Film review: Il Riccio February 1, 2010

While I was in Italy, I watched a really great movie, guess what, it was French! Directed by Mona Achache, it is based on a bestselling novel by French writer Muriel Barbery. Its original title is “Le Hérisson”, in italian, “Il Riccio”. It doesn’t look like it’s going to be translated into English sadly, but hopefully if the DVD comes out they will make it with English subtitles.

The basic storyline deals with Paloma, a suicidal 12 year old, way too intelligent and perceptive to accept the shallow and banal lifestyle of her upper class French family. Thus, she has decided to kill herself on her 13th birthday. Before she does this though, she is dedicating herself to making a film which explains why life is so absurd.

A few floors below her apartment lives another perceptive, unconventional character. Renée, who is by title the apartment’s dull lower-class concierge. Through the help of another fascinating inhabitant of the apartments, Paloma discovers who Renée really is: a lover of literature, a lover of films, a lover of people. She is, much like Paloma, a hedgehog (un hérisson), who hides her elegant and tender core with a thick emballage of sharp spikes.

The film follows their growing interaction, and their struggle against the truly dull and blind people in their lives, many of whom are found in the same building Paloma and Renée live in.

I read the novel a year or so ago, and found it super, although very heavily littered with literary quotes from Tolstoy and other “greats”. The film manages to translate this passion for literature in an interesting way – Paloma’s passion for journal writing is transformed into a determination to make a film before her death. This allows the film to be a lot less text-based, and gives the story an aesthetic which the book could not have, due to its heavy reliance on literary quotes. For anyone who can understand French or Italian, I would recommend both reading and watching the story.

This is definitely not a chickflick, or a little movie to project young Garance Le Guillermic into tween stardom. With witty, sardonic touches, lovely cinematography and some top class acting, this is a sociopolitical commentary which will resonate far beyond France.

-> Interesting articles can be found by searching “Il Riccio” on Google, but unfortunately all the ones I found were in Italian.

-> Good quality photos of the film are available here

The dilemma of old photos February 1, 2010

A post I originally wrote in Italy in early January, but it’s taken some time before I could post it…

Tonight seems to be lighting some lightbulbs…

Sometimes I have conversations which light so many sparks..

For days now I’ve been thinking I should get rid of some old photos I have on my laptop. I carry it everywhere with me, and I’m not really comfortable with people browsing through my photos with my old boyfriends.

That seems pretty normal, but it got me thinking about why the heck I kept the photos anyway. I’m talking about boyfriends from 6 years ago, even. There most certainly are not any feelings left. I have been known to be a hoarder, but in the past few years I’ve really gotten rid of a lot of crap that was lying around, both in my rooms and in my head. These photos have stuck. Tonight, rather quickly and without much fuss, I deleted a whole bunch.

I found one note I wrote  in 2008 in the week in which I broke up with a guy who was suspected of heavy drug use. I had noted down the dates on which I found out various things…Today he told me he did ecstasy and weed…Today was the drug test…Today I told him I’d leave him if he didn’t get help…Today he didn’t recognise my name…Today we stopped speaking… It reminds me of a docket I filled in at the police station when my digs was burgled.

I deleted almost everything. Why am I keeping that note? Why am I keeping a photo with him in which I look positively radiant?

To remind myself that we can be sincerely convinced of the wrong thing.

I thought he was off drugs for life. I thought we would love each other for ever. I thought I’d be back to visit him again. I was wrong, on all counts.

Then I found a photo from 2006, I’m 16 years old and positively pimply, full of Jesus and holy convictions. He’s beaming too. This time I was wrong and I knew it from the start. A three-week long relationship which ended by my hand because I knew “God does not want this”. In three weeks there was enough time for his hints at marriage, and my photos. I delete everything, except the photo which, four years ago, I captioned “luv!!!”

The 2004 file is frightening and I can’t open it right now. I just hover over all the folders. Yes, there are entire, separate, folders. I’m only 14, or 15 at most. Our first ever fotos 2geda. Trip to Ushaka. Anniversary!! Happy stuff. Sadness. Letters. Saved emails. Chat history.

My longest relationship and one of my biggest fuckups in all two decades of my life. Possibly also the most embarrassing…teenage luv is one of those things which will probably be brought up at my 21st and will make me turn pink with shame

My first relationship was my longest, and has probably had the most long-lasting consequences. I have dealt with all the immediate issues – the pain, the resent, the lack of self-worth, and a lovely bundle of other crap that hits you when you break up after two years with a guy who, apart from God, was all that kept you from suicide. I keep forgetting he gave me a ring once, it’s still at the back of my cupboard, and every time I remember it’s there, I remind myself to go sell it. I could do with a microwave. When I’m back home I’ll go dig it out.

My own immaturity and my psychological problems compounded, so as to turn a boyfriend into a life-saver. And by turn then, a life-taker. If I’m not an atheist today it’s because I reckon it was God who kept me going through those years. I had nothing else, and losing that boyfriend was monumental.

Why, why still all these words? I have read some of these saved chat conversations before. Soon I think I will sit down and read them all. Why, when I know I will ruin the rest of my day and get bleak?

Because at the end, I will get up on my feet and know that I got through that. I’m still here, and it’s been nearly five years. I am changed; stronger and better. And two lives which seemed inseparable, are now unrecognisable together, and happily so.

Because the next time I get hurt, whether it’s a guy breaking my heart, or my car rolling into a pole, I know I will remember those days, when I was absolute shit. I got out of that. I can face anything.

