Read Online The Same River Twice by Ted Mooney - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Ted Mooney
Ads: Link
ce film, mon premier.”
A woman in the front row stood up, aiming a camera at him. The flash went off and she sat down again.
“When I made this film,” Max continued, “I was twenty-six years old, working on a budget of nothing, more or less. We shot it in New York in thirteen days, averaging thirty-two setups—complete changes of camera and lighting—per day. The conditions were not ideal, but I can tell youthat I have never again worked as freely and easily as I did making
Fireflies
. Maybe that’s what first films are for.”
Pausing to drink from the glass of water that had been set out for him, he recalled that at the time of
Fireflies’s
release he was still married to Diana, Allegra had yet to be conceived, and he spoke no French at all. His real life, in any sense that mattered, had barely begun.
“Well,” he said, “it’s easy to sentimentalize one’s youth. So let me not waste more of your time. We’ll see the film, and afterward, if you have questions, I’ll try to answer them.”
An usher with a flashlight hurried two last ticket holders to their seats. The lights went down.
Movies
, Max thought,
are just another kind of lie
.
RAIN FELL IN SHEETS against the facades of buildings and rebounded off the pavement in bull’s-eye splashes. Odile shook out her umbrella. She’d spent the morning inspecting the clothing boutiques of the first and second arrondissements to see what was selling and to catch up with the trade. Now she stood just outside the glass vestibule of a music-and-electronics emporium on the Champs-Élysées, waiting for the rain to let up. She stared into the downpour, half mesmerized by its fall and force.
Her run-in with the Russians had prompted her to make her own inquiries about Thierry. At the Sorbonne she was told that he was on emergency leave, attending to a family problem. His home phone was answered by a machine. His apartment intercom—twice she had tried it, once at night—brought no response. Even the friend of a friend who’d first put them in touch professed to know nothing of his whereabouts and seemed surprised to hear about his leave. Whatever the reason for Thierry’s disappearance, Odile began to doubt that he would return anytime soon.
She checked her watch, then turned her back to the weather and passed through a set of glass doors into the megastore’s tri-level atrium. Part of an international chain, the establishment had opened barely a year ago to uniformly hostile press. Since then it had become a sensation, as much a social draw as a retail outlet, and Odile now paused to take in the spectacle. The ground floor was packed with students, office workers on lunch break, and others, like herself, just waiting out the rain. They sorted impatiently through CD bins or stood at listening stations, pressing headphones to their ears while their eyes went wary. A marble staircase, centrally placed, ran to the upper floors, and Odile took it to the top.
Twice since returning to Paris, she had dreamed she was back at theBrest train station, pushing through the crowd of people waiting to buy tickets, people she now understood to be desperate. All was as it had been—the dimness, the silence, the guards, the ruin—but now she, too, was desperate, no longer a traveler on an errand but another refugee, someone whose world had been erased by catastrophe and fate. Panic gripped her as she fought through the crowd, pushing and pleading and kicking until at last she reached the ticket window. But there, in place of the gray-haired matron, she found Thierry filling out the forms, and though he recognized her and spoke to her teasingly, in good humor, he wouldn’t sell her a ticket. “Because you can’t pay for it,” he said when she demanded an explanation. “What’s more, your seat has been given away.” In the distance were sirens, growing louder as they approached.
She wandered among the floor samples, televisions, DVD players, personal stereos, cell
A woman in the front row stood up, aiming a camera at him. The flash went off and she sat down again.
“When I made this film,” Max continued, “I was twenty-six years old, working on a budget of nothing, more or less. We shot it in New York in thirteen days, averaging thirty-two setups—complete changes of camera and lighting—per day. The conditions were not ideal, but I can tell youthat I have never again worked as freely and easily as I did making
Fireflies
. Maybe that’s what first films are for.”
Pausing to drink from the glass of water that had been set out for him, he recalled that at the time of
Fireflies’s
release he was still married to Diana, Allegra had yet to be conceived, and he spoke no French at all. His real life, in any sense that mattered, had barely begun.
“Well,” he said, “it’s easy to sentimentalize one’s youth. So let me not waste more of your time. We’ll see the film, and afterward, if you have questions, I’ll try to answer them.”
An usher with a flashlight hurried two last ticket holders to their seats. The lights went down.
Movies
, Max thought,
are just another kind of lie
.
RAIN FELL IN SHEETS against the facades of buildings and rebounded off the pavement in bull’s-eye splashes. Odile shook out her umbrella. She’d spent the morning inspecting the clothing boutiques of the first and second arrondissements to see what was selling and to catch up with the trade. Now she stood just outside the glass vestibule of a music-and-electronics emporium on the Champs-Élysées, waiting for the rain to let up. She stared into the downpour, half mesmerized by its fall and force.
Her run-in with the Russians had prompted her to make her own inquiries about Thierry. At the Sorbonne she was told that he was on emergency leave, attending to a family problem. His home phone was answered by a machine. His apartment intercom—twice she had tried it, once at night—brought no response. Even the friend of a friend who’d first put them in touch professed to know nothing of his whereabouts and seemed surprised to hear about his leave. Whatever the reason for Thierry’s disappearance, Odile began to doubt that he would return anytime soon.
She checked her watch, then turned her back to the weather and passed through a set of glass doors into the megastore’s tri-level atrium. Part of an international chain, the establishment had opened barely a year ago to uniformly hostile press. Since then it had become a sensation, as much a social draw as a retail outlet, and Odile now paused to take in the spectacle. The ground floor was packed with students, office workers on lunch break, and others, like herself, just waiting out the rain. They sorted impatiently through CD bins or stood at listening stations, pressing headphones to their ears while their eyes went wary. A marble staircase, centrally placed, ran to the upper floors, and Odile took it to the top.
Twice since returning to Paris, she had dreamed she was back at theBrest train station, pushing through the crowd of people waiting to buy tickets, people she now understood to be desperate. All was as it had been—the dimness, the silence, the guards, the ruin—but now she, too, was desperate, no longer a traveler on an errand but another refugee, someone whose world had been erased by catastrophe and fate. Panic gripped her as she fought through the crowd, pushing and pleading and kicking until at last she reached the ticket window. But there, in place of the gray-haired matron, she found Thierry filling out the forms, and though he recognized her and spoke to her teasingly, in good humor, he wouldn’t sell her a ticket. “Because you can’t pay for it,” he said when she demanded an explanation. “What’s more, your seat has been given away.” In the distance were sirens, growing louder as they approached.
She wandered among the floor samples, televisions, DVD players, personal stereos, cell
Similar Books
