My favourite movies

MOONRISE KINGDOM (2012)

directed by Wes Anderson

what a beautiful love story...

with a great cast of actors (Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Frances McDormand, Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton and more)

...beautifully and humorously directed

..... the cinematography is great

This is a love story of 2 youngsters who have a brief encounter and become pen pals. 

They plot their great escape together and chaos unfolds.

I love the pan-faced children with their serious and no-nonsense dialogue. 

Quite refreshing.

 

QUARTET

with Maggie Smith, Billy Connely, Tom Courtenay and Pauline Collins
The film was directed by Dustin Hoffman

It's so funny how things work. Just Wednesday night friends and I were talking about the lack
of support of classical music and opera in SA. The fact is that a handful of us support local
popular music, like pop, folk, rock and other styles. I feel quite proud of the fact that I  support local music. 

Unfortunately I cannot say the same for classical music / opera. I think I have seen the inside
of City hall for a classical concert a very few times. I can probably count those times on both my hands. It is a fact that there are less and less opportunities for classical musicians in this country and that if we are not careful it is an industry that might just die on us.


The 3 of us who had this conversation decided we are going to check out the classical calendars and be sure to start tuning in to these events just as we would at rock and other concerts. Why not?

Then tonight I went to watch Quartet - a beautiful movie about an old age home that caters especially  for retired musicians. What an interesting concept. Besides the fact that the movie is filled with humour and romance - what touched me the most in the movie was the conversations around the fleeting nature of life.  The different story lines in the movie made me think about the measurement of happiness and how it is not necessarily what we achieve, 
but how we enjoy the "now" and deal with the consequence of age that matters the most.



It was great to see all those old people have fun,laugh and live passionately in spite of the constant reminder of "the approaching end". Must one really come so close to your end before you can truly live honestly and passionately? I hope not.

I think this movie inspires. It inspired me to be less serious about myself, my job, my so called place in society and to live in the moment. It also inspired me to go to the opera more often - to go and support my local philharmonic orchestra and classical musicians. It also reminded me why I love music so much. It really does put fun into life and relieves pain when it feels most unbearable. 

Check out the Cape Town Philharmonic orchestra calendar. I know Pretty Yende is performing very soon and heard that it is a shame to miss this internationally acclaimed opera singer. 

http://www.cpo.org.za/

For classical shows in Stellenbosch: http://academic.sun.ac.za/music/concerts.html

If you live in Joburg, check out this site: http://www.jpo.co.za/

If you would like to add more sites for others to have a look at, feel free to make your comments and recommendations here.