Movie Review: Hugo

Posted on May 1, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

Hugo was the second movie I watched last weekend. It was also a movie that I purchased without having watched it first.

“Welcome to a magical world of spectacular adventure! When wily and resourceful Hugo discovers a secret left by his father, he unlocks a mystery and embarks on a quest that will transform those around him and lead to a safe and loving place he can call home.”

This was another movie that had a really melancholy feel for me.

I’m pretty sure that the reason it felt so sad to me was similar to the reason that From Up On Poppy Hill felt so unhappy. It filled me with a sense of nostalgic longing for times lost long ago. In Hugo, you see the love of story-telling and how creative and wonderful the first movies were. If the story of Hugo is even remotely close to historically accurate, the first movies in that time were filled with such wonder and imagination that it makes me sad that people aren’t that passionate about the movies these days.

Sometimes, I feel like the actual story-telling in the 80s was better than it is in current movies and that so many of our modern movies are all about fantastic special effects and less about telling an amazing story with wonderful characters. Maybe that’s also because of when I grew up and where I’m at in my life now, but I really feel like today’s movies are more recycled ideas than they are expressions of passionate imagination and story-telling. I don’t remember having seen too many movies lately that left me thinking or that I felt really inspired by or that I perceived as unique and awesome.

Hugo really did tell and amazing story, though. It was filled with wonder and sadness all at the same time. I was really impressed with how strongly Hugo tugged at my emotions and what a unique story it was. But the melancholy undercurrent really was strong and it made me less likely to watch this movie again any time soon. That doesn’t make the story less intriguing, it just means that I don’t have the emotional capacity at this time to be subjected to that kind of emotional stress.

Overall, I’d rate the movie either as a high three or a low four. Something that I’m glad that I own and that I appreciate, but I’m not entirely certain how often I’ll be able to rewatch it just because of how it makes my heart feel.

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Book Review: Cordelia’s Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold

Posted on May 1, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

I started Cordelia’s Honor (Science Fiction 590 pages) by Lois McMaster Bujold a while ago and finally finished it today.

I was really excited about this book. I’m on a big science fiction kick these days, as the current project that I’m working on is a science fiction story. My current story starts in a similar place to this story, so I was extra excited about it because it dealt with a scientific team conducting an initial survey on a new planet. Things on the planet go terribly wrong and the first 170 pages of the book are absolutely fascinating, combining really interesting survival and hostage situations.

And then I made the mistake of reading the back of the book. This kind of ruined the entire middle of the story for me because I knew how things went for Cordelia and Aral. This ruined the element of suspense for me and I really struggled to find the emotional implications of this story. Having read the back of the book, I didn’t feel the emotional connection between the characters the way I usually do when I have no idea what’s going on with the story.

The section when Cordelia returns home to Beta Colony is genuinely frightening. After everything she’s been through, she gets worse treatment from her own people than she did when she was captured and a prisoner. The reason that Beta Colony is such a genuinely frightening portrayal is because of the idea that people can just come into someone’s life, decide they’ve had mind-manipulation of some sort, and then create the very problems that the doctors are supposed to prevent or treat. I almost felt myself going a little crazy myself during this section of the book, and that’s kind of saying something.

I also struggled with the names in the book. So very many “V” names involved in the Barrayaran culture that sometimes I didn’t know who the characters were or what their relationship was to each other or the other characters in the story. And I didn’t really care enough about any of them (except Aral) to do the research to remind myself as to who was who.

There was something about Cordelia’s character that just bothered me on some levels. If she was used to being a Captain on a space vessel, I would have thought that she wouldn’t have embraced a world without control so extensively. She gives up everything she’d worked so hard for during her entire life, her career, her ship, everything, and never seems to miss traveling the stars. Nor does she have any problems with just doing what she’s told. She doesn’t seem to miss her old life at all and that strikes me as very odd. Every now and then, she demonstrates this keen military mind and extremely competent leadership, but it’s almost like she has an on/off switch and it’s conveniently timed. And sometimes her thoughts seem rather disjointed. She thinks about appropriate attire for Gregor or other random thoughts about adequate parenting that she has no real basis of understanding for. It was kind of jarring.

The story really picked up again towards the end and there were some really great sections around page 534 about life in general. It’s about how relationships hurt and that when you really do love someone that you will wind up hurting each other, even though you love each other dearly. But the point is that love is worth it. Love is worth everything. It’s going to hurt sometimes, but it’s always worth it.

Overall, I’d say that this book is about a three on my rating scale. Reading the back of the book really ruined a lot for me and I think I’d rate the book a bit higher if I hadn’t read the back of the book. I enjoyed the book and I’m glad that I read it.

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Movie Review: From Up On Poppy Hill

Posted on May 1, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

I found a whole bunch of movies from Studio Ghibli when I was shopping the other day and I picked up all those I found. It was actually last weekend when I watched From Up On Poppy Hill and I am only just now getting around to writing a movie review for it.

