ShadowDragon1
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Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 10:05 AM
It isn't "hippie crap", It's rude and uncalled for to say that.
Buddhists don't "pray" per se, they have meditation rituals, acts of contemplation. They aren't really praying to any kind of god.
Many active and productive people are Buddhists. An aspect of altruistic compassion is found among many Zen Buddhists. It's in-part focused on "the self", but is not
"self centered" in a negative way.
Please refrain from calling it "hippie crap". I see nothing wrong in Jeff Bridges incoporating some of his Buddhist spiritual philosophy into the character of Kevin Flynn. It's not really about selfishness, but about making the character more like a real person instead of a flat 1-dimensional character.
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"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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ShadowDragon1
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Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 10:49 AM
Jeff Bridges incorporating aspects of Buddhist spiritual philosophy was *not* "selfish", and they are not "deluded". That is kind of an intolerant thing to say.
He and Joe worked that out together, and it was to expand a bit upon the character.
Now, selfishness or self-centeredness is about glorifiying oneself, which is NOT what Bridges was trying to do. Self-centeredness is also about material, financial and personal gain over others and disregarding them.
Buddism's focus on "the Self" but is not for materialistic personal gain and neither is it about glorifying oneself. It's about the individual living a life and seeking to let go of the "wants" or desires that result in a person's suffering.
Jeff Bridges was not trying to glorify himself nor was he seeing gain disregarding others either IMO.
FYI There are many people that are *not* "stoners" that are Buddhist. Many Japanese, Tai, Chinese, Korean, and others are Buddhists.
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"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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ShadowDragon1
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Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 11:25 AM
Abraxas Wrote:Hence the reason why I said American Buddists. The Buddists claims are righteous in certain aspects, but again, they rely on the self. Which is selfish. In a spiritual way, not material.
Besides, the point is they should have kept it out of the flic. Its use made no sense in the film and it is an action film not a religious biography. You never addressed my other statements. Would you feel the same if Bridges was praying to God rather than himself? |
Alot of American Buddhists are asians, and even a handful of non-Asians are Buddhist. Many of them are NOT stoners.
I'm white, practice Tai Chi and meditation techniques, and have a strong affinity for Zen Buddhism, and I don't sit around smoking weed hours upon hours doing nothing. I've never even tried Weed, and many American Buddhists I know of don't either.
Some Zen Buddhist ideas and themes were incorporated into the film and made sense in the context of the story and the character and what the story wanted to convey. Tron Legacy is a action adventure fairytale with a mild spiritual element, it's not a straight out action movie. That would be something like "The Expendables".
I wouldn't care of Bridges or his character Flynn was shown praying to God. Just like it didn't bother me when Denzel incoperated his Christianity into his character in "Book of Eli". If it's part of the story, it doesn't bother me and long as it isn't overly preachy, or saying things like "you MUST believe what I beleive or you an evil person that is in league with Satan!"
Nothing FLYNN said nor Bridges himself (in any interviews) said was overly preachy in my view. Flynn didn't speak diatribes about the Four Noble Truths, or ricite every Koan, nor did he start chanting "Nam-myoho-renge-kyo" at any point. Flynn's zen references were somewhat vague and pretty damn minimal in my view.
"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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ShadowDragon1
User
Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 11:45 AM
| Abraxas Wrote:Ummm....Denzel did not incorporate Christianity into the Book of Eli. The film revolved around it. That is close to saying Passion of the Christ was trying to push Christian views. People knew that getting into it. Denzel played the part that was wriiten for him. Jeff Bridges arrogantly demanded that if he were part of Legacy that he would have some say in his character. Thus the incorporated Buddist stuff. Bad example for you, but helped proved my point even more. And your reasoning about how it fit into the film is false. If anything the film had more of a Christian tone than Buddist. At least until Bridges brought the Buddist stuff to the table. |
Denzel is Christian, and it's reasonable to assume he incoporated aspects of his ideas and beliefs into his character in the Book of Eli.
Jeff Bridges also played the part written for him. It was the writers, Joe, and Jeff that agreed to incorporate *some* aspects of Zen Buddhism into the storyline and into the character of Kevin Flynn.
It wasn't something Jeff Bridges "demanded". I see no evidence of that. From what I gather from many interviews and those that have met Jeff, he LOVED being in TRON and *wanted* to be in the sequel as long as the script was *in his view* very good and was interesting to him. His creative involvement in the script and the characterization of Kevin Flynn was a mutual thing, not a selfish thing.
Please show me some evidence that Jeff Bridges "arrogantly demanded" that he wanted some say into his character just for him to be in Tron Legacy? Where is this idea coming from? Your claim is very dubious. It's pretty much your own speculation with no evidence to back that up.
There are many elements and aspects to the film. Many are classic mythological elements. Some of those seemingly "Christian tones" can be found in pre-christian mythology and lore; some being from Greek lore and Sumerian mythology. Such mythological archetypes and story telling structure is extensively covered by Joseph Campbell's writtings.
Just because the writers or Jeff Bridges incoporated aspects of something you or a few others don't like, doesn't mean they were being "selfish". It's not their job to cater to, or give regard to the *few people* that may not like or are intolerant of a few minor, vague references to ideas from Zen Buddhism, or any other thing some people don't like.
Their job is to tell an interesting and entertaining story. In that endeavor, to me, they did a pretty good job. Again, the movie is a fairytale adventure in the vein of a mythological tale, not a pure action movie.
