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The Curse is Lifted?
Nov. 13th, 2006 02:16 pmWell, for the first time in I-don't-know-how-long I had a really great weekend!
Friday Night: Kylie and I watched 'Nightwatch" on DVD. It was pretty damn good and followed the first 1/3 of the book quite closely. It was sort of like Matrix mixed with Buffy, with something else in there too, something almost French (Delicatessen, City of Lost Children) in its surreal portrayal of darkness - I haven't seen many other Russian films (except Solaris) so I'm not sure if this quality is present in others, or if it is just this director having a familiarity with Jeunet's films. The visuals were very slick, but I never found the special effects overused. On the contrary, in some places I found them to be quite original and truly stunning. The story-line benefitted from not following yours standard linear 'hollywood' plot too. It was told sometimes in flashback, and often very subtly, and at times I wondered if it was all too complex for a viewer who hadn't read the book. But no, Kylie got by just fine and really enjoyed it too. If you're sick of most of the vampire films and books out there at the moment I'd definitely recommend "Nightwatch" as both a film, and the fiction novel by Sergei Lukyanenko.
Saturday: Waking up early on Saturday morning to take the boys to swimming is always a rough start to the weekend, but I chose the day and once that 1/2 hour is over it's plain sailing from there.
I spent what was left of Saturday trying to reconstruct my ideas from scratch for the story ("A Plan for Pierrot") that I have been having trouble with. I went right back to basics, dissecting each character and their flaws and motives without reference to the other characters. Seems that, again without knowing I've done so, I've fitted all the characters into their correct and traditional "Commedia dell'Arte" roles! This definitely makes it easier for me to examine old Commedia Operetta scripts for the basic Commedia structures, the general story skeletons that were used to hang 'current-affairs' banter, and then I can subvert those traditional tales! :) What I've already written fits in amazingly well with the standard Commedia structures, so much so that I won't have to change much at all to find my way to the ending. Not only that, but it also fits with the standard structures of film noir and hard-boiled detective/crime. This is very heartening news, because that is exactly what I was hoping to achieve. I now know the ending (a subversion/inversion of the traditional Commedia 'Innamorati' tales [ie Romeo and Juliet, Cyrano de Bergerac etc]). I just have to find a clown-eyed view of the path that will take me there. This is still been a little difficult because the POV clown in question is a Traditional clown trying to solve a Commedia problem with Traditional clown props and training. Not an easy thing for me to wrap my head around, especially when I am neither a clown nor a harlequin!
Sunday: We got up as early as is humanly possible on a Sunday morning (around 9am) and headed into the city with the boys. It was one of our semi-regular 'Family Days' and, for a change, Kylie told them nothing of where we were actually going. The guessing games all the way into town on the train were fun, but not once did they guess.
We normally do the Art Gallery of NSW/State Library/Australian Museum tour on a Sunday, but this time we stayed on The Rocks side. First we went to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA), which was a little bit disappointing actually. I don't think the building layout is very well organised. There is no 'flow-through' so you end up in dead ends and have to back track. In the end we weren't sure what we had seen and hadn't and just gave up. Then we wandered The Rocks for a while, had lunch, and then made our way to the main attraction.
We ended up at the Observatory, which excited the boys a lot. They love anything to do with space and astronomy so the looks on their faces when they found out was worth it. We had a good look through the museum, saw sunspot activity on the sun, watched some pretty decent 3D presentations on the Solar System and star birth and death. There appeared to be a LOT more on the DVD/CD-Rom they were showing us they we didn't actually get to see. I'm going to go back and ask how I can get my hands on a copy. It was pretty good and, although it was a bit overcast, we had a great day. It was back on the train and home again after that. We'd pretty much tired each other out, which was good. It was definitely an 'early-to-bed' night for all of us last night.
So, a great weekend for a change! No illnessed (neither me, nor the boys), no accidents, no insomnia. And, even though it is only Monday and too early to be sure, this week is looking good too.
