the body that tells them that for this one moment in time, this one instant, everything’s got a chance to be okay, even for a little while. And they roll with it. So did I.
But what goes up must come down. Junkies know that, too. When the movie ended and the lights came back up and the sound was just a fading tremor against my skin, I always crashed, always fell back to earth again and always found it the same as Ihad left it. Grey. Cold. Hollow. Now though, for the first time in longer than I can remember, there was a chance for something different in my days. Not enough to make it all go away. Not enough to change everything. But enough to make it seem like I could take it one more time. Like I could carry on. Like a dodge. Like escape. Like a drug. The movies became my fix, my need, and I couldn’t fucking wait for another one.
Granite
T HE ONLY HEIRLOOM I kept was the story chair. My dad’s chair. The one he read from when I was still small enough to fit in his lap and later the one we fought over to read in front of that huge old fireplace each evening. A big overstuffed leather chair with a welcoming depth that seemed to draw stories out and pull you in at the same time. I don’t know why it mattered that I keep it, only that it seemed right, only that it felt right to sit in it. Now it was the viewing chair. I invested in the biggest television I could find, a video player and home theatre system to enjoy the movies I began collecting. Browsing through the video collector books I’d purchased led me to fantastic films I’d never heard of and to slick and memorable Hollywood movies I’d either bypassed or ignored. It hadn’t taken long to fill a few shelves with titles I would watch over and over. I would gather the night around me and disappear into the chair and the world of the movies.
I’d missed the education that film provides. For the three decades I’d been a journalist, film had been something you fled to on those evenings when the pace of work required escape. It hadn’t been elevated to a haven, as it was now, and I wondered how I’d managed to miss the point of it all. The point being, of course, that film is rapture. Film is romantic education. The romance of the senses. It could sweep me away, and I let it.
Cinema Paradiso
appeared to be one of those films. Based on what I had read, it pointed to a tale about denizens of a filmhouse who retreated into the romantic whirl of story to elude the mundane, banal, and humdrum course of ordinary existence. The decades it revealed were the war years in Italy, a time of great tumult when loss was the common currency of being. That, I believed, was something I would have no trouble relating to.
The evening promised to be a fine one. The arctic front that had made news across the continent had dissipated and been replaced by an ironic belt of warm southern air that melted the snow and ice, driving the city into an artificial springtime glee. I’d seldom taken the time to actually view my neighbourhood, and on this night it seemed inordinately alive.
The theatre was called The Plaza and it was famed for its eclectic choice of fare. A heritage building, its owners had been careful to preserve the ornate fixtures of its 1920s decor. I had been there often and loved the charming ambience of its subtle art nouveau interior. Movies at The Plaza were a reconnection to the febrile heart of filmdom, and in its air was the very breath of DeMille, Capra, Fellini, and Truffault.
There was a considerable line when I walked up. I stood there in the hushed light of evening and began the lifelong habit of observing the people I shared space with. They were, for the most part, a typical upscale neighbourhood collection of sorts: old-money college students, artistes, former radicals turned realtors, and moneyed elitists bent on maintaining a fey proletarian contact.
The first indication that things were out of kilter was a heightened buzz in the conversation
But what goes up must come down. Junkies know that, too. When the movie ended and the lights came back up and the sound was just a fading tremor against my skin, I always crashed, always fell back to earth again and always found it the same as Ihad left it. Grey. Cold. Hollow. Now though, for the first time in longer than I can remember, there was a chance for something different in my days. Not enough to make it all go away. Not enough to change everything. But enough to make it seem like I could take it one more time. Like I could carry on. Like a dodge. Like escape. Like a drug. The movies became my fix, my need, and I couldn’t fucking wait for another one.
Granite
T HE ONLY HEIRLOOM I kept was the story chair. My dad’s chair. The one he read from when I was still small enough to fit in his lap and later the one we fought over to read in front of that huge old fireplace each evening. A big overstuffed leather chair with a welcoming depth that seemed to draw stories out and pull you in at the same time. I don’t know why it mattered that I keep it, only that it seemed right, only that it felt right to sit in it. Now it was the viewing chair. I invested in the biggest television I could find, a video player and home theatre system to enjoy the movies I began collecting. Browsing through the video collector books I’d purchased led me to fantastic films I’d never heard of and to slick and memorable Hollywood movies I’d either bypassed or ignored. It hadn’t taken long to fill a few shelves with titles I would watch over and over. I would gather the night around me and disappear into the chair and the world of the movies.
I’d missed the education that film provides. For the three decades I’d been a journalist, film had been something you fled to on those evenings when the pace of work required escape. It hadn’t been elevated to a haven, as it was now, and I wondered how I’d managed to miss the point of it all. The point being, of course, that film is rapture. Film is romantic education. The romance of the senses. It could sweep me away, and I let it.
Cinema Paradiso
appeared to be one of those films. Based on what I had read, it pointed to a tale about denizens of a filmhouse who retreated into the romantic whirl of story to elude the mundane, banal, and humdrum course of ordinary existence. The decades it revealed were the war years in Italy, a time of great tumult when loss was the common currency of being. That, I believed, was something I would have no trouble relating to.
The evening promised to be a fine one. The arctic front that had made news across the continent had dissipated and been replaced by an ironic belt of warm southern air that melted the snow and ice, driving the city into an artificial springtime glee. I’d seldom taken the time to actually view my neighbourhood, and on this night it seemed inordinately alive.
The theatre was called The Plaza and it was famed for its eclectic choice of fare. A heritage building, its owners had been careful to preserve the ornate fixtures of its 1920s decor. I had been there often and loved the charming ambience of its subtle art nouveau interior. Movies at The Plaza were a reconnection to the febrile heart of filmdom, and in its air was the very breath of DeMille, Capra, Fellini, and Truffault.
There was a considerable line when I walked up. I stood there in the hushed light of evening and began the lifelong habit of observing the people I shared space with. They were, for the most part, a typical upscale neighbourhood collection of sorts: old-money college students, artistes, former radicals turned realtors, and moneyed elitists bent on maintaining a fey proletarian contact.
The first indication that things were out of kilter was a heightened buzz in the conversation
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