Recitation

Yesterday, my sister asked me what Les Miserables was about. And I gave her a full, detailed, oral synopsis. I do this a lot, actually. After seeing a movie, I like to see if I can recount the entire plot by memory. I did it after Noah, after Cloud Atlas (that was hard), even after Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt 2. I understand that it's probably incredibly annoying, especially when the person starts walking around and I follow them.
I don't know if it's a good thing to be able to explain a movie to a person within ten minutes. Why not just send someone to the theater for you and have them tell you what happened? Because plot isn't the only thing that matters in a movie. People put a lot of hard work into the music, the dialogue, the visual aspects, etc. That's why I found it incredibly hard to tell her exactly what happens in Les Miserables. First of all, there are three overlapping storylines at any given time. Secondly, it is a musical. They don't speak that much, they sing, so I found myself reciting song lyrics multiple times. Also, there is a tremendous amount of backstory and hidden motives that I couldn't really explain to the proper extent. That is why people make movies two hours long; it's impossible to wrap up a worthwhile story into a ten-minute, one-sided conversation. I can only imagine that after being told the plot of a movie, people think something like,"Well, that was a waste of time." But, I can never imagine going to a movie without feeling something important by the end.