Freaky Friday

Posted on July 25, 2012 by thingsilovedasakid

Ah, Freaky Friday. At my primary school in the 1980s, it seemed like any time there was a rainy afternoon or ‘special occasion’ like the last day of school, the teachers would wheel out the dusty VHS copy from the school library (in my imagination – who knows, perhaps it was kept under lock and key in the principal’s office) and know that they could keep a bunch of kids entertained in a family-friendly, Disney kind of way. (We’re talking the original Freaky Friday starring Barbara Harris and Jodie Foster here, not the (highly enjoyable) remake with Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan before she went all court case).

I’ve always had a special place in my heart for this film, and when it popped up at the charity store where I work I couldn’t resist snapping it up. (Yes, that job does provide me with a fair amount of blog material).

I’m sure you’re all familiar with the premise of the film, in which teenage Annabel swaps bodies and lives with her busy stay at home mother, Ellen, for one very freaky Friday. Mother and daughter are flung into the day to day hassles of high school and domestic life, with Ellen taking on a hockey game, and Annabel attempting to look after her younger brother and whip up a roast turkey, with chaotic results.

The vintage of Freaky Friday is instantly revealed through the gorgeously kitsch animated credits. Whatever happened to animated credits? Someone ought to bring it back. In ways I love the other-era, 1976 setting of this film, taking place in a time when teenage girls wore jeans and stripey t-shirts and parted their hair in the middle, typing tests were part of the school curriculum, Jodie Foster had freckles and braces, and two incomes weren’t needed to pay a mortgage. It was also lovely to see a positive, non-Mean Girls portrayal of teenage girls in Annabel’s friends (and points for a character called ‘Bambi’).

Less rocking aspects of this time period included a husband telling his wife to “just show up and look pretty” to a work event (though Annabel as Ellen does call him a “male chauvinist pig” in response), tinned cat food containing horse meat, and the fact that wood panelling was considered an acceptable method of interior decoration.

Freaky Friday is a great story, and while I enjoyed the feeling of nostalgia, and marvelling at what a great actress Jodie Foster was even in her youth, I realised (a little sadly!) that I prefer the 2003 version. I just found the first film too dated. As Jodie Foster said in the DVD interview, this is a film for little girls. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

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The Children of Green Knowe

Posted on March 7, 2012 by thingsilovedasakid

The story of how I rediscovered this beautiful story is an interesting one, and I owe a large part of my blog idea to it.

When I was younger, every now and again, I would recall an amazing story I loved as kid (it was actually a book that belonged to my older brother), but much to my frustration I could never remember its title or author, and the book had long since disappeared from the house.

One day at the charity store where I work casually, I was putting out a box of books for sale and one title caught my eye. Sure enough, it was The Book! – The Children of Green Knowe. After all these years of wondering about this amazing story I used to love, it turned up at my work, and I snapped it up for a couple of dollars.

I re-read the book and, as I had in my younger years, absolutely loved it. When I reached the end, I was in tears on the train during my morning commute. It’s such a beautiful story. I’m a sucker for any bittersweet, tragic, meant-to-be-together-but-can’t story, and combined with the sheer magic of the setting and the way you come to know the characters, it’s an amazing novel.

Tolly is sent to stay with his eccentric great-grandmother during school holidays. She lives in a 900 year old castle, on a semi-rural property complete with a groundskeeper called Boggis, a bunch of mysterious children, deer, squirrels, field mice, foxes, owls, peacocks, fish, shrubs pruned in the shapes of animals and people, the ruins of a centuries-old cathedral, a moat, and a stone Saint Christopher.

Tolly discovers that there are children dwelling within the house, who the lonely boy with barely a family – a distant father, a departed mother and stepmother with whom he doesn’t click – desperately needs. Green Knowe and its inhabitants provide Tolly with a place where he truly belongs.

