Martial Arts 2: Electric Boogaloo: The Street-quel

Previously, I posted a blog entry about martial arts and the scientific method.  In it I talked about how important aliveness is to a productive learning environment, that way you can actually pull off what you learn.  After I posted it, martial arts schools around the world began incorporating more aliveness into their curriculums, while those who didn’t were forced to shut down in shame.  Thanks to that entry, I am now stacking paper to the ceiling and riding on 24 inch chrome.

Okay, that story is as full of myth and magic as the stories you heard in your Karate class growing up.  In reality, a lot of people who responded wanted to know about self-defense specifically, which makes a lot of sense.  What good is an activity that improves your health, self-confidence, concentration ability, body awareness, speed, strength, and coordination if you can’t use it to hurt someone?  Some people went even further and pointed out that alive arts can’t prepare you for the streetz because of all the deadliness.

Honestly, these people have a point, but not in the way they think they do.  Its like when you agree with someone that you’re both disappointed with Obama’s presidency, but as you begin to express your disappointment that he hasn’t closed Guantanamo Bay, they start going off on a tangent filled with so much closet racism that coat hangers become the new international symbol for hatred.  The fact of the matter, though, is that alive martial arts can’t completely prepare you for the streetz.

I’ve never gotten into a fight in the streetz, but I’ve gotten very close many times and have seen quite a few happen right in front of me.  You want to know what stopped me each time from getting into one?  If you think emotional maturity and feeling like I have nothing to prove is the answer, then you’ve never met a male between the ages of fourteen and dead.  The reason is because every fight I’ve ever seen outside of a school yard (and plenty of them on one, as well) has involved either weapons, far superior numbers, or far superior weapon numbers.  Knives, bats, brass knuckles, gun blades- I’ve seen them all.

I’ve..  sniff…  lost many a friend to the gun blade.

To think knowing how to properly pull off a jab-cross or uchi mata will help you get through ten opponents or someone with a knife is as misguided as thinking a snap kick will do anything other than let nearby predators know that you will be their easiest kill of the day.  You simply can’t prepare for such an unpredictable, dangerous event in any sort of controlled environment that requires respect for your opponent’s safety and genitalia.  However, and this is important, an alive martial art is immensely better than a shitty interpretive dance.

If you wanted to use eye jabs on people, which would you rather take: boxing, which teaches you how to properly throw and avoid punches, or a shitty LARP fest where you throw eye jabs in slow motion at someone who isn’t even trying to block, stopping right before you hit them?  If you were a boxer and tried to pull off a finger job, all you’d have to do differently is point out your fingers when throwing punches.

If you did a “deadlier” martial art, though, the list of things you’d have to change on the spot would be much longer.  You’d have to learn how to react when your opponent is actively trying to block instead of compliantly letting you attack them, deal with them actually attacking back instead of just absorbing what you are throwing, raise your qi to a level deadlier than your opponents, roll for a +5 to agility, and fight in a way that doesn’t reveal you’ve been training in something better suited for opening a plastic water bottle case than poking out a person’s eyes.  I’ll take boxing, thanks.

Some “clever” people are going to want to point out that you train the way you fight.  I’ll respond with this: you’re about as clever and free thinking as someone who points out that Justin Bieber or Twilight are terrible, an observation so safe and bland trying to disguise itself as edgy that it probably writes jokes for Jeff Dunham.  Also, while alive martial arts don’t train with deadly techniques, martial sharts (my new name for shitty martial arts that lack aliveness) train slow, without a resisting opponent, and people usually stop their attacks before the “kill” (read: mildly uncomfortable) position.  In actuality, this argument could be reversed and used against these people much more effectively.  In debate we call that a "turn" and in freestyle ciphers we call that an "oh shit, son!"

 

Here is a video where Bas Rutten explains in two minutes why LARPers' deadly patty cake game wouldn't work in an actual fight, as well as the fact that you should never fuck with Bas Rutten (perhaps the most important lesson of all).

