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Almost... enh!
Sales don't happen often in Japan, normally only in January and July, but when they do, they're worth it. Today, at Marui (as the OIOI department store is known), I scored two lovely sweaters for 10$ each! I almost bought more, but since one can really only wear those sweaters during four, perhaps five months of the year, I reined myself in.
My end-of-year blitz has progressed... somewhat. The blanket for B2 will be done tonight; I just have to keep crocheting the border until I run out of yarn, and that'll just take a couple of episodes of Carnivale. As for the rest, I've only a little bit of handsewing left to do on a skirt (finish hem and tack waistband down), a zipper to set on another, a dress to hem (but I need red bias binding for that one), linings to sew into 4 pencil cases, a simple top to assemble (already cut), and pyjama pants to hem and make a drawstring for (and think about a matching top).
On the bright side, my apartment looks pretty neat and tidy!
Now, what to review? How about a Silver Screen Double Feature?
A Woman of Affairs:
Greta Garbo was a beautiful, beautiful woman.
Now that that's out of the way, we can concentrate on the movie itself. It's silent, which is something I always find pleasant and strange at once. I like seeing just how it's possible to tell a story without words. Of course, that's what most of dance is, but dance has developed its own languages to communicate what we otherwise would through words. Silent movies aren't exactly like pantomimes, because the actors were actually speaking (and there are those cute dialogue cards), so it's fun to try reading lips, but at the same time, poses and expressions are exaggerated enough for the audience to understand without too much difficulty.
Garbo plays an heiress, Diana Merrick. She's secretly engaged to her childhood sweetheart, Neville, but Neville's father doesn't approve, and Neville is sent off to Egypt to make a name for himself. Diana eventually marries David, the one who's been hanging hopefully around, and a man her brother greatly admires. On their wedding night, police officers burst into the room, ready to arrest David, who jumps out the window to his death. Everyone is shocked, because David was such a good man, and no one can think of why he would kill himself. Diana hides the police's involvement and makes up a lame story about David being drunk (though he never drank) and becomes a woman of the world, spending her time on the continent with various rich men. Scandalous! Ten years later, she returns to England to find her brother dying from the drink, and Neville engaged to Constance, a sweet, innocent young thing. Of course, Diana and Neville still love each other, but consider it too late to do anything about it. So Neville marries Constance, and a year later, Diana is in a French convent, dying. Neville is fetched, since he seems to be the only one she wants to see. He brings Constance along. Diana gets better, but pretends to no longer love Neville, for Constance's sake.
There's more to it than that, including a tragic end for Diana, but it boils down to questions of honour, a virtue which I think is woefully undervalued nowadays. Diana holds back her feelings so that Constance and Neville might be happy together, which I understand. I don't understand, however, why she never revealed (until much later) that David had been a thief and had killed himself (accidentally or not) rather than be arrested. Instead, she let people believe that he had either a) committed suicide or b) had a drunken accident. Did she simply not want to disillusion her brother, who worshipped the ground David walked on? It's hard to imagine she just didn't want to be thought of as the wife of a criminal, but I don't see why she wouldn't want to repair some of the damage; presumably, if David had stolen something, there had been victims, right?
Final verdict: 7.5/10
The Gay Divorcée:
The title is slightly misleading, as the plot of the movie revolves around a woman trying to get a divorce, but that's a minor quibble, since it's really an excuse to watch some pretty dance numbers. And while it's a joy to watch Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire dance together, I almost wish they'd done nothing but that. Ginger's voice has a quality that just annoys me, for some reason, whether she's singing or speaking.
Now, I wasn't expecting a movie of that era to be politically correct in any way*, but I was suprised at all the casual pot-shots taken at Italians, not to mention the character of poor Tonetti himself. Although, I guess that when everyone in the movie is white, you have to find someone to make fun of. Still, I must admit I laughed at: "I'm not going to leave you alone with an Italian! Why, he might be a tenor!"
The fact that Fred Astaire insisted on filming his dance sequences in a single take is well-known, I believe, and do I ever wish all films about dance went about things the same way! Quick cuts may fool some of the viewers, but wouldn't it be easier to just find actors who can dance, or dancers who can act?
Final verdict: 7/10, + .5 for the dancing, for a total of 7.5/10
* While I was visiting my family last summer, my father and I bust a gut laughing as we watched some dance numbers from a Busby Berkeley DVD set he'd just bought. Along with the usual over-the-top extravaganzas, such as a scene of a couple kissing by a waterfall inexplicably turning into a scene in which dozens of girls in sparkly swimsuits perform complex swimming and dance moves in giant fountains, there's a number about a serviceman looking for "[his] Shanghai Lil" in a bar, complete with a chorus of soldiers and cheongsam-clad barmaids. When Shanghai Lil finally appears, she looks every bit as Chinese as I do (but I'll bet I'd pwn her with my mad chopstick skillz!) and sings about loving him "long long time, many tear I cry!" in an accent that sounds like nothing I've ever heard before. And because the chorus of soldiers wasn't grand enough, the whole navy appears and starts dancing on the tables while the soldiers perform some sort of dance drill! O_O;
My end-of-year blitz has progressed... somewhat. The blanket for B2 will be done tonight; I just have to keep crocheting the border until I run out of yarn, and that'll just take a couple of episodes of Carnivale. As for the rest, I've only a little bit of handsewing left to do on a skirt (finish hem and tack waistband down), a zipper to set on another, a dress to hem (but I need red bias binding for that one), linings to sew into 4 pencil cases, a simple top to assemble (already cut), and pyjama pants to hem and make a drawstring for (and think about a matching top).
