Letters to God #7: The Lord's Prayer

Pieces of Letters to God

Our Father, which art in heaven

Good day Big Guy in the sky :).

Hallowed by thy Name.

Thy kingdom come.

Well then, here we are and it's good to be here - to be so near You. I like looking up at the blue sky and know that Thou art there. Get it? You're up there making beautiful art. I read that we've managed to create multiverses in a lab the other day. This is probably old news to You, what with having created multiverses from the get go - Big Bang and all that. I imagine that You're proud though, Your creatures take after You. We live to create, or as Professor Tolkien more aptly put it, sub-create. If You've kept up with the news You know it's all doom and gloom down here - all rape and murder. That's what we do when we're not sub-creating. People are saying it's the end of days. I say it's the gentle and kind invasion of Your kingdom. It's like the bit in Final Crisis where non-existence invades existence - only it's gentle and kind. We're not being gentle and kind about it though. We're quite brutal in reaction to gentle and kind things. Do me a huge favour, would Ya? Carry Anene, Reeva and every single human being (everyone who was a potential generator of goodness beyond measure) who tragically passed away lately gently into your bosom. Send the Lady on the Grey to bear them away on her steed:

'He is gentle enough to bear the mightiest of you away on his broad back, and strong enough for the smallest of you' - Neil Gaiman.

Also, please forgive the folk who took their lives, even... Or rather, especially when we can't.

Thy will be done in earth,

As it is in heaven

This is the bit about Your will and our free will that I don't understand so well. I get the end bit where evil will find that it has been serving You all along. What I don't get is what's happening in between - it gets murky there. Our will is pretty much reigning in the earth sphere right now. I'm not too sure what how the governance is top-side but down here it's Jacob Zuma.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgives us our trespasses,

As we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation,

But deliver us from evil.

Padre Nostro

Padre nostro che sei nei cieli,
sia santificato il tuo Nome,
venga il tuo Regno,
sia fatta la tua Volontà
come in cielo così in terra.
Dacci oggi il nostro pane quotidiano,
e rimetti a noi i nostri debiti
come noi li rimettiamo ai nostri debitori,
e non ci indurre in tentazione,
ma liberaci dal Male.

At this point the whole world needs a hug. I'm not sure about the rest of the multiverse but give them a hug too. There's a lot of pain and suffering doing the rounds. People are in great need of daily bread, daily hugs and just good ol' fashioned daily love. Hook us up, ol' G. We need a whole new level of strongs for the forgiving some trespasses bit. Folks is nasty out there lately and John Legend's approach seems to be the most attractive: "Now I’m not afraid to do the Lord's work, You say vengeance is his but I'm'ma do it first." It's a bit of a steep learning curve as You can see. I can't speak for the rest of humanity on this one but I need my trespasses forgiven. At the rate I'm going I'm a burglar! Temptation is pretty much everywhere and hard to avoid. You've seen the second The Lord of the Rings movie, right? There's the scene where Gollum's leading Frodo and Sam through the Dead Marshes and tells them not to look at the dead faces in the water. That's pretty much the first thing Frodo does! They aren't even cute hobbit girls in revealing dresses, just creepy, dead faces and Frodo's tempted to look. Temptation is rough. Deliverance from evil is straight up necessary though, hey. We need every form of escape we can get from evil's gaping maw.

That's it for now, Big Guy. Later times.

For thine is the kingdom,

The power, and the glory,

For ever and ever

Amen.

My Magical Place: Django Unchained

When a Quentin Tarantino joint hits the big screen we all pay attention. People like me get wildly excited and forget to wear pants to the cinema. Other folks throw their hands in the air in disdain at the amount of blood that will be spilled on-screen and worry about the direction in which our society is headed. Add American slavery to the mix and you have Spike Lee refusing to see the film.

