In which my Christmas is wonderful.
The original plan for my Christmas was for self and faye_noire to head out West and spend it with my sister and BIL. Sadly, Things happened, and thus there was no journeying.
As it happens? I am totally okay with that.
On Monday, we played with our Christmas present from said sister (LEGO LORD OF THE RINGS, wherein Gimli, Legolas and Sam trade off being awesome, and poor Frodo less so), then headed out for a candlelight Christmas Eve service. Afterwards, we drove around with the radio playing jazz versions of Christmas carols, and admired the Christmas lights and Christmas reindeer and, in one yard, Christmas T-Rexes. (How did I not know these existed? :hearts:)
Today, we unwrapped presents (I have owl slippers!), and played more LEGO LORD OF THE RINGS ("No, seriously, Frodo, put your damn elven cloak on already, I've told you five times!"), then went to see LES MISERABLES and RISE OF THE GUARDIANS. LES MIS made me cry, because it always makes me cry, but at the same time, it didn't move me as deeply as maybe it could have. Hugh Jackman was good as Jean Valjean, even if his singing voice is no Colm Wilkinson, and Anne Hathaway was excellent as Fontine, but dammit, Russell Crowe, Javert is not a tenor, and I don't just mean that he was singing the role too high. Javert is not a hero: he's too inflexible. He doesn't give his enemies any credit. They gave Javert this moment where he pins one of his medal on Gavroche's dead chest, and it was like, dammit, no, he is no longer the kind of guy who would break and commit suicide over Valjean being a better man than he thought.
Anyway. Yes, I have Opinions on Javert. Tanya finds this bemusing, as she doesn't like the character at all, but she also had to read the book for school and I didn't, so I'm sure that makes a difference.
Helena Bonham Carter and Sasha Baron Cohen had enormous fun chewing the scenery as the Thernardiers, but really, did anyone doubt they would? I don't remember who played Marius, but he did an amazing job - he made him more than just Useless Male Lead. I was interested in him, and his fate, and could understand why Eponine had the hugest crush on him, and why Valjean took an interest in him (above and beyond the whole 'okay, fine, Cosette chose him' thing). Cosette did not escape being Useless Female Lead, but I don't blame that on the actress. That would take a helluva lot more than just good acting to make something more of Cosette than the most generic of Good Victorian Heroines. And Eponine was good, but I don't know how much of that was riding the coat-tails of the aforementioned really good Marius.
So we watched that, then went out and replenished our snacks, and went in to see RISE OF THE GUARDIANS. I've seen some commentary around the blogosphere pointing out that it's, shall we say, not unproblematic. And this is true! But honestly, I was not thinking about problems when I was watching it. I was enjoying the hell out of it. Next step: hunt up the book series that it's apparently based on, and see what that's like.
Tomorrow, the plan is that we're going to have some friends come over to play board games and card games and who knows, maybe even LEGO LORD OF THE RINGS, and then eat ham and mashed potatoes and pecan pie. If I have time, I'll try to work my way farther through the Yuletide archive: I got a gloriously fluffy MAMMA MIA! story for my story about Harry (over here), and my recipient really liked the story I wrote, so the key bits are already in place. :-) In the meantime, this has been one of the best Christmases ever.
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth. Feel free to comment there using OpenID.
As it happens? I am totally okay with that.
On Monday, we played with our Christmas present from said sister (LEGO LORD OF THE RINGS, wherein Gimli, Legolas and Sam trade off being awesome, and poor Frodo less so), then headed out for a candlelight Christmas Eve service. Afterwards, we drove around with the radio playing jazz versions of Christmas carols, and admired the Christmas lights and Christmas reindeer and, in one yard, Christmas T-Rexes. (How did I not know these existed? :hearts:)
Today, we unwrapped presents (I have owl slippers!), and played more LEGO LORD OF THE RINGS ("No, seriously, Frodo, put your damn elven cloak on already, I've told you five times!"), then went to see LES MISERABLES and RISE OF THE GUARDIANS. LES MIS made me cry, because it always makes me cry, but at the same time, it didn't move me as deeply as maybe it could have. Hugh Jackman was good as Jean Valjean, even if his singing voice is no Colm Wilkinson, and Anne Hathaway was excellent as Fontine, but dammit, Russell Crowe, Javert is not a tenor, and I don't just mean that he was singing the role too high. Javert is not a hero: he's too inflexible. He doesn't give his enemies any credit. They gave Javert this moment where he pins one of his medal on Gavroche's dead chest, and it was like, dammit, no, he is no longer the kind of guy who would break and commit suicide over Valjean being a better man than he thought.
Anyway. Yes, I have Opinions on Javert. Tanya finds this bemusing, as she doesn't like the character at all, but she also had to read the book for school and I didn't, so I'm sure that makes a difference.
Helena Bonham Carter and Sasha Baron Cohen had enormous fun chewing the scenery as the Thernardiers, but really, did anyone doubt they would? I don't remember who played Marius, but he did an amazing job - he made him more than just Useless Male Lead. I was interested in him, and his fate, and could understand why Eponine had the hugest crush on him, and why Valjean took an interest in him (above and beyond the whole 'okay, fine, Cosette chose him' thing). Cosette did not escape being Useless Female Lead, but I don't blame that on the actress. That would take a helluva lot more than just good acting to make something more of Cosette than the most generic of Good Victorian Heroines. And Eponine was good, but I don't know how much of that was riding the coat-tails of the aforementioned really good Marius.
So we watched that, then went out and replenished our snacks, and went in to see RISE OF THE GUARDIANS. I've seen some commentary around the blogosphere pointing out that it's, shall we say, not unproblematic. And this is true! But honestly, I was not thinking about problems when I was watching it. I was enjoying the hell out of it. Next step: hunt up the book series that it's apparently based on, and see what that's like.
Tomorrow, the plan is that we're going to have some friends come over to play board games and card games and who knows, maybe even LEGO LORD OF THE RINGS, and then eat ham and mashed potatoes and pecan pie. If I have time, I'll try to work my way farther through the Yuletide archive: I got a gloriously fluffy MAMMA MIA! story for my story about Harry (over here), and my recipient really liked the story I wrote, so the key bits are already in place. :-) In the meantime, this has been one of the best Christmases ever.
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth. Feel free to comment there using OpenID.