Troja

Tonight we went to see Troy. Many of my thoughts on the film were summed up in a comment I left in Neil's blog, so I'll just copy them here:

Marty and I saw it tonight, and were speculating on the way home about how much violence was likely edited out for the German version. We've noticed it in other movies (even Harry Potter!) that the American version generally has more violence... I think this could have been a hell of a lot gorier than what I saw tonight. I'm just curious.

Of course, by that token, we should have had more nudity in Germany! I don't think I saw a single (female) nipple! And certainly no frontal nudity for the men or the women.

Okay, this makes my interest in the film sound somewhat prurient, doesn't it? My take on the rest of it: Paris was a prat (Helen not much better), I loved the way Achilles fought but I cringed when he went screaming through the burning castle after his girlfriend, the ships were the coolest, Peter O'Toole is extra-freaky these days, and Hector was, as always, the best man in that whole war.

However, I didn't mention the possibly BEST part of the movie -- at least for us. There was a certain phrase that was repeated over and over in the film, and every time we heard it, we had to laugh. Because of this mini-review we read in a brochure we picked up at the theater before going into the movie:



Hahaha!

In other weekend news, last night the Harmunichs sang as part of the Lange Nacht der Musik (Long Night of Music) here in Munich. This is a night when venues all over town host concerts and one ticket gets you in to any of them. There are hundreds of musical performances between 7pm and 3am! We sang at 9pm on a small stage in the foyer of the Gasteig, Munich's cultural center. Here are a couple of pictures -- one of us on the stage (with yellow lights shining down on us!) and one of us singing a small encore after we came off the stage.


Click to enlarge.

And finally, a couple of days ago we went to see West Side Story at the Deutsches Theater in Munich. It was performed by a touring Broadway company, in English, with German subtitles! Actually, they were on screens at either side of the stage. The subtitles were really interesting, because they didn't translate directly so much as give the meaning of the dialogue, songs, etc. And sometimes there were subtitles during the dances, when there was no singing going on! They were mostly explaining the backstory ("The Sharks are Puerto Ricans, immigrants.") It was a hoot. And a very good production.

I believe we have thoroughly celebrated our anniversary this year!