Prepared to be lucky (revisited)

Lately, my Zune's playlist is full with original soundtracks. Atonement OST has taught me the beauty behind OST that is curcial to be incorporated in a film. Of course, I have owned several OST's before Atonement - thanks to Miss Eti for introducing Craig Armstrong. Slumdog Millionaire, Brokeback Mountain, Mystic River, Changeling, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Chicago, and Moulin Rouge are among films that I've collected their OST. However, the best part of this is what Tyla Tharp said in her The Creative Habit: Learn it and use it for life, "digging your grooves".

Listening to all these great composers, I started to gain interest knowing their other works. This process also introduced me to another world of creativity in arts. For example, after being mesmerized by melodramatic soundtracks in Cinema Paradiso, I've come to know Ennio Morricone, Italian Academy Award-winning composer for Cinema Paradiso itself and other great films such as the astounding Once Upon a in America. The soundtracks Cinema Paradiso and Deborah's Theme relatively from both films mentioned, have been re-arranged and played by numerous musicians in all over the world and one of them is the great comtemporary jazz trumpeter, Chris Botti. This is the point I think I got my "groove". Botti's music expressively pulled me into the ecstactic jazz music. Other than that, his music makes me wanted to listen to opera songs, which I never thought I would fall in love to. Nessun Dorma popularly sang by the legendary late Luciano Pavarotti, which is also an aria from the final act of Giacomo Puccini's opera Turandot, is one of the songs recomposed and played by Botti.

On top of that, his music has become a part of my daily routines. Again, Twyla emphasizes that it is important to have a solid rituals of preparation in order to pull out creativity in daily life. Botti's music gives me a solid ritual as I wake up turn on his music, grab a cup of coffee, stand next my room's window, look outside at people walking to classes and I feel like I'm lilting in this beautiful rhapsody. This ritual really helps me creating my character in my theater class, such as imitating different styles of walkings with different feelings - being late to class, enjoying a sunny morning, walking while eating, etc.

After all of this crap that i just wrote, I think your creative endeavors can never be thoroughly mapped out ahead of time. You have to allow for a suddenly altered landscape, the change in plan, the accidental spark - and you have to see it as a stroke of luck rather than disturbance. Habitually creative people are, in E.R. White's phrase, "prepared to be lucky". I'm lucky enough to know Chris Botti.

p/s: I just bought (BOUGHT! - i don't buy DVD except for this one) Chris Botti in Boston which features Sting, Josh Groban, Katherine McPhee, Lucia Micarelli, John Mayer, and Steven Tyler!

Bad decisions make good stories (meh...)

Say you're on a climbing route (refer to rock climbing if you wanna know what it is like). Fail to clip a quick draw on a bolt. When suddenly everything goes to hell. So, you fell to the next bolt, far away from the one you missed, the fall was not the 'right' one, and soon that crappy situation is a thing of the past. Too bad you can't meet all of climbing's challenges with a rope and quick draw. I mean, you could try. But I'm pretty sure that would be considered assault.

In other unrelated events, it then lead to these things that we beg for. A root canal, an I.R.S. audit, coffee spilled on our clothes. When the really terrible things happen, we start begging the god we don't believe in to bring back the little horrors, and take away this. It seems quaint now, doesn't it? The flood in the kitchen, the poison oak, the fight that leaves you shaking with rage. Would it've helped if we could see what else was coming? Would we have known that those were the best moments of our lives?

I have come to a few points in my life that I 'kinda' have regrets on a few decisions I have made in my life. Yea...you can't go back and fix it, just keep the head held up high, life offers better future, you won't go anywhere if you keep on thinking about it, bla, bla, bla.. But, seriously, it keeps on hitting you right in the face! (This is where I need Quantum Theory together with Source Code (a movie - and yes, I just did a parenthesis in one) exist in my life).

However, the best part of these regrets are actually the story of your life you have just written, putting everything into the picture - plots, actors, settings, and even costumes (enjoying wearing skinny jeans to the office!). As the great Chaplin would say that life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.

It's more than just a songbird

So...while waiting for the man to get online and to Skype with him. I decided to watch Adele's 'Live at Royal Albert Hall'. The clips of this concert have been posted all over YouTube and I have seen some of those, especially my favorite songs of her.

The YouTube clips did not impress me at all. Until I saw Malin (a theatre friend of mine) posted 'Someone Like You' performance from the concert, I was moved. The freaking Adele cried at the end of the song! Hence, I would suggest for those who want to experience it, do watch the whole concert and not just the clips from YouTube.

Then, what's next? I Torrent-ed the concert (yes, SOPA didn't go thru!).

Here I was. Watching the concert and totally blown away.
From her hits (“Rolling in the Deep,’’ “Chasing Pavements’’) to heartfelt covers (including a fantastic, rootsy rendition of the SteelDrivers’ “If It Hadn’t Been for Love’’), the performances are routinely inspired. With the voice of an angel - and the potty mouth of a sailor - she’s a force throughout.

