About three lives ago, when we were living in a scientific research station in Ecuador, we watched The Postman (Il Postino) with a group of Westerners. After the movie, which is one of our favorites, we were sitting there, wondering why the room had suddenly gotten all dusty, when a privileged teenage British hipster/tourist named Aelys (pronounced like Alice, but her parents preferred the Welsh spelling) announced that she hadn't liked the movie because it was too slow. Charlie's Angels 2, she liked, but not this.

We immediately concluded that Aelys was as annoying as her name.

There are many Aelys's in this world, people who only like movies with explosions and plots that involve world domination.

If you are an Aelys, you will not like the movie Once, which has been hanging around various Seattle theaters for about three months now.

It is the story of a busker (played by Glen Hansard, of The Frames) who meets an immigrant pianist (Marketa Irglova, a classically-trained Czech pianist). Both have romantic problems and both write music to salve their respective pain. It is very cute, but very slice-of-lifey. Nothing explodes. No one wants to dominate the world.

If you haven't seen the movie, your patience is rewarded, because it's playing at The Big Picture in Redmond. If you haven't been out there, you should, they've got plush-ass chairs and you can drink booze during the film. In fact, you can order booze before, and they will bring it into you during. Try that at the Meridian 16. (Once is also at the Harvard Exit, for you car-eschewing Capitol Hillians.)

After you see Once, or if you already have, you will be interested in this news, which, despite being the putative reason for this post, somehow got buried in the sixth and final paragraph: Stars Hansard and Irglova are touring, playing the songs from the movie. They will be at the Moore on Monday, November 5th.