Forrest Gump Movie Review

By: Michael Gruber 

                Forrest Gump is a film version of a story of a seemingly slow man, Forrest Gump, who without really even noticing, plays a role in the shaping of history through his influence on others.  Unlike most films, actually any film, Forrest Gump has no central problem to the story it instead simply follows Forrest throughout his life.  From meeting Jenny to shedding his leg braces, to meeting JFK it still remains inspiring.  As you watch and become enthralled by the story of Forrest Gump and begin to understand this “different” man from Greenbow, Alabama, you’ll come to find yourself laughing, crying, and thoroughly inspired by Forrest’s story.

                From the start it was obvious Forrest wasn't the brightest of people with only a 75 I.Q, and the braces for his legs just gave the other kids one more excuse to tease him except for one child Jenny.  She was Forrest’s best friend and the only person except for his mother who really believed in him.  From the very beginning Forrest’s mother told him, “life’s like a box of chocolates you never know what your gonna get.”  In Forrest’s case this was generally true whether he was playing football at the University of Alabama, shaking JFK’s hand, saving lives in Vietnam, playing Ping Pong in China, shrimpin’ with Lieutenant Dan during Hurricane Carmen, or literally running cross country from one ocean to the other.  During the movie neither audience nor Forrest could have predicted what he would do next.

                Just like the feather drifting fluently through the air Tom Hanks gave a fluent and flawless performance as Forrest Gump.  Going with out say we also feel that everybody else in the cast played their role with incredible accuracy.  With this being said we also loved the unique plot and Forrest’s story and give the movie four out of four stars.   Forrest Gump was both hilarious and inspiring at the same time thus making it an instant classic.

Cavit Ula, Michael Gruber

5/14/14

Cost of College is too high.

College is becoming less and less affordable for the average student.  The average cost of tuition for the 2013-2014 school year was $30,000.00, and at the end of four years a student will be left with an average of $29,000.00 of debt. The average income of a median family in the U.S is $51,000.00. With college becoming exceedingly important to a student’s future as time progresses, such high prices for an education are unacceptable.  An education is becoming almost necessary to have a shot at securing a future, and higher education seems to be turning into a privilege more than a right.  This is quite alarming, and to have a chance at a future, extreme changes must be made – and fast.

If we do the math here, after four years of college the students will owe more than what they make in a year. It takes time for college graduates to find a job where they get paid well. Also students end up not finding a job in the field they major in, and they end up going back to college to major in different fields.  It’s just not adding up the cost of college shouldn’t put you behind.  College should a head start not a setback.

However, this is a solvable problem.  Tax reform and redistribution of government funds could help in alleviating the problem.  Instead of putting so much money towards national defense, we should put that money into education so college is affordable for students.  Maybe, if we were to spend more money on education and less on defense all of the defense wouldn’t needed because we’d be smart enough to stay out of wars. Also are economy wouldn’t be in debt.  

An expensive education leads to a less educated population, which leads to less educated and often bad decisions, which in turn runs the risk the country falling into trouble which could have been prevented.  Knowledge is power and knowledge is becoming less affordable in this country and the rich continue to hold power getting richer as the poor get poorer and the gap between the classes grows every day.

Soft News Story

Cavit Ula, “The Bachelor?”
A Fictitious Soft New Story By: Michael Gruber

Cavit Ula is from Turkey, but prefers chicken as he feels it is more flavorful and is less prone to an unfortunate dry texture. Cavit is said to prefer his chicken fried, though nobody knows for sure being as nobody has ever asked because nobody actually cares. A fierce fan a competitor in the soccer Mr. Ula has been seen streaking and yelling gibberish when there is an unfortunate outcome in a match he has stake in. Don’t let this character flaw discourage you ladies, GQ magazine named Cavit the 88th best bachelor of Magnolia, NJ an award similar to being named the best amusement park restaurant in other words, meaningless. So, what does Cavit bring to the table in a relationship? Probably nothing, but let’s try to make some stuff up to make him feel better.

Cavit is, well Cavit is breathing but so is everybody else. All jokes aside Cavit is a great guy. So, who is Cavit Ula and why is him being single and ready to mingle news? As mentioned Cavit was named one of Magnolia’s best bachelors, but why? Well while not a billionaire, Cavit does show alot of potential. An excellent soccer player and dedicated student Cavit would be found only in the dreams of most women.

Its now been established that Cavit is a cool guy. But, the real news is what we may be seeing on ABC’s the Bachelor. Its been reported by TMZ and the Insider and rumor has it the Cavit Ula may have been cast for ABC’s upcoming season of the Bachelor. But, before we all get too excited imagining young Cavit handing out his roses until he gets to live happily ever after remember nothing is finalized and at this point everything reported on the subject including this article has been unwarranted speculation. 

Pretzels in the Dugout

By: Michael Gruber

What better way to enjoy a pretzel than from the bench of a high school baseball game.  Sterling High School baseball bench regulars call themselves, “the pretzel gang.”

Not playing in the game can get you down, but the pretzel gang say otherwise and instead of getting down decide to eat two to four pretzels to keep spirits high while cheering on teammates out in the field.

