"Cash for Clunkers" Good, but not great

The five-billion government stimulus plan "Cash for Clunkers" is wrapping up this week after it helped boom the nation's retail sales up near three percent last month. For many auto retailers, this program is a life vest that saved them from the sinking economy. But for auto recyclers, "Cash for Clunkers" is only good, not great.

Here is why:

Documentary Review: Steven Spielberg

Every time when you are about to sink, you are magically thrown with a life vest – this is the life of Steven Spielberg, one of the most powerful and influential filmmakers in the world. From a Jewish boy who felt shamed about himself, to a high school student who never won a satisfactory grade and to an ambitious, young film director who ran out of resources and ideas, Spielberg can be seen as a synonym of the word “legend.”

Producing his first film at the age of 12 and winning a film prize at 16, Spielberg’s genius in filmmaking was impressive enough to draw anyone’s attention. But his true film instinct was shown by how he spent his playtime as a little child – all his games were to do with making a story – as his sister recalled. In fact, interestingly, Spielberg’s story was never told by himself. The Biography of the History Channel interviewed so many people around this extraordinary filmmaker but Spielberg himself. It was this obvious absence of the number one character in this documentary that told the story, from multiple, rounded viewpoints.

Spielberg’s family members, including his parents and sister, are the best sources to explain where the many creative and well-known scenes in his films came from. For example, his sister remembered the image of a child being confronted with weird-colored sky and a monster when he opens the door was actually an episode of their childhood stories Spielberg created for their playtime.

From his colleagues’ points of view, who are prestigious film producers, stars and composers, Spielberg is someone who would always give people inspiration. The filmmaker’s legendary character was manifested by the same plot happened in different peoples’ lives – they all did not believe Spielberg’s talent until they met him at the first second – unexceptionally, everyone was intrigued by his creativity.

Photograph by Cynthia

It was these personal accounts and anecdotes that explained why Spielberg was able to survive after falling to the bottom from the top of a cliff and then climb higher again every time. For example, when Spielberg was shooting Jaws, he had no script, no shark and no crew. He ran out of time and resources. But surprisingly, just because of the lack of a satisfactory man-made shark, the film’s thrilling effect was even made more significant by only showing part of the shark. It was Spielberg’s passion and determination that predicted his great success.

Photograph by Cynthia

One of the most difficult tasks of producing a history documentary like Spielberg was to reconstruct the events of the past that were never recorded visually, but this documentary episode overcame the difficulty by skillfully using archival materials. Although actions that happened in the past can never be presented to the viewer as they were, the use of still photograph slideshows with special effects such as zooming and panning made the history alive and dynamic again. In order to prevent the dullness of the archival impression, the use of Spielberg’s film clips to accompany people’s recall and description adds great interest and pace to the documentary itself.

The filmmaker’s history answered the question posed at the beginning: The person who threw Spielberg a life vest when he was about to sink was nobody but himself.

Audio Slideshow: It's NOT FREE to "e-recycle"

Documentary Review: Planet Earth - Caves

Photograph by Cynthia

Many media scholars categorize the contemporary science/environmental documentaries into three themes. First, the pre-modern idea: Nature is mother; she is fragile. Second, the modern theme: Nature is hostile; it needs to be controlled. However, the BBC’s documentary Planet Earth – Caves fits neither of the two. It represents the third category, the post-modern concept: Nature is full of uncertainties and risks.

Friends versus enemies

Human beings make sense of an object by recognizing its opposite – the long established narrative structure of almost every story in every society – hero versus villain, the powerful versus the weak, and nature versus culture. Caves is by no means an exception.

Inside the world’s largest cave which is deeper and larger than the Empire State Building in New York, many creatures, like the cockroaches, never get to see the sun. Hundreds of thousands of them crawling on a slope depend on their friends – the bats which have regular contact with the outside world – to drop any tiny amount of nutrition to the mound.

However, the bats themselves, even in a quantity of forming a huge black storm when they fly out of the cave during the day, have fatal enemies: eagles and snakes. A montage of eagles swiftly capturing a few separated bats with their sharp claws and swallowing them alive in the sky, accompanied by intense background music of orchestral strings, truly reminds you the real-life chase scenes you saw. When snakes appear, the same tactic is used: Close-up shots of disturbing killing and ruthless eating, dark and nerve-racking music clearly show you once again that even in one of the least discovered corners on the planet, the basic law of jungle still applies.

