Smith is a GODDESS

Ah, My Goddess! is cool. As a quirky, supernatural spin-off of the traditional sempai-kohei relationship, Ah, My Goddess!touches on a couple of facets. The movie reminds me of I dream of Genie and Bewitched and whatnot. In cases like the ones in these stories, I firmly believe in strict contracts of lifelong companionship. They make things interesting. In this story, the contract is initiated in the form of a wish for a wish-granting goddess' eternal company. I like situations like these because they guarantee either happiness or shenanigans. These bonds are stronger than marriage.  By the nature of said bonds, each party must learn to overcome their differences or prepare for an eternity of displeasure. It's cool to see stories that are driven by ultimatums because their plots are typically more drastic and relevant.  A perfect example of such drastic plots twists is Keiichi's expulsion from his dorm. Keiichi's rash decision to board a goddess in an all-male dorm results in homelessness, a problem which Keiichi and his new woman must face quite abruptly.

It is nice to see losers like Keiichi get broads.  I always feel happy when characters like him are given breaks by the universe.  Keiichi, as previously mentioned, is at the losing end of the sempai-kohei relationship at his school.  Naturally, he is bullied and disrespected by his upperclassmen and that isn't very nice.  But it is pretty awesome that he was compensated for his suffering with a hot goddess.  

Another way to look at it is to consider the amount of trouble women cause for men-- especially men like Keiichi.  He had enough to worry about before this crazy lady came into his life and got him into all kinds of trouble.  I mean sure it works out in the end, but gee whiz, Belldandy kinda messes stuff up a bit. Women.

Smith MONONOOOOke

Princess Mononoke is a pleasant flick to watch. In terms of both production and and story, Mononoke's value is is immediately apparent. In the fashion of all great directors, Miyazaki couples his film's intrinsic soundness with a slightly more elusive message about the nature of humanity and its relationship with the rest of the natural world.

My favorite of Miyazaki's devices is his method of personifying the animal's of his world.  As a human, the animals portrayed in the film are discomforting.  Miyazaki cuts the human advantage in the circle of life by giving the rest of the animals not only an obvious increase in size, but also a cognitive capacity which mirror humanity's quite closely. In an even more outlandish twist, the animals are also able to communicate verbally with humans.  Not only are their mechanisms of speech similar those of humans, but also they communicate with the same vernacular.  By giving the animals such substantial advantages in the circle of life, Miyazaki presents the natural order with an invaluable opportunity for peace.

The unfortunate reality is that nothing really changes between humans and beasts.  Even with the ability to communicate solutions and intentions, the animal world remains vicious.  The blame does not fall solely on the humans, however, they are certainly characterized as the common enemy of the animal world.  Even under the oppression of their universal adversaries, the beasts continue their own struggle for dominance by fighting in species-related conflicts.

I would like to think that Miyazaki personified his creatures thusly in order to illustrate the true wilderness of humanity.  I believe that humans have really really lucked out in terms of evolution.  It is my opinion that any number of animals could have risen as the dominant species of the world, but our environmental conditions called for thumbs and a bipedal gait.  Consequently, we were given the the physical capability and the environmental pressure necessary to develop efficient communication an universalize intellectual content. It could have been any animal. I wish horses ruled the world. I would dig that so much. Everything would be pretty.

Smith Grave Fireflies

Grave of the Fireflies was a real bummer to watch. I can't say that I've ever seen a movie that is so comprehensively depressing. It would be one thing if there were a single instance in which the main characters experienced fortune, but there isn't.

From the word go, the two main characters, Setsuko and Seita, are thrust into an unfamiliar family dynamic. In beginning of the film the children lose their mother in a United States air raid on Japan. From this point on Seita is responsible for providing for himself and his little sister. Naturally, the fourteen-year-old Seita seeks out support from his aunt (his dead mother's sister). At first, Seita's aunt seems happy to take care of the children. It seems that she considers it a prideful deed to care for the homeless children of her supposedly critically injured sister. When Seika reveals that he and his sister are, in fact, orphans, their aunt changes her tone. At this point she begins to criticize Seita's unemployment and accuses the children of leeching her family's resources. Their aunt even begins to scold them for enjoying themselves through activities like playing piano in the middle of the day. I lived with a lady like this while i was evacuated for hurricane Katrina. It was great that she let us use her house, but she was a total bitch.  There were like four kids at her house and she wouldn't let us use the computer or do anything fun like swimming. Idk that lady burns me up. I had to put up with her boring nonsense for two weeks until I relocated. Relocating, however, was great. I moved about an hour away to my other cousins' house where we got to do all kinds of fun stuff. My cousins were my age, so moving provided a great opportunity for peer to peer discourse and activities. We did fun stuff like jumping bike into lakes and climbing trees. I enjoyed it. The bottom line is that children need distractions in times of crisis. When parents aren't present it becomes difficult to make that happen because they don't have free time. too bad.