I know a lot of people aren’t going to like this, and explain their combat ideas as if abstract theorizing will ever help you outside of an 8 year old ass kick fantasy.  To quote Mike Tyson, “everyone has a plan until they get hit.” If you heard that quote and want to give me a lecture on how you could use a special striking technique you've mastered that would let you push someone’s nose cartilage into their brain, I already know I can beat you in a fight.  If you attacked me at a bar I’d say the exact same thing your former significant other used to say: “the only reason I haven’t called the police is because of how unthreatening you are when you put your hands on me.”

This man has bitten another human being’s ear off, and he is still more pragmatic than most RBSD practitioners.

Then again, maybe these martial sharts actually do train with Death Kumites when people aren’t looking.  In boxing, it is well known that constantly being hit on the head takes a toll on the brain, especially when you compete at high levels.  Considering how stupid, corny, and pseudo-philosophical martial sharters are when they speak or type, theres a very real chance that they test their deadly moves out on each other under the light a full moon.  Many don’t survive, and those that do, well…  the night, it…  it changes them.

Even if that awesome theory isn’t true, though, I think I may have another.  In fact, I think I may have blown the lid off the entire Ninjitsu disciple.  In most parts of the world, self-defense laws only let you react with a certain amount of force or else you cross the line from victim to assailant (unless you’re Israel, that is). With such an ineffective style, anything that isn’t an emotionally riveting ballet recital or Firaga spell will probably qualify as “excessive force.”  After suing you, your assailant can then sneak back into the shadows with all your riches- it is the way of the shinobi.

Punchline's Top 5 2011 Movie Countdown... of Death!

Recently, blogging sensation and internet bad boy David Zafra created a list of his five favorite movies of the year.  It’s a great list with great movies.  My list is almost the same, so it would be pretty pointless to make my own entry.  What kind of lazy, uncreative person would do such a thing?  Looks like we’re about to find out together, internet.

Movies are a divisive and subjective topic.  Some people prefer drama, other people prefer action, and still others prefer “parody” movies that brilliantly point out that things in pop culture do, indeed, exist (take that, Descartes!).  Creating a list is a difficult and intricate process, where you have to create some sort of criteria for quality that is vague enough to encompass different genres and tastes while still trying to concretely ascertain exactly what “quality” is in any given movie.

I decided that level of preparation is for sucker MCs, though, and instead drank enough alcohol to kill so many of my brain cells you would think they were part of a pro-democracy movement in Latin America during the Cold War.  That would make my hands that were holding the bottles of booze US supported dictators, which makes a lot of sense considering the horrible things they got away with last night.  One of those horrible things was this list, where I use a rating system comprised of MMA fighters.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go take Anastacio Somoza and Augusto Pinochet and think about what we’ve done.

Kids, heres a fun activity you can try at home!  Each time I make a point that Zafra already made better in his blog, tell each of your parents a secret about one another that they were never supposed to know!  It’ll be an edu-taining and uproariously good time!  You’ll never confuse the words “adultery” and adult” ever again!

5.  X-Men First Class

I have to be honest, leading into this film I wasn’t too excited.  I had never gotten into X-men to the same extent as other heroes when I was younger, and the advertising didn’t pull me in too much either.  The scars were also still fresh from X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which terribly perverted my ability to ever fully trust again.  The only joy I ever felt involving the movie was when it was banned by the United Nations for grossly violating human rights.  I was relieved, knowing that if there was one body that the international community always obeys, it is definitely the UN.

With all this in mind, I was blown away by how good the movie is.  What particularly struck me was the characterization of the main cast, both as individuals and their interactions with other main characters.  Young Magneto and Professor X in particular had the type of chemistry that most people will spend their entire lives trying to find in a romantic relationship.

The commentary on the human condition (fear of the unknown, tribalism, stratification, how we have historically treated blue skinned demigods, etc) and the dichotomy between Magneto’s Malcolm X approach and Professor X’s Martin Luther King Jr approach were also very well done, which add a refreshing layer of depth to what most might expect to be just another Hollywood action blockbuster.  Clearly this movie knows that its good looks won’t last forever, and decided it was time to go back to school to make something of itself.  That’d show its parents were wrong!

