Independent Low Budget Films
I almost went through life without seeing very many movies. When younger it seemed there were always other more exciting or demanding things to do. I don’t don’t mean real young— then I could hardly wait to see the latest Abbot and Costello movie. I tried to watch one of their movies about 10 years ago; 5 minutes was about as long as I could take it. We change over the years. During my productive years I had even less time to see movies. When I owned a heavily landscaped tract of land in a rural community, I was too busy keeping the place up to watch movies. Then, 10 years ago, I moved to a high rise in a wealthy suburban county—so each day, upon arising, I could do pretty much whatever I felt like doing, finally no longer a slave to property, to a career, to the acquisition of money, to competition, to making things go my way, to fighting battles for those in a weak position to fight their own legitimate battles, or to social obligations of any kind. Heaven on Earth based on my personality. Perhaps Hell on Earth for birds of a different feather.
When I moved to the high rise I began to watch netflix movies of all sorts, usually late at night when, too tired for anything requiring vigorous mental activity, a movie was good amusement. At 3 movies a week for 10 years that comes to 1560 movies. Add to that the 69 courses I completed on tapes from the Great Courses Company (1854 lectures on various topics from some of the best University Professors) and I have spent a good ten years digesting my own life experiences, exposing myself vicariously to other unique individuals, and learning a lot about a wide array of topics. Self induced semi-hermithood is a good life IF health holds up; IF we can find activities to keep us mentally active; and IF we stay in shape by wandering around—in my case, nature settings/select urban neighborhoods.
After 1560 movies, there are few main line movies of any quality left to view. So I have begun to watch Independent low budget movies. They seem to fall into two categories—the absolutely horrible, and the excellent, with few in between. Most main line movies are designed to keep a fast paced multifaceted adventure which has endless quality scenery and unexpected events in the movie to keep us riveted to the screen. It is very entertaining, but just as often, not very realistic as a real life adventure. There are exceptions. The whole goal of most main line movies is to keep you on an emotional rollercoaster with rapid paced action, great scenery, and unexpected turn of events.
Of course real life, for most people, is not that spectacular. Add all the electronic gadgets we spend so many hours of the day on, and our world is fast paced, high input (but low quality), and emotionally draining. Time for any real quality thinking has been reduced substantially for most people. What this all means for human civilization is beyond my comprehension. Considering the amount of support a Donald Trump or Ted Cruz can garnish, we really need to think about the amount of quality thoughts existing among our citizens. I guess all these reality shows and gadget obsessions generate a whole new generational culture and attitudes.
Many independent movies take one particular character and dwell on that character for an in depth look at their mind set, their perhaps peculiar situation in life, and the hurdles their persona generates.
Diversity is one of the main forces driving the evolutionary process, and my many years of teaching college age young people certainly attests to that. Like many young people I came out of my formative years with fairly rigid beliefs in right and wrong. Remnants of ‘some people are going to hell and some are going to Heaven’ (the Billy Graham pitch) had been ingrained somewhat in my mindset. Daily interaction with young people of varied backgrounds, personalities, culture, and race,—slowly, but steadily, kind of eased away the rigid ethical standards created by various religious sects.
The evolutionary process is a practical process based on what works best, a process certainly not based on any self importance of any member of any species. The notion that God is on the side of any groups in this journey called life becomes more and more absurd the longer the evolutionary process exists. In fact, the only species with any extensively developed ethical nature is the human species. Ethics exists in humans solely as an opportunity to maximize contentment for the greatest number of people. Just because the evolutionary process did not deal us the best hand in life, does not mean we necessarily have no chance for some contentment along the way. When the Golden Rule prevails, then the chances for the less fortunate to have some contentment goes up exponentially. The Golden Rule is a wonderful ethical tool.
