stelly38

[stelly38]

Oh jeez, I’ve spent countless hours staring at those perfect, heaving man-tiddies; burning their image onto my retinas and etching it into my brain. And as fun as that is, I don’t think ‘enlightenment’ is ever the resulting feeling.

aidan turner as declan o'hara in rivals, episode eight.

[stelly38]

Taggie's so happy for him!

[stelly38]

I am convinced that Harriet Walter and Matthew McFayden have been in every period drama ever produced, whether film, television, or stage. Every. Single. One.

Even if you don't see them, they're there.

[stelly38]

And who gets to shampoo it? Don't forget the conditioner, to make it silkier than it already is naturally. For the shampoo, would you put the whole man in the bath, or would you just lather him up while he sits in a chair? What if he gets his pants wet from all the water running down his chest? Guess those pants would just have to come off. And that would be such a shame...

aidan turner as declan o'hara in rivals, episode eight.

[stelly38]

I adore Charles Fairburn. He should have had more screen time. Maybe for S2?

[stelly38]

Do you think he combs or brushes it? Did they have a special chest-hair-wrangler on set? Maybe she got to touch him up right before shirtless scenes?

It's sick how much the gifs of this scene have mesmerized me, like a deer caught in horny headlights.

aidan turner as declan o'hara in rivals, episode eight.

[stelly38]

It’s been a while since I found a show as utterly charming and captivating as Around the World in 80 Days.  I’d never read the Jules Verne novel, nor had my husband, but he did take a moment to find out what had been changed from the source material.  A good amount, but not to the show’s detriment, (at least in this viewer’s opinion).  I also read a few review columns that seem to agree, claiming the series was a vast improvement upon the book, both in terms of plot and characterization. 

I loved it so much I don’t know where to begin… I mean, David Tennant is spectacular in everything, as he was in this.  The man is an extraordinary actor, seamlessly morphing from someone deserving a good throttle to someone in great need of a hug all in a matter of seconds.  But he should not overshadow the two other primaries, Ibrahim Koma as Jean Passepartout, and Leonie Benesch as Miss Fix.  One of the more endearing storylines in the show was the burgeoning romance between Passepartout and Miss Fix, and it was a delight to watch the two navigate their feelings toward each other. 

Phileas Fogg’s friend bets him he can’t actually complete a trip around the world in eighty days, and the race is on, taking the unlikely trio through Paris, Italy, the Arabian Peninsula, India, Hong Kong, an unnamed island in the Pacific, and finally, America.  At each stop, one or more members of the trio bumble into predicaments and then are either saved by the other members, or they manage to bumble back out.  Through all the bumbling (often to comedic and tense effect), our characters learn about tradition, family, love, progress, and feminism.  One or more of these themes was central to the subplot at each geographic location.  

So, I thought it was perfect, then, that the only theme America had to offer was one of guns and racism.  That seems to be all we’ve ever offered.  I can’t emphasize enough how spot-on this choice was.  Hats off to the writers. 

The series included a few instances of saccharine, family-appropriate vignettes (usually enough to turn me off), but something about the story, and David Tennant’s charming portrayal of Fogg, kept me happily riveted. Even my husband was won over (he approaches most of my period drama picks with a skeptical eye). 

Tennant is eminently watchable, and this show sealed the deal.  Going forward, I will watch David Tennant read the phone book.  Or something similarly dull, because they don’t make phone books anymore.  I will watch him in nearly anything.

This series was a fun little distraction. Find it on streaming; start with your PBS affiliate.

[stelly38]

Aidan Turner in Article Magazine [part 5]

[stelly38]

Reblog daily for health and prosperity

[stelly38]

Found in a sarKafkagus?

Khepri, Late Period, ca. 664-332 BC. Now in the Egyptian Museum of Berlin.

[stelly38]

And for you, sir? Steak, still mooing.

[stelly38]

Phileas Fogg | Around the World in 80 Days. 1.02

[stelly38]

This review contains spoilers.

‘Epic’ was the word that hung in my mind after watching The Brutalist.  Everything about the picture was epic, from the allegorical story, spanning thirty-three years, to the larger-than-life characters, to the three-and-a-half-hour run time (which includes a fifteen minute intermission).  It was shot in 35mm VistaVision, and I was lucky enough to see it on an IMAX screen. 

The story follows Hungarian jew László Tóth from his entry at Ellis Island through his success as a talented and respected architect in his new country.  Everything in between, however, is what shapes him, and later in the story, his wife (Felicity Jones).  László has an already-assimilated cousin, Attila, who welcomes him to his home in Pennsylvania.  László’s first encounter with the cousin’s Catholic wife includes a conversation where she asks what happened to his nose.  Indeed, he’d injured it, but the question is purposely ambiguous; the viewer isn’t immediately sure if her intent is pure.  This incident foreshadows many of László’s encounters with Americans as he navigates finding employment, leaving his cousin’s house, homelessness, drug addiction, and the arduous process of bringing his wife and niece over from Europe. 

