#at least the cinematography was stunning

[toasterdrake]

having a lot of feels rn lads

[doux-amer]

I didn’t get why people found Wi Hajun hot in Squid Game (I mean, I’m aware what scene in particular made people feel that way even though it was grossly violating to watch for me), but I get it now after watching Little Women. I was hooked from the first episode. Sometimes it’s a matter of styling, hair, and the character and Choi Doil? He was it.

[mandacantu]

10 Reasons Why I Actually Loved The Crow Remake

FKA Twigs - I'm not going to sit here and pretend I am not a huge twigs fan, because I love anything she touches and especially her music. This was her first time as a leading lady and I thought she did a good job. I do think there were some points where her line reading could have been a little more fast paced in some spots, but overall, I think she was captivating, eloquent and emotional. And wow, so many stunning visuals that we got of her from this movie!

2. We didn't have to see depictions of brutal and violent deaths of women in this film. I didn't want to spend too many of my thoughts on comparisons to the original The Crow, but one thing I noticed was that I didn't have to endure the violent and sexually abusive death of Shelly or any other woman in this movie. I do like the original movie but never cared for the way they went all in on Shelly's death. In this remake, we still see Shelly die but we don't have to endure gratuitous SA scenes whilst losing the leading lady. I appreciated that and was able to relax more, honestly.

3. The villain had actual motivation for killing and being a villain. There was some decent backstory and character development for the villain and that is something that I always appreciate. Some of my favorite pieces of media (like Spirited Away and Knives Out) do well to at least give the villain a story or a reason for being bad. I think it adds depth to the story and for me, helps immerse me into the plot more.

4. It felt like a comic book come to life. From the color grading and palette to the way scenes were cut and moved from one to the next, it felt like I was flipping through a comic book. There were moments that were very whimsical in depictions of love and then very gritty scenes. The contrast in some of those scenes felt similar to flipping a page in a comic.

5. It was very romantic and spent a lot of time focusing on their love story. I thought their love was believable and felt like that whirlwind kind of love where you just want to party and kiss all night. It gave me a reason to care about both of the characters and it gave Shelly a place in the spotlight where she becomes so much more than just a symbol of loss for character development. Focusing on their love and giving us some romance was a timeless decision and puts their love story up there with Romeo and Juliet or Christian and Sateen.

6. Soundtrack was amazing! If you are into some new wave, some goth tunes and some dance tracks, this is the playlist for you. Beyond just the soundtrack, it was truly a different experience to see it synced up to parts of the movie as intended. The intro was amazing, I thought it was like a James Bond meets Underworld mixed with some NIN music video sprinkled in there. The folks who worked on the score deserve a standing ovation. There were moments where I was tearing up because of how well the music paired with the scene. Most memorable and moving was Joy Division's Disorder when they bust out of rehab together and a perfectly placed Boadicea by Enya. There were so many other good ones too, I'm seriously considering seeing it again just for the mini music videos you get from the film.

7. It was aesthetically pleasing. And I'm not just talking about the eye candy that was Bill Skarsgård, though lets give him his flowers for being a true Mr. Fanservice! The actual visuals were beautiful. I loved the cinematography and color choices. It was truly a feast for the eyes. Just take a look at this beautiful gif set by pizgif!

8. I could easily see a story about grief and the longing for justice for loved ones. I thought it was a good story and as I watched it, I thought to myself that the person who wrote the original comic must have gone through an immense loss. It wasn't until I looked it up that it seems to be confirmed that The Crow was inspired by such loss. The moodiness of the movie itself added to the weight of the tragic storyline. In that, I liked that it takes a while for Eric to become The Crow. Losing someone you love transforms you and in this sense, the movie is all about that transformation and pain and longing.

9. I liked the ending. I don't want to say too much to spoil it, but I enjoyed the different ending and I was definitely teary eyed and sniffling as I left the theater.

10. It was goth as fuck. I think goth can be a multitude of styles and honestly shouldn't be something that has a gatekeeper. This was emo-boy-goth, it was e-boy-tiktok-hottie-goth, it was goth in a different flavor. I think folks are quick to see this new Eric not dressed like a new-wave-leather-daddy-goth as decidedly not dark enough. To quote a favorite musician, he was "goth as fuck, even when [he's] not in black, gothic is the pain you feel and not the clothes that's on your back."

Closing thoughts: A lot of the negative criticism is coming from men or diehard fans of the 1994 movie, so I am not surprised. This rendition felt like the same story, just done differently and with more emphasis on the love story than the revenge plot. There is nothing wrong with that and nothing wrong with a gothic romance heavy action flick.

This was intended to be a different version of The Crow and that isn't a bad thing. I personally think that if they had done the styling to be an exact replica of Brandon Lee's rendition then the movie would still get tons of hate, if not more. It was a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation for sure. I'm glad they took a risk and deviated from the '94 version.

We have been doing remakes since the creation of art. It has always been common to hear that the new movie coming out is actually a retelling of this classic tale or continuation of that scary story. Remakes are not a new concept and some of them do well to tell the same story in a different way. We are in the day and age where there isn't really an original idea anymore, anyway. In a world full of countless retellings of Batman/Joker and Spiderman movies, why not remake The Crow? I say fire it up!

I think they do a good job to pave the way for others to retell this love story in the same vein as The Joker and Harley Quinn. Hell, I would say to keep going, next let's see a remake where The Crow is about two badass lesbians. (I might have gotten too peppered up watching the movie, it was hot.)

P.S. I loved that there were little things like Eric wearing Shelly's jacket later in the movie. I feel like a lot of critics saw him wearing this jacket and were quick to bash the costume design too, but this is the kind of attention to detail that made their love believable to me. And I thought he looked cute as hell in it.

Okay, the end.

[thesublemon]

best picture

For the first time in a long time, I watched all of the movies nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars this year. Partly on a whim, partly for a piece I’ve been working on for a while about what is going wrong in contemporary artmarking. I cannot say that the experience made me feel any better or worse about contemporary movies than I already felt, which was pretty bad. But sometimes to write about a hot stove, you gotta put your hand on one. So. The nominees for coldest stove are:

Poor Things. Did not like enough to finish. I always want to like something that is making an effort at originality, strangeness, or style. Unfortunately, the execution of those things in this movie felt somehow dull and thin. Hard to explain how. Maybe the movie’s motif of things mashed together (baby-woman, duck-dog, etc) is representative. People have been mashing things together since griffins, medleys, Avatar the Last Airbender’s animals, Nickelodeon’s Catdog, etc. Thing + thing is elementary-level weird. And while there’s nothing wrong with a simple, or well-worn premise, there is a greater burden on an artist to do something interesting with it, if they go that route. And Poor Things does not. Its themes are obvious and belabored (the difficulty of self-actualization in a world that violently infantilizes you) and do not elevate the premise. There’s a fine line between the archetypal and the hackish, and this movie falls on the wrong side of it. It made me miss Crimes of the Future (2022), a recent Cronenberg that was authentically original and strange, with the execution to match.

Anatomy of a Fall. Solid, but not stunning. The baseline level of what a ‘good’ movie should be. It was written coherently and economically, despite its length. It told a story that drew you along. I wanted to know what happened, which is the least you can ask from storytelling. It had some compelling scenes that required a command of character and drama to write—particularly the big argument scene. The cinematography was not interesting, but it was not annoying either. It did its job. This was not, however, a transcendent movie.

Oppenheimer. Did not like enough to finish. But later forced myself to, just so no one could accuse me of not knowing what I was talking about when I said I disliked it. I felt like I was being pranked. The Marvel idea of what a prestige biopic should be. Like Poor Things, it telegraphed its artsiness and themes and has raked in accolades for its trouble. But obviousness is not the same as goodness and this movie is not good. The imagery is painfully literal. A character mentions something? Cut to a shot of it! No irony or nuance added by such images—just the artistry of a book report. The dialogue pathologically tells instead of shows. It constantly, cutely references things you might have heard of, the kind of desperate audience fellation you see in soulless franchise movies. Which is a particularly jarring choice given the movie’s subject matter. ‘Why didn’t you get Einstein for the Manhattan project’ Strauss asks, as if he’s saying ‘Why didn’t you get Superman for the Avengers?’ If any of this referentiality was an attempt to say something about mythologization, it failed—badly. The movie is stuffed with famous and talented actors, but it might as well not have been, given how fake every word out of their mouths sounded. Every scene felt like it had been written to sound good in a trailer, rather than to tell a damn story. All climax and no cattle.

Barbie. Did not like enough to finish. It had slightly more solidity in its execution than I was afraid it would have, so I will give it that. If people want this to be their entertainment I will let them have it. But if they want this to be their high cinema I will have to kill myself. Barbie being on this list reminds me of the midcentury decades of annual movie musical nominations for Best Picture. Sometimes deservingly. Other times, less so. The Music Man is great, but it’s not better than 8 1/2  or The Great Escape, neither of which were nominated in 1963. Musicals tend to appeal to more popular emotions, which ticket-buyers and award-givers tend to like, and critics tend to dislike. I remember how much Pauline Kael and Joan Didion hated The Sound of Music (which won in 1966), and have to ask myself if in twenty years I’ll think of my reaction to Barbie the same way that I think of those reviews: justified, but perhaps beside the point of other merits. Thing is. Say what you want about musicals, but that genre was alive back then. It was vital. Bursting with creativity. For all Kael’s bile, even she acknowledged that The Sound of Music was “well done for what it is.” [1] Contemporary cinema lacks such vitality, and Barbie is laden with symptoms of the malaise. It repeatedly falls back on references to past aesthetic successes (2001: A Space Odyssey, Singin’ in the Rain, etc) in order to have aesthetic heft. It has a car commercial in the middle. It’s about a toy from 60 years ago and politics from 10 years ago. It tries to wring some energy and meaning from all of that but not enough to cover the stench of death. I’d prefer an old musical any day.

