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nlwjournal · 4 years
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I’m Dying
I miss my friends, I miss school which is shocking, and most of all I miss being apart of a community. I want to see people pass by, I want to say hello to every person I know, and I just want to be social again. According to my Myers & Briggs test, I am an INFJ-A or INFJ-T. I is introvert. I am 69% introverted, and 31% extroverted. Yes, I love being inside, but I’m not getting my 31% of extroverted-ness that I usually get, so I’m kind of dying. 
ALL I WANT TO DO IS HUG MY FRIENDS, MAKE DUMB DECISIONS THAT I’LL LEARN FROM, AND BE ALIVE AGAIN, BUT I CAN’T DO ANY OF THAT. 
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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Period
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A god
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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The Perks Of Being A Wallflower Is Now In My Top 5 Movie List
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Wow. Just wow. I don’t know why I haven’t watched this movie before today.
But, considering my headspace at the moment, this movie hit all the spots. It dealt with death, trauma, college, waitlists, love, hate, depression, relationships, high school, friends, sexual assault, etc. The list goes on and on, but I’ve been thinking about most of these topics recently. Quarantine has been challenging, and I’ve found myself thinking about subjects I haven’t thought about in a while. Nothing harmful, but it’s not what I usually think about on my day to day. 
Okay, but I just want to talk about Logan Lerman’s acting. I’ve seen Lerman in the two Percy Jackson movies, Fury, and a couple of episodes of Hunters, and this performance was astounding. Lerman plays a shy freshman in high school named Charlie, who’s trying to fit into the world after his best friend committed suicide; he also has PTSD, which takes a toll on his mind. The thing is when he played the role, he was 20 years old, and he looked way older than a real freshman in high school would. Yes, a lot of actors do this, but not many are successful at it. Lerman plays the character in a very held back, tight, timid sort of way, which fits well into the story. Every choice he made felt right, every impulse he took felt authentic, every line he said made me want to crumble because it was so real, and that’s how freshman are in life. It was just so realistic. The whole movie, he spoke like the was holding back, and in the end, we finally find out what that is.
Toward the end of the movie, Charlie has a mental breakdown, which causes him to learn the truth about his Aunt Helen; she sexually abused him as a young child. He’s been repressing this memory for years now, and throughout the years, it’s come out as images, but never the truth. During the actual mental breakdown, Charlie is sitting in a chair, helpless. He keeps telling himself not to cry, looking around him, touching his face, etc. It’s such a crazy moment, and Lerman played it so well. During the scene, he ends up calling his sister, and at the beginning of the movie, he said that he wishes his friend wrote a suicide note, which ultimately made me feel that he was going to kill himself. His sister tells one of her friends to call the cops and send them to her house. He begins to walk around his house and into the kitchen, which made me think he was looking for a knife. In one of his flashbacks, Aunt Helen flips her wrist over, revealing two cuts, so I immediately thought Charlie was going to cut himself. Thankfully, he does not commit suicide; he just passes out. The cops find him and take him to the hospital. Then begins his healing process, which follows to the end of the movie. 
Females hurting males isn’t talked about much in the media, so it was so shocking when that detail was revealed. I thought this movie was going to be a fun teen movie, but boy was I wrong. Throughout the film, Aunt Helen was depicted as Charlie’s favorite person, but she was terrible to him. The flashbacks seemed like loved and cherished memories when, in reality, they were repressed and acted as the opposite of the truth. 
Also, Paul Rudd was in the movie; he did great. He played Charlie’s English teacher, and they had a strong bond. Rudd’s character would give Charlie new books to read and write reports on because he noticed Charlie’s enthusiasm for reading. He plays a good father figure for Charlie. Now, Charlie’s family doesn’t seem to be having problems, but Rudd’s character offers guidance throughout the movie. They get to a first-name basis, which is quite cute. Relationships: There is this one exchange between the two of them that has remained one of the most iconic scenes in the movie. I’ve seen this scene online a million times, but when I watched it, it hit me like a truck. It goes:
Charlie: Mr. Anderson? Can I ask you something? Bill: Yeah. Charlie: Why do nice people choose the wrong people to date? Bill: Are we talking about anyone specific? [Charlie nods] Bill: Well, we accept the love we think we deserve. Charlie: Can we make them know that they deserve more? Bill: We can try.
Reading this scene without context hurts, but watching the scene with context is something else. At that moment, it led me to examine all the past relationships I’ve had and how they affected me. Do I think I deserve the love of crappy people? Why? What do I deserve? I’m still figuring this out. 
College/Waitlists: TPOBAW* touches on the subject of college because most of the supporting characters are seniors, and they’re going through the process of applying to colleges. The love interest, Sam—who is an incredible character—initially got waitlisted for Penn State, but got off the waitlist leading up to the end of the movie. This. Broke. Me. I recently got waitlisted from one of my top schools, and I was and still am crushed. I was manifesting getting into that school, and I didn’t. It hurts a lot. To see Sam get off the waitlist gave me a teeny bit of hope, but I’m still not that optimistic about it. 