He meets Harrison Van Buren, (Guy Pearce), who becomes a kind of employer/patron, hiring him to design and build a large community center. Van Buren inserts himself into every facet of László’s life, offering him a place to stay on his vast estate, inviting him to dine with the family, and easing, through his wealth and influence, many processes that would be difficult or impossible for most immigrants to manage. For his part, Pearce was exceptional in the role, exuding out-of-touch aristocratic arrogance at every turn. Van Buren liked to think of himself as a ‘friend’ of László’s, but their relationship was anything but. The community center project dragged on over multiple hurdles, and was subject, at any time, to Van Buren’s rages.  At various points, it looked like the project was all but kaput.  The film reached an emotional and symbolic climax in a scene between Van Buren and Tóth that takes place in an Italian marble mine, during a business trip to procure materials for the community center.  It is here that Van Buren’s true character is confirmed, and the men have a falling out that seems (for reasons that should be obvious) irreparable. 

“This place is rotten; this country is rotten,” his wife Erszabet says, after learning what horrors Tóth endured in that Italian marble mine.  This line really encapsulated the movie for me, and was the phrase that stuck around in my head long after the credits had rolled. This isn’t an easy film to watch, but it is beautiful.  It brilliantly turns the story of the American Dream on its head, and exposes it for what it really is—a myth.

The last scene takes place in 1980, where László is shown in a wheelchair, at a celebratory retrospective of his career, the Venice Biennale.  The community center eventually was completed, although that wasn’t shown.  Regardless of how difficult the job had been, or how toxic his boss was, Tóth kept coming back to finish the project, to labor through low points, quitting, red tape, and a tragic sexual assault.  But we learn that he was driven to finish it because he’d designed the structure to symbolize the link he’d felt with his wife when they were both being held in different concentration camps during the war.

Tóth gets the last laugh, however: his structures were artistic replications of concentration camps, actualized in churches, community centers, and schools—those ubiquitous, pedestrian places that house the mundane, day-to-day existence of most Americans.  

Criticism of Corbet’s picture is pointed at gaps in the story.  More specifically, that certain characters aren’t fleshed out; that Harrison Van Buren disappears without any explanation, etc).  However, if you believe this film to be an allegory, these gaps simply don’t matter.  Harrison disappeared the way the wealthy elite have always been disappearing when shit gets real—they have money, friends in high places, political clout—access that allows them to make all the bad stuff go away. There are never any real or lasting consequences for them.

The film is so packed with symbolism that you could take apart all the dialogue and put it back together again, analyze every shot, and still find that all the meaning has not been wrung from it. 

Catch this in theaters currently. You’ll be thinking about it for a while. 

[stelly38]

Tag game: people I'd like to know better!

Thanks for the tag, @rapha-reads !

Last song: That Old Feeling, by Mr. Chet Baker, pictured above.

Last book: Almost finished with Rivals, by Jilly Cooper. I'm really liking it.

Last TV show: Currently watching the 2008 TV series Little Dorrit, with Claire Foy and Matthew McFayden.

Sweet/savory/spicy: Spicy, then savory. And the spicy has to be really spicy, like pain-and-running-sinuses-and-streaming-tears-spicy. Heavenly.

Relationship status: Married to my man for almost twenty years!

Last thing I googled: Directions from my house to the vet. My cat had an appointment.

Looking forward to: maybe fall... we might be able to take a vacay this year (fingers crossed).

Current obsession: Same stuff as usual: hairy-chested men; hot naked men, Aidan Turner, various other boyfriends, especially those that are hot and naked, etc. etc. etc.

I'll tag the following folks... no pressure; play if you like.

@persephones-journey @therearentwords @pegleggysue @hampop @shirley-girly @chelebelleslair @dim-anas

[stelly38]

I'm trying to figure out where I should be, mentally, in terms of the new administration. I don't do a whole lotta political anything on tumblr, because it is my single escape site, where I come to take refuge from all of that. And for the most part, it works.

Obviously, I can't insulate myself from news. It gets in, especially in our insane 24-hour news cycle.

But after the first two (?) days of the new administration, shit ain't looking so good. My frustration with following various individuals and various news organizations is that all they seem capable of doing is telling me how terrible shit is, and how much more terrible it's going to get. And I have ended up unfollowing and blocking all of those that I used to pay attention to: all the Robert Reichs, the Dan Rathers, the Cenk Uygurs, etc., etc. Because no one, not a single one of them, could ever tell me what to do in the face of very real horrible shit, like what's going on now. All they could do was tell me how fucked we all were, and then ruminate on all the different ways we were going to be fucked in the future.

And I'm just not interested in that anymore. I don't need a hundred different talking heads all telling me the same thing ad nauseam.

What I would like to find is someone who's been through shit like this before, who can advise how to navigate it. When should I panic? When should I leave the country? Is that even rational? How do I gauge when to bolt?

Tumblr folks, I'd appreciate your input. Do you know anyone (or are you someone) who has navigated something like this before?

And for the record, I vote, every election, up and down ballot, and I live in a blue state where my representatives already vote the way I would have them. I have two "minority" strikes against me: I'm female, and I'm jewish.

What say, yous?

[stelly38]

They shaved his chest for this, whatever it is, but I can only be a little mad, because fucking look at him.

[stelly38]

oh, holy christ.

LEO SUTER Vikings: Valhalla #3.03 "Lost"