In some sense, independent movies often enable us to comprehend better what some people are up against in life, and the forces around them which impact on them. The whole movie is often focused on a particular character and a supporting cast. When we focus on life as an endless contest between evil and good, or between God and the Devil, all we really do is ensure we will never be much of a happy camper in life. We see this all the time in the biggest enthusiasts of select religious sects. How can one not be emotionally angry most of the time when surrounded by so many evil people? These people are so sure that particular human created scriptures are, for sure, the Word of God, that they spend their whole lives trying to make life miserable for the heathens all around. There is no such thing as appreciation for diversity amongst this population, it is all about nailing heathens in any way available. In some broad sense, much of history is about ’true believers’ trying to eradicate, by whatever means necessary, heathens of one sort or another. It is really just one massacre after another. It is a rough world into which we are born.
I don’t know why, but I have always disliked seeing other humans or animals in pain. It is, I guess, just my nature. Not something I earned or learned, just something that is there about me. Dislike of certain people over others by me comes mostly because some people cause misery for others as a peculiar need on their part. For the most part I have been protected by genetics, environment, and help from other people (often non family) in my life when I needed help at different points in time. All of this was unearned stuff—good luck I guess, and thus it became my wish that more people could have such good fortune. Well, they can if only the Golden Rule prevailed in all societies. Of course, evolution isn’t about to die as we ourselves are destined shortly to do—so I sense, in the long run, the Golden Rule will win out. Many things are interesting food for thought, but the future is not one of them. Sometimes it is tempting to wish one could just visit the future, for a spell, out of curiosity. Then again, we all come into this world by chance, a random meeting of a particular egg and sperm, so to visit the future legitimately, we would run the same risk all over again.
When I watch Independent films I often feel like I did in those many times of conversation between myself and some individual student. Everyone has a tale to tell about their lives, and these personal tales, to the extent one listens, are very moving and intriguing. So little is often as it seems, at least to the extent we begin to understand people on an individual basis. Some of what others really are, I wish I could be; some situations with which others really are facing in life I am so glad I am not burdened. And so it goes, round and round the wheel of fortune goes, and where it stops nobody knows, except it always stops and we exit.
Well into my terminational phase of life, so far in relatively good health, economically independent, and no longer directly involved with young people or any other age people over any problematic situations, it is currently reading and independent movies which help keep me abreast of the real world out there. The Golden Rule still remains as my ethical base, but I use my FANAFI (Find a Need and Fill It) Fund to help the less fortunate rather than any personal interaction. Life, once past our productive years, is all theatre. The rat race is over, twas a good and challenging experience, and for those of us who survive our productive years in good health, the terminational years are whatever we make of them on a personal basis.
I suppose, in some sense, whenever we analyze someone different from ourselves in any kind of meaningful open minded way, we have essentially created a low budget film in our own mind. The saddest pictures in life, at least to me, are those really decent young persons in life with substantial potential to achieve productive lives, who end up settling for less, simply because there are so many hurdles for them to overcome that they exhaust their willpower in the battle, and just give up—settle for less than their potential. Many of these hurdles would never exist in a fair and just society. The eyes often communicate just how much emotional stress a person is under, especially young people. Even when they get some help by others—ourselves or otherwise—they still face numerous and difficult subsequent hurdles. Eventually I realized that no matter much effort helps them over an immediate hurdle, there will be endless more hurdles for them down the road. But we feel good to have helped them at a certain point in their lives. Then, later, we find out they never reached their potential, gave up for varied reasons and settled for a lot less then their potential. It made my own life seem a bed of roses, albeit my own life, compared to some, is/was, I suppose, no bed of roses. Most things in life are always relative, or so it seems.
The longer I taught and lived, the sadder the process for these young people seemed. “Fair is fair” has a long way to go in this endless evolutionary process. The upside of all this is that our own country has come a long way in eliminating some of the injustices dealt to so many of our citizens. We started out with essentially landed white Protestants having the most rights and over the years more and more groups fought for, and won the same rights for themselves. It is always remarkable when intelligent, good people, actually argue that the Constitution should not be an evolving document to achieve the same rights for all it’s citizens. To these people, the Courts should not be the instrument to grant life, liberty, and justice to all citizens, but instead no others should get such rights unless a vast majority of the majority having certain rights, vote to let others get the same rights. Catholics, Jews, immigrants, blacks, women, children, handicapped, the poor, gays, etc. have all, over time, achieved some of the rights others have had in the days of the original Constitution. The problem is that this process, mostly achieved via the courts, creates an easy excuse for people who have always had the same rights, to see their own current difficulties in life as a direct product of these others, now with the same rights they have always had, as actually the reason for their own problems. It is some sort of variation of “things were much better before these other groups started getting their rights. They are the reason life for me is now difficult.”