Maybe the curse that has afflicted my last few weeks has finally lifted.
Friday Night: Kylie and I watched 'Nightwatch" on DVD. It was pretty damn good and followed the first 1/3 of the book quite closely. It was sort of like Matrix mixed with Buffy, with something else in there too, something almost French (Delicatessen, City of Lost Children) in its surreal portrayal of darkness - I haven't seen many other Russian films (except Solaris) so I'm not sure if this quality is present in others, or if it is just this director having a familiarity with Jeunet's films. The visuals were very slick, but I never found the special effects overused. On the contrary, in some places I found them to be quite original and truly stunning. The story-line benefitted from not following yours standard linear 'hollywood' plot too. It was told sometimes in flashback, and often very subtly, and at times I wondered if it was all too complex for a viewer who hadn't read the book. But no, Kylie got by just fine and really enjoyed it too. If you're sick of most of the vampire films and books out there at the moment I'd definitely recommend "Nightwatch" as both a film, and the fiction novel by Sergei Lukyanenko.
Saturday: Waking up early on Saturday morning to take the boys to swimming is always a rough start to the weekend, but I chose the day and once that 1/2 hour is over it's plain sailing from there.
I spent what was left of Saturday trying to reconstruct my ideas from scratch for the story ("A Plan for Pierrot") that I have been having trouble with. I went right back to basics, dissecting each character and their flaws and motives without reference to the other characters. Seems that, again without knowing I've done so, I've fitted all the characters into their correct and traditional "Commedia dell'Arte" roles! This definitely makes it easier for me to examine old Commedia Operetta scripts for the basic Commedia structures, the general story skeletons that were used to hang 'current-affairs' banter, and then I can subvert those traditional tales! :) What I've already written fits in amazingly well with the standard Commedia structures, so much so that I won't have to change much at all to find my way to the ending. Not only that, but it also fits with the standard structures of film noir and hard-boiled detective/crime. This is very heartening news, because that is exactly what I was hoping to achieve. I now know the ending (a subversion/inversion of the traditional Commedia 'Innamorati' tales [ie Romeo and Juliet, Cyrano de Bergerac etc]). I just have to find a clown-eyed view of the path that will take me there. This is still been a little difficult because the POV clown in question is a Traditional clown trying to solve a Commedia problem with Traditional clown props and training. Not an easy thing for me to wrap my head around, especially when I am neither a clown nor a harlequin!
Sunday: We got up as early as is humanly possible on a Sunday morning (around 9am) and headed into the city with the boys. It was one of our semi-regular 'Family Days' and, for a change, Kylie told them nothing of where we were actually going. The guessing games all the way into town on the train were fun, but not once did they guess.
We normally do the Art Gallery of NSW/State Library/Australian Museum tour on a Sunday, but this time we stayed on The Rocks side. First we went to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA), which was a little bit disappointing actually. I don't think the building layout is very well organised. There is no 'flow-through' so you end up in dead ends and have to back track. In the end we weren't sure what we had seen and hadn't and just gave up. Then we wandered The Rocks for a while, had lunch, and then made our way to the main attraction.
We ended up at the Observatory, which excited the boys a lot. They love anything to do with space and astronomy so the looks on their faces when they found out was worth it. We had a good look through the museum, saw sunspot activity on the sun, watched some pretty decent 3D presentations on the Solar System and star birth and death. There appeared to be a LOT more on the DVD/CD-Rom they were showing us they we didn't actually get to see. I'm going to go back and ask how I can get my hands on a copy. It was pretty good and, although it was a bit overcast, we had a great day. It was back on the train and home again after that. We'd pretty much tired each other out, which was good. It was definitely an 'early-to-bed' night for all of us last night.
So, a great weekend for a change! No illnessed (neither me, nor the boys), no accidents, no insomnia. And, even though it is only Monday and too early to be sure, this week is looking good too.
Maybe the curse that has afflicted my last few weeks has finally lifted.
