"Il Postino" and other Bank Holiday thoughts
Ok, this was a rather quiet and even a bit boring long weekend. I stayed at home after various rather desperate attempts to find some last minute trip. Didn't happen as foreseen... So I stayed back here in London, the city that never rests. Pprobably, for every person leaving the city for the holiday and there must have been MANY who left, according to plane ticket prices, there must have been one tourist coming here and of course lots of them are Spanish, as you could tell walking down some of the main streets in the are. It's crazy though, that bein in a pub the other night, with a live band performing the leading singer started to shout out nationalities (for whatever reason) and when it was Spain's turn, I was the only who went "yeaaaaaaah", which even lead to some closer standing people starting to turn around (yep, same feeling as when you enter a bar and everybody starts to slowly turn around and stare at you) to check who that loud and lonely Spaniard actually was... I mean, the place was fully packed and you're telling me I was the only one there. Oh well, maybe it's just that I was the only one who shouted, whatever, let's move on.
I watched one of my flatmate's movies again yesterday: IL POSTINO (The Postman). In Italian (English subtitles)!!! And yes, another romantic flick, but hey it's not like there's much more variety other than romantic commedy, silly commedy, romantic drama, a few Jude "The Cheater" Law flicks (puagh!)... annnnnnd more moshy goshy romance, what can I DO? I'm already trying to improve our library with some "Coach Carter" like movies but it's hard I'm telling you, the ratio is still 10 to 1, romantic flicks all the way.
Ok then, the movie was, I don't know how to express it, a bit weird. Let me see. The story is nice: a postman (very simple person) on a poor Italian island, delivers the post to Pablo Neruda (poet from Chile gone there into exhile) and conquers a woman's heart with some help of Neruda's poetry, whilest discovering the deeper meaning of poetry for himself... if that makes any sense.
(If you haven't seen the movie and pretend to do so, I'd recommend you stop reading here!!!)
The Postman does not only find the woman he loves (and ends up marrying, Maria Grazia Cuccinota) and the meanings of poetry during "Don Pablo's" time on the Island (he leaves after about 1 year) but also something he's been clearly lacking of: what he thinks is a true Friend, a person who will listen to him and give some non-interested advice.
Neruda, whom he ends up deeply respecting and admiring, even impulses some changes in Mario's (Massimo Troisi) life, impulsing his creativity and in a certain way, his interest in trying to make things better or at least confronting them (when he reproves the local politician for some unfulfilled political promises) which eventually lead to Mario's death in a riot during a communist meeting, where the Postman went to, in order to read one poem he wrote but also because in some way he thinks Neruda would be proud of him and because he wants to possibly proof to himself that he's worthy of his "master's" ideas of changing the world.
The changes might seem of minor importance on a first view but considering the initial image given of Mario int he first scene "Grown up, lazy guy, living in his father's house and without a job and any illusion or hope in his life at all", the change he experiences is fantastic.
The really sad thing to me is not as much his death, which we are aknowledged 6 years after it actually happens, just because Neruda decides to go back to the Island and the story is told to the spectator in retrospective, but the fact that the poet fails his "friend" Mario and doesn't relate to him, not even in the one and only letter he sends back to Italy, through his secretary.
Maybe Mario gets too caught up with the poet, and Neruda is a busy person and all that, yeah, yeah, but not even a word in the letter he sends back to ask for some of his things to be sent back to Chile?!? Too bad.
Maybe sometimes we expect too much from certain "friends". Probably Mario's secret hope of some word of affection from his old friend remained until the day he died, but then again, probably Neruda was what Mario considered a real friend and the poet didn't share feelings as deep as those after all...
"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things and no good thing ever dies" in the words of Andy Dufresne but still, maybe there's times when reallity should be faced. Anyway, as long as it doesn't do you any bed I'm all for sticking to Andy here...
Another sad thing about the movie: Massimo Troisi actually died about 12 hours after the movie was finished, as unbelievable as it may sound, due to some heart failure (apparently he delayed heart surgery in order to being able to finish the movie). I think he was really good playing his character, really.
