Some Cool Quotes From Around the World

Some Cool Quotes From Around the World

What's Your Favorite?

Chinese

A worn out boat still has 3000 nails in it.

Madagascar

A lean ox is not licked by his companions.

Chinese

A fool plants a tree in the morning expecting to saw planks that night.

Unknown

The smallest flame is better than hot smoke.

Danish

If you stir up the bog, you must bear the smell.

Arabic

He who touches honey is compelled to lick his fingers.

Persian

The larger a man's roof, the more snow it collects.

Swiss

In calm water, every ship has a good captain.

Finnish

What can a man understand about a ladle?

English

Kisses are the richest dessert.

Bosnian

The head is older than the book.

Children of Men

You know those movies that you rent/watch atleast once a year because you just love them so much? You already know what happens, you can quote lines, but everytime you watch it, you discover something new that makes you love it even more?

For me, one of those movies is Children of Men, with Clive Owen and Julianne Moore. I watched it again about a week ago and was blown away, more so than ever before, by how well the film is shot. I definitely wanted to encourage my friends and fans to check it out if you haven't already so I asked

a movie critic friend of mine, Pete Spedale, to dive a little deeper into the film and do a more professional review. He did.

I've included the review below. Make sure to check out the below link to Pete Spedale's reviews on Rotten Tomatoes! He does a great job of reviewing new movies that you can see in theaters. 

Thanks Pete!

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/user/744271/reviews/?id=326459204&fb_source=message#reviews_main

Dystopian futures have been a staple in the movies since Metropolis in 1927. They can range from cutting edge (The Matrix) to ridiculous (Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure). One thing all of them should have in common: they should immerse the audience into the new world they have created. This world is the driving force of Children of Men, a unique take on the future of mankind. Writer/Director Alfonso Curaon crafts a wonderful tale of despair, mystery, heroism, and suspense as Children of Men pushes its hero, Theo (Clive Owen) further into the desolation of a dying Britain.

A great tragedy has befallen humanity in 2027. The youngest person in the world has just died. He was 18 years old, because humanity has become infertile starting in 2009 (for reasons unknown). Right after the death, Theo unexpectedly gets a call from his ex-wife Julian (Julianne Moore), who is active in a group of rebels fighting the British government. She asks him to escort a group out of Britain to a society called the Human Project. The group includes Julian, Luke (Chiwetel Ejiofor), the leader of the insurrection, Miriam (Pam Ferris), a voodoo worshipper, and Kee (Clare-Hope Ashitey). The reason for the aid of Theo and secrecy is a whopper: Kee is pregnant. Theo must navigate through multiple treacheries including betrayal, power grabs, and lots of weapons.

From its first scene, Curaon tells you there is something a little off about our current setting. His dying society bears an uncanny resemblance to a war torn Europe post-WW II. The color scheme is destaturated to paint the world in bleak grays. For every LCD billboard there are 10 poor homeless people staring at them. The uniqueness of showcasing a future society as one the audience has seen in the past makes it easier for the audience to understand 2027 Britain as well as provide a terrifying paradox of a future society than cannot advance. This hauting image of a poverty-stricken, urgent, dying society is elevated using a hand-held camera with long unbroken takes. By experiencing the world with the characters instead of above them, Curaon transplants humanizes this lovelorn place and allows the audience to personally feel the character's pain.

If only Curaon's script could match his setting. Overall, the script is very strong and emotionally competent. There is a violent unexpected attack in the first 5 minutes of the picture, which sets the script up for lots of twists and turns as the story goes along. There are two inherent problems for the story though: The Human Project is a macguffin (for those who don't know, a macguffin is a Hitchcock term describing a plot element providing motivation for a character's actions that is not explained to the audience), and the direction of the story is the path of least resistance. What this means is that the story does not bother explaining the epidemic of infertility or how a new baby will survive in the current setting. Instead, the script focuses on the consequences of the baby ending up with the rebellion or the government. Despite the macguffin, Children of Men's script does a great job of showing character depth and progression while providing some really suspenseful chase sequences and unexpected acts of heroism along the way.

