Djjmann's Blog

Examining Differences in the Movie, “X-Men”

djjmann — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 22:34:32 +0000

The movie, X-Men, portrays a good example of how differences tend to collide with each other and produces a sort of view that makes each a danger to the other in some way. As I watched the movie, I examined the types of differences that the director of the movie portrayed in an indirect way. I saw differences in race and gender. Like in this movie, the two races, the mutants and the humans, had a huge difference between each other; but more specifically, the mutants under the control of “Magneto”. They hated the humans because they saw them as a threat, thus wanting to annihilate them for that. In terms of gender, both genders are giving respect with power in the movie; in other words, in this movie, men are made to possess a unique-strong ability or power as well as women. These differences I examined as gender is opposed to the contradiction in other examples relating to gender issues not in the movie are what can tell us about a society’s norm.

Living The Supposed Enjoyments of the Past in the Present

djjmann — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 19:14:20 +0000

“People robbed of their past seem to make the most fervent picture-takers, at home and abroad” – This statement Susan Sontag made in the six paragraph of her essay is a very profound or important statement that conveys the emotions of a person who has gone through youth-hood or childhood and has no evidence of past experiences that people enjoy listening to because it tells alot about you and the family; And lives his/her adult hood in such a way as to gain all the empirical knowledge that is lacking by seeking within yourself that spirit of youthful or childhood enjoyment and then through deciding in the participation in those activities, one gains empirical knowledge. These pictures by such a person would be displayed in a family history and would be reflected upon haven finally been able to do such an activity that lacked before and it includes taking photographs not only in one’s own country, but also other countries.

What a “Good” Milestone To Remember..

djjmann — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 19:03:31 +0000

It is a great milestone indeed, the raising up of an iconic image of America with honor and raising the iconic image, “The American Flag” for its respect haven fought the war for the “good of the many”. I believe in better and positive ways’ of dealing with a situation instead of dealing with the situation in an inferior or ‘cheap’ way – as I call it – of taking away countless numbers of lives for the ‘self – advantage’ of one’s own self because life is precious and should be treated with respect. Yes I believe that the raising up of the flag by those six Americans is a very important milestone, but we should always remember that “behind every flower, there may be a thorn”; and as for this flower or “just cause”, there ‘is’ a thorn. A lot of people have been blinded by this iconic image from critically analyzing the cause and the effect of this situation; this cause is of course…. to win and the effect of course because America always looks for new and easier ways of accomplishing something is to win not just many departed souls, but many innocent departed souls and I am talking about the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is awful to think of annihilating an entire state like region after haven finally taking control of a region which is also a part of the country where the two bombed regions reside; I just wonder if America thinked before doing that. Anyways, I feel that this picture really shows one of the integrities we uphold which is strength and courage; And I would feel strong and courageous to look for a logical and true answer why America haven been exposed to the determination of Japan’s will to defend its country to go and do more harm, infact greater harm by ending the lives of even little innocent kids who just came into this world.

Photojournalism

djjmann — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:39:47 +0000

First, what is photojournalism? Many have said that is is the reporting of events using photo graphs, the use of still pictures to depict a point and it is the use of past pictures to portray an idea; but, photojournalism to some others viewpoint is a particular form of journalism(the collecting, editing and presenting of new materials for broadcasting or publication) that creates images in order to tell a story. Photojournalism, indeed, is what we humans do everyday; Everyday, we look at either a billboard, a picture of someone, a poster, magazine and etc, and make inferences based on the context of what is being displayed. If the background has negative contexts then the feeling or view toward it will be negative; and as for positive, it will be viceversa. After viewing critically the photo of Joel Sernfeld, Metro Bus Shelter, 7th Street at E Street, Southwest, Washington D.C, In April 1995 photo about a forty – three year old mother of three who froze to death in a bus stop after being turned away the night before, I got this feeling of desolateness with the non – passing of pedestrians and the non – passing of cars too which are only parked. Looking straight to the bus stop which is the focal point of the picture, the feeling of dryness envelops because there are no pedestrians waiting for the bus and the level of loneliness that that place seems to be suffering from. However, when I look towards the street across the bus – stop, their lies the “Department of Housing and Urban Development” building. Why I am saying this is because it looks very ironic that that building is there and a poor person in need is suffering in that urban area. This ironic situation to me, is the cause of me viewing the tone of this area the way is is.

