This is my first post here, and honestly, I’m not really sure how things like this are supposed to start. But I guess honesty is a good place to begin.
My username is tryingagainpages.
I decided to keep an open personal diary here, but anonymously. Just a place where I can write my thoughts as they come — without filters and without the need to look “normal.”
There will be a bit of everything here:
my thoughts, emotions, sometimes just streams of consciousness.
Sometimes there will also be notes and reviews about anime, manga, visual novels, and other things that left an impression on me.
But really, this blog is about one thing.
I’m trying to start again.
I’m trying to slowly climb out of a long and painful depression and agoraphobia that have been affecting my life a lot. I want to learn how to live again instead of just surviving day after day. Small steps, page by page, post by post.
Maybe this place will become something like a recovery journal.
Maybe just a quiet corner of the internet.
[EN: I’ll be writing my posts in English, but I’ll also post a Russian version in the comments.]
On Saturday night, I was in the mood to watch a musical. I could have watch Funny Girl for the fifth time or finally take the plunge and watch Cabaret, something I have been trying to do for two years ever since I saw Fosse/Verdon. I decided to step out of my comfort zone and for once not let my anxiety dictate what I watch on TV. I turned on Cabaret and watched it over the course of two days.
My expectations for the movie were pretty high. I knew it was not going to be a conventional musical given the plot and Bob Fosse's direction. However, the movie is almost four decades old and we have a tendency to underestimate stories and forms of media in general when it is not from our generation. However, I must say that this movie is pretty unforgettable and even pretty modern for the era.
We have Brian, played subtly and beautifully by Michael York. He has the glow of an innocent out-of-towner who is then taken under the wing of the eccentric Sally Bowels, played by Liza Minelli, whose performance I will discuss later. From the get-go, there is a notable spark between them and you actually feel like you are going to be taken on an adventure. They both live in a boarding house, which is pretty stable and calming compared to the other dominant setting, The Kit Kat Klub.
The Kit Kit Klub. What can I say about this establishment other than it is Cabaret. The whole movie is dependent on this environment and it is a testament to the set design of how it turned out. The movie would have been nothing without it because the hedonism just jumps out at you. I felt as if I could smell the tobacco smoke of the club patrons. The performers made me want to dance on stage with them. All of this was led by the Masters of Ceremonies, played by Joel Grey as his finest. Prior to watching the film, I thought I was going to be annoyed by this man whose makeup frightened me. By then end of the viewing, I was enraptured by his presence. He helps us navigate the film by being its one constant. Even in the rise of Nazism both outside and inside the club, he is still on his feet performing for the patrons and being as brazen as in the start of the film. What adds to his fascinating persona is the mystique behind it. There is no background to this person. Does he have a home, a family, a conscience? The only thing we do know is that life is a Cabaret and he is managing it. Rightfully so.
What contributes to the beauty of the film are the relationships. The chemistry between Sally and Brian is electric and even a third participant cannot eclipse it. In all seriousness, the movie surprised me with how modern it was. The scene where the Baron, Sally and Brian are dancing in a circle, you really feel the tension and the heat within one another. In my opinion, the movie served as an example, maybe a flawed one, of multiple party relationships. These people had chemistry and they embraced it. Also, Brian, while quiet and introverted, was never trying to be someone else in the film. His possible bisexuality was cited multiple times and never in a way that felt like he was chastised and or discriminated. He was who he was, but that did not make him love Sally any less. This movie, while it could have done better in terms of LGBTQ+ representation, did go farther than a lot of films at the time. I should put in as a disclaimer that I am not a member of the LGBT+ community and cannot speak for them. I am just an ally and any comments on this topic are encouraged.
