I finally went to Dover. It’s one of those places that I felt like I HAD to go because it is literally a 30 minute train ride, and costs almost nothing to get to. Unfortunately, I have over-romanticized Dover to the point of parody. My concept of the place is based entirely on “We Both Go Down Together” by The Decemberists. It is not a very romantic song, well I suppose it is tragically romantic. But I always imagined Dover to be nothing but rugged white chalk cliffs and the open sea. A place that some baroque Victorian novelist would choose to use as the point of climax in a burgeoning romance. But it is none of these things. It is the least romantic place I have been since arriving in England. I should have known. Dover is a port town, which means that it is dominated by movement, the transportation of people and things. The port is brimming with pollutant pumping semis and disembodied announcements that caress the edges of the cliff so that the vibrant green and white and blue that I imagined is so invaded that I feel like I am trespassing on government land instead of taking a nice stroll by the seaside. It was beautiful, don’t get me wrong. But it was beautiful in the way that airports are beautiful, transient, alien, and non-human.
I went with my friend Liz Vogt, which was nice because we both ran out of breath walking up to the cliffs, and therefore were spared the shame of being out of shape. It was a really beautiful day, wonderful hiking weather, cool and sunny. It would have been nice to have a picnic on the cliffs, but I also would have dreaded carrying any kind of extra weight up the incredible incline. We were hungry when we came down and walked through Dover high street in search of some curry. But nothing was open. It was 4pm. And nothing nothing nothing was open except some greasy Fish n’ Chips places and a couple Kebab shops. By this time the sun had disappeared and early English dusk was setting in. It was cold and we had no idea where the train station was. So we gave up, after walking the entire (quite long) high street with hysterical results. We finally found the train station after getting some jumbled thick German directions ‘left petrol station, right school…” On the train we were still miserable. So we used our 21st century saavy and called Dan. In student housing, we get a literal PILE of take out menus, so he picked up one for Masal Gate (an Indian place in Canterbury) and gave me the number. After some train tunnel signal interruption, I finally got the order in and confirmed for 6pm. We were still on the train, got to Canterbury then had to catch a bus. We got back to my place (where I had ordered the food to be sent) at about 6:05. The restaurant was supposed to call me, but totally didn’t. As we were walking up we saw a shady car parked in the lot, but kind of ignored it and went inside because we were quite cold. The moment we walked in, Cody asked if we had ordered food. We’re like “yeah!” and he says, “Well I told the guy that no one did because I didn’t know, and he already left.” To which I replied with expletives as Liz and I ran wildly outside to flag down the shady car that could be none other than the Masala Gate delivery Guy. I literally jumped in front of the car. I was way to hungry to let this one pass me by. Liz ran the flank, and we surrounded the car in time to get the goods. And what goods they were. We stuffed ourselves with sweet curry and Nan, until we could hardly move. Liz had to go to choir after that, I just chilled. Haha.
Today, we had our usual film meeting at Bramley’s, a chance for us to wax poetic about what we all love most, the cinema. It was nice tonight because it was a small group, just seven of us. Sometimes it goes double and that can be quite daunting for intense conversation/ debate about film. The night pretty much ended with Cody and I talking about the film Wendy and Lucy which is currently my favorite film. Since it has now been turned into a one person conversation (me relating the exchange on my own blog) I won’t pretend that I can sum up what Cody was talking about. But it got down to a debate about the lack of fantastic elements in the film (by fantastic I mean illusions, special effects, futuristic projections, breaking the time space continuum). I would categorize the film as realist, or humanist. It is quiet, slow-paced, concerned with ‘the everyday’ experience, and has no succinct ending. It sounds like the viewer’s worst nightmare, some artsy film taking itself too seriously. But it is the complete opposite of artsy, it is bare bones filmmaking (director Kelly Reichardt has a crew of volunteers and edits the films in her New York apartment). Cody and I also argued about that, he citing Primer as a ‘better’ result of low-budget filmmaking. But this is less about Cody’s want to show me ‘another perspective’ for consideration, and more about my own experience with the film. Cody and I have very different relationships with reality and differing taste in films (his favorite is 2001: A Space Odyssey, my previous favorite was Drop Dead Fred). So I would never condemn him for having a different opinion, or anyone for that matter. The conversation didn’t really seem to be about the movie, it was more about what cinema should represent. I think that is a question that will never be satisfied, and one that seems unproductive. Cinema is as varied as any other art form, so it seems to me that, like art, it should be approached with respect to the intention of the film. I believe the intention of Wendy and Lucy is to portray a young independent woman trying to make something of herself in modern America, without an education and with little money. Wendy is traveling to Alaska with her dog Lucy, trying to find work in the Alaskan canneries. The American dream is dispelled when she experiences a serious of semi-self-inflicted hardships, her car breaks down when she has been warned that it is on it’s last leg, she is arrested for shoplifting, and when she is jailed she loses Lucy. She spends most of the film looking for Lucy and talking to this old security guard at Walgreen’s, who lets her use his cellphone to call the pound. When Lucy is gone, Wendy is completely alone. She is in a strange place and no one back home can help her out financially or mentally. She counts every cent, even picking up loose change in her car seats, and trying to turn in aluminum cans for some extra cash. Maybe it was the aesthetic, Wendy has crudely cut dark brown hair, an ill-fitting blue hoodie and cut-off shorts. She finds solace in diners and gas station bathrooms. Maybe I could identify with the main character. But thank God for that. I have never found myself able to ACTUALLY identify with a main character, except for a few occasions – Ghost World and the animated series Daria. Even those were a little too dark and monotone for my taste. Wendy, though, is an idealist who is just trying to survive in the only way she knows, by doing everything the wrong way. It is rare to see a female protagonist with any kind of ideals, let alone ideals that are so fiercely independent.
So maybe that’s why Wendy and Lucy is now on the top of my favorite movies list. Or at least that’s what Cody and I’s conversation would want me to believe. In reality, the film was a beautiful portrait of solitude and disconnect between people and people, as well as people and nature. It is the exploration of personal disaster in a culture that promotes individualistic success, a success that I imagine is quite foreign to the wayward Wendy. It denies the myths of financial independence that have been pumped into our mainstream media for decades. This is a woman who is living by the very cash in her hand, not the credit on her card. She has no debt, but also seems to have no future. There is no happy or tragic ending, there is only constant motion, which may be realist (a supposedly ‘unproductive’ approach to cinema), but at least it’s Real.
Mostly.
