Life of Pi - A different look

chase

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Over the Thanksgiving holiday, found myself watching "Life of Pi"
in a half-empty theater, and not having read the book or reviews,
had an uneasy sense that the movie was either an art gem or a
hopeless flop.

The movie unfolds with the charms of the lovely Tabu as Pi's mother,
and an impossibly characterized Adil Hussain as Pi's father. The
movie revels and celebrates religious syncretism to an extent
that would have the monotheist fundamentalists scurrying for the exits.

Pi's mother recounts Yashodha being astonished at the universe in
baby Krishna's mouth, and Pi enjoys Amar Chitra Katha comics, that
can only be appreciated by older generations of Indians.

Pi is drawn to a Church and questions the nature of Jesus sacrifice
to the nonplussed priest, who has a standard answer - "faith".
Pi thanks Vishnu for bringing him to Christ, and expresses a desire to
be baptized, despite his agnostic father's admonishment that you can't
follow multiple religions simultaneously.

Pi is also drawn to the local mosque and copies their prayer styles.

Then begins the life-changing journey of Pi, finding himself marooned
at high seas in a life-boat with the company of a Bengal tiger. The
subsequent episodes highlight the movie's strong Hindu message,
both implicitly and explicitly.

In one scene, after Pi barely escapes the tiger's attack, stranded
on a makeshift raft, reasons as only a Hindu would - that the tiger's
nature is to kill and eat - for that is his Karma. Unencumbered by
a philosophy that would put man in charge of all animals (thus in a
position to decide the tiger's fate), Pi proceeds to do the unthinkable
for a vegetarian - catch a fish, and kill it, to feed the tiger, despite
the knowledge that keeping the tiger alive is suicidal for Pi: there could
not be a better implicit message of duty/dharma. His breakdown at killing
a fish is an explicit ode to the Dharmic credo of ahimsa.

The trails and tribulations that follow with forlorn Christian and
Islamic messages are perhaps the author's attempt to seek the divine
from a syncretized viewpoint that is only possible in a Hindu, and
would have monotheists squirming in their seats.

So how would the average viewer on this forum like this movie, that on
the surface seems to be proclaiming the superficial Hindu's message of
"all religions are equal"? Pi's rationalist father has an answer: "faith is a
house with many rooms". Pi's wandering of the rooms at will captures the
Hindu's freedom, unshackled by dogma, of exploring divinity from a Hindu
lens, while remaining grounded in Dharmic faith.

Pi's father eloquently says: "you are only seeing your own emotions
reflected in the wild tiger; it is not benevolent at all" (rephrased).
Pi learns this message at the end of his painful journey.

The Hindu's nurturing of Abrahamic creeds in his environs - hoping to
see a (non-existent) reflection of his sensibilities in the Abrahamic
creeds - subtly captures this message, but will surely be lost in
the difference-anxiety ridden majority.

Or perhaps I am only taking away the message I want to see, reflected
by my own sensibilities :)

Don't miss this one, and see it in 3D if you can. Thumbs-up to director Ang Lee
for this magnificent melding of cinematography with computer imagery.

Raj Vedam
Yahoo! Groups
 

Known_Unknown

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Wow sounds amazing! I just took a quick look and was surprised to see the variety of personalities from different countries that have worked on this project!

This will definitely be on my list of movies to watch! :D
 

LurkerBaba

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@Singh gave a completely different opinion on this movie. :notsure:
 
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W.G.Ewald

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Is Pi pronounced Pie or Pee?
 

The Messiah

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Is it worth watching or not. Give answer in yes or no.
 

Known_Unknown

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I looked at some more reviews, and it seems that the OP was making the movie sound overly philosophical. :dude:

Apparently, Pi decides to feed the tiger not out of some dharmic beliefs, but because Pi is trapped on a raft that is being tugged by the boat which the tiger occupies. Pi feeds the tiger fish to keep it from eating him and make it well-disposed towards him.

If there is any underlying philosophy, it's merely the Wille zum Leben.
 

Das ka das

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I looked at some more reviews, and it seems that the OP was making the movie sound overly philosophical. :dude:

Apparently, Pi decides to feed the tiger not out of some dharmic beliefs, but because Pi is trapped on a raft that is being tugged by the boat which the tiger occupies. Pi feeds the tiger fish to keep it from eating him and make it well-disposed towards him.

