WATER AND WEEPING
Friday, November 10, 2006
On the way to the UN conference center today, there was a short protest by members of the youth summit who were holding placards asking delegates to think of their children. It's just about the right time to remind the conference of their obligations. Snags have come up, dirty negotiating tricks have begun, and country representatives have started to retreat to the usual cynical positions defined by sickening self-interest.I also came across an interesting article in the Khaleej Times of Dubai, which reminded me of the post from CoolMyPlanet blogger Samir, who weighed in from Bangalore about the elements and Indian film and how for some time rain has been shaping images and narratives projected in countless theaters in India.
Rain has a lot to do in Indian cinema, Samir tells us. Rain hides tears, "it is the thin screen that hides love scenes, it accentuates the curves of the curvaceous heroine and generates steam around the panting hero." How true. Similar scenes have also been used in Philippine cinema using rain as a frame. I think this is because the very character of rain inserts its own narrative in any story.
In India, adds Samir, "rain is beyond science, our very social fabric revolves around rains. During periods of low rainfall farmers have had weddings for frogs, have married donkeys - all to please the rain gods." This is an interesting notion, applying human ceremonies on animals in order to plead for favorable weather patterns, the word 'favorable' having come to mean more and more the word 'predictable'. And more and more, climate chaos appears to be the offspring of human kind's marriage with greed and fossil fuels.
I wonder what Samir will say about the Khaleej Times article on rising sea levels devouring islands in the Sundarbans, which is supposed to be the world's largest estuarine Delta. What are the Sundarbans like? Rising seas certainly have a lot of implications on Philippine cinema, which has for so long used large parts of the tens of thousands of the country's discontinuous coastline as settings for countless movies.I wonder what the effect will be if the world indeed does not wise up and we get more extreme torrential rains and rapidly diminishing coastlines?
Would it mean that tears will have more hiding places?
Would there be more or less love scenes in movies?
Would more curves be displayed?And what will happen to the steaming, panting hero?
One thing for sure, there will be more weeping. On the left, by the way, is Greenpeace volunteer, top model and actress Angel Aquino in the Filipino movie Crying Ladies...
What do you think? Tell us your thoughts. We want to know...
posted by Redster @ 6:10 PM,
4 Comments:
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At 11:25 PM,
The No Show said...
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haha natawa ako dun sa Crying Ladies. our very own Angel Aquino! Anyway, no to torrential rains. They ruin getaways. Argh. And if we get more of that, we get less of movies shot outdoors. Too much of a hassle trying to shield gadgets from getting soaked.
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At 10:24 AM,
Anna Maria M. Gonzales said...
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Umaaraw, umuulan, kinakasal ang tikbalang.
Umuulan, umaaraw, kinakasal ang bakulaw.
Hey, I love rain. The gentle kind, of course. I appreciate typhoons, too. They're nature's way of cleaning up. We humans just get in the way. :-) -
At 7:05 PM,
Redster said...
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i also like rain! the non-gentle kind and also typhoons actually, maybe not really about the clean up bit but marveling at the gale force winds and everything floating by whenever there's some flood or something.
lumilipad isip ko pag umuulan. -
At 10:20 PM,
Gaia21st said...
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Ulan, one of my favorites.....Kuya Red(!!), I knew we had something in common....I too love rain in all its forms, regardless of intensity. Strong rains, and yes, even typhoons, often remind me of how much more force nature has over us mere mortals :)-- rushing rivers or calm streams, raging waterfalls or a drop of dew from a leaf, the effects are the same--mesmerize and inspire me.
