#mostly a study of THAT SCENE from the re trailer

[desude]

Last steps to Midgar ⛅️

[chevvy-yates]

Have you done other cosplay other than CP77?

Ive always been interested in cosplaying but never found a way to explain to my parents about it... they think it's weird and I never got into it. As an adult in my mid/late 20s now, I feel like it's too late for me to start

Sure. I started to cosplay around 2005. I haven't done that many, tho because sewing/crafting process took me longer and longer the newer the costumes got with me having less and less time (first still in school, then lots of time during my studies and almost none when I started working). Btw my mum found it weird as well but in the end she was proud of what I did. She's still showing people my last/newest ones and just asked me yesterday when I do sth again. Also it is never too late to cosplay. I'm in my 30s now and I really want to pick it up again. I still have a small list of what I wanna do. So feel free to start any time! :) Also it doesn't matter if you buy the costume or you sew it yourself (the latter is more win for you when you finally finish it and can be proud of it that you did all that).

Well where to start?

I've started with J-Rock/Visual Kei cosplay. The scene was pretty big back then in my country (Germany) until 2012 when it got nearly extinct bc people started talking mean behind backs (also K-Pop taking over …) and it got lots of drama (kindergarten behavior). I continued on but then I got back into playing video games and thought, alright I'm gonna do some games cosplay, too!

I've done only three and they cost me over 600 bucks to make each: Arno Dorian from Assassin's Creed Unity, My oc Inqusitor Lavellan from Dragon Age Inquisition and Triss Merigold from The Witcher III. I've got no good photo from the last tho, and I felt somewhat awkard bc it was my first female cosplay ever — done only male characters before, felt weird, idk. Still want to wear it one day again to get some good shots that all the hard work was worth it.

My Visual Kei cosplays were mostly Kuina from Royz and Kyotaro from √eight and I did one of my beloved Hizumi (not my cp77 oc) from D'espairsRay. I did a few others but they are not worth mentioning.

chronologically order: left is me, right the original, I'll link videos if a music video is available for the jrock stuff.

KYOTRARO (Vocalist of √eight) (every) Taro cosplay (I'll only show this one bc the others are not worth it) was mirrored from the hair (and contacts), tho. I loved this one, I was very very close to the original I think. Kyotaro-san still has a special place in my heart. <3

YOSHIATSU (Vocalist of CrazyShampo (later DADAROMA)) when I wanted to be a cute anime boy or sth like that.

KUINA (Guitarist of Royz) — Haru no Yoru no Yume FYI: V-Kei bands often had an outfit for a single they did a video for and during that time they changed their hairstyles like once a week, therefore there's always a slight difference in the hair colors/styles/contacts/makeup. Also back then it was super annoying to get high res photos. V-Kei cosplayers mostly made their costumes from scartch using tiny pixel pics the band members uploaded to their ameba blogs back then.

Version 1

Version 2

KUINA (Guitarist of Royz) — AREA Still one of my favorites, ahhh.

KUINA (Guitarist of Royz) — Starry Heaven was a whole pain to find fitting patterns and to sew as well.

Arno Dorian – Assassins Creed Unity (Elise Reveal Trailer Version) Arno is my baby. Idk how many times I watched the trailer trying to analize the friggin' seams on his coat. the coat alone has over 40 single pieces to sew together.

Hizumi (ex-Vocalist of D'espairsRay, now in NUL.) – FINAL CALL There's two versions, the official from shoots and the live version – I did the last where Hizu had this fluffy hair <3 (klick the link). Didn't look like it was much of work, but I ordered fabric to be printed for this … expensive stuff, ugh. everything except the pants and bracelets is selfmade (yes even the belt).

Inquisitor Lavellan – Dragon Age Inquisition I just realized I have no real screenshot of my cutie elf wearing this outfit how I sewed mine together. It's kind of a mix of the outfit my human oc had along with my elf oc lol – I'm sorry.

Triss Merigold – The WItcher III Sadly only a selfie, ugh. Definitely doesn't do the costume justice – blood, swaet and tears were put into this costumes thrice as much as I already did with Arno and Lavellan. I punched the pattern into leather myself what you can see on the vest. everything leather was also dyed all by myself.

I mean:

Triss' outfit is my true maserpiece, so far. proud af

Wow compared to all my former cosplays my CP77 cosplay is nothing against that bc I didn't sew a thing for it, I just combined stuff together. But it is so satisfying when you don't have to prepare half of a year with a deadline to go to a convention being totally exhausted from a sewing marathon that lasted 3 months straight, each evening after work and all day on the weekends (therefore I stopped some day).

Okay done :,D

[brentwatchesmovies]

Brent’s Top 10 Movies of 2019

Scorsese is probably my favorite living filmmaker, but I’ll be honest, when I heard that Scorsese was making this movie, and *how* he was making it (heavily digital de-aged actors) I was a bit skeptical. De Niro and Pacino haven’t been turning in interesting performances in quite awhile, and Pesci came out of a decades-long retirement for the movie as well. On top of that, the first trailer released did little for me. All that to say I was an idiot to doubt the master.

Scorsese returns to the crime genre that he re-invented many times over the years, this time with the eyes of a man in his 70’s, looking back on his life and career. The movie is very long, but in my opinion, it needs the length. The viewer needs to *feel* the totality of a life, and as is his intent with The Irishman, the *consequences* of this specific life. The final hour or so of this movie feels like a culmination of Scorsese’s career in many ways. The energy and entertainment of a crime/mob epic, with the fatalism and philosophical leanings of a movie like ‘Silence’. It’s a 3.5 hour movie that I’ve already rewatched, and actively want to again, so that alone ought to speak volumes.

Harmony Korine made one of my favorite movies of the 2010’s, the neon-soaked and often misunderstood ‘Spring Breakers’, so I was already in the bag for whatever he did next. When I heard it was a freewheeling stoner comedy where Matthew Mcconaughey plays a guy named ‘Moondog’ costarring Snoop Dogg, I reserved its location on my top 10 list.

This movie doesn’t have the empty heart at its core that defines Spring Breakers, opting instead for a character study about a ‘Florida man’ poet after his life pretty much falls apart. It’s basically plotless, stumbling from one insane, borderline hallucinatory sequence to the next, but I just loved living in the world of this movie. Beach Bum almost feels like a deliriously fun VR simulation of hanging out with Matt McConaughey and his weirdo friends down in the Florida keys. This is one that probably won’t pop up on many top 10 lists but I really adore, and will surely rewatch it a dozen times in the years to come.

Let the record show, I’ve been a huge fan of Bong Joon-ho since I first saw his monster movie/family drama ‘The Host’. Some time later, he went on to make ‘Snowpiercer’, one of my favorite movies of the last decade. All that to say, I think Parasite is probably his best movie, and a true masterwork of thriller direction. It also has his usual brand of social commentary and a script filled with darkness and humor, following a South Korean tendency to juggle multiple tones throughout, sometimes all in one moment or scene.

Parasite also follows a big 2019 trend of commenting on class and social dynamics between the rich and the poor. I think that’s part of why it’s done incredibly well at the box office (especially for a Korean language film), the fact that people can relate in a huge way, regardless of which country your from. Parasite is one of the most entertaining movie viewing experiences I’ve had this year and I’d recommend everyone check it out.

If you were to ask me what the funnest movie-going experience I had in 2019 was, I’d have to pick Rian Johnson’s ‘Knives Out’. Hot off making one of the best Star Wars movies ever made (don’t @ me) Johnson decided to make a passion project in the vein of classic Agatha Christie style murder mysteries, and the results are a total blast. Filled with clever twists and turns, weaponizing the structure of murder-mysteries against the audiences expectations, it stays one step ahead of you the entire time.

Aside from the clever mystery of it all, it’s the actors performances and chemistry that really sell this thing. Jamie Lee Curtis and Toni Collette are expectedly great per usual, and Daniel Craig is having the time of his life as Mississippi private-eye Benoit Blanc, but the heart of the movie is relative newcomer Ana de Armas. She brings an emotional weight and anchor to the movie that always keeps you emotionally invested amidst the terrible, money hungry backstabbing by the other heightened characters. I hope everyone sees this movie and Johnson is able to give us another Benoit Blanc adventure somewhere down the line, I’ll be there opening day.

Nobody makes an upbeat, feel-good movie like Ari Aster does! After last years light and breezy ‘Hereditary’ (which I liked a lot but didn’t totally love) he’s back with a completely riveting and emotionally draining (not to mention horrific) masterpiece. What I connected to most in Midsommar is the journey of Dani, played incredibly by Florence Pugh. The way the film portrays the relationship between her and her dog shit boyfriend played by the (usually) charming Jack Reynor keeps you invested in every twist, perfectly paced out over the movies admittedly long runtime.

I won’t get into spoiler territory, but where this movie goes in the end is what makes this a fully 5-star movie for me. After putting you through hell, like Aster loves to do with bells on, Midsommar ends in a euphoric, psychedelic orgy of music and violence that I couldn’t help but laugh out loud. Midsommar rules so hard and I can’t wait for whatever twisted thing Aster cooks up next.

One of my increasingly favorite brands of movies is a finely crafted, primo slice of dad-movie cinema, and James Mangold has made one with Ford v Ferrari. The story chronicles the partnership of ex-racer and designer Carroll Shelby and racer Ken Miles as they work to make a Ford that can compete in the 24 hour race of Le Mans. Bale and Damon are a blast to watch bounce off each other and the race sequences are pretty damn thrilling, combining (what I expect is) a solid amount of great VFX with practical racing to great effect.

I also didn’t expect it to have as much to say about the struggle to create something special by passionate people and not committees while also inside the very machine that churns out products on an assembly line. Just a random note, this original movie was just put out by 20th Century Fox, now owned by Disney but that’s completely unrelated and I’m not sure why I’d even bring that up??? Anyway, I love this movie and dads, moms and everybody else should check it out.