The acting ranges from solid to great. Clive Owen is very good as Theo. The script gives him a haunted past, which he uses to push himself into perpetually more dangerous scenarios. Chiwetel Ejiofor showcases impressive complexity for a character that could have had one note to his personality. Pam Ferris and Clare-Hope Ashitey (in her 2nd role) provide spunk and determination to the story, and Michael Caine (as Theo's hippie friend) and Julianne Moore are always great. The one failing is that the government and rebellion are essentially faceless entities, making their causes unimportant to the central characters.

Children of Men is one of those rare instances where at the end we wish there was more time to explore the consequences of the story. It leaves you with plenty of questions about the fragility of humanity and the unsteady equilibrium of peace the world revolves around. Children of Men could make for a great TV miniseries; until that day, Alfonso Curaon's adaptation of P.D. James's novel is a cautionary tale about the value of human life that won't leave your thoughts very easily.

My Story...

I sent this excerpt in an email to a new friend.

I grew up in St. Charles, IL which is about 35 miles west of Chicago and went to a private Christian High School called Wheaton Academy. As a teenager, I was a golf caddy during the summers at St. Charles Country Club, which is where I started earning my first dollars (technically not true. I was a paper boy from 8-12). Caddying would eventually afford me the opportunity to go to college for free on the Chick Evans Scholarship: (http://www.wgaesf.org/site/c.dwJTKiO0JgI8G/b.6021361/k.8BED/WGAESF_Home.htm)

At Northwestern, I lived with 40 other Evans Scholars both men and women in our 'fraternity' house. The program and the scholarship were the greatest blessings I could have possibly imagined. I studied for 4 years at NU and got my degree in Communication Studies with a minor in Religion. I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do for a job but it just so happened that, in April of 2008, while on my way toward spring-breaking in Spain, I met a man at a bar at O'Hare who was an Area Vice President for a company called Covidien, which manufactures and sells surgical supplies. At the time, Covidien didn't hire anyone with less than 3-5 years of sales experience, but a few weeks after meeting, that guy emailed me to tell me that Covidien was starting a new program where they were going to hire a class of Sales Associates right from undergrad and we thought I would be a great candidate.

Long story short, I got the job. I moved to Connecticut and worked for Covidien as a member of the very first Sales Associate Development Program. There were 11 of us, all between the age of 22 and 26 and we spent 15 months together learning how to sell Surgical Devices. I spent 6 months on an inside sales team, where I brought my base of 140 accounts from trending towards the high 70% to quota mark all the way up to 104% to quota. In that time, I might have been one of the wealthiest self-made 23 year olds in the country. I also met my current girlfriend, Amanda Markoya while I was there (www.amandamarkoya.com). 

From that role, I was promoted to an outside sales position out in Los Angeles where I co-managed a $6.3 Million territory. My partner, Eric Scharmach, and I, brought that territory, (which included accounts like UCLA) up to just over 100%. It was a very high visibility position within the company and, though I bumped heads a lot with my partner and my manager, at the end of the day, we did what we needed to do to reach 100%. Amanda and I lived together in North Hollywood for about 8 months, while she trained to be a makeup artist. 

In October 2010, I was promoted to take over my own territory as a Surgical Device Rep. One of the youngest people to ever do that within the history of the storied US Surgical (now Covidien). It wasn't until shortly thereafter, I realized that, even though I was continuing to pass through wonderful thresholds within the company and was making a good amount of money, I wasn't quite sure that selling surgical equipment was what I was meant to be doing. I pondered on that for about 6 months before I decided to leave the company in April 2011 to pursue 1. Starting my own companies 2. a career in comedy.

As you can imagine, this was not an easy decision to make but I did it anyway. I packed up and moved back home to Chicago where I focused on starting my companies and pursuing comedy (Amanda and I broke up and she moved back home to Connecticut). I worked at Chili's to pay the bills between July 2011-December 2011 and then in January, quit that job, sublet my apartment and went to live in San Antonio with my friends Josh, Rebekah and little baby Grace Gulley who essentially have been like my family. They helped me in every way possible while I focused more intently on developing my start-ups. In December of 2011, Amanda and I got back together and began our long distance Connecticut Girl, Nomad Boy relationship. I moved into the city more permanently in May of this year, when I started working at Wildfire. In August, Amanda moved to Brooklyn, so we now have a much cooler NYC Girl, Chicago Boy connection.