A Sense Of Space

djjmann — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:02:30 +0000

After watching the two films, “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” and “The Four Feathers”, I noticed that the two have peculiar characteristics that display how the film designers made use of their space. The Film Maker for, ‘The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” used weird and distorted shapes that depicted a weird and irregular feeling in viewers. To my understanding, I see those weird shapes as a symbolism of an irregular feeling. The maker of this film drew attention sometimes directly to the main character’s (Dr. Caligari) face and the side of a situation that is going on like when Dr. Caligari wanted a concession to enter the fair from a worker, the scene was pictured in the side view and sometimes directly to his face when he had to sit down. Until the the early forte’s, the use of sound was not present in the movies, thus, this movie relied on texts to communicate the idea(s) behind a scene(s). As for, “The Four Feathers”, the setting took place in two distinct areas, a palace in England and the desert. The film makers indirectly display a sense of transition from a period of pleasure and happiness in serving as a soldier in England to a period of struggles and distress in the Sudanese Desert. The filmmakers in this film used real environments and not imaginary environments like in the first movie which reminds one of, “Alice In Wonderland”. These senses of space, I think, defines or explains the film makers, in the two movies respectively, purpose of making use of the spaces used.

The Metaphysics Of “Dead Man Walking”

djjmann — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 18:11:35 +0000

In this technological age, humans have reached the height of enabling fellow human beings to view reality by using methods that are ought to be deceiving, but are hard to capture with the naked eye, sometimes mostly because of the persuasive details a film designer adds to a setting. That brings us to the fact that most film designers of the 21st century make sure they lift the spirit of ‘potential viewers’ more in watching what is trying to be depicted in a movie, comedy or documentary by adding details which are hard for most viewers to grasp and know as being the cause of the impressive setting of a film. Such details are immensely displayed in James Bond Movies; the film designer persuades the viewer to watch not just one movie, but many of them, by including backgrounds that one thinks can only can be accessed by maybe the U.S Government or CIA Agency or even nobody which is known to be called, “fantasy”. Thus, Film Designers, in order to keep the money flowing support those settings with occurrences that can happen in such places to play with the viewers mind more – using late 20th century and early 21st century entertainment innovations. Hence, people look at those settings as being very cool or interesting, thus enabling a successful capturing of enthusiasm. In the movie, Dead Man Walking, which is about a young man convicted of murder and rape is on Death Row and is looked after by a nun who acted as his spiritual advisor, is a good paradigm of a powerful emotional state because of the settings which are two, in a New Orleans prison and a poor African-American Projects in New Orleans called “St. Thomas Projects”. The movie was a very compelling to emotion movie that really put my mom and I to a deep sad emotion that one should feel even though it’s just a movie, but a movie that’s about true life experiences. I think that the film designer(s) did a good job in using various materials in the background of the scenes to portray the feelings of all the characters of the movie and most especially, “The Dead Man Walking”. Such scenes like the father of the boy who got murdered by Matthew (convicted murderer), after undergoing a divorce with his wife had his dead son’s belongings packed; This scene displayed an intense feeling of sorrow to me. Another scene which I will use as my main scene, is a very powerful scene that I thought the designer really persuaded my thoughts in indirectly experiencing how it really feels to watch a person on Death Row finally reach and go through the, ‘ End of the Row’ by displaying the execution chair, syringes which were kind of huge, the liquids being injected in him, how executioners surround a person on an execution chair, a pastor last minute life prayer; also the sorrows being depicted in the tears or if not, small tears flowing out of the witnesses eyes and many more intense details or materials used. I feel that this role of the setting in my main scene played a major role in the story and that is to express the moral of what the movie is about which is,” one cannot eat their cake and have it”; In other words, one cannot do evil and expect to not pay for it. From watching this movie, I can conclude that if I choose to be told this story instead of watching it myself, I would not feel the impact more than I would if I watched the movie myself.

The Day I Wanted To Beat-Up My Computer

djjmann — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 21:37:51 +0000

It was a very busy Monday – afternoon school day. Every street I passed in my neighborhood was filled with students of all ages carrying back-packs coming back home. The roads were filled with cars and trucks honking there horns in the name of punctuality. I saw many wonders today that a future editorial like me, would want to write about; like two rigorous police chases around the junction near my school and one in the high-way, two individuals quarreling over a small scratch to one of there cars (and I just guess… its just greed – which is true at some cases), and the most striking, a Jewish guy that I now refer to as, religiously, the “Jewish” guy – who I thought is very religious because of all those rigorous messawges he gives to his face which I thought is one of the norms of his people – that asked me If I have a cigarette, but I am not the only person he asked – which I thought as a very ironical and strange.
I knew from all these experiences that I would have a lot of work to do and my level of anxiousness to write there experiences in an essay format was high; so, I could not afford to loose that level of anxiousness due to some situations that may come my way.
Well, I was happy when I came home because of the sudden feel of peace from all the troubles of the ‘outside’ world and relaxed on my parlor couch for almost half an hour. I was still thinking about the experience I had about the Jewish man like the causes of his action. It was very perplexing for me to continue to divulge into and so at a point in time, I stopped thinking about it and started to think about something else. Now this time, I was thinking about my ‘girlfriend’ who is supposedly my friend. It was quite long, but at a point I said, “ok,ok,…. Alvin, quite dreaming about her and start doing things that are more important at this time”. I immediately, ended my daily reflexion/ dreaming period and headed to my room to start my various works.
I chose to do my editorial work first. I then turned on my computer not knowing that there is trouble lurking ahead. I then remembered a word I encountered as my teacher was teaching that I did not know of the meaning. So, I looked it up in “Dictionary.com” and suddenly, Bammm!!! My computer was infected by twelve viruses and I couldn’t believe how people can be so wicked like this by putting a virus or viruses in something many people prefer using especially those who have mobile phones with internet in them. The virus was so bad that my computer started to function very slowly and next thing, my computer could not function at-all – the curser was not working and the keyboards too. I restarted my computer thinking that it would atleast remedy the situation of the curser and the keyboard, but, it did worse by stopping at the point before the windows appears. I waited for like ten minutes for the windows to appear, but It didn’t. So I restarted the system three other times and the same thing occured. At this point, I finally concluded that I was in ‘deep dodoo’ because of all the work I had to accomlish before eight o’clock the start of watching T.V.

