The Rose and The Lily

Huwebes, Enero 31, 2013

Lord of the Rings: Film Review

Movie: Lord of the Rings

Directed by: Peter Jackson

Based on JRR Tolkien's novels

Genre: Fantasy-Action-Romance-Historical

Movie Summary:

An ancient Ring thought lost for centuries has been found, and through a strange twist in fate has been given to a small Hobbit named Frodo. When Gandalf discovers the Ring is in fact the One Ring of the Dark Lord Sauron, Frodo must make an epic quest to the Cracks of Doom in order to destroy it! However he does not go alone. He is joined by Gandalf, Legolas the elf, Gimli the Dwarf, Aragorn, Boromir and his three Hobbit friends Merry, Pippin and Samwise. Through mountains, snow, darkness, forests, rivers and plains, facing evil and danger at every corner the Fellowship of the Ring must go. Their quest to destroy the One Ring is the only hope for the end of the Dark Lords reign!

Welcome to Middle Earth:

LOTR is one of the greatest classic movie I've ever seen in my life; both Master Tolkien and Director Peter Jackson did an amazing job and I admired them for that. They're great people to look up to.

Middle Earth is what the LOTR's world was called; Like Earth, they have their own universe, creatures, traditions, cultures and problems to deal with. There are many magical creatures such as Hobbits, Elves, Dwarves, Trolls, Orcs and more. But of course, there's also the race of Men; Humans are the main ingredients of most stories and moves and in LOTR it was mentioned that humans are the most complex and 'not lame' characters. If someone's thinking that human race is typical and boring well that's definitely not true.

History of Middle Earth:

Middle-earth, or Endor is the name used for the habitable parts of Arda after the final ruin of Beleriand, and is east across the Belegaer from Aman. It is north of the Hither Lands shown in the Ambarkanta and west of the East Sea; and throughout the First and Second Ages it went through many colossal geographical changes, caused by Iluvatar.

Tolkien, in one of his letters, estimated the end of the Third Age to about 6,000 years before his own time. The action of the books is largely confined to the north-west of the Endor continent, implicitly corresponding to modern-day Europe. The history of Middle-earth is divided into several Ages: The Hobbit and the main text of The Lord of the Rings deal exclusively with events towards the end of the Third Age and conclude at the dawn of the Fourth Age, while The Silmarillion deals mainly with the First Age. The world (Arda) was originally flat but was made round near the end of the Second Age by Eru Ilúvatar, the Creator.

"Middle-earth" is a literal translation of the Old English term Middangeard, referring to this world, and the habitable lands of men. Tolkien translated "Middle-earth" as Endor (or sometimes Endóre) and Ennor in the Elvish languages Quenya and Sindarin, respectively. The north of Endor became the Eurasian land-mass after the primitive Earth was transformed into the round world of today.

The Elves of Middle Earth

The Elves of Middle Earth are the first born children of their worshipped deity, Eru Illuvatar. They are known for being tall, having long silver, blonde or black hair and of course their pointed ears. They are indeed beautiful creatures that is very hard to resist. Elves does not age, and they are agile too. They are expert in archery and can heal themselves too. They are somewhat immortal since they don't get old but they can die in the battle field once beaten hard. Another reason for them to die is if they "Fade away".

For most elves, having a romantic relationship with mortals are tabboo or forbidden, because once they tie themselves with a mortal that will also mean their death. Mortals will remain as mortals, they'll get old and die while Elves will remained young and beautiful. Once their soulmate died, they will fade away. When the time of Elves has come to an end, they all sail back to their homeland, Valinor or the Undying Lands.

Additional Infos:

Elves, like Men, are both Children of Ilúvatar (God, The One) and thus are very similar to Men. Unlike Men, however, they are immortal, in that their bodies do not age once they have reached maturity, so that they do not seem to become elderly or die of old age, and they are not afflicted by disease. They can be killed by physical injury however, or they may come to death from wasting away if after long eons of life they lose the will to live. The Elves came into existence before Men, and when they die they pass to the Halls of Mandos in Valinor, where they await the end of Time.

