Hancock and Dujardin

I saw a midnight showing of the new summer superhero movie “Hancock” a few nights ago. The previews made this movie look to be very promising: Will Smith as a superhero who drinks way too much and causes havoc because of it. I was also excited about this movie because of the originality of the idea. The first half of the film lived up to the hope, and featured a great mix of action, humor, and dramatic scenes. However, the second half of the film was a complete failure. While I won’t give away any of the plot, I felt like the second half of the story was poorly written, and didn’t do the movie as a whole any justice. All in all, this movie is a tough call since it is half great and half terrible.

I also recently finished reading “We’ll To the Woods No More” by Edouard Dujardin. This is an obscure French novel originally published in 1888, and according to the introduction it didn’t receive much acclaim and became a “forgotten novel.” However, it did receive recognition a few decades later when James Joyce discovered the novel and said that it inspired him to develop and perfect his stream-of-consciousness technique. As a fanatical Joycean, I had to check it out to see how it relates to Joyce’s work. This is definitely as stylistic read, since the story overall isn’t too exciting (though it isn’t necessarily boring). The work is written from first person, in the present tense, and follows the internal thoughts of a young man walking around Paris one evening as he waits for and ponders about the woman he loves. It is not difficult to follow (especially if compared to the stream-of-consciousness masters that came decades later) and can be quite interesting and a bit humorous at times. Now, as I said before, it is a stylistic read, and I found as I read along I was wondering if the story would ever reach a “climax,” or if it would just drift from here to there aimlessly. However, when I got to the final chapter, I was really blown away, as many of the seemingly unimportant events suddenly have a lot of relevance. Also, since it is told completely from the narrator’s mind, the reader can figure stuff out which the narrator hasn’t figured out yet (and perhaps never will). Also, the book is quite short, being less than 150 pages. I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in modernist and stream-of-consciousness writing, especially fellow Joyceans; or, anyone interested in French love stories; or, fuck it: anyone that wants to read.

That is all for now. I am hoping to put a story up soon (though I have been saying that for a while and still have not followed through). Have a happy Fourth!
- Liam