For at least two weeks, every few days I would attempt to get the movie Joyeux Noël properly set up via our T9 Android 8.1 TV Box to play properly. Only one of the 'apps' (namely, Cinema HD) that I have downloaded into our Android TV Box was able to access any working link sources for the movie; but although the movie played flawlessly enough, none of the three sources included subtitles whenever the French or Germans spoke ─ and that probably happened ⅔ of the time, since the movie was as much about the French and German soldiers as it was about the Scots.
Now, there was a subtitles option whenever a movie source was being played. But never have I seen such a discrepancy between when the subtitles played, and when the actual involved scene was played. I swear, the subtitles for some of the subtitle options were probably more than a minute out of sync with the scene they were supposed to be translating ─ it made the movie impossible to immerse oneself into, let alone capably follow.
So I had decided to try and watch the movie via a website rather than a movie 'app', for I do have both Firefox and Chrome browser 'apps' downloaded into our Android TV Box.
However, the problem here is that the browsers in the Android TV Box do not respond at all as efficiently as they do on my computer ─ they are infernally slow to react. Often, the delayed reaction is so very slow that I lose patience and re-initiate actions that would have commenced eventually had I been more patient, but there is no way of knowing this.
And time and again, in my research I would find a source for the movie that had properly synchronized subtitles; but when I would attempt to play the movie when my younger brother was with me (he doesn't know how to operate the Android TV Box), the properly subtitled movie would not display ─ the subtitles would be absent.
Finally, this morning I got everything set up before my brother had risen.
And at last, we got to watch the movie ─ it was at website MovieLand.to, and it had five source links to choose from. However, I learned that only one of the five would actually allow the closed captioning (as it incorrectly labelled its subtitles option) to work.
But it did so in perfect synchronization.
It was definitely worthwhile as a dramatization ─ with considerable licence ─ of an actual incident that took place around Christmastime in 1914 during trench warfare in France.
A couple of good background pieces on the movie and the World War Ⅰ incident are here, for anyone interested:
- ArmchairGeneral.com: The Christmas Truce of 1914 – Facts Vs. Fiction
- Telegraph.co.uk: The astonishing war story that a nation chose to forget
Actual personages in the movie are fictional, I expect. For example, I cannot imagine that there were a pair of opera singers (who were also lovers) in the German trenches ─ one a German soldier, the other his visiting Danish sweetheart ─ who subsequently deserted and turned themselves over to the French after the Christmastime truce had ended.
Nevertheless, it was the scene where the German singer was serenading his fellow soldiers in their trench on Christmas Eve with (if I recall correctly) "Silent Night", when a Scot bagpiper listening in the Allies trench decided to play accompaniment, that I was most affected with emotion.
Yes, tears flooded throughout that scene, for the Scot bagpiper next chose to play "Oh Come All Ye Faithful", to which the listening German soldier / singer burst forth with "Adeste Fidelis".
It was beautiful.
Christmas is so near, yet I think that this is the most barren lead-in for Christmas that I have experienced in many years. What has capped this mindset for me is my younger brother's driving suspension nigh 20 days ago along with the news that his girlfriend Bev has to work on Christmas Eve and on Boxing Day.
For a number of years, she has been spending all of Christmas Eve and all of Christmas Day with us, resulting in a two-day Christmas movie-watching binge enhanced with the alcoholic drinks of our choice, and all of the wonderful food and good will that is shared under those circumstances.
With just the one day off work, she can hardly be coming here to spend a night ─ especially since she lives a little over two miles from here, and my brother cannot drive her.
Even if she somehow did come and spend Christmas Eve here after she worked (she works in a bar), she would be unable to spend all of Christmas Day here because to do so would result in lots of drinking ─ she loves her white wine. The last thing she would want is to have to spend the night here after a day of emotional movie-watching and drinking throughout Christmas, only to have to somehow pull herself together Boxing Day morning and somehow get to work ─ also about two miles away from here.
So it's looking like there will be no wondrous festive time of it as had been the case in recent years.
We're not likely to even have a Christmas dinner now, for my brother will be treating the day just like it was any other day of the year ─ to wit, he will most likely take off in the afternoon to begin getting drunk somewhere.
I can only look forward now to having his drunken alter ego showing up in the evenings of both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. And since of late his brain is so enfeebled with drink that after getting home, he cannot sit in front of the T.V. for more than five minutes before he starts to pass out, I won't even try to watch T.V. with the inebriated presence.
Consequently, I don't know what I am going to do now. I had so very much been looking forward to Bev and our two days of celebration.
I have no friends anywhere near that I can visit, nor is there any other family I could easily visit ─ the only option in that regard is a late cousin's widow and their adult children, who would undoubtedly be home to celebrate with their mother. But that's a walk of three miles just to get there ─ and I would not want to go empty-handed in the way of drink.
Would I afterward feel like hiking the three miles back home? Bloody hardly ─ I'm 70 years old! I don't drive, and my mostly absentee wife has me so deeply mired in debt that a taxi is beyond consideration.
So I'm feeling rather down, for sure.
The past couple of days have found me too depleted to care to get out and do some desired grocery shopping, but maybe I will manage it early this evening. However, I still have to make a post in my private blog, so I ought to get that started and see how events play out for me.
I want to post a few photos before I call it quits with this post, however.
Google Photos notified me today that it had created a two-image collage from two photos that were apparently taken on this day exactly seven years ago ─ i.e., December 18, 2012:
So far this season, no snow has yet even slightly blanketed the ground ─ it's been lightly raining today, and at 5:15 p.m. as I type these words, I have just heard on the radio that it is approximately 8º Celsius.
But here are the two original photos ─ we live in a cul-de-sac, so that is the view that was presented from our house looking out toward the street seven years ago here where I live in Surrey:
I prefer the rain over snow, but normally snow does make for a spectacular-looking Christmas, doesn't it?
I have two other images I want to post ─ the first is a photo that I took four days ago. It was late Saturday evening, and I had watched T.V. by myself, for my brother was to spend that night at the home of his girlfriend Bev as he quite often does at the finish of his Saturdays.
I wanted to capture the lovely effect of the Christmas lights in our darkened living room, but my iPhone 5's camera flash illuminated everything and spoiled the desired effect:
Google Photos subsequently created this "enhanced" version of that photo:
Okay, I've dragged this on long enough, so I shall stop here right now.
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