Ha nem lenne az intenzív hősi tetteket igénylő háború, Ukrajna megnyugodna!

An Unfinished Life

A loving mother (Jennifer Lopez as Jean Gilkyson) packs up and leaves after her partner becomes abusive (Damian Lewis as Gary Winston), her daughter happy to leave things behind (Becca Gardner as Griff Gilkyson), as they head back to the wilds of Wyoming. 

There the child's grandfather awaits (Robert Redford as Einar Gilkyson) and is something of a grouchy mcgrouchersons, but he means well and sticks up for the downtrodden even if he's difficult to get along with.

His partner (Morgan Freeman as Mitch Bradley) was mauled by a bear and is now generally confined to his belovéd cabin, not blindly seeking rash vengeance, preferring to let the seasoned bear live in peace.

The bear's still around in fact and is eventually captured and then encaged, not in the most hospitable confines, it's sad to think he's no longer roaming free.

Jean and Einar are at odds because Jean accidentally killed his son, after falling asleep at the wheel, he tries but can't honestly forgive her.

She finds work in the old rugged town as 'lil Griff takes a shine to gramps, as he teaches her old school ranching ways, chartered chillin', inchoate enrichment.

But something doesn't sit quite right about that bear's sullen incarceration. 

A plan is hatched seeking animate freedom.

Even though he has quite the temper.

It's a strange mix in An Unfinished Life between different types of violence, on the one hand Jean clearly has to leave her relationship, no one should put up with that kind of nonsense.

But on the other an injured stalwart goes to great lengths to forgive a bear, it's possible he or she may strike again, but are they just functioning according to instinct?

I was happy to see a sympathetic attitude kindly applied to misunderstood bear kind, grizzlies used to range across so much more of North America, and now they don't have very much land left.

It's clear the human has had opportunities to change and definitely should have known better, it's different for a wild daring animal who may freak out if you suddenly surprise it.

Still though, if a bear strikes once and there's no strict penalty, what happens if it strikes again?, if you could transport the bear into the wilds of Northern Canada and Québec, however, there won't be many people around (although bears have been known to travel vast distances back to their original hangouts after being relocated).

The vast majority of the time the bear won't strike according to the books I've read, I've seen several while out and about as well, I've kept my distance and never had any problems.

If only bears were never grouchy or somehow aware of the danger they're in.

I truly believe many of them are.

And that either way they've never meant us much harm. 

Since our ancestors landed! 😜

Gdyby nie wojna wymagająca intensywnych aktów bohaterstwa, Ukraina bylaby chlodna!

Mura b' ann airson a' chogaidh a dh' fheumadh gnìomhan dian de ghaisgeachd, bhiodh an Ugràin socair!

Aubergine

Glide in glisten galavanting

unrenditioned spiral spampling

nigh helixium ambrosial 

delicate counterproposal

myrtle metric unescorted

crazed inquisitive contorted

visual resuscitation

mesmerized antiquatation 

barnyard bristles burnished brambly

enigmatic courtly campy

trails with sinuous suspending

cliffhung petroglyphs distending

cornbread clamp contumely wizened

discombobulated hydrant

husky niblet narwhal knightly

cavalier seaside alightly

whirlin'.

The Batman

*Spoiler alert.

Reinvented again for another reboot which reimagines traditional tropes, trajectories, a much less pulpy light illumination recast in dire solemnity.

The Riddler returns to confound the Batman with pejorative puzzling and plagued putrefaction (the Penguin also making an appearance), a pattern emerging the details discomforting, the players well-known to the reclusive billionaire.

In this sombre reawakening Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) spends little time managing Wayne Enterprises, having yet to envision the circumstances in which his businesses could benefit ailing Gotham.

Alfred (Andy Serkis) is forlorn yet dutiful and thoroughly worried about his disengaged charge, no doubt proud of his crime fighting agility yet still rather anxious regarding the future.

Batman's more of a young adult in this instalment, still coming to terms with his coveted legacy, passionately lured by the prestige of his role yet at times uncertain as to how to proceed.

He even wipes out at one point and takes a rather severe tumble, the results of which should have perhaps been more serious realistically considering his noted mortality.

The film's still more like the Christopher Nolan Batmans even if he does take quite the unexpected fall, with more of an emphasis on scientific fact than unobserved fantastic comic book reckoning.

Perhaps it's just the subconscious favouritism of yesteryear but I find myself longing for something less logical, like sociopathic Jack Napier's descent into a vat of acidic chemicals only to emerge the nefarious Joker.

