red cliff & words part II
i've recently been watching john woo's red cliff. & omg, it's sooooooooo good. there are 2 parts to it with a total length of 4 hours. but it's totally worth it & doesn't seem long when you watch it. apparently the western release is half the length (i think the version i watched was the hk one). it makes me wonder what they found to cut, because everything flowed so nicely & seemed really tight - in other words, no unneccesary scenes.
timeripple we are going to find ourselves a copy & i will make you watch this with me.
of course, it doesn't hurt that tony leung & takeshi kaneshiro have leading parts either. i was telling one of my friends about it & she was like, "takeshi kaneshiro - just thinking about him makes me *happy sigh*" um, yeah - he is awfully good looking & speaks multiple languages. what's not to like? even my mom thinks he's handsome. :)
& now for the words - same as the one from satakieli , only these words/phrases come from timeripple :
Dirty sea shanties, illustrated Jane Austen, mortise-and-tenon, props, wu xia
dirty sea shanties
well, i don't know too many sea shanties, but the only really dirty one that comes to mind was one i learned during my semester at sea - a rovin'. & well, it describes just what this sailor does with a certain female who's "trade" was the navy & what happened as a result. anywho, i find them kind of amusing, since they fit so well into the image of sailors with a girl at every port & so forth. i'm quite sure they were great for the sailors themselves too, since they served as a way to while away time as they worked aboard ship, timing their work, amuse themselves & warnings against all sorts of nasty things that can happen if you're not careful. great bits of culture & glimpses into shipboard life, albeit some of the more unsavory bits. but hey, you take the bad with the good. such is life.
illustrated jane austen
i love illustrated books - picture books included. but in this case, i'm referring to classic books, like treasure island, sherlock holmes, & robin hood that come with illustrations. i find it's usually best when the author does his or her own illustrations (like howard pyle for robin hood), but some illustrators are just so awesome that it doesn't matter. in terms of jane austen, my favorite illustrator is charles e. brock. i discovered him in a set of jane austen books at my college library & they were just so pretty & lovely. here's an example from emma:
this looks so much better in person, but i think you get the idea.
mortise & tenon
for those of you who don't know, mortise & tenon is a type of joint. here's what it looks like:
the ancients used it for ship building, & i learned about it in a class on nautical archaeology, which was lots of fun. i don't know what else to say about them, except that they were cool & are a sign of good workmanship, since the pieces had to fit together perfectly.
props
ooo props. i love props - theatrical & movie type props that is. i think i first started working with props spring semester sophomore year, but i really got into them a year later for a school production of rose of versailles. lacy fans, powdered wigs, fancy furniture, but best of all, shiny swords & all their accoutrements! it was so much fun! my favorite props are character props. you have to get into the character's mind & often times this includes working with the costume designer & actor as well as the director. what kind of person is he/she? what kind of stuff would they carry around, have in their room, bag & pockets? that kind of thing. i think character props are more fun than stuff like set dressing since there's more interaction, but it's all great & fun stuff!
wuxia
yay, wuxia. i think i might have mentioned this is a really old post, but fyi - wuxia is a literary & i suppose, media genre from china that involves stuff like you see in crouching tiger hidden dragon. anyway, i've known about wuxia for as long as i can remember, though under a different name, & rediscovered it on a trip to hk a few years ago. i think it's one of my favorite genres both to read & watch, though reading is much harder for me, since i have to wait for translations - sometimes it's the same for movies & tv. my favorite wuxia author is jin yong. he's considered a classic/pop culture phenomenon since his books have been made into numerous tv dramas & movies & keep getting re-made, especially the condor hero trilogy, which i think has been re-made 4 or 5 times now & will probably continue to do so. i think wuxia is a lot of fun since it usually involves some kind of adventure & strong kick-butt females. most of the protagonists tend to be male (after all the setting of most of these is ancient china), but there are always smart, intelligent females who can totally kick butt. my major beef with it is the whole idea of honor, which i touched upon in words part I. & i suppose the pride issue. alot of the characters are so hung up on pride that it's the fight now, explain later kind of thing which i find totally annoying. but then, a lot of the times, that's what drives the plot. still, overall, tons of fun. :)
& because i didn't get around to it before, timeripple , these are for you:
curly hair, classics in movies, asian music & dramas, philosophy, horses.
