Quick announcement before I dive into today’s essay!
This month, I’ll be hosting a virtual retreat exclusively for paid subscribers between August 19-23.
The theme for the 5-day retreat will be vision.
What is it? How do we cultivate and create it?
The capacity to nourish an idea, a possibility of what could be, is a concept that has come up time and time again in my work, whether that be with organizations or individuals.
I’ve also seen a great deal of misconception around what it actually is.
As we close out the last month of summer, I thought it would be the perfect time to explore this and set the course for the rest of 2024.
This 5-day retreat will take place via email. Every day, you’ll receive a lesson in your inbox as well as a creative, reflective exercise.
This is the first time I’m doing this via SubStack so we’re experimenting! Depending on how it goes, I’m considering doing these educational retreats every quarter for paid subscribers.
If you’d like to participate, please upgrade your subscription. For less than the cost of your monthly coffee budget, you’ll be able to access my entire archive, receive several deep-dive essays every month, bonus content from my podcast, as well as exclusive events like this.
Thoughts from Dystopian Landscapes
Last weekend, I stayed in and watched two very different movies: Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, and A24’s Civil War.
I very much enjoyed both and excitedly looked up other commentaries and discussions online after finishing them.
What I found surprised me.
I’ve previously spoken about passive, literal thinking and why it’s a serious issue.
What struck me about much of the negative discourse around these movies was how poorly they understood the nature of art.
My spoiler-free thoughts:
In Civil War, the main characters are journalists (played by Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, and Cailee Spaeny). The story follows them as they navigate to DC (in the form of a roadtrip) in the midst of a country torn apart by war.
Violent episodes - some explicitly horrific and others more subtle - interweave throughout their travels and are explored from different angles and perspectives.
A grim fatalism permeates the film, a numbness echoed in Kirsten Dunst’s performance as a weary, experienced war photo-journalist and further emphasized by the contrasting wide-eyed naivety and youth of Spaeny’s character.
The story unfolds on multiple layers with themes explored through the visual language, coloring, tone, mood, and character arcs.
There is an objectivity in the film’s shots, very much like the work of the journalists at the heart of it. The narrative language is not personal, but rather like an observant witness.
That very distance - its neutrality - is what asks the audience to fill in the gap.
It is a movie that requires us to think, to be an active participant in its realization.
These are clearly deliberate artistic choices Garland made in service to his vision.
Which is why I was enormously surprised by the shallow, banal complaints in so many reviews.
Why didn’t the movie explain the cause of the war? Why didn’t it explain if the President was a good or bad guy? Why didn’t it tell us why Texas has an alliance with California?
Because that is not the intent, purpose, or point of the work.
It is not meant to spoon-feed us answers, but rather to present a particular perspective, narrative, or interpretation (the artist’s vision) for us to engage with and contemplate.
Civil War asks the audience to consider many questions:
What is the role of journalism / media during societal and cultural crises?
What does it mean to be “good / right” or “bad / wrong” when each side is absolutely convinced of its truth? Do we ever really know what side we’re on if both sides are involved in death and destruction?
How fragile is democracy? What happens to ethics and morality, nationalism and humility, when what we’ve long seen as an “elsewhere” issue happens in our own country?
How do we reconcile an overall collective desensitization to human suffering with the primitive part of us that finds adrenaline and life in the brutal battle for survival?
In order to engage critically with art, we must first understand what it is trying to say.
The same lack of understanding for artistic framing, purpose, and vision applies to the discussion around Furiosa.
Like all of George Miller’s work, Furiosa is visually and aurally stunning, a larger than life concept, operatic in scope, and rich with vivid metaphors and iconography.
Despite its overall critical acclaim, the movie didn’t do as well as expected at the box office when it was released over Memorial Day weekend.
What I found more interesting were the reasons given for it. That it was because:
it was a prequel and not a continuation / expansion of Fury Road
the pacing, sound, design, action, etc were different from Fury Road
of Anya Taylor-Joy’s casting as Furiosa rather than bringing back Charlize Theron
Max himself is not in the movie
The uneducated assumption that a lack of commercial success somehow equates to a lack of artistic quality is already problematic in and of itself.
Furthermore, the fact that people wanted (or expected) an exact repeat of Fury Road says a lot about why we have such a preponderance of regurgitated remakes and a dearth of new or original ideas.
It’s a prequel. Obviously, it’s not the same.
It’s a different work, a different story from an earlier period in the timeline of the Mad Max world. And as such, the movie should (and does) stand on its own.
Every choice made in the film reflects this fundamental vision.
Since the story is set years prior to Fury Road, it would have been ludicrous and utterly disingenuous to have Charlize Theron repeat her role.
Theron possesses a certain physicality in her acting, an energy that flashes across the screen. In Fury Road, she is a perfect fit for Furiosa who is at a certain stage in her life.
She is a mature woman, comfortable in her body and what she’s capable of, and her physical presence, energy, and confident self-grounding reflect the years of lived experience which have shaped the character into who she is at that moment in time.
In Furiosa, we see the journey of the character from a child to a young woman. The casting of Anya Taylor-Joy is an excellent one because she physically embodies this.