“Yokohama, 1963. Japan is picking itself up from the devastation of World War II and preparing to host the Olympics. Against this backdrop of hope and change, a friendship begins to blossom between high school students Umi and Shun – but a buried secret from their past emerges to cast a shadow on the future and pull them apart.”

It seemed to be a general trend for the movies that I watched last weekend to have a melancholy undercurrent. While I enjoy the animation style and the music from the Studio Ghibli movies, this one seemed a little bit more unhappy than the others I have seen. In that sense, I would say that this movie is a success for clearly demonstrating the different emotions that must have been prevalent during that era in Japan.

On the one hand, you have a country after a series of brutal wars and violence, trying to move into the future while also respecting its past and history. It must have been so hard for the people in that time to figure out what they really wanted and what was going to be best for the country as a whole. From what I’ve studied about Japan, it’s a country devoted to history and learning. After so much violence and war, it must have been really hard for them to figure out what from their history would help them move forward into the future and what would just put them back on the same path of violence.

I really liked the parts of the story with the print press and showing how complicated a process it was to make news back in those days. The whole process filled me with kind of a nostalgic longing for a time when people put their hearts into activities they loved. Even though this was a cartoon, animated movie, I could feel the passion the characters had for their respected clubs and also for their history. How much time and effort did it take to stencil in absolutely every character, then use the paint roller on each separate piece of paper, then wait for each one to dry, and disseminate it? Oddly, it really motivated me even more to want to create something beautiful.

I’m still uncertain about how I feel about the love story plot/sub-plot. I really appreciated that they loved each other and didn’t have any physical contact and that their love was more based on their mutual work towards common goals and a shared sense of what was truly important in life. They just didn’t want to be alone and they wanted to remember the people they loved. They wanted their loved ones back. And that moved me. I guess the whole issue about loving someone in a platonic and not purely romantic way really appealed to me. But the whole part about how their past might have impacted their relationship was really awkward. That’s the part I’m still uncertain about.

Overall, this was a really beautiful movie and really well done, though not one of my favorite of the Studio Ghibli movies.

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Movie Review: Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Posted on April 6, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

I went and saw Captain America: The Winter Soldier this afternoon. There is no way to talk about this movie without talking about spoilers. So if you haven’t seen the movie and you want to be surprised by what happens, I recommend you wait to read this until after you’ve seen the movie.

I enjoyed so many good previews before this movie, which means there are not many movies on my list of things I need to see, including Earth to Echo, Lucy, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, X-Men: Days of Future Past, and Maleficent. It seems as though this summer will have a lot of super hero movies and I am looking forward to all of them.

I don’t really know if it’s because of where I’m at in my life or because the movie did such a good job of messing with my emotions, but there were at least three times in the movie where I got fairly teary-eyed.

The first seriously emotional moment for me was when Steve visits the nursing home. Such a huge part of my heart screamed at me that this is what love really is. Love isn’t just adventures and saving the day and having a great time. Love is support and heartache and forgiveness. Love is about so much more than just physical intimacy. Watching Steve at Peggy’s bedside as she was old and weak and he was young and healthy and strong was extremely heart-wrenching for me. His love for her was obvious and reminded my own heart’s ability to love. It was a very moving part of the movie.

Another part of the movie that was emotionally gripping was when Steve went to see Sam at the VA and Sam was leading a group in dealing with life and PTSD. Watching the veterans talk about how real life situations put them back into unhealthy memories and watching them work through their issues was pretty powerful. As was listening to what happened to Sam’s wingman and them talking about decisions to stay in the service, particularly Steve’s comment about how he doesn’t know what makes him happy. With all the changes in my life these days, I can very much relate to Steve’s questions about how he doesn’t know what he would do if he wasn’t Captain America. Leaving a career that’s been your whole life, or even contemplating leaving that kind of lifestyle, can be very confusing and unsettling.

But the most emotionally heart-wrenching part of the whole movie was what they did to Bucky. He was just starting to get the edges of memory of what his life was like before he became the Winter Soldier, but then he gets wiped again. For whatever reason, Bucky and Steve tread parallel, yet completely opposite paths. They are both given great power and then one becomes the hero and one becomes the villain, and as with all great friendships, the two best friends are then pitted against each other. One fights for love and country and one fights because he’s ordered to and that’s what he was created to do. They have to face each other and the demons and memories of their own pasts. It’s heartbreaking in every way imaginable. And my current situation certainly did not help my heart with the viewing of this movie.

