Tag: vision
612 – Davi Kopenawa, Bruce Albert, Alison Dundy – The falling sky – words of a Yanomami shaman
The Falling Sky is a remarkable first-person account of the life story and cosmo-ecological thought of Davi Kopenawa, shaman and spokesman for the Yanomami of the Brazilian Amazon. Representing a people whose very existence is in jeopardy, Davi Kopenawa paints an unforgettable picture of Yanomami culture, past and present, in the heart of the rainforest–a world where ancient indigenous knowledge and shamanic traditions cope with the global geopolitics of an insatiable natural resources extraction industry.
In richly evocative language, Kopenawa recounts his initiation and experience as a shaman, as well as his first encounters with outsiders: government officials, missionaries, road workers, cattle ranchers, and gold prospectors. He vividly describes the ensuing cultural repression, environmental devastation, and deaths resulting from epidemics and violence. To counter these threats, Davi Kopenawa became a global ambassador for his endangered people. The Falling Sky follows him from his native village in the Northern Amazon to Brazilian cities and finally on transatlantic flights bound for European and American capitals. These travels constitute a shamanic critique of Western industrial society, whose endless material greed, mass violence, and ecological blindness contrast sharply with Yanomami cultural values.
Bruce Albert, a close friend since the 1970s, superbly captures Kopenawa’s intense, poetic voice. This collaborative work provides a unique reading experience that is at the same time a coming-of-age story, a historical account, and a shamanic philosophy, but most of all an impassioned plea to respect native rights and preserve the Amazon rainforest. (amazon)
“When I come back from a trip among the white people, the dizziness leaves my eyes after a while and my thought be-comes clear again. I no longer hear cars, machines, or airplanes. I only lend an ear to the tooro toads and krouma frogs that call the rain in the forest. I only hear the rustling of the leaves in the wind and the rumbling of the thunders in the sky. The ignorant words of the city politicians gradually vanish in the quiet of my sleep. I become calm again by going to hunt and making my spirits dance.
The forest is very beautiful to see. It is cool and aromatic. When you move through it to hunt or travel, you feel joyful and your mind is slow-paced. You listen to the chirping of the cicadas in the distance, or the cries of the curassows and the agami herons, and the clamor of the spider monkeys in the trees. Your worries are eased. Your thoughts can then follow one another without getting obscured.”
0429 – The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey (1988)
spacetime coordinates: remote Cumbrian mountain village 1348 >> 1980s New Zealand
The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey is a 1988 feature film, an official Australian-New Zealand co-production, directed by Vincent Ward.
Ward and his production team based the look of the film on extensive research into the Middle Ages, particularly the mining industry, although this was then rendered imaginatively. The colours of the film are based on medieval art and, in particular, medieval and renaissance artists’ ideas about heaven and hell. The blues in many of the modern-day sequences are based on the inks in the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, while the reds and oranges of the motorway lights and furnace fires evoke images of hell in the works of Hieronymous Bosch, Pieter Bruegel and Matthias Grünewald. Ward later said he had not achieved what he wanted to with the colour of the modern-day scenes due to the film’s short shooting schedule. Ironically, the colour in the medieval scenes, which were turned into black and white, was far better than that in the 20th century scenes. Some of the mining scenes were inspired by engravings from the German mining manual De re metallica, although it dates from two centuries after the time of those scenes. The angel of death seen flying across the moon at one point is based on a medieval engraving in Paris’ Père Lachaise Cemetery.
See also: Middle Ages in film
0424 – The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings
The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings (Polish: Wiedźmin 2: Zabójcy królów) is an action role-playing hack and slash video game developed by CD Projekt Red for Microsoft Windows, Xbox 360, OS X, and Linux. The game was released for Microsoft Windows in May 2011, for Xbox 360 and OS X in 2012, and for Linux in 2014.
It is a sequel to the 2007 video game The Witcher. Like its predecessor, the game is based on The Witcher series of fantasy novels by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The player directs the actions of Geralt of Rivia, a monster hunter known as a Witcher. The fantasy world in which his adventures take place owes much to Polish history and Slavic mythology.
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS (MINIMUM): OS: Windows XP/Vista/7 // Processor: Intel 2.2 GHz Dual-Core or AMD 2.5 GHz Dual-Core // Memory: 1.5 GB (Win XP), 2GB (Win Vista/Win 7) // Graphics: GeForce 8800 (512 MB) or Radeon HD3850 (512 MB). Resolution: 1280×720. // DirectX®: DirectX 9.29 has to be installed. // Hard Drive: 25GB
253 – The Dark Tower (2017)
The Dark Tower is a 2017 American science fantasy western film directed and co-written by Nikolaj Arcel. A continuation of Stephen King‘s novel series of the same name, the film stars Idris Elba as Roland Deschain, a gunslinger on a quest to protect the Dark Tower—a mythical structure which supports all realities—while Matthew McConaughey plays his nemesis, Walter Padick, the Man in Black, and Tom Taylor stars as Jake Chambers, a New York boy who becomes Roland’s apprentice.
Intended to launch a film and television franchise, the first installment combines elements from several novels in the eight-volume series, and takes place in both modern-day New York City and in Mid-World, Roland’s Old West-style parallel universe. The film also serves as a canonical sequel to the novel series, which concludes with the revelation that Roland’s quest is a cyclical time loop; the presence of the Horn of Eld, which Roland carries in the film, indicates that this is the next cycle.
0095 – Valhalla Rising (2009)
spacetime coordinates: Scottish Highlands around the year 1096
Valhalla Rising is a 2009 English-language Danish adventure drama film directed by Nicolas Winding Refn, and starring Mads Mikkelsen. in writing the script Nicolas Winding Refn was responsible for the spiritual, metaphysical and plot related part while Roy Jacobsen was responsible for all the Norse mythological, viking and historical themes due to his extensive knowledge about vikings and Norse paganism.
The film follows a Norse warrior named One-Eye and a boy as they travel with a band of Christian Crusaders by ship in the hopes of finding the Holy Land.
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0058 – Alexander (2004)
spacetime coordinates: 4th century BC Macedonia // India // Babylon // Arabia // Persian Empire // Battle of Gaugamela // Battle of Hydaspes
Alexander is a 2004 epic historical drama film based on the life of Alexander the Great. It was directed by Oliver Stone, with Colin Farrell in the title role.
The film was an original screenplay based in part on the book Alexander the Great, written in the 1970s by the University of Oxford historian Robin Lane Fox.
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TimeSpace Warps 