From everything2.com:
schwing
An exclamation coined
by the Saturday Night Live skit Wayne's
World and popularized by the movie of the same name.
One would generally exclaim "Schwing!!!" after the mention of a
particularly alluring female. Saying "Schwing!" is usually accompanied
by a pelvic thrust.
According to "Wayne's
World: Extreme Close-up", schwing means (in layman's terms) "My word she is attractive".
Of interest:
Schwing is actually an onomatopoeia for the sound of a sword
leaving its scabbard.
Think about it, you'll get it.
Source:
Mike Myers and Robin Ruzan Wayne's World: Extreme Close-up
New York: Cader Books, 1991
Scroll down for related material.
See also...
"It don't mean a thing
if it ain't got that...."
\
Moral of the story:
The Legend of Bagger Vance
by The Rev. Charles P.
Henderson
Cached from GodWeb.org
I have said elsewhere that movies and movie theaters are the
post-modern substitutes for the religion and Gothic cathedrals of the
past. (Click here for more.)
That point is illustrated once again by
Robert Redford's Legend of Bagger Vance, a beautifully
photographed film based on the novel by Steven Pressfield. In this
movie, which uses the game of golf as a metaphor for life, Redford
repeats the formula which he employed so successfully in River Runs
Through It, where fly fishing was the metaphorical setting for a
parable of redemption.
Redford understands what he is up to, and how to avoid the minefields
that might lie in his path. Rather than speaking of movies as a
substitute for religion, he frames his purpose in far less provocative
terms. "When I was young, mythology was huge for me - larger-than-life
characters in bigger-than-life situations," he is quoted as saying on
the film maker's website. It's hard to imagine religious viewers
objecting to a film maker who purports to be engaged in myth making.
After all, few people who are committed to any of the major faith
traditions acknowledge that their own faith tradition has much in
common with myth. Myth is what others believe; one's own faith is
truth.
Still, it would be a good idea if people who are concerned about the
health and vitality of a particular faith tradition followed very
intently what Redford is up to. He continues: "It's the classic journey
of a hero who falls into darkness through some disconnect with his
soul, and then of his coming back into the light with the help of a
spiritual guide. It also had a very strong love story, which is the
best way to show the hero's coming back to life. Lastly, it had a
challenge, a great contest. In the mythological sense, there finally
has to come that 'slaying of the dragon' scene, and in this case it's
an extraordinary golf match. You put all that together and you have a
solid foundation to tell a really good story."
As he has done in several prior films, Redford cast as his male lead an
actor who strongly resembles the young Robert Redford. In this case,
Matt Damon was given the Redford like lead. Clearly Damon not only
looks the part, he understands the significance of the undertaking.
After reading the script, Damon commented. "This is a story of
redemption." Redford cast Charlize Theron as the female lead. She too
connected with the major themes of the script in a deeply personal way,
seeing the struggle of her character, Adele Invergordon, as the mirror
image of that of her own mother, who fought to hold the family
construction business in South Africa together following the death of
her father.
But the star of this film actually turns out to be Will Smith, whom
Redford chose to play the part of the title character, Bagger Vance.
The choice of Smith might strike some critics as curious. But Redford
explains: "When you're dealing with someone who is a spiritual guide,
how are you going to present that character? Are you going to have him
coming in on a moonbeam or go for something else? I chose a different
route, which I felt was more interesting both visually and from a
storytelling standpoint - that of a 'coyote trickster.' The 'coyote
trickster' means you're never really going to know what this
character's up to - the very person who is going to describe the
mysteries of life to you is himself a mystery. I thought that was great
stuff. And for me, Will Smith was the perfect person to play that
character."
Again Redford chooses to describe Bagger Vance using terminology that
will be less threatening to persons of major faith traditions. After
all, few Catholics, Protestants, Muslims or Jews are going to object to
a movie in which an African American plays the "coyote trickster." Or
even "spiritual guide." But how about Savior or Messiah? And that is
exactly what the Will Smith character is in this movie. Likewise, who
would object to a "coyote trickster appearing in the form of a caddy in
a golf tournament. But how about the Christ figure appearing in that
role? And that too, is what the Bagger Vance character represents.
Inside each and every one of us is our one true, authentic swing.
Something we was born with. Something that is ours and ours alone.
Something that can't be learned ... something that got to be
remembered. -- Bagger Vance
The overwhelming majority of movie reviews written from a religious
perspective focus on issues like the amount of sex, violence, or
profanity in a particular film. Or the way in which religion is
treated. This film, in which neither religion or God are even
mentioned, and which does not have large amounts of either sex or
violence, may not even appear on the radar screen of such reviewers.
This is a big mistake. Ironically, those who review movies, television
shows, or computer games for their religiously committed readers are as
mesmerized by violence and sex as the film makers and television
producers whom they criticize. By focusing on these topics, such
reviewers are missing the big picture. Which is that spirituality is
moving out of churches, synagogues and mosques and into movie theatres,
television networks and computers.
What really matters is not the amount of either sex or violence in a
particular film, but the messages and meanings that are communicated.
And whether a particular message has sufficient power as good story to
capture and hold the attention of an audience. The stories that capture
and hold your attention are the ones that shape your life. This the
founders of all the world's great religions understood very well.
People are not influenced by being preached at, lectured to, or coerced
into prescribed patterns of behavior. People are motivated by powerful
stories that convey a sense that their own lives have meaning. Better
yet is a moving story that also contains clues about specific actions
that the listener might take, leading to some greatly desirable result:
like happiness or a sense of well being.
One of the reasons I like this film is that it conveys something that
Christian mystics, Buddhist masters, and spiritual guides from other
faith traditions have understood for thousands of years. Becoming the
person you are meant to be involves the sometimes ironic and painful
process of letting go of the ego and its needs, dying to the self, so
as to enter a deeper relationship with the world, with other people,
and ultimately with God.
For Christians, it is Jesus Christ who leads one along this path. For
Buddhists, it is the Buddha. For the Matt Damon character in this
movie, it is Bagger Vance. Taking this journey, as this movie makes
clear, involves certain "habits of the heart" which religious
practitioners refer to as spiritual discipline. In Buddhist meditation
it is called "attention." In the Legend of Bagger Vance this is what
Matt Damon learns. And Robert Redford, who evidently has studied
Buddhism, portrays the process vividly. Using an imaginative
combination of zoom lenses, camera angels, and shifts in perspective,
the film makers are able to convey the difference between being
distracted by one's surroundings and attending to them. Bagger Vance
refers to it as "being in the field." In this important distinction
lies the difference between being trapped by ego (sin) and being
liberated (born again/saved/redeemed). The result for Matt Damon, is
not just victory in a golf match, it is victory over the demons that
had taken possession of himself.
Being able to tell a moving story that captures and holds one's
attention, ... this is what gives any communicator power, whether
within the traditional media of religion or the new media of
television, film and the computer. Unless the leaders of organized
religions remember this lesson that their founders understood so well,
the great news story of the twenty-first century will be the continuing
migration of humanity's spiritual life from the world of organized
religion, and its institutions, to the commercial world of the new
media. If you think that a giant corporation like Dreamworks, Disney or
Time/Warner can be trusted as the caretaker of your soul more than,
say, the Roman Catholic Church or the Society of Friends, then this may
constitute good news. If you believe, on the other hand, that the
world's great faith traditions are better served by institutions whose
sole purpose is to nurture the spiritual life, then what is happening
in popular culture may be a cause for alarm.
Archive
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|
Charles Henderson |
The Rev. Charles P.
Henderson
is a Presbyterian minister
and Executive Director
of CrossCurrents.