I remember having a very long conversation with my good friend, RP about Cinema Paradiso.
One Saturday night we were hanging out at our favorite bar and he mentions that he was watching this movie the night before and he was very much touched by the story. I commented on how I was affected by Alfredo’s story about the soldier. (And how much I loved the part when Toto was watching spliced old film after Alfredo's funeral)
Excerpt from Cinema Paradiso Synopsis as narrated by Robert E. Yahnke.
Salvatore asks Alfredo for advice. The two walk the streets, and Alfredo carries on about why God created women. They sit on the stoop of a doorway, and Alfredo spins a tale: "A king gave a feast for the loveliest princesses of the realm. A soldier standing guard saw the king's daughter go by. She was the most beautiful of all, and he fell in love with her. But what is a simple soldier next to the daughter of a king? When he met her, he told her he could not live without her. The princess, taken with his depth of feeling, told him, 'If you wait for 100 days and 100 nights under my balcony, I shall be yours.' With that the soldier went and waited one day, ten days, twenty days. Each evening the princess looked out, and he never moved. In wind and rain and snow he was always there. At the end of 90 nights tears streamed from his eyes. He didn't have the strength to sleep. And all that while, the princess watched him. Finally, it was the 99th night. The soldier stood up, took his chair, and left." Salvatore is stunned. "What happened then?" "That is the end!" Salvatore exclaims. "And don't ask what it means. I don't know." He stands. "If you figure it out, you tell me."
RP and I agreed to disagree in the end.
He tells me he would rather not know. The thought that at one point, the princess could actually be his is enough to make him a happy man; he would willingly wonder forever about what-might-have-beens, because it would slaughter his soul and enforce a lifetime of grief if he realizes she'd never be. One more day will finalize his fate, the answer would be real. He would rather not know.
One line summarizes my answer to him, 'What if the princess wanted to be yours?'.
2 comments:
Ladies and Gentlemen, be the FLAME, not the MOTH. It's a lot easier. =)
Why be the loyal soldier standing under the weather, when you can be the sneaky gardener or pool-boy?
Hell, I'd rather be the chimney-sweep!!!
At least I get the girl, and I don't have the stupid WHAT-IFS.
Let's not let this little sob fairy-tale move us to similar acts of martyrdom.
(DISCLAIMER: I'LL STAND OUTSIDE MY PRINCESS' WINDOW FOR THE FULL 100 DAYS AND MORE)
In one more night, the princess would have been his. But she also could not possibly have kept her promise. And it would have been terrible. He would have died. This way, however, at least for 99 days, he was living under the illusion that she was there, waiting for him.
This is Toto's answer to Alfredo.
My answer, 7 years after, is that: if the princess really had loved him (or at least seems willing to), she would've find it in her heart to be with him sooner. Sooner. If after 10, 50, 80 days of enduring the bitterest cold nights and blistering hot days-- without an ounce of assurance; It just means that the she is not the one and the princess is incapable of loving him.
Ultimately, the reason for leaving is not because of fear nor uncertainty but merely finding "the" reason to stay.
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