"Herz-Schmerz-Eichhörnchen" and else also Herz-Schmerz on the weekend...

On Friday night my husband and me went on an outing to Aachen to attend a concert of The Miserable Rich at the Raststätte in Aachen. Though our lovely daughter Debora, now living there, was to join us, this spitefully did not happen... Still like last November in Duisburg a wonderful live performance by a bunch of great musicians and a wonderful audience. What will remain as special memories about this one for me apart from the performance is the ice-cold almost freezing red wine - "I'm sorry for it, but we store the bottles outside" (at the time -7 degrees C ;)), but never mind so I drank three glasses and the effect only revealing itself very slightly. The cold coffee, the remains of the band, my husband was treated to for free, and of course the expression "Herz-Schmerz-Eichhörnchen", relating to the following song and video, though it all takes a rather graphic turn - something to do with the fact that the animator had split up shortly before ;). And the rather awkward pronunciation of "Kater" after so many German words with "ch" - Aachen-Herz-Schmerz-Eichhörnchen ;)!


The second take on Herz-Schmerz, heartache, was left to Saturday evening when I treated us to watch the final episode of Sherlock season 2, The Reichenbach Fall (notice even there a lot of "ch" and since Johann Sebastian Bach also featured, as Grimm and Hänsel und Gretel, a lot of German stuff indeed). Spoilers ahead so if you have not yet watched it and intent to do so, please do not read on...

I must admit that I've been sort of warned because of the hysteria this episode evoked on the internet - even before it had been broadcast, kindled by several people. Yet somehow funnily though I often can hardly hold back my tears during emotional, or better even sentimental scenes, this one did not provoke so many tears like for example the scene in Nightwatching where Mijnheer van Rijn realises that inspite of his art he cannot revive Saskia. What  nevertheless made it special is its great humour, its being so hilariously old-fashioned (eg when it makes the viewer believe that in a chase featuring car(s) and pedestrians, the pedestrian is able to win). The revelation that Moriarity is more as the criminal mastermind is also a great illusionist, taking on this way down the illusion that the world can be destroyed by a superweapon or a superkey (in fact I despise all the movies where the least thing the hero has to do is to save the world, big, bigger, biggest, megabig). And then of course there remained "The Final Problem", which turned out to be: "What shall I do, sacrifice my life or sacrifice the lives of the people I love?" Yet indeed it was not even that simple because to sacrifice my life would also mean to make the life of the one person, who really loves me, quite miserable. And the answer is not yet worked out - a perfect fix indeed.

Is Sherlock omnipotent?

Spoiler alert for anyone who has not yet watched "A Scandal in Belgravia", please do not read on, for there might be some spoilers here.



I must admit that this episode fully fulfilled the high expectations, yet I had my troubles with the last ten minutes, which felt so much like a fairy tale ending; for Sherlock is apparently omnipotent, always being at the right spot if his dearest are in need, and if so he is also benevolently forgiving them all their wrongs/sins, even if they had been abusing his most precious, his intellect. Speaking of which, he might be everywhere indeed, but come once as close as to arousing any emotions in him at all, and he starts to lose hold of his intellectual powers, at least as far as that he gets less cautious.


PS: My husband couldn't help but comment on the numberplate of the car that took Sherlock to the airport, for it almost bore my surname - the pronunciation would be the same but the spelling wrong -, which happens to be not my husband's by the way ;D.

Zu-fall

This morning I was informed that abebooks had found some items matching my search for publications of "Royal Shakespeare Company" between 1974 and 1981 (in fact I'm looking for yearbooks) and they turned out to be two programmes for a play entitled "Sherlock Holmes". Later on this came up, my favourite radio station dedicating an hour of classic rock music to tears, entitled "96 Tears". A funny coincidence when one imagines that I'm well aware of the fact that all over the world some people are growing hysteric about the fact that today  the final episode of the second series of "Sherlock" will be broadcast... ;D. Poor John!

Alas the link does not work correctly any more, it was a radio show of mainly 60s songs entitled "96 Tears", after this:

Mycroft and Watson

What I particularly love about this scene is the fact that it's not just Mycroft playing cat and mouse with John Watson but if one considers that Mark Gatiss is playing Mycroft, a rather intriguing dimension is added. For here the creator is toying with his creation and he is from the looks of it damn sure of his power. Poor John simply has no choice but to go the way he directs him. And thinking of the possibilities that this encounter offers/ plays on, things could get very interesting in the future. My personal view is that Dr Watson is by far the more interesting character and it's simply marvellous how this formerly dull sidekick has become a multi dimensional being. Especially in this scene I began asking myself which of the both is more disturbed/insane, Sherlock or John?!

What are actors actually thinking while shooting a scene?!

I'm aware of the fact that this sounds highly provocative, but yet it somehow fits in the line of my last few posts. After it has been established by the commentary contained on the official DVD  that in this scene from Sherlock

Benedict Cumberbatch was indeed - as I had been perceiving - very much worried about his tight suit and the vicinity of the swimming pool, I wonder if I'm also right about Martin Freeman's thoughts and what his bodylanguage and facial expressions are telling. My thoughts were the following: So I'm John Watson, Sherlock doesn't have a clue and will be surprised at the possibility that  John may in fact be Moriarty.  John won't let him be in doubt for long though and reveal his true state as the pawn in this lethal game as soon as possible. As soon as the word "heart" gets mentioned by John or rather Moriarty, John realises that everything Sherlock will have to offer is but a McGuffin, the real target is Sherlock and John is his most vulnerable point, so from this point onwards John will look for any opportunity to let Sherlock off this most dangerous hook disregarding his own life...I'm certainly intrigued by this histrionic potency of making my imagination run wild, very well done indeed.