Essay 2

The character that I believe stayed most true to themselves and their culture is Olive from Little Miss Sunshine. She worked hard to be successful in her beauty pageant, no matter what other people around her would say. When she was first told she would be able to compete in in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant everyone was happy for her and she was even more excited to be in it. Once they were on the road to get to the pageant her family starts to fall apart. At one point she is told not to eat ice cream because her family tells her that she will not win the pageant if she eats the ice cream. At first she does not eat the ice cream but then realizes that she does not care what other people think. As her families dreams start to fall apart they all start to live dreams through Olive. They put pressure on her to win and worry about how she looks and her chances to win.

Even though Olive hears the things that her family worries about and still keeps her confidence. She still has a huge desire to win. Once she gets to the pageant and starts to compete she sees all the other girls with fake hair, fake teeth etc. But she still sticks with her personalty. She shows worry about the other girls but still has confidence. When she gets on stage there are a lot of people who wonder why she is there and her family starts to believe that she is not going to win. They ask her if she wants to leave and not compete but she stays and tries to get everyone to open up to her being different from the other girls.

In Olive's final performance she gets on stage and dedicate her dance to her grandpa who had died and helped her come up with the dance. When she starts dancing it is a raunchy dance that offends all the parents in the crowd and the judges. When the head judge tells her to stop she keeps going and her family joins in on her dance. They finally come around to embrace Olive's personalty and realize she is perfect just the way she is. Throughout the whole movie Olive is true to who she is and never lets anyone tell her otherwise.

There was not a total strain on her losing her culture. Part of her keeping her culture was her not changing herself to conform to the look of the other girls in the pageant. But overall there was not a threat to her culture.

I adore Olive and how she was able to be herself throughout all of her adventure. Even with all the outside pressuring her to change she stayed true to herself.

Essay 1

My personal favorite movie that we watched this year was Chak De India. It was interesting and and was very empowering.  It is not often that you see a movie about women succeeding in sports. I was also able to relate with the girls in the movie. I am often put down for being a girl. People saying that I am not as important and can not do as much with my life. That was the same issue the girls in the movie were having.  And I am also put down for being a girl who plays sports. People like to say that women's sports are a joke and are not as serious as men's sports. People just like to use the excuse that you are a woman as a way to make you feel lesser. Something that I found very different in this movie to my real life is the importance of field hockey and cricket in India.
All the girls on the team have a strong dream of winning the World Cup in field hockey. They are all also constantly being told that their dream is a joke. Saying that it is a goal that will not be able to be accomplished. Most of this comes from the men in their lives. Weather it is their fathers or boyfriends they say that because they are women it is silly of them to want this dream. All of India is also discouraging them from playing because they do not want to be a joke anymore. They are told that they are women and need to become house wives and moms. They take this criticism and turn it into the motivation to prove all of them wrong. These are also things that I hear in my life. I am told that I am a women and am lesser then men. They say that women are not as smart, not as hard working, not as strong etc. But I also take this and use it to my advantage. Hearing all these things just makes me want to prove them all wrong. It gives me the same motivation that the girls in the movie have. They take it and show that if  you do not let things get to you and turn it into a positive you can succeed. Seeing their success it shows me i can also do anything I want with my life.
This whole movie is an underdog story. These women come from all over India and have to learn to play together to become great team. This is a lot like my soccer team. We mostly do not play together during the off season and we have to become cohesive. We have to overcome some of the same issues the girls in the movie had to. We learned to positions that would help the team. Personally I went from being the one scoring goals to being in charge of stopping them. We also have the issue of egos. The Indian team had many girls who wanted the spotlight and they had to share it if they wanted to win. This is a problem with every team and the ones who can overcome it are the ones who win. Watching this movie was almost a mirror image of my team. We are all so different, but are able to come together and win for our school.
Something different I saw in this movie compared to my own life is the different sports that they play. In this movie the two most important sports they play are field hockey and cricket. Unlike here in the U.S. we play ice hockey and baseball. The reason those sports are more important in India than they are here is because those sports steam from The United Kingdom, and the United Kingdom occupied India for several years. It is all based on our pasts. This shows how much our pasts influence our present.
Overall I really was able to feel connected to these girls because they have to overcome some of the same things that I do. They overcame this problems and it has made me determined to do the same.

Reaction to Little Miss Sunshine

Little Miss Sunshine was good movie. Also it is very hilarious. It was the classic dysfunctional American family. The grandpa was a drug addict that was very supportive of his granddaughters dream. The father was a failed author who was always shoving his message down his family's throats. The mother was the optimist, until everything started to go wrong. But she did come around in the end. The brother was keeping a vow of silence until he was able to enlist in the air force. When he found out he would not be able to get his dream, he focused his efforts  on helping his sister reach hers. The uncle was a depressed man who had fallen from grace. In the end they all did what they could to forget the failures they had had to help Olive reach her goals.
This movie had a lot of cultural similarities to my life. Mostly because is was based in the Untied States.  One thing that is big in the United States is the whole beauty pageant. In the United States a lot of our culture is based around looks. We are a very obsessed with the idea of the perfect beauty. When Olive actually makes it to the pageant she sticks out because she is not made up with fake hair and a ton of make-up. She is true to who she is and does not let the other girls sway her from her way. I always have respect for people that do not want to look fake and change themselves for the benefit of others(which happens a lot more nowadays).
Something that was very familiar to me in this movie was the food. They choose very common American food for this film. The first meal they had was Kentucy Fried Chicken. They had the American problem where everyone has a million things going on. It seems like sometimes a family dinner is the first thing to go to the wayside. But this is something that should be really important in family life.
I can say I have ever been in a beauty pageant or been to one. But from watching this I do not really want to be. It seemed like it was very shallow but did give these girls confidence.
Overall I really enjoyed this movie. It was super funny and basically made fun of the "typical" American family. I would recommend everyone watches this movie.

