#Lust Life Love Movie Review

[haveawish]

Miller's Girl Review/Recap

Spoilers for the full movie!!!

No seriously...I spoil the full movie, so if you've not seen it, turn back!!

Cairo is 18 years old bibliophile and inspiring author, who is extremely intelligent, lonely and bored of her life in Tennessee, Cairo's rich lawyer parents completely abandon her, leaving her to dwell in their mansion like a ghost left behind. Cairo seems convinced they don't care about her. That dynamic isn't explored any further sadly.

 Cairo is striving to escape to Yale but struggling with her entry essay. To write about her greatest accomplishment. Cairo realizes she has none, as she’s been insulated in the bubble of her privilege or as best friend Winnie calls her “just another run-of-the-mill generationally wealthy gal living in a haunted ancestral mansion,” 

 The college essay is actually the catalyst for the movie. Cairo needing inspiration and along comes failed writer Jonathan Miller. 

Miller is stuck in his mundane life as a literature teacher, his writing career amounting in a poorly received book and a wife who is more focused on her own career and any available alcohol than placating her husband.It’s unsurprising that Jonathan becomes drawn to Cairo — though his wife exudes sexuality, a good portion of the movie she's in her lingerie, it seems to be no match for Cairos charms.

Cairo is like a breath of fresh air to Jonathan, a young attractive girl who intellectually seems to be on the same wavelength as him and appreciates his opinion and wisdom. He thinks he finds in her a willing protégé into whom he can pour his own unrealized ambitions as a novelist.

Jonathan lets himself be seduced by Cairo’s Intelligence in literacy and flattery. Her being complimentary of  his own book strokes his ego, not to mention her receptiveness to his attention.

Somewhere along the line Miller forgets himself and his boundaries as an educator, treating Cairo not as a student under his care but as a peer and fellow writer.

The movie throws in moments of  mutual attraction and showcases Miller's descent into crossing the line of appropriately, keeping on pushing his own choice of college on her even after she said she was dead set on yale, sharing a cigarette multiple times, inviting the girl to an event after school filled with Miller's friends, looking like a first date as they squeeze next to one another during the reading.

With midterms looming, Jonathan gives Cairo a special assignment: write an essay in the style of an author she admires. An assignment that will soon prove fatal to his career and possibly his freedom.

A mix-up in the classroom lands Cairo’s cell phone in his possession and he breaks another unspoken boundary, he drives to his student house who he is aware lives alone to return it to her.  

What follows is completely up to interpretation of the audience whether or not the two of them confront their mutual attraction. Whether the pair actually shared a forbidden kiss or if they even went further is up for debate. Something may have actually  happened between them at her house. I wouldn’t be surprised if his ‘fantasy’ is actually him recalling their night together when he reads her story.

Cairo delivers her midterm essay inspired by Henry Miller, sent with the note ‘love, Cairo’.

Feeling underappreciated by his wife as usual Jonathan lurks to his man cave where he proceeds to read and masterbate to Cairo’s essay, whether Jonathan is recalling the night or imagining this would've happened between the two is never stated.

The story  in which she thinly disguises Jonathan and herself as her subject and proceeds to write a smutty story almost fanfiction-like of a liaison between the two protagonists. 

 This finally shakes out  Jonathan of his lust filled head to put a stop to things, but unfortunately  for him he's  already gone too far. He's toyed with Cairos growing feelings  much less (potentially) with her body. As the two of them try to navigate the repercussions of their inappropriate intimacy. 

Jonathan tells Cairo to scrap the essay and write a new one; the complete turn around shocks Cairo.  

One day he was this cool teacher who's her friend and potentially her lover, he gives her attention and flirts with her and then next day he threatens her of failing the class. threatening to fail Cairo over the story is the worst thing he could have done in Cairos mind. If he had done it, she would've not been able to go to the college of her choice, Something extremely important to her, which he's well aware of, maybe restricting her to go to any college  at all. Leaving her stranded in Tennessee would have been her worst nightmare.

What follows is the complete ruin of any type of relationship the pair had, Cairo is angry and vengeful. Jonathan's betrayal blindsighted her and as the intelligent girl she is feels that blow to her pride and her feelings. Cairo let's rip at Miller, all his insecurities laid bare, Miller eventually calls Cairo a child and she calls him a coward. 

