Heads. Heads. Heads. Heads.

Cafe Society
#1

My husband opened his solstice present tonight, freshly arrived from the UK: Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, on DVD.

See, he had a much-treasured copy on VHS, taped off HBO or something. It was this copy that was the first copy I ever saw, shortly after we first met, and he and I enjoyed it many times therafter. and then he loaned it to a friend who . . . (I’m cringing as I type this!) . . . taped over it.

The program that got taped over it was Babylon 5. If it had been anything else, I might be giving the the hubby his solstice greetings at visiting hours at the state penitentury.

I was reminded of this fact recently, so I thought, a-ha, I’ll get him a new copy for solstice, and, this being the Modern Age, I shall get it on DVD.

Except that it’s not available on DVD in the US, just VHS. tsk Barbaric. Utterly barbaric. But a comment at Amazon sagely advised that it is available on DVD the UK, on a Region 0 disk, no less. Ah-HAH, I thought. So I ordered it from Amazon.uk forthwith. (Along with the UK versions of the Harry Potter boxed set. “Sorceror’s” Stone indeed. sniff)

There was some trouble playing it, as it is PAL format, and our DVD player choked on it. He tried it in his computer, but the default Windoze DVD player and WMP just sat upon it indefinitely. I popped it into my Mac, and of course it took off right off the bat, verifying that the disk was okay, but the screen on my iBook is 14 inches—not optimal for cinematic enjoyment.

But, we gave Bill Gates one more try, and finally Real Player is Delivering the Goods. :slight_smile: There are no extras. There was no pamphlet. But, my god, it’s brilliant! I can’t wait for the tennis scene!

#2

“There must have been some point…early on. Someplace where we could have changed it this time.”

I knew exactly what you were talking about from the thread title.

#3

Oh man. That would be the awesomest Christmas present ever, if only I could figure out how to make my DVD player region-free.

“Death is ‘not.’ Death isn’t. You take my meaning? Death is the ultimate negative. Not being. You can’t not be on a boat.”

“I’ve frequently not been on boats.”

“No, what you’ve been is not on boats.”

/from memory, so probably paraphrased a bit

#4

Statement! 15 - 0. :smiley:

#5

A DVD that’s available in England?!? I don’t believe in it!

How’s that for a setup?

#6

Heads.

Caught it on… Bravo? The other month. Brilliant. But… what is it? The style reminds me of Waiting for Godot, but… I’m forgetting something obvious.

No, I know who the gentlemen are, I just… there’s something passing familiar about it, the stylistic choice. And yet I can not say what it is.

#7

“Do you want to play a game?”

#8

Which is why I have the Apple video thingamajigger and 15’ of S-video and RF cables dragging from my TV to my Mac.

That, and a tennis racquet.

#9

It’s a Tom Stoppard play. Perhaps you’ve read some of his other works?

wikipedia

#10

The first time I saw Rosencranzt and Guildenstern are Dead, my flatmate had picked it up, and I didn’t know the first thing about it.

At that time, I had a regular supply of liquid LSD from a clever chemist pal o’ mine, and I had a regular Friday night ritual.

The ritual involved coin tossing. First I would do a two-out-of-three to determine if I would do the psychedelic thing that night. If it came up “tails,” I’d leave it for another night. If it came up “heads,” (naturally,) I’d put one drop in a glass of water, and continue the ritual. I would continue to flip the coin, and each time it came up “heads,” I’d add another drop of LSD to the glass, until it came up “tails,” at which point I’d drink the glass.

This particular night, I got two heads straight-away, fetched a glass of water and my vial of LSD, and put a drop in. Then I started flipping again.

Heads. Drop.

Heads. Drop.

Heads. Drop.

Heads. Drop.

Heads. Drop.

…and on and on.

Eventually, I stopped thinking “This one must come up ‘tails’” and incredulously adding drops. I knew that I had thirteen drops in there at least, and there was no way I was going to add any more, comfortable ritual or no. I set the coin down without seeing “tails” once.

I drank the glass at a draught, and then went downstairs to watch the movie with my flatmate.

As we set about the other requisite movie-watching ritual (rolling a doobie,) I told him about my weird experience with the coin-tossing, and we had a brief conversation about probability which concluded with the jokey supposition that The Universe intended me to be extremely high in order to view this film, which neither of us knew thing one about, but which came highly recommended.

By the time the joint was rolled and we started the movie going, the LSD was coming on strong. Then that opening scene: “Heads. Heads. Heads. Heads. Again, heads.”

It really coloured the rest of the movie for me. :smiley: