family

T-Minus 287 Days OR 6888 Hours OR 413291 Minutes OR 24797452 Seconds (Weddings)

Posted on by Tim Kuefler

At the time of writing this post it is less then ten months until I get married to my fiancee Mysticque Moore. I’m living in that space between potential and reality, what will be and what already is, and for the first time in my life, I’m not really wondering about how things are going to play out.

I know it will be a good day. We’re going to have a practical wedding.

A beautiful and blushing wedding. A beloved wedding. A unique and individual wedding. A story book wedding. A traditional wedding. A masculine wedding. A feminine wedding. An authentic wedding. A glamorous wedding. A momentous wedding. A lovely wedding. A rock ‘n roll wedding. An intimate wedding.

But most importantly, it will be our wedding. And whether all of that hyperbole comes true or not, I wouldn’t want to have anyone else by my side.

You see, dear readers, movies and television make wedding planning seem entirely more hectic and also less hectic then it actually is. Whatever the hell that means. And no, wedding planning, like anything else in life, is not a series of moments strung together in a magical way and which leave you feeling glossy all over. Wedding planning is work and it takes time, but it’s also wonderfully straightforward. Every time you complete one task, there is yet another one to work on. At first this bothered me, but I had an epiphany the other day.

Because I’m working house renos, revitalizing my team at work, and investing more time into timotheories, I’m just busier then I have been in the past. Being tired isn’t an excuse to be in a bad mood though, so whatever I can do to stay positive is essential.

Earlier that day, I was feeling fairly tired. Especially after work; but I was also excited to see Miguel and Mysticque. So I headed right over to her house, and then I quickly found out that she had a hard day too, and was tired as well. On top of that, Miguel wasn’t feeling very good about some classmates and he was restless. We had dinner and sat down for some family time, but because they were both on edge, and I was tired, it didn’t take much for frustrations to come out.

I’ll admit that I was part of the problem, but the bigger lesson I learnt was that much like wedding planning, life is nowhere near as hectic nor as simple as entertainers make it out to be. I should always strive to do what I can, but more importantly I can control my attitude, I cannot control others. Wedding planning is just a lot more decisions being made at a higher pace then normal life, once it’s over, if you look back on it, it’s better to have fond memories then bad ones.

timotheories Summarized

And so I leave you with this theory creative cuties. Treat your daily life exactly like planning a wedding, make decisions, plan the best you can, expect things won’t go according to plan, and most importantly enjoy yourself during the process.

Because once that time has past, you’ll be left with two realities. Either you look back fondly on the planning or with regret about how you behaved during the process. That, and your partner wants you to enjoy yourself too.

Tim!

Film Franchises Are Great, But Can We Please Stop The Fanboy Fights? (Cross Talk Ep. 29)

Posted on by Tim Kuefler

I just came back from a fantastic date at the theatre – Star Wars Episode VIII was on the menu today; it was an early Christmas gift from my fiancee. Sweet deal right?

As you may know by now, I love movies, and this was an ideal way for Mysticque and I to spend some time together, with one of my favourite activities, and then bask in some post-film analysis. She SO gets me on a personal level, and I’m super excited to share this passion with her and our family, especially as Miguel grows up, and as we add onto our little tribe – family time is important to me.

This is why of the many reasons why The Fast and the Furious franchise stands out in my mind as an excellent piece of film, worthy of your attention, admiration, and love. But this is not a post or a video about that love, rather it’s a plea to the general populous. Please stop hating on other peoples spirit movies.

Chris channels Star Trek and Friday The 13th on a regular basis, Mike loves him some John Wick (more than anyone I’ve ever met), and I can’t help but carry the torch for Star Wars, Marvel, and my BFF – The Fast and the Furious franchise. Chris also wanted to let me know that he loves Star Wars, much to the chagrin of Fanboys out there – contrarian to what pop culture and water cooler etiquette teaches us.

But didn’t Yoda teach us why fear is such a bad thing already? We fear what we don’t understand, but if we could have a little empathy for The Hunger Games, Fifty Shades of Grey and Harry Potter, maybe we’d all be a little bit more settled… Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. Yeah I have Star Wars on the brain, and no, I’m not going to spoil The Last Jedi for you. We should have all learned that lesson from episode 28 of Cross Talk.

Franchise wars are a very real thing, but that doesn’t mean we can’t hold hands and try to love one another better. This episode of Cross Talk is a thorough discussion on the matter and all three of us gents have some excellent points to make on the topic.

