#& i do take a lot of inspiration from the remake where she feels more realistically well rounded in regards to her ability to remain calm

[nitrateglow]

Scattered thoughts on the West Side Story remake

In general, I really enjoyed the film, largely on the strength of the performances. Everyone ranged from pretty good to amazing, with Rachel Ziegler and Ariana DeBose being the standouts. And Rita Moreno's supporting part was brilliant-- I like how she was given a substantial role and not just a lame ass cameo.

The music and dancing were great too. Ziegler's voice is just gorgeous. One trend I don't like in some modern musicals is casting famous people who cannot sing (Russell Crowe in Les Mis and Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan in Mamma Mia still haunt my nightmares). While not everyone here is a 100% unknown, I like that everyone seems to have been hired because they can actually hit the notes.

I thought the beefed up backstories for some of the characters were really interesting. (Chino's buffed up personality and background were my favorite of these new touches. He goes from being a breathing plot device to a truly tragic figure in this version.) I know some people don't like how Tony was made into an ex-con, but I appreciate that this time around they wanted to make him feel more like a credible ex-gang member. That's something I never bought in the 1961 film.

Speaking of the 1961 version, I haven't seen it in a few years, so I can't compare the two in more detail, though I do remember enough to where I can say I preferred the staging and direction in certain scenes in the older film. A lot of it has to do with my personal aesthetic preferences though.

Like, I'm not as crazy about Spielberg's staging of Tony and Maria's first encounter at the dance. The dancing between the rival groups is spectacular, but there's so much going on that the lovers get overwhelmed by it. The blocking of the scene has them retreat behind the bleachers to have their first dance (a parallel to showing Romeo and Juliet's instant chemistry through a conversation in sonnet form). However, I much prefer the 1961 film's dreamy approach, where time slows and only the lovers remain in focus. I get not wanting to repeat such an iconic moment or it coming off as corny in the 2020s, but I don't think it was replaced by anything of equal inspiration.

Actually, this brings me to a general issue I had with the remake's more pronounced "gritty and realistic" approach. One on hand, it makes sense-- the original show and 1961 film were noted for their realism, or at least, their very expressionist-tinged realism. It's meant to contrast with the romanticism of the lovers, who like Romeo and Juliet, want to go "Somewhere" their love won't be poisoned by divided loyalties and violence.

However, the more pronounced sense of unvarnished reality has two drawbacks in Spielberg's version. One, it makes the "falling in honestly and truly love in less than 48 hours" thing a bit harder to swallow. I can buy love at first sight in heightened, operatic reality-- less so in a setting that wants to resemble everyday reality.

Second, there are a hell of a lot of moments where characters break into song and the extras around them give them "wtf" looks. It's like the gag in Enchanted where Giselle starts singing in the park and Robert's like, "what now," only that movie's a meta-parody of animated musicals and WSS wants me to invest in this world and these characters. Having other people go "0_0" when someone sings takes me out the movie. You can't have your old-fashioned musical and your 21st century "lol irony take nothing seriously" schtick in the same film.

But overall, I really enjoyed this one. It's a remake that isn't just a rehash of a beloved film and it makes decisions that distinguish it completely. I plan on rewatching the 60s version, actually, just to reintroduce myself to it, since it has been over half a decade now.

[fandomsideworks]

Played Alone in the Dark (2024).

Gameplay wasn't bad, graphics were slightly glitchy for me, but on God, they needed to develop this story more.

The Dark Man and the cult thing just didn't mesh very well in terms of story.

I played Emily first, and when Edward was telling her about his investigation into the cult, I thought "Oh, okay, cool- Emily's story centers around the Dark Man because it's ties in with her uncle, but Edward's will be more focused on figuring out the cult."

Except both of their stories center on the Dark Man.

If I recall correctly there's an implication that the cult is using Jeremy Hartwood for something, but nothing really comes of it. The cult just kind of gets pushed into the background (and into in-game documents) while the Dark Man is front and center.

This game is very similar to the Resident Evil 2 remake (which is ironic because the first Alone in the Dark was inspiration for Resident Evil) and if you've played that game, you know that while Claire and Leon explore a lot of the same levels and deal with the same enemies, they also explore other locations because their stories take slightly different paths.

The only time that I recall Emily and Edward's locations diverging is when they're going into their kind of Personal Demons- which, I should also mention, was another aspect not very well fleshed-out in this game. Emily goes to a WWI trench, and Edward goes to a few different locales in his memories.

I really wish the game had done that differently. I wish that Emily had been focused on the Dark Man, and Edward's thing had been the cult. I also wish the devs had done more to clearly connect Jeremy, the Dark Man, and the cult.

The other thing that bugged me was like... They're not on the same page. Depending on who you're playing as, the other MC will act like you're crazy if you start bringing up monsters. I don't know if it's that the devs couldn't figure out a way to realistically separate Edward and Emily without one of them dealing with the supernatural and the other just having a really weird night at Derceto, but it didn't really help the already non-existent chemistry between these two characters.

Edward's backstory was somewhat better developed, in the sense that they dropped hints that he knew Grace pre-game.

Emily's was just... Clunky. She knows Lottie and Baptiste (I might be misremembering their names), but they know her by her husband's name, except that she doesn't want to be known by it anymore, so where do they know her from and in what capacity, then later we find out she's a governess, then when the game's nearly over we find out about her husband.

They could have done more to lay some groundwork about Emily's past with her husband, maybe drop a few more hints that she's been to Derceto before for reasons unrelated to her uncle. Overall I feel like she and Edward (again, Edward to a lesser extent) and their backgrounds were not built up as smoothly as they could have been. Their backstories largely seem like afterthoughts that suddenly become relevant towards the end of the game.

Again, I liked the game itself well enough- mechanics were good, I enjoyed hunting for the little items whose names I can't remember (langnipipes?), I thought the enemies were interesting in design. But they really should have spent some time smoothing out the story and making it more coherent, especially the main characters.

[yngai]

thinking about how poorly ada wong crosses over into other horror franchises as opposed to non-horror as a general rule of thumb

[deadlymodern]

Thank you for tagging me, @herpixels​​! 🌼

I'm not going to tag anyone specific because I literally wanna see everyone's take on this. So, please, if you want to, do it! 

I went a bit overboard, sorry 😗If you actually read it all, I will love you forever.

YOUR WRITING PROCESS 

Show us a part of your script or explain how you write your scenes. Do you write in screenplay format or novel format? Etc, etc.

I love writing in novel format but, for sims storytelling, I feel the need to write a screenplay.

I start by writing all the dialogue along with the action cues and setting descriptions. This helps me visualize how much space I will need for the characters, which and how many props will be necessary etc.

From the simple screenplay, I make a shooting script and a checklist. 

The shooting script is super helpful because it allows me to break my screenplay down into shots so I go in game already knowing exactly what I want from it. 

This will all sound like I think I'm some big shit but honestly... I just get brain farts WAY too often. So having everything kind of ready helps me remember little things like ADDING THE DAMN POSES INTO THE S4S for examples lmao.

SCENE BUILDING 

Show us you in the middle of scene building through pictures, gifs, or a video. Explain what is the best thing about scene building and what is the worst!

Scene/world building is 100% my favourite part of the whole process! 

I use a lot of references from the real world. The small coastal village of Brindleton is based on many places in England, mostly villages/towns in Cornwall and Devon. 

I enjoy looking for inspiration pictures on Pinterest and going on Google Earth tours, really LMAO.

Of course, there is only so much I can do with Sims to make it look realistic, but if you squint your eyes and shift your head, maybe? fjhgdfhjkg

I do the same for my residential lots and interiors. But interiors are a bit more fun for me because, besides not needing to worry about background extras, I can personalize the environment to my characters. 

CC/POSE MAKING 

Do you make your own cc/poses for your scene? If so, what is your process like to create? Do you just go off the top of your head? Do you use reference photos?

Nowadays, I make 98% of my poses. The remaining 2% is just me making some adjustments on pre-existing ones. I can't help it. I absolutely love seeing my visions come to life like this. 

I also enjoy making poses because I like giving my characters some distinguished body language. 

For example, Beth is the only character who slightly puckers her lips to the left. Usually, when she's thinking or when she's upset. It's basically the main part of her face - other than her eyebrows - that will give her true feelings away.

And Mary, on the other hand, is way less emotionally repressed. Any minor inconvenience will make her upper lips twitch upwards. She also pouts a lot more and has more eyebrow movements. 

Yes, I am a loser for paying attention to these things shhhhhhh.

Usually, I don't need anything other than an accessory or two. But lately, I've been LOVING to make recolours and convert objects into pose accessories. Whenever I have my script ready, I take note of what I will need for the scene in my checklist.

You probably don't even notice or care as much as I do, but still! They add much to the narrative imo and I feel like I'm giving depth to the characters by tailoring their accessories and the world around them. It's really fun for me!

GETTING IN THE ZONE

What do you do to get in the zone to work on a scene? Examples include: show us your playlist you use when working on a scene, what’s your go-to scene snack/drink, etc.

I have playlists on my Spotify for the main characters as well as one for the story. Beth and Mary's individual playlists are the ones I listen to the most and they are called Countryside Teacup and European Train Ride respectively because these are the vibes I get from the songs in there dslkfjsklfsd.

I also LOVE listening to instrumental playlists on youtube like this Cottagecore and this Royaltycore ✨massive points to you if you can find my comment on the royalty core video 🌚

I don't really snack while working on my story posts but I drink mate tea like CRAZY or, sometimes, I'll just have a beer to get my creative juices flowing ehe.

SCREENSHOTS FOLDER

Give us a look into your screenshot folder to show us just how much goes into ONE scene for your story. (Scrapped pictures encouraged!!!)

I never take too many screenshots with different angles because of my pre-planning! 

However, I do have, like, 10 to 15 repeated shots because I take some with DOF, some without, some with shadows, some without etc. And I'm always terrified of the screenshot not working, so I press the my hot keys like 5x jddjlkgd.

Here are some scrapped pictures from previous story posts:

CAPTIONS

Are you a caption on the picture kind of storyteller or captions in text box type of storyteller? Why? Do you do both?

I love doing the graphic novel format, with "speech bubbles" sort of. I personally find it immersive. But I also love and crave for the novel format, so I'll write a little "after scene" sometimes in the text box for extra depth ☺️

EDITING

Explain and show us your process editing a scene through a video, gif, or picture. A Before and after will suffice if you aren’t in the middle of editing a scene as you answer this.

Since I've done a few posts telling a bit about my editing - and, truthfully, not much goes into it - here is a before and after!

THROWBACK

Show us an ANCIENT story scene you done in the past and explain how you would do the scene differently today!

Okay, ANYTHING from my early simblr days is cringe worthy. The dialogue isn't good, the lighting is extremely yellow - due to my crappy laptop -, the outfits and the settings are all over the place, I--

I chose this one image because it was one of the first times I was doing a story post instead of just a gameplay update. I don't even have much else to add, just look at it jkljdfklgjdf. 

But I'm going to have plenty of scenes set in the past where I will get the chance to remake the school and dress my teen girls properly and I'm so excited. Like, making slate pose accessory excited fjdigjfido oh, boy.

[inmyarmswrappedin]

Admittedly it’s been awhile since I watched Skam or looked through their instagram posts, but in my memory it always felt like the instas were just used to give another glimpse into the characters, never anything really flashy, and the way each character used their accounts always felt really true to who they were. But I think the remakes use it way more as an extension of the storylines and it feels less realistic? (For lack of a better word) Like a lot of posts just feel like pure

staged fan service (see: Wtf, Skamfr) or they go a little overboard with content (see: Druck) that goes beyond what I’d actually envision the characters “sharing”. I don’t know if that makes sense? And I could be idealizing how Skam used it too, since like I said it’s been awhile since I looked at the og stuff. But yeah, I feel like the remakes have turned the social media aspect of the shows into a bit of a cringefest. 😳 What do you think?

Hi anon 📳 Sorry for the delay, I think this is a very interesting ask, and I wanted to think about it a bit before answering.  

I’ll leave aside the question of realism, which you noted yourself you used for lack of a better word. I think at this point the discussion about the way Skam approaches “realism” is more nuanced than how it was used when there wass only one Skam.   

I guess I would say that Skam used the instagram accounts mainly in two ways: 1) so the characters could all show how they wanted other people to see them, and 2) as the cherry on top to a character arc, when the character would post something more vulnerable on his/her ig account. 

I think in general the remake teams didn’t fully get the point of the ig accounts because these teams weren’t really fans who followed Skam as it dropped. They came to the ig accounts as a finished product. 

Skam France posted a veritable torrent of content for s1 and s2, and I think some of it was really good. I really liked Yann’s ig account, for instance. I thought his posts really leaned on Jonas’ political side, which not all remake Jonases did. I also liked that the girl squad would hang out at random places (like a Sephora and a park iirc) without Manon, in s2, to show how Manon was growing distant from the squad because of her relationship with Charles. 

But one thing that started with Skam France was creating ig content for every clip. So that when a clip dropped, a bunch of pics and stories from every character involved in the scene would also drop. I think this is just not really necessary? Most high school students don’t document every school day like this, or even document every time they go to the movies, meet up to discuss fundraising ideas, go buy some snacks at a convenience store, and so on and so forth. 

On the other hand, we also have to allow for the idea that technology marches on. When Skam was airing, ig stories were still pretty new. Most people posted memes and random shit to their instagram feed, rather than to their stories. Nowadays feeds are more curated, and stories are for shitposting. So one aspect of how Skam used igs, which was to post content that would clearly define a character (such as Paradise Hotel memes for Eva, cheesy inspirational quotes for Vilde, or news clips for Sana) would probably all just go on stories nowadays. Compare the Skam igs with the Skam Austin igs in s1 (or, like, your memory of the Austin igs, since FB deleted them............), which were also created by Julie Andem and Mari Magnus, and we can already see some changes in the way teens used instagram (even allowing for cultural differences between Norway and the US). The pics would look “better” as in more professional, better lit, better angles used. Whereas the Skam characters seemingly would take a pic and then posted it, it was as if the Austin characters had taken a bunch of pics and posted only the really good ones. I also don’t remember the Austin characters posting memes either to their feed or even to their stories. 

When it comes to Druck... I absolutely agree that I don’t really buy high school students would post that much content and so personal, and it also loses the effect when there’s so much content posted. For instance, Nora’s Nov 13 post is the first time Zoe appears in Nora’s ig feed, which was a momentous occasion because Zoe confessed to her sister that she felt judged by Nora. But Nora had previously posted so much Zoe content on her stories, that the milestone of posting Zoe to her feed went unnoticed.

But then on the other hand, Druck has a limited episode runtime (where Skam didn’t) and viewers have consistently responded favorably to the Skams developing storylines on social media away from the main. People ate it up when Isak posted pics of his life with Even in s4. And I don’t necessarily dislike the concept of giving more meaning to certain lines or moments by adding context over social media. E.g.: without social media, we would have little to no idea what Finn and Zoe argued about towards the end of the season. Thanks to the chats we do, and thanks to the ig content, we’re actually invested in Finn and Zoe working out, because we’ve seen them act coupley in so much content. What about Kiki and Carlos’ apartment? Would we care that much about it if there hadn’t been so much content of the gen 1 characters “renovating” it? 

Since we’re talking about different remakes, I admit I’ve never been a huge fan of how much content the Skam España characters posted. Much like with Skam France, I feel like sometimes they just shot content to go with the clip, pretty much to promote the clip in a way, and when I look at their feeds now, I just feel there are so many generic posts that are super cute, yes, but don’t really tell me anything about the characters or what they were going through at the time or what they wanted people to think their lives were like at the time. To be clear, a lot of their posts do tell me stuff about the characters and what they were going through and what they wanted people to think their lives were like. But many of those posts could be gone and I wouldn’t miss them. For me, it’s the difference between having Mari Magnus, who for so long was Julie Andem’s right hand woman and assisted in every step of creating Skam, come up with and post the ig content, and hiring someone like Gominuke, a well-known influencer, who knows how to use ig to promote a product. While we’re talking about the way a social media manager’s background and personality will affect the sm content for the Skam, Druck hired Farid-Philippe Bouatra starting with s2, and he was really good at coming up with reasons why introverted characters such as Matteo would post consistently (#MatteoMonday and #FlorenziFriday). 

Anyway. Obviously Skam France hiring professional photographers for their sm content and posting these photoshoots to the characters’ accounts is cringy as all fuck, and no one beats Wtfock at generic, bland posts that don’t say anything about who a character is, what they’re going through or what they want people to think their lives are like. There was a time where I was slightly salty about Wtfock characters posting more memes and shitposts than the Skam España characters, but that all went away after oh, the 20th generic food post coming out of Antwerp. People come at Nora Grace for her feminist posts, but do we want to talk about Zoë’s abundance of shallow “girl power!” (I will not call those posts feminist) pics? Or what about literally monetizing the social media by having Kato post a legit ad for makeup? 

[nadziejastar]

I’m glad the creators want to emphasize thatCloud’s “badass, silent dude” personality was just a fake persona he created. I think a lot of fans had the misconception that was his true personality all along.

Warning: FVII Spoilers

Nomura: “While Cloud may look this way, he was a dork. I believe those of you who played the the original would understand what I mean by saying he’s a dorky character.”

I totally agree. I think a lot of people aren’t good at picking up subtle characterization, especially since the original game didn’t have advanced cutscenes or voice acting. Cloud always seemed like a dork to me after I learned he really had dissociative identity disorder and his whole SOLDIER thing was just a persona--an alter. Barret knew it, and made fun of him. So many people complained that Cloud was OOC in Advent Children and I remember feeling confused because I really didn’t think he was? He was depressed, but it seemed realistic after everything he’d been through.

“In severe cases of mental splitting when the extreme pain drives that person into disassociation, at the moment the person disassociates from their body, the soul-psyche manifest coping mechanisms to survive. To disassociate from the painful trauma felt in the body, the soul and mind will split into sub personalities, or create alternate identities. These are called alters.”

While we’re on the topic of Cloud’s fake badass silent persona, the way Tifa repairs Cloud’s fractured mind in FFVII always reminded me of the power of waking in KH. I’m sure FFVII was the precursor to this idea. Cloud developed his badass persona when he watched Zack get murdered right in front of him. He dissociated and took on a tough guy alter in order to cope.

Sora turned around. Empty husks? Is he saying they’re going to break them with sorrow and put another heart into them…? Or did they already do it?

“Translation—they were gonna turn all the members into Xehanort.”

“Make more Xehanorts?” You’re hollowing out people’s hearts to put Xehanort’s inside them?!

In order to turn people into Xehanorts, they had to break the person’s psyche with pain. That way, the Xehanort “alter” can take over the body. I’m sure that’s what the mind control experiments were about.

You could say Cloud’s heart was in the Realm of Sleep, like Ventus’s was when he first met Terra and Aqua. He was unable to talk and he was not really aware of his surroundings. Cloud’s mind was in pieces and Tifa had to “dive” inside his psyche to repair him and restore him to completeness.

KH3′s tagline was “face your fears”. When I write my KH3 rewrite fic, I wanna give each of the Seven Guardians one of these segments to fully explore their fractured psyche. A time for them to face their insecurities and fears, and actually show them being healed. That’s THE biggest thing I think KH3 was missing. Before waking up, each character needed a Tifa to help them piece themselves together. Riku got swallowed by the Demon Tower in the beginning. I think the Demon Tower was supposed to be something that causes you to be trapped in your worst nightmare. Then he’d have to face his fears with the help of Mickey. His “other self”. He’d have to confront all his insecurities and his guilt over feeling like it was his fault Destiny Island got destroyed.

Mickey got swallowed by the Demon Tower later on. Then he had to deal with his guilt over feeling like he failed Aqua and left her to rot in the Dark Realm. I think the Dark Aqua boss fight was probably originally supposed to be part of Mickey’s nightmare that Riku was trying to wake him from. All the things she said sounded like a reflection of Mickey’s worst fears. And that darkness bubble thing looked like the same thing Sora was trapped in at the end of KH3D, when he was in the nightmare.

I think ALL the main characters, including Sora, were supposed to get a segment like that to give their arcs closure. Sora would have to dive into the abyss at the beach (the KH equivalent of the Lifestream that Cloud fell into). That beach is basically the collective unconscious. All of Sora’s sleeping memories (of Castle Oblivion/Namine, Roxas, and Xion) would have to be confronted. And after that, he’d have to help Aqua face her worst feelings, which was that she failed to save Ven and Terra.

The whole opening of 0.2 foreshadowed the part where Sora would wake Aqua up. Sora didn’t really connect with her heart in KH3 or help her face her fears, though. The whole saving Aqua thing felt so rushed. I think higher ups at either Square or Disney thought that a AAA game like KH3 shouldn’t “waste” so much time with exploring the characters’ psyches and the story needed to move at a faster pace. But we missed out on so much.

I’m sure Ven was supposed to face his fears of feeling like he failed Terra. Lea would have to face his fear that he abandoned Isa for his new best friends and forgot all about him. He’d have a lot of guilt over that and he’d have to face a Nightmare Saix which would be the manifestation of all his worst fears. Honestly, I’m sure the FFVII Remake will do a better job demonstrating the power of waking than KH3. Which is sad.

Back to Cloud. In Crisis Core, you see a shy insecure kid who can’t even face Tifa. That’s the real Cloud. The part of himself he can’t accept.

Cloud never even really wanted to be a SOLDIER for its own sake.

He just wanted to accomplish something. He was lonely and depressed and thought a man was “supposed to be” a soldier. He just wanted to be noticed by Tifa. And Tifa didn’t know this. She genuinely thought Cloud was just a typical boy who wanted to leave home so he could fight in the war.

She took care of him during his time of weakness. And the whole point of FFVII was that Cloud was “weak”. I liked that he wasn’t the generic badass hero who simply “won” the girl by being strong and cool. And it made me like Tifa, too. At first, she wanted her and Cloud to fulfill the stereotypical heterosexual relationship roles. She told Cloud that when she was in trouble, her hero would come rescue her. Then Tifa got to know the real Cloud.

He loved her. But he wasn’t really that heroic. Even his mom thought he needed a girlfriend that would take care of him. But Tifa accepted him anyways, even when he didn’t live up to her knight in shining armor fantasy. She got her relationship with him, with all its flaws. She was HIS hero, actually. I liked that because FFVII was really the first game I ever played where the main couple had what I thought was genuine intimacy instead of simply the girl being the “prize”. And I LOVE FFVII. After he is pieced back together, Cloud acts completely differently. He isn’t cocky or cool. He seemed humble, quiet, and not so much a natural “leader” type.

Zack was the badass everyone thought Cloud was. He took care of Cloud after they were experimented on and Cloud was broken. I cannot help but think that Lea and Isa’s past was originally similar to theirs after being experimented on. Crisis Core was an inspiration for me in imagining their past. Lea is similar to Zack. Cheerful, confident, resilient, and heroic. Very compassionate, too. The way he talked to Cloud even when he was “broken” was very sweet. And I think Isa was similar to Cloud who is more sensitive, vulnerable, and needy. Cloud mentally fractured after watching Zack die in front of him. I wanted to write something similar with Lea and Isa. Isa mentally shatters because he witnessed Lea lose his heart. :)

[mamcollection]

Artist Gina Beavers Satirizes Our Insatiable Appetite for Personal Beauty in Her New Show at Marianne Boesky

Makeup as Muse: Gina Beavers

November 28, 2020

Despite my art history background and general love of art, I am less than eloquent when writing about it.  Nevertheless I will continue soldiering forward with the Museum's Makeup as Muse series, the latest installment of which focuses on the work of Gina Beavers in honor of her recent show at Marianne Boesky Gallery. Beavers' practice encompasses a variety of themes, but it's her paintings of makeup tutorials that I'll be exploring.  Since I'm both tired and lazy this will be more of a summary of her work rather than offering any fresh insight and I'll be quoting the artist extensively along with some writers who have covered her art, so most of this will not be my own words.

Born in Athens and raised in Europe, Beavers is fascinated by the excess and consumerism of both American culture and social media. "I don't know how to talk about this existence without talking about consumption, and so I think that's the element in consuming other people's images. That's where that's embedded. We have to start with consumption if we're going to talk about who we are. That's the bedrock—especially as an American," she says.  The purchase of a smart phone in 2010 is when Beavers' work began focusing on social media.  "[Pre-smart phone] I would see things in the world and paint them! Post-smartphone my attention and observation seemed to go into my phone, into looking at and participating in social media apps, and all of the things that would arise there...Historically, painters have drawn inspiration from their world, for me it's just that a lot of my world is virtual [now]."

But why makeup, and specifically, makeup tutorials?  There seem to be two main themes running through the artist's focus on these online instructions, the first being the relationship between painting and makeup.  Beavers explains:  "When I started with these paintings I was really thinking that this painting is looking at you while it is painting itself. It’s drawing and painting: it has pencils, it has brushes, and it’s trying to make itself appealing to the viewer. It’s about that parallel between a painting and what you expect from it as well as desire and attraction. It’s also interesting because the terms that makeup artists use on social media are painting terms. The way they talk about brushes or pigments sounds like painters talking shop."  Makeup application as traditional painting is a theme that goes back centuries, but Beavers's work represents a fresh take on it.  As Ellen Blumenstein wrote in an essay for Wall Street International: "Elements such as brushes, lipsticks or fingers, which are intended to reassure the viewers of the videos of the imitability of the make-up procedures, here allude to the active role of the painting – which does not just stare or make eyes at the viewer, but rather seems to paint itself with the accessories depicted – literally building a bridge extending out from the image...Beavers divests [the image] of its natural quality and uses painting as an analytical tool. The viewer is no longer looking at photographic tableaus composed of freeze-frames taken from make-up tutorials, but rather paintings about make-up tutorials, which present the aesthetic and formal parameters of this particular class of images, which exist exclusively on the net."  The conflation of makeup and painting can also be perceived as a rumination on authorship and original sources.  Beavers is remaking tutorials, but the tutorials themselves originated with individual bloggers and YouTubers.  And given the viral, democratic nature of the Internet, it's nearly impossible to tell who did a particular tutorial first and whether tutorials covering the same material - say, lip art depicting Van Gogh's "Starry Night"  - are direct copies of one artist's work or merely the phenomenon of many people having the same idea and sharing it online.  Sometimes the online audience cannot distinguish between authentic content and advertising; Beavers's "Burger Eye" (2015), for example, is actually not recreated from a tutorial at all but an Instagram ad for Burger King (and the makeup artist who was hired to create it remains, as far as I know, uncredited).

Another theme is fashioning one's self through makeup, and how that self is projected online in multiple ways.  Beavers explains: "I am interested in the ways existing online is performative, and the tremendous lengths people go to in constructing their online selves. Meme-makers, face-painters, people who make their hair into sculptures, are really a frontier of a new creative world...It’s interesting, as make-up has gotten bigger and bigger, I’ve realized what an important role it plays in helping people construct a self, particularly in trans and drag communities. I don’t normally wear a lot of make-up myself, but I like the idea of the process of applying make-up standing in for the process of self-determination, the idea of ‘making yourself’."

As for the artist's process, it's a laborious one. Beavers regularly combs Instagram, YouTube and other online sources and saves thousands of images on her phone. She then narrows down to a few based on both composition and the story they're trying to tell. "I'm arrested by images that have interesting formal qualities, color, composition but also a compelling narrative. I really like when an image is saying something that leaves me unsure of how it will translate to painting, like whether the meaning will change in the context of the history of painting," she says.  "I always felt drawn to photos that had an interesting composition, whether for its color or depth or organization. But in order for me to want to paint it, it also had to have interesting content, like the image was communicating some reality beyond its composition that I related to in my life or that I thought spoke in some interesting way about culture."  The act of painting for Beavers is physically demanding as well: she needs to start several series at the same time and go back and forth between paintings to allow the layers to dry.  They have to lay flat to dry so she often ends up painting on the floor, and her recent switch to an even heavier acrylic caused a bout of carpal tunnel syndrome.

But it's precisely the thick quality of the paint that return some of the tactile nature of makeup application.  This is not accidental; Beavers intentionally uses this technique as way to remind us of makeup's various textures and to ensure her paintings resemble paintings rather than a photorealistic recreation of the digital screen. "The depth of certain elements in the background of images has taught me a lot about seeing. I think I have learned that I enjoy setting up problems to solve, that it isn't enough for me to simply render a photo realistically, that I have to build up the acrylic deeply in order to interfere with the rendering of something too realistically," she explains.  Sharon Mizota, writing for the LA Times, says it best:  "Skin, lashes and lips are textured with rough, caked-on brushstrokes that mimic and exaggerate wrinkles and gloppy mascara. This treatment gives the subjects back some of the clunky physicality that the camera and the digital screen strip away. Beavers’ paintings, in some measure, undo the gloss of the photographic image."

