Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Masked and Anonymous

On a routine visit to the GP for a repeat prescription for some sleeping tablets, I had to wear a mask in the waiting room, due to my head cold I've been sniffling with for the last week. I was also asked to sit at the far end away from the main seating zone. Kids eyes furtively looked me over, the creepy lady in the face mask!

On a brighter note, the NZ International Film Festival is underway. We've seen 3, missed 3 that we'd booked for (due to sickness) and have 8 more planned in the next 10 days.

The highlight so far is 'Big River Man' about the Slovenian Martin Strel whose hobby is swimming the length of the worlds longest rivers. This film is about the Amazon swim. Amazingly, Strel is not a super-athlete, but 53, overweight and a heavy drinker. After swimming the Danube, Mississippi and Yangtze, the Nile had been proposed as his next river, but Strel said, "I am not going to do the Nile. It's long but not challenging enough, it is just a small creek. The Amazon is much more mighty."

He barely survived the 66 days, 5000+ km in piranha infested waters. This is the trailer for the film.

Big River Man - Trailer from KNR Productions on Vimeo.

2 comments:

Nik said...

It's too strange that you and another Auckland blogger I've "met" online were at the same movies as me and I didn't know it. It's like I'm being stalked, or am a stalker... Anyway, "Big River Man" was great, although I felt vaguely sad at the end for how Strel ended up I think.

Amanda said...

Stalking Haha. Yes, sad I left thinking he'd lost an opportunity to be really famous. I had never heard of him before this film. I also thought he'd probably keep doing swims and eventually kill himself at it.
Am also going to "It might get loud" so I can stalk the other guy if you like :-)