FINALLY!

The Boondock Saints is an amazing film, and one of my all-time favorites!  What I like most about it is the fact that it relates so well to my Senior Exit project.  The film is about these 2 Irish brothers who start out “two ordinary men who were put in an extraordinary situation” (Smecker) and then become extraordinary, and possibly heroes, too.  It all starts when a bar fight goes too far and the brothers have a strange dream or something mystic that tells them “destroy all that which is evil…so that which is good may flourish” (Connor and Murphy).  They then decide to take on the mob, and kill whoever they deem evil or corrupt.  I’m not ruining the story too much in here, because someone will complain, but for more, just watch the movie.  Seriously!

Anyways…I’ve uploaded 2 things in this post: a scene from The Boondock Saint (which I just got done seeing in theatres!) and a small part of the original screenplay I found online.

                                     PRIEST
                         What is it my son?

                                     SMECKER
                         It’s ethics. I put evil men behind
                         bars, but the law has miles of red
                         tape and loopholes for these…
                         cocksuckers to slip through. I’ve
                         found out there are these two young
                         men who fix the situation with an
                         iron fist. As if they have God’s
                         permission. But what they do is wrong
                         and I should arrest them…
                         technically.

                                     PRIEST
                         God’s permission? God doesn’t…

               Rocco shakes the priest.

                                     SMECKER
                         But in this day and age I believe
                         what they do is… necessary. I feel
                         it is… correct.
(more talking…)

     SMECKER
                         I’m beginning to see. I’ve been doing
                         my job… well for fifteen years and
                         it’s just not enough. All the things
                         I wish I could do, these guys are
                         doing. Millions of dollars in tax
                         payers’ money wasted on shit like
                         wire taps and surveillance. Theses
                         boys go in and take care of it for
                         the price of a bullet.
                              (looks up)
                         Ww-what do you think I should do?
                         Because I’m a law man.

               Rocco jostles the priest again.

                                     PRIEST
                         The laws of God are higher than the
                         laws of man.

In the video clip, which does use profanity, I’ll find a clean version for my speech or paper or something, the “saints” are exposing themselves to the public and explaining their reasons for killing others. These men don’t want the world to see them as murderers and say that they really are the “lesser forms of filth” (Connor) and are necessary to keep corruption from the innocent.  These guys see that they are extraordinary, and instead of just excepting it and moving on, they share their knowledge with the world.  They expose themselves and show that they are not afraid of the law or any police.  They are working for higher laws and rights and are justified to kill.

The second thing is part of a scene from the script.  I couldn’t find the video for this scene, so you can just uses your imagination.  “Smecker” is an FBI agent that was sent to Boston to solve these mob murders, and convict whoever was responsible.  He starts out like any other cop, going just far enough in his work to uphold the law, but after he seeing what the saints are doing, he begins to wonder who’s right in this situation.  Now, Smecker is gay in the film, and therefore not religious at all, so coming into a church was very unlike him.  He was drunk, though.  Anyways, in this scene, you can see the struggle between the ordinary and extraordinary; how one can raise above the “laws of man” and one cannot.  This is Smecker’s realization that such people do exist and can do the right thing by ignoring regular laws.  I don’t want to give too much of the movie away, so I won’t go into too much detail on this one, but it is very interesting!

Watch the movie, it is amazing!

Book Time

Alright, I just risked my life in this new snow storm to buy my own copy of Julius Caesar because I knew you readers were waiting patiently for me to post again. This is the post to make up for Monday’s “IOU”, so enjoy it!

So, this is actually the first piece of literature that got me really interested in the whole “heroes gone bad” idea. I mean, I read this in 10th grade, right after Crime and Punishment, and I really saw Brutus as an extraordinary man (see my first blog for a link). Everyone knows that Brutus is great, wonderful, and wise, and if not for the whole killing of Caesar part, Brutus could have seen himself rise above in history and take on a great hero status. Unfortunately, though, Brutus is too trusting and naïve and Cassius all too easily convinces Brutus that Caesar is too prideful and will turn tyrant once he becomes more powerful. Brutus keeps the impression that he is doing the right thing and being heroic until the very end, but in reality, he’s just made himself a murderer.

