Category: 20th century

Anatomy of A Scene – “I came in at the end…The best is over.”

“A lot of the best scenes in the show revolve around this conflicted mobster, Tony Soprano (played brilliantly by James Gandolfini), who suffers from both innate anxiety and depression, along with his dysfunctional families who intend to drag him down if he can’t help doing it himself.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cQOej9nuho

‘The Sopranos’ is one of the most highly acclaimed television shows of all-time and is not just a show about a man caught between his real family and his mafia family but also about a certain period in American life. A lot of the best scenes in the show revolve around this conflicted mobster, Tony Soprano (played brilliantly by James Gandolfini), who suffers from both innate anxiety and depression, along with his dysfunctional families who intend to drag him down if he can’t help doing it himself.

There is a particular scene early in the 1st season where we are first getting to know the character of Tony Soprano and what makes him tick. The first scene in his therapist’s office, which would be a recurring motif throughout the show, has Tony trying to pin down the roots of his depression, which is what brought him to Dr. Jennifer Melfi (Lorraine Bracco) in the first place. Tony has no idea what is causing him the blues, pontificating openly that it could be “stress, maybe?” especially as he has recently started to have panic attacks occur out of nowhere.

Dr. Melfi asks him about what could be causing the stress he is feeling? Tony isn’t sure but believes that “it’s good to be at something at the ground floor.” Now, the audience can assume what he is referring to is the La Cosa Nostra or Italian-American mafia, which is on the decline as the show first aired in 1999 and could be on its way out. However, since Dr. Melfi isn’t aware yet who Tony Soprano is and what his life in the mafia like, she assumes he means about life in suburban America in the 1990s, which had a lot of amenities including bigger houses and bigger cars with a more privacy, but for which has left many Americans feel unfulfilled.

“I came in at the end…the best is over.” While Tony may be referring to the historical arc of the Italian mafia and how it’s in irrevocable decline, the show paints it to Melfi and the audience as something deeper yet not as pronounced. Melfi replies, “Many Americans, I think, feel that way”, implying that while the country has gotten materially wealthier and more prosperous to a degree, our family and perhaps spiritual life has been on the decline for quite some time and perhaps has led to a moral decline.

While Tony was inferred to be talking about the mafia and how he is now boss of his Soprano crime family unlike his father who never ‘reached the heights like him’ or wasn’t as successful materially in terms of his life in the suburbs, Tony still feels unfulfilled by his success.

While his father wasn’t as successful in the mafia life, he still passed it down to his son, but in those days, Tony feels as many Americans would relate to that there was more pride and togetherness in their communities among families of different backgrounds. In the atomized suburbs, it’s harder to connect with those in your family or to form as tight of cultural or religious or social bonds with people of your background.

“But in a lot of ways, he had it better. He (Tony’s father) had it better. He had his people. They had their standards. Their pride. Now, today, what do we got?” The scene also demonstrates that this was filmed in 1999, just at the turn to the 21st century, before 9/11 happened, the 2008 financial crisis, the election of Donald Trump as President, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Even on the cusp of 2000, the show demonstrates that not all was rosy in America and there was a sense of dissatisfaction back then with where the country was headed and that the ’best days may be behind us’ in more ways than one.

While the focus is on the decline of mob life in this scene and in the show, which does so consistently over six brilliant seasons, it also highlights a parallel loss of faith and trust in American institutions as well as the rise of greed, malaise, and apathy in our cultural attitudes, and a sense that maybe American decline is our future. While the scene is not overtly political, you have Tony reading the Newark Star-Ledger, a New Jersey daily paper, indicating that “President Clinton warns of Medicare going bust in Year 2000.”

The front-page newspaper headline tells you that even back then in 1999, there were worries about our institutions eroding, the promises meant to be kept at danger of being broken after many decades of effort, and the average middle-aged suburbanite feeling unsatisfied about the prospect of a dimmer future, especially for his or her children. While Tony’s parents were better off because of their closer family and community ties in the big city or the exurbs nearby, he was not able to say the same about his suburban life. Even at a time where his generation were able to still have had a better life materially and perhaps financially than their parents, would their children be worse off in both ways if the decline is to pass, both financially and spiritually?

Twenty-two years later since this scene first aired on HBO, it is interesting to look back at Tony’s anxieties as being prophetic rather than misplaced. Younger Americans of my generation and the generation behind me look at it reasonably and think that Tony Soprano, despite his crimes and misdeeds and his Mafia boss life, may have had one thing right: “I came in at the end, the best is over…” Now, the question remains, how do we deal with it as a country and as a people?

My Thoughts on the ‘Muhammad Ali’ PBS Documentary

“Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. Rumble, young man, rumble. Ahhhhhh!” This catchphrase from the Greatest boxer of all-time, Muhammad Ali, still ring in my ears as I write about the legend.”

“Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. Rumble, young man, rumble. Ahhhhhh!” This catchphrase from the Greatest boxer of all-time, Muhammad Ali, still ring in my ears as I write about the legend. After 8-hours of rarely seen footage, insightful interviews from those people who knew him best, and catchy music and news events highlighting the era and period in which the Greatest grew up in, the Muhammad Ali documentary on PBS (American public television) is a real knockout. There is too much television and movies out there to choose from especially with the streaming services but the Muhammad Ali documentary, recently released in September of 2021 is worth a watch.

Eight hours in total length, split into four ‘rounds or parts, the documentary chronicles the entire 74-years old in which Muhammad Ali or Cassius Clay walked among us mere mortals from his childhood in Louisville to his rise to boxing stardom dating from Rome to New York City to Manila to his old age, where he sadly struggled through the progression of the fatal Parkinson’s disease. Ali was a man who was almost too unreal to believe he had existed because of all he said, accomplished, and did during his life.