Tonight I will watch another independent movie. All day long I had been looking forward to heading into Chicago this evening to attend a play, a ticket for which I purchased several weeks ago. I like the off the beaten path small theaters scattered around Chicago. There must be a hundred of them. The actors are often very good. Still, as to be expected, some are terrible and others are very good.
I decided to take an hour nap before getting ready to leave, but—as all too often—I laid in bed thinking about the trip to the suburban train station (about a mile away) the train ride in on an express train (a Half hour) a half mile walk to the El Station, a half hour ride on the El, then a half to one mile walk to the theatre. The weather isn’t all that bad, easily manageable. But then, when the play is over and I leave the theatre to return home it is the same time schedule in reverse except the suburban trains take an hour to get back (only locals run in the evening) and if unlucky, there will considerable waiting for Els and suburban trains. In Spring, summer, and fall this trekking around late at night is kind of nostalgic, reminds me of younger days when I was a better fit with the young crowd which dominates the streets at these hours. But staying home more and more often wins out at the last minute—cooking a sumptuous meal, finish reading a book I am in the middle of, continue to clean up my desk a bit, clean the kitchen floor, watch a movie and listen to a DVD lecture, and more likely than end up in a very mellow mood with all kinds of thoughts about all kinds of topics. Often, after the movie finishes, I get amazed all over again that I am still alive and kicking, still mobile, with no stresses of import with which to deal, and at some point me and Sheebiejiebie the cat, retire to bed and I listen to the same songs I listened to when young, up until about the mid 70’s. At 75 this will certainly be the final lap. Anything after that will be life minus a full deck, limited physical capabilities, poor memory, etc. Frankly, after watching the Republican debates, if this is the level of thinking potential Presidents express—well, maybe ten years more will be lived in full blown nationwide/global chaos. In the past there was always somewhere to run to escape. Not today, the major problems are all global, despite what these angry knuckle-heads pretend on the debate stage. This is not good theatre at all. Well, I suppose if horror shows are one’s theatre, it is.
It is hard to defend how all this pondering, musing, analyzing, postulating, logicating (invented) at my age has a any purpose. In the end, we are all dead (Heaven notwithstanding). On the other hand, the goal of life, for higher species, is contentment. Perhaps those who comprehend little about life, but follow a simple life based on the Golden Rule can get just as much contentment as those who comprehend much more about life and also follow the Golden Rule. In my life I have seen a lot of good people reduced to tears about their life situation. I have also personally let a lot of people down for varied ‘good reasons’ at the time. Often later on, it was clearer to me that there were no ‘good reasons’ for me to walk away. It takes a lot of personal strength to endure or win certain situations on behalf of someone else, and it is hard to forgive our own weaknesses in this area. Everything we do or don’t do is not forgivable. This reduces our potential level of contentment. While I am more contented now than at any point in my life, this is a relative comparison. There is no such thing as total contentment. We can only speak realistically in terms of more or less contentment at different stages in our lives. More difficult to accept is that the center of attention of God’s evolutionary process is the process itself, never us as individuals. We get reminded often enough, in varied ways, that nothing is really centered around us as individuals. That’s a tough pill to swallow, probably the biggest let-down in life. Actually, none of us even got to audition for the role we ended up playing in life. And when the curtain comes down, there is no chance for an encore, no reviews to look over, no thunderous applause. In most cases—finally—most everyone will say something good about us, albeit it will all fall on our dead ears. It is just as well, funerals are not the best time for honesty—if there ever is a good time. I mean really, honesty about what? The evolutionary process goes forward, on evolutionary time, without us. Still, all things considered, I am glad a particular sperm managed to hook up with a particular egg, the most important sexual event in my life, and I have no memories of it whatsoever. Soon, I will have no memory of anything. That’s a good thing, we cannot miss anything without memory. Death levels all. Fair enough.
