Daily Slow Chat

2 comments

1. Last month, I finally bought new lenses for my old backup glasses. Not exactly cheap, that.

   My optician warned me that the model isn’t being sold anymore, so if anything happened, there would be no spare parts for it. She recommended I should just get new ones instead.

   Getting new glasses is a hassle, because I get headaches at the slightest pressure. So it usually takes me ages picking out a model of glasses I can live with. I haven’t needed my glasses repaired even once in the last decade, so I figured, whatever, not important, I’ll stick with the old ones.

   This morning, in the dark, I accidentally wiped them off my desk and a water bottle fell on them. Knocked one of the ear side pieces off from the main frame.

   *All the regret*. 🙁 🙁 🙁

   Really hope I can either find the tiny connector metal piece (fell off, no luck so far…) and glue it, or go ask if it could be replaced by a side piece of a different model. The frame’s still intact, after all. (Though I think I’m going to another optician to ask this than my regular one. I want to avoid the “I told you so, why didn’t you listen” look, ahaha sob.)

2. I don’t know why so many online yoga sessions are billed as morning yoga. I understand the need to start the day with the feeling of having done something good for yourself, but in the morning my body isn’t really in peak shape to stretch 😅 Cobra pose straight out of bed, yikes.

   So, I watched Stalker yesterday.

   First of all, this isn’t really an adaptation as much as it is a “here’s what I got from the book” by Tarkovsky, which isn’t much. There’s the vague concept of the Zone, which is the main point of the book. There are three characters, one of whom is the protagonist of the book, but he has absolutely nothing to do with the book self. It was super disappointing because the book is so good at character writing. Instead Tarkovsky turned him into a whiny twerp. Totally butchered. His wife, too, was such a strong woman in the book. Here, the first scene has her wailing on the ground because Red is going into the Zone. Justice for Guta!

   There are many beautiful shots. You can pause any scene and have a beautiful picture. Wait, you don’t have to pause it even, because every scene lasts 15 minutes with little camera movement.

   In the end, without my fun friend with whom I could pass commentary, I don’t think I would have made it through the film. I am divided if not having read the book would have made it better, because then I probably wouldn’t understand anything.

   The weirdest thing, however, came after the movie. I was reading around a bit, and found this:

   >We were shooting near Tallinn in the area around the small river Jägala with a half-functioning hydroelectric station. Up the river was a chemical plant and it poured out poisonous liquids downstream. There is even this shot in Stalker: snow falling in the summer and white foam floating down the river. In fact it was some horrible poison. Many women in our crew got allergic reactions on their faces. Tarkovsky died from cancer of the right bronchial tube. And Tolya Solonitsyn too. That it was all connected to the location shooting for Stalker became clear to me when Larisa Tarkovskaya died from the same illness in Paris.

   There are a lot of shots in the film where the actors are wading through or straight up lying in murky, foamy, horrid water. I felt so bad for them. Turns out it was even worse than I thought.

   So yeah, watch the movie, I guess? Or you know what, screw it, just read the book. It’s more or less the same time investment, and you’ll get out so much more.

   Hollywood, adapt this book, you cowards.