If you looked in an English idiom dictionary for the expression, ‘larger than life’, a picture and short description about Muhammad Ali should be there as well. The swagger he had when he walked in a room, his way with words as a poet and the ability to dress down his opponent with insults as powerful as his punches, and his commitment to not only his religion but the people around him such as a friends, family, and even random strangers who he would often give money, food, or anything they needed when they were going through a tough time.

Ali was not just talented in the ring, but he was also extremely intelligent, wise beyond his years, and able to be charismatic with many people he would meet. Most boxers would keep to themselves back in the 1960s or 1970s and would not embrace trash-talking, denigrating their opponents, or making bold claims that they weren’t sure would come to fruition. Muhammad Ali did the exact opposite and he built up a reputation to the point where billions of people knew who he was from America to Africa and from Asia to South America. His rants became legendary, and his diatribes were shown to garner a huge amount of press to sell his fights. In my view, he made boxing a global sport and he connected with all people regardless of race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion. He had love for everybody except for the men he would fight against.

The difference with Muhammad Ali compared to other braggart boxers is that he would often back up his predictions by making them real especially in his early days beating boxers like Sonny Liston and Floyd Patterson. He would not only predict that he would win his fight, but he specifically predicted the round in which his poor opponent would be knocked out. His legend grew the more he talked trash and made fun of his opponents and he backed it up in the ring by winning constantly. If he were not Muhammad Ali in terms of talent, hard work, and pure drive to be great, as a boxer, he would have faded away quickly, He simply was a once-in-a-century talent who kept boxing as a world sport in his era and it was the height of its popularity as a sport in America.

Ali, perhaps because of his family upbringing, his change of religion to Islam, or because of an innate sense of right and wrong was a plain-spoken activist who didn’t mince words. He was against racism in all its forms, was against the Vietnam War, and stood up for the poor and disenfranchised people around the world who were without the same opportunities that he had been able to take advantage of because of his boxing talent. While he was a devout member of the group, the Nation of Islam, and had his differences with both Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., because of his affiliation with that group, he often strived to be a critical thinker on issues of race and religion and would dutifully follow his conscience often when expressing himself in public, as he often did in the national and global spotlight.

Sadly, Muhammad Ali, in pursuit of fame, fortune, and women, made serious mistakes along the way to become the greatest boxer of all-time. The constant time spent on the road, the brutal training regimens, the temptations he succumbed to with extramarital affairs, and even his disregard for friendships such as with Malcolm X or neglecting his wife(wives) or children due to his first love of boxing. He was an imperfect man who committed many sins as he puts it in the documentary.

However, even his sins did not stop him from putting in the work to commit more good deeds than sins throughout his life and for which when it came down to his estimation of himself as a Muslim at the end of his life, he felt comfort knowing he committed more rights than wrongs upon his death. The difference too with Ali is that he knew he had done wrong and tried to make amends later in life for his misdeeds. He apologized and atoned for his womanizing, unnecessary insults of other boxers, and his previous disavowal of friends and family like Malcolm X when they conflicted with his loyal membership to the Nation of Islam.

When I think about this documentary, the way it was able to catalog every major event in Ali’s life while simultaneously describing how he must have felt or acted the way he did during those pivotal moments in his life make this documentary the greatest one made about ‘The Greatest’ himself. Few documentaries go into that much detail, use relevant interviews and narration, while maximizing the quality of historical footage to draw the viewer in. If you are new to the good works of Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, Lynn Novick, David McMahon, and the rest of his wonderful documentary team, he is one of America’s greatest filmmakers in this genre.

Having done previous documentaries on ‘Baseball’, ‘Jackie Robinson’, and the other famous American boxer, ‘Jack Johnson’, you can tell that Ken and his team feel as comfortable documenting American sports history as much as his other documentaries on American politics and war history too. The sheer years of effort it takes to create an eight-hour long documentary like this one on ‘Muhammad Ali’ shows you how dedicated to the craft of documentary making Ken Burns and his team are. They have been doing it for over forty years now and it seems like they get better and better with each new documentary. If this documentary is the first you’ve seen by Ken Burns, do yourself a favor and watch the other sports history documentaries and check out his other ones on other aspects of American history.

What I enjoy most about documentaries about sports or political figures done by Ken Burns and team is that they highlight major events, victories, and defeats of that person or the team, but they also make sure to put that figure or people fit in with the swirling tide of history and timeline through the music soundtrack, the relevant footage, and the interviews with those people from the same era or who know that era in history.

The ‘Muhammad Ali’ documentary is not just about ‘The Greatest’ himself but about the times he lived in as an American and how he changed the country just as he was changed by the country himself. He influenced America more than most figures throughout the 20th century and will be remembered by future generations. He will be known not simply as the greatest boxer of all-time but also as a man who stood up for his principles, fought or did not fight for what he believed in, and enacted positive social changes by helping the poor, the disenfranchised, or even the stranger on the street.

He was a larger-than-life figure who transcended both sports, politics, and culture, and this ‘larger than life’ documentary pays great homage to one of the most celebrated and remembered Americans in the nation’s 246-year long and counting history.

‘The Edge’ – Film Review and Analysis

“Whether it was ‘The Revenant’ with Leonardo DiCaprio or ‘The Grey’ with Liam Neeson, these films highlight man’s struggle to overcome the elements, the animals, and even his own demons. Many of these ‘man v. nature’ films focus on one main lead and a small cast of supporting characters but most of the film’s runtime is about the sole main character. ‘The Edge’ is different.”

I have always really liked Man vs. Nature type of films. Even though they have similar premises and conclusions, it really is a raw kind of film that grips you and leaves you wondering what you would do in a similar kind of situation. Whether it was ‘The Revenant’ with Leonardo DiCaprio or ‘The Grey’ with Liam Neeson, these films highlight man’s struggle to overcome the elements, the animals, and even his own demons. Many of these ‘man v. nature’ films focus on one main lead and a small cast of supporting characters but most of the film’s runtime is about the sole main character. ‘The Edge’ is different.

