Loving Vincent
Movie “Loving Vincent” is certainly an experience worthy of the
tickets to go to the cinema. The main idea of it is to make
“animated” film by painting endless number of quality oil
paintings in the style of Vincent van Gogh about the painter
himself. I have been warned that this idea is actually by far
the strongest part of the film, and that the story of the film
itself is by far the weakest part of it. I won’t do the spoilers
here, but yes the end comes rather flat.
The visual side has been however troubling as well. It is truly
beautiful, there is no question about that, but this film showed
me the great difference between pictures (especially ones in the
tradition of post-van Gogh painting, what a irony!) and films.
The great pictures (in all traditions, it applies
perfectly well even to Rembrandt’s “Return of the prodigal son”)
are best when they don’t tell the whole story, but when they are
more a catalyst to make a viewer sit down and think her own
story. From this point of view, van Gogh was (with a bit of
artistic license) the first painter who stressed this role of
pictures even more by omitting a lot of realism and leaving just
those catalyst parts of the image.
On the other hand, the biggest beauty of every film is a story.
Some films are beautiful, have pretty pictures, but what makes or
kills it is how the story is made. There is endless list of
beautiful pictures which lack a good story (the review of this
film points as an example to “What Dreams May Come”). I don’t
want to deal now with quality (or lack of thereof) of the story
of this film, but I want to emphasize that perception of a film
is quite different from the perception of a picture. This
difference in perception made me torn to two sides by two
different both unpleasant feelings. While beautiful pictures made
me feel constantly “Wait! This was a beautiful picture, I would
like to watch it properly!” I had also constantly that feeling
that I forgot my glasses at home (no, I don’t need glasses for
watching films yet). Images in films are not supposed to be
abstract, thought-inducing experience, they are suppose to reveal
and deliver a story. I had that constant feeling “I would love to
see how this girl looks in reality.”
So, my conclusion is that it was a great idea. I don’t care that
much for the quality (or not) of the film as a film, or
a detective story. It was a great experience, I came to new
appreciation of Vincent van Gogh’s paintings, but do I welcome
the inevitable avalanche of imitations of this film which are to
be expected? No, I think once was enough.
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Pokud nebude hnutí ANO trvat na účasti A. Babiše ve vládě, měli bychom …
(odpověď v interním dotazníku KDÚ-ČSL)
Podle mého „na jednání o naší případné účasti ve vládě
přistoupit“. Zde je můj komentář (který se do formuláře nevešel).
Zároveň zcela souhlasím s tím, že lidovci (a každá politická
strana) vstupovala do voleb s tím, že jsou ochotni se zasazovat
o správu věcí veřejných …
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O panu Drahošovi a ozbrojení obyvatelstva
(komentář k diskusi na Facebooku k včerejší diskusi
prezidentských kandidátů panů Drahoše a Zemana)
Byl jsem z té včerejší diskuse upřímně nešťastný (tedy z pěti
minut, které jsem vydržel sledovat).
Ne, proto, že by novinář Primy byl neschopný minimální novinářské
práce a jenom se snažil přivést diváctvo co nejvíce do …
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On Lying
(a comment to the blogpost by Robert O’Callahan)
I think the truthfulness among Christians is overrated. Here,
I said it.
OK, before saying anything else, I have to say that it is very
important, and I know what I am talking about. I had my brush
with an addiction …
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Podpora kandidátů na prezidenta
(z emailové diskuse)
K obavám z roztříštěnosti:
Pokud v prvním kole bude mít Zeman více než 50% hlasů, bude
zvolen. Pak je úplně jedno, kolik hlasů dostane Drahoš
a Fišer. Pokud v prvním kole nedostane více než 50%,
a předpokládejme, že do druhého kola se dostane, pak záleží na
kandidátovi …
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Review of “Escape” and “Mr and Mrs Percy Weasley”
There is a biblical verse from Galatians 3:3: “Are you so
foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected
by the flesh?” What I mean is that “Escape” and “Mr and Mrs
Percy Weasley”started as one of the best fanfictions I found
anywhere. Obviously, from …
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Úvaha postvolební
Co jsem napsal dnes ráno jednomu kamarádovi na IM:
Tak já Ti nevím. Jsem hodně nešťastnej z té včerejší
post-volební diskuse předesedů vítězných stran. Kromě toho,
že jsou morálně radikální názory dost neuctivé k milionu
a půl našich spoluobčanů, tak efektivně dotlačili Bureše
k tomu, že v této chvíli jediná …
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On The Third Way or the Reply to Dave
(Comment to the article by Dave Schmelzer on a Christian and
politics)
Hi, Dave,
let me add couple of comments from this side of The Pond.
First of all, of course, I blame completely confused American
terminology, especially in the political matters. Here Socialists
are not afraid to call themselves …
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Yet another on the infallibility in the Church
(written originally as yet another comment to the blogpost “How Many
Theologians Does it Take To Define Infallibility?” by Melinda Selyms)
First of all: thank you, these are very good questions, which actually made me
think (doesn’t happen that often on blog comments).
Certainly, some rules are necessary even …
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The Holy Protestant Tradition?
