You don't go to the French Film festival for cutting edge cinema.
As Pru pointed out when she declined my invitation to join me yesterday afternoon, most of the films that get shown end up becoming available on Netflix, so your motivation to go has to come from something other than a desire to read subtitles (not that there's anything wrong with subtitles because some of us love subtitled films).
Besides not having a TV, much less Netflix, I enjoy the festival for all kinds of reasons, not the least of which is reveling in being at the FFF now that there are comfortable new seats (bonus: with cup holders) to spend hours in. Those years of camping out in seats with springs digging into our backsides and torn fabric are but a distant memory.
The film Pru had passed on was "Abdel et la Comtesse," a charming comedy about a Contessa with no sons, only a daughter to whom she couldn't pass down the nobility title of her late husband. To the rescue comes a jailbird named Abdel, who also happens to be an art-savvy thief who knows which objets d'art to take and which to leave behind because he's that well-informed about art.
Plus he ultimately has a heart of gold, a code of honor and the Contessa's veterinarian daughter falls for him, but only after Abdel teaches the Contessa to throw gang signs, walk like she doesn't care and take on a local gangster who looks to be about 10.
Plot aside, the movie gave me several French film staples that I love: a gorgeous, old chateau, a character who smokes everywhere and a love story.
Because I've been going to the festival for so many years, it always boggles my mind when I run into somebody without a clue what's going on. That was the case after Mr. Wright and I ate at Branch and Vine when we finished and the chef inquired, "What's next?" After sharing our intention to see a film at the FFF, she was gobsmacked. "Oh, so that must be what the crowds of people were about. I stopped by Carytown on the way over and it was mobbed!"
Okay, I can understand people not going to see French films, but how could you not even know about the four-day event? Especially since it's been going on now for 27 years. But I try not to judge.
Mr. Wright and I were headed back to the Byrd a few hours later when I ran into a couple of people I knew, another reliable perk of the FFF.
First there was the Frenchman, looking tanned and rested, whom I hadn't seen since he closed his restaurant so he could have more time to be with his aging parents in France. Next came the woman I'd met a few years ago at a music show when she first moved into the city. Introducing me to the woman she was with, she explained that her friend was a glass artist and that I wrote for Style Weekly.
It struck me that she was reducing us both to an easy description and I challenged her about how she'd describe herself as succinctly. I know her as a painter and a cyclist, but she admitted she'd have described herself as a graphic designer, which is how she pays the rent.
Funny how we reduce ourselves to what we do for money.
We'd all come to see "Le Collier Rouge," a film set in 1919 about a man conscripted into WW I. It's unfortunate for him because it happens shortly after meeting and falling in love with a woman at a nearby farm after she asks that he make a delivery of hay to her. The audience realizes that they're hot for each other because he's worn his Sunday suit to drop off the hay and she has put on a lovely white eyelet blouse to work in the garden while awaiting his arrival.
I mean, come on, some of us don't even shower unless we have a date, so I see getting gussied up is a sure sign of obvious mutual attraction.
The story, which was told in flashbacks, followed the man into the horrors of war (there were several bayonet-filled scenes I had to close my eyes for) as he became disillusioned with the chaos of war and slaughter of innocent men. In a moment that can probably be ascribed to PTSD, he eventually awards his dog his Legion of Honor medal in front of the entire village and gets carted off to jail for treason.
Naturally, it, too, had several standard issue French film cliches from using a bicycle as transportation to an old French house lit by oil lamps to a love story.
I'm telling you, I love French films for these familiar chestnuts.
After a leisurely morning and lunch at a bustling Garnet's, we headed to Carytown for the FFF one last time. Amazingly, we even snagged the same seats we'd had Thursday and Saturday evenings, minus the giant man with big hair who'd plopped down in front of me Thursday, necessitating craning my neck at an unnatural angle for the entire film just so I could read the subtitles.
But we hadn't allowed for the introduction of the French delegation, students and volunteers, a lengthy process that involves introducing every intern, every student, every Byrd Theatre employee, every actor, director and creative person involved with the entire FFF. I'd sat through it in the past and vowed never to do so again, but the organizers had slyly not included it in the festival schedule, so we'd been ambushed.
I'm here to tell you that I sat there for an hour and a half of the introductions and munched through a medium buttered popcorn before feeling like we were never going to see ""L'echange des Princesses" and giving up. Well, actually I just turned to Mr. Wright and suggested we blow this pop stand rather than devote any more time to waiting for a 3:15 movie to begin when it was already 4:30.
Au revoir, French Film Festival. I love you, but I've got limits.
Until next year...because. let's face it, I always come back.
Showing posts with label french film fest. Show all posts
Showing posts with label french film fest. Show all posts
Sunday, March 31, 2019
Friday, March 29, 2019
Synopsis en Francais
It's that magical time of year when all the Carytown banners are equal parts red, white and blue and French speakers mill about on Cary Street.
Bonjour, 27th Annual French Film Festival. Glad to have you back.
And since it wouldn't be a French Film Fest without running into Barbara, we'd only gotten as far as Bygones before she and her new husband passed by and stopped to chat. It's sort of the unofficial launch to the festivities for me. Or put another way: every year for well over a decade, Barbara and I - always without dates - have run into each other socially because we were drawn to the same nerdy events.
We still do, except we now have companions who like nerdy women.
They'd just come from "Libre" and we'd just finished dinner at Greek on Cary and were headed to see a short, "Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" followed by a full length feature, "Fait d'hiver."
Before going inside the Byrd, I chatted local theater with manager Todd, who had not only enjoyed TheatreLAB's production of "Sweeney Todd" as much as I had, but had used his specials effects skill set so that he and his wife had gone to see it with fake slit throats.
And lest I doubt him, he showed me photographic evidence.
Waiting for the films to begin, I checked out the crowd. A woman behind me had been to three of the four master classes offered this morning. The trio two rows behind me had driven down from Bethesda for the four days of the festival and like to hang out at "Con Con," as he pronounced it, at least until someone corrected him to Can Can. Meanwhile, an official usher draped personalized seat marker covers on the three seats in front of us, a privilege for having donated cash money to the festival.
I'm happy to report that once again, festival goers were told to stay in the moment with an onscreen sign reading, "NO texting during screenings. Violators may be removed." Mais, bien sur.
The French are civilized like that.
French director Robert Enrico (RIP) was the focus this evening, with his first and last films being introduced by his lookalike son Jerome before being shown.
We were told that "Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," yep, from the 1891 Ambrose Bierce short story, won at Cannes as well as at the Oscars when it came out. The story of a Civil War-era civilian being hanged on a bridge struck me as the unlikeliest of starting points for a French director in 1962, yet the film captured the era evocatively in shades of black and white.
I don't know if I've ever read the short story, but I think I must have because I somehow knew halfway into it how it would end.
As the credits rolled, a woman near me turned to her spoiler of a companion and complained, "You shouldn't have told me what was going to happen!"
Jerome had informed us that we'd be seeing "Fait d'hiver" on the only subtitled 35 mm copy of the film left in the world, which felt pretty special. I always get a kick out of seeing the blip on the screen signaling the switch to the other projector.
The 1999 film was set in 1970 and based on a true story about a divorced man who decided not to return his kids to his ex after they come for a visit. Although the oldest daughter escapes and returns to her mother, the two younger ones want to stay on with Dad, barricading the windows and doors and shooting at anyone who dares approach the house.
It touched on several issues - fathers' rights post-divorce, PTSD, the bonds soldiers develop in wartime, overeager media hype - while always keeping at the center of the story the fact that this guy sincerely wanted to be with his kids but his wife had full custody.
Mr. Wright took issue with its slow pacing because the saga unfolded over 16+ days, many of them represented by little more than the police captain deciding to give the man one more day to surrender. Because the captain had served with him in the military, he felt certain he wasn't going to do anything awful and wanted to give his old friend a chance.
And there was such a purity to how devoted to their father, not to mention fun-loving, these two kids were, whether standing sentry with a gun at the window or collecting the bottles of nutritious milk that the local doctor delivered at the roadside for them.
The interesting part was, when the powers-that-be decided that they'd wasted enough time (other divorced dads were publicly siding with him) and the tanks and gendarmes began rolling in, breaking windows on the house and tossing stinkbombs?/teargas? inside, the camera froze and the credits began rolling up.
"Oh, no!" the woman behind me wailed loudly. "They can't do this!" Of course they can, honey. Ever seen "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?" She was far from the only one moaning and groaning at the absence of a clearly expressed ending.
But, hey, this isn't Hollywood, kids, and if a French director who'd been making films for 27 years wants to end on an unclear note, more power to him. Besides, if the police wound up killing those two adorable children, I, for one, didn't need to know about it.
It's enough to know that I can count on four days of hearing French spoken and seeing French films that follow no American rules.
And most likely, another Barbara sighting or two.
Bonjour, 27th Annual French Film Festival. Glad to have you back.
And since it wouldn't be a French Film Fest without running into Barbara, we'd only gotten as far as Bygones before she and her new husband passed by and stopped to chat. It's sort of the unofficial launch to the festivities for me. Or put another way: every year for well over a decade, Barbara and I - always without dates - have run into each other socially because we were drawn to the same nerdy events.
We still do, except we now have companions who like nerdy women.
They'd just come from "Libre" and we'd just finished dinner at Greek on Cary and were headed to see a short, "Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" followed by a full length feature, "Fait d'hiver."
Before going inside the Byrd, I chatted local theater with manager Todd, who had not only enjoyed TheatreLAB's production of "Sweeney Todd" as much as I had, but had used his specials effects skill set so that he and his wife had gone to see it with fake slit throats.
And lest I doubt him, he showed me photographic evidence.
Waiting for the films to begin, I checked out the crowd. A woman behind me had been to three of the four master classes offered this morning. The trio two rows behind me had driven down from Bethesda for the four days of the festival and like to hang out at "Con Con," as he pronounced it, at least until someone corrected him to Can Can. Meanwhile, an official usher draped personalized seat marker covers on the three seats in front of us, a privilege for having donated cash money to the festival.
I'm happy to report that once again, festival goers were told to stay in the moment with an onscreen sign reading, "NO texting during screenings. Violators may be removed." Mais, bien sur.
The French are civilized like that.
French director Robert Enrico (RIP) was the focus this evening, with his first and last films being introduced by his lookalike son Jerome before being shown.
We were told that "Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," yep, from the 1891 Ambrose Bierce short story, won at Cannes as well as at the Oscars when it came out. The story of a Civil War-era civilian being hanged on a bridge struck me as the unlikeliest of starting points for a French director in 1962, yet the film captured the era evocatively in shades of black and white.
I don't know if I've ever read the short story, but I think I must have because I somehow knew halfway into it how it would end.
As the credits rolled, a woman near me turned to her spoiler of a companion and complained, "You shouldn't have told me what was going to happen!"
Jerome had informed us that we'd be seeing "Fait d'hiver" on the only subtitled 35 mm copy of the film left in the world, which felt pretty special. I always get a kick out of seeing the blip on the screen signaling the switch to the other projector.
The 1999 film was set in 1970 and based on a true story about a divorced man who decided not to return his kids to his ex after they come for a visit. Although the oldest daughter escapes and returns to her mother, the two younger ones want to stay on with Dad, barricading the windows and doors and shooting at anyone who dares approach the house.
It touched on several issues - fathers' rights post-divorce, PTSD, the bonds soldiers develop in wartime, overeager media hype - while always keeping at the center of the story the fact that this guy sincerely wanted to be with his kids but his wife had full custody.
Mr. Wright took issue with its slow pacing because the saga unfolded over 16+ days, many of them represented by little more than the police captain deciding to give the man one more day to surrender. Because the captain had served with him in the military, he felt certain he wasn't going to do anything awful and wanted to give his old friend a chance.
And there was such a purity to how devoted to their father, not to mention fun-loving, these two kids were, whether standing sentry with a gun at the window or collecting the bottles of nutritious milk that the local doctor delivered at the roadside for them.
The interesting part was, when the powers-that-be decided that they'd wasted enough time (other divorced dads were publicly siding with him) and the tanks and gendarmes began rolling in, breaking windows on the house and tossing stinkbombs?/teargas? inside, the camera froze and the credits began rolling up.
"Oh, no!" the woman behind me wailed loudly. "They can't do this!" Of course they can, honey. Ever seen "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?" She was far from the only one moaning and groaning at the absence of a clearly expressed ending.
But, hey, this isn't Hollywood, kids, and if a French director who'd been making films for 27 years wants to end on an unclear note, more power to him. Besides, if the police wound up killing those two adorable children, I, for one, didn't need to know about it.
It's enough to know that I can count on four days of hearing French spoken and seeing French films that follow no American rules.
And most likely, another Barbara sighting or two.
Sunday, March 25, 2018
Found in Translation
And another French Film Festival is in the rear-view mirror of the Peugeot.
It may not have been my best work - I made it to a film a day for four days - but this year's festival will be memorable for the pleasure of sitting in the Byrd's new seats all four nights and...drum roll, please... having had a date for two of the films, a first unless you count girlfriends.
And they count, but this is different.
Two of the films -"Les Gardiennes" and "Cessez-le-feu" - had World War I themes and settings, little surprise given that 2018 is the centennial of the end of the Great War, but which also meant both contained war scenes that necessitated me closing my eyes to avoid seeing horrible things.
My inner documentary dork was well fed with "Un Francais Nomme Gabin," the story of France's most iconic actor and a man I'd never heard of, Jean Gabin. That he'd made 95 films meant that the documentary-maker had a treasure trove of images and interviews to tell the star's life story.
Although I'm not sure I'm buying that he'd have rather been a farmer. Talk is cheap once you're a star. That's like saying, "I wasn't really hungry for that hot fudge sundae" after you've devoured it. Easy to say, hard to believe.
Arriving early for "Cessez-le-feu," I caught the Q&A after "Du Soleiel dans Mes Yeux," notable because FFF founder and host Peter Kirkpatrick translated what director Nicolas Giraud was saying and afterward, Giroux commended Peter for "not only conveying my words but my emotions as well." They even hugged on it.
Later, when "Cessez-le-feu's" director Emmanuel Courcol came up to introduce his film, he spoke French, saying, "I speak perfect English, but I want Peter to translate for me." That got a major laugh.
Between translations, I chatted with a woman in the row behind me today when I overheard her and some friends discussing the Gabin film. Next thing you know, she's telling me that much as she loves French film, Italian film is her favorite, so I bring up "Call Me By Your Name," which she's yet to see.
Then she explains why Italian is best for her, that she comes by it honestly. Seems once she and her husband retired, they moved to a small hill town at the base of the Alps near Milan and lived there for a year and a half. "It changed my life, changed me," she shared. "I recommend it highly."
I hear you, ma'am.
A young woman took the empty seat next to me as the presentation of the French delegation and volunteers was beginning, but she was so focused on her phone that when the audience began applauding the festival's accomplishments, she continued to scroll with her left hand and snap her fingers with her right, a Beat-like concession to what was going on.
Byrd manager Todd was called up and provided a stirring, scenery-chewing speech about the legacy of the Byrd and the FFF. Likening the combination to one of the city's must-see monuments, he intoned, "The French Film Festival and delegation is an annual monumental achievement and deserves to be recognized as such!" Clap, clap, clap.
"Cessez-le-feu" had all the makings of a fine Sunday afternoon romance, what with a bearded war hero just back from the trenches and a lovely sign language teacher who falls for him just when he could really use it. Once they've acknowledged it's mutual, he insists that it's time to be selfish.
That would be selfish, but in the grand, romantic tradition. As in, it's all about you and me, baby, and to hell with the rest of the world. This is still an option in 2018, right?
"Be selfish with me," she says back. "Let's be selfish together!" he responds, one-upping her. When he entreats her to return to Africa with him, she has to remind him that she hardly knows him. Clearly she hadn't gotten the memo about living for today after the uncertainties of war.
The way I see it, selfishness is something you earn with life experience and best when accompanied by the good fortune of finding the right person.Because doing so is nothing short of a monumental achievement.
And I heard from someone who knows that it deserves to be recognized as such.
It may not have been my best work - I made it to a film a day for four days - but this year's festival will be memorable for the pleasure of sitting in the Byrd's new seats all four nights and...drum roll, please... having had a date for two of the films, a first unless you count girlfriends.
And they count, but this is different.
Two of the films -"Les Gardiennes" and "Cessez-le-feu" - had World War I themes and settings, little surprise given that 2018 is the centennial of the end of the Great War, but which also meant both contained war scenes that necessitated me closing my eyes to avoid seeing horrible things.
My inner documentary dork was well fed with "Un Francais Nomme Gabin," the story of France's most iconic actor and a man I'd never heard of, Jean Gabin. That he'd made 95 films meant that the documentary-maker had a treasure trove of images and interviews to tell the star's life story.
Although I'm not sure I'm buying that he'd have rather been a farmer. Talk is cheap once you're a star. That's like saying, "I wasn't really hungry for that hot fudge sundae" after you've devoured it. Easy to say, hard to believe.
Arriving early for "Cessez-le-feu," I caught the Q&A after "Du Soleiel dans Mes Yeux," notable because FFF founder and host Peter Kirkpatrick translated what director Nicolas Giraud was saying and afterward, Giroux commended Peter for "not only conveying my words but my emotions as well." They even hugged on it.
Later, when "Cessez-le-feu's" director Emmanuel Courcol came up to introduce his film, he spoke French, saying, "I speak perfect English, but I want Peter to translate for me." That got a major laugh.
Between translations, I chatted with a woman in the row behind me today when I overheard her and some friends discussing the Gabin film. Next thing you know, she's telling me that much as she loves French film, Italian film is her favorite, so I bring up "Call Me By Your Name," which she's yet to see.
Then she explains why Italian is best for her, that she comes by it honestly. Seems once she and her husband retired, they moved to a small hill town at the base of the Alps near Milan and lived there for a year and a half. "It changed my life, changed me," she shared. "I recommend it highly."
I hear you, ma'am.
A young woman took the empty seat next to me as the presentation of the French delegation and volunteers was beginning, but she was so focused on her phone that when the audience began applauding the festival's accomplishments, she continued to scroll with her left hand and snap her fingers with her right, a Beat-like concession to what was going on.
Byrd manager Todd was called up and provided a stirring, scenery-chewing speech about the legacy of the Byrd and the FFF. Likening the combination to one of the city's must-see monuments, he intoned, "The French Film Festival and delegation is an annual monumental achievement and deserves to be recognized as such!" Clap, clap, clap.
"Cessez-le-feu" had all the makings of a fine Sunday afternoon romance, what with a bearded war hero just back from the trenches and a lovely sign language teacher who falls for him just when he could really use it. Once they've acknowledged it's mutual, he insists that it's time to be selfish.