And yeah… I totally flubbed on the title shown in the video, but I’ll correct it soon. I promise – I’m not at my house this evening, where all of the files are stored on my computer. Please just enjoy that small error, knowing I’m human too, and consider that I was so excited to get this video out to you, that I decided to bite the bullet and edit as soon as possible.

With all of that shared… tell us what your opinions are on the ongoing challenges of film franchise wars! We love comments. And shares! And subscribers! No more theories for today friends, but come back y’all and we’ll give you something in the way of an album review tomorrow.

Tim!

And He Kept On Preaching In The Synagogues (JAY-Z, 4:44 review)

Posted on by Tim Kuefler

If I owned a sports bar, clothing line, sports agency, and multi-millions in real estate and art investments, people would probably come running to hear me too.

 

JAY-Z – 4:44

released Jun 30, 2017
********** 10/10

Sean Corey Carter, bettter known by his stage name JAY-Z, which has also been written as Jay-Z, Jay Z, Jay:Z and Jaÿ-ZJay-Z, Jay Z, Jay:Z and Jaÿ-Z, is an American rapper and businessman. Or should I say, business, man? As it says directly on the album cover, this is his thirteenth studio album, and it’s probably one of this most mature efforts yet.

I mean yeah, Reasonable Doubt was groundbreaking, and The Blueprint a masterpiece, while The Black Album made us miss him, but 4:44 is his apologetic letter for being an asshole, and man does it sing with sincerity and truth. It’s personal, poetic, and poised to take the place of top hip hop record of the year, ironic given that his wife had a top charting album last year. JAY-Z is a legend, and 4:44 is his opportunity to put together an album for him. This is not a cool album, trying to keep up with current day hip hop, there are no singles here. If anything, it sounds like it was put together quickly and abruptly.

So yeah, this is and isn’t a response to Lemonade. It’s more about us getting to see JAY-Z as a fallible human. He raps about being black and racial inequalities, infidelity, his daughter, politics, his personal wealth, and a total dismissal of his ego. It’s fucking brilliant.

But it’s not for your average fan, it’s for those who appreciate his legacy and understand who he is and what he has done for the game.

Kill Jay-Z is a direct reference to the time that Solange Knowles attacked him in an elevator, and it brings up the degradation of his friendship with Kanye West. Also he apologizes for the first time officially to Beyonce, confirming that Lemonade is a true account. He later does that and more on title track 4:44, especially apologizing to all of the women in his life that he has played.

One of my favourites songs is The Stoy of O.J. and it features my favourite line of the album too. This comes when Hova raps “I’m not black, I’m OJ….OK” that sarcasm is a beautiful aftertaste to the cutting wine it was served with. But it’s not like Jay hasn’t rapped about his financial freedom before, nor the fact that black people won’t have security until they understand how Jewish people get rich off of credit. A bold statement within a real album.

Smile is another essential track about his mother Gloria Carter, who outs herself as a lesbian, but JAY-Z lovers her all the more, and encourages all of us to love who we love because life is ever-changing.

We get to see the classic dissing raps of older Jay on Caught Their Eyes and  Marcy Me, going after Prince’s Estate on the first of these two tracks, respectively. Or should I say disrespectively?

Of course the middle of the record also features Family Feud which is a gold mine of lyrics and beats from the heart. It addresses the old schools and new of hip hop, with Jay-Z proving that he has still got it, after all, on track closer, Legacy, he proves family extends to all black people. He wants to leave something meaningful behind in his business work.

Pros: Absolutely essential tracks to this record are The Story of O.J., Smile, and Family Feud. But every song has an element of sincerity to it, making this the most intimate JAY-Z album to-date.

Cons: It’s somewhat awkward to listen to Bam and Caught Their Eyes, they aren’t the most flow friendly tracks. Also that awkward hook on Moonlight about the La La Land fiasco. Seriously?

Runtime: 36 minutes

Points of Interest: Featuring appearances from his daughter Blue Ivy, his mother Gloria Carter, Frank Ocean, The-Dream, and wife Beyonce, this stripped down album has a certain vulnerability to it which we’ve never seen before.

