Anxiety

So I’m not too worried, about my paper really. The only thing I really worry about is the length and it flies both ways. I’m worried that with the information I have, and I have managed to find some pretty decent information finally about this topic, that it is going to run over the eight pages. However that being said I am also worried that I won’t be able to get the eight pages because I won’t be able to use all this information as well. There is a point of some redundancy and I worry that it will begin to ramble and not make sense. But as for all my info I have the movie, the collection of books, a book I found from the library called “The Science of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, an article about object conflict and placing emphasis on objects, and an email that popped up yesterday from my grandma. I also have two or three websites that I have been researching a bit on. Truth be told I have about half this paper done already but it’s in sections I now have to tie it all together, and that could be tricky. I’m glad however the last three or four papers have been on this towel subject, because I can use them to create this new and lengthy paper, I am so glad it’s not any longer. Anything over 6 pages seems a bit daunting, in my mind at least. I hope I can do this film and it’s creator Douglas Adams justice.

Just the Facts

“It’s an important and popular fact, that things are not always what they seem.” – Douglas Adams

“It’s a tough galaxy. If you want to to survive out here you’ve got to know where your towel is,” Ford says.

Ford runs at the unarmed Vogons brandishing his towel as a weapon and yipping. This in turn causes the Vogons to run away screaming, “Run away!! He’s got a towel.”

In the end Ford asks Arthur, “You’ve got your towel?” Arthur responds, ” Yeah, why am I gonna need it?” “Only always,” Ford replies. Arthur chuckles and says. “Right cause I wouldn’t want to go anywhere with out my lovely towel.”

“Hitchhiker’ Guide to the Galaxy” the book states a towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly because it has great practical value. You can use it to wrap around you for warmth, to lie on on the beach, sleep on under the stars, as a sail on a mini raft, wet it for use in hand to hand combat, wrap it around your head, use it as a scarf, wave in case of emergency to signal, and of course dry yourself off with if it still seems to be clean enough. More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. If a strag, nonhitchhiker, discovers that he has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possesion of a toothbrush, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, space suit, etc. Furthermore, the strag will happily lend the hitchhiker any of these items that might have “accidentally” been “lost” along the way. For anyone who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against all odds and stil know where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

This is only the beginning it would take up way to much to put it all in here now.

In “Adolescents’ and Adults’ Internal Models of Conditional Strategies for Object Conflict” by Henry Markovits and Martin St-onge it is said that in their studies there were lower levels of aggression in people when an object is more important for the physical well being. Behavoirs can be different from specific interaction to more abstract constructs like dominance.

Other movies with similar objects of obsession:

“Star Wars” shows Jedi needing lightsabers, Luke Skywalker having father issues, Han Solo needing his ship Millenium Falcon.

“Star Trek” Kirk needing his ship Enterprise, Kirk’s father issues, Spock has humanity issues with his emotions.

There are more but I have too much here already.

PS Don’t forget your towel on Monday the 25th for Towel Day!!

Placing Emphasis on an Object

In “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” a towel is used quite often to solve the dilemas of the moment by Ford Prefect. He has taken on the job of teaching Arthur how to survive and hitchhike through the galaxy, and tells him that his towel is the most important thing to have. Reading in the book Douglas Adams explains that it has a phsycological effect on strags, nonhitchhiker’s, for anyone who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy and still know where their towel is, is clearly someone to be reckoned with. In “Adolescents’ and Adults’ Internal Models of Conditional Strategies for Object Conflict” by Henry Markovits and Martin St-onge it is said that in their studies there were lower levels of aggression in people when an object is more important fo the physical well being. Behavoirs can be different from specific interaction to more abstract constructs like dominance. Ford fits this perfectly as he is very laid back and his job of exploring the galaxy has allowed him to pick up the social structures of many different planets and species and incorprate them into his own life. “There is evidence that children and adults possess internal models of peer relationships that faithfully reflect some important structural characteristcs of observed behavior. Evidence has been found that adults are sensitive to some basic organizational parameters of social networks.” So just through living you gain this imagine if you travelled alot, like Ford and could gain the knowledge he has. The amazing thing is we do this daily without even conscieously thinking about it.

