Beowulf is the type of movie that just came out of nowhere, and just by its title alone, demanded attention. The poem, which the completely Computer Generated film is based off, had reached a sort of cult status among the populous. It wasn’t as popular Homer’s Iliad or the Odyssey , but people were fascinated enough about it for Hollywood to decide to turn it into several movies. Most of them were what you would call trash.
Enter Zemeckis’ vision of Beowulf. With the screenplay co-written by Neil Gaiman of Sandman fame, this film was either going to soar or plummet. With Beowulf, there is no other conclusion.
Zemeckis had long collaborated with Alan Silvestri, and even if you don’t like the choice of Beowulf going CG, you will agree with the composer. This is a soundtrack that exhibits two things – hubris, and pure heroism, much like the tale.
The soundtrack begins with a bang thanks to the main theme, which runs just a few seconds short of a minute. It begins with some sort of rock like musical, and it runs in the background for the remainder of the composition. But what garners your attention is the chorus. It is aggressive, takes you by the horns and tosses you around for a bit before letting you go. The male chorus is loud, and with nearly ever syllable a massive drum beat is sounded. A few female lines are heard in the end, with a different phrase than the males. It is an addicting song which you can play for several minutes and not tire of. The fourth song on the track, What We Need Is a Hero, expands on the main theme, and is another excellent song, adding more lines for the female chorus.
For some reason or another, Silvestri placed in what could best described as lullaby songs. Sung by Robin Penn-Wright, they are very simple, yet at the same time, soothing songs. A string is usually found in the background, adding to the sense of peace. It gives a sense of a mother singing to her babe. It can be debated wherever these add or retract to the soundtrack. Whereas the soundtrack is full of pounding songs, with powerful drums and lyrics, here we have these very quiet songs. They stand out there, for better or for worse. They aren’t the type of songs you can listen to over and over – a few times, and you want to move on, but they will remain in the back of your mind.
Beowulf is focused on the battle between the title character and two monsters – Grendel, and a dragon. What Silvestri gives us is some amazing battle tracks. I Did Not Win The Race and Beowulf Slays the Beast come to mind. Second Grendel Attack follows loosely behind. I admit I do not know much of Silvestri, but I am certain just by listening these are some of the best battle tracks he has written.
Grendel’s mother also has two of her own themes – The Seduction, and The Final Seduction, which appropiatley enough, is the next to final track. Both songs just scream ‘corruption’ and ‘manipulation’, which is exactly what Grendel’s mother does to Beowulf.
The album ends with a pop version of A Hero Comes Home, the seventh track. It is not the worst way to end the soundtrack, but it was not the best way either. It feels alot to desire for. After the epic magnitude of the previous sixteen tracks, we are left with this. Its an enjoyable listen, but it doesn’t remain in your memory.
Overall, Beowulf is exactly as you expect: proud, and manly, with alot of drums and horns and epic chorus. For those who like to sort of things, Beowulf is an excellent choice to fill you with adrenaline. For everyone else, it will leave you with some disappointments. It might provide you with an enjoyable listen, though. And with it just running for a mere 46 minutes, it’s not a very long soundtrack either.
Four out of five stars – take off a star if you’re not much of a fan of ‘epic’ soundtracks.
Hard enough for when I have the windshield wipers on there is a WAVE of water being pushed off the window. We've been in a drought for, oh I don't know, a couple of months now. There's a big pond near where I live, and it the water was, essentially, at toe level. So, we really needed it.
In other words, it looks like I used the wrong translation for Kenzoku. I thought Kenzoku meant family in Japanese, but it looks like it was a mistranslation. The appropriate words is KAZOKU. So, it looks like I'll have to get used to the new title. While we're on the topic of Kazoku, it has now reached 115 pages. Essentially, ever since the beginning of October, I have written around 20 something pages (from 80 something to 115). That's a big accomplishment for me - essentially, that's a chapter per week. I have a strong feeling I'll be finishing Kazoku by the end of the year.
After much debate, I decided in the end to give Steve Jablonsky the money he deserved for composing the music for the Transformers film. I left the house at 10:40, thinking I would have enough time to go to Best Buy and head to my Astronomy class.
I was sadly mistaken. I went to Best Buy, and all they had was the soundtrack (which in truth is eight popular rock songs that are in no way, shape, or form inspired by the movie). So, I went to Target, Wal-Mart, and finnaly, Barnes & Nobles. None of them had it. Period.
By the time my search was done, it was already 1:30, too late for me to go to Astronomy. In the end, I downloaded the score off of bittorent.
Kinda ironic how that was my original plan to begin with.
So, I was at work for an hour. Awesome.
