Comcast Games Pt III; Song of Lunch
Oct. 12th, 2010 09:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
grrgoylStill playing games with Comcast.
I had hoped paying the $50.45 would be the end of the matter. Then I made the mistake of checking the website a few days later, only to see my account, which remember hadn't updated for weeks despite all the changes I had made, showed the payment, as well as the outstanding balance between the $50 the phone said I owed and the $68 the website claimed.
Calling the phone line again gave me the message that I owed nothing. Games, I tell you. Games.
Not wanting to be disconnected over $18, I again logged online with a rep to ask about the discrepancy. Rather than go into the whole sordid affair, I kept it simple, asking whether I owed the $18 or not. He said I didn't. I have something I can print out as proof. Can't wait for next month.
~*~
A far more pressing matter that I'm sure has you all filled with concern is whether or not I got to see the new Rickman thing, "The Song of Lunch." I have, no thanks to the BBC, who have the nerve to post videos on the World Wide Web, only to block anyone from outside the UK watching them. Fuck you, Beeb. YOU are contributing to internet piracy and file sharing (and of course a mere 48 hours later it was on YouTube, so fuck you twice).
I instantly emailed![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
meamjeffyjeff, who disappointingly reported back that he got the message 36 minutes into the broadcast, and anyway would have to hook his VCR back to his TV and of course UK videotapes are useless to me without an expensive conversion process. I passed this on to kavieshana, who answered, "I'm just impressed he got that email back in 1992 where he's living with his VCR."
So yes indeed I saw it. And this is what I thought:
It's based on a poem by Christopher Reid published in 2009, and I only know that because it was in the opening titles. I'm not a big poetry person, but this is less poetry and more poetic prose. Like all good writing, I got much more out of it on the second viewing than the first. And of course, being recited almost entirely by Rickman (with brief but I suppose necessary interruptions by Emma Thompson) is a check in the plus category.
Simple premise: Two old flames meet for lunch 15 years later, at his request. She is married, successful, content. He is not. It's not clear what he was hoping to get out of this encounter, but it all goes spectacularly awry almost immediately.
As anyone who has had a similar experience can attest to, it takes no time at all to stray from "the good old days" to remembering everything about the other person that annoyed you. Unfortunately in the case of this lunch, it creates a domino effect: The worse the conversation goes with her, the more his relationship with the wine bottle deepens -- so much so, you have to wonder if it didn't play a factor in the original breakup.
What we do know was she was stolen from him by a handsome, more successful poet (real-life husband Greg Wise, who played the scalawag Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility that stole Marianne from Rickman's Colonel Brandon). In Rickman's mind she's Eurydice to his Orpheus, stolen by Hades (my very favorite Greek myth, BTW) and he's trying to save her -- the problem with the plan, however, is she doesn't want saving and is "perfectly happy being dead."
It's really kind of heartbreaking, watching the two of them. Every gesture she makes, every curve of her limbs evokes wistful, erotic memories for him. All she sees when she looks at him is a sad, washed-up man getting progressively more pissed. But what kind of harpy responds to Rickman's pleading observation, "I think I'm falling in love with your wrist," with a sharp reminder that it's the wrist of a married woman?
This is the mark of great actors. Whereas a few posts ago I commented that Michael Cera can only play Michael Cera, it takes real effort to remind oneself that these two once were a married couple (Love Actually), a pair of police detectives (Judas Kiss), and of course barely in the same room together in the aforementioned Sense and Sensibility.
Eventually the bottle wins out (in a fairly convincing performance, considering Rickman claimed in interviews for Bottle Shock that he didn't have much of a taste for wine) and the "date" ends about as badly as it can. Made twice as painful on the second viewing when you see how excited he was to see her again, practically jogging through the streets of London to get there.
What also hit me twice as hard the second time was the seemingly abrupt, one-word ending. The bistro is chosen as their meeting place because it was one of their favorite haunts. Upon first returning there, Rickman is struck by how much it has changed -- new staff, new tablecloths, new menu. He also misses the restaurant's proprietor, Massimo, a jovial man full of life.
The bistro, of course, is a metaphor for how the world moves on with or without us. But the real shock comes when he recognizes the aged Massimo sitting in the corner as he leaves, describing him as a "husk of a man" who would "crumble" if you touched him. This is the exact impression we'd gotten of Rickman during the "date." You're left to wonder if he recognizes himself in those words, and if so, if they came as a slap in the face to him.
I loved this because it's something else that gives us a look at a new side of Alan. Like when his eyes nearly pop out as he "ogles" a leggy waitress. Or when he desperately wills an inconvenient erection down. But perhaps most of all, when the waiter produces his briefcase that he had left behind and he says, "Look..." in a distinctive "Awwww..." tone of voice, my heart did a funny little flip in my chest.
Not quite what I had expected, but a nice little taste to tide me over until Deathly Hallows comes out next month.