timeripple we are going to find ourselves a copy & i will make you watch this with me.
of course, it doesn't hurt that tony leung & takeshi kaneshiro have leading parts either. i was telling one of my friends about it & she was like, "takeshi kaneshiro - just thinking about him makes me *happy sigh*" um, yeah - he is awfully good looking & speaks multiple languages. what's not to like? even my mom thinks he's handsome. :)
& now for the words - same as the one from satakieli , only these words/phrases come from timeripple :
Dirty sea shanties, illustrated Jane Austen, mortise-and-tenon, props, wu xia
dirty sea shanties
well, i don't know too many sea shanties, but the only really dirty one that comes to mind was one i learned during my semester at sea - a rovin'. & well, it describes just what this sailor does with a certain female who's "trade" was the navy & what happened as a result. anywho, i find them kind of amusing, since they fit so well into the image of sailors with a girl at every port & so forth. i'm quite sure they were great for the sailors themselves too, since they served as a way to while away time as they worked aboard ship, timing their work, amuse themselves & warnings against all sorts of nasty things that can happen if you're not careful. great bits of culture & glimpses into shipboard life, albeit some of the more unsavory bits. but hey, you take the bad with the good. such is life.
illustrated jane austen
i love illustrated books - picture books included. but in this case, i'm referring to classic books, like treasure island, sherlock holmes, & robin hood that come with illustrations. i find it's usually best when the author does his or her own illustrations (like howard pyle for robin hood), but some illustrators are just so awesome that it doesn't matter. in terms of jane austen, my favorite illustrator is charles e. brock. i discovered him in a set of jane austen books at my college library & they were just so pretty & lovely. here's an example from emma:
this looks so much better in person, but i think you get the idea.
mortise & tenon
for those of you who don't know, mortise & tenon is a type of joint. here's what it looks like:
the ancients used it for ship building, & i learned about it in a class on nautical archaeology, which was lots of fun. i don't know what else to say about them, except that they were cool & are a sign of good workmanship, since the pieces had to fit together perfectly.
props
ooo props. i love props - theatrical & movie type props that is. i think i first started working with props spring semester sophomore year, but i really got into them a year later for a school production of rose of versailles. lacy fans, powdered wigs, fancy furniture, but best of all, shiny swords & all their accoutrements! it was so much fun! my favorite props are character props. you have to get into the character's mind & often times this includes working with the costume designer & actor as well as the director. what kind of person is he/she? what kind of stuff would they carry around, have in their room, bag & pockets? that kind of thing. i think character props are more fun than stuff like set dressing since there's more interaction, but it's all great & fun stuff!
wuxia
yay, wuxia. i think i might have mentioned this is a really old post, but fyi - wuxia is a literary & i suppose, media genre from china that involves stuff like you see in crouching tiger hidden dragon. anyway, i've known about wuxia for as long as i can remember, though under a different name, & rediscovered it on a trip to hk a few years ago. i think it's one of my favorite genres both to read & watch, though reading is much harder for me, since i have to wait for translations - sometimes it's the same for movies & tv. my favorite wuxia author is jin yong. he's considered a classic/pop culture phenomenon since his books have been made into numerous tv dramas & movies & keep getting re-made, especially the condor hero trilogy, which i think has been re-made 4 or 5 times now & will probably continue to do so. i think wuxia is a lot of fun since it usually involves some kind of adventure & strong kick-butt females. most of the protagonists tend to be male (after all the setting of most of these is ancient china), but there are always smart, intelligent females who can totally kick butt. my major beef with it is the whole idea of honor, which i touched upon in words part I. & i suppose the pride issue. alot of the characters are so hung up on pride that it's the fight now, explain later kind of thing which i find totally annoying. but then, a lot of the times, that's what drives the plot. still, overall, tons of fun. :)
& because i didn't get around to it before, timeripple , these are for you:
curly hair, classics in movies, asian music & dramas, philosophy, horses.