Elves are (generally) unusually handsome of face and body, and they have far better vision and hearing than Men. They also have skills and abilities, and perception of things around them, far greater than that of Men, although whether this is an innate quality or is the result of long experience after having lived so long, is not known. They are also light of foot, can travel long distances without leaving tracks, and often can walk lightly across snow where the boots of Men would go through.

My Insights:

I like LOTR's Elves, they're totally cool and awesome. While watching and reading about them, I could honestly relate them to Angels and the beings from Heaven. I don't know if Master Tolkien did based them from the holy beings but its like that. They are beautiful, does not get old and much better than humans. And just like how Angel-Human relationship is forbidden, Elf-Human relationship is not allowed as well. Elves are the known highest and lived the longest for many many centuries since they're Eru's first borns. And speaking of Eru, this deity is like the representation of Almighty Creator in Middle Earth.

I personally love Lord of the Rings not only because of it's high quality and huge production sets, special effects and costumes but also because it mirrors a lot of things and there's a message in it. It is like the fantasy representation of this world and the problem it's facing. Elves looking down at Men, Elves having an unend conflict with the Dwarves, these represents the races fighting and discriminating each other.

LOTR taught me to become strong at all times and that I should not give up no matter how hard the problem is, there is always a way to survive. Darkness will not stay forever, light will shed at the right time and the Highest won't leave us alone. A lot of things happened in the movie and there's a lot of things to understand; life will always go on no matter what, every ending has a beginning. And when it comes to LOVE, it taught me that nothing matters when it comes to this feeling; no status, race or anything will stop you from loving the person you really love. If the two are meant for each other, nothing would stop them. Not even Death will win. It is true that Love conquers all.

LOTR is such a unique and complicated 2 hours movie that you need to do a lot of absorption in order to understand everything but I gotta say it's worth it. I am also proud of the casts because they did a pretty good job on portraying their assigned characters. They all got it right. It is worth using a huge amount of money in this film since it's really beautiful and many liked it too. Though there are many who said that there's a huge difference between Tolkien's and Jackson's I don't really have a problem with it because for me, I found both of their works good and besides, the movie is only BASED, it's not really the whole book so I guess Director PJ can add or less if he wants.

Here's a video about LOTR:

Resources:

www.youtube.com

http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings_(film_series)

www.fanpop.com (for the pictures)

Au Revoir!

~Yumi Lemuel/Mare/Care Bear/M'Lady/"Ojousama" daw/Akira/Abby

(Mary Louise O. Sarion)

Genre: Fantasy

Fantasy(Movie Genre)

This kind of genre is always accompanied of imaginary worlds or anything beyond normalcy. Fantasy is known for it's dazzling special effects and visuals which does not exist in real life. It is obviously the counterpart of reality.

The identifying traits of fantasy are the inclusion of fantastic elements in a self-coherent setting, where inspiration from mythology and folklore remains a consistent theme. Within such a structure, any location of the fantastical element is possible: it may be hidden in, or leak into the apparently real world setting, it may draw the characters into a world with such elements, or it may occur entirely in a fantasy world setting, where such elements are part of the world. Essentially, fantasy follows rules of its own making, allowing magic and other fantastic devices to be used and still be internally cohesive.

Examples of Fantasy Movies:

**Lord of the Rings

**Harry Potter

**Chronicles of Narnia

**Final Fantasy: Advent Children

**Peter Pan

**Alice in Wonderland

**Suckerpunch

Resources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy
http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100122025108/religionwiki/images/b/b7/The_chronicles_of_narnia_prince_caspian02.jpg
www.google.com

~YL(Mary Louise O. Sarion)

Miyerkules, Enero 30, 2013

Yumi's Top Movies

Lord of the Rings(1)

Jennifer's Body(2)

Legion(3)

Freddy Vs. Jason(4)

~YL(Yumi Lemuel)

Mary Louise O. Sarion

Movie Character of the Week: Eowyn of Rohan by Yumi

"No living man am I! You look upon a woman! Éowyn I am, Éomund's daughter. Begone if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him"

From what movie: Lord of the Rings

Actress: Miranda Otto

Short Background:

