34 posts tagged “analogical imagination”

"As a younger person, I would have loved to enter a Tolkien-esque world (and could easily pass for a hobbit too!), and some of the imaginary worlds I was drawing as a teenager, but I don't really have those kind of escapist longings any more. More and more I see fantasy worlds - as in The Arrival - as a way of tapping into the real world, of trying to understand reality better through a speculative lens. If I was to visit that world, I would immediately lose my bearings, like entering a metaphor without its real-world anchorage. I prefer to visit using only a pencil on paper."

-Shaun Tan

Here we go folks!

Movie:  The Fountain, Darren Aronofsky

The Fountain (Widescreen Edition)

Synopsis:
Yesterday, today, tomorrow. Past, present, future. Through time and space, one man embarks on a bold 1000-year odyssey to defeat humankind's most indomitable foe: Death. Hugh Jackman plays that man, devoted to one woman (Rachel Weisz) and determined to protect her from forces that threaten her existence. His quest leads him to a Tree of Life...and to an adventure into eternity. Darren Aronofsky (Pi, Requiem for a Dream) directs, continuing his string of imaginative, involving filmmaking with a tale alive with ideas and filled with astonishing vistas. "Not many films can blow your mind and break your heart at the same time, but this one will."

This film wasn't well received, but I think that's because it is difficult to understand.  And if it's difficult to understand, it might just be right up our alley. :)

Extra Credit: The Orphanage, Guillermo Del Toro
It's still in theaters so it's not fair to make it the main movie, but GO SEE IT.  It's from the maker of Pan's Labyrinth, only it's *better.*  Yes, you heard me.  Go watch it and come back so we can discuss it!

Book: His Dark Materials Trilogy, Phillip Pullman

His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass)

Philip Pullman

Synopsis:
From Amazon.com: These books are what the very best of Children's literature does. They are entertaining and fanciful, yet they simultaneously challenge and educate both the mind and heart. Like hot soup when you are sick, they are "Good and Good for You."

"His Dark Materials" are a great counter-point to the mindless fun of Harry Potter and friends. Pullman's writing is educated and insightful, his characters are real and multi-faceted. The series is packed with adventure, ideas, beliefs, fantasy, talking armored bears, Texas Balloonists, animals, gypsies, and just about everything else. The tone of the series is serious, and as dark as the name implies.

"Chronicles of Narnia;" "Prydain Chronicles;" "The Hobbit;" "Harry Potter;" "The Time Quartet;" "Wind in the Willows;" and now..."His Dark Materials." Philip Pullman, welcome to the club.

Controversy:

These books have caused quite the controversy, as they were written by an atheist, and the story is said to be very anti-religious.  Because of this, I think *everyone* should read them.  There's no use debating whether or not they are good or bad, or harmful or insightful if we don't know what we're talking about.  No matter where you fall theologically, these books are an exciting ride, and can lead to some pretty awesome discussion!

Note: Normally, we put it to a vote, but this round I have very little time, so I'm picking the book and movie selections based on what I'm already reading/watching.  I hope you guys don't mind, and I think they're decent enough choices that we can have some fun with them. :)

We're not dead.

I'm not, at least.  I just have been having a tough time getting into this book, or any for that matter.  :)

Feel free to keep reading and posting your own thoughts though!

Here are the links to everything we discussed regarding Annie Dillard's books!

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Straying Trail of Blood
Random Quotes
Laura's Reaction

Holy the Firm

Quotes
Dillard and Christianity
Comparing the Days

Magnolia (New Line Platinum Series)

I *just* finished watching it.

I really, really liked this movie.  I'm not sure I fully get it with just one viewing, but the main message reads loud and clear.  Do not tell me this is just novelistic.  Do not tell me these things only happen in movies.

I'll probably post more on it later.  I just wanted to say how much I liked it. :)

PS  Spoiler (highlight to reveal): I love the frogs!  How awesome is that?

Not too many people voted, but it's all good.  Not too many people participate either, but it doesn't matter.  I'd rather have quality than quantity, and boy do we have it. :)

Here's the book for this round:

Happy Death

Albert Camus

"As the novel follows the protagonist, Patrice Mersault, to his victim's house -- and then, fleeing, in a journey that takes him through stages of exile, hedonism, privation, and death -it gives us a glimpse into the imagination of one of the great writers of the twentieth century. For here is the young Camus himself, in love with the sea and sun, enraptured by women yet disdainful of romantic love, and already formulating the philosophy of action and moral responsibility that would make him central to the thought of our time."

