I finished a book!
And yes, for once in my life, that is worthy of announcing.
I finished 'The Reader' and realized that it was the first new book I've read in almost two months- since spring break. I do believe that's the longest time I can remember that I've gone without reading a new book- or really any book at all. I can read again!
There's something fitting- or something- about the fact that the first book I've read in nearly two months is 'The Reader.' It was very good, very poignant and rather disturbing. It was an interesting take on the Holocaust, or the aftermath of the Holocaust, more accurately, and the effect it had on people and their lives in Germany. It seems most of the things we see and hear about the Holocaust focus on the victims, understandably, and God knows I don't discount any of that, but it was interesting to see the other side of it. The "innocent" perpetrators who just went along with the Nazis, without actually being a part of it, and the effect that would have, the different kind of survivor guilt it caused.
Also watched 'The Duchess'- which was also quite good, even if they did over-simplify Georgiana's life to the point of making it nearly fictional. Keira Knightley proved that she can actually act (something I've never been sure of until now, I admit) and the costumes were just gorgeous. Ralph Fiennes was very good as the Duke (not surprising).
I'll admit to being severely pained/disturbed at the "rape" scene-- all the more so because all through it, I knew that no one in that time (and about half the states today) would call that rape, because a husband was doing it to his wife. I won't go into all the many reasons that is wrong. Which reminds me, I have no idea why that movie was rated PG-13; it should have been rated R, if not for the actual nudity, since there wasn't much, but for the thematic elements. the movie involved a rape; how is that in any way proper for a 13 year old to watch?
Dominic Cooper still looks too much like a little boy for me to take him seriously in any adult role, including as Charles Grey. And this may just be me, but for whatever reason, I don't like him much because no matter what he plays, he looks, well, like an untrustworthy seducer to me so I can't believe him sincere. I would think it's me making too much of his playing Willoughby except it can't only be that, given that I'd forgotten all about him playing Willoughby and didn't recognize him when I saw him again. Either way, something about him makes him less than believable in a supposedly-romantic role-- which detracted severely from what should have been the poignance of the last scene with him and Keira Knightley.
I suppose it's understandable but I thought it interesting how completely they cut out all the stuff about Georgiana's addiction to gambling and her indebtedness; in a movie's need to make the heroine likable, they made Charles Grey a sympathetic character (notwithstanding Dominic Cooper) and completely erased the better part of Georgiana's life. I think they might almost have done better to leave in some of the gambling and the indebtedness, show more of what made Georgiana so scandalous. I'd have liked to see how well they do at portraying a woman who was both ahead of her time and yet trapped in her time, who was sympathetic and pitiable and at the same time, very hard to like or approve of because of all her manifest weaknesses and faults. Georgiana was a fascinating character but the movie scrubbed her up so thoroughly they made her much less interesting. I'd have liked to see how a movie would do at portraying a heroine who was immensely flawed and not entirely appealing but always fascinating, with something of that same morbid fascination that a train wreck might have. That would have made a much more interesting movie than this, that was more worth watching for the costumes than for anything else. And I personally think Georgiana herself would be horrified at how little they showed or included of the politics of the time, of which she was such an important part. They reduced her life to a domestic soap opera and only that-- and while her life certainly was like that, they cut out the other half of her life entirely, the more interesting half, I think, that of how a woman could be so involved in politics, in that time.
And now, back to the writing competition.
I finished 'The Reader' and realized that it was the first new book I've read in almost two months- since spring break. I do believe that's the longest time I can remember that I've gone without reading a new book- or really any book at all. I can read again!
There's something fitting- or something- about the fact that the first book I've read in nearly two months is 'The Reader.' It was very good, very poignant and rather disturbing. It was an interesting take on the Holocaust, or the aftermath of the Holocaust, more accurately, and the effect it had on people and their lives in Germany. It seems most of the things we see and hear about the Holocaust focus on the victims, understandably, and God knows I don't discount any of that, but it was interesting to see the other side of it. The "innocent" perpetrators who just went along with the Nazis, without actually being a part of it, and the effect that would have, the different kind of survivor guilt it caused.
Also watched 'The Duchess'- which was also quite good, even if they did over-simplify Georgiana's life to the point of making it nearly fictional. Keira Knightley proved that she can actually act (something I've never been sure of until now, I admit) and the costumes were just gorgeous. Ralph Fiennes was very good as the Duke (not surprising).
I'll admit to being severely pained/disturbed at the "rape" scene-- all the more so because all through it, I knew that no one in that time (and about half the states today) would call that rape, because a husband was doing it to his wife. I won't go into all the many reasons that is wrong. Which reminds me, I have no idea why that movie was rated PG-13; it should have been rated R, if not for the actual nudity, since there wasn't much, but for the thematic elements. the movie involved a rape; how is that in any way proper for a 13 year old to watch?
Dominic Cooper still looks too much like a little boy for me to take him seriously in any adult role, including as Charles Grey. And this may just be me, but for whatever reason, I don't like him much because no matter what he plays, he looks, well, like an untrustworthy seducer to me so I can't believe him sincere. I would think it's me making too much of his playing Willoughby except it can't only be that, given that I'd forgotten all about him playing Willoughby and didn't recognize him when I saw him again. Either way, something about him makes him less than believable in a supposedly-romantic role-- which detracted severely from what should have been the poignance of the last scene with him and Keira Knightley.
I suppose it's understandable but I thought it interesting how completely they cut out all the stuff about Georgiana's addiction to gambling and her indebtedness; in a movie's need to make the heroine likable, they made Charles Grey a sympathetic character (notwithstanding Dominic Cooper) and completely erased the better part of Georgiana's life. I think they might almost have done better to leave in some of the gambling and the indebtedness, show more of what made Georgiana so scandalous. I'd have liked to see how well they do at portraying a woman who was both ahead of her time and yet trapped in her time, who was sympathetic and pitiable and at the same time, very hard to like or approve of because of all her manifest weaknesses and faults. Georgiana was a fascinating character but the movie scrubbed her up so thoroughly they made her much less interesting. I'd have liked to see how a movie would do at portraying a heroine who was immensely flawed and not entirely appealing but always fascinating, with something of that same morbid fascination that a train wreck might have. That would have made a much more interesting movie than this, that was more worth watching for the costumes than for anything else. And I personally think Georgiana herself would be horrified at how little they showed or included of the politics of the time, of which she was such an important part. They reduced her life to a domestic soap opera and only that-- and while her life certainly was like that, they cut out the other half of her life entirely, the more interesting half, I think, that of how a woman could be so involved in politics, in that time.
And now, back to the writing competition.