In ‘The Edge’ (1997), this survival film does something else by highlighting two men who have different intentions and different backgrounds. One is a wealthy man named Charles Morse (played by Anthony Hopkins) and the other is a photography presumably who take pictures of models and is very much a person of the city who is not used to nature or wildlife. Bob Green (played by Alec Baldwin) has ulterior motives in mind but comes off as affable and friendly enough in giving Charles a gift for his birthday in the form of a hunting knife. Charles is accompanied by his beautiful wife, a model named Mickey, who Bob takes pictures of as well as Bob’s assistant, Stephen, who is also new to being in wildlife. The small group are joined by a few friends in a cabin in the Canadian wilderness to celebrate Charles’s birthday.

From the beginning of this film, you can tell that Charles is more comfortable with his intellectual pursuits than with his friends. He loves Mickey, his wife, but he understands that he is more interested in books than in people. Charles is particular obsessed with a survival book / guide that he is reading and is fascinated by the natural surroundings that he has brought the group to and the people who hunt there for bears and other wildlife.

Charles’s fondness for nature and of survival are to come in handy later on in the film and is an excellent use of foreshadowing when things go haywire later on. During this birthday celebration, the viewer can also tell that Bob while he is kind to Charles is envious of him, his life, his money, and his wife. He openly flirts with Mickey and kisses her platonically. Charles can sense this animosity and is wary of Bob’s intentions.

Part of the reason why they all have come up to the Canadian wilderness besides Charles’s birthday is to find, interview, and take photographs of a famous Alaskan Indian hunter. During their flight, as Bob and Charles make small talk, Charles blurts out of the blue to him: “How do you plan to kill me?”. Before Bob has a chance to respond, a flock of birds come out of nowhere and strike the plane’s engines and its windshield killing the pilot and causing a downward crash.

The plane crash lands in the lake and all three men (Bob, Charles, and Stephen) are all shook up but survive the crash. The pilot does not but the men quickly realize they may be stranded for a while. Charles, given his survival skills knowledge, takes charge and encourages the other two men not to panic and to learn from him. Using his encyclopedic knowledge from his memory, he is able to make a compass to plot their course forward, make a small fire, and also give them advice about how to proceed.

Charles is not perfect in his survival skills and he almost gets swallowed up by a river rapid that almost carries him away until Bob pulls him out. For most of the film, it is unclear to the viewer how the two men really feel about each other. Their survival and getting out of the wild takes first priority. This becomes even more pressing when they wander into the territory of a giant Kodiak bear who is a real ‘manhunter’ as Charles calls him.

Stephen injures himself while climbing and Bob mistakenly hangs up the blood-soaked clothes of Stephen later on at night around the fire drawing the bear to him. This costly mistake leads to the Kodiak bear tracing their scent and finding them. Instead of burying the clothes, Bob lets them hang above their campsite causing Stephen to be attacked and brutally killed by the bear. Bob and Charles barely escape and realize that if they want to survive this ordeal, they must band together to trick the bear and then kill him.

Food is also a concern for both men as they haven’t eaten anything since they crashed and will starve to death if they don’t kill the bear. This is another instance where Charles comes in handy as he is able to distract the bear while Bob goads the bear into falling into their trap. By working together as a team and using a hidden spear to impale the bear, Bob and Charles are able to kill the bear together even when they both end up wounded from the encounter.

This is a small victory in the long road to survival for both men as they are able to eat well, don bear skins, and even find a cabin where they can get supplies. However, this is not the end of their animosity or wariness of each other. Man’s most fatal enemy is not nature or animals but often his fellow man and that comes into play.

While Charles is a smart and dedicated man to have achieved his wealth and success, he may have been naïve to who Bob is and what his wife Mickey was doing with him. Bob is not a survivalist and relies on Charles to survive but with the bear vanquished and having reached a cabin with some ability to reside there for some time, does Bob need Charles anymore and will his wife Mickey miss him if he didn’t come back?

The viewer has a lot to absorb and while I don’t want to spoil the film’s ending, ‘The Edge’ is not just about survivalism, but the edge of our tolerance of one another or our shared cooperation when a woman or money or prestige comes between people. Both men are not perfect, and they gain more when they cooperate rather than try to kill one another. Bob has the negative traits of hubris, envy, and short-sightedness. He is not able to survive the woods without Charles but wonders how much he truly needs him now that they have conquered the bear. He also covets Bob’s wife and wonders if he could murder Charles and get away with it by making it look like an accident.

Charles is an avid survivalist but may be naïve about the people around him. He also knows that Mickey and Bob and other people may take advantage of him and he may not know if they truly love him for him or if it is for his wealth and influence. While Bob is a personable, fun, and outgoing, Charles is an introvert with a love for knowledge and learning. They are opposite personalities, which is why they clash at times during this film.

While being in a precarious, life-threatening situation can bring the best out of people, it can also bring the worst out of the people, which is why ‘The Edge’ is a great film. Survival films like it do not just focus on the brutal realm of the wilderness where our creature comforts and our money cannot protect us, but they can also focus on man’s cruelty to man as well as our ability to work together too. ‘The Edge’ does a good job of pointing out how we can rise to the occasion when our survival counts on it but also shows us how dark human nature can be when we feel compelled to act out of jealousy, rage, and deceit.

‘The Edge’ is a great and underrated film, which I do highly recommend. The vistas of the Canadian wilderness are brilliant shown through the cinematography. The Kodiak bear, which was played by a real bear, named Bart, does a great job of showing how terrifying and powerful a giant bear can be when it is attacking you. Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin are respectively some of the best actors of their generations and they do a great job of highlighting the unique personalities of their characters. You really believe the scenarios that they could find themselves in having been stranded in the wilderness for weeks. It is a believable kind of film from being able to make a fire, to finding fish in the river, to being attacked by a bear, to climbing and hiking day after day in unknown territory.

