After watching the movie, I’ve gotten the soundtrack and have put it on while I pull my late hours of doing crappy TAFE work.
It’s got such a good mix of Christian music and my personal favourite of Mandy Moore. Mandy Moore has crystal clear voice, and when she sings “Only Hope” it sends shivers down my spine.
In conclusion, I highly endorse this movie and soundtrack.
This movie is sappy. Incredibly sappy. A figment of a teenage fantasy.
But I love it. Absolutely.
When I first saw this movie about 5 years ago, I was stunned by its predictable, terrible dialogue. We sat there and guessed what the next line was going to be – and we were usually right. It was one of the first few times that I had met Eric’s best friends.
I have always been a romantic dreamer. I watched it again tonight, and couldn’t help falling in love with it all over again. I watched the scene where he proposes to her and I cried. CRIED.
There is something stunningly charismatic in both Shane West and Mandy Moore.
I had a blood test done on me a couple of weeks ago. Routine stuff, just checking on cholesterol levels.
I haven’t had the time to go back to the doctors to get the results. I’m not fussed, I don’t expect anything seriously wrong with me. I’m young, I don’t eat fantastically but I’m not obese and right now in a good state of health.
However, I come home the other day only to have my mum hand me my blood test results saying she was at the doctors and she wanted to ‘check on my cholesterol levels.’
I’m fucking pissed off.
As far as I am concerned:
I’m going to go the doctor and give him a piece of my mind.
On Sunday morning I headed to the Canterbury racecourse to see what goodies I can garner from there.
I am now extremely poor.
I’ve bought a six Australian Home Journal Fashion Catalogues from the 1950s. It’s terrific! I must admit that the 50s is my favourite era of fashion. I love the big crinoline skirts of the 50s and the structured style features. It is an era where they made things with complete precision and grace.
I have long held the view that lace is evil. I look absolutely horrific in lace. As is mesh/tulle. I have problems with the scratchy nature of synthetic net fabrics. However looking at the beautiful vintage garments I couldn’t help but just think how wonderful that whole era was and there was some truly beautiful pieces. The elaborate construction of each piece – it is an art that I respect.
In a period that had no overlockers or modern buttonholers, the intricate detail that goes into this is just stunning. I think of the young girls who used to make their dresses on a hand operated Singer as opposed to the lovely industrial machine that I used at TAFE and at home with the various foot attachments that help me get precision.
French seams, bound edges and welt buttonholes. Oh the bliss.
Now that I know how to make a welt buttonhole, I’m never going back. Apart from the minor point I don’t even know how to operate the buttonhole function on my domestic sewing machine. Not to be disloyal to my little Janome and all – she’s still the best little machine ever. She’s absolutely no fuss and can stand being knocked about in the boot of my car.
At the fair I also found a book that I must simply buy damn the cost. It is a 1939 Butterick pattern catalogue! I mean screw the patterns, patterns from those times are terrible (I have a few and they are absolute awful because the pieces aren’t labelled bar a stencilled number, have no seam allowance, are single size and have poor directions on the construction process) – but the fashion is absolutely amazing. Intricate pleating and shirring details with clean lines and interesting adornments.
It boggles the mind that the average female back in that era would make their own clothes with that level of precision and detail. Among my friends I’m one of the better sewers, but even this stuff for me would take many hours of practice to achieve perfection. I lack the experience. My patternmaking skills are still quite limited at the moment – my mind races with ideas on how to create that look – and I know that I will fail miserably.
One thing I lament horribly about my patternmaking is my inability to have an intuitive understanding of proportion. My patterns are created to industry standard with perfect notching and trued seams, but I still get too caught up with the picture as opposed to how it falls on the body. My last patternmaking assessment is testament to that. When I made the dress, it completely went back together no problems. Just that I followed the production sketch so faithfully that I didn’t take into account where and how things would sit. I rectified the problem after I sewed up my toile by editing the pattern and fixing the lengths, but I was chagrined that intuition was so far off.
Truth be told, after seeing all these catalogues, I just want to make patterns. For all those garments. Then make it up properly. I kinda wish I could set myself up in business and sell reproduction patterns.
At the fair I saw a historical fashion parade with dresses in between the WWI and WWII periods. They were simply fantastic. A basic yellow shift which was completely covered in hand embroidered beads. A floral chiffon dress with a full circle skirt and angle pleats. A rich brocade coat. I can not express how beautiful it was.
