PS: The post I've talked about before? The personal exposure in my first blog? Here it is translated from the
original in Portuguese.
Amélie on the stairs
Hello. My name is Adriana
and I want tell you a story.
One day, a few years ago, I went to the movies and, as usual, I was super late. I bought the ticket and run off to my destiny – that, I heard, was fabulous. Being in time was my priority, and, with the movie as my goal, I went up the stairs heading to the theater. On that moment, when I looked up, I saw the person I wanted to not see at all on those days. OK, for him, maybe the meeting wasn't thrilling either. We crossed our paths, one up, the other down, in a violent shoulder encounter. That was one of the most awful and depressing moments of my life. So surreal, I felt like it was happening to someone else. Perhaps that’s why I couldn't think about it at that exact moment. The point was to be on time for the movie.
The picture was The
Fabulous Destiny of Amelie Poulain. I fell in love with Amélie, her insane
imagination, so much like my own and the
people I love. Her fear of breaking in peaces so similar to myself, her curiosity
and her care about others so familiar. At the end, crying buckets - So, little Amelie... your bones aren't made of
glass. You can take life's knocks. If you let this chance go by,
eventually, your heart will become as dry and brittle as my skeleton.
So... go get him, for Pete's sake! -, I came back to the stairs
scene...
And something absolutely amazing happened then: I realized that the fiction was the shoulder crash, a meeting so rude and brutal between two beings who, not along time ago, shared their dreams, ideals and hopes.And a beautiful love. More real and intimate was Amélie’s world, screened in shadows and light before my eyes. Amelie was extremely close.
Fiction, in movies, literature, music, painting, photography is not an escape, but, for me, it is a way to meet ourselves. All of these forms of telling I cherish deeply, even when they are pretty close and almost a routine. They compose my life through amazing tales.
The story Amélie and the stair is the first one. Others will come. Each and every one of them I met at a movie theater. With all of them, I can find myself. Sorry if this sounds corny, but it’s true. And I hope that you'd relate to it. This place is mine and yours. The stories can have no end, even after the final period. If you want to tell your own view of a story, send it to me and I'll post it here. Or you may tell one of your own, or show your dissatisfaction - there is a space in here for that. You can also leave just a commentary, and I will treasure each of them. However, a commentary can be very restrictive, and I think that the movies and what we learn with them shouldn't be enclosed in a tight space. Doing so is restrict the imagination and the wish of telling a story.
So, you're very welcome to the Amélie’s imagination and her steps of tales.
PPS: I saw Batman vs Superman in a Easter Sunday. That reminded me another story I wrote about Easter and movies for Os Degraus de Amélie:
Movie
Kitchen
For me, Hamburg always was the city to which the Beatles lost their first bass player and where all the cool European rock bands played at their beginning. The place of the craziest rock gigs, I thought the city should be amazing.
In the year of 2009, I came to the city for a period of training in company specialized in catering. I don’t cook anything, I’m not even capable of boiling the water for tea – my kettle is electric. That I care for the most elegant teas in the world is a surprise to my mother, who is perfectly familiar with my poor taste for food. Junk is a compliment to my specialty, one that I’m careful to choose – my fries must be crunchy, no less.
Well, about the catering. The company provided an opportunity to improve its workers skills on food delivering in different branches of activities. One of them were the movie’s production. In this area I can move easily. I'm a compulsive learner, always eager to discover different fields of action in life and business. This facet of my personality allowed me to apply for an excellent job as a professional learner, with the chance for a lot of good and weird experiences.
One of these opportunities took place in the Easter time, year 2009. Alone in an unknown city, lost in translations in an impossible language – despite it sounding so beautiful - I took a bold resolution: invite the other young, crazy and hungry 16 trainees from the different parts of the planet for an Easter lunch in the tiny flat that the company had put us in. The residential area was great, but there were no shops around. We were used to risk a few adventures around the city, looking for different places and people. This time, we could have a nice and homely reunion in the minuscule box that was home for us in German, an attempt to know each other better, be closer and, of course, have lots of fun. Nowadays I realize that this was also an attempt to diminish the home sickness a bit. Ok, a very obscure attempt – we were cool or what? On the outside, we were all free souls in the universe… On the pit of our most secret feelings, we just wanted to be back home.
