Uncanny Saturday afternoon when Jean, Tish and I had to rush to Robinson’s Magnolia, to catch a screening of La la Land. I asked: What?
My two girls rattled about seven Golden Globe awards including Best Picture. I think.
I sort of thought, if it was Best Picture, why is no one swooning gaga over it on facebook? I would have noticed.
Anyways, I went along, wondering about the title. If it’s Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, it’s a treat.
Excitement hushed as I took a bite on my organic chicken burrito. Nah. It was the Los Angeles highway packed with traffic scene, and young people started hopping out of their cars, swaying to a rolling twenties(?) music. I remembered Jean and Tish saying this film garnered Best Music, too.
Okay, a musical. After enduring High School Musical for my two teens a decade ago, I swore I will not watch any teeny boppy flick.
But there goes the story, a man and a woman, Sebastian, a jazz pianist, and Mia, a talented actress auditioning for her place in the theater, accidentally meeting each other here and there, and because of one incidence too many, decided to be together. For four seasons.
It would have been a good love story, except for the part that both are in search of their dreams. As destiny would have it, Mia got her role in Broadway, and Sebastian, after a touring stint with a modern jazz band, built his own jazz bar.
Fast forward five years later, Mia comes back to Los Angeles, now a deemed theater artist, with her husband and a toddler of a daughter. And by some strange pull, she is led to Seb’s, Sebastian’s jazz nook.
And the two saw each other again. No hellos. No words. Just a look and an acknowledgement that, I suppose, they have reached their respective dreams.
Do I like it?
My daughters were disappointed. I had my reservations. Will hold my comments until further feelings arise from reviewing the film in my mind.
And now, after two days, here I am, trying to find the satisfaction one expects from watching a movie.
If this was Best Picture, surely it would have a great impact on me. There was none. Sadly.
And so I had to think more. Those Golden Globe judges must have seen something that would have impacted the viewers.
And so I came up with credits for this movie, even if in my view it is a tragedy.
First, it is a story of the ordinary people. The dreamers, specifically.
Which brings me to the title that I googled for meaning, La la Land, meaning “Los Angeles or Hollywood, especially with regard to the lifestyle and attitudes of those living there or associated with it; a fanciful state or dreamworld.”
These ordinary people have this illusion that their lives will only have meaning if they attain their dreams. And, more often, they miss out on one important thing: LOVE. These dreamers mistake that success and happiness can only be achieved after realizing their dreams. And love can be set at bay. These dreamers, unbeknownst to themselves, have been reduced to a mechanical existence, mere robots, or even slaves of their own passion. Thus, the tragedy.
Second, this movie brought isms for revaluation. The idealist and the realist, for one, comes in conflict. Holding on to tradition, as sustaining the art form of original jazz, for another, as against reinventing the music to fit in to the new techno-aided sound.
Third, the slow, or rather seemingly unhurried presentation of events, as contrasted to the quick flashback of what could have been, allowed the audience to create misgivings, hoping, as I did, that I could have my happy ending. Nah, again. It was a ploy utilized to make the viewer own the tragedy. For who amongst us did not miss on true love, and lived with what we bargained for.
Fourth, the music was jazzy, and it brought the audience, including the juvenile, to a time melancholic, like dream time.
There are many other things worth commenting about, such as the acting, remarkable, and the costumes, appropriate and nice, ha ha, and the dancing, and the museums, and the stars. Oh, well. But I leave that for others to see.
Spectre: the unraveling of a specter.
12 Nov 2015 Leave a comment
by eileenleyva in Commentary, Cultural, Entertainment, Mpvies Tags: James Bond, Movies, Spectre
Spectre begins with a dire foreboding, the Day of the Dead in Mexico City, a culture seemingly grotesque. for the living enlivens the dead, in a peculiarly festive way. Strange though it may be, it is a fitting opening, a foreshadowing of what is to come, for the world’s most famous secret service spy, his secret known to everyone, except perhaps, everyone who has lived with the MI6 for the past half century, has grappled as to why Bond was Bond, a man alone unto himself.
The SPECTRE is a fictitious acronym which stands for Special Executive for Counter-Intelligence, Terrorism Revenge and Extortion, for the demise of the MI6 or the British Secret Service. For all intents and purposes, fault was assigned to the distinguished characters: M, Q, Moneypenny, and 007
And while the eradication of the secret service seems inevitable, a specter arises. A phantom. A ghost from Bond’s archrivals arises, too. A juxtaposition of two impending deaths: the secret service and Bond’s own.
Thus the cardiac high-action, sniping, bombing, and inverted helicopter flying, or falling. in Mexico City, where the dead comes to life.
But all at once, the movie transports to holy Rome, the city that encapsulates the glory of the past. Bond follows another lead, and discovers that there’s more than meets the eye. But of course, that is always what Bond story lines are about. But the motion is set. Bond gets an eye view of who his nemesis are, even if it was a little obscured, or darkened.
There was a reference to Tokyo, an allusion that most likely implies how Bond’s every move is seen. Thus it was imperative that Bond himself was injected with a GPS. And in all the succeeding scenes, a specter follows.
At the icy Alpine Austria, Bond finds the daughter of an enemy, the enemy who was set to make Bond’s life miserable. The daughter is a therapeutic doctor. and she brought Bond to her father’s honeymoon nook, the very same place that archived Bond’s story, from being an orphan, to a skill filled days cruising the mountains with his adoptive father, to the disgust of his step brother.
In sharp contrast to the snowy mountains, Bond and the lady doctor were ushered into the center of an arid desert, where a meteorite once landed to earth. And here Bond meets his step brother, the very same one who was reported to have died with his father in a snow avalanche. And all the past two decades, his step brother was scheming on executing his revenge on the orphan boy who found favor in the eyes of his father.
The step brother was the brainchild of SPECTRE, designed not just to have a domination of the world, but more importantly, to ensure the wicked end meant only for the boy with the blue eyes. James Bond.
So the story unraveled. And 007’s story is now complete.
Daniel Craig essayed the James Bond role magnificently. Gosh, he is so fit and agile. The curtain calls for a final vow for this actor, and the jalopy is definitive enough.
But gosh again, I have enjoyed Bond movies all my life, but Daniel Craig’s Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Skyfall, and Spectre gave the most profound and in-depth picture of the spy. He was a man, after all.
Licensed to kill? No, not at all. That was the spy bound by duty to pull the trigger. And that’s another point. Bond threw his pistol. Definitive enough. He is licensed to kill no more.