Right now, the only things to do is to wait for the days to pass by until I get to Guwahati. I think I deserve a long rest. I also need 5.5 GB of DC comics to whet my appetite.
Anne Rice is this writer whom I have been unable to make up my mind about. Some of her books ( Interview With the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, Servant of the Bones ) are so low-paced they can give Rip Van Winkle a complex. While others ( The Queen of the Damned, Vittorio the Vampire, The Tale of the Body Thief ) are white-heat. She also happens to write the darkest, most erotic bondage-themed fairy-tales ever ( The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty, Beauty’s Punishment, Beauty’s Release ) In Bombay, I had been to this shop, Lotus Books, that had an amazing collection, with amazingly high prices. Jeez! They actually increase the book prices every day with the changing exchange-rates. I found the Vampire Companion, a complete guide to Ms Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, and the nearly tattered copy had a price tag of six hundred and thirty rupees. Bloody grave-robbers, living off the dead!!!!!
I got Blood and Gold for sixty rupees yesterday, which is a very low price for a book released last year. And last night, I watched the first cd of Interview With the Vampire. Anne Rice had written the screenplay herself, so there were no surprises, except that I didn’t know Brad Pitt plays Louis. I thought it was Banderas in that role. The story moves at a leisurely pace, much like the book, with the philosophical discussions ( which were so integral to all of Rice’s books – existential angst of the vampire community ) chopped down. Tom Cruise plays LeStat in a flamboyant manner, the character’s cruelty, his vainness, his moments of unrestrained joy at being a vampire being enacted quite well by Cruise. Neat scene: a “dance of death” with a corpse of a plague-ridden woman. In my imagination, ( and Rice’s, i think) Lestat was much more taller, much more handsome.
Again, the disadvantage of VCDs – the annoying hiss of badly encoded audio cuts down much of Elliot Goldenthal’s background score.
The highpoint of the movie so far was Kirsten Dunst’s role of Claudia, a cherubic vampire child. I found her very different ( as in looks and demeanour) from the chirpy role of Mary-Jane in Spiderman; pretty impressive acting, I must say. I wonder if the film didn’t run into censorship problems with the Lolita-aspect of the whole thing – Claudia was supposed to fall in love with Louis, about fifteen years her senior.
I am trying to get my nocturnal bearings straight before i go back home, in order not to disturb my parents’ idea of “daily habits”. So my go-to-bed time gets earlier, and so does my rise-time, and as Mr James Thurber once put it, it’s enough to make a man healthy, wealthy and dead, all at the same time.
In tune with the above theme, I dutifully switched off the movie after the clock struck 12 ( or rather, after the digital watch beeped once), and went to sleep.
::They actually increase the book prices every day with the changing exchange-rates.
You know, most shops in Delhi do that. Robbers galore.
*Sigh*
This was exactly what led to the Kleptomaniac phase of my life. Remind me to tell u about it sometime…
wow! curious…
will do.
er…this 5.5 GB of comics…is it travelling to Bangalore any time soon ?
It’s travelling to Bangalore in the first/second week of November. :-D
Along with..oh..about 13 divX rips of movies.
uh… I know the 5.5 gigs can’t really travel to Delhi… but what if I send a friend of a friend with gobs of blanks? Pretty please? Pretty pretty please? Or maybe I’ll come….
Come!!! :-D
you’re tempting me….(not to mention fate)
Aah ! Thank you kindly.
Note to self: Get writer repaired now !
That package shall also include thy Cream album. Apologies for having kept it for so long.
can i …
uhmmm.. can i too copy ?
Anytime, buddy.
You were in Bombay? The man himself??
:-)
The same time you were in Bangalore. In time-slots of 6 hours on 3rd and 6th. The first time, escorted me to Planet M, Shoppers Stop, Andheri, and the second time, Arul Mani and myself went to Lotus Books.
Was this your first trip to Bombay??
I had come once, when I was in the Third standard and Nine years old. ;-)
Sort of funny aside: I read an interview a couple years back with Dunst and they asked her if she was dating anyone. At the time she wasn’t and when they asked her why she was having so much trouble finding someone she liked she said ‘my first kiss was with Brad Pitt in ‘Interview.’ It kind of set the bar high.’
I thought it was funny, anyway :)
Hmm. Ms Dunst seems to have a nice kiss-record…vampires, upside-down kissing. Wonder what/who’s next. :)
Hey, are you someone I’ve met in real life?
I am doomed.
I know this doesn’t have anything to do with your question. Just a general observation. “No, I don’t think we have” is the answer.
:)
Why are you doomed?
Just one of those days, I guess. ;-)
In Bombay, I had been to this shop, Lotus Books…..
where is this place?
bandra?
where in bandra?
SV Road. The junction between the Western Express Highway and SV road, to be precise. I believe u can be more specific by telling the autowallah to take you to Bada Masjid on SV Road.
BTW, the prices are obscenely high at Lotus. You’ve been warned!!!
I am trying to get my nocturnal bearings straight before i go back home, in order not to disturb my parents’ idea of “daily habits”.
ha ha ha.
incredibly funny.
You mean my trying to change my nocturnal bearings? Or my parents’ idea of daily habits?
zyaada chaat rahaa hoon kya?
having known both, i would say both!
Ahem Ahem.