Oh-oh, Diana --
(Paul Anka)
My hope is that by now anyone who wanted to see this season’s superhero flick, Wonder Woman, has done so, and that I will not be giving away the plot line by adding my personal lens to the pages of revues out there.
First, I have to say that I liked it. I didn’t love it, but I liked it. And yes, it was the role model thing, but not just for kids. This ‘Diana’, in my opinion, was more than an image to inspire little girls to kick over the traces of bondage and leap into the skies of their desires. This Amazon princess was for big girls too.
A quick plot scenario for those who have not seen the movie: Diana is the daughter of the Amazon queen living on the sequestered island of Themyscira in an advanced civilization of Amazons. There are no men on the island. (How Diana arrives is not clear.) The young princess is trained arduously in self-defense, leaping, lassoing and aiming arrows with relentless precision. She’s a natural, with a passion for life and a curiousity about ‘the world’, despite her mother’s dire warnings about its evil ways.
Princess Diana grows into a beautiful (of course) young Amazon seething with questions about life beyond the isolated splendor of Themyscira, and then one day she watches as a WW1 Air Force pilot crashes into the sea off shore, pursued by a German warship. Diana dives into the sea and saves him, naturally. Then, when she learns of the atrocities of war in the world at large, she is enraged and takes it upon herself to rid the world of the war god, Ares.
This is where the story becomes interesting for me. Diana didn’t have to leave her idyllic home of warrior women. She could have bowed to her mother’s pleas and lived her privileged life sheltered from the chaos and heartbreak. But she chose to engage with it because something drove her to ‘right the unrightable wrong’.
It is this archetype that, for me, was the ‘take home’ from the film.
The Amazons pay no attention to the world and perils of humankind. Even the Great War. They are oblivious behind the mists of Themyscira. But Diana rises above the isolationist, ‘don’t rock the boat’ attitude of her people. She hears the call of the world for help and knows that she must put herself out there and risk it all. Her mighty purpose.
What sent this message home big-time for me was that immediately after seeing the movie, I attended a gathering of supporters for Ecojustice, the organization of lawyers and scientists that represents community groups, non-profits, and Indigenous communities on the frontlines of environmental justice. There was a young mother giving an update on her fight to keep oil rail cars, (filled with volatile, flammable, and toxic substances prone to violent explosions and spills when the trains derail), from traveling through her West Toronto neighbourhood.
I spoke to her afterwards and asked where she kept her golden lasso.
Here before our eyes was the archetype that I had just seen on the screen. She could have just looked after her family, her job and her close, familiar little world, but instead she took the call to step out and show up, making waves, speaking in front of crowds despite nerves. Her mighty purpose.
This is a narrative for our time. We can no longer isolate our precious selves in narrow themes of family and career and facebook. The World is calling us. Life is calling us to be the one we were sent to be. All of us have a Wonder Woman inside waiting to show up and nothing, no thing is too small to take on, even if it’s just signing petitions and writing letters. It all counts. It’s about showing compassion for our world in our own way.
And, of course, in the end, Diana realizes that to be human is to know and experience deep hatred and fury, but also deep love and compassion. And in the last moments, standing high above the fiery wrath ending WW1, tears flowing, she grasps that love is the most powerful force of all.
Another worthy take away; but the archetype of Diana/Artemis, the Roman/Greek goddess of hunting, wilderness, and wild animals, and protector of the girl child, was the theme that shone through for me. Diana ... stepping into the world with a bow slung over her broad shoulders, and a glint of purpose in her eye.
She is Diana, the goddess I love . . .
I will be by her side as she shines for the Earth.
-- Naida Supnet
(Paul Anka)
My hope is that by now anyone who wanted to see this season’s superhero flick, Wonder Woman, has done so, and that I will not be giving away the plot line by adding my personal lens to the pages of revues out there.
First, I have to say that I liked it. I didn’t love it, but I liked it. And yes, it was the role model thing, but not just for kids. This ‘Diana’, in my opinion, was more than an image to inspire little girls to kick over the traces of bondage and leap into the skies of their desires. This Amazon princess was for big girls too.
A quick plot scenario for those who have not seen the movie: Diana is the daughter of the Amazon queen living on the sequestered island of Themyscira in an advanced civilization of Amazons. There are no men on the island. (How Diana arrives is not clear.) The young princess is trained arduously in self-defense, leaping, lassoing and aiming arrows with relentless precision. She’s a natural, with a passion for life and a curiousity about ‘the world’, despite her mother’s dire warnings about its evil ways.
Princess Diana grows into a beautiful (of course) young Amazon seething with questions about life beyond the isolated splendor of Themyscira, and then one day she watches as a WW1 Air Force pilot crashes into the sea off shore, pursued by a German warship. Diana dives into the sea and saves him, naturally. Then, when she learns of the atrocities of war in the world at large, she is enraged and takes it upon herself to rid the world of the war god, Ares.
This is where the story becomes interesting for me. Diana didn’t have to leave her idyllic home of warrior women. She could have bowed to her mother’s pleas and lived her privileged life sheltered from the chaos and heartbreak. But she chose to engage with it because something drove her to ‘right the unrightable wrong’.
It is this archetype that, for me, was the ‘take home’ from the film.
The Amazons pay no attention to the world and perils of humankind. Even the Great War. They are oblivious behind the mists of Themyscira. But Diana rises above the isolationist, ‘don’t rock the boat’ attitude of her people. She hears the call of the world for help and knows that she must put herself out there and risk it all. Her mighty purpose.
What sent this message home big-time for me was that immediately after seeing the movie, I attended a gathering of supporters for Ecojustice, the organization of lawyers and scientists that represents community groups, non-profits, and Indigenous communities on the frontlines of environmental justice. There was a young mother giving an update on her fight to keep oil rail cars, (filled with volatile, flammable, and toxic substances prone to violent explosions and spills when the trains derail), from traveling through her West Toronto neighbourhood.
I spoke to her afterwards and asked where she kept her golden lasso.
Here before our eyes was the archetype that I had just seen on the screen. She could have just looked after her family, her job and her close, familiar little world, but instead she took the call to step out and show up, making waves, speaking in front of crowds despite nerves. Her mighty purpose.
This is a narrative for our time. We can no longer isolate our precious selves in narrow themes of family and career and facebook. The World is calling us. Life is calling us to be the one we were sent to be. All of us have a Wonder Woman inside waiting to show up and nothing, no thing is too small to take on, even if it’s just signing petitions and writing letters. It all counts. It’s about showing compassion for our world in our own way.
And, of course, in the end, Diana realizes that to be human is to know and experience deep hatred and fury, but also deep love and compassion. And in the last moments, standing high above the fiery wrath ending WW1, tears flowing, she grasps that love is the most powerful force of all.
Another worthy take away; but the archetype of Diana/Artemis, the Roman/Greek goddess of hunting, wilderness, and wild animals, and protector of the girl child, was the theme that shone through for me. Diana ... stepping into the world with a bow slung over her broad shoulders, and a glint of purpose in her eye.
She is Diana, the goddess I love . . .
I will be by her side as she shines for the Earth.
-- Naida Supnet
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