My blogging might be slight this week, due to a pile-up of tasks.
-An interview with Darren Aronofsky, director of Pi, Requiem for a Dream, and The Fountain (which I saw last week).
– Finishing my review of Flags of Our Fathers.
– Working on my review of Babel.
– Writing the review of The Fountain (which is a really wild head-trip of a film).
– My regular full-time job at Seattle Pacific University.
– Beginning my final editing sweep of Through a Screen Darkly in preparation for its January publication.
– A screening of Little Children.
– A screening of The Prestige.
– Locking myself in a hotel room somewhere for three days straight to write chapters 13, 14, and 15 of the sequel to Auralia’s Colors. (What’s it called? Currently I’m torn between Cyndere’s Midnight, Cyndere’s Risk, and Cyndere’s Guardian. Which tickles your fancy?)
I like Cyndere’s Risk.
I like Cyndere’s Midnight.
I like Midnight too.
Cyndere’s Midnight. It has the same mysterious quality that Auralia’s Colors does. The word “midnight” also sounds risky to me, so it’s sort of those 2 titles mixed together. The other 2 are more concrete. Unless that’s how you want to go. Which would be fine, too! BTW, I’m very intrigued by these books.
And I can’t wait to read your pieces about Fountain & Flags. I’m very interested in those films.
Not knowing much about the stories I’ll take a guess. I like the way “Midnight” plays against “Colors”.
BTW, I’m curious about the name “Auralia”. It makes me think of the tune Aurelia to which we sing the hymn “The Church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord” or several other hymns…
http://www.seiyaku.com/hymns/en/429.html
But in fact Aurelia has all kinds of interesting meanings and associations…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurelia
I’m looking forward to finding out what it means to you, Jeffrey.
I’ll be honest: While I wish I could say that I chose the name for its intriguing array of associations, truth is I made it up during a hike in the woods, and I stuck with it because it sounded good. The associations I discovered later were a cool surprise, but I’m glad I spell it differently.
Thanks for mentioning the hymn, though. I *didn’t* know about that one.
At the risk of sounding corny, Cyndere’s Risk sounds too much like a play off Schindler’s List . Might confuse the uninitiated.
Dying for three of those reviews: Flag of Our Fathers (heard some questionable things about this), Prestige and The Fountain (a film that I hope is just great…)
Well, as The Fountain has played at festivals, there’s no review embargo, so I’ll say this for now: You might want to adjust your expectations slightly. It’s worth seeing, and it’s more of a head trip than any of Aronofsky’s previous films, but it’s not entirely satisfying. Great effects, ambitious concept, good performances. And its exploration of the power of myth is provocative. But what is the film trying to show us about good and evil and the path to eternal life? That’s not nearly as comforting as Aronofsky seems to think it is…
That IS great news! Perhaps Criterion could get involved, but that’s probably asking too much. All of Malick’s films cry out for the “Criterion treatment”.
Thanks for this update. You know, if it hadn’t been for the fact that you’ve been such a tireless cheerleader for this movie I probably never would have watched it which means I would have missed something wonderful. I hope to see the longer version.
Chuck