Thoughts on Avatar: Close, But Still a Swing and a Miss

Hi Everyone,

Well, today I will talk about movies again. This time, Avatar is the subject. Avatar, you may remember, was released last December with much pomp and fanfare. Much was made of its visual appeal. The film cost $250 million to make, and took four years to make (planning and development began as early as 1994). When it was released, it broke several records at the box office and was a gigantic commercial success.

I didn't necessarily want to see it in theaters, since anything which is so widely hyped tends to draw my skepticism. However, I have been eager to see it for quite some time. I heard that it promoted the sanctity of native cultures, the importance of a connection to the natural environment, and the transcendant connection of all forms of life. I also enjoy movies that involve travel to distant planets. So the prospect of a sci-fi space movie that expressed a "new age-y" message of harmony seemed like it would be right up my alley.

I got to start watching it yesterday night, friday night, on netflix. The movie is 2 hours and 42 minutes long, so my family and I watched half of it last night, and will watch the other half tonight. So here I will talk about my impression so far.

The film follows Jake Sully, a marine who is hired by a private security force working for a large mining company. The company has hired him to protect a plant they operate on Pandora, a moon in the Alpha Centauri system, much like Earth. Jake lacks the knowledge most scientists on Pandora, but possesses an iron will to overcome his troubles moving. The film implies that the Earth has been ridden with wars in the time between now and the film's future setting; since it is set in the year 2154.

Anyway, Jake is put in an avatar, the body of a na'vi, a creature who lives on Pandora. Jake controls the body of his avatar with his mind somehow. Anyway, he wanders deep into the Pandoran forest, tangles with various forms of wildlife, and meets a female of the na'vi tribe. She resents him at first, but takes him to her village. They decide, again, with considerable reluctance, to take Jake in. This is about where we left off, when Jake is learning the ways of the na'vi. In one scene on the floating mountains, the Hallelujah Mountains, they are, quite literally, showing Jake the ropes.

So far, my feelings about the movie are about what I thought they would be. I like it overall, but I do have some issues with it. First off, I find this much more believeable and identifiable than

Star Wars was. Again, this one touched on concerns much more important to me. This energy industry embodies the current corporate model of the profit above all. As the head of the industry says "The one thing the bosses hate more than bad press is a bad bottom line." I think it is a good thing that this is being brought up in a movie with as much critical and commercial success as Avatar.

That leads to my next point. It seemed that this had at least as much to do with special effects as its perceived message. There were several scenes where the na'vi talked about the connections to all life forms and the world of nature itself. The way this was presented, though, is often second behind the visual graphics and effects, which are amazing. Knowing that this is also James Cameron's creation, who also did Terminator and Titanic, it isn't a surprise that the visual appeal would be a top priority for him. However, I feel disappointed in that the film seems to be sacrificing an opportunity to reexamine life, in order to wow everyone with uber-cool special effects and rake in a fortune at the box office.

I have only seen half the film so far, though. I have heard that the end of the film consists of a grand battle between the na'vi and the humans. Again, this smacks of a concession to the formula of Hollywood. Rather than trying something different, the film seems to be reconstructing a well-worn equation with the newest graphics. That is their decision, but this is my decision to weigh in on this. But again, I have only seen part of this. I will report back here when I have seen the whole thing. See ya then!

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.

The Quest of Vivian O. Reed (1924-2010)

Hi Everyone,

Well, I gave you all my word that I would dedicate an entire post to my Grandmother who passed away last week. I am here now to follow through on that. The picture above is one I found of her ("Grammy," her grandchildren called her) with me when I had just been born. This picture was taken 20 years ago, come next month. That is her holding me as a baby.
I use this because I cannot stress enough how important family was to her.

Vivian Odh was born on March 30, 1924, in Winnetka, Illinois. She was raised in Evanston, Illinois, with her parents, and her younger sister, Audrey Pearl. Vivian (called "Vivie" by those who knew her) attended Northwestern University, and graduated within days of being married to Thomas Reed, my grandfather. They were married in June of 1947. They lived in Illinois, Texas, Minnesota, Indiana, New York State and Massachusetts.

