The Deactivating Conundrum

I think that all of us, at some point in our Facebook lives, have faced the ultimate question: to deactivate? Or not to deactivate? One of the most difficult decisions of the modern age which plagues us all.
It takes some serious shit to make us go as far as removing Facebook from our lives. I personally just devoted a full twenty minutes hovering over the 'deactivate' button, questioning my decision. In doing so, it feels like you're going to lose contact with the entire world and perhaps your socialnetworking life might just implode. But really, what does Facebook offer us? Mind-numbing hours are spent 'stalking' people we once knew/haven't known ever and never will. New mums are posting never ending pictures of their babies, telling us what they weigh, what they just said and when they last puked. Pages that we 'liked' in year nine haunt us by posting cliché quotes and three second videos of cats. 

It's not breaking news that Facebook is a massive waste of time, and the classic 'I hate Facebook' rant is one that is seen on an almost weekly basis, right before the speaker caves in and re-activates (which I admit, I will resentfully do at some point) but why? In deactivating we are literally only temporarily removing Facebook, its easy because all we have to do is type in our user name and password and that's it, we're once again forcefully divulged into other peoples lives.

It's natural that people are curious about the lives of others. Entire companies rely on gossip to maintain their income. Magazines write entire articles about celebrities that have had a bit of a wardrobe malfunction and newspapers infamously listen to private phone calls then broadcast them to the world in the form of "news." But where is the line between an invasion of privacy and outrightly putting your life out there for the entire world to see. Discretion is clearly a thing of the past, pictures of people having sex pop up on an almost hourly basis in the form of 'after-sex selfies' and it has become something that people are just okay with. It becomes worse by the fact that we don't even need a computer to access Facebook any more. We occupy all of our time with it, it's on our phones, our tablets and our laptops. Even when the app is being painfully slow we wait for it to load. We actually sit and wait to see what pointless shit is happening to irrelevant people in our lives.

One of the worst things is that it can actually affect our opinions of ourselves. If we upload a picture that doesn't get any likes it feels like the cyber universe is calling you fugly. If your boyfriend deletes all of the pictures of you and him after you break up its like someone has kicked you in the face. It's fundamentally abnormal to be so involved in things that should be done in private. Imagine a world where you couldn't take a snap of yourself and put it on the internet for the approval of others. What would you do instead? Take a picture, get it developed then walk around the street asking people to say if they like it or not? If you were going through a break up and you couldn't incessently stalk your ex's Facebook page to see what they were doing what would you do? Would you ring and demand to see every single picture that has been taken of them since you broke up? No, you would drown your sorrows in vodka and watch Bridget Jones on repeat like you should.

The point is, that in a moment of self-realisation I have seen that Facebook (and all other social networking sites for that matter, I just particularly loathe Facebook) is toxic. Once you've seen something that you didn't want to, you can't unsee it. You cannot live your social life vicariously through Facebook. It gives a false sense of popularity or unpopularity through the volume of 'friends' that you have. I am about 98% sure that I will be eating my words in a matter of days when I eventually re-activate my account, but for now I say: If you ever find yourself hovering over the deactivate button, do it, you're there for a reason (and I doubt you'll miss much.)

Dallas Buyers Club

I watched Dallas Buyers Club at the weekend and I watched with high expectations. I must admit, that these expectations were met and I really liked the film. However, I didn't enjoy it for the reasons that I thought I would. After watching The Oscars, I felt really irritated that the lovely Leo didn't win the Oscar for best actor in his recent film The Wolf Of Wall Street. I felt even more irritated after seeing Matthew McConaughey's speech  about how he is his own hero (arrogant much?) But then I realised that I was perhaps just bieng biased because I am 100% in love with Leo and I hadnt actually seen Dallas Buyers Club at this point so I couldn't really say that McConaughey didn't deserve the Oscar. I needed cold, hard proof.

