Welcome...and initial guidelines...

This blog will be used in the spring of 2008 by 80+ students at Drexel University to investigate the effects of Iraq on culture and the reverse. Our goal will be to better understand why the US is in Iraq, and to question whether literature can help us on this journey.

Weekly plans and other materials will always be posted in Vista, not this blog. So go to Bb Vista to get the discussion prompts and other instructions.

I intend this blog to manage our discussions and track our collective investigation.

You should have received an email from me inviting you to become a contributor to this blog. The email was sent Monday afternoon to your official Drexel email address.

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Cloverfield

Back in the day Japan released a little film called Godzilla. It had clear themes of the west dominating the east. Godzilla generally stomped all over Tokyo's couch much as we had during WWII. The use of the atomic bomb was not left out seeing as that was how Godzilla came to be, a nuclear test. So the east got dominated by the west and the east made a movie basically stating that the west was a bunch of douchebags for generally walking all over the east even though they provoked us into a war. So fifty years later when the east has started to catch up to us to the point where there is potential for them to reach us or even surpass us we come out with a movie about us getting stomped out. Cloverfield is basically a mediocre Godzilla style movie with a Blair Witch Project style filming. A giant monster stomps all over New York City's couch instead of Tokyo's. Everyone dies, they level the city and the end is ambiguous and not at the same time. The city gets bombed but there is a low volume clip after the credits roll that says "somebody help us" and "its still alive." There is no direct connection that the monster came from the east, but the back story from the movie (courtesy IMDB) says that it was disturbed from deep sea oil drilling platforms, so it is related to something that is very big in our economy and something that is going to change, but is still up in the air about what is actually going to happen. So it all ties back to America needing to change its economic policies if it wants to stay on top. Otherwise, China will linger on our block, give the finger to a cop, and set it up to get on top.

No comments: