Pulp Fiction

Pulp Fiction is a thriller/indie genre film directed by the great Quentin Tarantino. Hearing the right off the bat one should realize that they’re in for an emotional and intellectual rollercoaster. Being known for his bizarre filming methods and extremely elaborate plot twists, I believe Tarantino out did himself with this move. Pulp Fiction can be described in many different ways, but in the easiest terms I can put it in, it is the intertwining stories of six different people all tied together by some bizarre event. The movie follows mobsters, small time criminals, an athlete, and an extremely allusive and infamous mob boss, Marsellus Wallace. The overall idea is the Marsellus is an extremely powerful man and no one disrespects him or the things he worked so hard for. To keep this man’s position clearly higher than everyone else’s, Tarantino doesn’t show his face till well into the movie, although you hear his name said numerous times before you meet the infamous man. That however, is not totally what separates this movie from many others like it. This movie is very different than many others for one key reason, the scenes are not in the right order. The movie jumps through sequences of time that aren't actually how the events occurred in real life. In one, very famous scene, you see Vincent (Travolta) get shot while coming out of the bathroom, a few scenes later they show why exactly he was there at that exact time. The movie shows the outcome, before the buildup. To anyone that’s seen a Tarantino film, you know the importance of paying attention to the story line, because if you miss one small detail you could be confused for the duration of the movie. This movie is certainly not an exception.  I believe that if the movie had unfolded in a more "traditional" way the entire feel of the movie would be completely different (not to mention that it wouldn’t be a Tarantino film if it was too predictable). A lot of the amazing aspects of the film came from the mild confusion of the story line, while capturing the real feelings of the actors. It's a movie you have to pay attention to, but draws you in so easily that you forget you're watching a movie. I believe the "non-traditional" way Pulp Fiction plays out is really what makes it one of the best movies made. I personally would rate this movie an A for so many reasons. Beside from this always being my favorite movie, the action mixed with confusion with the always present hilarity makes a beautiful string of events. The cast in the movie is seriously incredible, John Travolta, Uma Thurman, Samuel Jackson, and Bruce Willis, for starts is quite the cast of amazing actors. They all have such a diverse palate of acting that the dynamic of the movie came out indescribable. The plot of the movie in every way draws the viewer in to find out what happens to all of these people and why all of there are stories relevant to the final scenes. The unraveling of the plot throughout the movie doesn’t give away too much, while foreshadowing (subtly) the events waiting to come. Are all of these factors really important? Yes. Tarantino tries to show all of his viewers that even when you think sometime is trivial, it could play a bigger role to your plot than you could have ever imagined.  

Agloe, The Fake Town

For my blog post I read one of the many articles listed in Wikipedia as "unusual." I had a hard time choosing just one article to read because I thought the majority of them sounded fairly entertaining. After browsing the long list of strange and unusual topics I finally picked one about a town in New York called Agloe.

The article goes into a brief history of the town and how it was actually designed as a copyright trap. For those of you who don’t know, a copyright is a specific case where the motivation for the entry is to detect plagiarism or copyright infringement. In laments terms, a copyright trap is just a made up place that the government makes up on a map, but in reality it’s not actually a real place.

In the early 1930’s there was a General Drafting Company founded by Otto G. Lindberg and his assistant, Ernest Alpers who assigned an anagram of their initials onto a dirt road intersection in the Catskill Mountains, which happened to be “Agloe.” Twenty years after the two men wrote their initials onto that intersection a general store was built there, and was named Agloe General Store because of the name on the map. After a few years of the store having a decent business, the name “Agloe” appeared on a newer map by Randy McNally. The old map company then threatened to sue McNally for assumed copyright infringement which the “trap town” had revealed, but due to the general store being named Agloe it was now a real place and the infringement could not be established. The general store eventually went out of business but Agloe appeared on maps as recent as the late 1990s but it has since been deleted. It alsp appeared on Google Maps until as recently as 2014. Since then the United States Geological Survey added Agloe to the Geographic Names Information System to inform others of the mysterious town that is Agloe.