So I watched the film. I genuinely wanted to come away from it feeling like I was wrong and that McConaughey did genuinely deserve the Oscar. However, after half an hour of watching, I thought that McConaughey's acting and character depiction didn't really seem very different to the style he has adopted before. Don't get me wrong, I love Matthew McConaughey. Put How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days in the DVD player, bring me a bottle of wine and some popcorn and I'm yours; and I must admit it was nice to see him in a film where he isn't taking his shirt off every five seconds. Despite all this, I still was questioning whether or not his performance in Dallas Buyers Club was Oscar worthy. I don't think it was.

However, after watching two minutes of his co-star, Jared Leto, I was 100% convinced that Leto fully deserved his Oscar (despite my love for Jonah Hill's portrayal of Donnie Azoff in Wolf of Wall Street.) I hadnt seen the trailer for Dallas Buyers Club, so I had no idea that Leto would pop up as a transvestite - and a rather attractive one at that. Once I realised the character was being played by Leto I was impressed. McConaughey's performance when compared to Leto's lacked depth and insight.

I'm not saying that McConaughey's performance wasn't powerful because it really was. One of the most moving scenes in the film for me was a scene in the supermarket where Ron Woodroof (McConaughey) makes his homophobic 'friend' shake Rayon's (Leto's) hand. This depiction of Ron's transition from a homophobe to a defender of his gay friend sends an important message to the audience. The relationship that exists and develops between Ron and Rayon comes to be one of mutual respect of one anothers sexuality. When Ron contracts the HIV virus, he is verbally abused by his former friends because they assume that he is a homosexual and that is how he acquired the virus. This ignorance from his peers forces Ron into the shoes of homosexuals and he is forced to endure the same abuse that they receive.

Although this film has a strong story and portrays messages that all should respect, I still believe that McConaughey's performance was perhaps not as deserved of an Oscar as much as everyone thinks it is. I must say that I though his performance in the Lincoln Lawyer oushines that of his performance in Dallas Buyers Club. Sorry Matt.

Jane Eyre

After reading Frankenstein for one of my modules at university, and finding it shockingly dull, I was very hesitant to read the next text that they had set us. But alas, I begrudgingly continued and read Jane Eyre. I can now safely say that this novel by Charlotte Bronte is the most inspiring and empowering novel that I have ever read. it gave me almost as much girl power as listening to Beyoncé does (because really, who radiates girl power like Queen Bey.)

In this novel, we are introduced to Jane Eyre. Jane is a fiesty girl to say the least. The novel starts with Jane as a child and when told that naughty children go to hell, she responds with "Then I must keep in good health and not die." Even as a child jane is strong and stands up for herself which is refreshing coming from anovel of this time period. Women reading this at the time that this novel was written would have been facing oppression and they didn't even realise that they could do anything about it. Being stuck in a domestic role was normal and being rude to men (especially men of a superior class and position) was outrageous. So having a young Jane Eyre speak back to a dominant figure was a clear statement from Bronte that men are not superior and should not be treated as such.

Throughout this novel, Jane makes it clear to her audience that she is aplain young lady and that she will not be told otherwise. When Rochester attempts to compliment her, she asks that she not be lied to and that she be accepted for the plain, educated girl that she thinks herself to be. This transforms Jane into a fictional role model that young girls can admire. It puts forward the idea of self-acceptance as opposed to the self-deprecation that we are presented with in other novels, such as Jane Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice.'

In actual fact, Kane Eyre is a novel that is dominated by female characters. The only men that we are introduced to in the novel all posess a huge backlog of flaws and unlikebale characteristics. Even Mr Rochester, the apple of our heroin's eye, is rude, foul tempered and tempremental. The female characters that we are introduced to are all strong and dominant. Jane herself is self-assured, wrong willed and independent. Jane's aunt is aggressive and the head of her household. Finally, the mistress at Jane's school is kind yet authoritative. As well as giving her audience plenty of strong female characters, Bronte also expresses the importance of the bond that can exist between women. Throughout the novel, Jane has a number of mother figures, sister figures and even an adopted daughter. Through all of these relationships Bronte explores the idea that women can and will form bonds easier than men will.