Not that The Dark Knight isn't one of the best films I've ever seen, but too much reasonable objective fact can take away from the resonant fantasy (not in Bond, the beginning of GoldenEye was terrible). 

I suppose The Dark Knight did succeed in finding rational means to uphold its sensation, as does Matt Reeves's latest vision, perhaps I'm just searching for the magically real, the cool thing about fantasies is they don't require scientific proof (assuming they don't take over). 

The Batman's still really well done with an impressive cast with many cool actors (Zoë Kravitz, Jeffrey Wright, Colin Farrell, Paul Dano, John Turturro, Peter Sarsgaard, . . .), who add feisty nuance and versatile daring to so many captivating scenes.

Oddly, the Riddler is caught but Batman still fails to stop him.

Batman wipes out.

The Riddler's plot isn't foiled.

With so many superhero films currently flourishing.

This one still finds a way to stand out.

Hoping they mix in Joaquin Phoenix's Joker.

Marvel's continuity is first rate! 

Se non fose porque a guerra requiriu intensos actos de heroísmo, Ucraína relaxase!

Jos sota ei vaatisi intensiivisiä sankarillisia tekoja, Ukraina rentoutuisi!

Wonder Woman 1984

Strange how 1984 was chosen for the title of the new Wonder Woman film, since Orwell's novel doesn't influence the plot, which has more to do with one man's unhinged megalomania. 

Indeed a somewhat bland artifact is found and brought to the Smithsonian in the 1980s, its legendary origins unknown at first as steadfast workers research and classify. 

But it turns out a television personality has been seeking its mythic prowess (Pedro Pascal as Mr. Lord), for it's reputed to grant a wish to whomever holds it in their possession. 

Diana (Gal Gadot) and co-worker Minerva (Kristen Wiig) were accidentally granted wishes, and didn't realize there was a penalty for unwittingly coaxing the treacherous stone.

Pedro wishes to become the stone itself and sets about granting elaborate wishes, his wish granting growing more and more outrageous as his prestigious worth ameliorates. 

Diana realizes he must be stopped and has to renounce her wish to do so, for even though she's ecstatic her love interest's returned (Chris Pine as Steve Trevor), his existence is taking away her powers. 

Minerva refuses to give up hers having grown accustomed to superheroic strength. 

The two face off near the chaotic climax.

As Pedro uses satellite technology to grant wishes throughout the world.

Satellites were huge when I was a kid not just in popularity but in size as well, now they're certainly much smaller yet possessed by a much larger number of people.

Does Wonder Woman 1984's use of the Orwellian date relate to contemporary global interconnectivity, or the ways in which satellites and other devices have linked billions of people across the globe?

The technology does seem essential and undeniably facilitates rapid communication, it's still fascinating how quickly one can converse with someone residing on a far off continent. 

But freedom lies with disconnection with a less engaged absorption of worldwide data. It's important to stay generally informed. But I feel so much better when I shut off the news.

I spent years finding cool articles to share with people and advertise my favourite news sources, and to contradict prevalent one-dimensional narratives which ignored the integrity of working people.

Perhaps some people did start paying attention and found some new news sources they liked.

Working class integrity goes without saying.

And used to be a focus in the media year round. 

Om det inte vore för kriget som krävde intensiva hjältedåd, var Ukraina avkopplande!

Hvis det ikke for krigen, der krævede intense heltehandlinger, ville Ukraine slappe af!

Cobbler

Radial repose rhapsodic

asymmetric symbiotic 

cruise control erratic winding

literary serpenspining 

perpendicular allotting

vogue vehicular biscotti

frieze frenetic fermentation

galvanized ricotta raisin

swoosh implanted altruistic  

cardio characteristic

knee-deep nestles nerve neutronic

kinaesthetic embryonic

roto rubicon supining

restive reveries entwining

micro macro maze mélangéd

rollercoasting ripples ontics

ursine. 

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

An ancient warrior fortunately comes across 10 vital rings which grant immortality, afterwards using his newfound power with invincible finesse on the field of battle (Tony Chiu-Wai Leung as Xu Wenwu).

Hundreds of years pass and the thrill of ruling loses its appeal, he begins to seek out myth and legend to discover alternative adventurous yields. 

He's led to a mythical forest reputed to nurture fascinating animals, whose unique supernatural existence endemically eclipses mortal agency.

Not that they likely wouldn't spiritedly co-exist with adorable hippos and freewheeling zebree, but having spent millennia secluded in wild embowerment it's difficult to determine how they may react.