That would be selfish, but in the grand, romantic tradition. As in, it's all about you and me, baby, and to hell with the rest of the world. This is still an option in 2018, right?
"Be selfish with me," she says back. "Let's be selfish together!" he responds, one-upping her. When he entreats her to return to Africa with him, she has to remind him that she hardly knows him. Clearly she hadn't gotten the memo about living for today after the uncertainties of war.
The way I see it, selfishness is something you earn with life experience and best when accompanied by the good fortune of finding the right person.Because doing so is nothing short of a monumental achievement.
And I heard from someone who knows that it deserves to be recognized as such.
Thursday, March 22, 2018
The Path Taken
Tonight, the poet was bested by nature.
Good thing I'm flexible because my simple plan - Secco, a poetry reading at Chop Suey and "Django" at the French Film Festival - began unraveling at stop #2.
For that matter, I was so busy blowing minds at stop #1 that I may have altered my own trajectory. Ready to get the party started, I chose Raventos i Blanc Brut Nature Rose "de Nix," a crisp sparkler from Spain along with brussels sprouts amped up with cured lemon, black lentils, Aleppo pepper and candied pecans, a dish so generous I couldn't finish the last couple sprouts.
Meanwhile, two women at the bar had just discovered Secco's "Uncork and unwind" happy hour, causing one to slip her phone into the bamboo box to qualify for happy hour deals. The other woman looked at her askance.
"I'm not giving mine up," she insisted. "No, I gotta have my phone out, but I want the discount. Do you think I can still get it?"
When her friend didn't answer, I jumped right in. Nope, I'm pretty sure you've already disqualified yourself by having been on your phone constantly since you sat down, not to mention after your Prosecco arrived and you began sipping, I told this stranger. She looked only barely disappointed.
"That's okay, it's not worth a discount not to have my phone out," she explained. That's when I realized I had the power to rock her world, but I asked permission first (as in, do you want me to blow your mind?) and she granted permission.
I don't have a cell phone, I told her. She looked surprised and then asked, "Oh, you left it in the car?" No, I don't have one. There were four simultaneous gasps. "Ever?" she asked incredulously. Ever. Serious panic was written all over her face. "How do you live? I couldn't live without mine," she said.
More's the pity, honey.
A woman sitting in between the two of us suddenly piped up. "I admire you," she claimed, but I assured her everyone says that and no one means it. "I only have mine for emergencies," she explained, but I was having none of it. And what did you do in emergencies 20 years ago? Problem-solve? Figure it out? Handle it?
Sheepishly, she said all of the above. Case closed.
As I was ordering dessert, a woman sat down next to me and began poring over a document. When my butterscotch pudding with creme fraiche and candied walnuts arrived, her head spun around like she'd seen the promised land. "What's that?" she had to know.
Only one of the best desserts in the city, I assured her. She gazed at it longingly and we struck up a conversation. Although currently a Fan resident, she's just bought a home in Greengate, the latest fake town center development nearly at the Goochland line. Trying to comprehend why anyone would abandon the city for the hinterland, she said quietly, "I need a new start."
Seems her husband has had Alzheimer's for years and lives in a facility and she's ready to live somewhere other than the home they'd shared (which had sold in mere hours). Perfectly understandable.
In fact, she decided that to celebrate her next stage of life, she was going to order a butterscotch pudding because mine looked so fabulous. The bartender leaned over and shared that she thought it was nothing short of amazing. "You think you know butterscotch pudding until you have this one," she told her.
Not that I needed it, it was nice to have corroboration.
Full of pink bubbles, sprouts and pudding, I left for Chop Suey Books, walking into a practically empty store. Something was amiss. The most significant English language poet born since WW II should have attracted more than three people.
"His flight got canceled because of snow," the clerk informed me. "He's reading at the Modlin Center tomorrow night instead." That's one of those good/bad news scenarios for anyone with a date Friday night, but at least now I knew.
Rather than dwelling on the disappointment of not having an Irishman read to me tonight, I punted, a simple matter of walking across the street to kick off my French Film Festival experience 2018 by seeing "Le Chemin." And like any FFF screening, that meant running into the faithful.
The cinephile just back from the Sarajevo Film Festival, who wanted my advice on getting involved with the Bijou. The theater manager who walked up behind me while I was getting popcorn and from behind asked, "Guess who?"
Probably the most unlikely was the woman whose open house I'd gone to in late February. Although it hadn't been mentioned in the party invitation, the occasion was her impending nuptials. When I'd asked her how she'd met him, she'd shared that they'd met on match.com just as she was about to cancel her subscription.
Lamenting my own lack of dating success, she'd told me to give up (as she had) and that's when it would happen. Here we were a month later, and an update was in order. "Our good luck rubbed off on you!" she said, delighted.
Around us, smart FFF attendees were jockeying for the Byrd's new seats, while the couple in front of me pulled out tuna fish sandwiches in baggies and began a twofold mission: eating their dinner without losing their primo seats and stinkin' up the joint with smelly tuna fish.
They finished just as the introductions were being made.
Two trailblazing women, the director and costumer of "Le Chemin," were introduced and gave minimal remarks before the film began. The title means "the path" and referred to a path where a young Parisian woman studying to be a nun walked everyday to treat a Cambodian villager's sore leg, a path that caused her to meet the husband of a woman dying of cancer.
But of course, the film was really about the path of life, how we meet people along the way, how sadness changes us and what we learn about ourselves as we engage with others. How we plan for one thing and something else comes along.
You know, the path that helps you realize when you need a new start or a butterscotch pudding. And sometimes both.
Good thing I'm flexible because my simple plan - Secco, a poetry reading at Chop Suey and "Django" at the French Film Festival - began unraveling at stop #2.
For that matter, I was so busy blowing minds at stop #1 that I may have altered my own trajectory. Ready to get the party started, I chose Raventos i Blanc Brut Nature Rose "de Nix," a crisp sparkler from Spain along with brussels sprouts amped up with cured lemon, black lentils, Aleppo pepper and candied pecans, a dish so generous I couldn't finish the last couple sprouts.
Meanwhile, two women at the bar had just discovered Secco's "Uncork and unwind" happy hour, causing one to slip her phone into the bamboo box to qualify for happy hour deals. The other woman looked at her askance.
"I'm not giving mine up," she insisted. "No, I gotta have my phone out, but I want the discount. Do you think I can still get it?"
When her friend didn't answer, I jumped right in. Nope, I'm pretty sure you've already disqualified yourself by having been on your phone constantly since you sat down, not to mention after your Prosecco arrived and you began sipping, I told this stranger. She looked only barely disappointed.
"That's okay, it's not worth a discount not to have my phone out," she explained. That's when I realized I had the power to rock her world, but I asked permission first (as in, do you want me to blow your mind?) and she granted permission.
I don't have a cell phone, I told her. She looked surprised and then asked, "Oh, you left it in the car?" No, I don't have one. There were four simultaneous gasps. "Ever?" she asked incredulously. Ever. Serious panic was written all over her face. "How do you live? I couldn't live without mine," she said.
More's the pity, honey.
A woman sitting in between the two of us suddenly piped up. "I admire you," she claimed, but I assured her everyone says that and no one means it. "I only have mine for emergencies," she explained, but I was having none of it. And what did you do in emergencies 20 years ago? Problem-solve? Figure it out? Handle it?
Sheepishly, she said all of the above. Case closed.
As I was ordering dessert, a woman sat down next to me and began poring over a document. When my butterscotch pudding with creme fraiche and candied walnuts arrived, her head spun around like she'd seen the promised land. "What's that?" she had to know.
Only one of the best desserts in the city, I assured her. She gazed at it longingly and we struck up a conversation. Although currently a Fan resident, she's just bought a home in Greengate, the latest fake town center development nearly at the Goochland line. Trying to comprehend why anyone would abandon the city for the hinterland, she said quietly, "I need a new start."
Seems her husband has had Alzheimer's for years and lives in a facility and she's ready to live somewhere other than the home they'd shared (which had sold in mere hours). Perfectly understandable.
In fact, she decided that to celebrate her next stage of life, she was going to order a butterscotch pudding because mine looked so fabulous. The bartender leaned over and shared that she thought it was nothing short of amazing. "You think you know butterscotch pudding until you have this one," she told her.
Not that I needed it, it was nice to have corroboration.
Full of pink bubbles, sprouts and pudding, I left for Chop Suey Books, walking into a practically empty store. Something was amiss. The most significant English language poet born since WW II should have attracted more than three people.
"His flight got canceled because of snow," the clerk informed me. "He's reading at the Modlin Center tomorrow night instead." That's one of those good/bad news scenarios for anyone with a date Friday night, but at least now I knew.
Rather than dwelling on the disappointment of not having an Irishman read to me tonight, I punted, a simple matter of walking across the street to kick off my French Film Festival experience 2018 by seeing "Le Chemin." And like any FFF screening, that meant running into the faithful.
The cinephile just back from the Sarajevo Film Festival, who wanted my advice on getting involved with the Bijou. The theater manager who walked up behind me while I was getting popcorn and from behind asked, "Guess who?"
Probably the most unlikely was the woman whose open house I'd gone to in late February. Although it hadn't been mentioned in the party invitation, the occasion was her impending nuptials. When I'd asked her how she'd met him, she'd shared that they'd met on match.com just as she was about to cancel her subscription.
Lamenting my own lack of dating success, she'd told me to give up (as she had) and that's when it would happen. Here we were a month later, and an update was in order. "Our good luck rubbed off on you!" she said, delighted.
Around us, smart FFF attendees were jockeying for the Byrd's new seats, while the couple in front of me pulled out tuna fish sandwiches in baggies and began a twofold mission: eating their dinner without losing their primo seats and stinkin' up the joint with smelly tuna fish.
They finished just as the introductions were being made.
Two trailblazing women, the director and costumer of "Le Chemin," were introduced and gave minimal remarks before the film began. The title means "the path" and referred to a path where a young Parisian woman studying to be a nun walked everyday to treat a Cambodian villager's sore leg, a path that caused her to meet the husband of a woman dying of cancer.
But of course, the film was really about the path of life, how we meet people along the way, how sadness changes us and what we learn about ourselves as we engage with others. How we plan for one thing and something else comes along.
You know, the path that helps you realize when you need a new start or a butterscotch pudding. And sometimes both.
Sunday, April 2, 2017
In Search of Adventure
I know where I'm going, so are you coming with me?
Pshaw, I don't let a little thing like my date canceling on me at the last minute to change my course at the French Film Festival.
Besides, within moments, I had a replacement and a mere hour later, he was picking me up on our way to Acacia for dinner at the bar with a view of the gorgeous blue skies outside.
Keeping solely to the bar menu - a personal favorite for its quality to price ratio - we had red pepper soup, oxtail ravioli (him) and tonight's market fish, rockfish, with a beet, goat cheese and mesclun salad (me) complemented by Riesling and a drink doing a fine job passing for an Orange Julius (look it up, kids) sans the creamy milk component and with the frisson of Lindera farms tumeric vinegar on the finish. Killer stuff.
Since it wasn't terribly busy yet, I engaged two favorite barkeeps in conversation about the unusual show we were seeing tonight, how gay events always get co-opted by straight people and why chili may be the perfect food.
After the dining room began filling up and after polishing off an obscenely rich Nutella/almond dacquoise with vanilla mousse, fresh strawberries and creme fraiche sorbet, we moseyed over to the Byrd Theater for the main event.
To my surprise, since I'd just been there the night before, there was now a raised platform looming over the center section of seats, so we took seats on the side. Five minutes later, we moved again because my seat was like an airplane seat permanently set on recline and, besides the person behind me hating me, it wasn't much of a prime viewing position.
Soon, an announcement was made that if you couldn't see both boxes - one with a harp, the other with a piano - as well as the entire screen, you should move. As a bonus, the balcony was open, so we headed there.
Neither of us could recall ever having watched a show from the Byrd's balcony, so this was one cherry we were popping together.
We sat down upstairs just as an announcement was made to put your phones away. "You'll have plenty of time for pictures later, but no phones during the show!" Meanwhile, the woman next to me was on hers and the guy in front of us was on his.
We moved again to escape their glaring screens, this time to the center of the balcony's back row and wound up with incredible seats. View-wise, it was especially cool because the projector platform downstairs appeared to be the front row of the balcony from where we now sat.
The Byrd's manager Todd explained that all the sounds we'd be hearing tonight accompanying the Magic lantern show would be analog sounds made by the Wurlitzer's instruments and noisemakers. Cuing organist Bob Gulledge, they took us through sounds of thunder, birds, even a train pulling out of the station.
Magic lanterns are a simple type of slide projector and the triple magic lantern we were seeing tonight had been made in 1887, although simpler models went back as far as 1659. If knowing that blew our minds, I can't imagine how it must have felt to a 17th century denizen watching projections for the first time.
Our black-clad narrator sat in the box with the piano, setting the scene with his descriptive voice and spot-on acting of various characters.
The show began with a primer on magic lanterns (fascinating) before moving on to the adventures of "Robinson Crusoe" as told by gorgeous, detailed colored slides. When Crusoe's boat set sail, we heard the sounds of the ocean. When he reached the frozen north and saw igloos (textbook grade-school type igloos that looked like they came in a kit), we heard the wind howl and saw falling snow.
When he got to the New World and saw Native Americans, we heard war whoops, horses galloping and fire crackling on the plains. In Italy, Vesuvius erupted with the sound of hot lava and thunder roared from storms at sea while we saw bolts of lightening appear and disappear on the slides.
And, throughout the story, the harpist played a beautiful accompaniment, causing my companion to note, "I'm going to hire her to play in my bedroom at night." We'll check back and see how he does with that.
And while most of the slides appeared to be painted, several of insects were real insects between glass and accompanied by the sound of bees buzzing. When our hero took on building a fence, we heard the sound of saw.
Really, it was a master class in the range of the Mighty Wurlitzer organ.
And while the story had a vintage feel, they were enough contemporary tangents - our hero grows pot and has terrible nightmares - both on the slides and in the narrator's commentary, to wink at the fourth wall and remind us it was 2017.
A smoke machine was followed by what the narrator called pure spectacle, some funny, some merely eye candy, like the changing geometric shapes and liquid gel effects that would have been at home at a psychedelic rock show. And if we were agog, the effect 200 or 300 years ago must have been startling.
All in all, a thoroughly groovy experience unlike anything either of us had experienced before. Walking out, we immediately decided on more stimulation, landing at Saison's bar for post-show discussion and cocktails in a room that was at full-pitch Saturday night energy levels.
And, oh, the discussions we had over-sharing with each other for the next few hours over drinks in fanciful tiki glasses. I do know he's the first person to ever describe me as erudite, impish and frugal in the same breath.
When over-planning kills magic, a last minute date can be the very best kind. Merci for the memories, French Film Festival.
Pshaw, I don't let a little thing like my date canceling on me at the last minute to change my course at the French Film Festival.
Besides, within moments, I had a replacement and a mere hour later, he was picking me up on our way to Acacia for dinner at the bar with a view of the gorgeous blue skies outside.
Keeping solely to the bar menu - a personal favorite for its quality to price ratio - we had red pepper soup, oxtail ravioli (him) and tonight's market fish, rockfish, with a beet, goat cheese and mesclun salad (me) complemented by Riesling and a drink doing a fine job passing for an Orange Julius (look it up, kids) sans the creamy milk component and with the frisson of Lindera farms tumeric vinegar on the finish. Killer stuff.
Since it wasn't terribly busy yet, I engaged two favorite barkeeps in conversation about the unusual show we were seeing tonight, how gay events always get co-opted by straight people and why chili may be the perfect food.
After the dining room began filling up and after polishing off an obscenely rich Nutella/almond dacquoise with vanilla mousse, fresh strawberries and creme fraiche sorbet, we moseyed over to the Byrd Theater for the main event.
To my surprise, since I'd just been there the night before, there was now a raised platform looming over the center section of seats, so we took seats on the side. Five minutes later, we moved again because my seat was like an airplane seat permanently set on recline and, besides the person behind me hating me, it wasn't much of a prime viewing position.
Soon, an announcement was made that if you couldn't see both boxes - one with a harp, the other with a piano - as well as the entire screen, you should move. As a bonus, the balcony was open, so we headed there.
Neither of us could recall ever having watched a show from the Byrd's balcony, so this was one cherry we were popping together.
We sat down upstairs just as an announcement was made to put your phones away. "You'll have plenty of time for pictures later, but no phones during the show!" Meanwhile, the woman next to me was on hers and the guy in front of us was on his.
We moved again to escape their glaring screens, this time to the center of the balcony's back row and wound up with incredible seats. View-wise, it was especially cool because the projector platform downstairs appeared to be the front row of the balcony from where we now sat.
The Byrd's manager Todd explained that all the sounds we'd be hearing tonight accompanying the Magic lantern show would be analog sounds made by the Wurlitzer's instruments and noisemakers. Cuing organist Bob Gulledge, they took us through sounds of thunder, birds, even a train pulling out of the station.
Magic lanterns are a simple type of slide projector and the triple magic lantern we were seeing tonight had been made in 1887, although simpler models went back as far as 1659. If knowing that blew our minds, I can't imagine how it must have felt to a 17th century denizen watching projections for the first time.
Our black-clad narrator sat in the box with the piano, setting the scene with his descriptive voice and spot-on acting of various characters.
The show began with a primer on magic lanterns (fascinating) before moving on to the adventures of "Robinson Crusoe" as told by gorgeous, detailed colored slides. When Crusoe's boat set sail, we heard the sounds of the ocean. When he reached the frozen north and saw igloos (textbook grade-school type igloos that looked like they came in a kit), we heard the wind howl and saw falling snow.
When he got to the New World and saw Native Americans, we heard war whoops, horses galloping and fire crackling on the plains. In Italy, Vesuvius erupted with the sound of hot lava and thunder roared from storms at sea while we saw bolts of lightening appear and disappear on the slides.
And, throughout the story, the harpist played a beautiful accompaniment, causing my companion to note, "I'm going to hire her to play in my bedroom at night." We'll check back and see how he does with that.
And while most of the slides appeared to be painted, several of insects were real insects between glass and accompanied by the sound of bees buzzing. When our hero took on building a fence, we heard the sound of saw.
Really, it was a master class in the range of the Mighty Wurlitzer organ.
And while the story had a vintage feel, they were enough contemporary tangents - our hero grows pot and has terrible nightmares - both on the slides and in the narrator's commentary, to wink at the fourth wall and remind us it was 2017.
A smoke machine was followed by what the narrator called pure spectacle, some funny, some merely eye candy, like the changing geometric shapes and liquid gel effects that would have been at home at a psychedelic rock show. And if we were agog, the effect 200 or 300 years ago must have been startling.
