Just thought I'd post up some of my essays.
‘Look Both Ways’ shows that communication is central to successful relationships.’ Discuss this statement.
'Look Both Ways’ is a romantic drama film that celebrates the triumph of the human spirit in the face of tragedy and disaster. In this film director Sarah Watt explores the lives of many characters all linked by the same tragedy: a train accident with a single fatality. Despite all being impacted by the accident, the characters do not ‘connect’. Fraught with personal frustrations and grief, they withdraw into themselves and fall into a debilitating reticence which becomes detrimental to their relationships until they open up to each other. This film also demonstrates that, without honest communication, relationships can only flourish on a superficial level. It is only after the characters properly communicate to each other and come to terms with themselves that they are able to form any relationship of lasting value.
Nick is a character who, through the confronting scenes he witnesses in his job, detaches himself from human suffering by viewing the world through camera lens. His casual statement, “Poverty, war, natural disasters, then back to the mini-bar” reflects his emotional distance from the horrific scenes and his attempt to dismiss them. This barrier between human tragedy and his emotions causes him to be at lost as to how to communicate his own grief and devastation to his peers when he was diagnosed with cancer. In a culture where cancer is synonymous with death, Nick is paralysed by the fear of death and unable to convey the news to Meryl or Joan. His inability to communicate his sickness is also embodied in his inability to accept his father’s death. It is only when he verbalised his frustration and guilt to Joan, “we should’ve helped him...I didn’t do anything...” And learns of her stance, “it doesn’t matter how life ends, it matters how it was” that he is able to come to terms with his sickness and tell Meryl he ‘isn’t in a position to start anything’. Although this honesty originally brings a fusillade of outrage from Meryl, ultimately this was the point when they could properly accept each other and start a committed relationship.
After attending her father’s funeral and contemplating on death, Meryl’s thoughts became subconsciously bound to paranoid imaginings of death befalling her at every corner. Her thoughts of death are shown in animations ranging from being crushed by derailed trains to eaten by sharks. Although some of these fears appear ludicrous, they take such a strong stranglehold on her mind that they prevent her from expressing herself properly, “it just kept coming like...like a freight train!” and place psychological restraints on her relations. Her thoughts on death also led her to a distorted, fatalistic mindset, trying to answer the random events in life with a trite, ‘maybe it was meant to be.’ As long as she held to reticence, her relationship with Nick was edgy and stiff with a tinge of uncomfortable formality. This was further exemplified by the hot weather in the weekend. However, Nick’s openness changed their relationship. Meryl pours out all that was bottled inside her: her fears, her loneliness, and most of all, a ‘hostage politeness gene’ which prevented her from being honest to everyone. This fiery intercourse between the two not only released Meryl from all previous psychological restraints but also enabled her to realise that happiness depended not on external forces but on the inner strength of a person; liberating her from her fatalistic mentality. As a result of their confrontation, Meryl was ready to accept Nick as her life partner.
Andy’s deep-seated belief that everyone had an agenda caused his relationships to be strained with hostility and tinctured with animosity. His egocentric and nihilistic personality was also a communication impediment with others and especially with Anna. His calloused question, “Did you do this on purpose?” and Anna’s stuttered reply, “I didn’t...I don’t want a baby” reveals the broken channel of communication between them. Andy’s inability to accept responsibility and commitment also play a part in his acrimonious dealings with Cathy as well as his frustration with Anna’s pregnancy. However, when Anna and Andy finally open up to each other, Andy walks out of his self-centred views and learns that ‘things just happen’ as opposed to ‘everyone has an agenda’ and are out to frustrate him. Their communication enables Andy to seek reconciliation with Anna and to accept life with an optimistic attitude; taking up responsibility as a committed parent.
The various relationships in “Look Both Ways” start off withheld and restrained by the characters’ personal fears and preoccupation with death. It is only after the characters overcome their barriers and communicate honestly with each other that they are able to truly begin a lasting relationship. Only after Nick has communicated to Meryl of his sickness is he able to embrace a romantic relationship. Meryl overcame her fears and fatalistic mindset because of her confrontation with Nick and emerged as a determined woman ready to commit. Likewise Andy’s decision to change his pessimistic mentality and commit to Anna came as a result of their open, honest communication. In each of the cases, “Look Both Ways” demonstrates that communication is the key to the beginning of successful relationships.
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Prompt: "Where we live strongly influences how we make sense of the world."
The physical landscape has exerted a perennial influence upon humanity and defined not only an individual’s view of the world but also the culture, values and tradition of civilisations. The physical world combines with our imaginations to form our views and values of events that surround us and define who we are. Culture and identity are formed when a society’s perception of, and struggles against, the external environment become intermingled with their internal landscapes, and thus is born all philosophy, literature, art and to some extent – religion. Malouf also attempts to convey the idea that an individual’s view of the world is formed in one’s natural landscape, and the inversion of what was perceived as normal may also change our perception of the world. In Fly Away Peter, this theme of change is explored in the Northern and Southern hemispheres through all three characters and especially brought into close scrutiny through the war.