Anyways, it would appear that Barack Obama is no longer wearing a flag pin. Now, before we saying that he is being unpatriotic, let's think about this for a moment. Why would he do such a thing? After all, he is a presidential candidate; one would assume that he would want to appear as patriotic as possible. One would assume that wearing a flag pin would appear to be patriotic.
Barack said "The flag pin has become a substitute for true patriotism."
He has a point there. The general rule of thumb is, if you keep on pressing something, it will lose its value. That counts for the American Flag. People put the American flag pin on their suits, to appear patriotic, but in truth, it really means nothing. If Bin Laden put on an American flag pin, would he be patriotic?
The current state of the American Flag appears to be just jewelery or a novelty. Kids salute the flag because they're told to. People raise up the flag around the 4th of July because "its proper". People put flag pins on their clothing because its "accepted".
The flag pin doesn't mean anything. The flag itself doesn't mean anything. Its our belief, in our country, in what should be righteous, and in our God, that means something. Without those things, that flag really doesn't mean anything. Its just a pretty piece of cloth.
Unfortunately, I'll be at work, so I won't be able to torrent it. :(
Even though I know I'm in College, it still feels alot like Summer Vacation to me. It probably has a lot to do with that on 2 days of the week, I have only one class to go to. The other days, I have only two. In fact, my only long day is Thursday, when I'm there from 10:30 to 3...but thats with an hour long break at 12, and as soon as I finish my Science Lab, I'm free to go.
It just feels weird...it's near the end of September, and I still have yet to wake up to school. I probably will soon enough. Its just weird I haven't yet.
In other news, I started reading Zombie Powder, Kubo Tite's first manga. It has a good story...but the problem is that it was canceled early, at the 4th volume, due to lack to readership. That's a shame, because like I said, it does tell a good story, and really nice character designs.
I should write out a really long and detailed post saying how amazing Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann is.
But I'm too lazy.Go figure!
I have decided to do a post documenting everyone who has had an impact on my life, thanking them for one reason or another.
Mom For not giving up on me when the so called professionals classified me as mentally retarded, and telling her I should be sent to a 'special' school. She refused, and insisted that I go to a normal school. She would spend three hours with me every day after school on the same stuff I learned, so I could get in my brain. Despite all my tantrums, she persisted, and it was because of her I could speak and write.
Dad Even though we butt heads on more than one occasion, and we practically fight tooth and nail, he is a good man, and someone I am proud to have for a father. He helps people without a second thought, right to the point of exhaustion. He puts his family first, before pleasure, and he would always play video games with, and for, me when I was little. I have great respect for him. He's not cool like I would wish, but he is an honorable person, and a good man.
Chris I remember when we were kids, me and Chris would always play video games together. Every day after school, we would have some massive gaming fest in the basement. We would argue, and bicker, but those were good times. More importantly, when I couldn't articulate my words, he would basically be my translator to mom. God knows how only he could understand grunts and screams. xD
Ryan Me and Ryan are an odd pair. He's more likely to play with Chris than he is with me, but when he's all depressed and stuff, he goes to me. So, I guess I'm thankful that he loves me enough to come to me when he needs me, and try to act cool and be another Cloud.
J.J. J.J was my first best friend. He didn't ignore me like all the other kids in Elementary would. I guess it was the fact he had just moved into the area, or perhaps I said outright to him 'Lets be friends!'. Whatever the reason is, he was my first friend, and I'd be damned if that isn't something to be thankful for.
Sergio I knew Sergio from Westwood Church, and he was good friends with me and Chris. I remember how one time, we locked Chris out of his house, and Chris knocked on the window so hard that he broke it, and ripped his palm. He had to get stitches and everything. I still feel bad about it. Around Middle School, he started to hang around with some bad kids.
I'm thankful to Sergio for two reasons - one, he showed me that Latin Americans aren't the mean kids I saw before hand. Alot of Latin Americans I encountered before him were not too nice towards me. My mom told me one time how a Mexican kid beat me up in the Park. So, Sergio showed me that skin color doesn't determine your personality.
And two, his dad was the very definition of cool. I'll let your minds decide for themselves what that means.
D.J. I really can't say much of D.J., mostly because I don't remember that much of him. I do remember how he was freakishly tall for kids his age. I guess In can thank him for being my only tall friend. *shrugs*
Kevin Liberty Kevin, like me, was somewhat isolated from society. He wasn't the best looking kid at school, and he didn't have the most money, although they certainly had a fair amount of it. The friends that he made mostly just tolerated him. The fact that he was friends with that 'weird kid' didn't help him so much. But Kevin didn't care! He was also a lot tougher than most kids, and if he wanted to be my friend, he was going to be my friend, and if anyone had a problem with it, he would kick their asses...and he did, on more than one occasion.