Beavers also uses foam to further build up certain sections so that they bulge out towards the viewer, representing the desire to connect to others online.  "Much of what people do online is to try to create connection, to reach out and meet people or talk to people. That is what the surfaces of my painting do in a really literal way, they are reaching off the linen into the viewer’s space," she says.  This sculptural quality also points to the reality of the online world - it's not quite "real life" but it's not imaginary either, occupying a space in between.  Beavers expands on her painting style representing the online space: "It’s interesting because flatness often comes up with screens, and I think historically the screen might have been read like that, reflecting a more passive relationship. That has changed with the advent of engagement and social media. What’s behind our screen is a whole living, breathing world, one that gives as much as it takes. I mean it is certainly as 'real' as anything else. I see the dimension as a way to reflect that world and the ways that world is reaching out to make a connection. Another aspect is that once these works are finished, they end up circulating back in the same online world and now have this heightened dimensionality – they cast their own shadow. They’re not a real person, or burger, or whatever, but they’re not a photo of it either, they’re something in between."

Let's dig a little more into what all this means in terms of makeup, the beauty industry and social media.  Beavers' work can be viewed as a simultaneous critique and celebration of all three.  Sharon Mizota again: "[The tutorial paintings] also pointedly mimic the act of putting on makeup, reminding us that it is something like sedimentation, built up layer by layer. There is no effortless glamour here, only sticky accretion.  That quality itself feels like an indictment — of the beauty industry, of restrictive gender roles. But an element of playfulness and admiration lives in Beavers’ work.  They speak of makeup as a site of creativity and self-transformation, and Instagram and other social media sites as democratizing forces in the spread of culture. To be sure, social media may be the spur for increasingly outré acts, which are often a form of bragging, but why shouldn’t a hamburger eye be as popular as a smoky eye? In translating these photographs into something more physical, Beavers asks us to consider these questions and exposes the duality of the makeup industry: The same business that strives to make us insecure also enables us to reinvent ourselves, not just in the image of the beautiful as it’s already defined, but in images of our own devising."

This ambiguity is particularly apparent in Beavers's 2015 exhibition, entitled Ambitchous, which incorporated beauty Instagrammers and YouTubers' makeup renditions of Disney villains alongside "good" characters.  Blumenstein explains: "So it isn’t protagonists with positive connotations which are favoured by the artist, but unmistakably ambivalent characters who could undoubtedly lay claim to the neologism ambitchous, which is the name given to the exhibition. Like the original image material, this portmanteau of ‘ambitious’ and ‘bitchy’ is taken from social media and its creative vernacular, and is used, depending on the context, either in a derogatory fashion – for example for women who will do absolutely anything to get what they want – or positively re-interpreted as an expression of female self-affirmation.  Beavers also applies this playful and strategic complication of seemingly unambiguous contexts of meaning to the statements contained in her paintings. It remains utterly impossible to determine whether they are critically exaggerating the conformist and consumerist beauty ideals of neo-capitalism, or ascribing emancipatory potential to the conscious and confident use of make-up."

More recently, Beavers has been using her own face as a canvas and making her own photos of them her source material, furthering her exploration of the self. "Staring at yourself or your lips for hours is pretty jarring. But I like it, because it creates this whole other level of self,” she says.

This shift also points to another dichotomy in Beavers's work: in recreating famous works of art on her face, she is both critiquing art history's traditional canon and appreciating it, referring to them as a sort of fan art.  "I think a lot of the works that I have made that reference art history—like whether it's Van Gogh or whoever it is—have a duality where I really respect the artist and I'm influenced by them, and at the same time I'm making it my own and poking a little fun. And so, a lot of these pieces originated with the idea of fan art. You'll find all sorts of Starry Night images online that people have painted or sculpted or painted on their body. It comes out of that. And I just started to reach a point where I was searching things like 'Franz Kline body art,' and I wasn’t finding that, so I had to make my own. Then it started to get a little bit geekier. I have a piece in the show where I am painting a Lee Bontecou on my cheek, that's a kind of art world geeky thing—you have to really love art to get it."

Ultimately, Beavers perceives the intersection of makeup and social media as a force for good.  While the specter of misinformation is always lurking, YouTube tutorials and the like allow anyone with internet access to learn how to do a smoky eye or a flawlessly lined lip.  "I think for a lot of people social media is kind of like the weather. We don't have a lot of control of it, it just is. It gives and it takes away. There's no doubt that it has connected people in ways that are great and productive, allowing people to find communities and organize activism, it can also be a huge distraction...I approach looking at images there pretty distantly, more as a neutral documentarian, and I come down on the side of seeing social media as an incredibly useful, democratic tool in a lot of ways," she concludes.

On the other side of social media, Beavers is interested on how content creators help disseminate the idea of makeup as representing something larger and more meaningful than traditional notions of beauty. "I was super fascinated with makeup and all of the kinds of costume makeup and things you can find online that go away from a traditional beauty makeup and go towards something really wild and cool...I also had certain paintings in [a 2016] show that were much more about costume makeup, that were going away from beauty. That’s the thing that gives me hope. When I go through makeup hashtags on Instagram, there will be ten or twenty beauty eye makeup images and then one that’s painted with horror makeup. There are women out there doing completely weird things, right next to alluring ones." In the pandemic age, as people's relationships with makeup are changing, "weird" makeup is actually becoming less strange. Beavers' emphasis on experimental makeup is more timely than ever.  I also think she's documenting the gradual way makeup is breaking free of the gender binary.  She says: "I mean with makeup, and the whole conversation around femininity and makeup—I think for a long time when I was making makeup images, there were people that just thought, 'Oh, that's not for me,' because it's about makeup, it's feminine. But it’s interesting, the culture is shifting. I just saw the other day that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did a whole Instagram live where she was putting on her makeup and talking about how empowering makeup is for trans communities...some people see make-up as restrictive or frivolous, but drag performers show how it can be liberating and life-saving."  Another point to consider in terms of gender is the close-up aspect of Beavers's paintings.  With individual features (eyes, lips, nails) separated from the rest of the face and body and removed from their original context, they're neither masculine nor feminine, thereby reiterating that makeup is for any (or no) gender.

All I can say is, I love these paintings.  Stylistically, they're right up my alley - big, colorful and mimicking makeup's tactile nature so much that I have a similar reaction to them as I do when seeing makeup testers in a store: I just want to dip my hands in them and smear them everywhere! I also enjoy the multiple themes and levels in her work. Beavers isn't commenting just on makeup in the digital age, but also self-representation online, shifting attitudes towards makeup's meaning, the relationship between painting and makeup, and Western art history.

What do you think of Beavers's paintings? 

[curejunereblogs]

An Extensive List of Phantom Thieves (怪盗)

but first the criteria:

The boundaries for what makes a thief a phantom and whether it's different from a gentleman thief are wobbly

We can't really just allow everyone who calls themselves "kaitou" to qualify, because there's Kaitou Sai from Nogami Neiro who is a serial killer which is A Very Bad Thing. most good examples of thieves have a "no kill" rule

If we set that they have to steal for Good Reasons, we cut off Kaitou Joker, who is very much a phantom thief, so we have to allow "thrill of the chase" as a valid-ish reason for stealing. no bonus points though, it just not instant disqualification

I found that "sends a calling card" is a good rule to stick to so I trimmed my original surprisingly long list based on whether I know for sure they send announcements or cards or letters or such. If you don't say "come and get me" to your target, you're pragmatic, a realist and also a coward

Which led me to a conclusion that to be a proper phantom thief, the main thing you should be after is the spotlight. You have to steal the show. Otherwise you're just a thief, maybe a gentleman, but not a phantom. Contrary to the name, you have to be seen. Good phantom thieves have a give-and-take relationship with their audience - they take the treasure, and give back a performance or some other form of entertainment (or purpose in life in some cases).

The following compilation doesn't include: books, hentai, eroge, BL, things where i couldn't translate the title into English, the ones that don't send calling cards(as far as i know) and in general a bunch of media i most definitely missed

Phantom Thief Hall of Fame:

- Kaito Kid(1987), Kaitou Saint Tail(1994) and Kaitou Joker(2007) are all brilliant examples of the genre, and if you don't know any of them, they all have a bunch of passionate fans each and they can all be googled really easily

- Joker and his gang from Persona 5(2017); i'm consiously placing him in the second/fourth place because even though he's really cool, very popular and is The phantom thief to a lot of people unfamiliar with the genre... he doesn't have a tophat (his persona is not enough)

- ... I'll just mention that Lupin the 3rd(1967) exists and go on

- and of course, Lupin III and about a quarter of all phantom thieves are in some way based on Arsène Lupin(1905) by Maurice Leblanc

- ex. there was a french-canadian cartoon about Lupin called Night Hood(1996)

- Cat's Eye(1981), cited as an inspiration for Saint Tail, is about a trio of sisters who steal stuff in order to get closer to their dad and it's epic

- Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne(1997), like Saint Tail, doubles as a magical girl series and is about magical stealing and the clothing is eastern and the manga swerves into weird territory in the end but it features one of the precious few phantom thief & phantom thief romances

- King of Bandits Jing(1995), while doesn't have the aesthetic, has the weirdness, the charm, the calling card (i think) and is generally cool enough to steal his place on the list whether he’s a phantom or not

- The Acrobat/Man of Twenty Faces(1990), also known as Akira Ijyuin; charming child somehow without most of the problems the CLAMP protagonists tend to suffer from

- Phantom R the titular Rhythm Thief(2012), a great example of a dancer show-off, has a dog

- The Black Rose from Ashita no Nadja(2003) is a tuxedo mask-esque character

- Kaitou Kiramekiman(2000) is a cool retrofuturistic-looking duo trying to save the world in a show that is tragically more about their police counterparts Doing Absolutely Nothing because the villains tend to be more popular in that franchise

- Pacricon(1999) takes place in a world where money has been cancelled(?), has a hella cool calling card

- Shadow Lady(1995)... well, there's a lot of fanservice - like, a lot, and it's tiring and i warned you - but there's also some genuinely funny twists like cancelling her heist on live tv just because she didn't feel like doing it. it also got very unceremoniously axed

- Kaitou Alexandrite(2006) owns/co-owns/frequents a bordel so there's some nsfw to be seen on occasion but it's tolerable and could be described as tasteful i guess. she stole someone's voice once. it also features one of the best identity reveals

- Chat Noir from Granblue Fantasy(2014) is a fighting unit; he has a "calling card" skill and i think that's beautiful

- Phantom Skye from Harvest Moon DS Cute(2005), a not-very-secret character, is an absolute cheese but it loops right back into being charming

- Kaito Rousseau(2006) for Nintendo DS, where a tiny thief boy is horrible at going unnoticed unless he disguises his face as whatever you draw on your ds screen

- Mask DeMasque from Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations(2004) is a thing?

- Sly Cooper(2002) is known as Kaitou Sly Cooper in Japan so he fits the bill

- PxP(2006), short manga about a girl thief in high school

- Sweet Kaitou Vanilla Moon(2010), pastry-themed phantom thief? hell yeah!

- Kaitou Reinya(2010), a short comedy that is not to be taken seriously but you might get a few chuckles from it and i don't regret giving it a second chance (warning: cartoonish animal abuse)

- Cat's Eye(s)(2010), a remake of the original tale of three sisters with different PoVs

- Kaitou Jack from Nishikida Keibu wa Dorobou ga Osuki(2013); it's a gag manga about a cute phantom thief boy and an old man detective that acts like a schoolgirl around that boy. ... I'm only mentioning it here because I like Jack's costume and "i'm-SO-done-with-this" faces and it's mostly intended to be funny. mostly.

- Kaitou Okami-Zoku Shonen(2013), a oneshot about a werewolf who eats people's hearts (metaphorically! through kisses) but is really stylish about it. Think P5 protagonist but alone and a werewolf

- Phantom Thief F's Scenario(2013) is a vocaloid song about a diamond heist on a luxury liner

- Kaitou Le Vin(2014) is about six people stealing wines and it's epic but they can't shut up about wine for one second

- Gaitou Alice(2015) is about a guy looking like Kaito Kuroba going into people's hearts to steal stuff before P5 made it cool. Features amazing artwork but kinda gross stuff closer to the end so it's kind of understandable why it got axed but it has a kind of weird charm to it

- Mystic Thief X from a mobile dating game Miss Detective's Undercover(2017) (i'm scraping for phantom thief content) is honestly excellent at his job. he might only be showing off for one person but damn it's romantic af and i love him

- Kaitou Shounen Jokers(2017) is a sequel to Kaitou Joker, and is directly about the previous protag's kid going to a phantom thief school (i have no hard evidence he sends calling cards but if he doesn’t take after dad i’m-)

- Kaitou Saint Tail girls!(2018), a sequel to Saint Tail, is very cute and has two new Saint Tails working together! i wish i knew more about it

- Kaitou Sentai Lupinranger VS Keisatsu Sentai Patranger(2018), live-action series that is a must-watch for anyone who loves phantom thieves because it's a masterpiece of a tv show; besides the three thieves it also features the best police officers in the genre (it kind of has to since they're protagonists too but boy does it deliver)

- Secret x Warrior Phantomirage(2019) is also a live action and it's all about girls stealing enchanted hearts! i actually don't know if they send cards but it feels right placing them after lupinrangers and they're definitely show-stealers

- Kilroy(2018) is a western comic about a guy who broke an unconventional mirror and has to do unconventional repairs

- Kaitou Kamaitachi(2018) has a cute reporter boy and a lot of butterflies

- Destined Memories(2019) is another mobile dating game, there are thieves (called the Crows) in victorian england and they send notices and it's way better at being a phantom thief story than an actual phantom thief story by this company that i'll maybe mention later if i get to compiling a list of thieves that don't send cards

- I really want to put Majo Kaitou Lip☆s(2019) in this category, I want her to send calling cards, but there's like two chapters out so there's still time. The artwork for this series is GORGEOUS and the idol imagery is amazing and i love it so much I just want her to be popular

i might've ignored some phantoms you may have heard about, but 50% i've checked and they don't send calling cards. If they do, additions are welcome!

