immersive" vs "intrusive". It isn't color.
  
• OK, so we quit paying attention to religion, philosophy and have ditched western culture for the "noble savage". How does a guy worth over $100 million spend $300+ million on popcorn munching entertainment that supposedly disses the war god Yahweh "man has dominion" material / technical model for the eco green nurturing earth mother mixed with Klingon warrior uses the force model with a straight face? Only in America circa early 21st century. Oh, and the main character makes this transition while inhabiting a bio-engineered amalgam of human and alien DNA linked up by some sort of MRI / wifi from the Star Trek school of technology. Maybe there is a meta humor statement here of this is what happens when any concept of "the good" or "the sacred" is forcefully removed from the Prometheus / Pandora / etc world of myth? I mean, he named the planet "Pandora" -- he must have SOME understanding of mythology. 
• The witch goddess psuedo orgy pagan transfer of human to "golem" TWICE (attempted) was just a bit much. Yes, yes, we got it -- western civilization murdered mother earth. Father god = evil. Mother god = good. Mother god get angry, mother god kill just like daddy. Mother god better though -- use spears and arrows and have swaying tail and chanting at home rather than nasty polluting boy toys with smoke, fire, video games and enough comfort to drink your coffee while mass murdering. Those men are all alike -- and no doubt they would waste time watching football on Sunday rather than tending the flowers too!
  

I really don't need to be reminded "this is just entertainment", I did have fun DURING the film. Is there really any reason to go QUITE as far out on the "noble savage vs technology" theme?. MUST we have TOTAL boobs on the side of technology (the compound reminded me of Jurrasic Park)? Is it REALLY "all or nothing"? The Pandora planet is 100% nurturing for those that are adapted -- with luminescent plants for the night, giant leaves to enfold you in secure sleep, and lovely creatures for you to "plug in" in order to have all the high speed thrills and spills of your earthly atv, hang glider, mountain climb, etc.Come to mommy and you can have everything if you just "grow up" like mommy says is best. There there now, mommy can provide with just a few simple rituals of "joining". So much better than awful "separation".

Damn -- daddy threw us out of Eden. If ONLY we were lucky enough to have a mommy god,  it would have been so much better! At least we got to play with all our nature destroying daddy tech computers and build us one hell of an amusement film making mommy look nice while we are destroying the planet!

Al Franken, God Spoke

I subjected myself to the Al Franken movie "God Spoke". One really big question would be "what was the point"? I assume that Al thinks it puts him in some sort of a good light. Al knows that all his "facts" are true, but everyone else is lying. Right now he is saying that "Bush is going down, and we are going to elect President John Kerry" ... however, every prediction about the war in Iraq that turned out not to be correct is a "lie".

One nice thing about Al is that he uses the "F word" constantly, and I suppose in his mind "well". He showed some 2004 election day gloating based on the exit polls ... how one of the stories of the election was "Air America", how he would abuse Bush the next day with "You blew it just like your Daddy", or makeing fun of Karl Rove being a "genius", when of course Al thought that the election would be won by Kerry.

Then we get to see the disbelief when Bush wins. He's close to tears when Kerry concedes and he stares in shocked disbelief as Bush accepts the victory. Then he starts talking about running against Norm Coleman.

I suppose what a lot of lefties would like about this is that he "gets his digs in" on Coulter, Limbaugh, O'Reily, Bush, Cheney, Hannity, etc, but it would seem to me that it puts just a wee bit of a dent in their supposed "less partisan view". It also seems that the neither Coulter, Limbaugh, or Hannity ran for Senator in a state with an excellent chance of stealing the election.

So much for MN nice!

DaVinci Code

We went to church this AM, and the DaVinci code this evening. I had read the book, and this was one of those cases were the book was definitely better. I like Tom Hanks, I think Ron Howard is generally a pretty good director. I'm not a film criitic, I can't say I can really put my finger on what the problem is with movie. My raw guess is that in order to make it as a film the sexual tension and developing relationship between Langdon and Sophie had to be there and be bought into, and that just never happened. There was also the problem of just attempting to follow the book too closely .. they needed to skip something and develop the characters more, but given the intricate way the code fit together, they likely didn't have any time. 

It also may just be one of those stories that knowing how it came out in the end just spoiled it too badly to hold interest for the length of the movie. There is one gigantic point of comedy here. Earlier this year we had riots worldwide due to a couple of tired old cartoons in a Danish magazine. The liberal press wrung their hands about how "they respect Muslims" ... indeed they do respect the violence and threats of violence used by the Muslims. 

Of course, they have no problem reporting on a movie that claims that Christ was "just a man", there is no power in the blood of Christ, and he never rose from the dead. While the movie points to the Catholic church, and Opus Dei as sinister and violent, the lack of bloodletting or even any threats thereof show pretty clearly that Christianity is far different from Islam. Is it possible for people to be so blind that they can't see the difference in MSM treatment of DaVinci Code vs the cartoons? I suppose the blind will always find a way to remain blind.

The movie is fiction, and obviously fiction. Were any of the secret organizations depicted nearly as powerful as Brown makes them out to be, he would be long dead. The Christian faith has little problem in standing up to challenges like Brown's, and has no need to "duck and cover" by prohibiting believers from seeing it, or threatening violence against those that created it. Star Trek isn't real either (although I know some folks this is a shock to) ... but it is still entertaining. 

If things had to be true to be entertaining, there would be no reason to listen to NPR!