Blijdorp (Rotterdam Zoo)

Today I went to Diergaarde Blijdorp (Rotterdam Zoo) with my mother and grandmother. (Love of nature runs in the family). The sun was shining and the park wasn’t too crowded. All in all it was a beautiful day and I have some pictures to show it.

Since my computer is acting weird again (I can’t put pictures in my blog, I can only link to my picassa web-album) I cannot show you examples. You will need to go my web-album .
I particularly like the butterfly with the ‘eyes’, the toucan, and the starfish. (which I wanted to incorporate in my blog…..)

Maybe later I’ll add some comments to the pictures so it is clear to everyone what’s on the photograph (some don’t need an explanation, but maybe others do). But in the meantime, if you want to know what I photograpehd exactly you’ll know where to find me

Wrong bet: Fighting – Dito Montiel

The criticism for this movie has been very diverse and I wanted to be able to judge the film myself, so out of sheer curiosity I walked into the cinema and got a ticket to see “Fighting”, directed by Dito Montiel.

Actually, one of my reasons for seeing the movie was Channing Tatum is in it. I liked him in “Step Up” and in “She’s the Man”, and no, not just for his looks. Now I was hoping he had delivered another nice piece of work with “Fighting”. Unfortunately, I got rather disappointed.

I like movies with good dialogue in it. Of course, you can’t expect a movie called “fighting” to have the most wonderful, catchy dialogue ever, but in this case dialogue was nothing short from abhorrent. Nine out of ten sentences couldn’t be understood because of the mumbling. The tenth consisted of incoherent slang. All in all the acting was pretty bad too. (Yes, even Channing’s wasn’t something to write home about (as we Dutch say)). The only actor really visibly making an effort is Terrence Howard, but then again his crazy accent is somewhat ridiculous.

The story itself is nearly non-existent and pretty cliché and has no original plot elements. Actually, I felt like I was watching a modern-day, pimped version of Jean-Claude van Damme’s “Wrong Bet”. But I’m sorry to say, the plotline in that movie was a whole lot better and more original (at the time).

With the dialogue, the acting and the plot-line not making the movie worth my while all my hopes were on the fight sequences. (I know, a girl isn’t supposed to say that, but it’s not for nothing that my friends sometimes jokingly tell me I have half an Y-chromosome hidden somewhere). You would figure a movie called “Fighting” would at least be saved by its fight sequences, but its not. It is as if Montiel tried to make a movie about the background of the fighters, about how people end up in these fights. The fights are only short moments in the movie and most of the time you can’t really see what’s going on. Most of the fights end as abrupt as they began. It is almost as if Montiel felt that too much fight sequences would destroy the movie, as if he was afraid it would become a real action-film instead of, what I guess Montiel intended, a motion picture about the people behind the fights. I wish he had made it an action movie, since now it is neither a drama nor an action movie.

Of course, there are some genuine attempts at emotion, but actually they just made me laugh when I wasn’t supposed to. Especially the speech made right before the last fight is hilarious. If you hadn’t yet made the link to Van Damme’s “Wrong Bet”, you must have after the last fight and the scene following that. I won’t tell you who wins in this new version, but I can tell you, the ending isn’t original either. (I’m not going to spoil it for those of you who still feel like seeing the movie after reading this by telling you what the similarities are precisely). Overall it is a terribly acted movie with an even worst script.

When I walked into the cinema I hoped that the movie wasn’t as bad as some people said it was, but now I realise that was just a wrong bet.

What? Where? How?

As I said last Tuesday I would go and attend my first Tribal Fusion Bellydance Class ever on Wednesday. So there I was, ignorant as to what would happen exactly and anxious because of all the bootcamp-related stories I had heard. I had seen some clips on Youtube showing Tjarda, our teacher and member of The Uzumé, dance. Of course I was impressed, but now I was also worried as to what would be expected from me. (I am not much of dancer, never was, and probably never will be, but willing to give it a try).