High School: Seeing a movie about the final months of senior year and not being able to experience that makes me want to jump into a dry well and never come out. It’s my last semester of high school, and I don’t get to do the things that I’ve been looking forward to for years. I was supposed to be in a play this spring that I would’ve been proud to do and happily look back on. I was supposed to hang out with my friends before not seeing them ever again. But mainly I was supposed to work hard until the end, and walk across that stage and finally graduate—this isn’t set yet, but judging by the current situation, I don’t see it happening. It just sucks.
 This movie hit home, and I’m glad that it did. 
TPOBAW*: The Perks Of Being A Wallflower
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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If you’re not scared, you’re not taking a chance. And if you’re not taking a chance, then what the hell are you doing? — Ted Mosby
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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If you don’t know by now—which you should because I talk about this constantly—Good Will Hunting is my favorite movie of all time. 
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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I’m just gonna leave this here because 1917 was so incredible. 
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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I’m Breaking The First Rule Of Fight Club
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First of all, Sasha and Kayla suggested the title, and I thought it was funny. The title was gonna be “Edward Norton And Brad Pitt Can Get It Any Day,” but that’s not school appropriate, and yet here it is 🤫
Anyway, Fight Club by David Fincher kind of blew my mind. I didn’t see the ending coming at all. Throughout the movie, Tyler Durden pops in and out for like a millisecond in some shots, but I didn’t want to search up why because I knew that would spoil the movie—haha little did I know.
Norton and Pitt killed this movie. Their chemistry was electrifying, and I believed every single second of their acting. Even the scenes where The Narrator/Tyler was hitting himself, which looks impossible. I definitely have a new love for Edward Norton, and I’m going to start watching more of his movies.
I always knew that Pitt was a good actor, but this movie really said: Brad Pitt is a good freaking actor. I’ve seen him in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Inglorious Basterds, and the Ocean’s films, but in this performance, he really stood out. In the scene where he’s in Lou’s Tavern and Tyler’s getting beat up by Lou, his acting is impeccable. When he’s laughing, it sounds like he’s enjoying it, it also sounds Joker-esque. I was terrified of him for the rest of the movie. Because he’s technically a figment of The Narrator/Tyler’s imagination, so anything is possible.
Also, I didn’t realize that The Narrator didn’t have a name. A couple years ago, I was reading the book All The Truth That’s In Me by Julie Berry, and no offense to Berry, but the fact that I didn’t know the protagonist’s name in the first three pages of the book prohibited me from reading. So, I’m not sure how I was able to get through Fight Club.
Maybe I was distracted by the plot of the movie? The whole film I did wonder, “how has someone not died yet?” It’s a freaking fight club for Jack’s sake—see what I did there… Jack’s… hahaha… if you don’t get that, watch the movie again. But seriously, how didn’t someone die?
In my eyes, the fight club showed the glamorization of violence in a man’s world—who am I to talk about this, right? So, from what I’ve seen, boys have been told not to show feelings. “Suck it up” and “take it like a man” are phrases I’ve heard fathers say to their sons. I’ve played sports all my life, and when a boy got hurt, the father was right there to tell them to stop crying. I guess fight club is a way to release all the tension and built up emotions with aggression and violence? Somewhere in the film, the Narrator says the line, “you weren’t alive anywhere like you were there,” meaning fight club. Maybe they liked being hit so they could feel alive? I guess, feel anything for that matter, because men aren’t taught to feel? I’m not really sure. I’ve been reading conflicting reviews online of what the movie actually means, but I still don’t get it.
I really enjoyed the slow-motion shots. The camera was moving for the actor, so the actor didn’t have to work so hard. The shots were just also really cinematic. A slow-motion shot that comes to mind is the sex scene between The Narrator/Tyler and Marla. Typically, I hate nudity in films—I still do—but I appreciated this one. There was something about the distorted racking of focus, camera movements, and general tone that fit the storyline well. It didn’t feel out of place, abrupt, or vulgar at all.
The last scene just took my mind to a different place. Since I didn’t see the big twist coming, I was so shocked. When The Narrator/Tyler shoots himself in mouth, it was a relief. This side of him he’d been repressing was finally gone, and he could truly become whole again. Also, it brought out his true feelings for Marla. The last shot of them together astonishing. Seeing the buildings fall and them holding hands, it was like aww that’s cute.
