Tuesday, August 25, 2015

5 Off My Head -- Lighten Up Balthazar

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I forget the context but several weeks ago the subject of the French auteur Robert Bresson came up and I admitted to you, the people, that I had shamefully never seen one of his films. I asked for suggestions where to begin and you were all very helpful! I have very kind, very intelligent readers, I adore you all. (Okay not you, but the other ones.) I have now seen two Bresson films -- Pickpocket and Au Hasard Balthazar, and they were both fabulous. That sequence in Pickpocket where the pack of thieves are reduced to a fluid series of hand motions, sliding billfolds in and out of the air like magic, was exhilarating cinema. And as for Balthazar -- jeez what a gut-punch of a movie.
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When I tweeted that I was attempting to make light of how much feeling I was feeling riding along with that damn depressed donkey from horror to humiliation and back again, but it did get me thinking -- why couldn't Balthazar just make like Breakin 2 and boogaloo himself outta that damn small town once and for all?  So here, with love, are...

5 Places Balthazar The Donkey Should Have Gone

1. Self Defense Class -- Just once I would have loved to see one of that assholes come at Balthazar with a whip and he swerves to the side and gets their arm pinned behind their back, or he just sprays the sons-of-bitches with mace, or something, anything. Yeah yeah Jesus Christ turned the other cheek but he didn't have access to nun-chucks, ya know?

2. Massachusetts Institute of Technology -- As proven in the one genuinely lighthearted sequence in the movie, Balthazar is shown to be really great at Math when he becomes "The Mathematical Donkey" in a circus act. Why couldn't Balty head to college? If given the chance maybe we'd be seeing a movie where Michael Fassbender's playing the donkey that invented the iPod instead.

3. The Hundred Acre Wood -- You know who could've snapped Eeyore out of his funk? One relaying of Balthazar's tale of lifelong woe and Eeyore would've realized how good he had it, palling around with soothing stuffed bears. 

4. Shrek's Swamp -- On the other hand I think Balthazar telling his sad story to Donkey from the Shrek movies would have driven Donkey to donkicide, and how much better off would we all be if that'd happened?

5. Fire Island -- What does a gay donkey eat?  
Hayyyyyyy
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1 comment:

sissyinhwd said...

The answer to #5 is Donkey Dick