[sinterblackwell]

harvest fireside amber fog

thank you! ❣️

autumnal asks

harvest - what fictional character do you most identify with? why?

i’d be repeating myself if i said kevin day from aftg but...kevin day. i was able to explain this more personally with @wetvoidstiles but in short, all the assumptions people made against him (readers and characters alike), all the potential he had from the moment he escaped the Nest, seeing him rise up to his own capabilities that emotionally impacted me for days afterward—they all just stuck with me and how perfectly it aligned with some of my own experiences.

he’s more an inspiration to me than anything else.

i think maybe another character could be kylie hood from “who’s afraid of the big bad wolf?” by janie marie. there was a moment that actually left me terrified where i felt a connection to her in that there’s some feelings that are incredibly hard to control, and for her, it absolutely consumed her. it’s one of those feelings that will pull you down if you let it and she actually got caught up in it for a while in the beginning, to the point where it became hard to read through her perspective.

how she eventually owned up to her own potential and gradually overcame that toxicity by just simply wanting to be a better person; that’s also something i identified with so just!! a new perspective.

fireside - if you had your dream wardrobe, what would it look like?

answered here. with photos to match!!

amber - share an unpopular opinion that you may have.

so, i answered this for @kritiquer and the funny thing about this is how my response probably would have made more sense if i wrote it for you since you have actually read aftg; so you may have been able to understand what i was talking about better. something even more ironic is how this opinion i’m sharing to you here may have worked better with kit.

another unpopular opinion i have is that i thought season three of wtfock (a skam remake, based in belgium; clips provided by @wtfockenglish if you’re interested) was actually written pretty well; their characters and the relationships that took place are what stand out to me most.

there were some things the writers should’ve handled more carefully (the hate crime, most notably), just like nora sakavic should’ve done as well in aftg, but with how much i connected myself to both series, wtfock in particular stood out to me because of its third season. if it wasn’t for everything that happened while it aired, i may never have felt as close to robbe and sander since they quite literally were put through a lot. i experience things really strongly and this time around, this season helped me through my first semester of college so you can also take that as you will.

you can say how a lot of the bloggers i follow still now (like @tehkatie and @skamamoroma for example) helped gain me some understanding of just how well to interpret s3 and it’s really all a matter of subjectivity at this point.

fog - how well do you think you’d do in a zombie apocalypse scenario?

i said in the tags that there were two scenarios, but there’s actually three. the first is my own take, the second is the more realistic outcome, and the third is a dream my mom’s friend had that has become a running joke in my family.

scenario one: i starve to death. i hardly eat nowadays, and in a zombie apocalypse there would be much less to choose from and more risks to be taken. as picky of an eater as i am, sensory deprivation or not, i’m also incredibly stubborn. this take is also more of a joke, but it’s a possibility since i surprise my mom—and even myself—with just how stubborn i can be so there’s no such thing as impossible.

scenario two: i get bit. whenever i’m truly frightened, i freeze. the first example that pops up in my head is that time a dog from my grandma’s backyard was released from his cage and was barking up a storm. he was big, he was angry, and there was a lot of yelling going on as i was just completely...frozen.

now imagine me when there’s a zombie attack. how useful will i actually be besides being used as bait?

scenario three (aka the only scenario where i actually survive, i just realized): i get separated from my family. i go beyond everyone’s (and my own) expectations and get stretched to my furthest limits and learn how to survive (like carol, from the walking dead!!). in my mom’s friend’s dream, i apparently reunite with my family by knocking down a bathroom door where they’re hiding in as the house they were camping out in was overrun and so i come as some kind of knight-in-shining-armor and kill all the zombies and save the day.

all in all, my most serious answer is that i really do think i won’t survive long. but!! if i learned anything from carol, it’s that you never know what you’re actually capable of so maybe i do have a chance?

[earthnashes]

Hey so I don’t typically do this but, on a whim I watched the Lion King remake and wanted to share my thoughts on it! <:

Final verdict? It... actually wasn’t as bad as I originally thought it was. Like I try not to have an opinion on a movie I haven’t seen, including remakes, because I wouldn’t have much to base said opinion on it otherwise. But after hearing how much people seemed to despise the movie and call it entirely soulless (and seeing clips out of context of the full movie) I was inclined to agree with that verdict.

But now that I’ve seen it? I honestly enjoyed it. I admit it lacked something magical the original had but for what it was, it was pretty good. This felt more like a slightly darker take on the story, and took a little more inspiration from Hamlet as far as I can tell and for what it’s worth, it worked for the realism the movie tried to convey.

So my thoughts on the movie! (below the cut cuz it got longer than I anticipated)

-The voice acting was pretty damn good. What the characters lacked in facial expression the cast tried to compensate with their voices and it kinda worked.

-The animation was beautiful; this is probably the most realistic looking CGI movie I’ve seen and I say that in a positive way. It’s just bloody gorgeous to look at. Speaking of realism, to touch back on expression I did notice that what the animals lacked in facial expression was also compensated by body language typical of that specific animal. Scar does a strange trot-pacing when he was scared, Mufasa rolled around on his back and did the cute happy cat squint while letting Simba climb all over him when they were playing, Zazu would ruffle his feathers when agitated, so on. There could have been so much more emoting, don’t get me wrong because that attention to detail was sometimes made too subtle to catch but, when it was there, I appreciated it. It felt like these creatures was emoting human feelings but in a way natural to them.

-I love the fact that Scar actually feels threatening and menacing. The original Scar is a joy, one of the best Disney villains created, and I always liked the fact that he’s shown as a whiny self-entitled brat when he actually becomes king (and further cements why he wasn’t chosen in the first place). But this Scar had actually fought Mufasa for the title of king and lost, and is entirely bitter about it; hell I wouldn’t be surprised if that scar on his face was from Mufasa in this version. His resentment toward his brother felt like it had more weight to it: Mufasa took the kingdom, Mufasa has the love and admiration that Scar believed is owed to him, Mufasa was the one chosen by the lioness Scar wanted. His want for everything Mufasa had felt personal, not like a mere obstacle, so much so that he went to the hyenas to achieve what he wanted (instead of it being implied he was actually friends with them; they were a means to a gain he couldn’t achieve alone).

 And it didn’t simply stop at Mufasa: when Sarabi refused to be his queen he basically sentences the lionesses to starvation until she relents (which she doesn’t thank god), it’s implied some of the lionesses have tried to leave before because Scar and hyenas patrol Pride Rock seemingly 24/7: I have no doubt he would have killed Nala if he found her in that scene. Zazu can barely be around the pridelands to give the lionesses news of the goings on in their home. Everyone owed him something and he was stopping at nothing to achieve it.

Like there was the scene where Simba and Scar were talking to each other and Simba turned his back on him and it felt like Scar was only just refraining from killing the cub. Yikes.

Scar was legit scary in this iteration and I honestly loved it.

-The added scenes give a tiny bit more depth to the suffering the Pride Lands faced in Simba’s absence and I really appreciated that. I also like how we’re shown some of Simba’s life with Timon and Pumbaa and why he seems so torn about being who he was meant to be: every time he brings it up, Timon and Pumbaa kinda shut him down on it. Not out of malice but it’s hurtful nonetheless and his hesitation showed from it. I think a lot of that might have to do with how Danny Glover voiced him: Simba stuttered a lot or would back away when his beliefs were challenged and that, at least for me, showed his fear of bringing change. What if it’s the wrong kind of change? The last time he tried to change something, his father died, so its better to be a nothing and not cause anything, right? Maybe I’m lookin’ too deeply into it but hey, that’s what I do best. <:

-The music is fucking amazing. If there’s no other takeaway from this remake then at the very least, the music is just... awe-inspiring, particularly the orchestral scores. There’s new scores in the movie that just got me caught up and was just... bro, it’s so damn good.

-Seeing Mufasa die in fully realistic CGI was painful. Every time he’d get hit or ran over I cringed; the sound design and the weight to the animation made sure you knew he was getting trashed. The part where he slipped and struggled to get down just to start rescuing Simba was a nice touch too, like it fully showed just how dangerous it all was, not just the wildebeests.

I love the addition of how he spoke to Simba through the chaos too, like trying to be assuring despite it; there was a scene where he’s like “it’s alright! Come to me son!” then he gets BLASTED and I was like NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! I do miss how he called to Scar as his brother though; with how they added dialogue to show Mufasa still loved his brother despite everything in the beginning, keeping the “Brother! Help Me!” would have nailed it home, but they got rid of it for some reason. :/

-The scene where Simba escapes was a nice change: I’m pretty sure one hyena did fall with him and like, legitimately died, and when Shenzi told the other two to look for him they were like “uhhhhhhhh actually, if that dude died there’s no way a cub would survive that. o3o” I like how they were honestly certain he had died instead of just pretending he was, but it would have been nice for that certainty to be challenged a little more when Simba had shown up at the end.

Also, Simba limping out of the bramble and into the desert, then him eventually just lying down to die was really sad to see. :C

-SHENZI WAS FUCKING SCARY AND I LOVED HER. I LOVE HER SO MUCH. She was more menacing that Scar, I’d say, because the hyenas felt more like they were following her, not Scar. They only went along with it because Shenzi thought it would work, and the moment he tried to throw them under the bus, it was Shenzi who put the nail to his coffin. Which was... oof. Yeah, seeing Scar pathetically attempt to fight for his life before being swarmed and screaming was a little horrifying, it was a little more than just his shadow this time.

-Speaking of Shenzi, I love the fact that she and Nala had a throwdown, that was so fuckin’ cool. Actually, the entire final fight (up until the Simba and Scar fight anyway) was great. I liked that we got to see more of the lions fighting for their home instead of slapstick stuff (which was great in the original but wouldn’t have worked here).

-Speaking of the final battle? The whole scene was really cool... but the final fight between Simba and Scar was so WEAK. That shit was weak sauce bro. They had this whole buildup to the final confrontation between true king and false king, the dialogue before it was tense and everything, the start of the fight was promising... then Scar accidentally falls off. Like... really? Fuckin LAME. Dude, I was hoping for a big-ass scrap like the final battle in Jungle Book. There was power and impact in the fight between Shere Khan and the animals, and the final confrontation between him and Mowgli was so well done. The original fight in the original was fuckin AMAZING! The two tear into each other and Simba wins because he outsmarts Scar by using a move he learned from Nala, something he always fell for himself and he used it to his advantage. Like, hell yeah!

But this? I legit said “that’s it?” out loud after it all, I couldn’t believe it. Lame. :/

-Simba and Nala bantering was really sweet. They were arguing about things they did together in the past and I did enjoy that, like showing that they were best friends through the past experiences they had. I also like the dynamic of when they actually got to the Elephant Graveyard and Nala was immediately aware of the danger they could be in and how reckless Simba really was being. She tried several times to convince him to leave, even as far as saying “okay, I can see just how brave you are so can we please go home?” and.. I dunno, I just thought it was a nice added touch to her character as a cub. As if she knows Simba so thoroughly she can see right through him.

-I really missed the characterization of Rafiki in this version. He came off as more a silent shaman than a kookie but wise baboon, and that would have worked if they... showed more of him and his personality? He was in the movie less here than he was in the original and I wasn’t really feelin’ that. :/

-I’m not gonna lie, the scene where Simba and Mufasa’s spirit reunite made me tear up a little. The original left goosebumps in its wake and it was a powerful scene, but this one was powerful in a different way? Like in the original Mufasa told Simba who he was, where as in this one Mufasa told his son how proud he was of being his father and how he always would be. And ya’ll, when Mufasa began going away and Simba just quietly, desperately saying “please... don’t leave me again” and Mufasa goin’ “I never left you, I never will” I was like NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Yeah, it got me man. DAMNIT Mufasa! ;-;

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

So all in all? I can honestly say I liked it. Is it to the point where I’d be willing to sit down and rewatch several times over like I did the original? Not quite. But this remake felt a lot like “The Lion King, but what if it was with legit real animals?” and in that sense, it worked. This felt about as realistic as the story of the Lion King could possibly get and I could appreciate it for that. They told the same story with a different flavor and direction and I still enjoyed it, and while I think Disney should be criticized for trying to shamelessly cash in on the nostalgia of their long time fans with the remakes, the actual people behind creating this remake (director, animators, sound design, everyone actually making the film and not distributing it) seemed to honestly care about the product they were creating and it shows in more than just the characters’ facial expressions.

Sooooo yeah. Sharing my thoughts on something no one asked for but I did it anyway. I enjoy talking about this stuff but enough about what I thought, what about you? If you’ve seen the remake, what did you think of it? O:

[dzamie]

I watched the live action Jungle Book! I’d say it was disappointing, but I set appropriate expectations going in. So, imma get into it:

So, the good parts first, in no particular order:

I really like Kaa’s hypnosis effect. The Disney animated movie’s swirling colors always looked really, really goofy to me, but the live-action’s waves of light and dark were very well done and legit alluring.

There are a lot of little jokes here and there that I feel were written in case they wanted to use them in a commercial. “You have never been a more endangered species than you are at this moment” is actually pretty darn funny.

The bodies moved well. King Louie was really the only animal I thought was straining realism too far; the positioning of limbs and torsos and stuff was pretty spot-on. Tails were a bit wonky, but you have to be looking for something like that, as someone with a slight tail fetish might.

This is definitely unintentional, but Mowgli makes an “oof” sound whenever something bowls into him or he leaps roughly against something. It sounds like the Roblox hurt noise. Tone-breaking, but HILARIOUS.

Having Mowgli seem to fear the bonfire was a nice touch.

As was having the final fight seem to take place at the watering hole, this time during wet season. Far from dry, the exact opposite of the Water Truce occurs - everything is in conflict.

Now, the less pleasant bits.

I mentioned the Water Truce callback was neat? Yeah. What a shame they took multiple minutes to repeat over and over that the Water Truce was that there was a truce around the watering hole. I’m glad they used all that time to explain why it was that Shere Khan wouldn’t attack anyone so he could conveniently see the man-cub. Also to set up the schtick where Mowgli has been Inventing Things because he is a Man.

Elephants are now a religion. I don’t like it, especially because it’s used to set up Mowgli rescuing a baby elephant from a hole, so that Baloo and Bagheera can see that Man Is More Powerful Than God.

The wildebeest herd exists only for shakycam purposes. There really isn’t much reason for Mowgli to not go directly into the river and escape Shere Khan on a log that way.

Oh how they ruined Kaa. I do rather like how she has a more cloying, sweet personality (it’s not better or worse than the animation’s rather goofy fellow, just different), but they whole-ass saw a snake character and thought “hey wouldn’t it be cool if she never wove around him or approached him from different angles? Let’s make sure to never show her for more than 8 seconds at a time, too; we MUST cut between her and Mowgli. There’s simply no way to shoot a scene where they’re both in the shot, talking.”

I hope you like snakeless ScarJo voiceover, because that’s literally half of Kaa’s appearance, from first line to last. It’s great that the man who hurt Shere Khan with fire just happened to be Mowgli’s dad, because I guess it’s not enough that Shere Khan wants to kill all humans in the jungle; he must have a Deep Personal Connection with the man-cub.

I can sort of understand coming out of the hypnotic vision to see Mowgli entirely in her coils, from a “this is Mowgli’s perspective” point of view, but wow it’s really unsatisfying. Look, the animated version had Mowgli slide into pre-coiled snek body, but at least we saw them interact. Kaa is pretty much a static prop here. What a waste of a serpentine character.

For someone who is afraid of heights and doesn’t know Mowgli, Baloo sure is eager to climb a big, tall tree and risk his own life against a giant, hypnotic snake.

Minor note: with all the focus on seeing Kaa from Mowgli’s point of view, Disney sure chickens the fuck out when it’s time to be snake chow. C’mon, you stupid mouse, show us what Kaa looks like inside.

