You might think that The Walking Dead is a typical zombie apocalypse TV show, but it goes more in depth than simply killing dead people. It shows how civilization would change, and how morals would change, in an apocalyptic world. Everyone is trying to survive and fight the dead. It would make sense for the living to team up against the dead. However, if you come across a stranger with food when you are starving, what stops you from killing him and taking his food? These situations get more complex when you are the person with food. How do you know someone else isn’t going to kill you to steal your food and supplies? They can’t if you kill them first.
          In The Walking Dead, Rick travels and lives with his small group of people, and they survive by trusting each other and staying together. They took over a prison that was rundown by walkers, and they lived there. It was the safest place they could live in. Then Rick crosses paths with The Governor. The Governor had set up the town of Woodberry not far from the prison. It was a walled city without walkers, and the people were controlled and lived in the dark. The Governor oppressed them, but it can be argued that their way of life was better with him than it would be without. It is also interesting that they named this oppressive plundering ruler, “The Governor.” In a world where all government has fallen, oppressive “governors” still take charge and tell other people how to live their life.
          The Governor told Rick he and his group must leave the prison or he will wipe them out. The Governor has a small army and heavily outguns Rick. Rick faces a dilemma. Assassinate The Governor and save his people, run and risk the lives of everyone in his group, or stand and fight and get wiped out.

How western directors present the colonial history

How western directors present the colonial history

Indochine, the winner of the Academy Award for best Foreign Film, is a French movie directed by Regis Wargnier in 1992. The story is set in Indochine (former name for Vietnam). Indochine was basically a love story but what arouses my interests is how the western directors present the colonial history.

In the movie, Devries, as the representation of the colonists, not only looks superior to the natives but also has more respectable characters which the natives do not have. She is braver and has strong will power; therefore the natives willingly obey her and respect her. Besides, the dark side of the history, such as the human trafficking and cruel repression of peasant uprising, is covered. The directors usually avoid showing the plight of the natives in their movies.

It seems to me that the director misrepresents the colonial history by embellishing both the figure of colonists and the cruelty of history. As a result, the audience would not feel guilty for the colonial history and re-evaluate colonization. For the westerns, colonization might be a rightful pattern of capital accumulation, but in the history book of those former colonies such as China and India, it’s purely evil and trampled.

The European colonization wave ended many decades ago. However, the rise of neocolonialism shows that the unequal relation between the former colonial states and former colonists is still not changed. The relatively backward countries are no longer dominated by direct military force, but instead, dominated by the economic and political control. The neo colonialism makes it necessary for the westerns to re-evaluate the colonialism and the first step is to rectify the misrepresentation of the history.

Got talent?

If you’ve seen the movie Good Will Hunting, and your perception of society and life has not changed after watching it, then you’re the worst when it comes to critical thinking.  The movie is about a guy named Will Hunting who is poor and has a job as a janitor at Harvard University. Will is surrounded by a lot of snobby pricks at the University, and they walk and talk as if they are the best human beings to walk the face of the earth, and to be real, Will would have been in that crowd if he had been born with two parents that hadn’t called it quits after a one night stand. You see, Will has a brain that lets him read and do math at a rate that would make any other student commit suicide, but seeing as he was born with no parents, he was never placed in school because of being sent to multiple foster homes. If that’s not bad enough, in each foster home, he was abused by his foster home “father.” So to make it clear: Will never had a chance from the start. Amongst all of these things that Will could complain about, Will gets very offended when people tell him “You have a gift,” or “ Don’t throw it all away.” Oh, and this so called “gift” and this “it” people refer to……are people seeing these things when someone is fresh out the womb, or when this someone can only from one word sentences? If you tell me yes, then I call bullshit. This bullshit is what people call “talent.”  The name Will Hunting and the word “talented” were probably never used in the same sentence before he showed up all the Harvard snobs with a few math equations, but after, Will gets praise from everyone. People weren’t calling Will talented for all of his life and then after one nerdy incident…..BOOM!!!

