Who ate all the peas?
Oh man, could I be any more tired? Last night I dreamt I was awake. For eight hours, I dreamt I was having real difficulty getting to sleep. I tried everything, but just couldn't drift away. Then I woke up. Some mornings, you know the minor demons are high-five'ing each other, the fetid little shits.
I went to see CONSEQUENCES OF LOVE last week. I just wanted to see a movie where nobody died, and given the fragile state of my heart, I really wasn't in the mood for anything that had the words 'epic love story' or 'tragic love triangle' in the synopsis.
CONSEQUENCES was a real delight. My kind of movie. The protagonist is a man who lives in a hotel, and has lived there for eight years. He barely interacts with the other inhabitants (who include a passing sales rep and an aging couple who used to own the place but have fallen on hard times thanks to the husband's gambling addiction). Even the waitress who speaks to him every day is not deemed worthy of a response. Instead he watches the world, occasionally writes in his book, sleeps, walks and indulges his ritualistic weekly heroin fix.
He is so still, that it becomes like a Tati movie watching all the other figures orbit around him. You barely notice the pace pick up, the complications set in, others emotions get the better of him, but as information about his past is revealed, the cornered nature of his present and ultimately doomed nature of his future becomes clear. But this is not a sad film. Melancholy and reflective yes, but not sad.
It is a film about the things you do because they must be done, not because you need external approval (a subject very close to my heart). About the effect you have on people's lives, even when those people are distant to you. About the legacy you leave behind for all time with each interaction. It's such a beautiful film, not just for these reasons, but also because the composition and cinematography are so striking but also delicate - you never feel that any of the story is being crowbarred home - it just seems to unfold as if you were undoing what seemed to be a simple piece of origami that was really complex and impossible to refold.
I also went to see the Javier Bardem flick MONDAYS IN THE SUN when the real star of this film is Luis Tosar (When the Bell Chimed 13, La Comunidad). Four men, unemployed since the shipyard's closure, gather in their friend's bar, the dole office and the inter-island ferry, to debate their future. A story of Spanish men, deprived of their public masculinity and contribution, forced to try to accept their wives' support. It takes the suicide of one of their number to bring some perspective to their individual and collective struggles. A slow movie - there is no resolution, just a burgeoning understanding of a new reality - the laziest comparison I can make is think Full Monty without the laughs, music or nudity.
And tonight Rebel Without a Cause, and soon the new Batman movie and maybe, just maybe, eventually, there will be a horror flick worth getting excited about.
Wouldn't that be nice.
I went to see CONSEQUENCES OF LOVE last week. I just wanted to see a movie where nobody died, and given the fragile state of my heart, I really wasn't in the mood for anything that had the words 'epic love story' or 'tragic love triangle' in the synopsis.
CONSEQUENCES was a real delight. My kind of movie. The protagonist is a man who lives in a hotel, and has lived there for eight years. He barely interacts with the other inhabitants (who include a passing sales rep and an aging couple who used to own the place but have fallen on hard times thanks to the husband's gambling addiction). Even the waitress who speaks to him every day is not deemed worthy of a response. Instead he watches the world, occasionally writes in his book, sleeps, walks and indulges his ritualistic weekly heroin fix.
He is so still, that it becomes like a Tati movie watching all the other figures orbit around him. You barely notice the pace pick up, the complications set in, others emotions get the better of him, but as information about his past is revealed, the cornered nature of his present and ultimately doomed nature of his future becomes clear. But this is not a sad film. Melancholy and reflective yes, but not sad.
It is a film about the things you do because they must be done, not because you need external approval (a subject very close to my heart). About the effect you have on people's lives, even when those people are distant to you. About the legacy you leave behind for all time with each interaction. It's such a beautiful film, not just for these reasons, but also because the composition and cinematography are so striking but also delicate - you never feel that any of the story is being crowbarred home - it just seems to unfold as if you were undoing what seemed to be a simple piece of origami that was really complex and impossible to refold.
I also went to see the Javier Bardem flick MONDAYS IN THE SUN when the real star of this film is Luis Tosar (When the Bell Chimed 13, La Comunidad). Four men, unemployed since the shipyard's closure, gather in their friend's bar, the dole office and the inter-island ferry, to debate their future. A story of Spanish men, deprived of their public masculinity and contribution, forced to try to accept their wives' support. It takes the suicide of one of their number to bring some perspective to their individual and collective struggles. A slow movie - there is no resolution, just a burgeoning understanding of a new reality - the laziest comparison I can make is think Full Monty without the laughs, music or nudity.
And tonight Rebel Without a Cause, and soon the new Batman movie and maybe, just maybe, eventually, there will be a horror flick worth getting excited about.
Wouldn't that be nice.
posted by Adele at 2:03 pm
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