Here's to five miserable months on the wagon and the irreparable harm that it's caused me.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the negative impact of trying to adhere to societal expectations or limitations, symbolized by being 'on the wagon.'
Stanley Kubrickβs quote speaks to the personal toll of strictly adhering to a commitment, particularly in regards to sobriety or self-control, suggesting that the struggle itself can lead to suffering and harm. It highlights the irony that in trying to improve one's life or behavior, the resultant pressure and misery can be damaging.
In practice
During a support group meeting discussing challenges with addiction, this quote can highlight the pitfalls of rigid self-discipline.
The reality of the final moment, just before shooting [the scene], is so powerful that all previous analysis must yield before the impressions you receive under these circumstances, and unless you use this feedback to your positive advantage, unless you adjust to it, adapt to it and accept the sometimes terrifying weaknesses it can expose, you can never realize the most out of your film.
Because I direct films, I have to live in a major English-speaking production center. That narrows it down to three places: Los Angeles, New York and London. I like New York, but it's inferior to London as a production center. Hollywood is best, but I don't like living there.
I've never achieved spectacular success with a film. My reputation has grown slowly. I suppose you could say that I'm a successful filmmaker-in that a number of people speak well of me. But none of my films have received unanimously positive reviews, and none have done blockbuster business.
A film is - or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme, what's behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later.
The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes.
Anyone who has ever been privileged to direct a film also knows that, although it can be like trying to write 'War and Peace' in a bumper car in an amusement park, when you finally get it right, there are not many joys in life that can equal the feeling.
Why should all life be work, when we all can borrow. Let's think only of today, and not worry about tomorrow.
Everything was good. But it was awful, too.
For every laugh, there should be a tear.
She went from opera, park, assembly, play,_x000D_ _x000D_ To morning walks, and prayers three hours a day._x000D_ _x000D_ To part her time 'twixt reading and bohea,_x000D_ _x000D_ To muse, and spill her solitary tea,_x000D_ _x000D_ Or o'er cold coffee trifle with the spoon,_x000D_ _x000D_ Count the slow clock, and dine exact at noon.
I remember nothing of this, no ambulance rides, nothing. Nothing between switching out the bedside lamp and the sudden indignity of rebirth: the slaps, the brightness, the tubing, the speed, the urgent insistence that I be choked back into breathing life. I have felt so sorry for babies ever since.
The emotionally sound person should be able to take risks, to ask himself what he really would like to do in life, and then to try to do this, even though he has to risk defeat or failure. He should be adventurous (though not necessarily foolhardy); be willing to try almost anything once, just to see how he likes it; and look forward to some breaks in his usual life routines.
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