Documentry Analysis: An inconvient truth

In this(not so) thrilling documentary former U.S vice president Al gore presents the hard hitting facts on global warming and what we need to do about it. An uplifting spectacle or a desperate appeal for attention find out in this review of Al Gore's An Inconvenient truth.

Overview
An Inconvenient truth is a documentary about Al Gore campaigning to raise awareness about global warming.The documentary focuses on global warming and its effects. It was filmed in 2005 and released in 2006 and director Davis Guggenheim complies locations from Al Gore's global warming seminars from mainly the U.S.A but a few other locations, like Japan.While mr. Guggenheim may have techniquely directed this Al Gore's voice is the one that comes through

Basic arguments

Al Gore's main argument is that we are the cause of global warming and that we need to stop. Throughout the documentary he bombards the audience with various facts and statistics that give evidence to the increase of C02 in the atmosphere and shows what has and will continue to happen to the earth if we don't do something. He claims that it will lead to melting of the polar ice caps and subsequent flooding of earth, the death of several endangered species, the rise of many invasive species( mosquitoes longhorn beetle), the ruining of the landscape and the overall destruction of our planet. In conclusion it all comes down to global warming is serious its happening right now and we need to do something soon.

Audience appeal
An inconvenient truth appeals a lot to people's inner environmentalist and perceives its solutions as not only necessary but easy. At the end of the film Al gore list was we can reduce our carbon footprint, and help diminish C02 in the atmosphere. He gives a ink to a website with information on ways to reduce our carbon footprint and ultimately put an end to global warming. the documentary clearly wants people to take a stand and through their actions force the governments into take this issue seriously and make it a global effort to maintain our enviroment.

 Persuasive appeal
An Inconvenient Truth utilizes all 3 persuasive techniques to a certain degree. Al gore displays ethos through his constant reminders of political career and vice presidential position. He even cleverly starts off his documentary by saying "I'm Al Gore the man who uses to be the next president of the United States" by making this joke he lightens the mood a bit while establishing his credibility as someone to be listened to. He also uses  a fair amount of pathos too. In certain segments he takes the documentary away from his global warming seminars to gives a bit of his life story. In these segments we see things like a his son being in an accident, his childhood friend dieing of cancer losing the 2004 election and being harshly criticized by bush and his supporters. There is pathos to be found on the global warming side too, like the polar bears who are dying due to lack of ice. But most dominant in the film is the use of logos. The whole documentary is chart after statistic after study, Al gore use charts to show the increase of C02 in recent years to predict flooding and the amount of hrricanes. Gore uses any numbers that help prove his point and show what is is saying is not speculation but logic based fact.

Bias
Al Gore is not what we can call a neutral party. He is the co -founder of Generation Investment Management an organization that is looking to regulate climate change. He is also critical of the way the government at the time was apparently ignoring the global warming epidemic. The government that was being led by George W.Bush who happened to barely beat Al gore in the 2004 election. Al gore views global warming as a no-brainier case and claims to discredit the evidence against it But he never actually stops to explain what some of the opposition is he just moves on and expects us to fully believe he is right. He might make a mention of argument here in there but it usually just to transition to the next statistic.Al Gore is not interested in a balanced discussion , he's interested in your undivided approval.

The Inconvenient Untruths
As I indicated in the last section, Al Gore does not provide a fair or balanced description on the threat on global warming and relies on a lot of exaggeration or speculation instead of pure scientific fact. In fact the film was actually taken to court over a UK school official not wanting to show the film to his students. The judged ruled while the documentary was broadly accurate it contained 9 alleged errors. Here are some of the following. Al Gore claimed the sea would rise up to 20 ft when Antarctica or Greenland melted in the near future(about 20-50 years), this devistation would take at least a millennia. He claims Lake Chad in Africa dried up due to global warming, when evidence points much more to overgrazing, population increase and other human factors. Al Gore also claims that hurricane Katrina was caused by global warming when there is insufficient evidence to make that claim. these are just a few of the outrageous claims made in An inconvenient truth and it really destroys a lot of the urgency and danger of the issue when so much data has exaggerated or practically made up. Al Gore thinks he can fool you with fancy speaking and impressive loking chart but if you look deep enough you can see the blatant propaganda that comes from his film.

Impact 
overall An inconvenient truth is a paranoid alarmist publicity scheme. It's a terribly one sided view on global warming and shows you more of Al  Gore's personal life and political career than footage for the focus of te documentary. The fil should have been caled Al Gore:the Movie because it's a desperate ploy for attention and way to make himself relevant after losing the a presidential election. I could forgive all that if it was very engaging and provided in depth and new scientific angles on global warming, it does neither. There is nothing interesting about an Inconvenient truth because it is just one long seminar. We treated to charts and slideshows the entire way through and nothing else besides Gore's autobiography.Since the documentary is so boring and one-note it doesn't leave much of an impact. I don't feel any more inclined to do any more for the environment than I( was already doing.In conclusion An inconvenient truth is dull, uninteresting piece of cinema that while intending to save the world provided to be something  the world didn't need.

