The Straight Story

1999 - Dir: David Lynch - 1 hour 47 minutes
Shown in FeckenOdeon 2 on 17th April, 2015
DAVID LYNCH
This is the most unlikely film to be directed by David Lynch. Mr Lynch is known for his surrealist films and has developed a unique cinematic style. The strange and, in many cases, violent elements contained within his films have been known to "disturb, offend or mystify" audiences. Nothing in this film is likely to do any of those things. His earlier work includes “Eraserhead” - a horrific and disturbing film involving the death of a child and inner demons. He achieved mainstream success with “The Elephant Man” which, while still dealing with a difficult subject, had a message of compassion. He then saddled himself with filming the un-filmable in the form of an adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi epic “Dune” - a massive flop. Then there was the strange “Blue Velvet” which started off with a severed ear and went on to psychopathic rape… and then there was “Twin Peaks” for television… and so it goes on. Everything Mr Lynch has done is disturbing, shocking, even revolting… and then in 1999 he decided that the story of Alvin Straight was “what I fell in love with next”. No sex, no violence, no guns, no grossness - and it’s fantastic. 
ALVIN STRAIGHT
It’s not often that a film is so faithful to the events that inspired it. It’s a fact that Alvin Ray Straight, was a WW2 veteran who lived in Laurens, Iowa. Just as the film depicts Mr Straight travelled 280 miles on a 1966 John Deere riding lawn mower to visit his 80-year-old brother Henry who had recently suffered a stroke and who lived in Blue River, Wisconsin . At a top speed of 5 miles per hour, the journey took six weeks. The event happened in the summer of 1994 when Alvin was 73 years old. Mr. Straight could not see well enough to get a driving license so he decided his only option was the mower. Setting off in early July, he towed a trailer loaded with gasoline, camping gear, clothes and food, and arrived at his brother's house in mid-August. Henry Straight recovered and moved back to Iowa to be closer to his family. Alvin died in 1996.
RICHARD FARNSWORTH
Mr Farnsworth, who plays Alvin, was a stuntman who first appeared in movies in 1937. He worked, mainly in Westerns, for many years and was one of the industry’s most respected (and mostly uncredited) performers. When David Lynch offered him the role, Farnsworth had no idea who he was. Farnsworth did not like violence or swearing, and Lynch assured him that there would be none of that in the movie. The lead role was a rarity for a man his age - 79 at the time of shooting. He was married for 38 years to Maggie and following her death took up with an airline stewardess 35 years younger than him. He was nominated for an Oscar for this role in 1999 but sadly, unable to cope with the pain of bone cancer, he committed suicide in 2000.
FREDDIE FRANCIS
A distinguished British cinematographer and director, Mr Francis was 82 when he made this film. He completed the shoot in just 23 days. The age and infirmity of the main actor made precision and speed essential but the result is beautiful. This is his last film - but he lived to be 90. 

Laughter in Paradise

1951 - Dir.: Mario Zampi - 1 hours 34 minutes - (UK)

Shown at The FeckenOdeon on 28th March, 2015

This isn’t an Ealing Studios comedy, though you’d be forgiven for making that assumption. Its cast of stock English eccentrics may well have been moonlighting from one of Mr Balcon’s movies - perhaps they bicycled between Ealing and Elstree or got Sid James to drive them in his Carry On cab. In common with a number of films of the era it does have a slightly serious undercurrent - how far would we go if placed under enough pressure? Do we really know ourselves? Would we be better people if forced to see ourselves as others see us?
There are some superb performances - particularly from Fay Compton and Alastair Sim - and there are others where the actors are having such fun that it’s infectious. A young John Laurie working out his grumpy Scot routine in preparation for Dad’s Army, Joyce Grenfell way over the top but delightful and George Cole in training for his St Trinians Flash Harry role. It’s strange that this film has rather fallen out of the spotlight when comedy classics of the 1950s are discussed because there is more of a plot, more substance and less pratfalls than many more celebrated films.
Rome-born director Mario Zampi (1903-1963) moved to Britain in 1923, starting out as an actor before turning editor in 1930 and producer in 1937, when he founded Two Cities Films with fellow countryman Filippo Del Giudice. As director, he specialised in comedy, Laughter in Paradise being followed by Top Secret (1952), Happy Ever After (1954), The Naked Truth (1957) and Too Many Crooks (1959), all of which display a surprisingly acute grasp of the British sense of humour.