After the warming-up (very much like yoga) and some strength and technique-exercises which I could follow because of their resemblance to some aerobics-exercises, the Tribal-stuff started. For me that was the point at which the what, where and how questions started popping up in my mind. I had always believed I knew my body quite well and thought I could control it pretty much too, but now I stand corrected.

I could sort of tighten my glutes without using the muscles in my legs (don’t even ask), but when it came to undulations I realised I had been deceiving myself all along. In undulations you first tighten your lower abs, followed by your upper abs (while relaxing your lower abs again) and next lifting your chest. Then you relax, lift your chest, tighten your upper abs followed by your lower abs. Then you relax and start over with the lower abs again. If done correctly the effect looks somewhat like a wave washing over your torso/upper body. After the undulations we had to lift our hip by tightening part of our abs and not by using the muscles in your legs.

I do what? How? And where exactly is that muscle?

I knew that you could train your lower abs and your upper abs, but I never knew you could tighten them separately. With me its tightening or relaxing my abs. There’s nothing in between. It must have looked very silly and amateurish but I still had so much fun and really worked on my posture too. (advise from my physiotherapist was to work on my posture). So, even though I realise I’m a hopeless case and will probably never look anywhere near what it should look like, I decided to take the course anyway. I like the work-out, the work on my posture benefits my back and the group is so much fun. I just accept that I will never be anyway near as good as my already bellydancing friends, let alone The Uzumé.

So, since you will never see me dance (not if I can help it), here’s a clip showing how it should be done:

The Burning Plain – Guillermo Arriaga

Some time ago a befriended co-worker went to the ’sneak preview’ in the cinema. He got to see The Burning Plain by Guillermo Arriaga, starring Charlize Theron and Kim Basinger. He said that he had to get into the story but eventually thought it was a beautiful movie. After seeing it he thought about it for quite a while, it sticks and makes you think about things. I should just go and see it for myself. Since he is known to be a harsh movie critic, always finding some fault or other, I decided that I really should go and see it. So I did.

The movie reminded me of Babel, which is not that crazy since Arriaga wrote and directed Babel together with Alejandro González Iñárritu. (I only found this out after I saw The Burning Plain). Whereas I thought Babel was good but not superb, I absolutely loved The Burning Plain.

Just like Babel, The Burning Plain, is much like a triptych. It shows multiple, at first sight non-connected, stories at the same time. In this case four:
* There is Sylvia in Portland who leads an empty life filled with one-night-stands. Obviously there is something from her past which troubles her still.
* There’s Mariana and Santiago, whose parents (Mariana’s mother and Santiago’s father) had an affair and got killed when their secret love-shack exploded with them in it. Together Mariana and Santiago try to deal with the loss of their parents and the fact that they had an affair. Their families don’t want them to have any kind of contact and they especially don’t want, or expect, them to fall in love.
* Gina and Nick are having a clandestine affair and are struggling to keep this a secret from their families, while at the same time they, especially Gina, are consumed by guilt.
* Maria, a young girl, sees her father’s plane crash. While he is in the hospital fighting for his life, he sends Carlos, his best friend, and Maria on a quest to find Maria’s mother, whom Maria never met.

Just like Babel, The Burning Plain doesn’t do chronology and I love the way Arriaga uses the lack of a chonological timeline to put you on a sidetrack time and time again. Of course I suspected things but I completely missed one of the biggest twists. Past and present are so mixed up that it isn’t until quite far into the movie that you realise how all the characters are connected. And in this connection you’ll find the big difference between the two movies. Whereas Babel shows the stories of people that are only connected by coincidence, The Burning Plain goes much further than that. When, almost in the end, you find out what really happened you cannot but aknowlegde the genius of the person who wrote the story and the stylish way the movie was directed.

Once the ‘big twist’ is revealed it was like an ‘aha-Erlebnis’. From beginning until ending you are wondering about the connections between the characters. “What does Sylvia have to do with Mariana and Santiago, or with Gina and Nick”? When eventually you find out, it is like a puzzle with the last piece falling in place. The result is a beautiful picture with a sad undertone, but not one I would have wanted to miss.

Yes, this movie may occupy your thoughts for some time, but yes, you should go and see it. (Just my humble opinion )