 Works Cited

 An inconvenient truth.Dir. Davis Guggenheim.perf. Al Gore. Paramount Vantage. 2006. film retrieved  from http://putlocker.is/watch-an-inconvenient-truth-online-free-putlocker.html

Baram,Marcus.An inconvenient  verdict for Al gore.abcnews. ABC.12 Oct. 2007. web. 11 Jan. 2015

Peck,Sally. Al Gore's 'nine Inconvenient Untruths'. the telegraph. n.p. 11 Oct 2007. web. 11 Jan. 2015


By Elijah Mourillon amateur critc

The Paladin Prophecy by Robert Frost

 So this month I will be reviewing the paladin prophecy by Robert frost. All I can say is if you like books with deep complex characters, an interesting easy to follow story, a good pace, believable attitudes and explanations for nearly everything. You will not want to read this book. Let me explain to you what exactly is wrong with this novel.
Summary

Will west(yes that's his real name) is your average teen boy, except for the fact that his life is shrouded in mystery. His parents move him around the country constantly and give him a list of rules to obey in his everyday life, one of the most prominent being not to trust anyone. But when strange men in black caps begin to follow him, his parents start acting strange and monsters seem to be around. Will accepts a dubious scholarship to a mysterious prestigious school he's never heard of. There he meets friends, enemies and has many strange encounters.

Writing Style

The book is written in a third person limited narrative. I must say in the age of multiple pov stytle books it's a relief there is only one central character's mind we follow. I say that because I can't think of anything that would be more insufferable, than having to follow more than one of the bland, cliche, underdeveloped, badly written one note characters in this book. These are some of the most uninteresting characters I've ever seen in literature, flat is an understatement. Our main character is supposed to be this unaware cautious shut in, that's what the characters in the book keep insisting, but he adapts to every situation, e takes plenty of dumb risks and for someone who supposedly never had any friends prior to going to this school he seems decently socially capable. It's odd to me as reader when a character who is supposed to be one way acts another way entirely Plot devices just appear out of nowhere and are given terrible half baked explanations. For example will needs to get airport security at one point even though an alert has been sent out for him, so out of nowhere he's like " oh I've got weird power that lets me put pictures in peoples head so i'm just gonna mess with the guards mind so he can't see my name on the list" no buildup, no warning, just right out of nowhere and if you think it's explained later, well not really.The worst thing about frost's writing is he saves the best for last, but the best is the only interesting thing about this book. Every single boring high school cliche is drawn out to the max, and all the cool fantasy stuff is literally in the last few chapters. He spends the whole book boring you to death and then at the end does something interesting. But you need a lot of patience to get that far. The worst part is the the last part of the book has a cliffhanger that even if you barely pay attention you can gasp what this means for the character. So that's how I was tricked into reading the second book(which is basically the exact same thing in terms of quality and what its problems are).

New Vocabulary
Some of the vocabulary needed to get through this snore fest include
never-was- an alternate dimension filled wioth monsters and ancient beings.
Paladin-a holy knight whose origins date back to the court of Charlemagne(8th century king)
Prophecy- the foretelling or prediction of what is to come.


Evaluating Effectiveness 
For a fantasy novel this book is pretty unbelievable. I don't ever believe any this could ever happen or would ever make sense in the real world, and this is set in the real world! The main problem is none of this makes any sense. I mean I summarized the generic special school plot because the fantasy is something else. So the villains are monsters, but they're also the original species of earth, but they're not evolutionary predecessors but a different race entirely and they were banished to an alternate dimension by apparently God and will learns all this from his guardian angel who is a dead fighter pilot from New Zealand who is part of a force that fights the ancient beings who are somehow escaping from the alternate dimension and the school bullies might be in on it because of an ancient prophecy that relates to creation of the school... I don't know, this is making Scientology look logical. Point being immersion is terrible because if the average reader can barely understand the story,so there is no possible way to get invested. Also like I said before since the characters are so bland the whole thing just bores you death while you pray for something to happen.
 Evaluate Bias 
Now bias may have some part in this. I'm of the mindset that if you're writing fantasy you should distance yourself from the real world as much as possible. However this book is very grounded in reality. Also the friends all have this preppy, extroverted attitude to them. Being pretty introverted myself, I may not be understand some of the groups concerns about will's occasional seclusiveness . This book is most definitely pointed at kids our age. Though may have a message of favoring excellence over the average. So if your a fan of the help the lowest rise and more support for average people you might not appreciate this book.

  Final Thoughts and rating

So all in all the paladin prophecy is an all around waste of time. It has no compelling characters to keep you invested the story. It's has no interesting plot details to make you want to read to the end and ultimately feels more like a chore than a n enjoyable experience. I can't stress enough how much I cannot recommend this book,it isn't even bad in an entertaining way, just incredibly dull. It's just not worth anyone's time and if weren't for the final chapters there would be nothing positive I could say. I will admit the final battle is kind of awesome and the twist at the end is pretty good. But this isn't enough to make up for the book being so boring. It is for these reasons that the paladin prophecy earns a 2 out of 5.

