Initially I wrote this as a review for the movie, because I just finished watching it, but I couldn't help comparing it to the book, so it turned out Initially I wrote this as a review for the movie, because I just finished watching it, but I couldn't help comparing it to the book, so it turned out to be about both.
I saw this movie as a child and it tore me apart. I had never felt this way about a movie before. I read the book later, as an adult. I am happy that I waited to do that, because the book is not like the movie. The characters and the story are darker and more complex. That isn't to say that the movie is weaker. Admittedly, there are some fundamental differences. Some things are changed, some key aspects and characters are left out in the movie adaptation. Nonetheless, it carries the spirit and essence of the novel it was inspired from. The differences are not disappointing or offensive, but balancing. They complete and complement each other. Both movie and book are unique and powerful in their own way, each offering something the other can't.
I find Gwenwyfar equally annoying in both (though I admit her redeeming features) and Morgaine equally amazing. It Lancelost and Gwenwyfar's relationship that is the most famous one. But I love the relationship between Arthur and Morgaine more. I remember how deeply touched and excited I was while watching for the first time. I was too young to understand all the complex nuances and subtle hints. As I got older, I saw it on a whole new level. I had an acquaintance who loves the movie and the book as much as me, but who could not accept that the love between Arthur and Morgaine goes beyond sibling love. I was quite moved. Even the first time, when I couldn't see everything that was left unsaid. I could feel it. I was quite shocked and excited to see that the nature of their feelings was presented much more unequivocally in the book and that I hadn't been wrong in what I had sensed.
I also came to discover new sides to the characters that were left out in the movie. They turned out to be much more ambiguous and layered than what we are led to believe in the film. The other wonderful surprise was the role Accolon that turns out to be much more substantial than what we see on the screen. And then there is Kevin, who doesn't appear there at all, but is a key figure in the novel and one of my three favourite characters, the other two being Arthur and Morgaine. The only serious gripe that I've got is the infatuation of Morgaine with Lancelot that doesn't bring anything neither to her as a character, nor to the overall story. It actually burdens the story and it feels very weird and out of place. Even though Arthur and Morgaine's relationship is supposed to be the scandalous element, I found her obsession with Lancelot and the way he treated her much more disturbing. I don't actually believe that she truly desires him. I actually think she sees him as another version of Arthur. And since she can't openly act on or even admit to herself how she feels about Arthur, she is projecting all those desires on Lancelot. But other than that, the whole plot line, the character development, the ideas invested, everything is truly outstanding.
What I want to close with is my belief that all those who claim that the story is anti-Christian, are wrong. It doesn't speak against Christianity. Actually, the pagans in the book, even Morgaine, who is the lead character, commit much worse atrocities than the Christians. So if we take it too literally, it might be seen the other way around. I believe it speaks against bigotry and extremism in all their forms, in all religions. It is a lesson she comes to learn the hard way. That names, images and symbols are not good or evil, right or wrong by themselves, but rather what we make them to be. It is the basic message the book begins with. That the world around us is shaped and ruled by our thoughts and believes and there is no such thing as true tale, that truth has many faces.
“Well, so it must be, for as man saw reality, so it became.”
“For this is the thing the priests do not know, with their One God and One Truth; that there is no such thing as a true tale. Truth has many faces and the truth is like the old road to Avalon; it depends on your own will, and your own thoughts, whither the road will take you, and whether, at the end, you arrive at the Holy Isle of Eternity or among the priests with their bells and their death and their Satan and hell and damnation… ”
'For all the Gods are one god,' she said to me then, as she had said many times before, and as I have said to my own novices many times, and as every priestess who comes after me will say again, 'and all the Goddesses are one Goddess, and their is only one Initiator. And to every man his own truth, and the God within.'
Even the old goddess has many faces and seems to be equally generous and cruel. In the end Arthur tells Morgaine that to him she is the goddess. Knowing how he feels about her, it is a fitting comparison, aiming to show that ultimately we all choose our own idols. If we can believe in one deity with many faces, why not in its new incarnations? If people come and go, if they are born and die and change a thousand times during their lifetimes, why do they not allow the same those in whose image they were supposedly created? I feel that this is the main point of the story and its true heart. It calls not to a god or a goddess, it doesn’t speak against or in defense of any religion, but rather it speaks about faith, faith in humanity in general. It is what Merlin tells to Vivian before he dies. That maybe the truest expression of the divine is our human nature and the joy we find in being humans. “I have called on the Goddess and found her within myself”...more
Desire. Is it pleasure or pain? Can and should we try to control it? To trust it? To understand it? Do we shape our desires or do they shape us? What Desire. Is it pleasure or pain? Can and should we try to control it? To trust it? To understand it? Do we shape our desires or do they shape us? What part of us is desire? Is it the purest and deepest aspect of human nature? Where does it come from? Can a desire on its own be vile or virtuous or only actions are bound to be judged? How much do we know about our desires and where do they lead us? What brings two people together? What brings together a French girl and Chinese man twelve years older than her? Set in the 1930s in Indochina, this is a tale about two people trying to break their bonds, but unable to do so. They are kindred spirits in more ways than one. They are both oppressed by their families, they are both unable to understand their feelings. They lose themselves in passion that is born from more than romance. It is a passion for change, for freedom. But can there be truly freedom in desire? Is desire bound to enslave us or free us? Buddhists believe that desire is the reason for all human suffering and only liberation of desire