Movie Recommendation
April 22, 2010
On my flight over to America I watched the Cohen Brothers’ latest film, A Serious Man. The last few years have seen me grow in my love for Cohen Brothers movies. I always loved Fargo, but No Country for Old Men really took my breath away, and I ended up being so impressed with Burn After Reading as it self-consciously spiralled out of coherence in the planned build-up to the hilarious and perfect final scence.
Anyway, despite my best efforts, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about A Serious Man for over a month. Scenes still come back to me, and I still find myself internally debating the meaning and message of the film. It’s a hilarious movie in lots of ways. The scene with Rabbi Number 2 is just brilliant and made me burst out laughing on the plane – really quite embarrassing! But it’s also a movie that will, as they say, get you thinking. If you’re into that kind of thing…
Movie Recommendation
October 4, 2009
Last night I went and watched the wonderful new Pixar movie Up with my wonderful girlfriend. It really is an amazing film and I unreservedly recommend it to everyone. You’ll definitely laugh, you’ll probably see your life in a new light, if only for a moment, and you may even cry.
Admittedly, I am a sucker for Pixar movies. But Up is particularly touching and hilarious. For a movie filled with silliness, it communicates a lot about the human need for companionship, the personal liberation which comes only with genuine acts of selflessness, and the adventure that it can be to befriend, empathise with, and even love, odd and different people/animals. The comparison between the life the protagonist led with his wife, and the life that the evil villan ended up living – alone in some parallel odd world with only his bones and ambition for company – is a great example of the way good film can simply communicate profound insights about the human condition.
I feel like to justify blogging about a children’s movie on my ‘philosophy’ blog I need to include some sort of philosophical reflection on the film. Well, the film involves an act of civil disobedience which would have made Henry David Thoreau and Dr. King smile from ear to ear; it raises metaphysical questions about the existence of possible worlds which David Lewis and perhaps Gottfried Leibniz would find illustrative; it raises the issue of animal ethics and the value of non-human life which would make Peter Singer sing showtunes; and suggests that the most happy life is one filled with activity, not passivity, which would rock Aristotle’s ancient socks.
