Octopodial Chrome

A group of Tolkien fans have produced a superlative Encycolpædia of Arda. Check it out—it’s good. Imperfect, but good.

Apparently The Lord of the Rings won every single award for which it was nominated. Despite my well-known concerns and grave with the adaptation, it will be an eternal monument as an incredibly well-realised visual rendition of a magnificent opus. Jackson captured the look of Middle Earth as none of us dared hope he would. From henceforth and forevermore I will read the books with his landscapes, his Riders, his buildings, his towers and many of his characters (not all, but many). My concerns are with his script, with his take, with his emphasis: never with the way he painted Tolkien’s great work onto the silver screen.

The mere making of the films demands recognition: for the first time in history, a trilogy has been filmed all at once, rather than piecemeal. The attention paid to atmosphere and detail was incredible: I recall a tale that the set for the Chamber of Mazarbul had shreds of parchment written with the Cirth Daeron scattered about itself—and that those shreds meant something. No camera ever focused on them; the effort of their preparation could be said to have been wasted—but they lent atmosphere to the actors, atmosphere that enabled them to better play their parts.

Jackson’s work was imperfect, but it far exceeded anything anyone might reasonably have hoped for. He surpassed what might have been expected, and has earned the right to hold his head high amongst our cinematic greats. To be brutally honest, I do not believe that he will ever reach or surpass the mark thus set—but that mark is graven in a fiery line which shall burn for decades to come.

I only hope that I live until the next interpretation of Tolkien’s works, the interpretation that weds visual excellence with narrative perfection to produce the film equivalent of Tolkien’s corpus.

I’ve read a very great deal about Gibson’s Passion from very perspectives. It occurred to me in church yesterday what the fundamental problem with it is: it is not Christ’s suffering and death which save us, but His Resurrection. That is why, even in the West, we Christians celebrate Easter, Pascha, the Feast of the Resurrection, not a theoretical feast of the crucifixion.

I then realised a problem with the Western theory of salvation-through-passion (albeit not the fundamental problem): it focuses on what was done to Christ, not on what Christ did. It’s a passive, feminine account of Salvation. It discounts Christ’s actions. He suffered, yes; He died, yes—and then He descended into Hell and harrowed it, freeing those who were bound there: trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life, as the hymn puts it. It is not by passivity but by action that Christ saved us.

I think that it’s also related to the Western love of inflexion points. Just as in the West there has to be an instant at which the bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Christ, so too there must be a single instant at which salvation is achieved. But that’s just not the way it is. The entire Liturgy is the process of changing the gifts into the Eucharist—and so to Christ’s entire life is part of the process of salvation. His incarnation as a man; His birth; His growing-up; His ministry; His suffering; His death; His resurrection; His ascension—all these are important. It’s not any one thing: it’s that God eternal became man and was born like we were, died like we do and rose like we will.

This obsession with one particular point in salvific history is unhealthy. It’s something like interpreting all of American history through the prism of 18th century settlements in Tennessee.

In an item brought to my attention by my dear brother, it seems that the California Supreme Court has ruled that Catholic Charities are not, in fact, a religious organisation—and thus that it must fund contraceptives for its employees, despite the Catholic stance against birth control and contraception. I suppose that soon the court will rule that black is white, the sky an interesting vertiginous shade and trees legally sentient.

If Catholic Charities are not religious, then what is? The fuckwits—I used the term deliberately: these are judges who brains have been severely fucked with, if they could come up with such specious reasoning—note that most folks served by the charity are not Catholic. What possible bearing does that have on anything? All that matters is that the organisation has a religious aversion to funding such coverage.

For that matter, how can any state justify requiring an employer to cover prescription contraceptives? Maybe that employer disagrees with them. Maybe that employer just doesn’t wish to pay for them. If his employees don’t like it, they can get another job—or simply stop screwing. One has no right to expect consequence-free happiness. With drink comes the risk of a hangover; with shooting, of an accident; with driving, of a crash; with sex, of producing children.

I don’t particularly agree with the Roman Church’s views on contraception (I think that it’s less ideal than it could be, but that it is not evil in and of itself), but that doesn’t change the fact that members of that church should be free to act according to their consciences.

I just finished watching Uncle Buck, just one of the many masterpieces in the Hughes œuvre. It’s amazing how astoundingly good so many of his films were: classics like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off; Vacation; weird Science; Planes, Trains & Automobiles; She’s Having a Baby; The Great Outdoors—and then he just dried up. Still, his numerous great films far outweigh the duds of his later years.

I entered the Ben Affleck/Sandra Bullock vehicle Forces of Nature with low expectations. Actually, it’s not at all bad. Despite what one might infer from the trailer, he actually does the right thing and sticks by his girl despite the not-insignificant attractions of Miss Bullock. It’s quite startling to see a movie advocating proper behaviour.

I saw Little Women on Saturday and, to be frank, I just wasn’t impressed. We’re supposed to pity this supposedly impoverished family—yet they’ve a fine, big house and can afford a servant. I hadn’t realised that mansions and maids are but one step away from utter destitution.