The only exception to any degree was a scene near the end where they curled together on a bed - filmed from above looking down. He told her how it would be when (if) he returned. She responded, but you knew neither believed he would.
If Campion wasn't portraying Keats as he really was, then she intentionally made the characters muted to emphasize each delicate and precious moment - well"if that's what you want. But real people don't act that way - not now, nor in 1819.
Time to slip out front for a cup of strong coffee. I say to the barista, ??Who's coming to this movie"you know, demographics? ? She's nonplused, smiles halfway. She might be thinking ??older crowd, ? but poetry is written by people of all ages. Good thing this movie has been diligently promoted - right before the nightly news with BBC. I'm a chick but I don ??t intentionally frequent those. ??I look for a thinking-person's movie, ? I say to her.
??That's why I work here"well, other than needing a job, ? she to me. This is an art house but they are increasing the menu of mainstream cinema"showing ??Inglorious Bastards ? on another screen.
Going through my past newspapers, I just came across a major piece in ??The New York Times, ? Sunday Style Section, of September 27, 2009, titled ??Last Flight of the Phoenix. ? It included a larger-than half page portrait from the '70, of Jim Carroll. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/fashion/27Cover.html He has a slightly startled look on his young face, mixed with a serene pose, as if he were daring the observer to come closer and wonder why.
I was captivated and read on, even sought out more details.
Having just seem ??Bright Star, ? I suddenly made the jump from one poet to another; I asked myself, what if John Keats had a second life, here in current times. What would he be like in this entertainment era.
He would surely be much like Jim Carroll, a prodigy poet in way out ways, startling, provoking - a writer of books ( ??The Basketball Diaries ? when he was only 16), a poet, a singer/songwriter/musician with his landmark album, ??Catholic Boy ? and hit song ??People Who Died. ? In 1980, he was a young man who explored the dark side of drugs and destitution. click here A lost boy. When reporters asked, ?? ??What's a Pulitzer Prize nominee doing fronting a rock band?' Carroll was already well-known in underground circles for having lived a life of mythic proportions. Good pictures here. http://catholicboy.com/intro.php ??Not so much a singer as an incantatory rock & roll poet, ? by NYTimes critic Stephen Holden in 1982. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/books/14carroll.html
In 1996, he came out with the album, ??Pools of Mercury, ? ??an amalgam of his crafts, part spoken word, part rock & roll, ? from ??Rolling Stone. ? http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/jimcarroll/articles/story/5926756/jim_carroll_cant_escape_rock__roll
The Rolling Stone Network spoke with Carroll by phone before he was about to leave on a spoken word tour. They asked him what his inspiration was for the new album, ??Actually when I started doing this record, it was mainly going to be a spoken word with music. Then there was just this sudden rock & roll energy. ? The Network people mentioned that a conversation with Carroll is filled with anecdotes and off on tangents, ??twice as long as you expected, ? and ??filled with insights and humor ? - even though he could be reclusive.
With Keats as Carroll, he would have lived longer this time, dying of a heart attack at age 60 (Sept.11, 2009)...but looking older than his years, gaunt with a profound beard, and scholarly glasses, a brown felt brimmed hat pulled down, as in the second page picture of the ??Times ? article. Enigmatic, forlorn. He never looked completely happy. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/fashion/27Cover.html I expect Keats would look that way in modern times.
Punk-rock singer Patti Smith told the ??Times, ? ??I met him in 1970, and already he was pretty much universally recognized as the best poet of his generation. ? That was what Keats' reading public said about him. Two young men of words, floating through a life of words strung together in poetic couplings.
Jim Carroll's nearly completed current novel, ??The Petting Zoo ? tells of ??an art world prodigy of the 1980s, Billy Wolfram, who was driven by his early fame, into seclusion, where he suffers psychological and spiritual criticism, ? by Alex Williams of the ??NYTimes. ? This must be Mr. Carroll's self-projection, and poetic introspection"and a Keats of a different style.
This article by Williams is in itself written in a poetic style befitting the celebration of a poet's life, thus making Carroll, an artistic and stylistic companion to Keats. Keats deserved a movie as a paean to his words, as does Jim Carroll. Hopefully these words of Carroll's hand and mind will be adapted to the large screen.
Jim Carroll's timing has always been skewed - originally published in 1978, ??Basketball Diaries ? made the bestseller lists after it was made into a movie in 1995, starring Leonardo DiCaprio. At book signings with DeCaprio, ??it was Carroll the crowds clamored for.' ? http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-jim-carroll15-2009sep15,0,7425211.story
Just as the ??Phoenix ? in the article title, this ??aging punk poet ? is expected to become a future player. His friends expect his new book to be posthumously completed"and published in 2010.
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