So I started a frenzy. Nothing that I decide to do is free from my neurosis and excessive ways. After inviting each one of the crazy trainees, I brainstormed a ton of ideas in order to achieve the most innovating, cosy, amazing, tasting, impossibly passionate and, of course, unexpensive lunch of all times. Create a nice theme became my mission in life for a few nights – thanks God the days were so full of work that I couldn’t think in anything else during day time. Before bed time, though, it was obsession hour. One night, I was watching German TV – it was a funny experience to say the least – when I paused the channel surfing in Mostly Martha. At that moment, I realized that, like almost everything else in my life, the movies would be the subject. And it made sense. My work was to provide food for movie’s productions. Yay. The subject of our amazing Easter lunch way from home would be the movies' food. After the compliments for my genius idea (!!!!), I started the search for the perfect meal.
First thought: movies about food? In this search, I must have forgotten most of them. Ok, here are the ones I actually remembered. Babette’s Feast was an immediate remembrance, but Babette’s blissful meal wasn't for me. Turtle soup? Salmon Caviar?? Stuffed quail??? No way, I’m very fond of processed meat to take so seriously this dinosaur. The dessert, maybe, but I had to google it, because I didn't remember which one was (can you blame me? After the turtle soup???). Well, despite the gross cousine, it was clear that Babette’s feast should make an appearance anyway. I took a mental note to put away the few and ugly furniture in my tiny house box and dominate the space with a big table, built out of whatever I could find. It wouldn't be hard, and the other guests could bring their own chairs. But that big table from Babbete's was a strong image. The china would be more difficult to find, but I wasn’t nosy without a good reason. The lady from the nearest boulangerie, our refuge of croissant and cinnamon among that sea of German box houses, for sure would lend us some.
Well, well. Other films? Mostly Martha again. Ok, from it, pizza or the spaghetti that the cute Italian chef cooks for Martha’s sad niece. I loved Julia & Julie, the most recent movie about food I've seen at that time. From it I chose the chocolat and almond cake. I downloaded the Julia Child book from the internet – hush –, a very badly scanned copy, but useful anyway. Bruschettas were also obligatory. Since the movie, I became very partial about it, all that fried tomato in a greasy toast. I have to confess that I could accept even the bad versions of it – Fridays, hello! -, everything for a bread loaded with tomatoes. The duck though... no way it would enter my kitchen. I already could see all the renegade people, schnaps friends, around the table, on a cold but sunny day, sunflowers in the room – the infinite possibilities on my head - all of them joyful and grateful for an amazing and happy meal… Delusion in the best Amélie fashion.
Ok. There is that Greek movie about cinnamon meatballs. I forgot its name. But to be honest, moussaka looks a very difficult dish for me, despite the big plans for lunch. That was another movie to be only remembered... The aubergines from Mediterrâneo. I love the final scene. Olives... The Son of the Bride’s tiramisu. Stop, stop! We don't need another dessert. Or maybe that was a good idea, tons of dessert and nothing else. It would not be bad at all. The most traditional films about famous chefs didn't call me at all. Vatel, nope. LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLAT, how could I've forgotten this one? I felt obligated to drop some tears over the food. Ok, the story was getting better and better.
When we talk about food, the best recipes for me are those from the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, the TV show with the guys the run around the whole episode – I love that! I don’t see it anymore, but I was a really addicted to it not a long time ago. Pita bread pizza with olive-oil, parmesan, rosemary (... and thyme...), everybody loves it. Stuffed mushrooms with goat cheese and rosemary... again. Well, at this point, we our lunch was composed by three entrées, three desserts and, more likely, a loooooooot of wine and brandy and whatever else we would be able to drink. But still no first course.
I could be really innovative and serve hamburger. Don’t be so crazy, Amélie. Mushroom Ravioli would be a nice touch, and the next day my second name would be vampire nerd. Well, maybe spaghetti wouldn't be such a bad idea. We always could relate it to the Lady and the Tramp movie. On the mad search for the perfect meal, all the movies that changed my mind about food and put me in the direction of the first restaurant at my sight after the screening disappeared of my mind. Just like that.
Chocolat is a very nice movie, but lets put a break on the dessert madness.
My head couldn't take it anymore, hurting badly at any tiny thought about those crazy plans. What about a bucolic and nice lunch? Bucolic... bucolic... Provence is bucolic! But I couldn't remember a nice meal in any movie scened on Provence, just the mad people around a table, under a tree, gossiping and drinking wine while bitiching about family and love affairs. Hmmm, drinking wine, of course. Italy? No, I needed something different.