Not only did I find myself feeling impressed by Jane's integrity, I also found myseld getting a bit irritated by some of the more submissive female characters in the novel. It made me think that if Jane can stand up for herself then why can't they? It was this very idea that empowered me at the end of the book. So thank you Charlotte Bronte, for I am officially a feminist.

The Wolf of Wall Street...

Yesterday I visited James at university. I do like Canterbury, the cathedral is amazing and for some reason I just like a cobbled streets, it just looks so much prettier than concrete. The original plan was to go to pizza express then just go home and watch a film (because who doesn't love pizza and a film) but then we decided to go and see Wolf of Wall Street before pizza because it came out yesterday. 

So, we buy our tickets for the 10 past 4 showing and we're told by the cinema man that the heating in our screen is broken and it might be a bit chilly. We brushed it off and didn't think it would be that bad because how much can heating really affect a massive screen room anyway? The answer is, a fucking lot. I was sat there with my north face coat on, gloves and James (kindly) offered me his jacket to put over my legs. Cute right? No, it was only cute until 5 minutes later he took it back for the sake of his own warmth, selfish bastard. Anyway, The Wolf of Wall Street is what this post is about. Oh. My. God. It was amazing. 

 

Initially, we thought that 3 hours was a really long time to sit and watch a film but once you were into it, it went so quickly just because it was so good. Now firstly, the budget for this film must have been ridiculous because there were hundred dollar bills being chucked all over the place, helicopters, designer clothes and a massive yacht. When you think that this is based on a true story it really does hit home how rich this guy was, the yacht he bought for his wife was actually originally designed for Coco Chanel! And he bloody sinks it through pure recklessness. Coco wouldn't be happy. 

Anyway, the film was hilarious and Leonardo DiCaprios performance was crazy, his "motivational speeches" were the best parts of the film. The first appearance of Jonah Hill is striking, to say the least. His peroxide fake teeth immediately draw your attention and look wrong on him. But the further you get into the film the more you forget it's Jonah Hill and his appearance becomes more understandable, his acting was amazing and he was hilarious as always but it wasn't like in his other films. This guy is a really diverse actor. If you compare him to Seth Rogen you really understand how good he really is. Can you imagine Seth Rogen being nominated for an oscar twice in the last 3 years? No, me either.

 

It's totally understandable why the film was rated 18. There was cocaine being snorted every 5 minutes, pills being popped every other scene along with alcohol, boobs, sex scenes that leave little to the imagination and genitalia left right and centre. But none of this detracted from storyline. There are so many films that lack a good story and use nudity and drugs just to attract people into watching the film but The Wolf of Wall Street incorporated it well. The way this film was shot was good, Scorcese ensured that the audience was following the story throughout, this was done through the use of monologues. On several occasions DiCaprio spoke directly to the audience and explained what was happening.

 

If I compare this to American Hustle (which we saw a couple of weeks ago) it's so much better and American Hustle was really hard to follow. Although still a good film, I would recommend The Wolf of Wall Street for sure. But the fact that the Canterbury cinema had leopard print chairs did work in it's favour.

The Paperboy

This evening, I watched a film with my dad called 'The Paperboy.' We are huge fans of Matthew McConaughey so we thought it would be a good watch for a Sunday evening. How wrong we were, never in my life have I watched a film and been bored, disgusted and shocked at the same time.

I am a massive fan of films, if you ask my boyfriend what I do with my life his answer would be "sleep and watch films." And I am usually quite easily pleased, I dont prefer a specific genre and dont really have preferences when it comes to films, but this was without a doubt a film that I will put in my "top 5 worst films ever" list (along with Running With Scissors, The Good Girl, What to Expect When You're Expecting and This is the Place.) First of all, in The Paperboy, there was no coherent story line. I genuinely kept asking myself "what the fuck is going on" and if you have to ask yourself that during a film you know its terrible. It was really disjointed and hard to follow. The annoying thing, is that it had the makings of a really good film; it had an interesting storyline, good actors and of course Zac Efron. However, it was almost as though someone had read the book, and thought that it would make a good film so just rustled up a mediocre script and paid absolutely no attention to the detail. It was created with very broad strokes, but you need the detal otherwise its just a huge blob of nothing.

