Leap of Faith

How to spend your hard-earned money, what causes to support, whom to innocently trust, the options vast and theoretically variable as pervasive ads tantalize and fascinate? 

There's the contemporary political vortex which enthusiastically presents intriguing alternatives, often driven by forthright personalities like the ones in Leap of Faith but much more powerful.

There's the overflowing heartfelt sitcom congenially demonstrating love and romance, familial problems and troubles at work all snuggly broken down into 24 minute segments.

There's Hollywood films similarly functioning through beloved faith in family and friends, the age old perseverance which resolutely champions the master-narrative with crafty volubility. 

The classic novel invests time honoured traditions with tragic challenges to old school reckonings, while skillfully blending demographic constituencies with financial burdens and sly characterizations. 

Now there's Netflix etc. which seems to showcase ideas Hollywood ignores, and has created an empire of epic illusion from simple tales with bucolic conclusions. 

There's the oldest of schools, the ancient religions that have faithfully stood the fickle test of time, patiently emerging and gradually disseminating hypothetically soulful divine beliefs. 

There's genre fiction disputatiously supplying magical takes on narratives flustered, fan favourites reaching cult status and admirably viewed anew successively. 

The world of music instantaneously available on your phone for a reasonable price, with a little research the global verve intricately jives in chill reverberation.

Local sports teams feisty and combative with championship goals in versatile sight, year after year the competition impressing as guts and dreams manifest raw courage. 

The independent realm at times presenting the coolest stories you've ever read or seen, lacking overt corporate agendas and uniquely sharing otherworldly ideas. 

Everything twisting and distorting and complementing with mad discursive intertwined gelastixity.

Like concrete discourse in abstract flux.

How to spend your hard-earned money!?

Star Knight

Alien encounters likely stretching back towards the dawn of unrecorded time, with comings and goings awkwardly authenticated through mythical beasts and august miscellany.

Technologically advanced and spiritually endowed with intergalactic frenetic moxie, facilitating custom, ritual and duty, beguilingly acquired through fragmentary permanence. 

The learned scripts and scholarly vicissitudes inarticulately duplicating alien codes, enriched through composite zealotry, credulous passion, and enduring faith. 

At times the bloodline even embraces extraterrestrials with righteous dignity, interplanetary breeding readily accommodated through random hookups and disciplined matrimony. 

The resultant mélange cosmopolitan and frisky encouraging dynamic multidisciplinary overload, as accordant emotion and wilderness whimsy viscerally intertwine with magnetic frenzy. 

In Star Knight, for intriguing instance, an alien descends to monitor humankind, and meets through random accident the nimble daughter of a local ruler.

The people believe his ship to be a dragon and retreat in horror when confronted, his mission peaceful his role observatory his curious action gallant and discerning. 

Seeking to be left exotically alone he amicably returns the maiden to her father, but not without having left her inquisitive and bold regarding the heavens and interstellar union.

A knight seeks her hand as well and is willing to fight to one day receive it, the alien confused by the chivalric ritual and notably uncertain as to how to behave. 

A local alchemist can't believe his luck and thanks the aliens for their coveted gifts.

Before his rivals curse his ambition with routine interminable banality. 

The question remains, what does one say if suddenly greeted by an alien, how should you react, what should you ask, is communication possible, would they try a buffet?

With the different options available at a buffet it's a good place to begin exploring terrestrial culture.

Don't visit the zoo, it may give them the wrong idea.

Cold glass of water.

La Ronde or Canada's Wonderland. 

Ordet

Dishevelled madness emphatically accompanies a scholarly son who embraced study, and took grand imposing theological works to distressed soul and body and mind.

Even amongst an upright people from a severe age religiously endowed, this devout son seems neigh unreachable according to quotidian scripture. 

Upon the farm, one of his brothers is raising a family without faith, his wife dutifully reproaching him yet still conjugally resigned.

His other sibling wholeheartedly seeks the adoring hand of a tailor's daughter, who believes in different spiritual traditions his father scorns with vehement sacrilege. 

Yet united through familial bonds they nurture strength and disciplined fortitude, resolutely caring for one another with kind pastoral bucolic eagerness.

The little children believe their uncle who predicts the future and heralds spirits, with the sincere trusting uncorrupted eye of wondrous observant faithful innocents.

Complications shatter the harmonious simplicity when routine child birth welcomes constraint, and bewildering death despotically envisages humbling loneliness and stoic resolve.

The insane blunt stark reincarnation proclaiming sheer and utter disillusion.

Before objective patience and despondent synergies boldly reawaken slumbering ecstasy. 

Strange to see grim volatile criticisms awkwardly dividing a farming village, acquiesced demographic consistency effectively determining biblical denomination. 

So many divergent alternative faiths vicissitudinously claiming divinity, with fisticuffs and arguments and drills literately fusing spiritual discord.