If you saw my list last year, then it must appear like I’m some diehard Mr. Rogers fan. I don’t really have many memories watching his show as a child, but what the documentary ‘Won’t You be my Neighbor’ and this film by Marielle Heller have in common is a shared fascination of his immense empathy and character. It’s only right that America’s dad Tom Hanks should play him, and I was surprised at the end that I was able to get over his stardom and accept him as Rogers. He’s not doing a direct impersonation, and I think it’s all the better for it, instead opting for matching his soft tone and laid back movements.

On a pure emotional level, this movie was a freight train. It didn’t help that the movie covers a lot of father stuff, from losing your own to becoming one yourself (2 big boxes on the Brent bingo card). Heller’s direction is clever in its weaponizing of meta/post-modern techniques, such as one incredible fourth wall break in a diner scene. It literally breaks down the barrier between Mr. Rogers, we the audience, and the films intent to make us feel something.

I cry a lot at movies, that much is well known, but it’s rare that a movie makes me weep, and this one did. Even thinking about scenes right now, days later, my eyes are welling up with tears thinking about the messages of the movie. Mr. Rogers and his lessons of empathy and emotional understanding have rarely been as vital and important as they are right now in our world.

Robert Eggers first film ‘The Witch’ from 2015 is one of my favorite movies of this decade, possibly of all time, so my hype for his black and white, period piece two-hander ‘The Lighthouse’ was through the roof. Even with sky-high expectations, it still blew me away. With dialogue reminiscent of The Witch in its specific authenticity to its era, to the two lead actors giving all-time great performances, It was one of the most entertaining film viewing experiences I had this year.

There’s something about both of Egger’s movies that I really keyed into watching this one: his fascination with shame and the liberation from it. Where Witch was from the female perspective, Lighthouse literally has two farting, drunk men in a giant phallic symbol fighting for dominance. It’s less a horror film than his first, but still utterly engrossing, demented and specific to his singular vision. I can’t wait to see 20 more movies from this guy.

This is another big movie of 2019, like The Irishman, where you can see the director looking inward, at what his films mean and represent. It initially caught me so off guard that I really didn’t know how to feel about it, but after seeing it again, it’s one of my favorites of the year, and probably Tarantino’s filmography overall. More akin to something like Boogie Nights or Dazed and Confused, letting us live with and follow a small group of characters, it mostly doesn’t feel like a Tarantino movie (until the inevitable and shocking explosion of violence in the third act, of course).

‘Hollywood’ is the most sincere and loving movie Tarantino has made, interested in giving us a send off to an era of Hollywood and artists that have been lost or forgotten (Some more tragically than others). In the end, the movie functions similarly to ‘Inglorious Basterds’ in it’s rewriting of history to give us catharsis. “If only things could have worked out this way.” Luckily in movies, removed from the restrictions of reality, they can. And once upon a time in Hollywood, they did.

Uncut Gems probably tripled my blood pressure by the time the credits rolled. A slice-of-life story about a gambler/dealer in New York’s diamond district, the movie follows Howard Ratner, played by Adam Sandler in easily the best performance of his career. Ratner is basically addicted to living at the edge of a cliff, being chased by violent debt collectors, juggling a home life and a relationship with an employee, and fully relying on risky sports bets to stay afloat. It makes for a consistently tense and unique viewing experience, expertly directed by the Safdie brothers.

Something that might not work for everyone but that I personally loved, is the chaotic way in which the movie is shot. What feels like loosely directed scenes, with characters talking over each other and multiple conversations happening at once, adds an authenticity and reality lacking from most other movies. It’s more adjacent to Linklater (thanks to Adam for the comparison) or Scorsese’s earlier films (also fitting, that he’s a producer on this). Following Howard Ratner as his life descends into chaotic hell was one of the best times I’ve had watching a movie this year.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

AVENGERS ENDGAME

DOLEMITE IS MY NAME

BOOKSMART

JOHN WICK CHAPTER 3

THE FAREWELL

AD ASTRA

[alexanderessex3dstoryart]

Character Design and Script Writing - Cyberpunk 2077 Case Study - 29/12/2020

For today’s research for both projects, I wanted to make a case study for a game I feel very much influenced by in terms for the aesthetics and designs for the Character Design project as well as the background atmosphere and visualization for the script towards the script-writing essay. I was fortunate enough to be provided a copy of the game to play it to experience what it’s like to explore these areas as well as well as having a book looking at the extensive lore that the game provides as well as artwork from the game.

From playing the game, your offered a series of roles that you can start yourself choosing from Nomad, Street Kid and Corporative roles. Each of these roles allow the story to be taken in different places making the game very personal to how you want to live if you were living in this world yourself. I myself went with the Nomad route and one instance I had that really struck me was when you first enter into ‘Night City’ for the first time. As you cross the border, you halt at a traffic stop within the city to watch a group of people robbing a shop for money. The group tries to escape and enter in the car but the city’s police comes flying in from above and immediately grapple down onto the city floor and fire without hesitation at the crooks. It leads to an intense bloodbath of the crooks and all you can do is just watch all the action happen in front of your car having front row seat to it all. Both you and your companion are devoid of all emotion not from the trauma of it, but this gruesome human onslaught doesn't seem to phase them one bit. In fact, nobody in the city is phased by it at all. 

Instances like these help establish what kind of world you’ve just entered as it’s presented as a kill or be killed setting. This works perfectly for the kind of idea I want to cover for the script-writing portion of the project as it’s not just the tone I want to loosely base this off from, but characters reactions to horrific acts and how it doesn't bat an eye to them showing how de-sensitised they are with it. This to me makes it feel like the city is transforming people’s mindsets to think the world is always meant to be like this giving no people hope to ever explore or Challenger themselves having seen what happens if you rebel or stand out. 

I think adding onto that, the trailer of Cyberpunk 2077 when it launched on the 10th of December helps to back this up. Whilst the game itself is very action heavy, dark and bloody, the trailer really emphasis and represents what kind of game your in store for. Specifically, it’s all about people, family and the connections you make in the world promoting the RPG mechanics of the game as there’s real people living through all of this madness which is where you the player are there to dwell and experience those stories being told to you.

This is help emphaised in the trailer by how little the protagonist fights at all being replaced with close up shots of people’s faces and showing their raw emotions to events that happen in the game like body language of hugging each other further pushing that sense of family and connection. All these moments are harmonised together with the music of the trailer which really brings the connection across. I think this is because it’s not very traditional to have soft sounding and emotional music for a violet game as many people could disregard it because it’s different. But the music plays to  the trailer’s strengths from how delicate people’s lives are here with long stares on people’s faces and two people having dinner outside. These little bit of human interaction makes us feel more for the content we are watching.

Looking at the trailer in a more character design approach, faces were the big draw for me specifically between the Maelstorm and the human’s faces. The human faces have this really interesting line design on their face where LED stripes shine out of their face. They look modified and give off a artificial wrinkle vibe to them helping to deliver that cyberpunk look to them. Although in  strange way to me, it makes them look a lot sadder whenever they have a natural face with no emotion on them. This detail to me feels it flows nicely with where I want to take my story in the script-writing process as people often get cybernetic augmentations to make themselves feel better similar to plastic surgery. That’s not to say there isn’t good cybernetics but in this world of mine, cybernetics are mostly seen of a way of fitting into the city and losing part of your character which is what my Hyde character is so opposed to.

Cyberpunk 2077 — Official Launch Trailer — V

In addition to playing the game, I also received the book looking at the lore of the game and background information. Reading through, it thoroughly details a lot of how the world works like how even the littlest of things influence how the world ticks presenting a really thorough case on it’s world-building which gives me great inspiration to how I might approach it. There was one thing that stood out to me in the book which was to do with these special devices called ‘Braindancers’ which serve as really advanced virtual reality headsets and specifically how they mention it’s usage of celebrities as people can get too attached to the devices praising celebrities through it like they’re part of their lives and losing their identity because of it. This reminded me from a scene from Ghost in the Shell (1997) film where a garbage man loses all his memories from his mind being hacked leaving him completely hollow inside with no memories attached to him. I feel both of these instances I want to get across in the script-writing from maybe the dangers of idolising and retaining your character.

Book

After reading the book, I thought I explore the game and take screenshots of areas that I found to be interesting for the script-writing process mainly areas like the slums and the city as those were my favorite to experience from how much they contrast from each other. What’s really nice with the game is that it has a built in photo mode where you can pause the game and screenshot a specific section of the world which you can then filter it to your hearts content.

The first image is one of the first slum looking environments that you find in a quest. Personally, I love the darkness that engulfs the scene here with only the lighting of the dim blue light and lanterns struggles to beat the darkness. Not to mention the smoke coming from the ground really helps to add character by all the gasses and smoke being stored and cramped in the smaller parts of the city whilst the outer city looks all glamorous.

Speaking of the city, this is a screenshot I took from the city center which is filled to the brim with architecture although strangely, not as much lighting as I would of thought would be put in here. Therese bright neon lights on the higher decks of the city sure but down below, it looks a lot darker and forgotten about in comparison. This look is something I definitely want to express in the script as it acts symbolic to the false persona that the city gives off compared to what we see on the outside.

Going back to character design, three different characters stood out to me when I was playing the game those being: Crusher, the Malestorm Gang and Johnny Silverhand.  

Crusher is this large mechanical figure that serves as a threatening bodyguard to anybody that is unfortunate to step in it’s way. Looking at him characterful, I really love the denseness of the character as he looks like this unstoppable moving force that forces itself into conflict with thinking it over. He reminds me of my Hyde character a lot not just from personality, but also the sheer bulkiness that he imposes to us. To me, this how I would want my Hyde character to be built up thick and dense when it comes to modelling him,

Having already discovered the Malestorm gang before earlier on in my research, what I found interesting about them in playing the game were their arms specifically the pipping that goes into them to create this cross between industrial and cybernetic arm. Whilst this is an easy comparison to make to my Hyde character as the arm is quite bulky, I would say it more perfectly suits my Jekyll character more from how human sized it is despite looking so mechanical if we were to compare this a sleek cyborg arm like Johnny Silverhand’s bionic arm. 