Listen, a lot people who notice that someone is better than them at something hate being honest with themselves and use the word “talent” to help them sleep better at night. “He was born being great at _____” is just one example statement of how irresponsible someone can be by dismissing somebody’s effort and then indirectly blaming God or genetics for the cause of somebody’s success/achievement. The people at Harvard couldn’t come to peace with a janitor showing them up, so they threw around the words “gift” and “talent” to make them feel less insecure. My point is this: Talent does not really exist, it is only apart of our imagination. Nobody is born and immediately identified as a great athlete or super genius. We only observe these things. As for Will, his no show parents and horrible childhood caused a late notice of his skills, which overall placed him at the bottom of the totem pole for years. If you think that talent exists, and that our cultural identity is not being focused on trivial things, then you are believing a lie that the government has been telling you. Most of the people in your society are mindless idiots, and you are one too if you don’t feel what I’m sayin.

Afraid of other's attention?

 A Critical Message about Materialism and Lookism to Modern Society from American Psycho

     A protagonist, Patrick Bateman was a 27 years old Vice President at P&P financial company in Wall Street, New York. He did a thorough self-management, had a nice view and expensive apartment, and had a fiancé from a plutocrat family. 

     To this explicitly perfect man, there were several things he could not fulfill his mind. He cheated on his coworkers’ fiancé, who was the best girl to Patrick. He sought a delight from call girls, not from his fiancé. He envied Paul Allen most because he made a hardest restaurant reservation at Dorsia, which was almost impossible to Patrick and his coworkers. Also, Paul Allen confused Patrick Bateman with the other coworker whose suit, hair style, and glasses were almost same as what Patrick had, lived in nicer landscape and more expensive apartment, and had the most decent business card. Patrick never satisfied with what he had and even had an extreme feeling of inferiority toward Paul Allen. Patrick’s inner mind was going breaking down and cruel, but numbness about killing people.  

     All extreme actions by Patrick seem to reflect our lost identity and unlimited desire.

     In the business card scene, Patrick gave a monologue, 

“Paul Allen has mistaken me for this dickhead Marcus Halberstram. It seems logical because Marcus also works at P&P and in fact does the same exact thing I do and he also has a penchant for Valentino suits and Oliver Peoples glasses. Marcus and I even go to the same barber, although I have a slightly better haircut”. 

     Why Paul Allen was confused Patrick Bateman with Marcus Halberstram? Characters in this scene could be audience who care about other's eyes in appearance. As Patrick thought, People might not want to wear similarly or look better. As Paul Allen made a mistaken to call Patrick, in Paul's eyes People care about their appearance and exaggerated action which caused Paul to get confused. As Paul did, modern people seek standard value on television show or idols so that people think that the standard of beauty is them. People compare to others with their pretentious value.

     On the contrary, after Patrick saw, his competitor, Paul Allen’s business card, he suddenly got freeze and dropped Paul Allen’s business card with his lost focus. Patrick feared about distinguished Paul Allen. This part of the scene seems to show us that Patrick had a low self-regard. 

     Even though Patrick's reaction was inflated and extreme serious, some of modern people might could have a feeling of inferiority or have an experience to think like as Patrick did. As the movie's title is American Psycho, Patrick became a psycho because he was masking all of his inferiority or something that he cannot fulfill inside by making a perfect shape in appearance! On the other side of his duplicity was a killer. Patrick killed so many people who made him uncomfortable by touching him or being distinguished.

     Whatever the value for looking perfect, modern people in this period or now and forever should have a strong self-regard by loving themselves and should not seek master pieces from outside to look perfect, but from inside. Modern people need to take off their masks and approach truly to others.

Never too old to Dream BIG

  Everyone has a dream, fulfilled with all the beautiful wishes and delightful hopes. As a lifelong fan of Ian Miller, one of Joanna Wang’s teenage dreams is to get an inset of Miller to use as her album’s cover picture. About six years ago, after a serious of emailing communication, Joanna finally got a reply attached with a typical Miller style’s work, which she used as the cover photo of this fantastic fairy tale style conceptual album “The adventures of Bernie the school Boy”.