She portrays a precocious young adult transitioning into womanhood, not yet fully mature. Hesitation and fear colors her arc as she undergoes learnings and experiences that gradually harden and mold her into who she eventually becomes.
Of course she doesn’t have the same physicality or mature awareness of Theron…that’s the entire point. That’s what makes the story - and Taylor-Joy’s performance as a younger Furiosa - grounded and realistic.
The subtle exploration of her relationship with Praetorian Jack (played by Tom Burke) is also honest to the story. It’s handled in a nuanced - and deeply human - manner given their backgrounds and the world they exist in.
The choice in pacing and energetic drive also reflects the difference between the two films. Cramming a story based on Furiosa’s formative years with the same degree of action as when she’s a seasoned, embattled leader would’ve made no narrative sense.
Furiosa doesn’t have a great deal of dialogue in the story (again, believable given her age and the trauma of her circumstances); instead, much is communicated in other ways. The uncanniness with which Taylor-Joy expresses without words displays her brilliant command over her art.
Miller also utilizes the difference in pacing to paint a greater meditative exploration of themes including:
What is humanity’s role in our own destruction? Is savagery born from an inherent survival instinct or is it a choice?
How does Furiosa’s character arc - entwined with emotional themes of revenge, grief, and longing - challenge our understanding of agency and empowerment?
How do our experiences shape us? How does the portrayal of antagonist and protagonist as reflections of one another ask us to consider blurred, gray areas?
In a world devoid of possibility, how do we understand or redefine hope and beauty? How do we define home?
Engaging with art means both seeing what the intent and vision is and actively reflecting on it.
Like education, art’s role is not to tell us what to think.
It is to challenge us to think for ourselves.
This requires being able to experience, examine, and understand a work for what it is…and not what we personally want it to be.
To assess a work’s ideas and vision - and its strength of conviction in conveying those ideas - without pushing our own desires and assumptions on to it.
To interact with it as a means of catalyzing new conversations, of challenging perspectives and creating meaning.
This necessitates active involvement, not passive consumption.
Because the richness and point of art is to encourage us to step beyond ourselves.
It’s why I can immediately tell whether someone has widely read fiction or if their reading has been limited to the realm of self-help, non-fiction, or how-to books.
The ability to strongly and critically engage with art has an import that radiates far beyond the medium.
It lends to media literacy, critical thinking, nuanced understanding and interpretation, seeing beyond the superficial and tangible, connecting disparate concepts, greater insights to who we individually are, and the deepening of true empathy for experiences other than our own.
Grasping, feeling, and understanding through the lens of our own lived humanity and then actively translating that into an awareness and thinking beyond self is something we need more of in this world.
I believe there are many reasons why this is sorely lacking in our culture (which I’ll explore in another essay). And although I don’t think this is a recent development, there are many factors in our modern world that exacerbate the issue.
But these are skills that can be developed. It’s the reason I launched the Break Down the Box initiative and am teaching programs like “Read Like a Writer”.
By improving how we engage with art and the humanities, we can cultivate deeper levels of thought and meaning.
More of this to come this month. In the meantime, if you need help with developing your voice, navigating change, or integrating authentic alignment, let’s talk.
PS If you want a fun movie to watch with the entire family, I also recently enjoyed “The Fall Guy”. It’s not a movie with heft but it does have charm and heart and is an example of honest, well-structured storytelling driven by strong characterizations without an over-reliance on artificial gimmicks.
Weekly Round-Up: Overtures & Codas
KIZUNA STUDIO
The July Kizuna Studio Roundtable: Members discuss the topic of “Authenticity on LinkedIn” and how we can navigate the challenges & resistance we may encounter particularly on that platform.
Our August Studio roundtable will be on the topic of “The Creative Spirit”. Follow the Kizuna Studio on Twitter (X) or LinkedIn to find out more!
Member Dr. Gabriel Barsawme’s latest podcast episode featured a wonderful convo with poet and fellow Studio member, Patrick Szajner.
Chris Fawthrop just launched his leadership newsletter on Substack
Jorge Medina’s excellent weekly newsletter - Brandly - contains deeply thoughtful insights to help with brand growth.
For those of you seeking to understand how to utilize video better, Andrew Warner’s “Invisible to Seen” newsletter has you covered
Ephraim Champion has been busy with a wide range of film and other commissions for music compositions
Laura has launched The Garden of Artists initiative for “those seeking soul, human connection, novelty, and the company and inspiration of the artists, the free thinkers, the writers and the wanderers of the world.”
If you’re interested in joining our Kizuna Studio community, click here:
WITH GRACE PODCAST:
Seasons of Change: Episode 3 featuring Jessica Yarmey is now live.
Besides the podcast, I’ll also be sharing new video essays and exploring other ideas on YouTube this month. To get notified, subscribe to my channel.
To access bonus content + personal commentary for each podcast episode, become a paid newsletter subscriber.
Recent Sketches
My creative experiment this summer: near daily vignettes of what’s on my mind (notes, reflections, musings for myself).
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hope you had a great weekend -
G