Open response to three Disney movies for the “Disney of Nature” class (Mr. Downs).

Open response to “Swiss family Robinson”

Honestly, this was the worst film I have ever seen. There is not a shred of reality in this film, nothing even close to real. I think that even the “Lion King”, a cartoon, is more realistic than this movie, because in the “Lion King”, at least some creatures die (which by the way does happen in real life). . I think that movies that are so far from reality have very little value for the regular audience, as was evident by the class’s negative reaction to it.
This movie, now that I think about it, is actually a quite typical American movie, where nothing happens except for good things. These types of movies are a reflection of the American tendency to overlook facts and replace them with glossy, nice, fantasies. Oh, it’s not just an American tendency exclusively, but I think its more prevalent here. Downs, I could write more BS here, and start repeating stuff I wrote in my essay for jungle book, but in the interest of saving trees I will end here and start my next reflection.

Open response to Bambi

•An exquisite work of superb cartoonomatography, the very famed and highly critically acclaimed motion picture “Bambi” surpasses all odds and expectations by at the same time being emotionally engaging to the viewer and yet having a uniquely lent (French for slow, for all you uneducated regulars, low lying street dwellers) tempo. “Bambi”, the motion picture, also is quite remarkable for its delightfully delicate and impressionistic in quality depictions of extra-indoor vicinities, i.e. the forests of vert (French for green). Though mostly of placid character, this film does have some quite astonishingly well, shall we say, vicious moments. The part of the picture (motion picture) where Bambi fends off his opponent antelope by acts of pure and brutal physical aggression may be too violent for the enjoyment of rather smaller children of the younger age groups.

Open response to “Little Mermaid”

Hey Downs, I actually learned something from watching this Disney movie. Apparently (can you believe this?) it is better where it is wetter, under the sea!!! I think it’s a very valuable piece of knowledge, don’t you? I mean, I used to think that it’s better in the mountains, but now, I don’t know! I guess I’ll have to find a college that’s under the see, you sea, just like Middlebury is in the mountains! Then, I will transfer there after a year at Middlebury, and compare, which is better! But actually, I might not actually have to do that: there’s an easier solution – I’ll buy a huge SUV that gets like 2 miles per gallon, cause the ice caps to melt and seawater to thermally expand, and then Middlebury will soon be under the see, you sea. It’s better where it is wetter, under the sea!!!

Downs, Thank you so much for the experience. i will never forget these two classes, ecolit and dis. of nature (BTW that’s the way it appears on the schedule – “dis of nature”, and that’s so appropriate; Disney movies are the dis of nature. GO OUTSIDE!!!)

Essay for the “Film Studies” class at Newark Academy (Mrs. Stephanie Acquadro)

(about famous Fellini’s movie “8 ½”)

I open the computer screen with intention to crack Guido/Fellini’s enigmatic journey and then I understand that really I have no idea as to what to write this essay about, or how to write it. Should I write about how autobiographic Fellini’s “8 1/2″ is, and about what sets in the film make Guido (or Fellini) decide to accept the reality of his life’s struggles? Or should I write about how Guido resolves to learn some lessons from his experiences? If I mention something about how much I hate this confusion and the torture of coming up with a single idea about the film studies, will Mrs. Acquadro still give me a decent grade? Or, perhaps, I should write about the connections between existentialism, neo-realism, and liberalism in politics? My dad is asking me, when I will finish writing this essay, and my dogs are anxiously waiting for me to walk them, my mother is reminding that the dinner is on the table. The total chaos is in my head, the mess is around me, and then I realize how similar this is to the film I am writing about. 8 ½ is a film about creative process, about the uncertainties, about confusion, about how it all interferes with the life of the artist and his own problems, and about how it finally comes to resolution when, in the course of this torturous journey, suddenly the brilliant idea crystallizes from the dark sub consciousness to the bright light and the moment of resolution comes. So I guess I will write this essay simply about writing it, and ignore all the criteria about how to write good analytical papers, the proper paragraph structure, and make it a true and honest work, and hope I’ll get to the bright star of excellence.

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Essay for the “Eco-Literature” class at Newark Academy (Mr. Jon Downs) 

Have you ever killed a human being? Probably not. But have you ever killed a tree, a fish, a bird? Most likely, yes. Have you ever defaced someone’s house? But what about an animal’s habitat? The atmosphere? Why is there such a difference between the way we treat members of our own species and members of other ones? Why the human moral is so strict and the moral toward the nature is so lax? In his essay, Land Ethic, Aldo Leopold attributes this difference to trends in human evolution. He argues that, just as human-to-human ethics is an adaptation for survival, human-to-land ethics is a natural result of man’s increasing power to change the natural environment, and furthermore are a necessity for human survival and progress.

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An excerpt from writings about the nature for the “Eco-Literature” class at Newark Academy (Mr. Jon Downs) 

Living in the beautiful White Meadow Lake community I quite naturally became a very environment conscious person. My favorite pastimes are outdoors activities: hiking, biking, sailing, swimming. I probably spend much more time outdoors than most people. And I cannot help but see and be disturbed by the debilitating effects of our increasingly industrial society on the natural environment. You cannot walk through the woods of my home town in New Jersey without hearing the deafening crackle of beer cans under your feet. You cannot look at the midnight stars faded by New Jersey’s suburbians, who insist on leaving their porch light on, without hearing the roar of the mighty greenhouse gas river (aka Route 80). You cannot stand on a sunken tree branch on the bottom of White Meadow Lake, trying to overturn your capsized sailboat, without realizing that the branch is actually the frame of an old rusting bicycle, feeding its share of lead, ferrous oxides, and Mendeleyev knows what else into the mouths of the perch and the bass. Now, why didn’t I remove that bike that was strangely lying in the middle of the frozen lake back in January?

A reflection about the nature for the “Eco-Literature” class at Newark Academy (Mr. Jon Downs). 

It’s a cool autumn day. and a grey sky hangs over the frigid waters of the lake. Old leaves float near the shore from which, just three weeks ago, we swam. A harsh wind blows from the northwest, disturbing the red and brown reflection of the hillside across the lake. It’s the kind of wind that would make the sailboat tilt. It carries the sent of firewood warming some house on the opposite shore. I can almost smell snow in the north wind.

My dogs slowly roam the shore of the lake. They’re in no hurry, and they seem proud or their accomplishment: the geese that they chased off the grass every day have finally surrendered, and are on their way to warmer lands. This is the dogs’ shore now, and any small creature that dares to enter this ground will have a hard time escaping.

One of them decides to take a swim, perhaps the last one of the season. They both look over the lake, as if they can’t wait until it freezes over and the space where the geese always escaped to will finally be theirs to roam.

Je sui à Paris avec mes deux chiens. Ce n’est pas que je l’imagine; c’est en vrai. J’ai décidé que, si dans l’histoire ‘’Le château de ma mère”, la famille faisait le chasse avec les chiens, et si mes amis fourreaux ont plut à Mlle. Obydol quand elle les a vu, donc les gènes Français doivent, en général, aimer les chiens aussi.. J’a eu tort!

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