All in all, a thoroughly groovy experience unlike anything either of us had experienced before. Walking out, we immediately decided on more stimulation, landing at Saison's bar for post-show discussion and cocktails in a room that was at full-pitch Saturday night energy levels.
And, oh, the discussions we had over-sharing with each other for the next few hours over drinks in fanciful tiki glasses. I do know he's the first person to ever describe me as erudite, impish and frugal in the same breath.
When over-planning kills magic, a last minute date can be the very best kind. Merci for the memories, French Film Festival.
Saturday, April 1, 2017
I Love Tonight
No regrets, that's the goal.
That applies to life, but it's also how I decide where I find my evening's adventure, and sometimes it's a song.
Another revolution of the sun meant that it was once again time for the French Film Festival, so I put on a navy and white striped dress over fishnets, tied a red scarf around my neck and looked about as French as I could hope for given my Irish ancestry.
As has been our standard for nearly a decade, the FFF begins for Pru and me at Secco, despite its move from Carytown to the Fan. From the secret stash, we chose Domaine du Dragon Rose from Provence to accompany a starter of grilled asparagus with a breaded egg (the yolk oozing decadently over our green veggies) and black garlic shoyu, a nearly perfect pairing that exuded Springtime.
I made a meal of spaghetti squash pancakes with peanuts, cilantro and harissa yogurt while Pru devoted herself to cheese, charcuterie and enough bon mots to have me falling off my stool in laughter.
About a woman we both know but can't find a reason to like, she casually summed up by saying, "She majored in marketing. That says it all."
Art history majors cut no quarter with sales types.
About a grown man still enthralled by sci-fi, she marveled, "This is a man who saw a million trailers for "Star Wars" and decided somehow it was going to be terrible. His father had to drag him to see it and of course he loved it."
Men, making bad calls since their youth.
Talking about the notion of a women-run world, Pru shared something she'd seen where men were caught in the wild, put into cages and taught how to be worthwhile members of a female-centric society before being set free as higher-functioning men. "Sort of a catch and release program," she said by way of summary.
Like what Jackson ward used to do with feral cats.
Properly sated and ready for culture, we moved on to the Byrd Theater - where I wished a happy French Film Festival to Todd, the Byrd's manager - only to be told that the previous movie had run late and the Q & A was just starting.
With 40 minutes to kill, we first browsed at Chop Suey Books and then headed to Sugar and Twine for chai (Pru) and a Little Debbie - squares of chocolate cake with whipped cream in between and chocolate ganache on top - (moi) a choice that had the cashier closing her head and nodding approvingly at my choice.
Once my chocolate addiction had been fed, it was on to see "Rock and Roll...of Corse" about Henry Padovani, the Corsican guitarist who'd formed the Police with Stewart Copeland and then Sting, but left when Andy Summers came on board and replaced him.
"If you don't learn anything after watching this documentary, you weren't paying attention," our host said from the stage before introducing the director and, I kid you not, Henry himself. Considering I hadn't known that the Police even had a guitarist for a year before Summers joined the band all but guaranteed I'd learn plenty.
Being the documentary dork that I am, I ate up all the vintage footage - the Clash, Kim Wilde, young R.E.M., the Bangles - while watching how this unlikely Corsican-born, Algerian and Corsican-raised bon vivant had moved from France to London at exactly the right moment to catch the wave of punk rock exploding there.
Small wonder it had taken 10 years to make the film given all the interviews done and footage dug up.
Henry, it seemed, was responsible for giving the Police the punk cred they so desperately sought despite Sting's obvious affinity for jazz and schoolteacher-deep lyrics.
With Police in his rearview mirror, he landed in Wayne County and the Electric Chairs, a band I'd never even heard of despite the band having been far bigger than the Police at the time and the interviews with their trans-gendered lead singer were not only hilarious, but revealing.
Apparently Henry is very well-endowed, in addition to being a fine guitarist and lover of life. Ahem.
I was amazed to learn that he'd been asked to be a VP at IRS records in '88 and he was the one who signed REM to their first major label deal (seeing a baby-faced Michael Stipe sing "South Central Rain" was nothing short of astounding). But he signed all kinds of talent: the Fleshtones, the Lords of the New Church, the Go Gos, the Damned.
Henry came across as a guy who'd always been thankful for the breaks that had come his way but everyone asked their opinion of him talked about what great energy he had, his enthusiasm for life and just what a decent person he was.
When the film ended, it got even better because Henry returned to the stage to take questions, his favorite being the guy who asked how he handled eating after moving from France to England. Answer: lots of fish and chips and beer.
And the evening would have been stellar if it had ended there, but instead, Henry took a seat on a dais in front of four light panels and proceeded to play two guitars and sing for us, alternating French and English.
Starting with English, he sang "I Love Today" clearly meaning every word. "Skeleton Blues," sung in French and written while he lived in a presbytery next to a cemetery, had him asking the audience how many were French and when a loud response followed, he was obviously surprised. "Jeezuzlord!" he exclaimed peering into the theater.
Sting's nickname for him had been Nature Boy, although at the time, Henry had no knowledge of the Nat King Cole song, but tonight he sang "Nature Boy" for us. He'd written "Time" as an explanation to a much younger girlfriend that age differences don't matter. So I've always believed.
I turned to Pru, asking her how old she thought that girlfriend might have been, 32? "If that!" she responded disdainfully. Oh, Henry.
"Highway" was an instrumental Lightnin' Hopkins-style dancey blues song, while he said the English-sung "Lean Love" was written when, "Men get the blues because they don't give us what we need." Works both ways, Henry. Don't you know even women get the blues?
After a tangent about how he knew all about Virginia and the Pilgrims and the boat coming over - "It's not far from you guys, right?" - he said he was going to do Lennon's "Jealous Guy."
Let me tell you, sitting in an 88-year old theater watching a 64-year old Corsican sing a John Lennon song with a Gibson guitar may just have been the most sublime Friday night I've had in some time. When he finished, he grinned and said, "I love that song!"
From the Police's first record "Outlandos d'Amour," Henry did "Next to You" in the simple acoustic style like when Sting had first played the song for the band all those years ago.
He closed with Edith Piaf's "Je ne Regrette Rien," about living life with no regrets, saying "It sums up the whole thing. Life." Amen, brother.
No matter how lean life or love gets, a bon vivant never regrets going to the French Film Festival.
That applies to life, but it's also how I decide where I find my evening's adventure, and sometimes it's a song.
Another revolution of the sun meant that it was once again time for the French Film Festival, so I put on a navy and white striped dress over fishnets, tied a red scarf around my neck and looked about as French as I could hope for given my Irish ancestry.
As has been our standard for nearly a decade, the FFF begins for Pru and me at Secco, despite its move from Carytown to the Fan. From the secret stash, we chose Domaine du Dragon Rose from Provence to accompany a starter of grilled asparagus with a breaded egg (the yolk oozing decadently over our green veggies) and black garlic shoyu, a nearly perfect pairing that exuded Springtime.
I made a meal of spaghetti squash pancakes with peanuts, cilantro and harissa yogurt while Pru devoted herself to cheese, charcuterie and enough bon mots to have me falling off my stool in laughter.
About a woman we both know but can't find a reason to like, she casually summed up by saying, "She majored in marketing. That says it all."
Art history majors cut no quarter with sales types.
About a grown man still enthralled by sci-fi, she marveled, "This is a man who saw a million trailers for "Star Wars" and decided somehow it was going to be terrible. His father had to drag him to see it and of course he loved it."
Men, making bad calls since their youth.
Talking about the notion of a women-run world, Pru shared something she'd seen where men were caught in the wild, put into cages and taught how to be worthwhile members of a female-centric society before being set free as higher-functioning men. "Sort of a catch and release program," she said by way of summary.
Like what Jackson ward used to do with feral cats.
Properly sated and ready for culture, we moved on to the Byrd Theater - where I wished a happy French Film Festival to Todd, the Byrd's manager - only to be told that the previous movie had run late and the Q & A was just starting.
With 40 minutes to kill, we first browsed at Chop Suey Books and then headed to Sugar and Twine for chai (Pru) and a Little Debbie - squares of chocolate cake with whipped cream in between and chocolate ganache on top - (moi) a choice that had the cashier closing her head and nodding approvingly at my choice.
Once my chocolate addiction had been fed, it was on to see "Rock and Roll...of Corse" about Henry Padovani, the Corsican guitarist who'd formed the Police with Stewart Copeland and then Sting, but left when Andy Summers came on board and replaced him.
"If you don't learn anything after watching this documentary, you weren't paying attention," our host said from the stage before introducing the director and, I kid you not, Henry himself. Considering I hadn't known that the Police even had a guitarist for a year before Summers joined the band all but guaranteed I'd learn plenty.
Being the documentary dork that I am, I ate up all the vintage footage - the Clash, Kim Wilde, young R.E.M., the Bangles - while watching how this unlikely Corsican-born, Algerian and Corsican-raised bon vivant had moved from France to London at exactly the right moment to catch the wave of punk rock exploding there.
Small wonder it had taken 10 years to make the film given all the interviews done and footage dug up.
Henry, it seemed, was responsible for giving the Police the punk cred they so desperately sought despite Sting's obvious affinity for jazz and schoolteacher-deep lyrics.
With Police in his rearview mirror, he landed in Wayne County and the Electric Chairs, a band I'd never even heard of despite the band having been far bigger than the Police at the time and the interviews with their trans-gendered lead singer were not only hilarious, but revealing.
Apparently Henry is very well-endowed, in addition to being a fine guitarist and lover of life. Ahem.
I was amazed to learn that he'd been asked to be a VP at IRS records in '88 and he was the one who signed REM to their first major label deal (seeing a baby-faced Michael Stipe sing "South Central Rain" was nothing short of astounding). But he signed all kinds of talent: the Fleshtones, the Lords of the New Church, the Go Gos, the Damned.
Henry came across as a guy who'd always been thankful for the breaks that had come his way but everyone asked their opinion of him talked about what great energy he had, his enthusiasm for life and just what a decent person he was.
When the film ended, it got even better because Henry returned to the stage to take questions, his favorite being the guy who asked how he handled eating after moving from France to England. Answer: lots of fish and chips and beer.
And the evening would have been stellar if it had ended there, but instead, Henry took a seat on a dais in front of four light panels and proceeded to play two guitars and sing for us, alternating French and English.
Starting with English, he sang "I Love Today" clearly meaning every word. "Skeleton Blues," sung in French and written while he lived in a presbytery next to a cemetery, had him asking the audience how many were French and when a loud response followed, he was obviously surprised. "Jeezuzlord!" he exclaimed peering into the theater.
Sting's nickname for him had been Nature Boy, although at the time, Henry had no knowledge of the Nat King Cole song, but tonight he sang "Nature Boy" for us. He'd written "Time" as an explanation to a much younger girlfriend that age differences don't matter. So I've always believed.
I turned to Pru, asking her how old she thought that girlfriend might have been, 32? "If that!" she responded disdainfully. Oh, Henry.
"Highway" was an instrumental Lightnin' Hopkins-style dancey blues song, while he said the English-sung "Lean Love" was written when, "Men get the blues because they don't give us what we need." Works both ways, Henry. Don't you know even women get the blues?
After a tangent about how he knew all about Virginia and the Pilgrims and the boat coming over - "It's not far from you guys, right?" - he said he was going to do Lennon's "Jealous Guy."
Let me tell you, sitting in an 88-year old theater watching a 64-year old Corsican sing a John Lennon song with a Gibson guitar may just have been the most sublime Friday night I've had in some time. When he finished, he grinned and said, "I love that song!"
From the Police's first record "Outlandos d'Amour," Henry did "Next to You" in the simple acoustic style like when Sting had first played the song for the band all those years ago.
He closed with Edith Piaf's "Je ne Regrette Rien," about living life with no regrets, saying "It sums up the whole thing. Life." Amen, brother.
No matter how lean life or love gets, a bon vivant never regrets going to the French Film Festival.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Life, Better than a Reproduction Lecture
I am completely unable to ignore the man who first informed me - before I knew it myself - that I was a hopeless romantic.
Oh, I was flattered when I heard from the west coast, "Oh, shoot, is this the end of the blog? Say it ain't so...xo," but I was, alas, so much busier with work and a decided uptick in my social life that I had to let go of something.
I certainly wasn't about to let go of things like a poetry reading at Scott House, with verse dedicated to topics such as nosebleeds, elk offal, pyre-building and gray scum (Gregory Kimbrell's first reading from his completely disarming and disturbing new book of poems, "The Primitive Observatory") or Allison Titus' elegiac space rock poems about fireflies lamping the back yard.
As a result, I decided to use my usual blogging time for fun so I didn't have to miss out on anything like the screening of "Labyrinth" at Hardywood (my first viewing of the Bowie/Jim Henson classic) or an afternoon under the spell of K Dance's "Shorts," with works by Tennessee Williams, Suzan-Lori Parks and Shel Silverstein.
With no obligation to keep track of my comings and goings, I left town for three days, taking long walks in unfamiliar places, doing a lot of reading and savoring the lobster roll my critic friend recommended. When I got back, it was to an unexpected message, letting me know of the sender's "continuing appreciation for what you do to show a strong, smart, engaged approach to living."
There are people reading me who get that? Praise the lord and pass the biscuits.
Right, and there was that time I went to the new Early Bird Biscuit and shared my biscuit and blackberry jam with a homeless man who called me kind for doing so. I would call the person who wrote that to me kind as well.
When the French Film Festival hit town, Pru and I set out to get our yearly Francophile fix, except that what she really wanted to discuss for those three days was not cineastes but my absence in the blogging sphere, having been immediately suspicious when I'd stopped.
Over dinner at Secco one day, Amour Wine Bistro another and Bistro Bobette a third, she tried to get me back in writing mode. "All these amusing things I've been saying and no one's writing them down for posterity!" she lamented.
Days later, I get a message from her. "It looks like your radishes are growing fat instead of pithy at present...hmmmm." After much back and forth about my personal life, she offered advice not printable in a family blog...or this one. Her summation? "Get out there and get pithy!"
Can I not be pithy without blogging?
Perhaps I'm too busy flaunting my D.C. roots with a James River Film Fest screening of "S.E. 67," a documentary about a group of Southeast Washington kids offered free college educations back in the '80s. I sign a petition to save the Enid Haupt Gardens in D.C., aghast that their demolition is even being considered.
There's a show and dance party at Studio 23 of go-go posters from the '70s and '80s (the graphic style instantly recognizable because I grew up seeing them everywhere), along with two DJs playing nothing but go-go, something that rarely happens outside D.C.
I have a ball dancing, talking to fellow go-go fans and even to a guy who'd attended one of the shows advertised in the poster. I overheard so many fascinating conversations and shared none of them.
Not having to blog meant plenty of time for dinner at the ever-fabulous Acacia (duck heart salad with strawberries, my, oh my and squid ink pasta with clams) before seeing Quill Theater's "King Lear" and repairing to Can-Can for Shakespeare discussion among the Saturday night divorcee crowd.
Did anyone really need to hear my thoughts on the new bands I've been seeing lately? The new Scott Clark Trio, for instance, or Microwave's soulful sounds at Cary Street? Zomes at Steady Sounds or the killer chops of Ralston, Parker, Fonville at Balliceaux? Probably not.
I have taken epic walks with my new walking partners, shared an unexpected brunch with an attentive artist and gone to a late night screening of a movie about wine, "Premiere Cru." At the Valentine's final Community Conversation, I enthusiastically discussed Richmond's public spaces with strangers and people of opposing opinions.
If anyone actually cares that I saw the cult 1986 documentary "Heavy Metal Parking Lot," I'd be thrilled to hear from them. Personally, it was a kick seeing all those skinny kids in the Capital Centre parking lot, the scene of most of my concerts for the first 8 or 10 years of my concert-going life.
Paul McCartney, Elton John, Cher, the Who, Fleetwood Mac, Diana Ross, the Beach Boys, Bruce Springsteen, Aerosmith, all revealed themselves to me for the first time at ye old Cap Centre, but at this screening, I got the bonus of seeing the building's implosion, something I'd missed, having moved to Richmond by then.
But who cares?
And does anyone really want to know that I've been to Merroir twice in recent weeks, along with Metzger, Pizza Tonight, My Noodle and Bar (I'm besotted with the decor) and the Roosevelt for a wine dinner with Chatham Vineyards, their delightful and voluble winemaker seated at our table? Probably not.
When it was last minute company I needed, I found it with an empathetic friend at Sabai for dinner and the Broadberry for a DJ out of Phoenix who took the stage at midnight after two others and melted our faces off with European beats.
Walking out of Richmond Ballet's Studio 3 series after being gobsmacked seeing "The Rite of Spring" and a world premiere of Mark Annear's "City Life," I run into the mustached scientist, whom I haven't seen in eons.
"Well, that was better than a reproduction lecture,' he observes in his usual deadpan, referring to the class he should have been teaching while he was instead watching dance.
Just before I get ready to leave the house Sunday, my trusty land line rings and it's the college friend who now resides in Key West, calling to check on me for the simple reason that I haven't blogged in a few weeks. Am I okay, how's my love life, how can anyone, friend or foe, be expected to match my energy level?
Although it sounds like typical friend phone conversation, you have to understand that we don't talk on the phone. Or if we do, there are years in between conversations. Clearly, he must have been worried and we can't have that.
After all, he's the one who advised me back in 2009 when my life was in shambles that, "Loneliness and regret are mean friends and piss poor mates."
I'm working on having none of either, thank you very much. So the blog is back, in some fashion or another, probably a less revealing one so more of my business is my own. How's that for pithy?
Say it ain't so.
Oh, I was flattered when I heard from the west coast, "Oh, shoot, is this the end of the blog? Say it ain't so...xo," but I was, alas, so much busier with work and a decided uptick in my social life that I had to let go of something.
I certainly wasn't about to let go of things like a poetry reading at Scott House, with verse dedicated to topics such as nosebleeds, elk offal, pyre-building and gray scum (Gregory Kimbrell's first reading from his completely disarming and disturbing new book of poems, "The Primitive Observatory") or Allison Titus' elegiac space rock poems about fireflies lamping the back yard.
As a result, I decided to use my usual blogging time for fun so I didn't have to miss out on anything like the screening of "Labyrinth" at Hardywood (my first viewing of the Bowie/Jim Henson classic) or an afternoon under the spell of K Dance's "Shorts," with works by Tennessee Williams, Suzan-Lori Parks and Shel Silverstein.
With no obligation to keep track of my comings and goings, I left town for three days, taking long walks in unfamiliar places, doing a lot of reading and savoring the lobster roll my critic friend recommended. When I got back, it was to an unexpected message, letting me know of the sender's "continuing appreciation for what you do to show a strong, smart, engaged approach to living."
There are people reading me who get that? Praise the lord and pass the biscuits.
