Walk the line

On Friday, Michael and I went to watch a movie.

After looking up each and every film on imdb.com (and dismissing most of them in the process), the clear winner was Walk the Line. It's a biopic about the country singer Johnny Cash. I didn't know much about him but the main draw for me was the music, for the same reason that I wanted to watch Ray last year.

Also, Reese Witherspoon is in it, and she is one of my favourite actors, so there you go, two very good reasons for us to go watch the film.

When we sat down in the cinema, the audience composition was very similar to that when we watched Memoirs of a Geisha, i.e. average age was 50 or so. I suppose most of them were there because they grew up listening to Johnny Cash.

There was a party of five sitting behind us, and one of the people was a woman who just would not shut up. Michael identified her for me as a popular Country singer, but he told me it would be too mean if I told you who she was, in light of what I'm about to say... heheheh...

Anyway this woman was obviously a rabid Johnny Cash fan.

She knew lots and lots and lots and lots of trivia about his life - his family, his relationships, his songs, his looks, everything.

Now, I don't object to her knowing all that trivia, really I don't.

What I object to is the running commentary that she kept up throughout the movie. My goodness. She just would NOT shut up.

For instance, the camera zooms close up on Johnny Cash's guitar, and pans along the fretboard, upon which we see is fixed a dollar bill.

So this woman goes "Iiiiiii!!!!! Id-dollar!!!! Rajtu d-dollar fuq il-kitarra! Rajtuha? Rajtuha? Eh? Eh? Eh?"

Or, during some poignant on-screen dialogue between Johnny Cash and his wife...

"Imma mhux hekk kienet l-ewwel mara ta' Johnny Cash, ta! Ma kinitx sabiħa daqs di, żgur! Il-ewwel mara ta' Johnny Cash kienet vera kerha, ta, imma vera kerha. Ta' dik it-tip illi, tħares lejha u litteralment tinġibed lura. Tinġibed, ta!"

When she first began doing this at the beginning of the movie, I turned around and gave her my filthiest look, but it didn't work because ninety seconds later she started back up again.

I had just had a half-pint of Guinness at O'Caseys by way of celebrating St. Patrick's day, so I was feeling a bit more mellow than usual, so I decided to ignore her. Eventually I almost got used to her, in the same way that you get used to really uncomfortable shoes.

Besides Ms. Motormouth sitting behind me (and her cronies, who occasionally jumped in too), there was another inconsiderate patron sitting at the veeeeeery end of our row, as far as possible from the door. He was wearing a suit, and obviously has an overly-high sense of self-importance, because he was one of those people who, when they are warned to switch off their mobiles at the beginning of a performance, decide that it doesn't apply to them.

His phone did ring at one point, but hey, pacenzja, it wouldn't be the first time that someone's phone has gone off in the cinema. But what he did next was completely unbelievable - he ANSWERED his phone!!! And he had a whole conversation on it in the middle of the film!!!

I'm still trying to decide whether this middle-aged audience was better or worse than having a whole row of teenage louts passing leery comments during any vaguely romantic scenes and chucking popcorn at each other.

Well, one good thing did come of it all...

I wrote a song!

No, wait, before you hide behind the sofa, my sisters have said that it is at least a hundred times better than O x'kesħa, OK?

Given the subject matter of the film, I wrote it as a country song, and, erm, *tried* for an American accent. I pitched it way down low like Johnny Cash liked to sing, and borrowed some vowel sounds off Reese Witherspoon... and I know that the "T"s shouldn't be sounded, but I thought that if I didn't enunciate, y'all might not understand my brilliant lyrics ;-)

The song is as yet without a title, I'm taking suggestions! The song is now titled "Johnny Cash Blues", with thanks to Toni.

Johnny Cash Blues (3.5 Mb, .mp3)

Comments

[Toni Sant]

This is just fantastic! I want to play your song on my next podcast. Is that OK with you?

Title suggestion: Johnny Cash Blues

[MaltaGirl]

Oh how fun! Yes please go ahead. As with all other contents of my blog, it's under a Creative Commons attribution license ;-)

I had been thinking of "cinema blues" but your title has a better ring to it, thanks!

[Jacques René Zammit]

I think the voice sounds sexy - must be the cowgirl/coyote ugly idea...
song reminds me of Oh Brother Where Art Thou.

prosit hi... any chances for eurovision?

[MaltaGirl]

Jacques, it's probably more due to my sore throat, LOL. I loved O Brother Where Art Thou, it's one of my favourite movies of all time but most people here have never heard of it. I'm flattered :-)

For the eurovision, I think we had already arranged that Reesa and Da Kween are going to do the vocals, with me on backup, and random bloggers doing the music. We still have a vacancy for a lawyer, if you're interested - I'm going to need legal representation when the audience sues for cruel and unusual punishment... muahahahaha...

[LadyVAM]

Apart from the terrible audience in the cinema that you encountered, the film was really boring. I saw it at home so I didnt have anyone commenting or taking off my attention from the film. Like you I didnt know anything about Johnny Cash but I was intrigued by the trailer and the fact that its about music.

It was a real dissapointment for me. I cant see what the fuss (the media did about the film) was about.

[MaltaGirl]

We both quite liked it actually, although it's not on my list of "must watch again". But as you say, I don't know how I'd feel about it if I hadn't been so distracted :-)

I imagine that a lot of the fuss would have been made by people like the lady sitting behind me, who would pick the film apart looking for the similarities and discrepancies between what was portrayed in the film and what is know about Johnny Cash's life.

Oh well... each to his own!

[Toni Sant]

Your Johnny Cash Blues is now part of the 16th podcast on my Mużika Mod Ieħor series.

[erezija]

bad film, nice song.