And the movie:

Magnolia (New Line Platinum Series)

I know it's been a while, but I like to wait until at least more than one of us have finished before we move on.  That said, it is now time to vote for the next book/movie!  As always, if you don't like the suggestions I put here (they're really more like idea starters) feel free to let me know what you *want* to read! :)

Book Suggestions:

Children of Men (Widescreen Edition)

Tsotsi

Magnolia (New Line Platinum Series)

As promised, a look at the days when compared and contrasted.  Here's a pretty little chart!  Sorry if the thoughts are in fragments.  I swear it makes sense when you read the book! :)

Holy the Firm

More comments on Day Two:

• Heartbreak, "caught holding one end of a love"
• Everything good looks fake
• Chart of possible (bad) reactions to a Day Two event (I didn't even realize that she was providing them until it was pointed out to me):

Reactions to Day Two

More comments on Day Three:

• There are no clean hearts, there are no depraved hearts.  There is no one but us.
• Ambiguity
• Anything can happen - expect the unexpected
• Danger
• Love
• Perfect faith = bad
• We become the flame, sacrificing ourselves to give light to others
• Irony - holding pairs of opposites together ("I am myself falling down slowly, or slowly lifting up.")
• Christ - Human and Divine, Eucharist - Christ with a cork
• Holy the Firm - Matter and Spirit
• Joy, Bliss
  

Holy the Firm

Annie Dillard

• Difference between Tinker Creek:  Enters into human suffering...the *real* mystery of life.
• "Nothing is going to happen in this book."
• This isn't about things changing for us, it's about *us* changing.  It is about personal transformation.
• Like Denise Levertov's poem, City Psalm

"I have seen
not behind but within, within the
dull grief, blown grit, hideous
concrete facades, another grief, a gleam
as of dew, an abode of mercy,
have not heard behind but within noise
a humming that drifted into a quiet smile.
Nothing was changed, all was revealed otherwise;
not that horror was not, not that the killings did not continue,
not that I thought there was to be no more despair,
but that as if transparent all disclosed
an otherness that was blessed, that was bliss.
I saw Paradise in the dust of the street."

• In both days 1 and 2, we think we have life figured out (especially in day 2!)
• In day three, we know more than anything that life is a mystery (I only know enough to want to worship).
• The movement from Day One to Day Two is not in our control, and in fact goes against what we want (remnants of Kierkegaard?)
• The movement from Day Two to Day Three cannot be forced either, and often feels like a revelation
• Day Three inevitably collapses into Day One...and the process repeats...but hopefully we progress closer and closer to truth
• Day Three experiences parallel that of mysticism and gnosis.
• Is there any connection to Nietzsche's three stages?

Symbolism (brief):

• In the beginning, the spider web is holding together beauty and violence
• Islands represent eternity coming into time: "Here is the fringey edge where elements meet and realms mingle, where time and eternity spatter each other with foam."
• Who is a moth lit with flame?
• Julie Norwich (Julian of Norwich was an anchoress and Christian mystic)
• The little god
• Annie herself
• The seraphs
• The nun, thinker, and artist

Okay, that's all I have.  I hope it helped! :)

Here are all the previous posts on the movie!  Beware, some of these contain spoilers! ;)

My Reaction

Coventina's Response and Questions

Common Theories - There are a *whole* bunch of them.

Ten Clues Explained - Explanation of what the ten clues that David Lynch gave out mean.

The Blue Haired Woman - What does she represent?

David Lynch and Transcendental Meditation - How does Lynch's real life background in TM influence Mulholland Drive?  Also an exploration of Alan Shaw's interpretation of the ten clues.

Shaking Betty - What does Betty's seizure in Club Silencio represent?

Mulholland Drive

Taken from Lost on Mulholland Drive:

Pay particular attention to the beginning of the film: at least two clues are revealed before the credits.

1. Jitterbug contest: Betty wins. Irene and her companion cheer her up.

   • The dance contest had been a stepping stone for Diane to move to Hollywood and pursue an acting career. We hear again of it at Adam's dinner party.

   • Betty is shown bathed in the spotlight as the scene fades into Diane's bedroom. We see images of dancing pairs while Betty, aside from the two old people, is seen without a partner. Irene and her male companion are apparently a manifestation of Diane's good/innocent side.