Moonrise Kingdom

2012 - Dir: Wes Anderson  - 1 hour 34 minutes - USA

Shown in FeckenOdeon 2 on 13th March, 2015

Welcome to the world of Wes Anderson - or rather to one of the worlds of Wes Anderson. Like no other director Mr Anderson requires us to totally surrender to his fantasies and immerse ourselves in the strangeness of his dreams. Disbelief is not permitted and the real (and modern) world isn’t allowed to break the spell. In “The Grand Budapest Hotel” it’s a strange ruritanian country in an undefined time period. Here we’re firmly in the 1960s in New England…. but not the 1960s and New England as we, or anyone apart from the director, has ever seen them. Was there even a US Department of Inclement Weather? Or has any child ever voluntarily put on a gramophone record of Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to The Orchestra? So - suspend your disbelief, believe in the unbelievable and just hang on for the ride. Unlike some directors Mr Anderson will make sure that you return to reality happily unharmed.
Anderson always fills his films with colours, never garish but usually definite and active. In "Moonrise Kingdom," the palette tends toward the green of new grass, and the Scout's khaki brown. Also the right amount of red. It is a comfortable canvas to look at, so pretty that it helps establish the feeling of magical realism.
The success of "Moonrise Kingdom" depends on its understated gravity. None of the actors ever play for laughs or put sardonic spins on their material. We don't feel they're kidding. Yes, we know these events are less than likely, and the film's entire world is fantastical. But what happens in a fantasy can be more involving than what happens in life, and thank goodness for that.
●    Commenting on the film's connection to the first time he fell in love, Mr Anderson said, "Well, what I wanted to do was re-create the feeling of that memory. The movie is kind of like a fantasy that I think I would have had at that age. When you're 11 or 12 years old, you can get so swept up in a book that you start to believe that the fantasy is reality. I think when you have a giant crush when you're in fifth grade, it becomes your whole world. It's like being underwater; everything is different."
●    This is an economy production - shot on 16mm film (the sort that used to be used for economy reasons in British television production) so it may appear a little grainy. The success of the film paved the way for big budget extravagance in “The Grand Budapest Hotel”.
●    Neither of the two young stars had ever seen a typewriter before filming. They had to be convinced of its purpose and method of operation.
●    There’s a game of Ludo in the film. In the USA it’s known as “Parcheesi” - and, as the game originated in India, it’s possible that this is the more correct name.

The Big Country

1958 - Dir.: William Wyler - 2 hours 40 minutes - USA

Shown at The FeckenOdeon on 28th February, 2015

This is a co-production between the star, Gregory Peck, and the director, William Wyler. The two, who had become friends while working on “Roman Holiday”, didn’t start out with the intention of making a western. The original idea was to make a comedy about a museum robbery in Madrid. Writers were hired and casting begun - but the story didn’t work out and the film never got off the ground.
A little later a friend drew Peck’s attention to a story by Donald Hamilton, “Ambush at Blanco Canyon.” which had been serial­ized in the Saturday Evening Post and later expanded into a novel entitled The Big Country. Peck showed the story to Wyler, noting that it had at least six good parts and was “an anti-macho western”. The director liked the project, and the two friends divided up their responsibilities and formed two separate production companies - Wyler’s was called World Wide Productions, and Peck’s was Anthony Productions. Wyler would be in charge of artistic matters, while Peck, in addition to having casting and script ap­proval, would choose the livestock, horses, and riders. Peck, who also had a development deal with United Artists, arranged for that studio to finance and distribute the film. That agreement was probably the most harmonious moment in the entire process. Wyler, a perfectionist, hired and fired writer after writer as the script developed and eventually admitted that he couldn’t remember who had written which part of the script - the Writers’ Guild of America were called in to arbitrate when the writing credits were being drawn up.
Things went downhill from there. Wyler called for re-take after re-take. Peck, also a perfectionist, was known for his careful preparation… which usually resulted in the scene being shot in one or two takes. After one row things got so bad that Peck had to be coaxed back to the set to complete the picture. They didn’t speak for years. The other actors fared no better - Jean Simmons was so traumatized by the experience that she refused to talk about it until an interview in the late eighties when she revealed, "We'd have our lines learned, then receive a rewrite, stay up all night learning the new version, then receive yet another rewrite the following morning. It made the acting damned near impossible." Despite the friction behind the camera the result is a fine piece  of work - perhaps the only “pacifist” western of its day….
NOT MANY PEOPLE KNOW THAT…
●    US President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave the movie four consecutive showings at the White House and called it "simply the best film ever made. My number one favorite film."
●    Gregory Peck cast all of his  sons (Jonathan Peck, Carey Paul Peck and Stephen Peck) in the film. 