Preview to Little Miss Sunshine

Little Miss Sunshine is a movie about a family in New Mexico on a road trip to California so their daughter Olive can compete in a beauty pageant. The family that is traveling is a father who has a nine-step confidence plan, a mom who just wants the best for her children, a suicidal uncle, a heroine addicted grandpa, a son who is in the mist of a nine month long vow of silence and a daughter who just wants to win a beauty pageant. On their way to California they go through trails that the average road trip would not have. Their VW bus breaks down and they then have to push start it. Their grandpa dies and have to steal his body. Once to the pageant Olive is true to herself and even though she wins, she learns how important it is to be yourself and how important family is.

Reaction to The King's Speech

 The Kings Speech is the story of King George VI and his battle with his stutter. He was the second son of King George V. When he was required to give a radio broadcast he is unable to go through it because of his awful stutter. His wife seeks the help of Lionel Louge to help her husband. At first he is hostile towards Lionel, but as time goes on they become very good friends. When "Berttie's" brother David is put on the throne after their fathers death, the Parliament start to resigned fearing that he will not be able to handle the threat of Hitler. David ends up leaving throne so he can marry a divorced woman. The country doubts Berttie's capability of being king because of his stutter. When the decision is made to go to war with Germany he must give a radio broadcast to the nation. With the help of Lionel he gives a great speech and is able to inspire a country.

This movie is set in the late 1930s and early 1940s. This was the biggest difference I saw in this movie. The clothes they wore were styled to match that time period. Also the cars and homes all resembled the time period.
The Kings lifestyle was very different for Lionel's and ours. Where ever he went he and his wife were dressed very nicely and people stop to adore him. Also they eat dinner at a very late time. When they would go to dinner they would put their daughters to bed first. Now the average American eats dinner at six and in the movie they would eat at eight or nine. Also the most common drink they would have is tea. Which is opposite from the United States where we mostly drink coffee. The king's family was very wealthy and whenever they had a party the best food and champagne was served.
I really liked this movie. It was a nice balance between history and entertainment. It is a great story and very entertaining. I would recommend everyone watches this movie.

Reaction to the Bet Collector

The Bet collector is a movie about a Philippine woman who goes around collecting bets for an illegal game called jueteng. It is a game that the poor locals rely on to get money. Most of the movie is her going around and getting bets from all of her friends for the game. In the movie you never get to see how the actual game works. This movie ends with them at some sort of celebration where the main character gets shot in the arm.
This movie may have been set in the Philippines but the numbers they used were Spanish. The reason for this is that the Philippines used to be colonized by the Spanish. Even though that was quite some time ago they still left their mark on the country. This can show how parts of different parts of cultural can stay in a country even after an extended period of time. 
Where they were in the Philippines was poverty stricken. Some people lived in shacks made from ruble. That is something you just do not see here in the United States. We have poverty but not to this point. I have never personally seen a make-shift village. It also seems like our government helps people who are in need and there was not any for these people. 

Something that is common in this movie with most other places was the corruption in the police force. Even though they are meant to stop the illegal gambling they still participate in it. In one scene the main character is taken to the police station and while there she takes bets from the officers. You see this everywhere there is always things on the news about someone being corrupt. And there is no exception in this movie. 
This was not the best movie. There was not a strong story line, making it hard to follow. The whole time I was waiting to see how the game was played and it never was explained.

Reaction to Kitchen Stories

 Kitchen Stories is about man researcher who goes into a bachelors house to observe him in his kitchen. When he first arrives his subject stays out of his kitchen as much as he can. He then drills a hole in his ceiling so he can observe the observer. But as the movie goes on they start to accept each other and become friends. But because of their friendship the observer faces the choice of either leaving the home he is in or quitting his job thus keeping his friendship. He chooses to stay and then starts to live his his former subject. The movie ends with the subject dying.
A cultural difference I have seen in almost every movie we have watched this year is the difference in the food they eat. In this movie their food was usually colorless and Nordic based. A treat to them was pickled herring. Potatoes and eggs seemed to be staples in what they chose to eat. Here in the United States you don't really see people eating things like herring and Lutifistk. Unless they have a stronger connection with their Nordic roots.

The landscape in this movie was very similar to the landscape in Minnesota, which would explain why so many swedes and Norwegians immigrated here. The Swedish and Norwegian culture is still very strong here. Unfortunately this movie did not show many aspects of that cultural. Since most of this movie took place in the kitchen. One thing that i did see was that the most common job was farming. When swedes and Norwegians came to Minnesota they came to farm because it was what they knew how to do. That is apparent in this movie.
Overall I enjoyed this movie. It was slow at times, but it showed that no matter how different people are they can still become fiends. Also it showed that its not human nature to sit and observer but to interact and become inquisitive.