   • In order of appearance, the credits list Betty well before Diane. This means that the partner-less jitterbugger we see is Betty. This fact is supported by someone shouting "Betty, Betty" off-screen right before the scene fades into Diane's bedroom. Does this mean that Diane is spinning a yarn when she tells us that she won a jitterbug contest? Or was the contest real, but just represented to us differently than how it happened?

   • Though people still jitterbug today, those are clearly supposed to be people from back in the day. Everyone is wearing vintage clothes. At present day nostalgia type sock hop most people would be wearing current clothing and maybe a few would be wearing contemporary versions of typical jitterbug attire. Are we supposed to believe this is all a throwback to the good old 50s or before (the time when Aunt Ruth was young) and not a jitterbug contest that Betty/Diane was at? (Also consult clue #10 F)

   Related: Jitterbug Contest

2. Right before the camera zooms in on the pillow it seems to focus on the area of the floor where the blue box later disappears at Havenhurst.

3. We here a noise that distinctly sounds like cocaine being snorted followed by the sound of someone breathing hard, falling into the pillow.

   • Somebody is falling into a (drug-induced?) sleep - a dream is about to begin.

   • We later see the same green blanket and red pillow when Diane wakes up. It's her dream.

Notice appearances of the red lampshade.

Another clue to the viewer that we have at least two alternate realities.

1. In Diane's dream the red lampshade appears at the end of a phone-call chain, in the middle of Hollywood's Byzantine conspiracy. The call is not being answered. Possible interpretations:

   1. It's a visual clue to us, the viewers, that Betty/Diane is the last in this pyramid scheme of Hollywood behind the scene operators. This is reality poking its head in Diane's dream reminding herself that it was she who arranged the accident, both literally (when she arranged the hitman to kill Camilla), and figuratively (when she created a better version of Camilla in her dream). The phone goes unanswered because Diane is unwilling to acknowledge that she is, indeed, the one and only creator of such machinations; the viewers themselves only make the connection hours later, when we see another shot of Diane's phone. 

   2. The call is meant for Diane Selwyn in the fantasy sequence, but it remains unanswered as her body lies decaying at Sierra Bonita.

   3. They call for real Diane Selwyn. Since the Hollywood underworld controls the movie business, Diane would idealize acceptance in this world. "The girl is still missing" refers to Diane holing up in her apartment for weeks, imagining Hollywood to be clamoring for her.

   4. It's a replay of the call to attend the dinner party, only with Mr Roque as the initiator and Diane avoiding the call. It's her pathological way of dealing with reality. Diane feels that she should never have come. She should never have picked up the phone when Camilla called that night.

   5. Mr Roque's line "The girl is still missing" is referring to Rita. There is a shot of her sleeping under the kitchen table before the phone call sequence starts, establishing that she is the girl who's still missing... from the crash scene. Was she on her way to a liaison with Mr Roque?

Related: Phone call chain

2. When Diane Selwyn wakes up and thinks of Camilla, we learn that the phone by the red lampshade is actually her own home telephone. When she answers it, Camilla invites her to 6980 Mulholland Drive.

3. More red lampshades:

   1. inside the corner shop at Pink's. In connection with the prostitute who looks like a doppelganger of Diane it could symbolize Diane being subjected to prostitution. Is she a call girl living a double life?

   2. another red lamp shade is visible at Havenhurst on first floor above Aunt Ruth's apartment. 

   Related: Red Lamp Shade

There's a blue lamp shade on the table in Mr Roque's room. Blue/Red as a yin/yang symbolism? 

Can you hear the title of the film that Adam Kesher is auditioning actresses for? Is it mentioned again?

Another hint that we deal with alternate realities.

1. We hear on the set that Adam Kesher is auditioning for the leading role in the "Sylvia North Story"
   (stagehand saying "The Sylvia North Story, Camilla Rhodes, take one." just about when Blond Camilla walks in). 

2. This movie title is mentioned again by Diane at Adam's dinner party. Wilkins tells that Bob Brooker directed the "Sylvia North Story" and Camilla was great in it.

Judging from the title, "The Sylvia North Story" is presumably a tragic story of a fallen starlet, for which both Diane and Camilla were auditioning. Irony to their tragic ends.

An accident is a terrible event... Notice the location of the accident.

On the way to 6980 Mulholland Drive, at Adam Kesher's house. It is the place where Diane is picked up by Camilla following her hand in hand up through the secret passage. Diane thought maybe Camilla was interested in reconciling with her after all, but did not know about Camilla's surprise announcement for later that night. The party turned out to be a horrible humiliation for Diane, so in her rage and jealousy she orders a hit on Camilla. Later she feels remorse about it. 

