I wanted to finish off the recent spate of documentaries with the high point of the series… One that we’ve been wanting to see ever since it came out. Of course I am speaking of Religulous! This movie is Bill Maher’s attempt to understand how people of faith can be people of faith (basically). In it he goes around the world to ask various people of faith to ask them how/why they believe the things that they do. Though he is focused on people who follow the various Abrahamic religions, the ground that he covers is quite wide-ranging. It includes: a trucker’s chapel (yes, at a truck stop), a holy land amusement park in Florida, a mosque in Jerusalem, a Moslem gay bar, an orthodox rabbi, some ex-Mormon’s in Salt Lake City, the Vatican and a U.S. congressman!
He makes it quite clear to these folks that he doesn’t for a minute believe that any of it is true and that he is just dying to know why it is that they do. This tact leads to quite a varied group of responses, though except for one of the “worshipers” at the truck stop, most of them do earnestly try to explain the foundations of their faith. These responses vary from interesting (in a somewhat startling fashion), entertaining, befuddling and downright insulting and scary (in the case of the congressman when he suggests that if it weren’t for the ten commandments that people might not have come to the conclusion that it is bad to kill each other).
Some of the most outstanding bits are the earnest attempts at explanation from the fellow who portrays Jesus at the amusement park, the woman at the amusement park who says that when Armageddon comes she’ll be flying through the sky on a big white horse, the bit about it being a miracle if it starts raining when you want it to and, my favorite, the priests at the Vatican who don’t seem to think that anything in the bible is meant literally.
While you could say that he is trying to be objective, I think that in a situation like this you can only be so objective… For a person not-of-faith to have a conversation with someone who is of-faith about their beliefs can be interesting, but having those conversations with dozens of people who all firmly believe in ultimate truths that contradict the other peoples ultimate truths, well, I think you would have to take most of they people say with a big grain of salt. Of course, as Maher has to have a point that isn’t just his opinion but also of greater import, he covers the dangers of faith… Specifically the danger inherent in people who actually want the end of the world to arrive because they believe that something better will come for them after that. Not really the safest way to think considering what kinds of weaponry modern civilization has at its disposal… Even if it were true, it still wouldn’t be a good thing for anyone whose belief system didn’t happen to be the correct one.
Ohh, shivers! Tonight I watched a documentary that was very thought-provoking in a number of ways. It was The Business of Being Born
(which is a very accurate title for the subject matter) and it basically covers the difference between “regular” hospital births and midwife attended, both at home and in the hospital.
The Business of Being Born
is told mainly through interviews with OB/GYN’s (both American and European) and midwives, with lots of footage of births and birthing processes, both at home and in the hospital. It is very blunt, both in its message and its methods. Starting with the basic fact that the United States has: the industrial worlds highest rates of hospital births, highest rate of cesarean sections and also the most expensive births. From which this country ends up with about the worst rates for infant and mother mortality in the industrialized world! The filmmakers look at the smear campaigns against midwives in the early 20th centuries and some of the horrible practices used against women going through child birth in the decades since then (some of these are too much to stomach watching). There is one troubling segment where they discuss how once medical intervention is begun (generally under the guise of relieving pain for the mother), each step of intervention leads to effects that pretty much require a further step of intervention. All of which ends up in an unhealthy, expensive (and for some, quite disappointing) viscous circle of even increasing intervention.
They thoroughly point out that only in a small numbers of cases is there any reason for childbirth to be a surgical procedure or even a hospital event, yet in this country that it what it has become in the vast majority of cases. It becomes obvious that they are using the ever-present American tactic of “giving direction through fear” to keep childbirth a profit center (for many: hospital profits, insurance companies profits, ensuring enough highly billable work for doctors) and to undermine (if not quash) traditional, logic and natural means of doing that for which the human was actually designed to do. Of course to me it all brings to mind the old RIAA philosophy of seeing anything that doesn’t feed these good old boy profits centers as some kind of evil or ignorant foolishness.
Anyway, I digress. The Business of Being Born is a project of Ricki Lake (but no, she is neither irritating or obnoxious here) which she was inspired to make after undergoing a hospital birth. Conveniently, the director got pregnant while the film was in production and her experience was worked into the film. All in all, even for one as skeptical of the Establishment as I am, it was still quite eye-opening. And unsettling, and maddening. The fear that people are saddled with (to bring gain to the greedy), and the limits of what the Establishment will do to defend itself against reason can be a little hard to take in such potent doses.
