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Ethereal
Weronika seems too delicate for the world; She’s childlike and blissfully adrift. Irene Jacob gives off this quality. Kieslowski cast her because of her shyness, he found it endearing. The way the last segment recalled “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” was likely not accidental, because Weronika seems like a character in a musical. In fact, she…
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Translating Essay 1: By Various Means We Arrive at Such an End
Before getting to Montaigne’s subject, regarding the proper strategy to deal with people we’ve offended, it might be useful to back up a step and ask why we need to allay the concerns of the offended at all. Certainly there are some human beings who plow through life never apologizing for the offenses they touch…
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Doubling
The French title of the film suggests a double meaning — La Double Vie de Veronique. Double Vie (vee) is double life … but it sounds so close to Double V (vay), which is French for W. Or, to put it another way, La W de Veronique … Weronika, the Polish version of the name….
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The Double Life of Veronique
I’ve been thinking today about possibly veering into a short series about the Krzysztof Kieślowski film made directly before “Three Colors: Blue”, called “The Double Life of Veronique.” When I was in Melbourne, Australia a couple years ago, I was wandering through their modern art museum complex, which included a museum of cinema, and noticed…
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Montaigne on Power
I’m nearly at the point now with my translations that I can start working on the essays that will accompany them. It’s not a moment too soon — I’ve been in a bad mood lately because my projects have been adrift. The Severance project is looking like a lot of work, so I’m avoiding it,…
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How to disappear
Lana Del Rey dropped a new song yesterday, but I’m not going to write about it, not yet anyway. I need to let her music settle in before I try to describe the feelings evoked. Instead, I want to go back to her “Norman Fucking Rockwell” album and the song “How to disappear.” In many…