American Fiction. Was okay. It tried to be clever about politics, but ended up being clomping about politics. At the end of the day, it just wasn’t any more interesting than any other ‘intellectual has a mid-life crisis’ story, even with the ‘twist’ of it being from a black American perspective. Even with it being somewhat self-aware of this. But it could have been a worse mid-life crisis story. The cinematography was terrible. It was shot like a sitcom. Much of the dialogue was sitcom-y too. I liked the soundtrack, what I could hear of it. The attempts at style and meta (the characters coming to life, the multiple endings) felt underdeveloped. Mostly because they were only used a couple times. In all, it felt like a first draft of a potentially more interesting movie. 

The Zone of Interest.Wanted to like it more than I did. Unfortunately, you get the point within about five minutes. If you’ve seen the promotional image of the people in the garden, backgrounded by the walls of Auschwitz, then you’ve already seen the movie. Which means that all the rest of the movie ends up feeling like pretentious excess instead of moving elaboration. It seemed very aware of itself as an Important Movie and rested on those laurels, cinematically speaking, in a frustrating way. It reminded me of video art. I felt like I had stepped through a black velvet drape into the side room of a gallery, wondering at what point the video started over. And video art has its place, but it is a different medium. Moreover video art at its best, like a movie at its best, takes only the time it needs to say what it needs to say. 

Past Lives. I’m a human being, and I respond to romance. I appreciate the pathos of sweet yearning and missed chances. And I understand how the romance in this movie is a synecdoche for ambivalent feelings about many kinds of life choices, particularly the choice to be an immigrant and choose one culture over another. The immigrant experience framing literalizes the way any choice can make one foreign to a past version of oneself, or the people one used to know, even if in another sense one is still the same person. So, I appreciate the emotional core of what (I believe) this movie was going for, and do think it succeeded in some respects. And yet…I was very irritated by most of its artistic choices. I found the three principal characters bland and therefore difficult to care about, sketched with only basic traits besides things like Striving and Being In Love. Why care who they’d be in another life if they have no personalities in this one? It’s fine to make characters symbols instead of humans if the symbolic tapestry of a movie is interesting and rich, but the symbolic tapestry of this movie was quite simple and straightforward. Not that that last sentence even matters much, since the movie clearly wanted you to feel for the characters as human beings, not just symbols. Visually, the cinematography was dull and diffuse, with composition that was either boring or as subtle as a hammer to the head.

Maestro. Did not like enough to finish. Something strange and wrong about this movie. It attempts to perform aesthetic mimicry with impressive precision—age makeup, accents, period cinematography—but this does not make the movie a better movie. At most it creates spectacle, at worst it creates uncanny valleys. It puts one on the lookout for irregularities, instead of allowing one to disappear into whatever the movie is doing. Something amateurishly pretentious in the execution. And not in the fun, respectable way, like a good student film. (My go-to example for a movie that has an art-school vibe in a pleasant way is The Reflecting Skin). There’s something desperate about it instead. It has the same disease as Oppenheimer, of attempting to do a biopic in a ‘stylish’ way without working on the basics first. Fat Man and Little Boy is a less overtly stylish rendition of the same subject as Oppenheimer, but far more cinematically successful to me, because it understands those basics. I would prefer to see the Fat Man and Little Boy of Leonard Bernstein’s life unless a filmmaker proves that they can do something with style beyond mimicry and flash.

The Holdovers. Did not like enough to finish. It tries to be vintage, but outside of a few moments, it does not succeed either at capturing what was good about the aesthetic it references, or at using the aesthetic in some other interesting way. The cinematography apes the tropes of movies and TV from the story’s time period, but doesn't have interesting composition in its own right. It lacks the solidity that comes from original seeing. (Contrast with something like Planet Terror, in which joyous pastiche complements the original elements.) The acting is badly directed. Too much actorliness is permitted. Much fakeness in general between the acting, writing, and visual language. If a movie with this same premise was made in the UK in the 60’s or 70's it would probably be good. As-is the movie just serves to make me sad that the ability to make such movies is apparently lost and can only be hollowly gestured at. That said, the woman who won best supporting actress did a good job. She was the only one who seemed to be actually acting.

Killers of the Flower Moon. The only possible winner. It is not my favorite of Scorsese’s movies, but compared to the rest of the lineup it wins simply by virtue of being a movie at all. How to define ‘being a movie’? Lots of things I could say that Killers of the Flower Moon has and does would also be superficially true of other movies in this cohort. Things like: it tells a story, with developed characters who drive that story. Or: it uses its medium (visuals, sound) to support its story and its themes. The difference comes down to richness, specificity, control, and a je ne sais quois that is beyond me to describe at the moment. Compare the way Killers of the Flower Moon uses a bygone cinematic style (the silent movie) to the way that Maestro and The Holdovers do. Killers of the Flower Moon uses a newsreel in its opening briefly and specifically. The sequence sets the scene historically, and gives you the necessary background with the added panache of confident cuts and music. It’s useful to the story and it’s satisfying to watch. Basics. But the movie doesn’t limit itself to that, because it’s a good movie. The sequence also sets up ideas that will be continuously developed over the course of the movie.* And here’s the kicker—the movie doesn’t linger on this sequence. You get the idea, and it moves on to even more ideas. Also compare this kind of ideating to American Fiction’s. When I said that American Fiction’s moments of style felt underdeveloped, I was thinking of movies like Killers of the Flower Moon, which weave and evolve their stylistic ideas throughout the entire runtime.

*(Visually, it places the Osage within a historical medium that the audience probably does not associate with Native Americans, or the Osage in particular. Which has a couple of different effects. First, it acts as a continuation of the gushing oil from the previous scene. It’s an interruption. A false promise. Seeming belonging and power, but framed all the while by a foreign culture. Meanwhile potentially from the perspective of that culture, it’s an intrusion on ‘their’ medium. And of course, this promise quickly decays into tragedy and death. The energy of the sequence isn’t just for its own sake—it sets up a contrast. But on a second, meta level it establishes the movie’s complicated relationship to media and storytelling. Newsreels, photos, myths, histories, police interviews, and a radio play all occur over the course of the movie. And there’s the movie Killers of the Flower Moon itself. Other people’s frames are contrasted with Mollie’s narration. There’s a repeated tension between communication as a method of knowing others and a method of controlling them—or the narrative of them—which plays out in both history and personal relationships.)

Or here’s another example: When Mollie and Ernest meet and he drives her home for the first time, we see their conversation via the car’s rearview mirrors. This is a bit of cinematic language that has its origins in mystery and paranoia. You see it in things like Hitchcock or The X-Files or film noir. By framing the scene with this convention, the movie turns what is superficially a romantic meet-cute (to quote a friend) into something bubbling with uneasiness and dread. This is not nostalgia—this is just using visuals to create effects. It doesn’t matter if you’ve seen anything that uses the convention before, although knowing the pedigree might add to your enjoyment. The watchfulness suggested by the mirrors and Ernest’s cut-off face will still add an ominous effect. It works for the same reason it works in those other things. Like the newsreel, it is a specific and concise stylistic choice, and it results in a scene that is doing more than just one thing.

In general, the common thread I noticed as I watched these nominees, was the tendency to have the ‘idea’ of theme or style, and then stop there. It’s not that the movies had nothing in them. There were ideas, there was use of the medium, there was meaning to extract. There were lots of individually good moments. But they tended to feel singular, or repetitive, or tacked on. Meanwhile contemporary viewers are apparently so impressed by the mere existence of theme or style, that being able to identify it in a movie is enough to convince many that the movie is also good at those things. The problem with this tendency—in both artists and audiences—is that theme and style are not actually some extra, remarkable, inherently rarifying property of art. Theme emerges naturally from a story with any kind of coherence or perspective. And style emerges naturally from any kind of artistic attitude. They are as native as script, or narrative, or character. A movie’s theme and style might not be interesting, just like its story or dialogue might not be interesting, but if the movie is at all decent, they should exist. What makes a movie good or bad, then, is how it executes its component parts—including theme and style—in service of the whole. When theme is well-executed it is well-developed. Contemporary movies, unfortunately, seem to have confused ‘well-developed’ with ‘screamingly obvious.’ A theme does not become well-developed by repetition. It becomes well-developed by iterationand integration. Theme is like a melody. Simply repeating a single melody over and over does not result in the song becoming more interesting or entertaining. It becomes tedious. However, if you modify the melody each time you play it, or diverge from the melody and then return to it, that can get exciting. It results in different angles on the same idea, such that the idea becomes more complex over time, instead of simply louder.