Right, and there was that time I went to the new Early Bird Biscuit and shared my biscuit and blackberry jam with a homeless man who called me kind for doing so. I would call the person who wrote that to me kind as well.
When the French Film Festival hit town, Pru and I set out to get our yearly Francophile fix, except that what she really wanted to discuss for those three days was not cineastes but my absence in the blogging sphere, having been immediately suspicious when I'd stopped.
Over dinner at Secco one day, Amour Wine Bistro another and Bistro Bobette a third, she tried to get me back in writing mode. "All these amusing things I've been saying and no one's writing them down for posterity!" she lamented.
Days later, I get a message from her. "It looks like your radishes are growing fat instead of pithy at present...hmmmm." After much back and forth about my personal life, she offered advice not printable in a family blog...or this one. Her summation? "Get out there and get pithy!"
Can I not be pithy without blogging?
Perhaps I'm too busy flaunting my D.C. roots with a James River Film Fest screening of "S.E. 67," a documentary about a group of Southeast Washington kids offered free college educations back in the '80s. I sign a petition to save the Enid Haupt Gardens in D.C., aghast that their demolition is even being considered.
There's a show and dance party at Studio 23 of go-go posters from the '70s and '80s (the graphic style instantly recognizable because I grew up seeing them everywhere), along with two DJs playing nothing but go-go, something that rarely happens outside D.C.
I have a ball dancing, talking to fellow go-go fans and even to a guy who'd attended one of the shows advertised in the poster. I overheard so many fascinating conversations and shared none of them.
Not having to blog meant plenty of time for dinner at the ever-fabulous Acacia (duck heart salad with strawberries, my, oh my and squid ink pasta with clams) before seeing Quill Theater's "King Lear" and repairing to Can-Can for Shakespeare discussion among the Saturday night divorcee crowd.
Did anyone really need to hear my thoughts on the new bands I've been seeing lately? The new Scott Clark Trio, for instance, or Microwave's soulful sounds at Cary Street? Zomes at Steady Sounds or the killer chops of Ralston, Parker, Fonville at Balliceaux? Probably not.
I have taken epic walks with my new walking partners, shared an unexpected brunch with an attentive artist and gone to a late night screening of a movie about wine, "Premiere Cru." At the Valentine's final Community Conversation, I enthusiastically discussed Richmond's public spaces with strangers and people of opposing opinions.
If anyone actually cares that I saw the cult 1986 documentary "Heavy Metal Parking Lot," I'd be thrilled to hear from them. Personally, it was a kick seeing all those skinny kids in the Capital Centre parking lot, the scene of most of my concerts for the first 8 or 10 years of my concert-going life.
Paul McCartney, Elton John, Cher, the Who, Fleetwood Mac, Diana Ross, the Beach Boys, Bruce Springsteen, Aerosmith, all revealed themselves to me for the first time at ye old Cap Centre, but at this screening, I got the bonus of seeing the building's implosion, something I'd missed, having moved to Richmond by then.
But who cares?
And does anyone really want to know that I've been to Merroir twice in recent weeks, along with Metzger, Pizza Tonight, My Noodle and Bar (I'm besotted with the decor) and the Roosevelt for a wine dinner with Chatham Vineyards, their delightful and voluble winemaker seated at our table? Probably not.
When it was last minute company I needed, I found it with an empathetic friend at Sabai for dinner and the Broadberry for a DJ out of Phoenix who took the stage at midnight after two others and melted our faces off with European beats.
Walking out of Richmond Ballet's Studio 3 series after being gobsmacked seeing "The Rite of Spring" and a world premiere of Mark Annear's "City Life," I run into the mustached scientist, whom I haven't seen in eons.
"Well, that was better than a reproduction lecture,' he observes in his usual deadpan, referring to the class he should have been teaching while he was instead watching dance.
Just before I get ready to leave the house Sunday, my trusty land line rings and it's the college friend who now resides in Key West, calling to check on me for the simple reason that I haven't blogged in a few weeks. Am I okay, how's my love life, how can anyone, friend or foe, be expected to match my energy level?
Although it sounds like typical friend phone conversation, you have to understand that we don't talk on the phone. Or if we do, there are years in between conversations. Clearly, he must have been worried and we can't have that.
After all, he's the one who advised me back in 2009 when my life was in shambles that, "Loneliness and regret are mean friends and piss poor mates."
I'm working on having none of either, thank you very much. So the blog is back, in some fashion or another, probably a less revealing one so more of my business is my own. How's that for pithy?
Say it ain't so.
Monday, March 30, 2015
You Can't Hurry Love
In case you haven't noticed, I tend to have an opinion on almost everything.
For instance, I see no point in not watching an entire movie. I know some people will come into a movie midway through and watch it with enjoyment, but not me. Nor do I start and stop.
Except when I do.
My final foray at the French Film Festival involved the particular kind of film for which I go to the event: a romance. Standing in line to get popcorn, I heard a familiar Frenchman and unexpectedly, I had a companion for the film, "Not My Type."
We found seats before it got too crowded, but my delight was in finding the most comfy seat I've ever sat in at the Byrd. Unlike most, this one had clearly been replaced since it was covered in pleather, not the tired red fabric of the other seats. And, lo and behold, no springs jabbing my backside.
The available seat to my right soon found an occupant while his wife continued on to look for another single seat. I pointed out that you're not supposed to talk during a movie anyway, so it didn't really matter that they couldn't sit together.
"I know but we like to hold hands," he explained. Very sweet. "And if I try that here, I might get smacked." Yea, by your wife, I told him.
Within a minute or two, his wife was back, signaling him that she'd found adjoining seats. My French friend began chortling. "She didn't want him sitting next to you!" he said, grinning. Whatevs.
The film was supposed to start at 2:45, but first they introduced the entire French delegation and the scores of interns who'd worked on the festival and then someone from the French Embassy spoke. By the time the film began, it was 3:40, a problem for me because I needed to be home shortly after 5.
It was a shame, too, because from the first few frames, I knew this was my kind of movie. A teacher of philosophy gets transferred from Paris to a small town 90 minutes away, a place in which he expects to languish, if not die.
Besides being consumed by his research and teaching, he's written a book about sex trumping love and why there's no point in committed relationships. Naturally he meets a hair stylist ("I'm not beautiful, I have charm. It's different") who reads tabloids and likes to sing "You Can't Hurry Love" at karaoke with her girlfriends.
He gives her Dostoevsky and Steinbeck to read. She takes him to his first Jennifer Aniston movie.
It's love at first haircut. Problems arise once she falls in love and realizes that he's the type who can't admit to love. They sit on the beach at the seashore ("You can't get bored looking at the sea"), her talking about how love means you make plans for the future.
Problems arise when she reads his book and realizes that he sees no point in love or long term relationships. Tears and heated discussion followed and then...
I had to leave. Now I was never going to know if he was her type.
It about killed me to walk out without knowing how their future was resolved, but I had no choice. I was hosting five of the coolest kids I knew for dinner and I couldn't be late.
Okay, so I wasn't hosting them at my house or cooking for them or anything as mundane as that. But I'd invited them all to join me at a wine dinner at Camden's and I needed to get myself ready for that and over there before they arrived.
In order to do so, I sacrificed the end of a movie I really wanted to see. It pained me to walk out, believe me.
In what turned out to be the hot topic of conversation to kick off the evening, I wore jeans to the dinner. I know it doesn't sound like much, but I don't wear jeans. Period. Never, I'd bought these yesterday at a thrift store for $2.50 on a whim.
Everyone noticed and commented ("Who are you?") and when my date said she'd never seen me in jeans in the five years we'd known each other, I shared that the last time I'd worn jeans, my boyfriend had dumped me. "Kind of risky to try again, isn't it?" she inquired.
I'd calculated the risk but admittedly, I'm not very good at math.
Arriving at the restaurant just as two of my friends did, I chose a center seat so I'd have everyone around me to talk, which was the whole point of asking them all in the first place.
My girl date was next, having arrived by Uber. Her driver had warned her that there were two motorcycle gangs in town this weekend for a music show, so she'd better be wary. She found this hilarious and chose not to call him when it was time to leave many hours later.
She was followed by Pru and her beau and our six-top was complete. Both of the gentlemen looked particularly dapper, disproving the notion that men don't dress for dinner. The Pandora station was set to Raphael Saadiq, an appropriately soulful soundtrack.
Tonight's wine dinner theme was the Pacific Northwest and wine rep Matt began the evening by standing on a bar stool (actually that was my suggestion but it got things off to an amusing, if precarious, start) to talk about the first wine.
In what had to be the most surprising way to begin the meal, we had a late harvest Sauvignon Blanc which drank sort of like Sauternes and was an ideal pairing with "faux" gras- a chicken liver mousse- over apple galette with shaved Tillamook cheddar.
We all agreed it was a brilliantly unconventional way to start the meal.
When Matt introduced the next wine, Lundeen Pinot Gris Estate 2013, he got a good laugh when he said that the winemaker as another liberal arts refugee. The same could have been said about the chef or most of my friends at the table.
We drank the lovely wine with an arugula, celery, red onion and rockfish salad, the youngest member of our group admitting that she'd only had rockfish once before. We're doing our best to bring her up to speed.
And while rockfish wasn't her forte, when we got off on the subject of Lip Smackers (or any of the flavored lip products young girls use), she was an expert. Dr. Pepper had been her favorite flavor, setting off a discussion of other disgusting offerings such as cherry vanilla and root beer.
We tried to remember if there was a correlation between flavors used and types of girls. No one could recall what flavor was the so-called "slutty" girls' favorite.
After much back and forth, Pru pronounced the Dr. Pepper queen a full-fledged member of the club as of tonight.
The third course was pork hand pies with lavender goat cheese creme fraiche and my date was the first to eat it properly (in hand) but we all soon followed suit, picking up the floral notes of the Emerson Willlamette Pinot Noir along the way.
By this point, everyone was fairly well lubricated, evidenced by the conversation, first about the Lance Linc lunchbox sitting nearby (only guys, it seems, understand the appeal) and then about "Fifty Shades of Gray," when one male friend claimed to have read it. "Twenty five was all I could handle," he quipped.
Ribbing continued when plates of roasted leg of lamb arrived with dried currant jam and fried fingerling potatoes. Each plate was adorned with sprigs of fresh thyme, although mine seemed to have an entire thyme plant atop it.
"Some people get all the thyme," it was said. I shared my abundance with those less fortunate because the thyme really made the dish, although had you asked Pru, she'd have voted for the currants because they are a personal favorite of hers.
The lamb was accompanied by Claar Cellars Cabernet-Merlot 2012 ("This is a really beautiful pairing," my date noted with a mouth full of lamb and a big smile on her face), tasting of dark fruit and spice.
I was busy discussing film with the left side of the table when I overheard a discussion of helicopter parenting on the right and put my bid in to join that conversation when I could. Many opinions there about how we're ruining future generations.
"Wine is sunlight held together by water. Galileo," the former bartender and pastry school student announced before using a copy of the menu to shape a decorating tube.
The official meal ended with dark chocolate cherry fudge pate and Thurston Wolfe "JTW's Port," a heavy hitter at 18% but exquisite with the chocolate.
Meanwhile we'd decided to further visit our youth by crafting a childhood game, the folded paper puzzle that tells your fortune. Several of us tried to complete one but it was the newest member of the club who successfully did so.
Since my pen was already out, I got to label it with numbers, colors and names so each of us could take a turn and learn our fate.
"In grade school, it was fun, but now it's just a creepy swingers' club," said the friend after his choices said my date was his future.
"All I want is for you to cut my grass," she informed him. Hell, that's not even two shades of gray,
That was officially the end of the wine dinner, but our group opted to linger over a bottle of Touraine Sauvignon Blanc 2013, pleasing Pru no end and resulting in the comment, "Do not look directly at a man's member."
In my opinion, because you know I have one, there are times when it's perfectly fine to look directly.
But only if he's your type.
For instance, I see no point in not watching an entire movie. I know some people will come into a movie midway through and watch it with enjoyment, but not me. Nor do I start and stop.
Except when I do.
My final foray at the French Film Festival involved the particular kind of film for which I go to the event: a romance. Standing in line to get popcorn, I heard a familiar Frenchman and unexpectedly, I had a companion for the film, "Not My Type."
We found seats before it got too crowded, but my delight was in finding the most comfy seat I've ever sat in at the Byrd. Unlike most, this one had clearly been replaced since it was covered in pleather, not the tired red fabric of the other seats. And, lo and behold, no springs jabbing my backside.
The available seat to my right soon found an occupant while his wife continued on to look for another single seat. I pointed out that you're not supposed to talk during a movie anyway, so it didn't really matter that they couldn't sit together.
"I know but we like to hold hands," he explained. Very sweet. "And if I try that here, I might get smacked." Yea, by your wife, I told him.
Within a minute or two, his wife was back, signaling him that she'd found adjoining seats. My French friend began chortling. "She didn't want him sitting next to you!" he said, grinning. Whatevs.
The film was supposed to start at 2:45, but first they introduced the entire French delegation and the scores of interns who'd worked on the festival and then someone from the French Embassy spoke. By the time the film began, it was 3:40, a problem for me because I needed to be home shortly after 5.
It was a shame, too, because from the first few frames, I knew this was my kind of movie. A teacher of philosophy gets transferred from Paris to a small town 90 minutes away, a place in which he expects to languish, if not die.
Besides being consumed by his research and teaching, he's written a book about sex trumping love and why there's no point in committed relationships. Naturally he meets a hair stylist ("I'm not beautiful, I have charm. It's different") who reads tabloids and likes to sing "You Can't Hurry Love" at karaoke with her girlfriends.
He gives her Dostoevsky and Steinbeck to read. She takes him to his first Jennifer Aniston movie.
It's love at first haircut. Problems arise once she falls in love and realizes that he's the type who can't admit to love. They sit on the beach at the seashore ("You can't get bored looking at the sea"), her talking about how love means you make plans for the future.
Problems arise when she reads his book and realizes that he sees no point in love or long term relationships. Tears and heated discussion followed and then...
I had to leave. Now I was never going to know if he was her type.
It about killed me to walk out without knowing how their future was resolved, but I had no choice. I was hosting five of the coolest kids I knew for dinner and I couldn't be late.
Okay, so I wasn't hosting them at my house or cooking for them or anything as mundane as that. But I'd invited them all to join me at a wine dinner at Camden's and I needed to get myself ready for that and over there before they arrived.
In order to do so, I sacrificed the end of a movie I really wanted to see. It pained me to walk out, believe me.
In what turned out to be the hot topic of conversation to kick off the evening, I wore jeans to the dinner. I know it doesn't sound like much, but I don't wear jeans. Period. Never, I'd bought these yesterday at a thrift store for $2.50 on a whim.
Everyone noticed and commented ("Who are you?") and when my date said she'd never seen me in jeans in the five years we'd known each other, I shared that the last time I'd worn jeans, my boyfriend had dumped me. "Kind of risky to try again, isn't it?" she inquired.
I'd calculated the risk but admittedly, I'm not very good at math.
Arriving at the restaurant just as two of my friends did, I chose a center seat so I'd have everyone around me to talk, which was the whole point of asking them all in the first place.
My girl date was next, having arrived by Uber. Her driver had warned her that there were two motorcycle gangs in town this weekend for a music show, so she'd better be wary. She found this hilarious and chose not to call him when it was time to leave many hours later.
She was followed by Pru and her beau and our six-top was complete. Both of the gentlemen looked particularly dapper, disproving the notion that men don't dress for dinner. The Pandora station was set to Raphael Saadiq, an appropriately soulful soundtrack.
Tonight's wine dinner theme was the Pacific Northwest and wine rep Matt began the evening by standing on a bar stool (actually that was my suggestion but it got things off to an amusing, if precarious, start) to talk about the first wine.
In what had to be the most surprising way to begin the meal, we had a late harvest Sauvignon Blanc which drank sort of like Sauternes and was an ideal pairing with "faux" gras- a chicken liver mousse- over apple galette with shaved Tillamook cheddar.
We all agreed it was a brilliantly unconventional way to start the meal.
When Matt introduced the next wine, Lundeen Pinot Gris Estate 2013, he got a good laugh when he said that the winemaker as another liberal arts refugee. The same could have been said about the chef or most of my friends at the table.
We drank the lovely wine with an arugula, celery, red onion and rockfish salad, the youngest member of our group admitting that she'd only had rockfish once before. We're doing our best to bring her up to speed.
And while rockfish wasn't her forte, when we got off on the subject of Lip Smackers (or any of the flavored lip products young girls use), she was an expert. Dr. Pepper had been her favorite flavor, setting off a discussion of other disgusting offerings such as cherry vanilla and root beer.
We tried to remember if there was a correlation between flavors used and types of girls. No one could recall what flavor was the so-called "slutty" girls' favorite.
After much back and forth, Pru pronounced the Dr. Pepper queen a full-fledged member of the club as of tonight.
The third course was pork hand pies with lavender goat cheese creme fraiche and my date was the first to eat it properly (in hand) but we all soon followed suit, picking up the floral notes of the Emerson Willlamette Pinot Noir along the way.
By this point, everyone was fairly well lubricated, evidenced by the conversation, first about the Lance Linc lunchbox sitting nearby (only guys, it seems, understand the appeal) and then about "Fifty Shades of Gray," when one male friend claimed to have read it. "Twenty five was all I could handle," he quipped.
Ribbing continued when plates of roasted leg of lamb arrived with dried currant jam and fried fingerling potatoes. Each plate was adorned with sprigs of fresh thyme, although mine seemed to have an entire thyme plant atop it.
"Some people get all the thyme," it was said. I shared my abundance with those less fortunate because the thyme really made the dish, although had you asked Pru, she'd have voted for the currants because they are a personal favorite of hers.
The lamb was accompanied by Claar Cellars Cabernet-Merlot 2012 ("This is a really beautiful pairing," my date noted with a mouth full of lamb and a big smile on her face), tasting of dark fruit and spice.
I was busy discussing film with the left side of the table when I overheard a discussion of helicopter parenting on the right and put my bid in to join that conversation when I could. Many opinions there about how we're ruining future generations.
"Wine is sunlight held together by water. Galileo," the former bartender and pastry school student announced before using a copy of the menu to shape a decorating tube.
The official meal ended with dark chocolate cherry fudge pate and Thurston Wolfe "JTW's Port," a heavy hitter at 18% but exquisite with the chocolate.
Meanwhile we'd decided to further visit our youth by crafting a childhood game, the folded paper puzzle that tells your fortune. Several of us tried to complete one but it was the newest member of the club who successfully did so.
Since my pen was already out, I got to label it with numbers, colors and names so each of us could take a turn and learn our fate.
