Theme of Bodies, Rest and Motion
This is a story about searching and trying to find home. Four people are looking for their place in life. It’s about belonging. They are at the beginning of the film living a superficial temporary existence.
We have a character Nick who is a man lost, he is looking for a purpose, a sense of belonging and direction. He is disconnected from his family and even from society, from his job, from his girlfriend. He seeking and wanting and does not know what that is but he knows he is missing something or someone.
Next we have Sid who at the beginning of the film is just the opposite of Nick. He is a body at rest. He belongs. His is happy with where he is and who he is and is not wanting. He is self-aware, comfortable with his life. He is happy just exactly where he is doing what he does and sure of his place in life. His character is unconventional. He doesn’t know to feel inferior that he is a painter, that he’s never been out of Enfield. When Carol asks him which is his career, the painting or the lawn mowing, her condescension is lost on him. He is free of want until he meets Beth.
Beth is in a sort of a lull. She too is searching but not in the way that Nick is. She is not pained by it. Beth is the one that nudges Sid into motion. Beth is living with Nick and senses his chaos but is less pained and less needy.
The film opens with everything already in transition, in motion. We first see an escalator moving up and down. People are going places and the escalator tells us that nothing is going to remain as they are. Nick works as a TV salesman but he’s been fired and it’s his last day, he lives with Beth but that soon changes, he lives in Enfield, Arizona but he plans to move tomorrow to Butte, Montana. Nothing is concrete nothing is working, not even the toaster.
The next image we see is the desert, vast, endless and un-chartered desert, again the idea of being lost, searching and of course being nowhere. Next, we see Beth at a left turn lane of an intersection, lost in thought, staring into space, she neither knows where she is nor does she know where she is heading.
However, despite Nick’s flaws and obvious misjudgement of himself, Nick does not become a ‘bad person’. On the contrary, it is these flaws and errors of judgement that shape Nick into a human, relatable character. Being human is not about perfection; on the contrary, it is flaws of character and errors of judgement that shape the human experience.
As much as generous and honest Nick Carraway is, he still needs a few important improvements in himself. Nick went to Yale, fought in world war one and moved to East of New York to work in finance. After moving to New York, Nick faces tough dilemmas throughout the story such as revealing secrets, and witnessing betrayal. His innocence and malevolence toward others was beyond his control. He did not have the ability or knowledge to know what he should have done in the spots he was set in. He seemed lost and having no control of what went on- almost trapped- but indeed, he had more control than he could have ever known. Because of the situations he has experienced and the people he has met, such as Gatsby, Tom, Jordan and Daisy, his point of view on the world changed dramatically which is very depressing. Trusting the others and caring for them greatly has put him in a disheartening gloomy position.
While Mexican Americans were considered white by law, the documentary A Class Apart sheds light on the struggles and eventual triumph of Mexican Americans in the their journey for racial equality within the United States. Following the Mexican War, Mexican Americans were subjected to a Jim Crow style of discrimination. Despite retaining U.S. citizenship, Mexican Americans were treated as second class citizens. Frustrated by social, political, and economic disenfranchisement, Mexican Americans sought the assistance of the United States Supreme Court, in what would become a landmark case, to secure the full rights afforded to them as United States citizens.
4). Nick’s assessment and criticism toward Jordan, Tom, and Daisy also show his skeptical and logical outlook on others around him. This tone shows Nick’s struggle between being like the emotionless and careless people around him (like Tom) or to be his own hopeful and romantic man (following
"Fed Up (Soechtig, 2014)." narrated by Katie Couric, focuses on the growing link between sugar consumption and the obesity epidemic. The film aggressively attacks the food industry, advertising, and the government who, it claims, all contribute to the U.S. sugar-dependent, obesity problem. The film sets out to prove the government, and food industry is knowingly causing an increase in the amount of obese children. It reserves its most critical comments for government advisory panels who make and enforce food and health policy, and its failure to properly regulate the food industry. They claim lobbyists for the sugar board have been instrumental in the removal of negative statistics from research papers worldwide. Instead
Happy, Biff’s younger brother, has always felt neglected by his father, because he was not as a...