I found this article very interesting because I have actually heard of it before through John Green’s book Paper Towns. Although the book doesn’t go into much detail about the town, it brushes up on it not actually being a real place. I liked reading this article and learning more background as to how mix ups like this can possibly happen, as well as how people fix these kinds of issues. I feel as if this information is very useful because it prevents problems like this ever happening again somewhere else in the years to come. I believe Agloe earned its own Wikipedia page for that exact reason, to inform people who may have never heard of it of the situation, and because it is such an interesting topic. I myself have never heard of anything else like this happening before and I’m sure I’m not the only one, which is why it was so interesting for me to read. Other people just like myself may have heard of it before but don’t really know much about it and want to know more, which is why I think it’s good it be publicly published like it has. I don’t think Wikipedia is the best outlet for the article to be published on though. I myself am not personally a fan of Wikipedia because I have heard so often before how easy it is for others to go in and edit or add things to any page they want. With an article like this especially, the facts are the most important. Posting the article on a different sight that doesn’t have this type of issue could help the article’s credibility to other readers. I would recommend it being in a historical magazine or something more along those lines or maybe expanding more on Algoe and having its own book for others to learn about. Until this happens though I think it is very useful for this information to be on Wikipedia.

the Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Hello fellow bloggers! Today I'm going to be posting about one of the episodes of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart that I have watched. The episode I chose to watch was the special edition episode called "A Look Back at Racism" which was aired on August 26, 2014.

 In the episode Stewart recaps racial incidences that have happened around the time of airing. Events such as the Ferguson shooting and the protests to follow it are a big topic of discussion. Although I am not very familiar with the Ferguson case Stewart explains the incident for a short amount of time at the beginning of the episode, and then goes on to state the opinion he is reporting to the world, which is basically making fun of everyone who talks about the case of Ferguson and tells them they have no idea what they’re talking about.

I really liked watching this episode and believe what Stewart is saying is so relevant to the topic he has chosen. Most people who report on the Ferguson incident only choose to report on it through the eyes of the police man and those who supported the police man’s actions, portraying him as a hero and talking about how they don’t understand why the black community is so angry about the policeman’s actions. Stewart takes this information and just completely makes fun of it, which I think is both hilarious and informative. He emphasizes the information given to the public and explains, in a sarcastic matter, why their opinions sound so ridiculous.

When the episode first starts he explains the general information of the case, like I’ve said before, and then shows a few clips of politicians and random people from the public of how they feel on the issue. One of the many video clips is of political commentator Bill O’Reilly telling the public that he came home from vacation and was furious about the way the case was being reported. Stewart takes this clip and makes fun of it, saying, “That is outrage. The shooting of Michael Brown, and any lack of transparency from the police department responsible for said incident is outrageous…. In how it has been reported. And I guess that’s not the only reason to be angry.” I think this comment hit me the hardest because he is so right. Many people who choose to discuss the Ferguson case only talk about what had happened instead of what actions the police officer could have done otherwise that could have saved an eighteen year old’s life. He then makes a side comments saying, “Why all the interest in holding police officers to a higher standard than gangs?” With a very sarcastic tone.

Stewart then goes on to talk about the ways African American people always end up with the “short end of the stick” in many social situations, even today. I think that is why I like this episode so much, because of how brutally honest Stewart is about there still being racial situations happening in our country even today. He supports this with extremely sarcastic comments like “you can’t get a fucking cab even though you’re a neurosurgeon, cause you’re black.” I think the way he portrays the truth about racism today is the only way to talk about it and show to the public how insane it is that these things are still an issue today.

Reflection on Professor's Blog

I don't really know how to react to this blog. I had trouble understanding the post a little bit. I'm not sure if you lean towards agreeing with the media or disagreeing with the media? The way I read it I took it as you disagreeing with the media, hopefully that is correct. I would think about rewording it a little differently so it is a little easier for others to understand.
 I agree with Heraclitus that things are constantly changing. As far as the media goes, I think the forms of media change but society will still always be surrounded by forms of the media. Yes, the world is constantly changing and we need to learn to adapt to the many different ways people communicate, I think many people today are too swarmed by these things and don't pay attention to life outside of their screens. We should all, including myself, take the time to try to put our phones away, close our laptops, and enjoy the world around us.

Introduction

Hi everyone! I haven't used this blog in quite some time but since we have to do this assignment I'm just going to use it like before.

I'm an English major with a focus on Professional Writing and a minor in Public Relations. I'm only a sophomore but after graduating I plan on getting my Master's degree and working for a publishing house, hopefully somewhere in Philadelphia. I hope one day I can make a difference in the world.