"In grade school, it was fun, but now it's just a creepy swingers' club," said the friend after his choices said my date was his future.
"All I want is for you to cut my grass," she informed him. Hell, that's not even two shades of gray,
That was officially the end of the wine dinner, but our group opted to linger over a bottle of Touraine Sauvignon Blanc 2013, pleasing Pru no end and resulting in the comment, "Do not look directly at a man's member."
In my opinion, because you know I have one, there are times when it's perfectly fine to look directly.
But only if he's your type.
Sunday, March 29, 2015
A Good Talking To
It's the classic story of two single women huddled together for warmth under one shared coat. At the end of the evening, there are declarations of love and they both dissolve in fits of giggles.
You know, that old chestnut.
Pru and I were overdue for a date, so I picked her up and whisked her off to Amour, where we found a restaurant full of French people and only one available stool at the bar. Given that it's the height of the French Film Festival, it was hardly surprising.
The owner was in rare form, no doubt a function of his pleasure at having so many French-speakers in the restaurant all week, and delighted us with his steady stream of witty patter, explaining that the handsome tie he was wearing made him look slimmer and he'd blow up like a balloon if he removed it and that white wine was for girls and red for boys.
We took him at his word on everything.
Pru was just coming off her birthday so it seemed only appropriate to celebrate with Veuve Clicquot as she opened presents not from me. Inside the gift bag was a veritable Byrd Theater survival kit: dark chocolate covered marshmallows, two kinds of biscotti, fancy gummies.
Few things are as lovely as beginning an evening with bubbles, but our busy days - hers packing, mine writing - also meant hungry bellies. Our cheese and charcuterie plate arrived to address those munchies with such temptations as fourme d'ambert, wild boar salami, Comte, speck, dried mango, grapes and cornichons. And that wasn't the half of it.
So many delightful things to eat meant plenty of time to take the temperature of each other's lives since we'd last had a girls' night out, far too long ago. Her recent night at the opera was up first.
We discussed the beach house she's rented and whether it should be a girls' only clubhouse or not given how much fun we had last time we did it sans men. We're thinking no boys allowed and possibly no red wine. White and pink only.
The subject of E-Z Bake ovens came up, necessitating we explain the concept to a Frenchman. I'd heard tell of a woman who'd demonstrated her mettle as a child by replacing the bulb in the oven with a higher wattage so she could cook bacon instead of miniature cakes.
Neither Pru nor I had had nor wanted an E-Z Bake oven, for what that's worth.
Delving into some personal matters of hers, I had to laugh long and hard when she told me, "I had a talk with myself because someone needed to do it and I knew if I didn't, you would." Right she was about that.
Since tonight counted toward her ongoing birthday festivities, naturally we had dessert and hers arrived with a lit candle. I can't sing, but the owner was gracious enough to wish her a "joyeux anniversaire" as she blew it out.
Even without it being my celebration, I was plenty keen on the mini duo of sea salt and caramel chocolate creme brulee and housemade raspberry sorbet. We agreed that all desserts should be sized that way to mitigate guilt and not make delicate flowers such as us feel stuffed. Unfortunately, no one was asking our opinion about dessert sizing.
Best Pru quip of the night: "Do I really want to die alone?" Do any of us really want to? Do we really have a choice?
After the last sips of Willm Cremant d'Alsace were savored, we made the frigid trek (was it really 77 degrees just two days ago?) to the Byrd only a few minutes late.
We had no problem finding good seats just as the films were being introduced. On the bill tonight were rare and restored films of the late 19th and early 20th century and tonight was the first time they were being shown in their restored state anywhere.
What was interesting about that was that once this cache of films from 1896-1905 had been discovered, in deplorable shape of course, they had to be transferred to digital to capture them and then put on 35 mm for posterity. Some were even hand-painted frame by frame.
And get this: they were being shown with musical accompaniment. Bob Gulledge was playing the mighty Wurlitzer with each film.
Because they were so old, they were incredibly brief, most about a minute long, but offered fascinating glimpses into the late 19th century world.
Several showed street locations such as the Place de la Concorde and Gare Saint Lazare, both alive with hansom cabs, carts, bicycles, pedestrians, horse-drawn street cars and the like. Dogs and children darted through it all.
Several films showed dancing - Russians with knives, ballet, a dramatic scene by the river - and one was a comical look at a marriage banquet (Bob Gulledge began by playing "Here Comes the Bride").
It was some time around then that Pru and I realized we were both shivering. If the air conditioning wasn't on, then there was certainly no heat on and we were reduced to huddling under her wool coat (I'd never even removed my jean jacket). Looking around, we saw several other women doing the same.
If it was intended to keep us awake, it seemed unnecessarily cruel.
The final short was George Melies' "Legend of Rip van Winkle," a treat since I've seen several of Melies' films thanks to my friend Jameson and the Silent Music Revival. This one was 15 minutes long and colorized, which was something new for the films of his I've seen.
As Bob Gulledge played and the film rolled, Todd, the affable manager of the Byrd, read the original text to the audience as we watched the film, much the way a bonimenteur would have done in 1905. In those days, there was no assumption that the audience could follow the story solely from silent pictures.
I found the language of the script wonderful. Rip was described as "a good and lazy bon vivant" and the gnomes "capered." When's the last time you heard "caper" used as a verb?
Tonight's piece de resistance was "The Byrd: A Love Affair," a documentary that's part of a series "Mythic Cinema Palaces" made by a French filmmaking team who discovered the theater a few years back when the director was asked to speak at the French Film festival.
Clearly the filmmaking gods work in mysterious ways.
It was a charming look at the landmark movie palace Richmonders know well, referred to as "a magical place to take us out of our daily world." We saw not only the vintage litter commercial, but an updated version that was a bit disconcerting simply because the original is so completely familiar.
What was most compelling about watching the documentary was the mirror effect. I could look at the screen as the Czechoslovakian chandelier was being shown and explained or I could look overhead and see it in real life.
When the camera follows the storyteller up four flights of stairs to see the instruments that make up the organ's works, I could recall going up those stairs myself years ago while shooting video with my co-worker. Since I'd been clueless about how organs worked, I'd been amazed to learn that each sound came from the actual instrument.
There was a scene of the annual Christmas Eve singalong, an event I've attended at the Byrd for the past 20 years. I didn't see myself, but I also can assure you I was there, although not singing given my inability to carry a tune in a bucket.
So while it was all very familiar, it was also surprisingly satisfying to see a documentary about a subject I know well made by people from another continent. Their reverence for and appreciation of the Byrd (and Richmond) came through in every frame.
When it ended, Pru and I reluctantly separated ourselves, giving up the shared body that that had made two hours in the theater tolerable. Walking up Cary Street with the FFF crowd, I heard my name called and spotted two friends hurrying against the wind.
We'd been so busy laughing and talking, I hadn't even noticed they'd been just ahead of us.
That lasted right up until I pulled up in front of her house to let her out, at which point I teased her one last time, setting off more giggles and a final, "I love you."
Just two bon vivants capering.
You know, that old chestnut.
Pru and I were overdue for a date, so I picked her up and whisked her off to Amour, where we found a restaurant full of French people and only one available stool at the bar. Given that it's the height of the French Film Festival, it was hardly surprising.
The owner was in rare form, no doubt a function of his pleasure at having so many French-speakers in the restaurant all week, and delighted us with his steady stream of witty patter, explaining that the handsome tie he was wearing made him look slimmer and he'd blow up like a balloon if he removed it and that white wine was for girls and red for boys.
We took him at his word on everything.
Pru was just coming off her birthday so it seemed only appropriate to celebrate with Veuve Clicquot as she opened presents not from me. Inside the gift bag was a veritable Byrd Theater survival kit: dark chocolate covered marshmallows, two kinds of biscotti, fancy gummies.
Few things are as lovely as beginning an evening with bubbles, but our busy days - hers packing, mine writing - also meant hungry bellies. Our cheese and charcuterie plate arrived to address those munchies with such temptations as fourme d'ambert, wild boar salami, Comte, speck, dried mango, grapes and cornichons. And that wasn't the half of it.
So many delightful things to eat meant plenty of time to take the temperature of each other's lives since we'd last had a girls' night out, far too long ago. Her recent night at the opera was up first.
We discussed the beach house she's rented and whether it should be a girls' only clubhouse or not given how much fun we had last time we did it sans men. We're thinking no boys allowed and possibly no red wine. White and pink only.
The subject of E-Z Bake ovens came up, necessitating we explain the concept to a Frenchman. I'd heard tell of a woman who'd demonstrated her mettle as a child by replacing the bulb in the oven with a higher wattage so she could cook bacon instead of miniature cakes.
Neither Pru nor I had had nor wanted an E-Z Bake oven, for what that's worth.
Delving into some personal matters of hers, I had to laugh long and hard when she told me, "I had a talk with myself because someone needed to do it and I knew if I didn't, you would." Right she was about that.
Since tonight counted toward her ongoing birthday festivities, naturally we had dessert and hers arrived with a lit candle. I can't sing, but the owner was gracious enough to wish her a "joyeux anniversaire" as she blew it out.
Even without it being my celebration, I was plenty keen on the mini duo of sea salt and caramel chocolate creme brulee and housemade raspberry sorbet. We agreed that all desserts should be sized that way to mitigate guilt and not make delicate flowers such as us feel stuffed. Unfortunately, no one was asking our opinion about dessert sizing.
Best Pru quip of the night: "Do I really want to die alone?" Do any of us really want to? Do we really have a choice?
After the last sips of Willm Cremant d'Alsace were savored, we made the frigid trek (was it really 77 degrees just two days ago?) to the Byrd only a few minutes late.
We had no problem finding good seats just as the films were being introduced. On the bill tonight were rare and restored films of the late 19th and early 20th century and tonight was the first time they were being shown in their restored state anywhere.
What was interesting about that was that once this cache of films from 1896-1905 had been discovered, in deplorable shape of course, they had to be transferred to digital to capture them and then put on 35 mm for posterity. Some were even hand-painted frame by frame.
And get this: they were being shown with musical accompaniment. Bob Gulledge was playing the mighty Wurlitzer with each film.
Because they were so old, they were incredibly brief, most about a minute long, but offered fascinating glimpses into the late 19th century world.
Several showed street locations such as the Place de la Concorde and Gare Saint Lazare, both alive with hansom cabs, carts, bicycles, pedestrians, horse-drawn street cars and the like. Dogs and children darted through it all.
Several films showed dancing - Russians with knives, ballet, a dramatic scene by the river - and one was a comical look at a marriage banquet (Bob Gulledge began by playing "Here Comes the Bride").
It was some time around then that Pru and I realized we were both shivering. If the air conditioning wasn't on, then there was certainly no heat on and we were reduced to huddling under her wool coat (I'd never even removed my jean jacket). Looking around, we saw several other women doing the same.
If it was intended to keep us awake, it seemed unnecessarily cruel.
The final short was George Melies' "Legend of Rip van Winkle," a treat since I've seen several of Melies' films thanks to my friend Jameson and the Silent Music Revival. This one was 15 minutes long and colorized, which was something new for the films of his I've seen.
As Bob Gulledge played and the film rolled, Todd, the affable manager of the Byrd, read the original text to the audience as we watched the film, much the way a bonimenteur would have done in 1905. In those days, there was no assumption that the audience could follow the story solely from silent pictures.
I found the language of the script wonderful. Rip was described as "a good and lazy bon vivant" and the gnomes "capered." When's the last time you heard "caper" used as a verb?
Tonight's piece de resistance was "The Byrd: A Love Affair," a documentary that's part of a series "Mythic Cinema Palaces" made by a French filmmaking team who discovered the theater a few years back when the director was asked to speak at the French Film festival.
Clearly the filmmaking gods work in mysterious ways.
It was a charming look at the landmark movie palace Richmonders know well, referred to as "a magical place to take us out of our daily world." We saw not only the vintage litter commercial, but an updated version that was a bit disconcerting simply because the original is so completely familiar.
What was most compelling about watching the documentary was the mirror effect. I could look at the screen as the Czechoslovakian chandelier was being shown and explained or I could look overhead and see it in real life.
When the camera follows the storyteller up four flights of stairs to see the instruments that make up the organ's works, I could recall going up those stairs myself years ago while shooting video with my co-worker. Since I'd been clueless about how organs worked, I'd been amazed to learn that each sound came from the actual instrument.
There was a scene of the annual Christmas Eve singalong, an event I've attended at the Byrd for the past 20 years. I didn't see myself, but I also can assure you I was there, although not singing given my inability to carry a tune in a bucket.
So while it was all very familiar, it was also surprisingly satisfying to see a documentary about a subject I know well made by people from another continent. Their reverence for and appreciation of the Byrd (and Richmond) came through in every frame.
When it ended, Pru and I reluctantly separated ourselves, giving up the shared body that that had made two hours in the theater tolerable. Walking up Cary Street with the FFF crowd, I heard my name called and spotted two friends hurrying against the wind.
We'd been so busy laughing and talking, I hadn't even noticed they'd been just ahead of us.
That lasted right up until I pulled up in front of her house to let her out, at which point I teased her one last time, setting off more giggles and a final, "I love you."
Just two bon vivants capering.
Saturday, March 28, 2015
C'est la Vie
I gave my derriere a breather, so to speak.
As devoted to the French Film Festival as I am, I couldn't sit in those Byrd Theater seats for another two films in one day like I did yesterday.
Besides, there was a cultural history exhibit opening at the unlikeliest of locations: a school.
Carver [ON] Record was taking place for one night only at Chesterfield Community High School, a place far beyond my usual range because it sits deep in the bowels of Chesterfield County.
How far out? Far enough that when I got out of the car, the din of happy frogs croaking in the misty evening air was in surround sound.
I knew it would be crowded because the parking lot had been full of cars and people making their way inside. There, I was invited to sign the guest book, given a program and directed to the gym.
Where usually sports are king was a huge installation marrying light and sound governed by how visitors like me moved their hands over posts with sensors on them. By drawing my hand up and away from the unit, I could make the images darker or lighter and the music louder or softer.
Hardly surprisingly, adults seemed slower to grasp the concept while high school students were creating compositions effortlessly in their digital native way.
The centerpiece of the evening was the hallway where certain lockers had been retrofitted with sound recordings of students past and present. What's particularly compelling about that is that the school was the sole secondary school for blacks in the county from 1948-70 so those students had a unique story to tell.
Standing at each locker to hear the reminisces of past students and the thoughts and hopes of current provided a glimpse into the past and future.
One former student talked about the hour and a half bus ride he had to take each way every day. About how if a kid played after school sports, he had no way to get home because his parents couldn't come get him so the only hope was a kind coach who lived in the area.
Another made the distinction between "black" and "African-American," saying one was a movement and the other an ethnic designation. Several mentioned the inherent inequality of "separate but equal" laws.
One man talked about the hierarchy of riding the bus. Apparently everyone knew who sat with whom, so he could count on boarding the bus knowing that no one had already sat down next to the girl he was sweet on.
I stopped to listen at each locker, sometimes with strangers and other times by myself. There were times groups of kids were laughing and shouting so loudly I had to listen to a tape loop twice so as not to miss it all. Or because some of the former students' musings were so eloquently put.
One of the lockers contained CDs made by a current student, Nas, and wrapped in pages of National Geographic magazine. His music was playing in that locker.
The final locker held the contents of the time capsule the students had collected, which will be buried and opened in 2065.
In it were all 12 cassette tapes holding the former students' full interviews (only snippets were used in the lockers) along with a cassette player, pictures and objects collected from the former students, things such as a microscope and a party dress.
The student standing next to the locker explained to me that all the memorabilia from the original Carver school had been burned when the school closed. It's hard to fathom that that ever seemed like a good idea.
In the cafeteria, a film played of some of the former students talking but with food and drink also in there, it was way too loud to hear any of it.
Instead, I moved on to the sound recording booth the students had built for the interviewing process. A student ushered me in, asked me questions and committed my thoughts on civil rights to a recording.
As I walked out, I stopped to listen to bits and pieces at some of the lockers I'd already heard. As far as I'm concerned, the coolest part of the entire project is that the lockers are permanent installations. Their sound boxes will live on in perpetuity and others will be added over the years.
By the time I left, it was clear that this endeavor was truly unique in capturing voices that might not otherwise have been available in the future. And the frogs were even louder, if possible, now that it was dark.
Only then, conscience raised, did I make my way north to the Byrd for tonight's FFF offering, "Parisiennes."
Sitting in my aisle seat noshing on popcorn, a man in my row stood and waved his hat until his friends spotted him and walked up to chat over top of me.
His first question was where they were staying this year (Linden Row, but in a courtyard unit because it was less pricey) and if they'd eaten at Max's on Broad.
The friends hadn't, leading to a restaurant discussion of where they should eat before they leave. I let it go on until I saw that the hat waver had seriously flawed opinions about local restaurants.
Only then did I share that I write about restaurants at which point the visitor had a dozen questions for me. Even once Peter, our FFF host, began speaking, he kept talking to me. His wife motioned that they should return to their seats and he stayed. She left.
It was only when the man in front of me nudged the guy and told him to fermez la bouche that he waved au revoir and returned to his wife, happy to have learned that he'd been right about wanting to eat at l'Opossum.
Tonight's film was introduced by the star, a lovely Japanese woman, and the director who was also holding the canine who had a bit part in the film.
The film told the story of a married Japanese novelist who goes to Paris -which she sees as a city of "free" women - seeking inspiration for her next book.
Through her five days in Paris, we see the women she interacts with as she tries to find someone to model her main character on.
Will it be the foul-mouthed female taxi driver who's obsessed with "Madame Butterfly"? The homeless woman who was a bouncer at all the hot clubs back in the '80s, turning Madonna away and sleeping with Prince? The ladies' room attendant who discovered a suicide in a stall? The lesbian butcher who hits on her?
Inevitably when she asks them about what's happened to them, they shrug and respond, "C'est la vie."
But with a French director, there has to be a man involved and this one is a Spaniard who is staying across the hall from her at the hotel.
He sees through her bravado when he tries to hit on her ("You think because you buy me dinner I'll sleep with you?" Without a pause, "Yes"), forcing her to acknowledge that she feels ignored by her husband and even telling him so by Skype.
"Maybe I'm here to remind you how lucky he is to have you," he says, making a good point.
Call me predictable, but one of my favorite scenes is in a disco where I got to hear club covers (not remixes) of songs such as "Sex on Fire" done as a slow burn and a languorous version of Daft Punk's "Get Lucky," both by women.
Also notable about the film was that despite it being set in Paris, it wasn't a postcard to Paris, the city just happened to the the setting. It was kind of refreshing.
I wasn't sure how the film was going to be resolved, so when the husband shows up to try to right his years of taking her for granted, I was genuinely surprised. This can happen?
