{"id":23982,"date":"2012-12-25T20:13:25","date_gmt":"2012-12-26T04:13:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=23982"},"modified":"2012-12-27T11:26:41","modified_gmt":"2012-12-27T19:26:41","slug":"life-of-pi-ang-lee-2012-usachina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=23982","title":{"rendered":"Life of Pi (Ang Lee, 2012): USA\/China"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy<\/a>.\u00a0 Viewed at Camino Real, Goleta, CA.<\/p>\n

\"\"\u00a0In order to acquire a clean soul, Piscine Patel was named after a beautiful clear-water swimming pool in France – the Piscine Molitor.\u00a0 His earnestness in\u00a0finding spiritual\u00a0meaning in all things, leads him on a voyage of the sea and of the soul in Life of Pi<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

After frequent\u00a0teasing by his\u00a0schoolmates in Pondicherry, India, “Pissing Patel,” alters his name to that of the mathematical symbol Pi.\u00a0 At sixteen Pi (Suraj Sharma) and his family say goodbye to India, in search of better opportunities for the family’s wild animal business, and must\u00a0journey by cargo ship, heading to\u00a0North America with their animals in tow.<\/p>\n

In the middle of the Pacific Ocean\u00a0somewhere near the Mariana Trench, a disastrous storm leaves Pi stranded in the middle of the ocean on a lifeboat, with a character named Richard Parker who constantly\u00a0attacks him, provokes him, and eventually tries to eat him!<\/p>\n

Richard Parker cares only about his own survival, while Pi is concerned about his own existence, as well as that of Richard Parker’s.\u00a0 Suffering seasickness, dehydration, starvation, and the loss of loved ones, Pi attempts to remain positive and active by creating a shelter, collecting rain water, and\u00a0implementing a make-shift\u00a0fishing net, all while keeping an open discourse with God and Richard Parker.<\/p>\n

When all of his supplies are washed out to sea, and he finds himself\u00a0on the brink of death,\u00a0Pi calls out to God in fear and anger, questioning why he has been abandoned.\u00a0 Finally relinquishing all, the skies suddenly clear and strange miracles begin to happen.<\/p>\n

Life of Pi<\/em> is told in retrospect by adult Pi (Irrfan Khan) to Canadian writer (Rafe Spall), and concurrently unfolds in real time with the younger Pi (Suraj Sharma).\u00a0 With a recurring theme of confronting one’s fears – Pi has two choices, he can succumb to his fears or choose to overcome them.<\/p>\n

Pi begins to experience beauty in simple things, and\u00a0acquires a simplistic appreciation of everyday life.<\/p>\n

Life of Pi <\/em>is inspirational, humorous and the most visually stunning film I’ve ever seen (sans 3D).\u00a0 Unlike other films with superior graphics created just for the sake of visuals, this film relies on the writing to enhance the visuals, rather than the other way around – the visuals are enhanced as Pi’s appreciation grows.\u00a0 An all around superior film, and my vote for Best Picture of the year.<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy.\u00a0 Viewed at Camino Real, Goleta, CA. \u00a0In order to acquire a clean soul, Piscine Patel was named after a beautiful clear-water swimming pool in France – the Piscine Molitor.\u00a0 His earnestness in\u00a0finding spiritual\u00a0meaning in all things, leads him on a voyage of the sea and of the soul in Life of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23982\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}