Xu finds the entrance to their peaceful home but is mischievously prevented from entering, a feisty resident bluntly refusing his unexpected visitation (Fala Chen as Ying Li).

He slowly falls in love with her and she indeed with him, but he is forbidden from staying in the village, so the two depart for the outer world.

Children are born their family expands but Xu's enemies soon come calling, and take the life of his cherished bride which drives him into a chaotic fury.

Years later he believes he hears her voice behind a forbidden gate.

And swears to break her free.

Unaware he's tragically mistaken.

Shang-Chi's mythic secluded forest with its multidimensional peaceful species, immediately bring humble Ghibli to mind, and I wonder if Marvel and Ghibli influenced one another (Marvel Comic Books and eventually Marvel Film) over the bountiful contemporaneous years.

Or if legends of mythic forest villages gained more prominence as Asian populations expanded, the less forest the greater the mystery the more mythically profound the innovative narrative.

Thus, I may search for some books chronicling the development of forest myths in Asia, which perhaps refer to Ghibli and Marvel, that may be asking too much!

And perhaps stories need to be written of integral First Nations exceptionality, still at eternal play in the unexplored forests of Northern Canada.

So much to gingerly explore if only time and weather weren't pressing factors.

Experimental venturing June through September.

Novel expenditure come January. 

Hvis det ikke var for krigen som krever intense heltehandlinger, ville Ukraina slappet av!

Ef það væri ekki fyrir stríðið sem krefst mikillar hetjudáða, þá væri Úkraína slakandi!

Black Widow

One of the oddest points I remember from reading Plato's Republic, was the theory that children could be taken away from their parents and raised communally without them.

When I pointed out the egregious error Plato had made by suggesting something so abhorrent (I had grown up with other people and it was clear the majority loved their families), I was reprimanded for not taking the point seriously, perhaps having encountered pedagogical psychosis, or a walking breathing idealogical textbook. 

It's always seemed self-evident that most people want to raise their children, and even develop a special bond with them, known universally, in less extreme times, as love.

When the time is right there are instances when poverty and youth require alternative options, but it's not as if such a decision is easy to make, imagine if the impoverished people who chose to keep their children weren't met with so much hostility, and were treated honourably for the tough decisions they've had to make.

There are still those who can't love, however, their lives a meaningless sterile indignancy, many of them manipulating the feelings of people who do, to achieve solipsistic ends.

Adoption, the creation of new families, is a feature of a truly advanced society.

Monstrously perverted by the villains in the haunting Black Widow.

 

Family without love, conviviality, or amicability. 

Rather, an antiseptic society attempts to cleanse itself of feeling, wherein which formula and calculation attain cultural cohesion as opposed to love.

Wherein which you're terrorized if you truly love things (such a burden to be sensitive), by other people who also love, but don't want to be terrorized by emotionless leaders, who see personal attachment as an inherent threat.

In Black Widow, a tyrant preys on orphans whom he subjects to extreme tests, those who pass eventually becoming spies, those who can't, never heard from again.

He turns the spies into fierce international soldiers spreading malice around the world, their loyalty unyieldingly guaranteed, by advanced psychotic brainwashing.

Unfortunately, such ideas persist and haven't faded into history, the cultivation of family and friendship much less amenable to absolute power (on the left and right).

If people argue loving your family is indeed an extreme position, they're clearly fucked in the head, and it's best to swiftly tell them so.

Families can be composed in so many ways with so much distinct unique variability. 

It's a shame things don't always work out.

But that's no reason for categorical dismissal.  

Wann et net fir de Krich waren déi intensiv Akte vum Heldentum erfuerdert, d'Ukraine relax!

Keby nebolo vojny, ktorá si vyžadovala intenzívne hrdinské činy, Ukrajina oddychovala!

Squirrels in Tree

Swiftly glide from branch to branch

in search of succulent intense

emergence healthy bright judicious 

berries burgeoning delicious

widespread multilayered merry

tantalizing pulmonary

randomly to juke and jounce

the samples visceral viscount

ze sprightly expeditious 'bundance 

glistening exquisite munchin'

gourmandized delirious

ethereal abounding flush

the scurry's mirth endearing hearty

immaterial malarkey

splayed adorability

laidback gregarious offbeat

shuffle.

Mononoke-hime (Princess Mononoke)

A young prince must fight a demon who threatens the prosperity of his humble village (Yôji Matsuda as Ashitaka), his people forced to flee long ago after infuriating the emperor. 