I was worried about whether or not the movie would remain true to the characters and I thought that the interaction between Natasha and Steve was fantastic. I was worried that they would put Black Widow into the movie only as Captain America’s love interest and that would have made me extremely angry. Instead, they were friends and comrades-in-arms and that strengthened both of them as characters. I thought their interactions were hilarious, especially the parts in the mall. Natasha would tell Steve exactly what to do and he was very confused, but her instructions were unbelievably amusing. “Public displays of affection make people very uncomfortable.” Yes, yes they do:) In fact, I was entertained by the entire section of the movie where Steve and Natasha are hanging out in civilian clothes. Partly because of the clothes they wore, but also because of their comments about their situation. Like Steve’s comments about how if he ran in those shoes, they would fall apart.

I really liked the different characters in the movie, and that really came through when you saw their different ways of attacking the same situation. Steve would talk about how to fight and what the game plan was and Natasha just did what she does best and blended in with the people around them. Black Widow was definitely always a spy and excellent at infiltration and skills of that nature. I was pleased with her character in the movie. Sam was also a great character and addition to the team. He was real and that really connected to me.

Overall, I really enjoyed the movie and it’s something that I will probably go see again in a couple weeks when some of my buddies get back. I’m happy with the story and the characters, even though it was a really, really heart-wrenching movie and story.

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Book Review: The Wind In the Willows

Posted on April 5, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

It’s taken me a few days longer than I thought it would because I didn’t have the energy to read, but I finally finished The Wind in the Willows (Fantasy 210 pages) by Kenneth Grahame today.

I guess this is usually listed as a children’s book and I think that would mostly be because of the mostly simple nature of the story. None of the characters are particularly young, but it’s possible that the book was written with a younger audience in mind.

I really enjoyed the descriptions of the various aspects of adventures and life. There were definitely a lot of times when I could almost feel the rush of the river or the call of an almost-forgotten home. I enjoyed how the winter in the Wilds Woods went from being dark and frightening to wonderous, or how the simple comforts of home could seem so inviting.

I found the characters a little bit confusing. Not the characters themselves, as they were very nicely described and stayed very easily within their actual lives, but rather the way I couldn’t exactly tell if the animals like Mole and Water Rat and Toad were actually animals. There were times when I thought the entire adventure was taking place on a miniscule level and times when I thought that the animals had somehow grown to be normal human-sized. It kind of made my imagination jump all over the place, which wasn’t really conducive to keeping me entrenched within the story. The dystopian future idea my brain came up with about how this was a time in the distant future where some animals had grown to be normal human-sized and they lived in their own communities neighboring the human ones or even interacting with them was kind of a fun place for my brain to hang out for a while. But my brain also enjoyed the idea of tiny animal communities and how their society mirrored ours. I mean, I used to build Lego houses and pray for some sort of magic that could make me the proper size to live in the house I built. So I like the idea of tiny cities and societies 🙂

I really liked the characters of the Mole and the Water Rat and even the Badger, but I never liked Toad. The Mole and the Water Rat were good friends and took great care of each other. They had adventures and helped each other out with taking care of the house or the boat or getting things done that needed to be done. I liked seeing the Mole’s confidence grow as he went out into the world and experienced so many things and I liked how the Mole the Water Rat and the Badger took care of Toad’s affairs and did everything they could to help him out, even though Toad absolutely never deserved their loyalty or their friendship. Even at the end, I still didn’t like Toad. He was ungrateful for everything and thought that he was the most clever and wonderful person around when he really was the worst sort of person. I’m sure there are people out there that will say that he reformed, but I don’t think so. I think he’ll eventually go back to hurting people and causing hardships for his friends.

Normally, there is at least one character that I relate to or see a bit of myself in, but that didn’t really happen this time. While I enjoyed the different characters greatly, I didn’t see too many attributes that I find in myself. I’d like to think that I could be as loyal as the Mole, the Water Rat, and the Badger with my friends, but I don’t think that I am. I think that in the case of my interpersonal relationships and my friendships that I accept that if no one talks to me that means that I am forgotten and no one cares and that they are all busy living their own lives and are better off without me pestering them. So while I could wish and hope that I would be a solid friend like the Mole, the Water Rat, and the Badger, I don’t know that I actually would be just because I don’t feel like I am fulfilling that role right now.

There was the tiny voice that whispered in my head that maybe I am Toad. Maybe I am the one that is only causing hurt and frustration to the people around me. Maybe I get so wrapped up in an idea that I never stop to consider the ramifications of my actions towards the people around me. But this is a pretty silly train for my brain to jump on, since I really do try pretty hard to be considerate of others. At least, I’d like to pretend that I do. But if nothing else, reading about all the damage that Toad did will make me maybe pause a little bit longer to make sure that I am not actually causing hurt and damage to my surroundings.