Following a chain of clicking from Brian Jepson’s Blog (I’m a sucker for anything that mentions mysterious tentacled creatures from the deep cold waters of Antarctica), I ended up at this MSNBC post, Doomsday fears spark lawsuit. Referring to a couple of folks in Hawaii who have filed a federal lawsuit against the Large Hadron Collider, because they fear that it may create black holes that might destroy the Earth! If you are keeping tabs on it, the LHC is an underground circular tunnel about 5 miles in diameter (or 27km circumference, if you prefer) whose stated purpose is: “LHC – the aim of the exercise: To smash protons moving at 99.999999% of the speed of light into each other and so recreate conditions a fraction of a second after the big bang. The LHC experiments try and work out what happened.”.
As loyal readers will remember, I made a post in February where I expressed similarly ridiculous fears. It’s nice to know that even if these fears are ungrounded, at least there are some people who have succeeded in bringing them to the forefront. If for no other reason then to attempt to get people to at least question the safety and ethics behind unbridled scientific research. With the advances over the last century or so in nuclear physics, biochemicals, miniaturization, genetics and especially cloning, we have hit a point where there is some research that shouldn’t be done, even if it can. Sometimes, this isn’t obvious until it is too late, as in Oppenheimer’s oft repeated quote that he is said to have made when he witnessed the first nuclear bomb explosion at Trinity: “I have become death; the destroyer of worlds.”.
This may not be an example of that, but, of course, the government is trying to get the case thrown out, seemingly before any of the scientific evidence is looked at, or at least that is what is implied here:
In 40 documents comprising hundreds of pages, attorneys and government officials contended that “scientifically, there is no basis for any conceivable threat” from black holes or the other theoretical horrors posed in the suit.
If the government has its way, the lawsuit would be thrown out on procedural grounds even before getting to the scientific arguments.
Of course, I realize how unbelievable these fears sounds (or downright silly), but as someone may have said at some point “I have witnessed too much to not believe the unbelievable”
I wouldn’t say watched it… But I did manage to glimpse some of tonight’s Oscars. I guess I don’t watch them often, as I thought that Billy Crystal hosted the show every year, but the new Daily Show guy was hosting.
Regardless, this may have been the first year that I thought that no crap had been picked for Best Picture nominees. All of the picks this year were actually movies that I would want to see. And it was fun to see the success of No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood. But in unrelated news…
gaze into the fist of dread
I’ve been thinking lately about The Quiet Earth. A great film from New Zealand that has been terribly overlooked in the last 20 years. From what I can remember, in 1986ish it had a brief “arthouse” release in the states and then a little vhs printing and that was it, until its US DVD release a year and a half ago. A great and quiet film about a science experiment gone terribly wrong, in that it removes nearly every person on earth. It is an interesting and compelling film about what one might do if they were the last person on earth, and how three really can be a crowd. But it also seems (at least to a paranoid soul like myself) to be a meditation on the dangers of science. Well, on the dangers inherent in utilizing our existing technology to the fullest. As Einstein once said, “It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity”.
I think about it whenever I hear about the idea of setting off powerful bombs underground on fault lines, in the hopes of using those as a preemptive measure against potential major earthquakes, but I also thought about it this week when I read this article at National Geographic about the search for the ridiculously (and inaccurately) named “god particle”, At The Heart Of All Matter. Obviously, I don’t think that anything terrible will happen, but still, reading paragraphs like this:
At four locations the beams will converge, sending the particles crashing into each other at nearly the speed of light. If all goes right, matter will be transformed by the violent collisions into wads of energy, which will in turn condense back into various intriguing types of particles, some of them never seen before. That’s the essence of experimental particle physics: You smash stuff together and see what other stuff comes out.
Does make me wonder if research may take that one final wrong step one of these days.
Very quiet these days. Another light viewing week. I’ve got plenty too watch, maybe too much even… But the time just doesn’t seem to be there. I did find some extra time… to run to frye’s at the last minute and pick up an iBook. Who knows what I was thinking, but it seems to be a good idea to have one. So yes, I’m fiddling about on it just now. I like it. It’s the first laptop I’ve had about aside from the 5300cs I’ve had hanging around for the last seven or eight years.
I’ll start things of with an old favorite, Sixteen Candles. I got a bunch of the Hughes/Ringwald movies and this was my first to view. I didn’t really recall it but, on seeing, it became quite familiar. I feel like this was the first of the “series” and though it’s not my favorite of the bunch, it seems like a good place to start. Pop/teen/romance masterpieces, all of them. Though I was the right age at the time for this, it never really spoke to me. It is fun though.