Oppenheimer wasprobably the worst offender in this regard. Just repeat your water drops, crescendoing noise, or a line about ‘destroying the world’, and that’s the same as nuance, right? Split scenes into color and black and white and that’s the same as structure, right? That’s the same as actually conveying a difference between objectivity and interiority (or another dichotomy) via the drama or visual composition contained in the scenes, right? When I watched many of these movies, I kept thinking of a behind-the-scenes story from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The story goes that Joss Whedon was directing Sarah Michelle Gellar in some scene, and when the take was over he told her how great she was, and that he could see right where the music would come in. And Gellar replied that if he was thinking about the music, he clearly wasn’t getting enough from her acting alone. This conversation then supposedly informed Whedon’s approach to “The Body,” a depiction of the immediate aftermath of death that is considered one of the best episodes of television ever made, and which has no non-diegetic music whatsoever. Not to imply that music is necessarily a crutch, or to pretend that “The Body” is lacking in other forms of stylization (it is a very style-ish episode). But more to illustrate the way that it is easy to forget to make the most of all aspects of a medium, particularly the most fundamental ones, once one has gotten used to what a final product is supposed to feel like. 

And that’s why most of these movies don’t feel like movies. They create the gestalt of a movie or a ‘cinematic’ moment—often literally through direct vintage imitation—without a sense of the first principles. Or demonstrating a sense of them, anyway. Who needs AI when the supposedly highest level of human filmmakers are already cannibalistically cargo-culting the medium just fine.

[1] “The Sound of Money (The Sound of Music and The Singing Nun).” The Pauline Kael Reader. (This book contains the full text of the original review, rather than the abbreviated review that I linked earlier.) 

[jezebelgoldstone]

RRR (2022, dir S. S. Rajamouli)

things i am not now and likely never will get over from RRR

DRIFT COMPATIBLE BATTLE COUPLE DETECTED

queer? platonic? queerplatonic? who gives a shit no matter what it was it was AWESOME

Colonialism Is Bad Actually: The Musical

the symbolism. holy shit. every BIT of it was absolutely amazing.

wow all the mains in this movie are just, really hot? my poor lil pan heart had a rough time with this one ngl

the fact that someone (likely many someones) watched this movie about Colonialism Is Bad Actually and said 'you know what let's dub this whole thing into Hindi and English and then not give an option to watch it with the original Telugu dialogue' sure was,,,,,,,,, A Choice

THE MUSIC

by which i mean the actual song-and-dance numbers as well as the like story soundtrack all of it is going on my playlist asap

listen the spirk-behind-glass scene is awful. spock and kirk can't even touch. they can hear. they can see. but they cannot touch. and i in my sweet ignorant bliss thought that was as bad as it could get.

tonight i learned that holding someone in your arms through the bars of their cell is so much worse

I watched it on Netflix but i looked it up on a few other ahem websites and on EVERY SINGLE ONE Telugu audio wasn't even an option.

there was not one single chance to tie things together or make a connection or do a setup/payoff or callback that was not taken. not a single one.

everything about this movie is 100% Extra

in short: this movie is a masterclass

aaaaaand the rest below a cut because WOW i have a lot to say actually

which brings me to the dancing oh my gods. not sure i've ever seen such enthusiastic dancing in anything in my entire life. seriously by the final number i was exhausted just watching them

in general, this movie is: stunning

"RAM." "BHEEM." "SEETHA." IT'S ABOUT THE SYMBOLISM.

also this was kinda hilarious because i watched it in hindi [the least disorienting option] and they kept SAYING "ram" but in the subs it was always fuckin RAJU so like. again with the Choices. like seriously what was the thought process there. WAS there a thought process.

FIRE. WATER. STORY. I JUST. I. HELP ME.

i ADORED jenny. with my whole entire heart. she is one of the very BEST examples of Ignorance Is A Privilege and also At What Point Does Ignorance Become Malicious that i have ever ever seen. i loooooooooved it. i mean i hated it a whole lot while it was happening but also i am SO GLAD that now rather than trying to explain all of this to people i can just tell them to watch this movie and then sit them down and be like, so what are your thoughts on jenny's culpability in literally everything?

oh and how you can be a kind person and still do atrocities! like jenny is so sweet and so kind and you just like her so much and yet. and yet.

t h e s y m b o l i s m

i cannot remember the last time i saw a movie so visually stunning. the cinematography is breathtaking. pause on just about any random frame and it could be a movie poster or hanging in an art gallery or what have you.

they also dubbed all the lines that were actually in english? i mean i get it for the characters who spent most of the movie speaking Telugu because you'd need their voices to stay the same through the whole movie yeah fine whatever. but like. they dubbed all the ENGLISH characters, too? like literally dubbed them from english into english??? the dialogue matched their mouths except the timing was veeeery sliiiiiiiightly off but it SOUNDED really obviously dubbed??? Y THO???

HOLY SHIT THE FIGHT SCENES OH MY GODS

Malli. Malli honey i love you. i'm just realizing i don't know if that's your actual name gods damn it. but whatever your name is child i love you.

and did i mention that everyone in this movie is beautiful? like. seriously. Ram and Bheem especially holy SHIT.

Physics Does Not Work Like That And I Do Not Care Because That Was AWESOME: The Musical

oooohhhhh they re-recorded and dubbed the fucking SONGS too. i am so pissed about this y'all i can't even tell you.

oh i want to do a whole entire post that's even longer than this one about the symbolism. hell i could probably do a whole entire post just on the fire/water symbolism even without everything else. It was AMAZING.

okay ram is fire and bheem is water and ram's people go to a valley on the shores of a river and the river is in literally every shot of the village and just ram BEING fire but water being a place of HOME and SAFETY for ram

i'm not crying shut up

MALLI AND HER MOTHER TRY TO REACH EACH OTHER BUT THEY CANNOT TOUCH THROUGH THE GLASS

BHEEM AND MALLI HOLD EACH OTHER THROUGH THE BARS OF HER CONFINEMENT AND HE HAS TO LET GO AND LEAVE HER

BHEEM AND RAM HOLD EACH OTHER THROUGH THE BARS OF HIS CONFINEMENT AND BHEEM RIPS THE DOOR RIGHT OFF

ooooooohhhhhhh and people holding hands right before they part. oh that hurts. all of those hurt so bad.

how every single time people held hands when they parted they always held on till the last possible second EXCEPT FOR RAM'S MOM.

she lifts her hand away from him and then pulls back and it was devastating

Predators Do Not Work Like That But I Do Not Care Because That Was Awesome And Also They Ate A Bunch Of Colonizing Cops: Queercoded Edition (ACAB)

bheem with his arms spread and rope or chains around his wrists or in his hands. i just. the way it flipped back and forth from 'he has the power' to 'he is helpless' to 'he should be helpless and isn't' was just. breathtaking.

AND THEN. AND THEN RAM. CHAINED UP THE SAME WAY. DOING THE SAME GODDAMN THING AND USING THE FACT THAT HE'S CHAINED UP FOR HIS OWN FUCKING PURPOSES BECAUSE HE SAW BHEEM DO IT FIRST DON'T TOUCH ME

okay listen this movie would've been good no matter what but like. they really are just SO beautiful. and. when ram. with like the long hair. and. beard. and like. you know? like. his. his hair. his general. everything. um.

literally at the most emotionally inappropriate moment i literally thought about that whole 'i saw a man so beautiful i started crying' thing and like that almost literally happened literally

Why There Can't Be Any Such Thing As Good Cops: The Romance (ACAB)

and like here's the thing i'm not sure i would've even NOTICED this had it not been for the linguistic chauvinism with the audio and everything but like both of them were hindu and a lot of the symbolism though awesome was also really strongly hindu and i just i don't know nearly enough about hindutva to have any kind of opinion BUT i also feel like maaaaaaaybe there was something a little uncomfy about some of this

oh no wait the suspenders dance. that might've actually been the best part. yeah.

oh all the british actors did SUCH a good job being so eminently punchable

throw cheetahs at each other! and snakes! somehow have upper body strength greater than the force exerted by a 800+ lb tiger lunging! throw those motorcycles! punch through those walls without breaking your fingers! use herbal paste to heal broken bones in a matter of a minutes! break solid stone with nothing but the strength of your shoulders and gay love! i am so here for all of this!!!

Throw Rocks Marble Pillars Live Tigers Cops At Cops: The Movie (ACAB)

i love that jenny felt bad for the poor little girl who got kidnapped enslaved and imprisoned so she. bought her a dress and a toy.

you know, to make her feel better about the whole 'being kidnapped enslaved and imprisoned' thing.

instead of doing, i don't know know, literally anything else. like even just saying to her aunt 'hey this makes me sad' or something. #solidarity.

the violence was violent and the romance was sweet

okay so during the fight at the midpoint like i know that by the end of it ram and bheem are literal fire and water BUT ALSO. Ram enters the scene in a flaming carriage and from that point forward the fountain is in pretty much every shot of bheem. just sayin.

love that lachu (or whatever his name really is) told ram that there was no cure. like yes! you go man! ram may be so beautiful that in forty minutes i'm going to be in tears but that's no reason to tell a cop the truth about anything! you lie to that cop man!

