The 39 Steps from Tobin Johnston on Vimeo.
In movies, when a man and a woman are handcuffed together
they always fall in love
I think about those times in film
where one person has to convince someone else to trust them
usually trying to get them to connect the dots about deep shit rolling down hill
or some
improbably bad thing about to happen
“There a bomb on that bus!”
“There are snakes on that plane?”
“You know dinosaurs are gonna get out.”
Soilent
green
is
people :(
“Come with me if you want to live.”, they say
or like
Cassandra cry, “Save your self. . . but save me too.”
Sometimes they just want to plead their case
they want to say that they didn’t do something they everyone else
thinks they did
with that soulful but insincere recitation
of baby,
baby,
baby
please
believe me!
I think about what if this happened to us
what if I had only one thing
to tell you
to convince
you to trust me
I would not want to say anything corny or unoriginal
those ___________
THREE LITTLE WORDS
take a life time to say
and are better said by action
not one but a montage lasting an entire life
I would not want to say anything I could not prove
I wouldn’t tell you
that everyday would be a photo booth smile
(and you won’t believe that anyway)
I wouldn’t want to lie to you
I wouldn’t want to tell you that nothing will ever hurt again
or that you can sell your black dress for a red one
No baby
buy a red dress
and we’ll keep the black one tucked away
I think if I just had a few things to tell you
Just a small amount of time to convince you
I would tell you
that the thing you worked your whole life to preserve
the thing that you have kept hidden within yourself
the thing that has kept you alone for most of your life
that is why one day
you will loved
and then I’d go out
and get
a pare
of handcuffs.
