Nightmares Ahoy

So I decided against any and all of my better judgment to rent Hostel 2 to watch with some friends. Of course if I had to sit through this movie, I was not going to suffer through it alone. So three of us gathered at a friends apartment with the movie and some blankets and decided to watch it. We went and rented Hostel 2, Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Thank You for Smoking. We needed the last to counteract the formers. We never did get to Texas Chain Saw, instead we skipped right to Thank Y0u for Smoking.

This movie made me rethinking ever going backpacking through Europe as I had planned in a few years. Instead, I wanted to curl up under my covers and never come out. The main plot was that these kids that go and stay at a hostel get bid on and sold to be tortured and killed. Three girls wind up being bid on even though you are made to think there are four and eventually you find out one of the girl's love interests is the fourth.

The first girl is kidnapped by a man who she thinks likes her. She was Lily in the princess diaries movies and we called her that instead of her name in the movie. So Lily was killed first by hanging upside down and being slashed up by a scythe, then her throat was slit. The women that brought her was bathing in her blood while she was killing her "prize."

The next was the stereotypical blond. She always wore the short skirt and low cut top. She was taken by a guy who decided to saw her face in half. The guy did not finish because the saw had gotten stuck in her face. The man couldn't finish and was so upset with that happened, as the girl was still alive, that he left the room and didn't want to finish. However, no one can leave without killing someone, so when he got in the elevator to escape that set the dogs on him. So he died.

Another man got the last girl. He had her dressed up as his wife. Talk about solving your relationship problems. She however was just tortured a bit mentally before castrating the man and having him bleed to death while bargaining her way out. A long story short, a lot of people died, we saw someone getting eaten (like cutting off flesh and then eating it) and I almost threw up a dozen times. If I don't have to see another slasher movie, I think I would be perfectly happy.

Ghosts of Abu Ghraib

It has taken me almost a week to wrap my head around this movie. Immediately after the movie I had no idea what to think or what to say. Everyone noticed a change in me that night as I walked into my room not saying a word. Instead of speaking, I just put my things down silently and crawled into bed for about a half hour. I did have to get up to have dinner and meet with people but I wasn't very talkative.


With that being said, I havc not really gotten the movie out of my head as of yet. When a professor questioned how I liked the movie, I did not know how to respond. It was an interesting tale, was the first thing to come to mind, even though it barely touches the true impact it made upon me. I could not believe what I had seen or what I had heard. It was an insult to every Iraq person, actually it was an insult to any human being with emotions and some form of empathy. For the accused to try and justify their actions... it is beyond my comprehension to even begin to try to understand their motives. I just didn't understand, and that bothered me.

Sabrina Harmann: [holding a large photo of herself smiling with a "thumbs up" gesture in front of the face of a recently deceased prisoner in a body bag] We came to the prison and we were told that a prisoner just died. And he died of a heart attack in the shower and that was they weren't going to come pick him up right away because they didn't have any means and that he was in a body bag. So, of course, Sergeant Frederick and me, we like, OK, it's just a dead body right. He died of a heart attack. So we went in. I believe Corporal Grainer took the photo of me. It was just a dead guy. It was suppose to be just a dead guy. We didn't realize until after these photos that he was bleeding in places that you wouldn't bleed from getting a heart attack. Well - the thumbs up I got that from the little kids. The smile I always smile for the camera. It's the natural thing you do in front of a camera. It really wasn't anything negative towards this guy. Like I didn't know he was just murdered. I thought its just war - another dead guy. No big deal.

This was obnoxious. I cannot even vocalize how angry this made me feel. Maybe it is watching someone you love die that angers me so, but it was horrible. I wanted to scream and cry at the same time. I wished that the family of the man would feel justice by their punishments. I do not feel justice from their punishments. I do not think that anything was solved. The problem still exists. I wanted for the longest time to be a JAG in the Air Force. While I may not because of physical limitations, I was saddened that things like this happen but it made my resolve stronger. I just do not understand.

Graphic Novel

The 9/11 report in graphic novel form was the most disturbing comic book I had ever read. I had never had a problem reading most books, but I put this down several times. Maybe it is because I knew people that died in 9/11 or just that the graphics made it that much more real.

Everyone always asks where were you when the first plane hit? It is not that I do not remember, it just is not as cool as any other story. I was in class in my grammar school, 7th grade and no TVs were allowed to go on and no recess for the day. We didn't know what happened and no one would tell us anything. We all thought it was because of so many kid's parents working in the World Trade Center buildings.

I liked this better then the actual 9/11 report in paper format. It was easier to get sucked into and it was almost like watching the events happen again, which was not so good. I felt this gave me more of a connection to 9/11 by reading and understand what exactly was going on verses just knowing what my parents and media has told me.