"Apocalypto" (2006)

My feelings for this film are kept in a cage, poked and prodded by on-lookers but unmoving (some lazy but not quite sad tiger). I'd like to release them before the harassment incites a lashing-out. What shall I use to coax? [There is a unique abruptness that comes upon a sentence that ends with a transitive verb used like an intransitive one. I love it.]

This film is violent and grueusome. I cannot deny it.

And yet, two days after viewing it, I cannot get it out of my head. Only five other films have ever gripped me like this: Fight Club, The Passion of the Christ, The Sting, Singin' in the Rain and Pride and Prejudice. They pervade my thoughts and refuse to let me go until I explore them or, in worst cases, until I watch them again. I've seen FC 8 times, The Sting 5 or 6 times and both Singin' in the Rain and TPotC twice.

I saw such horror and such evil on the screen that I started pulling my Bible out of my bag, intent on readin up some [Ancient city]ians to keep me grounded because NOTHING in this film spoke of God, nothing. I was shocked and grossed-out. I was very uncomfortable and many times I tried to figure out how long a scene or incident would last to decide whether it was practical to leave the theatre (and come back?), taking into account that my brother, who was sitting beside me, probably would not understand.

I never did read anything; I took a long time un-doing the Velcro flap, waiting for loud bits to cover me but by the time the book was open, right side up and at the desired page, the incidents on screen were stomachable, oh and also I was mesmerized.

I am impressed. I really.. don't know what to say about this. I left the theater slightly shaken up. To my delight, the film let us out at 01h30 onto sketchy mcdark n' creepy Richmond Street of downtown Toronto. Much more to my delight, my brother is 6'2" and fights when he needs to.

I think the violence could have been diminished by about 10 or 15% and the film still would have made people squeamish, it still would have made us understand the primal and brutal society/culture but perhaps we would not have been so deeply disturbed to the core. (I am willing to admit that maybe it's just me.)

Despite all this,


despite it, I say, I really loved this film. I mean, at first I felt violated; I had to play some God-singin' music and read the Bibs to make sure I could sleep but the next day and yesterday I have found the violence slipping into the background while artistry and complexity come to the fore. I don't know if I'd recommend this film to or whom. I do know that I'd like to own a home copy myself and may even look the other way if someone (a.k.a. me) decided to shell out more money for a second big-screen viewing.

I can't grasp all of what grasps me about this work. I have snippits and snapshots in my head but more than that there is something so deep-seated, so intriguing..
something draws me in.
There is some higher, purer standard of human life that I caught a glimpse of and though I am excited to now have the knowledge that it exists, I struggle with the knowledge that I will never attain what it is that fascinates me so. Something is pulling me in and calling my name. It's an amped-up version of The Lord of the Rings films, the intricate and complete alternate world that begs us to join it while we know it does not exist. It's like, for me, the rich music of the 1970s that tell me I should have been born in the late 60s because I was meant to be there. I was there...I am there...but secretly not.

The parts of men, the traits that God has given us, the ones that, ignoring our fallenness, make us amazing creatures are glorified and exposed, enshrined. I like that. It's rare, it seems exceedingly simple and something to be proud of. What is...who is man that He is mindful?

If I could be so moved by the best traits of man, put on a pedestal, an x-thousand- or million-dollar budget with planning and hard work, then how the heck more amazing is God? Who... could exceed myself? Who or what could possibly be greater than man? We invented electricity! Imagine, Arrogant Self, who is better than thee on thy BEST day? He surpasses all and we are naught. Hmmm... this is not where I expected the post to end up.

To be continued....

9/10