It wasn't until I began going around trying to raise money for my ventures (a video-sharing app vision and a surgical quality assurance company) that I realized how close I was getting to doing something that I wasn't ready to do, i.e. be the CEO of a company. While the idea of running my own startup is, and will always be, appealing, and I know that I would be successful at it, I realized that I more so should be focused, in this time of my life, on pursuing my passion: comedy.

Since making the decision to pursue comedy whole-heartedly, I have began creating a Kirk Sells brand on the Internet and everywhere I go. I continue to create content, perform shows, release videos, etc. While I work towards greater exposure in the comedy community. I stopped working on one of my companies and just recently turned the other into a production label so that I can help myself produce high quality creative material. I am trying to brand myself as a Comedy Rapper but have talents that include Standup, Improv, and Writing. I am also training in 3 classes at second city: Acting 1, Comedic Songwriting, + Clowning & Physical Comedy and will be auditioning for the 2nd time for the SC Conservatory next Friday. My goal is pretty straight forward: It is to be on Saturday Night Live. 

If you haven't seen some of my stuff online, here are some links:

Who Am I? - Kirk Sells

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFap9-qdXTI

Oregon Trail, Bitch- Kirk Sells

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n947p2QREqs

Kirk Sells - Comedy Demo Reel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJPPVpzyR14

In the shorter term, I should have a new rap video out by the end of October, done in the similar style of Oregon Trail, Bitch and I plan to have a 6 song EP out on iTunes by January 1, 2013. I will continue my improv and acting training at Second City.

Anyway, I know thats long-winded but that is my story. Hope we can learn a bit more about one another and I certainly have some introductions that I would like to make between you and some other influential men and women that I know.

A Quick Preview of the Upcoming Oscar Season Movies

My friend, Pete Spedale, does a hell of a job keeping his friends in the loop on upcoming movies. As someone that doesn't really keep tabs on what is coming out, I found this to be incredibly helpful. Take a look...

1. The Master (Sep 21) - Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (Boogie Nights, There Will Be Blood) created a story loosely based on the Scientology Church creator (L Ron Hubbard). Philip Seymour Hoffman is the leader of "The Cause" and Joaquin Phoenix is a lost soul loyal follower. Tom Cruise was supposedly unhappy with this movie's creation.

 

2. Looper (Sep 28) - Director Rian Johnson (Brick) teams up with Joseph Gordon-Levitt again to craft a sci-fi feature where he is a time-assassin that has to come face-to-face with his future self (Bruce Willis). Lots of great buzz from the Toronto Film Festival.

 

3. Argo (Oct 12) - Ben Affleck stars in and directs a movie about hostages freed from Iran using a fake film crew making a fake movie. Ebert predicted it would win best picture.

 

4. The Sessions (Oct 19) - John Hawkes is a man who can't move his body from a disease so he hires a sex therapist (Helen Hunt) to help him through his first time. Acting Buzz surrounds this one.

 

5. Cloud Atlas (Oct 26) - A historical/sci-fi movie directed by the Wachowskis (The Matrix, Bound) that spans several milennia from the distant past to distant future. Hugh Grant, Halle Berry, and Tom Hanks star. Lots of great buzz out of Toronto.

 

6. Flight (Nov 2) - Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, Back to the Future) and Denzel Washington team up to tell the story of a pilot who impossibly lands a crashing plane saving lives, but a lot of the story lies beneath the surface.

 

7. Lincoln (Nov 9) - Spielberg's biopic on Abraham Lincoln (Daniel Day Lewis) and how he got us through the civil war. Everyone should be excited about this one.

 

8. Anna Karenina (Nov 16) - Kiera Knightley teams with her Atonement director (she was oscar-nominated in that movie) to retell Tolstoy's psychological study masterpiece. Should be good, but will be overshadowed by Les Miserables.

