Reaper-Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh’s Reaper is a painting that, through very little realistic representation and a lack of action, evokes little emotion. The painting depicts a man tending to his field of wheat with a house in the background. The subject is simple to an extreme. Although the majority of the painting is made up of the natural environment it doesn’t seem to be glorified to any extent. The farmer too, doesn’t seem to be a man of any importance and is painted as such, in a very simple fashion with outline and limited detail. It is through this non-glorification that the viewer is left almost unable to care or feel anything toward this man or environment.

Also adding to this apathy is the unrealistic color and lighting. With a sky of green and mountains of blue it may be hard for viewers to place themselves in that environment. The absence of shadows, as well any sort of personal or specific features, leaves the painting dispassionate. While the composition is good, leading the viewer’s eye right to the farmer, it leaves your eyes wandering across the rest of the painting in a sort of lethargic indifference. Although the colors are bright, the indefinite style and shapes leave the scene looking almost childish making the painting feel ephemeral and therefore meaningless.

The Calling of Saint Matthew-Caravaggio

With The Calling of Saint Matthew, Caravaggio uses extreme realism to portray an event that in many ways is very surreal. Through realism to an extensive degree the painting becomes more believable and therefore has a deeper affect on the viewer. Caravaggio’s use of light is what propels this from a beautiful painting to a masterpiece. The light appears incredibly realistic and natural with a single source not shown directly upon the subjects but appearing from an unseen side window. The shadows it leaves on the wall add to the overall composition of the painting by breaking it up into parts while also directing your eye toward Saint Matthew. What is even more stunning is that the light not only adds to the painting in a visual sense but also represents the godly act of the calling of Saint Matthew. It is amazing that Caravaggio can represent something that seems so distant and incredible with the use of light that we see throughout the day that seems very commonplace and natural.

The piece is natural in almost every way. Even the facial expressions are not overdone or glorified. The subjects look as though they are in wonder to a believable extent. However, having three separate subjects pointing at Saint Matthew may be slightly overdone. With even one subject pointing, most viewers, especially those who know the story of Saint Matthew, would understand which subject is him. Despite the painting’s obviousness it still remains a powerful image of a sacred event.

Black Dogs by Jason Burhmester

According to rock and roll legend, in 1973, Led Zeppelin was in New York for a set of shows at Madison Square Garden. Before the final show 203,000 dollars went missing from their safe deposit box at the Drake hotel. The thieves were never found. However, in Black Dogs by Jason Buhrmester, we are offered a possible explanation on how the heist may have gone down.

The novel centers around a group of young men from Baltimore. They are a group of street rats and petty thieves stealing car stereos and running scams to get by. We are given a picture of a group of confused teenagers who have recently become adults. We see them working together, partying together, and getting into a lot of messing situations together. Throughout the novel the characters and their broken homes become easy to sympathize with after a string of seemingly endless bad luck leading up to their master plan to steal some cash from Led Zeppelin.

Everything that can go wrong does and every effort to right those wrongs leads to more trouble. These are some hard luck fellas, which, in the end makes them very likable characters. The dynamic of their friendship is interesting and relatable. It’s hard not to like a group of high school buddies trying to accomplish something together, and that is definitely how the book feels. The main protagonists are, in general very average and may be very much like a number of people you know.

One of the great things about this novel, as it relates to music, is how accurately Patrick, the main character’s fandom of music is portrayed. He has a love for Black Sabbath and talks about it often. This also leads to his dislike for Led Zeppelin. The accurate portrayal of music fans and their attitudes toward music they like and dislike is primarily what drives this novel. All characters involved seemed to have attitudes that relate to the music they enjoy.

Another driving force throughout that novel is humor and irony. Antagonist Backwoods Billy runs a violent biker gang, The Holy Ghosts, filled with born-again Christians. He scolds them for using the lord’s name in vain and then orders them to beat the shit out of people. It’s characters like this that keep the story interesting and moves it along.

One of the strongest attributes of the story is how quickly it moves along. Thanks to realism in relation to both the characters and their environment the novel keeps the reader interested with humorous as well as unfortunate anecdotes. It leaves you very able to picture with detail every situation these young guys get themselves into, and throughout most of it, it leaves you glad you’re not one of these guys.

The Crazies

What Jaws did for beaches is the same thing The Crazies would do farms, if farms were places people actually wanted to hang out to begin with. Nonetheless, Breck Eisners remake of George A. Romero’s 1973 film The Crazies makes a barnyard at night an even less appealing place to hang out.

The film takes place in Ogden Marsh, Iowa, a town of about twelve hundred people. A mysterious airplane has crashed in a nearby river and contaminated the town’s water supply. The water seems to be making people go crazy and it’s up to town Sheriff David Dutton (Timothy Olyphant) to try to save the town like a captain standing at the helm of a sinking ship. Dutton’s wife Judy (Radha Mitchell) and his Deputy Russell Clank (Joe Anderson) are his constant companions throughout the film. The three of them fight for survival as entire town turns violent and the government steps and attempts to sort things out with an equal amount of violence and force.

The film, in many ways, is a good remake. It has certainly maintained an old school and retro feel by using exaggerated lighting and limiting the amount of gore. Although gore is present in a couple of situations the violence is often implied and the scene ends before the viewer is exposed to all the blood and guts. Despite this true-to-it-roots style made the film more enjoyable the predictably that goes along with it may have detracted from some of the suspense.

Along with the predictably other factors played a role in ruining a number of scenes in the film. The majority of the acting, while not awful, left something to be desired. This was especially true in the more serious situations when the lackluster dialogue left lines feeling forced and insincere. This was almost always the case when Sheriff Dutton and his wife were onscreen alone.

Although this may have detracted from some parts of the film, it is, after all, still a horror film and the best scenes didn’t any include anyone talking, but rather screaming. A certain scene has the potential to be iconic. The government had set up a quarantine room for those they assumed to be “crazies.” Within the room a number of characters, including Dutton’s wife, are left strapped to beds after the government evacuated the area. As they lay in the darkened room another “crazy” walks down the hallway toward them dragging behind him a bloody pitchfork, which was apparently very sharp. The scene effectively captures a feeling of helplessness and utter fear.

What keeps the film interesting despite some setbacks is the cinematography and the highly accurate portrayal of a small town. A number of opening shots and a few subsequent shots would not look out of place in No Country for Old Men. They feature vast open fields and massive expanses of blue skies that look beautiful and cinematically sit nicely in contrast to the actual events of the film. While The Crazies isn’t a great film it’s a film that you’ll probably think about late at night at your grandpa's farm,and it might freak you out a little bit.