In addition to the arms of these characters, the eyes are such a huge part of the aesthetic I really enjoy from them with their use of shapes and neon lights lighting up the scenery wherever they go. The lore behind the design is that if you want to join the gang, you have to get your eyes gouged out and replaced with these artificial eyes instead which is really creepy but fascinating to me. I think terms of the Jekyll character, the eyes seemed to be a better fit for my Hyde character giving the him a more menacing and threatening aura to him.

Only Malestorm Eyes

And lastly, one other character I felt inspired by was ‘Johnny Silverhand’ your companion in the game. His bionic arm is what sticks out to me the most as it has a very sleek and well rounded design like it was designed for a human. I can imagine for the Jekyll character that i could combine aspects of the Maelstorm gangs arms with the one that Johnny possess to form a very chunky top but gradually becomes a lot thinner as the arm goes down.

Back to the character itself, there are two design aspects I like being the muscular structure and the consideration for re topology on Johnny’s bionic arm. The overall muscular structure is how i slightly imagine Jekyll’s body to be as well built. But maybe I might consider less muscular meat on his body due to him not as exercising as much to an average human. I raised the question of retopology to how the arm acts on a ball and socket set up for the arm to flex which I thought was quite interesting to see as I wonder if that was considered first before making the character.

Sketches of Johnny Silverhand before Keanu Reeves came onto the game

I think from look at all of these character designs, I have good ideas for what I would like to do to my models from the rough sketches I have of them already. I feel the idea of Johnny and the Maelstorm gang’s arm being fused together is an idea I want to hold onto despite thinking my Hyde character as inspiration for the mdoel. Overall, the research on character design on ‘Cyberpunk 2077′ has been invaluable due to having so many of the elements and ideas I want to cover being found here in this game.

[exploringbrazilianculture]

Exploring Brazilian Culture!

Below excerpts represent a virtual study of Brazilian culture by Columbia College Chicago (CCC) undergraduate students enrolled in the Humanities, History and Social Science (HHSS) Dept. online course:  HUMA121 “Latin American Art, Literature and Music” .

This virtual showing on tumblr is hosted by CCC students enrolled in this HHSS Dept. course with its instructor, Jesus Macarena Avila. This investigation began with a study on Tarsila do Amaral and her involvement with the cultural movement: Antropofagia.

Amaral with creative intellectuals like Oswald de Andrade and Anita Malfatti advocated a new ideology, the Manifesto Antropofago.

This investigation was only enhanced by the course's online contributors and guests: Dr. Roberto J. Tejada and Ariani Friedl. Dr. Tejada's expertise of Latin American art history and knowledge on Amaral's cultural production.

Dr. Tejada gave cultural and historic interpretations of Amaral's paintings like "Carnaval em Madureira" (1924, oil on canvas, 76 × 63.5 cm) showing the Afro Brazilian influence on the work. 

Below are students' comments on what was learnt from Dr. Tejada's lecture: 

"The speaker Dr. Roberto J. Tejada did an amazing job really helping me comprehend what was going on, and the different and creative ways with the European side and the afro American side were trying to solidify the culture and understanding of one another’s history."

"Amaral is also well known for creating the work of 'Anthropofagia', according to Dr. Tejada, in which its 'main intention was to create a mythic space in a language of painting through using bold colors and unusual forms, in order to create a vision specific to Brazilian history and attending to contemporary human geography/landscapes'."

"Dr. Tejada gave a great explanation of Amaral’s painting Anthropofagia. Made in 1929, its intention was to create a mythic space in painting using non-contemporary forms and vanguard themes to connect to Brazil's history of violent colonialism."

"Some background information about that Dr. Tejada touches on the fact where many Brazilians might have come from. The government encouraged immigration for the most part from Europe. Around the year 1888, the population contained many white Brazilians but also as well many black Brazilians. 

Brazil was also one of the last countries in Latin America to abolish slavery. So even from then on racism was something that was influencing many policies (specifically Immigration policies), systems created in Brazil, etc."

"Dr. Tejada made a good point when he stated 'the word itself, signifies the Tupi language and enhancement, it seems to serve the undeniable presence of indigenous people. The indigenous culture is elevated and given importance just as any other subject European painters would put forward’."

And Ariani Friedl (above) representing Chicago's annual cinematic program: Mostra Brazilian Film Series gave an insight to this year's film programming.

Friedl was recently interviewed by Illinois Latino Voice's TransLatinx artist, Jesus "Jesse" Iniguez, this is an excerpt: 

Jesus "Jesse" Iniguez: Due to the national Shelter in Place order, how has Mostra become more accessible to a wider audience this year? 

Arian Friedl: Due to the pandemic and the impossibility for us to have a MOSTRA in person, we decided, as many other organizations, to present our MOSTRA XI virtually. This has been a completely new field for us and we have had to learn a great deal of new techniques and ways of doing a festival.

JJI: As with previous festivals, What film(s) are this year’s highlights? What are the themes or concepts being featured for Mostra Brazilian Film Festival 2020?

AF: As you know, MOSTRA present Brazilian films with social conscience and every year we bring films which address different aspects of Brazilian culture, environment, social issues, history and others.  This year we will be featuring films related to our political history, environment, gender and race issues and others.

JJI: Thank you so much for your time during our “new normal”. You can find Mostra’s film listings on their official website: http://mostrafilmfestival.org/xi/

Below are student/instructor film review excerpts:

"Amazônia, o Despertar da Florestania", Dirs: Christiane Torloni & Miguel Przewodowski, Documentary/1h 46min/2018 (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"How has Brazil dealt with nature and its natural resources in the early 20th century? What state is the Amazon Forest in? Based on interviews with specialists from the most diverse areas and the rescue of historical figures, the notion of forestry is discussed: the citizenship of the forest, a term necessary to reflect on Brazilian identity.

Although dramatic, sometimes bordering on desperate romanticism, the questions raised by the documentary Amazônia, the Awakening of Forestry are treated with the necessary urgency and a very welcoming tone by the actress, environmental activist, and now even filmmaker Christiane Torloni. 

In her directorial debut, Torloni accesses something profound, mystical, and sacred, but no less concrete or vivacious: the surreal power of the Amazon rainforest – and the risk of its disappearance.A documentary film of a conventional format like this only works with the cast's quality and constitution. 

A movie like this is only as good as the level of testimony it collects and makes available to the viewer. Fortunately, there are media personalities of weight, prestige, and intelligence, from the fields of art to sciences. All are coming together to trace and unravel the devastating panorama in which we find ourselves as a society." -- E. Reynaga

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0Dvm-VH1L8k

"Açúcar", Dirs. Renata Pinheiro & Sérgio Oliveira, Fiction/1h 30min/2020 (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"Açúcar is a surreal but haunting portrait of an aging sugar cane plantation. It centers on the main character, Bethânia Wanderley (played by Maeve Jinkings), a last remaining family member of a historic Brazilian plantation family. She tries to repair the old mansion and thinking of new crops to revive the plantation industry.

Although this is a fictional tale, it does reference actual facts about slavery in Brazil (being the last Latin American country to abolish slave ownership). As the story progresses, Bethânia begins to see or "hallucinate" things around the old mansion, is it the Wanderley's past with slavery? Or is it the local people, descendants of slaves plotting to get the aging land back? Is it this about “revenge” or reclaiming human rights?

It's beautifully photographed against a sugar cane landscape referencing Afro Brazilian beliefs in Orixas and body possession. Directors Renata Pinheiro and Sérgio Oliveira has won awards for their own films and this feature is a collaborative work at re-looking Brazil's slavery and the history of plantation families." -- J. Macarena Avila

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rQBfzNZMags

”Mormaço", Dir: Marina Meliande, Political Drama/1h 36min/ 2018 (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"Mormaço combines different genres, fantasy, political, drama, etc. using visuals to make social commentary about 2016 Rio de Janiero's Olympics. That year, many resident areas were displaced to create attractions for tourism for the Olympics.

This feature is a dazzling, but slow burner story using different genres based on true events surrounding the 2016 Olympics when one of the hottest summers faced Rio de Janiero's area.

It centers on a public lawyer, Ana representing residents being threaten to move. The residents have regular meetings with Ana to prepare to lobby against the city government. Then Ana develops a unknown medical condition that starts a metaphorsis that only complicates her life." -- J. Macarena Avila

"After viewing the film I did some research and learned from an article titled 'Film Mormaço Interweaves Fiction and Reality to Retell Story of Vila Autódromo Evictions' that these events in the film are based on historical events that actually occurred. 

The article also states that Mormaço 'makes use of actual footage of these events.' Many of the scenes illustrating war and protest are primary sources that I found very interesting. 

Knowing this about the film made me want to watch it a second time to catch all of these primary footages. Mostly because of how seamless the transition from historical footage to current footage. Overall, I felt the film was not only entertaining but also informational." -- J. Heflin

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FwSanEqppds

"Deslembro", Dir: Flávia Castro, Drama /1h 36min / 2018 (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"Quickly summarizing this movie, it’s about a girl named Joanna, who lives with her mom, stepfather, and two stepbrothers in Paris. Her parents announce that they would be moving the family to Brazil and it is very clear at the beginning of the movie how Joanna feels about the decision. Of course, the move is inevitable and the rest of the movie is located in Brazil. 

The move to Brazil allows Joanna to be able to explore new things, like the world of literature, her first love, and she awakens politically. Being in Brazil seems to bring up a whole bunch of old disturbing memories from Joanna’s childhood that have something to do with her fathers’ disappearance which then leads Joanna to have a slight hope that her father may be alive.

Leaving this paragraph on a cliff hanger just in case anyone ends up wanting to watch it. I believe that this was a very well written and portrayed movie. It caught my interest because it just seemed relatable. Something realistic, unlike this other movie that I was interested in watching which seemed more fiction based." -- Y. Contreras 

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4qFP5cbmyEg

"Mulher Que Sou" (15m), Dir: Nathalia Thereza (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"The film 'The Woman Who I Am' follows a single mother who is in search of a new beginning away from what appears to be the rural lifestyle she once lived. We immediately begin the story following our main character, Marta, who is traveling alongside a mountain by bus before abruptly switching to a highway where she continues her travel into the city. Later, as she is searching for apartments we are introduced to her daughter who she consults with during this process. 