It’s kinda weird that Bagheera and Baloo are so familiar with each other, considering that Mowgli has been in close contact with Bagheera all his life and neither met nor heard of the bear.

Shere Khan is almost comically evil to the wolves. Makes it hard to take his “I’m actually justified in my desire to kill you” thing seriously.

I feel like Disney hasn’t grown out of its “haha imagine SONGS in a CHILDREN’S MOVIE. What a stupid fucking idea” phase. Baloo and Mowgli sing off-tempo and off-key, and King Louie does a weird half-speaking thing that lets you know they want to do a song, but haven’t the slightest clue how to transition into one, and they still want to pretend to be a gritty serious realistic movie with no singing because that’s too silly.

King Louie Is Twenty Five Goddamn Feet Tall Because We Watched King Kong The Other Day

They set Louie up to be a mob boss, calm and composed for like a minute or two, and that goes out the window in no time flat. They try to bring back that structured “I help you you help me bada bing bada boom" thing back in the chase scene, but literally nobody cares what the chaser says in the chase scene. If they did, it wouldn’t be a chase scene.

“No, they don’t fear me, they fear you.” Except clearly they fear you because your MO this entire time has been “let’s kill and threaten animals and see if Mowgli comes back faster.”

Baloo, the laziest bear you ever did see who heard the wolf pledge exactly one (1) time and immediately dismissed it as propaganda, can recite it from heart because Shere Khan needs to be directly confronted with The Power Of Friendship

Can’t be a climax without fire. It’s a good thing that Mowgli can always find a safe path through this raging inferno that’s been burning steadily through the forest for the last few minutes or more.

Mowgli’s entire strategy hinges on many things that could go wrong at any moment:

a) the vines don’t catch on fire as he’s running through the burning forest

b) the vines and branch don’t catch on fire after he suspends them in the air in the middle of a huge forest fire

c) the dead tree, notably made of dead wood, which some may know to be extremely flammable, is not on fire nor does it catch on fire as he’s climbing it

d) Shere Khan follows him onto the branch

e) Shere Khan leaps at him on the fragile branch that Shere Khan seems to notice is weak

f) the vines and branch don’t catch on fire while he’s climbing them in the middle of a huge forest fire

g) he finds a way back out of the woods literally filled with fire

h) Shere Khan even follows him all the way in rather than going “nah the little bitch is gonna burn. Let him.”

i) the animals forgive him for setting the trees ablaze

They let ScarJo sing Trust In Me during the credits. Minor suggestion: don’t.

I choose to interpret Mowgli not seeing what happened with Kaa and Baloo to mean Kaa is still alive, and the monkeys trying to dig Louie out of the ruins to mean that he’s dead. This is entirely because of favoritism.

Compared to the animated version, this movie is much more based around Shere Khan, compared to around Mowgli and the jungle. Rather than “Mowgli won’t be safe here; send him to the Man Village so Shere Khan won’t kill him,” it’s “Mowgli won’t be safe here, but Shere Khan is going to threaten and probably kill us until Mowgli returns anyway, which he surely will because Shere Khan said so.”

They tried to do a grey-morality sort of thing by justifying Shere Khan’s fear of fire and hatred towards Men. But it kind of backfires because Shere Khan keeps being incredibly evil for no particular purpose aside from making his death be a good thing for everyone, and the one crime Mowgli commits (big fire) would not have happened if Shere Khan hadn’t announced his plan to kill the man-cub.

I really miss the allegories to different kinds of philosophies towards society from the animated version. The live-action replaces them with examples of different abusive relationships (Baloo is a manipulative fast-talker, Louie is supposed to be a mob boss, Kaa’s comfort is genuine but overshadowed by a desire to do harm), which is... nice, but not really my cup of tea.

Holy shit there is SO MUCH SHAKYCAM. You can barely see some of the scenes from all the shaking around. “Did we inspire adrenaline in you? Don’t you wanna go fast?” Yes, of course, but what am I doing this about? “...SHAKYCAM!! LOUD NOISES!!” It’s overstayed its welcome.

Realistic CGI animals are actually terrible at emoting.

This felt like yet another action film. Every opportunity they had, they threw in another fight scene or chase scene. You could take most of them out, cut off about 15 minutes from the movie, and still not have removed anything important.

All in all, I’m glad I now have 22 seconds of Kaa saying things. They really shouldn’t have given ScarJo so much coverage in the commercials, though. She’s in the movie for about 4 minutes, and she’s a visible snake for much less. I don’t think I’d pay to see this, and really this just gives me more reason to not watch other Disney live-action remakes.

Shakycam should have died eight years ago. Bring back shot composition.

[that-shamrock-vibe]

Movie Review: The Lion King (Spoilers)

Spoiler Warning: So I am slightly later to the party than originally intended but I will be talking about this movie in detail and am posting this review a day or so after it is released in U.K. cinemas, so if you haven’t yet seen the movie, either go and watch the original or wait until you have seen it before reading on.

General Reaction:

I have several problems with Disney’s “live-action” remake of The Lion King, not only with the choices the actual movie makes, but unfortunately also some of my ranting will be down to the live-action remake fatigue that has struck almost every Disney fan with the recent onslaught of remakes coming out. For me, The Lion King is where I have reached my  peak because up until now the live-action remakes at least brought something different from the originals for me.

Here however, if for some strange reason you haven’t seen the original animated version of this movie...as I know at least one person who hasn’t...then this may be a brand new enjoyable movie for you. However, for the rest of the world that has, this was pretty much the exact same movie scene for scene with dialogue that seems very tired and characters that lack the basic sense of emotion.

I just want to clarify something, anyone who knows me knows I do not talk follow trends when writing these reviews, so the fact that I am going to spend a lot of this review pretty much complaining about the movie is not because it seems to be the “it thing” to hate it, but instead I have actual reasons as to my disdain.

I do blame Jon Favreau for some of the problems with the movie, especially because he hit it out of the park with The Jungle Book remake back in 2016. I can remember walking out of the cinema after seeing that movie with such a sense of enjoyment from my cinema experience which was decorated in Jungle Book paraphernalia, to the actual movie which was obviously based on the original animated version but also took inspiration from the novel the original was based on.

Here though there was no decor save for one lion totem hidden away, and from the very start of the movie I was seriously underwhelmed by it all.

I don’t know if something got lost between the 2D animation and the CG animation but the movie just felt rather slow compared to the 1994 animated version. There was something so iconic and special about the original version that maybe it was simply the case that nothing could match up to it, but if that is the case then the talent behind the scenes should have at least tried to do something different with the story like Aladdin and Dumbo tried to do.

I genuinely believe that Jonny Fav blinked when tackling this compared to The Jungle Book because while The Jungle Book is a classic it isn’t as iconic or beloved as The Lion King and therefore maybe he didn’t want the backlash if he changed it and it wasn’t received well.

Also, this “live-action” version of the animated movie has 30 minutes more content in it than the original 1994 animated version, this is both a good and a bad thing. The two worst crimes of this movie, aside from it lacking originality and emotive facial expressions, as well as one particular song which I will get into, are two minor scenes that stretch-out pointless plot-points.

The first just after the “Circle of Life” opening where the movie follows the travels of the mouse that Scar eventually tries to eat. But this mouse is followed from the bottom of the cliff-face into the cave that Scar is in.

The second is after Simba begins to question everything he has been told about life and slumps down on that ledge. In the original 1994 version there are leaves and particles that originally spell out “Sex” that are now replaced by a piece of Simba’s mane flying away and going on a journey for five long minutes.

This hair lands in a lake, floats across a Savannah, is eaten and subsequently pooped out by a giraffe, rolled away in a poop ball by a dung beetle before being separated from the pile and being carried up to Rafiki’s tree by worker ants. In the original, a breeze carries leaves across Rafiki’s path which he catches and it is over in about 2 minutes.

Both scenes are dragged out, almost completely irrelevant to the plot and just took me out of the movie questioning why I’m following a mouse and a piece of hair.

Then I have to quickly talk about the stampede scene which leads to Mufasa’s death. 2-D Animation vs. photo-realistic technology is becoming a massive battle in cinema recently particularly at Disney, but there are many things that hand-drawn animation can get away with that live-action cannot. Not only did I get zero facial expressions from Simba or Mufasa in this scene but also that stampede scene in the original animated movie is so grand and has such an emotive response from audience members no matter how many times you see it whereas here, it didn’t seem as epic. It still felt grand because it’s a stampede but not on the level of the animated version.

To end this section on a positive, I do appreciate the photo-realistic CG because it does comprise the entire movie, even the scenery, because it all does make it seem like watching realistic animals for the most part.

Cast:

Alright so there are some good and bad thing about the cast and characters. For a start, the characters in “live-action” are emotionless, lack any real form of empathy and require your love of their 2D animated counterparts to gain any affection from the audience.

The best characters in this version are Timon, Pumbaa and the Hyenas, even Zazu is high-up for me...this presents another problem with the movie, the comic relief of the movie is the best part about it. But it is true, while Billy Eichner as Timon and Seth Rogen as Pumbaa may not be as strong a double act as Nathan Lane and Ernie Sabella, they are still rather funny together and actually are given more of a meta humour than in the original movie. Not only with their version of “Hakuna Matata” but also the new Hyena distraction scene which in the original is the Hula scene but now starts off as the beginning of Beauty and the Beast’s “Be Our Guest”.

The hyenas meanwhile are made more formidable and fearsome in this movie, not only is Florence Kasumba as Shenzi more of a leader of her clan even opposing Scar at times, but both Keegan Michael-Kay and Eric André prove to be almost as good a double act as Kay & Peele. For this reason they’re high up on my list.

Donald Glover is an okay adult Simba. He has got that innocent youthful tone that adult Simba should have given the experiences of his life, but he does just feel like he’s reading a script rather than actually acting..

Beyoncé is, well Beyoncé in lioness form but the thing that lets her down is the lack of emotion on Nala’s face. Also I don’t understand why the back of her ears and tail were blackened aside from the fact that Favreau wanted Nala to stand out from the other lionesses.

Scar is as fierce as ever and Chiwetel Ejiofor proves once again why he is a great villain actor.

I was also pleasantly surprised by Simba’s mother Sarabi in this movie as not only did she have more to do but her backstory with Mufasa and Scar, which doesn’t necessarily make me want a prequel but adds to the Hamlet story that this story is based on, and has Scar state that she chose Mufasa over him...so does that mean she was somehow romantically involved with her now brother-in-law? Also Alfre Woodard is great in the role.

James Earl Jones is back and...it’s simply for nostalgic purposes because there is nothing really elevated in his performance. If anything his performance falls slightly flat in parts but otherwise he’s fine.

The biggest letdown for me is the character of Rafiki, who in the original 1994 version is my favourite character. I love the fact he’s a shaman, I loved his first meeting with Simba I could easily watch it over and over again. I do not understand why they effectively cut that scene and the message of morality that comes with it.

Then he only had his stick when preparing for that climactic fight. It seemed as if they were saying that point was him coming out of pacifism but it isn’t fully shown, but I wanted to see Rafiki walk around with his stick like he did in the original, they copied pretty much everything else but got rid of that?!

Also the one bit of facial emotion that any of these characters show is in the beginning “Circle of Life” sequence when Rafiki carries baby Simba to the edge of Pride Rock and Simba looks genuinely sad to be pulled away from his mother.

Speaking of young Simba, both JD McCrary and Shahadi Wright Joseph do a good job as the young versions of Simba and Nala respectively. I think McCrary tries very hard to recapture the emotion that can bring grown men to tears when Simba finds his father dead, it doesn’t quite stick but he tries.

Songs:

I don’t know if it is because the original score and soundtrack is so iconic and ingrained in popular culture, or just that reworks of the same songs don’t really work...Aladdin for all its plusses still fell into that category...but the songs from the original movie in this version do nothing good for me.

“Circle of Life” is supposed to be the energised introduction to the movie, but if you were to watch the opening to this movie and the original side-by-side, it is practically a shot for shot copy but this version is slower and therefore misses a lot of the cues. Even the shot where you first see Zazu flying over to Pride Rock is underwhelming and they screwed that up twice, first at the start and then again at the end of the movie.

“I Just Can’t Wait To Be King” was also slightly lackluster because of the fact this movie seemed to take away the fantastical elements of the performances in favour of apparently making it more grounded, but it was still a fun performance. I think the two young actors playing the two young cubs did a great job vocally and the performance of them hiding from Zazu amongst the animals was an okay alternative.

“Be Prepared” is the one time I have been actually offended in one of these Disney live-action remakes, this song is one of the greatest villain songs in history. They take a performance which fully executes the Elephant Graveyard but also turns the hyenas into the New Reich! This is Scar monologuing for a couple of minutes and the “song” lasts about maybe 30 seconds. This was my favourite song in the original and it fizzles out completely.

“Hakuna Matata” is a fun song as it was in the original, like “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King” the fantastical elements are taken out of it so Pumbaa swinging on the vine swing and the use of the bugs and the diving into water are all taken out. Even so, Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen do a good job singing as does JD McCrary...Donald Glover on the other hand is not a singer.

“The Lion Sleeps Tonight” is probably my favourite song in the movie, and it’s a song not original to The Lion King which is more of a problem for the revision of the soundtrack to the original 1994 version but the fact Timon and Pumbaa got essentially their own doo-wop group going of the animals that also inhabit their home, it’s just such a good rendition.

“Can You Feel the Love Tonight?”...if it wasn’t for Beyoncé would be an absolute bomb because Donald Glover, again, cannot sing. Also the song happens way too quickly. The movie is effectively a shot-for-shot remake but some scenes are cut short and Simba and Nala’s reunion is made very short before this song kicks in.

Recommendation:

I can’t say this is a perfect movie, if you love the original and want to see that again you will like this just fine, if you were wanting something different like how Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast altered themselves slightly then you won’t really get that here.

I still recommend it as a movie to see just one because it is an important movie to see just to see how stretched out these live-action remakes are becoming. However, I will agree with those that say it is one of the worst remakes.

[revengeisalwaysanoption]

Skam Meeting @ Gaystatale - Part 2

In PART 1 I forgot to write that, when Pietro was asked how much of himself there is in Filippo he said that inevitabily, since he is part of LGBT portaying a gay man, there’s a bit of Pietro in Filippo.

