Movie Review: Cold War by Pawel Pawlikowski with Joanna Kulig and Tomasz Kot

First of all, I have to say that I am not really a movie fan. I don’t often go to the movies but last November, I watched a movie called Cold War directed by Pawel Pawlikowski which marked me.

The story takes place in the former Eastern Bloc between 1952 and 1964. The action starts in Poland where Wiktor (Tomasz Kot) and Irina, two music teachers who want the Warsaw city-dwellers to discover Polish folklore. They travel to the secluded countryside to record old traditional songs. A bit later they decide to create a company composed of talented young peasants that will sing and dance the traditional Polish songs. During the auditions, Wiktor discovers a gifted young singer called Zula (Joanna Kulig). They immediately fall in love. The traditional company has a real success all around Poland and its neighboring countries. Political Polish and USSR leaders also really appreciate their work but want to use this company as a propaganda tool: they want them to sing songs to the glory of the USSR… Between state oppression and lies, Zula and Wiktor’s relationship is going to be complicated. There will be many unexpected events and they will have to travel between the East and the West including to Paris and deal with the Cold War.

This movie is only shot in black and white which gives it a special atmosphere. Even if there are no colors, there are dark and light contrasts which bring different tones. Mastering black and white is a characteristic of Pawel Pawlikowski’s movies (for example his movie Ida).

Cold War won the “Prix de la mise en scène” at Cannes 2018. I think that it really deserves it since the historical reconstitution was very well done.

Music is also very important in this movie with many beautiful traditional Polish songs and a music theme that follows the actors throughout the whole movie.

To conclude I would strongly recommend this beautiful movie to those who like historical movies and impossible loves.

Camille Metz

The American school system

As you may know, I spent a year in the US for my 9th grade year at school. At first, I wanted to present you a day in my life during this period but I had way too many things to talk about, so I decided to present the pros and cons of the American school system.

First I’ll start with the advantages (because, positivity is good):

I really liked the school system. During class it isn’t always hard work; they learn by having fun. We didn’t have to copy multiple pages of lessons (#handdestroyed) ,they were already all typed with maybe sometimes some words to fill in, which enabled us to concentrate more on the class. All of the teachers were very nice; we had a close relationship with them but with some distance not like in France where there is a very large distance. This enabled me to be more confident in my work. Succeeding at school was quite easy, you just had to listen well in class and do a little bit of homework. I remembered that I was never seated at a desk at home for more than 15 minutes or just in general, I never spent my whole weekend working. I liked that the class was more about discussions and group projects than personal work. School ended at 3pm which enabled students to practice an activity. I did field hockey for fall, I was part of the theater group to paint the backgrounds for the scene the day of the show and for spring I did lacrosse (loved them all!). I think it was very good to finish school early and do an activity because it encouraged students to do a sport since everything was on the school campus.

Now some drawbacks:

I didn’t like that we had the same program every single day, it was boring and sometimes I felt that I was living the same life over and over. Also I hated, especially at the beginning of the year, that teachers obliged you to turn around during class for a moment and talk with someone. I was petrified since everyone knew each other and I was alone, not knowing what to do. At those moments I felt time going suddenly VERY slow. Last but not least I think the school canteen should really propose healthier meals. Every day, the menu proposed burgers, fries, chips, ice creams, fried chicken or pizza (well there were vegetables but they were not good). The only healthier item was corn but with a lot of pepper, but still with lots of butter. As a consequence, I always brought my own meal.

Isn’t it so contrary, encouraging doing lots of sports but having a lot of unhealthy food at a cheap price and the healthy one is super expensive??

My blog post is coming to an end. I hope you enjoyed seeing some of the things you maybe never knew about the schools in the US; also, American high schools are not at all like in the series, I’m telling you!

Aude

The importance of being who you really want to be

Sometimes, we feel like we should not be who we exactly think we are. We often don’t realise what it implies for us.

Why do we want to act differently?

I am not saying that change is not good. I think it is really important, but we should be aware of our changes.

When we were young and innocent kids, we didn’t use to care about what people thought of us. But as we grew up, we changed our behaviour and tried to become someone else: more mature, more polite, more attractive...

I think that the first thing that makes us change (even though it’s a bit of cliché) is society. What we see on TV, advertising, what we listen to on the radio... when we were young, those icons were for the most part our models. And even though it is changing, they are all full of clichés: the bad boy, the caring little girl, all dressed in black and white clothes,...

This influences us a lot, and often puts ideas on our minds without us even noticing it.

Moreover, as we get older, society brings us a very useful way to normalise ourselves: social networks! All of the lifestyles and styles we see are also referring to models we have, and make us want to look like those happy and perfect people.

The tastes we have change depending on our age, and on the context: you’ve probably noticed that we all act differently depending on who we are with.

We speak, emphasise and behave differently when we are with our parents and the headmaster for example.

It shows a capacity to understand politeness, and this is good. But sometimes, we need to be aware of what we change. For example, if we change our hobbies depending on our friends, then there might be a little problem.