Seducing Doctor Lewis

La Grande Séduction

2003 - Dir: Jean-François Pouliot - 1 hour 44 minutes - Canada
Shown in FeckenOdeon 2 on 13th February, 2015

We ended our small cinema’s 2014 showings in November with “Calvary” which was billed as a “black comedy”. Many of us struggled to find the comedy. We’re glad to say that tonight’s film is an out and out comedy. It’s supposed to be funny and nobody gets their brains blown out. Brendon Gleeson, the owner of the splattered brains, is not in this film - but he is in the less successful 2013 re-make. We gather that nothing was changed apart from the plot, the location, the title and the language spoken… 

The decline of traditional industries and changes in ways of working have caused problems for ordinary folk the world over. The Canadian fishing industry, though in good health overall, has changed. It’s no longer viable for small communities, with poor communications with the large centres of population, to compete with conglomerates with factory sized boats and industrial scale processing plants. This is the background to the plight of Ste-Marie-la-Mauderne on the north coast of Quebec - where things have got so bad that every single inhabitant is claiming welfare. Small wonder that they grasp at the opportunity of a new source of employment with such vigour and ingenuity…
This is an old fashioned little film. The plot is barely believable as some of the more pedantic critics have hastened to point out. It’s a bit of whimsy - comparable to Passport to Pimlico or perhaps Waking Ned - both equally unbelievable but both equally charming.
The Film was made in Harrington Harbour on the coast of Northern Quebec. Although life in the area is undoubtedly hard, the citizens are adamant that their fishing industry is healthy, their town is prosperous and a plastics factory is not on their list of “must haves”. They were not impressed when the film company made their tidy little town look run down and dirty.
None of the “stars” are well known outside their home territory of the province of Quebec but they’re all regulars on Quebec’s many TV channels. Raymond Bouchard and Lucie Laurier each have film careers spanning 30 years. The endearing and cheeky acting ensemble works hard, and Ken Scott's script (his first) finds ways of wringing irreverence from the apparent good nature of the situation, flipping cynicism and urban snobbery on their heads by conjuring a romantic view of hamlet life.

Saving Mr Banks

2013 - Dir.: John Lee Hancock - (USA)
Shown at the FeckenOdeon on 31st January, 2015
Some critics have pointed out that this film was bound to be over sympathetic to Walt Disney because it was made by the Walt Disney Studio. There may be a grain or more of truth in this but there’s no doubting that this is a beautifully constructed and well acted account of the making of one of Disney’s finest achievements. There’s also no doubting that P.L.Travers was a tricky customer to deal with. On her own insistence, all dealings with the studio were recorded on audio tape and it’s evident that Emma Thompson hasn’t overplayed her character’s eccentricities - by all accounts the real Mrs T was a good deal nastier.
The accusation that the studio was merely making an extended plug  for its 50th anniversary re-release of the original film probably scuppered its chances of Oscars and other awards. Certainly the central performances are worthy of recognition. Emma Thompson has never given a better observed performance and Tom Hanks, fresh from his exploits in “Captain Philips”, really gets under the skin of Disney’s character. Mr Hanks had his own argument with present day Disney puritanical producers when he tried in the interests of accuracy to persuade them to show Walt smoking. Disney was a heavy smoker with a persistent cough. He died of lung cancer two years after the release of Mary Poppins. A compromise was reached where ashtrays are shown but not the actual smoking.
Tom Hanks is a distant cousin of Walt Disney which may account for the physical resemblance

