Cinema at Home

K and I watched some films together to celebrate the end of the year.

I haven't been to the cinema much after I left York, and much less after busy everyday life and language barrier have inconvenienced my leisure life.

Well, language barrier is just an easy excuse. The main reason is probably that I have tried to avoid the feeling of disappointment that might inflict on me after unsatisfactory viewings.

It is rather a stupid reason somehow, as so many good stories are simply missed. Perhaps, there is no such a thing as 'bad' story, as I have often argued with K in the aspect of literature. The deciding factors to one's enjoyment are his/her preference and interpretive approach. Whatever story gives pleasure, whatever pleasure it is. More precisely displeasure is also a kind of experience, I would think.


The Lost World of Mitchell & Kenyon is a BBC documentary about Mitchell and Kenyon's business of filming their town people around a century ago when film was just a totally new idea to the world.
I heard about the discovery of the lost trove of M & K's film reels around 2 (?) years ago when I was still in the UK. The news came with a photo of the first-ever filmed official football match. The news was interesting, but seeing the documentary itself was even more fascinating. M & K's business was to propose to film people (mostly the working class) and invite them to pay to see themselves in the theatre.
This business idea fascinated me in that it played with the curiosity of the public about their own images and about this new invention in the world.

M&K seldom made stories (except some attempts), but the everyday-life images that it collected around the Edwardian period are themselves fascinating reflections of a foregone past.

I was amused and surprised.


Changeling

Director: Clint Eastwood

Changeling is an adaption of a real case in 1928 in Los Angeles. The story is saddening, but it was compelling with the dialogues nicely written and acting impressively carried out.

It was probably my first time to see and to remember Angelina Jolie in a film. It is a story about a mom's unending search for her son throughout her life and her fight against the corrupted and dysfunctional police system in the first half of the twentieth century in California. I think AJ's acting is great in general, especially when she is performing the role of Mrs Collins as a determined and clear-minded woman. There are moments, however, when I felt that the actress fails to convince me that she is as attached to her son as she should have been. She does not really show strong attachment to her son, for instance, no hug, kiss, or affectionate conversation is portrayed when Mrs Collins and Walter, her son, spend time together.
Or is it simply my misconception of familial attachment? Maybe it is precisely the reality that the emotional tie between family members is not usually visible and does not need to take the form of physical contact at all.