Mrebo

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/27/showbiz/movies/spielberg-indiana-jones-4-ew/index.html

God, I wish this was in Off Topic.

But I think there is merit in what Puggo says.

darth_ender said:

Mrebo, you have an eloquence about which that I envy.  Your posts are always thorough and unapologetic, and I appreciate it.  I echo what you have said when I say that these rituals have no real significance except in that they bring us closer to God.  They are the means he has chosen for us to return to him, though as an omnipotent being, he certainly needs no ritual from us to give us salvation.  Instead, it is a means of communicating, and a way for us to demonstrate our willingness to obey.  Thanks for the good comment.

Thank you for all the nice words.

darth_ender said:

Mrebo said:

darth_ender said:

Wow, you really go out with a bang!  Way to spend mankind's final hours, you sinful Camellia sinensis addict.

 

Disclaimer: Mormons do NOT believe the world is ending today.

I am a tea addict. I easily have 6 cups a day. I didn't read what the whole Mormon underwear thing was about the tea thing is a deal breaker.

 Ah well...we'll baptize you for the dead and force you to join once you've passed away.  HAHAHAHA!!!

 

 

You know, I'm impressed this thread stayed on topic without devolving into the pettiness it just did for so long.

That is something to look forward to!

It is impressive, considering some of the nonsense that goes on in various internet forums, let alone non-moderated ones. I actually thought "You, sir, are a disrespectful, self-righteous, high-horsed jerk" was a mild rebuttal to the proposed corpse desecration, etc. Hopefully my tea levity in the midst of pointless insults wasn't misunderstood.

darth_ender said:

Wow, you really go out with a bang!  Way to spend mankind's final hours, you sinful Camellia sinensis addict.

 

Disclaimer: Mormons do NOT believe the world is ending today.

I am a tea addict. I easily have 6 cups a day. I didn't read what the whole Mormon underwear thing was about the tea thing is a deal breaker.

My comments aren't directly relevant to Mormonism, so replying here:

TV's Frink said:

Yes, but the ceremony they get in the afterlife is unnecessary for anyone but the living.  The dead can have a ceremony given to them by the dead, or by Jesus, or whomever.

In fact, you could argue that a baptism is entirely unnecessary for the living as well.  If God can indeed look into my heart and know my innermost thoughts, would he not know that I had accepted Christ as my savior?  Why is there this need to declare it in public?

Of course, being non-religious myself, I think the way I live my life and treat others is much more important.  If there is a God, and this God is truly above mortal emotions like pride and jealousy, he/she would not even care if I didn't believe in him/her.  He/she would only care about how I lived my life.

Which leads to my central issue with most religions: that I am somehow a bad person (or at least severely misguided) because I don't believe as they do.

My point (which got lost in my rambling, perhaps) is that in my view, baptizing the dead is done for the benefit of the living, not the dead.

I suppose there's an argument that God requests such rituals as a means of solidifying people's commitment to their faith. Humans are built in such a way that rituals can help.

There are professions that require a formal swearing-in ceremony, like the legal profession. It doesn't matter that the candidates have already been declared competent, if they are not sworn in, they cannot be lawyers. It is quite possible that God recognizes the psychological benefit of ritual.

I attended my first funeral of a family member a few months ago. I found the (Catholic) wake thoroughly unsatisfying as far as rituals go. The only analogy I could come up is that it was like waiting at the DMV with a dead relative behind the counter.

I was offended when the priest went up and asked God to forgive my grandmother and save her soul. I wanted to slap the nitwit because if anyone was going to be saved it's she and it seemed awfully late to be asking. I reasoned with myself that we are all "sinners" needing forgiveness, but I still wanted to slap him.

Ultimately it all felt too much about the living when they're the one's sitting in chairs while my poor grandmother had no such luxury. Maybe I'm just not good at mourning.

Your agnostic views are very much like those of my significant other. She also especially takes issue with the idea that she is a bad person for not believing as others do. If a Christian is sincere, it is understandable that they would be upset when others' do not also seek salvation. If it's only about judging you for not yielding to peer pressure, their opinion is worthless.

