Remakes

BLOOD SHOULD BE SPILT
I've just heard that the excellent film, "Let the Right One In" is going to be given the Hollywood remake treatment.
Why doesn't Hollywood come up with new ideas of their own? What gives them the arrogance to remake a great film? Instead, why not back the superb original?

You'd think the powers that be in LA would have learnt from the flops of past remakes. I remember how I flinched on hearing they were going to remake the black and white, "The Women" I suspect most people haven't seen this brilliant comedy starring Rosalind Russell, Norma Shearer, Joan Fontaine.. not one man appears in the film, oh yes, at the end, Norma Shearer's husband's legs and feet are running down a flight of stairs to meet her.

I think, finally, finally, Hollywood did remake this film, but from the poster, it looked more like Sex and the City. I didn't go to see it.

What's that phrase? If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Don't even touch it.

Cats

Sushi and her sister, Couscous were neutered yesterday. Today, when I stroke them, they turn their heads into the palms of my hands and purr loudly. They are curled up right now in the little pink study behind me. They're keeping close.

Dilemmas

Not getting much right at the moment. I think I know what I've got to do, but one person's 'right' is another person's 'wrong' isn't it?
Seems that books have to be plot driven more than anything else. I can work with that.
But do we follow our head or our heart?

Erosion Re-writing

I've reached the part in Erosion, Chapter 27, where it's not editing now, it's re-writing. I'm excited, because I know this is what is needed, but it's going to be hard work and take time. I think I've got four weeks to get it clear and then re-edit the lot. Then I'll be busy with other work and looking at other people's work, so won't have the right head space for mine. Editing will be fine then, but certainly will be difficult to be creative.
I really like the people in Erosion, really like them. Group hug? Don't think they'd like that at all. In fact I know how one or two of them would definitely react. Not pretty.
Right. Stop distracting myself. You have a deadline missus.

Writing dialogue

Funny when you have conversations with yourself. I'm working on Erosion now, and it's great, I'm on a roll with chalets collapsing, ground falling away, the shock and devastation.
And then I paused, listening to the characters' words as I was reading them aloud. I imagined I was at the Writers' group and someone said, '....I don't agree with their views.'
And I said, 'Well, they're not you. They don't live in Chorlton, they weren't teachers at universities, they don't quaff wine and go to writers' groups...' and then I started crying.
Someone asked if they were based on people I knew. Not exactly. Definitely not exactly, but they're based on people I've known but only in a hazy estimation (that's not a cop out) and these people with this other way of thinking and living in a world that no longer exists are all dead. And it upset me. And then I realised why these characters have these views. I want the people I knew to be heard. I just want them to be heard. That's all.

Happiness

Lost my beloved green glasses a few weeks ago and found them outside this morning dangling from a red geranium plant.

Oliva, Oliva, Oliva

Simplicity, paring down to what we need. The Lost Steps, a tatty book I found on a charity shop bookshelf. Who was it by? Alejo Carpentier. A revelation about what we need, enjoying it and then thinking we need more than this and finding out to our loss, that we don't. Lesson learnt? What do you think? We're human beings living in a world surrounded by 'things' and I mean, that because they are merely things. And proving ourselves, to ourselves, by striving to do this, that, and why? What do we need to prove to ourselves? Why do we need to prove anything to ourselves, putting the whole, proving things to other people, aside? Why isn't it enough just to be?