This establishes for the audience their relationship with one another but also theimportance of and emphasis placed on the value of listening to her daughter and including her in this journey. While the prevailing theme of this film, I contend, was identity, we also can identify themes of femininity, single motherhood, modernity, and beauty all woven into the dynamic of Marta’s character. 

These intersections help us to understand and even challenge the ways in which we often place mothers in society, especially those that are single or value women past a certain age, questioning their worthiness to be called beautiful" -- G. Paredes

"Oddly enough, the Woman I am was probably my least favorite out of all the films I watched at Mostra. Don’t get me wrong I still enjoyed the film and thought it was pretty good, but it had a lot of potentials that was wasted. There were scenes where the dialogue was too rushed and others where nothing was happening for a particularly long time. 

One thing I don’t like is that they didn’t show you some things. For example, the characters would be talking about something off-screen, and the way they were talking about it, you would think it would be some, what of a big deal. They didn’t show the thing in that scene and I thought they were leaving it to be some sort of reveal later on in the film. 

But it never gets mentioned again and the audience never gets to see what the characters were talking about. In my opinion, it would’ve been fine not to show it if it was a quick mention but the character made it seemed like it was kinda important. 

A reason I did like the film’s 'secretness' is that it captured what the film was supposed to be about: a mom and daughter moving on from their past to a new beginning." -- K. Williams

View this short here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=05-F8PDvxdY

"Azougue Nazaré", Dir: Tiago Melo, Fiction/1h 22min/2018 (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"The film Azougue Nazaré was a drama film released in 2018 directed and written by Tiago Melo. The film is about the start of a new destructive supernatural phenomenon and different spiritual ideologies that collide within this community.

The film touches on religious topics and events in Latin American and was very informational and entertaining. I felt that this film was well put together and although I was not used to many of the different rituals and traditions are shown in the film.

It was very easy to follow along and even relate some of these traditions to ones in my culture. I usually would never go for a film that has to do with religious topics but the film’s artistic values and images caught my eye." - J. Heflin

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NFxE51n0IQo

"Quebramar", (27m), Dir: Cris Lyra (Portuguese w English Subtitles)

"Going off of Mostra Festival’s description of the film, Breakwater (Quebramar) is a movie about a group of girls from São Paulo who takes a vacation to a remote island for the New Years. While on this vacation, the girls hang out, form a connection, build a safe space, and discuss with each other their experiences being in a part of the LGBTQ+ community. 

The things that caught my attention most about this movie and made me want to watch it were the categories 'LGBT' and 'black perspective' because those both relate to me. The movie was filmed in the style of a documentary, though I couldn’t really find any proof it was. 

If the film was scripted, then I have to give a huge round of applause to the actresses because they delivered them seamlessly and made it feel natural.One of my favorite things about the film is how casual it was. It was a feel-good film where everyone was having fun, bonding, and really supporting each other." -- K. Williams

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xNDquFNV9dQ

"Sem Asas", (20m), Dir: Renata Martins

"Sem Asas, or Wingless in its English translation, is a short film about a boy with a longtime interest in flying discovering he 'can'. I watched this movie because it was under the category 'black perspective' but I enjoyed it so much because it broke a lot of basic representation the media gives us.

The film mainly centers around the boy but also features his parents. I mention this because the movie really focuses on this family’s strong bond. That’s one thing media rarely gives movies, films, T.V, and etc that focuses on black representation. There’s always one parent (usually the dad) missing or dead and if both parents are there, the marriage is toxic and on the verge of breaking. 

This family however is very close and from what the movie showed us very healthy. They help each other out when asked, joke around, lightheartedly tease each other, and were overall worried for each other. Another thing this film didn’t do that most media does was only make it about struggle. 

I won’t lie the Black community does have a lot of struggles and situations it has to deal with but those things are usually the only thing media recognizes us for. While the representation of that is important, it starts to build an image in your head when that’s pretty much the ONLY time you see yourself and your community focused on in media. 

Yes, there is black on black violence, broken family, major poverty, and many other things but that’s not all the black community is. I think Wingless did a good job of portraying this."-- K. Williams

View trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPkWmJvC-Tc

This for educational purposes and co-hosted by

Friedl's video introduction (created/produced by Sara Vianni) to enrolled students in the HUMA 121 course, "Latin American Art, Literature and Music".

[mst3kproject]

1112: Carnival Magic

Those of us who have heard of Al Adamson tend to associate him with movies like Psycho-A-Go-Go and Blood of Dracula’s Castle, so it’s weird to see him trying to make a family-friendly talking animal movie.  He fails at it, of course, but I don’t think that’s got anything to do with the genre.  Al Adamson just wasn’t any good at making movies.

Markov the Magnificent is a carnival magician who can talk to animals.  You’d think he’d use that in his act but instead he mostly just annoys the other performers until they insist he be fired. This leads to the secret coming out… but it’s not Markov’s powers that are revealed, it’s those of his buddy Alex the Chimp, an animal who can talk to people.  With Alex on stage, and Markov finally using some of his mind-reading and spoon-bending abilities, the carnival is suddenly the biggest thing in town.  Unfortunately, some of the attention they attract is the wrong kind, like that of a scientist who would like nothing better than to dissect a live chimpanzee, I guess just because it’s the evilest possible thing to do.

Out of curiosity, have any of you ever seen a chimpanzee in a zoo?  If so, you may have been surprised that it didn't look like the ones you see in movies.  Movie chimps are skinny and pink, while zoo chimps are dark grey and look like they could tie you in a knot with one hand while lifting a small car with the other.  Why is that? Because every chimp you've ever seen in a movie, tv show, commercial, or circus is less than about seven years old. When chimps reach puberty they not only become much bigger and stronger, they quickly realize that humans are smaller and weaker, and it gets very difficult to convince them to wear cute costumes anymore.

A movie about saving a talking animal from evil scientists so he can pursue a career in show business sounds like it ought to be fun, I guess.  It would probably work better as a cartoon, where we could be confident that no real animals were abused in the making of it. Even so, most of what actually happens in Carnival Magic is just kind of dull and depressing.  Occasionally you do get an attempt at something ‘zany’, but it never quite lives up to the kind of antics a description of the plot would lead you to expect.  When Alex decides to steal a car and go for a joyride, for example, that sounds like it ought to be funny, but it somehow just never works.  The music is an oddly un-fitting banjo piece and the screaming girl in the back seat reminds us constantly how dangerous this would be in real life.

(If you’ve ever tried to look up this movie on Wikipedia, by the way, you will have doubtless discovered that Carnival Cruise Lines owns a ship called the Carnival Magic.  Should I ever find myself on board, I believe I will decline any offer to dine with the captain.)

When Alex is not getting up to supposedly hilarious hijinks, the movie has two modes. One is pastel people wandering around the carnival apparently having fun, and the other is the various characters telling us about their traumatic backstories.  Markov’s pregnant wife died in a car wreck, leaving him with nothing but a talking ape and a broken heart.  Stoney the carnival owner forces his daughter to dress and behave like a boy so she won’t remind him of the wife who left him.  The carnival publicist ran away from home to escape a controlling and abusive father, and so on.

Of course you can make movies about this stuff.  People make some very good movies about this stuff.  Most of those movies, however, do not include scenes of chimpanzees wearing bras on their heads.  Seeing this kind of material in Carnival Magic makes it feel like we just tuned in to that hilarious sitcom our friends have been urging us to watch, only to catch the Very Special Episode in which one of the characters did drugs or had cancer and then it was never mentioned again.

I think the ending is supposed to be about the entire carnival coming together to save Alex from the evil scientist, but we haven’t seen any sign that Alex has unified them.  The people around Markov are already his friends and already committed to the survival of the carnival as a whole.  If Alex had inspired carnies who were on the point of running away to become accountants or something to remain with the show that would be one thing, and they do succeed in saving Alex, but the scene is presented as if it’s a climax without a story.  It’s also absolutely ridiculous watching the carnies sneak up on the secret chimp dissection lab, because they’re all very ordinary, out-of-shape people in street clothes doing their best to act like they’re on a police raid.

The evil scientist, Dr. Poole, is kind of a strange inclusion, himself. In my review of Octaman I remarked on how a lot of movies set up a conflict between scientists who want to study something and showpeople who want to ruthlessly exploit it.  The 70’s King Kong remake is a pretty good example, but in that movie – and in many others – those who want to put some oddity on display for money are the bad guys and those who want to learn from it are good.  Carnival Magic inverts this by suggesting that to study something is to destroy it, whereas to show it off is to help it be enjoyed by all the world.

There is a point to be made here.  A fair bit of what we know about anatomy and physiology of both humans and other creatures has been learned by doing atrocious things to both the living and the dead.  I don’t think, however, that Carnival Magic was the right way to make that point.  For one thing, Dr. Poole’s desire to dissect Alex alive makes no sense.  It’s not Alex’ physiology that makes him remarkable, it’s his behaviour.  Watching him alive could surely teach us infinitely more than taking his corpse apart.

For another, the options we’re given is Alex being a specimen or Alex being a literal circus freak!  Arguing that science should leave an animal alone to live out a happy life in its natural habitat seems reasonable – telling science to leave the same creature alone so it can perform for crowds of strangers is kind of horrifying.  It’s like if Free Willy ended with the titular whale returned to the aquarium having been saved from a taxidermist or something.  Sure, it’s better than death, but the audience still knows that this is not what’s best for this creature. If we’re supposed to believe that Alex wants to be a star, then that should have been established at the beginning of the movie, perhaps by him escaping Markov’s trailer and trying to entertain people.  One or two short extra scenes about this would have made the whole arc much more palatable.

Several characters describe Alex as being something more than an animal, so I think we’re supposed to regard him as a character in his own right.  This doesn’t seem entirely successful, because Alex doesn’t come across as having goals or desires of his own.  He happily goes along with whatever Markov wants to do, and when Markov’s not around he wanders about getting into mischief with no real sense of direction.  Part of me wants to believe this is an intentional attempt to portray a non-human mind that simply doesn’t prioritize the way we do.  Another part just wants to call it bad writing and I’m not sure which I ought to listen to.