Him acknowledging her as a child is sickening now that the viewer has seen his actions throughout the movie. To him she's a femme fatale, a fantasy when he wants her to be but when things get real and serious, she's just a naive child and he knows better.

Cairo for all her scheming is still a teenage girl who for the first time has her heartbroken, and that heartbreak turns to cold rage and to get her revenge not even her best friend Winnie is safe from her plans.

Winnie is an interesting character throughout the movie that doesn't get the screen time and depth she deserves.

Winnie is a known lesbian according to Cairo, though Winnie playfully disagrees, claiming to like both as she tells Cairo of her flirtations with high school coach and Jonathan's friend Boris. Although Winnie claims to be interested in Boris, it is obvious to both the viewer and Cairo that Winnie has unrequited love or lust for Cairo.

Cairo offers to make out with Winnie and send a picture to Boris to try to get the coach jealous, perhaps getting her revenge at that moment at the coach rather than her desired revenge against Jonathan. Cairo manages to manipulate Winnie's obvious feelings for her, kissing surprisingly lustfully and hard since it was a supposed ruse, however that moment soon breaks and Cairo dismisses Winnie coldly.

Boris is shown to be a complete hypocrite. His boundaries with students are just as bad as Jonathan despite his denial. The first meeting we see of him and Jonathan is Boris stealing Cairo's erotic novel she had left behind and reading it aloud, completely ignoring any decency of Cairo's privacy. His relationship to our knowledge doesn't go as far as Cairo's and Miller's. However texting a student's personal cell at night is a violation in itself. At  the end of the movie  he tells Jonathan that he “never crossed the line”  in complete denial of how close he could have been in the same boat as Jonathan if Winnie didn't protect him from Cairo's threats. Winnie and  Cairo's friendship becomes a casualty as Cairo blackmails her silence by threatening to out Winnies situation with Boris.

His ‘survival’ for Jonathan's public fall from Grace.

The telling thing is that Cairo didn't lie when talking to the Dean. 

The fact that Cairo told the total truth to the dean leads me to believe that the kiss we saw wasn't real, she was all set to ruin his life and mentioning the kiss would've been the sure way to do that, however she didn't mention it once.

I believe Cairo is many things..but I don't believe she is a liar.

Honestly kiss or no kiss, it doesn't really matter.

Even more confirmation that Miller is not the victim of this story. The dean was asking all the right questions to find out if he did anything inappropriate. The fact that every answer she gave was the truth and the dean looked disgusted is proof in itself. She had a meeting with Cairo first, and Jonathan confirmed everything that Cairo said but was trying to excuse his actions the entire time. The dean thankfully didn't buy into his excuses.

Jonathan Miller is the Villain of this story, his choices were what lead him on this path, he could have done what any respectable teacher would have done and shut Cairo's flirtations down, but his ego and attraction won over his common sense.

Cairo’s actions do not cancel out her victimhood.

The Ending however was a bit too ambiguous for my taste. Through it all, Jenna Ortega is captivating enough to keep me watching. Freeman is completely overshadowed by not only Ortega’s performance, but most of the supporting cast. “like imitation crab in gas station sushi” is a very accurate description to his portrayal of the very one note character.

Cairo Sweet may be the character I will defend absolutely. A morally grey protagonist who deserved better.

[gallafics]

𝙶𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚊𝚏𝚒𝚌'𝚜 𝚁𝚎𝚟𝚒𝚎𝚠

Title: Quatervois Author: @dodgerbear84 (Ao3)

Rating: Explicit Series: N/A

Chapters: 8/8 Word Count: 51.5k

Archive Warnings: No Warnings Used

Favorite Character: Two lovely side characters; a bartender named Cam & Mickey’s friend Kenny. And of course our boys.

Least Favorite Character: I didn’t have any characters in particular that I disliked, but Gracie’s mom?? iykyk

Ao3 Summary: “Quatervois (Qua-ter-vwa): A crossroads; a critical decision or turning point in one’s life.

Closeted soldier Mickey meets farmer Ian in a bar when on leave from his base in the Deep South and discovers that making the leap toward happiness isn't as tough when you have someone on your side.”