Ordet's style of film is something I'm not used to a direct illustration of imaginative belief, wherein which archaic lecture and austere fervency generously coalesce with narrative affection.

Was there once a time when religious tales showcasing family life and exotic miracles, widely dominated domestic markets inquisitively inhabited by the faithful?

Was faith so strong that supernatural and otherworldly films created revenue, and were in a studio's best interest to modestly disseminate with robust vigour?

Like the western it likely faded with the secular passage of peaceful times, in the constructive wake of blinding wars which reduced humanity to so much rubble.

Discursive realities monumental trends enthusiastically enriching coffers.

Novelty to trend to anachronism.

Back to school.

Chapter and verse. 

Andrei Rublev

An alternative cultural construction with manifest differences delineating structure, long before the global economy had secured widespread sustenance and reasonable lodging.

The Medieval world as intricately depicted sees religious endeavour faithfully grounded, at animate odds with pagans and artists who stray from the obedient path.

Without a market to sell his work and talent too imposing for traditional canvases, Andrei Rublev is avidly tasked with painting houses of religious worship.

Difficult to gain his trust or even convince him to take the commission, the fear of failure much too threatening in a climate of ruthless disciplinary punishment. 

So exacting so austere that even the most gifted refute prestige, and desperately fear their inspiration will fail to placate despotic envy. 

More difficult to meticulously nurture the aesthetic glory of a large cathedral, where your complex loyal design will be swiftly scrutinized by so many.

Individual texts may pass unnoticed or only interest a select few, but a public building will indeed be visited by a vast a/critical audience.

Where the devout artist's loyalty and faith will also be self-critically disposed.

Innocently answering their unique calling.

While conflict annihilates soulful reckoning.

It would be intriguing to learn more about the production and reception of Andrei Rublev, which bravely challenged the Soviet people not to overlook their religious heritage.

At a time when censorship was keen although not as orthodox as Stalin's tenure, the release of a 3 hour tome that lives up to its image and reveres religion suggests wild daring.

It's original monumental filmmaking that gathers thousands to collectively recreate, complex varied compelling shots of industrious impeti boldly undertaken.

To directly challenge a hostile regime with such innate overwhelming brilliance, no doubt recasts artistic conceptions through previously unimagined codes of conduct.

I even searched to see if they had actually cast the bell.

So realistic. So sincere. So inherently dangerous. So artistic. 

The apotheosis of religious filmmaking, crafted in communist Russia.

Údolí vcel (The Valley of the Bees)

The austere shadow of strict devotion objectively haunts upright ideology, as severe disciples refuse to compromise regarding life or blossoming community.

An adolescent enrages his newlywed father as he scandalously marries a teenage girl, after which he is sent to live in a religious order near the swelling sea so far away.

Life is strict and devout and disciplined but the brothers and knights care for one another, the passage of time accompanied by learning as they forge a nuanced unity of one.

Their vows are absolute however and changes of mind don't factor in, for some the endless praise and self-flagellation depressingly tedious as the years pass.

The boy, now an observant young man, loses faith with the order eventually, notably after a friend tries to escape and is then caught and fed to mad dogs.

Such an occurrence seems sincerely at odds with the Christian calling so he swiftly leaves, and heads back home to his old school castle to freely start life over once again.

But he's strictly chased by a fanatical knight who's gone mad and won't give him up.

No matter how bluntly he's adamantly rejected.

He refuses to ignore the Order's dogma. 

Another more worldly priest less emphatically consumed by absolute pretensions, lives in the world albeit a holy one and attempts to reasonably dissuade him.

His arguments are simple and wholesome temperately generated by communal life, the practical observations of unorthodox realities which still humbly fit with a loving God's teachings.

He reminds the passionate ideologue that the absolute application of religious teachings, will result in collective despondency since so many people simply can't live that way.

Isn't it better to live and attempt to follow the rules as best one can, and not to seek objective justifications to punish the people who've caused no harm?

The knight can't rationally stand the friendly and curious unafraid enclaves, as he meets them in a strange country where they aren't as pious as his native land.

When he hears that his old companion the one he's too blind to see he's in love with, has taken up with his father's widow and seeks to marry her with the priest's consent, he loses his mind in the "offending" foreknowledge that his friend will live an honest just life, likely even surrounded by a loving family strictly forbidden by the Order.

Madness follows, the furious yearning to end his object of desire's fruitful bearings.

The ending as tragic as so much ideology. 

As it imposes absolute calamity 

(There were so many more potential friends in the Order).

(I've mentioned this before but in case there's any confusion, I'm no longer looking to get married).

Criterion keyword: dogma (I was searching for the old school "Dogma Films").

Soleil Ô

It's important to play an active role, to take part, to add your voice, racial discrimination is an unsettling reality that consistently frustrates able bodied workers.

It's wonderful to see when citizens engage and write books or direct films to help struggling minorities, a lot of genuine sympathy and sincere care diligently goes into their compassionate construction.