But even in such a seemingly simple and cruel world, one complex philosophy implies: Beauty sometimes conceives the evilest purpose and danger. Thousands of silk threads hung from the ceiling of a cave just look like a pearl curtain, shining and alluring in the dark. But for many flying insects, they are the most deadly trap. The threads are made of glow worms’ mucus to glue the passing-by insects. Again, racking close-up shots of the worms slowly consuming the helpless, trapped preys strike you with the cruelty and perhaps force you to reflect on what is really meant by the powerful versus the weak.

Man versus Nature

During the entire episode, man appears as an observer most of the time. The nature neither seems to be a threat to human beings nor a vulnerable baby who needs to be protected. Nature is nature. Man is man. The two’s interaction and conflict isn’t shown until the production diary finally reveals, and this is where Planet Earth’s post-modern concept prevails.

The film crew’s preparation for shooting the cockroaches needed to be extremely careful: Crew members had to wear paper suit and use black tapes to seal any possible apertures to avoid cockroaches crawling into their neck and pants. In order to obtain a smooth, continuous shot of the carpet of cockroaches covering an entire slope, the crew had to work more than six days to install a device that would allow the camera to move steadily.

When a crew member got stuck in a narrow passageway, the only way to get him out was to break his bone so that he would be able to bend his body. When another crew member broke his ankle because of falling onto the slippery stalactites, it took 100 cave experts three days to rescue him. When the crew finally got down to the Chandelier Ballroom containing full of six-meter long crystals after two years of permission seeking, their number one priority was not to break even the tiniest part of the cave.

These facts seem to manifest one underlying theme: Man is not a threat and intruder to the nature. He does not seek to conquer the nature, nor does he exploits. Rather, he awes the nature, and tries to explore it. He might not be able to anticipate what danger and risks are waiting for him next, but he is not afraid and will not stop.

This rather positive image of a sensitive western explorer is also created by sacrificing that of the Mexican nest hunters, who build primitive wood ladders to access to the inside of a cave and grab the hardworking birds’ nests for money. Another binary opposition is therefore established: an intruder versus an explorer.

This is reinforced once again by David Attenborough’s concluding commentary: “Who knows how many Lechuguilla are still waiting to be discovered?”

Documentary Review: National Geographic Cameramen and Women

Photograph by Cynthia

After watching the CNBC’s documentary video, “National Geographic Photographers,” you may wonder this question: Is it really worth almost killing yourself to take a single photograph?

Here is National Geographic wildlife photographer Nick Nichols standing in the middle of an African rainforest. His hands are covered by hundreds of crawling and flying bugs that keep invading into his eyes, ears and mouth despite his constant attempt to swipe them away. Bigger worms have dug into his feet – dug, literally – and a local guide has to help him dig those out again with a big needle. His legs are horrifying, too: There isn’t a single clean area left that hasn’t been bitten by various kinds of insects.

“Most of the time my job is not to take photos but to survive in the environment where I got my photos,” said Nichols.

Almost every National Geographic photographer is a one-man-band who is thrown into a strange world to figure out where to go, what to photograph and who to talk to by him or herself. Disease, danger, loneliness, fatigue, worries and frustrating pre-arrangement work are the photographers’ closest but haunting friends.

“Maybe the troubles are more glamorous,” photographer Jodi Cobb said and laughed, noting that her job is not really as romantic and cool as you might have imagined.

But what’s the point of putting oneself in such an awkward situation? You ask.

A number of National Geographic photographers would probably give you the same answer: “To capture the moment you might never see again in your life.”

William Allard pressed his shutter before his plane crashed onto the ground; Cobb stood on a moving train pulling half of her body outside the carriage; and Nichols took one last possible shot when his subject – a wild, angry and roaring elephant – started running toward him.

These are the moments that manifest National Geographic’s one-century-old, founding philosophy: The mind must see.

But seeing clearly and sharply human being’s personalities, lives, emotions, histories and conditions is not the whole goal Allard’s photos try to achieve - a group of south Asian girls dancing in a nightclub, a nude stripper shaking her body on a stage, and a prom-dressed blonde coming out of her luxury car - Allard wants his photos to move, smell and sound.

If these collages of human beings can present the mind with the opportunities to see what the self is like, then animals can probably tell the mind how to think the self.

Nichol’s wildlife photos completely abandon the previous static fashion. He incorporates the 60’s rock style so that his animals are singing, dancing, fighting and struggling, too – just like human beings.

“The static photos just don’t do the job, because the world is moving,” said Nichols.