As characters go, Markov’s not a great one, either.  Main characters in a movie ought to have a chance to learn and change, but Markov is pretty much the only human in the movie who doesn’t.  Ellen learns to break free of her father and become her own person, and Stoney learns that she can still love him regardless.  Dave the PR guys learns to be patient with women.  Kirk the tiger tamer grows more bitter and hateful until it destroys him, while his girlfriend Kim comes to realize what an ass he is.  Markov is exactly the same at the end as he was at the beginning – a guy with weird powers that he doesn’t put to any good use, and a talking ape for a surrogate child.  Perhaps nearly losing Alex is supposed to show him how much the chimp meant to him, but he already spent half the movie telling us that Alex is all he has.  He knows he’s got issues related to the death of his wife but seems unwilling to move past them.

In my review of Cry Wilderness I noted that it edged out Carnival Magic for the coveted title of ‘Worst Fucking Movie of Season 11’ mainly by being more racist. There’s a bit of racism in Carnival Magic, too, and it’s got a similar flavor although it’s not nearly so all-pervasive.  Cry Wilderness had its slightly magical Native Americans, here to help and support the white people.  Carnival Magic mostly cannot be bothered to have anybody who isn’t white say lines, but it still manages to have its slightly magical Buddhist Monks who raised Markov and presumably taught him his powers.  This is dumb, and actor Don Stewart sounds like even he doesn’t believe it.

Considered as a whole, Carnival Magic is pretty messy and never manages to settle on a tone.  Alex’ antics, Kirk’s revenge, and the various personal stories don’t quite feel like they’re all part of the same narrative. If I go back to that ‘sitcom’ metaphor, it’s like several episodes combined into a movie, but instead of being stitched end-to-end like in Riding With Death, they’ve been intercut to look like they’re all going on at once and it still doesn’t feel like a unified whole.  Yet for all that, there’s something weirdly fascinating about it.  Maybe it’s the contrast between the cheerful carnival setting and the often dark personal stories.  Maybe it’s trying to puzzle out what Adamson hoped to accomplish by the juxtaposition.  Whatever it is, it’s another reason I’d rather re-watch this than Cry Wilderness.

[jcmorgenstern]

I finally watched 3x19 and I'm sorry but this was the dealbreaker for me. I tried to be openminded about the show twinning Clary to Jonathan but this episode just highlighted why that was a shit decision and 3x20 looks so anticlimactic I want to cry. Magnus had no agency in his storyline. Maia's storyline revolved around her shitperson ex. The heavenly fire was embarrassingly stupid (but blacksmith Izzy was hot af). Dark Clary and Jonathan are fucking flops. I'm out, friend.

I’m so sorry you feel that way, nonnie. If it makes you feel any better, I think everyone kind of feels like they’re clutching at scraps. And like, I feel for the individual writers because tbh they’re all like…one-shot writers under a lot of stress and pressure and are doing their best, but…the season really didn’t come together for me either, mostly for the reasons you’ve said. I don’t know what kind of constraints todd and darren were under, so I understand it’s possible a lot of stuff was going on behind the scenes we didn’t know about, but I’m kind of disappointed with how they chose to organize the season.

I have to admit, I never liked the clary/jonathan bond from the get-go, (honestly i was morose for weeks and bitched about it so much my coworkers at the lab were like SHUT THE FUCK UPPPP about your stupid tv show) mostly because it tripped off so many consent issues for me. like, tbqh, if I wanted to see a man feel entitled to a woman literally all I have to do is go outside. so if they were going to do it, I expected some MAJOR rennovations but…they really didn’t, so far. I like what Kat and Luke brought to it but….the seb/jace bond was already on Thin Fucking Ice as far as “fundamental consent issues” go, but like in canon he doesn’t really have THAT much interest in Jace (esp sexually) so like….you can dance around it in fic. but the way they’ve chosen to romanticize jonathan’s obsession and entitlement to his…sister… is….really just not very enjoyable?

And like yall. you know I enjoy a good bit of sebclace/morgencest but like….not like this, where it kind of feels the writers kiiiiind of don’t give a shit about consent at all, or didn’t really make an attempt to work it through (or really even think about it lol). This is doubled when you look at the Maia/Jordan plotline where like….ok if this was a beautifully written slice of life character study (10 episodes per season, 1.5 hours each) I could see them delving into the realism of Maia kind of getting back with Jordan only to realize he’s bad news. but like. the show is not beautifully written, they don’t have the time or space to delve into a complex issue in a meaningful way, so really it just comes across as romanticizing a shitty/abusive ex. Which…again. Not ideal.

The club scenes were fun but honestly (and yall know how little I say this), it really nailed home how fucking good the first half of COLS really was in terms of,,,,intrigue and this fun romp through Europe with these dark undertones and honestly the show felt a bit cartoonish? Like take it from someone who writes a lot of bad fanfiction….it felt like bad fanfiction. bad fanfiction with HUGE and glaring consent issues lolololololololololol

and like I’ve talked about both these things with @neenwolf a lot and…what she said and I agree with wholly is that…even if they have maia curb stomp Jordan (they won’t, he’s going to die tragically so she can suffer more), they still made her ENTIRE storyline about ….dudes, specially her shitty ex so like….no? They marketed this as “maia gets the pack and becomes alpha and shows people who’s boss” but that….never happens at all and it’s. a little embittering. (Very. embittering). and like she’s got the Good Thoughts so Nina if you wanna add more pls do

Honestly tho…re:3x20. if there’s anything I’ve learned about this show is that they SUCK at cutting trailers so like…idk. I’m expecting a little more than the trailer, but at the end of the day…3a’s finale feel VERY flat for me so I’m expecting more of the same. We know Jonathan does a villainous face-heel turn so ……it’s gonna be junk, from my point of view, and like all the other threads I enjoy are kind of shit rn so like…..can we not???

And I’ve been thinking about Magnus more and….I think my big problem there was that he wasn’t really working through his issues or even grappling with what had happened to him, he was just….kind of used as a shipping prop. and I get why it happened–they wanted to replicate the success of 2x18, but didn’t realize this is…a very different scenario and that people actually cared about what’s happening with magnus (sleeping for 15 hours? coping with alcohol? breaking down in front of alec and feeling ashamed of it? feeling so unwhole without his magic he’s willing to die to get it back?) separate from just ~m@l3c drama~ like what the narrative requires there is not shippy montages but actual character work looking at Magnus’ struggles, and at Magnus himself. and so overall it just left me with this bitter feeling that a) magnus losing his magic, his only independent plot since 1902, was all just to further the ship and b) that anyone actually thinks we WANT m@l3c drama in the year of our lord 2019. (seriously can there be just ONE chill couple in this show for ONCE).

everything about heavenly fire IS embarrassingly stupid (how the sword starts flaming right when she picks it up?? ghslkfjhghghhghghhghgghgg) but yeah blacksmith izzy was….Very Good. (I’m so proud of my honorary Iron Sister!!!) I was kind of concerned she’s smelting with liquid metal with bare skin but a) i know jack shit about the finer details of forging and b) honestly that’s probably the least of izzy’s worries writing-wise so whatever.

anyway we can go on but rest assured nonnie it’s……..Not just you who’s like “wtf lol” it’s kind of all of us at this point.

[samuraiko]

My Top 10 Moments of THE ROYAL TUTOR

I did not even know this series existed until I saw the trailer (in Japanese) during Todd Haberkorn’s panel at SakuraCon 2017. I remember thinking that it looked interesting, but knowing nothing about the cast or the story, I sort of forgot about it. 

And then I saw the first episode on the FUNimation site, and I immediately fell in love. I religiously ran home every Tuesday night after work to be sure to catch each simuldub episode as it was released, doing everything I could to avoid spoilers. I laughed until I was breathless and in pain at times. I cried more than once. I watched and re-watched certain scenes because they were just that good. And I am devoutly praying that we get a Season 2.

I cannot recommend this series highly enough. It’s available on Crunchyroll subbed, and on FUNimation’s site dubbed. It is so very well worth the watch.

Having now seen the entire series (repeatedly binge-watching it between new episodes, and making audio recordings so I could listen to the series while at work), I just have to share some of the moments that just embody all that make this series so wonderful. It is (mostly) spoiler-free, but you have been warned.

Your mileage, of course, may vary.

#10 - The teacher learns the students' lesson (Episode 2, “The Prince Interviews") 

The moment that first really got my attention for Heine. The notion that he could learn just as much from the princes as he could teach them made him a much more relatable character, and it also gives a subtle but deft hint of the standard to which Heine holds himself. Like his students, he doesn't always get it right (considering his inadvertent failure to consider his words before he speaks with Leonhard in the very next episode), but the first steps are there. And its theme is repeated over and over throughout the series. 

#9 - 1.3 million lives (Episode 4, “The Princes Go to Town”)

A surprisingly beautiful moment that provides much-needed exposition without you even realizing it's doing it. That the princes can't see the forest for the trees becomes their first real lesson - while studying with Heine, it's not just about facts and figures and history, but the realities of the kingdom that they stand to inherit. (And this is just the capital, which lies right outside their palace door - you can almost hear the realization set in of how much more vast their responsibility will be to an entire kingdom.) And when balanced with later episodes and Heine's background, it gives it a much more poignant feeling upon re-watch.

#8 - Kai and Helene (Episode 8, “A Timid Heart”)

I don't care what the manga says, I am firmly captaining the Good Ship Kai/Helene (see my vignettes 'Tea and Sympathy', 'Silent Treatment', and ‘Words, Words, Words’). Kai's struggles to express himself are eminently relatable, as is Helene's frustrated sadness at not knowing how to make things easier for him. And to see the evolution of Kai's relationships with the palace staff in general (and Helene in particular) is deeply satisfying. To convey so much through so few words is a gift. And the scene in the garden is both beautiful and bittersweet - massive props to both Daman Mills as Kai and Sara Ragsdale as Helene.

