Zoned Out
Reading "Roadside Picnic" by Arkady & Boris Strugatsky. The novel that the Tarkovsky movie "Stalker" was based on. Man, that was a serious butt burner. Strange movie. Maybe I will get a chance to see it again someday. Caught it years ago at the Fox Venice with my friend Momoko. That was a long time ago... So long ago in fact, the theatre had a smoking section.
Just like I thought, the book makes more sense than the movie. Maybe it was the language barrier but it just seemed like nothing happened for like three hours worth of film. The idea that someone would have the balls to do this and get American audiences to sit through it has intrigued me since then. The jist of the story is that there are these six areas around the planet where aliens landed and "partied" for a number of years. They didn't have any malicious intention toward the human race other than to treat us as though we were the equivalent of cockroaches. After the party, they split and now the "Zones" are forbidden areas that are not legal to enter--because of danger and the fear of contamination. People sneak in anyway--to retrieve artifacts and sell them on the black market. Artifacts that are probably the alien equivalent of candy wrappers or empty beer bottles but that have strange properties and fetch high prices on the black market. The people that sneak in to scavenge "The Zone" are called stalkers. They've learned by trial and error where to step and how to behave inside because one false move usually means death or worse.
Good book. It works on many different levels in a way that reminds me of the book that was the basis for another Tarkovsky film: "Solaris". "Roadside Picnic" is available online if anybody's interested in checking it out.
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Does sound like an interesting movie. I'll have to check if it is on DVD.
--sunil
I don't recommend the movie. The book is pretty cool though if you like science fiction. Russian films in general are kind of an acquired taste IMO. And that film in particular has it's own peculiar problems/issues. It's about 3 hours long and most of it is about these three guys that are basically crawling around in a junkyard. You have the feeling throughout the whole movie that something is about to happen, but then nothing happens. I would be curious to see the movie again maybe after reading the book, but only as a student of his films and of russian cinema in general.
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