I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m starting to outgrow my taste in pink.
I am in shock myself.
Don’t mistake me. It is still my preferred colour of choice.
But pink is completely inappropriate to make early 20th century clothing. Pastels were definitely not in until the 50s (again so much love for the 50s). The darker more vibrant colours are much more suitable.
Maybe I’m broadening my horizons. But I did buy a gorgeous pink umbrella!
Later, I dropped off to the Bankstown Markets and picked up the Reader’s Digest Complete Book of Sewing for the princely sum of $2.
Ironically, both the vintage fair and the markets sold old stuff.
On Thursday I went to see Mark Ravenhill’s “Shopping and F**king” which was performed at the Lighthouse Theatre at Macquarie University by Dramac. I was really disappointed that due to Kath’s illness she couldn’t come out with me to see it 
.
In terms of the play itself, the play with the violent ideas of consumerism, sex, drugs and abuse. The script was excellent and used a repetition to get its points across. I think I missed quite a few nuances of the play having only watching, so I’ll have to read it to really absorb it. My favourite scene was when one of the characters talk about his experience with Ecstasy and how it made him so happy and how happy it made him to give away the tablets only to be confronted by the harsh reality of his partner demanding the money.
The show was well cast. Everyone seemed to fit very naturally in their roles. The real show stopper for me was Josh who played a character looking to be abused and he had this plaintive quality that made you wish you could fulfil all his wants and needs – despite them being extremely disturbing. James was a close second. There was a hint of restrained violence about him that made him look like he had real power over the characters and the intense way that he paraphrased The Lion King was hilarious. (I almost didn’t recognise him sober!)
The set was interesting. The floor was covered with MDF boards painted white with fluorescent slogans that are currently the mode on Supre t-shirts (in fact Josh was wearing one). There was a bar/kitchen area comprised entirely of white painted milk crates. Two elevated mattresses made a bed and white boxes behind the bed created the wing. The eye was immediately drawn to it because the whole thing had a white base and the actors made a stark contrast. The actors used the space effectively but there was a scene where they were supposed to be in a department store which was lost on me because it looked like they had just walked into the living room despite the script clearly described a different context.
The set was placed inwards to the centre of the theatre with seating arranged in a U shape around it. In the back of the set there was a tiny television (and I sat front row centre) that was used to play some of the clips in the play. However the nature of the seating arrangements would preclude the arms of the U from seeing the television screen – it would have been more effective to use a projector.
The television was used to play clips during scene changes. There was a few clips of monks living their spartan lifestyles and at others to contrast scenes of wholesale baby chick production. I found the clips to be distracting actually. The serious nature of the play made it a very quiet, controlled piece. To be suddenly jarred into these clips which were haphazard was irritating.
I thought that the sound guy was really good but the lighting could have been better. I looked up at the ceiling and noticed there were hardly any lights and no colour gels. I’ve done a few plays at uni and I remember all the lighting guys spending hours with the gels and getting the lights on correctly. It seemed bizarre.
One of the first things that struck me about the Lighthouse Theatre was the size. It is easily twice the size of Studio One. The light and sound desk were in their own little room near the ceiling so I didn’t have the wretched blue lamp in the back being a distraction. It had it’s own beautiful foyer/kitchenette area which was wonderful – how many times have I stood outside in the cold waiting for it to start! It was such a lovely, lovely space.
Another thing that struck me as odd was the lack of publicity. I had to ask 3 different people for directions to the theatre and one of them even set me in the direction of the wrong theatre! At the Lighthouse itself there were no posters hanging except for a small stack of postcards sitting on the Front Of House desk. Granted that it was a Thursday night and it was the middle of exam season, but there was less than 20 people.
Internally I’m cringing. I guess having done mostly Revues where our whole life is about the show and publicising it, the whole concept was an anathema to me.
I spoke to James after the show talking about the differences between NUTS/Studio Four and Dramac plays. He told me their budget was absolutely tiny – 500 for everything outside theatre hire. I supposed this is probably the reason why they didn’t have more expensive things to play with like projectors and lights.
I had a terrific time watching it. I really enjoyed it – one of the best productions I’ve seen this year. Granted, most of the shows I have seen this year have been more towards the comical side of things so a serious piece of theatre was wonderful. It’ll be interesting to see more productions on the other side of Sydney.