Keeping the mood light, backup third baseman, Nick Semiraglio, says, “while the guys on the field are working keeping their batting averages up, I’m over here keeping my pretzel average up, I’m at four a game.”

The Pretzel Gang says, “ We pride ourselves on the proud tradition of eating pretzels and cheering on the team” while outsiders may feel as though the pretzels take away from the game and cause a distraction, pitcher and bench frequenter, Brent Ewald, say,” pretzels definitely don’t take away, they keep us chewing and they keep us focused, some guys eat seeds, we eat pretzels.”

All the while the pretzel gang and the entire team for fact couldn't stop with the praise and thank for Mrs. McGoldrick who provides the teams pretzels.

However, there are some players within the team such as pitcher, and center fielder, Donovan Casey, who doesn't show such valiant support for the pretzel gang and has said rather bitterly, “I started the pretzel gang when my mother originally brought them for me and I so generously shared with teammates, I’m the leader.”

It looks like there's a split between the team, pro-pretzel and anti-pretzel.  

Why do we give things names?  It's obvious right?  We give things names in order to identify them.  When children are born they're given names usually by their parents.  The naming is the first step in creating their identity separate from all others.  As one's personality develops some people will even at some point receive a nickname to further reflect what they represent.  But, what is a nickname?  First regarded as an "eke-name" meaning an additional name, which later became "neke name" due to an incorrect word division mixing noun with indefinite article, and by the Middle English era nickname meant a known variant.
It seems like everyone and everything has a nickname.  Nicknames can be good and bad, a good nickname can do one wonders, yet a bad one such as one given by a school bully can stick and negatively effect somebody their entire life.  We don't only label other human beings with nicknames, we give everything a nickname e.g. lollipops may be referred to as "lollies" or "suckers".  In cases such as this it seems that we assign nicknames because they are shorter and therefore more efficient than the original name.
Moreover, whether nicknames are providing a more expressive name to a person or making language more efficient I think nicknames are usually a good thing.

It was in 1939 when the world first met Batman in Detective Comics #27.  Batman, Bruce Wayne who as a young child witnessed the murders of both of his parents and feels responsible and dedicates his life to the service of justice.  Wayne doesn't do this by becoming a lawyer, judge, or police officer, no because it's fiction and a comic book instead he funds his alter ego, Batman, a superhero who utilizes technology opposed to powers to clean up the streets of Gotham.  I'm sure everything above is old news, everybody and their mother has general knowledge about Batman, but why does everybody know about Batman?  How did Batman go from a character featured in a comic book in 1939 to a character almost a brand known globally.
Just as Batman the character evolved, Batman as a pop culture icon evolved.  Since his inception in 1939 Batman has stayed relevant hardly ever fading.  Today, Batman whether it be in comics, movies, video games, on T-shirts, clocks, wallpaper, socks, you name and it has a Batman variety all of these things together make Batman a profit generating machine.
Batman is just one example of fiction or story that becomes a brand.  The same is true about Superman, Spider-man, Captain America, and almost every superhero they go from appearing in comics o appearing on everything from t-shirts to bow ties.  And, its just not comic book characters the same applies for characters and such from novels for example everybody knows who Harry Potter and Bilbo Baggins both characters from books(Harry Potter books, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy).  The same thing can occur with popular TV shows and movies such as Star Trek and Star Wars.
This phenomenon when literature, movies and TV, all of which are encompassed by story inspire other literature, movies, TV, and even video games and go from a story to a brand is an incredible thing. I feel as though this speaks to society's infatuation with story that something as simple as a character can inspire books, movies, TV shows, clothing etc.

Language was developed as a necessity, to fill a void, a need, at its most basic as a primal function language allows for communication etc.  From language story was developed.  First, story was told verbally, than written down, than there were television and movies, and even videogames now tell stories.  As a new medium is developed not long after a method of telling story through the particular medium will develop. 
One such new medium is Twitter.  I'm all but certain that you already know, Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables users to send and read "tweets", which are text messages limited to 140 characters. Registered users can read and post tweets but unregistered users can only read them.  One would imagine that with the limiting factor of only 140 characters would restrict creativity and particularly the ability to tell story through the medium.  In fact, Twitter seems not just more suited for things such as breaking news and personal expression, but only suited for things such as breaking news and personal expression.  However, this is not the case.  Much to my surprise there is such a thing as Twitter fiction which includes but is not necessarily limited to fiction which fit within a 140 character space.
Here is an example of such 140 character fiction:
She asked, “Will she be OK?” He said, “Her brain tumor was the size of a fist. What do you think?” Silence burdened the descending elevator.
Other Twitter fiction authors have told their story using not just one 140 character tweet, but instead multiple 140 character tweets drastically changing the dynamic of the story.  Elliot Holt is one such author.  She told a story of the death of a woman through multiple tweets and multiple characters in the story.  Here's the story.
Story evolves to fit every medium, so what's next for story?
For more information on Twitter fiction and Twitter's evolution etc. check out the video below.