At the movies
Jan. 22nd, 2006 11:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trixtahI had a bit of a movie weekend this weekend.
Firstly, I watched Desert Hearts again, for the first time in about 10 years. You know, I'm so glad I had that for my "coming out" movie. It played at the Auckland Film Festival in 1986, in my last year of school, and just after I decided that this sex with girls thing was really me. How nice to have a positive cultural icon to relate to.
I'm glad I saw it before reading the book. Some of the decisions made for the movie - such as changing Ann's name to "Cay" and making her a sculptor rather than a cartoonist - seem rather egrerious in hindsight. My favourite scene in the book - where Vivian and Silver help pick out Ann's pewter dress - is necessarily missing. "Pewter... the colour of your eyes" doesn't really work when the actress has almost black eyes. It's a shame, because it was where Silver essentially scoped out Vivian, and handed over the torch. So to speak. I'm also slightly annoyed how the movie skips across Silver and Ann/Cay's relationship, although it's kind of implied in the bath scene.
Still, it's a fabulous romantic movie. I can't decide whether it beats out When Night Is Falling for total escapist romance... Hell, why decide? It's also interesting how one's tastes change as one gets older. In 1986, I thought that Helen Slater was yummo as Vivian, but Patricia Charbonneau was teh hawt. Now, I totally worship Helen Slater, whose acting is fab and utterly shows the conflict that goes on in those circs, and sit there wishing they'd gotten a better dialogue coach for Patricia Charbonneau, who makes an "interesting" meld of an attempted US-western accent, and her own native Canadian. Well, it's kind of cute, and so is she.
I'm trying to figure out whether the movie had an effect on what appears to be a real fetish I have for women smoking. Well, "real" in terms of the fact that I find it a big turn-on, not that I have to have it to get me off. It's bloody bizarre, because I find smoking as a habit pretty gross (in terms of smell and detrius), and it's certainly an addiction I don't grok. I get the fact it is addictive, but I don't understand how anyone smokes enough cigarettes to get hooked in the first place. Mind you, I smoked pot a couple of years before I even tried a cigarette, and it seemed fairly... pointless, after that. There you go, how to stop the kids from getting hooked on tobacco - make sure they smoke marijuana at a formative age. :-)
Anyway, Helen Shaver smoking cigarettes. Dear lord. I'm tempted to run out and visit my g/f with some cigarettes in my hot little hand and make her have at least one in front of me. (She doesn't really smoke now, but she used to.) Disgusting, I am.
Then I went to see The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe at the movies. There was airconditioning. All I can say is that it was a great big MEH for me. 6.5/10, perhaps? And it would be about 4/10 if it weren't for Tilda Swinton. She was bloody fantastic. Utterly utterly blew everyone else away, even Liam Neeson trying to do "magisterial". When it got to the sacrifice scene, I was almost shouting "Do it! Do it! Go girl!" I managed to restrain myself.
The CGI was really good. It wouldn't have been possible to make this movie even 5 years ago. The scenery was awesome, of course (I did my obligatory homesick snivel at one point). Oh, and I liked the shot when the train is pulling out of Paddington station. The building on the left is based on the real building. Stuff to the right of the tracks is pure CGI. Clever. And I'm sure I know the station they stopped at with the flowers, although I can't think of where. Somewhere like Colwall or Ledbury on the Great Western line? Probably not a real station, although it looked like one. James McAvoy was spot-on as Mr Tumnus, and I loooved Mrs Macready. Those were the good points.
The music was, frankly, indifferent at best. The kids' acting was crap, although Lucy was kind of ok. I wanted to strangle Peter. Sanctimonious little prick. The premise of absolution without redemption (Edward), wildly irritated me. I don't find it so glaring in the book. And the whole noble "Sons of Adam" thing, and the fact that a bunch of snot-nosed kids can get plonked in as the absolute rulers of a varied population was surprisingly annoying on a political level. I must be getting really earnest in my old age. We don't get a sense of the children changing or maturing at all.
Those things do remind me of why The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is probably my least favourite Narnia book.
Some small details were also annoying. At the beginning of the movie - ah yeah, no air-raid sirens at all? Waiting until the middle of a bombing raid (which you could hear many miles off, sirens or no) to get into the shelter? Puhlease. The violation of Mr Tumnus' house wasn't given enough prominence. It was like the kids were going "Oh, yeah, house is trashed." where it really should have shocked them. What happened to Mrs Beaver's sewing machine? Why didn't they read the words etched on the Stone Table? I missed Father Christmas's high tea. And WTF was going on with the frozen waterfall and the wolves? Where were the giants?
If they make the others, I'll undoubtedly see them, because they're better stories. I'm just hoping that if they use the same actors, that they improve as much as the Harry Potter ones have (although I really don't think they were that bad in the first HP movie. Must see it again and check).