What wasn't surprising was that my derriere was completely numb at this point after two plus hours in a seat with springs that kept jabbing me no matter which way I turned.
But that's life at the French Film Festival.
As devoted to the French Film Festival as I am, I couldn't sit in those Byrd Theater seats for another two films in one day like I did yesterday.
Besides, there was a cultural history exhibit opening at the unlikeliest of locations: a school.
Carver [ON] Record was taking place for one night only at Chesterfield Community High School, a place far beyond my usual range because it sits deep in the bowels of Chesterfield County.
How far out? Far enough that when I got out of the car, the din of happy frogs croaking in the misty evening air was in surround sound.
I knew it would be crowded because the parking lot had been full of cars and people making their way inside. There, I was invited to sign the guest book, given a program and directed to the gym.
Where usually sports are king was a huge installation marrying light and sound governed by how visitors like me moved their hands over posts with sensors on them. By drawing my hand up and away from the unit, I could make the images darker or lighter and the music louder or softer.
Hardly surprisingly, adults seemed slower to grasp the concept while high school students were creating compositions effortlessly in their digital native way.
The centerpiece of the evening was the hallway where certain lockers had been retrofitted with sound recordings of students past and present. What's particularly compelling about that is that the school was the sole secondary school for blacks in the county from 1948-70 so those students had a unique story to tell.
Standing at each locker to hear the reminisces of past students and the thoughts and hopes of current provided a glimpse into the past and future.
One former student talked about the hour and a half bus ride he had to take each way every day. About how if a kid played after school sports, he had no way to get home because his parents couldn't come get him so the only hope was a kind coach who lived in the area.
Another made the distinction between "black" and "African-American," saying one was a movement and the other an ethnic designation. Several mentioned the inherent inequality of "separate but equal" laws.
One man talked about the hierarchy of riding the bus. Apparently everyone knew who sat with whom, so he could count on boarding the bus knowing that no one had already sat down next to the girl he was sweet on.
I stopped to listen at each locker, sometimes with strangers and other times by myself. There were times groups of kids were laughing and shouting so loudly I had to listen to a tape loop twice so as not to miss it all. Or because some of the former students' musings were so eloquently put.
One of the lockers contained CDs made by a current student, Nas, and wrapped in pages of National Geographic magazine. His music was playing in that locker.
The final locker held the contents of the time capsule the students had collected, which will be buried and opened in 2065.
In it were all 12 cassette tapes holding the former students' full interviews (only snippets were used in the lockers) along with a cassette player, pictures and objects collected from the former students, things such as a microscope and a party dress.
The student standing next to the locker explained to me that all the memorabilia from the original Carver school had been burned when the school closed. It's hard to fathom that that ever seemed like a good idea.
In the cafeteria, a film played of some of the former students talking but with food and drink also in there, it was way too loud to hear any of it.
Instead, I moved on to the sound recording booth the students had built for the interviewing process. A student ushered me in, asked me questions and committed my thoughts on civil rights to a recording.
As I walked out, I stopped to listen to bits and pieces at some of the lockers I'd already heard. As far as I'm concerned, the coolest part of the entire project is that the lockers are permanent installations. Their sound boxes will live on in perpetuity and others will be added over the years.
By the time I left, it was clear that this endeavor was truly unique in capturing voices that might not otherwise have been available in the future. And the frogs were even louder, if possible, now that it was dark.
Only then, conscience raised, did I make my way north to the Byrd for tonight's FFF offering, "Parisiennes."
Sitting in my aisle seat noshing on popcorn, a man in my row stood and waved his hat until his friends spotted him and walked up to chat over top of me.
His first question was where they were staying this year (Linden Row, but in a courtyard unit because it was less pricey) and if they'd eaten at Max's on Broad.
The friends hadn't, leading to a restaurant discussion of where they should eat before they leave. I let it go on until I saw that the hat waver had seriously flawed opinions about local restaurants.
Only then did I share that I write about restaurants at which point the visitor had a dozen questions for me. Even once Peter, our FFF host, began speaking, he kept talking to me. His wife motioned that they should return to their seats and he stayed. She left.
It was only when the man in front of me nudged the guy and told him to fermez la bouche that he waved au revoir and returned to his wife, happy to have learned that he'd been right about wanting to eat at l'Opossum.
Tonight's film was introduced by the star, a lovely Japanese woman, and the director who was also holding the canine who had a bit part in the film.
The film told the story of a married Japanese novelist who goes to Paris -which she sees as a city of "free" women - seeking inspiration for her next book.
Through her five days in Paris, we see the women she interacts with as she tries to find someone to model her main character on.
Will it be the foul-mouthed female taxi driver who's obsessed with "Madame Butterfly"? The homeless woman who was a bouncer at all the hot clubs back in the '80s, turning Madonna away and sleeping with Prince? The ladies' room attendant who discovered a suicide in a stall? The lesbian butcher who hits on her?
Inevitably when she asks them about what's happened to them, they shrug and respond, "C'est la vie."
But with a French director, there has to be a man involved and this one is a Spaniard who is staying across the hall from her at the hotel.
He sees through her bravado when he tries to hit on her ("You think because you buy me dinner I'll sleep with you?" Without a pause, "Yes"), forcing her to acknowledge that she feels ignored by her husband and even telling him so by Skype.
"Maybe I'm here to remind you how lucky he is to have you," he says, making a good point.
Call me predictable, but one of my favorite scenes is in a disco where I got to hear club covers (not remixes) of songs such as "Sex on Fire" done as a slow burn and a languorous version of Daft Punk's "Get Lucky," both by women.
Also notable about the film was that despite it being set in Paris, it wasn't a postcard to Paris, the city just happened to the the setting. It was kind of refreshing.
I wasn't sure how the film was going to be resolved, so when the husband shows up to try to right his years of taking her for granted, I was genuinely surprised. This can happen?
What wasn't surprising was that my derriere was completely numb at this point after two plus hours in a seat with springs that kept jabbing me no matter which way I turned.
But that's life at the French Film Festival.
Friday, March 27, 2015
Walk Behind Me
When the French flag is flying over the Byrd Theater, I know it's time for my annual binge-watching.
While it was tough to abandon a sunny, 77-degree afternoon to enter the darkness of the Byrd Theater, no self-respecting French film lover would do otherwise.
Given that it was the first day of the festival, what surprised me was that it wasn't more crowded, although 4:30 on a Thursday afternoon isn't ideal for the 9 to 5 set.
As the first film of the day, it came closest to starting when it claimed it would. If there is one thing the French Film Festival is not, it's punctual about starting.
"Do you know why you're special?" Peter, the FFF organizer, asked of us about the film borrowed from the British Film Institute. "You're about to see the only 35 mm copy with English subtitles of this movie in the world."
I'll be the first to admit that I get a kick out of knowing that sort of thing,
The film was Francois Truffaut's "Day for Night" and considering I'd only seen one Truffaut movie in my entire life ("Wild Child"), I figured I owed it to myself to be there to see the cinematographer and stunt coordinator of the film introduce it.
When the film started, I was immediately reminded of how much I enjoy watching movies on film and not video. I love the look of film.
The 1973 film was about a director (Truffaut acting) making a film (maybe that's why it won the Oscar for best foreign film) and starred Jacqueline Bisset, an actress I'd forgotten all about, but remember all the guys being hot for at the time.
It had plenty of very French moments - "Walk in front of me so I can look at your behind" - as well as a story that involved everyone falling into bed with everyone else oh-so casually. Or maybe that was more of a '70s moment like a package arriving in brown paper tied up with string.
"Do you think women are magical?" one immature guy asks his co-workers. "Some are and some are not," he's told by a woman. By a man, it's, "No, but their legs are because they wear skirts and we wear pants."
I already had an inkling of that.
When filming on the movie within a movie ends, it's with one character's simple conclusion: "My sweet, my darling, you're wonderful. We all need that." Do we ever, none more so than those who don't get it much.
So now I've seen my second Truffaut film, enjoyed it immensely and realize I need to see more.
Walking out of the theater, the air was almost as soft and warm as when I'd walked in, although we were on our way to sunset.Still, it was a treat to not be the slightest bit chilly going outside.
Having taken a pass on the next French offering, I headed straight to the Valentine for the opening of "Beard Wars," a brilliantly curated new exhibit.
Making my way through a crowd that included some of the most awe-inspiring beards you can imagine, I found myself in front of a wall of photographs both new (by the multi-talented Terry Brown) and old (no doubt from the collection).
On the left hand side of each was a Civil War general with a picture and a description of the man and what he was known for. On the right hand side, a picture of a Richmond guy with a very similar beard and a bit about him.
I knew we had some world-class beards in this town (hence the Richmond Beard and 'Stache League) but I have to say there were some magnificent match-ups.
One guy's wife asked him to shave his beard because it was scratchy and he compromised by shaving his chin, leaving his mustache, mutton chops and side beard, also knows as "friendly mutton chops." Friendly to the wife, I suppose. See? I was learning new things.
Another guy had come out at the First Annual Mid-Atlantic Beard and 'Stache Competition, figuring it was the best way to show people how he self-identified. Well done.
Midway through the show, I ran into a photographer friend, IPA in hand, and chatted with her long enough to learn that she checks my blog any time she runs into me to see if she merits a mention. This is that.
Yet another said he first grew facial hair when he hit puberty because he hates to shave. Hate, he repeated in case we weren't clear on that. One used his nipple-length beard as a conversation starter. Curly, straight, gray, red, blond and brunette. One guy's mustache was wider than his face.
There were also on display four shaving mugs and a rare silver-plated mustache cup (to keep your beverage out of your 'stache) from the collection.
Turning from the cups, I almost ran into a guy with mutton chops and a fabulous handlebar mustache handing off his beer - complete with straw - to his mother. She and I chatted for a bit and I joked that her son should have brought a mustache cup so he wouldn't have to use a straw. "I offered to bring mine for him but he said no," she claimed. So much for my joke.
Turns out her son has a sponsorship from a facial hair grooming product company, meaning his visage has appeared in a British sporting magazine and he's gone to Austin to compete in beard competitions on the company's dime.
Who knew facial hair had such big payoffs?
In case you can't tell, I thoroughly enjoyed the exhibit and a big part of that was because of how it had been curated with the generals for comparison. It was like a cultural lesson in the similarities in facial hair between now and 150 years ago.
Leaving the show, I walked past three bearded guys shooting the breeze in parking lot. Two of them had beards past their arm pits. It truly was impressive.
Back in Carytown, I dropped by Secco for a glass of J. Mourat Collection Rose and a hilarious story. As a guy is leaving Secco, his friend spots him from across the street, yelling to ask what in the world he's doing at a wine bar.
"This where bitches be at!" he hollers from Secco's front door all the way across Cary Street. The owner is thinking of having that screened on t-shorts for the staff. I seconded the motion.
From there, I went on to admire photographs of a friend's mother from the '60s, '70s and '80s. What a stylish creature she had been despite a cigarette frequently in hand. Some were even taken in Paris, making them an ideal prelude to my next stop: more French film.
The crowd for "The Return of Martin Guerre" was half the size of the one for the 7:00 film, but I guess that's to be expected on a school night when you're talking about a film that doesn't start until after 9 p.m.
Introduced by its director, Daniel Vigne, the film appealed to me because it was one of a handful of the films that made up my first exposure to foreign films and I still recall being moved by it, partly because it had been based on a true story.
Something that struck me tonight that would not have occurred to me in 1982 was that it was a film about identity theft in the 16th century. How au courant a theme is that? And, get this, the village where the story took place faded back into obscurity after the notoriety of the film, only to grab the headlines again four years ago because a terrorist cell was discovered there.
Mon dieu, it was fascinating to see Gerard Depardieu young (34) and not as big as a whale like he was in "My Afternoons with Margueritte," which I also saw at the FFF.
Just as compelling was how much more relatively realistically the 16th century was portrayed in 1982 than it would be now. People's clothing looked dirty and hand-sewn. If the actress who played Martin Guerre's wife had on any make-up at all, it was undetectable. It's ridiculous to see a woman playing a peasant and see that she's wearing mascara or even the palest of lipstick.
That said, I don't buy Martin returning from fighting wars after nine years with a bowl-cut haircut. Seems unlikely.
What I particularly enjoyed was watching the love story unfold between the Martin pretender and the neglected wife of the real Martin. The actors conveyed a very touching and sensual relationship.
Being totally engrossed in the film, I couldn't have been more surprised when the two women in my row got up and left an hour into the film. What, you don't like a well-acted true story, shot in a real medieval village and scripted to use words like 'calumny'?
Be gone, ladies. Obviously we're not cut from the same cloth.
Your legs must not be as magical as mine.
While it was tough to abandon a sunny, 77-degree afternoon to enter the darkness of the Byrd Theater, no self-respecting French film lover would do otherwise.
Given that it was the first day of the festival, what surprised me was that it wasn't more crowded, although 4:30 on a Thursday afternoon isn't ideal for the 9 to 5 set.
As the first film of the day, it came closest to starting when it claimed it would. If there is one thing the French Film Festival is not, it's punctual about starting.
"Do you know why you're special?" Peter, the FFF organizer, asked of us about the film borrowed from the British Film Institute. "You're about to see the only 35 mm copy with English subtitles of this movie in the world."
I'll be the first to admit that I get a kick out of knowing that sort of thing,
The film was Francois Truffaut's "Day for Night" and considering I'd only seen one Truffaut movie in my entire life ("Wild Child"), I figured I owed it to myself to be there to see the cinematographer and stunt coordinator of the film introduce it.
When the film started, I was immediately reminded of how much I enjoy watching movies on film and not video. I love the look of film.
The 1973 film was about a director (Truffaut acting) making a film (maybe that's why it won the Oscar for best foreign film) and starred Jacqueline Bisset, an actress I'd forgotten all about, but remember all the guys being hot for at the time.
It had plenty of very French moments - "Walk in front of me so I can look at your behind" - as well as a story that involved everyone falling into bed with everyone else oh-so casually. Or maybe that was more of a '70s moment like a package arriving in brown paper tied up with string.
"Do you think women are magical?" one immature guy asks his co-workers. "Some are and some are not," he's told by a woman. By a man, it's, "No, but their legs are because they wear skirts and we wear pants."
I already had an inkling of that.
When filming on the movie within a movie ends, it's with one character's simple conclusion: "My sweet, my darling, you're wonderful. We all need that." Do we ever, none more so than those who don't get it much.
So now I've seen my second Truffaut film, enjoyed it immensely and realize I need to see more.
Walking out of the theater, the air was almost as soft and warm as when I'd walked in, although we were on our way to sunset.Still, it was a treat to not be the slightest bit chilly going outside.
Having taken a pass on the next French offering, I headed straight to the Valentine for the opening of "Beard Wars," a brilliantly curated new exhibit.
Making my way through a crowd that included some of the most awe-inspiring beards you can imagine, I found myself in front of a wall of photographs both new (by the multi-talented Terry Brown) and old (no doubt from the collection).
On the left hand side of each was a Civil War general with a picture and a description of the man and what he was known for. On the right hand side, a picture of a Richmond guy with a very similar beard and a bit about him.
I knew we had some world-class beards in this town (hence the Richmond Beard and 'Stache League) but I have to say there were some magnificent match-ups.
One guy's wife asked him to shave his beard because it was scratchy and he compromised by shaving his chin, leaving his mustache, mutton chops and side beard, also knows as "friendly mutton chops." Friendly to the wife, I suppose. See? I was learning new things.
Another guy had come out at the First Annual Mid-Atlantic Beard and 'Stache Competition, figuring it was the best way to show people how he self-identified. Well done.
Midway through the show, I ran into a photographer friend, IPA in hand, and chatted with her long enough to learn that she checks my blog any time she runs into me to see if she merits a mention. This is that.
Yet another said he first grew facial hair when he hit puberty because he hates to shave. Hate, he repeated in case we weren't clear on that. One used his nipple-length beard as a conversation starter. Curly, straight, gray, red, blond and brunette. One guy's mustache was wider than his face.
There were also on display four shaving mugs and a rare silver-plated mustache cup (to keep your beverage out of your 'stache) from the collection.
Turning from the cups, I almost ran into a guy with mutton chops and a fabulous handlebar mustache handing off his beer - complete with straw - to his mother. She and I chatted for a bit and I joked that her son should have brought a mustache cup so he wouldn't have to use a straw. "I offered to bring mine for him but he said no," she claimed. So much for my joke.
Turns out her son has a sponsorship from a facial hair grooming product company, meaning his visage has appeared in a British sporting magazine and he's gone to Austin to compete in beard competitions on the company's dime.
Who knew facial hair had such big payoffs?
In case you can't tell, I thoroughly enjoyed the exhibit and a big part of that was because of how it had been curated with the generals for comparison. It was like a cultural lesson in the similarities in facial hair between now and 150 years ago.
Leaving the show, I walked past three bearded guys shooting the breeze in parking lot. Two of them had beards past their arm pits. It truly was impressive.
Back in Carytown, I dropped by Secco for a glass of J. Mourat Collection Rose and a hilarious story. As a guy is leaving Secco, his friend spots him from across the street, yelling to ask what in the world he's doing at a wine bar.
"This where bitches be at!" he hollers from Secco's front door all the way across Cary Street. The owner is thinking of having that screened on t-shorts for the staff. I seconded the motion.
From there, I went on to admire photographs of a friend's mother from the '60s, '70s and '80s. What a stylish creature she had been despite a cigarette frequently in hand. Some were even taken in Paris, making them an ideal prelude to my next stop: more French film.
The crowd for "The Return of Martin Guerre" was half the size of the one for the 7:00 film, but I guess that's to be expected on a school night when you're talking about a film that doesn't start until after 9 p.m.
Introduced by its director, Daniel Vigne, the film appealed to me because it was one of a handful of the films that made up my first exposure to foreign films and I still recall being moved by it, partly because it had been based on a true story.
Something that struck me tonight that would not have occurred to me in 1982 was that it was a film about identity theft in the 16th century. How au courant a theme is that? And, get this, the village where the story took place faded back into obscurity after the notoriety of the film, only to grab the headlines again four years ago because a terrorist cell was discovered there.
Mon dieu, it was fascinating to see Gerard Depardieu young (34) and not as big as a whale like he was in "My Afternoons with Margueritte," which I also saw at the FFF.
Just as compelling was how much more relatively realistically the 16th century was portrayed in 1982 than it would be now. People's clothing looked dirty and hand-sewn. If the actress who played Martin Guerre's wife had on any make-up at all, it was undetectable. It's ridiculous to see a woman playing a peasant and see that she's wearing mascara or even the palest of lipstick.
That said, I don't buy Martin returning from fighting wars after nine years with a bowl-cut haircut. Seems unlikely.
