Sunday, March 12, 2006

Pasta and Syriana



After a night from hell I eventually start to feel a considerably better by about 9am and manage some painkillers that start to see off the residual headache. By afternoon I feel delicate, but recovered.

I’m scheduled to meet up with P&S tonight, but vague ideas I had about going to the supermarket and cooking for them are now a non-starter.

They suggest food and a film, but whilst I feel ok for the film, I comment that the first thing my stomach needs to deal with isn’t curry!

Angels that they are, they bring food to mine, colonise the kitchen and rustle a rather fine pasta dish. What excellent friends.

Food consumed we head to Showcase (shock horror tickets have gone up to £3.75!) and join about eight other people in watching Syriana. I have no idea how the Showcase manages to stay open now that the proliferation of multiplexes has stolen so much of its business, but I’m very glad they do.

The film is complex, with a multitude of story lines that only come together right at the end. Keeping up with them in the face of this withheld information is a bit of a challenge (especially in my fragile state), but it’s well worth the effort. An intelligent film, with some flaws (stereotyping of various characterisations for example), but well constructed and played out. Just leaves you feeling rather depressed about the state of the world and the west’s complicity in it all. Not to mention very aware about the responsibility you bear as a consumer of that black gold.

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