The Film Critic
Film is so captivating; yet, I can be critical.
In cinema some things come out more
than others in the screening;
being run over by that 4X4 for instance …
or sitting alone in the Commodore Theatre
In Aberystwyth in 1987, watching Citizen Kane,
wanting to sit in all 400 seats at once.
A cat scratching its ear in the front row.
You know I cannot go for more than one day
or so, without the picture briefly slipping, losing my
body and then coming back to it again. Take three.
I once met a mother who had gone to the cinema
with her two children. I was tangled in the screen.
They pulled me out of the action, saving me.
The woman was my wife.
The children were mine.
“That’s movies for you!” she laughed, “Still,
there’s a lot to be said for projection.”
Then I couldn’t find her, or remember them.
I’m sixty five years old and have been
re-shot many times from many angles
and I don’t even know what scene I’m in.
“Here we go.” Says the mouth.
“We’ll try again and even harder.” Reply the eyes.
Now, increasingly though, I find
I’m living in a world of out-takes,
where story line is just one those things
that you have to learn to live without …
and the film crew is coming closer,
wide eyed in amazement,
figures in a landscape of my own imagining,
wondering where to begin.
• • •
David R. Morgan is a full-time teacher in England and a children’s author with 15 books published so far. He is in the middle of writing a series for A2Z Press of Florida about all sorts of insects and larger animals and even single cells. For the last 4 years he has been working on a Soundings project with his son, Tobias. performing his writing to Toby’s original music. This work is available on David R Morgan YouTube, Spotify and Soundcloud.