Goals 2017 -- November Recap

I did make some progress in my effort to move from a paper file box to a digital one, but I certainly did not complete the task.  Mush more to do. 

Pro tip: there are some things that are just going to be too difficult to scan, also (for example, the 150-page owner's manual for my camera).  For such items, in an effort to continue my move towards the digital, I have had some success finding PDF versions on manufacturer's websites. If that fails, I'm stuck with paper.

What I Watched -- Doc Shorts: The Unexpected

Our third SLIFF film was actually seven films -- Doc Shorts: The Unexpected.

Mickey's Pets.  Mickey has been taxidermying animals for some time, but this is her first entry into the National Taxidermy Championships.  When her deceased peacock arrives in the mail, she gets to work making it look alive again, and we follow her through that process all the way to the competition.  This was both S's and my favorite.

The Day of the Wall.  This is a wordless depiction of an Italian festival which I don't really understand.  A few words may have helped out.  The best part was the little girl rocking out to the music in her head during the end credits.

6 Toes.  Did you know that polydactyl cats (with more than the normal number of toes) are colloquially referred to as Hemingways?  I didn't.  6 Toes is odd: part autobiography, part biography, part history.  Reasonably enjoyable (and delightfully short).

Balloonfest.  Back in 1986, the city of Cleveland attempted to shed its nickname ("the mistake by the lake") by making it into the Guinness Book of World Records by releasing 1,500,000 helium-filled balloons into the air.  They did it, but it didn't turn out quite the way they hoped.  Quaint and mildly amusing.

The Tables.  A world-champion table tennis player installed two permanent tables in Bryant Park, in the heart of Manhattan.  A diverse community has developed around them.  I liked this one a lot.

Molasses & Lemon.  An odd little attempt at comparing love and heartbreak, highlighting the similarities between the two.  More confusing than enjoyable.

Lost Paradise.  A facility originally built to house a nuclear warhead has been converted into a disaster survival bunker for the ultra-rich.  It was an interesting thing to learn about, but should have been about one-third as long as it was.

What I Watched -- What If It Works?

The second SLIFF show of the year was What If it Works?  The festival doesn't host many comedies; they don't lend themselves to the contemplative navel gazing that such festivals thrive on.

This one, though, with its additional subject of mental illness, made the cut.  And, boy, am I glad it did!

Where I think the film succeeded so well is in treating each person's mental illness respectfully, but keeping it light-hearted and funny.  Adrian's OCD is hilarious, but at the same time, you can easily see how his condition wreaked such havoc on his life.  Grace's multiple personalities are comically divergent, but come from a place of serious damage, which surfaces from time to time.

Bottom line: a totally adorable love story about two broken people.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Sea Shepherds

There was a short film that preceded The Islands and the Whales, which focused on the animal conservation work that the Sea Shepherds do -- primarily, attempting to stop illegal fishing.  I had heard nothing about them before this movie (or at least don't remember it if I did).  As we were walking back to the car, S told me about a Animal Planet show, Whale Wars, which had been more or less cancelled back in 2013 after Sea Shepherd's founder, Paul Watson, was charged with several serious crimes.  There were a few more episodes aired in 2015, but it's not clear that any more will be produced.

As with so many organizations of their ilk, that the Sea Shepherds are polarizing.  Paul Watson and several others have been charged with serious crimes in some countries.  But they have also been given amnesty by governments of other countries.

There is no question that they take bold action to stop illegal fishing.  (Check out this fascinating article in The New York Times about their 111-day chase of one of the world's most notorious illegal fishing vessels, which was on Interpol's most wanted list.)  The question, I suppose is this: should the Sea Shepherds be taking such actions?  In all likelihood, what they're doing is illegal (hence all the criminal charges).  Is it worse than the illegal fishing?  Should ramming and sinking the fishing vessels be such a point of pride? (See the Appendix to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeal's reversal of a denial of a request for injunction against the Sea Shepherds.)  Whose job is it to step in and prevent over-fishing, if the Sea Shepherds don't?  (There doesn't seem to be much argument that the over-fishing is, in fact, happening.)  And even if it's possible to identify the government or organization who should step in, will they?  Can we count on a government to do anything?

That injunction that was granted (link above) was sought by the Institute for Cetacean Research, a Japanese research organization.  The ICR claims that its whaling activities are permitted under the research exception to the International Whaling Commission's whaling ban.  But, if this 2007 New Yorker article is to be believed, "the institute has produced virtually no research of any regard, and all the whales that are purported to be under study are also butchered for the purpose of selling whale meat to the Japanese public."  Are they just exploiting the research loophole, knowing that no foreign government will call them out on their behavior?  The US government had an opportunity to make a statement, by upholding the denial of the injunction, but didn't (no surprise there).

