I just found out today that Marianne, the inspiration for Leonard Cohen’s ‘So Long, Marianne’ has died. Not everyone knows that ‘So Long Marianne’ was about a real Marianne, but in the ‘sixties Cohen lived with her for a while. She was Norwegian and in this memorial he describes her as ‘a beautiful soul.’
http://www.nme.com/news/leonard-cohen/95406
I keep thinking that any day now we will hear the news that Leonard Cohen is dead. But the guy just keeps going on. He’s a sort of guru of mine: any time I don’t know how to deal with a situation I think, ‘What would Leonard do?’ Of course, Leonard doesn’t want to be anyone’s guru – but that’s exactly what makes him perfect for me. I have a sort of Groucho Marx approach to discipleship – I wouldn’t choose as my guru anyone who actually wants to be a guru.
There’s a nice joke in ‘Finding Dory’ – which we went to see for Mark’s birthday (his choice) where the heroine, whenever she’s lost and doesn’t know what to do, thinks ‘What would Dory do?’ The eponymous blue john dory suffers from short-term memory loss, but what was a brilliant joke in Finding Nemo turns into a rather dull, overworked trope in this follow-up. It had its moments – I liked the character of the octopus with seven limbs – but basically it was lame. Which, for film featuring a load of fish and sea-creatures, is some achievement. Don’t bother.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2277860/?ref_=nv_sr_1
What you should bother with, though, is ‘Spotlight’. I’ll probably come back to this as it deserves a full review and deeper consideration, but the 2015 film of the Boston Globe’s uncovering of mass abuse by Catholic priests in Boston and how it opened a can of worms far larger than anyone could have dreamed, is a masterpiece. Beg, steal or borrow (but not from me).
That’s all for now folks. I’m in summer mode which means that posts are sporadic. Sorry about that, but I expect you’re all sunning yourselves on some strip of sand somewhere in the Med and don’t need me anyway.
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 