After a long hiatus of several or more years, I seem to have re-entered a film sphere - a couple of months back I was persuaded to go to see a biopic about Edith Piaf and was blown away by the performance of Marian Cotillard, and wept profusely - always a good sign, a far as I'm concerned.Last weekend, cold and snowy, we scurried into a cinema to watch 'Silk' - a fine example of how to waste a great deal of money - and I don't mean the cost of the ticket. Someone watch it and tell me what the point of it was, please. If it hadn't been cold outside I would have walked out.
We should have gone to see アース, which could be interpreted as either 'Arse' (phonetically) or 'Earth' (semi-semantically).
I have to say, that it's difficult for us gaijin - outsiders - foreigners - especially us native speakers of English - not to find amusing some of the ways in which the Japanese have incorporated what was once our native tongue into their language system. The other day we caught the 'Sea Bass' - written in Roman alphabet and katakana - a bus, or a fish? Next door is the 'Freshness Dog Cafe' - written in Roman alphabet - a cafe for fresh dogs? The other day I saw some 'naive' toilet paper... the mind boggles.
We regularly have film evenings - projected large onto the living room wall. The other night we watched Bruce Springsteen live at Barcelona, 2005 (?), belting out his post-9/11 stuff , plus a fair few golden oldies. The fact that my fellow watchees not only failed to share my appreciation of his greatness, but even dropped off, is a lesson, or two.
I am now told that Marian Cottillard won the best actress award the other day at the BAFTAs and that Daniel Day-Lewis won the best actor award, but said in his thank-you speech that Cotillard should have won his too. (Cotillard evidently couldn't speak, overcome).
THUNDER ROAD
The screen door slams, Mary's dress waves
Like a vision she dances across the porch as the radio plays
Roy Orbison singing for the lonely
Hey that's me and I want you only
Don't turn me home again
I just can't face myself alone again
Don't run back inside, darling you know just what I'm here for
So you're scared and you're thinking that maybe we ain't that young anymore
Show a little faith, there's magic in the night
You ain't a beauty, but hey you're alright
Oh and that's alright with me
You can hide 'neath your covers and study your pain
Make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain
Waste your summer praying in vain for a saviour to rise from these streets
Well now I'm no hero, that's understood
All the redemption I can offer, girl, is beneath this dirty hood
With a chance to make it good somehow
Hey what else can we do now
Except roll down the window and let the wind blow back your hair
Well the night's bustin' open, these two lanes will take us anywhere
We got one last chance to make it real
To trade in these wings on some wheels
Climb in back, heaven's waiting down on the tracks
Oh oh come take my hand
Riding out tonight to case the promised land
Oh oh oh oh Thunder Road,
oh Thunder Road, oh Thunder Road
Lying out there like a killer in the sun
Hey I know it's late, we can make it if we run
Oh oh oh oh Thunder Road, sit tight, take hold,
Thunder Road
Well I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talk
And my car's out back if you're ready to take that long walk
From your front porch to my front seat
The door's open but the ride it ain't free
And I know you're lonely for words that I ain't spoken
Tonight we'll be free, all the promises will be broken
There were ghosts in the eyes of all the boys you sent away
They haunt this dusty beach road in the skeleton frames of burned-out Chevrolets
They scream your name at night in the street
Your graduation gown lies in rags at their feet
And in the lonely cool before dawn
You hear their engines roaring on
But when you get to the porch they're gone on the wind, so Mary climb in
It's a town full of losers, I'm pulling out of here to win
http://youtube.com/watch?v=KngiJUNdsu0
http://youtube.com/watch?v=3-8LUvW9qv4
Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day;
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state,
Nor would I love at lower rate.
But at my back I always hear
Time's winged chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song; then worms shall try
That long preserv'd virginity,
And your quaint honour turn to dust,
And into ashes all my lust.
The grave's a fine and private place,
But none I think do there embrace.
Now therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may;
And now, like am'rous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.
Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Through the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.
To his Coy Mistress
by Andrew Marvell
(1621 - 1678)
Thunder Road
by Bruce Springsteen
(still with us)
