It has been ages, and I am afraid to see when last I wrote. Suffice it to say that I survived the pandemic, despite India.
I have also found myself continentally adrift, and am now as far south as I have ever been. Blasted by cold winds from the Antarctica, my life has been upended, largely by me. I also read far lesser, and for this again, I blame myself.
Anyway, finally joined a public library in the city (suburb) that I find myself in. Apparently we can borrow fifty items (books! audio! visuals!) at a time. The collection is erratic but atleast I have started reading again.
That is how I found myself with this book, Filmish.
Right off the bat, allow me to tell you how excited I get about movies as well. I am now at the age when all the content I consumed in my youth has become a part of who I am and seeps out in references and mental tags. So the cover, of this book, has recognisable scenes from Aliens, Clockwork Orange, Modern Times, The Wizard of Oz and Star Wars.
And yet, it is not the usual pastiche of Americana cultural hegemony trivia things. Instead, it is divided into sections “The Eye”, “The Body”. “Time”, “Voice and Language”, “Power and ideology” and so on and uses these as themes to construct a narrative of how movies have both shaped us and are shaped by us.
It also becomes a useful bibliography shall we say, of some movies that I will probably need to watch. Why? I do not know. They intrigue me, although I think in our times with a surfeit of content, I am not even sure if I can take any more. I type this entire paragraph for instance by looking out the window and typing on a wireless keyboard, because my eyes can no longer bear to look at the screen.
But if however we could slow down our time, and cut ourselves off from the world to reflect and look back, then I am glad that I came across this book.
Today I shall be sending it back into a chute.
Sanctum Meum 