I also watched Brothers Keeper. Another one of those sad lonely documentaries which has taken me years to get around to watching. It’s good and it really makes you wonder, like any good mystery. Personally, I think that they did do away with their senior brother and I felt like I had to question their motives a bit behind doing this movie. But I could see their position and understand why they did what they did. The darker motive that some law officers started flinging about seemed much less likely then just a plain ol’ mercy killing, however odd these fella’s situation might have been. But it’s a good movie, interesting in a number of ways. The boys are rather mysterious in their own way, a bit more savvy then they let on. Of course, I did avert mine eyes at the “pig slaughter” scene and some of the scenes with Lyman Ward (was he the shy one?) were a bit much in the sad way. I almost had to avert my eyes when he was on the stand.
Then The Tin Drum. I think it’s a great Lit movie. I hadn’t seen the movie for many years or read the book for quite a while either, but it still seems a satisfying rendition of the story. Of course, it looked really good (Criterion and all) well beyond the VHS experience of my past. The horsehead scene handily beats the Godfather’s horsehead scene for disturbing grossness (it was a natural for a picture here, but I just couldn’t do it… Opting for a more friendly image) and there are lots more great scenes. Really just a strong movie all around. Very well acted, well produced, the boy looked just creepy enough, yet not really, to make the age and size issues seem not too unbelievable and a great story! I would suggest though reading the book and watching the movie.
And on a lighter note, I watched Houseboat. I felt unsure as to if I had even seen a Sofia Loren movie before, so that was good and interesting, she’d be quite a catch for a ol’ stodger like Cary Grant… Speaking of Cary… I found his character an odd love interest for Loren and I’ve never liked him (strangely though, I think I’ve seen 6 of his films in the last year or so) or most of the characters he plays. This one was no different. In fact, I didn’t really like any of the characters, even the kids were annoying. It was enticing to see Werner Klemperer show up in the cast, but his role was very light, almost as if a bunch had been cut out. Regardless though, it was, of course, completely predictable and there were my issues with the cast, but it was a finely enjoyable old romantic comedy. And it had Sofia Loren!
I’ve had a busy week! I watched Dead Ringers which is always fun. It seemed a bit sillier then the last time I watched it (the effects of age, I suppose), but I still like it. Quite tense at times and you can’t help but feel bad for some of the characters, especially when Claire learns about the “fabulous mantle twins”. All in all though, I couldn’t help but think though of Julian Sands twisted doctor in Boxing Helena, who I find creepier, due to his childlike nature.
I also started off the Kubrick with Lolita. I’d never seen it and, man, had I been missing out. Very good film, very good performances from the whole cast (especially though, from Peter Sellers, always a favorite of mine). It was involving, intriguing and I highly recommend it. I hear the book is good too!
I followed that up with the Documentary A Life in Film. That was good too. I could have done without Tom Cruise as the narrator but, when he wasn’t actually on-screen, he was easy enough to forget. I never knew much about Kubrick, so it was good to hear a bit.
I also watched Angels in America. I had little interest in watching this, plus the six hour length scared me, but I was quite surprised. Though I didn’t actually like any of the characters, they we’re all well done (except the two scenes that lapsed into a few seconds of bad acting) and the story was good. As for the length? Well, I’m starting to feel that it’s odd that anything under 3 hours can even be called a film. There’s no time to develop anything worth developing in 90 minutes. The six hours went by easily.
I also watched Me Without You, another film I’ve never heard of but liked quite a lot. I fell right into the “Yay Holly, Boo Marina” camp… Rooting for Holly and Nat from the beginning (why do I get to be such a sucker for these romances sometimes? Tim and Dawn, anyone?). I really got into it. Queasy at their first punk rock party, mad at Marina, mad at Kyle Mac and his terrible hair… I fell for this fun film and the great soundtrack.
Speaking of Tim and Dawn, I rewatched the first 6 episodes of The Office, the real (UK) version. That was fun as always. I never tire of this show.
Last night, in the haze of a cold, I put in Sexy Beast. This time, the third I think, I am no longer having much troubles with their brogues (I wanted to subtitle it the first time). A great movie. The opening scene ranks up with the “leaving the restaurant” scene in Reservoir Dogs >as one of the best opening/title scenes I know of. Past that though, the movie is awesome. Ben Kinsgley is tremendous, as usual, and the whole thing is great. Acting, story, script, cinematography, everything. Easily one of my top ten films (though my top ten list is at least 50 films long).