V for Verification - Addendum

The above screenshot is cropped from a Facebook reply (written by a family friend) to a Note written by my sister, inviting her to a local upcoming film screening. I hadn't even heard of Day of Wrath, but the other movies mentioned seemed pretty significant given my last posting; Taxi Driver, The Passion of Joan of Arc, and The Spirit of the Beehive.

DeNiro and his chariot in Taxi Driver



Woman Warrioi Jovovich clone gestates in Resident Evil

Milla Jovovich was mentioned in my last post for her portrayal of Alice in the Resident Evil series and as the warrior spirit of Love in The Fifth Element, but my favorite role of hers has to be as Joan of Arc in Luc Besson's ironic historical tale, The Messenger (Dustin Hoffman deserves his own post for his role). She plays the dark angel again as Violet in Kurt Wimmer's 2006 bomb, UltraViolet, a Vampire no less...

Vivacious Valkyrie of Vendetta

So maybe Britney's crazy haircut thing wasn't just about avoiding a drug test? And what was up with that whole umbrella fiasco...

Natalie sporting the Ox constellation, complete with
a tri-piece pyramid guarding her Heart

The Spirit of the Beehive came across my radar as one of the inspirations for Pan's Labyrinth, which is one of the films that opened my eyes to the Mother Goddess pattern. It's a great film in it's own right, but for the pattern's bee significance, see my last post (edit: and my addendum at the end of this one) . Vouch.

THE SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE (1973), Víctor Erice

Set in the 1940s in a small village in post civil war Spain, Victor Erice's "The Spirit of the Beehive" is a haunting story seen primarily through the eyes of a young girl, Ana (Ana Torrent). After watching "Frankenstein" at the community theater, Ana becomes obsessed with the monster, and her sister, Isabel (Isabel Tellería), convinces her he is living in an abandoned building in the field by their house. One day she discovers a wounded soldier holing up there. Thinking he is the Spirit (as Isabel named the monster), she brings him food and clothing. When the soldier is discovered and killed, Ana's life and view of the world around her changes drastically. One one level, "The Spirit of the Beehive" is a probing account of a little girl and her dreams, imagination and the space she inhabits. The scenes with the two sisters interacting are priceless. However, on another level, one is aware of allusions to Franco, the political turmoil in Spain, and a country torn apart by civil war. The world of youth is never free from these darker allusions. Vast stretches of empty land and a village that appears to be inhabited primarily by children are haunted by their presence more than relieved by their innocence. Seen numeroud times, "The Spirit of the Beehive" will reveal different, yet always compelling, interpretations of how children are part of this complex larger world.

How's this for a beehive:

click to view fullsize


synch-update
1/29/09 | 2:02 PM
The Spirit of Jennifer Hudson

Earlier today, in a brief conversation with my MoMs, I learned that she'd pre-ordered The Secret Life of Bees from Amazon.com weeks ago (It arrived this morning, I plan on borrowing it for analysis this weekend), just in time for my last two posts, V for Verification - Addendum and The View from the cheap seats (revised), which are both curiously peppered with connections to bees, and - factoring in yellow taxicabs and the new NFL SuperBowl champs - the colors yellow and black. One of my high school teachers once told me that human eyes differentiate between yellow and black better than between black and white...

Honeybee Hudson performs in black, gold and white

Chris Knowles over at The Secret Sun put together a mind-opening post on the 43rd SuperBowl (well done) recently that brought even more significance to the Bee pattern considering The Secret Life of Bees star Jennifer Hudson's performance of the National Anthem. The American Idol runner-up gained fame after her Oscar-winning performance as a third sister in Dreamgirls alongside the Queen Bee-yonce. Shortly after her surprising selection to the prestigious committee that hands out Oscars, the Academy, her family was mysteriously and brutally murdered in President Barak Obama's hometown and political birthplace, south Chicago. This performance was her first public appearance since the murders.

...more to come on those honeybees