He successfully slays the intruder but touches its infected tentacles too, a curse then emerging within his arm which the village elders cannot cure.

Not willing to sit back while it spreads he boldly departs in search of medicine, making his way to a rowdy village engaged in the act of making iron.

He's welcomed for having rescued some of its menfolk from irate wolves, the village leader (Yûko Tanaka as Eboshi-gozen) eagerly entertaining and letting him get to know her people.

But as it dishearteningly turns out, their ironworks is destroying the local wilderness, where a resident forest god has lived forever, in quiet peace and regal seclusion. 

The animals are loosely united and intent on fighting the destructive town, arguments erupting amongst them, at other times, cohesive calm.

A young maiden lives with the wolves and is just as fierce in her condemnation, known as Princess Mononoke (Yuriko Ishida), she denies fear and exhales resolve.

Prince Ashitaka soon finds he's in love with her as all hell emphatically breaks loose.

Eboshi-gozen wants the god's head to grant immortality. 

But is unsure if the legend's true. 

Princess Mononoke and Prince Ashitaka find comfort in their mutual adoring amicability, the ideal unification of masculine and feminine harmoniously embracing age old enlightened daring.

It's more difficult to figure out the role matronistically played by Eboshi-gozen within, for on the one hand she supplies freedom and community, on the other, environmental devastation.

Not only the naturalistic bedlam to be expected by efficient mining, but she also pursues the forest god itself, intent on despairing ancient resiliency. 

She frees many from vile servitude and supplies honest work for her surrounding cast, while promoting the development of Mordor, it's a difficult contradiction to balance.

Environmentally friendly mining practices at peace with resident animals, certainly would have been less burdensome, and providing a heightened degree of friendly interdependency.

Love still innocently flourishes beyond problems associated with industrialization.

A narrative like none other.

Forest mystics, spellbound exhilaration. 

*Note: Ghibli doesn't show up in spellcheck!

Nebýt války vyžadující intenzivní hrdinské činy, Ukrajina se uklidnila!

The new Denver Broncos owners seem like a dynamic bunch. 

Can't wait for the 2022 season to start!

Broncos! 

🐎

Als het niet voor de oorlog was die intense heldendaden vereist, zou Oekraïne ontspannen zijn!

Kurenai no buta (Porco Rosso)

An aging pilot hiding away on a remote exotic island, with some wine, a tent, a plane, and a radio, the hours slowly pass by, until called upon yet again (Shûichirô Moriyama as Porco Rosso).

He's somewhat of a virtuoso and was feared during World War I, his daring exploits exceedingly agile mechanistic maestro intuitive ignition.

He works as a bounty hunter recovering loot obtained by pirates, who grow weary of his nimble meddling, and hire a challenger to face him (Akio Ôtsuka as Donald Curtis).

His plane stalls, he's suddenly shot down, after just having made his last payment, the government changing and promoting fascism, which doesn't jive with his democratic sympathies.

Fortunately, friends have been made, one who'll set about rebuilding his plane (Bunshi Katsura VI as Mr. Piccolo), his granddaughter's brilliance seeking distinguished prominence (Akemi Okamura as Fio Piccolo), if she can stop love from fouling things up.

She designs his new wondrous jet stream just before the secret police arrive, the two escaping to Porco's secret hideout, which the pirates have meanwhile discovered.

The challenger arrives and is jealous of how much a maiden thrice widowed loves freewheeling Porco (Tokiko Katô as Gina), and defies him to fight once again, enough money to cover his costs versus Fio's begrudged hand. 

L'amour's injudicious vicissitudes bewilder nimble Porco's individualism, the intensity swiftly increasing the more he denies them, the more he attempts to reconstitute anew.

Transformed into a pig who some quietly say can only have his curse lifted by heartfelt innocence, he worries intently about age and probability, still with no interest in settling.

Definitely the strangest Ghibli I've encountered (it's rather literal) yet still abounding in feminine strength, as it creatively contends with a bellicose world so often composed by combative men.

Versatile lyrics enlighten the madness yet inspire more danger as they're sought after, equanimous tandemed quaint domesticity reservedly tempting romantic plots.

A film certainly like none other this airborne Kurenai no buta (Porco Rosso) imaginatively glides.

What's love like if uncertainty abounds.

And you consistently take to the skies?

Wenn da nicht der Krieg wäre, der intensive Heldentaten erfordert, würde sich the Ukraine entspannen!