Unfortunately, a lot of the areas you could compliment this movie about are also areas that you could criticize.  While a lot of the main characters got awesome characterization (the bromantic couple, Mystique, Beast, Shaw, January Jones’s chest), the rest of the cast were lacking in development.  As for the civil rights undertones, when they got it right they got it right, but when they didn’t, they didn’t (if I had a dollar for every time Mystique said “mutant and proud,” I wouldn’t be behind you right now demanding that you give me all the money in your wallet).

Had the movie characterized a bit more of its cast and treated subtlety in its themes differently than your date’s genitals during high school prom, it could have been higher on the list.  Regardless, it is a really good movie.  I’d give this movie a Chael Sonnen, because if it had a better idea of when to shut the fuck up, the lack of groan-inducing moments would cause it to pass the line into greatness.

4.  Midnight in Paris

Quick, when someone complains about “people these days,” what do you do?!

(a) explain to them that all throughout history, people have never been perfect and those who romanticize the past are remembering only the good parts

(b) agree with them, talking about how things used to be better when people understood what respect and decency meant, back when bread was a nickel and minorities knew their place

(c) tell them that their misery stems from being a failure of a person and blaming their inadequacies on their time period is one of the saddest excuses for not being able to get laid you’ve ever heard

(d) reveal to them their dissatisfaction are the symptoms of the poison you slipped in their food, and that they only have fifty eight more hours left to find the antidote

(e) declare that your robot processors aren’t build to understand human emotions, and that if they don’t stop complaining you will send them to the tin mines with the rest of the humans

If you answered a or c, then you would probably enjoy what this movie has to offer.  If you answered b or d, there is something wrong with you.  If you answered e, then I can only warn the readers out there that the weakness of our new robot overlords is the switch located on their arm!  Quickly, before its too late!

The premise of the movie is that Owen Wilson’s character is a screenwriter in love with the past, specifically the 1920s.  He travels with his fiancée to Paris, and at one point finds himself out wandering the streets at midnight.  He encounters a car from the 1920s and hilariously decides to jump in without questioning what kind of people would be cruising the streets at midnight in such a car.

It turns out for the better, though, and hes transported back to the time he so admires.  He meets and kicks it with badasses of the period such as Picasso and the Biggie and Tupac of American literature themselves, Hemmingway and Fitzgerald, respectively.  I won’t spoil any more, but suffice to say realizations are made and lessons are learned.  One of the best parts is that the movie never even tries to scientifically explain how Wilson is able to go back in time, which would distract from the point of the movie.  We don’t want to know the force is made up of midi-chlorians any more than we want to know how many lobotomies our screenwriters have had.

The only thing I would say the movie could have done better was to improve or drop the subplot with Wilson’s romantic interest.  There is nothing unique or interesting about it, and stands out a lot when compared to how great the main plot and its themes are.  This movie gets a Shinya Aoki, because if its other aspects were as good as its main aspect, it would be nearly unstoppable.

3.  Warrior

 

This is a movie about mixed martial arts, perhaps the first of its kind that isn’t terrible.  The story focuses on two brothers who each have their own reason for competing in the prestigious Sparta MMA tournament.  The two brothers have an estranged relationship with each other as well as their father, who was an abusive alcohol when they were children.  Can the two brothers overcome their estranged relationship with their father and each other?  Can both find what they were looking for out of the tournament?  Can this movie really be that good if these are the kinds of questions we are asking?

Luckily, the answer to that last question is a resounding “fuck yeah!”  The movie is good at manipulating your emotions against you, to the point where I thought it had a black belt in Jiu Jitsu- of the heart.  The movie gives you a reason to root for both characters, which I think is great.  In most sports movies the protagonist is the only person with something meaningful at stake, while the competition is portrayed as obstacles.  The truth of the matter, though, is that everyone has their own unique background and motivation for doing something; you aren’t the only one with something to lose.  This movie does a great job of showing that.