Scene It

 Have you ever played this game called Scene It? You have to go through the game using scenes from a movie to answer questions such as what was arthur wearing when he hitchhiked onto the vogon ship? The answer is his pj’s and a robe and of course his towel? My scene I am choosing to represent is different however. It happens when you first see Arthur and Ford in the washroom on the Vogon ship. Arthur is just figuring out what is all really going on and how to use The Guide. While this is going on you see Ford scrambling around with his towel trying to break pipes and get a signal out so they can get off the ship. As Arthur asks more questions, Ford stops and explains about what’s real and not (by Douglas Adams views at least), and realizes that Arthur has left his towel on the floor. He quickly snatches it up and places it around Arthurs neck and tells him that if he wants to survive out here in space then he has to know where his towel is. This seems to signify that the towel is a very important thing in a hitchhiker’s life. They then together use Fords towel to break a steam pipe and get a signal out to be picked up by another ship. Arthur still seems confused about all the goings on but he keeps his towel around his neck and goes along with Ford, afterall he’s an alien and that’s just how they roll right.

PS Found out Official Towel Day is May 25th, Bring your towels if you want to survive!!!!

Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“It’s an important, and popular fact that things are not always what they seem.”     -Douglas Adams

Having said this I don’t know really how many of you know who Douglas Adams is or anything about this movie so, this is a comedy that is way out there. An off-the wall, make you stop and think at things in a new perspective kind of out there. It’s the story of Arthur, a brit, who get caught up in an adventure when the world suddenly get s destroyed and finds himself hitchhiking across space with some strange characters. His friend, and alien he discovers, Ford, the girl that got away, Trillian, and the president of the galaxy, Zaphod, who’s also the guy who stole Trillian away.The ship they get picked up on is fully emotioned and there is also a manically depressed robot named Marvin onboard. As they set out across the galaxy they are being chased by a race called the Vogons who believes they have kidnapped the president. Throughout the whole movie there is one key item however, a towel. So my focusing question is; What is the signifigance of the towel in the movie?

Having read the five volume set of Douglas Adams Guide series I vaguely remember the actual usage of the towel, I say this because they never actually really tell you in the movie they just keep making references to it and using it throughout. I remember in the movie the towel being used as a weapon, and a shield, a tool and a scarf, oh and drying off too. I also remember thinking when I watch the movie that it’s hilarious when Ford first runs back to the house the first thing he grabs for Arthur is a towel. I t should be fun to find the signifigance, I loved reading his books. He unfortunately died in 2001 at the age of 49 due to a heart attack. He never got to see the completion of his movie, production was halted for 9 months before it was decided to finish it in tribute to him and in hopes of carrying on his dream of making all 5 books into movies.

P.S. There is a national towel day too, it’s in May and I believe it’s the 11th, so everyone bring your towels.

History Repeats Itself

 

So we’ve watched the two movies and have come to see that they are both comedies and very humorous. The music, or muzak depending on the venture, is predominant in both features and enhances the story. The question that comes to mind though is, where did these stories themselves come from? As was pointed out by Allison in class, “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” is loosely based upon Homer’s “The Odyssey.” “Raising Arizona” however to me reminds me of what were once called dime store novels.

A dime store novel, as defined by wikipedia, has become the catchall term for several different, but still related forms of late nineteenth and early twentieth century U.S. popular fiction, including “true” dime novels, story papers, five and ten cent weekly libraries, “thick book reprints and even the early pulp magazines. Dime novels widely varied in size and genre but were normally about 100 pages or less and had some sort of illustrated cover. My husband, Rob, calls them the science fiction shorts and comic books he has. 

I can remember when I would visit my grandparents in Hugo, OK and being “bored out of my mind” and begging to go down to the corner store where they still sold these stories for ten cents, and loving them. Do you ever read a book and try to become the person in the novel? If you’re really good at it and have a great imagination you can get lost for hours in a good story and go on many wonderful adventures. Well, nowadays we have movies to add to it and the same thing translates over, you can get lost in the story and become the character. 

Back in the day though all people had were stories that were told person to person and then short stories or dime store novels were printed and sold en masse to the public. Fantastic stories of wild west adventures, of the boy who went on an adventure to find gold in Alaska, the girl who defied all odds to become a doctor, and many more. However, after a while you begin to see many stories coming back around just altered in ways to create them new. Such as “The Odyssey” and “O’ Brother Where Art Thou,” in both stories the main character is trying to get back to his wife and it seems as if “the gods” are all against him. Add in “Raising Arizona” and you can say that there is the story of good versus evil, for in “Raising Arizona” H.I. appears to be confronting his alter self in a dream like state. In “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” the convicts have to come to terms with their “evil ways” as Delmar and Pete call them and become good again so they can live theirs lives free. 

