Earlier in the week, Patrick asked Debbie to meet a guy in the Spokane Valley and purchase, on Patrick's behalf, a computer. Debbie agreed to do it and I asked if I might tag along and enjoy the ride. Debbie said, "Sure."
So I put on long sleeves, covered my legs with sweat pants, put on my wide brimmed hat, along with a mask and sunglasses, and put sun screen lotion on my hands and face (next time I'll remember my neck), and piled into the Camry, well, ha!, protected.
The transaction occurred at Starbucks on North Sullivan. No problems. We blasted to Staples and took advantage of their packing and shipping service. Patrick will have his new device on Wednesday.
Then we returned to Kellogg, mission accomplished.
2. In May of 1963, in Greece, zealots, with the covert support of the police and military, assassinated democratic, anti-war Greek politician Grigoris Lambrakis, a leader of the resistance to Axis rule during World War II, and an outspoken proponent of human rights and an array of social freedoms.
In 1967, the Greek writer Vassilis Vassilikos, wrote a novel, Z, based on the assassination of Lambrakis. The title refers to the first letter of the Greek word, Zi ("He lives!"), a popular source of graffiti that began to appear on buildings in Greek cities in protest of the political conditions that fostered the assassination of Grigoris Lambrakis.
Costa-Gavras co-wrote and directed the movie, Z. It won the 1969 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
I mentioned in my blog post yesterday that I have had this movie in the back of my mind for over forty years, ever since I saw Costa-Gavras' powerful 1982 movie, Missing.
I started the movie Friday, but, because of sleepiness, stopped it after forty minutes.
Today I watched it all.
First of all, Costa-Gavras presents the movie in a documentary style. I experienced it as cinema verite.
Secondly, the movie alternates between two stories.
On the one hand, it tells the story of the military and police, the movie's unnamed country's security apparatus. From the first scene of the movie, we learn of the military's and the police's view that those in their country who support democracy, human rights, and pacifism are like mildew, mildew that must be bleached out of the country's social system, eradicated from schools, universities, the streets, and elsewhere as a threat to the country's unity and its preservation of law and order.
Once the assassination occurs, fairly early in the plot, the movie focuses, in part, on the military and police's efforts to cover up their involvement in the killing and we see ongoing campaign of lies and misinformation get underway.
The second story Z tells is of a persistent investigative magistrate whose work leads him to discover that the assassination was, indeed, supported by the the military and the police and we watch him doggedly pursue the facts and the truth of the case.
I'll leave it at that. If you'd like to find out more about the cover up and the investigation and how it all turns out, watch the movie. I won't spoil it by telling you.
3. In his interview with Greta Gerwig in their episode of Adventures in Moviegoing, Peter Becker expresses astonishment that Gerwig, when she chose her influential movies to present, didn't include movies by French New Wave director Erich Rohmer.
I didn't know why he asked her this, but did some shallow digging and learned that many who follow Gerwig's work and that of her her husband, Noah Baumbach, see that Rohmer is a strong influence on their work.
This meant nothing to me.
So, I unlocked the doors and knocked down the spider webs at Vizio University and decided it was time to look into this. I haven't watched any of Greta Gerwig's movies -- I've only read about her -- and the only Noah Baumbach movies I've watched are The Squid and the Whale and Margot at the Wedding.
Upon looking at Eric Rohmer's list of movies, I realized that in 1983 or 1984, I went to the Magic Lantern in Spokane and saw Pauline at the Beach, but I have no memory of how I experienced it.
In the Criterion interview, Greta Gerwig talked a bit about a film cycle Eric Rohmer directed in the 1960's. It comprises six movies under the overall title of Six Moral Tales.
They are all offerings on the Criterion Channel.
I watched the first of these movies this evening, a short, twenty-three minute film, The Bakery Girl of Monceau.
A few thin observations.
It's a street movie, filmed in a small section of Paris. That it wasn't filmed on a soundstage creates the illusion that it is closer to reality itself, free of the artifice of a studio soundstage.
It focuses on a male law student's inward monologue as he pursues a woman he doesn't know but has fallen in love with.
He buys a lot of cookies and sweets at a bakery and flirts with the eighteen year old woman who waits on him.
Toward the end of the movie, he confronts a decision: on which woman should he focus his attention? The elusive Sylvie? Or the bakery girl, Jacqueline?
It's a moral tale.
By what moral justification does he make his choice? Or is there one?
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