I was watching Three Colours: White in the library yesterday.. White reperesents equality and Kieslowski manages to illustrate it quite splendidly too. The main characters are Karol (the main actor) and Dominique (the main actress). The film is set in both Paris and Warsaw. Basically, Dominique brought Karol to court to file for divorce on the grounds that their marriage have not been consummated after half a year. I didn't quite understand what the word "consummate" means until I checked the dictionary when I got back. Consummate means to "complete" a relationship or marriage by having sex. Karol, a Polish, doesn't speak French and has to rely on an interpreter at the court hearing. At the court hearing, he says "Just because I don't speak French, u won't hear my case?" This is the point when Julie (the main character from Three Colours: Blue enters the court and gets shooed away - see how the films link up together). So Dominique wins the court case because she's a French citizen. (!!) Karol still loves Dominique a lot but is chased out of the house with just a suitcase. He spends the night at the Metro playing music using his comb. Here, we see the entry of Mikolaj who throws 5-franc to Karol. Mikolaj asks Karol if he wants to run away to Poland with him... Karol says yes, but his passport has been taken away by the court. Karol then shows him the apartment where Dominique stays and through the silhouette, they see Dominique undressing with a man. Karol then uses the 5-franc coin to ring Dominique up... and this is part is quite *urgh, like heart-wrenching*. Dominique says to Karol: "Good. perfect time you called." Then you hear her moaning and moaning.. and the camera focuses on the decreasing value of $ left in the public telephone.. 5-franc, 3-franc, 2-franc.. etc. Karol then finally slams the phone down. Heart-broken of cos. *fast forward* Mikolaj then hides Karol in his suitcase and they fly to Poland... h/ever, at the Warsaw airport, the (heavy) suitcase doesn't appear out of the conveyor belt and Mikolaj is worried. It turned out that the suitcase had been stolen by airport crooks and when they brought their "loot" to the rubbish dump, Karol stumbles out of the suitcase where he is assualted and abandoned. But he still lives. I remember he was looking at the rubbish dump and saying "ah. home at last". ...*fast forward* Karol eavesdrops on someone's conversation and buys up a plot of land where Ikea is going to build their factory and makes lots of money. H/ever, he still thinks of Dominique and calls her up. She slams the phone down on Karol. He then decides he's gonna take his revenge on her. Karol pretends he's dead, complete with the obituaries, funeral, coffin and the dead body. I remember there's one statement which Karol made which kind of sums up what it's like for the East European countries after the disintegration of communism. Karol's driver was asking him about where to get the body and Karol replied: "One can buy anything these days." Karol then left his entire fortune to Domonique... *fast forward* Dominique claims the fortune and then is arrested by Polish police because they suspect she killed her husband for his money. The end.
Obviously I left out a lot of interesting parts cos it's way way too long to condense and I've got another movie to talk about. Just watched it and it's for next week's tutorial - It's called The Dream Life of Angels(La Vie Rêvée des Anges)directed by Erick Zonca, France, 1998. It talks about two homeless girls (Isabelle and Marie) who stay together in a flat which was unused because the original owners were in a coma from the car accident. Though both girls were poor, Isabelle is pretty street-wise and works her way up.. being a waitress on rollerskates. Marie chooses to sleep around (and this is illustrated in great great detail) with a rich (and bastard) guy called Chris, who's the owner of a club. As it always turns out, Chris chooses to leave Marie and her life turns upside down. Marie and Isabelle's friendship become very strained and Isabelle decides to leave her. So she was writing on a piece of paper addressed to Marie: "I hope you choose to live the way you really want, every day, every second. to live your dream". She then goes to Marie's bedroom to place the note where she's just in time to see Marie jumping off her apartment. sad and tragic, huh? I'm trying my best not to be a voyeurism or romanticizing tragedy here.. but it's really illustrates the whole idea of "individuals on the margins" (the tutorial title) quite aptly. Funny like all my units at the moment are studying marginalized people in Europe (for European Studies), in NYC (for Anthropology) and for 18th-19th C India at the moment.
Allie my niece just celebrated her one year old birthday and Moon sent me Allie's photos via e-mail... so thanks there. very cute. babies. but then, i guess all babies are cute. :)