On 11th November, we mark the 13th edition of Bookshop Day, which seeks to point out the importance of bookshops in furtherance of reading and literature. Thus, on this date I´d like to refer to one of the last film releases which has caught my attention: Coup de Chance, Woody Allen´s latest film. Coup de chance means “fluke” in English. The story takes place in Paris and the actors play their roles in French, in their mother tongue. The director always pays tribute to those European cities which he has chosen for some of his films such as Barcelona or San Sebastian. However, on those occasions, the cast of the film played their parts in English regardless of the location of the film. Why does the director manage to pay tribute to those cities? Just by making the city become another character in the film thanks to its beauty and splendour. In this film, Paris in autumn is as beautiful as Paris in spring or summer because Paris is the “City of Light” and it can be as outstanding as the performance of the actors of the film. Anyway, what´s the point of mentioning Woody Allen´s latest film? Somehow, Coup de Chance is indebted to the story of The Great Gatsby. Don´t get me wrong, Coup de Chance is NOT a film adaptation of The Great Gatsby but one of the main characters, Jean Fournier, is reminiscent of Jay Gatsby. The literary character is mentioned in the film so you can´t miss the reference but obviously, if you have read The Great Gatsby, you understand the implications of that reference much better. On this day, let´s pay attention to the stories we come across in books, books we choose to buy in our favourite bookshops, books we read and books we often lend so that others can also also enjoy them.
Today it is also Armistice Day, a day on which we commemorate the end of World War. These days we are living the outbreak of a new war conflict and lots of people are suffering its consequences. Therefore, it´s worth mentioning this red-letter day. If you want to learn more about this day, you can read my post “Our recent history in clips” (10th November 2014).