If there is any underlying philosophy, it's merely the Wille zum Leben.
Jawohl mein Fuhrer!
 

Known_Unknown

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A more realistic review:

Life of Pi: Crouching tiger, hidden drama

The point of interest in Ang Lee's Life of Pi isn't what it does with the book by Yann Martel (which I haven't read), but what it confirms about today's movies — that no image is too fantastical to be committed convincingly to screen.

The eerie calm of a bioluminescent sea, at night, is shattered by a breaching whale, while stars shimmer in the horizon like stage lights positioned by God — it's primal theatre. We know that it's just technology, just pixels and paint, and yet, we buy the illusion with a sharp intake of breath. Lee's use of 3-D is so stunning and simultaneously so serene that his film makes Avatar look like a broken lava lamp.

Look beyond these visuals, though, and we're left with very little, which is somewhat surprising in a film that sets out to tackle the biggest of Big Questions. It isn't for nothing that the protagonist is named Pi, after the mathematical constant that, in its decimal form, is an endless stream of numbers. It is infinite, like a certain perception of God.

And God is everywhere in this story — in the stories of Krishna that Pi's mother (Tabu) narrates; in the various religions that Pi subsequently affixes himself to; in the "carnivorous island" that, in long shot, resembles a reclining deity; in the cosmic contrivances that steer a novelist to his next plot or save a youngster from death; and in the premise of this fable-like narrative itself, which promises to make believers of sceptics.

And how could He not be present in a story about a zookeeper's son who is shipwrecked and forced to share a lifeboat with a tiger for 227 days, which is its own kind of eternity? (Pi is played as a teenager by Suraj Sharma, and as an adult by an excellent Irrfan Khan.) The film's early portions are set in "the French Riviera" of south India, which is romanticised as some sort of antediluvian wonderland. (Appropriately enough, I suppose, given all the water that lies ahead.)

These meditatively paced scenes, barring some questionable enunciations, are a treat for Tamil audiences, the highlight being an exquisite lullaby voiced by Bombay Jayashri; and fans of Sivaji Ganesan may rejoice in his appearance, finally, in a Hollywood blockbuster, even if it's only through a Vasantha Maaligai poster. But after this idyllic heaven, boy and beast are torn from their shelters and cast into hell. The film could be titled From Puducherry to Purgatory, with a scenario ready to be riven by existential interrogation.

For instance, what is man but an animal? Forced to find food for the tiger, Pi fashions a net, nabs a fish and pounds it to death. He rejoices briefly, but is struck by sorrow when he stares into the creature's dead eyes. We've been told, earlier, that the human characteristics we imagine in animals are a reflection, in their eyes, of our own emotions — and what Pi sees now is his reduction to this atavistic self. (And he's a vegetarian.)

But these revelations are rare. For the most part, Pi is remarkably self-possessed, with survival tools in hand. And God takes care of the rest. When Pi is thirsty, it rains. When he's hungry, food comes swimming by. (Or flying by. Cue, special effects of winged fish.) Even the shark fins knifing the waters pose no real threat. We could be on an adventure safari.

The problem, most likely, stems from opening out a mostly ruminative book into an extravagant movie. But Lee doesn't help, either, by prettifying everything at the expense of drama.

There's nothing to sink your teeth into, and we're left with the feeling that Lee's ambition was simply to capture, through today's technology, every animal on earth, every phantasmagorical vista in the skies — the facile combination of menagerie and mysticism makes the film look like the curious offspring of James Herriot and Carlos Castaneda. There's lots of spectacle (the children in my theatre were delighted), but little soul. At its best, Life of Pi plays like an odd-couple comedy. There's nothing here as wrenching as Tom Hanks's plight in Cast Away. And his costar was a volleyball.

Suraj Sharma is an able enough physical presence, but he's dwarfed by the tiger, who is wonderful. It isn't just the physical fact of the animal, at first snarling and powerful and eventually an emaciated wreck. The tiger, digitally rendered with such wizardry that we feel like reaching out and stroking its springy whiskers, is also the only character in the film with a palpable inner life.

It must be those eyes, which reflect our own emotions without lapsing into cutesy Disneyfication. When this tiger falls into the ocean and struggles to clamber back onto the lifeboat, it's one of the film's few moments where we feel something, where we care, where we root for someone's triumph. That a creature caged inside a computer should evoke such emotion is a testament to the omnipotence of today's special-effects artists. God, in Hollywood, is less a manifestation of infinity than ones and zeroes.