Django Unchained, set two years before the American Civil war, is pretty straightforward in its premise: Django, brilliantly portrayed by Jamie Foxx (Ray), is a slave who has been unchained. The unchaining is done by dentist-turned-bounty hunter, Dr. King Schultz, the fastest gun in the South, played by the charming Christoph Waltz, whose previous role in a Tarantino gig (2009's Inglorious Basterds) as SS Col. Hans Lando was breath-yanking. Django and King team up to kill some bad white folk and to save Django's wife Broomhilda, played by the oh-so-beautiful Kerry Washington (Ray) from the evil clutches (I think that's an appropriate phrase) of Mississipi plantation owner, Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio). Lots of things happen in-between that - and that's where the fun is.

What makes Django Unchained such a great picture is that even though the element of slavery is there to jar your brain and incite a strong emotional reaction (and rightly so) it's a terrifically good, if quite simple, story that just happens to take place in an inhumane era of America's history. At its heart it's a Spaghetti Western and pays homage to classic movies in the genre. The movie has some beautiful shots of Django looking very much like Clint Eastwood in Sergio Leone's The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) - the movie Tarantino states is the best-directed film of all time. He especially looks the part in the gunslinger shots in the theatrical poster. Django Unchained takes its title from Sergio Carbucci's spaghetti western, Django (1966) with Franco Nero as Django. Nero makes a cameo appearance in this feature. The title also alludes to the films Hercules Unchained (1959) and Angel Unchained (1970). Both these films also deal with the themes of escape from captivity and revenge. By now, we all know that Tarantino is well versed in revenge and he doesn't skip a beat with it in this feature. Django is angry and will gun down anyone who stands between him and his woman.

 

The movie's musical score's excellent and is one of its best elements. The scenes with Rick Ross' '100 Black Coffins', John Legend's 'Who Did That To You' and 'Freedom' by Anthony Hamilton are perfect.

Leonardo DiCaprio and Samuel L. Jackson (Pulp Fiction) play their roles as Calvin Candie and Stephen to a tee. The whole cast deserves a standing ovation though. If you've not seen Django Unchained yet do yourself a favour and rectify the situation today. This is Quentin Tarantino at his very best.

The only thing really wrong with this movie is that Boba Fett isn't in it, what with being the coolest bounty hunter in a galaxy far, far away and owning a ship called Slave I. I really should write some fan fiction with him in it, a la Fifty Shades of Grey.

 

P.S. At this rate Tarantino should direct the films based on Stephen King's Dark Tower series and Jamie Foxx play the role of Roland Deschain.

Home(less)

“Almost thought we’d made it home / But we don’t know this place at all”

-          Fire Fire, Flyleaf

I’m very preoccupied with the idea of home and homelessness; these binary opposites seem to be one of the resounding themes of my life. Both states have a push/pull relationship in my life. I struggle with the idea of home because I’ve never felt at home anywhere I’ve ever been – my soul has been restless for as long as I have been breathing (which is not really that long).

“All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own.”

-          Hebrews 11 v13 -14

I catch glimpses of what I imagine home is all the time, especially in books. J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth feels the most like home to me. Every time I read any of Tolkien’s books I think, That’s it right there. I catch glimpses of home at home (where I live) some days but that doesn’t happen often. I like my people and whatnot but where I live is not it for the most part. I don’t feel that I belong here and yet I believe it’s necessary that I stopped here and learned what I needed to learn for whatever reasons. I find glimpses of home in religion, especially Christianity and I’m inclined towards believing that restless souls must have a place where they find rest. Was not thirst created to be quenched after all? The theme of home is also quite prevalent in music and my ears tend to gravitate towards that sort of musical space. Even my playlist is titled Home.

Then there’s the state of homelessness that I fear and am intrigued by because I feel I’m in it somehow. I’m fascinated by homeless individuals and when I can talk to them I do but they’re not very forthcoming about the details of their lives. What I want to know is Day 1 of being homeless, what’s that like? Do you carry whatever luggage you have and just sit down at some point, like the ‘detective’ in Paul Auster’s City of Glass? What drives a person to homelessness? Is it a gradual series of unfortunate events? Or can it be a sudden, unexpected thing? Bam! You’re homeless. I’m lead to believe that it’s mainly a gradual sort of thing because of how I sometimes feel about my life. I think it’s a very real possibility that I could be homeless one day. I worry about this shit. No one really believes me but they don’t know me like they think they do. I know me and homelessness could happen to me. Life isn’t anyone’s friend – it will take you wherever circumstances and your actions dictate. Some of us aren’t going to walk away from this without wounds that cut down to the very core of our beings – it just doesn’t work that way. Charles Siboto is a fairly intelligent young man but as a result of consequences both foreseen and unforeseen he became homeless. That shit right there could happen. The thing with homeless people is that they’re like the ultimate ninja of the world. No one really notices them. Sure we see that they’re there but we go out of our way to pretend that they don’t exist. I see them and want to know what they’re about. I need to know. So I can be prepared.

In addition to the physical ideas of home and the lack thereof there are the conceptual and metaphorical states and I often wonder how they relate to one another.  Take as an instance the fact that I live in a physical structure with my people – that’s home and yet I feel it’s not. When I’m weary of the world that’s where I want to retreat to but it’s still not home at all, it’s merely shelter. I still prefer it to anyone else’s home even though it’s still lacking in something essential. For my mom where we live is not home, for her home is Sterkspruit, where she was born in the Eastern Cape. She seems to know without a shadow of a doubt that that’s where she belongs. For me Sterkspruit is even less like home than where I live. Technically speaking I have a home but spiritually I don’t feel that I belong there. It’s very fascinating how that plays out.

I am spiritually homeless and so are many people in the world. People do strange things to find home – African Americans come to Africa to find their roots but I think they find that they wouldn’t have a great time living in most African countries more often than not. Some of them probably find something they’re looking for, I don’t know. The human race is spiritually homeless I’d wager. It’s that whole Matrix idea where you have something stuck in your mind like a splinter you can’t remove. That’s what it feels like. Some days it’s an annoying feeling and on other days, good days, it’s all fine and you don’t mind at all. One of the main reasons for things like religion and stories is to find home. ¡Mayday! says, “Find yourself a heaven and an angel you can hold / They say the world is ending but we really never know”. Unlike Tolkien’s Elves, whose existence is tied to the world and its fate, ours is a separate and unknown fate. We are merely visitors in the world.

Anyhoo, that’s my take on it. God, even E.T. needed to find home so it must be an important endeavour. That’s if for now, I’m er... going home.

My Magical Place: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

'In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.'

Thus one of the greatest children's books introduced our little furry footed friends to the world and all were amazed and the world has never gotten over hobbits since.

Peter Jackson takes us back to his beautiful rendition of Middle-earth that we all fell in love with in The Lord of the Rings and from the opening scene it feels like we've never left. I'm thoroughly impressed by Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Guillermo del Toro's story-telling ability; they manage to expertly navigate the line between being true to the source material (thus pleasing us rabid fans) and recreating the story where it is necessary. Jackson and his brilliant team set the bar quite high with The Lord of the Rings and I was afraid that The Hobbit would not live up to that standard - the book, after all, is a written for children and is much less epic in scale. The fact that Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth) was involved didn't make me any more comfortable. I like Mr del Toro but his imagination is a bit too dark and twisted for Middle-earth.

I'm glad to report that my fears were unfounded and that The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey lives up to Jackson's legacy and that the story is brilliantly told and the visuals are amazing. I'm not convinced by 3D technology yet and the 48 frames per second (over the standard 24) that the movie is filmed in didn't change much for me. Be warned that some people in the audience complained about headaches and dizziness. Bear that in mind when you go see the movie. Initially the movie was meant to be released in two parts but it's been decided on a trilogy now with The Desolation of Smaug and There and Back Again being released in 2013 and 2014 respectively. It's a cash-in scheme for all intents and purposes but if the quality's as good as the first offering fans won't mind forking out the cash for more Middle-earth goodness.