I had hoped paying the $50.45 would be the end of the matter. Then I made the mistake of checking the website a few days later, only to see my account, which remember hadn't updated for weeks despite all the changes I had made, showed the payment, as well as the outstanding balance between the $50 the phone said I owed and the $68 the website claimed.
Calling the phone line again gave me the message that I owed nothing. Games, I tell you. Games.
Not wanting to be disconnected over $18, I again logged online with a rep to ask about the discrepancy. Rather than go into the whole sordid affair, I kept it simple, asking whether I owed the $18 or not. He said I didn't. I have something I can print out as proof. Can't wait for next month.
~*~
A far more pressing matter that I'm sure has you all filled with concern is whether or not I got to see the new Rickman thing, "The Song of Lunch." I have, no thanks to the BBC, who have the nerve to post videos on the World Wide Web, only to block anyone from outside the UK watching them. Fuck you, Beeb. YOU are contributing to internet piracy and file sharing (and of course a mere 48 hours later it was on YouTube, so fuck you twice).
I instantly emailed
meamjeffyjeff, who disappointingly reported back that he got the message 36 minutes into the broadcast, and anyway would have to hook his VCR back to his TV and of course UK videotapes are useless to me without an expensive conversion process. I passed this on to kavieshana, who answered, "I'm just impressed he got that email back in 1992 where he's living with his VCR." So yes indeed I saw it. And this is what I thought:
It's based on a poem by Christopher Reid published in 2009, and I only know that because it was in the opening titles. I'm not a big poetry person, but this is less poetry and more poetic prose. Like all good writing, I got much more out of it on the second viewing than the first. And of course, being recited almost entirely by Rickman (with brief but I suppose necessary interruptions by Emma Thompson) is a check in the plus category.
Simple premise: Two old flames meet for lunch 15 years later, at his request. She is married, successful, content. He is not. It's not clear what he was hoping to get out of this encounter, but it all goes spectacularly awry almost immediately.
As anyone who has had a similar experience can attest to, it takes no time at all to stray from "the good old days" to remembering everything about the other person that annoyed you. Unfortunately in the case of this lunch, it creates a domino effect: The worse the conversation goes with her, the more his relationship with the wine bottle deepens -- so much so, you have to wonder if it didn't play a factor in the original breakup.
What we do know was she was stolen from him by a handsome, more successful poet (real-life husband Greg Wise, who played the scalawag Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility that stole Marianne from Rickman's Colonel Brandon). In Rickman's mind she's Eurydice to his Orpheus, stolen by Hades (my very favorite Greek myth, BTW) and he's trying to save her -- the problem with the plan, however, is she doesn't want saving and is "perfectly happy being dead."
It's really kind of heartbreaking, watching the two of them. Every gesture she makes, every curve of her limbs evokes wistful, erotic memories for him. All she sees when she looks at him is a sad, washed-up man getting progressively more pissed. But what kind of harpy responds to Rickman's pleading observation, "I think I'm falling in love with your wrist," with a sharp reminder that it's the wrist of a married woman?
This is the mark of great actors. Whereas a few posts ago I commented that Michael Cera can only play Michael Cera, it takes real effort to remind oneself that these two once were a married couple (Love Actually), a pair of police detectives (Judas Kiss), and of course barely in the same room together in the aforementioned Sense and Sensibility.
Eventually the bottle wins out (in a fairly convincing performance, considering Rickman claimed in interviews for Bottle Shock that he didn't have much of a taste for wine) and the "date" ends about as badly as it can. Made twice as painful on the second viewing when you see how excited he was to see her again, practically jogging through the streets of London to get there.
What also hit me twice as hard the second time was the seemingly abrupt, one-word ending. The bistro is chosen as their meeting place because it was one of their favorite haunts. Upon first returning there, Rickman is struck by how much it has changed -- new staff, new tablecloths, new menu. He also misses the restaurant's proprietor, Massimo, a jovial man full of life.
The bistro, of course, is a metaphor for how the world moves on with or without us. But the real shock comes when he recognizes the aged Massimo sitting in the corner as he leaves, describing him as a "husk of a man" who would "crumble" if you touched him. This is the exact impression we'd gotten of Rickman during the "date." You're left to wonder if he recognizes himself in those words, and if so, if they came as a slap in the face to him.
I loved this because it's something else that gives us a look at a new side of Alan. Like when his eyes nearly pop out as he "ogles" a leggy waitress. Or when he desperately wills an inconvenient erection down. But perhaps most of all, when the waiter produces his briefcase that he had left behind and he says, "Look..." in a distinctive "Awwww..." tone of voice, my heart did a funny little flip in my chest.
Not quite what I had expected, but a nice little taste to tide me over until Deathly Hallows comes out next month.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-10-13 09:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-10-13 10:49 pm (UTC)Hello from 1992
Date: 2010-11-23 10:34 pm (UTC)Re: Hello from 1992
Date: 2010-11-30 06:29 pm (UTC)