The Piano

I went and saw a movie this evening at the Michigan Theater, and on the walk over I thought of the last time I was there-which was last Labor Day and I saw Casablanca for the first time-and I thought of the first time I was there...
It was the winter of 1994. It was a dark and cold night. The middle of February in Michigan is usually dark and cold! I remember sitting in my apartment-bored and not wanting to sit alone watching tv-so I looked in the newspaper that Sunday evening and found the movie The Piano was playing in the Michigan Theater. It gave the address and I knew the location. So despite not having been there before, but having driven around it many times I bundled up and went out into the cold night. The Michigan Theater was not so much warmer inside as the outside that night. I sat near the front on a side aisle, and watched the previews and anxiously waited for the film to start.
The Piano was an excellent film. It starred Holly Hunter, Anna Paquin, Sam Neill and Harvey Keitel. It presents a story where the heroine has lost her husband-and the daughter has a very interesting story on how her father died, as well as why he mother does not speak! Hunter moves to the other side of the world to marry and brings her daughter with her. The film was interesting and the ending was very symbolic-depending on which one you saw. Apparently there were two endings-one where Hunter dies and one where she does not. I was fortunate to see the revised version where she did not die, and it made the movie much more symbolic, rather than depressing.
I don’t know if this movie will ever be released again, but it’s worth seeing if you enjoy drama and aren’t looking for a Hollywood movie with a lot of guns, drugs and violence.

The Piano
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107822/

Amazon.com-the Piano [1993]
http://www.amazon.com/Piano-Holly-Hunter/dp/0784011176/ref=sr_1_5/103-3049609-4562242?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1190263305&sr=1-5

Thursday September 20th, 2007

Casablanca

Last Labor Day [2006] I went to the Michigan Theater to watch Casablanca for the very first time. I’d seen parts of it-very short parts mind you-referenced in other films-like in When Harry Met Sally [one of my favorite movies too] There is no other way to really view this film, especially for the first time, other than on the big screen in a packed movie theater. It was also my fist time sitting in the balcony at the Michigan Theater. It was a very enjoyable event. While I had gone alone the people around me obviously enjoyed the movie as much as I did. The balcony in the Michigan Theater is renovated and the seats are much more comfortable as well as provide more leg room than the seats on the main floor.
The movie itself was very enjoyable, and gives some twists and turns that you’d expect from today’s writers. It’s a story set during the Second World War, and it has two people who loved each other once-and probably still do-randomly coming in to each other’s lives again-though for a short time. Rick [played by Humphrey Bogart] and Ilse [played by Ingrid Bergman] haven’t seen each other in several years, but you’d never know it by the way they seem to look at each other. Rick is the owner of a nightclub in Casablanca and seems to do well for himself. Isle turns out to be the wife of one of the leaders of the underground working against the Germans in Europe.
The back drop for the film is exotic, the story line is as old as man and time itself-two people in love, but the right thing to do is not what they want to do. Do they follow their hearts or follow their conscience?
It’s an enjoyable film and I’ve enjoyed seeing it when it’s been broadcast on TV, but it cannot be beat seeing it on the big screen in a movie theater. If you have the chance, go and see it, and take someone you care about with you if you can!

Casablanca
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034583/

Thursday September 20th, 2007