Aliens

The Night I Was Serenaded By Space Aliens!

Yeah, Another Blogger84 Comments

The other day I was gearing up to republish one of my early stories, those poor neglected souls that are buried in the WordPress catacombs, though I hadn’t chosen my victim yet. After all, I thought, wouldn’t it be right to give new life to an essay that almost nobody read when it came out in 2015? Why, back then my blog had fewer readers than Donald Trump has good qualities.

But then I pondered the situation a bit more and said to myself, “nah!” I mean, I don’t really want to read any of that moldering stuff either, so I’m going to spare you. Therefore it is time for me to regroup and write another chunk of new material. But what? Oh well, I’ve been putting it off long enough. I’ve always figured that nobody would believe me (not even my wife Sandy), and that I’d be labeled a kook (just like the other people who’ve gone public with stories almost identical to the one I’m about to tell). But I’m pretty sure I don’t care about that anymore. Sandy and everyone else, hold onto your hats or whatever the hell you want to hold onto. I swear upon my dead goldfish’s body that every word I’m about to type is true. What follows are my recollections of the night I was serenaded by space aliens!

Photo credit: The Virgin Group

It was a dark and stormy night. Damn straight it was. Exhausted, I crept into bed at 12:45 AM, about half an hour earlier than usual, and within seconds was sound asleep. Sandy, even more pooped than me, had conked out at 12:15. That’s what dark and stormy nights will do to you. October 25, 2012, my 65th birthday, was off to a very inauspicious start.

I’d been in dreamland for no more than 40 minutes when I felt a tapping on my shoulder. “What’s wrong, Sandy?” I yelled, shocked out of my deep slumber. But nothing was wrong with Sandy, who continued to sleep the sleep of babies. That’s when I saw a hazy ball of pale green light hovering one foot above me. A thick and long projection, aglow in muted yellow, extended from the ball’s core. The projection, a finger to end all fingers, jabbed me in the shoulder good and hard.

“Yo, nitwit, don’t fall back asleep unless you’d like me to slap you real profoundly upside your head. I’ve come a long way to meet with you, so get out of bed, put some clothes on, grab your house keys and follow me. A surprise awaits you,” the aura said. It’s true that I’m pretty much a nitwit, but despite that I know that in certain circumstances it behooves one to follow orders.

“How’d you get in here?” I managed to ask the aura as we went down the stairs, summoning up an iota of courage from I know not where. “And how come you speak English? Are you of Anglo-Saxon descent?”

The aura stopped moving and looked at me, so to speak, straight in the eyes. “Listen,” it said, “I’d have found a way into your house under any circumstances. But you made it easy for me. You left your front door unlocked, genius! And why do I speak English? I am fluent in every language spoken throughout the universe, of which there are millions. I am not your average Joe. And speaking of Joe, my true name would be unpronounceable for you, so Joe is what I want you to call me. Kapeesh?”

“Yes sir, I mean Joe,” I said.

“Okay, Neil, let’s get going again.” Naturally, Joe knew my name.

Moments later we were outside. I locked the front door and followed Joe, who floated through the air very purposefully, to my backyard. Plunk in its middle sat a sleek round vehicle, maybe 20 feet in diameter and gleaming in what little light penetrated the sky’s turbulent clouds. I was getting pounded by rain. With his sturdy finger Joe opened the spacecraft’s door and waited for me to enter. He then floated inside and closed the door. Joe’s dim glow wasn’t enough for me to make out distinct details of the interior, but I recognized the shapes of a table and several chairs. Even an aura needs to sit, or shall we say rest upon something now and then, I surmised. And a table comes in handy almost anywhere, don’t you think?

In any event, the main things going on involved my heart, which was beating at a faster pace than it ever had, and the state of my bowels, which were poised to soil my pants. What was in store for me? Was this the end?

“Joe,” I said, “give me a break. I’m not too bad a guy. After all, I’m doing my bit to keep print publications alive by subscribing to half a dozen of them. And I helped an old lady cross the street not too long ago. Well, come to think of it, that was last year. But you get the idea.”

Joe ignored my comments. “Sit down, Neil,” he said brusquely. He then reduced the volume of his illumination, lowering it more and more till he was invisible to me. The end, I was certain, was only seconds away. Probably Joe’s versatile finger would be involved in my demise.

Next thing I knew, though, the ship’s interior began to brighten. Within moments Joe was shining like a 150-watt bulb. And Joe wasn’t alone. No, beside him another aura had appeared, and its luminance was the equal of his.

“Neil, I would like you to meet . . . wait, pronouncing her name is beyond human capabilities. You shall call her Jane.” From Jane’s mauve core a baby blue projection, as firm and lengthy as Joe’s, emerged. It reached out to me, gently brushing my forehead. I liked that.

