Unlike Athena, who emerged fully formed out of Zeus’s thigh, the quartet of “Girls” – chronologically young women but called by a more immature younger-female appellation – spent six seasons finding themselves. And the show’s creatrix, Lena Dunham, used the dyad signifying the archetypal Feminine – Moon and Venus – as their strategy for self-discovery. […]
Archetypes: Film: Review: ‘The Danish Girl’ (2015)
The Feminine unfolds and blossoms at a tempo unique to the individual who either embraces or grapples with the gifts of Aphrodite. Einar Wegener, a male, 20th-century, Danish artist, whose story is at the core of The Danish Girl, was unique in confronting this Venusian challenge. Directed by Tom Hooper, and based on David Ebershoff’s […]
Archetypes: Film: Review: ‘Carol’ (2015)
Venus, the archetype signifying love and pleasure, is at the heart of most enduring relationships. Although same-sex unions are now increasingly embraced by the general population, they were at one time more than Venusian. They were non-mainstream-Venusian, and aligned with the Uranian archetype of uniqueness, rebellion and, for some, subversiveness. However, this notion of anarchy-in-love […]
Archetypes: Film: Review: ‘Mustang’ (2015)
There’s estrogen, and plenty of it, in Mustang, a film that explores the treatment of the Feminine in a coastal village in northern Turkey. Co-written and directed by Deniz Gamze Ergüven, the movie creates a personal and cultural tug of war between two archetypes – Venus and Mars – culminating in a bittersweet victory. The […]
Archetypes: Film: ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ Brings On the Matriarchy and the Feminine (2015)
The great balancing act in Mad Max: Fury Road isn’t the circus-like, high-pole-dipping soldiers swooping down onto enemy vehicles like birds of prey, or the astounding center of gravity that keeps racing rigs and trucks from keeling over onto desert sands out of sheer momentum. The real equilibrium here is the propulsive paean director and […]
Archetypes: Film: Review: ‘Clouds of Sils Maria’ (2015)
A bit of meteorological magic – fast-moving clouds that take on the appearance of a determined snake energetically moving through the Maloja Pass in the Swiss Alps – oversees the transformations at the heart of Clouds of Sils Maria. Written and directed by Olivier Assayas, the movie provides extensive details about this phenomenon which, from […]
Archetypes: Film: Review: ‘The Homesman’ (2014)
Despite the title, The Homesman is a film that richly explores the Feminine and provides a heartbreaking contrast between the Venusian archetype of seduction and beauty and the Lunar archetype of nurturing, caring and mothering. Directed by Tommy Lee Jones, the movie is set around 1850, as hardy folk from the East migrated westward. Mary […]
Astrology: Film: Review: ‘Venus in Fur’ (2014)
If you couldn’t get enough of Jack Baker’s (Jeff Bridges) cinematic jaw-drop in The Fabulous Baker Boys, as soon as seemingly tone-deaf loser and gum-snapping chanteuse Suzie Diamond (Michelle Pfeiffer) starts to soulfully warble her heart out and blow him away, you’ll love that film’s brainy, French, cinematic stepchild, Venus in Fur. In fact, there’s […]
Astrology: Film: Review: ‘Only Lovers Left Alive’ (2014)
There’s a tasty question posed in the title Only Lovers Left Alive. Are the film’s two protagonists the only two very long term lovers allowed to endure another day, until they’ve racked up centuries’ worth of togetherness? Or are “lovers” – those passionate, caring, committed loyal few under the archetype of Venus – the only […]
Astrology: Film: Review: ‘Under the Skin’ (2014)
Before extraterrestrials became pop culture’s ultimate “other” – entities whose plasma, motivations and origins were defined by their mystery – a predecessor “alien” hogged the limelight. The more primitive version of the terrifyingly enigmatic was the female. And, in Under the Skin, these two mythic and incomprehensible figures – one from earth, the other from […]