Commentary: February 2021 Archives
Last Friday night (5th) we met up with EffanC to go see Penguin Bloom.
I'd been following the Penguin movie, Cam and Sam's Instagrams for a while so was probably a bit over excited to see it (never a good start heh).
It stayed pretty close to the true story (as much of it as I know).
If I had to complain about anything, it would be that I was hoping to see more of Sam's relationship with Penguin. Apparently she would spend hours with Penguin and pour out her soul to the bird, but there really wasn't much of that in the movie.
Another thing that was really only touched on peripherally was Sam's relationship with Bron. Bron was Sam's best friend from school, and apparently a pretty awesome person. But Sam pushed her away after her accident. There's awakwardness in the couple of scenes Bron's in, but it didn't go into the depth or explain it the way I was hoping it would. After reading the book but not getting answers from the movie, I was like, did Sam and Bron ever become friends again? Well I asked Sam that night, and it turns out they did! So that was pretty great news.
The other remarkable thing about the movie is that they actually filmed it all at the Bloom's real house! They redecorated it all, but that was actually where everything happened in real life. Amazing stuff.
A lovely movie, with outstanding performances from all involved.
I bought and read the original Penguin Bloom book when it first came out. For Christmas I asked for the follow up book - Heartache and Birdsong, by Sam Bloom, Cameron Bloom and Bradley Trevor Greive. This one is even more of Sam's story and ends with a very personal letter to her boys. Another lovely book from the family that has been through an awful lot.
A few years ago I borrowed "To Catch a King" by Harry Patterson (aka Jack Higgins) from the club because it sounded interesting, and I think Stu said he'd heard of the story. I finally got around to reading it last year before bed, and finally finished it in the new year. It's a bit hard to know how much of it is true, but some of it was definitely fact - there were indeed plans to capture (the ex) King Edward VIII - apparently by both sides. Anyway, the book was a great fun read, I enjoyed it.