Interpol Concert and the 1970 film "Love Story"
I saw Interpol back in 2005 (September 30th, to be exact- I just looked up their setlist from back then, they only had two albums out and I can remember it still being quite an amazing and memorable show) when they played the State Theatre in Portland, before it was shut down for basically being a condemned building. At that show, during their song "Not Even Jail" off their second album, which they were touring for, one of their fog machines caught on fire and they just continued to play through without missing a beat. I remember going to that show with a couple of my sister's friends whom she met while attending Bates College (we all did radio shows there while my sister was Program Director). We were sitting up in the balcony of the State Theatre and looked at each other while the fog machine caught fire as if to say, "did that just happen? did we really see that?"
The band returned to the State Theatre last week touring behind their fifth album, El Pintor, and since losing their original bassist a few years back (which really seemed to lose them some steam- I saw them a few years back at the House of Blues in Boston right after they lost their bassist and it seemed like something was definitely missing from the band, something lacking in the cohesiveness of the band and their signature sound). This show found the band reaching back in the catalogue to please longtime fans like myself, with a few tracks off their debut and stellar album, Turn on the Bright Lights. I remember having just left Bull Moose music around the time their debut album came out and my friend Corey was still working there. I went to purchase the album and instead he gave me a promotional copy sans the linear notes, but I've keep that CD in my collection ever since. I like the story behind how I got it and it still stands up as one of my all time favorite CDs- very reminiscent of bands like Joy Division, but slightly more 'rocking.'
The difference between that 2005 and last week's show (2015) is that this time around I was standing about 6 feet from my ex-girlfriend (unknowingly) and her new beau. I should have known better, but I really did not let it deter me from enjoying another concert. In fact, I just completely ignored the fact that she was there. We broke up in mid-January and haven't spoken since, other than awkwardly making sure neither of us would be home during her process of moving out of the place we shared. Sure, I would leave her notes, trying to get her back for about a month or two (it took her until mid-March to move her things out), to no avail- and then soon discovered that she started dating this new guy almost immediately after we broke up (maybe giving herself about 2 weeks to 'heal' from the 'hurt' I put her her). Well, at the Interpol show, this new guy barged through a few people, including brushing shoulders with me, in a rather rude and knowingly fashion as I took he knew exactly who I was and what he was doing (re: being an ass) in order to talk to some guy he knew standing in front of me. Whatever. That kind of behavior just proves to me these two people deserve each other- because they are both rather petty, immature people who routinely think the world deserves to hear every innate complaint they have (I'm guilty of sneaking peaks at his Facebook page to see what they are up to together, you know, since my ex decided to 'block' me from seeing her page).
The band returned to the State Theatre last week touring behind their fifth album, El Pintor, and since losing their original bassist a few years back (which really seemed to lose them some steam- I saw them a few years back at the House of Blues in Boston right after they lost their bassist and it seemed like something was definitely missing from the band, something lacking in the cohesiveness of the band and their signature sound). This show found the band reaching back in the catalogue to please longtime fans like myself, with a few tracks off their debut and stellar album, Turn on the Bright Lights. I remember having just left Bull Moose music around the time their debut album came out and my friend Corey was still working there. I went to purchase the album and instead he gave me a promotional copy sans the linear notes, but I've keep that CD in my collection ever since. I like the story behind how I got it and it still stands up as one of my all time favorite CDs- very reminiscent of bands like Joy Division, but slightly more 'rocking.'
The difference between that 2005 and last week's show (2015) is that this time around I was standing about 6 feet from my ex-girlfriend (unknowingly) and her new beau. I should have known better, but I really did not let it deter me from enjoying another concert. In fact, I just completely ignored the fact that she was there. We broke up in mid-January and haven't spoken since, other than awkwardly making sure neither of us would be home during her process of moving out of the place we shared. Sure, I would leave her notes, trying to get her back for about a month or two (it took her until mid-March to move her things out), to no avail- and then soon discovered that she started dating this new guy almost immediately after we broke up (maybe giving herself about 2 weeks to 'heal' from the 'hurt' I put her her). Well, at the Interpol show, this new guy barged through a few people, including brushing shoulders with me, in a rather rude and knowingly fashion as I took he knew exactly who I was and what he was doing (re: being an ass) in order to talk to some guy he knew standing in front of me. Whatever. That kind of behavior just proves to me these two people deserve each other- because they are both rather petty, immature people who routinely think the world deserves to hear every innate complaint they have (I'm guilty of sneaking peaks at his Facebook page to see what they are up to together, you know, since my ex decided to 'block' me from seeing her page).
