tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1157342843002612388.post2437834774664926577..comments2024-03-05T15:10:07.370-06:00Comments on A Building Roam: Reflections on Django UnchainedPQhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14491626995530401441noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1157342843002612388.post-13943393973073044042013-01-06T21:01:12.087-06:002013-01-06T21:01:12.087-06:00That's a good quote. I might have to try Taran...That's a good quote. I might have to try Tarantino on the small screen, though. It's not meant as a judgment of Tarantino or even violence in film to say that I am a bit faint hearted. I did like the music from the clip you put up though.<br /><br />I think it is hard to describe the brutal aspects of slavery because the accounts of it all show that it was so appalling. What are we to do with it, in the end? What sort of relationship do we form with that kind of past? Judging the perpetrators doesn't really seem like enough, because it was a system, much like the prison system you describe today. It isn't about one bad guard, it's about a whole cultural mindset that has to be overturned. seana grahamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03774794086733027289noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1157342843002612388.post-24502900865357800302013-01-06T19:33:36.487-06:002013-01-06T19:33:36.487-06:00Love the meaning behind the name Django, thanks!
...Love the meaning behind the name Django, thanks!<br /><br />I do recommend seeing the film, even if you have to cover your eyes at times, because even if you take all the violence out it's still a great picture. The only time in which a slave being whipped occurs in the film is rendered in such a way where you see nothing but the woman's face. Despite his bad rep for gore, Tarantino tends to leave the very worst violence off screen. <br /><br />In the post I mentioned the film's excessiveness, at times he somehow makes the violence so exaggerated as to seem silly and not at all believable. I also read somewhere that when they filmed (or tried to film) a scene of a female slave being beaten, Tarantino and many of the crew started crying. Such horrifically painful depictions of violence were apparently cut out from the final version. (I've also skimmed through the original script which has other horrible acts I'm glad didn't appear in the movie.)<br /><br />On another note, I read something in an interview that again feeds into the animal slavery/animal rights thing I mentioned at the end of this post:<br /><br />"The only thing that I've ever watched in a movie that I wished I'd never seen is real-life animal death or real-life insect death in a movie. That's absolutely, positively where I draw the line. And a lot of European and Asian movies do that, and we even did that in America for a little bit of time. ... I don't like seeing animals murdered on screen. Movies are about make-believe. ... I don't think there's any place in a movie for real death.""PQhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14491626995530401441noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1157342843002612388.post-78009760759911330882013-01-05T20:04:26.020-06:002013-01-05T20:04:26.020-06:00Great piece. Oddly enough, I've recently been ...Great piece. Oddly enough, I've recently been bantering back and forth elsewhere about learning that there is an acupunturist here in town named Django Saax Barbato, which with no disrepect to him, I find amusing. So I looked up the name Django just now. No surprise that it has become more popular after the rise of jazz guitarist Django Reinhart. What I did find a little surprising, and which may of interest to you too is that it is Romani for "I awake."<br /><br />I am a bit of a wimp when it comes to watching violence in film, so evaluating Tarentino is a bit beyond my scope, but you might be interested to read a piece an Indian blogging acquaintance of mine did a good piece about Pulp Fiction recently, which I think you'd find yourself in some resonance with. It's <a href="http://girishshahane.blogspot.com/2012/12/pulp-fiction-morality-play.html" rel="nofollow">here</a>.<br /><br />In a more general way, though I think the respect Wu-Tang Clan accords Tarentino does reveal that his aims are serious, I also think that it is extremely hard to portray graphic violence without exploiting it. I read Geraldine Brooks' <i>March</i> a while ago and found that her attempt to render the beating of a black woman slave in it the weakest part of the book. I wouldn't want to censor the attempt, but I don't think many people succeed at not sensationalizing it.<br /><br />I've been reading a classic suspense novel set in 1963. I won't mention the title because it would give away something of the set up for anyone who might happen to read it, but I will say that there is a black man in a dilemma in it, and there is a near perfect rendering of what the situation of such a person (who in that era could have been played by Sidney Poitier) who has risen to the professional class and yet has a deep awareness that his good standing could turn on a dime, simply because of the color of his skin. It is odd that we are now nearly fifty years later, and yet I think President Obama would be a perfect exemplar of the situation. seana grahamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03774794086733027289noreply@blogger.com