Tuesday, July 24, 2001

The Caveman's Valentine (2001): Stunning visuals and a great performance by Samuel L. Jackson manage to override a weak plot.

There are multiple levels in human interaction:
- There's the literal face value of words that one communicates.
- There are cues such as body language.
- There is a near-psychic undercurrent that comes between the lines.
- There is an undercurrrent that you imagine, and you know you're imagining it.
- There are levels that you imagine, and you think it's real.

People who can communicate effectively on all of the first three levels tend to do very well in life, and people who don't, don't.

"Crazies" like Jackson's character in this movie may deal ONLY on the third level and up, and are thus unable to cope successfully in communication with others. Those who are grounded in the "reality" of the first and second levels are only getting part of the story. You know, when someone says something to you that's completely innocuous, but you feel a completely different undercurrent? I often feel that I'm missing half of what's being communicated in certain interactions, because I get the first-level stuff, and some of the second and third levels, but fail to interpret and respond to it quickly enough to communicate effectively there.

It seems like these levels of communication almost contain a definition of the range between "sanity" and "insanity."

Discuss amongst yourselves...