One could argue that just because God wouldn't feel petty emotions of jealousy or pride doesn't mean he wouldn't care when people shut their eyes to the truth. And that does seem to be a primary argument in Christianity - that if you've been exposed to the teachings of Christ and do not accept, you therefore reject God. Christians feel that they're pointing right to the path of salvation and a non-believer is like 'thanks...but I'm gonna go this way.'

There is an issue with defining what makes someone a good person or is living a good life. To say that one is living good enough for God assumes that one knows what God deems good - not only society and culture.

Ultimately, I agree it's difficult to fathom God excluding truly decent and moral people from heaven. But if that simple axiom were the Word of God, I don't think it would mean very much for the reasons given. Living well in order to achieve salvation could mean whatever people felt was good. There would be no backstop or mechanism for God to require anything more concrete. And again, I think this goes to the value of ritual.

In Judaism, one needn't believe in God. It is very much about living a good life. But even then, there are many rituals backed by an ethnic and cultural identity that helps to define what constitutes living well.

Humans have so many psychological, emotional, and cultural hurdles, that religion can serve to offer a concrete means of overcoming those hurdles. Many people turn to God only when things get very difficult.

I have wondered whether someone with no major hardships in their life who lives well is just as worthy to enter heaven as someone with many hardships who sins constantly but honestly seek forgiveness from God.

There are people who live very bad lives. People who commit terrible crimes. And maybe it's due to psychological issues and traumatic experiences. Maybe God would see the goodness in their soul and save them, whether or not they even seek his forgiveness. Maybe a person who lives a good life just got a lot of lucky breaks but would have been rotten to the core if things had been a little different. So there is some difficulty of going down the path of simply living well. For some people, that position might simply be a way of dodging the pesky question of whether there is in fact a deity.

But again, I ultimately agree that if  a person is truly moral and lives as God desires, they should be saved even if they do not dot i's and cross t's - assuming there is a deity of course.

Anyone find the adolescent screaming of Christensen's "I hate you" even more pronouncedly garish and un-Star-Warsy when put side by side with the OT?

(purely rhetorical question)

TV's Frink said:

DON'T TRY TO BLAME IT ON THE LENGTH OF THE LIST. THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR HATING ON RIC.

I don't know that any film could do Ric Olie justice is all.

TV's Frink said:

 

Mrebo said:

3. Star Wars Episode -I: Rise of Ric Olie

:-/

 

I know, I know, but I needed a third movie. Lists of 2 seem lacking.

Warbler said:

nah,  If I am going to watch a jury movie, its going to have to be the ultimate jury movie,  12 Angry Men.

You hate squirrels?!

Warbler said:

doubleofive said:

 

Warbler said:

I just got summoned for jury duty.

Yay?

 

nay. 

Watch Runaway Jury! That's a fun movie, not to give you any ideas or anything :P

What movies should probably never ever be made (or maybe they should)?

1. Comedy in which concentration camp prisoners put on a variety show...

[Well there was Hogan's Heroes and The Producers' Springtime for Hitler, but that could be one messed up movie]

2. Old Yeller 2

3. Star Wars Episode -I: Rise of Ric Olie

The epic tale of Ric Olie, since Star Wars has always been about the Crusade of Ric Olie, before it was the Adventures of Luke and before it was the Tragedy of Anakin.

Bester said:

Never liked 'of the' titles, as they are lazy and don't fit with title structure created by Ep 5 (The Empire Strikes Back, not Strike of the Empire!)

As titles go, Return of the Jedi/Attack of the Clones/Revenge of the Sith are about as bland as they come.

The Phantom Menace is actually one of my favourites, as its meaning is not entirely obvious (is the 'menace' Palpatine or Anakin......or just the general darkness that is to come? Or maybe all of these things).

The menace was obviously the Trade Federation ;)

My problem was that there was never a "phantom menace." There was an obvious menace handled ham-handedly. It never made sense why everyone was so blind to what was going on (here I will defer to RLM's rant on that topic).

I don't entirely disagree with your critique of "of the" though I'm not sure how to use Jedi in a title without it sounding flat - ie "The Jedi Return."

Discussion poodoo (usefully ambiguous word, in this context).

Serious question: are Mormons going to try to convert me after I die? Or was that only for Jewish people?

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this link are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Mrebo.

Good presentation. I liked the simplicity of the plot. I also like the idea of few Jedi, though I don't know if 6 Jedi in the galaxy (for Vader to hunt down) is enough. Overall it's a good concept, albeit filled with pretty people :p

TV's Frink said:

I'm grumpy?