Because we must remember the faces, the light in the eyes that I believed was lighting my only love, and we must know that we can play games with lights, that lights fade.

Because we must remember also the words, the words that bind and mislead, and never mean what we want them to, words we write on our hearts and behind our eyes, so we see the world through them. Bring those words to the surface, to the conscious, so we may not be beguiled again. So we may have the power of discernment. Frankly, to recognise bullshit for bullshit.

This is why.

Digging through my Drafts: Drama Monologues February 1, 2010

Before I jetset off to Grahamstown again, I thought I should springclean my Drafts folder and work on all those unfinished posts from Italy…

Well. It seems I have unfinished stuff from as far back as June 2009…

As promised (over six months ago!), the scripts of the monologues I performed for my Drama Practical exams in June 2009

1: An extract from Demigod, by Richard LaGravenese

I know that you’re going…I know it. I’ve been thinking a lot about what you said and I believe that you love me too…And I understand that she gives you something else, something you need. But two years…what does a person do? Do I have a nervous breakdown? Do I start a new career? I mean what do I do? I’m not coping Frank.

I mean I was doing our laundry, like I always do on Sundays. And in the middle of folding our bedspread, I noticed your jockstrap in the washing machine. Drowning in the wash cycle. It was twisting and turning, being mangled and manipulated into all sorts of painful positions. It looked as if it were crying out for help. Then the strangest thing…I imagined you were still in it…the jockstrap I mean. I got hysterical. I couldn’t stop laughing. …People started staring at me…This woman came up to me and said “Dear, you should be careful not too inhale too much of that fabric softener”…Then all of sudden I heard your voice. So I ran over to the machine, lifted the lid, and I swear I could hear you in there, choking on the Sunlight and the Lemon Fab. But I couldn’t make out what you were saying, so I yelled, “Frank, what is it, what are you saying?” And the manager of the laundromat yelled back, “Lady, I’m gonna call the police if you don’t stop screamin’ at your wash!”

It made me think, Frank. It made me think that maybe I’m not handling this too well. I can’t drop two years of being lovers and go back to being friends, like ‘adults do’. We never were friends, Frank. We slept together on the first date, remember? I don’t want to be your friend. I loved you, but I never said I liked you. And if being adult means throwing me away for that..that slut rag you picked up on the train platform, then the most mature thing I could do for you would be to rip your face off!

2: Extract from The Star-Spangled Girl by Neil Simon (adapted to the character of a middle-aged Italian woman)

Mr Cornell! I have tried to be friendly, I have tried to be neighbourly, I have tried to be cordial. I do not know what it is you are trying to be. That night you carried my trunk up the stairs, I was thankful. The fact that it slipped and fell five flights and smashed to pieces was not your fault eh… And when you started leaving me messages scribbled on the staircase, I thought it kind of sweet, if a little crazy eh?

But things have gone too far, Mr Cornell. I cannot take the gifts from a man I hardly know! I do not need you tying little bottles of perfume to my cat’s tail. The poor baby was swishing it around last night and almost beat herself to the death with it! And really I do not need you painting my balcony without telling me. At least you could say, Mrs Marconini, I would like to paint your balcony. Instead, what happen? I went out there last night, and my slippers from Roma – Roma ti dico! – are still glued to the floor! And I certainly do not need you watching me go to work every morning through your big fancy telescope! In short Mr Cornell, and I do not want to say this again. Leave me alone!

Confessions January 30, 2010

i miss you, kid.

i’m excited to go back to my other home, Grahamstown

today is just another step in the cycle, today is just another box to tick, today is okay.

my mind is so weak
i need to get electrically shocked
i know Grahamstown will bring out the jumper cables.

i miss being around you, it’s too good a feeling to deny I don’t miss.

The South Africa vs Zimbabwe soccer match! January 28, 2010

January 27, 2010

For the first time in my life I went to a soccer match! I know this is shameful both as an Italian and as a Durbanite, but what the heck, I’ve never been too exact with my culture(s).

South Africa’s Bafana Bafana soccer team played against the Zimbabwean team, and won 3-0. As much as I enjoyed the game, I spent a lot of time gawking at the newly built stadium, and people-watching, which always fascinates me…

I’ve been getting my journo face on, I think the photos actually came out alright!

An update for the seeker of “italian housewiFes in panties”… January 27, 2010

Here, kid.

Here’s a lolcat (perhaps, lolfox) for you.

It made my day.

Can we do it? January 26, 2010

The universe has a question:
Are you strong enough, are you mature enough, to deal with the life of a nomad?

My answer:
Bring it on. I have no regrets.
Life is both smiling and hurting, life is landing and leaving, life is holding and letting go.

I will not close my eyes, I will not avoid seeing things that hurt. Because in that second I shut my eyes, I could miss a world of explosions which could fill my heart with love and joy.

(I only blame Aerosmith, because their lyrics inspired me)

headdesk January 24, 2010

What I’d like right now

1. High Street in Grahamstown, losing myself among the veggie vendors and the faces just like mine
2. The Drostdy Lawns at Rhodes with the sun reaching down to me through the greenery
3. That tough kid I was last year. The one who cried and shook but got through it all. What is it about holidays that turns my soul into the consistency of pap? I need to man up, I need to back up, I need to back off. There is one person in my heart and there is one person in my bed, and that is always always always and only ever me. Time to man the fuck up.

[Breathe, and I'll carry you away... Owl City]