I don't define myself by the media I consume, I define it by me
Movies
Interesting weekend, film-wise, inasmuch as we watched Ice Storm, which was excellent and I didn't really like it at all; and Animal Kingdom, which was excellent and I did like it; and talked surprisingly a lot about Prince of Persia, which was rubbish and I liked it so much I'm going back to see it tonight because it's only ten bucks and the Male's ditching me for work socialising.
Now sure, Ice Storm has Christina Ricci (in the Male's words) sexually harassing Elijah Wood, which is almost always going to be a win in my book. And Sigourney Weaver was magnificently cold and, hell, everyone gave an amazing performance of a really sharp script and I was so goddamn bored for the entire thing omg. I just didn't care. These people were too normal, too mundane. I thought Christina Ricci was an excellent depiction of a girl flirting with the edge of control, but I didn't really get anything out of it. And that, I realised as we were discussing it, is the thing for me. I need to get something out of it. I want something to spark, start a fire, drive me. I want inspiration.
This is something PoP had in spades, for me. In part, perhaps, this is because it handled its issues poorly, or incompletely, or not at all - sharp edges are the things that snag. And it's full of the big, the bright, the beautiful (conceptually and visually) and all the breathless questions that I like best.
That said, the most hilarious conversation the Male and I have had about it is the one where I was suggesting that, actually, Dastan has the ideal skillset for sneaking into the seraglio, not to mention that when he was becoming a strikingly hot man, all the ladies would've been aquiver for the King's adopted bit of rough. And this is when the Male chips in with a misremembered line from the movie, about Dastan being, "not yet wise" and how he didn't see why we needed to know in the movie that Dastan was still a virgin, but y'know, Disney, cocksuckers. And I lost it laughing, because the line was actually about how Dastan's all worried about getting married and the King says (effectively) that this makes him wise, but I love that my boy was sitting there in the theatre thinking about the lead male's sexual history.
Anyway.
Then on Sunday night we went to see Animal Kingdom, which was just as gritty and Australian as anyone could have hoped, but also very tight and magnificently done. (Not always the case: sometimes our media Aussie-twists itself into cult-only, but this was straight-up excellence.) It incorporates (though fictionalises) some dark elements of Victoria's police-and-criminal past, which chilled me as I watched them and remembered the exhibits about them at the Police Museum. And the lead kid was rock-solid awesome as the teenager detached from life by the shit that's been thrown constantly at him. He really held his own against a stellar cast, so hats off to him.
Music
Mastodon were the guest-programmers of Rage on the weekend, so the Male bought a five-hour tape and we've been watching our way through it since. They talk pretty hilarious rubbish, including the best outsider's definition of cricket ever. ("There's a bunch of numbers and something happens and no one cheers.") This has involved the requisite Slayer and Led Zep (all ten inches of Jeff Martin's love) and Judas Priest, but also a dip into Alice in Chains and Soundgarden that had us pausing the tape and getting into a discussion about how to actually define the sound of grunge, because people (young, sheltered sorts who sadly missed out on the important parts of the '90s) keep asking me to do so, and I can't. The word "onomatopeic" was definitely used (and possibly even spelt correctly) and the neighbours can probably be grateful that the Male's amp still isn't working. In the end, the best piece of evidence comes from Spiderbait, who did a grunge version of one of their punk songs, and the subtle differences are illuminating.
ETA: To whit:
Sam Gribbles - album version (punk)
Sam Gribbles - Hey Mr Tambourine Man (grunge)
This topic returned last night, when the Male loaded up the CD player with Soundgarden in chronological order, as part of his homework assignment from one of our old friends that he provide a best-of (I guess because Ronnie assumes that if Soundgarden are reforming, he'd better bone up before the summer festival circuit). So first up was 1987 Soundgarden, which resembles a large number of awesome things, but pretty much none of them are grunge. (And seriously, wtf Chris? At one point, after boggling for about two and a half minutes of a three-minute song, I said, "Can he still make this sort of noise, do you think?" and the Male said, "Does anyone really want him to?" GOOD POINT.) It's just sort of fascinating looking at where this musical movement that defined my teen years sprang from.