She raised four children, my aunt, Katherine, my father, Phil, and my uncles, Peter and Kevin. Any of them will tell you that growing up with her was an extraordinary experience. As a devout Christian scientist, she regularly attended church and has an extraordinary base of faith. She loved working with people, particularly with children, and spent many years of her life as a teacher, both in regular school and sunday school. She was patient in dealing with people, even with me back when I was not as easy to talk to. She called us and sent us letters regularly.

There isn't much this post can do to pay justice to the woman that was Vivian Reed. She had a strong, indomitable spirit. Even during the last few weeks, she remained surrounded by relatives who loved her deeply. I was not able to visit her in that time. The nurses who visited her said several times that she would be gone within a day or two. Yet several times, she remained. It was as if she was waiting for someone. My father spent the last three weeks with her, and transcribed a few things she said.

Thinking of a favorite memory of her is difficult now. There are many memories I have of her fondly describing her rich experience of life to me. I didn't always understand, or appreciate her wisdom. Sometimes I wouldn't listen because I wanted to do my own thing. Later, I came to appreciate listening to Grammy's insights. I also enjoyed listening to her tell stories about my dad when he was growing up. She also told stories about me, so I never got too judgemental.

Sometimes Grammy may have seemed aloof or in her own world, but those who knew her knew that this was not the case. She cared not only for her family, but her friends, and her neighbors. Anyone who knew her for a length of time knew how lucky they were to have Vivian O. Reed in their life. I am just beginning to appreciate now just how lucky I was in knowing her.

My sincerest thanks go out to her, and also to my grandfather, Thomas, to whom she was married for 62 years. He is a lucky man. I wish the best for him, for Vivian's family, her children, her grandchildren, including me, and her friends in Massachusetts, back in Colorado, and elsewhere. I will give thanks for the gift of her life, and will celebrate the legacy of Vivian O. Reed.

I don't know how much more I can say that will pay adequate tribute to my grandmother. I will just say that her life here was a gift to all who were touched by it. Her love, her light, will always shine. I'll have more up soon. I apologize for the lateness of this post. It has taken a week to gather up the appropriate thoughts and feelings for this post. See ya soon.

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.

An Emotional Day for Many

Hi Everyone,

Well, I've come back in the middle of the week again. Maybe the reason I keep returning in the middle of the week is that I keep having a lot to write about. However, today I am less excited than I was last week. Today finds me more sad, but not necessarily a bad kind of sad. The kind of sad that is oddly peaceful. Today, I will wax somewhat emotional, but I promise it will be for a good reason.

This past friday, I talked about the theater class I really enjoyed taking this semester. Well, yesterday was the last day of it, the day of the final. Our final was to read a monologue we had written. We were to perform it for the class and ourselves. We were continuing from last wednesday. I read through it throughout the morning.

I decided to read my monologue near the beginning. My monologue was written from the perspective of a teenager back in school. I was talking to a friend, or to someone who I could depend upon. No one else understood me, so I told this person, emotionally, that I felt alone, and that I was willing to have people in my life, I concluded by asking if they would be my friend.

I asked with some emotion, since this is how I often feel. I often feel that I am without a reliable friend or counterpart, outside of my family. Since my best friend moved away, to Washington state, back in 2005, I have been mostly by myself, believing, like the character, that I was alone in my perception of the world.

This is why yesterday was so important. After each of us finished our monologues, which some of the people had trouble performing, we talked about our experience in the class. One girl, in particular, said many of the things I had felt about the course. She said basically many of the things I was going to say.

As I went through middle and high school, I became self-conscious and reserved. I rarely opened up to anybody. As I mentioned about this class, I was able to interact, ironically enough in an acting class, more openly than I have, at least recently. This was very important to me. I said as much, and then we left class and resolved to connect via the best way we knew how... Facebook. We even started a facebook group for people in this section of this class. Sadly, the professor will move St. Louis next fall, but I was able to find the aforementioned facebook group, and yesterday I was voraicously friending the people whom I recognized from the class.