To be honest, all of us have been through a phase where we tried to find our “true” personality. It is not bad, or problematic. It is a problem if we do not realise it/we do not stop trying to change for years.

So. We change for many different reasons: our social environment, the models we see, our familial context and also the historical one. Those changes aren’t bad, as long as we are fully conscious of them, and as long as we are not an absolute chameleon.

How can we change that?

Well, there are actually many ways.

The first step is to realise the scale on which you change: is it a lot? Not much? Depends?

Then, the best way may be to understand why you want to change your behaviour and what affects you the most: is it TV, social networks, or the radio? Then, try to understand that

1) what you see is not the complete truth and just a part of somebody’s life,

2) instead of wanting to be like them, try to make them inspire you and

3) you are yourself, and being a copy will not help you or anyone.

It is important to remember that being yourself may not always be easy, because we all have our flaws, but being somebody else will NOT get rid of those.

Finally I’d say: changes are not always bad, as long as you realise what it means for you. I hope this article will help you to be yourself and understand that you are worth it!

Love always

Marion

THE RISE OF ADDERALL OR “THE STUDY DRUG”

For this article, I hesitated to talk about a less controversial topic that I also had a strong interest in, but I thought this topic would actually be more interesting to most students and people directly involved in an environment of stress caused by constant high demands of productivity which can understandably get overwhelming and worrisome sometimes.  This article does not have any intention to advise you to consume this drug whatsoever, it is purely informative and written in the hopes of raising awareness about this issue and a chance to remind people of the impact, which *can* indeed be considered as natural and admissible, of anxiousness due to fairly new and sometimes harsh standards present in today’s society, especially considering its popularity in American society.

 

What is “Adderall”? : BRIEF PRESENTATION

Adderall, (or Adderall XR), code for the C9H13N molecule, is the brand name of a psych stimulant drug, which is essentially amphetamine, more precisely a combination of four amphetamine salts. Amphetamine was first synthesized in Germany in 1887, and has been used pharmaceutically in the U.S. since 1927. Early on, it was used to combat congestion, as well as fatigue for soldiers during WWII who nicknamed it the “go pill” due to the extra supply of energy and alertness, as well as the maintaining of morale it provided them. The main aim of this drug remains to treat ADHD/ADD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder/Attention Deficit Disorder) conditions or narcolepsy in children and adults.

 It has now become widely controversial partly due to the fact that it is now being used by a totally different demographic: healthy, young adults, especially college students with a powerful statistic that 24% of college students have already consumed Adderall, showing a disparity between a hypothetical 24% of people coincidentally having ADHD and the realistic explanation that a significant part of this percentage includes recreational, originally ‘healthy’ users. Indeed, Adderall has very interesting effects and seems like an attractive and practical or even fun drug as it is sold in the form of a seemingly innocent pill, and “fix” to most users at the beginning.

What are the effects provoked by it? : SHORT TERM AND LONG TERM

Adderall does indeed have interesting effects, which are originally not intended to make people “high” and to be used in the right dose, but, which like all drugs, has a potential to develop extremes which fascinate. Adderall, if prescribed in the right dose especially, can provoke feelings of euphoria, energy boost, a feeling described by users of acute “clairvoyance”, invigoration, similar to the high experienced by cocaine users, which is not that surprising considering Adderall or “amphetamine” is actually only differentiated from methamphetamine because of one single group of components.  After the high, comes the crash, like any drug, which can imply different negative side effects such as appetite suppression, irritability, feelings of restlessness or even in the long term heart-related problems such as tachycardia, that is to say an acceleration of the heartbeat, which can, if pushed to extremes, lead to death. The different long-term effects thus include a permanent alteration of the brain system as well as of the body.

What does this say about our society? : THINK TANK

Seeing as young people are nowadays ready to do anything to increase their productivity due to high pressure on a daily basis, we can emit the sad but accurate representation of the predominance of productivity over health and general well-being, both physical and mental. It is thus important to remind people thinking of taking Adderall or more generally of people who feel this type of overwhelming and, in truth, quite unhealthy pressure at times who have in mind to result to extreme measures in desperate times, that fixing a temporary problem with a permanent solution is not the way. The aim of this article is certainly not to judge or emit moral judgment on people taking such drugs or recognizing themselves in this attitude, but rather to make readers obtain an informed personal opinion and choice about such matters, and mostly think about what kind of society they want to live in and to act consequently staying strong and true to themselves in hard moments, always keeping in mind that if you damage your body, to use a contextually fitting materialistic analogy, there’s no way of ever buying your way out of it.
Emma P

 

More information at:

-          TV Series Video Extract Featuring Adderall (Rami Malek as Elliott from the TV Show ‘Mr Robot’): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFL8tOmtVuM

-          More Information About the Drug at “Drug Classroom” (Doses, Uses, Effects on Brain and Body): https://thedrugclassroom.com/video/adderall/

-          Huffington Post Article Featuring Adderall and its Newfound Importance in American Society: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/high-times/adderall-amphetamine_b_4174297.html?guccounter=1