In Diane's dream Rita is getting high-jacked on her way to Adam at the same place, but she escapes hit & accident.
Possible interpretations: 

1. The messed up hit both prevents Camilla from reaching her destination (the dinner party?) and allows Diane's guilt to be assuaged as the hit fails. This way Diane wants to undo her terrible crime.

2. If an accident is to be taken figuratively and not literally, then the dream accident of Rita on Mulholland Drive is just a stand-in for Diane's accident - an unexpected and traumatic event (dinner party) where her illusions shattered. 

3. In Diane's dream the hit on Camilla was initiated by the shady consortium of producers who decided to not have her in their movie. They ambush Camilla on her Mulholland Drive ride in the same way as Camilla set Diane up, bringing her to the party.

Watch for the reprised line "What are you doing? We don't stop here!" by Rita and Diane.

Who gives a key, and why?

• Coco: from Aunt Ruth to Betty...to enter the "dreamworld".
• The Hitman (blue key): To confirm the deal is done.

Who gets the key?

• Rita: in her bag with the hit money. Diane wants to transfer her guilt; there is no way Betty would carry it in the dream.

• Diane: on her coffee table. Probably she retrieved it from somewhere else.

Observations: 

Only one key is given in the film. The key that Coco gives to Betty. The hitman doesn't give a key. He *leaves* it for Diane. Moreover Betty doesn't touch Rita's blue key either.

There's a sleight of hand going on here. The viewers are lured to focusing on the blue keys. But neither is ever "given". Betty is given the key to Aunt Ruth's apartment because Aunt Ruth is dead, just as Diane is given another key because Camilla is dead (see clue #10). So if the Coco key is a clue, then Coco's relationship with the two main protagonists needs further examining.

Notice the robe, the ashtray, the coffee cup.

These are chronological narration elements used for time references in the "real time" scenes. 

Robe:

• Ruth's: (precious, purple) at Havenhurst, with the note for (Bitsie) Betty. Betty uses it to cover Rita.
  Rita is wearing it the first day around. »here
  It was almost regal and it was clearly meant for Betty, but only Rita wears it. Betty is never able to put it on. When you look at these clues you begin to see that Diane envied Camilla because she was enjoying the success that Diane had wanted and had been dreaming of since her days in Deep River. 

• Rita's: (distinctively red robe with a black collar) on second day during the rehearsal scene with Betty. »here

• Betty's: (hot pink) at rehearsal. »here

• Diane's: (shabby, white) when Diane remembers the flashbacks in her apartment. It looks like a faded version of her dream robe. »here
  When Diane is wearing the bathrobe we are in 'realtime' (neighbor scene, suicide), when she is wearing hot pans it's a flashback (couch scene, masturbation).

Related: MD Costumes

Piano ashtray:

• When the piano ashtray is there it is a flashback (love scene on couch with Camilla), when it is gone it's the present (neighbor picking up, Diane alone on couch having flashbacks, suicide).

• The piano ashtray is there with Diane and Camilla on the couch. Diane obviously swapped apartments before ordering the hit on Camilla (respectively prior to the dinner party).

Ashtray with cig butts:

• On the table by the red lamp we see an ashtray filled with butts of filter cigarettes. One of them has a mark of red lips stick. Since Diane is not shown to be a smoker, those butts could be from Camilla or her neighbor.

Related: The ashtray

Coffee cup:

• Diane brews herself a coffee in a cup similar to those at Winkie's. This could be a clue
    - to her being employed at a diner (waitress Betty/Diane?) respectively being a kleptomaniac
    - a clue to Diane's dream incorporating personal objects. If so, are we to take the hitman scene at Winkie's likewise as fantasy and not based on a real-life event?

• The cup changes into a glass of Whiskey in the couch scene with Camilla. 

• At the Ryan Board conference Luigi orders a cup espresso.  

• At the pool party Diane sips coffee from a cup that has SOS written on it. This echoes the "help me" cry of Vincenzo Castigliane at the meeting. The cup sports the same colors but different style and pattern as Luigi's espresso cup earlier.

What is felt, realised and gathered at the club Silencio?

• Felt: Love, unreturned love, pain, tears, spasm, loss, fear, compassion.
• Realized: All is an illusion. The Dream wasn't reality. Lies. Hollywood is fake. The dream is over.
• Gathered: Betty gets a Blue Box with a triangular keyhole in her bag.
  