What I particularly enjoyed was watching the love story unfold between the Martin pretender and the neglected wife of the real Martin. The actors conveyed a very touching and sensual relationship.
Being totally engrossed in the film, I couldn't have been more surprised when the two women in my row got up and left an hour into the film. What, you don't like a well-acted true story, shot in a real medieval village and scripted to use words like 'calumny'?
Be gone, ladies. Obviously we're not cut from the same cloth.
Your legs must not be as magical as mine.
Saturday, March 29, 2014
Black Iron Bitches Brunch
Who can be bothered with her daily walk when she has girlfriends to meet for brunch?
The Monument Avenue 10K had caused us to scrap our plans to meet at 821 (hence last night's visit) and try Lunch instead, despite a 40-minute wait when we arrived.
Ho-hum, just another Saturday morning at Lunch.
With umbrellas overhead and plenty to start talking about, our trio would have waited longer than that.
As if turned out, it wasn't even ten minutes before we were offered three seats at the bar and all was right with the world.
The music was set to solid gold soul - Dusty Springfield, Stevie Wonder- and our only wish was that it was louder.
I was the only one who hadn't brought major news but the other two had plenty. One is about to get a big, juicy promotion where she'll get to run things efficiently instead of pushing paper and the other is seeing a new (and very handsome) man, the best kisser she's ever had.
Hold on to a good kisser, my dear, because it bodes well for other things.
There were plenty of post-10K runners in there but between the three of us, we don't have one athletic bone in our bodies, so while they may have been eating the runner's special of an egg white omelet, we were more into real food- Nutella French toast, Greek omelets, the Ike with a monster pile of potato chips.
They talked about how a few drinks (or even caffeine) before shopping loosens a girl's wallet, but since I hate shopping, I stayed out of that one. Our server complimented my friend's cute glasses, recognizing them as the exact same ones she has. On more philosophical matters, we tried to figure out why guy friends never go to brunch together.
After plowing through our food, we set about coordinating upcoming music events: the great busk, a new Turkish band, a loud feminist punk band. Not the kinds of shows you want to be left out of.
Since it seemed rude to linger at the bar when people were waiting outside to get in, we took our post-meal conversation out to the sidewalk for a while.
Being better at the girl thing than I am, one was off to go shoe shopping and the other to go thrifting while I was returning to the Byrd for another French film.
Lady Luck was with me because I found a prime parking space next to Coppola's and managed to slide into an aisle seat for "Demi Soeur" with a minute to spare.
Taking up residence next to me were two young guys, one of whom commented, "This looks good!" when the opening credits began and all we could see was a church spire.
Optimist or French film expert, it was hard to tell.
But he was right about the sweet comedy about a mentally challenged woman (and her pet turtle, Tootie), Nenette, trying to find her father after her mother dies and instead finding her half brother, a lonely, introverted man with an ordered life but no friends or contact with his own family.
Because it was French and things like this never happen in American movies, the woman gets lost in the woods and stumbles on a rave with a screaming band called the Black Iron Bitches thrashing onstage while people on Ecstasy dance hypnotically.
It's through meeting the Bitches that she ends getting a makeup job from Too Much, the lead singer (a black star on her eye and deep plum colored lipstick on an old woman look pretty interesting), along with a bag of Ecstasy when the cops arrive mid-show.
It's that drug which she uses as sweetener in her brother's coffee, having been told that's what it is, that causes him to see everything and everyone in a new light. It was most definitely a ringing endorsement for drug use to affect a better personality.
He ends up having a euphoric day, the best of his life, with his half sister at the seashore, releasing his pet hermit crabs to the ocean and visiting and trying to make amends with his ex-wife and son from whom he's been estranged.
It wasn't a deep movie and it's not likely to be as memorable as any of the other films I've seen this time around at the FFF.
But I like to think that watching a sweet parable about what matters in life kind of counts as doing something girly after brunch.
It also gives me an idea for what my brunch buddies and I can call ourselves from here on out.
The Monument Avenue 10K had caused us to scrap our plans to meet at 821 (hence last night's visit) and try Lunch instead, despite a 40-minute wait when we arrived.
Ho-hum, just another Saturday morning at Lunch.
With umbrellas overhead and plenty to start talking about, our trio would have waited longer than that.
As if turned out, it wasn't even ten minutes before we were offered three seats at the bar and all was right with the world.
The music was set to solid gold soul - Dusty Springfield, Stevie Wonder- and our only wish was that it was louder.
I was the only one who hadn't brought major news but the other two had plenty. One is about to get a big, juicy promotion where she'll get to run things efficiently instead of pushing paper and the other is seeing a new (and very handsome) man, the best kisser she's ever had.
Hold on to a good kisser, my dear, because it bodes well for other things.
There were plenty of post-10K runners in there but between the three of us, we don't have one athletic bone in our bodies, so while they may have been eating the runner's special of an egg white omelet, we were more into real food- Nutella French toast, Greek omelets, the Ike with a monster pile of potato chips.
They talked about how a few drinks (or even caffeine) before shopping loosens a girl's wallet, but since I hate shopping, I stayed out of that one. Our server complimented my friend's cute glasses, recognizing them as the exact same ones she has. On more philosophical matters, we tried to figure out why guy friends never go to brunch together.
After plowing through our food, we set about coordinating upcoming music events: the great busk, a new Turkish band, a loud feminist punk band. Not the kinds of shows you want to be left out of.
Since it seemed rude to linger at the bar when people were waiting outside to get in, we took our post-meal conversation out to the sidewalk for a while.
Being better at the girl thing than I am, one was off to go shoe shopping and the other to go thrifting while I was returning to the Byrd for another French film.
Lady Luck was with me because I found a prime parking space next to Coppola's and managed to slide into an aisle seat for "Demi Soeur" with a minute to spare.
Taking up residence next to me were two young guys, one of whom commented, "This looks good!" when the opening credits began and all we could see was a church spire.
Optimist or French film expert, it was hard to tell.
But he was right about the sweet comedy about a mentally challenged woman (and her pet turtle, Tootie), Nenette, trying to find her father after her mother dies and instead finding her half brother, a lonely, introverted man with an ordered life but no friends or contact with his own family.
Because it was French and things like this never happen in American movies, the woman gets lost in the woods and stumbles on a rave with a screaming band called the Black Iron Bitches thrashing onstage while people on Ecstasy dance hypnotically.
It's through meeting the Bitches that she ends getting a makeup job from Too Much, the lead singer (a black star on her eye and deep plum colored lipstick on an old woman look pretty interesting), along with a bag of Ecstasy when the cops arrive mid-show.
It's that drug which she uses as sweetener in her brother's coffee, having been told that's what it is, that causes him to see everything and everyone in a new light. It was most definitely a ringing endorsement for drug use to affect a better personality.
He ends up having a euphoric day, the best of his life, with his half sister at the seashore, releasing his pet hermit crabs to the ocean and visiting and trying to make amends with his ex-wife and son from whom he's been estranged.
It wasn't a deep movie and it's not likely to be as memorable as any of the other films I've seen this time around at the FFF.
But I like to think that watching a sweet parable about what matters in life kind of counts as doing something girly after brunch.
It also gives me an idea for what my brunch buddies and I can call ourselves from here on out.
Like Going Steady
Life is a party, let's live it together ~ from Fellini's "8 1/2"
Let's.
On my way to the Byrd theater to see an Italian movie about Fellini as part of the VCU French Film Festival, I ran into a foodie friend and our brief conversation set the tone for the evening.
Agreeing that it would be tough for either of us to date a vegetarian or a non-drinker, he observed, "If I had to, I'd date a vegetarian over a non-drinker. No one wants to have sober sex all the time."
Now there's something I hadn't considered.
I was greeted outside the theater by a French friend who'd saved me a seat for "Carte Blanche de Jacques Perrin," a film tribute and portrait of Fellini, and who'd also brought dark chocolate crisps to snack on.
If you're curious about why an Italian film was showing at a French film fest, put your mind at ease. A French director had selected it because of its French cinematographer.
I learned the basic Fellini premise: "For women, love is everything and then sex. Men are just the opposite." Sobriety during either was not mentioned.
We returned to form with "Cousin Jules," a sumptuous 1972 French documentary that followed an elderly blacksmith and his wife in Burgundy for five years in a beautifully meditative film that the film's cinematographer warned us was definitely not an action movie.
Scenes were languid, unfolding as naturally as life in the French countryside must have been back in the '60s and '70s.
Interesting as it was to watch the blacksmith light fires, pump bellows, heat metal and shape things, I was far more fascinated with watching the wife's domestic life.
Peeling potatoes with one finger reduced to a stump, drawing water from the well, grinding coffee, she was always simply dressed in a dress and apron with black, woolen stockings. You'd have thought the film was from 1868 rather than 1968.
We learn she dies only when we see him over a graveyard wall shoveling. He carries on, carefully making their bed every day, preparing meals alone and filling a bottle from a barrel of wine to accompany his meals.
It was striking how much the world has changed in 46 years.
Their lives had been recorded in CinemaScope and stereophonic sound so we heard every nuance of birds flying overhead, roosters crowing at sunrise, the scraping of the man's straight razor against his coarse stubble and the shelling of dried corn.
Afterwards, my friend remarked that the sounds of the film had been particularly evocative for him, recalling those of being at his French grandparents' house as a child.
Breathtaking and riveting as my friend and I found the documentary, not everyone else did, including the older trio behind us who chattered away throughout. I finally said something to them but they kept on. Others did the same until finally they buttoned it for the last half an hour.
I bid au revoir to my friend after the Q & A, my backside deadened from the punishing Byrd theater seats (plenty of people were smart enough to bring cushions, but, no, not me).
When I stopped at Cafe 821 to eat, I walked in to hear my name called by server (and bass player) Gabe, who insisted I take a table since all the bar stools were occupied.
Hardly surprising given that this weekend is both Slaughterama, meaning the bike kids are here, and United Blood, meaning the hardcore crew has arrived, but when I want my favorite black bean nachos, there's just no going anywhere else.
Luckily, my server was also a familiar face who wanted to know where I'd been and where I was going (film to music so I could stand for a while, I told her) and understood completely when I left all chips without cheese sitting on the plate.
Walking outside into the still balmy air, I was glad I had a show to go to and happily surprised when lots of friends were there.
Before I even made it to the back room, a girl came up to me and asked if I was the Karen who wrote "ICGOAO." Well, sure, but how the hell had she known that?
"I see you around a lot and I just figured it out," she claimed. before introducing herself as one of the female arm wrestlers who had read my post on that fabulous night of estrogen power.
Further back I found plenty of people I already knew. There was the pretty DJ doing a special French pop music show on WRIR Sunday that I'll want to hear, the overworked and inventive dulcitar player, the platinum blond organizer and the Romanian folk musician, whom I had to move when he began blocking my view.
The draw for me was VA Beach's Suburban Living, a dream pop quartet with glorious guitar lines and enough reverb to qualify as my beloved "music from a cave."
It was hard to decide if they sounded more like the Cure or a melding of Real Estate and Wild Nothing, which is to say, two other Cure-derived bands.
Completely to my taste, in other words, as a shoegazing musician friend noted with a grin. His, too, so he should know.
Next up was Positive No,, who will be playing Suburban Living's hometown tomorrow night on the exact same bill.
"Two nights in a row," lead singer Tracey said. "It's like we're going steady!"
She's the high energy burst in front of the hard-hitting (and dimpled) Willis on drums and between Andre and Kenny keeping it loud and fuzzed out as everyone began to react to the music.
Even though Balliceaux had those beautiful windows open, it quickly got warm in there with everyone crushed in and half-dancing.
Exactly how you expect it to be at a party when you're living it together.
Let's.
On my way to the Byrd theater to see an Italian movie about Fellini as part of the VCU French Film Festival, I ran into a foodie friend and our brief conversation set the tone for the evening.
Agreeing that it would be tough for either of us to date a vegetarian or a non-drinker, he observed, "If I had to, I'd date a vegetarian over a non-drinker. No one wants to have sober sex all the time."
Now there's something I hadn't considered.
I was greeted outside the theater by a French friend who'd saved me a seat for "Carte Blanche de Jacques Perrin," a film tribute and portrait of Fellini, and who'd also brought dark chocolate crisps to snack on.
If you're curious about why an Italian film was showing at a French film fest, put your mind at ease. A French director had selected it because of its French cinematographer.
I learned the basic Fellini premise: "For women, love is everything and then sex. Men are just the opposite." Sobriety during either was not mentioned.
We returned to form with "Cousin Jules," a sumptuous 1972 French documentary that followed an elderly blacksmith and his wife in Burgundy for five years in a beautifully meditative film that the film's cinematographer warned us was definitely not an action movie.
Scenes were languid, unfolding as naturally as life in the French countryside must have been back in the '60s and '70s.
Interesting as it was to watch the blacksmith light fires, pump bellows, heat metal and shape things, I was far more fascinated with watching the wife's domestic life.
Peeling potatoes with one finger reduced to a stump, drawing water from the well, grinding coffee, she was always simply dressed in a dress and apron with black, woolen stockings. You'd have thought the film was from 1868 rather than 1968.
We learn she dies only when we see him over a graveyard wall shoveling. He carries on, carefully making their bed every day, preparing meals alone and filling a bottle from a barrel of wine to accompany his meals.
It was striking how much the world has changed in 46 years.
Their lives had been recorded in CinemaScope and stereophonic sound so we heard every nuance of birds flying overhead, roosters crowing at sunrise, the scraping of the man's straight razor against his coarse stubble and the shelling of dried corn.
Afterwards, my friend remarked that the sounds of the film had been particularly evocative for him, recalling those of being at his French grandparents' house as a child.
Breathtaking and riveting as my friend and I found the documentary, not everyone else did, including the older trio behind us who chattered away throughout. I finally said something to them but they kept on. Others did the same until finally they buttoned it for the last half an hour.
I bid au revoir to my friend after the Q & A, my backside deadened from the punishing Byrd theater seats (plenty of people were smart enough to bring cushions, but, no, not me).
When I stopped at Cafe 821 to eat, I walked in to hear my name called by server (and bass player) Gabe, who insisted I take a table since all the bar stools were occupied.
Hardly surprising given that this weekend is both Slaughterama, meaning the bike kids are here, and United Blood, meaning the hardcore crew has arrived, but when I want my favorite black bean nachos, there's just no going anywhere else.
Luckily, my server was also a familiar face who wanted to know where I'd been and where I was going (film to music so I could stand for a while, I told her) and understood completely when I left all chips without cheese sitting on the plate.
Walking outside into the still balmy air, I was glad I had a show to go to and happily surprised when lots of friends were there.
Before I even made it to the back room, a girl came up to me and asked if I was the Karen who wrote "ICGOAO." Well, sure, but how the hell had she known that?
"I see you around a lot and I just figured it out," she claimed. before introducing herself as one of the female arm wrestlers who had read my post on that fabulous night of estrogen power.
Further back I found plenty of people I already knew. There was the pretty DJ doing a special French pop music show on WRIR Sunday that I'll want to hear, the overworked and inventive dulcitar player, the platinum blond organizer and the Romanian folk musician, whom I had to move when he began blocking my view.
The draw for me was VA Beach's Suburban Living, a dream pop quartet with glorious guitar lines and enough reverb to qualify as my beloved "music from a cave."
It was hard to decide if they sounded more like the Cure or a melding of Real Estate and Wild Nothing, which is to say, two other Cure-derived bands.
Completely to my taste, in other words, as a shoegazing musician friend noted with a grin. His, too, so he should know.
Next up was Positive No,, who will be playing Suburban Living's hometown tomorrow night on the exact same bill.
"Two nights in a row," lead singer Tracey said. "It's like we're going steady!"
She's the high energy burst in front of the hard-hitting (and dimpled) Willis on drums and between Andre and Kenny keeping it loud and fuzzed out as everyone began to react to the music.
Even though Balliceaux had those beautiful windows open, it quickly got warm in there with everyone crushed in and half-dancing.
Exactly how you expect it to be at a party when you're living it together.
Friday, March 28, 2014
There's Only Today
Vive la France.
The French film festival began with two free screenings and we all know I am all about the free.
I arrived at the Byrd theater behind a woman who not only wanted to hear the names of the upcoming films, but the film run times as well. Mon cherie, that's what the program is for.
After scoring some buttered popcorn from a favorite Gallery 5 server, I found a seat at the end of an unoccupied row.
First up was "Cineast(e)s," a documentary about female filmmakers and their unique challenges.
Twenty French women filmmakers discuss whether or not you can spot a woman-made film, half saying you can and half saying you can't.
My favorite was the one who observed that if you looked at a film, you could see that it was either a woman director or a man in love. In the case of "Annie Hall," she said, it seemed like a woman, but was really a man in love.
Talking abut the challenges of a woman directing a predominantly male crew, several said you abandon heels and lipstick to take control.
Several disagreed, saying you put on make up and a dress and boss them like a woman, whether they like it or not.
Needless to say, no consensus was reached and filmmakers, some who began shooting in the '50s and '60s and some in the aughts, all held definitive opinions about writing and directing French film.
Approaching the bathroom after the film ended, I first saw a line and then heard a woman behind me say, "And so it begins."
The bathroom lines at the French Film Festival are always the worst part of the weekend, but the break between films was lightened when an unexpected French friend showed up with a box of dark chocolate covered marshmallows and took the seat beside me.
He joined me for "Il est Minuit, Paris s'eveille," a documentary about Paris' Left Bank music scene between 1945 and 1968, a cluster of clubs who began around midnight every night.
Unfortunately, director Yves Jeuland, who spoke before and after the showing, was presenting the 52 minute subtitled version rather than the 90 minute French version.
It wasn't the dumbed down version I wanted to see.
I fell in love with the opening credits done in a vintage '50s jazz style, with ovals of color against a black background, with the occasional drumstick tapping out a rhythm.
The film was chock full of old footage, gathered over a period of ten plus years, and showing the cellar and cabaret scene on the Left Bank.
With a post-war attitude of "live it up," the artists who performed at these 200+ cafes - Juliette Greco (looking like a young Cher with long, dark hair and bangs), Jacques Briel, Charles Aznavour, the Freres Jacques group - epitomized a post war attitude, singing songs with direct meanings and, even more shocking, average looking (or even odd looking) men singing them.
Shops that closed at 5:00 became cabarets at 9 p.m with as many people as possible flooding in to hear these new style singers.
I'd have loved these places, which didn't get going until midnight and featured music, poetry, theater and dance. Oh, yes, and mimes like Marcel Marceau.
My friend and I were amazed at how much vintage footage was contained in the film (including Orson Welles-shot footage of Paris streetscapes) along with current interviews of many of the former cabaret stars.
They were all so romantic about that period in Parisian history.