About midway through the story, the Mole and the Water Rat meet the Friend and Helper. It’s such a powerful and moving experience for them that once the Friend and Helper has disappeared, the Mole and the Water Rat are filled with such a sense of loss, sorrow, and regret for all they had seen and all they had lost that it almost makes it impossible for them to live their lives again. Where I’m at in my life right now really made this a powerful section for me because of the memory of time and adventures shared. Memories of random drives through the countryside or along the ocean or even just through the local area. Memories of rain and floods and hurricanes. Memories of rock climbing and working out. Memories of watching movies on the couch and laughing at everything. Memories of such beauty and wonder that it makes my heart ache. So when the Friend and Helper gives the Mole and the Water Rat one last gift, I found myself moved with longing. On page 111: “For this is the last best gift that the kindly demi-god is careful to bestow on those to whom he has revealed himself in their helping: the gift of forgetfulness. Lest the awful remembrance should remain and grow, and over-shadow mirth and pleasure, and the great haunting memory should spoil all the after-lives of little animals helped out of difficulties, in order that they should be happy and light-hearted as before.”

Overall, I liked the book. I would probably rate it about a three, as it’s not something that is screaming to me about how wonderful it was, but it’s something that I probably wouldn’t mind reading again. I suspect the next time I read this book, though, that I will just skip over the sections that deal with Toad, as I really didn’t like him.

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A Story About Progress

Posted on April 4, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

If you want an easy, completely happy story about how life is perfect and everything is filled with kittens and beautiful days, this isn’t a story for you. If you want a real story about how making your life what you want it to be takes hard work and effort and how that can affect your life, then please read all the way to the end of the story. It’s not going to start in a positive place and it may not always be an amusing story to tell, but it gets better and it shows how things work out for the best.

I often struggle with how much of my personal and real life to share with the interwebs or how much of this space should be devoted to topics and concerns not related to the artistic process of writing. But the grand truth of the matter is that I am human and everything in my life contributes to my reading and writing and other artistic endeavors.

Things this past week have been all over the place. I don’t actually remember the last time I slept for more than an hour or so in the last nine or ten days. I suspect that has contributed greatly to some of the insanity in my life recently. It’s hard to focus and not overreact to things when you can’t think straight due to a lack of rest.

So I’ll start at the bottom. Things went really badly on Wednesday. I was faced with a situation that I wasn’t emotionally or mentally prepared for and that situation caused me to break down in a variety of levels, which happened while I was at work. Work is never a good place for things to break down because then you run the risk of damaging your career as well as dealing with the damage to your personal life.

I am not very good at hiding my feelings. I never have been good at pretending to be something I’m not. So I guess it came as something of a surprise to me when it turns out that I guess everyone around me except me figured out that I had stronger feelings than I realized. I had no idea exactly how much trouble I was in with how strong my feelings are until I was told about it from someone else. As it turns out, they’re right. But now I know without a shadow of a doubt what this is and how it feels, which will help me recognize it in the future if I ever encounter this again. It’s powerful and consuming and amazing. It’s a destructive inferno or a source of hope and dreams that makes you believe you can accomplish anything. It can’t be ignored and doing so causes unbearable amounts of internal agony.

So go me, I finally acknowledge exactly how strongly I feel and I admit it to myself. So it’s either too little too late or too much all the time. But either way, the bottom line is that I can’t change how I feel, but I also am an unwanted presence in the life of someone I care about deeply. We can’t be in the same room or building or vehicle. We are done permanently. And the person I care about, all the people I have ever cared about, are better and happier without me in their life. I was worried about how the person I cared about was dealing with everything that happened, but I shouldn’t have been because they are stronger than I could ever be and life is easier for them without me.

But that’s not what I’m going to talk about tonight.

It was hard to admit that my feelings were so strong. It was hard to realize that my feelings are isolated and that the future and the dreams that I wanted are shattered. It was hard to accept that my career isn’t going to go where I wanted or hoped it would. But I have other things that I want from my life. My idea of having a cabin and being able to read and write and hike all day haven’t changed. I can still have that life, I just have to put a little bit more work into my career until I can retire. It’s going to be up to me to have the purpose and motivation to get through these next years. I don’t feel like I have much room for growth and I’m disappointed that things that I have been working for so hard for all these years aren’t likely to happen, but I can still achieve the long-term goals I set up for myself. It just won’t be as satisfying. And that future dream is one where now I will be alone instead of sharing my life.

So after what happened on Wednesday where I had to both acknowledge my own feelings and accept that my feelings are not shared and my life will be alone instead of shared, it put me in a really bad place where I was again consumed by all the thoughts my brain likes to whisper like a slow-drip poison in my mind. Thoughts about how I am incapable of love and that no one could ever possibly love me. That everyone I know is better off without me in their lives. That I am an inferno that consumes everything alive and beautiful surrounding me, leaving only ashes of people and things that were once magnificent. That I will destroy everything I touch. That I am isolated and alone and it’s all my own fault.