It's a fascinating issue to read about.  Everyone has a perspective.  Photographs like these support one perspective.  The rule of law and desire for orderly and cooperative world operations supports the other.  Time will tell, I think, which one wins out.

What I Watched -- The Islands and the Whales

My first SLIFF film of the year was The Islands and the Whales.  The preview set the movie up as a clash between Faroe Islanders and the Sea Shepherds, an activist group whose stated goal is to protect the oceans and the animals who live in it (sort of like The Cove, except that it was about dolphins in Japan).

That really wasn't the case.  The heart of the story was the conflict between the Faroese people.  There is a local doctor who is alerting the islanders to the dangers of whale meat (and meat from sea birds, which the islanders also catch and eat), specifically the high concentration of mercury.  He is trying to educate the people on the dangers this causes, and encouraging them to eat less whale meat.

On the other side of the fight are stubbornness and traditions.  The islanders are a traditional people, and their all-hands-on-deck style of whale hunting dates back generations.  They live on desolate, rocky outcroppings off the north coast of Scotland, about halfway between Iceland and Norway.  Not much produce will grow there, and it's a long way from anywhere.  They depend on the whales and sea birds, whose meat makes up a substantial portion of their diet.

Though the film has an obvious perspective, it doesn't settle on anything.  It did, however, leave me with a lot of reading to do.  More on that in my next post.

Bottom line: beautiful shots of the desolate landscape make the conflict all the more understandable.

SLSO - Show #3

Technically speaking, Jurassic Park was not part of my SLSO subscription this year.  But when I was that the symphony orchestra was going to be screening the movie with a live score, how could I not go see it?

And boy am I glad I did.  I forgot how much fun Jurassic Park is, and it's even better when the music really rises and falls and resonates with all the volume and much more quality than it does in a movie theater.

There were times during the screening that I completely forgot we were even at the symphony, and there were other times that I was so engrossed watching the musicians that I missed sections of the movie.  But what a great opportunity, to see (yet another) classic early-90s film, support the local arts scene, and get to drink a special T-Rex cocktail!

Anyone up for North By Northwest or Harry Potter coming later this season?

SLSO - Show #2

The title piece of the second show of the season, a couple weeks back, was Beethoven's Symphony No. 5.  Who doesn't want to see that?

Well, in order to get there you had to sit through the first half of the show.  I didn't know any of the pieces, but it was interesting viewing.  We started out with a Strauss horn concerto. SLSO's own Roger Kaza was the soloist.  It was nice to see an instrument like the horn, which usually is relegated to the background except for the Christmas concert, get to do something that was written for it.  We were then joined by relatively-local soprano Christine Brewer for Berg's Seven Early Songs.  Again, it was not a collection I knew anything about, but I'm always entertained by having a vocalist on stage to watch.

Then, after intermission, everyone held their breath for those famous four notes.  In truth, I probably cannot write a very good review of the performance.  It was so great to hear such a famous piece live (for the first time!) that I was not paying sufficient attention to the details of the performance to say anything meaningful.  I would expect, however, that the performers feel the pressure of such a well-known symphony, and either have performed it before (so are comfortable with it) or spend the extra time to make sure it's as good as everyone hopes it will be.  For me, it was.

What I Watched -- Basic Instinct

In addition to Alive, I recently watched another early-90s production, Basic Instinct.

This was an "it's Saturday night and we're surfing Netflix" find, but neither S nor I had seen it, so we went for it.  I knew that the movie was somewhat risqué, but I didn't realize what a shock it must have been to regular movie-going audiences 25 years ago.  It was shocking to me now! S's comment was classic: "That's very porny for such an old movie."  He's not wrong.

The plot is as simple as you might expect: Sharon Stone plays the sex kitten who is suspected of killing her lover.  Michael Douglas is the cop who is investigating.  Shenanigans ensue.

Bottom line: definitely worth seeing, if only for the role it played in changing movie history in my lifetime.

What I Watched -- Young Frankenstein

On one of the many days that S and I struggled to find a movie to watch, I relayed to him some of the films on my list of movies to see.  He couldn't believe I hadn't seen Young Frankenstein, so that was the choice for the evening.

I'm not much of a Mel Brooks fan, but that's mostly because I don't know exactly what his work is, and I don't follow him in particular.  Upon investigation, it turns out that I've seen Spaceballs (stupidly funny), Robin Hood: Men in Tights (my favorite of his films that I've seen), and the remake of The Producers (if that counts).  And there's Gene Wilder as the title character, and I like him (mostly because he was Willy Wonka, once upon a time).

Bottom line: I'm not sure I'd call it a classic of American filmmaking, but it was definitely amusing.