Soleil Ô follows the plight of African migrants who move to France in the post-colonial period, but it wasn't made by concerned French citizens, it was created by Africans themselves.

According to the colonialist dogma they had been brought up with, they were equal citizens in France, and were surprised to find a lack and housing and employment after they picked up one day and moved there.

The film experiments with narrative techniques as it explores various aspects of racist tensions, which still pop up with alarming regularity there's still so much work to be critically done.

Back in Africa for instance, the abundance of languages is thoughtfully presented, before the colonized citizens have to fight one another in English and French with crosses turned into swords.

A grouchy bigot cantankerously complains about immigration in a relaxed restaurant, before a black singer inspires the patrons and he suddenly changes his stubborn mind.

A mixed-race individual who looks white has to suddenly walk away, from an angry man who just can't help his instinctual hatred and knee-jerk prejudice.

As a white woman and a black man playfully flirt with one another on the street, passers by look on in shock and offer multiple awkward different takes.

Even though black people possess requisite skills they're still forced to work in specific sectors, many of which demand no education and involve industrial cleaning.

I would argue that Soleil Ô's multiple exploratory scenarios, present pioneering mockumentary techniques decades before they became conventional (they may have also been popular at the time but were referred to by a different term).

The comedy is instructive without being violent and there is one character who keeps showing up, the events loosely tailored around his experience as he tries to make coherent sense of things.

It effectively uses humour and logic to rationally comment on distressing realities, hopefully convincing hard-hearted peeps that there are less drastic solutions to economic problems (people shouldn't be assigned specific jobs solely based on the colour of their skin for instance).

First rate experimental cinema perhaps decades ahead of its time, courageously created by the actual citizens whom the racist attitudes affected, Soleil Ô is worth checking out by concerned multicultural citizens, especially because the same attitudes still persist, and need to be fought by the next generation. 

I was watching a scuba-diver hanging out with some humpback whales on Instagram the other day, and I suddenly wondered: do whales think we're angels? 

I often think whales have similar belief systems to our own because they have massive brains. Not that the size of the brain matters, bees seem to be quite intelligent too, but I can't imagine something with that colossal of a brain not being capable of considering things like the afterlife. 

And then snorkelers and scuba-divers just suddenly show up from above the water's surface, a place where they can't go (for long) and wave and potentially hug them, and then disappear, perhaps never to be seen again! 

Could such behaviour be traditionally mistaken for the emergence of angels?

When whales beach themselves, I often think a rogue demagogue whale has convinced them that they can live on the surface, and they foolishly follow his lead, like preachers warning about the end of the world, and their congregation stockpiling canned goods in turn. 

If they do think we're angels, I hope they never make it to the surface, for they may not like what they find. 🗽

Another reason I think this point may be valid is that whales and dolphins have odd sleeping habits. As far as I know, half of their brains are always awake, only half of a whale or dolphin brain sleeps at one time. This introduces a big difference between our species because our entire brain shuts off when we sleep, preventing the onset of psychosis (I hate it when I don't get enough sleep [all of my worst job experiences were ones that kept me up 20 hours a day]).

At least, I wonder why animals as intelligent as dolphins keep returning to areas where humans slaughter them every year. Why wouldn't an intelligent animal simply avoid the hunt and go somewhere else? Answer: they can't remember things well enough because their brains never fully shut down.

Thoughts. 🐋🐬 🧠

The Adventures of Mark Twain

Mark Twain elaborately concocts a unique imaginative flying machine, upon which he chases Halley's Comet with three fortunate literary stowaways. 

Tom, Huck and Becky are unsure as to how to proceed, and never really settle into the versatile invention, inquisitively searching for structure and meaning while instinctually absorbing the bountiful narratives.

Stories within yarns within tales within legends creatively emerge with theoretical whimsy, presented through curious lighthearted exploration as the kids heuristically investigate away.

A ship much more like a mind its multivariable elements cascading, through trial and error and riveting hypotheses its temporal comportment ahistorical.

Perhaps part of the paradigm shift which led to much less severe religious interpretations, wherein which the literal executions lost their prominent cultural influence.

A move away from exacting obsessions with extremely precise uptight rules and regulations, to a more open-hearted freeform compendium liberally composed through manifold alternatives.

Twain himself struggles with the dutiful recognition of a regenerative constituent bipolar renaissance, within which his psyche proactively duels while realistically resonating rationales less ideological.

Difficult to suppress the reflections at times while ethically composed and poignantly accentuated, the active latent indissoluble antipodes habitually insistent with reckless remonstrance.

Thus, the importance of laidback comedy from pent-up time to pent-up time, not the new obsessive violent variety but the less destructive impulses of Twain and Chaplin. 

Twain's ideas and clever witticisms are seductively sprinkled throughout the script, his observant well-timed well-crafted comments judiciously diversifying tact and treatise.