Television
We've been watching our way through the second series of Dollhouse, but not really pushing it, since irradiatedsoup mentioned the high frequency of ~*Ideas*~ and associated brainmelt. We're up to "Meet Jane Doe". So with that in mind:
Highlight: Sierra's origin ep. Holy smokes, that was brilliant. Slightly confusing, since the time switches weren't labelled, but brilliant. Topher, man, having the first ethical dilemma of his life and having been picked for not having any morals and always being very careful with his toys, omg, just... ♥ Though obviously, as an Australian, I find it highly alarming that that could happen to Priya without any diplomatic anything.
Lowlight: The episode we just watched, I think it was "The Left Hand"? Look, it featured Topher imprinting Victor with himself, and the only thing better than Topher is two Tophers, having a conversation about Tophery things. (Yep, he really is the sleeper gold. He didn't really rate in most of S1 for me, but he's been up with a bullet since the final two eps of that, and all through this season. Go you good thing.) Otherwise... Bennett was adorable but there was too much of her, her flashback involvement with Echo has just left us completely baffled about where the hell that's supposed to fit on the timeline, the whole senator resolution was equally baffling, and frankly I get bored of watching Caroline/Echo covering the same ground over and over with tidbits of new stuff to keep us interested. Not to mention it irritates the fuck out of me when they program someone with assassin skills but can't give him the ability to kill with one movement. Except they did, just only with redshirts. Significant female characters get strangled. Slowly. Whatever. (Let's just say the episode was a whole lot better before it even started, when the Male was suggesting that one of Alpha's imprints was Bennett.) Though as always, I loved Adelle, and her little approving smile at Topher just makes me want to get a 'ship on, it really does.
I'm finding this second series, in general, a lot more hit-and-miss. Some of the hits are not just hard, they're amazing, but some of the misses are barely even in the ballpark.
All that's missing from this post is books, and there isn't really a lot to report there. I just finished reading Guy Gavriel Kay's Ysabel, which was quite nice - loved the main character and the job GGK did of view-pointing a teenage boy. But really, my reading life is just marking time until I get my hands on Mr Kay's newest, Under Heaven, because... well, seriously. GGK and Tang China (is it Tang? I can't remember but surely it must be). This is practically my fantasy-fiction OTP.
Interesting weekend, film-wise, inasmuch as we watched Ice Storm, which was excellent and I didn't really like it at all; and Animal Kingdom, which was excellent and I did like it; and talked surprisingly a lot about Prince of Persia, which was rubbish and I liked it so much I'm going back to see it tonight because it's only ten bucks and the Male's ditching me for work socialising.
Now sure, Ice Storm has Christina Ricci (in the Male's words) sexually harassing Elijah Wood, which is almost always going to be a win in my book. And Sigourney Weaver was magnificently cold and, hell, everyone gave an amazing performance of a really sharp script and I was so goddamn bored for the entire thing omg. I just didn't care. These people were too normal, too mundane. I thought Christina Ricci was an excellent depiction of a girl flirting with the edge of control, but I didn't really get anything out of it. And that, I realised as we were discussing it, is the thing for me. I need to get something out of it. I want something to spark, start a fire, drive me. I want inspiration.
This is something PoP had in spades, for me. In part, perhaps, this is because it handled its issues poorly, or incompletely, or not at all - sharp edges are the things that snag. And it's full of the big, the bright, the beautiful (conceptually and visually) and all the breathless questions that I like best.
That said, the most hilarious conversation the Male and I have had about it is the one where I was suggesting that, actually, Dastan has the ideal skillset for sneaking into the seraglio, not to mention that when he was becoming a strikingly hot man, all the ladies would've been aquiver for the King's adopted bit of rough. And this is when the Male chips in with a misremembered line from the movie, about Dastan being, "not yet wise" and how he didn't see why we needed to know in the movie that Dastan was still a virgin, but y'know, Disney, cocksuckers. And I lost it laughing, because the line was actually about how Dastan's all worried about getting married and the King says (effectively) that this makes him wise, but I love that my boy was sitting there in the theatre thinking about the lead male's sexual history.
Anyway.
