Justin Kurzel’s 2015 Macbeth is twisted with violence and bloodshed from beginning to end. Similar to Shakespeare, Kurzel sets his film in 11th century Scotland, where a battle of forces rages on barren plains set beneath the looming Scottish Highlands. Kurzel, however, makes one slight adjustment: He sets his film within the depths of Hell. […]
One thing that I always find fascinating is footage from events rather than recreations. Mein Krieg is a perfect example of something that I would watch for the use of being able to actually see what people back then saw, with the exception of color. Photography of war became really popular with the Civil War. […]
Image via Wikimedia commons Our group had the privilege of doing a war adaptation of Hamlet. We were trying to go for a WWII look and feel. To do that we had to take a more modern approach to the language and we also decided to modernize the names. I can’t see men in WWII […]
Although here in the US we are beginning to see more political action, these seem to be small and short term in scale. Even the Occupy movement seems to have all but disappeared from the media. As cold-hearted as it may sound the citizens here are just not desperate enough to be able to affect […]
I had initially set out to write this blog about the role of Vietnamese women and children in the Vietnam War against the United States. But as I was searching for information I came across an interesting article from the Smithsonian Magazine called “Children of the Vietnam War.” The article talks about the many children […]
“Human beings are foolish. Thanks to bigotry, religious fanaticism, and the greed of those who traffic war, the Earth is never at peace, and the specter of nuclear war is never far away (1).” – Keiji Nakazawa Barefoot Gen is a fictitious chronicling of this event, with details both before and after, but undoubtedly […]
Homeless: The Organization of Beggars The first qualm with the morality supposed by society is how they treat the poor. In the film M by Fritz Lang we see a contrast in the way the poor are treated and the helpfulness they have given to society. Directly disproving stereotypes of low moral standards the “beggars” help […]
All Quiet on the Western Front talks about many aspects of war that would otherwise not have been mentioned. One of the most important yet under-rated is the aspect of Trust. Let’s start at the beginning. The First World War is confusing, everyone is fighting, but they do not have a solid goal they are […]
Where to start, I want to truly write just a blog. With a work of literature I believe it’s possible to just discuss the way the text made you feel and the thoughts that came to your mind. So I want to pretend, for just a second, that class problems can be separated from race, […]
The growing exceptionalism and ideal of national identity throughout European countries was a major cause, because it created friction between countries as well as racist and nationalist bias. The new found nationalism led to many uprisings across Europe, such as that of the Irish, Poles, Italians, and many more. Because of these tensions, new allies […]
As “A Specter is Haunting Europe” opens readers are introduced to Europe in 1899 at the “site of the world’s first peace conference”. (1) Readers are then invited back further in the century to discover how spectators arrived to this place in history. Within this flashback readers are given a look into the minds and […]