English Essay on Look Both Ways

Ok yay, second essay in a day (oh shit, it's 3am, not a day then...)

Umm... Hopefully this turned out better than the last one. Time limit still way out, I think I need to work on somehow getting rid of distractions while keeping the computer. Is that even possible? At least the word count is more reasonable now.

My quotes definitely need work... Had to force some into it, probably very obvious where I did too >.< class="MsoNormal">

Edit: Titles are FTW

Part 2

‘Look Both Ways shows that despite life’s trials, happiness is possible.’ Discuss.

Happiness is one of the main themes explored in Sarah Watt’s award winning film Look Both Ways. The concept of being happy is an abstract one in a film preoccupied with other more powerful and overshadowing themes such as death and fear. Every character in the film is exposed to some form of these ‘trials’, random chance events that have the power to destroy lives. Look Both Ways explores the possibility of characters maintaining happiness despite the events that seem to have the ability to destroy any reason to be happy, and ultimately take control of lives. Some such events that might prevent happiness in the film include cancer, fatal accidents and deaths of those close to us, as well as the wider implications and people affected by each of these events, some perhaps not first-hand. However, Look Both Ways is a film which proves that happiness is not based on the difficulty of life trials, but on the strength of the human spirit that ultimately dictates the possibility of happiness. This is shown through some of the key characters in the film: Meryl, Nick and Julia.

Meryl provides an excellent example of someone who has been traumatised by her experiences with death, especially in her family. Her father’s death left her floundering and disorientated, such that her own view of life and death became distorted and fatalistic, making trite comments such as “maybe it was meant to be”. Combined with the impact of watching a man get run over by a train in front of her, her mental health has severely been damaged, made evident by the flashes of paintings that signify her imagination, filled with morbid scenes of her own death played out in countless different scenarios. She is buffeted by these bouts of paranoia and fear and “seeing death everywhere”, unable to face the world without being plagued constantly by images of her own death. Meryl seems to be completely dominated by her fears, scarred from the loss she experienced. However, despite the dreary circumstances Meryl faces, Look Both Ways is a film about hope and victory. We are shown that happiness is not dependant so much on external forces beyond our control, but rather on the strength of the inner character. Meryl realises through a chain of events together with Nick, her coming to terms with the death of her father and the accident she witnessed depended upon her own true acceptance of her circumstances. Only upon her actual submission to the fact that “things just happen” could she finally begin to regain her happiness, signified by the final photomontage at the end of the film.

Nick is another main character in the film who is subjected to the powerful forces of random events, termed life’s trials. After he was diagnosed with cancer on Friday, in response to his legitimate question “How long do I have?” he is told that “the specialist will see you on Monday”. Nick was left with nothing but his wandering, troubled mind, left to its own devices for an entire weekend, all the while harbouring the fear of this cancer that he has been told he has contracted.. After the sentence was passed by the doctor, unhealthy “speculation” is the only thing he has left to do, waiting impending doom. Happiness is probably the last thing on Nick’s mind at this stage, as his preoccupations and fears about cancer all billow out and take control over his mind, will and emotions. Despite this, the end of the film and the cathartic rain that falls symbolises hope, and Nick finally learns what it means to depend on the “light to show us the next footstep”. Nick eventually realises that he cannot fight the cancer, “then there’ll be more I don’t know”, and so in finally letting go of this inhibiting burden, and “face his own death”, he is able to take up happiness again, once again evident from the photomontage at the end of the film, where he even recovers from his cancer.

Julia is more of a peripheral character in the film; however her story ties in strongly with the centrifugal force of the film, the local train accident during which her husband perished. The loss of a loved one is a difficult one indeed, emphasised by the director in the extreme close-up shots of Julia’s face, showing the extent of the grief and devastation she experienced. In this sense, she is not dissimilar to Meryl, but they differ in their individual expressions of the grief they feel. The deep-set sorrow felt by Julia is something constantly referred to with film techniques throughout the film to alert readers as to the significance of this as a theme. After the initial shock of the death of her husband, Julia is approached by the train driver, who offers an apology in the form of a card. Julia is also offered a choice here, she could continue to dwell in her despair or accept what’s happened as unchangeable and random, and begin the journey to regaining her happiness, a door which the apology opened. Julia in exchange offered her forgiveness, freeing not only the train driver of his burden, but also of her own. By forgiving someone for the indirect loss of her spouse, she has already sown the seeds of redemption and happiness in her soul. Her husband’s death did not change, but what underwent the change to enable happiness to bloom again was her own mindset.

Ultimately, the characters in the film Look Both Ways learn that happiness is not necessarily something influenced totally by external events, but can also be engineered in them. Despite the rigorous trials of life, characters show that it is still possible to obtain true happiness independent of outward circumstances, proving that it is more a state of mind than an actual factor that they too cannot control. It can therefore be concluded that happiness is actually very much in the minds of people, able to be unearthed if it is called for by someone, regardless of their current situation, environment or difficulty they face.