A BRITISH SOLDIER HIT LOKI IN THE HEAD WITH A BRANCH AND THEN STOLE MALLI AWAY

BHEEM HIT RAM IN THE HEAD WITH A BRANCH AND THEN STOLE MALLI AWAY

i know other people got hit in the head with tree branches too but STILL

honestly i really like that ram and bheem were, well, ram and bheem. but i mean im glad they weren't like ram and lakshman or bheem and arjun or something. not even just because that would've been brotherly like i'm glad they weren't arjun and krishna or something either. i liked that their names weren't from the same story. i liked it better this way and i can't even articulate why.

i am never ever ever going to get over the progression of part of bheem's introduction being something going wrong and him holding two ropes (he has all the power) with his arms spread and that being used to show us how incredibly strong he is -> something going wrong and bheem with ropes around his wrists (he shouldn't have any power at all) holding his arms spread and that being used to show how incredibly strong he is in a completely different way

like every time there were ropes or chains in bheem's hands or around his wrists it meant something, and it was a beat in the rhythm of a discernable arc, but now i can't remember all of them gdi

oooohhhhh there was SO much more symbolism i wanted to talk about but it's so late that i have a headache and this post is so long my computer's lagging like two sentences behind so i should stop and go to bed. sigh.

just go watch this movie, okay? pleae? I cannot IMAGINE who would've read this whole thing,m but if you did, just watch it, all rigth? (and if you happen to know of any site - ANY site - where i can watch it in FUKIN TELUGU kindly drop a link please and thank)

[cultofcreatures]

My Top 15 Vaporwave Horror Movies

I thought I would put together a list of vaporwave/dreamcore/liminal aesthetic horror movies that I find to feel outside of time and space. That's sort of my vibe here on tumblr, and I also like the mantra of "if there's something you want to see that no one has made yet, make it yourself." These are films that I personally love, and the list not meant to be definitive. Remember also that art is subjective. I hope someone out there finds at least one film they want to add to their watchlist! It's been a minute since I've seen some of them, so let me know if I need to correct something.

15. Mandy (2018)

I wish I could add pictures for all of these entries, but I can still only add 10 pictures to a post blah. It's such a shame because I wanted to show off that gorgeous aesthetics of all these films. Oh well. This is a revenge flick about a cult kidnapping Nick Cage's girlfriend and him losing his marbles about it. Definitely recommend if you're the mood for vibes and/or Nick Cage NickCageing.

TW: violence, blood, fire

14. Come True (2020)

This is a haunting, fantastic vibes movie. It feels so otherworldly. It's about a homeless young person participating in a sleep study to be able to safely get some sleep. It would be an almost perfect film if it weren't for the just garbage ending. If you've seen it, you know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, just skip the last 5 minutes, and take it for what the rest of the film is: beautiful.

13. Braid (2018)

This film follows a couple of young drug dealers on the run from their supplier crashing at a mentally unwell friend's house. The catch is they have to play along with their host's unhinged "game" while they hide out. Not gonna lie, this film is trippy af and definitely not for everyone. I can guarantee that no matter what, it is a ride.

TW: heavy drug use, blood

12. Perfect Blue (1997)

A pop star retires to become a full-time actor, which angers some of her fans. Her sense of reality becomes warped when one obsessive fan begins to stalk her. I don't love some of the turns this movie takes when it comes to mental health, but it's hard to deny this film is classic that has stunning animation.

TW: negative depictions of mental disorders, violence, blood

11. Skinamarink (2022)

This controversial found footage movie is sort of hard to describe because it's so otherworldly. Basically, two kids wake up one night to find their dad and all of their doors and windows are missing. Everything about this nostalgic yet terrifying film is vibes and aesthetic: liminal, vaporwave, voidcore, dreamcore, you name it. It feels like a fever dream, and it's a nightmarish journey you won't soon forget, for better or worse.

10. Vivarium (2019)

A couple are looking for a home to share. They follow a strange realtor to an even stranger labyrinthine neighborhood that seems to have no escape. If you're into liminal spaces, this film will definitely scratch that itch for you.

9. Revenge (2017)

This is a r*pe revenge tale that has absolutely beautiful scenery and cinematography. I love the sweeping liminal landscapes and vibrant vaporwave colors. It's a standard plot as far as the genre goes, but it's directed by a woman, so it has a different angle that I find to be superior to most films of the genre.

TW: violence, gore, SA, blood

8. Don't Worry Darling (2022)

A 1950s housewife begins to suspect that something about her utopian community is not what it seems. This film seems to be a bit controversial, too, for some reason. Whatever the case may be, I adore the liminality and dreamy feel of this film. You really get a sense that this world is outside of time and space.

7. It Follows (2014)

This film is straight up about a sexually transmitted curse. Jay sleeps with her boyfriend for the first time, and then finds out she must outpace this demon that can take the shape of anyone forever lest it kill her, or she must pass the curse on to someone else. The shots in this film are to die for. Especially for connoisseurs of the liminal, vaporwave, and dreamcore. Highly recommend for the visuals and music alone.

TW: gore, blood

6. House (1977)

Gorgeous decides to stay with her aunt to hopefully get closer with a group of six of her friends. The girls come to find her aunt's house is more than meets the eye. The visuals and absurdity are what make this movie. It's a classic for a reason.

TW: cartoon gore

5. Akira (1988)

Tetsuo gains psychic abilities via a secret military project and becomes mad with power. It's up to his friends and a small group of psychics to stop him. This is another classic anime. Its 1980s futuristic mentality really lends itself to the vaporwave atmosphere of the cityscape. I highly recommend this classic if you haven't seen it.

TW: violence, body horror

4. Censor (2021)

Enid is a serious film censor with a shrouded past that includes her long-missing sister. She watches a film that bears eerie resemblance to her vague childhood memories that begin to take hold of her as tries to piece them together. I don't think I'm totally clear on when this film takes place, which is what I love about it. It has a spooky surreal quality that will both draw you in and unsettle you.

TW: violence, blood

3. She Dies Tomorrow (2020)

Amy is convinced she is going to die tomorrow. Her friend Jane comes by to comfort her, and then becomes consumed by the thought she will die tomorrow as well. This film is as strange as it is beautiful. It will either leave you in tears or confused af or both.

TW: blood

2. The Neon Demon (2016)

Jesse is a very young, gifted model who is new in town (probably LA). She quickly signs with an agent and begins getting gigs, breeding the contempt of the established models around her. This is probably one of the most visually appealing films I've ever seen. The music is on point. The low key acting is a vibe. I just adore this film. 10/10, highly recommend.

TW: gore, blood

1. The Platform (2019)

A man wakes up in a prison that is an indescribable liminal pit where there are a seemingly never-ending number of levels. A platform full of food is lowered through each level once a day, and everyone on the lower levels must fight to survive. This film is just so utterly anticapitalist and gorgeous that I can't help but sing its praises. I think everyone should watch this movie at least once. It is horrifying yet eye-opening. Certainly one of my favorite films of all time.

TW: gore, violence, blood

Thank you for reading my list! Like I said, I wanted to make a list like this because I couldn't find one when I went looking. I hope you found something to add to your watchlist! I tried to include some of the big TWs for these movies, but they're far from complete lists. So please check websites like doesthedogdie.com for more complete TW lists if you have any concerns. Make decisions that are right for you. Thanks again, and have a happy and safe new year! xx

[weirdozjunkary]

OKAY SO! I literally JUST got back from watching the FNAF movie and HOLY FUCK DID I ENJOY IT! I have SO MUCH to talk about from it oh my god! I would give it a solid 8 or 9/10. Not prefect but I enjoyed it so much.

Non spoiler right below and full spoilers under the cut.

Spoiler free- I absolutely adored the movie! The entire cast did a splendid job! I couldn’t be happier with everything that I saw on the screen! For what it is it was astounding! So much love to the fans and everyone that had worked on FNAF in the past. My only complaints was the pacing and dialogue as the pacing was a bit jumpy and the dialogue felt awkward at times, as well I know that the whole lore of FNAF itself would limit a fair bit of an audience. But other than that I loved it so much. From the animatronics to the actors to the cinematography, all of it was beautiful and I truly hope that Scott makes at least one more, but if not I’m still happy what we got.

Full spoilers- I adored everyone who was on screen, from mike to Abby to Vanessa, the animatronics and William, all of them were a delight to watch. The movie truly felt like it was one of Scott’s works, from the serious stuff to the jokes, it was brilliant. A lot of my favourite jokes were with Abby and Mike not taking any shit.

What I found interesting was how they made Vanessa the daughter of William Afton, wether adopted or by blood. I think she could have been more of a use than she did, as she mostly just warned Mike until the very end where she did one thing and then got stabbed. But other than that I think she had a good amount of screen time.

Mike and Abby were great from the start, I do wish we got more backstory from Mike though, like to show more how he’s troubled rather than just keep repeating that his brother got kidnapped. But Abby was really good from the start. I did like how she saw the ghosts kids before Mike got the job rather than right after from what you usually see in movies with ghosts.

The animatronics were stunning onscreen. They looked so good! The perfect balance between creepy and cute. They all had great moments showing both how they are just both kids stuck in children’s entertainment animatronics, and also animatronics needing to kill people for Afton.

Speaking of which, my BIGEST complaint about afton was that he wasn’t in the movie enough. He had a total of I think ten minuets of screen time, and that’s only five from the beginning and five at the end. But still, he was exceptionally off putting every time he was onscreen. Mathew did an excellent job at that.

The fucking matpat cameo though. Oh my god that was fucking hilarious. Him just being a waiter in a diner was the best fucking way they could’ve put him in without just being that crazy guyTM. And the fact he literally says “that’s just a theory” my god. ALSO THERE WAS FETCH! THE MOST FAMOUS FUCKING FNAF ROUMOR EVER!