Sir Ian McKellan reprised his role as Gandalf and delivers yet another great performance as the wizard, if not better and more subtle. Also returning to their roles are Hugo Weaving as Elrond, the never ageing Cate Blanchett as Galdriel, Christopher Lee as Saruman and Elijah Wood and Ian Holm in cameo roles as Frodo and Bilbo respectively. Martin Freeman (Sherlock) plays the role of young Bilbo Baggins with nothing but charm; he brings the character to life. A very good looking Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage) and his company of dwarves are very endearing and amusing. One can't help but love them. It's high time the dwarves get the spotlight. Andy Serkis deserves a special mention in delivering another haunting and, dare I say, heartbreaking performance as Gollum. I am especially glad about the inclusion and expansion of the character of the wizard, Radagast the Brown (Sylvester McCoy). His absence in Lord of the Rings was understandable but it was still a loss. My inner fan boy is rejoicing.

If you're a fan of The Lord of the Rings or just want to see good fantasy movie The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey should be at the top of your list of December movies. Expect a hobbit, adventure, raucous dwarves, trolls, orcs, goblins, wolves, stone giants (uber cool, these), a hint at a dragon and just all-round magic. Some people felt the movie was too long but I felt it was too short. The wait till the next instalment is what is too long.

My Magical Place: Rise of the Guardians

I went to go and see Rise of the Guardians purely because I was bored and seeing Skyfall (2012) a fourth time didn't seem healthy. Also, Santa with those pretty badass tattoos looked pretty cool. Oddly enough most of the children at the cinema were getting tickets for The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 (2012). Brave new world, I guess.

I’ve read reviews in which Rise of the Guardians is said to be The Avengers (2012) for children and to a large extent I agree – it’s a team-up movie at heart but for the most part it’s the story of how Jack Frost (Chris Pine) becomes a Guardian. The story takes place roughly 200 years after William Joyce’s The Guardians of Childhood series, which I’ve not read and thus can’t comment on.

It’s a movie for children so the plot is quite easy to follow: The Man in the Moon transformed Jack Frost into a winter spirit about 300 years ago, which means he can manipulate ice using a magical staff but it also means that no one can see him as that requires that they believe in him first, which no one does. Being invisible is a lonely affair for Jack and because he’s quite mischievous he doesn’t get on well with the Guardians, who comprise of: North, or Santa Claus (Alec Baldwin) as most of us know him. He is the Guardian of Wonder, has an amusing Russian accent and sports badass tattoos on each forearm, one reading naughty and the other nice. He lives in the North Pole and manufactures wondrous toys with the help of his Yeti and the constant interruption of his elves, who are useless but extremely cute and somewhat reminiscent of the minions in 2010’s Despicable Me. Sandy, the Sandman is the Guardian of Dreams and the coolest of the Guardians. He doesn’t speak but uses his magical sand to make images of what he wants to communicate. This, of course, often results in some amusing misunderstandings. He is my favourite character in the movie and is a joy to see in all of his 3D glory. The only reason to see this movie in three dimensions is Sandy. Tooth, the Tooth Fairy (Isla Fisher) is in charge of collecting children’s memories (stored in their teeth) and preserving them at her palace, with the aid of baby fairies. She’s a lummox. Finally there’s E.Aster Bunnymund, the Easter Bunny (Hugh Jackman) the Guardian of Hope who brings Easter eggs to children the world over. Jack refers to him as a kangaroo because of his Australian accent.

All in the world is not well though, as another spirit, the Bogeyman, also known as the Nightmare King (Jude Law) is hell-bent on destroying everything the Guardians hold dear in order to have all the children believe in him and his nightmares. The Man in the Moon sends the Guardians a message to recruit Jack as one of them and from there a whirlwind adventure ensues that’s magical, amusing and gorgeous in 3D. Rise of the Guardians is fun and embodies the festive spirit without having to try too hard.

Children will love this movie and adults will appreciate its sentiments. Rise of the Guardians made me grin like a kid. It’s not the best thing you’ll see this year but it is something special.