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The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Film
- Hits: 951
My son here for a few days to visit, time to catch him up on Culture. I'm forever recommending him books and films, and he's forever making notes never to see them, so - trapped in my company for a couple of days we take in a few classics.
First of all Art Bell & David Paulides - The first - host of Coast to Coast AM Radio - excellent listening for the long drives, and the second, for his unique take on Missing People in the wilderness. (Missing 411).
Which are wonderfully disquieting things to listen to when you're up too late driving someplace too far and you need interesting company.
Which - while briefly here - and having listened to any number of the episodes - are easy to dismiss as the ravings of a lunatic or mental illness - but there's always the "What IF?".
By which I mean, what would you do if you saw something truly inexplicable? Like a close encounter with a Bigfoot - or UFO? Would you tell anyone? And how do you communicate experiences - such as "enlightenment" for example - via language to someone that hasn't shared the experience? How would you persuade them?
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Anyways, those two, merely to share a taste. Follow this up with "Jose Chung's From Outer Space" - Season 3, Episode 20 of the "X-Files" - with which he's not so familiar, but my personal favorite, which addresses the theme of "Truth" when dealing with extraordinary events, "Truth" as told from the various points of view and biases of the several witnesses who were there.
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Follow this with "The Evil Dead II" - which I've reviewed and recommended elsewhere here - and to him - only *busy busy boy* he's not yet seen.
He gets it. Or - at least he gets why I like it so much - for a completely schlock horror/comedy film it touches quite a few nerves. My nerves, at least.
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And now to: "The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover". Starring - a very Sexy Helen Mirren, Tim Roth, Michael Gambon, etc, etc.
I billed this as "The Unicorn Chaser". My bad.
So, over thirty years since I've seen this - and - it upset me then - and upsets me still now. But I'm better able to make sense of it.
By which I mean I "got-it", when I saw it, the bullying privilege and bungling incompetence, Margaret Thatcher in Britain, etc, etc, BUT - Another 30 plus years in the world and I'm really getting it. Wow. Revise the accents, update the dialogue (and food - no more fine cuisine, use Chick-Fil-E and Taco-Bell,...) and here we are...
7 Years fine dining in Calgary. I get it.
It's a masterpiece. Don't read the reviews, they've been done by half-wits and eunuchs, cuckolds and idiots, watch it, it's trying, it's difficult, it's cinematically the equivalent of watching all of Van Gogh's (or Rembrandt's or Vermeer's) paintings in a single viewing, their life's understanding distilled into a movie, the aesthetics, the dialogue, the characters, it's never been more relevant - or topical.
The boy (so he says) loved it.
Cabeza de Vaca - Adventures in the Unknown Interior of America
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Books
- Hits: 931
Which is the first person narration of Cabeza de Vaca's 8 years in North America. One of only 4 survivors of the 1527 Narvaez expedition (from 400 initially) he became one of the first Europeans to cross North America, his odyssey saw him taken slave by various of the Native tribes as he worked his way from Florida to Mexico City - plain speaking, he embellishes nothing - yet, given his ordeal he is remarkably precise about locations, times and distances, as well as offering some cultural insights into the peoples he met.
I love this sort of stuff - History is much more interesting when told to you through the eyes of it's witnesses.
Chapter 21
Five Christians quartered on the coast came to the extremity of eating each other. Only the body of the last one, whom nobody was left to eat, was found unconsumed. Their names were Sierra, Diego Lopez, Corral, Palacios, and Gonzalo Ruiz.
Chapter 23
THE ISLANDERS wanted to make physicians of us without examination or a review of diplomas. Their method of cure is to blow on the sick, the breath and the laying-on of hands supposedly casting out the infirmity. They insisted we should do this too and be of some use to them. We scoffed at their cures and at the idea we knew how to heal. But they withheld food from us until we complied.
Chapter 35
They said that a little man wandered through the region whom they called Badthing [Mala Cosa]. He had a beard and they never saw his features distinctly. When he came to a house, the inhabitants trembled and their hair stood on end. A blazing brand would suddenly shine at the door as he rushed in and seized whom he chose, deeply gashing him in the side with a very sharp flint two palms long and a hand wide. He would thrust his hand through the gashes, draw out the entrails, cut a palm's length from one, and throw it on the embers. Then he would gash an arm three times, the second cut on the inside of the. elbow, and would sever the limb. A little later he would begin to rejoin it, and the touch of his hands would instantly heal the wounds.
Read the Wiki Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%81lvar_N%C3%BA%C3%B1ez_Cabeza_de_Vaca
And, should you be stuck finding the book read it online here: https://www.google.ca/books/edition/The_Journey_of_Alvar_Nu%C3%B1ez_Cabeza_de_Va/RMQRAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&printsec=frontcover or here: http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/cdv/rel.htm
The Wolfpack
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Film
- Hits: 1221
The Wolfpack is a 2015 documentary that tells the story of six brothers and a sister whose father confined them inside of their 4-bedroom, New York City apartment for almost all of their lives.
Read the Wiki here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wolfpack
Not a great documentary, but an interesting one, by virtue of it's subjects.
In line for a mediocre burger
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Other
- Hits: 948
I'm in line for a mediocre burger. Not a small line, a pretty big line, maybe 30 people.
This place - it's been "Opening Soon" in town for the past 4 months. Last year they had one of those food trucks, sold burgers, fries, poutine, and Stormy was all over it, telling me all about it, I had to go, best burgers ever, etc, etc. Then this year, they gave up the truck, they were popular enough I guess, and now they have a more permanent location.
So finally, after months of false starts they're finally open, 6 hours a day, 4 days a week, and I'm waiting here in line with everybody else to see what all the fuss is about.
Meh. 30 minutes in line. I go all in on the burger - triple deluxe, maybe $8.00, and the large poutine, $12.00, and - sincerely - none of it's a big deal. Like mediocre. Expensive even, for what you're getting. A&W, Even McDonalds do it - or some version of it - better and cheaper. And while I'm happy to support a lousy independent over a lousier multinational - I see no reason for this to be lousy.
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