Little Ashes
When I was at university, I wrote a mediocre essay about L'Age d'Or (which, by the way, is not a movie anyone should watch more than once -- Un Chien Andalou is brilliant; L'Age d'Or, not so much). Reading Robert Short's The Age of Gold: Surrealist Cinema at the time piqued my interest in the delightfully-twisted youthful friendship between Luis Bunuel, Salvador Dali and Federico Garcia Lorca.
I then read Ian Gibson's The Shameful Life of Salvador Dali a couple of years ago (well, I read most of it -- it's stupendously long), and my obsession with Lorca/Dali really took root. (I have helpfully excerpted the part about the abortive buttsex.)
Naturally, I was excited that a very slashy adaptation of the Lorca/Dali ~*love story was being brought to screen. Alas, it was apparently released on a very limited run, so I didn't get to see it in theatres. But! It finally leaked to internetland just recently! *\o/*
There are clearly problems with Little Ashes. It's not a great movie: the interplay of English-Spanish is a little weird; it feels anachronistic in places; the narrative is a little loose (and quite a departure from reality, natch). But I still loved it.
As a story about friendship shading into love in a society that can't accept it, it's beautifully fraught. Every moment that Lorca and Dali stare longingly at each other is gold. Overwrought it may be, but I felt wonderfully verklempt as the credits rolled.
Watch it. Then write me the requisite Bunuel POV fic, because he was so gay for Lorca.
I then read Ian Gibson's The Shameful Life of Salvador Dali a couple of years ago (well, I read most of it -- it's stupendously long), and my obsession with Lorca/Dali really took root. (I have helpfully excerpted the part about the abortive buttsex.)
Naturally, I was excited that a very slashy adaptation of the Lorca/Dali ~*love story was being brought to screen. Alas, it was apparently released on a very limited run, so I didn't get to see it in theatres. But! It finally leaked to internetland just recently! *\o/*
There are clearly problems with Little Ashes. It's not a great movie: the interplay of English-Spanish is a little weird; it feels anachronistic in places; the narrative is a little loose (and quite a departure from reality, natch). But I still loved it.
As a story about friendship shading into love in a society that can't accept it, it's beautifully fraught. Every moment that Lorca and Dali stare longingly at each other is gold. Overwrought it may be, but I felt wonderfully verklempt as the credits rolled.
Watch it. Then write me the requisite Bunuel POV fic, because he was so gay for Lorca.