#7 - Heine wins over Leonhard (Episode 3, “You Don’t Need to Accept Me”)

I almost went with the sachertorte moment over this one, but between the music, the art direction, and the voice acting, Heine's quiet but impassioned speech to Leonhard imploring him not to give up on himself came through in the end. And Micah Solusod as Heine and Alejandro Saab as Leonhard completely sell the first true beginnings of this teacher/student bond. Leonhard finally gets the tutor he's so desperately needed, and then two episodes later, the whole scene gets a marvelous callback.

#6 - The princes’ investigation (Episode 11, “The Pair’s Promise”)

Another segment bolstered by fantastic music and vocal performances, this one makes the list because now we see just how far the princes will go for what they believe in (a nice setup for what comes in the final episode). Admittedly, the apples don't fall far from the tree when it comes to the misuse of authority and power at that age (as we see later in the same episode with Viktor himself), but the princes' investigation shows a logical precision and ruthless determination to face an unpleasant truth.

#5 - Licht and Viktor (Episode 6, “At Café Mitter Meyer”)

I admit that of the four princes, Licht took the longest to win me over (initially, I kept mentally comparing him to Ukyo from Samurai 7, which is still a compliment). One of the most poignant moments in a series filled with them, the scene of Licht and Viktor talking outside the café is heartbreakingly lovely and real. Outstanding dialogue and voice acting from David Wald and Stephen Sanders (as Viktor and Licht, respectively) takes what could have been sappy and overplayed, and turns it instead into a breathtakingly real scene - being willing to put aside your own wishes and wants to make the person you love happy.

#4 - Heine pleads with God (Episode 11, “The Pair’s Promise”)

Probably the shortest scene on the list, but there are two reasons why I put this one this high - an astonishingly deft vocal performance from Micah Solusod as Heine, and a shining character moment for Heine. Heine's voice throughout nearly the entire series up to this point has been controlled, calm, almost stoic - but when it finally breaks, the depth of feeling is tremendous. It is also the only time in the entire series we see Heine ever ask for something, and even then, it's not for himself.

#3 - Bruno’s inner demons (Episode 7, “The Whereabouts of a Dream”)

I will freely admit that Bruno is my favorite character in this series, in no small part thanks to consistently amazing performances from Chris Wehkamp. Up until now, Bruno's relentless pursuit of academic superiority has been almost played for laughs. But Bruno's internal monologue while delivering his paper, and his later confession to Heine beneath the rose arbor, give him a depth that is agonizingly real. And then to see them counterbalanced by his moments of absolute joy is a sheer delight.

#2 - The dreams of four princes (Episode 12, “The Last Lesson”)

A soulful, desperate plea from our young princes to the men who will supposedly decide their future. All of Heine's efforts bear fruit as the four share their hopes and dreams of what Granzreich could become if given the chance. Even in the face of near-certain defeat, they stand their ground and make their case, to devastating effect. Some of my favorite music cues from the series, plus earnest performances from our leads and dialogue echoing lessons from the very first episode, make this anime-only scene so worth the watch.

#1 - The entire wine cellar scene (Episode 9, “The Price of the Past”)

This is where I gush. The other nine spots on this list had me re-arranging them constantly, but this spot was never in doubt. The entire scene in the wine cellar is hands down one of my favorite in all of anime - the art direction, the dialogue, the choreography, the vocal performances (especially from Daman Mills as Kai and Micah Solusod as Heine, though Dallas Reid as Maximillian damned near steals the scene), and above all the music (the ONLY time that particular cue is used, and it is astounding - if this series gets a soundtrack, it had damned well better be on it), all come together for a tour de force. The insights we get into both Kai and Heine on real strength and when to use it (and not use it) are some of the most effective in the entire series. And all of Heine's myriad facets come together in this one scene with a clarity and economy that is as visceral as it is beautiful. I can watch this five-and-a-half-minute scene (or even just listen to it) over and over and never tire of it. 

[spiritcc]

Sherlock Holmes 2013, real talk

Now that the Vague(tm) post is up, I can finally have a real talk between us pals and gals, which is still the same, but now is full of spoilers and has no advertisement value to it. It's been three years now or so, and I still have to talk in riddles all the time, it gets quite tiring, I want to actually discuss stuff.

So here we go, real talk mode on, let's slap some pic before the cut so it would look nice or whatever.

So, let's start with that list I made during the first episode, the top list of episodes. Let's see what I think now: I'm lost. I don't know, it’s been many times when I just wanted to put several of them on one place, because I can't just say "yeah that's the best one full stop nothing is as good as this one ever" because it's certainly not true. I don't think I can make a list now, I can certainly swap it with top-middle-bottom kinda line.

1. Rock, Paper, Scissors/Halifax/Baskerville Hound

These are the top percentile that I really struggle to put on places, all three are great in their own way, none of those is worse than the others.

2. The Mistresses of Lord Maulbrey/The Musgrave Ritual

They're not my best choice, but these are enjoyable and in no sense bad, or even average or whatever. The Ritual is very fun and I love it, but it's a standalone episode that doesn't tie into anything, so it kinda automatically loses importance points on that.

3. 221B Baker Street/Clowns

These go into the average territory, they have their moments, but I don't enjoy them as much. I still think the first episode has little to offer, and I'm still not sure exactly why I think the third one was not this good. Irene Adler, probably.

4. Holmes' Last Case

That's the only one that is legitimately bad in my opinion, I was never fond of it and I'm still not.

So, the fandom of this show is basically non-existent, that happened, it never managed to set off, all that, no rocket science for anyone involved. If somebody does post a thing about the series, it's mostly gifs, or art, or other pictures, so mostly graphic kind of content. That is not bad in the slightest, it's just that nobody actually shares any thoughts here, or pretty much anywhere else across all the platforms I'm on. So what I'm saying is, with the total lack of other opinion, I sometimes feel like what I'm saying about this series misses everyone else's thoughts by a good mile. Does everyone else go as deep as I do sometimes with all that analysis stuff? Does anyone actually consider the plot, artistic decisions, context and so forth? I've honestly no idea. Does it sound absurd to everyone, or ass pull-y? Everyone keeps saying it's good, but they never say why, but then again, there's no side content like *chokes* j0hnl*ck, and the series pretty much gives you no choice but to focus on its plot and other quality material. I don't know, honestly, if you guise are up for some fandom contribution, those kind of answers would be nice. Even if it does turn out that nobody ever gave a shit as much as I did, I would still stand by my points till I evaporate. Yes, I think the show's biggest strengths are its plot, characterisation and the subtext. Can't make a pretty gifset out of that, can you.

When I’ve just finished the show when it first aired, I already thought that the plot was quite neat, but boy oh boy I had no idea what it actually was like. I keep saying re-watch the show because a lot of mindblowing stuff will float, but now that I think about it, all that stuff totally relates to Moriarty. I think the cabman reveal is the biggest one out of the bunch, and again, it’s all about Moriarty. I hope he’s appreciated, he’s not only scary, but he’s a legit genius that’s been there all along and nobody had any idea. Other than that, there are many minor details that are either foreshadowing, tiny Chekhov’s guns or points that finally piece together now that you know the whole plot. All of that comes from one of the ideas of the show that you see just as much as the heroes do and it’s up to you to interpret and pay attention to that information. And yeah, I do think it works quite nicely, if it’s related to the main Moriarty case, then I’ll assure you all the answers are already there in the episodes. Well, there are other details too, but sometimes they’re total asspulls, like that frog poison, it’s completely made up, but it doesn’t serve any actual relevance so nobody cares. 

I don’t really know what kind of canon continuity this show follows, it does establish that the Study goes through first, but then it’s just all over the place. “Never write about Irene Adler” oops shit outta luck buddy that was literally my first story after the Study came out tough shit tough shit. I don’t know, really. The parallels are kind of hard to draw when the canon is scattered in bits and pieces across the series. There’s my Sholto interpretation, of course, but that’s just about it, because the second episode is pretty much the only one that focuses on one canon story. But there are a few details I noticed and forgot to mention as always:

If you follow Watson’s narrative only, it’s pretty clear a point about the canon asspull Moriarty that just kind of appeared out of nowhere was made: in the course of the series, Watson has indeed never seen Moriarty in person. Disguise? Of course, even Lestrade did, but never in person. Lampshaded by the show itself when a few characters said that Moriarty sounds more fictitious than anything else. 

Real life rumor parallels? After Holmes “died” England was raging so hard the queen herself was said to allegedly write a letter to ACD asking him to revive the character. The show: Holmes is dead, the queen pays a visit to his creator, Holmes suddenly comes back to life. I think that sounds pretty neat. 

Nothing to do with the canon, but the whole premise of the last episode - a literal race against the clock, anybody? That’s not even a thing in Russian, this expression, but that still sounds neat in my book. 

So, apart from all of that, acting, right? This series revived my faith in the Russian scene, I know there are loads of talented actors out there, they just don’t have the right material to work with. Here, I think, everyone had a blast, that is a quality show with a very enjoyable script, no matter what Russians think *hiss*. I mean yeah, if Kavun actually gave them freedom to work on their characters, of course that usually does a great job. I’m pretty sure someday I would be able to write a whole paper on Holmes’ character, because he’s so consistent in his quirks and behaviour, that was a character extremely well thought out by Petrenko: he thought of his walk, manners, gestures, sounds, everything. After examining that for a while, it takes less than a second to tell him and his brother apart, you just know the guy so well by this point. 

Then, of course, Panin, Boyarsky, all the other secondary actors, I think these guys were praised a lot of times without me. I’ll tell ya I was actually surprised when exclamations about “PANIN IS THE BEST WATSON!!” started popping up, I mean of course I knew he was amazing, but I would’ve never dared to think it would be on that level. My pride is Howard Ostrom’s opinion that not only Panin is his favorite Watson, but also Boyarsky is his all-time favorite Lestrade. I’m never worried about Panin in this series because he always gets his praise, but I do care about Boyarsky’s mostly underappreciated work here, and man this feels good. I mean yeah I totally get why he’s dislikeable as a character, but I have dreams, Harold, he’s so freaking good in my opinion. 

