I've been at it since May 4 2008 - say, 750 posts. Over the years I've received about half a dozen comments where the writer said he/she intended to take up something (a book, music) I'd mentioned or recommended. Very gratifying. Of course they may have been fibbing.
Recently I slagged off Quartet seen at our local film festival. Returning to the main festival cinema I found a board carrying forty post-its, mostly one word, all ecstatic about Quartet. My opinion hasn't changed about this piece of stodge but I feel I must allow mention of these views.
I was limited to two or three lines. After writing them I checked with my cinema reference, Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian. Here's his view of Quartet.
Movies we saw at Borderlines festival
Moonrise Kingdom Silly title. Two troubled twelve-year-olds, a boy and a girl, leave society behind to embrace la vie sauvage in an island off the New England coast. The first half is inventive and has its charms, but the exigencies of the plot and certain American beliefs in what is "proper" render the second half mechanistic. The director Wes Anderson, famed for his quirkiness, (eg, The Royal Tenenbaums), attracts a stellar cast, all of whom make the best of their cameos.
Amarcord Italian director Fellini (La Dolce Vita, 8½) lays aside obscurity and re-creates his childhood in the port of Rimini during Mussolini's rise to power. A vividly realised scrapbook, alternately uproarious and touching. terribly noisy and featuring a class of male teenagers capable of breaking any teacher (or parent) on God's earth. Released 1973, hasn't aged a bit.
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ReplyDeleteHelp! I go away for a few days to play doctors and nurses and when I return I find that you have upped sticks to a new address and personality and redecorated the blog!
ReplyDeleteThey will catch up with you one day RR (and all the other AKA's) and demand all that back rent.
(I got waylaid by your Shakespeare link, so the above is a copy of my comment there)
I haven't seen Quartet but your reaction confirmed my response to other reviews which I had read earlier. It reminded me of the New Yorker Cartoon you once quoted to me. As the curtain rises a man in the audience says to his wife, "Already I don't like it."
ReplyDeleteI saw Quartet last week and loved it because it brought very warm memories to me. Volunteer office work at a summer camp for Amateur Musicians.
ReplyDelete7 weeks of heartwarming sounds coming from the concert hall of the main lodge on the lake and from various summer cottages, studios and the camp site. Workshops, masterclasses - voice, piano, winds, jazz, celtic music, chamber music, classical and blues guitar and concerts at the end of each week. Good conversations and laughter in the dining hall, drinking and dancing in the evenings.
Avus: I have now provided a short explanation and - more to the point - a clickable way back from Lady Percy.
ReplyDeleteJoe: Those New Yorker cartoons are part of a visual pantheon chez Robinson. Life concisely encapsulated. Another in the same genre: A small boy waving an angry fork at the dinner table; the caption: "I say it's spinach and to hell with it."
Ellena: You'll have to forgive me for not experiencing those same warm memories when I saw Quartet. For me it was like looking at a well-dressed corpse - an equivocal event you'd be disinclined to prolong.
What happened to you is a variant of the wine that does not travel. In Brittany there is a cheap and cheerful white wine called Gros Plante. Many British holidaymakers drink it to accompany Une Assiette de Fruits de Mer - the constituents gathered that very day - often at a delightful restaurant overlooking a harbour or some other seascape. Since they can't take the fresh crab, winkles, clams, etc, home with them they take bottles and bottles of Gros Plante ("It hardly costs anything.") as a reminder of that wonderful meal. Back in Sheffield or Wallsend or Scunthorpe they open one of the bottles in keen anticipation only to discover that although the wine is still cheap it's now far from cheerful. Which also blights their holiday memory. Sad. Yours is the other way round - the impossibility of re-creating pleasure. Keep your memories to yourself and don't risk their destruction by watching Quartet again.