Our native landscape forms part of our values in life and the inversion of what was ordinary and normal to us serves to highlight the views we had adopted through that landscape. The arrival of a Dunlin in the Sanctuary accentuates this point; Jim is held spellbound by the Dunlin while Imogen dismisses it as ‘the most ordinary thing in the world’. How the ‘little common visitor’ of Imogen’s childhood could be so precious and exotic to Jim left her bemused: ‘She had come so far to where everything was reversed that even that didn’t surprise her.’ When the normal routines of life are disrupted by an incontrollable occurrence such as the war, people still seek to cling to what used to be taken for granted. The people of Armentieres fought to retain a ‘measure of normality’ despite already being bombarded many times. In the midst of a blasted forest, Jim observes an old man’s bizarre act of planting seeds. His ‘refusal to accept the limiting nature of conditions’ is uplifting for Jim as much as the war is injurious to his frame of mind. Though the landscape may be changed and normality in life may be taken away, there is still continuity in the midst of the change that enables people to hope and be sustained through it.
Malouf is also interested in exploring the concept of how individuals cope with changing landscapes. A person’s landscape is often the foundation of his view of life and the destruction of it can lead to uncomfortable, and sometimes even detrimental, psychological developments. Jim carried a strong sense of purpose in the Sanctuary and he appreciated the uniqueness of every bird. However, after joining the war effort and witnessing death and destruction on a daily basis, Jim stands in the ‘utterly blasted’ landscape and scorns the futility of uniqueness: ‘what can stand against [the war]? A keen eye for the difference…between two species of wren…?’ In the Sanctuary Jim had sought to ‘give [a] creature, through its name, a permanent place in the world’ but the destructive nature of the war made Jim realise that ‘nothing counted’ if all the things he had tried to give a place in the world were to be smashed, destroyed, and replaced by something else. Thus by waking up to the ephemeral nature of life and landscapes, he also realises that the only permanency given to the world is in one’s memory. The destruction of nature not only damaged Jim’s psyche but also enabled him to view the world from another perspective.
In a person’s journey of growth and maturation, the landscape often plays a role in defining one’s life and answering one’s questions. Our experiences and imagination, as well as our interaction with the physical landscape, form part of our philosophy of life. The external landscape helps to build the internal landscapes – intertwined with our latent imagination, the landscape evokes from us certain sentiments that help us to come to terms with the seemingly arbitrary nature of fate. It is when watching the waves that Imogen contemplates on the meaning of life, and recognises that ‘a life wasn’t for anything. It simply was.’ The waves, with their white peaks and rhythm, stood ‘poised a moment holding the sun at their crests, then toppled.’ The waves are a metaphor for life, symbolising that however brief, transient and wasted a life may seem, ultimately it was a unique presence that could not be substituted. This is also exemplified in our annual remembrance of the ANZACs, who fought in the First and Second World Wars and many other peace-keeping missions. Our tradition of retrospect and homage to those soldiers forge our identity as Australians under a free flag. This legacy is passed down by those unwilling to allow the ANZACs to become a vague, tenuous and forgotten page of history, and consequently these events, when called to remembrance, remind us once more of who we are, and how we became this.
As the physical landscape around the world varies, so does the culture it produces. Our upbringing and connection with the physical environment stimulates our imagination to produce works of art or other monuments that would identify us from other groups of people. The geographic barriers that divide the earth also ensure diversity and hence produce variegated cultures each distinct from one another. Although each culture is unique, one common factor between civilisations is that they are all based, directly or indirectly, upon inspiration and observation of the physical landscape; incorporated with human imagination. The Australian Aboriginal culture is closely linked with Dreaming, which explains the formation of the world and how the Australian landscape came to be. In ancient times many civilisations such as China, Greece, Germania and Egypt also invented gods to ensure their security and prosperity against their harsh or capricious landscapes. The physical landscape not only nurtures our bodily needs but also passes down to us a heritage of our ancestor’s struggles for and against the environment while we continue to define our own struggles, and in the process, construct and redevelop our culture.
Humanity’s imaginative ability is an integral part of our existence and differentiates us from other forms of life. The landscape exerts upon us a certain influence that is unique and peculiar from any other thing and the destruction of our native landscape means too, the devastation of our psychological landscapes. Malouf shows that in the face of disruption, we retain a part of ourselves that had been formed in our landscape; a component which may later become our hope and strength. Many of our experiences and interaction with the physical landscape join together in our imaginations and help us to find answers to life’s questions as they had helped Imogen come to terms with Jim’s death. Not only does the landscape define who we are on a personal level, it also defines our culture and ultimately, our society’s views and values. In effect, it defines our very humanity. All these underline the importance of the imaginative landscape in every individual and community.
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