*shrug*

Curmudgeonly perhaps?

As for opinions on the Star Wars [omitted to avoid broken fingers], check out the thread on that topic.

timdiggerm said:

All these accusation of Lucas using Sith Eyes because he's lazy or whatever smell like Lucas-bashing for the sake of Lucas-bashing, a trap these boards fall into all too often.

Sith Eyes were used in ROTS because they look cool.

You may say they look stupid, but you're also potentially blinded by your intense PT/Lucas-hatred. They look cool, so they put them in. To think that the audience would not understand that Anakin is evil after he killed Jedi "Younglings" is absurd, and it's completely unnecessary to accuse Lucas of that.

A voice of excessive reason! I agree it was probably more about looking cool. But I'm not going to go out of my away to argue against the idea that Lucas was lazy (actually offered offhand by someone arguing in favor of yellow eyes, not me). I'm only saying they are unnecessary. Clearly a big part was: the Emperor has yellow eyes, so the Sith have yellow eyes. And clearly I agree that it's absurd the audience wouldn't understand. I wasn't accusing Lucas of anything. Let's not get bogged down in silliness...I am still wondering if anything from Return of the Ewok could add to ESB or RoTJ.

Bingowings said:

Or maybe people who type that they look stupid, don't make sense etc mean what they say???

I am tired of people impugning motives and sincerity because they might disagree...

Sepharih said:

A cop-out they may be, but Sith eyes exist in episode III to remove any doubts and give clarification that yep...he's evil all right.

I would never have gleaned that from him killing children.

I think it's fair to criticize it as somewhat lazy...

And totally unnecessary.

...but part of me feels like Luke could benefit from that given how shaky his motivations are.

Then why should his eyes turn yellow?

Sith Eyes may not be the answer, but Mark Hamill's expressions just don't "say it all" to me, and there are apparently even interpretations of the scene where he's not close to the darkside at all.

We see Luke palpably angry, powerful, losing control. I think it's the height of silliness to formally mark a turning point with gimmicky yellow eyes.

To me the best solution is to remove yellow eyes from RoTS. If the audience can't detect a hero slipping into the fast and easy path marked with anger, that's the audience's failing.

Reminds me of a discussion at work today about fast food registers that only have pictures of food on them and automatically dispense change because so many of their employees are not otherwise competent enough to handle a register. I thoroughly object to the path to Idiocracy that we're on!

Back to the topic at hand, anyone have thoughts on inserting the scenes I linked into ESB?

Is Boba Fett the Kenny of Star Wars? I wanted him to climb out of that Sarlacc more than anyone but let's not keep killing him over and over again!

Vladius said:

That's like shooting an arrow and painting a bullseye around it. Having yellow eyes is an effect, not a cause. If you don't address or don't like the causes then it doesn't make any sense.

It's a visually oriented medium, right, but that doesn't mean you need a cue. Yellow eyes would be redundant because Mark Hamill's expressions say it all.

Indeed, paint me confused...as giving Luke yellow eyes would only apparently accentuate the problem Seph has with the scene.

Ultimately, one does just gotta have faith when it comes to religion. The outstanding question for me is always: okay, well why should I have faith in this or that particular set of beliefs?

When it comes to something like the Garden of Eden being in America, such assertions will not make sense to the many of us who are not Mormons. But it is useful to recognize that every religion has such faith-bound elements that are not supported (and sometimes even contradicted by) known facts. I suspect such a critique of Mormonism might be more pronounced because it is a newer religion with an unusually America-centric slant that many construe as a corruption of Christianity, or as you say "weird."

My question is why have you chosen to put your faith into Mormonism?

Sepharih said:

What I dislike about this interpretation is that I feel it does an injustice to the emperor and mcdiarmid's performance.  What I always took away from his performance was how unbelievably confident he was throughout the entire run of the movie.  Every single scene with him he seems practically omniscient, every single piece of the world moving just as he expects it too, everything proceeding as planned....except for three times.  The first is obvious.  The second is his surprise at luke's arrival on endor.  And the third:

 "You've failed your highness.  I am a Jedi....like my father before me."

"..........so be it......Jedi."

