stunt_muppet

After Kung Fu Panda on Saturday (which I already sort-of blogged about) and an attempt at watching Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back which ended tragically once the DVD sputtered and died (it turned out, upon further investigation, to have some sort of strange, disgusting film on it which we couldn’t clean off), I went to the movies on Sunday with Uncle, Brother, and Grandpa.

We were going to go see Frost, Nixon (I have been in fandom for so long that I cannot put the slash between their names, even if that’s how the title’s actually meant to be typed), but, since it was a matinee on a rainy Sunday, the theater was beset by legions of grandparents, all of whom were apparently going to go see Frost, Nixon as well. The show we were headed to, and the next one after it, were sold out, which, since this is sort of a small artsy theater which I’ve never seen sold out, surprised me a little.

Instead, we went to go see Gran Torino, which to be honest I wanted to see more anyway. It’s got Clint Eastwood as a cantankerous old grandpa who, at one point, actually wields a shotgun service rifle (so my brother tells me) and angrily tells a buncha young punks to get off his lawn. And, since this is Eastwood, actually sounds hella scary doing so.

It’s a pretty good movie – nothing revolutionary so far as plot is concerned, but Eastwood’s a lot of fun to watch even when he’s being a generally appalling person (the movie does contain just about every racial slur and insult you’d care to name). I also have a great big old soft spot for grouchy old men with a decent and even affectionate side buried way down deep which is then unwillingly excavated by a much younger person who isn’t put off by their curmudgeonliness, which…is basically the plot of Gran Torino. So I was quite happy with it.

The only sour note that I could think of was at the very end, which included some of the most blatant crucifixion imagery I’ve ever seen in a movie that wasn’t actually about Jesus. While I was (predictably) crying a bit to see Eastwood’s character die, the heavy-handed Christ-figure implications took me out of the moment for a while. I got the parallels without being hit over the head with them, movie.

On Monday, my cousin (who’s an even bigger geek than I am) insisted that my brother and I watch Aliens, because it was a classic action movie and et cetera, despite my brother and I both being rather squeamish. I’ve decided that the best way to watch movies like this is with someone who has seen it already and can tell you when to cover your eyes. (What? I can’t watch the damn chestbursters, okay? I can’t even look at the facehuggers, because I know what they’re doing and what happens to people who get facehugged. ) It’s an entertaining enough film, and Sigourney Weaver is very good at making Ripley damaged without being useless.

I was impressed by how well this movie treated its women; Ripley did get stuck as the Momma Bear, which always raises dodgy Gender Role Alarms in my head, but Vasquez was strong and tough and uncompromising without being less of a woman (as in her “You ever been mistaken for a man?” dialogue), and she went out heroically. And even with Ripley playing mother to Newt, she was still competent and clear-eyed – except for that scene where she insisted on risking everyone’s lives to go back for Newt. I’m not sure what to think about that one.

Other than that, the cinematography was very nice, the alien models looked good (from what I could see between my fingers), and a couple of the characters I liked actually lived (Bishop specifically, though I liked Hicks well enough), which I didn’t expect. On that note, I was impressed that the movie managed to make me like the Marines that accompany Ripley despite knowing that most of them were toast from the beginning. I’m not about to go out and watch the rest of the series, but I enjoyed the movie.

It also took me two hours to get to sleep that night because I kept thinking I saw something move in my room. Well played, James Cameron. Well played.

Today, Uncle brought the VHS he found of The Mouse That Roared, and while I deeply respect and enjoy Peter Sellers I’m also willing to admit that the main reason I was enthusiastic about seeing it is because I was told William Hartnell was in it, and I get a little geeky thrill from watching Doctors and Companions in other roles.

I was pleasantly surprised here; not only does Hartnell have splendid comic timing, but he’s disconcertingly handsome in his red tailcoat, barking orders and all. But enough of my fannish shallowness.

Peter Sellers is good as the nebbishy Grand Marshall, but I found him funniest as the ridiculously smarmy, scheming Prime Minister, since it lets him underplay just a bit in a very over-the-top role. And, of course, Sellers in drag as the Duchess was always good for a giggle or two.

The two points I didn’t enjoy as much were the Fifties Feminist Fail and the sudden veer into a message movie in the last few minutes. To be fair, the movie had an anti-nuclear-proliferation thread running through the whole story, but I found it rather heavy-handed in the last few minutes.

I’m noticing a bit of a common theme in this week’s movie reviews. Hmm.

On another note, Geeky Cousin introduced me to the Fables series of comics as well. I’m not normally much of a comics reader, as I don’t know where to start for most of the series I actually want to read (Watchmen had the advantage of a definite start and endpoint without eight zillion volumes in between), but Fables intrigues me; it’s a recasting of fairy tales with a cynical spin but (by the looks of it) shorn of the sort of navel-gazing self-pity that soured me on Wicked and its ilk. It seems to be more in the vein of Into the Woods or even the Artemis Fowl books than anything else. Apparently Borders carries the series, so I might just give it a look.