English Essay

A commentary written on a Prose (Aprox 1000 Words)

Ok I lied, more like 850 words. I felt like I really failed at this commentary, I'll tell you what mark I get as I'm sending it in to the teacher as well.

The passage from The Loom seems to be about the isolation of a mother, the hobby that she finds, and the use of it as an expression for her feelings. From the very start there seems to be a sombre mode present in the poem, and we first find out about the isolation from when ‘we dig her out’ she juts ‘crawls back in, only deeper.’ It is presumed that the mother goes into this isolation because of an external pressure, because she seems to ‘have taken refuge’ in it. It appears as if that the mother seems to be unable to communicate properly to the daughters, and they are unsure about what they should do in relation to this situation.

The use of three sisters seems to represent three different views on what they should do about this situation. Two of the sisters, are at opposites in view points, with Jo wishing to ‘break through’ to their mother, to talk to her, while Linda ‘defended the fortress’ that she was in. However it was the middle daughter, who provides a compromise to their situations, giving their mother a loom, which allows for communication, at their mother’s pace. There is the use of two of the sisters to present widely divergent views, while the one in the ‘middle’ often viewed as a mediating role, provides the solution to their conflict.

One of the most obvious themes in the prose is the use of colour to represent different things, both in the life of the mother, and the pieces made from the loom itself, seemingly comparing the pieces made from the loom as a snapshot of the life of the mother, or more accurately, of the lives around the mother. The first colours that are presented are brown and neutral shades, the ‘colours she preferred’. However later on she discovered that she could pick up threads selectively, so that she could show ‘flashes of colour’ or ‘never show it at all’. Even if it wasn’t easily apparent at the start, or even visible at all, if the piece was turned over, ‘the colour would still be there’, just not apparent in the ‘right side of the fabric’. This seems to draw a parallel with the mother’s ways of expressing, at the start, seemingly only showing feelings about herself, separated from the rest, the dull browns and neutral shades. Yet through the loom she is able to display her true feelings, not large overt ones, but one’s that seem to only peek through, appear as a flash, but if feelings could be turned over an examined like the pieces from the loom, would end up ‘startling the eye’. The feelings were there, just that she was incapable of expressing them, or perhaps more precisely, that the daughters themselves were incapable of understanding them completely.

This is further illustrated by the fact that when Jo, the sister that wished to break through directly, receives a muffler, she regards it immediately as ‘Mom’s colours’, perhaps without disdain, but without the immediate appreciation of the colours in it. Sharon, who seems to understand their mother better then Jo, asks her to put the muffler on, and then was surprised as ‘light, hidden colours leaped from the brown fabric’. She then states a phrase, one of the most important in the poem, ‘You’d never know it unless you looked real close’, to which Sharon replies with perhaps the most striking phrase in the passage, ‘Most people don’t’. This seems to symbolise the fact that even though it is not apparent at the start, it is still there, and that most people tend not to notice this fact.

The flashes of colour that is apparent though her weavings are reminiscent of periods in her life, each representing different things. There is the grey, for the cold mornings, when she warmed clothes for Jo, brown for the lunch and the brownies that they had made. White was the colour of sheets, while blue was Cathy’s favourite colour. Even though all of these colours are part of her life, every one of them are also connected to her daughters, which, as these would be important memories, show that they are important to her. This is emphasised through the fact that she loves weaving, and ‘never misses a class’, with the only exception being when ‘her daughters are home’.

The final few parts of the prose seem to suggest that their mother is not as strong as their father, as ‘she was crying’ when Jo had to leave. Also she is described as a ‘lighter mass’, one which gravitates naturally ‘toward a more substantial one’. She then returns home, and once again ‘amidst the comings and goings of the live around her’ she is by herself, a ‘woman bent over a loom’. In this she slowly weaves her pieces, which is synonymous for the lives around her, and of her life. Perhaps devoid of other ways to express herself, she continues weaving these images of live, ‘weaving the diverse threads of life’ into a ‘miraculous, mystical fabric’ which expresses her true feelings and views.

Definition of Literature

The slow accretion of detail that gives the reader something to do is the hallmark of literary writing. The knowledge that there is more to know the more the writing is experienced contrasts with the smooth superficiality of pulp fiction which leaves the reader no decisions to make because their sympathy is unambiguously directed by the writing. literature describes an event or character in a way that honours the complexity of experience. And this makes commentary writing possible.

With this, I shall post a commentary soon. Hopefully.

Btw, since the essays/questions/whatever will be huge, the rss ----->>
Is prob your best bet for finding new things.