The Mid East, the Far East, the West Coast, and the End of it All

I try to resist offering the typical commentary.  I don’t wish to go on and on about U.S. policy in the Middle East and how it should support the dictators that support us and back the revolutionaries that back us.  That’s fairly obvious.  I don’t wish to bore you with the details of how we should help our very good friend, Japan, during her time of dire need.  That’s quite obvious, too.  Instead, I want to explore something else--the Oscars as it relates to the Apocalypse.

It sticks in my craw that The King’s Speech won best picture over the masterpiece, Inception.  Quite frankly, it disgusts me a little, which is strange since I’ve never put much weight on the Academy Awards.  I admit, Colin Firth was beyond great and deserved to be honored.  Helena Bonham Carter seems more beautiful and accomplished than ever, and, as a huge Churchill fan, I think that role was done brilliantly.  But, alas, there’s no award for best Churchill. 

            No, as much as I liked these characters, they don’t compare to the dynamic storyline of Inception.  To intervene in another’s subconscious and invade different levels, dreaming within a dream within a dream, is an incredible concept that was magically executed.  This film has the cerebral benefits of its predecessors Memento, The Matrix, Donnie Darko, and the low budget, time traveling mind bender, Primer.  It asks you to doubt yourself and your perceptions. It asks you to doubt your own advice.  It challenges you to figure and refigure what’s happening long after the projector’s been turned off. And that’s the beauty of it…it’s nearly endless.  So, after seeing this odyssey am I really supposed to feel good about motion picture’s highest prize going to a movie about a stuttering monarch?  It’s a fun, clever work, but it’s no Inception.   

            Maybe, it’s because the academy prefers to indulge in the lighthearted, as opposed to the graver aspects of our existence.  The higher, mortal truth that they’re, in effect, ignoring is posed repeatedly in Inception:

 

  You’re waiting for a train--a train that will take you far away.  You

  know where you hope this train will take you, but you don’t know

  for sure.

 

            I believe we’re all waiting for a train, as is our world.  Perhaps, its arrival is being foretold right now--dead fish, dead birds, widespread military conflict, earthquakes, tsunamis, global debt, loss of identity, loss of purpose…and the list goes on and on.  We’re getting “kicked up”, but it seems the world, at large, doesn’t feel that kick.  Instead, we plug our ears with our fingers, hoping that the cheers for the frivolous will drown out the train whistle in the distance.