Life of Pi

Genre: Theist fantasy.

Director: Ang Lee

Cast: Suraj Sharma, Irrfan Khan, Tabu

Storyline: A shipwrecked boy and a tiger learn to share a lifeboat, and a life.

Bottomline: Very pretty pictures, but very little meat.
 

W.G.Ewald

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Das Leben selbst ist ein Meer voller Klippen und Strudel, die der Mensch mit der größten Behutsamkeit und Sorgfalt vermeidet, obwohl er weiß, daß, wenn es ihm auch gelingt, mit aller Anstrengung und Kunst sich durchzu- winden, er eben dadurch mit jedem Schritt dem größten, dem totalen, dem unvermeidlichen und unheilbaren Schiffbruch näher kommt, ja gerade auf ihn zusteuert, dem Tode: dieser ist das endliche Ziel der mühsäligen Fahrt und für ihn schlimmer als alle Klippen, denen er auswich.
Arthur Schopenhauer W I 369
 

ashdoc

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Over the Thanksgiving holiday, found myself watching "Life of Pi"
in a half-empty theater, and not having read the book or reviews,
had an uneasy sense that the movie was either an art gem or a
hopeless flop.

The movie unfolds with the charms of the lovely Tabu as Pi's mother,
and an impossibly characterized Adil Hussain as Pi's father. The
movie revels and celebrates religious syncretism to an extent
that would have the monotheist fundamentalists scurrying for the exits.

Pi's mother recounts Yashodha being astonished at the universe in
baby Krishna's mouth, and Pi enjoys Amar Chitra Katha comics, that
can only be appreciated by older generations of Indians.

Pi is drawn to a Church and questions the nature of Jesus sacrifice
to the nonplussed priest, who has a standard answer - "faith".
Pi thanks Vishnu for bringing him to Christ, and expresses a desire to
be baptized, despite his agnostic father's admonishment that you can't
follow multiple religions simultaneously.

Pi is also drawn to the local mosque and copies their prayer styles.

Then begins the life-changing journey of Pi, finding himself marooned
at high seas in a life-boat with the company of a Bengal tiger. The
subsequent episodes highlight the movie's strong Hindu message,
both implicitly and explicitly.

In one scene, after Pi barely escapes the tiger's attack, stranded
on a makeshift raft, reasons as only a Hindu would - that the tiger's
nature is to kill and eat - for that is his Karma. Unencumbered by
a philosophy that would put man in charge of all animals (thus in a
position to decide the tiger's fate), Pi proceeds to do the unthinkable
for a vegetarian - catch a fish, and kill it, to feed the tiger, despite
the knowledge that keeping the tiger alive is suicidal for Pi: there could
not be a better implicit message of duty/dharma. His breakdown at killing
a fish is an explicit ode to the Dharmic credo of ahimsa.

The trails and tribulations that follow with forlorn Christian and
Islamic messages are perhaps the author's attempt to seek the divine
from a syncretized viewpoint that is only possible in a Hindu, and
would have monotheists squirming in their seats.

So how would the average viewer on this forum like this movie, that on
the surface seems to be proclaiming the superficial Hindu's message of
"all religions are equal"? Pi's rationalist father has an answer: "faith is a
house with many rooms". Pi's wandering of the rooms at will captures the
Hindu's freedom, unshackled by dogma, of exploring divinity from a Hindu
lens, while remaining grounded in Dharmic faith.

Pi's father eloquently says: "you are only seeing your own emotions
reflected in the wild tiger; it is not benevolent at all" (rephrased).
Pi learns this message at the end of his painful journey.

The Hindu's nurturing of Abrahamic creeds in his environs - hoping to
see a (non-existent) reflection of his sensibilities in the Abrahamic
creeds - subtly captures this message, but will surely be lost in
the difference-anxiety ridden majority.

Or perhaps I am only taking away the message I want to see, reflected
by my own sensibilities :)

Don't miss this one, and see it in 3D if you can. Thumbs-up to director Ang Lee
for this magnificent melding of cinematography with computer imagery.

Raj Vedam
Yahoo! Groups
the original book has a lot of philosophy---the movie doesn't have that much .
 

Singh

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Visual effects hold your attention till the first half. The story is all mumbo-jumbo like the Alchemist.
 

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