The news of David Bowie passing has been hard for me to comprehend. It's something that I still don't know if I fully accept. As I spend my whole day thinking about him, reading about how he affected some people, and listening to his music, I remembered one moment in cinema that he'd affected greatly.
I've written about Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou before and how it affected my life. But I never really went in depth with how beautiful and fitting the final scene of the movie was. The scene is short and it involves Steve Zissou sitting outside of his own premiere with an almost defeated look on his face. And when he leaves, he does it in a fashion where his facial expression doesn't change.
Anderson then queue's up Bowie's Queen Bitch to play as the visuals on the screen move into slow-motion. It's an interesting movie on Anderson's part and, honestly, it's the most triumphant I've ever heard the song on film. It fits so perfectly and listening to it now after the last lines of dialogue ("this is an adventure"), is definitely a more emotional experience for me.
I spent the last 20 minutes listening to the song and not looking at the lyrics and just letting the aural environment engulf my being. I played the scene over and over again in my head. I thought of all the contributions to film Bowie's music has made. How his discography includes the perfect song for any scene (if you look at his IMDB page, you'll see his music has been featured in over 300 movies).
So here's to David Bowie. For making cinematic history and making movies sound a whole lot better.