Firstly, I watched Desert Hearts again, for the first time in about 10 years. You know, I'm so glad I had that for my "coming out" movie. It played at the Auckland Film Festival in 1986, in my last year of school, and just after I decided that this sex with girls thing was really me. How nice to have a positive cultural icon to relate to.
I'm glad I saw it before reading the book. Some of the decisions made for the movie - such as changing Ann's name to "Cay" and making her a sculptor rather than a cartoonist - seem rather egrerious in hindsight. My favourite scene in the book - where Vivian and Silver help pick out Ann's pewter dress - is necessarily missing. "Pewter... the colour of your eyes" doesn't really work when the actress has almost black eyes. It's a shame, because it was where Silver essentially scoped out Vivian, and handed over the torch. So to speak. I'm also slightly annoyed how the movie skips across Silver and Ann/Cay's relationship, although it's kind of implied in the bath scene.
Still, it's a fabulous romantic movie. I can't decide whether it beats out When Night Is Falling for total escapist romance... Hell, why decide? It's also interesting how one's tastes change as one gets older. In 1986, I thought that Helen Slater was yummo as Vivian, but Patricia Charbonneau was teh hawt. Now, I totally worship Helen Slater, whose acting is fab and utterly shows the conflict that goes on in those circs, and sit there wishing they'd gotten a better dialogue coach for Patricia Charbonneau, who makes an "interesting" meld of an attempted US-western accent, and her own native Canadian. Well, it's kind of cute, and so is she.
I'm trying to figure out whether the movie had an effect on what appears to be a real fetish I have for women smoking. Well, "real" in terms of the fact that I find it a big turn-on, not that I have to have it to get me off. It's bloody bizarre, because I find smoking as a habit pretty gross (in terms of smell and detrius), and it's certainly an addiction I don't grok. I get the fact it is addictive, but I don't understand how anyone smokes enough cigarettes to get hooked in the first place. Mind you, I smoked pot a couple of years before I even tried a cigarette, and it seemed fairly... pointless, after that. There you go, how to stop the kids from getting hooked on tobacco - make sure they smoke marijuana at a formative age. :-)
Anyway, Helen Shaver smoking cigarettes. Dear lord. I'm tempted to run out and visit my g/f with some cigarettes in my hot little hand and make her have at least one in front of me. (She doesn't really smoke now, but she used to.) Disgusting, I am.
Then I went to see The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe at the movies. There was airconditioning. All I can say is that it was a great big MEH for me. 6.5/10, perhaps? And it would be about 4/10 if it weren't for Tilda Swinton. She was bloody fantastic. Utterly utterly blew everyone else away, even Liam Neeson trying to do "magisterial". When it got to the sacrifice scene, I was almost shouting "Do it! Do it! Go girl!" I managed to restrain myself.
The CGI was really good. It wouldn't have been possible to make this movie even 5 years ago. The scenery was awesome, of course (I did my obligatory homesick snivel at one point). Oh, and I liked the shot when the train is pulling out of Paddington station. The building on the left is based on the real building. Stuff to the right of the tracks is pure CGI. Clever. And I'm sure I know the station they stopped at with the flowers, although I can't think of where. Somewhere like Colwall or Ledbury on the Great Western line? Probably not a real station, although it looked like one. James McAvoy was spot-on as Mr Tumnus, and I loooved Mrs Macready. Those were the good points.
The music was, frankly, indifferent at best. The kids' acting was crap, although Lucy was kind of ok. I wanted to strangle Peter. Sanctimonious little prick. The premise of absolution without redemption (Edward), wildly irritated me. I don't find it so glaring in the book. And the whole noble "Sons of Adam" thing, and the fact that a bunch of snot-nosed kids can get plonked in as the absolute rulers of a varied population was surprisingly annoying on a political level. I must be getting really earnest in my old age. We don't get a sense of the children changing or maturing at all.
Those things do remind me of why The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is probably my least favourite Narnia book.
Some small details were also annoying. At the beginning of the movie - ah yeah, no air-raid sirens at all? Waiting until the middle of a bombing raid (which you could hear many miles off, sirens or no) to get into the shelter? Puhlease. The violation of Mr Tumnus' house wasn't given enough prominence. It was like the kids were going "Oh, yeah, house is trashed." where it really should have shocked them. What happened to Mrs Beaver's sewing machine? Why didn't they read the words etched on the Stone Table? I missed Father Christmas's high tea. And WTF was going on with the frozen waterfall and the wolves? Where were the giants?
If they make the others, I'll undoubtedly see them, because they're better stories. I'm just hoping that if they use the same actors, that they improve as much as the Harry Potter ones have (although I really don't think they were that bad in the first HP movie. Must see it again and check).