love is how you spend your time
It’s so rare to find beautiful animated story telling online. This must be the best I’ve ever seen as I’ve been watching it a few times a year for about 3 years. Of course a good story is a crucial first ingredient and there are few more fascinating than that of the great master serial story teller Charles Dickens. Even from the little that I’ve read I find his stories and characters stuck in my head forever rattling around and recurring. Bleakness is charm with imagination.
Here’s a pathetic cowboy flick with a script that’s right up there with the most predictable ever. After he’s shot in the shoulder right at the beginning it’s so obvious after stumbling wounded through the snowy forest that he’s going to go over the falls. Like superman he’s spectacularly immune to frostbite and hypothermia and survives against all odds and elements and kills everyone.
In the end everyone dies. No surprises there either. It boils down to a miserable conflict between two sad lonely men who can’t even communicate as they face each other in death at the very end. But they do still manage to fall in love as they fade into the dusty desert sunset. If only they could have talked to each other all of this bullshit could have been avoided. But sigh sadly no and give it a miss. There’s no sex. Only violence. It’s not even funny. Seraphim Falls is pants.
I love finding pictures and messages in the sand. They’re usually close to the waves and soon washed away but they’re always very beautiful.
I have so many memories of West Pier in Brighton. Some from when I was lonely and afraid. Some are sad and make me cry. Some are inspiring and make me smile.
I’ve never been able to walk onto the pier. It’s like an offshore phantom. I think that there’s something quite beautiful about glamour in decline.
It’s in the evenings at this time of year that I miss it the most. Then the starlings come home to roost. They are from all over the world and will be moving on soon. But together each evening their display is spectacular.
I don’t really follow any of the domestic English politics any more. Probably because I find it even more boring from a distance. And generally I’m not much of a fan of Martin Rowson’s cartoons. But this one really struck me today. It looks wicked and sweet. Tragically I don’t yet know enough about the context to get the joke. I’m not sure if I’ll find the energy or inspiration to read enough to find out but time will tell. Or perhaps someone will explain it to me. I would love to know if it’s actually funny and why.
Last night I watched Sylvia, a film about Sylvia Plath. I’ve loved her poetry for some time and thought that the Bell Jar was a stunning and devastating novel. I’ve never been much of a fan of Gwyneth Paltrow but she was brilliant and beautifully complex and sexy as Sylvia. It was funny to see Daniel Craig as Ted Hughes. I kept thinking of him as James Bond throughout which was a bit amusing.
There’s a scene where they are at sea in a rowing boat. Ted is encouraging her to simply write and get it done. Sylvia is blocked, brooding and unresponsive. Then they are caught up in the current of the outgoing tide and the situation becomes a bit dangerous. Sparked by this Sylvia becomes animated and inspired by thoughts of death and memories of attempted suicide. Ted is clearly disturbed.
As inspired by life and death, her brilliance walked a fine line and ended tragically.