Not often a public figure is so universally commended without crude accompaniment, when do you ever here anything negative critically mentioned about the old school phenom?

The Adventures of Mark Twain may have passed under the radar way back in my youth I admit I had never heard of it, at least until around this time last week when it suddenly seemed like a cool film to see.

Definitely a chill film for children interested in reading and bizarro imagination, a claymation gateway to a world of books poetically awaiting at the local library. 

Twain's insights make the film fun for grouchy adults who might not want to watch another kids film at the same time.

Perhaps overlooked due to its harmless unorthodox reflections on religion.

Which I thought were charmingly displayed.  

The Man from Earth

A well-liked professor announces he's leaving to his disappointed and confused thoughtful colleagues, the sudden nature of the shocking departure ruffling an inquisitive feather or two.

He tries to swiftly hit the road but they manage to convince him to stay for a party, which he begrudgingly agrees to attend without much enthusiastic pomp and ceremony.

Some people just don't like farewell gatherings and aren't habitually attuned to free-flowing emotion, but in this case it has more to do with the solemn fact that he's immortal.

His friends are naturally curious about why he's leaving and where he intends to go, and he awkwardly avoids their questions before simply telling it like it is.

Being of intellectual dispositions they're instinctually prone to doubt such claims, and proceed to effortlessly introduce highly spirited qualms and refutations. 

He's quite an agreeable chap though and is able to congenially hold his own, slowly but surely breaking down barriers intuitively contradicting his eccentric bearing. 

Dating back over 140,000 years he has clever things to say about so many different things.

Even if he needs to leave when people notice he doesn't age.

Having immersed himself in so many epochs. 

With people so formerly aggressive and much more covetous of their feudal neighbours, living for 140,000 years seems like it would have blended impossible odds with infinite distress.

To avoid so many roll calls to consistently keep head attached to neck, while learning so many languages and variable customs throughout the millennia. 

I imagine you could move to different cities and creatively remain for a century or two, and fluidly observe the dynamic ebb and flow with crafty relatable multivariability. 

It would have been cool before colonialism to have travelled to North South America and Australia, and live there for thousands of years you'd possess so much indigenous wisdom. 

The Man from Earth's a lot of fun with a cool cast of characters from old school pop culture (Tony Todd, David Lee Smith, John Billingsley, Ellen Crawford, Annika Peterson, William Katt, Alexis Thorpe, Richard Riehle), demonstrating their chops with reliable industry in a cool chillin' script straight out of Star Trek's finest.

I don't deny the possibility that such immortals may live among us.

You'd have to wonder if they ever get bored.

So much to do.

So little time! 

A River Runs Through It

Family first and foremost reciprocally resigned in pristine pastures, a sturdy minister and his adventurous sons tenderly taken care of by an adoring mom.

Strict but not overbearing the natural tendency to erupt in play, openly encouraged within temporal limits reasonably applied each and every day.

Fly fishing forges the backbone of glib inquisitive rural endeavours, local rivers and fields and forests ebulliently itemized in joyous caricature.

It's focused on several times and becomes something artistic if not spiritual, the youngest lad remarkably entertaining with paramount dexterous improvised brilliance. 

His older brother's somewhat more tried and true and spends six years away from home at school, learning the integral ways of literature to be creatively taught with bucolic industry.

The younger takes to the wild and emphatically learns the art of journalism, freely expressing his withering whimsy with a festive fair-hand and spry open-mind. 

But somewhat unsettled somewhat borderline reckless he pursues risk-fuelled gambling and drink beyond reason. 

Yet still never arrives late for fishing.

And always puts on quite a show. 

Narrated with old world omniscience as if oracled fate was clairvoyantly hewn, exciting moments and tragic expenditures objectively passing with sagacious sentiment.

I remembered so many exuberant hours curiously exploring throughout my youth, as I watched those rambunctious lads engage in resolute countryside quorums. 

Such a shame when disciplinary regulations counterintuitively produce wanton interludes, the legionary impetus of the pervasive patterns alternatively encouraging adventitious catalogues.

Such a shame when a lack of order counterintuitively begets despotism, through the unfortunate contemptuous dismissal of laidback chillin' and relaxed intuition.

What a consistent pain applying reason and logic to find realistic solutions.

Sport always seems to fend off carnage.

The arts unfortunately lacking commensurate mass appeal. 

A House Divided: Denmark Vessey's Rebellion

Strategic Planning.

Variable details.

Inherent volatility. 

Exacting daring.

With slavery still rampant in 1822, an established artisan seeks his people's freedom (Yaphet Kotto/James Bond III as Denmark Vessey), Haitian slaves having recently fought a successful rebellion, he wants to cut loose from Charleston (South Carolina) and head out to join them.

His situation is rather prosperous for he was able to buy his freedom, and set himself up with a profitable business, while reading books and embodying confidence.

The majority of his brethren remain enslaved but many listen to his unorthodox counsel, as he lays out their significant numeric advantage, and how they can access ships in port.

