Like a train on fire

Exactly thirty years ago I saw Todd Haynes first feature, a festival film called Poison.  It has remained one of my favourites, to the dismay of many a friend who call it unsettling, odd, disturbing.  I was still in university, and brought a sweet, handsome boyfriend (and his roommate) to see it.  Afterwards they scratched their heads.  There was very little discussion.  "Well, THAT was interesting!" I recall the roommate saying facetiously.  I suspected then, as I know now, that my interests are not to everyone's taste.

The movie begins with an intertitle: The whole world is dying of panicky fright.  Three separate stories are presented and interwoven, leading to a well-edited climax - and a strangely tranquil denouement.  A bullied boy disappears.  A plague erupts.  A prisoner finds love.  They are titled in the credits as Hero, Horror, and Homo.  I watched it again a few days ago.  It had been drumming in my head for some reason.  I thought it fitting then, all things considered, to cap the year with it.

Roads, like story lines, are funny things.  Which one, indeed?  Alice's plight, and mine.  Like some of us, I've been spending time trying to sort the threads.  I have certainly feared, like Dr. Graves, that I would get distracted - and drink from the wrong cup.  Here's hoping things get a bit smoother for all of us - so I need not title another end-of-year post like a scene from a disaster movie.  All we really need, these days, is a strangely tranquil denouement.