I would be remiss if I did not mention the side love story of Natalia and Fritz. They served to characterize the innocence of love and the struggle of the Jewish community in 1930s Germany. This is when we get to the hardest part of the movie: the rise of the Nazis. The movie did such a good job of never letting us forget what was going on. While we were enjoying learning about these characters, Nazism was in the background until it could not be ignored. We went from seeing a lone Nazi soldier getting kicked out of the club to the audience being filled with them at the end. Don't even get me started on the "Tomorrow Belongs to Me" scene. The Baron's cavalier attitude about the Nazis serves as the perfect mirror to how they were underestimated in real life. Bob Fosse succeeds in balancing the rise of Nazism and the story of Sally and Brian until they are unfortunately mixed together.
While I have you, we need to talk about Liza. Prior to the movie I only knew a few things. She is the daughter of Liza Minelli, guest-starred in Arrested Development, and has an Oscar. Tell you the truth, I did not have enough experience with her to understand the hype. Now I see everything in a different light. Ms. Minelli shined in this movie. She made Sally lovable and relatable, even in all her eccentricity. She had me mesmerized for in every performance at the club. The movie feels like it was tailor-made for her. This makes me sad, because we never got to see another film like that in her career. She ended being used for tabloids and offered roles that quite frankly did not do her justice. Recently, I had watched the film, Arthur, and now that I think about it, it was a thankless role. She did not get to showcase her true talents which I think is a real waste.
My verdict: Cabaret is a must-watch film that will have you humming the songs days later.
The movie won 8 Oscars and lost Best Picture to The Godfather. You know how good you have to be competition to that film? This film needs to be talked about more. It is the perfect movie musical in that it can attract even those who abhor the genre. It would be pretty hard to do a reboot of it. DO NOT GET ANY IDEAS HOLLYWOOD!
What do you guys think? Sound off in the comments. Should there be reboot? Who should star/direct?
A Turn In The Wrong Direction Driving takes ages, the roads to Kara looked like it'll go on forever. She hadn't slept for hours now. She had to find her. Her eyes began to fall, leaving her in a daze. Everything was shaky. "I can't rest now, I have to keep moving forward.." All of a sudden, CRASH! The front of her vehicle hit the end of a metal post keeping cars from falling off the edge and ending one's life, though the car didn’t stop but instead slid to its left due to the incline of the ground. The impact made Kara jump and hit her head hard on her car door. Darkness consumed her. In her mind she thought of water, the thought of the ocean sinking her slowly to the bottom. She wasn’t afraid of drowning, in fact she was rather calm, the sounds of the waves soothed her nerves making her forget reality in total. Forgetting her current situation in the real world. The feeling of water swishing around her, seeing the little bubbles of trapped air created from small fishes with their small fins swimming past her still body. But, deep in her psyche she knew this couldn’t be reality. She desperately wanted to ignore it and sleep in the cool water. The back of her head then started to pinch uncomfortably making her finally face that her fantasy was coming to an end, maybe even her own life would come to an end as well if she wasn’t careful. No, she couldn’t let herself go that easily, not even for this life to go on for infinity. She still had one last objective to be filled. Not only did the pain in her head get only worse but she felt a light touch on her neck. Not pressing too much for it to hurt the same but instead a tap as if something was trying to poke dead roadkill with a stick thinking it will magically come alive.. The darkness came back again, her breathing began to get raspy as she was pulled into reality once more. She breathed heavily, lightly opening her eyes she saw a figure that looked like her car, of course it was wrecked, but was on the ledge, about 8 or more feet above her. She couldn't open her door, she pressed against it keeping the wight steady as it was the only thing that was keeping it from falling with her in it. Though it could only hold it for so long. Hearing a few small rocks fall near the vehicle two hands grabbed rhe door prying it open and swiftly began to pick her body up and ran, she didn’t open her eyes as she didn’t want to see the tragedy of her mission being unsuccessful and only get much more difficult, but at least she didn’t die from her own vehicle. She heard an explosion in the distance behind her. The sound of metal crashing and and the smell of smoke from blazing flames. When she lightly opened her eyes she saw a little town in the distance...