Evil also chases through the movie in “Raising Arizona” in the form of “the lone rider of the Apocalypse” chasing after H.I. The same can be said for “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” for when Delmar, Pete and Everett meet Tommy and he confesses he sold his soul to the devil he claims “he’s a white guy with a dog and dark glasses.” At the end of the movie and throughout they are actually running from this man because he’s the warden and would love nothing more than to hang them.  

In watching both of these movies I was reminded of the fictitious stories I used to read as a child because while there was no way they were real, I could immerse myself into them and enjoy the story, which was only enhanced by the music that accompanied them. When reading a dime store novel one often puts them music to the story in their imaginative state and in the movies the cornball music the was played was perfect to the story. A wild chase scene got plucking banjos and yodeling, something fun that let you know it was a chase and active but a complete farce. 

Many dime store novels in the beginning were wild west adventures and during times of boredom and more often than not during times of hardship these novels inspired people to keep on going and pushing on, not just giving up. Some people were inspired to pull roots and move on to a better place, others were inspired to go on a wild adventure and become “Billy the Kid” or Wyatt Earp, still others were inspired to write stories themselves. As more and more people began to write more and more stories came about and were more original than they used to be, this is how dime store novels have come to include such a wide variety of genres and works. But still throughout them there is always a common thread to link one or another. While the characters will change and the story itself will change time or place, the most common thread is of good versus evil. 

When looking for a dime store novel now you have to search hard and sometimes far and wide, and you don’t pay ten cents for them anymore either. The newest versions are of the science fiction group and started being printed around the 1930s’ or so. When we started to take an interest in what might be out there, this opened a whole realm of possibilities to make new stories. Bugs and aliens attacking earth, little green men and their death rays shooting from flying saucers that hovered above our cities. Sound familiar? It’s happening again, even now someone somewhere is writing a “new” story but using a basis off an older story to feed and supplement theirs.

Probably the best thing however about all this repeating of a story is that as these stories get passed down through the generations, they get retold in a more modern era of the time. In addition as we go on we add the history of civilization and it’s growth to the story as well. Let’s take “The Wizard of Oz” for example, while set in the depression, it showed life through a girls eyes, while she was in a dream state, about becoming a better person. Well, in “Raising Arizona” we see through H.I.’s eyes in his dream state about becoming a better person. In “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” the cons are looking to become better people, after their initial break out that is, and it’s also set in the depression. Also in the “Wizard of Oz” the characters are chased by the wicked witch of the West, evil, and has these minions to do her biding. In “Raising Arizona,” Smalls the bounty Hunter chases H.I. and the two cons while not connected to Smalls are like minions of evil. “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” almost has two-forms of evil, the warden and his minions and the KKK group that turns out the leader is Homer Stokes. Katie says in her blog, I thought it was funny watching the rally take place because the first thing I thought of was the guards in the Wizard of Oz. 

As we go we bring stories from the past that we’ve read, like dime store novels, or seen, be it television or movies, and incorporate them with the current story. The more these stories are passed on the more advanced they get, so in a way dime store novels have just evolved with the generations and become increasingly mainstream and available to the public. 

Music

So given that there is a theme to everything and everyone, the question is: Does the music in “Raising Arizona” and “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” fit the story being portrayed? Well yes I believe it does actually, think about it. In “Raising Arizona” you have plucky banjo music and yodeling, all things you wouldn’t expect until you look at H.I. and his character. Slapstick and funny, especially through the cahse scenes the music apropriately fits the scene. When you think of dueling banjos, and yodeling often you will get images of chase scenes in other movies, or if you’ve seen them, you get images of concerts, and shows, with people dressed “goofy” and purposefully making you laugh.

In “O Brother Where Art Thou” the music is more set for the time period of the story not neccesarily the characters. The blue grass twang that is flooded throught the story showcases the area, people and period. Songs of sorrow and of losing their way only to find it again, songs of love and of hope during the great depression made a large impact on society and helped the american people to cope and get back on their feet. Being able to play and/or sing back then was also a way of getting money if you were jobless, or at least a meal and sometimes a place to stay if you were so lucky. Many new songs and players came from that era and have been passed on through genereations, being remade and played again and again.

So yes I would have to agree that the music of the movie does indeed fit the story being portrayed. In fact it not only fits it but enhances it as well.