November 26, 2004

• News Flash from Felony Flats

  A few moments ago, I shut off the VCR and came over here to post a
  movie review, and found a message from Greyfox on the internet
  answering machine.

  When he recorded the message, fire and emergency vehicles were just
  arriving to put out a fire that had started in one of the little
  buildings there at the Flats, and spread to a second one.  He has
  promised me more details tonight after nine when his cell phone minutes
  are free.

  Two Movies in Two Days

  When Greyfox lived here, we watched a lot of movies and TV.  He
  apparently needs to be entertained almost constantly.  I found the
  endless clamor of broadcast TV and rented video absorbing, distracting
  and addictive.  I find its absence now that Greyfox doesn’t live
  here to be the greatest of all the compensatory benefits of my
  husband’s absence.  Some of life’s trade-offs:  lose a
  husband, gain a little bit of peace and quiet, some time for thought
  and reflection.

  I’m not totally against movies, not even close to it.  But I am
  selective.  I’m not even totally opposed to television, but I
  don’t intend to make any moves to get our four local broadcast channels
  back online after (first) the antenna wire broke and (then) the antenna
  itself fell from its mast with a heavy load of wet snow.  If the
  universe were to drop a satellite dish in my lap and give me a
  subscription to some of the better news, information and entertainment
  channels, I’d test whether I could indulge in them with moderation.

  Yesterday after my Thanksgiving brunch Greyfox and I returned to his
  cabin with a few hours to kill before I was due to pick up my vanload
  of passengers that evening.  As we left the restaurant, he
  described a number of videos he had on hand.  Some I had seen and
  others were thrillers or horror flicks (his favorites) that I had no
  desire to see.  He told me about a western starring Billy Bob
  Thornton and Gary Busey.  He couldn’t recall its title.  That
  sounded to me like the most promising of the bunch.

  Well, it was a western, I guess.  Gary Busey was in it, but not
  Billy Bob Thornton.  I don’t know where that stray thought of
  Greyfox’s came from.  Ghost Rock was a sort of supernatural
  shoot-em-up chop-saki descendant of the spaghetti westerns.  The
  fairly well choreographed anachronistic Asian martial arts were more or
  less explained by the presence of a family of Chinese
  immigrants.   What went unexplained throughout the picture
  was just who in that picture was really alive and who was a
  ghost.  Those were some substantial and deadly ghosts, quick on
  the draw and accurate shots.  Mildly entertaining, but less so
  than the box full of kittens, what remains for me of the movie is a
  vague sense of what-the-fuck.

  Then last night the benificent Universe saw fit to drop the Prisoner of
  Azkaban on me.  That was a finders-keepers moment.  My best
  guess was that it was dropped where I found it by a thief who’d had a
  paranoid moment.  I’ve had my share of those, and dropped my share
  of hot merchandise, back in my more lawless days.  I would have
  let it lay if it hadn’t been so to my liking, but given what it was, I
  wasn’t going to leave it there for the next finder who happened along.

  That third book in Jan Rowling’s Harry Potter series was the first one
  I read.  Doug had talked to me previously about Harry Potter,
  telling me the books were good and that I’d like them.  He didn’t
  really get my attention, though.  I suppose I dismissed them as
  kids’ books — until, that is, he checked The Prisoner of Azkaban out
  of the school library, brought it home and handed it to me when I was
  extremely ill, bed-bound and bored.  I was hooked, and have had
  pre-publication advance orders in for the later volumes in the series,
  so I’ll have them as soon as possible.

  That is one of the reasons I was eager to see the film.  Another
  reason is that it introduces Sirius Black, animagus, Harry’s godfather,
  and other than Albus Dumbledore perhaps the only true adult hero thus
  far in the series.  I wasn’t disappointed in the movie. 
  Often I am disappointed when I see films made from books I’ve
  liked.  Not this time.

  I loved it — loved seeing how Harry, Hermione and Ron have grown –
  loved flying on the back of Buckbeak — loved the whole thing.  I
  especially like the portrayal of Professor Trelawney by Emma
  Thompson.  I occasionally wonder why Jan Rowling chose to poke
  such fun at divination, the most accessible and user-friendly of all
  the “magickal arts” and to give comparatively straight and respectful
  treatments to things such as magic wands, werewolves and ceremonial
  magic.  There has to be a story behind that, and it is a story I
  would enjoy uncovering.

  • 7:56 pm
  • 5 Comments