Elijah Mourillon

Amateur Critic

Disclaimer: I do not own the paladin prophecy by Robert Frost. The use of names and Images is for review purposes only and not for personal gain. 

The Blood of Olympus by Rick Riordan Book Review

The final Heroes of Olympus book is out and needless to say there was a lot of excitement.

 Was it everything we’d hoped for? Was it a major flop? Well I’ll give you my thoughts on the book.

Summary

It’s an intense race against time as a group of young Demigods struggle to stop the awakening of the ancient god Gaea. Percy, Annabeth, Frank, Piper, Jason, Leo and Hazel travel to Greece to try and stop the rising of Gaea, while Nico, Reyna and Coach Hedge transport the Athena Parthenos statue to Camp half-blood to make peace with the warring Greeks and the Romans, all before The Roman feast day on August 1st when The Romans will destroy the Greeks and Gaea shall destroy the world. Along the way they meet old and new characters, face ghosts from their past, learn about the state of the gods and try to fulfill the great prophecy whilst keeping each other safe.

Writing Style

The book is written through a series of the different characters' p.o.v’s(point of view). Each p.o.v is written in a third person omniscient style and this allows us to better understand what each character feels, their motivations and their history. The transitions from one point of view to the next are smooth, and easy to follow, where as in some of Riordan’s other work (cough Kane chronicles Cough) it’s seemed a bit clunky. The book’s style is a blend of action, adventure, mythology and comedy. The characters are all teenagers and talk and act as such which is why it's easy for our age group to understand and relate to them. All the character have unique and identifiable traits, so you never feel like your just reading the same point of view. It's like the most exciting road and these are definitely the characters you want to ride along with.This is mostly meant to be a lighthearted adventure with some intense bits skillfully strewn in. Although, it is worth noting that, being a finale, this particular book plays up a bit more of the intensity and severity of the situation.

New Vocabulary

A lot of the vocabulary in this book includes old Roman and Greek words as well as other terms. Here is some of the interesting vocabulary I learned

Repellere equites- Latin for repel horsemen: a square formation used by roman soldiers to fend from horseback warriors.

Retiarus- A Roman gladiator that fights with a net and trident.

Ponifex maximus- Roman high priest

Makhai- spirits of battle and combat.

Demigod- An offspring of a God and a mortal. Has all human vulnerabilities, but obtains powers from their godly parent.

Evaluating effectiveness

For the rules in place, considering Gods, demigods and how they fit in today’s society, I’d say book is fairy believable. I mean that in a sense that, I never feel like what I’m reading is too stupid to ever work, or too out there to ever make sense. It’s always stays within in its established rules and any new rules never ruin the story. It’s quite engaging, having great characters, great action a very fluent story and a pace that keeps you interested but not overwhelmed. Since the character are very fun, interesting and relatable it helps the reader to stay invested even when the p.o.v is shifting.

Evaluate Bias

Now I will admit to being fairly biased. I am a huge Percy Jackson and practically read every mythological Rick Riordan book. So that’s probably a strong contributing factor to my love of this book. I'm also just a big fan of Mythology in general and there's plenty of it present in the novel. If you have no interest in Percy Jackson or want to see a really serious and dramatic approach Greek mythology, you probably won’t like this book.  As for bias present on the author, I can't really see any bias that wasn't intentionally created for the characters.

Final Thoughts and Rating

Overall the blood of Olympus is a fantastic book filled with all the action adventure and drama you’d want. Though, that may be the book’s fatal flaw. If you’ve read Percy Jackson, or if you’re even the least bit familiar with the action/adventure genre, a lot of these plot points are very predictable and you can predict what’s going to happen from nearly, the moment events start to play out. On the one hand it’s everything I wanted but at the same time there’s no big surprises, nothing that blew my mind or I couldn’t see coming. Perhaps I could just be used to the author's style, but I felt this book lacked the payoff that was displayed in some of Rick Riordan's finale's like The Last Olympian, the last book in the original Percy Jackson series.

But aside from that there’s tons of good. We really get to see progression in all of the main characters, even the characters who started of as either bland or annoying like piper and Jason.All story arcs come to close for now, with some cliffhangers for future books. We get lots more interesting mythology, and see characters we haven’t seen in a while. The action as I’ve said is really good and it’s just a really fun, epic adventure. So only due to its predictability I still award The Blood Olympus with a solid 4.5/5 but in the end it still gave me what I wanted and didn’t disappoint, just didn't blow me away like I'd hoped. I definitely recommend this book to Heroes of Olympus fans as it’s a fitting end to the series, I'd also recommend the the entire Heroes of Olympus series for Percy Jackson fans or for Mythology fans in general.

Elijah Mourillon

Amateur Critic

Disclaimer: I do not own Percy Jackson, Heroes of Olympus or any of Rick Riordan’s work. The use of names and Images is for review purposes only and not for personal gain. All terms definitions were found in The Blood of Olympus Glossary and images from Google images.