LOVE THOSE LADIES

I have much to consider in this blog, but for the moment I only have time to pass along this movie review I just read at Salon.com.  That two of my favorite actresses, maybe even my two favorite actresses, are together in a film that sounds so wonderful is reason to continue living - at least until I see it.  And then, I could get the DVD and see it over and over.  It sounds like the sort of film that deserves to be called literature, thus included in a book blog.  Read and rejoice.




Maggie Smith and Judi Dench in "Ladies in Lavender."

"Ladies in Lavender"
Maggie Smith and Judi Dench prove beauty is ageless in this sparklingly lively period piece.

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By Stephanie Zacharek

April 29, 2005  |  "Ladies in Lavender," the directorial debut of actor Charles Dance, is the kind of small, fine-boned English picture that's usually sold with one of those deadly art-house-cinema trailers. You know the kind: The actors' most emotive moments are plucked out of context and put before us against a backdrop of swollen string music. Sometimes there's even a handy voice-over to alert us to significant plot points: "Two lives will be changed forever by a stranger" -- that sort of thing.

Trailers like these are designed to attract the widest and dullest possible audience, but so often they do a disservice to the very movies they're trying to sell. Personally, I'd run a mile from "Ladies in Lavender" if it were the kind of movie its trailer wants us to think it is. But the movie itself, sensitively but sturdily made, with an ear attuned to the most delicate notes of the story, is the sort of small, independent-minded picture that so much of American indie cinema strives, and often fails, to give us. It's a conventional picture, but it feels so deeply alive that it's practically a novelty.

Ursula (Judi Dench) and Janet (Maggie Smith) are two elderly unmarried sisters living together, in the cliff-top home they grew up in, in Cornwall. The story opens in the late '30s; as the picture unfolds we learn that Janet has been married before (her husband died in the Great War), but Ursula doesn't seem to have had many suitors, if any, in her youth. One morning, after a storm, the two women step out into the garden in their nighties to find out how much damage the wind and rain have done to their plants. They look down to the shore and see that a man has washed up there overnight; he lies face-down on the beach. The two women, clutching their dressing gowns around them, rush down to see if he's still alive. ("I suppose the sensible thing would be to turn him over," Janet says.) Finding that he's still breathing, they get help and tuck him into one of their spare beds, waiting anxiously for him to come to.

The young man's name is Andrea (he's played by Daniel Brühl, the expressive, likable young star of 2003's "Good Bye Lenin!"), and he speaks only Polish and German. The story that follows is relatively simple; as we learn more about who Andrea is, and what role he comes to play in the sisters' lives, the picture takes on deeper and more delicate textures.

Dance adapted the script from a short story by a nearly forgotten author named William J. Locke. (Dance was doing a film in Budapest and started flipping through one of the many books that were being used as set dressing; it was a collection of short stories by Locke, which Dance took it upon himself to "liberate.") The picture is simply made with a minimum of gimmickry. In a few places, Dance can't leave well enough alone: He uses some slow-motion and flashback effects that feel superfluous and clichéd. But mostly, he trusts the story, a seemingly simple skill that some filmmakers never get around to learning. And he recognizes that the strong landscape of Cornwall has to be a character in the movie: Its fierce jagged shores look like no other place on earth, and even the light has a rough, vital quality. (The fine cinematography here is by Peter Biziou.)

And beyond all that, we have the pleasure of watching Maggie Smith and Judi Dench. (The solidly entertaining supporting cast includes Miriam Margolyes, David Warner and Natascha McElhone.) Smith plays the sensible sister, the one who's grounded in reality every minute. But she's deeply moving in the way she reveals, scene by scene, the silky-strong quality of the bond she has with Ursula, and the way her annoyance with her sister is bound up with passionate protectiveness. And Dench, hands down one of the most beautiful actresses now working, is so radiant here that you can barely take your eyes off her. There's a strong current of sexual precociousness in the performance. Her Ursula is elfin and flirty, not in a way that's inappropriate but in one that's simply ageless.

While actresses dread, understandably, arriving at that point in their careers when the only thing that's left to them are "old lady" roles, neither Smith nor Dench seem too worried about it. They both understand that the trick lies not in playing an age but in playing a character. Their best years aren't behind them but inside of them.

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About the writer
Stephanie Zacharek is a senior writer for Salon Arts & Entertainment.