The days passed in a fast pace while I was thinking about the Easter lunch. About that, I thought better, became more docile and decided the subject. Spaghetti and meatballs would be – so much thought for that… ok. Come on, it would be funny, trivial, irreverent... I was not too convinced yet, but even so a sense of peace finally reached me.
Just a few days before Easter Sunday, with my shopping list in my pocket, the china deal agreed with Hildegard, the owner of our favorite boulangerie – Pain Allemand, her ex-husband was French - the sunflowers ordered in the flower market, Cedric, the cutest and craziest Irish trainee in the company called us all to eat and drink until death got us apart in a restaurant in the port area in Hamburg. Everybody said a loud yes, despite some cold feet and fake fear. Until now, this was the only part of the city we had not been yet, and all we need was a good reason – like we really needed that - to go to an unknown and different place. The reviews on the restaurant were excellent, the place was the best in the city, the chef was young and very famous, The music was great, some said. The patrons would usually end the nigh dancing, drinking and whatever.
Shopping list safe in the pocket, there I went with the others trainees to this magic place.
Forget the cold irony of this cruel world. Soul Kitchen was a true heaven for lost souls. Everything we could expect and more, much more. Our grasshopper party – 16 people that looked like the black plague – fit perfectly in the warehouse that accommodates the restaurant. Our noise wasn't more than a little stone in the ocean of chaos… The food? Amazing, beautifully served, although it almost never reached to the table that had originally ordered it – wandering dancing fingers would grab what was at hand from the server tray. The customers? No one was similar to the other, an unbelievably crazy crowd. Everybody were together, and each one by its own.
It was insane. A beautiful madness. We went there for dinner on Wednesday, going back home just for a change of clothes before work. At the company, throughout the day, I promised myself I would go to the grocery store after work. It was Thursday, and somehow we found our blameless selves at Soul Kitchen again. We didn't even care for schnapps before getting there. Next morning, I stopped at the box house with a slight guilt and the shopping list yet in my coat pocket. On Friday, the sun got up to a desert city, and of course Soul Kitchen was the only place to go. And who goes to a grocery shop on Friday before Easter??? No way. This time, when I got home, there was only a distant thought about the shopping list, that got lost under the sofa when I threw my coat there, never stopping for a second while kissing a cute Irish.
The days were spent on a raze mist, and we lost the perception of time. The sky was not a limit, and more chaos the better. On Saturday there was a private party at Soul Kitchen, and just when we were about to take our disillusioned souls to another place, the heaven’s door opened at last, a band started a gig and we could finally eat tons of an amazingly good dessert, with some weird collateral effects… Better not talk about it.
The sun rising in a grey sky, we put ourselves together and headed home. The 16 grasshoppers stopped first to pay a mandatory visit to Frau Hildegard in order to get the everyday cafe au lait and croissant. The owner was not there, only the Iranian guy that worked for her, with his ipod on and not much more in mind. For that reason, without any sane person to remind us, the Sunday Easter came and went unnoticed, without notice. We just realized the Easter had gone away when the German receptionist at the firm, early on the next Monday, asked about missing home on the Sunday Easter. But by then it was too late.
That’s one of the reasons why I usually say that making so detailed plans is almost impossible. And futile. I missed my so cherished and over planned lunch? Oh, well, to say the truth, while over thinking about it, I had this lunch a million times already, through a zillion of movies, with different people from around the world. And more: I wouldn't trade my drunk and happy Easter for nothing else. Soul Kitchen had been a nice surprise and a very good choice.
*** On the 2010 Sunday Easter, I saw Soul Kitchen (Directed by Fatih Akin. Germany, 2009, 99 min.). It was crazy fun, an wonderful experience, and so this story came to mind.
All the refernces, in order of appearance: 1, The 5th Beatle is Stuart Stutcliffe (yep, I know George Martin is called that too); 2. Mostly Martha (2001); 3. Babette's Feast (1987); 4. Julie & Julia (2009); 5. A Touch of Spice (2003); 6. Son of The Bride (2001); 7. Vatel (2000); 8. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (2003-2007); 9. Like Water for Chocolate (1992); 10. Lady and the Tramp (1955); 11. Twilight (2008); 12. Chocolat (2000).
The first movie on my edition of 1001 Movies to See Before You Die (the one from 2006, with Jack Nicholson on the cover) is A Trip to the Moon (Le Voyage Dans la Lune), by Georges Méliès. It is a 1902 production, from the time movies were mostly experimentation and sheer magic born on the mind of such amazing dreamers as Méliès. 