Many slave owners fear such a potential outcome but the mild-mannered governor isn't that worried, unable to consider the possibility that there would ever be an armed revolt.

But that's what Vessey plans and even comes close to directly leading.

He's outrageously betrayed in the end. 

Finicky familiarity. 

A House Divided: Denmark Vessey's Rebellion presents unfortunate realities associated with group dynamics, notably ye olde treachery while attempting to plan something controversial.

There must be people out there who are generally trusted by many (Biden and Augustus Caesar for instance), and who fellow group members respect and don't try to usurp with determinate mad power grabs.

Denmark Vessey seems to have possessed these qualities but he nevertheless quarrelled with a jealous African American, who preferred to expose his rebellious plot and remain a slave, rather than see his adversary succeed (it makes no sense and happens all too frequently).

There are other leaders who rule by fear and thereby command the respect of many, but isn't their world rather dark and dangerous, and don't their adversaries have legitimate cause?

I've met people who seemed rather rough and grouchy who weren't really that bad to work for, others who pretended to be right as rain until it became clear they bore secret grudges.

And people who were just generally cool who were respected because they dealt fairly.

A shame Denmark Vessey didn't succeed.

Cool that this old school film still honours his memory. 

Belfast

I've always loved the scene in Doctor Zhivago when Yuri Andreyevich is asked how he'll live within the newly formed Soviet Union, and he simply states something like, "[I'll] just live".

You see he isn't seriously interested in politics or religion or ideology or revolution, but rather just in simply living a quiet life with friends and family.

Such peaceful ambitions in volatile times permeate much of Belfast's learning, as it generally focuses on three generations of a loving family from Northern Ireland.

It's sweet and tender, wild and forthright, innocent and wise, confused yet earnest, as its characters attempt to simply live surrounded by shortsighted religious tension.

If you've ever wondered how life persists when dangerous idiocy turns culturally violent, I'd argue Kenneth Branagh's heartfelt Belfast is a superlative exemplar.

Plus, if you happened to have watched Branagh's Henry V when you were in high school, and felt cool when after 15 minutes or so you generally understood the language, and then thought he was one of the coolest directors around, and then waited for years, while generally enjoying his films, for that one that stood out as a genuine artistic masterpiece, unconcerned with status or popularity, just overflowing with artistic soul, look no further than his brilliant Belfast, a potential companion piece for Doctor Zhivago.

I guess I never mentioned that my father was a religious man, who attended mass practically every Sunday of his life. It gave him a general sense of peace and calm and when the pandemic prevented him from going, he lost his life.

My father was a religious man but he wasn't strict or nutty or ridiculous, he still believed in medical science and evolution and even loved great writing and argument (like other friends I've known who are religious).

Unlike austere religious people, he made you feel welcome within the church, and didn't judge or critique or fear you because you were different or strange or inquisitive.

I think about the church at times but apart from dad, there's been a lot of disillusion, and I generally prefer how things are done in Québec, where science actually makes prayers happen.

That's just me though, I'm not here to judge, but I really don't get it when religions start fighting, especially different denominations within the same religion, it seems incredibly foolish, not to mention, totally nuts.

So many productive lives ruined.

In the name of saviours who preached peace.

I'm old enough to accept that it happens but I'll never make peace with such reckless idiocy.

Belfast is a must see film.

The pursuit of life beyond disparate violence. 

Planet of the Apes

Explorers sleep quietly slumber for millennia while swiftly passing through space, bravely uncertain as to where they might eventually end up, adventurous and daring, expeditionary finesse, they dream civilization incarnate, and sedately persevere. 

Crashing suddenly in a lake roughly 2,000 years after their departure, they have just enough time to escape, boldly paddling unencumbered to the surrounding desert shores, with enough food and water to last three days, and the pioneering spirit to endure and then some.

They trek for quite some time until enthusiastically finding life, a single plant unassumingly declaring the probability of others.

Vegetation is soon abundant and fresh water readily available, they soon jump in to freely bathe, before encountering a disturbance.

Their clothes are gone they wildly dash to catch the entities who stole them, only to discover a race of humans rather primitive and mute.

The humans are raiding crops but from whom remains undetermined, until furious apes lithely riding horseback appear with nets and horns and rifles.

Suddenly shocked and separated the startled travellers quickly flee, one shot in the neck with a non-life threatening wound then brought to a nearby village. 

He can't talk and he swiftly learns that on his newfound world people surge and struggle.

But there are other forms of communication.

To employ before regaining speech.

I can't discuss how this film ends because I'd rather not spoil the fun, it was one of my favourite cinematic surprises in my youth, and I'd hate to spoil the ending for others.

Not that hundreds of people will be madly rushing to see a Planet of the Apes film from 1968 anytime soon, when several new ones have recently been released, nevertheless, it's worth checking out if you haven't seen it (and somehow never heard what happens in the end).