(written originally as a comment to the blogpost “How Many
Theologians Does it Take To Define Infallibility?” by Melinda
Selyms)
I am a Protestant, so I am not entitled to bring much to this
discussion, but we were yesterday with my wife in Wittenberg, so
I cannot resist to add …
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On “A Painfully Familiar Reason for Using NFP”
Record of my comment to another nice article by Melinda Selmys.
This is one of those sad places where I am afraid my voice will
be completely ignored, because exactly the people who will most
dogmatically insist on NFP will be the ones who will be the least
likely to …
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Review of Aftershocks
Some thoughts on the fan fiction Aftershocks.
We need to know without a shadow of a doubt that Padma did not
kill Parvati before we can move on.
I am extremely confused about this whole work. On the one hand
there are some parts which are really trully excellent. Whole …
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What We Were Made For: Gratitude For Normal
(unfortunately, FanFiction.net allows only one review per
chapter, so I was not able to add this to my review of
chapter 90 of The Missing Moments by Ash-and-Vine).
When I was something like fourteen I was in hospital for surgery
which made me for a week unable to move …
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What is racism?
With relation to the current affair of kids running on their
father on live BBC News there was discussion on our the
internal email list of my employer. This is one side comment
I made there:
[…] Yes, it is a wrong idea, slightly racist, perhaps, but
these thoughts happen.
(Someday …
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The Problem of Neil Gaiman
So, it happened. I read “The problem of Susan” by Neil Gaiman and
I am completely disgusted by it. Not because Aslan did the White
Witch proper, or because he ate all those lovely little
children. Serves them well, and it is certainly the author’s
prerogative to decide that …
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1. září 1939
W. H. Auden
Původní překlad anglického originálu vytvořil Ivo A. Benda, upraveno.
Sedím v jedné z putyk
Na Dvaapadesáté ulici
Jsem nejistý a mám strach
Zatímco umírají chytré naděje
Ubohého, nepoctivého desetiletí:
Vlny hněvu a strachu
Cirkulují v jasných
I temných zemích světa
A tíží naše soukromé životy;
Nevyslovitelný pach …
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Láska nebo strach. Vyberte si.
Dan Drápal napsal do dnešních (7. února) Lidových novin velice
hezký článek „Co chybí Junckerovým scénářům.“ V zásadě mi
nezbývá, nežli s ním souhlasit, ale přece jenom bych rád přičinil
několik poznámek na jeho okraj.
Jednak je asi třeba zdůraznit, že je velice dobře, že nějaká Bílá
kniha vůbec vznikla …
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Harry Potter … poznámky jako odpověď
Argonantus napsal poměrně rozsáhlou recenzi všech románů Harryho
Pottera. Pokusím se zachovat starověce a dodat dostatečně dlouhé
citace, aby to dávalo smysl.
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Harry Potter as the teacher of DADA
I just want to shout loud agreement with many these negative
reviews of “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child”. It is really
a bad fan fiction signed off by J. K. Rowling for reasons I don’t
want to speculate about (yes, I guess, most her money go to
Lumos …
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Nezlořeč králi
(původně psáno jako odpověď příteli na podzim 2016, ještě před
zvolením pana Trumpa za amerického prezidenta)
V poslední době mnoho lidí zlořečilo zvláště v Praze panu
presidentu Miloši Zemanovi. A to nikoliv v soukromí, ale na
veřejných shromážděních.
Dovol mi abych se k tomuhle vyslovil, protože si myslím, že tohle …
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Post-Communist Conservatism
While listening to the episode 30 of the Eastern Border
podcast (a very touching one, thank you, Kristaps), I was touched
by his notion of the post-Communist conservatism. The idea is
that many nations in the former Eastern block seem to be a way
more conservative than people in the …
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Otevřený dopis katolickému příteli
Povídali jsme si trochu o ekumenismu a Večeři Páně (resp.
svátosti Eucharistie; pro zjednodušení dále „Večeře Páně“, ale
nechci se tím nijak evangelicky vymezovat) a když jsem se vrátil
na místo na zbytek programu, tak jsem si uvědomil, že bych Ti
chtěl říci ještě něco. Nechtělo se mi ale otravovat …
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Cycles of Christianity
I was just listening to the series of three podcasts by Dave
Schemlzer on the Hero’s Journey and Fresh Christianity (episode
one, two, and three).
I haven’t came with some opinion on the series itself, but Dave
also mentioned on the side a book by Phyllis A. Tickle …
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P. Halík na cestě ke zradě?
(původně komentář k článku P. Halíka k americkým prezidentským volbám)
Pane profesore, jakkoli si Vás velice vážím a jakkoli jsem
naprosto znechucen vítězstvím pana Trumpa v amerických
prezidentských volbách, a jakkoli zbytek příspěvku je naprosto
přesný, přesto Vás musím opravit v jednom bodě. Pan Trump sice
doslova řekl, že miluje …
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Stages of grief
I am just reading an interesting blog post by my Melinda Selmys
reflecting on her reaction to the Mr. Trump’s victory in the US
elections.
I am Czech, so I have a little experience with the similar
situation, which I would like to share. Since 2013, Mr. Miloš
Zeman …
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