“Hello, Neil,” Jane said.

“Jane, I’m honored,” I gulped.

Jane continued to rub my forehead as she settled into a chair next to mine. Joe sat opposite me, waiting for Jane to speak again.

“Neil, it is for a very good reason that Joe and I have traveled the spaceways to make your acquaintance,” Jane began. “We are cosmic ambassadors of good will and visit your small planet every day, quietly and efficiently, from our home many light years away. Back and forth, back and forth. That’s what we do. And each visit is on the occasion of a special someone’s 65th birthday, a day on which many humans need some cheering up. I say special only in an affectionate sense, of course. I’m not implying that there is anything particularly special about you. And here’s why we are crossing paths: On December 31, 2011 Joe and I threw into a humongous hat the names of every person on Earth who would turn 65 in 2012. We drew names until we had one for each date of the year. Neil, you are the selectee for October 25.”

“Yes, you now are officially old, Neil, but we are here to tell you that you shouldn’t feel blue about that,” Jane continued. “Countless millions of humans are on the same rung of the age ladder as you, or above, so take comfort in their company. What’s more, there might be many more years of good life ahead of you. And if not, well, your journey will have been a fulfilling one when it reaches its conclusion, n’est-ce pas?”

And with that Jane and Joe shoved their remarkable fingers beneath the table and lifted up a chocolate birthday cake. Happy Birthday, Big Guy! it read. Sixty-six unlit candles, one of them for good luck, covered the cake’s surface. Jane aimed her finger at the candles and they instantly ignited, just as I knew they would. As I blew the candles out, Joe and Jane serenaded me with the Happy Birthday song. And I soon joined in. Our three-part harmonies were majestic, reaching the ethers.

“Neil, I want to apologize for the way I acted towards you before,” Joe said after the song was sung, shoveling chocolate cake into his core. “I’m kind of testy, on edge. This Earthly assignment is getting to me. Jane and I have been doing this gig for, what, 100 years? I can’t begin to tell you how f*cking sick I am of the Happy Birthday song. Shit, if my planet had a retirement system I’d be first in line to sign up. Ah, what’s the use? It’s been a pleasure, pardner. Adios.” He opened his ship’s door and out I went.

A few minutes later, stuffed with cake, I was back in bed. Joe and Jane silently had lifted off from my backyard, their ship disappearing from sight in less than a nanosecond. Never again, I’m certain, will I see them.

Nearly six years have elapsed since my 65th spin around the Sun. I think about Joe and Jane every day. And I take delight in the knowledge that studied opinions and from-the-heart outpourings, uplifting or not, can arrive from outer space.

 

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Arrival, Moonlight, The Edge Of Seventeen: Three Movies Face The Jury

Yeah, Another Blogger26 Comments

Film commentary used to be a big part of the publication that you presently are gazing upon. Which is why I’m on my bended knees right now, begging the movie goddesses and gods to forgive me for not seriously evaluating any cinematic creations in oh so long a time. A quick look tells me that it has been three months since I last delved deeply into any. Three months? Man, hundreds of movies have been released in that time. And I’ve taken in a fair number of them, 20 or so. It’s not that I didn’t want to spin a review or two or three. I did. But, being a dumb f**k who seems to be getting dumber by the day, I couldn’t figure out anything meaty or nifty to say about most of the fare. Or figure out their plots half the time either, to be embarrassingly honest. Hey, not all of us are destined to inherit the mantles of Pauline Kael and Roger Ebert.

So far today, though, my dimness factor has not been deplorable. I therefore have decided to share some thoughts and observations about three movies that my wife Sandy and I caught on big screens recently: Arrival, Moonlight, and The Edge Of Seventeen. Here we go.

Two of these three films, Moonlight and The Edge Of Seventeen, are lovingly-crafted and expertly-scripted examinations of the human condition. (Arrival is a different animal altogether, one to which lovingly-crafted possibly applies, but expertly-scripted doesn’t). They are coming of age stories that couldn’t be more different in their feels and approaches. The former, an engrossing downer that places a magnifying glass over the marginalized side of American society, is relentlessly gritty and roiling. The latter, on the other hand, is buoyant and breezy. It’s full of yuks and carries a smart, sarcastic swagger, yet is kept real by swift undercurrents of unease. Each in its own way rocks.