Éowyn was a noblewoman/shieldmaiden of Rohan, daughter of Éomund and Theodwyn, younger sister of Éomer and niece of King Théoden. Forced to spend most of her youth caring for Théoden in his declining years, she yearned for an opportunity to prove herself in battle. She was driven to despair by her unrequited love for Aragorn. When she was rebuffed by the men she longed to accompany into battle, she disguised herself as a man and accompanied the Rohirrim army to Minas Tirith, where she won great renown in the Battle of the Pelennor Fields by slaying the Witch-King of Angmar, with the help of Meriadoc Brandybuck, whom she had carried with her. Severely wounded by the Ring Wraith, she nearly died, but recovered with Aragorn's help in The Houses of Healing. There she met Faramir, the Steward of Gondor, and fell in love with him. The two married in TA 3020, and settled in Ithilien after the War of the Ring.

Yumi's Insights:

Eowyn is one of my favorite movie characters and I admire her fully for her personality and bravery. Applying the Feminist film theory, I could say that she's not a typical woman or a female to be viewed as a 'sex object' or passive character though throughout the film of LOTR, she's discriminated by being not allowed to join the battles and fight; And this is obviously because of her gender as a female. In LOTR, human females are not to fight and they are nothing but passive characters who did nothing but to mourn for the death of their men, hope that they will return or take care of the children from the background. They're not really doing anything different except from the typical things women used to do even in real life. But Eowyn is a hell lot of different from the others, she proved to many that she's not just a woman to be kept in the house, that she can also do what men can do--and this is proven when she slayed the Witch King. She's such a strong woman and deserved a better title than being a Shield Maiden alone. I can say that Eowyn symbolizes those women who worked hard and can do things like what men can also do.

~YL(Mary Louise O. Sarion)

Resources:

www.fanpop.com

http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/%C3%89owyn

http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/3000000/Eowyn-lord-of-the-rings-3060264-1024-768.jpg

stock knowledge XD

Days and Nights: MY NIGHTS ARE MORE BEAUTIFUL THAN YOUR DAYS REVIEW

Title: My Nights are more Beautiful than your Days

Year Released: 1989

Directed by: Andrzej Zulawski

Genre: Drama-Romance-Pyschological

Film Summary:

Lucas, a computer genius facing an unnamed terminal illness that causes him to lose his memory, meets Blanche, a young woman who seems unable to break free of her vicious environment. The two plunge into a brief but intense affair, understanding that their days together are numbered. This a strangely poetic and powerful film that celebrates love's victory over death and suggests that sentiment has some currency even in a pragmatic world.

'Love means lots of pain...'-Blanche

This is the first time I had watched an Italian film with this kind of theme and I could honestly say that I was shocked and got confused by the depth of the story. The story is about two people who both had traumatic past when they are children and this miserable past greatly affected them both emotionally and psychologically. They randomly met at a restaurant and that's where their relationship started; it was really complicated and I found it hard to absorb everything. While watching the film in the classroom, I was staring on the large screen and my mind was like 'What the heck is going on?' 'I don't get it, what are they going to do?' or 'What is this film really all about?'. I was sooo confused and like Luca and Blanche, my mind also got affected on how they mind were. My head seriously ached while watching and I think it's because of trying hard to decipher the message in the story. I would say that they are both somewhat 'crazy' in their own way. I noticed that while Blanche was crying or whining about the love and other stuff and I think it has something to do with her past. And Lucas' was very obvious, his mind was a lot more screwed than Blanche. That's my own opinion though.

The part when they both went to the beach and let the huge waves swallow them was one of the part which I like the most, while watching that last scene my heart felt a little pang of pain and sadness for the two main characters. It's pretty obvious that they're going to kill themselves by drowning; it's a heartbreaking scene. The two had enough already; too much pain, sorrow and misery in their lives and like there's no one else to save them from the darkness eating them from the inside. Even the world they're living in looks cruel and evil, the people surrounding Blanche made her do things that she doesn't really want. And through Death they were saved and taken away from their suffering.

Subjective Response:

Until now while doing this film review, I am still confused and there are still some parts of the film that remained vague to me. I gotta say that the Director is really awesome and good for making such nice film with unique plot and theme. It was twisted in many ways and I think it did also mirror the reality of people who experienced traumatic events in their lives and how it affected their growing and the people around them. Set aside the sex scenes and rated M scenarios and one shall see the true meaning in the story. Two people who were broken and shattered at an early age, only wants to find love and someone to shed light in the darkness surrounding them. And they found comfort with each other.