There were huge gaps in the film that no matter how much you focused, just couldn't be filled. When watching a film you expect to understand whats happening, but it just kept provoking questions, and not the kind of questions you want to be asking yourself, why was Ward trying to get Hillary out of jail? This made absolutely no sense to me, because it wasnt explained. And if it was, it was very easily missed.

My first mistake may have been watching this film with my dad. But I thought "Oh its only a 15 how bad can it be." Very bad. Very very bad, is the answer. The sex scenes in this film were unbelievable for a rated 15 film, I actually had to fast forward them because not only were they incredibly graphic (with John Cusack at one point burying his face into Nicole Kindman's you know what) they were also very long, they went on for minutes. I'm sure you only really have to go so far before people can imagine for themselves whats going on.

Some of the images and themes in this film were really dark and quite deeply disturbing. From what I could gather, Matthew McConaughey's character, Ward Johnson, was a homosexual that liked to engage in violent sexual intercourse with black men (taboo at the time in which the film is set) and we are introduced to this fact when he is found in a hotel room, his face completely smashed in and he is tied up. Obviously what your mind first races to is that he has been raped, so the image that they show is really quite disgusting. Not only this, but at the end of the film, Ward is graphically murdered by Hillary, who cuts his throat in front of his brother. I am 18 years old and found this whole film horrible to watch so is it really appropriate for 15 year olds?

In my honest opinion, this film had the potential to be really engaging, interesting and actually quite good. But the entire story is just butchered. Sex, violence and some good actors have just been thrown together in the hope that people will watch the film. If you want to see murder, a 20 year old boy persuing a 40 year old woman and Nicole Kidman pissing on Zac Efron, then by all means buy The Paperboy and waste an hour and a half of your life. But I strongly advise against watching this film, it is absolutely rubbish.

"So peaceful shalt thou end thy blissful days, And steal thyself from life by slow decays." - The Odyssey

Okay so one of the compulsory texts that we were given to read at uni this term was the Robert Fagles translation of Homer's 'Odyssey.' I can safely say without a shadow of a doubt that it is the most pain I have ever experienced whilst reading a book. Like literal mental torture. Now, I may only think this because I absolutely hate greek history and classical civilisation (I took it at AS level, got a U in a mock test and quickly dropped the subject) or am I right in thinking that its just really really difficult to stay attentive to?

Having read 'The Illiad' I'm actually starting to think that its the latter. See, with 'The Illiad' I kind of knew the story of Troy anyway so it was fairly easy to follow - especially when you have the image of Brad Pitt as Achillies firlmly implanted into your head. But I wasnt at all familiar with the story of Odysseus which is why I think it was just a very difficult read.

In the seminar discussions, the topic of "is The Odyssey timeless?" came up, and quite honestly I think that the answer is no. Firstly, the language barrier is going to be a big issue in the first place, everything is just so dramatic that it does get quite exhausting after a while. This does make sense when you think about the fact that originally the text was read orally to people so the narratve has to be dramatic in order to engage listeners. But in reality, who is going to sit down and listen to someone read them 'The Odyssey' in 2013? I fully understand that this poem is a classic and has been passed down through the ages, but these stories simply aren't relevant anymore in the format that they are offered by this book. I can't think of many people that would voluntarily pick up this book and settle down with a glass of wine and a good greek battle.

Call me modern, but I think that changing the format of the story of Odysseus would actually make it more appealing to new generations and younger audiences. Perhaps transferring the main stories in the poem to a modern day setting. Or making a film that would welcome more audiences. If Romeo and Juliette can be turned into a hollywood blockbuster (with none other than the glorious Leo DiCaprio) OR BETTER YET a cartoon amazingly named "Gnomeo and Juliet" then why are there no adaptations of The Odyssey?