I’ve been this low several times in my life, but never to this extent. Everything hurt so much and I couldn’t find solid reasons to stay. It was not an okay place for me to be and as I sat there on the floor crying and trying desperately to fight every single urge for action that my poisoned brain kept whispering at me, I thought about the difference between real life and television shows or movies. If my life was a neatly scripted demonstration of the magic moving picture box, someone would have called me or knocked on my door at just that critical time. I would have felt loved and wanted and everything would turn out okay. But I knew that after everything that has happened in my life that no one was going to save me. I have burned so many bridges and pushed so many people away that there isn’t anyone left except me. If I was going to get up off the floor, it was going to have to be me that saved myself.

So I did. I got up off the floor and I did something I’d never really done before. I asked for help. All I really did was to post a message on my facebook that said that I really needed to talk. I didn’t honestly expect any sort of a reply, so I did the dishes because I hadn’t been and they were piled up in the sink. I knew it was a task that was manual labor, but still something I could actually accomplish. Something that needed to be done that would make my life a better place. Something to keep me active and occupied. After I did the dishes, I made up my mind to erase all the heartbreaking words that sprawled over every inch of space on my whiteboards. All the self-hatred and disparaging thoughts that I plastered over ever surface in my apartment.

But then the completely unexpected happened.

People started replying to my facebook message. I started a number of internet chats with people, some very good friends, some random buddies, some previous coworkers. I talked to everyone and a whole bunch of people, people I would not have anticipated responding, helped me get through a really rough night. I cried and typed and just having people to talk to helped me out immensely. I was honest with two of my close friends and they helped me see things through different perspectives. By the time I was ready to pretend to try to sleep, I felt so much better than I had.

Because I asked for help. Not from the same people who have been helping to carry me this whole time, but from everyone. People have surprised me a lot in the last month or so and I started feeling like maybe I really can do this. Here’s something I wrote that I thought was exactly right about the whole situation: “You know what happens when you try to fight a war by yourself? You lose. You know what happens when you ask for help? You burn everyone out. Solution: Build a bigger Army.” And that’s exactly what I did. I reached out to anyone who was willing to help and people were. It made me unbelievably thankful for all the people in my life and the huge impact even someone you feel you don’t know very well can have to make things better.

I recognized that I needed help and I asked for it. I’m not very good at asking for help so that was a huge milestone for me. Even better, it worked and helped.

Thursday was a long and tiring day at work and then I was almost too late to a really important event for last night. But I made it there, even after doing several U-Turns, and had another really amazing night. I even ran. Not for very far, granted, but I did it and it didn’t hurt! Then, when I got to where I was going, I was finally able to shut down that part of my heart that still remembers what being in love feels like. I was able to be helpful and supportive and fun and everything that I really am and my emotions didn’t interfere with the situation. I came home last night and felt like I was absolutely on top of the world. I guess finally accepting that my life will never be the way I would wish and then allowing myself to go back to working on my long-term, achievable goals for a quiet life helped me come to terms with accepting that the relationship I wanted will never happen because I am unwanted in the life of someone I love.

Today was then a great and fantastic day. A group of us went bowling and then I sat on the tailgate of my truck and took my shoes off and read a book. It was the perfect temperature outside and the wind blew through the trees, sounding just like the river we used to go camping on when I was a kid. It was so amazing to just enjoy the day.

Things went a little weird when a transportation issue complicated things. I thought that the arrangements that had been made were completely accomplishable on a professional level – that I could ride in a vehicle for two hours with someone who can’t stand me and wants nothing to do with me. I have been in longer trips with people who flat out hated me and whom I certainly didn’t like very much. I was willing to do whatever it took to take care of someone but it just wasn’t a good idea. But, again, I was able to control my emotions and listen to other suggestions as to how to fix the transportation issue. A solution presented itself, and though not ideal, it should work just fine.

Here’s where this story starts to show bigger signs of change. I don’t blame myself for the transportation issues, and I don’t blame the other person involved. I don’t feel guilty or badly about what happened. It frustrated me for a while that the person we were trying to help might have been a little disappointed, but I’m not blaming anyone and I’m not feeling any negative emotions about what happened. We tried some other venues and some other options, but they didn’t pan out. And the other person involved was strong enough to stand by their own beliefs and judgment. I didn’t let my emotions control me and I was mostly able to keep tight control over the things I said. That hasn’t really ever happened. I tried really hard to be okay with everything and everything worked out. Maybe not the ideal way, but it still worked out.

I have even been able to start making a dent in the way I think. Usually, multiple times during the day, I’ll think about something from the past and my brain will fill in what happened and then add in self-hatred for fun. As I am an interactive person, I tend to then talk to myself and say out loud that I hate me. Or what I did wrong this time. Or that no one could ever possibly love or want me.