What was distinctive about that era was how it opened the door for non-traditional singers to come thorough. Good looks, height and a classical voice no longer were required to be a hit with the masses.
Absolutely no one thought Aznavour would succeed because he didn't fit the mold. The surprise was that the molds were being thrown away by this time.
How else to explain the oddly-eared Serge Gainsbourg and his instant hit, "The Ticket Puncher," with its allusion to suicide based on job frustration? Or the oblique "Be Pretty and Shut Up," a song which made a woman's role perfectly clear?
What was funny was the reactionary development of the Right Bank scene where all the tourists and bourgeoisie flocked to "experience" the cabaret scene in a safe and controlled environment. In other words, a commercial take on the swinging cellars.
No, thanks.
Eventually the film moved on from the '50s scene to the '60s, where singers got even deeper and more oblique.
We haven't finished talking about love
We haven't finished smoking cigarettes.
The how can we possibly call it a night?
When the lights came up, the Frenchman turned to me beaming and noted that the film had been far too short.
I agreed. It had flown by in the blink of an eye, making me wish for the French 90 minute version. Of course I was going to love a documentary about French music so did it have to be over so soon?
He bragged about recognizing nearly every singer in the movie, not to mention 95% of all the songs performed.
But then, he grew up over there.
Meaning he didn't need to wait for the translation of the director's comments during the question and answer period like most of us did.
Blinking against the light, it was tough to accept that the fun was over.
Wait, we hadn't finished hearing about love. We hadn't finished hearing about music. Time to go drink wine and discuss the things that matter.
Day one of the French Film Festival. And so it begins...
The French film festival began with two free screenings and we all know I am all about the free.
I arrived at the Byrd theater behind a woman who not only wanted to hear the names of the upcoming films, but the film run times as well. Mon cherie, that's what the program is for.
After scoring some buttered popcorn from a favorite Gallery 5 server, I found a seat at the end of an unoccupied row.
First up was "Cineast(e)s," a documentary about female filmmakers and their unique challenges.
Twenty French women filmmakers discuss whether or not you can spot a woman-made film, half saying you can and half saying you can't.
My favorite was the one who observed that if you looked at a film, you could see that it was either a woman director or a man in love. In the case of "Annie Hall," she said, it seemed like a woman, but was really a man in love.
Talking abut the challenges of a woman directing a predominantly male crew, several said you abandon heels and lipstick to take control.
Several disagreed, saying you put on make up and a dress and boss them like a woman, whether they like it or not.
Needless to say, no consensus was reached and filmmakers, some who began shooting in the '50s and '60s and some in the aughts, all held definitive opinions about writing and directing French film.
Approaching the bathroom after the film ended, I first saw a line and then heard a woman behind me say, "And so it begins."
The bathroom lines at the French Film Festival are always the worst part of the weekend, but the break between films was lightened when an unexpected French friend showed up with a box of dark chocolate covered marshmallows and took the seat beside me.
He joined me for "Il est Minuit, Paris s'eveille," a documentary about Paris' Left Bank music scene between 1945 and 1968, a cluster of clubs who began around midnight every night.
Unfortunately, director Yves Jeuland, who spoke before and after the showing, was presenting the 52 minute subtitled version rather than the 90 minute French version.
It wasn't the dumbed down version I wanted to see.
I fell in love with the opening credits done in a vintage '50s jazz style, with ovals of color against a black background, with the occasional drumstick tapping out a rhythm.
The film was chock full of old footage, gathered over a period of ten plus years, and showing the cellar and cabaret scene on the Left Bank.
With a post-war attitude of "live it up," the artists who performed at these 200+ cafes - Juliette Greco (looking like a young Cher with long, dark hair and bangs), Jacques Briel, Charles Aznavour, the Freres Jacques group - epitomized a post war attitude, singing songs with direct meanings and, even more shocking, average looking (or even odd looking) men singing them.
Shops that closed at 5:00 became cabarets at 9 p.m with as many people as possible flooding in to hear these new style singers.
I'd have loved these places, which didn't get going until midnight and featured music, poetry, theater and dance. Oh, yes, and mimes like Marcel Marceau.
My friend and I were amazed at how much vintage footage was contained in the film (including Orson Welles-shot footage of Paris streetscapes) along with current interviews of many of the former cabaret stars.
They were all so romantic about that period in Parisian history.
What was distinctive about that era was how it opened the door for non-traditional singers to come thorough. Good looks, height and a classical voice no longer were required to be a hit with the masses.
Absolutely no one thought Aznavour would succeed because he didn't fit the mold. The surprise was that the molds were being thrown away by this time.
How else to explain the oddly-eared Serge Gainsbourg and his instant hit, "The Ticket Puncher," with its allusion to suicide based on job frustration? Or the oblique "Be Pretty and Shut Up," a song which made a woman's role perfectly clear?
What was funny was the reactionary development of the Right Bank scene where all the tourists and bourgeoisie flocked to "experience" the cabaret scene in a safe and controlled environment. In other words, a commercial take on the swinging cellars.
No, thanks.
Eventually the film moved on from the '50s scene to the '60s, where singers got even deeper and more oblique.
We haven't finished talking about love
We haven't finished smoking cigarettes.
The how can we possibly call it a night?
When the lights came up, the Frenchman turned to me beaming and noted that the film had been far too short.
I agreed. It had flown by in the blink of an eye, making me wish for the French 90 minute version. Of course I was going to love a documentary about French music so did it have to be over so soon?
He bragged about recognizing nearly every singer in the movie, not to mention 95% of all the songs performed.
But then, he grew up over there.
Meaning he didn't need to wait for the translation of the director's comments during the question and answer period like most of us did.
Blinking against the light, it was tough to accept that the fun was over.
Wait, we hadn't finished hearing about love. We hadn't finished hearing about music. Time to go drink wine and discuss the things that matter.
Day one of the French Film Festival. And so it begins...
Monday, March 25, 2013
Word Games
Pay too much attention to the French Film Festival and you'll miss the great Spring snow.
Hell, I missed even knowing it was coming.
On the other hand, "Le Prenom," a film essentially about a dinner party-long war of words and revelations, was delicious.
But a movie about food requires food so my FFF girlfriend and I made a pit stop at Secco for sandwiches.
I don't know which of us was happier, she with her curried egg salad with crispy onions or me with my house bacon, Gouda, spinach and whole grain mustard.
If nothing else, the aroma of our lunch eaten in the close quarters of the Byrd seats must have had our neighbors drooling.
And then there was the comedy of words we watched.
Is naming a baby Adolf or even Adolphe wrong? Do friends have the right to pass judgment on your children's names? Is a 26-year old age difference between a man and woman understandable when the women is your mother? Is it okay to take credit for killing a dog when you didn't actually do it? Why are French men so charming and thoughtless at the same time?
Afterwards, we stretched our legs before the next movie, the historical drama "Therese Desqueyroux."
But the wait was endless as the French delegation of actors and directors got introduced, followed by the UR and VCU interns who'd helped with the FFF, followed by a reading, followed by endless boredom at being stuck in uncomfortable seats for far too long.
Rather than suffer in silence, we slid out (getting a thumbs-up from a French friend sitting two seats away) for a stop at Amour and some Lucien Albrecht Cremant d'Alsace rose and a trio sampler of a Dutch egg, crispy on the outside and soft-cooked inside, sherried crabmeat and a decadent foie gras.
But the issue of the moment was where had all this snow come from while we were stuck inside?
We had no clue, but a charming and erudite law type from Jamaica joined us at the bar, followed by Carytown's newest restaurant owner and his smiling bartender, so we got a little company to tell about our recent film-watching, among other things.
On the table were such hot topics as children's books, Scrabble and men who remember women's birthdays.
By that time, Carytown was a ghost town, so I left the film-lover to go get a music-lover and find some jazz.
We found it at Commercial Taphouse where the Scott Clark 4-Tet was in full swing.
Honestly, we were just grateful that everyone hadn't closed down for the snowy evening, so getting to hear one of my favorite jazz drummers was icing on the cake.
Taking the only unoccupied table, the one in the back under the big (read: cold) front window, we had a mostly decent view of one of Richmond's best quartets.
Friends came in, musicians all, saying they were going to give the music six minutes and if they didn't like it, go build a snowman on the grounds of the VMFA.
An hour later, they were still there.
Maybe it was because drummer Scott and bassist Cameron (who was also celebrating his birthday come midnight) with occasional horns from Bob and Jason, were playing some of the pieces from the work he wrote based on his reading of "Bury Me at Wounded Knee."
I'd first heard the work back in January at a show he'd done at For Instance Gallery and I recognized the aching, tribal quality of the music as soon as he began playing it.
I don't know how someone couldn't be caught up in such moving music.
And since one of the friends who'd come in was a drummer, I wasn't the least surprised when their six minutes lasted indefinitely.
During the break, Scott came over and we talked about composer John Cage and the tribute to him, the Musicircus, I had attended and he'd played in the other night at UR.
Naturally the weather came up and he admitted that he was only too happy to come out and play on this snowy night.
"What else was I going to do?" he asked rhetorically.
My sentiments exactly.
Hell, I missed even knowing it was coming.
On the other hand, "Le Prenom," a film essentially about a dinner party-long war of words and revelations, was delicious.
But a movie about food requires food so my FFF girlfriend and I made a pit stop at Secco for sandwiches.
I don't know which of us was happier, she with her curried egg salad with crispy onions or me with my house bacon, Gouda, spinach and whole grain mustard.
If nothing else, the aroma of our lunch eaten in the close quarters of the Byrd seats must have had our neighbors drooling.
And then there was the comedy of words we watched.
Is naming a baby Adolf or even Adolphe wrong? Do friends have the right to pass judgment on your children's names? Is a 26-year old age difference between a man and woman understandable when the women is your mother? Is it okay to take credit for killing a dog when you didn't actually do it? Why are French men so charming and thoughtless at the same time?
Afterwards, we stretched our legs before the next movie, the historical drama "Therese Desqueyroux."
But the wait was endless as the French delegation of actors and directors got introduced, followed by the UR and VCU interns who'd helped with the FFF, followed by a reading, followed by endless boredom at being stuck in uncomfortable seats for far too long.
Rather than suffer in silence, we slid out (getting a thumbs-up from a French friend sitting two seats away) for a stop at Amour and some Lucien Albrecht Cremant d'Alsace rose and a trio sampler of a Dutch egg, crispy on the outside and soft-cooked inside, sherried crabmeat and a decadent foie gras.
But the issue of the moment was where had all this snow come from while we were stuck inside?
We had no clue, but a charming and erudite law type from Jamaica joined us at the bar, followed by Carytown's newest restaurant owner and his smiling bartender, so we got a little company to tell about our recent film-watching, among other things.
On the table were such hot topics as children's books, Scrabble and men who remember women's birthdays.
By that time, Carytown was a ghost town, so I left the film-lover to go get a music-lover and find some jazz.
We found it at Commercial Taphouse where the Scott Clark 4-Tet was in full swing.
Honestly, we were just grateful that everyone hadn't closed down for the snowy evening, so getting to hear one of my favorite jazz drummers was icing on the cake.
Taking the only unoccupied table, the one in the back under the big (read: cold) front window, we had a mostly decent view of one of Richmond's best quartets.
Friends came in, musicians all, saying they were going to give the music six minutes and if they didn't like it, go build a snowman on the grounds of the VMFA.
An hour later, they were still there.
Maybe it was because drummer Scott and bassist Cameron (who was also celebrating his birthday come midnight) with occasional horns from Bob and Jason, were playing some of the pieces from the work he wrote based on his reading of "Bury Me at Wounded Knee."
I'd first heard the work back in January at a show he'd done at For Instance Gallery and I recognized the aching, tribal quality of the music as soon as he began playing it.
I don't know how someone couldn't be caught up in such moving music.
And since one of the friends who'd come in was a drummer, I wasn't the least surprised when their six minutes lasted indefinitely.
During the break, Scott came over and we talked about composer John Cage and the tribute to him, the Musicircus, I had attended and he'd played in the other night at UR.
Naturally the weather came up and he admitted that he was only too happy to come out and play on this snowy night.
"What else was I going to do?" he asked rhetorically.
My sentiments exactly.
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Onscreen/Offscreen
I guess the French weren't enough, so I added in some Spanish.
Braving a mobbed Carytown, we found the last parking space behind the Eatery and made our way to the Byrd.
Showing was "Nos Plus Belles Vacances," and the overflowing theater was a testament to the appeal of a romantic comedy about three couples, one's mother and two kids vacationing in Brittany during the heat wave of 1976.
Introducing the film was Julie Gayel, the lead actress of the film, wearing a black sparkly shirt and a million-dollar smile.
After gifting the festival's founders with a bell with which to call the smokers and eaters in from Cary Street between movies, she took her seat.
Next to me.
It was my first time sitting next to an actress while watching her onscreen and except for her texting through the first few minutes of the film, it was kind of cool.
I did notice that she buried her face in the shoulder of the man next to her (presumably her paramour) for one of the romantic scenes, but other than that she was just another French actress who decided to sit next to me.
The film did a great job with the period details like rope wedges, K.C. and the Sunshine Band being played at the local disco and the much smaller bathing suits and shorts men wore back then.
One of the best subplots was that of her character's 12-year old son falling in love.
When he meets an adorable farm girl, he immediately asks if she's married, to which the little girl responds, "Golly, no," and he begins to court her endearingly.
His wooing got a lot of "awwws" from the audience throughout.
"Girls are trouble," the 12-year old soon concludes.
But love is everywhere and soon a man is courting the grandmother, assuring her, "I'll get you past your past."
Now that is a truly romantic line.
My favorite actor in the film was Gerard Darmon, a French Moroccan who played one of the husbands with a dry humor and great intelligence.
I mean, if I was going to choose one of the male leads for my very own, he'd have been the one and I know nothing more than how expressive his face was.
But with the French it's all about l'amour, so the husband who'd started the movie by being discovered in the throes of adultery ends by acknowledging how much he loves his wife,
You know, the one played by the actress sitting next to me.
Unlike yesterday, I only managed one French film today, mainly because I was going to the Latin Ballet to see "El Pintor: A Profile of Spanish Women."
The dance was based on the paintings of Julio Romero de Torres, a Spanish painter who'd portrayed Spanish women of all classes as well as his native Andalusia, and many of his paintings were projected on the screen behind the dancers.
The female dancers wore dramatically colorful long dresses which swirled around their bodies as they danced, while the men dressed simply in dark pants and vests.
It was really the men I was most engaged by, partly their high-heeled flamenco moves, but also the athleticism of their dancing.
One of my favorite sequences featured a group of men clad in black, all with claves, banging rhythmically while stomping across the stage.
And who can resist a man with castanets and arms flung overhead?
The program made its way from inspiration to beauty to love, passion and tragedy, always incorporating flamenco into whatever emotion was being portrayed.
It was a shame that the music was recorded and not live, but no doubt that was a budget constraint.
The audience at the Grace Street Theater was almost as lively as the dancers, clapping often throughout and calling out encouragement during particularly impressive sequences.
One man in the front row was prone to calling out "Bravo!" at the end of certain numbers, but I was never sure if that was a recognition of dance talent or attraction to a certain dancer.
If I'd been so inclined, it would have been for the dancer with the sinuous hips and lithe form who danced the male lead.
That is, if I decided to go Spanish instead of French.
I did so like the way Gerard Darmon sang a song at the summer festival in the movie. And raised his eyebrow.
Dancer or actor/singer, now there's a choice.
The kid didn't know the half of it.
It's men who are trouble.
Braving a mobbed Carytown, we found the last parking space behind the Eatery and made our way to the Byrd.
Showing was "Nos Plus Belles Vacances," and the overflowing theater was a testament to the appeal of a romantic comedy about three couples, one's mother and two kids vacationing in Brittany during the heat wave of 1976.
Introducing the film was Julie Gayel, the lead actress of the film, wearing a black sparkly shirt and a million-dollar smile.
After gifting the festival's founders with a bell with which to call the smokers and eaters in from Cary Street between movies, she took her seat.
Next to me.
It was my first time sitting next to an actress while watching her onscreen and except for her texting through the first few minutes of the film, it was kind of cool.
I did notice that she buried her face in the shoulder of the man next to her (presumably her paramour) for one of the romantic scenes, but other than that she was just another French actress who decided to sit next to me.
The film did a great job with the period details like rope wedges, K.C. and the Sunshine Band being played at the local disco and the much smaller bathing suits and shorts men wore back then.
One of the best subplots was that of her character's 12-year old son falling in love.
When he meets an adorable farm girl, he immediately asks if she's married, to which the little girl responds, "Golly, no," and he begins to court her endearingly.
His wooing got a lot of "awwws" from the audience throughout.
"Girls are trouble," the 12-year old soon concludes.
But love is everywhere and soon a man is courting the grandmother, assuring her, "I'll get you past your past."
Now that is a truly romantic line.
My favorite actor in the film was Gerard Darmon, a French Moroccan who played one of the husbands with a dry humor and great intelligence.
I mean, if I was going to choose one of the male leads for my very own, he'd have been the one and I know nothing more than how expressive his face was.
But with the French it's all about l'amour, so the husband who'd started the movie by being discovered in the throes of adultery ends by acknowledging how much he loves his wife,
You know, the one played by the actress sitting next to me.
Unlike yesterday, I only managed one French film today, mainly because I was going to the Latin Ballet to see "El Pintor: A Profile of Spanish Women."
The dance was based on the paintings of Julio Romero de Torres, a Spanish painter who'd portrayed Spanish women of all classes as well as his native Andalusia, and many of his paintings were projected on the screen behind the dancers.
The female dancers wore dramatically colorful long dresses which swirled around their bodies as they danced, while the men dressed simply in dark pants and vests.
It was really the men I was most engaged by, partly their high-heeled flamenco moves, but also the athleticism of their dancing.
One of my favorite sequences featured a group of men clad in black, all with claves, banging rhythmically while stomping across the stage.
And who can resist a man with castanets and arms flung overhead?
The program made its way from inspiration to beauty to love, passion and tragedy, always incorporating flamenco into whatever emotion was being portrayed.
It was a shame that the music was recorded and not live, but no doubt that was a budget constraint.
The audience at the Grace Street Theater was almost as lively as the dancers, clapping often throughout and calling out encouragement during particularly impressive sequences.
One man in the front row was prone to calling out "Bravo!" at the end of certain numbers, but I was never sure if that was a recognition of dance talent or attraction to a certain dancer.
If I'd been so inclined, it would have been for the dancer with the sinuous hips and lithe form who danced the male lead.
That is, if I decided to go Spanish instead of French.
I did so like the way Gerard Darmon sang a song at the summer festival in the movie. And raised his eyebrow.
Dancer or actor/singer, now there's a choice.
The kid didn't know the half of it.
It's men who are trouble.
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