As I was restarting the computer and it just was too stubborn to continue to the windows I felt like throwing it on the floor and maybe that would make the computer understand how I feel about making use of it. So, I abandoned my zeal to make the computer function and headed to my friends house so that hopefully if he’s there, I would make use of his computer.

Every Detail Matters

djjmann — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 03:24:04 +0000

We humans tend to forget that there will come a day that something which is ought to have known is needed for gathering information which would lead to a certain conclusion about you. It can be a certain conclusion that will determine the observatory level of details or it can be a conclusion that your just not attentive.

After drawing the front and the back of a penny, I noticed that my own drawing does not completely match the original penny. However, I found some features of my drawing and features of the original penny that I can link together like the face of Abraham Lincoln and the one cents sign.

I barely drew anything. I left out all the significant parts like the year it was minted, and others. There is no doubt in my mind that I will learn from my lack of observing and remembering small details as a result of this reckoning experience. This has taught me a big lesson.

That House Across The Street

djjmann — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 21:04:24 +0000

Once I hear the phrase, “haunted house’, the first thing that comes to my mind is a house that has paranormal activities. I go-on and think of door bangs, clocks ticking and stopping all of a sudden, round objects like balls rolling by their-selves, sudden chills as a result of a the proximity of an entity, orbs, strange noises and many more.

One of my favorite T.V series I like to watch is the “Ghost Adventures” series by TAPS. I watch at least one episode a week during the school year, but many a week during the vacation times (lest I have time to watch them).

I loved to investigate mysteries ever since I was a small kid even though it was by reading stories about people who experienced it and reading books that are about mysterious phenomenons. I would always flick the channel to watch some scary movies like Chucky, Nightmare On Elm Street, Holloween, Candy Man and many more. The night, especially after eight o’clock was the starting time I usually loved to watch scary movies. During those days my siblings and I, and sometimes our parents would eat dinner while watching the scary movie: it was like eating popcorn in the movies.

Anyways, there is a house across the street directly in front of my house. I’ve heard so many stories about the house and the more I heard of them, the more I would like to investigate the house, but I know that I am putting myself at risk if I go there. I have a friend, a unique one indeed who I believe would be of good use to help me in this future investigation. People called him, “The Mysterious One” because nobody was sure if he was o.k because he loved talking about him seeing small children dressed in medieval clothing running around the house even during the summer days in front of the haunted house, chubakabras during his visit to see his grandmother in Mexico and seeing a large beast in the Atlantic Ocean beach on Far Rockaway. Even one of his friends, while gossiping about him said that his room is full of pictures of ghosts, dead people in coffins and other mysterious pictures pasted around his room. But, I believe that he is not ‘a mystery’ and will be handy in helping me solve the mystery that will change the way people in our neighborhood view paranormal mysteries.

Well, how does it feel to be in a house that is full of strange activities that cannot be explained? And how does it feel to have a close encounter with a person living in the after-life? All this may be answered when I finally visit those who are still lurking in ” That House Across The Street”.

The Pencil Life

djjmann — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:20:04 +0000

Rise and shine, it’s morning time,

Time for me to help my friend, “The Paper” make some fame,

Uppp……. Here I goo!! …. Upp, upp and awayyy!!

I am so excited because it’s time to give some fame,

Fame that will get everybody looking at my friend, “The Paper”, glamorously.

As I am put into this dark place (bag, pocket, e.t.c),

I just wonder what type of paper friend I am up against,

Is it the rough type? Or the smooth type which will help make my day?

I think of this because I don’t like frequent new noses as a result of touching ‘fire’,

It’s so debilitating and most especially agitating!!!

Sometimes, I even get cut with a knife on my precious nose,

And it doesn’t make my nose into my usual roll, instead, an ugly facial makeover.

Now well, well, well…. what do I have here?

A virgin of fame I see!!,

In-fact, I’m lucky because it’s a smooth paper friend indeed!!

I assure my boss (owner of pencil),

that after this,

he will bear the fruit of success through the rich handwriting( I will make the paper look fine so that my boss will be respected of his writing more).