Often, I have felt like I didn't appreciate something enough while it was happening to me. Have you ever gotten that? Well, I often come across this feeling. I didn't have that with this class. Even though I was sad yesterday and today, and for the last few weeks, I certainly appreciated it much as I experienced it. I feel like I really learned something about interacting.

In improvisation, we learned about "saying yes" going along with a story someone else states. For instance, if someone in the act asks "Why is your hand on fire?" responding as if your hand really was on fire. I often have trouble saying "yes" to life's little "improvs." I want there to be the right idea that will make things work. In the improv, however, I learned that it works better if you go into it without an idea, and let one randomly emerge. This summarizes why this was so important.

That was yesterday. This morning, when I woke up, I was told by my family that my Grandmother passed away early this morning. She was my father's mother, and she lived to be 86 years old. I cannot think of many things to say about her. I could not possibly say everything that needs to be said in one blog post. I will say some words here, and elaborate further on Friday.

I will say that she was a wonderful person. She was devoted to her family, children and grandchildren. She was also a devout Christian Scientist, and a teacher for many years. She was a good friend to those she knew and made an big impact on the people she met, even the hospice nurses who helped her for the last few weeks. She passed away peacefully, having been at home, receiving care for three weeks.

I will give a full biographical sumnation of my Grandmother on friday. For now I will just say that she is survived by her husband, my grandfather, her sister, her four children, my aunt, two uncles and my father, seven grandchildren, my cousins, my brother, and, by your humble servant. Her love and her light will always shine. See you all on friday!

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.

On My Own

Hi Everyone,

Well, this is the first week of my weekly check in. Hopefully, I'll do better on this year's resolution. I have not much to report on this week. So I will talk a liitle about what I've done this week.

Well, I found that the link I put up on Tuesday didn't work. I apologize for that. The point of that was to point out that I was excited about this. I knew that a lot of people in higher education wrote books and published editorials in newspapers. I just thought it only extended to professors in ivory-tower institutions like Harvard, Stanford, USC, and those places. I didn't expect that it would extend down to an institution like the one I attend. So that got me excited when I saw that.

Anyway, my parents were out of town (yes, I still live with them, even though I'm in college), and so I have been with my older brother. On Tuesday evening, he went to go join my parents back east, and I had to stay here on my own. I was here by myself for two nights. IT made me somewhat sad to be living by myself for the first time. Luckily, I wasn't all alone, I had my cat to keep me company. Unfortunately, she only seemed to want to keep me company when I had to do my homework.

Speaking of which, I had to do an interesting assignment for a political science course I have been taking this semester. It was a two-page paper, not an essay, but an "issue brief" about a subject. It had to do with what would happen, and what would happen to the international political scene. For research, I looked at a magazine called "Foreign Affairs." There was also a piece by Frontline shown to us in class. This episode came out a few years ago. It was interesting, because they say the recent political unrest in Iran is likely to have a lnger impact on the country than other such episodes in the past. It took my mind elsewhere to work on this the night I was alone.

Anyway, the semester is almost over now. I am, of course, liking the summer, however, I also find myself sad, somewhat. You see, I took a theater acting coures this semester. I already told you about the course. I enjoyed it immensely, and the professor was a big part of what made it work. The energy and attitude that she brought to it made the experience work.
It has been an experience. There are those classes that are experiences, not just you going back and forth, to and from class, mindlessly taking notes, studying for tests, and then going on to the next thing.

This was something that I put myself into, along with the others in the course. I had never thought about acting before. I had thought about it, but I could never concieve of myself doing it. I am too self concious. Well, this helped me let go of that, if only for brief times, and connected with the people just as mush, maybe more than I usually would. So I visited the woman's office hours about what I could do.

What sort of thing would I do about this? Well, there's another acting class next fall. I think I'll take that. See ya there, and see you all next week.

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.

