You are here: Home » Journal » Questions
Remembering our mortality significantly improves our daily lives if we can endure and overcome the sense of looming finality. We live each day in routine. Even those finding something new to do each day end up in the routine of novelty. Newness becomes their pattern. My own life desires some new narrative, or at least, a deepening of narrative developed through literature.
Therefore, please recommend books, short stories, and films containing themes of seizing the day, living in the moment, and enjoying life to the fullest with the consequence of death.
Secondly, perhaps harder to find, but please also suggest material with themes of the life after the thrill has come and gone or themes of having to deal with the consequences of living temporary bliss.
"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." ~James Dean
Permanent link to this post (141 words, estimated 34 secs reading time)
When you watch a film for the first time, what do you try to see? Do you usually become captivated by the narrative and the story, or do you count the product placements and continuity errors? Do you pay attention to the style itself or do you feast on the eye candy?
Permanent link to this post (53 words, estimated 13 secs reading time)

These days I am on a self-reflexive cinema kick. I have becoming increasingly fascinated by metafilms and metafiction in general. As I explore the differences of film, theatre, and literature, I am ever more intrigued when an artwork draws attention to itself. What caught me in the television show, Modern Family, was the constant breaking of the fourth wall as the characters glance up at the camera at opportune or infortunate moments. This technique seems to reconnect with an audience in a why not too dissimilar from how actors perform in interplay with the audience. Similarly, Abed and Troy's In the Morning segments from the show Community just do something so right. I am trying to expand my repertoire of films and programmes in this genre; therefore, I would like to put it to you, Hivemind, for your own favourites. Which self-reflexive films have you enjoyed and what scenes stuck out to you?
Here are a few to get you started:
- Adaption
- Stranger than fiction
- Synecdoche
- Tropic Thunder
- 8½ (1963)
- Tristam Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (2005)
- Vanya on 42nd Street
- Shadow of the Vampire (2000)
- Blazing Saddles (1974)
- Spaceballs
- Inception
- Barton Fink
- The Hudsucker Proxy
- Breathless (1960)
- Inglourious Basterds
- eXistenZ
Permanent link to this post (204 words, 1 image, estimated 49 secs reading time)

In Korea, military service is mandatory for all males. Some have suggested that females should be excluded due to average physical differences i.e., strength. Given that the basic training of the military is heavily physical, is it a legitimate argument to discriminate women? For the sake of his discussion, let us focus on mandatory duty instead of optional duty. Also, remove the possibility of segregated positions such as having females being given desk jobs or other non-physical labour. I have discussed this topic before; however, I am curious about what you all think about this aspect of the topic. Korean friends, please do not hesitate to give your opinion on the issue. This is a gentle discussion because I am curious ^_^
Permanent link to this post (124 words, 1 image, estimated 30 secs reading time)

Hyemin is at a dinner party with her schoolmates. She has enjoyed her conversation with her senior named Taehoon. They have known each other for over one year. Hyemin tells Taehoon that she is tired and too drunk, so she wants to go home. Taehoon offers to bring her to a nearby motel. Hyemin is worried at first, but Taehoon promises that he will be the perfect gentleman—besides, he says, he is like her older brother. Hyemin goes to the motel with Taehoon; however, while she starts to sleep, Taehoon makes sexual advances. Hyemin says she only wants to sleep and keeps rejecting Taehoon until Taehoon finally becomes frustrated and angry. Hyemin asks Taehoon why he tricked her into coming to the hotel. Taehoon counters saying Hyemin knew his intention all along and knew what was going to happen. Taehoon reminds Hyemin that he paid for the expensive motel room and then tells Hyemin to stop pretending to be innocent.
Instructions: split the total value of 100% between Hyemin and Taehoon for their part of the responsibility in causing the conflict e.g., “X”=70% and “Y”=30% or “X”=50% and “Y”=50%.
After, please explain your answer. Why did you assign the percentages in that way?
After answering, read the next quote and watch the scene:
Once upon a time, a woman was picking up firewood. She came upon a poisonous snake frozen in the snow. She took the snake home and nursed it back to health. One day the snake bit her on the cheek. As she lay dying, she asked the snake, "Why have you done this to me?" And the snake answered, "Look, [woman], you knew I was a snake." Natural Born Killers
Scene: The Crying Game -- The Scorpion and Frog
Permanent link to this post (294 words, 1 image, estimated 1:11 mins reading time)