"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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ShadowDragon1
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Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 1:33 PM
[ Abraxas Wrote:Again, I reiterate, Book of Eli was a christian based movie considering the bible was a key element in the flick. Tron has nothing to do with religion. And simply put, there should have been no direct Buddist crap in the movie. There were no vague references. Almost everything that came out of his mouth was in reference to that stuff.
LOL, it is an action flic. Nothing more. There is no mythology to it. Say what you will to justify as it is falling on deaf ears. The references are obvious and you are the only one on here so far that I have seen that has this attitude about it. So, I must safely assume you are Buddist. I really hope you change your way of thinking, because in the end, you will not be able to help yourself when it comes to answering for your life. |
It's not "buddhist crap" and that is really intolerant and uncalled for to say that. I'm not a Buddist but have studied it in the past pretty extensively.
The movie is not a straight action film, it's a fairytale action-adventure movie.
I wasn't saying the movie central theme was about any religion.
Just that several peices of Flynn's dialogue are minor references to Zen Buddhism and fairly vague. He wasn't directly quoting Buddhist Koans or any of the Four Noble Truths.
The movie is filled with mythological and symbolic archetypes, the story pretty closely follows the monomyth structure, the hero's journey as described extensively by the writings of Joseph Campbell
.
Tron Legacy incoperates the concepts and archetypes of the crossing through a portal into an underworld/netherworld.
The film is filled with other mythological symbols as well, such as the Indentity Disc is based on the Hindu holy weapon the Chakram, and Clu is a doppleganger and symbolizes Flynn's "shadow" his unfettered ambition, he is like the concept of the Homunculus, a creature created by a man and given life by his creator, the dark mirror reflection made manifest.
Flynn shares some symbolic aspects with the sumerian god Enki, Quorra fits with the warrior-woman/warrior-goddess archeypes from Welsh mythos, and has an Joan of Arc aspect as well.
The whole film is expressed and presented as a kind of quasi-mythological fable. It's unfortunate you don't see that.
Your intolerance of Buddism by making rude comments (saying it's "crap" etc) about it is totally rude, tactless and uncalled for. order abortion pill http://unclejohnsprojects.com/template/default.aspx?morning-after-pill-price where to buy abortion pillwhere to buy abortion pill ordering abortion pills to be shipped to house buy abortion pill online
"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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ShadowDragon1
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Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 1:43 PM
I wasn't lumping in Christianity with Sumerian lore. I was only saying that some elements in Tron Legacy are concepts/ideas/symbolism that pre-date *some elements* or ideas also found in or thought only to come from Christianity. Nothing more.
I was refering to how Flynn has some symbolic aspects of Enki (a sumerian creator deity), and the greek figure Prometheus. Refering to the monomyth structure, classic symbolic mythological achetypes that are many thousands of years old and found in a wide spectrum of mythology and religious mediums.
"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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ShadowDragon1
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Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 2:42 PM
Abraxas Wrote:
Obviously I tolerate it as I still watched the movie and bought some of the merchandise. But, as I said before, what place did it have in the film? None whatsoever. As I said above, Jeff Bridges is good at playing himself. This is why his acting career has been stale until recently. And his newest performaces are even questionable. |
The storyline deals in part about how perfection is unknowable, this in-part ties into some lines of thought among Zen Buddhism and Taoism, so aspects of those are relative to the some aspects of Flynn character and how his perspective changed over time.
| Look at Crazy Heart. He was good in it because he was playing himself. Does he not have his own band and music interest. Look at Tron. All he did was spout off a bunch of Buddist jargon and die at the end. The only supposed rude comment I made was calling it crap. |
The main character in Crazy Heart was a alchoholic and stopped being invovled with this son and became a deadbeat. Jeff Bridges isn't an alcholic and not a deadbeat and was very involved with his children's lives. The only similarity to the character is Jeff's interest in country-blues music and likes to sing and play a guitar. It takes talent to act like a total drunk deadbeat and then come back out to be remorseful and reclaim a music carrer IMO. I think his Oscar and Golden Globe was actually well EARNED.
And it really should have been geared more at Bridges himself. Believe what you will. The info is out there for everyone to make thweir own informed decisions about what to think about the afterlife or lack thereof.
But, my point was it has no place in a movie that is advertised as secular. No worries, though. KF is dead and we should not see Bridges in the next film. Everyone has panned his performace anyhow since he basically just played a reiteration of the Dude. |
In the context of the character of Kevin Flynn and some of the ideas and concepts expressed in the movie, the minor Zen Buddhist aspects IMO did have a place in the movie.
Many Tron fans I know liked those elements, and also want Jeff Bridges to return as Flynn in some manner in the possible sequel. Your view about Mr. Bridges and the few references to Zen Buddhist ideas is, as "the dude" says, just, like.. your opinion, man...
"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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NortRelznir
User
Posts: 49 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 2:58 PM
Gambraxtroll strikes again. Would someone please construct an all Tron Evolution site for this kid so that he can just hang there and spout his flame bait comments and tell himself all about how much better he is than everyone and how nothing really matters to him.
Please? Because it's ruining this place. How about an ignore function. Something.
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ShadowDragon1
User
Posts: 2,056 | RE: Simple question to discuss
on Wednesday, February, 23, 2011 3:06 PM
Sorry, the few, minor Zen Buddhist references and ideas in the film are a part of the story and the character Flynn, whether you like it or not.
Go watch some one-dimensional action movie with no symbolism and no element of any spiritual philosophical meaning. It won't have any Buddhist "crap" to bother you then.
"The film is about finding human connection in an increasingly digital world." - Joseph Kosinski
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