And now, every single time I even remotely start to think about how much I suck, my brain automatically kicks in with how much that’s a bunch of lies. So now I tell myself out loud, “No. No more hate. No more hate in my life.” And I find myself talking out loud about how thankful I am. I’ll be thankful for the weather, for the trees, for the wind, for the people in my life, for the specific things I love about all the people I love, for where I live, for everything. I don’t blame myself anymore for what happened. I don’t blame the person I love, either. It’s been a hard time for both of us, and I suspect it’s going to be hard for a while. I don’t know that we’ll ever be on speaking terms again, let alone friends on any level. And that’s okay. If this makes life better for them, I’ll support it wholeheartedly. I’ll be fine on my own. I’ve survived this long and now that I’m finding more things to be thankful for and having a better control of my emotions, things are getting easier and better for me, too.

I really am awesome. And fantastic and amazing and wonderful. I’m loyal and dedicated. I have good ethics and morals and I stand up for what I believe is right. A lot of the time, I’m fun, energetic, adventurous, and joyful. I’m super caring and generous. I’m thoughtful. I’m artistic and pretty good with words. I’m smart, intelligent, and well-educated. I have a fun sense of humor and I am not afraid to like things that I like.

Sometimes, things just go wrong. And that’s okay. Sometimes, things go right, too. The last few months have been arduous and stressful, but I’ve learned a lot. I know what being in love feels like and that’s pretty awesome, since I didn’t know what that felt like before and there are so many people who go through their entire lives without feeling that kind of passion. I am thankful for all the amazing memories I have of that time but the past is gone and finished. I can’t cling to hope and dreams that are one-sided. I refuse to stop loving and someday, maybe I will learn how to be loved. But if that never happens, I know I’ll be just fine on my own because I’m not really alone. There are people out there who care about me and would miss me if something ever happened to me. I asked for help, and I received tons of replies and help.

Now it’s time to keep moving forward and to see what I can be now that I have returned to a state of mind where I will go out and adventure and see the world and be thankful for everything and everyone in my life. Retirement will come eventually and until then, I will continue to build my dreams.

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Movie Review: Adventures In Babysitting

Posted on March 31, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

Adventures In Babysitting is one of those movies from my childhood. Some movies from the past should be left in the past, but this is not one of them.

The movie starts with Chris Parker getting ready for her big date, which means that she is singing and dancing in her room. This is a situation which I am very familiar, as I tend to do the same thing when left to my own devices. I definitely sing and dance around my home, though not usually because I am getting ready for any sort of date. Usually, it’s more along the lines of just having a good day and thinking happy thoughts 🙂

So next, the movie turns towards the Anderson house where Sarah and Brad are preparing for the impending arrival of their babysitter, Chris. This movie wins every single awesome award from my childhood, as well as from my current life, because of the portrayal of Sarah. I don’t know how old Sarah is supposed to be, but she is probably under the age of 10. When the audience is first introduced to Sarah, she is coloring pictures of Thor. Her entire room is decorated in Thor posters and paraphernalia and she is dressed like Thor, complete with silver helmet and plastic hammer. She was a fangirl before it was cool or acceptable. I mean, think about it. This movie came out in the 80s. Comic books and things of that nature didn’t become popular or cool or whatever for quite some time and yet, here is this young girl who is not only Thor’s biggest fan, but her parents appear to encourage her interests and allow her to do whatever she wants. So not only do you have a young girl in the 80s who is following her own interests, but she’s also completely supported by her parents who appear to be pretty well off.

It’s easy to see why this was one of the motivational movies from my childhood and it makes me kind of happy that there were movies like this to influence me early on in my life. Even though I was probably too young to fully get all the neat things about this movie, it clearly made an impact in my life, and a positive one at that.

So then the movie goes on to driving on the expressway without a spare tire and what happens when you leave your wallet at home. The night goes progressively worse for them and it’s all really interesting because it borders on the plausible and becomes more amusing as it goes.

This movie then goes on to remind me about how things are different these days. There are a lot of mentions of checkbooks and the whole adventure starts because Chris doesn’t have enough money to pay for a cab for Brenda to return from her running away from home, and it would have cost $40. The value of money has changed so drastically since my childhood.

One of the other fun things about this movie is the music. They have to sing the blues and they stumble into a party. With the exception of the first song in the movie, none of the rest of the songs are ones that were huge or ones that I recognize from those days. But they are fun songs. I have mentioned several times previously that I judge a lot of movies based on their soundtracks and maybe I am unduly influenced towards movies with music I enjoy. All the music was totally dance around in my house worthy 🙂

The big part of this movie that really motivates me is near the end where the team heads down to get their car from Dawson’s garage and Dawson isn’t going to help them out and Sarah appeals to Dawson by telling him that he is Thor and it’s his job to help people. This is one of those times when having faith in someone shows huge benefits. Sarah absolutely believes that Dawson is Thor. And to be fair, he does look quite a bit like Thor. And Sarah’s belief in Dawson changes how he reacts to them and eventually things work out. She tells him that he’s not helping them out because he’s wearing a baseball cap instead of his special silver helmet. So she gives him hers and things are saved.