Besides, the prospect of The Prince Formerly Known as Beast turning more beastlike depending on how mad Belle is at him is amusing enough to sell me on the series. :D

In other exciting news, my mom took me boot shopping as a belated Christmas present on Monday, and I ended up with what are essentially biker boots. Put ‘em together with that bustier I got at RenFest this fall, and I’ve got the makings of the perfect outfit for pretending I’m way more badass than I actually am.

Also, I’ve written a whole three hundred words over the past four days! Hurrah for me. Given that my previous total for the entire week was zero, it’s definitely an improvement.

A few snippets, to make me feel like I’ve accomplished something (but no stocking!fic):

The next hundred words or so of “Nothing Lasts (But Nothing is Lost)”, all freewritten:

They are each the sole mercy afforded to the other.

There was a war - no, there were many wars, fought with soldiers stolen out of time. Displacement on a massive scale - enough to throw time out of joint over and over again.

He had to stop it somehow.

When he woke for the first time he was nauseous, every sense swimming (humans have no word for the feeling of displacement in time, not knowing when now is or when the past was or the future will be). Even when the headache subsided there was the strange detachment of mind from body that always came after regeneration (did it? Was it supposed to?).

Was it like this the last time? He couldn’t remember – he still can’t. But last time he wasn’t this different. He stretched his left arm and reached too far; he tried to stand and couldn’t find his balance.


A bit of that Zoe/GLaDOS fic that may or may not get used:

“Listen to me, you stupid machine,” Zoe snapped, dropping the gun. “I’ve completed every single one of your inane, sadistic little games. I’ve done everything you asked of me. I have every right to access the databanks!"

For a moment, the computer was silent; one spherical receptor swiveled to focus on her.

“Fine,” it said petulantly. “Be that way. I was going to let you into the databanks after the party. I was going to give you the grand tour.” Its voice dropped, suddenly, becoming deep and distorted. “But if you’d rather just go blundering in on your own, that’s fine too.”

“Thank you,” she said firmly. “Now, query sequence: Herriot, Zoe; show all data; file body search –”

“I wasn’t finished!” it snapped, and despite all her frustration Zoe couldn’t help but fall silent. “I was just going to warn you that I’ve got decades of files backed up. I remember everything. I have an infinite capacity for knowledge. If you perform a simple search, we’re all going to be here for a very…long…” Its speech slowed, warped again. “…time.


A sentence or two of dialogue from Chapter 2 of “An Experiment, of Sorts”:

“Humans, Doctor,” she replied, not looking up from her book, “are burdened with leisure time, to dispose of as we see fit. Goals can be accomplished, journeys prepared for, duties attended to, but I’m afraid there simply isn’t time to go off on adventures.”


A bit of Chapter 2 of “The Memory Always Lies”, which I actually didn’t write recently but would like to prove that I am still working on:

That watch was greatly detracting from his enjoyment of the game.

He hadn’t thought about it much at all until yesterday; in fact he had forgotten it entirely until then. But since then it had become a preoccupation, cluttering up the corners of his mind while he was trying very hard to think about something else.

If he could only remember what he’d done with it. That was what bothered him, more than anything else. It had been a gift – the gift, given on the last day he’d seen him – and he’d apparently lost it. And the worst part was, he simply couldn’t think how.

They’d parted ways, and he’d tossed John the watch, and…and he’d kept it, until eventually he didn’t have it anymore. There was that long, puzzling blank in between.

He had told him he wouldn’t forget.

Someone elbowed him in the arm. “You feelin’ all right, Smith?”

“Hmm? Yes, yes, fine.” No matter how long he’d been lost in thought, Manchester’s (that was the one in red, wasn’t it?) score remained at a discouraging zero. “Why, what happened?”

“The ref’s an idiot is what happened,” Browning interrupted. “How was that a foul? He barely even touched him! Blind bastard.”


Random Three/Liz pr0ns, begun long ago for the Het Porn-a-thon and occasionally puttered with when I want to feel like I’m doing something productive:

Any moment now, Liz thought, something would fall over. Probably something breakable. Probably something expensive.

Granted, most of the terribly important lab glassware was on another bench – even in the proverbial heat of the moment she knew better than to make sudden moves around the condenser – but this bench in particular still housed a rack of test tubes at least, maybe a beaker or two, to be taken into consideration.

Even if they’d been in a hurry (and they weren’t; neither of them had anywhere to be, indeed they could have been positively languorous at this very moment if it wasn’t broad daylight in the middle of the lab), there was a storage closet or some such thing not ten steps from the lab’s front doors. They wouldn’t even have needed to wait. Putting all this equipment in danger was completely unnecessary.


You know, the Rich Text entry editor used to work just peachy on FireFox. I'm not sure what's wrong with it now.

To bed, to bed.