The Railway Man
Tuesday I watched the Riddick movies, while working. The first one was mostly Meh. The second was way more fun, with the Necromongers and such. The third was the best of the three. Poor puppy.
Today, Gert and I went to see The Railway Man after work.
It’s a movie after a true story about a man, Eric Lomax, stationed in Singapore during World War II. After the surrender of Singapore by the British in 1942, he and his fellow soldiers are captured and transported to work on the Thai-Burma railroad. Because Lomax is a radio man, he and his troop are at first kept in relative good conditions. But then the men start building a radio. And when it is found, Lomax takes the blame. Despite it being a radio only capable of receiving signals, he is extensively tortured because the Japanese believe he has been sending signals. One of the men torturing him is Interpreter Takashi Nagase.
After the war, Nagase escapes prosecution by pretending he never did anything but interpret. Lomax gets sent home and learns to sort of live with his experiences. Years later, he marries Patti. And when she discovers how deep his trauma runs, she sets in motion a sequence of events wherein Lomax travels back to the place where he was held. There is a museum there, now, and a Buddhist Temple. And Nagase is the tourguide there.
What follows is a deeply emotional meeting between the two where they try to reconcile the past and find a way to live with what happened instead of despite of it.
The movie takes a few liberties with the real story, notably in how the meeting between Lomax and Nagase plays out, but on the whole I found it deeply moving. The movie is slow (some might say too slow) and heavy; it cuts deep, both in the flash backs in the camp that depict the torture Lomax had to endure, as well as in the current time where the scars of that earlier time are still clearly visible. It is well served for ruminations about Human Nature, what one does in the most dire of circumstances to survive, how and what it does to you in the long run, and what is needed for true processing and dealing with things.
Yesterday I started at Webcare. Spent the day watching various people work to get a feel for the systems and the work. Today I actually got to do work. Since I’d done it before it was very well doable. I mostly did the stuff I knew and picked up questions about other departments as I went along. I don’t know as much about them as my “home” department, but that’ll come with time. I’m excited, it’s gonna be fun.
Yesterday I finished After Earth, the book of the movie. Now, the movie was really bad, but the book is actually pretty good. It helps it was written by Peter David. This is also what convinced me to take the book when I was over at Kim’s the other week to rummage through her box of books-to-get-rid-of. I’ve read several Star Trek tie-ins that Peter David wrote and I really enjoy those. He’s a good writer. Which was evident throughout the book. Of course he has to follow the script but he really managed to make it his own and work in a lot of extra background info about the world of After Earth that rounded out the story. The book is much better than the movie.
Saturday we went to Ikea, really early in the morning. I got the big Hemnes cabinet along with some fabric baskets to put inside it. When we got to the kitchen part, I fell for the dishes there. I’d been bored with my regular whites anyway so I got new plates and bowls in dark purple and faded green. Also two picture frames to display some of the Paul Kidby prints I got as a Kickstarter reward. After getting home I spent the rest of the day building the bloody cabinet. By nightfall it was ready so I could put stuff in it. It will probably take a little bit of getting used too, as it’s a wee bit deeper than I anticipated/remembered. But it does already look much better than before. It’s real nice to have a proper place to spread out the altar.
Movie day with Gert yesterday. I had the whole day off, so I went to the city early in the morning to meet up with him. Did some shopping first at Xenos where I bought me two awesome tea boxes.
Today I had a late shift so I went to the store in the morning. After getting to the register with my basket I realised I forgot my wallet at home :S Fortunately I could place my basket near the register while I biked back home to get it. So my quick shopping trip took a bit longer than expected 😀
ent to see Pacific Rim with Gert last night. I didn’t really know anything about the movie. Hadn’t even heard about it until a day or three ago. Didn’t know what to expect except “Godzilla-like monsters” and “giant robots”. I’m always up for sci-fi (related) things, and I’d seen a few gifsets on tumblr about the movie that made me think I’d like it. So when Gert, rather urgently, suggested we do a movie, I suggested Pacific Rim. He (obviously) said yes.
I liked the idea of the pilots needing to be brain-connected to be able to control the Jaegers, but I would have liked to see a bit more about how it works and what its effects are. Besides the giant flashback to Mako’s childhood, we don’t much get to see that, and I would have liked to know more about the effects of the neural handshake outside of the actual piloting. Does it linger, do you always keep basic access to each others memories? Bits and pieces with the other pairs would seem to suggest this, but I always like more of the sciencey stuff.
I loved how he played his character. Newton was fun, too, but a bit too naive at points. The interplay between was awesome thought. Even though they bicker a lot, they come through for each other in the end.
Raleigh, I kept thinking “I know this actor, I know this actor”, but I couldn’t place him and that distracted me some. But he was nice to look at, a decent guy and I really enjoyed his relationship with Mako.
The first of the February books was Ursula LeGuin’s The Dispossessed. I have read LeGuin before, but that was mostly the fantasy side of her (Earthsea series) although I do recall having read a book with short story sci-fi stuff too. Reading the back blurb I was immediately intrigued.