moonlight_2016_filmMoonlight, which unfolds in three separate segments, follows Chiron, a neglected and insufficiently loved gay black male, from his preteen years through his mid 20s. Life never is easy or a comforting experience for Chiron (played expertly, in chronological order, by Alex Hibbert, Ashton Sanders and Trevante Rhodes), who is raised in poverty by a cocaine-addicted mother who loves her son but maybe loves her drugs as much or more. Compared to Chiron, pretty much any of us who thinks he/she has problems should think again. Just the basics, such as finding food and shelter, are frequent challenges for Chiron, whose less-than-wordy personality is a result of the many stones that life tosses at him. Never has he been bolstered by more than a couple of willing and able supporters. And, on top of all of that, his homosexuality confuses and frightens him. He’s uncomfortable in his own skin.

img_1266The environment presented in The Edge Of Seventeen is a far more materially comfortable one than that displayed in Moonlight, but that doesn’t mean that life is splendidly manageable for the film’s protagonist, Nadine (Hailee Steinfeld). It isn’t, not by a long shot, though Nadine’s woes, compared to Chiron’s, look like nothing more than toe bruises. Nadine, a high school junior who has struggled all her days to locate self-confidence and to forge friendships, is a funny wise-cracker. She also spends a lot of time being sad, letting the slings and arrows get to her. She’s on the verge of what? Not quite despair, but something close to that. Most fortuitously for Nadine, familial and social support systems, and opportunities, are at hand, as might be expected for a middle-class white girl living in a well-stocked house with a mother and brother of good quality, and attending a good school. It’s a question of how, or if, she’ll take advantage of what’s around her.

img_1265Do Moonlight and The Edge Of Seventeen, as different as they are, have anything in common? I think so. A two-pronged theme that runs through both is human connections, and the lack thereof. Chiron and Nadine do not find it easy to locate the pathways that might bond them with others. They are hungry to connect, but their internal mechanisms (not to overlook outside forces, especially in Chiron’s case) get in the way. But they try. And they become better at the game as time goes on.

I’ll say little more about these two films, as I’m usually reluctant to provide data in quantities that might spoil another’s movie-going experiences. What I will mention is that the acting in both is excellent all around. Besides the leads in each movie, a tip of the hat to Mahershala Ali, whose portrayal of a very decent-hearted drug dealer who partially rescues Chiron from a totally disastrous existence, is heartbreakingly fine. Likewise to Woody Harrelson. He shines as a teacher who feels, really feels, in a most understatedly wry yet wise way for Nadine and her plight.

Connections, to my mind, is also a formidable motif running through Arrival. I’m not fully confident saying this, though, because what in the world Arrival actually is all about is significantly beyond me. And, I might add, beyond four or five other reviewers whose analyses I’ve looked at. Nevertheless, a few of those reviewers pretty much swooned over Arrival. How do you swoon over something that leaves you puzzled? Beats me. I guess that the movie’s atmospherics and high aims were enough to please them.

img_1298Anyway, Arrival is a sci-fier that definitely wants you to put on your thinking cap. Good luck with that, as I just mentioned. It is a present day aliens-visit-Earth affair. The aliens land simultaneously at 12 locations around the globe in sleek vehicles, two creatures per craft. (Spoiler alert, of sorts. I’m about to spill more beans than I did with Moonlight and The Edge Of Seventeen). They don’t speak any human languages, not unexpectedly, though it sure would have been keen if they did. But they do grunt and bellow in their own tongue. Unfortunately, what those noises mean no human ever figures out. But all is not lost, as they also have a written language, one composed of ink-blotty symbols. And — eureka! — eventually a couple of real smart humans decipher it, taking alien–human connections to a better level.

The visitors, super-giant octapi types that never leave their space ships, in my opinion don’t explain all too well (after the point in which their ink blots become understood) why they landed on our orb in the first place. That’s a big gripe that I have with the movie. Explain to whom, you ask? Why, to Louise Banks (Amy Adams), a linguistics expert and one of the aforementioned real smart humans. Upon the aliens’ arrival, Louise had been hauled out to meet and greet two of the huge beings, at their States-side landing site, by a befuddled and nervous U.S. military. Somehow, if I’m not mistaken (and I could be), the aliens knew in advance that they would hook up with Louise, clairvoyantly understanding that Louise is just what the world needs to help reduce high-running tensions among nations. To bring the world closer together, in other words. She’s a connector, see? Yup, the long-limbed animals are promoters and harbingers of peace, and real heroes, in my iffy interpretation of things.

There’s an unusual misty and mystical charm to Arrival that you won’t encounter every day. That’s a good thing. And a reason to check it out. There also are too many scenes loaded with clichéd actions and reactions, and dialog that frequently clunks heavily. If your movie-going time is limited, my suggestion is to put Arrival on the back burner. It’s a different story for Moonlight and The Edge Of Seventeen, though. Those you won’t want to miss. They are primo.

 

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