Film

   film

I was watching an episode of Entourage and Billy, the a-hole director when asked about his movie said "I don't make movies, I make films." For some reason this  quote stuck with me. Regardless of the pretention in such a statement, he's right in stating there is a definite difference. We've been talking alot about connotation and denotation in class, and this seems to be a good example. The word film carries with it a sense of art... a feeling of putting more on screen than some unmemorable characters into a hackneyed plot. American Beauty, in my opinion, is a true film. It is a character driven film that can relate to everyone on some level. It's use of colors and mise-en-scene, or the objects in the frame, conveys meaning and deep feelings. Regardless of who you are or what you think about movies, a movie like American Beauty or Umberto D., an Italian film about the slow deterioration of an old man into  poverty, does something to you at a very basic, gut level. This ability of a movie to make us think and feel a certain way is an amazing part facet of the human mind, and shows us there's a common link between everyone through art.

Puzzle

   puhz-uhl

The term puzzle, in my life, is mostly used to  describe how I spend my free time. I always have jigsaw puzzles up in my house or am doing a crossword puzzle before I go to sleep. It's something about looking at individual pieces of a whole in complete disarry and needing to put it together. I was watching a documentary on people who make crossword puzzles, and one world champion puzzler said, "I see empty spaces and I have to put something there." This need to fill empty spaces, I believe is a very vital part of our lives. Whether it be crossword puzzles or our mission to find our soul-mate, the feeling of incompleteness bothers us as humans, and we feel the need to correct it. No real scientist has ever looked at a problem and said, "I don't know how it works, I'll just let it be." We need to fill what is whole, find a solution for the problems, and expore the unknown.

                                                      Humor

hyoo-mer

 I've always thought it was such an interesting fact that, regardless of race, nationality, language, or gender, we all laugh the same. Sure, we may have variations of a laugh, but the basic "ha ha ha" of a laugh is universal. I don't know what it is, if there's a humor part of the brain, but somewhere along our evolution, the common ancestor must have been a funny one. It's a gut reaction to laugh at something that is funny, despite the fact that there is no universal "funny". I wonder if there's any one thing out there that would make everyone laugh. If there's a joke that could transcend the complexities and differences in the human mind, and touch all of our "funny areas". Nevertheless, laughter will always be the universal language because everyone knows how and when to laugh at something. It's just so.. HUMAN!

Music

   myoo-zik

I once read that in medeival times the traveling musicians who were very good at their craft had a natural rhythym in everything they did from speaking to walking. Even their pulse would tend to match beats with whatever it was they were singing. I think this is absolutely amazing, and in truth, am not surprised at it. Why else would there be so many musicians out there who were just born with the talent? Do you think Jimi Hendrix or Jimmy Paige started out on the same level as everyone else and just practiced that much more? Do you think Neil Peart was, at some point, without a natural rhythym? Of course not. These guys were born with something inside of them that was musical. Music is part so much a part of our lives that I believe it is one of the few things that can actually touch our SOUL. Even those who are not musically inclined can actually feel something when they listen to a really moving piece of music no matter the language of the person singing it, if in fact there are words at all.