{ Monday, January 26, 2004 }
I have to stop and try to remember the things that I did other than work this weekend, from which I am very weary. Those non-work things include:
- Went to see Master and Commander. Was fairly enjoyable. Got to look at handsome men for two hours. Like the doctor in the movie, I would have liked more ornithology.
- Went to see Elizabeth do an artist talk at the Helen Pitt Gallery about her Free Luck project, alternative economies and the necessity of people having non-transactional interactions.
- Took Dos Pesos out for a walk or two.
- Made waffles and tea.
- Ate half of a prime rib at OK chain restaurant Milestones. This was a much-needed break from work. It was yummy.
- Read Hotel Splendid by Marie Redonnet. I'm still on the fence about this one. Three sickly and aging sisters in a state of permanent menopause try to keep a delapidated hotel from complete decay. They are alternately sour and hopeful. It could be really brilliant, haven't decided yet. Reminds me of both Beckett and Concrete by Thomas Bernhard, but doesn't move. If I must read about futility, I generally want it to inspire either despair or Herculean (if bootless) exertions, not worry and stasis.
The rest of the time was spent working, preparing to work, avoiding work, and recovering from work.
LINK | 2:07 AM | TB
Oh dear... post-cinema ablution as commentary... :)
Yeah, Master and Commander did seem to be quite amputation and bloody wound heavy, but it was a great movie from the perspective that it didn't sugarcoat the (miserable, often brief) life of a sailor in the Royal Navy. Too often, we have this glamourous view of history that ignores the grime and dirt that was actually present at the time. (Compare the shipboard scenes in this movie with those in Pirates of the Caribbean, for instance!)
The best part, though, was that there was no needlessly long prologue or epilogue. Brief statements to introduce you to the ship and its mission, and then BLAMMO! Jumped right into the thick of battle with the Acheron. Then, at the end... oops! Guess we need to hunt the Acheron again! Nothing needless about getting back to England or any other kind of sappy resolution. Wish more movies were like that.
Bjorn | January 26, 2004 12:16 PMHotel Splendid does sound like an interesting storyline, though I've never read it. It reminds me of a short story by Yousiff Idriss called "House of Flesh" which is about 3 grotesque sisters and their beautiful mother who marries a blind holy man; the three sisters each sleep with her stepfather, posing as their mother (with their mother's help, although only the stepfather doesn't know what's going on). Eventually the girls grow deaf and the stepfather figures out what's going on but no one says anything - hear no evil, see no evil. Very great extrinsic and intrinsic storyline (Ok, it's really not all that much like Hotel Splendid, but it reminded me of it)
Mohamed | January 26, 2004 5:34 PM{ Post a comment }
I went to see Master and Commander, too. Well, I got taken to see it. There were people dressed as elves in the lobby waiting to see another film, I forget what.
bhikku | January 26, 2004 2:22 AMI would have liked there to be fewer amputations in Master and Commander. I never really enjoy on-screen amputation.
In the end I wondered why Master and Commander had been made. It seemed like a lot of money to spend on something with too many amputations and not enough birdies.
Then I started to wonder why lots of films get made, and this line of thought seemed like a dangerous hyperbola, so I rushed to the bathroom instead and consigned to the porcelain huge amounts of water which had once belonged to the Pepsi company.