Overall, this movie is fun and amusing and light-hearted and everything I needed for tonight. I’m glad I own it and I actually rewatch it rather frequently, so it’s either a high four or a five on my rating scale.

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Movie Review: Pacific Rim

Posted on March 30, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

It surprises me that I haven’t yet done a review on Pacific Rim, since this is one of those movies and soundtracks that enjoy greatly.

To be honest, when Pacific Rim first came out, I didn’t really have any huge desire to go see it. I wasn’t really watching many movies around that time because I had just moved and didn’t feel like going out by myself, which meant that I didn’t really know anything about any of the movies that were in theaters.

You know how you randomly meet someone who you connect with on every level, and you connect so strongly that everyone around you can just FEEL it, even when they don’t know what they’re feeling? Yeah. I didn’t know what that was like, either. Now I know what that feels like and it’s a feeling that is unbelievably rare and something that I will never mistake if I ever feel it again. It’s intense, addictive, and powerful.

I can imagine that’s exactly what it would feel like to be drift-compatible with someone and to use giant robots to go face giant monsters in order to save the world. The passion and fire that can connect two people together adds drive and purpose to life. Take that passion and that connection and use it to save the world from giant alien monsters.

Pacific Rim was a visually beautiful movie. I enjoyed the technology and the details that went into creating the Jaegers and the Kaijus. I liked the different Jaegers and the different types of pilots for each different model. The Jaegers were designed from the inside out, with gears and working mechanics and all the things that would make machines of that size work. Then, the Jaegers were given the outside skins and the designs both inside and outside were all unique and created with the cultures and personality types of the pilots and main countries of the crew who put the Jaegers together. Even the names were unique, but I have to say that Gypsy Danger is just plain cool.

Probably my favorite aspect of the entire movie was the fact that this was not a romantic movie. Mako and Reily are both strong characters with their own stories, their own histories, and their own sense of purpose. Neither of them are just there as a romantic interest for anyone else, and that’s a bit rare in today’s movies. But the key and the part about this movie that really stuck with me was that the two characters are only really amazing when they are a team and working together. Sure, they’re great individually, but as a team? Unstoppable.

I also enjoyed the cross-cultural aspects of this movie. For once, you see the whole world involved in something that would actually require the world to deal with it. If giant monsters come out of a breach in space that occurs in the ocean, the monsters aren’t going to just destroy America or China or wherever. They’re going to go wherever they want and destroy whatever they want. Nationalities and man-made borders aren’t going to make any difference to giant alien monsters. So the fact that you get Australians working with Americans working with Chinese working with Japanese working with Siberians is pretty fantastic.

Overall, this is obviously a movie that I saw several times in the theater, then I bought the soundtrack, and I own the movie as well. By my own standards, that ranks this movie as a five, which is one that I will happily buy and watch repeatedly.

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Book Review: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Posted on March 24, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

Continuing on my current trend of reading shorter books, I started The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Young Adult Fantasy 224 pages) by L. Frank Baum yesterday and was easily able to finish it today.

I enjoyed this book and this story very much. I liked that this was a story of adventure and fun and I was absolutely moved by all the bright and different colors. I have never read this story before, nor have I seen any of the movies that share the title. I’d have to say that none of the ones I’ve seen previews for could possible do justice to this book.

I think there are some lessons to be garnered throughout this story, even though the notes by L. Frank Baum specifically state that this story is intended purely for entertainment.

Dorothy is a very simple girl from Kansas. She longs for her home because it is the home that she knows. This really strikes a chord with me because people ask me all the time why I want to eventually move back to my home state, where it apparently rains more than most people would like. It’s my home and I miss it. I miss the rain and the way the world smells clean afterwards. I miss seeing the sunsets over the ocean and mountains right after a storm. I miss the storms and the lightning. I miss the greens and I even miss the greys. I miss listening to the rain on the roof and the days of hot chocolate and cozy warm blankets. I miss dancing in the puddles and in the rain, so soaked that you might as well jump in a pool. I miss the forests and the scenic drives. I miss the ferry rides. It is my home and I miss it terribly. And that’s exactly what Dorothy misses in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. She misses the home that she knows. So while my home and Dorothy’s may seem like polar opposites, I understand her yearning all too well.

One of the really big things to take away from this story, though, is to be polite to everyone and help out everyone that you can. Even the smallest creatures or events are connected in ways that we can’t possibly understand. Helping a mouse now might lead to saving one of your friends trapped in a poppy field, or getting directions when you are lost.  Also when you help people, you make friends who are willing and eager to help you, as friends should always do. Dorothy, Toto, the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion all become friends and they help each other out. Each one has several times in the story where they are uniquely suited to save the adventure and the rest of their friends and they each perform their tasks with all their heart. They go back for members of their party who are lost and don’t leave them behind. They share in each other’s enjoyment and each other’s sorrow. They are friends in the true definition of the word.