Review: This fic actually blew me away. The writing style is extremely cinematic and had me convinced I actually just watched a movie instead of reading a book. I could vividly picture Ian’s farm, their facial expressions, the bar, the creek—everything. I felt like I was there watching it in person.

Mickey and Ian’s build up in this fic is beautiful. Their flirtation is both cute and sexy while also having hints of pining and being slight idiots. Mickey falling for Ian in this fic is a favorite of mine because it’s so obvious how much they want one another but have things that are keeping them apart.

This fic really has it all. There’s spice, there’s banter, theres fluff, there’s lust and longing and perfect comedic timing! It’s all around a beautiful fic that has made its way to my personal downloads because I will be re-reading it!

Spoilers Below↓

Favorite Moment: So, I’m a sucker for the moments in a story that just rip your heart out and absolutely stomp on it in front of you, so, I would say my favorite part is when Mickey is leaving the state, getting ready to deploy and he and Ian are saying good-bye…

“Don’t think about what you’re leaving behind. Think about the bright future ahead of you. Promise me you won’t dwell on us saying goodbye.” Mickey’s heart clenched tightly in his chest. “I promise.”

Equally favorite moment is their first meeting, it’s so tense and Ian’s so nice and Mickey is gay panicking and ends up being an asshole

“I wasn’t asking to be your friend. I was just being friendly. Big difference. Sorry to have offended” Mickey watched as Ian headed back to his corner and felt irrational anger bubble up inside him. “What? You’re not gonna thank me for my service?” Ian laughed loudly and hollowly, turning to face Mickey and lifting the hem of his black shirt up to his chin. Mickey gaped at the display of rock hard abs and firm pectoral muscles. It lasted a moment before he spotted the livid red skin of severe but well healed burns covering the left side of Ian’s body from waist to armpit. “You gonna thank me for mine? Didn’t think so. Drink your beer, soldier, I won’t bother you again.”

Honorable mentions, their first kiss, Mickey visiting the creek, the conversation about Ian’s bed (iykyk), still obsessing over their reunion, the waterfall scene (!!) and so so many other good moments in this one!!

Favorite quote(s):

“Anything happens to Ian and you’ll have this whole bar looking for you.”

“You totally fed it.” “The fuck you on about?” “The stray cat. You fed it. You make out like you’re this tough badass but you have a caring side”

“I just… I ain’t ever… this is all�� wow fuck. Kiss one guy and you use your grip on life.”

“There’s a sight I could never get tired of seeing.” Ian leered. “Me sweating my tits off while I try to stay fit enough to be a soldier even though I drink beer like water and smoke more than a funeral home chimney?”

“Nobody has ever touched me there.” Ian mumbled against Mickey’s mouth. “You’re beautiful.” Mickey had never said those words to anyone before.

“Then you came along. You, with your fucking attitude problem and killer smile.”

There were honestly so many moments in this fic that made me insanely happy and have stuck in my brain. It’s such a beautiful story. If you haven’t read it 10000/10 recommend, if you have read it? Go read it again!!!

Final thoughts: The plot was plotting. The spice was spicy. The romance was romancing. The chemistry was off the charts. I cried. I laughed. And everyone in the gym probably thought the lady on the treadmill was crazy cause I couldn’t stop grinning at my phone! Amazingly, beautiful, cinematic masterpiece!!

Thank you so much, DodgerBear, for blessing us with this fic!!

— Harley, Gallafics Reviews

[whoiwanttoday]