Mary Poppins

1964 - Dir.: Robert Stevenson (USA)
Shown at The FeckenOdeon on 31st January, 2015
As those of you who attend tonight’s film (Saving Mr Banks) will find out, Walt Disney promised his daughters that he would make a film out of their favourite series of stories - “Mary Poppins” by P.L.Travers. Because of the obstinacy of the author it was a promise that took 20 year to fulfil…. but that’s this evening’s story…
This is easily the best of Disney's experiments in combining animation and live action, and one of the studio's best-loved films. It was the last feature overseen by Walt Disney before his death in 1966. It was nominated for 13 Oscars and scooped five, including best actress for Julie Andrews in her screen debut. It was certainly the spoonful of sugar that sweetened the bitter pill Miss Andrews had swallowed when Warner Brothers cast Audrey Hepburn as Eliza Dolittle in the film of “My Fair Lady”. Julie had created the role on the West End and Broadway stage and was understandably miffed when Audrey (who couldn’t even sing) took the big prize. Revenge was sweet - Mary P beat Eliza D not only in the awards stakes - but also at the box office.
Mention does have to made of Dick Van Dyke’s “cockney” accent. Quite how Disney’s vocal coaches could have got it so wrong remains a mystery. Now 88 and still going strong Mr Van Dyke recently said he was completely unaware during the shoot that anything was wrong with his attempted cockney brogue. “I was working with an entire English cast and nobody said a word! People in the UK ask what part of England I was meant to be from and I say it was a little shire in the north where most of the people were from Ohio.” Ohio-ese apart, the film is packed with unforgettable sequences, adorable cartoon characters and timeless songs, it's quite simply supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!

Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines

or HOW I FLEW FROM LONDON TO PARIS IN 25 HOURS AND 11 MINUTES
1964 - Dir.: Ken Annakin (UK/USA)

Shown at The FeckenOdeon on 27th December, 2014
Unless you had parents who took you to big city centre cinemas back in the 1960s you’re unlikely to have seen this film presented in the way its makers intended. For some reason 20th Century Fox decided to throw buckets of money at what to all intents and purposes is an extended Ealing Comedy. If the Rank Organisation had owned the rights it would probably have been made in black and white and had the story (and costly cast) pruned to the bone. As it was, Fox shot it in the horrifyingly expensive 70mm Todd AO format in Technicolor, hired every British comedy actor capable of drawing breath and commissioned vast sets, accurate replica aircraft and a sweeping orchestral score. The result is a very British comedy with international spectacle. The version we’re showing tonight is a restoration of the original roadshow version - complete with intermission, overtures, etc. This is the first showing in Todd AO in the UK for many years. We apologise if you can’t quite see the bottom of the picture - our screen has to expand to its very widest and deepest to accommodate the extra large picture
This is a good humoured romp that takes great joy in over the top characterisations. These days we may find the racial stereotyping uncomfortable but it’s a least even handed - everybody of every colour, race and background is equally lampooned. As Robert Morley’s newspaper tycoon says “The trouble with these international affairs is that they attract foreigners”.
Although director Ken Annakin is best known for large scale American financed movies (The Longest Day, Monte Carlo or Bust, Genghis Kahn) he was born in Yorkshire, worked as salesman and journalist before breaking into films with a short for J Arthur Rank. He directed a string of very British low budget features (Here Come The Huggetts, You know What Sailors Are, Three Men in a Boat) before heading to the wider screens of California. It could be said that this film brings together the two strands of his career. He died at the age of 94 in Beverly Hills in 2009.
THE FLYING MACHINES
The 1910-era aircraft used in the film were replicas built using the authentic materials of the originals, but with slightly more powerful engines (supplied by VW and Rolls-Royce). About 20 planes were built at a cost of about £5,000 each. Two of the replicas (the 1910 Bristol Boxkite and the 1911 Roe IV Triplane) built for the film still fly across the English countryside as both are preserved in the "Shuttleworth Collection" based at Old Warden, Bedfordshire. There are two real vintage aircraft to be seen in this film: a 1910 Deperdussin Monoplane and a 1912 Blackburn 'Type D' Monoplane.

