Movies (Trance, 42) and memes
Hi, everybody!
I've seen a couple of movies in the past few days, and I thought I'd share my thoughts.
Trance: Let's not kid ourselves - I totally went to see this because the prospect of seeing Rosario Dawson and James McAvoy together was too incendiary for me to resist. And they are gorgeous together. This is a movie with twist after twist after twist, and while it strains credulity that all of these different pieces would have slotted into place, I think the logic does hold up. There was one shot at the end (Simon's ending) that made me roll my eyes very hard, but I actually liked that both James McAvoy and Vincent Cassel ended up playing against type (JM especially).
42: I'd read a couple of poor reviews for this movie, which made me dread it to some extent, but I found it to be very enjoyable and not at all what I'd feared. The reviews made it sound like a white-savior movie, which I didn't think it was, really; it was more that it was an incomplete story of a black, heroic protagonist. I would have loved to see more of Jackie Robinson's inner life and more of the daily details of his life, but thought the movie did a nice job with what it chose to work with - which was mostly Branch Rickey choosing a warrior to open white baseball up to African-Americans' money. The music was incredibly heavy-handed, but the performances were great, particularly Chadwick Boseman as Jackie, Nicole Beharie as his wife Rachel, and Chris Meloni as Leo Durocher. CB is super-hot, as was the intense eyefucking Jackie and Rachel indulged in as he played ball.
And I thought I'd indulge myself in doing that "first lines" meme that's currently making the rounds. These are the first lines of the 21 stories I've most recently posted, not written; if it was just stories I'd written, there'd be a few from the current round of Sherlock Remix, plus the big Sherlock story I drafted recently that's with my betas as we speak, and the fusion story that I will finish drafting this weekend (this I vow!). Let me know if you see any patterns or faults in the kinds of lines I use to kick off my stories, please.
1 - Mycroft had no real need for anything stocked at the chemist shop - the bright colours of hair dye and nail varnish were unappealing, condoms grossly unthinkable - but desire meant that she lingered when she'd been dragged there by classmates after cheap costume jewellery that would surely turn their skin green.
2 - It was better than porn, Joan thought, sinking back against her pillows, the glossy pages of Architectural Digest slipping under her fingers.
3 - He wore bruises under his suit as he walked along the seemingly empty street, cobblestones uneven under his feet, not caring if this was to be the last dawn he ever saw.
4 - Becoming Mrs. Fairford had been most agreeable.
5 - She goes quiet when he comes toward her, holding herself still to see which way he will strike so she knows which way to jump.
6 - The Pirate Who Loved Ham couldn't help grinning from ear to ear - The Boy with the Scarf knew everything!
7 - Simon Milligan entered his shabby bedsit - the way the lead paint peeled was definitely proof of evil - and found Manservant Hecubus sitting in his one decent armchair, feet propped up on the coffee table right where Simon usually put the food he was eating (evil! unhygienic and evil!), and watching the black-and-white squiggly lines of static.
8 - Blair did his best thinking at the gym.
9 - Dana had a suspicion that she and Dan viewed New York very differently.
10 - Steve knew from the moment he saw the Vibranium shield that it was the one that belonged on his arm.
11 - John bent down to do up his laces properly, breathing deeply as he did.
12 - Grandmère is fluent in four languages and prides herself on speaking English when she is in England.
13 - It is so tiresome, having to explain things to John when all he really wants to do is watch the light fall on John's face or listen to John scold him in that delightfully proprietary way he has, as if John is the one who will be inconvenienced if Sherlock falls down in a dead faint from malnutrition the way that John keeps threatening in his most impressive trust me I'm a doctor voice.
14 - Lestrade opened his eyes, stared up at the ceiling, and gave thanks that it was Saturday.
15 - "Someone's been a very naughty boy," Peter said, doing that G-man thing he did where his face was angled away but his eyes unerringly hit their target.
16 - Esther came to get Isaac just as the show ended, so there was no extended celebration for his return.
17 - "Clotted cream," Simon sighed, poking disconsolately at his creme brulee.
18 - "Teach her," Philippe had said, as if she were a child, as if he were not yet a child himself, but Prince Philippe was his lord and master and the request had the force of a command.
19 - The quid pro quo for Sherlock getting those hours at the Baskerville facility - hours he had used to test the limits of John's friendship - was that he had to accept all of the publicity that came from his rapid-fire solving of seven-and-above cases.
20 - Born to be on stage, that one, and dangerous for the way he so recklessly mixed truth with his little tricks and traps and taunts.
21 - "Mary, must you?" he asked, wishing that the novel spread open before his eyes had the power to hold his attention for more than a few minutes at a time.
