There are quite a few sonnets about having children and reproduction as a tool to ensure you live on in some form, or that your beauty is continued and I mentioned on the last film of these that I found it hard to always connect to them. So much so that when one of the Project films did a good job of interpreting the text to the modern age it stuck in my memory, as it did with the Van Driest film and the one with the grandmother figure recently. I mention this because this is another one, where the writer implores the subject to look in the mirror and consider that the way to preserve their beauty against time is to have a smaller version of it; this is similar in theme to many of these sonnets and maybe it is the narcissism that I see in this idea that puts me off when I try to read them. Anyway, this short film, number 50 in the series, is the next to have that challenge – and the next to do really well with it.
The film is set in a bar and the poet is an old bar man serving drinks to a young man who is clearly trying to get up a bit of courage to go and talk to two cute girls at the end of the bar. It is a very clever device and one that makes it feel very modern despite some of the specifics of the words – the older man is using these words and the device of the future and having children, to chide the younger man into going for it – look what you can have versus the alternative of being alone or, as it says, "die single". I really enjoyed how the film worked the words and a big part of this was the delivery of all the cast members.
Forgive me because I don't know which was Spence and which was Cohen, but both of them were really good here. The speaking part was grizzled and assertive, with good body language and acting to back up the words; on the other side of the bar the silent role is just as hard since it demand reaction where the original writer didn't account for any; the younger man does well and it feels like interaction and not just verse poured out onto the other person. The two young women have less to do but they are chatty and link well with the other end of the bar.
My favorite part comes at the end though, because throughout the film the tone has been encouraging and all about the younger man, and this is a tone that could have continued until the last word. Instead the film sends the younger off full of enthusiasm, and leaves the bar man alone for the final few lines, which is the alternative of dying single without leaving a child behind – here the film and performance turns just a touch more serious and it is clear from his delivery that part of the barman's enthusiasm was that he knows what he is talking about as he will "die single" as is. It is a very nice touch at the end and really brought the short film home well.
The film is set in a bar and the poet is an old bar man serving drinks to a young man who is clearly trying to get up a bit of courage to go and talk to two cute girls at the end of the bar. It is a very clever device and one that makes it feel very modern despite some of the specifics of the words – the older man is using these words and the device of the future and having children, to chide the younger man into going for it – look what you can have versus the alternative of being alone or, as it says, "die single". I really enjoyed how the film worked the words and a big part of this was the delivery of all the cast members.
Forgive me because I don't know which was Spence and which was Cohen, but both of them were really good here. The speaking part was grizzled and assertive, with good body language and acting to back up the words; on the other side of the bar the silent role is just as hard since it demand reaction where the original writer didn't account for any; the younger man does well and it feels like interaction and not just verse poured out onto the other person. The two young women have less to do but they are chatty and link well with the other end of the bar.
My favorite part comes at the end though, because throughout the film the tone has been encouraging and all about the younger man, and this is a tone that could have continued until the last word. Instead the film sends the younger off full of enthusiasm, and leaves the bar man alone for the final few lines, which is the alternative of dying single without leaving a child behind – here the film and performance turns just a touch more serious and it is clear from his delivery that part of the barman's enthusiasm was that he knows what he is talking about as he will "die single" as is. It is a very nice touch at the end and really brought the short film home well.