  Joanna Wang describes her feeling of finally see the released of this album as “A dream come true”. For her, this album is not only a record of songs but her own musical stories. She makes her album like a storybook for “kidult”.  It is not easy for this young indie singer to display herself in a purely Joanna Wang style as she has a famous jazz music composer dad, whose fame may overshadow her own talents. But Joanna Wang finally proves her gifted ability with this album which includes 12 innovative conceptual songs that are all filled with splendid imagination and combination of the lyrics as well as the tunes.

   Joanna Wang suggests that it would understand this album better if listeners can view this album as a whole. Therefore, different songs in this album are like different episodes of a musical film. As one of the featured songs, Plotting Revenge, the piece that I write in my research paper, is a typical conceptual music work that put realistic content into a surrealistic nutshell.

  The general feeling of this album, reflected by the Progressive Rock music style and Gothic design, is like Joanna Wang finally put her dream into concrete work. She has a big dream that she can create her own music style but not only a guitar jazz girl with smoked voice. From her album, I can still image the scene where 7 year old Joanna Wang portrayed her little dream of music with an Ian Miller book. Never be afraid to dream big, a big dream can drive people to work tough, to spare no effect on a goal. “The process of producing this album is hard but sweet, especially when you see all the musical notes finally come together and become the melody you are dreaming day and night” said by Joanna Wang.

  Always remember the initial faith of a dream, conquer all the barriers step by step and finally the greatest results will come, that’s a meaning of life.

  I attach this live of Joanna Wang, enjoy and feel her innovative music style of this unique album.

Welcome to the Future!

In case you have yet to be told, let me be the first to enlighten you.

Welcome to the Future! 

   

        Though it may be hard to believe for younger generations, the world wasn’t always the way it is now. You couldn’t always text your friends whenever you wanted to hang out. You couldn’t always watch your favorite television show on a long car ride. And you most certainly couldn’t always live in such a way where everyone was an equal. Focusing on this, Brad Paisley created a music video for his song “Welcome to the Future”.  The video, found below, focuses on the idea of innovation and gives multiple examples of then versus now.

            Many of his examples refer to technological and communication advancements that have created a more fun and smaller world to live in. He shows things such as robotics and prosthetics in order to show people that many “futuristic” ideas are happening now. For example, he sings "I'd have given anything to have my own Pacman game at home. I used to have to get a ride down to the arcade but now I've got it on my phone." The below pictures are visual examples he used in the video to emphasis such changes and innovations that have taken place. The first photo is of a younger boy playing a Pacman game at his house emphasizing how unrealistic having the game at your house was and the second photo shows Brad Paisley demonstrating having the Pacman game on his phone to play. By reminding people of how things used to be, he brings into hindsight the changes that have happened over the years giving rise to the song's name "Welcome to the Future".

           In addition, Brad Paisley uses examples of children saying what they want to be in the future to show viewers that the world is not done changing. Because it is known that children are the innovators of the future, the video is using these children to show that the world is going to continue to change. They are showing that innovation and specific goals such as becoming doctors, feeding the world, and beating cancer are going to help push the world to a better tomorrow. With this, innovation has become the driving force into the future.

So in reality...

Innovation- the real first to welcome you to the future. 

Why do people reproduce “Pride and Prejudice” tirelessly?

  When you google “Pride and Prejudice”,there are a variety of versions coming out. The original novel is rearranged into movies by Robert Z.Leonard in 19940 and by Joy Wright in 2005, and even into six television versions. It also is adapted into stage plays. Why do people be so into this story and remake it over and over again? 

  Those beautiful outfit and fantastic location apparently satisfies our visual need. Is that all? Is that the only reason we spent millions of dollars on refilming the story? Of course not! Actually, the attractive contain, or the story plays an important role. The romantic love story touches our heart and people find the ironic characters funny when relate them to those superficial people in real world; in the other word, resonance helps. This movie, by using amusing method, reflects a lot of social issues that has not been solved yet. Take an example. As marriage of Elizabeth, is disrupted owing to her poverty, people nowadays are still treated differently according to their wealth. Also, like Elizabeth’s best friend, Charlotte Lucas, who marry to a mercenary man just for money and status, some people at present marry for money. Elizabeth and her father, Mr. Bennet, opposite to those mercenary people, insist on their idea thinking that spirit things, like love, are much more important than money and other material things. They are like models to guide us back to the real life track and help us realize what actually matters in our life.