As I mentioned before, this is not your latest and greatest clubbing hip hop record. It is chock full of thoughtful and revealing songs, and deserves the attention of an alumni of JAY-Z’s work. To say that he is the greatest rapper of all time isn’t that big of a boast – the confessional nature of this record solidifies his reputation.

theories Summarized

If it hasn’t been made clear for you just yet, JAY-Z is a business, man. Him and Diddy are almost tied for the most financial successful rappers of all time . But that’s not what this album is about. It’s a testimonial to his screwups, him owning his coldness, and settling into middle age. Hova has worked with so many different arists over the years, but I find it fitting to mention his 2004 collaboration with Linkin Park before I close this post off. RIP Chester Bennington. Jazzy will hold it down for you from here on out.

Tim!

Too Old To Be A Kid, Too Young To Be A Man (A Monster Calls review)

Posted on by Tim Kuefler

Why is the stories from our youth always seem to have the most impact on us as adults? They leave a legacy all their own and one which compounds over and over again, creating ripples in the lives of those around us.

 

A Monster Calls (2016)

Cast: Lewis MacDougall, Sigourney Weaver, Felicity Jones, Toby Kebbell, Liam Neeson, James Melville
Director: J.A. Bayona
released on blu-ray March 28, 2017
********* 9/10

IMDB: 8.0
Rotten Tomatoes: 82%, Audience Score 88%
The Guardian: ****/*****

Juan Antonio García Bayona, better known as J. A. Bayona, is a Spanish film director. He is the guy responsible for The Orphanage, The Impossible, and now A Monster Calls. Which should probably have been called The Monster. Just saying. Anyway, he is now set to direct the fifth instalment of the Jurassic Park film series, Jurassic World II.

Bayona is now going three for three, so I’d say it’s a safe bet that this is a heartfelt and glowing review. Just look at the plot, if you don’t believe me. Taken from Wikipedia…

Young Conor O’Malley (Lewis MacDougall) must face his mother’s (Felicity Jones) terminal cancer, his strict grandmother (Sigourney Weaver), his estranged father (Toby Kebbell), and his school bully, Harry (James Melville). One night at 12:07 a.m., Conor encounters the tree-like Monster (Liam Neeson), who tells Conor it has come to relate three true stories, after which Conor will tell the Monster his own story, the truth behind his nightmare. They continue to meet at 12:07 to tell the stories.

First story

An old king who has lost his entire family, save a young grandson, remarries a beautiful young woman. He dies before the prince comes of age, and many believe the queen poisoned the king. Not wanting to hand the kingdom over to the prince in a year, she plots to marry the prince and remain queen. The prince runs away with a farm girl he loves. They stop and sleep under a yew tree (the Monster), but in the morning he finds the young woman murdered. The prince tells the villagers that the queen, a witch, must have done it, and they rally to overthrow her. The monster awakes and joins the mob. Before the commoners can reach the queen, the Monster carries her away to a far-off land where she lives out the rest of her life in peace. Though she was indeed a witch, she did not kill the young woman or the king. The prince had murdered the young woman in order to inspire his people to back him into overthrowing the queen.

Second story

An apothecary follows old traditions and beliefs, using herbs and brews to cure ailments. His business becomes less popular as a local parson tells his congregation not to accept the apothecary’s old ways. When the parson’s two daughters become sick, the parson asks the apothecary to save their lives after all other resources are exhausted. When the apothecary asks why he should help a man who has turned people away from his skills and denied him the yew tree, his best source of healing ingredients, the parson promises to give him the tree and deliver the parishioners to him as customers. Yet the apothecary says that he cannot help, and the girls die. The Monster awakens from the yew tree to destroy the parson’s house and raze it to the ground as punishment.

While the apothecary was a greedy man, he was a healer and would have saved lives, including the girls’, if the parson had allowed him his way of life. The parson was a man of belief, but was willing to discard his beliefs when they were in the way. The healing traditions followed by the apothecary require belief in order to work; without the parson’s, the apothecary was unable to treat the two girls. Belief is half the cure.

Third story

A man was invisible because no one ever saw him. Tired of this, he summoned the Monster to ensure people would take notice.

Fourth story

Conor must confront his nightmare to tell the fourth story. His mother has been pulled to the edge of a cliff by a sudden collapse of the ground, and Conor must hold her hand to save her from falling. Eventually, his grip fails and his mother falls. The Monster forces Conor to confess the truth: Conor loosened his grip on purpose. While he could have held on longer, he let go in order to stop the pain of having to hold on. Conor ultimately understands the complexities of human beings, and that though he doesn’t want his mother to die, he understands it is inevitable and something he must accept, and that he wants the experience to be over.

