As the film Little Women was shown on TV here recently, the occurrence gave an impetus for a(nother) groundbreaking theory ;^) -- "which is mine and which belongs to me and I own it and all that is to it", for all of those who've seen their Monty Pythons -- that there are three "seminal" genre Trini films that affect the rest of the relationship with her works, namely Times Square, Little Women and The Frighteners. These films not only represent their respective genres to a (usually) full extent, but also if one sees one of these as the first personal Trini Alvarado Experience and loves the film, other Trini films in the same genre may not rise to the same prominence, not to mention the other genres. Those who saw the TSQ back "then" will undoubtedly love it most even after all these decades of her career; similarly, those who got to know Trini thru Women or Frighteners (as maybe even one of their all-time fave films), rather certainly see her primarily as a sweet'n'stern Victorian caretaker or a modern-day kickboxer, according to personal film preferences. Similarly, as I could see from a voting I initialized several years ago, the votings about fave films tend to be a bit biased if the person has only seen one film from her, no matter how good and loved it is... On the other hand, I can nevertheless say that the first film I saw from Trini is still (in terms of "serious" cinematic approach) my fave: Powell's superb American Friends, but her acting here is also so uncharacteristic that it does anything but lessens the film's appeal... In fact, I can say that had I seen any other film from her as the "introduction", this site would not be up and running -- not that the other films are decisively worse, but just because Friends has elements that total to much more than the sum of the parts, like the superb characterizations, not to forget of course the Oxfordian architecture ;^) -- and undoubtedly someone else would be wasting his/her time on this undertaking... So, she can "thank" ;^) Monty Python for this site being online. I can also ponder whether this site would be around had I back then known that she'd become apparently a feckin' sex symbol especially after The Frighteners. But at least she possesses the complete craftmanship of the profession as opposed to < insert the name of the hottest new "talented" model/singer-come-actress of the hour >... No, I didn't watch the "Little Women" broadcast, as the Romania-Italy match matched ;^) better my testosterone level during the Euro2000 football (no, not the one you Yanks call f-ball) tournament -- even Pippo Inzaghi managed for once to beat the offside trap and score. Plaudite. But even that performance couldn't later give them The Pot with only 30 secs to go...

© e t dankwa 26 June/4 July 2000