may lead to ultimate happiness. But along with pain can we also find pleasure in unfulfilled desires? Is all longing pain and dissatisfaction? Can it be an inspiration, a fuel? Don’t those of us focusing only on present pleasures close the doors for achieving greater ones? Should we give up the possibility for more in order to fully enjoy what we have now or should we sacrifice some of that bliss for the hope of a bigger one? Longing brings pain and emptiness with itself, but it also makes the good part even better. Which is better? An ordinary, calm, perfect happiness or happiness stained by the pain which comes with longing, but also enriched by the intensity and passion that come along with it? The former sounds better if we accept that happiness is just a lack of pain. But Is it just that? In “Notes from the Underground” it is explored the idea of finding pleasure in pain. People don’t just desire what they cannot have. They also desire what ultimately can never bring them happiness. Often the greatest joys and sorrows are consequences of each other. This is a story of doomed lovers, who love each other with all the intensity and passion of people who know they are about to lose each other. "He didn’t speak of the pain, never said a word about it. Sometimes his face would quiver, he’d close his eyes and clench his teeth. But he never said anything about the images he saw behind his closed eyes. It was as if he loved the pain, loved it as he’d loved me, intensely, unto death perhaps, and as if he preferred it now to me.". Do we treasure the most that which we are bound to lose? Do we sometimes risk to lose it in order to feel it more intensely? If we always want more, does that make us adventurers, masochists, seekers of wisdom…or maybe just people? Desire can built us or ruin us. Sometimes is does both. If desire is pleasure and pain equally, how do we cope? How do the protagonists do it? She admits her feelings only in the end, when she has already lost him. Maybe because she was afraid that loving him would make the loss all the more painful? But it would have made the anterior pleasure all the greater and wouldn’t those precious moments, her getting everything she can out of them, eventually be a consolation as well? Maybe this is why he loves pain. It is pain born out of feeling which he savours at its wholesome. Do we dare to be adventurous and desire or are we determined to treasure that which we already have? Dreams of the future can both enrich and rob us of our present. It is all about balance. We should always look with hope for the future and dream, but not in a way that makes us forget the value of that which we have now. We should always remember the value of what we already have, but we should also always remember to dream. Hadn’t great artists and adventurers dreamed and desired, we wouldn’t have had everything we have today. Worlds are built on dreams and desires.
He is an actor, an escapist, an explorer of the dark and rusty corners of the human soul and all those little, guilty selves that swiSlightly spoilery
He is an actor, an escapist, an explorer of the dark and rusty corners of the human soul and all those little, guilty selves that swim just below the surface, always waiting to emerge and reveal to us one less than ideal identity, or, as in his case, a destructive one. At its core this is a novel about destruction. To him people are no more than mere figures, voiceless objects, beautiful pieces of wood, netsukes. He explores them, savoures them, destroys them. To him they are "a hope. To annihilate". He is a collector of human misery, he pursues death. To him sex is not an exquisite pleasure, nor a process of creating a new life. To him danger is the strongest stimulant and every sexual act is another step toward his goal of ultimate self-destruction. Because he is "the spirit of negation". To him "a body opens like a flower, like a wound beneath the assassin’s knife, a street hit by a grenade.". This is a very dark story - enriched by the sensual and original voice of the author - that strips the body of one "normal" marriage and reveals all its imperfections with bold candour, showing that quite often beneath all the glamor, makeup, dashing clothes and dazzling smiles there are scars. Scars that are often visible only to the one that bears them. He tries to show those scars to the only person of some value to him - by dropping "clues" - but she stays blind to them and even when they become bloody red, she ignores them. The ending is tragic and brutal and while I thought it didn't serve any particular purpose, I see it differently now. I think that had it been any different, it wouldn't have sent the message it sends. And it is a simple message. "Wake up before it's too late". It calls for us to look deeper into ourselves and those close to us, it begs us not to let ourselves be so dazzled by the beauty of the netsuke as to lose all desire to feel and understand its substance. Open your eyes, because the life that's on the line may turn out to be your own.
I admit that I couldn't get through the rest of "The Vampire Chronicles", but this one stays a favourite.
First, I really like Anne Rice's prose. It isI admit that I couldn't get through the rest of "The Vampire Chronicles", but this one stays a favourite.
First, I really like Anne Rice's prose. It is so beautiful and enchanting. The whole story comes along with a good measure of dark sensuality, which I particularly like. What is more important to me, though, is that it presents, in a very captivating way, problems which have been haunting humanity since for ever. How many people in reality live tortured by guilt and loneliness and feel different than everybody else the way Louis does? Or how many people are tormented by the thought that their looks do not show their true self and that the others are unable to see past the surface? (Claudia). Or how many people are forced to live and suffer with someone they can never quite connect to, out of necessity, loneliness, because they love them despite all, or all three at once? I think many people can relate to the heroes (I should say anti-heroes, really) of this dark tale.
What is loneliness? What is the world? What is eternity? What does it mean to be immortal? What is the nature of existence? Is there God? What does it mean to be good? What does it mean to be evil? And which is the bigger evil - to be the actual committer of a crime or to allow it? What is life, what is death? It speaks not only of, and the value of, life and death of humans as individuals, but of the life and death of beliefs, values, possibilities.
It is told through the POV of one narrator, but it has a really big scope. Anne Rice shows an amazing skill in reflecting people's feelings and struggles. What is fiction if not a mirror to reality? Two opposite concepts which are not that opposite, after all. Every creation of art is a message born out of its creator's experience and inner world.