  Thus, the main reason for remaking is that the problem described in the movie still exits and we still need this enduring popularly story to correct our value.

Are you Disgusted or surprised?

There is a lot of cultural difference around the world, this behavioral perspective to assess the extent to which difference in culture are related to difference in behavior. The behavioral perspective can be seen as a positive or negative action on different areas. I have posted the pictures below which display the boy sucking cow milk using his mouth. I don’t know what you feel about the picture as a reader but it is clear some people feels these are hilarious and funny and other people think this are dangers and gross. In some part of Western Europe and North America where cultural values and living conditions of peoples separate from domestic animals and those who have no contact with the cow or where milk is coming from; it is bizarre to watch this picture and dangerous physically or otherwise. For those people who live in most part of Africa and Asia where their life are closely integrated with their domestic animals and have a close contact with their animals are not a big deal rather it is funny.

http://www.snotr.com/video/6486/Water_Boy

 

                        If the video is not working for you please click the link posted above 

Here is another video I posted which was shown two years ago in some talent show. I don’t know how individual will react to this video too. A man with a theatrical appearance was drinking a lot of water until his belly was full; then he spit it out in a very controlled manner and different theatrical fashion. It is always clear that spitting out something after we put it in our mouth is not pretty, let alone after we put it in our stomach. But this man who calls himself a water boy makes it look cool and funny.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Want to figure out how happy you are?

Have you ever know how happy you are?  Here is a website that tell you the levels of happiness and life satisfaction.

http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/

What’s your result? Are you just satisfied to adequate food and clothing? Do you feel it accurate when you are experiencing setbacks?

Be honest! You do want to gain truly happy. No matter what kind of lifestyle you prefer, the ultimate goal is to gain happiness. Especially, the improving material things make the quality of life become much better than before, people more focus on the abundance of the soul instead of money or rights. This consensus of life is developed to a kind of mental culture over time. People more care about the mental healthy from personal standpoint, striving to pursue happiness of life.

However, the mortal enemy of the happiness--setback--is the biggest impediment to obtain happiness. How to revive good feeling when people are covered by negative emotions caused by setbacks become a big issue.

The reason why I notice this problem, since I sew the Adele’s music video, “Rolling in the Deep”. Adele presents a woman experienced the failure in love, covering by many bad feelings. What shocks me in this video is that she chooses to fight with setbacks. The video is expressed well in inner details, when she experiences her unhappy lovelorn. More important, she expresses a full process that fights with the negative feeling. Get right view of setbacks and recognize its essence; learn from it; adjust attitude and head off again that what’s I want to say!

Want to get rid of disencumber, and gain happiness? Since the bad feelings caused by setbacks are inevitable, just help yourself! Nobody should yield to failure, come on, you can change it to your valuable resources.

Look this video and try my method. I think you will have some of results!

Discrimination? Color or Power?

    In the famous movie, Django unchained, freeman Django is experiencing doubt and discrimination from the whites and the society. When they are entering the plantation of Calvin, the steward, also a black person, is attacking Django via disdainful language and rude behavior. 

 

    However, it is worth mentioning that the steward is also a black person, but he still discriminate Django only based on his black face. The color seems cannot be simply explained as the reason of the discrimination, and these behaviors cannot be concluded into racism issue. 

    The steward's power is coming from his master, Calvin. But go deeper to the origin of Calvin's power; it is the legal system that helps the white people to control the black salve as their properties rather than normal people. And it is the power from the legal system that silence the black's complains and convey them the inferiority mind. On the other hand, it is Django's weapon on his hand enable himself to invisibly fight back the steward via his cold face against the steward. 

 

    So far, one thing that can be sure is that the mutual discrimination between the steward and Django comes from the different power they own. And these powers make them feel superior to the other one from the heart. 

    After the power, both from authority and from the weapon, is given to some people, they have the special and superior rights to do something that normal people cannot do. When some vicious purposes are added into the difference, the discrimination forms.In this case, when the power comes to white and black issue, the racism is raised. So, generally, it is the power that makes people distinct themselves from the others and finally forms the discrimination between two groups of people.

Posted by Wei Li