Kevin was the reason why it was so hard to leave SABIS and go to a public school. We still keep in touch, thanks to the wonders of AIM, but it still hurts when I think of him.
Jesse First off, his last name is Mosher, which I swear sounds like some rock and roll term. Anyways, we weren't terribly close, but he was a good friend to me, and very nice towards me. So, I guess I'm thankful for that.
Caitlin I really don't know how I can put this into words...basically, this has been the most tragic relationship I have ever been in. When I first moved to North Carolina from Massachusetts, I didn't have any friends. How ironic that at the same time, Caitlin moved three houses down. Its pretty obvious that we became good friends because of that.
I can say the high light of our relationship was during the first term. She would sit with me at Lunch everyday, even though it would just be the two of us, and more times than not we were so exhausted from school and life we wouldn't talk about anything. We would go to movies practically every other week. If it wasn't for Caitlin, I never would of have heard of Firefly or Serenity.
When she told me she was bi, I knew in my heart we could not before friends again. It wasn't simply because of her being bisexual, but it was because she lied to me. For so long she said she was straight. The fact that she lied to me for so long, I just couldn't accept it. We drifted after that.
I think Caitlin is the reason I sympathize with gays. Its my way of saying I'm sorry.
Kevin McCarty Well, I knew that I would have to dedicate some post to him sooner or later. So, I guess I might as well do it now.
Its hard to put Kevin into a category of 'good' or 'bad'. We humans love to do that - it makes things simple. Kevin is very hard to put in either category. He did a lot of great things, but he also did a lot of bad stuff too.
I'll just focus on the good stuff. First off, he was a friend to me after me and Caitlin drifted apart. Caitlin was my only friend, so I was essentially alone. I don't remember how we first met - Kevin and I would argue about that when we were still buds. But, essentially, after our first conversation, I had a pretty good feeling we were gonna be friends.
And we were. We had our ups and downs - his negative views on Christianity being the worst - but for the most apart, we got along pretty good. He didn't mind me holding onto one of his most treasured videogames for four months, so that had to say something.
Kevin introduced me to a lot of great people, in both real life and through the internet. He got me into anime. He got me to join OtakuBoards, which I can tell you right now, is one of the greatest things anyone has ever done for me.
Kevin was, and I dare say, still is, a good guy. We just, for one reason or another, drifted apart. We had a big fight when Summer started, and its safe to say we are no longer friends...and unless God decides to twist fate's strings and have me and Kevin be forced work together (like us being in the same class at UNCG when I transfer there, or us getting the same job somewhere, or some other insane event), I don't think we ever will be friends again.
But, you know what? I have no regrets. I am blessed to have Kevin as a friend for my final two years of High School. He taught me alot of things about people, and most importantly, myself. And that is the most important thing you can learn from any relationship.
Now that is done, let me move on my internet pals! :D
Galb/Prime This man is the only reason I still have Yahoo. My first, and only, adult pal, he was the organizer of this massively popular Warcraft RP. It was my first serious RP experience, and I still have found memories of it. I still say that it was the best RP experience I ever had, even higher than that of Citius Altius Fortius. Garshtnar Garwood (my Forsaken character I played as) remains in my heart as one of my most favorite characters.
Galb has always been an interesting person. He was my first real contact with D&D, that so called taboo game that I always knew about but never actually played. He showed me that D&D wasn't even close to being associated with the dark magic...unless you call saying 'Cast fireball' magical.
With him being atheist, we had our share of debates. But they would never be arguments. He was essentially my coach for when I would meet other like minded individuals.
Kitty Oh, how I adore this girl. I really do. Kitty is, in a word, awesome. She's just the very incarnation of 'I'm cool! Let's hang out!' The fact that she's an anime/video game geek, and is smoking hot, explains why. Plus, she was one of the first to join Citius Altius Fortius. That has to count for something, right?
And don't get me started on her perfect use of emoticons.
Tiana Now, if Kitty is like a cousin to me, then Tiana is like a sister to me. Its hard to explain how I can have these feelings someone I have never even met before, but I just care about her like that. And she cares about me in the same way. Now, we relate in the same way that me and Kitty, but our relationship goes deeper than that. Its very hard to explain.
Lazarus I swear to God, I am a clone of this fine example of human intelligence. We get along on everything, from movie interests to what we want out of Roleplays. The only thing I have disagreed with him on is his agnostic views. If we ever do meet, I am certain I will feel like I am staring at myself in the mirror.
No matter the cost, we need to meet.
