Did he have passion?

There’s this great little romantic movie called Serendipity that I really love.  I don’t know all of the reasons, probably something about destiny and love and chance that draws me in.  But aside from all of that, there’s this little quote in the movie when the main character is beginning to doubt his direction in life and his friend speaks this line:

“You know the Greeks didn’t write obituaries. They only asked one question after a man died: “Did he have passion?”.

I can’t help but turn that question on myself…do I have passion?  Sometimes I’m not sure of the answer.  Lately though, I’ve been finding these little pieces of art that inspire me.  They give me passion.  Some of them I’ve watched many times and always the same result, I’m driven because of them.  So, here’s to hoping that they might do the same for you:

I’ve watched this one so many times…I love all the clips, they make me smile, they make me want to experience more of life (and to film it)  WARNING: contains some cussing at the end

winter. from gnarly bay productions, Inc. on Vimeo.

I just found this one last night…it’s simple, just a guy and girl and a song.  but the dude just really gives it and I dig that.

Ben & Noelle Kilgore “live at Ida Red” from Kelly Kerr on Vimeo.

This is possibly the best piece of film I’ve seen outside of a theater.  In fact, I’ve probably paid $10 for movies with less plot, worse acting, and worse cinematography than this little gem:

APRICOT — A Short Film by Ben Briand from Moonwalk Films on Vimeo.

manchurian.

Despite my foreknowledge that I probably wouldn’t like the film, I went a head and rented “The Manchurian Candidate” (2004) on Blockbuster Online a few days ago. Jen and I watched it tonight and as you might have guessed from my first sentence, it pretty much sucked. A few months ago we watched the original 1962 film, I drifted off to sleep in the middle of it, but Jen watched the whole thing. From what I did see of the original, I can say that they should have just let it be. The 2004 version wasn’t all bad, I thought Denzel Washington did an OK job. I usually like his work pretty well, however I don’t think this was by any means his strongest roll. Aside from that I thought the cinematography, lighting, sound editing, and pretty much everything else was bad. Add that to the fact that Meryl Streep was in the movie and had a major roll…UGH!

I can’t complain too much, I knew I probably wouldn’t like it, but I was curious to see what it was all about…”Curiosity killed the cat.” In this case curiosity killed about two hours of my life.

million dollar baby.

I’ll make this brief- if you haven’t seen or haven’t planned on seeing “Million Dollar Baby” yet, drop what you’re doing and go see it. It really is that good.

oscar

Ok, my rant for the moment. Not that I care about the stinking Oscars in any way shape or form…but…I’m a little ticked that Mel Gibson didn’t get props for Passion of the Christ. I mean, he doesn’t have to win, but a nomination would have been nice. It was the 3rd highest box office hit of the year for crying out loud! it was entirely done in a dead language! i mean…seriously! …this is obviously all politics. I guess they could turn their heads the other way when it was Peter Jackson and the storyline was a bit more vague in Return of the King, but not for The Christ.

Their denial of nominating this film is not unlike their denial of the truth behind it.

They are supposed to look at the art…not the politics behind it. They are hypocrites and fools.