The ending was great, and the perfect sendoff. The kids finally realizing that Afton was the guy who killed them. And the fact that they made the spring locks of his suit go off. And then watching the kids drag him away from the main floor was bone chilling. And at the very end seeing the kid in the golden Freddy suit stare at Afton as he’s bleeding out, always inches from death but he’s not letting him die, then shut the door as Afton quietly reaches his hand out to him, that was my favourite moment of the entire movie. And of course there was the famous line “I always come back.”

[a-fantasy-lover-surfing-the-net]

Till the end of the moon review

I recently rewatched the drama and felt like reviewing the first Cdrama I ever watched. After watching some cdramas in the past 7 months since I first watched the drama, I now trust myself to write a decent enough review after somewhat familiarizing myself with the genre and overall cdrama space.

Rating: 9.5/10 (1000 bonus points for searing itself in my mind and staying there even after 7 months)

Acting: 10/10

Story: 9/10

Chemistry: 100000000/10

OST: 10/10

Costumes: 10/10

Hair & Makeup: 9.5/10

Production/Set Design: 10/10

Visual Effects/CGI: 10/10

Rewatch Value: 10/10

Li Susu, an immortal time travels 500 years into the past to prevent the ascension of the Devil god, who goes on to destroy the world in the future. It's a story of love and hate, good and evil, redemption and damnation. The characters are very well conceptualized and depicted beautifully by talented actors, stunning costumes, really good hair and makeup, and great cinematography. The amazing production and set design along with impressive visual effects and CGI really immerse the audience in the world of TTEOTM. This was a high budget drama and it shows... each and every frame of the drama, it feels lavish. If you are even a little bit interested go watch the first episode and l promise you'll be hooked and end up finishing the drama.

Now unto my spoiler filled thoughts:

I find it interesting that the typical backstory themes and some character arcs of the male lead and the female lead have been swapped here. The FL usually has a dead parent or abusive household or terrible luck and so on. The ML usually comes to the FL's rescue or stands up for her and so on. We all know that Tantai Jin is Disney Princess coded given his dead mother, abusive and neglectful upbringing and his animal telepathy powers. LSS both as Ye Xiwu and LSS repeatedly saves TTJ and stands for him. While TTJ also saves her many times, he does not get a chance to stand up for her because she usually takes care of herself and she is not suspected or wrongfully accused where she would need someone to support her. Also, TTJ basically became a part of LSS's family as her uncle took him under his wing and he promised to stay in Hengyang Sect with her in ep 35 before all hell breaks loose. And who can forget that LSS marks TTJ with her Phoenix mark, typical ML behavior.

Their romance is my ultimate enemies to lovers pairing. It has just the right amount of fighting, messiness, animosity and angst for me. I feel that other pairings don't have enough of it for me to consider them as an enemies-to-lovers couple. Their visuals, their chemistry, their acting and the story everything was so great. Who else has three epic weddings in one drama? I am still not able to move on from this couple and drama.

While the misunderstandings were obviously supposed to lead to a turning point in the story, I feel like it was in character for them to jump to conclusions and assume the worst without fully thinking things through and which then led to them acting rashly. I mean both TTJ and LSS had bad history between them so in the early stages of their relationship where their trust in each other was shaky, it's understandable that they were prone to misunderstandings. Also, they're both not good at communicating with each other. In the mortal arc, LSS was never fully honest with TTJ and they never addressed their past misdeeds properly (like OG Ye Xiwu was very cruel to TTJ and he never talked to her about it and just brushed it off). In the immortal arc, TTJ deceived LSS when he became the Devil God.

For the most part the story was gripping, progressed at a good pace and conveyed many themes that become apparent on rewatches. Though it was obvious that the last 5 episodes and the ending were rushed because the censorship rules changed as they went into production. This was one of those dramas that needed at least 5-10 more episodes to properly flesh out the story. It was a missed opportunity that we didn't get to see LSS ruling the Demon realm and Ami's antics.

Another victim of the decreased episode count is the arc of the second leads. Tbh, I wish that Pian Ran and Ye Qingyu were the SLs but I think I would have enjoyed seeing the complete character arc of Xiao Lin/Gongye Jiwu and Ye Bingchang/Mo Nv and the resolution between them. That said it was appalling that they didn't bring back Pian Ran and Ye Qingyu in the immortal arc. I really missed their dynamic with each other and with the main leads. It is disappointing that they didn't even get an open/ambiguous ending to give us some closure and satisfaction.

The actress did a phenomenal job in making us hate her as Ye Bingchang and Tian Huan. Those characters as villians really worked as they were in a way the ones who had the markings of the female lead (these characters at the start of their stories could easily be heroines in any other story) but they turn into villians. Tantai Minglang was a good, serviceable villian and the actor did a lot with how little he was given. Di Mian was selfish and manipulative traitor who was almost scarily competent. I mean he did achieve what he wanted by becoming the Devil God and opening the Tongbei formation. The point of Devil God as a villian is not his character and his motivations but rather he represents our inner demons and how each of us has the power to overcome them.

Out of all the dramas I've watched, only TTEOTM's entire OST is on my regular playlist to listen to. Every time I listen to "Let's be like this for 10,000 years", I feel the love and tragedy of Sang Jui and Ming Ye's story all over again. It's impressive that a song can make you relive those feelings and the story every time you listen to it. All the songs fit wonderfully in the scenes they're played over and also make us feel those emotions again when listening to them separately.

On my first watch, the dream arc felt a little out of place and jarring, which, in hindsight, was probably due to the fact that it was my first cdrama. Upon rewatch I've come to appreciate that it gives a look into the age of Gods and it shows that the Devil God was so powerful that to stop him the Gods had to sacrifice themselves and only Ming Ye was able to survive. The action sequences here are just magnificent to watch and they definitely seem movie level. It also serves as a warning to the audience, LSS and TTJ that they could also have a tragic end if they don't learn the lessons from it. Unfortunately, in the mortal arc they did have a tragic end. However, in the immortal arc, TTJ is able to learn from his experience as Ming Ye and succeeds in defeating the OG Devil God and becoming the Devil God himself with control over his own destiny.

One of the most prominent themes of the drama is redemption and that love and compassion are powerful enough to change a person's fate. The themes of Taoism and Buddhism are evoked throughout the drama. There are also many other minor themes like the food is used as a guesture kindness (when LSS first gives TTJ a proper meal), affection/care (when TTJ gave LSS the goose themed meal), love (when LSS gives badly cooked meals to TTJ), betrayal and trickery (the poisoned porridge) and comraderie, friendship, brotherhood and familial love (when TTJ shares meals with his sect brothers and master). Both TTJ and LSS have dead moms, terrible fathers and great adoptive dads (Zhao You and Qu Xuan Zi), these are just some observations I made.

I may not love the ending but I don't hate it either as it was obvious to me that they reunite once again and live happily as a family (the audio ending really makes it clear). Even though I'm irritated we don't get to see it, I'm still satisfied that we get a hopeful ending rather than a tragic one.

Until now I've mostly been lurking in fandom spaces by liking and very rarely commenting and reblogging but never posting my own original post. The fact that my first ever post is on TTEOTM shows how much I love it. I'll probably be posting more TTEOTM analysis stuff so be on the look out for that if you're interested. Also, I welcome your recommendations as I'm still a newbie to cdramas and kdramas.

You can also check out my costumed cdrama rankings here.

[dorkydegeneracy]

1. Andor

2. Obi-Wan Kenobi

3. The Mandolorian

4. Ahsoka

-----------------------------

5. The Acolyte

5. The Book of Boba Fett

Andor is by far the greatest live action Star Wars project to date, which is a shame because I think it is the least watched of all projects. As someone who loves the political intrigue side of Star Wars, this show speaks to me on a personal level. I understand that most Star Wars fans may not value this aspect of the series. Indeed, I have heard from many fans that this is their least favorite aspect of Star Wars. Nevertheless, I truly believe that Andor is the only show that I can confidently say makes for good television (not perfect of course, far from it). Diego Luna's performance rivals only one other lead actor's performance imo for the best performance in live action Star Wars (more on that in just a second!). Kyle Soller's Syril was a pleasant surprise standout. Overall, the cast delivered in a way that I did not expect.

The other projects imo have writing/cinematography flaws that severely effect the quality and overall enjoyment of the show.

---

Obi-Wan Kenobi ranks second for me in LARGE part because, despite some valid concerns of characterization, Ewan McGregor absolutely nailed his portrayal of Master Kenobi! Ewan is a phenomenal actor. We all know this. His Obi-Wan was a highlight of the prequels, and he tried his very best to hold this show together because he cares so much about Star Wars.

Unfortunately, there are so many questionable writing issues. Chief among them, Reva's character was terribly written and the continued existence of her character damages Obi-Wan's legacy as the protector of the "last hope." Second, the budget was the smallest of all of the shows, resulting in lower quality cinematography and special effects. Lastly, there were too many strange gaffes that made the it hard to take the show serious at times (this includes the trenchcoat fiasco, Flea's portrayal of a kidnapper to name a few).

Other straws that make the show valuable and interesting to me include:

1) Excluding Reva, everything else that happened in the show doesn't present concerns for me in terms of canon compliance. In fact, the way the show ends leaves the possibility of a more introspective character story about Kenobi learning how to communicate with Qui-Gon, and his life on Tatooine.

