(no subject)
I have today and tomorrow free from work, so I arranged to meet Old Schoolfriend today. As usual, we met at a bookstore, where I ended up buying a couple of new books (quelle surprise :P): Hyinen hauta by Finnish author Ilkka Auer, the third segment in his YA fantasy series and Kuun kirkkaus [Brilliance of the Moon] by Lian Hearn, the third book in the Otori series that has finally been translated into Finnish.
After that we had lunch at this nice Indian restaurant which is pretty close to her home and then continued on to have one of our traditional movie nights :). I guess today's theme was gorgeous looking movies which didn't exactly have that much plot in them...
The films we watched were Korean Duelist, Zhang Yimou's Hero and The Fountain. The first two I had already seen before, since they were my dvds, but it's a completely different thing to see them on my 25" tv than on her 42" (I think) widescreen tv with surround sound and all...
The Fountain had both of us quite baffled in the beginning, but it started to make more sense the further along the story went. Still, the plot was maybe a bit too ambitious (kindly put). The three different levels on which it was told and the different timelines were very confusing and the spiritual aspect of the story didn't really work that well.
Still, if someone asked, I could probably write an essay length pseudo-analysis on the film and it's story and themes, since everything was so vague that it would be extremely easy to tack on your own interpretation on everything. It does stay haunting your brain, however.
It looked gorgeous, though, and I really liked Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz in the lead roles.
I think I'll include my latest reading in this post as well: 8. Legends II: Shadows, Gods, and Demons edited by Robert Silverberg is a collection of stories set in various authors' established worlds. The authors included were Robin Hobb (Farseer), Robert Silverberg (Majipoor), Tad Williams (Otherland), Anne McCaffrey (Pern), Raymond E. Feist (Riftwar), and Neil Gaiman (American Gods).
I didn't read the Hobb story, since I've onlyl read the first Fitz trilogy and didn't want spoilers for the rest. The Silverberg story I found pretty boring, Williams was okay - I guess I'll have to read those Otherland books one of these days, since I already have them on my shelves, McCaffrey revisited Moreta's story in a fairly entertaining way, Feist was okay and Gaiman told of Shadow's adventures in Scotland where he came across Grendel and his mom.
This was actually the anthology I was complaining about earlier which I found pretty boring. All of the stories were fine as commute reading, but none of them really made that much of an impression. I guess I'll just add it to my bookmooch list now...
After that we had lunch at this nice Indian restaurant which is pretty close to her home and then continued on to have one of our traditional movie nights :). I guess today's theme was gorgeous looking movies which didn't exactly have that much plot in them...
The films we watched were Korean Duelist, Zhang Yimou's Hero and The Fountain. The first two I had already seen before, since they were my dvds, but it's a completely different thing to see them on my 25" tv than on her 42" (I think) widescreen tv with surround sound and all...
The Fountain had both of us quite baffled in the beginning, but it started to make more sense the further along the story went. Still, the plot was maybe a bit too ambitious (kindly put). The three different levels on which it was told and the different timelines were very confusing and the spiritual aspect of the story didn't really work that well.
Still, if someone asked, I could probably write an essay length pseudo-analysis on the film and it's story and themes, since everything was so vague that it would be extremely easy to tack on your own interpretation on everything. It does stay haunting your brain, however.
It looked gorgeous, though, and I really liked Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz in the lead roles.
I think I'll include my latest reading in this post as well: 8. Legends II: Shadows, Gods, and Demons edited by Robert Silverberg is a collection of stories set in various authors' established worlds. The authors included were Robin Hobb (Farseer), Robert Silverberg (Majipoor), Tad Williams (Otherland), Anne McCaffrey (Pern), Raymond E. Feist (Riftwar), and Neil Gaiman (American Gods).
I didn't read the Hobb story, since I've onlyl read the first Fitz trilogy and didn't want spoilers for the rest. The Silverberg story I found pretty boring, Williams was okay - I guess I'll have to read those Otherland books one of these days, since I already have them on my shelves, McCaffrey revisited Moreta's story in a fairly entertaining way, Feist was okay and Gaiman told of Shadow's adventures in Scotland where he came across Grendel and his mom.
This was actually the anthology I was complaining about earlier which I found pretty boring. All of the stories were fine as commute reading, but none of them really made that much of an impression. I guess I'll just add it to my bookmooch list now...