Simultaneously, the film's far off agrarian inhospitable planet includes parts that been devastated by war, and as I've mentioned before,  after choosing this film at random one evening when I was perhaps 10, it seemed like nuclear war would no doubt be an impossibility on our world, if wiser heads historically prevailed.

Which is another reason this war in Ukraine is so horrifically devastating.

If a country's leader is threatening to use nuclear weapons, how does that leader still have a country to lead?, why hasn't he been arrested?, and why is that country still a member of the United Nations?

Baffling.

Perhaps stranger things have happened.

But certainly not within my lifetime. 

Nattvardsgästerna (Winter Light)

I suppose when you're happy doing your own thing and you've generally created spiritually enriching films, according to improvised guidelines which imaginatively mutated over time, it may at some point occur to you to direct the saddest most despondent film ever conceived, to make a distressing point cloaked in sheer austere lugubrity. 

Pushing things past the strictly solemn to approach rarefied uncompromised misery, Ingmar Bergman's Nattvardsgästerna (Winter Light) distills utter complete hopelessness. 

It's unfortunate to shyly say that the lack of hope is derived from honesty, from a pressurized irreconcilable desire to share one's thoughts with imposing candour. 

Does such a truthful need reflect genuine social lucidity, inasmuch as the ability to freely express oneself is oft admired and sincerely celebrated?

Is the sharing of doubts and misgivings not encouraged by different cultures, to avoid pent up obtuse hardheartedness followed by shocking emotional explosions?

In Nattvardsgästerna, the individual under examination occupies a prominent position however, and people look to him for strength in difficult times of spiritual stress.

When he makes his own lack of faith apparent and expresses it with candid levity, the results are completely disastrous for his diminutive humble flock.

He attempts to ease troubled minds by modestly employing frank concern, but misjudges tortured temperaments who were seeking guidance not familiarity. 

The cultivation of ideals thus receives distraught import, through morose unrestrained melancholia blindly abandoning its lofty discourse.

It's an extreme example sheltered in woebegone obfuscation, utilizing provocative misjudgment to comment upon mortality.

If you could approach every social interaction like a French judge interpreting the Civil Code, socially, not judicially, each interaction adapted to specific circumstances, then perhaps through lauded perspicuity you could efficiently prescribe communal medication (one case at a time).

Populism has wildly challenged the establishment of wise decision making however, through realistic democratic loopholes which instinctually bewilder.

Those occupying positions of power must proceed confidently nevertheless.

As alternative rationalities clash and codify.

A bleak film.

Disposed noblesse. 

Amistad

The 19th century.

A group of slaves being transported at sea courageously revolts and takes control of the vessel.

Unfamiliar with nautical logistics, they rely on two former captors to sycophantically steer, but weeks later provisions grow slim, and they're forced to gather fresh supplies on land.

They weren't being led back to Africa as promised, and are soon detected by the American navy, who imprisons them as runaway slaves, thinking their bondage was secured legally.

At the time, Britain has nobly outlawed slavery but Spain still permits human trafficking, the Spanish crown seeking to reobtain what it claims is its property, the Americans confused by conflicting demands.

If the individuals whose freedom has been denied turn out to have been born in a Spanish country, they then belong to the Spanish crown, or the scoundrels who acquired them on its behalf, and, unfortunately, there's little the abolitionists can do.

But since they were illegally obtained in Africa their rights to freedom have been scurrilously denied.

But their lawyer needs to prove they came from Africa.

And he can't speak their language.

It takes quite some time in fact before they find someone who can, and even with the reliable African testimony, the Africans still have to prove their innocence three times.

Amistad covers a lot of ground as it champions liberty and freedom, intertwining multiple diverse threads as it weaves a compelling plot.

The independence of the American courts is analyzed through political intrigue, since the freedom of the wrongfully enslaved Africans will enrage the American South.

President Van Buren (Nigel Hawthorne) is worried about losing the next election, but also about starting a civil war, so he interferes behind the scenes, although he thankfully can't guarantee specific outcomes.

The abolitionists approach Christianity with open-minded considerate impacts, religion at times an instrument of persecution, here it pursues social justice.

Amistad is at its best as lawyer Roger Sherman Baldwin (Matthew McConaughey) gets to know his clients, notably the feisty Cinque (Djimon Hounsou), who led the sublime revolt in question.

As they slowly learn to communicate a world of enriching ideas opens up, Baldwin interested in learning about African customs, Cinque generally frustrated by appellate courts.

Kindness and understanding guide Amistad's resiliency, as it concentrates on compassionate endeavours, interwoven into a practical dynamic.

Its graphic depiction of slavery's innate horrors encourage impassioned just pursuits.

Difficult to imagine anyone could have ever treated people that way.

Amistad successfully assails such injustice.

*Billions of animals still suffer from much worse circumstances around the world. The abuse inflicted is horrifying. I'm glad so many people are trying to change things.