That’s my whole point with this project. Brutus was an extraordinary man, able to go above the law and above others because of his character and person, before he killed Caesar. Until that point, Brutus never over-used his heroic nature and stayed within his own rights and laws. Killing Caesar was the move that pushed Brutus over the line and made him a villain…

OK, I’m going to try to explain my theory thus far, so try to stay with me… Like I have stated before and in other blogs, an extraordinary man has the ability to go above and beyond ordinary laws. A lot of times the people (yes, once again, almost always white men) become heroic by overstepping the lines other can’t cross. The way one becomes a hero depends on the outcome and intention of their action or actions. If more good than bad occurs, then the character is usually seen as a moral, justified person. If the bad outweighs the good that is brought, or was thought to have brought, the line was probably over stepped and the person goes down with the bad. It may be a little sketchy still, but I am trying so please comment if you have more imput or questions.

Anyways, back to poor Brutus. In his case, while he thought he was doing the right thing, the bad that came about his action outweighed his intended good, and ultimately made Brutus take his own life. Right after Caesar’s death, Brutus and Cassius run out of the city, build up armies, and begin fighting. More than one unnecessary death occurs. If he only waited for Caesar to become the corrupt dictator everyone feared he would (or at least said he would), then maybe Brutus could have lived a wonderful life as a hero to the people. Now, I do have to point out that Brutus was still called “the noblest Roman of them all” (Act V Scene V) but that was only because his intentions did stay true. However, in this case, intent does mean nothing when compared to the action.

More to come!

And by that, I mean I’m going to sit down for 2 hours, re-read all of Julius Caesar, have a long discussion with my dad, get very confused, then come back to my blog with my newly learned knowledge and insight.

Ok, from re-reading the play, I noticed that everyone says nothing but praise and nice things to Brutus even after he kills Caesar.  Now, I did mention that before, but I thought at one point people did start to question his nobility.  However, I was wrong.  So then I became very confused with my views of Brutus.  I mean, he clearly went above the mystic line I always speak of because Caesar didn’t necessarily have to die.  But at the same time, the leaders of Rome and other high figures made it a mission to keep Brutus’s memory a good, noble, and moral one.  I could not, and sort of still can’t, figure out how those two could work together.

So I talked with my dad, who owns literally (yes, I do mean literally, I can weigh it for you) over 2 tons of books and knows a little of just about everything, and he explained that Brutus was supposed to be portrayed the way he was to show that tyranny and self-importance in decisions and conflicts don’t work.  Brutus bases everything he does off of what he thinks will better Rome and leaves himself out of the equation; Cassius and Caesar don’t.  My dad said I have to be careful with using Shakespeare because his reasons for writing the play are not the same as my intentions for using the play.

But that talk lead me to believe that Brutus then wasn’t a bad guy or someone who over-stepped the line.  Clearly he was trying to better his world with no personal gain.  Again, though, my dad helped me out and told me to look at the big picture and back at my own thoughts on heroes and villains.  I said that if the bad outweighed the good, then something went wrong, so I looked at Brutus and Rome at the time and asked myself if there was more bad or good.  The answer I found was that since Caesar’s death lead to civil war and Mark Antony taking over, more bad was definitely done.  (Yes, I know I already said this too, but now I feel more convinced.) 

So now I’m back and forth on my thoughts of Brutus  but ultimately I feel that he gave up his extraordinary abilities when he allowed himself to be manipulated by Cassius and then stepped over his bounds by killing Caesar.  Cassius made killing Caesar seem like the right thing to do to Brutus, and if Brutus would have allowed his own emotions to come out and help, which he didn’t believe in doing, he could have seen through Cassius’s plan and probably wouldn’t have killed Caesar.  But by giving up his own strengths to Cassius, Brutus became an average person who was then unable to justify the killing of another human-being.  He is still called noble because he did everything right (meaning he kept his reasons to only what Rome would have wanted and needed), he just wasn’t extraordinary anymore. 

Brutus is a good show of someone who goes too far, and yet I can’t call him the villain anymore.  He did the wrong thing for the right reason, but in the end, he could have avoided it all.

I know a lot of that was just repetitive, but I needed to clarify all of that for myself.  That really is the main purpose of this anyways, right?  For me to formulate my ideas and go into details the things I learn on my way?  Well, I think it is, so you all will just have to deal!

Alright, now I’m done…hopefully…