 I'm not sitting here saying that this book should be put in the freezers of all who own it and left there forever and book shops should cease to offer this epic poem to the poor sods that will think that its a good read. I am simply saying that on a personal level, it wasn't enjoyable at all and to be on an English Literature degree and studying this is completely baffling to me because this is classics. And I must admit I felt at a bit of a disadvantage. The essay that I wrote on this text was quite literally the worst essay I have ever written in my life and I was quite frankly ashamed to hand it in because I'm rubbish at Greek history, I was expecting Shakespeare galore!

The historical context of this poem is infuriating. The way that women are treated is not comfortable to read in a time where women are no longer just pieces of meat. And the so called "hero" of the poem is rather arrogant and exceptionally violent. Killing a lot of men for eating some of your food and attempting to court your wife becuse they thought you were dead? Okay, a bit of a slap on the wrist maybe but murder? No.
This poem will always be timeless theres no denying, there are elements of it in films such as 'O' Brother Where Art Thou' by the Cohen brothers so the story will always apply. It's just about adaptation and making it a bit more interesting I think.

But maybe I'm just still resentful about my grade U in classical civilisation...

"Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat" - Robert Frost

Okay so, I am studying Creative Writing and English Literature at University and I'm not going to lie, I only applied for it because the UCAS deadline was two days away, I was rejected by London College of Fashion, and I had to quickly choose a University and a course that I wanted to do. So, I thought, I'm good at English this sounds perfect! But alas, here I am, a week into my course, being told that by December I am to write ten pages of a stage-play and thirty lines of poetry. And never in my life have I dreaded something so much! In a mere two weeks, I have realised what an absolute moron I am for not reading the course structure properly and putting myself in a position where I will really struggle with a year thats (in theory) supposed to be really easy! Nice one Paige.

I can deal with the stage-play, because it actually sounds quite fun. Part of the coursework is to go and watch a new play in London and give a presentation on the effectiveness of the writing, which lets face it, sounds fun! Everyone loves a night out at the theatre in London - and I can just use it as an excuse to get really drunk, isn't that what freshers do? But poetry, ah poetry. Now, simply put, I am not good at writing poetry.

If I am given a poem to read, I can take it apart and spend hours trying to withdraw every possible meaning, but trying to gain inspiration to write a poem of my own is proving to be quite difficult. I have come to the very sudden realisation that I am a reader, not a writer. Many will argue that they walk hand in hand, if you have a passion for reading then you must automatically be acquiring the skills that you need in order to write, merely by analysing the works of other writers, but I disagree with this. I think that in order to write well, especially write poetry well, you need to be passionate about life and be able to dissect your surroundings and find beauty in everything which then becomes inspirational. I do not have this skill, and I feel inferior sitting in a class amongst people that clearly have the potential to be amazing writers. Now, I may have the potential to become an amazing reader, with persistance and the development of my analytical skills I will gain a deeper talent for writing analytical essays and evaluating other peoples work. But what good is this in a poetry lesson? Where do I find inspiration? And most importantly, how do I produce a poem when I'm not a poet?

Although, clearly, my poetry class is causing me countless internal battles, I am really enjoying the English Literature side of my course. I have my first lecture on 'The Canon: A Short History of Western Literature,' which sounds really interesting. I received an e-mail a few days ago that instructed me to take out a library book and read an essay called 'Monuments,' which I did, and already I'm reading things that are so thought provoking! The essay basically explored the paradox of a poet being both alive and dead at the same time. Very Schrodinger's cat-ish I know. But it was an interesting thought because it meant that in death, a poet (or any writer, at that) leaves behind a monument, their writing keeps them alive. Using Shakespeare as a specific example, it was his poetry that thrived when he was alive, his plays were very undervalued. Now, if you ask any GCSE or A-Level student, they would be able to name you at least four Shakespeare plays and maybe two of his poems at the most. Three hundred years later and Shakespeare lives on through his work, you can't escape him! He's left, right and centre if you're an English student. As readers, we become Shakespeare's tomb, his monument. It was literally the most interesting essay I have ever read, not that I've read many.

And so, this blog will be an update of my uni life. I will feature some book reviews, film reviews and anything that takes my fancy really! The blog world is my oyster.

xo