Leningrad Cowboys Meet Moses

The Cowboys have fallen on hard times, down on their luck and stricken, forsaken, filiblustered.

They were once one of Mexico's most exhilarating acts, but after duelling with tequila incontestably, collapsed upon destitute ruin.

The band still exists however even if several of its members did not survive, those remaining somewhat revitalized after an invitation to play in New York.

But they've been tricked, hoodwinked, bamboozled, as they learn shortly after arrival, for Vladimir (Matti Pellonpää) their once loathsome manager turns out to have set up a ruse.

He seeks to once again rule them and lead them back to northern realms, and has awoken as a scandalous prophet who refers to himself as Moses.

The band is weary, downtrodden, aghast, and succumb to his ironclad will, which supplies a rickety motorboat for their journey across the Atlantic.

Meanwhile, he stays behind to chisel off spry Liberty's nose, before hitching a ride clasped and wingéd to the lonesome European coast.

They're reunited without much delay and are even joined by old school band members, and set off merrymaking homeward bound through less inhospitable continental climes.

But Vladimir hasn't failed to make headlines and he's become a wanted man.

And the law avails in hot pursuit as they actively gig hot damn.

Leningrad Cowboys Meet Moses adds significant layers and depth, to a narrative eclectically posturing with unyielding jocose inhibition.

A collection of wry self-reliant ideas intermittently staked uniformity notwithstanding, the story appealing to subsequent nodes which elucidate demonstrative beacon.

Sometimes the plot's surely secondary to verbose improvised momentum, providing adhesive broadened outlines which embrace reformed asymmetry.

For 'tis not argument Kaurismäki covets but rather offbeat ironic declension, messages bridled to slam dunk transparency as they softly sway in complement willow.

Enlivening inherent dimension through spatiotemporal interplay, it highlights disembodied ascension with aeronautic grassroots unconveyed.

A break from paramount logic resets and recasts judicious responsibility, inasmuch as too steady a jet stream cloys wise recourse clad indubitably.

Meet Moses takes its time to let loose but then settles to bewilder anew.

The Leningrad Cowboys are a real band apparently.

And still perform to this very day.

Bad Boys for Life

Time has past and methods of fighting crime have adapted, yet Detective Mike Lowrey (Will Smith) still applies old school reckonings to the volatile realm within which he plays.

But he's been shot down by an unknown assailant who ballistically came calling during flippant carefree fun.

Distraught partner Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) invokes divine intervention to aid his robust recovery, while settling into retired life, unsure of his stable routine.

And a new team lies in wait after Lowrey fully recovers, tech savvy yet lacking daring, led by precise pragmatic vision (Paola Nuñez as Rita).

Will the unstable mix of strategic planning and sheer impudence produce exclamatory results as the vengeful track and yearn?

Will Mr. Lowrey see something beyond the unattached ephemeral as his work with Rita progresses?

Will irresolvable speculation lead Mr. Burnett to once again contend, as clues manifest probabilities, and teamwork vests credulity?

Will Smith and Martin Lawrence irresistibly back at it and then some, bringing vocal spirits to the lively fore, after a considerably withdrawn hiatus.

They've still got it, that defiant spark from long ago, reciprocal mutually constructive disarray that contextualizes stark contention.

Lawrence's aggrieved summative evaluations add hyper-reactive humour, while Smith's intense driven presence keeps things seriously grounded, hewn.

It's like Martin and Fresh Prince still asserting themselves after all these years, a rare treat if you grew up watching both shows, still appealing to new audiences regardless.

The new recruits diversify its holdings and introduce less combative by-the-book character, not that they aren't ready to head out in the field, but their manners are much more reserved.

Unless provoked.

They even find remarkably well-integrated cover diggin' deep at local night clubs.

It's a solid 20th/21st century blend skilfully synthesized by Adil & Bilall.

It takes Lowrey and Burnett a long time to figure out who's oppressing them, and considering who's been shot their response time lacks speed, but the patient reflective struggle does build quite the crescendo (it's a cool ending), with a Vaderesque reversal, back before it all began.

Bad Boys for Life provides a fierce yet thoughtful narrative that reimagines age old themes, this variation as technologically infatuated as it is with mobile practice.

Okay, it's more infatuated with direct action which is certainly a good thing, a chillin' break from the cold calculation that qualifies so much daily life.

Judging by the responses of North American audiences there's still something to be said for interpersonal relations.

Technology may be astounding.

But it can't replace face-to-face conversation.

Witness

A young Amish child (Lukas Haas as Samuel) on his first trip to the big city, finds himself immersed in high level corruption, after witnessing a brutal murder, while waiting for his train to depart.

As unaware of the repercussions as the honest cop who takes his statement (Harrison Ford as John Book), he's soon revealed the identity of the killer, and it's indeed one of New York's finest (Danny Glover as McFee).

