2 posts tagged “movies”

Tried to watch The Diving Bell and the Butterfly last night with Terrie. I read the book about 5 years ago and then heard they had started making the film, so have been waiting for ages to see it. For some reason I missed it at the cinema, so was all excited last night when Terrie bought it home with her to watch.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is the true story of Jean-Dominique Bauby, the Editor of French magazine, Elle, who suffered a stroke at 41 and woke to find himself with Locked-In Syndrome,  his only form of communication with the world, blinking his left eye-lid. While most people would just give up and become depressed and bitter, Bauby, with the help of his speech therapist, writes a book. That's right, he writes a book. His speech therapist uses a unique technique of dictation, with Bauby blinking his eye when the alphabet is recited to indicate which letter he means. Letters become words - words, sentences, and viola, a book is born. And it is beautiful. While reading it, I remember being so deeply touched. Bauby says that the only two things not paralyzed are his imagination and his memory, so he 'travels' to different places, eating sumptumous meals, kissing beautiful woman and 'living' his life. It's his butterfly. His reality is his diving bell. Even writing this I start to get emotional thinking about the strength of character Bauby displayed. He is truly an inspiration.

My mum is a nurse and until recently, worked in the brain injury unit at a rehabilitation hospital here in Sydney. When I told my mother about the book, she relayed a story to me about a 35 year old woman she was nursing who was starting to emerge from Locked-In Syndrome. The lady was in the car with her husband after attending a party, earlier, her husband had a few drinks, and then drove them home. On the way he took a corner wrong and ended up crashing the car, slightly injuring himself, and putting his wife into a coma. When she woke, they found she had Locked-In Syndrome. Of course her husband was filled with guilt, and my mother told me how he would sit next to her just crying his eyes out. Her first words, when able to communicate were 'It's OK, don't cry'. Which makes me wonder exactly HOW people like Bauby, and this lady can have such strength, and in this case, forgiveness. And in the end, she recovered. Which is extremely rare, most people do not regain motor-control and they live their lives with full cognition, but paralyzed, literally locked-in their bodies.

So, after being so touched by the book, and also the story my mother told me, I was so eager to see the film. And wouldn't you know it, half way through the movie the DVD freezes. No problem I think, and grab the other dvd player from my room secretly thinking 'Terrie's DVD player is such a piece of crap, won't even play a brand new release'. Only to find that I'm taking my frustrations out on the wrong inanimate object, and the dvd has a scratch across it and won't play on my machine either - grrrr.

Without sounding all corny, the book/movie really does make you appreciate the little things. And the fragility of your mortality.

I guess I should stop complaining all the time...

Super slow internet for the rest of the month means I can't post as much as I'd like, and only really have access here at work... so if this post seems (more) disjointed (than usual) it's because I'm pretending to work too...

Last night I went to the Night Noodle Markets in Hyde Park that are on for Good Food Month. It was so much fun! If you live in Sydney you should go. They're only on this week and next - which doesn't really make sense as they were PACKED last night and it would be great if they extended the run for a month to encourage more people to come spread out over the month, with less time waiting in lines. The lines, were crazy, after about 7pm there was a 1/2 hour wait in most queues - so my advice is, get there early, eat and then spend the rest of the time checking out the entertainment - they had Chinese dragons, noodle making performances, drummers, and a movie playing - not all at once, because that would have been annoying... and I felt soooo sorry for the person who had to be the back half of the Chinese dragons - no fun... walking around hunched over holding onto the waist of the person who's holding the head - and getting all the glory... poor things.

After the noodle markets we went for a walk around town, and this morning my feet are killing me - thats what walking all over Sydney in high heels will do to you... I feel like someone has hit my ankles with blocks of wood the way Kathy Bates did in that Stephen King movie when she hobbled the author she loved so that they couldn't escape (what the hell is the name of that movie??!!!)

Speaking of movies, saw Step Brothers the other night - hilarious!!! the Judd/Aptow powerhouse continues to steam on... Will Ferrel co-wrote it as well as acted in it, and he is so funny. It's a little annoying at the beginning, just because its so over the top, but once you accept that its just pure silliness, you will laugh your butt off - funniest movie I've seen in ages. Not a funny movie: In Bruges... it had great reviews and it wasn't baaaaddddd, but it was a case of all the good parts being put in the trailer. So I felt a little ripped off. But still, worth seeing (on DVD). Looking forward to seeing Burn After Reading - I missed the last Cohen Bro's flick No Country for Old Men - everyone told me it was too gruesome, and I'd just had a horrific experience watching Wolf Creek so thought it was best if I gave that one a miss.

Tonight is Frenchie's birthday, and for some god forsaken reason she's having her party 40 minutes out of the city at this little Korean restaurant (which is supposably amazing, so I'm looking forward to eating there). This is kind of convenient for her because she lives out of the city - but only 20 mins, but for the rest of us its going to mean one expensive taxi ride home. I told her I was going to take my car as I didn't want to pay $60 for a taxi and she was not impressed - I think she wants to have a BIG night... so maybe I'll train/bus/bus it - ugh, even the thought of that makes me tired - I'll share a cab with someone... Now, some of the people coming to Frenchie's birthday are not exactly on my xmas card list. There is Two. Who is visiting with Frenchie and her hubby, and apparently he's not my biggest fan either - hey, can't like all the people, all the time. He's from Miami, and is taking a break before starting Grad School in the state next year, and his background is in IT. Oh, and yeah, he knows EVERYTHING. About anything you ever needed to know/had an opinion on. And his opinion is a lot more important than yours. Then there is Jodie and her boyfriend Joe - Jodie is 41 and Joe is 31, Jodie makes oodles of money and flys around the world being super fabulous and Joe is unemployed... its a funny situation. But Jodie is convinced that Veronica and I are after Joe. It differs, sometimes I'm after him, and sometimes its Veronica. I usually try and stay away from places when I know she's going as I hate seeing them fight - and just to clarify, he's not interested in either one of us, he loves Jodie... then there's Murray, who is very intense and can only communicate when in the middle of a D & M. Last party, he cornered me and held me captive for 20 minutes while he talked about how I just need to visualise my goals and believe in myself and I could do anything. He also writes erotic fiction, has a 19 year old daughter he smokes weed with - so they can get on the same level and communicate apparently - and has just started an art class where the goal is to make a cast of a naked woman and paint it to express your feelings or something. Nice guy, just very intense.

Now that I think about Frenchie's friends, they all have such extreme personalities. And her personality is insanely big too. I think thats why I dread these parties a bit - everyone fighting for attention... but they're always interesting and usually end with someone doing some kind of weird dance/falling over... ahhh, Frenchie... I do dread the parties, but I love them too...