Back to the where we left off:

- So basically the question was if Ludo thought Italy was ready for S2, and he said that yes of course, there have been LGBT characters even on Rai (Italy’s national broadcaster) 

- So Izzy (the girl interviewing Ludo and Pietro) praised how down to earth and real the language feels in Skam Italy. Ludovico was glowing as said it was the best praise he could get, because making his characters sound 17 and from Rome when he 35 and from Milan... Then he admitted that he got there, to deliver that ‘realism’ thanks to a long process that he and his crew have been taught by the Norwegian team, through interviews and meetings. Still, the realness has also been brought by the actors themselves who had room to improvise (and Bessegato downright refuses to write “ao’ “ and “daje” on his scripts) and showcased their talent (ALL of them). 

- For the Pride speech, since he is a straight man, he felt that the best solution was to simply translate from the Norwegian and then let Pietro act it out as he saw fit. 

- The only one for whom it is a bit different is Beatrice, because Sana is very far from who she is as a person, so she needs a bit more guidance and to stick to the script.

- A lot of the moments and quotes that we love the most are improvised, a part from “zozzoni” who came from Bessegato himself. 

- He concluded by saying “c’è tanto dei miei ragazzi in quello che sentite” awwwwww.... (”there a lot from/of my kids* in what you are hearing”)

*kids as in a gender neutral version of ‘guys & girls” *

- Then the clip with the Gay Test was shown, and he repeated what he had already said in Rome: he got a 2, so he had to take the test a couple of times to get a 0 and direct Fede to do the same.

- The clip was used to introduce a question about stereotypes and how much Bessegato felt the need to go against them and if he felt like he succeded.

He said that he felt like he did and it’s one of the aspects he is most careful about in Skam Italia (avoiding stereotypes) especially because all S3 by Julie Andem was about breaking the stereotypes concering two guys falling in love and how a gay guy is supposed to be.

That led him to the choice of having the coming out while the boys where playing FIFA, because it felt like the symbol of “a hetosexual friendship between two guys”... But he is aware that now and then “qualche cazzata l’avremo pure detta” (we probably ended up saying some bullshit). 

The stereotypes can be true, after all, but it’s important to show some other aspects of reality as well.

And of course Filippo (and Pietro) listen to Britney Spears ;D

- And that’s where Pietro added his bit about not fighting the stereotypes by marginalizing/hurting/insulting those who fit them. If the message you are trying to deliver is meaningful, you need to handle the way you communicate with great care or it will get lost.

A gay guy who is a effeminate or a lesbian who is a butch, for example, should be admired because they feel comfortable in their own skin and by the way who are we to judge others without knowing about their journey towards acceptance.

And what’s wrong by the way, about challenging some heteronormative macho behaviour (he used manspreading as an example: if one wants to be a decent human being and sit properly, he should, without worrying about not looking straight enough or something). No man really fits into the ‘alpha male’ stereotype, but straight men probably feel less bound to challenge it. And whilst his straight friend only cries when no one can see, in his own room, he feels free to do it in front of everyone, after spending two years crying his eyes out towards self-acceptance

- Bessegato knows how important it is for the audience to feel that the characters are relatable (then why doesn’t he get the need for rep? who knows) so, unless it’s a reality that he knows well by himself, he always speaks to people belonging to that community so that he can give a realistic picture. He referred to Sana again (which made us start wondering if he’s currently writing her season, huh ;) ?), saying how he is consulting with a Muslim friend of his.

- Pride clip, and Pietro underlined again how making it resonate so much as has been a team effort from everyone (writers, director, Federico, etc.)

- S2 has been written AFTER the 4th of March 2018, when we had the elections that would lead to the Salvini-Di Maio government. Izzy asked why they left Italian politics out of the show, he basically said it’s more important to show people something about worlds/realities they didn’t know about before, making them deep and meaniful so that people can empathize. He got loads of messages from people saying that thanks to Skam they had the courage to come out to their friends and family, that’s the kind of response he wishes for.

That’s what bringing politics into a series like Skam means to him: affect the society around you by showing and encouraging virtous behaviours (one of the reasons he decided not to change the coming out scene, though he was tempted too). Showing good people, instead of wasting time critizing the bad. 

“I want to inspire, not to destroy” . And by the way, having a character insulting Lega (Salvini’s party) doesn’t do any good: who was already against him will say ‘yeah, I think so too’ and who supports him will go like ‘oh great, now they’re insulting me’ and it will only serve to radicalize the latter.

Again he talked about Sana and how to show a true friendship between her and the girls can come to be is more important than giving a judgement about our current political situation (giving how islamophobic Italian society can be, I do agree with him that Sana’s season is going to be quite important for our country)

- Pietro stressed that in our society, the coming out IS a political act. Trans’ bodies are a political act. Our identities, our lives... Just telling our stories is  a revolutionary political act. Every day we do politics just by being true to ourselves, not choosing a way that would be more comfortable and reassuring. Which doesn’t mean you are an asshole for not coming out of the closet, though.

- I don’t really know why he digressed by complaining about how we insult him and the cast when the clips don’t come out or things were better in the og and such, but he did.

- By the way they had Filippo saying “fascisti di merda” because Rome has a big problem with neo-nazis from Casapound beating people up in Gay Street, it wasn’t a jab to the government itself.

- Effettivamente: it was really important and meaningful clip for him. He was tempted to give it a dramatic turn, with Giovanni not accepting Martino straight away. He said ‘you generally use this trick: I’m not mad about the matter itself, but about you not telling me: it’s Fiction 101.’ and that it’s the kind of conflict that would be resolved pretty soon.

(Personally: I said that when Yann went to Lucas and said “tell us what’s wrong or solve whatever it’s going on and then come back to us”  he gave me the vibe of someone who would make a coming out about themselves, not necessarily in a bad way, but more like ‘why haven’t you told me before, am I such a bad friend???’ and I could tell without watching the show, but just that one clip... because it’s the way storytelling works)

- He praised David for changing the scene. He personally hasn’t seen Skam France - all directors basically mind their own business and take care of their own remake - but he gets that after SkamOG and SkamIT it was wise to have changes and that if it worked for Yann as a character then why not? The fact that we were still talking about it on Monday afternoon meant David’s change wasn’t that bad after all, huh?

He couldn’t go through with his idea because it would have been OOC for Giovanni to react that way, given how Ludovico Tersigni fleshed him out through S1 and S2 up to this clip.

Moreover, he felt like ending ep 6 on a sad note after all that happened to Martino at the end of ep 5 and up to Effettivamente would be too much.

Like Nicholas in the bloopers he said “He saw Rocco kissing his girlfriend”, instead of ‘Niccolò’, which made us all laugh ;D

- He said that he wants every remake of S3 to be loved and appreciated, given how important it is, that we shouldn’t make it into a challenge. The Norwegian team gave them Skam so that the message of love and acceptance could reach as many people as possible and that’s what all the directors care about (they sometimes give each other advice). So he personally will never take part in any feud against and back up who disses other remakes.

- Pietro: “there isn’t a ‘right’ formula. Personally, I cried while watching this clip. I wasn’t there when they shoot it so I saw it when it came out, just like you. Because its message is about the importance of communicating: Martino gets into a fight when he doesn’t know how to express his emotions, or he can’t, but then he bravely takes that little step that opens new scenarios to him... So, do we want to tell people that they are allowed to come out to their best friend and that the worst it can happen it’s telling them to fuck off? That sometimes people, even those you would never expect to, when they see that there’s something deep there, there’s a history behind it and a feeling and when you can get those emotions across to the ones you’re speaking to, then maybe it won’t result in being beaten up?

- Then every reaction, even a negative one, is still meaningful: it gives me more info about the person I came out to. Communicating opens the door to emphathy, which is also the reason why Filippo doesn’t take it to heart when Martino says those things during the Pride clip, because he knows Martino is in the middle of his journey and sees the potential in it. It’s about showing the shades of emotions that can happen while interacting. 

- Ludovico said that we should be forgiving with Martino’s dad, since his reaction wasn’t that negative from an estranged father who doesn’t really communicate with his son. He said we shouldn’t stigmatize reactions that are not immediately 100% supportive and ideal.

Thanks Ludo, but no thanks. He might not be homophobic, but he still feel like an asshole to me.

- To him the crucial message of Skam is: people need people. Talk to them, you’ll find them more ready to listen than you’d expect. People are the solution, not the problem.

- Yes/No question to Pietro about Emma’s words to Martino in the last clip of episode 5... He said no, of course. People still care if you are gay in 2018/2019.

- How do they choose the music for Skam Italia? Well, it a lenghty and expensive (in terms of royalties) process and sometimes the songs we hear are not even their first choice but the 4th or 5th. Some of the proceedings became urban legends, like going to LA to get Britney’s approval to use one of her songs... Some are chosen by the music consultants, some are suggestions from Bessegato himself or the cast.

- Question about MI: he approached it with care, as Julie did in the original. He got some pointers from a psychiastrist on what he should modify to tell his story... He still ended up receiving a letter, recently, from an association of doctors who deal with these MI (he said ‘doctors’ not psychiatrists) telling him that he mixed elements from BPD and the bipolar disorder (and pointing out the inaccuracies of the OG as well, before someone uses this to diss on SkamiT) but that the end of the letter they thanked Skam because, apart from the inaccuracies it is good that someone talks about MIs a bit more in depth and that it doesn’t label people with MIs as ‘crazy’, people that you don’t wanna hang out with because they aren’t right in their heads but it’s rather a situation that can be dealt with, that can be managed and that have different levels of severity...

I also walked up to him later on to personally thank him about changing Nico’s MI, because after we discussed it and complained about the inaccuracies - he smiled when I said that - it led us all to get some more info and a deeper knowledge of BPD.

Okay, now that’s all X°D

[whythehellnaut]

Why’s Lion King (2019) review

I watched my favorite animated movie, the original Lion King a couple of days ago to prepare to see the remake so I could compare the two, and I have to say the original is my preferred version by far, by a rather disappointing margin.  I can respect what Disney was trying to do with this remake, and I certainly enjoyed myself and can give praise where it's due, but there's so much that doesn't work in this as a result of going live action.  I can say that what does work best is the visuals.  I honestly can't tell that these aren't live action animals.  They move realistically and every hair on their bodies can be seen swaying with their body motion.  If anything can beat Alita: Battle Angel for the best Visual Effects Oscar, it's this.  But, in spending all of their time and effort on this, they seem to have skimped or gotten lazy on a lot of other areas.The main complaint I've heard, which came about during the trailers, is that the characters don't emote enough.  In trying to be realistic instead of cartoonish, Disney forgot that actual animals provide more facial expressions than what they show in this movie.  This complaint is true, and a major fault in the film, but the problem actually goes further than that.  Sometimes the mouths don't sync well with the voices or their movements don't match the actors' tone of voice.  Zazu will say something in a panic, but will continue bobbing his head around in the same way that he does when he is calm, like nothing is wrong, almost as if they were real animals filmed by nature documentarians and then hastily given voiceovers from actors who weren't seeing who they were portraying.  Sometimes they will recreate a scene where a character takes less action than in the original.  For example, in the animated film, when Mufasa asks to speak with Simba alone to scold him, Simba's eyes go wide and he crouches down in fear, as a real cat would.  In the new version, he doesn't even move.  I don't understand why they would spend so much time animating these characters to be realistic, then cheap out and exclude a very basic, yet still realistic motion.  This is only one example.  It's aggravating how static they are over the course of the movie when the characters and even backgrounds were always dynamic in the original, which made it the masterpiece it was.The performances aren't even particularly good.  Donald Glover seems bland and generic for the most part, leaving no impression that Matthew Broderick didn't leave first.  JD McCrary as young Simba sounds like she's reading directly off a script for the first time, always either overacting or underacting like she doesn't know the context.  John Oliver is funny in his delivery, and a good choice for Zazu, but seems to have been directed to only mimic his comedic voice he uses in Last Week Tonight, which is a pundit show much different from a movie.  It ultimately doesn't fit, and feels very awkward, but I blame director Jon Favreau more than Oliver.  Beyonce has about ten lines in total as adult Nala, and makes it clear she was only cast to sing "Can You Feel the Love Tonight?"  Chiwetel Ejiofor sounds good as Scar, but in the iconic line from one of my favorite scenes in the original (and in cinema in general), where Jeremy Irons dramatically whispers "Long live the king," and tosses Mufasa off the cliff, Ejiofor botches it and makes it sound, again, like he's reading off a script, resulting in an underwhelming death scene, both due to Scar's voice, and his lazily animated movement.  Seth Rogen is fine as Pumbaa, but all I can hear is Seth Rogen playing himself, as usual.  Even James Earl Jones, the same actor who played Mufasa in the original, sounds tired and less emotional than he previously did, either due to age or bad directing.  The only performance I enjoyed more than the original is Billy Eichner as Timon.  He is less exaggerated than Nathan Lane but perfectly pulls off the personality and updates the humor of the movie with his performances that almost sound like well made adlibs.  He is the best part of this movie, in my opinion.The third big problem I have is that almost nothing has changed.  75% of it is a shot-for-shot, line-for-line remake, which is especially noticeable having seen both movies within days of each other.  This makes the poor performances all the more aggravating because they literally just had to mimic the original and call it a day, and still couldn't come close to matching that.  Some of the shots are neat, impressive homages, like in Circle of Life, but it can get boring when so much is exactly the same but with less emotion and movement.  Even the background music and instrumentals, while I expected them to be similar, often seem ripped straight from the original.  Circle of Life, I am quite certain, is the same exact song recorded in 1994, but with a new vocalist.  That's sad if they couldn't be bothered to remake even that.But what has changed, and how much of it is good?  As I mentioned with Timon, the humor is updated.  The silly puns were expanded on to make funny quips, sometimes poking fun at the original, the live bait scene is genuinely laughable without the hula dance, as they reference another Disney movie and a hilarious way, and the In the Heat of the Night reference is replaced with an "I hate bullies," exchange, which is more appropriate and relevant now.  The musical numbers are dumbed down.  I Can't Wait to be King is no longer presented like a colorful art exhibition, but instead a stroll through the watering hole, and Be Prepared is limited to the final verse that Jim Cummings sang in Irons' place, and excludes the geysers and goosestepping, for example.  The chemistry between the hyenas has changed, with Shenzi now a regal leader with a little more dynamic with Nala, but Bonzai and Ed are now replaced with nameless Hyenas played my Keegan Michael Key and Eric Andre who bicker about personal space, which can occasionally be funny, but they rarely bounce off of Shenzi or even interact with Scar.  About half an hour of run time has been added with mostly needless filler.  Some of it is good, like showing the turmoil the lionesses go through under Scar and the Hyenas' rule, better explaining what went wrong, and a fun scene showing how Rafiki discovers Simba is alive, but lots of it is pointless nature show style shots, like spending three minutes following the mouse that Scar tries to eat in the intro.  As I said, I can respect that they tried to go for a nature show inspired look, and some shots do work, but it mostly brings down what should have been a great movie.Reviewing a remake is difficult because you have to take into account whether the movie is good when you ignore the original.  In this case, it's alright, but the original is such a classic that almost everyone in the country has seen it.  It's freakin' Lion King.  I can't help but spend most of my time comparing the two versions.  Overall, I believe the first is far, far superior, but I think many will appreciate the new look, and some may even prefer it.  However, my final verdict is that watching the original at home or at a rerelease (which seems to happen fairly often with such a stellar work of art) is a better time to spend an evening.