Book soon transfers the knowledge to his supervisor, but he's placed his trust in the wrong elite cop, shots fired shortly thereafter, moments later he's on the crazed run.

To Amish country.

Where no one will find him.

If he can keep that yap shut.

And refrain from scandalous endeavours.

Work abounds in the old school surroundings, as does temptation, and orthodox rules.

Surveillance haunts disputed emotion.

There's no quarter, no frank ergo sum.

Long before cellphones guaranteed law enforcement could ubiquitously monitor the population, public movements were still often scrutinized, private pastimes uprightly presumed.

In tight-knit communities anyways, and at work, and at home, the concept of privacy still had much more meaning, and could at least be theoretically conceived.

Without vast resources.

Headstrong individualism meets its panoptic particulars in Peter Weir's forbidding Witness, as a trustworthy by the book policeperson closely follows established rules.

Having once taken procedure for granted, he struggles to meticulously adjust, his genuine goodness guiding the way, his bold temper begetting comeuppance.

A sympathetic depiction of the Amish unreels within, beyond sociopolitical constructs, a simple existence with nothing to hide, harmless living for strict rule followers.

The disruption may indeed be controversial, but it's integrated without fuss or alarm, peaceful ways still cognizant of justice, willing to aid distraught virtue in peril.

L'amour.

Restraint.

Confinements of the hypothetical.

Urban tempers so feisty condoned.

An odd mix that could have been more controversial.

Diane

Guilt haunts a reliable community volunteer as her grown son's drug addiction becomes increasingly distressing.

She's sure and steady, well-oiled, remarkable, overflowing with humble self-sacrifice, always willing to lend helping hands.

She serves food to the down and out, finds time to visit sick friends, takes care of the elderly, and loves sitting back to discuss bygone days.

Except for one moment in particular, one extravagance that led to grief.

It's unknown if it brought on Brian's (Jake Lacy) troubles, but she unfortunately acts as if it was the root cause.

But she won't give up on him.

Stops by almost every day, brings him food, is critical but not overbearing, sympathizes unless he's reckless.

He responds. Seeks help. Sort of recovers. Becomes overbearing.

Their relationship's somewhat dysfunctional, Brian either wallowing in despair, or seeking to hoist the upper hand when he's sober.

Diane (Mary Kay Place) patiently deals, showcasing the unsung grace of spry active virtue.

Unassured yet sheltered.

Remorseful yet feisty.

She isn't a saint, I don't mean to suggest she's saintly, but her indiscretions are by no means scandalous, in the present moment, long after an impassioned youth.

Or young adulthood.

The time frame isn't specified but you can guess from the relative age of the characters.

A strange film nevertheless, one which possibly makes more sense if you've ever done good deeds, or been weighed down by guilt for things you haven't done, or simply like chillin' with family.

Why the film explicitly presents Diane engaged in hard drug use is a point of confusion, but notwithstanding a bizarre dream sequence, it does resonate with communal optimism, and establish a strong group of friends.

Who argue, reminisce, listen, tease, protest, are there for each other like a sponge or a duster, understand one another, facilitate, appease.

With that familiar kind of camaraderie that presumes but doesn't judge, that predicts but doesn't wager.

Diane and Brian forge a troubled symbiotic nomenclature nestled within discursive drives.

Actively administering.

Flexible choice composure.

Most of the time.

Todos lo saben

A wedding brings a family together to exalt in celebration, the festivities overflowing with spirit, inhibitions let loose to praise.

But as guards are let down and passions erupt, covetous malfeasance clandestinely violates.

Soon it is known that kidnapping is afoot, and the identity of the perpetrator remains a bitter mystery.

Old school social relations call motives into question, as despondent candour joylessly obscures lucid trust.

Financial responsibility dismally beckons, a lifetime of hard work hauntingly underlying stoic sacrifice.

The past interrogatively echoes.

As the present crumbles astray.

Emergent futures contend in Todos lo saben indeed, as disturbing essentials anxiously prognosticate.

Hives of activity maddeningly posture before settling down with forlorn resignation.

Its characters are strong, compassionate, resilient, loving.

They don't only care for their immediate family, but seek the prosperity of their workforce as well.

Like a versatile community.

The film excels at presenting passionate logic, the overwhelming emotions that characterize sincere distress rationally generated with sober feeling.

Everything's understood with astute enough composure.

It matures like the vines its reels cultivate, coming of age in the mid-afternoon sun.

Storms may disrupt its smooth delicate maturation, but not without augmenting rough unique compelling flavour.

It examines religion without preaching, infidelities without scorn, science without authentication, loyalty forbidding dependence.

Even though characters seek just outcomes, it doesn't mean it's easy, and even though they have resources they can access, it doesn't mean alternative solutions are shelved.

Suspicions bluntly arise.

Level heads contemplatively acquiesce.

Like culture under seige.

Todos lo saben peacefully reckons.