On the bright side, my apartment looks pretty neat and tidy!
Now, what to review? How about a Silver Screen Double Feature?
A Woman of Affairs:
Greta Garbo was a beautiful, beautiful woman.
Now that that's out of the way, we can concentrate on the movie itself. It's silent, which is something I always find pleasant and strange at once. I like seeing just how it's possible to tell a story without words. Of course, that's what most of dance is, but dance has developed its own languages to communicate what we otherwise would through words. Silent movies aren't exactly like pantomimes, because the actors were actually speaking (and there are those cute dialogue cards), so it's fun to try reading lips, but at the same time, poses and expressions are exaggerated enough for the audience to understand without too much difficulty.
Garbo plays an heiress, Diana Merrick. She's secretly engaged to her childhood sweetheart, Neville, but Neville's father doesn't approve, and Neville is sent off to Egypt to make a name for himself. Diana eventually marries David, the one who's been hanging hopefully around, and a man her brother greatly admires. On their wedding night, police officers burst into the room, ready to arrest David, who jumps out the window to his death. Everyone is shocked, because David was such a good man, and no one can think of why he would kill himself. Diana hides the police's involvement and makes up a lame story about David being drunk (though he never drank) and becomes a woman of the world, spending her time on the continent with various rich men. Scandalous! Ten years later, she returns to England to find her brother dying from the drink, and Neville engaged to Constance, a sweet, innocent young thing. Of course, Diana and Neville still love each other, but consider it too late to do anything about it. So Neville marries Constance, and a year later, Diana is in a French convent, dying. Neville is fetched, since he seems to be the only one she wants to see. He brings Constance along. Diana gets better, but pretends to no longer love Neville, for Constance's sake.
There's more to it than that, including a tragic end for Diana, but it boils down to questions of honour, a virtue which I think is woefully undervalued nowadays. Diana holds back her feelings so that Constance and Neville might be happy together, which I understand. I don't understand, however, why she never revealed (until much later) that David had been a thief and had killed himself (accidentally or not) rather than be arrested. Instead, she let people believe that he had either a) committed suicide or b) had a drunken accident. Did she simply not want to disillusion her brother, who worshipped the ground David walked on? It's hard to imagine she just didn't want to be thought of as the wife of a criminal, but I don't see why she wouldn't want to repair some of the damage; presumably, if David had stolen something, there had been victims, right?
Final verdict: 7.5/10
The Gay Divorcée:
The title is slightly misleading, as the plot of the movie revolves around a woman trying to get a divorce, but that's a minor quibble, since it's really an excuse to watch some pretty dance numbers. And while it's a joy to watch Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire dance together, I almost wish they'd done nothing but that. Ginger's voice has a quality that just annoys me, for some reason, whether she's singing or speaking.
Now, I wasn't expecting a movie of that era to be politically correct in any way*, but I was suprised at all the casual pot-shots taken at Italians, not to mention the character of poor Tonetti himself. Although, I guess that when everyone in the movie is white, you have to find someone to make fun of. Still, I must admit I laughed at: "I'm not going to leave you alone with an Italian! Why, he might be a tenor!"
The fact that Fred Astaire insisted on filming his dance sequences in a single take is well-known, I believe, and do I ever wish all films about dance went about things the same way! Quick cuts may fool some of the viewers, but wouldn't it be easier to just find actors who can dance, or dancers who can act?
Final verdict: 7/10, + .5 for the dancing, for a total of 7.5/10
* While I was visiting my family last summer, my father and I bust a gut laughing as we watched some dance numbers from a Busby Berkeley DVD set he'd just bought. Along with the usual over-the-top extravaganzas, such as a scene of a couple kissing by a waterfall inexplicably turning into a scene in which dozens of girls in sparkly swimsuits perform complex swimming and dance moves in giant fountains, there's a number about a serviceman looking for "[his] Shanghai Lil" in a bar, complete with a chorus of soldiers and cheongsam-clad barmaids. When Shanghai Lil finally appears, she looks every bit as Chinese as I do (but I'll bet I'd pwn her with my mad chopstick skillz!) and sings about loving him "long long time, many tear I cry!" in an accent that sounds like nothing I've ever heard before. And because the chorus of soldiers wasn't grand enough, the whole navy appears and starts dancing on the tables while the soldiers perform some sort of dance drill! O_O;