9. Life of Pi (Nov 23) - Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon) director a story of a boy and a tiger who are shipwrecked and learn to live with each other to survive. The visuals look stunning, and it should be family friendly.

 

10. The Hobbit (Dec 14) - The pre-story to Lord of the Rings tells the story of how Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) came to acquire the Ring. First movie of 3, with Peter Jackson directing. Should be visually engrossing and long.

 

11. Les Miserables (Dec 14) - Tom Hooper (the King's Speech) directs Victor Hugo's tale. Anne Hathaway, Hugh Jackman, and Russell Crowe star. Should be the frontrunner for several oscars including best picture.

 

12. Zero Dark Thirty (Dec 21) - Kathryn Bigelow (the Hurt Locker) directs the tale of how the US and Seal Team 6 successfully found and killed Bin Laden. Very controversial, should still be very tense and patriotic.

 

13. Django Unchained (Dec 28) - Quentin Tarantino's (Pulp Fiction) story about a freed slave (Jamie Foxx) turned into a bounty hunter who has to save his wife, who is still owned by the slave's former plantation owner (Leonardo DiCaprio). The sentence describing the movie is so bizarre this is the one movie I want to see more than any other. I believe it opens on Christmas.

Thanks Pete! This is awesome.

The Alien Definition of Laughter

The Alien Definition Series


LAUGHTER-


Laughter is the human body’s physical response to the brain’s sudden understanding of something previously misunderstood. While each individual human has an irreplaceable pattern, pitch, and tone to their laughter, the sound will derivate, in it's most natural form, from the primary communication orifice; generally at a very harsh frequency. 


Often originating unexpectedly and unanticipatably, the sound itself is generally regarded as enjoyable by humans and is sometimes associated with approval (pg. 29) or acceptance (pg. 22) There is evidence, however, that the laughter of some individuals can cause an increased level of anxiety to those within range of the frequency. See: Ax-murderers, Super-villains, Mother-in-laws

Caution: Humans will often generate a 'false' laughter as the result of an awkwardness (pg. 37) stemming from their inability to comprehend something on the level of their more intellectual peers. Despite their desperate attempts to mask it, there is a terribly unsubtle and easily distinguishable difference between the genuine human expression of joy (i.e. laughter) and it’s imposturous counterpart, which humans so often exercise.


The Alien Definition Series, gradually dissects the core definitions, justifications and reasonings behind basic human emotions, actions, responses & institutions.

A Different Thought on Age

If you believe that every second of every minute of every hour of every day is a chance to make your life all that you want it to be, then you aren't the age you tell people you are.

I can't afford to think that I'm 26. I have to allow myself to know that I am exactly 26 years, 26 days, 21 hours, 52 minutes, and 45 seconds old and I have to desire to do something with that information. I have to stop counting my time by days or weeks or months and realize that every moment has as infinite value as the last. Age is not a countdown toward death, rather, a countup toward life.

Be encouraged. Your life will be remembered by the cumulation of your great days... and you are in control of all of it.

#luckmanagement

A Bad Day

today has been a 'bad' day... assuming you believe those actually exist and you still have the capacity to have them. a bad day for me recently has just seemed like a day of growth.

My motorcycle was towed and it cost $500 to get it un-towed. It hurts. I won't deny that. But on a positive note, it was towed, not stolen; It cost $500 not $700 or $800, and they didn't put that annoying sticker on my bike. You know what sticker I am talking about. It's the 'You've been towed' sticker' but it's not even just that, it's the 'Not only have you been towed but now we are going to put a big sticker on your windshield that will require some goo-be-gone and creative use of your ice-scraper (which you never thought you would use in the middle of July) to get off' sticker. So overall, it wasn't too bad.

I guess I also learned a lot today about how I could have avoided being towed (better luck management, being more conscious, aware, perceptive, driven) and how I respond to painful adversity. I didn't handle it well today, in fact I acted quite childish, but I grew from the adversity and promise to 'get em' next time'. Consequently, I did do some great writing today based on all the events that occurred today. And a day with good writing can never be a bad day.