Spirituality Archives | Otaku No Culture

Avatar Fire and Ash. On Why My Journey With This Franchise Is Truly Over.

James Cameron can still build spectacle, but the latest return to Pandora in Avatar Fire and Ash expands outward through action rather than deeper into the metaphysical questions that once made Avatar resonate.

There was a time when James Cameron’s films mattered. He burst onto the scene with The Terminator, and from there his command of the blockbuster only grew through Aliens, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, True Lies, and Titanic. Each project felt bigger, bolder, more assured. Ego may have inflated alongside his skill, but when he’s focused with one universe, Avatar Fire and Ash is falling flat. I’m not wowed by the digital graphics. I want deeper, spiritual, meaning.

I read the first film as Cameron’s take on environmentalism, filtered through soul transference and a very direct moral lens. It wasn’t subtle, but it had intent. The second film pushed into new territory, including a deeper engagement with spiritualism. That spark, however, was nowhere to be found on Cameron’s third return to Pandora. I found no meaning between the lines, no sense of discovery.

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In Gints Zibalodis’ Flow (2024), Slow and Steady Wins the Survival Race

Pardoning the pun, but Gints Zilbalodis’s Flow is continuing to make waves at theatres this year and next, and it’s an Oscar contender. Also, for those asking–no, this cat is nothing like Jiji from Kiki’s Delivery Service!

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Review (Mild Spoiler alert)

When there’s no dialogue to guide what the movie Flow is about, what’s presented is less of a story and more like events that track why we, as audiences, should love a stray black cat. Apparently, the world went dark overnight; some flood has rendered many cities underwater, and the only survivors we find are animals. While a great mystery looms over why another tsunami wave happened, that’s left for the older viewer to figure out. But for a child, they’re marvelling at a children’s book brought to life!

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Surviving The City Can Be Rough. In Volume 3: We Are the Medicine What’s Examined is Based on Real Life.

In this graphic novel series, Surviving the City, isn’t just about how one culture is dealing with colonialism, but rather with how many other lives can get affected at the same time.

HighWater Press
Spoiler Alert

Some knowledge of what the graphic novel series, Surviving the City, wants to educate is required to acknowledge what the latest instalment Volume 3: We Are Medicine, hopes to heal. Ever since the news about finding a mass grave of children near a former residential school in Kamloops broke out in 2021, there were a lot of protests and finger pointing. The world blamed people in prominent positions of power of the atrocity. Even now, the after-effects are still ongoing. Some reconciliation has happened since, but what’s presented here as fiction is coming true in the real world after reading “Chief says grave search at B.C. residential school brings things ‘full circle’” from the Kelowna Capital News.

This story by Tasha Spillett (pictured above left) makes up the backdrop where Miikwan and Dez are thinking about their futures. This author/educator/public speaker strives for a world where multiculturalism is embraced and everyone is treated with compassion. It’s basically what Gene Roddenberry envisioned for Star Trek, and everything Sisko would fight for when he travelled back in time and became part of the protests for equal rights in “Past Tense, Parts One and Two (Deep Space 9).”

In this story, these youths want to make the world a better place. They will soon graduate, and instead of figuring out what to wear for their last prom, these two indigenous teens change their plans and want to help after this news broke out. These are wonderful kids. Even Dez, the protagonist from the first two books, gets involved! After her own dealings with “The System,” how she deals with authoritarianism is important too. Continue reading “Surviving The City Can Be Rough. In Volume 3: We Are the Medicine What’s Examined is Based on Real Life.”

The Zen of “Demigod The Legend Begins” at Fantasia 2022

Demigod, The Legend Begins may well be a prequel to Legend of the Sacred Stone, because Su Huan-jen is part of the cast.

Played at Fantasia 2022 July 23, 2022

Demigod The Legend Begins, is a visual treat. Not only do we get to watch Taiwanese glove puppet theatre on the big screen, but also the story is epic! Through the magic of editing, these characters come alive.

However, I must wonder if Bunraku is the appropriate term to use to describe this style of puppetry. The motions of these medium-sized dolls are achieved via hiding the puppeteers with simple tricks of the camera. Instead of watching a stage show, we are watching it though the eyes of the cinemtographer–where we have medium shots and closeups of the characters instead of wide shots to show these action figures in motion. In truth, this technique is the centuries-old tradition of budaixi—Chinese opera using glove puppetry. This movie updates the music with modern day electric guitars, and I’m fairly sure one song is taking cues from Fleetwood Mac’s “The Chain.”

When a robe needs to look like it’s rustling, good ol’ fashioned fans are used. When the background needs to come alive, we have CGI replacing those green screen moments. Also, we have some well placed smoke effects and cups of blood to splash around when needed! The presentation is as good as those classic wuxia Hong Kong films from the 80s. But I can’t help but chuckle when they move off camera like a Muppet. That’s okay; Demigod The Legend Begins is not meant to be as perfect as other films using marionation.

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A Closer Look at LAAPFF’s Spirited Away Program

This unique set of eclectic works do more than define humanity’s relationship with Nature. There’s spirits, wisdom and counter-culture to be found in each.

Regal L.A. LIVE:
A Barco Innovation Center
1000 W Olympic Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90015

Sept 29, 2021
9:00 pm

Thematically, the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival’s Spirited Away shorts program is an apt title to describe a set of works that deals with spirituality. It’s a topic few understand when they are about philosophies from smaller regional areas.

Udval Altangerel is a Mongolian filmmaker whose works explore anthropological subjects, and to introduce this group of films, she wrote for the program guide, “Guided by shamans and ancestral spirits, we traverse the line between the living and the dead, tradition and transformation, fiction and nonfiction.”

This unique set of eclectic works do more than define humanity’s relationship with Nature. There’s spirits, wisdom and counter-culture to be found in each. Fans of slam poetry will like Hinga. This piece argues for change. Unlike the fight to keep Fairy Creek pristine in my neck of the woods, this performance theatre is captured onto film and explores the complexity of what the Filipinx people in the Bay Area are passionate about. They want a utopia that transcends political and geographical barriers. Their message isn’t hard to follow, but it’s the rhythm which sets an unusual pace.

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[Fantasia 2021] The Sensory Experience that is Phil Tippett’s Mad God

This mystery nightmare tour found in Mad God focuses on the descent through Hell–the ruins of Earth presumedly–with a nameless figure in search of something.

Fantasia Film Festival 2021
Encore performance Aug 24th 9:00 AM (EST)
Tickets can be purchased here

At a cursory glance, Phil Tippett’s Mad God looks like a product spat out of many creative minds. There that genre fans can recognize from the movies he’s worked on, namely Dragonslayer. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Robocop, but as for who produced this wild trip, the concept is 100% Phil.

The story came from a cumulation of experiences from this special effects maker’s life ever since he thought of it 30 years ago, and it took many more to realize. On this list includes the advice he was given from fellow filmmakers and also him reading a lot of Milton and Dante. The visuals are comparable to that of splicing all that’s creative from Tim Burton, Clive Barker, H.P. Lovecraft, Jan Švankmajer, Guillermo del Toro and Guy Maddin’s into a huge melting pot, and it works. This master of stop-motion animation crafted a movie that would’ve been shelved for good had it not been for his fans and colleagues who said, you gotta finish it.

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