A Word From a Familiar Source

Hi Everyone,

Hey. I know that it isn't Friday yet, but I thought I'd share this with you guys. Take a look at this editorial in the LA Times:

http://http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-gibson-20100511,0,5441855.story

It was a really insightful esay, but here's the part that was most interesting. If you look at the author's description at the bottom of the page, it says he is a professor of sociology at the place I go to college. And I figured out that this man is the same person who was the professor of the intro to sociology class I took last fall. Anyway, it was something I thought you gus might like to hear about. See ya later in the week!

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.

(You and) I Don't Have To Dream Alone

Hi Everyone,

Well, here I am to give you my first weekly post. You've probably heard about the disastrous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. This spill is beyond the scope of what any previous spill has done. This comes right on the heels of a disappointing decision by the Obama Administration to expand some offshore oil drilling in this area, as well as off the coast of Virginia, and in some areas in Alaska. This spill is only the most visible symbol of why going halfway on these proposals do not work, but I will devote more time to this in the next post. For now, let us just hope that this will be the time when we say "enough."

Anyway, what I wanted to write about this week was this. I have been taking a theater class this semester, and I have had to go to plays for it. This Thursday, I went to attend this play. I was surprised when I entered. The actors first asked us questions to construct a brief skit, incorporating all our answers. They did this to illustrate how they created this play, Out of Thin Air.

The play was great to watch. Interacting with the actors beforehand gave it a different feeling. Usually, watching plays feels like looking through the actors through a glass wall, but this one was like watching their stories come alive. It showed the stories of all of the actors in this company.

It showed their childhoods, going through the uncertainty of their growing up, to their joy now. It didn't hit me at the time, but after the play, some of us got in a circle with the actors, and my theater professor, and talked about it. The full effect of the production hit me then. I realized that as I watched, I had connected with the characters in a way I hadn't with many people before.

It reminded me of a movie I used to watch a lot. You may have noticed the movie poster above. This movie is called Waking Life. It depicts a man who is in a dream, wakes up, and then it turns out this is a dream, and then he wakes up into another dream, and then another one. All the while, He hears about, and discusses, many philosophical, and more importantly, existential truths. I used to watch this quite regularly. It used to be a ritual for me to watch it, and allow my thinking to slowly reflect the messages contained in Waking Life.

I watched Waking Life again on Friday, and then I realized, this is a lot like the play I saw last week. The movie contained various scenes, some focusing on discussion, and others on action. One scene had a man wondering how humans can have free will when outside forces seem to be running the show, whether it be God's determination or scientific law. Another scene had the central character floating out the door, across town, to a movie theater. None of the characters are given names.

In the play, we see parts of each of the actor's lives, childhood to the present. We see moments of innocence, like a girl saying goodbye to her mother when going off to college. There are moments of peril, as one man depicted his days as a teenager in the midst of the violence in Kosovo in the '90's. There are moments of sadness, tension, and ultimately, unity and joy. The same clear, light feeling that Waking Life evokes to me, was also brought about in this play. Something else, a feeling of connection, warmth, that I got to know someone.

Let me describe it this way: I used to see plays about romance, that made me feel lonely because I don't have a girlfriend. This made me feel like the opposite of that. Happy Mother's Day, treat your Mother good today. My Mom is out of town today. I called her this morning, and I told her I was working on my blog. Happy Mother's Day, Mom. See y'all (as they may say in the South) next week!

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.

A New Way Forward

Hi Everyone,

Well, I'm back again, and like the politician on the campaign trail, I have a new way forward. I have had a habit of writing a long piece and then taking a month or two off. So instead of that, I will write on this blog once a week.

I will also write about a few things, not just about the larger issues in politics, society, et al. I write about the larger issues here, since I rarely get a chance to delve into these things in depth. I will now also add other things about what I see and do when I am off the blog.

I will write every weekend. My goal will be to write on Friday, but it will be some time every weekend. I will write on Saturday or Sunday if I cannot write in on Friday, like this week. I will report back when I have more for you later today. See ya then!

This is the Daily Reeder, Over&out.