‘The Edge’ is overall a very compelling and realistic film. It does a great job of blending elements of ‘man vs. nature’, ‘man vs. animal’, and most importantly ‘man vs. man’, which is an element missing from our survival films. I would be lying if watching ‘The Edge’ didn’t make me want to buy my own survivalist guide to learn about how to survive in the wild for days or weeks. A terrifying plane crash, a boat whose engine doesn’t start, or a car engine that goes dead is enough to make anyone panic.

I believe it is important to prepare like Charles did for that kind of horrible situation and not to panic or dwell with shame. As Charles says at the beginning of the film, “Those who get lost in the woods often die of shame because they were ashamed that it happened to them.” This is an important quote of his to keep in mind. When the chips are down, you have to use your knowledge, resources, and will to survive whatever the circumstances. The best time to start preparing for that kind of occurrence is now.

Cultural Spotlight – Brazilian Jiu Jitsu

“A growing and popular martial art can be found in Brazil known as Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. While Jiu Jitsu or Judo originated in Japan and was meant more for fighting and hand to hand combat, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is more focused on using the skills of grappling and then submission in order to become victorious.”

You cannot fully enjoy a culture until you dabble in or learn about its martial arts if that culture has them available. From Karate in Japan to Kung Fu in China, most martial arts are thought to be of Asian origin but that is not always the case. A growing and popular martial art can be found in Brazil known as Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. While Jiu Jitsu or Judo originated in Japan and was meant more for fighting and hand to hand combat, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is more focused on using the skills of grappling and then submission in order to become victorious.

Brazilian Jiu Jitsu has become more popular in recent years especially due to the corresponding growth of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) sport, which focuses on mixed martial arts training including BJJ as part of a fighter’s overall repertoire. Jiu Jitsu originated as a martial art in Japan and was firstly used by Japanese samurai warriors as a means of self-defense especially if they were unarmed and without any other way to fight.

While Japanese Jiu-Jitsu has morphed into the modern Judo sport, which emphasizes throws, takedowns, and joint locks, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu was founded as a martial art that is similar but focuses primarily on ground fighting including submission and stamina.

A student of the traditional form of Japanese Jiu Jitsu and a participant at the Kodokan, Mr. Mitsuo Maeda brought his training and his over twenty years of experience with him over the ocean to Brazil where he arrived in 1914 essentially founding the sport which became known as BJJ. Maeda had a lot of prowess in Judo actions like throws and takedowns, but his specialty was in ground fighting, which made it logical for him to want to help create a new form of the martial art.

History was made when Maeda met Gastao Gracie, a businessman, who encouraged his sons including Carlos and Helio to study Jiu Jitsu with Maeda as his students. Over time, the two brothers adapted the Judo style of jiu jitsu to their own liking including the ability to adapt the system of ground fighting known as ‘newaza’ to be more of its own kind of sport and that anybody of different size or strength could learn about. Instead of relying on pure strength like Judo, BJJ relies more on knowledge of the various moves you could make, anticipating your opponents’ actions, and using speed to gain an advantage over your opponent.

For many years, the Gracie family would create Brazilian jiu jitsu and establish this unique fighting style, which incorporated other elements of wrestling, judo, and jiu jitsu but is primarily focused on how to grapple and submit your opponent on the ground. Since the Gracie family were experts in the sport they help found, they rarely lost a match but ended up spreading the sport around Brazil and the rest of the Latin America throughout the latter half of the 20th century. Without their influence, their competitions, and their move creations, BJJ would not be as popular as it is today.

Rorion Gracie later came to the United States in the 1970s to spread the sport to America in the hopes that it could compete with boxing, karate, wrestling, and other forms of martial arts that had gained a hold in the popular culture. Rorian Gracie’s biggest move in terms of popularizing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and helping to mainstream the sport was making it part of the skillset needed for the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). Rorion co-founded the UFC along with Bob Meyrowitz and others which came about in November of 199

Rorion’s younger brother, Royce, was an instrumental part of showing how Brazilian Jiu Jitsu could be instrumental in helping a smaller or less big fighter win a match due to the leverage, technique, and thinking involved in making the right move at the right time. Royce Gracie is one of the greatest MMA fighters of all time and is in the UFC hall of time. His influence helped paved the way for the Brazilian form of Jiu Jitsu being integral to competing in mixed martial arts with its grappling, submission, and ground fighting techniques.

The Gracie’s have helped create many new BJJ fighters and MMA fighters in general. From Brazil to America to the rest of the world, BJJ is an extremely popular martial art whose origins in Rio de Janeiro by way of Japan have changed people’s lives for the better. Not only great for one’s sense of accomplishment, BJJ is great exercise and good for one’s mental health too. While not as physically punishing as boxing or wrestling, you have to be in great shape to win in a BJJ match and to do rolling (sparring, grappling) with another classmate in a class.

From podcast host Joe Rogan to TOOL musician Maynard James Keenan to the late, great Anthony Bourdain, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu counts millions of students from around the world who rank from white belt to black belt. GI or No GI, you don’t need to be a certain size or weight level to get started. You just simply need to be determined, practice at least a couple of times a week, and be willing to learn a lot in order to be successful in this particular martial art. Once I have the chance to do so, I would like to start training and getting involved in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and I hope that you at home will consider giving it a chance as well. Good luck.

‘Office Space’ – Film Review and Analysis

“1999 was an incredible and unique year for movies in America. In an era where Hollywood would regularly produce thought-provoking content that did not dumb it down for audience and would tackle tricky real-life topics without a filter, it may have been the golden age of film for those of us in the Millennial generation.”