2) The Obi-Wan/Anakin relationship. One of the key goals of the Prequels and the Clone Wars was to expand on this relationship. It is a fascinating tragedy at the heart of Star Wars. I would have loved it if the whole show was about Kenobi's guilt, seeing him get back in touch with the force, communing with Qui Gon, and Tuscan Raiders. However, the little that we did get was fulfilling, and Darth Vader releasing Obi-Wan from his guilt over Anakin was beautiful.

3) Eventhough there were critiques about having Princess Lei play the key role that she did in the show, Vivien Lyra Blair was very likeable and portrayed the spirit of princess Leia in a new way. Never in a million years would I have said that I needed or wanted to see Leia as a child, but I am glad that I did. She was for sure a highlight.

That's enough about Obi-Wan. It's not like I could possibly convince anybody who thought the show was holistically bad (a valid criticism imo) to find any redeeming qualities.

---

The Mandolorian is a visually stunning show for the most part, and it serves as the foundation of live action Star Wars. Admittedly, I have little significant criticisms with the stories told throughout the series. My biggest issue with Mando, and I will continue to die on this hill, is that I want it to be more about Mandolorians. This is why, believe it or not, season 3 is my favorite season. It finally focused on the show's namesake, and builds on the incredible world of Mandalore, one of the best things to come out of the Clone Wars. I desperately want Mandalore to rise again. It's such an important planet in the canon, and people love all the lore that is associated with Mandalore.

I think Grogu is an amazing character, and I love his connections with Luke and Ahsoka. I love Din Djarin and his role as Grogu's father figure. These characters are very valuable and important, but they should not have been the focus of the show. I want more clan conflicts, and I want to see Mandalore grow! I want flashbacks to Bo Katan's childhood, when Mandalore was thriving! Why has there not been a single mention of Satine Kryze in a show called the Mandolorian? I know the show is not about Satine. Nobody is asking for the show to be about Satine. But Satine is supposed to be Bo's older sister, and there is so much character development to be expounded upon there.

Other than that, I just don't personally have a connection to the Mandolorian in a way that I do with Andor and Kenobi. Seasons 1 and 2 just really weren't my type of show. Season 3 did pique my interests tho.

---

Lastly, Ahsoka! I thought Ahsoka was okay, but it really just confuses me tbh. My confusion stems from two key things: 1) Thrawn was very lackluster; and 2) the world between worlds was even more complicated.

Thrawn in the books and in Rebels is arguably the smartest, most cunning creature in the universe. This is his primary attribute which makes him stand out in a universe of force wielders, aliens, and bots. The Thrawn in Ahsoka made some questionable decisions, and heavily relied on Morgan Elsbeth as his fellow strategist. He also just looked goofy to me, but his skin is blue so I won't harp on it too much.

Unlike some fans, I find the world between worlds to be an interesting addition to the Star Wars universe. The mechanics established in Rebels were relatively straightforward: some sort of plane governed by the force containing various doors to different points in time. The mechanics of the world between worlds were complicated in Ahsoka.

First, Ahsoka entered the world between worlds (WBW) after falling off of a cliff at sea. Was the ocean a magical gateway to the WBW? Did Ahsoka die? Nobody knows. My best guess is that the WBW is probably an astral plane where one's spirit enters, and not their whole corporal being.

Secondly, if the WBW is an astral plane, that means that Anakin's soul was communicating with Ahsoka. Was he trapped there? Is he a force ghost? Do all force ghost reside here? And then Anakin's force ghost shows up at the end! I just have so many questions.

Third, Ahsoka did hop between different points in the timeline, but did so as a younger version of herself, which we have never seen before. Additionally, Ahsoka never walked through a door on her journey.

All of this just makes the world between worlds hella confusing.

I'm not that bothered by Sabine is training to become a Jedi. Let me be clear: her midichlorian levels are insanely low, and had this been in an era during the Jedi Order's prominence she would have been sneezed at. But I can appreciate having a character who is truly like the rest of us train as a Jedi. That was the whole point of Rey being a nobody, which they immediately retconed. No, Sabine being a Jedi isn't necessarily canon compliant, but the force is within us all, right? God knows I wouldn't be sufficiently force sensitive, so I can relate to Satine on a personal level.

---

The last two are set apart from the rest in all fairness because I have not watched them in their entirety. I have watched 10 minutes of Boba Fett, and after hearing what was going on in The Acolyte, I watched detailed recaps of the season because I do think that Lucas Films will be creating more stories that will build on stories established therein. Overall, I don't believe that these two shows are of the same caliber as the rest of the Star Wars live action projects.

[boring-horror-enjoyer]

Maxxxine: A Satisfying Horror Trilogy

Maxxxine is a mix of beautiful cinematography and an extremely compelling plot. I'm not gonna lie: If you're looking for a scare, you won't really find it here.

The plot focuses intensely on Maxine's character as an individual and her survivalist nature, painted in the way anyone from the outside looking in would view it: a selfish girl clawing to the top of fame. Mia Goth gave a life to this character, and it almost felt like you knew her. You sympathize with her. In all, it's a "good for her" movie.

There were a few gory scenes here and there throughout the movie. Although this could be described best as a drama/thriller over horror, it has one of the most gory end scenes I've ever seen in a commercially produced film. I was floored, it was unexpected but a fantastic way to grip you till the end.

Maxxxine ties into the X and Pearl films incredibly well. The essence of Pearl is felt throughout the movie, and is perhaps why there is such a sympathy (at least for me) to Mia's character. The monologue at the end of Pearl was one of the most stunning scenes I've ever seen, and has of course stuck with me as I mention it now. It is an artful horror trilogy. If you want gore, watch X. If you want psych horror, watch Pearl. If you want a cherry-on-top plot, Maxxxine is best served after X. If you don't recall much of either movie, Maxxxine simply will not hit the same.

[potatotalksculture]

Potato Tweet: Barbie has already been robbed during the nominations. Now it’s been robbed even more.

I assume it’s common knowledge by now that Oscars are not about art, at least not in the first place. So when I look at the politics of the awarded, I worry. Oppenheimer is good, no questions asked. What I worry about is the politics of not giving an Oscar to Killers of the Flower Moon at all. Through that the Academy kind of admits that it doesn’t care about Native Americans and their story. They care about Mariupol, but doesn't one dare talk about Gaza. They care about gazing at women much less than about taking a quick, light-hearted look at their psyche. That’s sad and irritating.

What increases my discontent is the amount of statuettes Poor Things has left the ceremony with. And I’m not gonna moralize about the sexuality of a child, I’m not a Victorian lady… I’m rather wondering about all the similarities between Yorgos Lanthimos’ film and Greta Gerwing’s film. Both staring a well known woman, who’s also a co-producer of the respective piece. The protagonist of each film is what seems to be a grown ass lady, who differs from the common understanding of “normal” and “suited for a society” in one way or other. Both Barbie and Poor Things are visually stunning.

The categories in which both films were nominated are:

best picture

supporting actor (where it was kind of obvious it’s gonna be Robert Downey Jr., but I was holding onto the glimmer of hope it’s gonna be Ryan Gosling, so that the Academy can say “Hey, we awarded this pink movie something! Sure, it’s for the male supporting role in a very feminine movie, but we awarded it something!)

adapted screenplay

costume design

production design

The only two categories in which Barbie was nominated and Poor Things wasn’t, are:

actress in a supporting role

original song (with “What Was I Made For?” and “I’m Just Ken”)

Which scores it the total of 8 nominations in 7 categories.

Meanwhile Poor Things scored 11 nominations all together. It was nominated, except for the already mentioned, for:

actress in a leading role

cinematography

directing

editing

makeup and hairstyling

original score

For some perspectve: Oppenheimer got nominated in 13 categories.

What I'm trying to say here, is that it was understandable for me that Barbie got robbed cuz it's too entertaining, too pink, too commercial for the Academy. It wasn't the greatest production of the year. But it was an event! And just because of that it's already earned a very special place in the cultural history of the western world. I'd be interested to know how much of the commercial success of Oppenheimer was carried by Barbie and the other way around. The double-feature-premiere was a worldwide event of a scale of its own. Meanwhile Poor Things showed up rather late to the party. It's not a multiplex film. It's a Mubi film. It's artsy. It's different. It's also a story about women's sexuality written and directed by a dude, based on a novel by a dude. And the Academy likes it more than a story by women for women about what it's like to be a women, which also allows it to prove how much they care about Art. AKA how pretentious they are. That's my beef.

[twig-tea]

Grand Guignol

Wanted to write down my thoughts on this movie because it was AWESOME and I don't want to forget lol. Non-spoilery thoughts above the cut and spoilers below it.

First of all, the colouring of this film is gorgeous. Everything is in dull greys and navy blues and cream, except for the red, and the red is throughout. There's red roses, red lighting, red ties, red viscera, and so, so, so much blood. It makes for a really stunning watch, to see this heightened red spurt and colour the white clothing of the protagonists, and on their faces.

The cinematography is also a lot of fun. So many dirty shots, where the creepy decorations of this school sit in the foreground and the characters having a conversation are left blurred in the background. Quick, hard cuts, so it's not clear whether something was real or not.

And I love the tension being around what is real vs what is fake rather than jump scares. The way cinema and pranks and voyeurism is woven into this plot to make everything more confusing is so well done; it puts us in the same situation as the characters stuck in this school with no clear sense of what's happening or why.

Most of all this was just fun. It was a wild ride where gross, gory, discomforting, messy, and generally weird shit happened constantly lol and I really, really enjoyed the experience.