All in all the movie was OK. Maybe in the 6.5-7/10 range. There seemed to be parts a bit poorly developed, like Mario's and Beatrice's (his wife) romance, but you can watch it, so it gets my approval. Nice picture by the way!!
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Random sports notes of the weekend:
- Chelsea wins the Championship in England. ow that was clear from the start despite ManU's overrated comeback effort. I give Mourinho one more year in the London. Either he wins the Champions League next year (Ballack might definitely help there) and retires as a hero or he just wins the league again, where Liverpool will be his only rival (sorry Sir Alex, but time has
come for you to retire from the Red... Devils(???) ), and leaves a threepeat behind him. Sure thing is, I don't see him coaching here later than 2007. Too much preassure, no respect at all from the press (he shares his part of fault here obviously)... He might settle for Madrid, Barcelona, the Portuguese National Team or even some stranger challenge like Bayern München for example, we'll see...
Brief NBA Playoffs situation analysis:
- So, Mavs-Gasol&co. (3-0) looks done. Disappointing performance by Gasol in games 2 and 3 and a bit of bad luck with the OT loss in a rather strange succession of events in the last couple of second were Terry missed a FT, grabbed his own rebound (Hello, boxing out someone? Terry actually is the PG...) and the German Guy hit a three pointer to send the game into OT. As if I didn't hate him enough... The Grizz' should at leaaaaaaaast grab tonight's. If Dallas wins it's a blowout, I'm telling you...
- Wizards-Cavs (2-2) looks quite intriguing. Both play through motions and none actually seems to know quite what it's doing. Great 3rd and 4th quarters by Arenas who really started to feel it (plus every time he put some preassure on D he got the foul, hey, very much Euroleague style here... The Cavs need to take more advantage of Ilgauskas who basically scored at will ehen fed by Lebron in the 4th. Hughes form should be worrying for Cleveland. He's absolutely our of rythm. On the opposite Caron Butler looks very good, sharp, nice addition to the mix for the Wizards and he's delivering!!
- Heat-Bulls (2-2) I think I mentioned Miami should've learnt the lesson from game 1. Ok, so they didn't wanna listen and now Chicago has won two ina row, caught some momentum going into game 5 and the preassure all of a sudden is on Miami. Some Shaq+Wade needed here desperately. Meanwhile, Nocioni is having a helluva series with 22+ and 9+ boards, while shooting above .500%. And think he sort of screwed it in game 1 for the Bulls...
- Lakers-Suns (3-1) Kobe sinkin' unbevlievable shots to first tie and then seal the game in regular and overtime. Who screwed it for the Suns? Mister Nash, back-to-back MVP candidate. I don't wanna take anything away from him. I think he's amazing and definitely makes his teammates better (Boris Diaw anyone?!!?!?) but... would MJ, Larry... have screwed it in to crucial moments in one and the same game with time running out and ahead in the score? I'll just leave that question up to you...
- Pistons-Bucks (2-1) Blowout win by Milwaukee the other night. Let's see if they can keep it up tonight...
- Clippers-Nuggets (3-1) I'll say 4-1 and bye to George Karl and his boys. By the way, Carmelo is overrated, Kenyon Martin might end up playing for the Knicks next season (he's a PRICK) and Vandeweghe's whole process of making Denver a contener might be tottering... All that work over the last few years for nothing? We'll see...
- Nets-Pacers (2-2) Ha, this a a cool one. Carlisle doing a pretty good job with his team, although Jermaine is helping him one of every two nights. This one will go into 7, and if it was tennis would end 20-18 in the fifth set. Now, you tell me these wouldn't have been the perfect playoffs, open for almost every team to grab a win here and there, for the Celtics kids to gain some experience. Everytime I think of it...
- Spurs-Kings (2-2) O dear, the Kings are reigning as of lately. Man, I knew it, I knew they could upset San Antonio. If they just hadn't botched game 2. High hopes on the Kings here. It'd be too cool to say bye to Monsieur Parker and his crew. Keep focused guys and don't screw it cause game 5 is the key!!!!
I'll leave the Euroleague update for Monday:
- Euroleague Final recap with special mention to "American Point Guards in Europe"
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