1999 was an incredible and unique year for movies in America. In an era where Hollywood would regularly produce thought-provoking content that did not dumb it down for audience and would tackle tricky real-life topics without a filter, it may have been the golden age of film for those of us in the Millennial generation. While not as ‘politically correct’, these movies such as ‘Office Space’ challenged our assumptions, made us question our modern comforts, and perhaps most importantly showed us the ridiculousness of having flair as a waiter or waitress at a chain restaurant as a part of the service given.

Poking fun at chain restaurants is far from the only good thing about ‘Office Space’, one of my favorite movies of all-time. During that year of 1999, two other excellent movies placed a mirror in front of our society and made us reflect on whether ‘modern’ was really that good and whether ‘materialism’ was that spiritually enlightening. While not as complex as ‘The Matrix’ or as serious as ‘American Beauty’, ‘Office Space’ is a comedy but not your average one. It chides you with wisecracking humor but also lays bare certain aspects of American adult life that are not just unpleasant but downright silly.

Whether it is a loud co-worker talking too much over the phone, a crappy printer that just won’t do its job, meaningless reports to file each week, or an obnoxious boss who makes you come in on the weekends, ‘Office Space’ is an ode to the white collar worker who despite the good health care benefits and the steady salary is unfulfilled with his life and is not sure why.

Peter Gibbons (Ron Livingston) is exasperated with his office job in IT (Information Technology) at a software company, Initech. He goes out of his way to avoid his obnoxious and micro-managing boss, Bill Lumbergh, who insists on him working on the weekends but also indicates wanting covers on the TPS reports, which is a mindless and meaningless task. Peter is comfortable with the job but knows deep down it isn’t satisfying him and he comes into work dreading it each day. Peter dislikes most of his co-workers including a lady who says to him, “Somebody has a case of the Mondays” to downplay his frustration of commuting to a suburban office park each and every week while dealing with traffic and the lack of purpose involved.

Probably the only reason Peter stays at his job are his two friends at work who sympathize with him, Michael Bolton (no relation to the singer as he makes clear) and Samir Nagheenanajar (who is obviously frustrated that no one in America can pronounce his last name). They are not as depressed as Peter but they also understand where he is coming from. Peter also gets sympathy from his neighbor, Lawrence, who lives next door. Lawrence does not work in an office and works on construction projects outdoors so he can’t relate to Peter so much with his drudgery at work but he emphasizes how nobody ever told him that he ‘has a case of the Mondays.’ He makes clear in a hilarious way that if somebody ever did that to him, they would get their ass kicked for that.

Peter’s unsatisfying life is also compounded by his girlfriend who is cheating on him and the fact that he is forced to go see a hypnotist who she thinks can help Peter get out of the funk that he is in. In perhaps the funniest scene in the film, the hypnotist / psychotherapist who is extremely overweight is in the process of hypnotizing Peter to snap him out of his lethargy regarding work and seemingly drops dead in front of him and his girlfriend.

Because the hypnotist died before taking Peter out of his temporary state of ease and relaxation, Peter’s whole personality changes and he stops worrying about work and his performance there with hilarious results. He starts to be honest about his work, his boss, and his forced weekend workdays and shockingly, instead of him getting fired, he gets promoted. Even though his girlfriend leaves him because of his lack of concern for the hypnotist’s death, Peter meets a new love interest shortly after.

His meeting with Joanna at an Applebee’s clone as he grabs a long lunch one day while skipping work; he is drawn to her because of her beauty, humor, and the fact that they both love kung-fu. Unbeknownst to her, she is also working a crummy job which is demeaning, and Peter starts to show her how to take control of her working life by caring less and being more honest.

After the hypnotist’s unfortunate death, Peter’s life does a complete 180 as he is more relaxed, less angry, and strangely more confident. He sleeps in more, gets a pay raise from two of his eight bosses (the Bob’s), and he devises a plan to steal a little bit of money from his company over a period of years. While not a good move on his part, Peter and his two co-workers, Michael and Samir, are also tired of the monotony and mistreatment at the hands of their bosses and co-workers. If they can get a little bit of money before quitting, they figure it won’t backfire on them.

While I do not want to spoil the rest of the movie, Peter is not innocent and bites off more than he can chew which causes him to wake up in a number of ways and to really fix his life instead of floating through it or resorting to a criminal action. He does realize that he is responsible for his own happiness or unhappiness and it is up to him alone to make his life fulfilling rather than meaningless. Peter is a likable character who a lot of people can relate to who have worked in an office type of setting. Still, what is blasé and unappealing to him, may be amazing and meaningful to others.

‘Office Space’ is not just about the negatives of office work and that kind of lifestyle but it is a meaningful referendum on a life not well lived. The film is a dark comedy by genre, but it also holds some deep truths within it. Director Mike Judge reminds everybody watching that you only get one life to live and how you really should consider spending it before time runs out. In addition to the fact that it is both a reflective and entertaining comedy, it is also of course a really funny movie worth a repeat viewing or two to catch all of the jokes.

While not very successful when it first released in 1999, it later became a cult classic film thanks to Blockbuster, DVDs, and the Internet’s growth. ‘Office Space’ is very quotable and I have myself referenced it multiple times especially when a printer I’m using is not working. The soundtrack of hip hop and rap from the 90s also makes it a true film from that decade. As many of America’s working men and women went from being in factories to office parks, this film has really hit a cord with not just Generation X but also the Millennial generation.

I would like to think that when you watch this film, you start to examine your own working life to figure out if it is ‘working’ for you or not. Maybe you prefer to be in another environment when you work or you prefer to work alone, this film probes the question of what office work is usually like and the downsides that it comes with. When this film was made, there were no remote work options and now it seems to be more popular. I like to think that one of the major effects of ‘Office Space’s later popularity in the 21st century is that it got more and more people to realize that cubicles aren’t and shouldn’t be for everyone. They just aren’t.

