Hello All,
As we discussed with the Eliade PowerPoints, focus on the ideas and concepts of The Myth of the Eternal Return, and don't get distracted by his allusions and references to specific religious and mythological figures. His core argument is that societies and individuals repeat the patterns (consciously or unconsciously), so the patterns themselves are what will be important to us.
In terms of those archetypal patterns, here are the concepts most important to Eliade's analysis of the Eternal Return:
The Center
The Road to the Center
Sacred vs. Profane Time and Space
Abolition of Past Time
Restoration of Primordial Chaos (Invasion of the Dead, Abolition of Norms, Sexual Excess, Indeterminate Unity)
Repetition of the Cosmogonic Act (Rekindling of the Fire, Ritual Combat, Erotic Element)
For Monday's post, choose one of these concepts, and explain (in a short paragraph) how that concept relates to J. Lisa Chang and Newton Thomas Siegel's short film, The Big Empty.
In the Big Empty, we can find some of the concepts from The Myth of the Eternal Return. In the film, The Big Empty, there is a woman whose heart aches and she is depicted as having a cold heart who is empty inside. In the concept of The Road to the Center, in this case, the woman is trying to find herself, probable love. The Center is her identity and people keep trying to define her rather than she defining herself. There is also the concept of Abolition of the Norms and it occurs throughtout the film. One instance is in the finale when she is at the beach and she freezes the beach. Also, there are people evading her body; going inside her body. This represents the people trying to define her. The Repetition of the Cosmogonic Act lies in her finding love at the end of the film. The woman is no longer isolated and she finally accepts herself. Her aching and her emptiness was her unwillingness to find and accept herself for who she is and she found happiness when she found love.
ReplyDelete--Maria De La Riva
In the Big Empty, we can find some of the concepts from The Myth of the Eternal Return. In the film, The Big Empty, there is a woman whose heart aches and she is depicted as having a cold heart who is empty inside. In the concept of The Road to the Center, in this case, the woman is trying to find herself, probable love. The Center is her identity and people keep trying to define her rather than she defining herself. There is also the concept of Abolition of the Norms and it occurs throughtout the film. One instance is in the finale when she is at the beach and she freezes the beach. Also, there are people evading her body; going inside her body. This represents the people trying to define her. The Repetition of the Cosmogonic Act lies in her finding love at the end of the film. The woman is no longer isolated and she finally accepts herself. Her aching and her emptiness was her unwillingness to find and accept herself for who she is and she found happiness when she found love.
ReplyDelete--Maria De La Riva
Chang and Siegel's film "The Big Empty" depicts the womb as the center.
ReplyDeleteThe womb is considered a temple by most cultures because it generates
heirs for the clan. According to Eliade, every temple is a sacred mountain where heaven and Earth meet. Likewise, the sacred mountain
becomes the center. Steve
Jessica Delgadillo
ReplyDeleteIn the short film by J. Lisa Chang and Newton Thomas Siegel, "The Big Empty," Eliade's concept of the road to the center is portrayed. The main character is aching and doctors can't figure out what is wrong with her; some even tell her it's all in her head. Yet, she still "aches" and eventually meets a specialist that uses her "emptiness" for the fame that came with such a discovery. Throughout the film, the main character seems to be trying to find herself or possibly love, but no one seems to care about her; they only care about the "wonderful discovery." However, a young man surprises her when he asks her if she ever ached from such emptiness. She finally comes to accept herself in the end of the film, and we can say she finds love with the young man who truly cared for her and not her "emptiness." The film is related to the concept of the road to the center in that the main character travels on a journey to find herself and ends up not only accepting herself, but also finds love.
Trisha Morrissey
ReplyDeleteThe archetype of the road to the center is expressed in J. Lisa Chang and Newton Thomas Siegel’s short film, The Big Empty. A young woman is depressed; she aches all the time and does not know what is wrong with her. She is trying to find herself as she seeks the advice of doctors and specialists but receives no answers. The doctors explore and find that she is empty inside; full of snow, ice, and pure isolation. One man stands out as he relates to her and shows sympathy by asking her if she aches or is in pain. He helps her find herself and helps her accept who she is. At the end of the film she finally finds her center which is indeed, her own identity. She accepts who she is, even with her “big empty,” cold interior and understands that life can begin again with a new outlook.
Erma Morales
ReplyDeleteIn the film by Chang and Siegel, "The Big Empty" the center represents the woman’s womb as the center. Since the womb is a sacred placed for all women given the fact that they can reproduce and create life with it. The womb carries many magical emotional such as aches, which is what the woman in the film had. They aches can represent different feelings such as stress, nervousness, or happiness (butterflies in someone's stomach). At the end of the film the woman accepts the pain in her stomach relating to who she is and what she was looking for.
Brian Dolph:
ReplyDeleteThere are many themes within Chang and Siegel's short film "The Big Empty", such as the concepts of profane and sacred time and space. The movie starts off within the profane world; that is, all is exactly as it is thought to be. There is nothing meaningful behind the actions of the people. This is especially true after the main female character discovers that she contains within herself a vastness of emptiness and is crowned "Miss Emptiness". It is not until near the end of the movie that the world begins to transform from the profane into the sacred. Once the man whom the main female character loves becomes lost within her "emptiness", she begins to think things through and time that would normally be profane becomes sacred as a deeper meaning begins to take form in her thoughts. She goes to the beach, which seems to be the first time given her reactions, and loses herself in joy. It is there that she accepts herself in a new way and releases some of her emptiness and allowing her to find the man she loves.