[hyper-archives]

Aladdin(2019) Review

I had so much fun watching the Aladdin remake that I was inspired to write a review, comparing and contrasting it with the original! It’s under the cut so I don’t clutter dashes and tags:

Recently I watched the Aladdin reboot in theaters. I might not have given it a chance if a friend of mine hadn’t insisted to take us to the movies for a fun time. Usually I’m highly against Disney remakes, and I still am, but this one actually surprised me, again, for a Disney remake. There were some aspects that fell flat with me, yet some I actually liked better than the original. I was inspired to write a review for this, comparing and contrasting the two to see how they stand up against one another. Also, this contains spoilers! STORY: More often than not, when a Disney remake tries to “fix” plot holes and nitpicks of the original, as so beautifully demonstrated by the remakes of Beauty and the Beast and Cinderella, they end up making their nitpicks even more prevalent and even worse. I was surprised to see that, with this movie, they added in aspects that I actually liked better than the original, which I honestly didn’t think was possible. Unfortunately, it gave off the impression that they felt like they had to speed through many of the original iconic scenes in order to get to those plot lines. Instead of the original’s beginning, starting with Arabian Nights and continuing with the merchant, very subtly being the Genie in disguise, this starts out with a character, very obviously played by Will Smith, beginning to tell a couple of children the story of Aladdin, followed by him singing the song. Though I didn’t like the the twist of the Genie actually being the narrator being so obvious this time around, as a lot of other aspects were far less subtle as well, the anticipation and slight build up to the Arabian nights song was rather exciting, and the song was extended as they took us on a tour of Agrabah. However, as I was talking about previously, the first Cave of Wonders scene is sandwiched in-between this introduction scene. This is where things take a different turn. A turn that I’m not all too crazy for. This time around, the One Jump Ahead sequence shares a scene with Aladdin and Jasmine’s escape from the guards, with the scene where she rejects the suitor playing after she returns to the palace from Aladdin's home, without the escort of the guards this time. She’s never told that Aladdin is to be executed. There’s no reason why they had to switch around these scenes, as, in the previous movie, the rejection of the suitor and the talk with her father was a better introduction to Jasmine’s character. However I’m wondering if they did this in order to feature more interaction between the two. In this movie, after Jasmine has to return to the palace, she asks where her bracelet is, believing Aladdin stole it, when it was actually Abu. Aladdin sneaks into the palace to return it to her, after which he’s captured and that’s where taken to the cave of wonders this time. Though I understand why they made this change, the flow of it is a little questionable. Nevertheless, the escape scene was fun to watch, and Jasmine’s reluctance to jump across the rooftops felt more realistic than a sheltered girl just suddenly getting the hang of doing so. Thankfully, the talk between Jasmine and her father feels a lot more meaningful. Instead of simply talking about wanting to be free and marrying for love, she wants the best for her kingdom, and expresses her sorrow for how poorly some of the peasants were living. I really like this addition, as it gives more compassion and responsibility to Jasmine without ruining her character. I also like the mention of their interaction with other kingdoms, as it feels less like Agrabah is a post-apocalyptic kingdom in the middle of nowhere. The Cave of Wonders scene is pretty underwhelming. Instead of disguising as a grizzly prisoner, Jafar is very direct with Aladdin, playing on the fact that he too was a peasant. I question what the change for this was others than the film doing something different, or perhaps it was the fact that the actor for Jafar wasn’t versatile enough to do that. The cave itself doesn’t come from a golden scarab, nor does it materialize from the sand, which is honestly greatly disappointing. The journey through the cave, the attempted escape, as well as Jafar’s immense devastation at the loss of the lamp, were all very mediocre. Thankfully, things pick up from here, quite obviously, with the Genie. His introduction, I’ll admit, is a little jarring at first, because this is where we really start to see the computer graphics at work, but regardless, it was well acted, lots of fun, and it’s clear to see that the crew did the best with the graphics they had. One little nitpick that I like that they fixed here is that they removed the scene of him attempting to kiss that exotic dancer, because, after he hit it off with Jasmine so well, I’m not sure why he’d do that if he’d want her as much as to make himself a prince entirely for her. After this, the humor really starts showing in the scene where Aladdin and the Genie get to know one another, and Aladdin reveals his feelings for Jasmine. What they don’t do with cartoonish gags, they make up for with witty dialogue and the actors’ execution of it. Then, comes perhaps my absolute favorite part, the Prince Ali scene. Again, they’re not able to pull off as many cartoon gags, so they compensate by spilling out as much color and character as a Disneyland parade. This scene is without a doubt on par with the original. The parade is followed by a scene that wasn’t in the movie, but I’m glad they added in. In this movie, the Genie is now disguised as a human accompanying him as what I’m assuming is his advisor as he aids in introducing Aladdin to Jasmine. Aladdin’s introduction is, to say the least, awkward. Hilariously awkward. Honestly, my insides were hurting from laughter. I suppose this is a good time to mention the addition of a new character, Dahlia, Jasmine’s handmaiden. She serves to ease a bit of the tension, as well as be a good friend of Jasmine’s, because honestly, one gripe I have with a lot of the original Disney movies is the lead characters’ saddening lack of companions. She accompanies Jasmine to a party, as the Genie accompanies Aladdin. With Aladdin and Jasmine wanting to be with each other, and their friends of the same gender as Aladdin and Jasmine respectively accompanying them, you can probably pick up on a romantic subplot by now. Anyway, the Genie’s attempt to make Aladdin look cool in front of the princess only turns her away more, so the Genie creates a diversion, wooing the handmaiden, so Aladdin can sneak in and give way to the A Whole New World sequence. I thought I’d be disappointed, but considering they couldn’t make it shine with the beauty of 2D animation, I thought it was rather beautiful for what they had to work with. Admittedly, I do miss them swirling through the clouds and interacting with birds and horses. They still keep in the kiss after this number, only it’s not really as passionate as the original one, which I suppose I understand, since it is their first kiss. Instead of being captured right afterwards, Aladdin is given time to reflect on his experience alongside the Genie. I like what they did here, jumping back and forth between Aladdin’s conversation with the Genie, and Jasmine’s conversation with Dahlia. Jafar and his guards waste no time capturing Aladdin the next morning, where he personally pushes him into the water, in a scene which is very awkwardly slowed down. I’m not sure how I feel about this change, but it adds an actual threat to this bland adaption of Jafar, who I’ll rip into after I’m done covering the story. The Genie saves Aladdin as usual, though the scene where Aladdin thanks him is actually a little more emotional here. You can really see where they’re starting to befriend one another. Aladdin later rats out Jafar as usual, only this time, Jafar escapes AFTER he’s sent to prison, which was a very underwhelming scene for an already underwhelming villain. It’s Iago who aids him in his escape this time, because I guess you had to make the bird useful? Though, he could have made him a useful character by involving him in the stealing of the lamp like the original, which I’ll get to. Meanwhile, Aladdin and the Genie begin having a dispute like they did in the ‘92 version. Instead of mentioning his wish to be free, the Genie is more concerned with Aladdin not telling the truth, being seduced by riches and power, like every other master he’s had. Again, it gets a little more emotional with the line “I’ve never called a master ‘friend’”. Conflicted, Aladdin goes back to his original home, and sings yet another reprise of One Jump Ahead. I do like the emotion and glimpse into an inner battle within Aladdin, but I don’t exactly see why he had to go all the way back to his home to do so. Jafar steals the lamp from him while he’s wandering through the streets instead of Iago sneaking it from him, which there really wasn’t any reason why they had to change that. Now that Jafar has the lamp, he wishes to be sultan. His rise to power is unfortunately much less climactic, removing the Prince Ali reprise alltogether. I suppose you could say that it’s replaced by new song “Speechless”, sung by Jasmine. As beautiful as it is, I’m not sure it has much  a place, as she appears to be singing this in her imagination. This pep talk she gives to herself empowers her to speak against Jafar and plead that her father’s most trusted guard side with her instead of Jafar. I like this bold moment for Jasmine, but the addition of the guard’s backstory feels like they’re trying to develop a character at the last minute. This doesn’t stop Jafar, as he wishes, finally, to become the most powerful sorcerer, casting Aladdin to the arctic. Instead of Jafar keeping Jasmine as a slave, he begins to marry her, which I’m honestly glad they changed, as marriage is slightly less uncomfortable of an outcome to watch than marriage to a character who’s supposed to be under 18. Aladdin saves her very directly instead of sneaking around, and I’m assuming the fight with a giant sorcerer snake is replaced by a mad scramble to keep the lamp from a giant Iago. Needless to say I was pretty disappointed at the lack of giant limbless reptiles. When Aladdin tricks Jafar into wishing to becoming a genie, the Genie seems to be in on the idea instead of oblivious like the original. I think the Genie believing that that was a bad idea in the ‘92 version added to the suspense though. Things end happily, but also pretty differently. Firstly, instead of Aladdin wishing to abolish the marriage law, he wishes the Genie free, which turns him HUMAN! I’m not exactly sure why they did this, but it doesn’t really bum me out, as it probably rules out the possibility of a sequel, thank goodness. He and Dahlia immediately decide to be together. Instead of the Sultan getting rid of the marriage law, he simply gives the throne to Jasmine so she can abolish it herself. I really like this change for Jasmine, after having expressed her desire to help her kingdom. One might argue that it’s historically inaccurate, but it’s a fairytale ending along the lines of a peasant marrying royalty. Aladdin is prepared to return home when Jasmine catches up to him, where they express their love for one another and deliver...another bland kiss. Eh, I guess that’s a small nitpick. After the ending, the credits play out on top of a scene where the cast starts dancing to an instrumental of Friend Like Me. Say what you will about this trope, but I love when the characters start dancing at the end of a movie. It does seem like a lazy way to end a movie, but when done right, it’s a lot of fun. And, all things considered, this movie was just that. CHARACTERS: Aladdin: If anything was perfectly recreated from the original, it was the casting of the actor for Aladdin. Not only did he look the part, but he sounded like both the talking and speaking voice from the original. He acted more unsure and awkward in his newfound Prince Ali role, but it felt more endearing and believable than him getting used to it right away. Abu: Not much changed from this version, though I find him cuter, as he looks like a real monkey. But get this, both he and the Cave of wonders keep their original voice actor, being Frank Welker! Jasmine: In this day and age, the media has been more focused on creating stronger female protagonists. Sometimes they come out genuinely lovable and responsible, like Moana, but their execution can be easily botched by making them come off as entitled and uncaring, valuing only outward strength. I was incredibly pleased at this version of Jasmine, because she rose to strength and confidence through the kindness of her heart. She was more believable too, being a little more sweet and naive, as I'd believe from a girl who's spent her whole life in a castle. Her romance with Aladdin felt more like innocent young love, which I rather enjoyed. However, it sometimes felt like she was stealing the spotlight from Aladdin just a bit. The movie still is about him, after all. The Genie: I'll admit, when I first heard Will Smith was being cast as the Genie, I thought this movie was instantly doomed. Boy was I wrong. I actually never cared for Will Smith or any of his roles in the past, but for me he actually succeeded in what Robin Williams did in driving the movie forward. Granted(pardon the pun) nobody will ever really match up with the rapid-fire entertainment of Williams' Genie, but I'm glad that Smith did his own thing. He and Aladdin had great chemistry, bouncing off one another, making for hilarious moments, and I was surprised to find that he was also able to deliver an emotional performance where it was needed. Dahlia: I was always rather sad at the fact that Jasmine had, perhaps less people to talk to than Belle did in her little town, so I'm glad they added in at least a handmaiden to keep her company. A character like this can easily be done wrong(take Darcy in Thor: the Dark World), but she turned out pretty hilarious. Her romance with the Genie might have felt shoehorned in if it wasn't as adorably executed as it was. It might have been a little fast for the both of them, but to me that just means that they were careful not to let it overpower the main romance. Jafar: Oh boy. If there's any main complaint I have with the movie, anything that would ultimately banish it from having any competition with the original, it would be this Flat-Sprite-Emmet Brickowski-bland "portrayal" of Jafar. Disney clearly had their priorities set on casting someone attractive, like they did for Maleficent, rather than someone who actually fit the part. He delivered everything with the finesse of a paper towel, and when he showed his more insane side, it simply looked like the domestic, meddling next door neighbor kind of insane. Okay, I'm sure many people will be hating on the actor for this, but honestly I'm not sure it's his fault. He'd probably be much better suited for a different kind of role. His lackluster performance only has me questioning Disney's creative decisions. Iago: Though I missed the grumpy, abrasive Iago, this new one, portrayed by Disney's new golden boy, Alan Tudyk, was amusing in his own way, with more subtle, in-the-background kind of humor. With so much going on already, a more vocal Iago might have complicated things. The Sultan: In all honesty, I like this new sultan drastically better than the old one. The '92 version being an easily manipulated childish little man got tiresome after a while, as well as him seeming aloof to what Jasmine really needed. In this movie, he's still bound by tradition but now with an immense love for his daughter, and it shows. I'm also happy with the mention of their late mother. It was a kind acknowledgement without looking overly sentimental in the way that previous remakes did. SONGS: Since I already talked about their sequences, I'm mostly going to be talking about the songs themselves. I'd just like to say right off the bat that Alan Menken once again outdid his past self with this score. I'm in love with the more ethnic feel of this score, as it makes the tale much more immersive. Arabian Nights: Though I wonder why they changed the lyrics as much as they did, this version of the song is actually better than the original. It's longer, more intense, and Will Smith performs this, along with his other songs, better than I thought he would. One Jump Ahead: From the beginning, it started out to sound like it'd be a more ethnic, yet as energized as the first, but something about this version didn't hit it off with me. This song in particular felt like they were all too aware of the fact that they were recreating a popular Disney song in a movie that wasn't a cartoon. One Jump Ahead(Reprise): Nothing much really changes from this one, but now you really get to hear how well Mena Massoud sounds as Aladdin. Friend Like Me: Considering that this is the first impression we get of the remake of the Disney character with one of the biggest pair of shoes to fill, they did pretty spectacular. Again, I'm very surprised with how much character Will Smith gave to this performance with his own flavor. That being said, it sounds like a great, classic song with a modern spin. Prince Ali: The scene was spectacular. The song was spectacular. I can't rave about this one enough. It's everything I could ask for in a remake of my favorite song in Aladdin. It has a modern spin, with newly added Middle-Eastern instruments, with as much energy as the original version. When prevented with both versions of the song, I'd honestly have a hard time deciding which one I'd listen to first! A Whole New World: I have mixed feelings about this one. It does have a beautiful build up, the singers carry it beautifully, but it doesn't flow as well to me as the original. One Jump Ahead(Reprise 2): Even though I still question the destination of this scene, I do really like this addition. Speechless(parts 1 and 2): I suppose I was always sort of disappointed that Jasmine was one of the only princesses without her own individual song, despite the movie not starring her. It's a beautiful song with a beautiful melody, but after a while I feel like Naomi Scott is overselling it a tad. I kind of like the album version better, where it's a key lower. But that's not the first time I liked it when a Disney princess power ballad was taken a key lower. MISC ASPECTS I'd mostly like to talk about the execution here. The original far outweighs the remake here. It's not just that it's hard to stand up against Disney 2D animation of the 90s, but the editing of this movie was just bad. And by bad I mean overkill. The Friend Like Me scene was particularly off-putting for me, as the realistic, dramatic lighting only made it look like the mood was set for a horror movie. Aladdin falling into the ocean is inexplicably slowed down. The scene where Jafar steals the lamp from Aladdin looks more like a perfume commercial. Sometimes it felt like a character couldn't drop a handkerchief without getting a 360-degree spin of the camera, and other times it felt like an over-dramatic commercial for a Disney park.....oh. The final aspect I'd like to get past really quick is the humor. As I mentioned before, a live action movie isn't able to carry on the same kind of humor as a cartoon, so they substituted that for more witty dialogue and clever acting, and honestly, I like it just as much as the cartoonish humor of the first. With all things said and done, and certainly, after all this praise, I bet you're wondering which one I liked better. It's a bit of a toss up actually. On terms of overall execution, theatrics, and especially villain, I prefer the original, but on terms of story and character development(excluding Jafar), I think I actually prefer this one. This probably means that the original is still better, as I expected, but this movie was a refreshing surprise of a Disney remake. I honestly didn't expect to have so much fun that my face would hurt from smiling. As fun as it is though, if asked if these remakes would never happen in favor of more original ideas, I'd still have to take that deal. Still, that doesn't take away that I had quite an enjoyable experience at the movies.

