'Down By Law' & the Crown Range
"Hey little birdy, fly away home / Your house is on fire, children are alone / Hey little birdy, fly away home / Your house is on fire, your children are alone..."
- Jockey Full of Bourbon, Tom Waits
- Jockey Full of Bourbon, Tom Waits
Can't get that damned song out of my head! Ever since I heard it at the start of Down By Law it's been bouncing around my mind, that silly growling rumble of a voice impossible to dislodge. "Hey little birdy..." *exasperation*
The movie itself was interesting (most of the time), shown in black and white with Tom Waits himself, Roberto Benigni and John Lurie in the main roles as vaguely innocent prisoners who meet in a Louisiana jail, suffer each other's company for an undisclosed amount of time, and then fumble their way into an escape. Benigni was wonderful. ^ - ^ There were some moments when I almost fell asleep (especially at the beginning) but watching three men parade round a tiny cell shouting "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice-cream" over and over was enough to make everyone watching grin rather broadly. That and Benigni practising his English on his new prison buddies: "If looks could kill, I am a-dead now." I've read some reviews which call this film a thing of beauty, and I suppose it might be, in a slow and vague kind of way (vague, not dreamy). There's no trace of anything which really marrs story-telling... no brutality, no coarseness or painfully obvious ploys. Maybe it's the deliberate obscurity which is it's attraction; that and the unobtrusive, well-trained touch that teases events into place. It never really trips, just flows along with a strange kind of off-beat grace. Down By Law is what it is... a 'neo-beat-noir-comedy' as described by director Jim Jarmusch. [Full article here] Not that I understand it.
View from the Crown Range towards Lake Hayes, near Queenstown NZ
This was Day 4 (I think) of our most fantastic trip round New Zealand. The landscape was amazing, amazing, amazing... Yes, that amazing. The panorama may give some sense of what it was like to stand there, on the side of a road which wound it's high-altitude way from Wanaka along rugged hill roads just recently sealed, through a vista bare save for tussock... But it was the size of things which hit me, and that isn't so easily conveyed. It was beautiful, almost alien despite the many times we've travelled that way: an alpine world of rock and cloud, towering juggernauts which cradle this beautiful valley like protective brothers. Queenstown is directly behind the sunlit hill on the left, the shimmering expanse of Lake Wakatipu southwards and hidden by the ridges at the back of the picture. Skippers Canyon is off to the right, Wanaka some distnace behind.
Now that low-pitched grating tune is back in my head, and I think it's time perhaps to get some sleep. (Late night is the only time the computer in this place is free.) "Hey little birdy, fly away home: your house is on fire, your children are gone..."
The movie itself was interesting (most of the time), shown in black and white with Tom Waits himself, Roberto Benigni and John Lurie in the main roles as vaguely innocent prisoners who meet in a Louisiana jail, suffer each other's company for an undisclosed amount of time, and then fumble their way into an escape. Benigni was wonderful. ^ - ^ There were some moments when I almost fell asleep (especially at the beginning) but watching three men parade round a tiny cell shouting "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice-cream" over and over was enough to make everyone watching grin rather broadly. That and Benigni practising his English on his new prison buddies: "If looks could kill, I am a-dead now." I've read some reviews which call this film a thing of beauty, and I suppose it might be, in a slow and vague kind of way (vague, not dreamy). There's no trace of anything which really marrs story-telling... no brutality, no coarseness or painfully obvious ploys. Maybe it's the deliberate obscurity which is it's attraction; that and the unobtrusive, well-trained touch that teases events into place. It never really trips, just flows along with a strange kind of off-beat grace. Down By Law is what it is... a 'neo-beat-noir-comedy' as described by director Jim Jarmusch. [Full article here] Not that I understand it.
View from the Crown Range towards Lake Hayes, near Queenstown NZThis was Day 4 (I think) of our most fantastic trip round New Zealand. The landscape was amazing, amazing, amazing... Yes, that amazing. The panorama may give some sense of what it was like to stand there, on the side of a road which wound it's high-altitude way from Wanaka along rugged hill roads just recently sealed, through a vista bare save for tussock... But it was the size of things which hit me, and that isn't so easily conveyed. It was beautiful, almost alien despite the many times we've travelled that way: an alpine world of rock and cloud, towering juggernauts which cradle this beautiful valley like protective brothers. Queenstown is directly behind the sunlit hill on the left, the shimmering expanse of Lake Wakatipu southwards and hidden by the ridges at the back of the picture. Skippers Canyon is off to the right, Wanaka some distnace behind.
Now that low-pitched grating tune is back in my head, and I think it's time perhaps to get some sleep. (Late night is the only time the computer in this place is free.) "Hey little birdy, fly away home: your house is on fire, your children are gone..."
posted by Anonymous @ 11:31 PM
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