Impaired watching: or are the Avengers really Spinning in my bedroom?
On Thursday morning as I am doing my naked yoga on the floor I get this weird rolling sensation in my head, and it freaks me the f*#k out. I try to calm down, though the medicine I’m taking for anxiety also is actually making it worse right now. I call the doctors to set up an appointment as soon as possible. They have an opening in a few hours…So I have to wait….I don’t know about you but having a weird rolling sensation in my head, thinking that I’m going to die, is not conducive to sitting still…I hang up the phone and try to breathe, staring off into the distance, deep inside my head where I think obsessively. But then it occurred to me….I should re-watch The Avengers. I looked at my phone to check the time, and sure enough I had about two and a half hours before my appointment. A distraction, and indeed a perfect distraction it turned out to be. The second time through this movie I noticed there were a number of interestingly homoerotic fight scenes that I didn’t catch before. And these scenes are fairly lengthy: very attractive men fighting each other for a long time….No objections. I can see the appeal. Action packed explosions, and car chases, created an extremely visually stimulating experience. I found it easy to get lost in the spectacle (as my Theatre History teacher would say) and care less about the plot. Before I knew it weird Robot Aliens were descending from the sky in New York, and RDJr was intercepting a nuclear missle, sacrificing himself as he flies out of the Atmosphere with it to presumably blow up the (‘bad people”?) Regardless, he falls back into the atmosphere in perfect synchronicity with the closing of the wormhole. He lives!
It is fun all seeing these characters come together like this. I’m definitely feeling like an insider now..Oh, and Mark Ruffalo was really terrific! His austere and simple demeanor enhanced the dichotomy between Dr. Bruce Banner vs. The Other Guy, as he’s commonly referred. But he does make some references that because I failed to watch The Incredible Hulk, went over my head….So I guess I need to go back and watch it…..
My doctor’s appointments always make me nervous… and whatever drug I’m on for anxiety isn’t really helping yet. Turns out I have what’s called Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo. Which basically means crystals have broken off in my ear and lie to my brain about my current relationship to gravity. In order to help me not feel motion sickness and this weird creepy electrical sensation I have to bang my head against the bed back and forth 10 times with 30 seconds between each movement. FUUUUUUN. But at least I know what it is. I woke up Friday morning banged my head appropriately, a typical normal morning ritual, and began making breakfast. Today was the day I was going to watch The Incredible Hulk….Yep…I’m still doing this project. I feel like I gathered more in the Title sequence than the whole movie. It was actually quite impressive. By the time the movie started I was a little thrown off with the demure behavior of our lead character Bruce Banner aka Ed Norton. On the contrary, Liv Tyler seems very committed to her role and sometimes it almost feels like she is in another whole other movie altogether. A great performance none the less. The common theme of man with superpowers vs. man with manufactured similar super powers comes up again. It definitely stands out in the Marvel Universe in that the whole energy seems less positive and kitschy and more somber and bizarrely tragic. New York never fails to take the biggest beating either in this movie, which I’m understanding to be a prerequisite for this universe. I am having a hard time watching this because of my aforementioned relationship with someone in the cast or crew. Also, I want to be honest but find it hard in this day of social media….so with all due respect, please overlook my lie when I say this movie was really good.