Last week I saw Buñuel's Viridiana. There were moments I thought were very interesting or very creepy or both. It was fairly obvious that her bringing a veritable raft of the wretched to stay on her uncle's estate was going to end badly. It's only surprising that it didn't end worse for her. (As far as I can tell, we are supposed to assume that the attempted rape was thwarted.) Anyway, the scene with the paupers lined up just like the Last Supper was pretty daring, and you can certainly see why the film was banned in several Catholic countries.
I'm not sure how much I actually enjoyed the film (as a lot of it was stressful waiting for the paupers to turn on her), but I'm not sorry I saw it. The scene where her crown of thorns falls out of her suitcase is classic! I have another couple of weeks before the next Buñuel over at TIFF.
I already mentioned that I enjoyed Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, except for the portrayal of Bruce Lee. I haven't entirely decided but I might go see Reservoir Dogs at Carlton towards the end of the month. I've never seen it, and while I don't generally enjoy ultra violent movies, I'm sure it's worth seeing. I briefly debated going to see The Hateful Eight again, probably also at Carlton but it didn't work out for some reason. I did see Pulp Fiction there not so long ago, though my notes says this might have been back in August. Good lord, how time flies! I would like to see Jackie Brown again, which is perhaps the most enjoyable of his films to watch (for me), so I'll keep my eyes out for that.
I'm scheduled to see Rohmer's La Collectionneuse, De Palma's Blow Out and Wong Kar-wai's 2046 this month. I'd be up to try to catch Jarmusch's Father Mother Sister Brother, but I may have already missed its run at TIFF, and I don't think it made it out to The Fox or the Revue. It's not my highest priority, but I'll see if it turns up somewhere close to me at some point.
It was quite overdue, and I finally found the time to watch Godard's Masculin Feminin. I liked it far more than I expected. I think it's a combination of the humour working with the material much better than in Breathless, and probably also I just like Jean-Pierre Léaud better as leading man, and it was particularly droll when the girls told him to turn that trash off (when he put classical music on) and he said his favorite musician was Bach. (I wrote a play ages ago where the male lead wasn't much interested in music past Bach...) I definitely wish this had been in the massive Godard box set. I may still part with this box set (if I could find anyone to pay me even part of what it is worth), though I definitely need to watch Une Femme est Une Femme, though I expect I won't like this as much (it sounds like it might be more like Vivre sa vie, which was ok but not amazing). Anyway, I kicked the idea around for a while and finally ordered a copy of Masculin Feminin, though it is being sent to my step-mother's house first, so I probably won't have it in hand for some time...
In terms of concerts, I saw a great concert by Tafelmusik where they did Bach's Brandenburg Concertos 1-4. I cut it a bit close, and ended up running and just catching the bus. Had I missed that bus, I would likely have been a few minutes late. For some reason, they rewarded all the subscribers with their 1994 recording of all the Brandenburg Concertos. I have a mini-subscription, so I also got the CDs. I think I might already have a copy of this, but I'm sure I can find someone who would want it.
Then last night, I went and saw a percussion concert as part of the UT New Music Festival. The first half were pieces by Vivian Fung and the second half were percussion pieces by Morton Feldman. I didn't like the final piece, as it was too long and monotonous, but the other pieces were good. Then last night I saw 3 pieces by Vivian Fung, including a very virtuosic flute concerto. I left at the intermission, as I didn't really want to see the Unsuk Chin piece. It made no difference in terms of getting home early. The TTC was terrible. Line 2 was shut down between St. George and Chester! So I decided to try to take the streetcar. As I made my move, they said that Line 2 service had been restored, but I wasn't able to jump off the train. It might not have actually mattered, as there was another announcement about the security alarm being pulled on a train. Definitely a bad night on the subway. But it wasn't much better waiting for the streetcar at Queen's Park. It was brutally cold out,* and the streetcar took forever to arrive. When we finally got to the East End, we got stuck behind a very slow garbage truck around Degrassi, and of course the streetcar couldn't maneuver around it. So a bad time getting home.
On Friday, I am back to see a student orchestra at Koerner Hall. They are doing yet another Vivian Fung piece, as well as Tchaikovsky Symphony 6. Then I see Cowboy Junkies, which will be an interesting bookend, as I saw Sudan Archives the previous Sunday at The Great Hall.
It doesn't look like I am seeing any TSO concerts in Feb., though I went to see them three times in Jan., so it balances out. I have two Soundstreams concert, including one at Hugh's Room. I also want to get over to Hirut a couple of times and the Rex two or three times. Indeed, I might move my ticket at Coal Mine to a different day so I can see Gary Smulyan a second time. I haven't entirely decided, and I don't want to then find out that those dates at the Rex are sold out.
At any rate, I probably can use this time productively. I finally got feedback from a few people I sent my script to. They basically agreed with me it was too talky. The overall idea was ok, but there wasn't enough conflict driving the action, and the whole thing needed a lot of tightening up. That said, one guy is leaning towards signing on for the main part, and I have landed someone who will direct the play, if I make significant improvements to the script. While I have fond memories of this first draft, I agree it really could blossom more if I put in the work and don't get all defensive about what I have written and resist making these changes. But still, it definitely means almost completely rewriting the piece, when it was only last Sat. that I got the whole thing down and formatted properly. Still, I want to see if I can create something I can really be proud of.
So that's the main news, and I really need to head off to bed now.
* It looks like we have a solid seven more days of this terrible cold weather, so none of the damn snow will melt and there isn't a chance in hell I am going to bike in this weather (which means I am definitely getting out of shape). This has been a really bad winter, weather-wise at any rate.