Au Revoir! XD

~YL (Mary Louise O. Sarion)

Resources:

www.google.com

www.imbd,com

www.mytwistedmindagain.com XD

Linggo, Enero 27, 2013

My Nights are More Beautiful than Your Days: A Review

"Love is a pond that can drown you"

- Lucan de Bonneval

The film Mes nuits sont plus belles que vos jours or My nights are more beautiful than your days (1989) was directed by Andrzej Zulawski who adapted it from Raphaele Billetdoux's book, Night Without Day. Its main characters being Lucas (Jacques Dutronc), a computer genius with an unknown terminal illness that causes him to lose his memory, and Blanche (Sophie Marceau), a young woman who lives in a very vicious environment filled with sex and lunacy as she performs a type of mind reading show after going under a trance-like state. Other characters include Blanche's mother (Valérie Lagrange), Edwige (Myriam Mézières), Ines (Laure Killing), Concierge (François Chaumette), Francois (Sady Rebbot), Page (Salim Talbi), Michel (Jean-Pierre Hebrard), and others.

The movie revolves around Lucas and Blanche where they first meet in a cafe after witnessing a poor couple arguing before coming together again, later Blache tells him that she will be going to Biarritz to perform in a casino to which Lucas follows her to reciting names of objects around him so that he may not forget them as what his illness is doing to him. It is later revealed that Lucas' parents had died after drowning in a lake when he was young while Blanche had been witness to her father's beatings of her mother as a child.

The acting was good, I've found that Jacques Dutronc is actually a singer, though despite this I thought his performance was satisfactory, filling in the insanity and randomness of Lucas quite well. Sophie Marceau was also very good, making quite an interesting heroine, though there were times that she seemed very off as if she couldn't define who she really was very well or seemed out-of-mind. For me, I find the characters of Lucas and Blanche to be very difficult to do since it involves lots of consideration towards how they should approach a situation with their past kept in mind, Duntronc and Marceau had done very well, not completely extraordinary but they expressed their emotions well and played the part swimmingly so I have no complaints.

The plot is interesting and had very good depth of perception, and the characters within it are as well, the execution is the one thing I question since it was not done very clearly which disappoints me though I would also like to point out that I, as a viewer, had some short comings as well.

The music was intence and searing, mellow on some but bold and raw on others, an interesting combination and one that added a lot of flavor and color to the film. I praise Andrzej Korzynski for them.

Confusing is a word that I would like to describe My nights are more beautiful than your days as, I don't really understand the movie most especially the build up in each scene and the growth of the characters within the story. Their motivations are not clear completely and somehow they end up being spontaneous that make the viewers say, 'Huh?'; I, myself, included. I guess it wasn't establiched well, I think - their reasons and such - more likely because they do not operate or work or talk like normal people do, which could be validated by their way of living and environment (for Blanche) and their illness (for Lucas). But still, I am new to this kind of film, I'd say it was absurd actually especially the scenes towards the end with the page and desk man, who I still wonder if are pigments of Lucas' imagination, true people or ghost (as said by the page when they were in the dressing room, saying he had died 2 or 3 days ago because of his sickness).

Though I think this film is a beautiful disaster, or more likely, would've been more beautiful (since it already is in my opinion) if not for the disastrous take on it (no offense on the film's director). The beauty comes from the settings and the way the emotions of the characters play out, especially the love scenes and the morning after they first spend the night together, then the beauty practically gets ruined after they speak, in riddles that I could not truly completely comprehend. Somehow it makes me feel that the words which I had failed to understand made me miss the entire depth of the film, making me as confused as I am now but it goes to show that this really isn't my type of film, full of eccentricies, absurdness, and strange double meanings. Not to mention that it is in french, subtitles were added but it is really hard to truly understand what they are conveying if you are only reading their words, their expression changes but tone of voice sometimes gets disregarded with the lack of understanding.

Overall, a good film. Not for those that are looking for a fun, entertainment-based product of big budget companies in Hollywood, but definitely a good story, if you get past the absurdities and eccentricity - maybe even watch it a few more times to make sure.