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ENCORA RUTH REICHL!

I've just requested a long list of books from the library, most of them new and not yet available - but the book I really want to read is Ruth Reichl's new one, Garlic and Sapphires, the Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise. I want to read it so badly that I think I'm going to make the long trek down to Salisbury this afternoon and buy it at B & N.  Reichle is currently the editor of Gourmet Magazine, so of course she writes on food.  Her two previous books, Tender to the Bone and Comfort Me With Apples, are on my all-time top favorite books list.  The new one is about her adventures as restaurant critic for the NYT, the two earlier ones are from her foodie days in California, Chez Panisse and all that jazz.  Truly though, this woman could write about anything, and I'd read every word.

Here's some intro to her, if you don't already know her.  Read Dave Weich's interview with her at Powell's, for a delicious taste of Ruth.  And here is what Publisher's Weekly has to say about Garlic and Sapphires:

Review:

"As the New York Times's restaurant critic for most of the 1990s, Reichl had what some might consider the best job in town; among her missions were evaluating New York City's steakhouses, deciding whether Le Cirque deserved four stars and tracking down the best place for authentic Chinese cuisine in Queens. Thankfully, the rest of us can live that life vicariously through this vivacious, fascinating memoir. The book — Reichl's third — lifts the lid on the city's storied restaurant culture from the democratic perspective of the everyday diner. Reichl creates wildly innovative getups, becoming Brenda, a red-haired aging hippie, to test the food at Daniel; Chloe, a blonde divorce, to evaluate Lespinasse; and even her deceased mother, Miriam, to dine at 21. Such elaborate disguises — which include wigs, makeup, thrift store finds and even credit cards in other names — help Reichl maintain anonymity in her work, but they also do more than that. 'Every restaurant is a theater,' she explains. Each one 'offer[s] the opportunity to become someone else, at least for a little while. Restaurants free us from mundane reality.' Reichl's ability to experience meals in such a dramatic way brings an infectious passion to her memoir. Reading this work — which also includes the finished reviews that appeared in the newspaper, as well as a few recipes — ensures that the next time readers sit down in a restaurant, they'll notice things they've never noticed before. Agent, Kathy Robbins. (On sale Apr. 11)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

 

MORE BOOKS

In between Pearl and The Ice Queen, by Alice Hoffman, I read a very dark mystery by Robert Wilson – The Blind Man of Seville. I have another of his to read, but I’m not yet sure if I can take another trip through such grim shadows so soon after The Blind Man. The ambiance is wonderful; I loved spending all that time (it’s quite a long book) in Seville and North Africa, despite the fact that most of it was spent plumbing the depths of darkness and moral despair.

But – The Ice Queen, now. I grew impatient with some aspects of the story, and wished she had concentrated more on the brother/sister relationship, and even more I wished she had put Ned’s whole paper on Magic and Chaos Theory into the novel. As an appendix, perhaps. But then, of course, she’d have had to write such a paper. It’s beyond me to summarize this story. If you know Hoffman you know all of her books are touched with magic. One of them, Practical Magic, was made into a movie that had very little of the charm and delicious wickedness of the novel. This one has lots of magic, plenty of passion, many references to fairy tales, and the most wonderful death scene I’ve ever read. One of the central themes of the book is loss, another is change, and they are of course connected. I have to quote a passage from one of the last chapters, about the paper I mentioned: Magic and Chaos Theory:

"At the heart of his paper was the notion that fairy tales relieved us of our need for order and allowed us impossible, irrational desires. Magic was real, that was his thesis. This thesis was at the very center of chaos theory – if the tiniest of actions reverberated throughout the universe in invisible and unexpected ways, changing the weather and the climate, then anything was possible. The girl who sleeps for a hundred years does so because of a single choice to thread a needle. The golden ball that falls down the well rattles the world, changing everything.The bird that drops a feather, the butterfly that moves its wings, all of it drifts across the universe, through the woods, to the other side of the mountain. The dust you breathe in was once breathed out. The person you are, the weather around you, all of it a spell you can’t understand or explain."

Fairy tales have been much on my mind since last month's Artsy Essay Contest at Judi's place.  I didn't enter it, because I found the topic too late to write a story, but I did begin a story.  Which soon became bogged down in everything else I've been doing in the past several weeks.  It's waiting for me, though.   It's in my head, and on my hard drive, waiting and calling to me.  So I was interested in all the fairy tale references in this book. 

