THE FIRST LINES

The first few lines of a story, a book, or a film, are perhaps the deciding factor as to whether we will indulge in it or not. Occasionally I will watch those first few minutes of a favorite film and then shut it off. I don‘t enjoy the remainder of the film as much as the first part. Two such favorites are from “My House in Umbria” and “The 39 Steps” (2008 version).

These two films are nothing alike; one has a young man herding his goats in the hills of Italy with a bit of modern civilization in a sportscast at his ears when a motorcar intrudes, carrying the main character of the story. The other begins in a men’s club in England (London, I presume) where a young man among all those old guys gets fed up with such a life and wants to head back to his work on another continent when a neighbor intrudes with a top-secret message for him to deliver; the messenger has only minutes to live.  

But I have yet to run across a story that starts with a bloodcurdling scream of one second’s duration. But one of mine does, and it’s finished. Maybe I’ll run it here soon. Then again, maybe not. There is enough scream-worthy material in the news these days to take our time. Yesterday it was in Tennessee; tomorrow it may be your birth state, as mine was yesterday. But wherever it is, it hurts too much to be writing.

But back a minute to the two films mentioned above. “The 39 Steps” in my most-read blogs is Number One with 656 pageviews (April, 2011) and I haven’t written up the other one. ♥♥♥