Philomena

2013 - Dir.: Stephen Frears - 1 hours 38 minutes (UK)

Show at The FeckenOdeon on 29th November, 2014

In the 1920’s, religious orders established what were called Mother and Baby Homes on the premises of lands and buildings donated to the Church. These facilities housed girls and women who had become pregnant out of wedlock and their children. Countless women were separated from their sons and daughters, who were often given up for adoption against their will. This film is the true story of one of the mothers.
There is no doubt that the Roman Catholic Church did Philomena Lee a great wrong when it allowed nuns to sell her son for adoption in America. It’s perhaps in the spirit of that Church’s creed of the forgiveness of sins that Philomena felt that meeting the Pope after this film’s release somehow made things a bit better. "I felt such a sense of relief for the guilt I carried and that I still carry a little bit today," she said after the audience," Those nuns would be so jealous of me now." The encounter came about through Mrs Lee establishing the Philomena Project, which lobbies for open access to adoption records. It happened less than a day after a Vatican spokesperson said: "The Holy Father does not see films, and will most certainly not be seeing this one.” The very next day it became clear that, not only had Pope Francis seen the film, but it was he who had requested an audience with Philomena.
Martin Sixsmith, who wrote Philomena’s story, as well as being a journalist, is an authority on Russian poetry and art. He has now returned to things Russian and is busy making documentaries about Mr Putin. He and Philomena remain friends and attended the glamorous movie premiere together - something those nuns might also have been jealous of. Both Judi Dench and Steve Coogan befriended Philomena and Mr Coogan accompanied her on her visit to Rome.

Calvary

2014 - Dir: John Michael McDonagh  - 1 hour 41 minutes

Shown in FeckenOdeon 2 on 14th November, 2014

Calvary emerges directly from the current crisis of Irish Catholicism brought about by sexual abuse by priests and its institutional covering-up. This subject may be distasteful for some - but it has happened and can no longer be swept under the Papal carpet.
This is the kind of movie that galvanizes and discomfits while it’s on screen, and is terrific fodder for conversation long after its credits roll. Even if you are neither Catholic nor Irish, this “Calvary” will engage your attention. This is a whodunit with a difference, a black comedy with aspirations, merrily lifting its name from the small hill outside Jerusalem where Jesus was slain. “Calvary”: the title serves notice and puts the viewer on guard. It flashes like the final destination on the front of a bus, as director McDonagh proceeds to steer us back and forth along the west coast of Ireland, veering between the profane and the sacred, the damned and divine. We know where this is leading, whether we like it or not. Your best advice is to sit back, hang on to your rosary beads and enjoy the ride…..
Maybe the director intended to create a composite portrait of a place from which the sea of faith has, within a generation (and, some would say, with good cause), begun its long retreat. The owner of the village pub, talking to Father James, refers to “your kind,” as if religion were the mark of an alien race. Tellingly, the community's most purely contented individual appears to be the non-believing doctor, who sucks cigarettes outside the hospital and accepts his own limitations with a lip-smacking relish. There are moments and characters here that initially amuse… but the laugh is stillborn as we realise the grim chill of the reality that is 21st century Ireland. A dark comedy tinged with bitterness.
The Director/Writer: At the age of 11 John Michael McDonagh could be found most Sundays carrying processional crosses and ringing Sanctus bells while his little brother, Martin, now a playwright and filmmaker, sang in the choir. Mr. McDonagh recently said he himself never had problems with a priest, aside from one in secondary school who caned him repeatedly. He wrote the script to the 2003 film “Ned Kelly” and wrote and directed the Irish comedy detective film “The Guard”. He’s no stranger to controversy having referred to the Irish film industry as “amateurish” during an award ceremony. He’s currently working on the third in his so called “suicide trilogy” - apparently a much lighter comedy entitled “The Lame shall Enter First”.
Brendan Gleeson: (Not to be confused with Jackie Gleason) Though Mr Gleeson is rapidly building a reputation as an Irish character actor, there’s the skill of a classical actor underneath all the blarney. He spent a good part of his early career on stage at Stratford upon Avon and only began acting in films in his late 30s. He’s worked with the likes of Mel Gibson and Stephen Spielberg and was Professor Mad-Eye Moody in the Harry Potter films. He’s been a teacher but has never been a priest.

