Day 28, The magic hour

In 1978, Terrence Malick released his amazingly beautiful Days of Heaven starring Richard Gere, Brooke Adams, Sam Shepard, and Linda Manz. Featuring a poetically sparse story, atmospheric soundtrack, and great performances. But that’s not what this movie is known for, no, it is known for something else, and if you have ever had the fortune to see this movie then you’ll know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t then here’s the trailer:



As you can see, it’s downright beautiful in every sense of the word. Terrence Malick and his director of cinematography Nestor Almendros employed a technique that many have tried to duplicate but have never really quite captured in the same way. Pretty much the entire movie was filmed during the early morning and late afternoon hours. Terrence Malick’s desire was to have a light sky with no real view of the sun. These times are called the “Magic Hour”.

You may be asking yourself, “Um, what the heck does this have to do with the PCP, Sean? This guy’s run out of ideas and is going slightly loopy from the over eating of vegetables.” But, no, that’s not it (I know, a shame, that would have given the project a wildly dramatic turn. This whole thing could have turned into a soap opera).

Let me have you guys do something, it’s rather fascinating believe me. Let me have you head on over to Patrick’s blog (be sure to come back) and look at his daily photostream on Flickr. I want you to compare his day 27 photo with his photo ten days later, day 37. Crazy, isn’t it? Now I realize today isn’t day 27 anymore but I had something more important to talk about yesterday. Anyway, today is day 28 and it’s the beginning of what I’ve been thinking of as the Magic Week. See the segue there? Nice, right? And yes I’m aware that it’s ten days between day 27 and day 37 but then the term wouldn’t work, so whatever.

I’m getting totally excited about these next days. Patrick informs us three that this stretch of days is when the body finally gives up the ghost and stops storing and forming fat around the body in the same quantities that it has been. As you saw in the Patrick pictures, between those ten days he became lean and cut, most especially around the midsection. I’ve been looking forward to getting rid of that unnecessary store of fat around my midsection since, well, forever and now, put on a giddy laugh with me, it’ll be happening. My body will run out of its stores of fat around the rest of my body and turn to its emergency stores of fat--the midsection fat.

Who else is excited? I know I am. It’s going to be a whole lot easier to see exactly how my muscles are developing and shaping if I don’t have that last bit of fat hanging around on my body. I’ll be able to see where I’m lacking and what I need to do to really form everything in the way I want to reach my peak condition. So yippee! I hope you all follow me and my daily photo closely in the next few days and watch as my body turns into clay, ready to be molded into something...amazing.

Have a nice day.