Museum of Japanese Immigration in Brazil

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Camera: Samsung Galaxy J2 Core

Location: Historical Museum of Japanese Immigration; São Paulo, Brazil

A Profile in Courage – Marshal Candido Rondon

Who is Candido Rondon? It is likely you have never learned about this Brazilian figure of history, but he was not only an exemplary Brazilian, but he was also an extraordinary explorer, friend to indigenous peoples, soldier, statesman, and traveler. Achieving the highest rank in the Brazilian military, he devoted himself to the service of his nation in the twilight of empire and the forging of a new republic. While not a politician nor a man hungry for power, he was a man of great courage, fortitude, and moral fiber. He put others before himself and never wanted to be immersed in the modern wants for fame or fortune as others greedily claim for themselves in the modern era.

While a military officer first, he was a famous explorer who cared about the environment and did his best to balance that with his desire for progressive development of connecting a new nation together through telegraph lines as director of the official commission. He not only cared about the environment but also sought for the protection of indigenous peoples who he encountered during his explorations and made sure that all of his interactions with them were both peaceful and friendly.

He did many incredible things in his life but as far as what I have learned about him; he was never a big braggart who boasted incessantly and who was much more concerned with how his men were doing whether they were his fellow soldiers, explorers, or countrymen. He was very successful because he set a powerful example and took care to accomplish whatever he took upon himself to the best of his abilities. From being a director for the protection of indigenous peoples to setting up telegraph lines as a commissioner to commanding fellow troops to explore the unknown regions of the Amazon, Rondon was a man who was the epitome of a ‘profile in courage.’

Marshal Rondon was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth and has various catastrophes and tragedies befall him as a child. His father died before he was born, and his mother died when he was only two years old. His grandparents died when he was a boy, so he was cared for by his uncle. Rondon was a victim of discrimination for his indigenous origin and was bullied because of it. He was not tall or very strong physically either.

However, none of these setbacks stopped him because nothing would stop a man who was courageous, determined, and a hard worker. Most of all, it should be said that rather than let these personal tragedies derail him and his life goals, it is likely that they spurred him on to achieve great things and to make the most of the time that was given to him with more awareness of the preciousness of life and how quickly it can be taken away.

Marshal Candido Rondon has great discipline and determination especially when it came to his education as a teenager and as a young adult. He studied both Mathematics and Physical and Natural Sciences at the War College in Rio de Janeiro. He became second lieutenant of the Armed Forces of Brazil in 1888. He was directly involved as a military officer in the formation of the Brazilian Republic after the fall of the Brazilian Empire. In addition to all of these academic pursuits, he self-taught himself various skills especially engineering. He also became physically disciplined allowing him to spend months and years in the harsh tropical climate due to his time spent in the military and military school.

Rondon was instrumental in connecting the Amazonian region of Brazil to the rest of the country. As an Army engineer, he was in charge of expanding the reach of the new republic and removing the isolation that this part of Brazil had become accustomed to. He built the first telegraph line that crossed the state of Mato Grosso. With his leadership, construction began on a main road from Cuiabá to Rio de Janeiro (The Capital of Brazil at the time). Telegraph lines were also established from Brazil to Bolivia and Peru. He maintained peace both with the indigenous tribes and Brazil’s neighbors during his time as the Telegraph Commissioner.

You could argue today that Marshal Rondon was the closest to being thought of as a Pacifist that a military officer could be. He always tried to make friends with the indigenous tribes of Brazil especially. He never ordered his men to shoot the Indians, even when they were being attacked by them sometimes by poisonous arrows.

Because of Rondon’s beliefs in Positivism and positivist thought, he wanted to make the indigenous tribes civilized and connected to the rest of Brazil in a non-violent and gradual way. For his actions, he later on in life became the first director of the Indian Protection Service (SPI), which still exists in Brazil today under a different name of FUNAI (National Indian Foundation).

After 1888, Marshal Candido Rondon became a member of the positivist church in Brazil, which was based on humanist ideals. Heavily influenced by the Brazilian thinker, Benjamin Constant, the Brazilian military and its new republic helped to spread the ideals of positivism within Brazil. Mr. Constant was influenced by the French enlightenment philosopher, Auguste Comte. Positivism as an ideology emphasizes naturalism, science and altruism, rather than any religious doctrine in particular. Marshal Rondon was influenced by positivism in his actions with regards to supporting the telegraph expansion and by his pursuit of co-existence and eventual friendship with the Indigenous populations. The positivism movement and the spread of Republican beliefs among Brazil’s military and political leaders helped in a major way in changing Brazil from an empire to a republic.

What most people outside of Brazil, especially Americans such as myself who are fond of history would only know about Candido Rondon, would revolve around his historic journey of discovery and exploration with then ex-U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt in 1913-1914. The Roosevelt – Rondon scientific expedition was a research expedition between 1913 and 1914 to follow the path of the River of Doubt (Rio da Duvida) in the Amazon. Because of sheer physical dexterity and encyclopedic knowledge of the Amazon, Rondon, miraculously, was the only man who came back healthy. The ex-President, Theodore Roosevelt almost died of illness and it could be said that Rondon helped save his life and that of his son, Kermit too.

Three of the Brazilians died during the expedition sadly. Without Rondon and the local experience and knowledge of his men, the expedition would have been a disaster. Historically, this was also an important moment to solidify good relations between the two countries which were both far away in terms of language and cultural connections at the time. The ‘River of Doubt’ was renamed the Roosevelt River (Rio Roosevelt) in honor of the former American president for completing the journey which would not have been successful without the assistance and perseverance of Marshal Rondon. There are times in a man’s life where you can state how his leadership was instrumental to the success of a group and in this expedition, Rondon’s leadership was unquestionably the reason why it succeeded and why it is remembered so fondly today.