After this, Connor returns, with the Monster by his side, to comfort his mother one last time, and she dies at 12:07. He returns home with his grandmother, who becomes caring towards him and gives Conor a room of his own, a room that used to be his mother’s. In the room he finds his mother’s old art book, which depicts the characters of the stories that have been told by the Monster, and a drawing of his mother as a child with the Monster.

Sad, thoughtful, and penetrating, A Monster Calls tells a story that we can all relate to, or at the very least, one which means something for the kid in all of us. I don’t know about you, but films which feature the loss of a parent always get me tearing up, but whether that is true for you or not, I can say with damn near perfect timing that Lewis MacDougall has the acting chops necessary to get you to feel the pain of bereavement. It simply is worthwhile.

Pros: The message is accessible, ushering away the monsters of youth with wonderment and fateful stories. Even the darkest moments of the film are made brighter by the authenticity of it’s narrative. Lewis MacDougall shines.

Cons: It can be a struggle to see Sigourney Weaver as a grandmother, and the bullies of the film feel more like pieces to be moved then real characterizations.

Runtime: 1 hour 48 minutes

Points of Interest: Liam Neeson appears as Conor’s grandfather in the photo of Conor’s mother as a little girl being carried by her father. The sixth time that Liam Neeson has voiced a CGI character –  three times as Aslan in the Chronicles of Narnia franchise, Phango in Khumba, and Good Cop/Bad Cop in The Lego Movie.

Too old to be a kid, too young to be a man. That’s how this films opens on the story of Conor, who is watching is mother die of a terminal illness. Where the fantasy intersects with reality is the beauty of this story, and it reminds me of the widely underrated film, Bridge to Terabithia, which also took advantage of childhood fantasy as a device for growing up amidst personal tragedy.

theories Summarized

The stories the Monster tells are really and truly for Conor’s sake, to aid him in his healing. It’s all beautiful and symbolic given that the Monster is a yew tree (known for it’s healing properties), while the Monster and the stories he tells are in fact derivative of Conor’s mothers own childhood drawings.

Most of all there is something moving in knowing that Conor doesn’t understand everything yet, and that might not ever, and the theory that monsters aren’t always what they seem.

Tim!

Meet the Family (Easter)

Posted on by Tim Kuefler

I’ve written about Easter traditions before AND even included some perspective as it relates to the history of the arts… but today I decided to write about Easter as an influencer on life. My life in particular.  Because I was born in the spring and Easter is a movable holiday, sometimes it falls before my birthday, sometimes it falls after, and very rarely it happens on my actual birthday (read: two times) and I suspect won’t happen again in my lifetime.

This is because according to Catholic traditions, Easter follows the first full moon of the vernal equinox. A pattern unbroken.

Certain events are like that though. Even though they don’t happen on the same day of the week each year, they happen on the same calendar month or in some fashion which guides their timing on a yearly basis.

Secondhand Firsts

But not this weekend.

This Easter season I’m visiting my girlfriends family for the first time. Yay! I’m supposed to meet a lot of the family all at once, cousins, aunts and uncles, and close family friends. But not her immediate family.

You see dear readers, my girlfriend is a planner with a system for introducing partners to her family. She does this because she has a young son and doesn’t want to create too many waves for him in her personal life. Now, as for meeting the whole family. My girlfriend had an unconventional childhood, because for most of her childhood, her parents didn’t raise her. Shock. Gasp. Well at least not ever at the same time, and it was not them alone that did it.

Mysticque was also predominantly raised by her aunt for quite a few years. And so her aunt has served as a surrogate mother along with her aunt’s three children who affectionately become her younger brother and two younger sisters.

No big deal right? I’ve meet parents before, and I’m a fairly charming, clean cut guy who likes to bring flowers, give a big greeting, and make a great first impression. In fact, I think it’s because I’m so secure in my own identity that I can assure the men in the room of my good intentions, plus I dress sharply and get to know the family, which goes over well with the female family members.

But I’m nervous, because I love her. I want to get along with them and make sure she gets the approval, because I know in my heart of hearts I’m going to be with her. And that’s the first time I’ve written that down, and shared it with world.

Whew.

timotheories Summarized

I think this is a good time to meet her family. Because Easter is supposed to represent a time of Christ’s rebirth, the time of my own birth, and a time to begin again. Cause you know sins are forgiven if we accept Jesus as our Saviour. I’ll just say for now that I’m glad that I met Mysticque Moore. I love her, and no it’s not theoretical – she’s the muse of my life.

Tim!