Then there’s Sholto and oh boy this is bad that I like him, isn’t it. He’s very charismatic, that’s all I can say, but mention one thing wrong and a shitshow will follow. Well, it won’t, nobody watches this series, but still. Can’t really dedicate gifsets to this guy either, especially not putting any quotes up. But you can’t deny his speech was so great in a wrong way. Then there’s Red, Halifax, and many very minor characters that I all like, they deserve some credit. 

That’s what I always considered the main issue about advertising this show, it’s just very hard to do the normal way. That’s why the trailer was not met well, it looked like nothing, some RDJ ripoff, lots of pointless action. But what can you show otherwise, all the things that make this show great cannot be captured by some sort of out of context gifset or an action compilation. How can you show a great plot and gradual character development in a trailer? All the context that piles up to make the series awesome? I really think you can only understand why this show is good is only when you actually see it, like I can’t really pinpoint why exactly, its strengths are not visual. Kinda like the BBC, quite hard to gif the show’s format for everyone to appreciate, that has to be experienced. That’s why I’m not exactly a fan of all those pretentious Petrenko gifs and Watson’s faces: of course they look neat, but that really cheapens the show out of context in my eyes. Watson’s faces are great because like 75% of those were in the background and you wouldn’t even notice them the first time on the grand scale, so to say. As a clueless gifset, it’s just a dude making faces. That’s not what this show is about. But if it helps to attract people, then there’s nothing else I can do, I will continue making those, but there’s barely anything special about that, every fandom does better things. And this show is special, you know it is, it’s very unique but by the fucking god this is so hard to capture for advertisement purposes. 

I am of course extremely clueless when it comes to other adaptations, so I found everything in this show unique and I don’t know how true that is. Apparently the second RDJ movie is like 70% identical to the third episode, or other way round, and I even kinda doubt that the series did not peek there at any point in time. And I felt the third episode the first time round, and it was so unique to me and shit, but apparently fuckity not. Despite that, I still think it’s great because it’s special. I personally love the gritty reality set up, the very blunt way of addressing very sensitive issues Russian-style, love how the plot works out, love Moriarty, I love digging into the details and find out that these were all intentional in my opinion. I like this show because we’re kinda on the same wavelength there, I pick up plot points, emotions and all that pretty fast and never wondered a thing, everything pieces together nicely and I always understood the show like it’s my own kid. Does anybody else have that kind of relationship with this show? I just kind of assumed everybody did. 

Well, the marathon goes on, I really hope it won’t be the last time I actually get an opportunity to talk. Hope it was interesting to an extent, no one else ever actually discussed the episodes beyond just re-telling the plot, and I thought that you know, pretty sure I’m kinda the authority on this business now, I can burp some things out. 

So to summarise, yes, quality stuff, and if I talk about it, I always talk deep, admiring faces or other shallow things is not my area. 

[mrmichaelchadler]

Home Entertainment Consumer Guide: March 28, 2019

3 NEW TO NETFLIX

"Kung Fu Hustle" "The Lives of Others" "A Separation"

8 NEW TO BLU-RAY/DVD

"Aquaman"

At its best, James Wan's "Aquaman" is a live-action cartoon, complete with armies astride seahorses and sharks. It has a fantastic cast, including great supporting work from Nicole Kidman, Patrick Wilson, and Willem Dafoe. It's refreshingly goofy from a company (DC) that too often takes itself way too seriously. Really, the only problem with "Aquaman" is one common to the genre: bloat. There's no reason for this movie to be 2.5-hours long, and you can feel its charm washing away as the length sets in. My kids were excited for about an hour and it almost felt more like an obligation to finish it. I recommend watching it in installments. And focus on the fun stuff. 

Buy it here 

Special Features Going Deep Into the World of Aquaman Becoming Aquaman James Wan: World Builder Aqua Tech Atlantis Warfare The Dark Depths of Black Manta Heroines of Atlantis Villaneous Training Kingdoms of the Seven Seas Creating Undersea Creatures A Match Made in Atlantis Scene Study Breakdowns Exclusive Sneak Peek of Shazam!

"Detour" (Criterion)

An acknowledged classic of Poverty Row, Edward G. Ulmer's 1945 noir is as pitch black as the genre comes. Restored recently after years of people watching degraded copies, "Detour" has probably never looked this good. As expert Noah Isenberg explains in an excellent special feature, "Detour" was made for almost no money in roughly a week, depending on who you believe. It's a stunning piece of work, containing one of the best femme fatale performances of all time from Ann Savage. Ulmer and Savage's take on the role is instantly mesmerizing. Gone are the typically glamorous looks of the femme, replaced by grit and sweat and dirt. Savage's character feels threatening in such a perfect way that we know the minute our protagonist crosses paths with her, he's doomed. 

Buy it here 

Special Features New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray Edgar G. Ulmer: The Man Off-Screen, a 2004 documentary featuring interviews with actor Ann Savage and filmmakers Roger Corman, Joe Dante, and Wim Wenders New interview with film scholar Noah Isenberg, author of Edgar G. Ulmer: A Filmmaker at the Margins New program about the restoration Janus Films rerelease trailer PLUS: An essay by critic and poet Robert Polito

"I Wanna Hold Your Hand" (Criterion)

Robert Zemeckis has been working with American nostalgia since his first film, 1978's "I Wanna Hold Your Hand," now available on a bonus-packed Criterion release. The film itself is a sweet comedy about not just Beatlemania but those years in which one had the time and energy to commit their lives to something like a band. A cousin of "American Graffiti," this ensemble piece is about a bunch of teenagers trying to get to "The Ed Sullivan Show" on the night that The Beatles would make TV and music history. It's a light-hearted comedy that doesn't hit every mark but is also truly hard to dislike. And it's particularly interesting as a stepping stone in the careers of both Zemeckis and Spielberg, who get together with Bob Gale for a fantastic special feature on this release about the making of the film. 

Buy it here 

Special Features New 4K digital restoration, approved by director Robert Zemeckis and cowriter Bob Gale, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray New conversation among Zemeckis, Gale, and executive producer Steven Spielberg New interview with actors Nancy Allen and Marc McClure Audio commentary from 2004 featuring Zemeckis and Gale The Lift (1972) and A Field of Honor (1973), two early short films by Zemeckis Trailer and radio spots PLUS: An essay by critic Scott Tobias

"If Beale Street Could Talk"

This might be the final great film of 2018 to be released on Blu-ray. There are some interesting films that came out the final few weeks of last year still to hit the market ("The Mule," "Bumblebee," others) but this is the last essential movie, one that you really need to see before you can close the book and move on to 2019. Barry Jenkins' adaptation of James Baldwin's book has been written about so many times since its TIFF debut, on this site alone, that there's not much I could possibly add to the conversation. Read my TIFF review. Read Odie's brilliant 4-star review. Read about it in our ten best. Read my interviews with Barry Jenkins and the stars of the film, KiKi Layne and Stephan James. I hold this movie very close to my heart and will for the rest of my life. It's gorgeous, riveting filmmaking and a true must-own on Blu-ray, especially given it has a commentary track by Jenkins himself. 

Buy it here 

Special Features Deleted Scenes Featurette: If Beale Street Could Talk: Poetry in Motion Audio Commentary by Barry Jenkins

"Mary Poppins Returns"

Everyone involved in this movie should give Emily Blunt a gift. Her prodigious charm is really the fuel that keeps this film moving (with no offense to Ben Whishaw and Emily Mortimer, who are always good). Blunt gets the film over its several dull passages, although even she can't save original songs that sound fine in the film but that I dare anyone to hum a section of outside of it. Like so many of the Disney live-action films, there's a magic missing here - the magic that allows a movie to live on in imagination when you're done watching it. This one is better than some (I'm still angry about "Alice in Wonderland" and "Beauty and the Beast") but that's mostly just because those movies didn't have a performer as charismatic and committed as Emily Blunt. For the record, my five-year-old STRONGLY disagrees. He loves this movie. But even he can't sing a song from it. 

Buy it here 

Special Features Deleted Song — "The Anthropomorphic Zoo" The Practically Perfect Making of "Mary Poppins Returns"  Seeing Things From a Different Point of View": The Musical Numbers of "Mary Poppins Returns"  Back to Cherry Tree Lane: Dick Van Dyke Returns  Practically Perfect Bloopers  Deleted Scenes Play Movie in Sing-Along Mode 

"Perfect Blue"

Satoshi Kon is an interesting enigma in that his name isn't as much of a household one as Hayao Miyazaki or Brad Bird but those who do know his work absolutely adore him. Kon's ambitious, visually breathtaking style is arguably never more brilliantly realized than in this 1999 masterpiece FINALLY getting a Blu-ray release for its 20th anniversary. That it took this long for a movie that so many people love to even get an HD release is telling in terms of how Kon's reputation doesn't seem to be at the level he deserves. 

Buy it here 

Special Features BRAND NEW REMASTER OF THE FILM NEW Lectures by Satoshi Kon featurette NEW Into The Blue featurette - New Interviews Original SD Version of Feature (Japanese mono Dolby Digital 2.0 with English subtitles) Angel of Your Heart Recording Sessions Angel of Your Heart Full English Version Theatrical Trailers and TV Spots—includes new trailers from US and UK re-releases Cast and Crew Interviews

"Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse"

For months, it felt like Disney's "Incredibles 2" was the runaway favorite to take the Oscar for Best Animated Film. Who could have guessed that an animated superhero movie, which is usually the genre of straight-to-DVD fare, could be good enough to topple the highest grossing animated film of all time? Make no mistake -- this is no ordinary superhero movie. This is no ordinary animated movie. It may only be a few months old, but it feels like a classic already, a movie that I know I'll see at least a dozen times over the course of my lifetime. It gets richer and feels more ambitious each time I see it. This is a very strong edition of the HECG and I hope you got a nice refund from the IRS because this one is a must-own too. It also comes with some fantastic special features, including a cut of the film that includes several scenes that never got past the sketch phase re-cut into the movie. 