The movie does make me think of Dissociative Identity Disorder or (DID). DID used to be called Multiple Personality Disorder, which has been depicted in the media incorrectly. I watch this youtube channel called DissociaDID, and that particular system was started by Nin, the host for the DissociaDID youtube channel. The DissociaDID channel was made to inform people of what the disorder truly is because in movies like Split and Fight Club— I’m not actually sure if The Narrator/Tyler has DID—have depicted people with DID as violent, but in the real world most people with DID are not violent at all. Now, I’m not sure if The Narrator/Tyler has DID, but he does hint at waking up at a different time, in a different place, as a different person, which occurs when someone has DID. And I’m not an expert, so here’s a link to the DissociaDID youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6kFD5xIFvWyLlytv5pTR1w/featured. Here’s another video that a YouTuber, Anthony Padilla, made where he interviewed people with DID: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek7JK6pattE&t=422s.
In conclusion, I need to pay more attention to detail. Maybe this was just an off movie day for me, but when I look back at some clips, the answer was right in front of my eyes. In the car crash scene, when the car is upside down, The Narrator comes out of the driver’s side, and Tyler comes out of the passenger’s side. In that scene, The Narrator was projecting Tyler in the driver’s seat, but to the two guys in the back of the car, The Narrator was driving. Also, in the first scene of the film, The Narrator says, “I know this because Tyler knows this.” HELLO, NICOLE, HE LITERALLY TOLD YOU THE ANSWER HOW DID YOU, MISS, THIS? I guess I was just lost in Edward Norton’s eyes.
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nlwjournal · 4 years
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GoodFellas? More Like SuperBadFellasWhoRobAndKillPeople.
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GoodFellas by Martin Scorsese was an incredible movie. Liotta, De Niro, Pesci, Bracco, and Sorvino did terrific jobs. I was dreading all the wrong choices Henry was making like drug abuse, adultery, reckless disregard for human life, etc. Tommy freaked me out for the majority of the movie, so I mean A+ to Joe Pesci. I was moved by Karen’s motions throughout the whole film, she is a powerful but insecure character, and I sympathized with her. Jimmy Conway was just such a badass—plus, I love De Niro with all my heart—I couldn’t really hate him until the end of the film when his motive was to kill Henry. Paulie was also just very cool; he was idolized as a god for most of the film. Overall, I enjoyed it.
Although, in my opinion, the movie doesn’t follow a three-act structure, it follows a two-act structure, if that’s even a thing. I’ve been reading this book, Into the Woods: A Five-Act Journey Into Story by John Yorke, and it describes the three-act structure as, “set-up, confrontation, and resolution, with a turning point toward the end of the first (the inciting incident), and second (the crisis) acts” (Yorke, 26). The movie did not feel at all in three parts. It felt like two halves. The first half is backstory plus the mob’s success, and the second half is the downfall. Because of this, the movie felt super drawn out and long.
I lost interest in a lot of scenes because I was waiting for something terrible to happen. Yes, bad events did take place like Henry beating up that guy who lives across the street from Karen, Jimmy and Tommy killing like everyone, Henry cheating on his wife, Henry and Tommy burning down the bar, Henry and Tommy hijacking trucks, and Henry and Tommy stealing $420,000 from Air France, but there were no repercussions. These characters were getting away with horrible things, and nothing was happening to them.
I’m not gonna say I didn’t like these characters, because I did, it’s just that they’re horrible people and yet we sympathize with them. We find some way to connect with these people even though they are doing illegal things. This goes for a lot of movies like all the Ocean’s films, Despicable Me, Drive, etc. We root for the bad guys, sometimes.
Apart from this, the only character I wanted to truly succeed was Karen; she was somewhat the only ethically good character—maybe not entirely, but her actions were justified. Karen had gone through so much, and I really just wanted her to win. In the end, she sort of does win because she’s now apart of witness protection and safe from the mob. But she’s still with her abusive husband, who she still seems to love for some reason.
(Total pivot) I thought that the use of voice-overs was very insightful. It lets us into the character’s minds. It’s kind of exhilarating because the audience is the only one being told these thoughts. I’ve always enjoyed voice-overs in film because it makes us appreciate the acting and picture more. We see the characters think out-loud rather than speak out-loud.
Also, I really liked the aspect of freeze frames. At first, I thought it was tacky, but after watching the opening of the movie again, the freeze frames became more important. The freeze frames occur because it’s a significant memory in Henry’s life. The ones that are shown in Henry’s early life show us his induction into the mob, his father beating him, the mailman being beaten, Henry blowing up the cars, etc. The freeze frames are Scorsese’s way to tell us, “LOOK AT THIS MOMENT, IT’S IMPORTANT!”
All in all, it’s a pretty messed up movie, but it was great. It made me love De Niro more than I already do. I was also pleased to find out that Ray Liotta was Charlie’s Lawyer in Marriage Story. And Michael Imperioli, plays Uriel on a show I watch called Lucifer—he’s barely in it though.
Yorke, John. Into the Woods a Five-Act Journey into Story. The Overlook Press, 2015.
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