This movie is pure comedic genius. Without descending to the kind of low-brow antics of Mr Will Farrell and Seth Rogen. With all due respect to those two greats, they have never managed to provide comedy entertainment that didn’t depend on bodily functions or sexual innuendo. It is an absolute joy then to watch a real caper that doesn’t makes you laugh out loud with jokes on love, on life and the vagaries of their intertwining mysteries.
The two Bloom Brothers make an incredible team whose own talents suit their real life personalities. Adrian Brody is a wonderful comedian whose understated style belies a delicious sense of timing and his depressed face lights up with such childish joy at the right moments you can’t help but be drawn in. Mark Ruffalo, a vet in Rom Coms, acts flawlessly but is not really stretched and one can’t help but feel that he could’ve been better used, having said that, the bittersweet ending that he played out, was not only brilliant and touches you thoroughly.
The ladies that underpin this comedy Rachel Weisz and Rinko Kikuchi are such wonderful foils to Brody and Ruffalo’s capering that you cannot help but be intrigued. Ms. Kikuchi’s is an absolute delight to watch even though she only has effectively 3 lines and a brilliant singing number. Although po-faced throughout the whole movie, she is a brilliant comedian and she really did steal the movie from under Ms. Weisz’s feet. Not that Rachel didn’t put up a feisty and delicious performance. Her eccentric millionairess character is a joy to watch and such a FUN character.
But what ultimately makes this movie such a sweet thing to watch is the locations and the way it’s shot. The locations are memorable and evoke a time long lost. Travelling by Ship, sharp suits that aren’t so sharp looking any more, all make me want to join in their confidence caper, their adventure of messy proportions. I cannot recommend this movie enough. Go out and catch it if you have a chance.
Currently on limited release at GV Vivo. *Cinema Europa*
Spending one day in London before I left was a great idea. I got to do a few things I haven’t yet had a chance to do. And now that my flight has been delayed, I thought I would take this opportunity to try and blog about the day I had in London.
First, I travelled First Class on Virgin Trains from Coventry to London Euston station. The train ride was quite something. You first get access to the Virgin Trains First Class lounge where they have free drinks and munchies. I loaded up on Virgin Cola and their Lemonade. They also provided a sandwich which was quite tasty and repeated offerings of refreshments. This is definitely the way to travel, especially when the increased cost compared to the regular seats is only marginal.
This was followed by a short but grueling taxi ride to my hotel, the Radisson Edwardian Kenilworth. Or simply the Kenilworth. I thought it’d be nicely appropriate given that I was going to be living in Kenilworth next year. The hotel certainly was charming though not quite in the same way my future town would be. Nevertheless, here are some pictures of my little classically London hotel room.
The hotel was located conveniently near to the British museum, and I whiled away my time before dinner taking in the great antiquities of the world. Here’re some examples that I thought were particularly striking.
My dinner was at a brasserie that my mentor/gourmet extraordinaire Richard had recommended. Brasserie Roux, an outpost of the famed La Gavroche. Service was provided by a staff seemingly entirely composed of the French, and most of the dishes were of classic French bistro standards.
Paris is a true city. And like any modern cosmopolitan metropolis, its presence is made known once you step off your coach, into the cool morning air. You hear strains of French spoken like a gentle game of boules played in your ears, whilst the julienne of Tourist french is heard coming from the bus around you. Even at the extreme edges of Paris, near Roissy (Charles De Gaulle) Airport, you feel like you’ve arrived when, by some strange quirk, the ticket machines only accept French Carte Bleues. Bien Sur! Les Cartes Credites, pouf- c’est merde etangere.
My exams ended on the 8th. And today on the 13th, It’s time for me to go off to Paris followed by Marseilles and some of the towns in the south of France, including Aix en Provence. From a very tender age, I had fallen in love with the region of Provence, largely due to the efforts of the writer, Peter Mayle, an Englishman living in Provence. You can imagine the excitement I’m feeling. The lavender, the wine, the earthy summer food, all of this and the Parisien life to look forward to.
I plan on doing a few things on this trip. Finishing the book i’ve started reading yesterday The Painted Veil by W. Somerset Maugham. His is a writing prowess unparalleled and beautiful in a sad almost fearful way. It reminds me strongly of Qian Zhongshu’s magnum opus Fortress Besieged, both books were about China but written from very different perspectives, and yet the troubles these charecters are all uniformly troubled souls. I cannot wait to finish this plainly written glorious piece of fiction set in a more polite time.
I plan on writing a little. I’ve brought my notepad and hope to be able to sit down somewhere and pen some thoughts.
I hope to have the load on my shoulders taken off, however slightly and live for once in the moment. Something which I preach a lot. But fear I don’t practice enough.
The exams are halfway done. Well slightly more than halfway done and here’s a semi-post mortem mortem. Tomorrow I have Property and here I am typing this blogpost. What scares me the most is the work that I have not done. I don’t think I’ve done enough for my exam. For this year almost. It’s a scary feeling to think that you’re getting by on the skin of your teeth and all those around you have that much more drive and that much more enthusiasm or fear, or a mix of both.
The fact of the matter is, the stuff that I’m studying right now, don’t make me hungry. They don’t make me wanna be a lawyer, or a kickass litigator, or a barrister. Whatever these topics are, they are stories to me above all; sometimes funny, sometimes sad stories. And I’ve outgrown stories. All I feel like doing with them is drawing threads through them and forming some sort of coherent overview of the way law looks like, a novella of the law if you will. This does not a law student make. These cases, these precedents do not offer anything but a glimpse into the law in the past, but nothing about what it can or should be. I don’t like that. I don’t like that it just seems to be a memorisation exercise at times and the detailed work is beyond most competent minds let alone mine. At this point, I’m just tired of it all and compared to those around me, I can’t even call myself the most hardworking.
Of course to those around me, this is something they don’t see. And that may be a symptom of my demeanor. I’ve never been one to mope. I can’t mope. I can’t be really dejected. In a moment of anguish, or fear, I’m more likely to crack a joke or just be alone. Never indulging in the frivolous exercise of self pity. What’s the point anyway? There’s always tomorrow to wake up to and tomorrow you hope to be a better person. A better, more intelligent, more hardworking person.
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