The Legend of 1900

This is one of my favorite movies, The Legend of 1900. There is one spot in this movie that I am very surprised at what the actor, I mean 1900 said.

 

He said “Big city. You just couldn’t see an end to it. The end…please? You please just show me where it ends? It was all very fine on that gangway. And I was grand too in my overcoat. I cut quite a figure. And I was getting off. Guaranteed. That’s wasn’t the problem. It wasn’t what I saw stopped me, Max. It was what I didn’t see. Understand? What I didn’t see. In all that srawling city there was everything except an end. There was no end. What I didn’t was where the whole thing came to an end. The end of the world. You take a piano. Keys begin. The keys end. You know there are eighty-eight of them. Nobody tell you any different. They are not infinite. You are infinite. And on those keys, the music that you can make is infinite. I like that, that I can live by. You can get me up on that gangway and you roll out in front of me a keyboard of millions and billions of keys that never end. And that’s the truth, Max. They never end. That keyboard is infinite. And if the keyboard is infinite then there is no music you can play. You’re sitting on the wrong bench. That’s God’s piano. Christ, did you see the streets? Just the streets! There were thousands of them. How do you do it down there? How do you choose just one? One woman. One house. One piece of land to call your own landscape to look at. One way to die? All that world just weighing down on you. You don’t even know where it comes to an end. I mean, aren’t you ever just scared of breaking apart at the thought of it? At the enormity of living it? I was born in this ship. And the world passed me by. But thousands people at a time. And there were wishes here. But never fit between prow and stern. You played out your happiness, but on a piano that was no infinite. I learned to live that way. Land? Land is a ship too big for me. It’s a woman too beautiful. It’s a voyage too long, perfume too strong. It’s music I don’t know how to make. I could never get off this ship. At best, I can step off my life. After all, I don’t exist for anyone. You are the exception, Max. You are the only one who knows I’m here. You’re a minority. And you’d better get used to it. Forgive me, my friend, but I’m not getting off.”

 

That’s what he said to his friend, Max, while Max finally found he still on that ship which was going to explode within only couple hours later. He said a lot about his own opinion of life. And I agree most of them, especially the part he talked about the “Land”. I agree that the land I used to live is kind of too large for me to fit in. I still have all kinds of problems to figure out when I am playing the game people have made me to play. I found it ridiculous that I have to play the game before I say that damn yes! They have already set up every law and regulation which they call them traditions and then put you into their own game. And there are only two ways you can probably choose: Quit the game and you will find that you will be blamed by a lot of people, even your friends, and your families. Or you still follow those ridiculous rules as they tell you to do so, losing you freedom, your imagination, and your soul. I am in a dilemma, and you?

 

I want to be free and also be a good kid, or perhaps I have already needed to be a good adult. I don’t know. Though I am glad I will have a brand new college life within few weeks later, I am still afraid that I have to continue playing this kind of game. I don’t want my life to become a gambling. I am tired of following all these rules…Please set me free!

 

 

By Alice 07/21/09