Double Indemnity

1944 - Dir.: Billy Wilder - 1 hours 47 minutes
Shown at the FeckenOdeon on 25th October, 2014

The story on which “Double Indemnity” is based was written in the 1930s by James M. Cain, the hard-boiled author of “The Postman Always Rings Twice”. A screenplay kicked around Hollywood, but the Hays Office refused it a production license because it would "harden audience attitudes toward crime.” By 1944, Wilder thought he could film it. Cain wasn't available, so he hired Raymond Chandler to do the screenplay. Chandler, whose novel “The Big Sleep” Wilder loved, turned up drunk, smoked a smelly pipe, didn't know anything about screenplay construction, but could put a nasty spin on dialogue.
Together Chandler and Wilder eliminated Cain's complicated end-game and deepened the relationship between Neff and Keyes (Edward G. Robinson), the claims manager at the insurance company. They told the movie in flashback, narrated by Neff. The voice-over worked so well that Wilder used it again in "Sunset Boulevard” (1950), which was narrated by a character who is already dead the first time he speaks. "Double Indemnity” originally ended with Neff in the gas chamber, but that scene was cut because an earlier one turned out to be the perfect way to close the film.
This is a dark, cynical, witty, and sleazy thriller about adultery, corruption and murder - and yet it has style by the bucket load and a plot that compels you to watch until the last frame, despite your natural reluctance.
MISSY ONE TAKE
Barbara Stanwyck (Ruby Stephens) had a hard start to life. Her mother fell under a tram when Ruby was only 4 and her father disowned her. By the age of 16 she was a showgirl in Ziegfeld Follies and in 1926 she made her first film. It was the start of a career that lasted for 64 years in film, TV and on stage. Her nickname was “Missy” and she had a reputation for getting a scene right in the first take - every time. She died in 1990, aged 82.

The Lunchbox

2013 - Dir: Ritesh Batra - 1 hour 44 minutes
Shown in FeckenOdeon 2 on 10th October, 2015

A BIT OF BACKGROUND READING….
Every weekday without fail something rather extraordinary is to be seen around midday on the chaotic streets of Mumbai. This is the sight of hundreds of stainless steel tiered tiffin boxes or dhabbas piled high on handcarts and bicycles being pushed through the streets by dhoti-wearing, white-capped wallahs. Expertly run by the Mumbai Tiffin Box Suppliers' Association, armies of these dhabbawallahs provide the invaluable daily service of speedily delivering piping hot home-cooked lunches to more than 200,000 busy office workers.
Many workers live 50 kilometres or more from their desk, a long commute on a packed train. There is certainly not time for the cook of the house to prepare a full meal before they leave home. So the lunch-filled tiffin boxes are picked up later in the morning, colour-coded and transported to the station, where they are collected by the tiffin wallahs, whose mission is to deliver each box to its corresponding workplace still hot from the pan – and to return the empty box to the home before the end of the working day. The service is reckoned to be one of the most efficient operations in the world. Its motto is “On time, every time”. With the essential core values of punctuality, teamwork, honesty and sincerity providing the backbone to the business, they have a staggering 99.99% success rate. This film is the story of a very, very, very rare failure.
AND ABOUT THE FILM…
A huge success in its native India, Ritesh Batra's film is actually a romance in the classic tradition - a “Brief Encounter” transposed to the rhythms and flavours of modern-day Mumbai. A romance about strangers who fall in love by way of letters. “The Lunchbox” isn’t an example of bravura moviemaking or cutting-edge style but simply a tale told with intelligence, restraint, and respect. It was originally conceived as a documentary about the lives of the dhabbawallahs and Mr Batra went to live among them in the hope of finding a personal story that would give the film a narrative. Gradually he became aware of the people on either side of the daily delivery and started to wonder what might happen if things went just a little bit wrong.
The film is ground breaking in many ways. For an Indian film to have no songs is unusual. Even more unusual is for an Indian film to tackle potential infidelity in such a head on way. We westerners may find the ending a little woolly. Perhaps we can bear in mind that if the film ended in the way we might wish it to it may have caused offence in India and it might well have felt the wrath of the censor.
There are some lovely performances here - Imrat Kaur, a much loved Indian TV star, plays Ila and seizes the chance of a role requiring great subtlety and feeling. Nawazuddin Siddiqui is more used to playing tough guys but here displays a considerable talent for light comedy. Bharati Achrekar as the unseen Auntie has made a career out of comic mothers…. but through it all moves the marvellous Irrfan Khan. One of the finest actors of our time, and blessed with a voice that can turn any of the languages he speaks into music, Mr. Khan is the film's heart and soul as he reads aloud Saajan's notes of longing. "I think we forget things if we have no one to tell them to," he writes to Ila. Luckily for them, and for us, the two have memorable things to tell.