The story is magical and wondrous in its detail, perhaps even more so to a Southern Hemisphere suburban born and bred reader, who can only imagine the sheer exoticness of concepts such as being ‘snowed in’, (the Northern equivalent of being sent home from school because it’s too hot, I imagine. Not that that ever actually happened!) Bengal matches (green and red flames? I want some!) and living on a property with stables.

The Children of Green Knowe is beautifully illustrated by the author’s son, Peter Boston, and takes us back to a time of boarding schools, and British fathers working in far flung outposts of the Empire – in this case, the country formally known as Burma.

The Children of Green Knowe is filled with beautiful imagery, which transports the reader into its world, along with providing a subtle, moving commentary on loneliness, belonging, the passing of time, the briefness of childhood and mortality. Not long into the book we discover the devastating truth about Toby, Alexander, and Linnet, but our relationship with them continues. I definitely recommended the book to anyone who wants to read a bittersweet, captivating story. I’m off to find the other books in the series, A Stranger at Green Knowe (which won a Carnegie Medal) and The River at Green Knowe, and to hunt down the BBC series.

*At the end of my copy of the book, published in 2006, there are contact details for the author’s daughter-in-law, who runs tours of the house in which the Green Knowe series is set (Lucy M. Boston based the series on her own house and garden – can you imagine?) I was so frustrated to find this out now, as I lived in London for two years and would have definitely hopped on a train to go visit the property. Next time for sure!

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Splash

Posted on November 12, 2011 by thingsilovedasakid

I recently rejoined the local library of my childhood, and have been rediscovering the joy of borrowing DVDs and glossy magazines, all for free. (Apart from when said DVDs are returned late…)

Having had a few days off work sick recently, I decided to borrow a few films, and couldn’t resist one of my childhood favourites, Splash. (Note: spoilers ahead, but you have had since 1984).

Starring a baby-faced Tom Hanks as the overworked Allen Bauer, the legs-to-the-sky Daryl Hannah as Madison the mermaid and the late, young John Candy (may he rest in peace) as his brother Freddie, Splash is a fish out of water (sorry) love story to warm the cockles (sorry) of your been-single-too-long heart.

Madison and Allen first meet as kids, when she saves him from drowning after he falls off a ferry while on holiday in Cape Cod. He dismisses it as his mind playing tricks on him and returns to dry land and ‘reality’. Years later, we meet Allen again in adulthood. Freshly single after yet another relationship goes awry; he decides to return to Cape Cod to recuperate. Yet again he takes a tumble off a boat, and wakes up on the beach to see our Madison, who has again rescued him. She gives him a kiss and dashes back into the water, leaving Allen to wonder who this mysterious woman is.

He isn’t left clueless for long, as Madison soon arrives in New York, in a rather distinctive fashion, to reunite Allen with his wallet. A sweet, idyllic love story unfolds. Madison’s childlike enthusiasm for daily life on dry land is infectious – who doesn’t think there’s a bit of magic in watching dough being tossed in the window of a pizza place?

At one point, Allen tells Madison the story of being rescued by a mermaid as a child but stops short, saying “nothing. I was just a stupid kid” – but the recurring motif of fish tanks in Allen’s home and office, showing his lifelong connection to all things aquatic, shows us this is a love that’s meant to be.

However, Dr Walter Kornbluth, a scientist determined to reveal Madison for who she really is, is an ever-lurking threat. Madison initially hides her true self from Allen, but when she’s captured in the name of science, her secret is uncovered. Dr Kornbluth has a change of heart when he learns the truth of the government scientist’s plans for Madison, and together with Allen and Freddie, sneaks into the lab and sets her free. Fleeing from the threat of recapture, Madison and Allen dive in the harbour and leave New York for an underwater metropolis.

Verdict: A childhood encounter with a mermaid, John Candy as an obnoxious older brother, Daryl Hannah rocking crimped waist-length hair and a men’s suit, some seriously dated technology, 80s New York New York, an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay – what’s not to love? Splash is a childhood pleasure definitely worth reclaiming.

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