So, what's going on with all of you?
I've seen a couple of movies in the past few days, and I thought I'd share my thoughts.
Trance: Let's not kid ourselves - I totally went to see this because the prospect of seeing Rosario Dawson and James McAvoy together was too incendiary for me to resist. And they are gorgeous together. This is a movie with twist after twist after twist, and while it strains credulity that all of these different pieces would have slotted into place, I think the logic does hold up. There was one shot at the end (Simon's ending) that made me roll my eyes very hard, but I actually liked that both James McAvoy and Vincent Cassel ended up playing against type (JM especially).
42: I'd read a couple of poor reviews for this movie, which made me dread it to some extent, but I found it to be very enjoyable and not at all what I'd feared. The reviews made it sound like a white-savior movie, which I didn't think it was, really; it was more that it was an incomplete story of a black, heroic protagonist. I would have loved to see more of Jackie Robinson's inner life and more of the daily details of his life, but thought the movie did a nice job with what it chose to work with - which was mostly Branch Rickey choosing a warrior to open white baseball up to African-Americans' money. The music was incredibly heavy-handed, but the performances were great, particularly Chadwick Boseman as Jackie, Nicole Beharie as his wife Rachel, and Chris Meloni as Leo Durocher. CB is super-hot, as was the intense eyefucking Jackie and Rachel indulged in as he played ball.
And I thought I'd indulge myself in doing that "first lines" meme that's currently making the rounds. These are the first lines of the 21 stories I've most recently posted, not written; if it was just stories I'd written, there'd be a few from the current round of Sherlock Remix, plus the big Sherlock story I drafted recently that's with my betas as we speak, and the fusion story that I will finish drafting this weekend (this I vow!). Let me know if you see any patterns or faults in the kinds of lines I use to kick off my stories, please.
1 - Mycroft had no real need for anything stocked at the chemist shop - the bright colours of hair dye and nail varnish were unappealing, condoms grossly unthinkable - but desire meant that she lingered when she'd been dragged there by classmates after cheap costume jewellery that would surely turn their skin green.
2 - It was better than porn, Joan thought, sinking back against her pillows, the glossy pages of Architectural Digest slipping under her fingers.
3 - He wore bruises under his suit as he walked along the seemingly empty street, cobblestones uneven under his feet, not caring if this was to be the last dawn he ever saw.
4 - Becoming Mrs. Fairford had been most agreeable.
5 - She goes quiet when he comes toward her, holding herself still to see which way he will strike so she knows which way to jump.
6 - The Pirate Who Loved Ham couldn't help grinning from ear to ear - The Boy with the Scarf knew everything!
7 - Simon Milligan entered his shabby bedsit - the way the lead paint peeled was definitely proof of evil - and found Manservant Hecubus sitting in his one decent armchair, feet propped up on the coffee table right where Simon usually put the food he was eating (evil! unhygienic and evil!), and watching the black-and-white squiggly lines of static.
8 - Blair did his best thinking at the gym.
9 - Dana had a suspicion that she and Dan viewed New York very differently.
10 - Steve knew from the moment he saw the Vibranium shield that it was the one that belonged on his arm.
11 - John bent down to do up his laces properly, breathing deeply as he did.
12 - Grandmère is fluent in four languages and prides herself on speaking English when she is in England.
13 - It is so tiresome, having to explain things to John when all he really wants to do is watch the light fall on John's face or listen to John scold him in that delightfully proprietary way he has, as if John is the one who will be inconvenienced if Sherlock falls down in a dead faint from malnutrition the way that John keeps threatening in his most impressive trust me I'm a doctor voice.
14 - Lestrade opened his eyes, stared up at the ceiling, and gave thanks that it was Saturday.
15 - "Someone's been a very naughty boy," Peter said, doing that G-man thing he did where his face was angled away but his eyes unerringly hit their target.
16 - Esther came to get Isaac just as the show ended, so there was no extended celebration for his return.
17 - "Clotted cream," Simon sighed, poking disconsolately at his creme brulee.
18 - "Teach her," Philippe had said, as if she were a child, as if he were not yet a child himself, but Prince Philippe was his lord and master and the request had the force of a command.
19 - The quid pro quo for Sherlock getting those hours at the Baskerville facility - hours he had used to test the limits of John's friendship - was that he had to accept all of the publicity that came from his rapid-fire solving of seven-and-above cases.
20 - Born to be on stage, that one, and dangerous for the way he so recklessly mixed truth with his little tricks and traps and taunts.
21 - "Mary, must you?" he asked, wishing that the novel spread open before his eyes had the power to hold his attention for more than a few minutes at a time.
So, what's going on with all of you?