There are many themes within the Chang and Siegel's short film "The Big Empty", but the concept that stuck out to me was the sacred vs profane spaces. I feel that these two correlate with each other, but what sets them apart the differences. In life many find that the sacred place is the "womb" of a woman, where life begins. When a life is created, it is in the "womb", that is the part of life where a person is most sacred and far away from profane. That's where the profane steps in. Something so sacred can be portrayed in such a profane manner. In today's time, they expose this part of the woman in a way that is far from profane through video and pictures. It's sad to think that one person can demolish this sacred act by portraying it in a profane manner. The film shows both the sacredness of being a bearer of life, and the profane act of just naming it the big empty, when really it is empty because it is not filled with life. Life is sacred and should be cherished just as much as the life giver herself. Miss Emptiness should be filled with life, love, and warmth.
ReplyDeleteMark Anthony Macanas
Basil Qumsiyeh
ReplyDeleteIn the film by Chang and Siegel, "The Big Empty. the concept of the road of the center appear when the main charachter is in pain and she is trying to define herself but instead , the people around her are defining her. and her specialist, instead of helping her to define herself and define the emptiness inside of her , he takes advantage of her ache to become famous, only one person cares about her and asks her about the pain she feels. at the end of the film she finds love with that person.
Jorge Solis
ReplyDeleteOn the film The Big Empty, the concepts of the center and the road to the center were applied. In the film, a girl feels different and finds herself having a heart aches. She goes to different doctors to see if they can find what’s wrong with her, but none of them where successful. Until, a Specialist predicts her problem and this is the case were the center is used. People are trying to define her, instead of the girl defining herself. The road to the center is used when she goes to the beach and freezes the ocean. She was able to find love and herself, she is no longer isolated. She was also able to recognize and accept herself.
Nathan Whiting
ReplyDeleteIn the film J. Lisa Chang and Newton Thomas Siegel's short film, The Big Empty, the girl had no idea what her "center" was. All she knew was that she was aching odd. It was the people around her who told her what her center was. But the center of a person is more than just the metaphysical, it's the spiritual center and the self perception of everyone. If the center is unknown or questioned, the person doesn't know who she is. If people told her what her center was, then all she has for her identity is how others see her; cold and empty. The doctors all observed her oddity, the Specialist saw and experienced her center, but she never knew what her center was or was she willing to accept her center without coming to terms with herself.
Megan Reimer
ReplyDeleteIn the film, "The Big Empty," produced by Chang and Siegel finding the road to the center was a dominate theme. The main character aches and complains that she is hurting. She visits several doctors but they can not find a cure to her problem. Later, she learns that she is her own enemy. The main character is filled with "emptyness" ; she is not facing a medical problem, but a battle within herself. Her goal is to find herself and this relates to Eliade's "Road to the Center" archetype. She is lost and aches because she is empty inside. Once she meets a man who is facing the same problem she can relate to him and falls in love with him. This makes her feel more complete and begin to find herself. She is following her road to the center and the path to finding who she truly is.
In the flim The Big empty the concept of the center can be appiled. The lady is cold and empty inside and that is symbolized by a freezing landscape similar to the north pole. This center is empty which means that the women feels empty inside. It is not until one of the explores goes missing does she begin to realize who she really is . -Joey Rico
ReplyDeleteIn the big empty it shows many of concepts of the road to the center. First because she is cold and aching she goes to many different doctors to find what is wrong with her. In other words, she is going to doctors to see if they can help her find herself. Then She meets the specialist who uses her to gain fame. When a guy who goes inside of her does not come back, she goes inside herself and goes on the road to the center where the lost guy is.
ReplyDeleteDiana Camacho
Danielle Williams:
ReplyDeleteThe three concepts examined by Eliade of Abolition of Past Time, Restoration of Primordial Chaos, and the Repetition of the Cosmogonic Act, all play very important roles in the message of J. Lisa Chang and Newton Thomas Siegel's short film, The Big Empty. The main character, Alice, is learning to let go of past time and form her own identity in the repetition of the original Creation. She lives life trying to figure out who she is and right before she does, a world of chaos ensues and then all past time is abolished. As Eliade notes, this is a recreation of primordial events. First, there was chaos in the universe, then there was creation which came with the abolition of all time before. The chaotic events preceding Alice's self-realization were that of all the doctor's, appearing on tv, men entering "the big empty", the man getting lost in "the big empty", and the turning of the ocean into ice when she steps into it. The recreation of the original Creation is when she forms her own identity in the epiphany that comes with stepping onto the ice and seeing her true love. The formation with her syzygy at the end on the ice is also a recreation of the Original Creation. Once this occurred, all past time, all past reality, everything that was before, was abolished.
The short film The Big Empty by J. Lisa Chang and Newton Thomas Siegel's was a weird movie. I saw no point to it because it was horrible. All i can get from it was that her insides were so cold that it was hard for anyone to live there. The entire movie is about her insides, which can represent the center
ReplyDeletean archetypal pattern from Eliade's analysis of the Eternal Return. it can also represent the road to the center because at the end the girl somehow walk and everything inside(the center) comes out.
Nadee Ramirez