Ship of the Week: Christian and Satine

A secret song between two forbidden lovers helps keep this pairing on my mind, particularly when it comes up on my shuffled music library.

Moulin Rouge centers around the tale of a young writer who narrates his tragic love story in the year 1899-1900. Freshly arrived in Montmarte, France, Christian vows to become a writer of Bohemian ideals, particularly love, even though he has never experienced it. Through a series of comedic events, he usurps the Moulin Rouge’s playwright and is set up with the star, a beautiful woman named Satine, in order to present his writing. Mistaking his identity for a potential investor, the smarmy Duke, Satine tries to seduce him and in a last ditch effort to distract her, he belts out into song. They are interrupted by the Duke and swiftly come up with the story that they were rehearsing the show’s new play, “Spectacular Spectacular.” He agrees to invest in the show with the stipulation that only he will be with Satine (in the biblical sense if you know what I mean). Things become even more entangled as it’s revealed Satine suffers from an illness, later to be revealed as consumption, and her blossoming affair with Christian continues to grow. The Duke becomes increasingly suspicious of the pair, and as Christian writes in a secret song to celebrate their love, a jealous dancer clues in the Duke. Enraged he scraps the secret song and orders Satine to submit to him that very night, something she agrees to in order to save the play.

In one of the best musical sequences EVER, she realizes she cannot go through with this as Christian despairs over this turn of events. When the Duke realizes she will not succumb to his advances, he tries to rape her, but she is saved by another dancer and reunited with Christian. The two make plans to run away and as she packes, she is informed of her illness and that if Christian comes back to the theater the Duke will have him killed. Breaking his heart to save him, Satine returns to the theater to finish out the show. Angry and depressed, Christian sneaks back into the theater and denounces Satine publicly, offering to pay her for her services. Emotionally shattered, Satine responds with the opening lines to their secret song as the performers foil the Duke’s attempts at murdering Christian. The curtain falls with an embrace between the two but of course this is the moment, her illness takes her. Christian immortalizes their tale, a love that will live forever.

Come what may, stories like these should always be in mind, and what better reminder than this not-what-it-seems eye chart hanging in your home?

http://tinyurl.com/b8wdnkw

Perhaps you’re not the framed song lyrics type of person, and instead you’d like a TINY RED WINDMILL ON YOUR DESK!? You can twirl it while you dream of a great love!

http://tinyurl.com/a3c6ake

In the off chance you would like some “supplemental” reading, I ask you to click one of the links below to enhance your Moulin Rouge experience here at IHOGeek.  The first, entitled Until the End of Time, has Christian not being left alone when Satine dies. Instead, they both die.

Okay, okay, relax. I didn’t mean to make anyone cry with this thought. How about something a bit happier? This fic, Quoi Qu’il Arrive, splits from the main story where Satine never finds out she is sick and the two happily run away from the Moulin Rouge.

Lastly, I leave you with a clip from the movie and some glorious images to hold you over until you get home and pop Moulin Rouge into the DVD/Blu-Ray player.

Leia Calderon
Editor
@ladyvader99