Few Brazilians have made as great of an impact on their country as Marshal Candido Rondon. The Indian Protection Service (SPI) had its problems, but it became FUNAI, which still helps indigenous peoples today throughout the country. The new Brazilian republic grew both more connected and stronger due to the telegraph and road construction commissions which were led by Rondon and his men. Rondônia is now a Brazilian state composed of the Amazon Forest that is named after the Marshal. His military service, his care for the Indians, and his positivist beliefs are still remembered by many Brazilians today. Marshal Candido Rondon died at the advanced age of 92 in 1958, in Rio de Janeiro, the capital of a country for which he did so much and honored so very proudly.

‘Everything In Its Right Place’ (A Video Retrospective)

It’s hard to really love most music videos today which tend to be shallow and lacking in any original thought. During past decades leading up to the 2000’s, it seems like actual effort and work was put into music videos of songs in order to get on MTV but also to highlight the themes of the song as well as the entire album. There are a number of my favorite artists who produce great music videos including Radiohead, The Smashing Pumpkins, U2, Oasis, Dave Matthews Band, etc.

However, MTV and official music videos are not what they used to be. In an age of instant gratification and live concerts being streamed of the songs you love, it’s hard to appreciate music videos as being part of an increasingly crowded creative marketplace. While official music videos may be dying, creative videos and covers of songs from our favorite artists seem to be on the rise. Considering that music videos are usually for hit singles of certain songs and not for entire albums, there has started to be a movement towards producing independent music videos for songs that never received the official ‘music video’ song treatment.

The rise of YouTube and other video platforms has allowed creative people who are fans of good music to produce their own music videos. While they started out as being kind of cliché or very amateur, they are now becoming very professional and also very related to the lyrics of the song in question. I saw a particular music video of a favorite song of mine featured on YouTube a couple of weeks ago. The song is ‘Everything in Its Right Place’ by Radiohead and it is an excellent song by my favorite band but the one thing that this song never had was its own brilliant music video to go with it.

Because of YouTube, the creative skills of a fan named ‘Capitao Ahab’, which is a pretty fun name in its own right, although I believe the original video creator’s name is Joschka Laukeninks who created it and titled it ‘BACKSTORY.’ It is a now an unofficial music video on the popular video platform that is really well done and professionally shot that has received almost two million views. A video like this would not have existed ten years ago but luckily it does. Part of the reason why this music video is so impactful is that it works so well with the content of this particular Radiohead song.

‘Everything in Its Right Place’ like many of Radiohead’s songs are open to interpretation but it is soothing with its use of synthesizers, digitally manipulated voices, and haunting electronic sounds that sound comforting when you have your headphones on at full blast. The lyric itself of ‘Everything in Its Right Place’ focuses on how to maintain your composure and your levelheadedness as you go through life. The fan music video’s storyline of a baby becoming a boy, a man, and then an elderly man highlights the ups and downs of life and how there are ‘two colors in my head.’

The ‘two colors’ could be interpreted as the good and the bad that you will go through as you go through life’s uncertain and mysterious waters. In particular, the song begins with the oft-repeated lyric of ‘Kid A’, the title of Radiohead’s 2000 album and expresses the experiences of a ‘boy’ as he is born, grows up, matures, and eventually dies. “Yesterday, I woke up sucking on a lemon.” Is also a lyric up to the fan’s interpretation but it implies that life can be sour as well as sweet and that you will have to taste and swallow the bitterness of life if you want to enjoy the sweet part of the fruit.

The music video begins on a hopeful note as a baby boy gains his first steps as he walks through his parents’ house. The sweetness of his childhood is referenced with meeting animals for the first time, having his 6th birthday, going to the beach, and experiencing pure joy at that age. Childhood innocence does not last forever so the boy ends up experiencing his first pains in life including the accidental burning down of his house, fights between his mother and his father, the divorce and exit of his mother from his life, pressures from his father to succeed as he ages into being a teenager.

Learning in school, riding his bicycle, summer days at the swimming pool are some of the joys of teenage life including his first experiences with girls as well with drugs and late nights with friends. Still though, the joys of discovery and youth are balanced out by his struggles with partying too much, getting into rights, being angry at the world and dealing with bad breakups. In one part of the video, the teenager emerges from the pool as a young man ready to take on the world in his 20’s. He thinks his partying days and life as a Bachelor will last forever until he stares at the woman of his dreams on New Year’s Eve and she stares back signaling a new relationship that will change his life.

They date, travel, live together, and the young man eventually proposes to the woman of his dreams. As the video speeds up, so does the aging and life of the man as he gets married, celebrates the birth of his child, and gets ready for middle-aged challenges and prospects. Moving into a house as newlyweds, getting a better job, moving up the corporate ladder, using his new car, traveling for work, going to important meetings, and shuffling along while growing a beard signifies how fast life speeds up the older you become. Sometimes, you’re running so fast that you can’t keep track of who or what you are. In the video, the man still remembers the little blissful moments of carrying his child with his beloved wife, family dinners, and trying to balance work and family until tragedy suddenly strikes.

The hardest part of life is unforeseen tragedies and we hope and pray to never experience any to happen, but this man has the tragic occurrence of seeing his wife and child running towards him across the street only to be hit by a bus and to be taken off life support. The song’s crescendo builds up as the man struggles through grief, longing, and how to move on when he knows he can’t but has to anyway. After the tragedy, what once was promising is now dull and at once he was fast to move through the world, he staggers slowly through it wondering what it is all worth and why keep going? How can one fill the void in their own heart when it was taken out of them and cannot be put back?

We see the man continue with his work, entertaining clients, meeting a new woman and getting married again but there is the lingering sense that it is not what he envisioned his life to be. He can have a child with her, but it won’t be the same as his first true love or bring back his first child. Trying to fill the void with an extramarital affair, fighting with his new wife, jogging and running to keep moving forward to futilely escape from one’s own pre-destined aging are all ways of coping both unhealthily and healthily as you go through middle age to becoming elderly in your later life.