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"Love Story"
starring: Ali McGraw, Ryan O'Neal
directed by: Arthur Hiller
written by: Erich Segal
Not to be confused with Taylor Swift's song and music video:
First off, it's like Nicholas Sparks read this original book and then watched the movie, perhaps over and over again in order to provide himself with a muse, because it seems like every single one of his books follows the 1970 "Love Story" plot. And, second of all, I think Ali McGraw may have played one of the original Manic Pixie Dream Girls with this character.
Even being a film from 1970, it still holds up as a great film, mostly thanks to the actors, Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neal, who really bring these characters to life and give them true personalities, in order to make us like them and actually care about them (something that was apparently missing from the novel). I think the director, Hiller, and scriptwriter, Segal, really collaborated in order to bring their own vision to this film, to make it something memorable.
The story by now is so well-known that there's no point in summarizing it for you. I would like to consider, however, the implications of "Love Story" as a three-, four-or five-handkerchief movie, a movie that wants viewers to cry at the end. Is this an unworthy purpose? Why shouldn't we get a little misty during a story about young lovers separated by death?
Hiller earns our emotional response because of the way he's directed the movie. The Segal book was so patently contrived to force those tears, and moved toward that object with such humorless determination, that it must have actually disgusted a lot of readers. The movie is mostly about life, however, and not death. And because Hiller makes the lovers into individuals, of course we're moved by the film's conclusion.
I really enjoyed this film, perhaps because they also knew not to drag it out for the audience. It ends abruptly, but concludes well enough to leave it alone, for the audience to think. (But apparently not enough, because they went and made a sequel later, about the aftermath). I might like this film a lot because I am a sucker for both tearjerker films from my generation, "A Walk to Remember" and "The Notebook" both novels written by the aforementioned Nicholas Sparks. And even more recent, there is the novel by John Green "The Fault in Our Stars" if this is your kind of film/story.
starring: Ali McGraw, Ryan O'Neal
directed by: Arthur Hiller
written by: Erich Segal
Not to be confused with Taylor Swift's song and music video:
First off, it's like Nicholas Sparks read this original book and then watched the movie, perhaps over and over again in order to provide himself with a muse, because it seems like every single one of his books follows the 1970 "Love Story" plot. And, second of all, I think Ali McGraw may have played one of the original Manic Pixie Dream Girls with this character.
Even being a film from 1970, it still holds up as a great film, mostly thanks to the actors, Ali McGraw and Ryan O'Neal, who really bring these characters to life and give them true personalities, in order to make us like them and actually care about them (something that was apparently missing from the novel). I think the director, Hiller, and scriptwriter, Segal, really collaborated in order to bring their own vision to this film, to make it something memorable.
The story by now is so well-known that there's no point in summarizing it for you. I would like to consider, however, the implications of "Love Story" as a three-, four-or five-handkerchief movie, a movie that wants viewers to cry at the end. Is this an unworthy purpose? Why shouldn't we get a little misty during a story about young lovers separated by death?
Hiller earns our emotional response because of the way he's directed the movie. The Segal book was so patently contrived to force those tears, and moved toward that object with such humorless determination, that it must have actually disgusted a lot of readers. The movie is mostly about life, however, and not death. And because Hiller makes the lovers into individuals, of course we're moved by the film's conclusion.
I really enjoyed this film, perhaps because they also knew not to drag it out for the audience. It ends abruptly, but concludes well enough to leave it alone, for the audience to think. (But apparently not enough, because they went and made a sequel later, about the aftermath). I might like this film a lot because I am a sucker for both tearjerker films from my generation, "A Walk to Remember" and "The Notebook" both novels written by the aforementioned Nicholas Sparks. And even more recent, there is the novel by John Green "The Fault in Our Stars" if this is your kind of film/story.
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