In the documentary “Fed Up,” sugar is responsible for Americas rising obesity rate, which is happening even with the great stress that is set on exercise and portion control for those who are overweight. Fed Up is a film directed by Stephanie Soechtig, with Executive Producers Katie Couric and Laurie David. The filmmaker’s intent is mainly to inform people of the dangers of too much sugar, but it also talks about the fat’s in our diets and the food corporation shadiness. The filmmaker wants to educate the country on the effects of a poor diet and to open eyes to the obesity catastrophe in the United States. The main debate used is that sugar is the direct matter of obesity. Overall, I don’t believe the filmmaker’s debate was successful.
This was Nick’s problem but worse since he was just in the same place a rut in his road and he was going nowhere. So Nick did what others would never even think about even doing he got out of his car and he walked the road of life. Literally! In Nick’s story at the crossroads he feels as if his life is in a rut as he described it so he decided to change his routine so he took a flight from California to all the way across the country to Florida and survive off the kindness of people, he did for the recognition of himself and for him to appreciate what he has,a very noble modification to his life. This was the experience where he walked into the appreciation of everything he has, and everything he will ever have, giving him the gift that doesn't cost a penny but is worth more than gold. The reward for the courage to walk the road of life with the clear goal of what lies ahead of the innovation of the soul and heart. His family will forever thank him for what he had to do for them to know what a soul that has seen the world and is willing to share looks like.Therefore sharing the kindness his change has brought to him and his
Biff never kept a steady job during his young adult life, and did not possess a healthy relationship with anyone that was in his life. As the play progresses the reader sees how much Biff becomes more self- aware. An online source states, “Unlike the other members of his family, Biff grows to recognize that he and his family members consistently deceive themselves, and he fights to escape the vicious cycles of lies.” When Biff returns home it becomes a struggle to keep a healthy relationship with his parents. Once Willy and Biff decide together that Biff will go and ask Bill Oliver for a loan is when the differences between the two characters are truly seen. Biff accepts reality for the first time in his life, and realizes how ridiculous it is to ask Bill Oliver for a loan, when he barely knows the man and worked for him about ten years ago. When Biff meets up with Willy after the ‘meeting’ Biff is talking to his Father and says, “Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!” This quote reveals that Biff recently has just experienced an epiphany, and realizes that what he was doing was making no sense. Biff is escaping the self- deception he was caught in with the rest of his
of myself, when all I want is out there. . .” (132). During the last argument with Willy, Biff
In his documentary Classified X, Martin Van Peebles describes three areas where African-Americans could be receive some sanctuary from the racism that pervaded almost all Hollywood films. These three places were: the Hollywood version of an all-Black film, the church, and entertainment. Black culture and music is prominent in mainstream society, but the people behind this culture don’t always receive recognition and respect for their creations. Mainstream White pop culture excitedly consumes and appropriates Black culture, but disrespects the source.
Willy just thinks that no matter what Biff does he is doing it right. He can’t escape his dream world.
I chose to analyze Despicable Me, an animated film geared towards a younger audience, because I was interested in examining underlying theories and messages that this film would be relaying to its viewers. Often times, when watching animated films, children are not aware of these messages, as they are absorbed by the characters, special effects, and humor. But as we have learned throughout this semester, our brains are subconsciously primed by the various surroundings we are exposed to. Since we also studied the impacts of entertainment, such as television and video games, on children, I wanted to see how a popular children’s film might also affect them.
The first theme I chose to focus on was freedom. I chose this simply because of the fact that he uses this word repeatedly throughout his book. I thought this was a great theme because he constantly talks about how you cannot and should not let yourself get bogged down worrying about what other people think about you or how other people perceive you. Nick believes that you are in control of you and only you, and if other people do not accept you for who you are, then that is on them and that is their problem. Nick says that people must stop trying to live up to everyone else’s expectations. He also says that we have to stop these negative attitudes, despite what our circumstances are, and we have to stop the nonsense of thinking we are not “good enough.” I chose the image of a person who has different paths in front of them to choose from. I chose this to depict that everyone always has options no matter what their circumstances are. Everyone has a choice of how they will live, as well as what their attitude and outlook on life will be. Nick learns th...
A.I.: Artificial Intelligence is a Steven Spielberg science fiction drama film, which conveys the story of a younger generation robot, David, who yearns for his human mother’s love. David’s character stimulates the mind-body question. What is the connection between our “minds” and our bodies?