Buy it here 

Special Features We Are Spider-Man Spider-Verse: A New Dimension The Ultimate Comics Cast A Tribute to Stan Lee & Steve Ditko The Spider-Verse Super-Fan Easter Egg Challenge Designing Cinematic Comics Characters Heroes & Hams Alternate Universe Mode: In this all-new viewing experience, discover alternate scenes, plotlines, characters, and more with the filmmakers as your guide. "Sunflower" by Post Malone and Swae Lee "Familia" by Nicki Minaj & Anuel AA (feat. Bantu) All-New Original Short "Spider-Ham: Caught In a Ham" 

"Wanda" (Criterion)

I'll admit to not remembering having heard of Barbara Loden's "Wanda" until the Criterion edition showed up in my mailbox. It's a stunning movie, a bleak de-glamorization of the criminal life. A blue-collar woman named Wanda can barely make ends meet and has her kids taken away in a divorce. She basically stumbles into the life of a petty criminal, and the two form a strange, mesmerizing Bonnie and Clyde duo. He's abusive. She seems constantly uncertain, almost as if she could just wander off the face of the Earth. It's Loden's only film and it's a fascinating piece of work, almost akin to Cassavetes in its dirty, sweaty, naturalistic style. It's a shame Loden never got to make another movie, but I love that this one is getting appraised again a half-century after it was produced. 

Buy it here 

Special Features New 2K digital restoration by the UCLA Film & Television Archive, The Film Foundation, and Gucci, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray I Am Wanda, an hour-long documentary by Katja Raganelli featuring an interview with director Barbara Loden filmed in 1980 Audio recording of Loden speaking to students at the American Film Institute in 1971 Segment from a 1971 episode of The Dick Cavett Show featuring Loden The Frontier Experience (1975), a short educational film about a pioneer woman’s struggle to survive, directed by and starring Loden Trailer PLUS: An essay by film critic Amy Taubin

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[lareinedumondejeb]

Lady at the vet on August 10th.

On August 10, 2017, my horse Lady was chased by dogs.  She had tied up and had wounds all over, particularly on the left foreleg. She was very lame, but it was difficult to see where the problem(s) was(were).

Using logical deduction (just about the only thing that would cause her to run around frantically was a pack of dogs, and the wounds looked like bites), I stated that, although we had not seen what happened, I was 95% certain it was dogs. Several days later we captured one of the culprits; a young puppy (at least) had returned to the scene of the crime and was too stupid to get through the fence when the kids came out.

left fore had the worst injuries.

The apprentice vet suggested x-raying the left foreleg, but I was convinced it was superficial, and that belief was backed by senior vet who arrived later. The only relatively untouched lower leg was the right hind. She also had strange scrapes on her chest, and a swelling on her neck with punctures that could have been teeth. I thought she had run into a fence, but after walking the entire fence line, realized that was impossible.

bite on neck

Her blood work, unsurprisingly, was consistent with tying-up (duh, it was obvious). She stayed the night at the clinic to a fortune’s worth of liquids. She also received Banamine, and the left fore was wrapped with DMSO and furacin (at an exorbitant cost, I should have done it before I left her).

The next day I brought her home. The first few days, she didn’t know which leg to favor, she was so sore. She was confined to the stall for the most part, but I took her out to graze. By the third day I knew something was seriously wrong with her left fore. I had seen many horses tie up. This was not only exercise induced rhabdomyolosis.

I did the best I could to take a video (ie I had my son do it) which I sent to my vet to convince him that yes, my horse was very broken, it was from the shoulder, and he needed to come out because I didn’t want to trailer her.

The above video was taken August 15. You can also see hives on her neck. For about a month, she would sporadically get hives on the left side of her neck, starting where the “bite” was. She because allergic to fly sprays (but I could use them as long as I didn’t get near the neck). No idea what that was about.

I sent the video to my vet, Dr. Trent Bliss at Interstate Equine, the next day. He said give her bute (I’d already done that on my own initiative). Two days later I texted him and said she was worse, and couldn’t get up properly, so he came out the next Monday (August 21, 11 days after the injury).

To be fair, I’d been regularly having the clinic look at Lady because of lamenesses I detected (and in one case, detected by two endurance ride vets –lameness pull) that were invisible or insignificant every time they looked at her. I have very sensitive unevenness radar.

The really good thing was that as soon as Dr. Bliss saw Lady walk on the 21st, he said “Sweeney.” (aka suprascapular neuropathy, or damage to the shoulder nerves).  I have since learned that many cases of sweeney are misdiagnosed because it is relatively rare nowadays.  I had never seen a case outside of the veterinary encyclopedias I used to study to prepare for the written exam portions of Youth of the Year contests.  My understanding (from my teenage days) was that it resulted from ill-fitting harnesses (collars); it was a disease of working horses (ironically, so was tying-up, or Monday morning disease, common in work horses that were given Sundays off on full rations).

Dr. Bliss also said, “wow, you’re right, it is the shoulder.” (The shoulder is often blamed for lower limb lameness, probably because from the saddle it feels like the shoulder isn’t working properly when the horse fails to fully extend the leg).

Lady had an acute and severe case of sweeney. Taking into consideration the hematoma and bite marks on the lower left leg, we believe she was grabbed by a dog and fell, over-extending the left leg behind the rear legs (one cause of trauma-induced sweeney).  For those of you who would want to be able to identify it, and complain that it’s unclear in the videos: the horse will pull the leg forward in a swinging motion, out from the elbow/shoulder.  The toe may drag (Lady did this for about a month, 4-8 weeks post-injury). Once the foot is placed, the elbow will turn out as the horse steps forward with the sound leg. It’s easily recognizable once you know what you;re looking for.

Lady was prescribed stall rest and EQUIOXX. a NSAID that can be administered long term to horses, for the foreseeable future.  At least three months and probably twelve.  At this time, she could barely get up, and couldn’t get up at all from the bad side (I had to roll her over when she fell).  She fell several times in the week before the sweeney diagnosis, because she didn’t understand she was disabled. (Fortunately, she soon learned to balance.) It was very discouraging.. not only would I not be able to ride her, she wouldn’t even be able to carry a foal if she couldn’t get up.

3 September 2017

Above are pictures from September 3rd, 3.5 weeks after injury. You can clearly see the atrophy.

I asked advice on the AERC Facebook page, had my mom ask her vet clinic, asked friends… There seemed to be no established procedure and no guaranteed cure. Lady is insured, and they would have covered surgery, but I really did not want to do this (even though my vet did mention the option). The general consensus was that the best bet would be acupuncture–which of course the insurance did not cover.

One month after the original trauma, I finally got an acupuncturist, Dr. Julia White,  out. We did an initial video (below). Lady required sedation, and was still twitchy with flies, but Dr. White did electro-acupuncture and then left the needles in for another 20 minutes.

I had my doubts, and we still don’t know the extent to which the treatment aided recovery (no random assignment, etc), but one thing is certain: it must have felt good, because Lady loves her needle sessions. The second time Dr. White came, after one week, Lady recognized her as soon as she got out of the truck, and stood quietly for the needles. We’ve never had to sedate her again, even though she has turned into a bit of a fire-breathing dragon now she’s feeling better.

Dr. White also advised using balance trainers (see picture below). Lady is also getting megadoses of Vitamin E and flax seed meal (for the omega acids). I use a TENS/EMS unit on her every day while cleaning stall, etc. (ideally one hour, but often less). At first I got no reaction from the atrophied muscle, but it slowly improved.

Lady on balance trainers (she’ll stay there 10+ minutes if you are beside her, but gets off as soon as I go to clean the stall), with TENs Unit

I also took Lady out to roll in sand almost every day (sometimes in mud, if it had rained). She is on free choice grass hay (I fill four hay nets a day, and she has about half a net leftover in 24 hours), and one cup of Nutrena Safe Choice (split in two feedings). She gets about 1/3 cup Nutrena Pro-force fuel with her EQUIOXX and Vitamin E. I started hand walking in early October, with the goal of “not making her more lame” each time; ie I was supposed to stop before she got worse, which at the beginning was about one minute.

November 1, 2017

See all those needles in the above pictures (Taken November 1st)? Lady doesn’t move a muscle during application. Her last session was yesterday. She also got a chiropractic adjustment; rearing and levitating is not good for you when you are already damaged.

The reason I am finally completing this blog is that I am hopeful, at last, after nearly four months, that I might be able to not only breed Lady, but potentially ride her as well. On Monday, Lady went nuts after her roll. Rearing, jumping, scootching around like an 850 lb greyhound in back of me. So I left her in the round pen to get a longe rope (she ground ties just fine even when she won’t lead). I sent her around me in both directions, bucking and snorting for about 30 seconds, to get her manageable. Then I took the video below.

She’s a different horse! Even after already having played more than she had in four months, she was barely lame, and had only a tiny bit of sweeney in the elbow at the walk. I was very excited and shared the video with Dr. Bliss. Dr. White came out yesterday and agreed with me that she was doing fantastic, considering the severity of the injury and the short time that has passed. Of course, she was much more lame on Tuesday, but already improving again yesterday. Still sore today, but not too bad. Dr. Bliss says I’ll know she’s mostly recovered when she does the crazy two days in a row.

Of course, now comes the difficult part: keeping her from damaging the rest of her body while she recovers, and/or redamaging the nerve by being stupid. She has to stay in the stall, on EQUIOXX, and have controlled exercise (i.e.,  hand-walking), until she’s in no danger of injuring herself. I am fantasizing with occasional turnout on good (not slippery or muddy) terrain, with horses near but not in with her, at around six months. I cannot wait to get her out of the stall permanently though, so I don’t want to rush things.

Video of today’s therapy session:

I will add to this in a few months, to document the changes.

  Lady a few days before the injury. The now-bad shoulder looked just like this one 😉

Sweeney Shoulder On August 10, 2017, my horse Lady was chased by dogs.  She had tied up and had wounds all over, particularly on the left foreleg.