Then on Sunday night we went to see Animal Kingdom, which was just as gritty and Australian as anyone could have hoped, but also very tight and magnificently done. (Not always the case: sometimes our media Aussie-twists itself into cult-only, but this was straight-up excellence.) It incorporates (though fictionalises) some dark elements of Victoria's police-and-criminal past, which chilled me as I watched them and remembered the exhibits about them at the Police Museum. And the lead kid was rock-solid awesome as the teenager detached from life by the shit that's been thrown constantly at him. He really held his own against a stellar cast, so hats off to him.
Music
Mastodon were the guest-programmers of Rage on the weekend, so the Male bought a five-hour tape and we've been watching our way through it since. They talk pretty hilarious rubbish, including the best outsider's definition of cricket ever. ("There's a bunch of numbers and something happens and no one cheers.") This has involved the requisite Slayer and Led Zep (all ten inches of Jeff Martin's love) and Judas Priest, but also a dip into Alice in Chains and Soundgarden that had us pausing the tape and getting into a discussion about how to actually define the sound of grunge, because people (young, sheltered sorts who sadly missed out on the important parts of the '90s) keep asking me to do so, and I can't. The word "onomatopeic" was definitely used (and possibly even spelt correctly) and the neighbours can probably be grateful that the Male's amp still isn't working. In the end, the best piece of evidence comes from Spiderbait, who did a grunge version of one of their punk songs, and the subtle differences are illuminating.
ETA: To whit:
Sam Gribbles - album version (punk)
Sam Gribbles - Hey Mr Tambourine Man (grunge)
This topic returned last night, when the Male loaded up the CD player with Soundgarden in chronological order, as part of his homework assignment from one of our old friends that he provide a best-of (I guess because Ronnie assumes that if Soundgarden are reforming, he'd better bone up before the summer festival circuit). So first up was 1987 Soundgarden, which resembles a large number of awesome things, but pretty much none of them are grunge. (And seriously, wtf Chris? At one point, after boggling for about two and a half minutes of a three-minute song, I said, "Can he still make this sort of noise, do you think?" and the Male said, "Does anyone really want him to?" GOOD POINT.) It's just sort of fascinating looking at where this musical movement that defined my teen years sprang from.
Television
We've been watching our way through the second series of Dollhouse, but not really pushing it, since irradiatedsoup mentioned the high frequency of ~*Ideas*~ and associated brainmelt. We're up to "Meet Jane Doe". So with that in mind:
Highlight: Sierra's origin ep. Holy smokes, that was brilliant. Slightly confusing, since the time switches weren't labelled, but brilliant. Topher, man, having the first ethical dilemma of his life and having been picked for not having any morals and always being very careful with his toys, omg, just... ♥ Though obviously, as an Australian, I find it highly alarming that that could happen to Priya without any diplomatic anything.
Lowlight: The episode we just watched, I think it was "The Left Hand"? Look, it featured Topher imprinting Victor with himself, and the only thing better than Topher is two Tophers, having a conversation about Tophery things. (Yep, he really is the sleeper gold. He didn't really rate in most of S1 for me, but he's been up with a bullet since the final two eps of that, and all through this season. Go you good thing.) Otherwise... Bennett was adorable but there was too much of her, her flashback involvement with Echo has just left us completely baffled about where the hell that's supposed to fit on the timeline, the whole senator resolution was equally baffling, and frankly I get bored of watching Caroline/Echo covering the same ground over and over with tidbits of new stuff to keep us interested. Not to mention it irritates the fuck out of me when they program someone with assassin skills but can't give him the ability to kill with one movement. Except they did, just only with redshirts. Significant female characters get strangled. Slowly. Whatever. (Let's just say the episode was a whole lot better before it even started, when the Male was suggesting that one of Alpha's imprints was Bennett.) Though as always, I loved Adelle, and her little approving smile at Topher just makes me want to get a 'ship on, it really does.
I'm finding this second series, in general, a lot more hit-and-miss. Some of the hits are not just hard, they're amazing, but some of the misses are barely even in the ballpark.
All that's missing from this post is books, and there isn't really a lot to report there. I just finished reading Guy Gavriel Kay's Ysabel, which was quite nice - loved the main character and the job GGK did of view-pointing a teenage boy. But really, my reading life is just marking time until I get my hands on Mr Kay's newest, Under Heaven, because... well, seriously. GGK and Tang China (is it Tang? I can't remember but surely it must be). This is practically my fantasy-fiction OTP.