"It’s me, Casper," he tells this girl who happens to be freshly infected with HIV while they're hooking up, and she’s just completely high on some pills some random guy shoved her to take because he couldn't keep his hands off her. And honestly, that’s just the final scene of the movie. If I had to rate this thing on a scale from one to ten, I suppose it easily deserves a twenty.
I suppose I might reframe the concept of "ignorance" as more of a lack of self-awareness, or perhaps just an inability to distinguish between good and evil. Is that actually a blessing? In a way, maybe it is, because then we’d essentially be acting like pure animals, where the sole purpose of existence is simply ensuring the survival of the species. We'd just spend our days playing around, hooking up, or occasionally brawling, and running for our lives from predators looking for a meal (if anyone gets caught, well, that's just how it goes), all without any heavy thinking, social etiquette, guilt, or sense of duty... That would be life, I guess.
I can't help but wonder if that scene where the cop tortures the guy who was actually the muscle for Bruce Willis could have been filmed in some kind of gritty cinematic version of Hell. In that scenario, the guy would probably vow revenge by promising to bring in two drug dealers to "interrogate" him using nothing but heavy-duty pliers and a flashlight. I suppose that would have made for a pretty unforgettable moment, wouldn't it?
So, I was recently reading an interview with 50 Cent, where he basically admits that his music doesn't matter to him one bit—his only real interests are, well, hooking up with women and downing endless bottles of overpriced champagne. It’s a bit jarring when you consider that everything he actually built was a direct result of his involvement in the music industry. It all feels rather distasteful, honestly.
I can't quite wrap my head around your take, dustytinker13, regarding the idea that good music is dying out. I've always felt that truly great music shouldn't be some fleeting trend; instead, it should be more like an expanding mass that grows over time. For instance, if you happen to love The Beatles or Elvis Presley, there’s really no reason why you couldn't listen exclusively to them. I suppose the real issue lies in how today's youth are constantly fed nothing but current chart-toppers, which often lack any real musical substance. Then again, there is a vast amount of high-quality music out there that exists entirely outside the realm of MTV or mainstream radio stations. Personally, I stumbled upon acoustic bluegrass a few years back and completely fell in love with the genre, even though until then, I had mostly only heard it used as background noise in various movies. My only real concern is that we might eventually run out of genuinely good melodies—since they seem to be used up so quickly—but so far, there has always been some new track that manages to prove me wrong. As for music videos, I think you're right; they've become an end unto themselves rather than a way to support the art. And don't even get me started on those talent shows on networks like NBC; they tend to pass over incredible vocalists just because their "guru" doesn't care for their look, while some total circus acts somehow manage to breeze right through.
Music is everywhere, though I suppose most people don't even realize it. It isn't going to go extinct, but since there seem to be fewer truly creative minds out there these days, the quality of original music feels like it's on a bit of a downward slide; instead, we see musicians just chasing a paycheck by churning out endless covers. I don't think new technology will ever actually threaten music itself—if anything, it might just pave the way for entirely new genres to emerge, much like how hip hop or techno once did. My real concern, though, is that the habit of listening to full albums might be dying out, leaving us in a world where nothing matters except the next big hit. MTV is to blame for all of this!