Star Wars is about Vietnam

Michael Ondaatje: Was Apocalypse Now a project the two [Francis Ford Coppola and John Milius] of them thought up?

Walter Murch [editor of Apocalypse Now]: No. Originally George Lucas was going to direct, so it was a project that George and John developed for Zoetrope. That was back in 1969.... After the success of American Graffiti in 1973, George wanted to revive it, but it was still too hot a topic, the war was still on, and nobody wanted to finance something like that. So George considered his options: What did he really want to say in Apocalypse Now? The message boiled down to the ability of a small group of people to defeat a gigantic power simply by the force of their convictions. And he decided, All right, if it's policitically too hot as a contemporary subject, I'll put the essence of the story in outer space and make it happen in a galaxy long ago and far away. The rebel group were the North Vietnamese, and the Empire was the United States. And if you have the force, no matter how small you are, you can defeat the overwhelmingly big power. Star Wars is George's transubstantiated version of Apocalypse Now.

-- Page 70, The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film, M. Ondaatje.

Google "Star Wars and Vietnam." The first two hits are these:

1. "Star Wars and the American Empire"
2. CNN article, "Lucas on Iraq war, 'Star Wars' ''
   

Read. And think for yourself.

Iraq. Somalia. Vietnam.

Shouldn't Luke had been played by a North Vietnamese actor?

Photo by: David et Magalie

The Nature of Blogs

Filed under: Random Thoughts.

Like I discover a wicked good book by a new author. Then I search for other books written by that person. I read everything they've written. Til they disapoint me. Or til I've gotten everything I can out of them. Same when I discover a cool new band.

It's like that when I chance upon a new blog. It starts with an above average post. I browse around. At that point, either I'm still intrigued or I am not.

If I am, then I am hooked. I head to the Archives and dig around. I read every post to get caught up. Very much like discovering a late episode of Northern Exposure or Sports Night. You go back to the beginning and watch all you can.

With blogs it's much easier to do that. I tried going to the beginning and reading sequentially, but these days I just read the current posts and go backwards.

I prefer that. The going with the flow of the nature of blogs. Which is, going backwards if you wish to know more.

Like that movie Memento. Like Life. Like meeting a new person. Like a reading a journal or a novel, but from the back. I am pointing out the obvious but someone's gotta do it.

A Brief History of this Blog in 14 Links

"The medium is the message." -- Marshall McLuhan.

If content is king, links must be the queens. Can one tell a tale with just links? I can sure try.

1. Steve Pavlina: Personal growth, personal development. Start a blog, quit your job, make big money. One out of three's not bad. He never said it was going to be easy. I just assumed it would be.

2. Google Adsense: Ads, ads, ads. Easy money. Yeah, right. More like, Adcents.

3. Technorati. What's my ranking? What's my ranking? Started at million something. Got it down to 300,000. It's actually all about the links. It took me awhile to figure that out. Rankings smankings. It doesn't mean anything.

4. Problogger. Helpling you blog for money. Tips. Advice.

Bottom line: It's all about the traffic. To that end...

5. Carnivals. Come join a carnival. Increase exposure, traffic.

6. & 7. Got ping? Ping-o-matic. Pingoat.

7. Site meter. Tracking traffic/visitors.

Be social. 8. Del.icio.us. 9. Reddit. 10. Digg.

11. Ezine articles. Be an expert. Get links. Get traffic. Worked to a certain degree.

12. daddy made it. My spin-off blog. Focus. Taget a niche. Daddy hasn't posted in awhile.

13. Blogsvertise. Blog for dollars. Get paid for posts. Full disclosure. Paid to blog/write but still made me slightly uncomfortable. I turned down one, did one and quit.

14. Hotel Rooom Nudes. Once I got pass the beautiful woman. The arty, professional photos. The honest, passionate and poetic writing. I was left with a very cleanly-designed, simple blog. Inspired, I wanted less clothes and no ads on my blog, too. One of two is not too bad.

Photo by: Danny S (flickr user: Dah Knee)