Cinematheque - 10/9/2004

Langlois' living room stood darkly amidst the cacophonous noises and flashing glares of Paris streets around ten at night. There were no exterior features in this place, or rather out of this place. A dull, featureless and ultimately supermodern structure, placed near enough haphazardly to be called haphazard, like punk rock Feng Shui.

It was all part of the plan. Observe without being observed. Eliminate interest in the construct in order to preserve its only viable resource - its sanctity. Totally usable, a commodity like any other. The second it was learned that Langlois was operating there the hipster covenant would descend; boorish, demonic critics of landscaped architecture and personal availability. Langlois wanted none of that. He'd seen it, lived it; often enough to understand the emptiness therein. Real things, true things, required no exterior construction.

The inside may have had features or things, but Langlois had forgotten them. It was night inside, separate, an entity unto itself. It was Langlois' private locale, his Teatro de Vive, as Dali had once referred to it. Not the aneurysm-inducing spectacle that Salvador was looking for but absurd enough in its own way to provoke moderate interest.

It was entirely possible that the only thing inside was Langlois himself, seated, maybe not - he could no longer receive signals from parts of his body - and staring at the single portion of light inside the room. His screen, his eternal fire, staring back at him. Langlois looked into the screen, bulky nineteen-seventies headphones studding his temples. Empty eyes, empty skull.

Originally this was the Great Movie, the film that really captured the intense levity of life, Verite in its most extreme. It was only looking outward, always, reproducing the daily scenes for Langlois.

His final thought, the narrator put down in text form, was of the failure to capture reality. Subjective consciousness, he realized, could never be fully rendered. Even to the self, in the self, everything is parts, slowly understood dynamic facets of a persona. Like writing something down. Its a full measure from any for of concrete. Langlois' final moment was utterly embracing the inanity of standing two steps away from reality in order to discover what reality was.

Christ that's postmodern of me.

Maybe I'll open up a fucking club.