LAURA JOHNSON
A&E Assistant
It’s pink. It’s bright. It’s got an 80’s inspired soundtrack that will make you want to put on your skinniest skinny jeans, Ramones T-shirt and rock out to the tune of bouffant hair-dos and rustling taffeta skirts. It is “Marie Antoinette,” Sofia Coppola’s newest installment to her girl seemingly lost in translation line-up of films. When I saw this movie, I felt as if I was that girl.
I don’t speak French, although the three years of sign language I took in high school really came in handy while gallivanting through Paris this summer.
Antoinette herself was a fish out of water in France. An Austrian forced into an arranged marriage at a young age, she had to learn how to do things her own way.
Because of Marie Antoinette’s French Queen status, Coppola opted to release her picture early to the French public at the Cannes Film Festival, months before the intended American release on Oct. 19.
Extremely excited that I was going to be able to see this before anyone at home, I was willing to pay the 12.50 Euro matinee price to see the film. The movie was in English but what they didn’t tell us about movie-going in Paris is that first you’ll need to sit through 30 minutes of commercials. Each one more outlandish than the next, including one about two mating ladybugs in a car. But finally the movie began.
Sopping and gooping with syrupy candy-coated lusciousness, the film made me want to jump inside, grab some vertical weave and frolic through the grass watching the sun rise with the Queen and her entourage.
Antoinette only wanted to have the time of her life. Not unlike Pepperdine students today, she wanted to be free from the bubble she lived in. Free from the rigidity of French tradition and rules, she just wanted to be herself. There is much that we as college students have in common with her and much we can learn from her:
1. There is no need to wash your hair. Similar to the dread-lock in the fact that it was never brushed, the pouf was introduced to the world in 1774. Not unlike Bob Marley, species were actually found growing on women’s heads after they died. Actually, let’s scratch that — don’t be like Ryan Cabrera, washing your hair is cool.
2. If you are ever upset or alone, anorexia is not the answer. Eating will solve all problems. Specifically, really delicate and expensively made French pastries.
3. Swedish men are better than French ones. (I can’t really elaborate on this point because I am confined by the walls of tasteful journalism, but it’s true).
The underlying message of the film is to enjoy the time you have with the world. Coppola likes to take things slow. Her technique of “Oh here’s a tree, oh wow I like fuzzy bunnies, let’s keep the camera on this for 5 minutes with no sound,” is really one that although beautifully aesthetic, allows people to fall asleep in the aisles. If I wanted to examine the anatomy of a tree, I would sign up for Botany class.
Inspired by the movie, later that evening, a friend and I bought French baguettes, and went to the Eiffel tower to discuss the meaning of life. I thought about how I wanted to live forever, just there in that moment. It occurred to me that maybe sometimes in life one needs to slow down, maybe even watch a tree.
10-26-2006
