L'arnacoeur

I went to see L'arnacoeur (Heartbreaker) at a pre-release preview screening yesterday. I didn't know it was subtitled, but the fact that it was signified good things to me. Firstly, if a subtitled film makes it to the Odeon and not just the Tyneside Cinema (my local Indie cinema) then that means it's had impact of some sort (or that it has a powerful distributor behind it). Secondly, it signified that I was about to see something quirky and I like quirky, so I was happy enough. I watch a lot of foreign films, subtitles don't put me off at all. However, about eight, maybe ten, people walked out within the first fifteen minutes!!! Obviously, the print-off preview tickets didn't have the original French title on them so people were thrown. Still, once there, why leave? Are subtitles really so off-putting to some?

Comment and discussion is most welcome, cuz I'm well confuddled.

Incidentally, it was a cute, outré sort of film. Better, I'd say, than the average American Rom-Com. Same ending, of course, but the story was told in a more whimsical, off-beat, way.

NB: The female lead is played by Venessa Paradis and I have to say, oftentimes, she looked a little like her other half in his Mad Hatter role. All wide-eyed and gap-toothed. Just saying. Perhaps, like some pet owners start to look like their dogs, then some girlfriends start to look like their boyfriends' film roles? Or vice-versa.

Nice Rock Stars? No ta!

I was thinking recently about how peope really don't like Chris Martin and, therefore, Coldplay. Though most people I know own hard or soft copies of at least some of their stuff. I got to thinking about how this disliking of them, but mainly him, came about. At first everyone loved Colplay and Chris Martin, didn't they? It felt like they did anyway. Then, I caught on to a flicker of a notion in my wee brain and it hit me. It's just cuz he's nice innit? That's all. And we don't like our rock stars nice. As soon as Chris Martin aligned himself with worthy causes and showed himself as an altruistic type, all credibility for Coldplay seemed to wane and Chris Martin slagging became a national sport. He's not the first to suffer this fate. If we trace the careers of a handful of other upopular types a pattern emerges. Think about it, Sting, rock god of the early eighties, became the person you sniggered and rolled your eyes at the moment he appeared on Wogan with his new bezzy mate, a Peruvian jungle dweller with a saucer stuck in his bottom lip, and ranted on about the Rainforests. Jagger, was probably sat at home watching in his pants, joint hanging out of his gob, a woman at each side, drinking JD neat and giggling as the death knell rang out over Sting's popularity. Next to hear the mighty clanging knell of doom was Bob Geldof. Mad, bad, lead singer of under-acheiving band The Boomtown Rats, decides to become Mr. Charity himself and single handedly invents Live Aid. Nobody would ever buy a Boomtown Rats record again and Geldof became known as "That awld twat". Even his prime-time, live TV, swearing antics couldn't save him now. Ding. Dong. Cling. Clang. Who's next? Why, Bono, of course. U2 used to be the coolest rock band on the planet. They did. Honest. Then Bono started appearing in photos next to Prime Ministers and Presidents, shaking their hands, telling them he spoke for all of us. His 'big thing', his cause, his Raison d'être, became Third World Debt. Overnight, one of the rockingest lead singers ever became known as a bit of an eejit. Liam Gallagher laughed so hard he blew a gram of coke off a mirror. It's a shame that caring about stuff makes a rock star a git, yet, you can be a pop star and do 'charidee' stuff and still be loved. We're odd beasts us humans. Odd beasts indeed. But at least we're not that c*nt Chris Martin, eh? That'd be shit.