Do we love the people or the place?

Last Monday I was lucky enough to enjoy a pre-Christmas dinner with friends at a London restaurant.  As I headed off to get my train a young woman stopped me and said, 'I'm in trouble - do you have any change?'  I'm normally very ambivalent about giving money to beggars but she was clearly distressed and seemed to be carrying her bedding in her arms.  I gave her the all change I was carrying and wished her well.  She wiped tears from her eyes and said simply, 'Thank you.' 

And so... I'd like to thank Garr Reynold's, who hosts the seriously good 'Presentation Zen', for bringing my attention to 'No Man is an Island', a short film by Jason van Genderen, shot entirely on cellphone, which uses images and text to tell a simple story of two cities.  Here are a couple of screen shots:  

    

The film might be easily dismissed as a gimmick; a sequence of juxtaposed images and text but... it won best film the Tropfest NY 2008 short film festival so is worth a look.  There is something quite beautiful happening between the images and the text; a story is evoked that tells far more than either medium alone could do.