Cutting here because I couldn't help but spoil from here on out.

I also really love the subtext of the show re: queer as monstrous. There is a suggestion that at least two of these characters were sent to this school abandoned by their families in order to be sacrificed because they are gay, or queer in some sense. The other characters have stories about doing physical harm to those around them, but at the least for Kenta, it's implied that whatever is going on with him and dressing femme--i won't assume--is what got him sent here (this is early in the film so I'm not counting it as a spoiler).

I had to laugh at the excessive lube; Japan's lube game is always incredible. We never get a normal amount of lube in a Japanese BL, and I live for it.

Also really enjoyed the cannibalism subtext! Cannibalism is always such an interesting theme in horror because it's such a taboo. This felt very Rocky Horror-like with the constant viscera shots and the open questions on characters' faces about where it came from.

The message in this film was so fascinating. Normally we get the trope of 'you have to defeat yourself ' as a hero's journey to get past self-doubt in order to win. In this case, Itsuki tells us he was forced to participate in...it's not entirely clear, bullying and mutilation at the least. He seems traumatized by the experience, and it's not clear how much damage he did on his own. But by the end of the film, after the teacher gave him the gun and told him to defeat himself, he manages to move through whatever was holding him back, and he fully embraces doing violence to others. He kisses Teshio, when he was surprised by/recoils from the kiss from Kenta. He laughs, glories in, is freed by the way he mutilated Teshio's corpse, and flashes back to his memory of when he was "forced" to hurt his classmate in his old school, but this time he's similarly elated. He had some initial reaction to seeing Kenta in a dress and wig--Shinji wondered if he wanted to wear it himself--and after the cult dresses him in heels, a dress, and wig, he does not remove them even after he's free and limping in the heels to drag along that sledgehammer. In this case, the hero's journey is one to freedom from moral constraints, allowing in the monstrous--both murderous and queer--parts of Itsuki to overcome any fear or self-hate or physical limitations, and to be victorious. And then we get the final scene, with the uncertainty as to whether the entire film has been a play, whether the play is in Itsuki's mind, or whether it's a metaphor for the audience to represent what happens. I think the uncertainty is the point. The entire film has been messing with our ability to tell what's real and what's fake, and maybe in the end it doesn't matter. Itsuki is dead; whether metaphorically because he's mentally snapped, or literally because he's killed himself, or because the whole thing was a metaphor and he's embraced his weirdness and joined this weird club and found acceptance in this group that puts on horror plays...the Itsuki who was traumatized and terrified of himself is gone by the end of the film, he's defeated the enemy within. I loved that.

And there's something in this film about how it gets us to be interested in this weird friend group before it starts killing them off for the sake of... entertainment, a ritual, to free their parents of the embarrassment, it's not entirely clear which. But there's something implicit in the morality here that these characters are humanized before they're demonized, and that we are set up to see the ritual as cruel and the level of violence as undeserved. This part reminded me of Gang of Cherry; these kids are fucked up, and cruel, and weird, but don't deserve the even more fucked up and cruel situation they're in, which in turn makes them even more fucked up and cruel, until it's a twisted version of enlightenment, when all you are is cruel and fucked up, and delighting in the purity of the emotion.

Anyway that's way too much navel-gazing for what is essentially 1.5 hours of intentionally bad blood-spraying camp and actors who didn't kiss in their BLs kissing in this. Big fan.

If you want realism, sexiness (there is a sex scene but it is not what I would call sexy; it's intentionally discomforting/edged with tension), romance, or a happy ending in the traditional sense this is not for you. If you like campy horror, strategic cinematography, gratuitous gore, gratuitous tongues, being discomforted, psychological horror, and metaphors on metaphors, I think you'll enjoy.

[sherlocking-out-loud]

sadness and emptiness feelings aside, Loki is an amazing show, with amazing actors. the sets and props are so beautiful and so well crafted and full of so many interesting details, the cinematography is on point, the visual effects are stunning and, last but not least, the score - what an absolutely magnificent body of work! Natalie Holt deserves all the awards for this.

[ewanmitchellcrumbs]

This is possibly an unpopular opinion, and maybe it's just my GoT trauma resurfacing, but somehow, I'm less excited about season 2 than before watching the teaser.

I love Olivia Cooke and her performance in HotD, I do, but HBO seems to have something of an obsession with Alicent's character. The events of season 1 were based on The Princess and The Queen, which primarily focuses on the events leading up to the Dance. Hence, it makes sense that she was a main character then. But it's a Targaryen civil war. Rhaenyra and her half-brother are fighting for the throne, not Rhaenyra and Alicent, so where is the Aegon content? Why didn't we get his poster instead?

The apparent scrapping of Daeron is concerning because he plays an important role in the war, and I’m unsure how/with whom they will supplant his character.

And lastly, if that was Laenor on the beach, then he still needs to die for Addam of Hull to claim Seasmoke. But how, when and where is that supposed to happen? Besides, if the greens discover he's still alive, wouldn't it give them further ammunition against Rhaenyra since they, heavily influenced by the Faith of the Seven, which generally doesn't approve of polygamy, would likely view her marriage to Daemon as invalid? If so, that would be quite the deviation from Fire & Blood since at least her youngest two sons' legitimacy was never questioned in the book.

(on a more positive note, the costume department seems to have stepped up their game, probably owed to a higher budget)

I think this may be slightly above my pay grade - bear with me!

I can understand the upset around Game of Thrones - the story was already there and even before they ran out of source material, the writers still deviated enormously from the established plot. It was unrecognisable by the end. The shit show it ended up becoming is part of the reason I was so hesitant to watch House of the Dragon in the first place (we were well into November last year before I watched the first episode)

With Fire and Blood, it’s not written like a traditional book, so it’s very much open to interpretation, beyond established events such as successions and battles, etc.

I think the writers have interpreted the story in a manner that HBO finds easy to market - Rhaenicent is a popular ship and it adds depth to the story to present it as this long standing lost love/lingering childhood resentment. Up to this point, Aegon has very much been presented as a character that does not want the crown, so it would be a complete 180 flip for him to suddenly go in guns blazing and ready to defend it. I actually think they’re going to spin Aegon’s actions during Rook’s Rest as him dealing with his grief and anger over his son’s death. He didn’t ask for this, and yet he’s suffering the consequences anyway. It’s incredibly tragic, but not enough to go on a poster (I expect he will get one though, all the main characters will)

I’m not really sure why the decision was made to scrap Daeron’s character, I guess we will have to wait and see how that plays out. Likewise for how they deal with Laenor’s story. I know it’s hard to have faith, as we’ve been burned before, but I am bowled over by Matt, Emma and Ewan’s performances so far, so if nothing else we’ll get some incredible acting and some stunning cinematography.

[avida-heidia-5]

I Just Watched: Society of the Snow (2023)

I don’t think I’ll ever be boarding on an aeroplane again after watching this!!! 😰

This was the most stressful and the most terrifying film I have ever seen. I was on the edge of my seat the whole way through! I spent a good chunk of the runtime hugging my legs close to my body in absolute terror! I’m not joking! 😧

The film is based on the harrowing true story of when Flight 571, while flying from Uruguay to Chile, crashed in the heart of the Andes Mountains, and the people who survived the accident work together to survive while trying to navigate their way home.

I wasn’t familiar with the story going into it. My parents have heard of it though, so I had to rely on them most of the time to know if what we were watching was accurate or not. I was also a little apprehensive upon reading the film’s synopsis because it sounded like your typical Hollywood blockbuster where they’re likely to glorify certain events and miscast actors who portrayed the real people involved in these events.

While watching the film however, I was pleasantly surprised to find that it didn’t feel blockbuster-y to me at all! Everything felt incredibly intimate, as if you’re watching a documentary with the way it was shot and acted. It felt grounded in reality thanks to the stunning cinematography and wonderful acting from the cast. The casting was excellent and the acting phenomenal. So much so, that I grew to care about the characters they portrayed and the perils they faced. Everyone was fully committed to their roles and shone like stars in the sky. I was admittedly close to tears by the end. It was so beautiful, I loved it! 🥲

I found out after doing some research that a lot of what happened in the film was accurate to the source material, including the scenes that involved c******lism. Having that bit of information in the film made my jaw drop. That was a very bold move on the film’s part! It was very disturbing to witness, but I enjoyed it regardless. Maybe a couple of minor details here and there were a little inaccurate, but that didn’t bother me in the slightest.

I’ve just learned that J. A. Bayona directed this. It’s a name you might not be familiar with, but he was the one who directed one of my favourite disaster films The Impossible (2012), which starred Ewan McGregor, Naomi Watts, and a very young Tom Holland. Funnily enough, that film was also based on a horrifying true event. Instead of a plane in the Andes, it’s a tsunami in Thailand in 2004; an event my parents also remember reading and hearing about on the news. I can imagine Bayona researching the hell out of these events to make sure the stories he tells are as close to accurate as possible, and he delivers to an insane degree every single time.

On another note, Michael Giacchino composed the score for this film. It’s not quite as memorable as his other work for, say, Pixar for example, but it suited the tone of the film exceptionally well. So if you’re a fan of his music, I recommend giving it a listen.

Overall, an utterly compelling and terrifying film to sit through. It filled its 2 1/2 hr long runtime very well. I cannot recommend this film enough! Give it a watch if you have the time.

