RandomCha

The European Film Festival begins. My first two takes.

Tomorrow I’m going to see Greg Allen’s adaptation of Eugene O’Neill’s Strange Interlude. It’s rarely performed. This production is about 5 1/2 hours long, with two intermissions. I can’t wait to see how Greg injects his humor into the show. There are nine acts, and I’ve read that one act will consist entirely of adverbs.

About Water: People and Yellow Cans [2007]

1. He is 85 years old. He has had to move at least 15 times because of the flooding.
2. Gigantic, rusted ships strewn across the desert floor. The seashore has receded and is now 150 kilometers away.
3. A man digs through the garbage to find something to eat. At his feet a tiny puppy has already found something and is chewing on it.

zoe_trope  summed up my feelings exactly: "I don’t like Twitter. It’s like the diarrhea of the Internet."

Bigger Than Life [1956]

second viewing:

1. Richie wears exactly the same jacket as James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause.
2. "They’ve figured out how to keep us alive longer. But they haven’t figured out why."
3. The walls of their house are covered with travel posters of places they’ll never have the time or money to visit.

Bigger Than Life [1956]

1. “God was wrong!” A few moments later, he knocks over the Bible and it falls to the floor.
2. The scene where Ed takes his wife to the high-end clothes store and has her try on a variety of outfits while he passes judgment on them predates Vertigo.
3. He is assaulted by a riot of colors and momentarily blacks out. When he opens his eyes again, the football is rocking back and forth on the floor next to the bed but his son is gone. Like he has suddenly vanished.

Two nights ago I had a dream that I wandered into Grandpa & Grandma Pittman’s basement through an open door. The basement was unfinished but there were ceiling lights on and it was well-lighted and clean. I had found a white cat and followed in into the basement. In one of the large rooms Grandma Pittman was standing in front of a table doing some ironing, wearing a rather fancy housedress (for her anyway) and a scarf on her head. I came up behind her and gently called out because I didn’t want her to be taken by surprise that I was there. She turned around and smiled at me. I was holding the white cat and petting it.

I woke up from the dream not remembering if Grandma Pittman was still alive or not. Then, after a moment, I realized she was dead. But I couldn’t remember the circumstances. Of course I remember how Grandpa Pittman passed away: the unnecessary hip replacement surgery Grandma had insisted upon, the complications that followed, him ending up in ICU. I visited him only once while he was in the hospital, with Mom and Dad. He couldn’t talk because he had tubes in his mouth, but he was awake, and he looked me in the eye and held my hand and squeezed it. A few days later he died. I vaguely remember Grandma Pittman being moved into the nursing home after that, most of the contents of the duplex being sold at auction and the duplex itself being sold. She lived at the nursing home after that. But I can’t remember how long she lived there before she died, or how old I was when she died. I guess I was in college. Did I go to the funeral?

I vaguely remember my other grandfather, Papa Lou, passing away. I didn’t go to that funeral. I was in Chicago. More than the death itself I remember Mom complaining about the mess because he had died without a will. Grandma Pittman did have a will; and I think Mom and my aunt had power of attorney. But it’s all so hazy now.

It’s a little sad that I remember so little about it all now. And if I remember so little now then I’ll remember even less as time goes on.

Yesterday I watched Fear Me Not; somehow it was weirdly connected with the dream I’d had the night before, and the thoughts I had after waking up. 

Awesome/disturbing new video. David Byrne is everywhere now!