[chrissy96trans]

[MAGAZINE INTERVIEW] 180420 WINNER for HARPER'S BAZAAR KOREA May Issue

JINWOO

Q. Do you have a personal favorite on the full album EVERYD4Y?

MOVIE STAR. It might be because I know the production process behind the making of the song and the motive and meaning of the lyrics but the lyrics are very realistic to me. I’ve found that I really like that kind of realism. (laughs)

Q. Is there a song [from the album] that you want to recommend we listen during this current season?

I want to recommend EVERYDAY to listen to during the spring. All the side tracks are good though.

Q. You usually always don’t do much to your hair but your curls are really eye-catching. Whose idea was it?

While I was thinking about our concept, I found this hairstyle on the internet. I said, “I want to do this hair!” while showing the pictures I found to our staff members. They all liked it. Actually, I curled my hair for REALLY REALLY promotions too but no one remembers it. (laughs) I want to keep curling my hair until the end of this promotion. Since I’ve always kept my hair long, I also want to try cutting it short like a buzz cut.

Q. Following “REALLY REALLY”, the public has become more attuned to Jinwoo’s vocal color. Is there a song you want to specially remake while highlighting your vocals?

Justin Bieber’s “Love Yourself”. I sang it very often when I practiced my singing [during my trainee period]. I recorded it multiple times too.

Q. You’re constantly working on your variety show skills by appearing on “Infinite Challenge” and “Live a Good Life”. You’re a vocalist in WINNER but how do you feel when you appear on variety shows alone?

As a singer, I think I’m given two options when I get to appear on variety shows. I can either forget the characteristics I show as a singer and immerse myself in the variety show or sustain my singer image on the show. I do the former. When I appear on variety show, I forget all about WINNER Kim Jinwoo’s appearance and I try to show me, the 100% human being Kim Jinwoo.

Q. Spending time as 100% human being Kim Jinwoo must also be precious to you then.

Yes, I’m a homebody so the time I stay at home amounts to quite a lot. But through variety shows, I’ve met many different people and I’ve become quite extroverted. I go outside to spend time with people more often now.

Q. Who is the artist you respect the most?

The late actress Choi Jin-shil. When I first watched the drama “My Rosy Life”, I became obsessed with it. Naturally, the acting she showed on that drama was really good too. That drama was the reason behind my wanting to officially start acting. 

Q. Many people always talk about how you are a “warm-hearted person who cries easily”. On the other hand, Seungyoon, who trained with you [for the longest time] said that you are tenacious and that you’re a “genius through effort”. Are you usually very generous to others while being strict on yourself?

That’s right. I really hate to inconvenience others. This makes me be really strict on myself. Because of that, whenever I get angry or sad, instead of depending on others, I tend to repress my emotions often. There are pros and cons to this kind of personality.

Q. Who do you think is the winner of life?

Myself (laughs). When I look back from the time when I was a child who grew up in the countryside to the present where I’m a member of WINNER, there have been many changes. I’m going to continue to work hard to go forward.

MINO

Q. Your never letting go of your camera on set really impacted me.

I’m really into photography right now. I started it as a hobby last year but I’ve become more focused(/serious) about it recently. But because of that, I’ve bought too many cameras that it’s becoming a problem. I counted the number of cameras I’ve bought so far and they totaled up nine.

Q. Do you like collecting things?

Actually, I love things(/objects) in general. Four years ago, I really loved action figures so I collected them. At the time, our dorm was small so organizing them into a cramped space was really exhausting. Now, I like things/objects that are useful and I like efficient things that I can create with more than things I just look at.

Q. What songs do you enjoy listening to these days?

Hmm, I’ll show you my playlist. My all-time favorite song is Childish Gambino’s “Redbone”. I’ve been listening to it on repeat today, here on set. I also like Bachi(?)’s “Beautiful”.

Q. It feels like your rap style is constantly changing.

When I was in high school, I admired rappers with hard/rough voices. I liked rapping voices like DMX so I made my voice raspy and even shouted when I rapped. But you need a voice that has a wide spectrum rather than an aggressive voice when you need to be able to own all the songs in an album. I became aware of that and kept working hard. Once I changed my style, the spectrum of music I could rap to widened significantly. These days, I like to put in unique words into my lyrics. I’m working hard to be aware of the very thin line between childishness and uniqueness. I hope that even if I use a word that has ambiguous meanings, the way people understand it is straightforward. Including myself, I like it when lyrics are memorable to listeners.

Q. How do you react when you are suddenly inspired in your daily life?

I note it down no matter what, whether by writing it or drawing it. I really hate it when I forget something because I didn’t note it down. I usually go to sleep at late hours because I enjoy the time right before falling asleep. Out of all the hours on the clock, that’s when I get the most ideas. When I think while lying down, I get ideas even right before my REM sleep and I either write it down or end up falling asleep, without noting anything. Whenever I fall asleep, I always regret it when I wake up. I think, “Ah! I had something amazing yesterday!”

Q. When I looked at your Instagram, I could see that you’re good at drawing and that you even design goods. It seems that you have a talent in creating. Is there an Instagram account that inspires you while producing music or designing?

Ah, I don’t want to share this… (laughs) I enjoy looking at Matt Cunningham’s Instagram feed (@moon_patrol). He’s famous for making collage artworks. I really like his art.

Q. I just noticed that your phone case has blue roses on it. I also saw a blue rose on the goods you designed.

I’m obsessed with blue roses [these days]. [One time] I was spacing out while starting at them and I looked up the symbol behind blue roses. Because they were originally difficult to attain, blue roses meant “despair/hopelessness” but as it became easier to attain, the meaning changed to “hope” and “miracle”. I loved that so I changed my Instagram profile picture to a blue rose. From that time on, my fans have been gifting me with blue roses, which I am grateful for. One time, during a concert in Japan, I received a real flower [a blue rose] for the first time. I was so worried that it’ll wilt while we were coming back home that I was really careful even on the airplane.

Q. Just like last year, you had your comeback on April 4th. What do you think WINNER will be doing on April 4th, 2019?

Fascinatingly, I used to like the number 3. But we received so much love from our 4/4 comeback last year, and we included the number 4 in the album name (EVERYD4Y), so as the point of connection with the number 4 increases, it feels like 4 is now a symbolic number for WINNER. I even feel different whenever the hands of a clock point to 4. (laughs) Director Yang Hyunsuk also supports the concept with number 4 so wouldn’t there be a high possibility that you’ll be able to listen to new WINNER music on April 4th for at least a few years from now?

SEUNGYOON

Q. Like the lyrics of EVERYDAY, what is something that feels “new every day” for you these days?

I’ve been taking photos. I like the texture of film cameras so I recently bought one. I take pictures of my members and of landscapes. I’m working on a photo album so I’m taking photos to put into it.

Q. I saw you taking photos of the flowers in the garden right outside. When you are publishing the photo album you’re working on?

It’ll most likely take some time since choosing which photos to include will take time. I’m thinking about including pieces of my writing with the photos. The writing will be about the inspiration I received from the photos. I’ll write the inspiration I got from the photo next to the photo and I’m going to leave blank spaces so people who get the photo album can fill it in themselves.

Q. Where do you usually get inspiration from?

I usually get inspirations from daydreams. With this album (EVERYD4Y), I got a lot of inspirations while thinking about our fans. Even just starting with the theme “fan” takes my thoughts to many different directions. For example, it can be about our attitude when it comes to working hard for our fans, something we receive from fans, or things we want to tell our fans. These are the strongest inspirations I received recently.

Q. Is there a song from this album where the recording process was very memorable?

MOVIE STAR, which I put the most effort and sincerity into when writing the lyrics. Most of the songs on this album can be enjoyed without much thought but we worked really hard to include our stories into MOVIE STAR. When my members wrote their rap lyrics, they tried to exert a lot of sincerity into each word so they kept revising their revisions. In the last part of the song, we all sing together and we sang it joyously as if we were out camping.

Q. WINNER has many hit songs but Kang Seungyoon’s “Instinctively” will always be remembered. Right now, as an experienced musician, is there a song you want to remake?

I feel grateful for “Instinctively” because it’s the first song that made it possible for the public to become familiar with my name. If I were to remake a song now, I think I’ll think about a lot of things before remaking it. When I covered “Instinctively”, I was young and inexperienced so I did it bravely, but now, as someone who lives as a singer who creates songs, the categories of worries I must go through while producing music has become more detailed.

Q. You are now in your mid-20s. Was there a recent moment when you truly felt like you were becoming an adult?

When I look at my past self, I think I wasn’t very understanding of myself and of others. I used to yell at myself, “Why is that all I can do? Why is this all I can do?” Now, I’m accepting of errors and mistakes and acknowledge my own. I also acknowledge that each person is different.

Q. Your members called you a “nagging mom” during their interviews. Which member does things that make you nag on them?

I don’t think I nagged on them that much recently… Actually, I nagged on Mino (laughs). When Mino becomes obsessed with something, he wants to buy all the equipments for that thing like an expert. Mino has been buying lots of cameras these days so I told him to stop buying them but he bought more (laughs).

Q. Who do you think is the winner of life?

Someone who achieves what they want to, someone who chases the happiness they define. In our case, many people liking WINNER’s music and remembering us for a long time, make us WINNERs, don’t you think?

HOON

Q. Just like last year, you came back with your full album EVERYD4Y on April 4th. What do you think you’ll be doing on April 4th, 2019?

Releasing a new album on the same date would be nice but personally, I want to show a new side of WINNER in a different season with a different vibe. We’ve promoted during spring and summer so promoting during winter would be nice too. If this becomes reality, we’ll probably be working on music [on 4/4] or we might be traveling.

Q. Which song in the album do you have special affections for?

Track 11, the song RAINING. This song is actually my first self-composition. I was treasuring it and didn’t include it in our previous albums but our Japanese agency said they wanted to release it so it was first released through our Japanese album and then released in Korea through this full album. It’s a very meaningful song for me.

Q. From your rap lyrics to your clothes, it seems like you’re a person who has your own specific color. Even when you wore the uniform for the Pyeongchang Olympic Torch Relay, there was a cheerfulness specific to Lee Seunghoon (laughs)

Whatever I do, I put storytelling as my first priority. That’s why even when I pick out what to wear, instead of something tasteless, I tend to pick out clothes that are cheerful and witty while thinking about my image. Generally, I like wearing comfortable clothes but I always make sure to color-coordinate well. Instead of black and grey, I look for colors that are fun.

Q. What’s the story behind the lunch box you posted on SNS? You posted it with the hashtag “#ihatecarrots” but the lunchbox has 6 carrots drawn on it.

The lunchbox is a goods I designed for our Japanese fans. We were able to choose the items. My members chose hats and bags but I thought a lunchbox would be fun. When I chose the band to be green and the lunchbox to be orange, I thought of carrots. The drawing of the dog on the lunchbox is my pet dog, Haute, but he doesn’t hate carrots (laughs). I was trying to come up with something witty and came up with that. Both clothes and items become memorable when there are stories attached to them.

Q. I saw the puppy academy diary you posted on Haute’s Instagram account (@maetamongisdad). There were detailed comments but which comment made you most happy as Haute’s dad?

There were many comments about Haute having a good personality. Whenever I see those kinds of things, I feel proud and think, “I’ve raised him well” so I like them (laughs). I think that dog-training is similar to human education so I make sure to be strict and establish order of rank with Haute.

Q. I saw that you also posted pictures of tasty hamburgers you’ve eaten on SNS. Can you share the #1 tastiest hamburger?

I pick New York Shake Shack burger as #1. When we went to New York to film our music video (2014 S/S), my members were very jet-lagged and tired so I searched up hamburgers and went to Shake Shack by navigating on my phone map. Rather than thinking they’re the best brand, it was memorable how it was in another country and I went to the store without depending on anyone and ordered hamburgers with limited English. I remember I said, “The taste of America!” while eating it (laughs). If I was told to go eat the same hamburger right now, I don’t think it would taste the same. Like I said, stories are important (laughs).

Q. Is there an artist who inspired you quite recently?

Chef Choi Hyunsuk. I went to one of his restaurants recently. I like what he shows as an entertainer on TV but the moment I ate the dish he made, I strongly felt the feeling of eating a piece of artwork. Experiencing the tastes and looking at the stories, decorations, and assortments that were created with the course in mind made me think, “He’s a real artist.”

translated by @chrissy96_

scans by @goduandme5 ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ (Tumblr wouldn’t let me include all the scans into this post so please make sure to check out the links)