Maybe if he stops running or walking or jogging, he will have to face his own eventual demise and departure from this world or face his memories of losing loved ones or losing his mother. The aged man with gray hairs continues to work, to exercise, to keep up his health by going to the doctor and trying to save his marriage. Some of these battles he will win, and some he will lose although we will never know from such a short video. Eventually, the man is elderly and looking back on his life from his bed and looks to be alone in the world.

However, he does not remember the tragedies that befell him as we all must endure in life sometimes. Instead, he remembers the first time he went to dance at a club, the way he looked at his firstborn child, hugging his beloved first wife, and how she stared at him lovingly on New Year’s Eve and how she stared at him at their wedding and when she gave birth to their child. He remembers the tragedy too but remembers those special moments that made his life truly worth living. You are left wondering after watching this four-minute video of a complicated, yet powerful life filled with tragedy and joy whether it was all worth it for the man. Would he do it again if he knew what was to happen in the future?

If we all knew what was to happen in the future until the end of our days, would we all do it again from the beginning? Would it be worth it even if there is pain, tragedy, and death? Would it be worth the love, joy, and pleasure that we experience as human beings as well? It really is out of our control, but this music video does an excellent job of pondering life’s deepest questions in only four minutes and only with the wistful yet dreamy lyrics of Thom Yorke from Radiohead creating a powerful combination of a great song and a great video. It may not be an original music video from Radiohead but whoever created it did a great job of getting a powerful message across to this 2-million strong audience on life, love, and loss.

If you would like to watch the music video on ‘Everything In Its Right Place’, you can find it here on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnfPaaMR6Qc

‘BACKSTORY’ Full Video on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/245687147

Brasilia

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Camera: Samsung Galaxy J2 Core

Location: Brasilia; Distrito Federal, Brazil

An Ode to Curiosity

What separates the dreamers from the strivers? There are a number of characteristics and personal qualities that distinguish someone who dreams of doing big things and one who actually strives to accomplish these big things. Among these characteristics include commitment, consistency, hard work, patience, perseverance and they are all important for different reasons but the most important characteristics that stands out to me is having curiosity and being willing to learn new things because of that curiosity. If you don’t have any curiosity or willingness to learn how things work and why, you can dream about making an impact all you want but if you aren’t willing to spend time learning about what you’re interested in and what you can improve upon whether physically or mentally, then your goals will likely not be accomplished.

This ability to strive for hard-to-reach goals amid an appetite for education, learning, and overall growth is exemplified by a number of great men and women throughout history. Even when they were unsure that they would not live to see their ideas or their plans come to fruition, their insatiable curiosity was used to move the goal posts forward often to the benefit of humanity as a whole.

I was reminded by this characteristic this past weekend as I went to a really well-done and educational exhibit on 500 Years of Leonardo Da Vinci regarding both his finished and his unfinished works. Books full of notes, dozens of paintings, and sketches, graphs, and illustrations to note what he had in mind for the furthering of humankind. I would say most of what he set out to do during his life was not accomplished during it but what he did was open up the ideas and the possibilities to the rest of the world so that some other engineer or inventor could go all the way to make his vision a reality.

Da Vinci was a genius, but he was also curious about how to bring about new ideas in the world. He did not care if they could never come to fruition or if they failed. Similar to other great inventors, he knew that sometimes you have to try things out one hundred or even one thousand times to get things truly right. You can’t be shy or timid if you have something you think can truly change the world and make it a better place. In some cases, Da Vinci’s ideas where decades or even centuries ahead of time and if more people were curious to the same extent, there is no telling that the 1500s could have been more like the 1900s much quicker.

To understand how to make a man fly in the air or how to bring him back down safely, to figure out how to make cities more livable, and how to engineer machines to bring energy and water to people more easily, these are all monumental tasks that stem from Da Vinci’s trait of having an insatiable curiosity. He was mainly self-educated and self-taught who loved learning about the wonders of the world from engineering to painting to the science of the human body. It is difficult to even comprehend how things would be different today had he been born in the modern era instead of during the renaissance era.

He was almost superhuman in his drive and in his motivation but what all of us can have in common with Da Vinci is to awaken the innate curiosity or curiosities inside of us. Few of us today, if any, will have the curiosity matched by the genius and intellect of a Da Vinci but all of us are curious about something and we want to do our best to master it. For some of us, it’s our curiosity to play a piece of music perfectly without stopping.

For others, it’s about solving an almost impossibly hard equation that could have real-world consequences. Whether it is art, science(s), programming, mathematics, politics, etc., you have to find out what you are curious about and how you can use your curiosity to further advancements and developments in any of these fields. You may only have curiosity about a particular field, but it is your prerogative then to be the best you can in that field in order to get that sense of fulfillment.

Leonardo Da Vinci was a special person and a once-in-a-lifetime talent whose likes we may have seen the last of but what he represents is our drive as human beings to reach new heights and to challenge past notions of what is and what isn’t possible. During his relatively short life, he was able to accomplish so much in different areas of human endeavor and still has had an impact on the world today more than 500 years after his death. He is an example of what is possible if you set your mind and your body to quenching your curiosity and leaving your mark on the world in some small way.

Even if you are not recognized during your life, it is important to keep notes, drawings, illustrations, and records of your hard work so that someone may be able to pick up the torch after you and carry it forward. Sharing your thought process and your ideas with the world long after your time on Earth comes to an end is the closest a person can get to a sense of immortality.

Da Vinci may not have made man fly during his lifetime or made them capable of constructing his idea of the perfect city, but he was able to leave detailed blueprints for other engineers and inventors to carry forward with their own innate sense of curiosities. Having an insatiable curiosity and a powerful imagination can drive you even when you have tried your 100th or 1000th idea. If you are curious, passionate, and willing to fail more than you will likely succeed, you will be sure of having some impact on the world and a chance to be remembered by others long after you have gone.