Today I am a moviebot!

Yesterday I continued my paper about octopi. This got me inspired to watch some octopus videos and eventually led to my watching of the Life Aquatic.
I love this movie. A lot of people I know like it, or really like it, but I actually love it.
Here’s why:

Bill Murray says something in the movie about how being eleven was the best part of life. I don’t know if that is necessarily true but I do see why he would say it. When I was a kid I loved science. I couldn’t think of anything else I would do except be a scientist. I collected rocks, insects, and played with microscopes and telescopes. I didn’t just collect rocks, look at the moon, and play with bugs. I actually studied these things. All of my rocks were labeled and organized by mineral, rock type, or crystalline structure. I would get pissed if someone called an insect a bug and I had posters of the solar system on my bedroom wall.

For me, when I am nostalgic towards childhood it isn’t because I miss childish fun or games, or some sort of innocence. Instead I long for the time when the world seemed eminently worth knowing. When every fact about the world just made it seem that much more awesome. “Holy shit Halley’s comet travels how fast?…Sweet. ” “The Apatosaor had two brains? That’s great!”

The Life Aquatic or “How Steve Zizzou got his groove back” is about the triumph of that feeling. The sense of pure wonder replaces Steve's half hearted drive for revenge, and his half hearted drive for love. It is only this emotion that moves him past the death of his friend, the death of his son, and his personal failures. Morality and purpose never take hold or provide comfort in the film: When Dafoe righteously calls the pirates monsters, Murray responds, “Yeah well I killed one of their guys when I shot him in the neck, we aren’t doing too bad ourselves”.
When his wife tells him his cat died, bitten by a rattlesnake he yells at her for telling this information to him so coldly. When his son warmly asks him what type of cat it was, Zizzou responds: “Who gives a shit.”

The hero of the story is a vain lying thief. He shows signs of real leadership: he single handedly kicks the shit out of a group of pirates, but he is also incompetent and lazy.

Every scene that centers upon the social plot of love and jealousy, or human betrayal, features some sort of animal creature in the background—often a little claymation lizard or a little seahorse. There is always some natural organism in the visual scene that either distracts from the drama, or shows the drama to be the distraction. Only life and death is given center attention.


The childish view of wonder wins out: even the father and son relationship can be viewed as one of discovery. Zizzou doesn’t learn not to cheat on his wife. He doesn’t learn to be kind to the interns. He doesn't become greater than his failings. He may not even be an admirable man but we like the guy nonetheless. More important than the deaths, more important than the successful conclusion of Zizzou's documentary, the emotional peak of the film is when all of Team Zizzou sees the Jaguar Shark--when they see the animal that is greater than any of their concerns, and greater than their drama. Pure exploration and adventure—the uncovering of more of the world is what saves Zizzou.

Spinoza would probably like this film.