Another thing they did a great job with was the relationship with the father.  During the course of the movie you see that he honestly wanted to try to make things right, yet at the same time he had done so many horrible things in the past the kids had no more second chances left to give him.  The scenes involving him were actually among the hardest scenes I’ve ever had to watch in any movie, and I’ve seen movies ranging from Oldboy to The Last Airbender.

Overall, this movie does nothing innovative, but it does everything right.  It is a great movie that will do for MMA what movies like Rocky and The Fighter have done for MMA.  And for that, I give this movie a Royce Gracie for bringing MMA into the spotlight in a new medium and prompting millions of “clever” people to point out how “totally gay” grappling looks.

2.  Drive

Drive is basically an action movie, but done with a strong art house type of influence.  On paper it sounds just like any other movie; a stoic getaway driver is busy badassing around town until he falls for a special lady and things get messy.  It seems like the kind of thing Michael Bay would think about when he masturbates.

Like we’ve seen with prohibition, not everything turns out the way it does on paper.  The movie uses barely any dialogue, instead focusing on subtlety and expressions, makes use of unique cinematography and music, and really focuses on the themes that drive the plot.  The movie also uses a lot of symbolism to emphasize these themes, which basically boil down to how difficult it can be to escape a life of corruption.

One of the most impressive things about this movie is how well each actor plays their role.  The only other times I’ve seen entire casts do what they are supposed to do so efficiently with such sparse dialogue is in porn.  Everyone does exactly what they need to, and in impressive fashion.  It really added an extra dimension of quality to an already great film.

Overall, this movie is not only one of the best of this year, but also one of the best movies of the past few years.  The only different between this movie and the number one movie is personal preference.  I give this movie an Anderson Silva, because it turns something normally associated with brainless violence into an art, and does so in a way that makes most competition look comically inadequate.

 1.  50/50

Yes, my favorite movie of the year is part comedy.  I don’t know if its because movie critics are incapable of laughter in their human forms, but for some tragic reason comedies are given less acknowledgement during movie nominations than small farmers and basic human compassion in Monsanto’s corporate policies.  This movie is a fantastic “dramedy,” nailing both the drama and comedy parts perfectly.

Joseph Gordon Levitt gets a rare form of cancer in his spine, relying on his girlfriend (Bryce Dallas Howard) and best friend (Seth Rogan) to help him through this difficult time.  This movie is loosely based on what happened to screen writer Will Reiser when he got cancer.  In this movie Seth Rogan plays Seth Rogan, both in the sense that he is his normal hilarious self and, when Will Reiser got cancer in real life, it was Seth Rogan who was his best friend who helped.  The plot does a great job of showing what people who have cancer have to deal with.

One of the cool things about the movie is that the conflict doesn’t come out of nowhere.  Levitt’s relationship with his girlfriend isn’t perfect even before the cancer hits and Seth Rogan isn’t the perfect friend.  As the movie things get increasingly harder for everyone involved, including Levitt’s family, and all of them take it in their own different ways.  It’s a flawless portrayal of how cancer affects everyone, not just the person who gets it.

The only weakness about this movie isn’t really a weakness you can criticize.  It does end in a happy, almost cliché way, but considering this is based on the life of the guy who actually wrote and had a significant role in putting together the film, the fact that he lives isn’t exactly a spoiler.  This movie is definitely more about the journey than the destination, though you will feel more relieved than you think you will despite the fact you will go into the movie knowing how it ends.

Throughout the movie, it achieves a perfect balance that so many movies have attempted in vein.  You will laugh when the comedy hits and be moved with the drama hits.  50/50 is based off of the premise that Levitt only has a 50/50 chance of living, but I think it could also apply to the perfect comedy/drama balance.  This movie gets a Jon Jones, because it balances everything effortlessly and is great at manipulating human weaknesses.  Our only hope at beating this is the Chosen One.

A Tribute to Protest

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