(Now I need to watch it again in the original Spanish language. We watched the English dub and it was actually pretty good. English dubbed versions of foreign languages are notoriously awful (at least, by Netflix’s standard), so I was surprised by that. I’ll need to see how it compares with the original Spanish version though.)

9/10

[theblogwithoutfear]

My thoughts on Echo

(Not that anyone's dying to hear my takes lmao) This is gonna be a long post so buckle up

I feel like a lot of people either really loved it or really hated it. I think I'm somewhere in the middle. There was a lot to love about it, there were some really great moments, but also there was a lot left to be desired. I didn't enjoy it nearly as much as I hoped, but I want to be fair about it. I'm interested to see if people agree with me, if I'm completely wrong, etc. So feel free to tell me if I'm way off base with some of these opinions.

To start, here's the things I liked about it (in no particular order):

The fight choreography. The brutality of it was really something, especially in that first episode. It felt pretty grounded and real for the most part, which I really appreciated. That's one of the things that set Daredevil apart, so it's really great to see that Marvel's willing to go there again (although I think it got tamer as the show went on, wish the brutality would have kept up)

Maya's characterization, especially in the beginning of the show. I liked her moral complexity, I liked her refusal to be a good guy or a bad guy (wish that continued more throughout, tbh)

The canonization of the Netflix shows!!! We finally have acknowledgement. The scene with the hammer? The flashbacks to Fisk's father? Amazing.

Parallels between Maya and Fisk. I loved the way their relationship directly mirrored the way Fisk interacted with his father. Fisk in essence, becoming his father—the exact person he always wanted to avoid. And then Maya kicking the ice cream man when he's already down? Like that scene with the bully in DD season 1? Chef's kiss.

Sound design/editing. They made some really cool creative decisions here, especially for a show about a deaf person. Very cool.

Depiction of Indigenous culture. I'm not qualified to really speak on this, so I may be way off base, but it felt really respectful to me. It didn't seem to fetishize or exoticize Maya's heritage; it explored the everyday lives of her and her family, the way they partcipate in their culture. The combination of her powers with her heritage was beautiful to me.

The cinematography at certain scenes. I don't think it was exceptional throughout, but there were some great moments. The flashback sequences with her ancestors, the silent movie thing, and the scene with Fisk and the ice cream man all had pretty stunning cinematography.

D'onofrio's acting. But that's a given.

Disability representation. It felt to me like it was done in a very respectful, normalizing way, which is so important.

Alaqua Cox's performance. I was really impressed. Maya Lopez is her first role; and she's really killed it. I think at times she could have expanded her range a little, but overall, very excellent.

As a bonus (because the show's not about him and I don't want to make it all about him): Matt's cameo. Amazing. It was such a cool decision to show a Daredevil fight from the villain perspective. It made Matt look soooo scary. Also, I love the implications that he's being puppeteered by Fisk! Even after all he's done to take Fisk down, Fisk still has the upper hand. Fisk knew he was there, and lured him there to get Maya to fight him? As a training exercise? Really cool, interesting implications to be explored in DDBA.

So there's a lot to love about the show obviously. However, at least for me, there was also a lot to criticize—and the criticisms overpowered the good things imo. Again, that's just me, and if you loved the show, more power to you!

Here's the things that I didn't like:

Tonal whiplash. It felt like the show couldn't really decide if it wanted to be a dark gritty crime thriller, or if it wanted to be a heartwarming family dramedy. There was also a little too much "Marvel humor," if you know what I mean. It was just really jarring at times.

The bait and switch. Whatever your thoughts on the show, I think it's fair to say that it was WAAAY off from what the trailers gave us. The trailers relied so heavily on content from the original Daredevil show, and the way they were edited made it seem like it was going to be a lot closer, tonally and quality-wise, to Daredevil. They made it look way darker and grittier than the show actually was. To be clear: I'm NOT upset that Matt wasn't in it more. It wasn't his show, and I was more than happy with his cameo. I'm just irritated at the bait and switch from the trailers, both tone and content wise.

Fisk's characterization. This is probably the thing that irritated me the most. He was so weak here!! I wasn't scared of him at all. In Daredevil, every time Fisk came on screen I felt like my intestines were shriveling up in fear. In Echo, though, he just felt so vulnerable and helpless and almost pathetic. I mean, Daredevil showed Fisk's vulnerability, but it almost made him scarier. Here, though, he just felt like a run-of-the-mill Marvel villain. A bad guy, sure, but not really scary. (I think the exception to this is the ice cream man scene, which was excellent).

Emotional stakes. They were too low for me. The writers didn't really give me any reason to care that much about what was going on. I didn't feel terribly connected to Maya or her family; I don't know, I just didn't feel that we had enough investment in them. I don't really know how to solve this problem—it definitely wasn't a matter of screen time, because they got plenty. But for some reason, I just didn't really feel connected to any of them. I think my one exception to this was Henry; something about him was really compelling, and I really cared what happened to him. But with everyone else, I just felt sort of disconnected and a little apathetic. To make matters worse, though, it felt like the writers kept trying to use shorthand to make us care—they used different tropes and techniques to try to manufacture emotion; lots of sappy music and dialogue and things like that. But honestly, it all felt very unearned. It felt like emotional manipulation a little bit, if I'm being honest.

Fisk and Maya's relationship. We were just kind of told that they are close, and we get one scene of Maya as a little girl (again, the ice cream scene, which was great). But at that point, they were already close. I think I would have bought into their relationship more if we got to see how they first met, and why Fisk cared about her so deeply. The thing that sets Fisk apart from other Marvel villains is his great capacity for love, imo. But their relationship felt cheap and inauthentic, and I just didn't buy it. I think we needed more scenes like the ice cream man scene for their relationship to feel really authentic.

Why was Fisk willing to give Maya his criminal empire? Make her the queenpin? After she shot him in the head??? This is a man who decapitated someone after that guy embarrassed him. Maya attempts murder, and Fisk is like "take my business." It just didn't make any sense to me. Maybe it would have made more sense if we got some more in-depth views of Fisk's love for Maya, but as it was, this just fell flat for me.

Fisk felt out of character in a lot of regards, but one of them is that he never learned ASL. What??? He's a smart man, and very good at languages. In Daredevil we see that he speaks the languages of everyone he works with—Madame Gao, Nobu, etc.—because he respects them and because he wants to be involved and know the ins and outs of his people. But he won't even learn ASL for a woman who he supposedly sees as a daughter???

The contact lens thing. That was just so weird, I did not like it Sam-I-Am. I don't know, maybe they'll make it work better if they use it in DDBA, but who knows.

How did Fisk gain so much power again??? At the end of Daredevil season 3, which is now officially canon, Fisk was universally hated by the city after everything he did. But suddenly he has all this power, and it's unexplained. To be fair, I'll give the show a temporary pass. I assume that DDBA will answer some of those questions, probably gaining power during the blip, going under the radar until he has the media under his control, etc. But it felt weird not to have any acknowledgement of his current position or how he got there throughout the course of the show.

Fisk being defeated with Maya's new powers. I don't know, I think just the way it was executed, it felt really cheesy. Even cringey. I think the storyline of the ancestor magic could have been so powerful and cool against a different sort of villain. It would have been more impactful against a villain who had been set up as a more direct metaphor for racism or colonialism (I mean, Fisk is used as a metaphor for gentrification in Daredevil, but they never really go into that in Echo). I don't know, I think the way he was defeated was just really dissatisfying, and I was just disappointed.

Maya's powers in general felt a little underdeveloped. It's different than the comics, which is fine, but in that case, I think they should have spent even more time going over exactly what she can do. I don't know, again, it just felt cheesy at times. Which would have been fine in another show, but in this one, which was billed as a gritty, dark, crime drama, it just felt really out of place.

Her family members suddenly getting powers and then easily beating up Fisk's goons? That felt really cheesy to me. It made Fisk feel absolutely powerless and way less interesting of a villain. I just was never at all in any doubt that Maya's family was going to come out of it okay, because Fisk was not scary and they beat him so easily. It made the stakes feel really low. At the end of the show I was just like, "Oh, Fisk is weak. Guess Matt apparently is too, because Maya and her family took Fisk out in like five minutes."

Honestly, just the whole last episode. Before that episode, the show was at, like, a 7 for me. But the last episode dropped it down to a 5 imo. Again, a lot of the stuff in episode 5 is fine, but just didn't necessarily fit the genre or tone of the show.

I was probably going into it with expectations too high. But I think, considering the talent that Marvel has, the show could have been incredible. I don't want to blame the artists too much, honestly, because there's clearly a lot of great artistic choices throughout. The whole thing feels like the writers wanted to do risky, interesting things with the storytelling, and then studio execs swooped in and were like

"No! You have to follow The Formula™️! The lead has to believe in herself and help everyone with magic and the villain needs to be defeated really conventionally and easily. And you need to use lots of jokes and sitcom style banter. It has to feel like a MARVEL movie, because everyone loves those. No one has any complaints about how stale they've gotten lately. Stick to the formula."

So it just feels like a bunch of half-baked decisions and risks they started on, but didn't fully commit to.

Idk, I'll give it a rewatch in a little while and see if my opinion changes or not. But those are my thoughts at this point. Again, not the worst show ever, but far below the bar of what it could have been. A lot of potential, but overall not to the standard that I think it deserved.

I'd be interested to hear other people's thoughts; if you agree, disagree, think I'm an idiot, etc.

(An obligatory Matt gif to end the post)