Life according to Pi

In my pursuit to watch all the academy awards nominees for Best Motion Picture I recently went and watched Ang Lee's "Life of Pi". First off, I like movies that make you think, and this movie did just that. Enough so that I walked an extra round around my block before returning home because I needed to process what I had just seen. Without spoiling anything, the movie asks the viewer to make up his own mind as to the stories being told in the film, and through that choice determine whether or not you are a believer. I do not really care for the religious message in the film but I do like that it leaves interpretation fully up to the viewer. (Which is always the case in some sense) Besides that there is some beautiful cinematography in this film, very fitting for the 3D format in which I saw it. Some of the images definitely stuck in my mind especially the CG animals that crowd the film, most notably one of the lead characters, the tiger Richard Parker. My own favorite animal, sharks, made numerous appearances as well, the one that I remember most vividly is the sharks fighting it out with a hippo underwater at night. Pretty stunning image! The stunning imagery continues in my favorite scene in the film when Pi and Richard Parker are both on the brink of starvation and Richard Parker is gazing into the abyss below. The camera then tracks his view into the depths and reveals the plethora of life that exists beneath the waves in a dreamy, surreal manner. Seldom has my love of the oceans been so beautifully condensed into on sequence. That scene also reminded me of my earlier idea of everything in the world happening at once, see the post entitled The Water is Still Running in the Niagara Falls. As a Divemaster I have a natural fascination of the underwater world that goes back to when I was a kid. Particularly the open and deep ocean is something that continues to fascinate me today. Just thinking about what amazing scenes take place deep below the waves where no human eye can see blows my mind. Just imagine, kilometers below the surface giant squids are fighting to the death with sperm whales as featured in the scene in "Life of Pi". The ocean is such a treasure trove of life where only a brink of it ever comes into contact with humans. Doing my Deep Diver Specialty here in Sydney some months ago I had a genuine Circle of Life moment doing my safety stop after diving to 40 meters. Just below the surface right in front of my face was these small blue cylindrical shapes, no longer than half a centimeter. At first I thought they were just thrash pieces floating around but when I approached one with my finger it actually jetted away from me. It was alive, I was surrounded by tiny life forms. And that after a dive which had offered more convenient oceanic life such as sharks, rays and fish. That experience further enhanced my fascination of the deep and expanded my own personal world, as explained in the Niagara post. That is something that often strikes me when looking at the waves, especially at open seas, how much stuff is going on right now under the waves, just like Richard Parker in the film. This realization is sometimes overwhelming to the point of being scary which is something I will come back to when I get around to writing about one of my favorite authors; H.P. Lovecraft, who also has a morbid fascination with the mysteries of the deep.