The Movie “Tree Of Life”

With the summer movie season now here, you will be seeing previews for a lot of big-budget blockbusters. But you will also be seeing previews and reading reviews for the movies that appeal to the “other” crowd of moviegoers, the crowd for whom the November/December movie season of “Academy Awards contenders” is the best movie time of the year. And if you have been keeping a close eye on the movie buzz lately, you have probably come across a lot of material on Tree of Life.  This new Terrance Malick film that stars Brad Pitt and Sean Penn, and that won the prestigious Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, if you have heard of this movie and are interested in seeing it, here are a few things you should know about the movie first! 

First of all, you need to know that this movie will still be talked about twenty and thirty years from now. However, at this moment, there is no way to tell whether this movie will be viewed in the future as a groundbreaking game-changer, or as a thoroughly catastrophic experiment in moviemaking! 

You should be aware of the fact that the stars like Sean Penn does not get much screen time in the movie, and Brad Pitt while giving a tremendous acting performance has hardly any lines in the whole movie. So if you are attracted to this movie because of the names it boasts, you might be disappointed.

You should go to this movie expecting an original, unusual, and sometimes frustrating cinematic experience; as long as you go into the movie knowing that it is a thoroughly unconventional adventure in film-making, you will be far less likely to leave the movie frustrated as many others already have and will be able to appreciate the movie for what it is. After all, the critics all love it and most audiences hate it. Otherwise, the movie is worth seeing so that you can see what side you are on, and so that you can say twenty or thirty years from now that you saw the movie when it first came out.

Horror Classics 50 Movie Pack Collection 

1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die: 5th Anniversary Edition 

Tangled
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Kurt Vonnegut’s Best Seller “Slaughterhouse-Five”

If you are one who enjoys exploring activities that increase your ability for thought at the same time, you are probably always on the lookout for good books. You are completely happy as long as it is well-written, entertaining, and informative  no matter if it is fiction, non-fiction, instructional, or historical. One book that fits all three of these categories is Kurt Vonnegut’s fiction masterpiece, “Slaughterhouse-Five,” which was first published in 1969. 

“Slaughterhouse Five” was Kurt Vonnegut’s sixth published novel, and it was also the most notable work written by this author, who is one of the greatest purveyors of dark humor in the history of American literature. Vonnegut worked on this novel for years before finally “getting it right” a struggle that is understandable, given the subject matter. 

Kurt Vonnegut was a prisoner of war during World War II, and along with many other prisoners of war he was sent to Dresden, Germany by the Germans. Although Dresden was set aside as a “non combat” zone, the city was fire-bombed shortly after Vonnegut and the other POWs arrived, and during this fire-bombing, over 135,000 people were killed, even more than the number killed in Hiroshima or Nagasaki. The only reason that he and his fellow prisoners of war survived the fire-bombing was by hiding in an underground slaughterhouse – “Slaughterhouse-Five”. 

For many years, Vonnegut talked to people about the “famous Dresden book” he planned to write, but he was unable to decide on the proper approach. Finally, Vonnegut settled on the same approach he took with all his books mixing humor and absurdity with dark and heavy subject matters. Vonnegut’s main character in this book is a fictional man who was in the same group of prisoners Vonnegut was in. And throughout this book, we see the war through this man’s eyes, and we see the fire-bombing of Dresden through this man’s eyes, and we quite possibly see this man going crazy! 

This book is considered to be one of the most important works of fiction in American literature, and it manages to entertain the reader while also exploring poignant ideas, insights, and knowledge. “Slaughterhouse-Five” might be just the book you are seeking if you wantto find a good book that will entertain you while also being enlightening.

Choose Your Battles In Conflict Resolution

When it comes to settling conflict in the home or in the workplace, it is important to do so in the least-unfriendly manner possible. Anyone who is hoping to become better at conflict resolution can take tips and advice from lots of places, but no matter where you learn from, it is important that you learn to choose your battles. Whether you are a coach, an athlete, a boss, an employee, a coworker, a student, a teacher,  a parent, a sibling, or a son or daughter, it is important to know both how to resolve conflicts when it is necessary to do so and how to walk away from conflicts when it is not necessary to resolve them. 

One of the first steps in learning to choose your battles is learning to recognize that it is not always essential for everyone else to feel that you are right. Many people struggle with this aspect of conflict resolution, as they feel that it is up to them to enlighten everyone else. Many times, you may be absolutely right about something – and someone else may be absolutely wrong – but the situation will not necessitate you letting this person know. Some examples of this are a person getting the facts wrong while telling an inessential story or taking a wrong approach to a project of their own. Whatever it is, recognizing that it is not always your place to correct someone else will go a long way in helping you avoid conflict to begin with. 

Contemporary Conflict Resolution, 2nd edition

You should also begin to make an effort to recognize that other people are not always in the wrong just because they are doing something that annoys you. It will help you keep things in perspective when you recognize that you are probably doing things that annoy the other person as well! After all, human beings are all different in small and large ways, and this does not mean that the differences indicate someone is doing something wrong. It is not up to you to force everyone else to conform to your ways; it is only up to you to learn to pick your battles! 

Overcome Control Conflict and Conflict Resolution are a couple of great resources if you want to learn more about mastering conflict resolution.