That moment is so powerful because you can see palpatine's huge incredible machinations and plans crumbling on his face...in realization that the one thing he never foresaw happening just did.....Luke chose the right path.  He bet the farm on luke...and he lost.

.....at least that's how I always saw it.....

Then his overconfidence was truly his weakness!

To me, the story completely validated his performance. It wasn't simply that he wasn't smart enough, nor that the Jedi were clouding his Force powers, it's that he was so unbelievably confident and had gotten to a point that he was simply out of touch with his own ability to persuade.

Sepharih said:

Vladius said:

Sepharih said:

 

Yeah, sorry, but I'm not buying that the scene does what i'm talking about "subtly" when Palpatine's dialogue flat out contradicts what I'm talking about.

How?

 

.......

 

Sepharih said:

He should have played up on Luke's compassion towards his friends and his desire to save them (mirroring anakin's fall more), trying to convince him to give in to temptation....to do just a little evil to do a greater good.

Instead he pretty much barks about how Luke has already fallen and just doesn't realize it yet, to give into his anger towards palpatine because there is no hope left already, and to strike in vengeance and turn to darkness.

At no point in the entire exchange does palpatine ever imply anything except that luke should just give into his hatred and anger of what palpatine has done, and turn evil.  He even chides luke by declaring his friends are his weakness.

 

They, of course are his weakness....but pointing that out along with everything else he says and does is antithetical to what I'm talking about.  He uses the danger they are in to bring out the anger in luke and get luke to unleash his rage at vader and himself, rather than as a way to tempt luke into playing by his rules.....give in a little and do a little evil ultimately towards a greater good.

Reading through this discussion confuses me.

Here is the understanding I've always had of what happened:

There never was a good reason for Luke to join the Emperor - and that isn't a problem for the story.

Mostly it seemed like the Emperor held out a vague hope that Luke could be turned (only at the suggestion of Vader, who wanted to save Luke), but the Emperor was just as happy to kill Luke. And it was already established that the Emperor's perceptions were faltering (as he could not detect Vader's true feelings).

Up to the electrocution, the Emperor was able to goad Luke into tapping into his anger and hatred. Basically Luke walked into a situation in which he was certain to die if he did not choose the dark side. For a moment there was the chance Luke might choose that route - for no other reason than victory in that moment. Luke surrendered and was nearly killed.

In your viewing of the scene, Seph, I think you're putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable, as it were.

As for edit ideas...could these be cleaned up and inserted into ESB? ;)

Boba Fett

Yoda

mrbenja0618 said:

Bingowings said:

Here's an idea that might not make me any friends.

Instead of having the Krayt dragon call scare off the Sandpeople why not just have Ben appear right next to one of them while they were trashing Luke's speeder (as if he has used his Jedi stealth to sneak up on them).

There could be an insert of a Tuscan looking up and see a robed figure right next to them and stare into his hood.

The line, "Hello there" could even be shunted slightly back so he addresses the sandperson and not Artoo.

His spooky nature and possibly his reputation could do the rest.

That way you don't have the somewhat odd shot of an old guy in a dressing gown making funny noises while approaching the more formidable looking alien chaps with spiky mummified face masks on.

He could then check on look and beckon Artoo out of hiding with the remainder of the lines. 

I actually did something different for this scene in my Redemption edit. It was always one of my few issues with ANH. They hear a Krayt dragon, and then see an elderly man stumbling towards and their response is to run... Even after taking out a healthy/much younger man? My solution is: They hear the dragon; then look in the direction of the noise, and see nothing... They freak out and run. It's going with the idea that it's the things you don't see that scare you the most.

I agree. Simple edit would be to show Obi Wan walking after the Tusken's take off. Leave it to the imagination what image he may have projected.

Darth Lars said:

Ian McDiarmid is awesome as Palpatine. It is as if he is the only actor who takes his role seriously. Some memorable quotes:

"I will make it legal"

"Wipe them out. All of them."

"I love democracy. I love the republic."

"The dark side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural"

I do like the first two quotes and have used them on occasion. The third felt too weak to suit the scene. I needed more from him to make it a proper explanation for his power grab, not just generic fluff of lovin' the Republic. Fourth had good delivery.

I did like some of the Watto scenes, just one of the more believable actors in the movies.