Being an artist, one's hardest task is really putting out your heart to the audiences. Be it a painter, author, singer, actors, etc. you have to be genuine of who you are and not being afraid of being 'naked' for the audiences. In this concert, Adele has totally shown to her fans, on the grandeur stage of Royal Albert Hall, of who she truly is - or an artist, lover, woman or human, in that matter.

I totally envy her courages and artistic instincts when it comes to presenting her oeuvres. You'd get to know how did she get to write songs in her album, who inspires her, why she wrote the songs, and what she feels about all of them.

When she cries at the end of the concert, right after a singalong of “Someone Like You,’’ there’s no doubt her emotions are genuine. It’s such a poignant moment that you’re left wishing Adele a speedy recovery. She clearly belongs in front of an audience.

It isn't just a peek through neighbor's window

Let me break this long hiatus with personal notes on A Separation or 'Jodái-e Náder az Simin'. It is such a breathtaking masterpiece. Often when I choose a film or any form of performing arts, I would pick those with strong touches on humanity. A Separation has that ability of awing you at the first glance. It'll, then, grab your hands and run across magnificent discoveries of humanity.

Warning

Spoiler

A Separation opens with Simin (Leila Hatami) and Nader (Peyman Moadi) facing a magistrate (and facing the camera, and hence, facing us). She has applied to leave Iran and wants her daughter, Termeh (Sarina Farhadi, the director's daughter), and husband to come along. But Nader won't go - his father, who suffers from Alzheimer's, needs his care.

Nader goes to work, and Razieh comes into their apartment, her daughter in tow, to tend to the old man. This arrangement doesn't work out, however: Nader returns home early one day to discover his father strapped to the bed, Razieh nowhere to be found.

What follows - an argument, an accusation, a push - is left open to interpretation, with Nader and his family on one side, and the fiery Hodjat and his clan on the other. And all of the chauvinist and religious biases of their country in between.

In those argument, accusation and push, everybody, in his/her utmost honesty on being the humans created for them, is simply trying to protect his/her loved ones, all the way to the points telling lies. The storyteller has put his heart on on telling the truth of the story, in which cultural and classes’ differences are being laid upon the audiences on its naked truth. For example, Razieh has to call her religious leader asking if she could touch an old man, Nader’s father, helping him out on his dirty clothing. She even afraid to swear upon Al-Quran on telling the truth about the pregnancy that she doubts caused by Nader. I was not startled much when I saw this, since I have seen and experienced such conditions. However, the story transcends itself easily and connects to other audiences who have never heard or seen this.

Thus, often audiences/people are afraid of watching or experiencing things outside of their comfort zone, they should realized that the in depth of their understanding on one issue, culture, norms, or people, is not something hard to swallow. By making A Separation specific to Iranian society, the storyteller has ensured his piece can travel the world. The movie has tremendous and compassionate understanding of human behavior, family bonds, and the way ordinary people would respond when they’re forced into a moral quandary. I can’t imagine anyone not being transfixed by it.

Technically, much of A Separation takes place in confined spaces: Nader’s middle-class apartment, the chambers of a courthouse, a hallway where the fateful act takes place. The director uses his camera to emphasize the spaces between people and their spatial proximity to each other. He wants to convey the physical realities of his characters as well as the emotional ones. That’s the sort of detail many filmmakers often overlook, because it doesn’t seem important. But this wise, humane movie wants us to empathize with its characters, and the more we understand their everyday reality, the deeper we’ll be drawn into their lives. A Separation succeeds so well that the end result is pulverizing. Sometimes, in an attempt to do the best we can for the people we love, we end up wreaking irreparable damage.

"If mainstream cinema leaves you soulless, see this film.
If you have a modicum of intelligence, see this film.
If you like great acting and directing, see this film.
If you like great writing and editing, see this film.
If you are a parent, see this film.
If you are a son or daughter, see this film"

Where's my expiation?

It has been two days that I woke up in the morning having the crappiest feeling ever. I wish I didn't wake up at all, I wish I would wake up in 10 years after, I wish I woke up not knowing what has happened, I wish I woke up that everything stayed still and I could run to those moments I screwed up and fix them, and I really really really wish I woke up next to the greatest man I have ever met in my whole life.

But, there I go. Sometimes reality has a way sneaking up and biting us in the ass. And when the dam bursts, all you can do is swim. The world of pretend is a cage, not a cocoon. We can only lie to ourselves for so long - or worst, lying to the only person who you care the most and who matters to you of all things. We are tired, we are scared, denying doesn't change the truth. Sooner or later we have to put aside our denial and face the world. Head on, guns blazing. De Nile. It's not just a river in Egypt, it's a freakin' ocean. So how do you keep from drowning in it?

Sometimes the smallest thing in life changes something forever and there will be times when you wish you can go back to how things used to be but you just can't because things have change so much. And, now, you tell me when the smallest thing is the biggest thing in my life.

I am taking all in. Paying for all the consequences. Even if i have to lose the most precious things i have ever had to get that chance again, to be there again, to look at you again, to smile with you again, to hold your hands again, to kiss you again and to love you again.

When you kiss me, heaven sighs

Give your heart and soul to me,

And life will always be

La vie en rose

Twisting and Turning