The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981)

The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981) was one of the first movies I saw when I went to university and I watched it with W for only the second time last night. It's aged just a bit, with the story-line not seeing as strong as it was the first time around, but it was still a good story. Merryl Streep is excellent in it, and ably backed up by Jeremy Irons.

It is the story of a man (Irons) who, while visiting his fiancee in Dorset, meets and falls instantly in love with a woman (Streep) who, so everyone in the town believes, had an illicit affair with a visiting Frenchman. I wonder if, even in movies, they would keep the veiled insults against Frenchmen in there nowadays. In any case, he feels compelled to help her escape her poverty and seemingly fatal shame. The film is a film within a film, with the main plot is mixed very cleverly with the story of a present day adulterous affair between Irons and Streep as they play the parts of the two characters from centuries past. All this is set mostly with Lyme Regis as its background along with the surround cliffs, all of which is well shot and very atmospheric.

I didn't remember the manipulative side of Streep's character from the first time I saw it, but this time it seemed a lot clearer. Did she love him, or was she just using him to escape from her poverty? His own naivety is equally obvious, particularly in his first engagement to the (amazingly) named Ernestina. I still don't know which it was. The main story ends one way, the present day story, another, with subtle little twists of the two stories coming together right at the end so that you're not supposed to know when they're acting being actors and when they're not. Very nice.

This is still a film to watch. Well worth the effort all round.

Japan turns to beer alternatives (BBC)

According to the BBC, Japan is increasing turning to beer alternatives. By this, they mean drinks that taste like beer even though they aren't beer. I remember my geography teacher at school saying, "Beer tastes horrible, but men like it because we're all basically masochists!" He was probably overstating the point, but too often in Britain this seems to be the case. So why do Japanese like the taste of beer so much?

Well, Japanese beer doesn't actually taste that bad. It's always cold, very, very fizzy, and often quite sharp. You get used to it quickly. Yes, compared to beer in other countries, you're often (usually) short-changed because the head is so large that the glass can be up to half empty. (Japan's oh-so-keen consumer groups haven't got around to weights-and-measures yet.) But, at least for a glass or two it tastes pretty good, and, as with everything in Japan, the quality is consistent and you know what you're getting. The only downside is the MSG. A regularly beer drinker from Europe is not going to get drunk quickly on Japanese beer, especially as Japanese only ever drink while they're eating, but 3-4 glasses in, and you get this very distinct, and rather unpleasant after taste. That's the MSG kicking in. MSG was invented by the Japanese and I remember the mother of my very first homestay family telling me, "You must put Ajinomoto in everything" (Ajinomoto being pure chemical MSG of course).

So perhaps making drinks that taste like beer isn't so strange after all. Japan's modern foods are now highly synthetic anyway and no one cares. Taste can be controlled, so the important thing is variety. Doesn't matter whether it's good for you, all that matters is that it's different.

A lot done in a little time

At last, we seem to have completed the planning for W's major project assignment. She has to produce both a dissertation and some kind of electronic media artefact to go with it. Ironically, the dissertation will probably be the easy (but boring) bit, while getting an idea that is both easy enough to complete and interesting enough to hold W's interest is much, much harder.

In the end, everything will be about icons. Personally, I think this is the obvious, but no less good, choice. By studying how to design icons, W should benefit for when she gets back to icon design full-time. She has all the design sense, but being aware of the issues in actual design processes should help her see yet more ideas.

Not that thrashing out the idea was easy. She wants my approval, but isn't happy with my rather basic and totally ill-informed ideas. In the end, the final plan is 95% W's idea and 5% my planning. Now all she has to do it put together the flow charts so that she can explain the idea and convince her tutors. No problem, just got to get on with it.