Did talent alone help Camilla?

Which one?

• Blond Camilla Rhodes is pushed by the Castigliane brothers to get the lead in The Sylvia North Story.

   

  Possible interpretation:
  The  conspiracy is Diane's rationalization for why she never became famous in real life. She believes that she's done everything right, played by the rules, yet outside forces have plotted against her, resulting in her failure. Bottom line, Diane refuses to accept responsibility for losing the lead part.

• Raven-haired Camilla

  1. Camilla had an affair with the director. She probably used her sex appeal and was willing to sleep around to get ahead. Note the look Coco is throwing over at Camilla and Adam, when Betty said at the dinner party: "Anyway, Camilla got the part", seemingly knowing of how Camilla used to further her career.

  2. Or did Diane and her money helped too? The assertion here is that the money seen ready to be handed over by Diane to Joe in the Winkie's scene is not a payoff for a contract to kill Camilla, rather it is money paid to Joe to in some way influence the casting of Camilla in a film – starting her off on the road to stardom.

Note the occurrences surrounding the man behind 'Winkies'.

• Dan meets the face of this God-awful feeling. He dies from an heart attack after seeing the "monster".

• Near the end of the film, after the hit on Camilla is settled at Winkie's, we see the monster again. Only it's not a monster anymore. It's a pathetic bum, stripped of everything, sad and disheveled. We see that he is just one more person transformed into something else by Diane's dream. But wait! The homeless man is a monster in her reality too. He is unleashing the miniatured couple of old people who then drive Diane to commit suicide. Though Diane wished she'd never have seen his face outside of her dream, he has been there all along.

• After Diane's death, we see the monster superimposed on top of the smoke. And then we see his face fade out while Betty's/Diane's face fades in. This last appearance of this "man" is especially instructive because with the connection between his face and Diane's face we are being told that this monster is yet another persona of Diane. 
  And so we realize that it is not a "man" at all. He is a she.

Where is Aunt Ruth?

• In Diane's dream Aunt Ruth is redeemed and shots a film in Canada. She is letting Diane stay in her apartment.

• In reality, as we learn from Diane at the dinner pool party, Aunt Ruth is dead, but left her an inheritance. Clue? There's a  black hat popping up in Aunt Ruth's bedroom, resting on the bureau in the scene where Rita gets undressed. Does is belong to a funeral outfit? Note: There is an old joke in movie business, "acting in Canada" is "being dead".

• Ruth shows off in the Havenhurst apartment right at the end of the dream, after Rita vanishes. She is dressed the same way as she left in the beginning. Possible interpretations: 

  1. It's Aunt Ruth's ghost, somehow interacting with Diane's fantasy in the same way that Louise Bonner and Dan at Winkie's could.

  2. In her lucid dream state Diane tries to rewind the dream. It has broken down with the disappearance of Betty and Rita. But her mind apparently doesn't want to let go of the fantasy. Its almost like she's picked up the story from the point of aunt Ruth coming back to her apartment for something at the beginning of the film. The message we are being given is that Diane is not looking forward to going back to her real life.

  3. Diane dreams of her aunt coming home from Canada to find her (Betty) disappeared. Just as in the beginning when Ruth and Betty missed another at Havenhurst, it symbolizes Diane's yearning for her beloved Aunt that can never be resolved because Ruth died before Diane arrived in L.A.

  4. Ruth comes into the room to separate dream from reality. It substantiates for us that there is no blue box on the floor, or in other word that is was a dream, or that the dream is ending. So, her presence is sort inaugurating reality, even if we are still in the dream. Further, if this scene reflects actual reality, then, can we even consider this woman to be Diane's aunt? Aren't we let to believe this apartment is rather owned by somebody else and merely served as a canvas for Diane's dream? It was all... an illusion.

  5. That final scene is a flashback to the time Aunt Ruth was still living. She is hearing a ghostly disturbance of her own.

  6. The movie is actually placed in the 50s. Betty/Diane is Aunt Ruth in her young years. It's her story. Thus about when Rita opens the blue box Betty disappears. She rematerializes as Aunt Ruth an instant later as to indicate that her dream is over. »more

• The last of David Lynch's clues asks "Where is Aunt Ruth?" and the last scene of the movie presents us with the Blue Haired Woman. Is she Aunt Ruth in her afterlife? »more