Each one of the characters are completely different sizes and shapes, with very different personalities. This is also a lesson in not judging people because they are not like you. If Dorothy had started her adventure and not been open-minded and caring enough to help the Scarecrow, even though she didn’t know him and he wasn’t a human like her, then the adventure would have likely taken an entirely different path. I very much liked how each of the characters were so very different. I guess the story would also say something along the lines of, “be who you are and amazing people will enter your life, but don’t expect them to be anything like you. Accept them for who and what they are and your friendship will only grow.”

I also liked that each of them already had the characteristics they were hoping magic could grant them. The Scarecrow had a lot of really good ideas during their adventures. The Tin Woodman cared more for those around him than I’ve seen most enlightened people do today. The Cowardly Lion showed more bravery in defending his friends than I think most people would show. They all just needed to believe in themselves in order to have what they wanted the most. I think that’s a hard lesson for anyone to learn. Believing in yourself takes a lot of work and courage and the path is often paved with self-doubt and self-judging. I know I’ve spent a lot of time being my own worst enemy and I still slip ever-so-slightly into those self-destructive thought processes every now and then, but I work hard every day to believe in myself and to know that I really am awesome 🙂 And so it is with the characters in this story. Once someone else believed in them and gave them what they thought they needed via magic, all of them became happy.

The Wizard of Oz amused me the most, as all the movies these days seem to spend the story glorifying him and showing what a great and terrible wizard he is, but really, he’s just a nobody who was pretending to be a somebody. Granted, he did some good things for the land of Oz by building the city and taking care of the people, but it was kind of a sham because he wasn’t doing it honestly as himself. He put on a mask and used tricks to convince the people to do what he wanted. Really, it’s Dorothy who is totally awesome and I don’t know that the media ever really gets that right.

Overall, this was a fun, light-hearted adventure story that was very well written. The story moved very quickly and I enjoyed it greatly. I am very glad I own this book and will likely read it again many times in the future.

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Movie Review: Hotel Transylvania

Posted on March 23, 2014 by C.A. Jacobs

I recently picked up a blu-ray player and Hotel Transylvania was the first blu-ray movie I watched on it. I really believe that animated movies are a lot better on blu-ray, since the picture was absolutely amazing.

I liked the imagination and the design of this movie and was quite a bit in awe with the first scenes and the castle and forest. I’m not really someone who pays attention to the animators and the internal politics that go along with that, so I judge a movie solely on my own perception of it. There were a lot of really beautifully done animated scenes in the movie like the village and the castle and the first sunrise. I have a very deep respect for those individuals who have true artistic talent and can make films such as this.

I enjoyed the different look at “monsters” and their lives and I thought the story was one of those universal lines about how sometimes people go kind of wrong directions when attempting to protect the people in their lives who they love. My parents encouraged all of my adventures and so I don’t know what it would be like to have parents who would discourage me from going out and seeing the world, but I felt like this movie did a very good job of showing what kind of environment that would be. The movie showed how and why Dracula felt so strongly about Mavis and why he didn’t want her to leave, and I feel that theme can be transferred to a lot of parents and maybe their concern over sending their children out to see the world. The world is a big, scary place and you never know what might happen. But you also can’t be caged if you have the desire to fly.

Speaking of flying, I almost died of cute when Mavis turned into a bat and was flying around the room with her tiny pink helmet. And then when she was doing the crying bat eyes. Cute animals get me just about every time.

There were two really moving moments near the end of the movie and those got me a little teary-eyed. Mavis’ present from her mom and the story that went with it and the moment when Dracula confronts the humans at the festival. I think the partial lesson there is that you shouldn’t judge people based on what you think they are supposed to be. Dracula spent the whole movie being frustrated, angry, and hurt by the humans, but when he faced humans from the modern era, he had to reevaluate all the things he thought he believed.

The in-flight movie on the plane caused me huge amounts of laughter. And it’s still making me smile to think of it. I was highly amused and I’m not quite sure how they got away with putting that in the film. But they did and I laughed 🙂

I think the only thing that I didn’t find amusing about the movie was the music. I’ve never been much of a fan of rap and music of that nature so some of the songs I found more annoying than fun. While I may not really judge a movie based on its animations and the politics involved therein, I do find myself putting a lot of weight into the soundtrack. I think if I was able to take out all the musical numbers that had rapping elements that I would have scored this movie a little bit higher because it really was a fun movie that I enjoyed. Except I found myself actually annoyed by the music on three separate occasions, hoping that the musical numbers would be done sooner or get cut off or something.

Overall, I enjoyed the movie. I’d rate it a three and kind of wish I had purchased it on sale, just because the music bothered me so much. But the story and characters were good, so I’m sure I’ll watch it again at some point, which is good since I did actually buy it 🙂

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