PEARL, A DAMN GOOD NOVEL

Well, as I was saying, quite some time ago - Mary Gordon's Pearl, A Novel. I finished it a while back, and Gail is now reading it. She's not as involved in it as I was - I have to think you need some serious down-and-dirty Catholicism in your background to get into any of Gordon's books. It's intrinsic to everything in them. (See my friend Tim's lengthy comment on the linked entry where I first talk about Mary Gordon.) The characters are the focus in her stories, and the characters are always deeply influenced -for better, or usually, for worse- by a Catholic childhood and/or adulthood. I am her audience, I must admit. Cradle Catholic, educated by nuns and priests all the way through undergraduate (and some graduate) school, began my teaching career in Catholic schools, yada yada. As Kate Clinton says, I am now a Recovering Catholic, trying not to react too hugely against my earlier indoctrination. Actually, I did react quite strenuously in the beginning, but have considerably mellowed now. I think.
(the book, girlfriend, talk about the book...oh!  okay, I will...)

But not very much - it's too much of a book to do it justice in a little journal entry. It's a mother-daughter story that roams from Manhattan to Dublin to Italy, the places where the three main characters are located for much of the book. Maria is the mother, Pearl her daughter, Joseph is Maria's lifelong friend and a surrogate father figure for Pearl. Although Pearl is the title character, this book is really Maria’s story. She is a ferocious child of sixties’ politics and anger, now the administrator of day-care centers for underprivileged children.

Her 20 year old daughter is in Ireland, spending a year in Dublin learning the Irish language, at least so her mother believes. In fact Pearl is learning many other Irish things besides the language – centuries of pain and anger as a result of "the troubles," martydom for a cause, the fragility of life, the fact that we are all capable of hurting others and culpable for it. The events of her semester in Ireland have led her to her own martydom, a hunger strike which she intends to end in her death, chained to the American Embassy flagpole.  After the State Department notifies Maria of what is happening in Dublin, she and Joseph get there as soon as they can.  

Okay, listen – I give up.  Here are links to two very good reviews, Rene Loth’s in The Boston Globe, and John Leonard’s in The New York Times. I know it's the cheap way out, but it's late at night and it's been the Week from Deepest Hell.  Read the reviews, then just read the book. It’s a gripping story of moral searching, fierce maternal love, the strangeness of life, love, religion, doubt, and history. And, unlike one of the reviewers (I think it was Roth), I DID notice –right away- the fact that the two main adult characters in the book are named Mary (Maria) and Joseph, and that it takes place at Christmas.

After a Winter's Silence
                     by May Sarton

Along the terrace wall
Snowdrops have pushed through
Hard ice, making a pool.
Delicate stems now show
White bells as though
The force, the thrust to flower
Were nothing at all.
Who gives them the power?

After a winter's silence
I feel the shock of spring.
My breath warms like the sun,
Melts ice, bursts into song.
So when that inner one
Gives life back the power
To rise up and push through,
There's nothing to it.
We simply have to do it,
As snowdrops know
When snowdrops flower.

NO TATS HERE

About tattoos (see this entry if you haven't yet), I just want y'all to know I have no intention of getting the biblio phile tattoo or any others.  I have always wanted one, or several, but do not get them because I am a universal blood donor - and if I get tattoo'd I will no longer be able to donate blood.  So they tell me.  This is one of the few tangible things I can do to help the world, and I do it as often as possible.  So, a dragon curled around a breast is something I'll just have to continue to do without.  Or a line of print down an arm.

Right now I'm reading Mary Gordon's new book, Pearl: A Novel. I am a serious devotée of Gordon's, have read all of her previous books.  The one called The Other Side helped me understand the Irish side of my family, made sense of things that had baffled me most of my life.  It's too bad she didn't write it before most of the baffling people were dead, but still, it was a relief to finally see what the deal had been.  This is perhaps the best one yet, in my opinion.  I've read only one review, some time ago, don't remember where, and it was very cranky.  I am tightly gripped, could barely stand to close the covers of the book last night and put myself under the covers of the bed.  Even knowing I'd have to get up early this morning and resume the life of a teacher.  Spring break spoiled me.  It's a big book, but not big enough.  I can't bear the thought of it ending.  I'll report in once I've finished it.  Any other Gordon readers out there?