Week 16

On Monday of this week, we discussed the movie Run Lola Run.   Some pretty interesting points were brought up.  As a class, we discussed how Lola's red hair could represent the power that she has.  We also talked about how the movie is like a video game and we are the people playing it.  The movie repeats the 20 minutes three time because it takes us three time to get to the next level.  Professor Tucker pointed out some things that I didn't realize were there when I watched it.  One thing was how the characters were first shown in the film.  They are pictured in a way so that it looks like the pictures are mug shots.  This is sometimes how characters are introduced at the beginning of video games.  While watching this movie, I was pretty confused, but after discussing it, I realized some of the purposes of the film.  The rest of the week we watched other student's presentations.

Week 15

This week we have been watching a movie.  The movie is titled Run Lola Run.  We were only able to watch the first 50 minutes of it today.  So far, the movie is about a girl named Lola and her boyfriend, Manni.  Manni accidentally lost $100,000 of his boss's money.  Now he is convinced that his boss will kill him when he comes to pick up the money in twenty minutes time.  Manni begins to plot robbing a store to get the money.  Lola tells him not to and to wait for her to get there.  Lola beings running all over the city it seems.  She goes to ask her rich father for the money but he refuses, so then she runs to Manni.  When she finds him, he is walking into a store holding a gun and preparing to rob it.  The two end up robbing the store together and then are chased by police.  Lola is eventually shot by a policeman.  Then, with some dramatically bad acting, she falls down and looks like she is dying.  Then randomly she says "stop", and the scene changes to the same scene as the one that started the movie.  Then the same sequence of events begins happening again only with some differences.  Overall, this movie was weird, but it held my attention.  I like how random it was and how it kept me guessing.

Week #14

Today in class we talked about pop art.  It was strange to talk about artist that are still alive and using art that is a little more popular today.  We talked about Robert Rauschenberg who was an artist who used materials that were pop culture "junk". Then we talked about Andy Warhol, an artist who uses serial use of images. He loved american popular culture. He takes Duchamp's indifference to a new level.  We learned that he made a 2 hour movie of a guy sleeping and a 24 hour movie of a tower.  I thought that was pretty American flag was interesting.  Professor Tucker brought up some interesting point about how we treat and actual flag and how we would treat a picture of a flag.

Week #13

This week we have been reading the book that Professor Tucker wrote himself.  It is call Derridada.  In class however, we have been talking about ready-made art.  We have discussed this before in class.  We also watched a video on Marcel Duchamp.  Professor Tucker talks a lot about Duchamp in his book.  The movie basically describes some of Duchamp's works and their significance.  Duchamp tried to bend the rules of art and create a new definition of it.  Duchamp would take everyday, useful objects and turned them into art by signing his name on it and naming the object. This lead us to discuss ready-made art.  On Friday, about half of the class brought in their own ready-made art in exchange for 100's on the rest of their quizzes.  Some peoples ready-made's were pretty interesting.  One guy made a chair out of a cardboard box.  I wasn't sure that was actually a ready-made but it made an interesting point.  The rest of the art was seemed relevant and most people seemed to think a lot about what their art meant.

Week 12

This week we finished reading The Stranger, which was about a man who basically had no feelings or concern for others.  It was interesting to think about how the main character lives a basically normal life only he avoids attachment to anything.  He ends up killing a man.  His excuse for killing the man was because the sun was in his eyes.  He is convicted of the murder and sentenced to death.  Most of the time while he is awaiting his death, he doesn't seem to care much about anything.  Right before his death however, he decided that he hopes when he is executed the people will greet him with cries of hate.  I found this book easy and interesting to read.  It was interesting to look at this book in detail.

Week 11

This week we have read Existentialism is a Humanism.  I found it fairly confusing to read.  In class, we discussed the various definitions of existence.  Dr. Tucker explained how the author was pondering his own existence and how he even knows that he exists or not.  Eventually, he decides that the one fact he can rely on to support the theory that he exists is "I think, therefore I am".   Dr. Tucker also talked about the relationship between God and man.  He talked about how God is considered absurd simply because his whole existence is irrational.  He is considered irrational because we can't see him.  We have no real proof that he is there.  So we must have faith to believe in him.  Man, however, is rational.  We can see man and know they are there.
Tonight we have our second to last movie to watch.  I'm hoping there are technical difficulties again or else I will be late. I am also hoping that this movie is in English.  Other than that, most of the movies have been ok. I at least was able to find something to write about both of them.

Blog # 10

This week we finished up reading Freud's book, Civilization and its Discontents.  We watched a movie about Sigmund Freud and his nephew. For today's class we read a bunch of poems off of the internet.  So today in class, instead of a commentary, we worked in groups.  We were given two poems and had to find certain elements in each poem. The elements weren't too hard to find.  They were things like "line that made you laugh" and "line with contradicting elements".   Then as a group, we made our own poem.  We each had to write a certain part of speech.  The catch was we didn't know what anyone else had written.  So the sentences came out really choppy but very entertaining.  Today's class was a good change from the usual lectures.