So not last Friday but two Fridays ago was National Paranormal Day, something I didn't know existed and there is a joke here about it not actually existing no matter how much some people abuse the scientific method to prove it does but I won't go down that rabbit hole. The point is that night I had a friend who made me aware and asked me to watch something Paranormal but I was busy so I didn't. They watched The Amityville Horror, a truly bad movie that was also part of a massive pop culture phenomena. It's a thing I am fascinated by because I am always interested in ideas that infect society and I wish I could have been there to feel it. To see if it felt like everyone believed there was a haunting in Amityville or not. If you don't know the story you can look it up but it's been pretty thoroughly debunked over the years, though of course there are still true believers, but it was a best selling book that lead to a massive hit movie that has lead to an official movie franchise and an unofficial one that has spawned combined hundreds of movies. You think I am exaggerating but I promise you I am not. Since Amityville is a real place as long as you don't call it the Amityville Horror anyone can make a movie and put Amityville in front of it and suddenly you have a movie sure to make money on streaming. It's how you get things ranging from Amityville Island and Amityville Vampire to Amityville Dollhouse and Amityville in Space. Anyway, I didn't come here to talk about Amityville but rather how I didn't watch it Friday night. But it put it in my head so I finally did watch it again, it's a not very good movie but one that has always been part of my life because it was just… always sort of there as a kid. On TV a lot, someone always had a VHS copy recorded off of cable somewhere. So I have seen it many times and the bright spot has always been Margot Kidder because she's the bright spot in a whole lot of movies. She has this moxie and charm about her that comes out in a very specific 70's Liberated Lady way that you don't see anymore. It's so era specific, a backbone and some spunk mixed with a world weariness and the fact that she has seen more than you have. It's why she was a pitch perfect Lois Lane but she is also in a few horror movies and one of them I deeply love she is the best part in, which is high praise cause Black Christmas is awesome. Anyway, I feel like I was intellectually aware she must be an attractive woman cause she's in movies and stuff but she was first and foremost Lois Lane to me as a kid and I couldn't sexualize Lois Lane. Guys, it turns out I can sexualize Kathleen Lutz. I dunno what it is, 4k resolution, getting older, some third thing you can feel free to tell me about in the comments below but man, she is gorgeous. Just so absolutely beautiful and I felt a little dumb that I hadn't fully registered this. Like I knew but I was embarrassed for my loins that they hadn't done their job and made me lust after her previously. They usually don't drop the ball like this. Anyway, in ultra high def I am here to tell you her face is a marvel. And you pair that with the sort of verve Margot Kidder always brings to the screen and I was smitten. To the point I was like, "Did anyone else notice how hot she is in this movie?" Guys, they did. My favorite review I found online was from a woman that said, "You'd think this movie would make me wary of ouija but now we're digging up the board to ask Margot Kidder to be our third". I get it. Today I want to fuck Margot Kidder.

[mama-qwerty]

The Knuckles Series - Review

Okay. So.

Finished the series.

I have thoughts.

First of all, it was fun. I view it as kinda filler episode material, that if someone watched just the movies they wouldn’t miss much. I watched it with my family and there were times we were all laughing and cheering and just enjoying the ride. It was silly and fun and Knuckles was adorable in every scene he was in.

That said, was it perfect?

No. No, it was not.

Here’s my take on some problems.

~ Setup felt rushed

We had the barest glimpse into Knux’s difficulty adjusting to a life on Earth, which, honestly, just made it look like he wasn’t being challenged enough. He can’t go from being on the run and fighting for his life at every turn to just sitting around playing VR and goofing off. That’s just not who he is.

Not to mention, his interpersonal skills are practically non-existent. He fought his whole childhood away. Presumably, anyone who came near him either wanted to exploit him, use him, or fight him. So he’s used to just doing things on his own, with no one to answer to, or take into consideration. That’s what I saw at the beginning—and honestly, it may have been easily handled had Maddie sat down with him and actually tried to get to know and understand him a little better.

~ Maddie

I felt for her, I really did. And I get that she was frustrated. Tom’s off who-knows-where, and she’s left at home trying to get the damage to the house fixed, while keeping tabs on three super powered alien kids, one of whom is actively attacking handymen, dragging a ton of dirt and sharpened sticks into the living room to make a warrior fighting pit, and dismantling the car to build himself an Iron Throne in the dining room.

She’s frustrated, and doing everything she can to keep herself from snapping. She didn’t sign up for this, but now has to learn on the fly how to deal with three very different, and very special needs kiddos.

But her referring to Knuckles as “our little red barbarian friend” kinda rubbed me the wrong way. He’s not a barbarian. He’s a warrior. He’s a traumatized kid who feels like the honor of his entire tribe rests on his shoulders. He’s struggling with this change and instead of trying to sit down and talk to the kid to explain how things are done on Earth, and see if there was some kind of agreement they could reach to keep them both happy, she just kinda gives up and walks away. Not very understanding, and doesn’t make her come off looking very good.

~ Pachacamac

Okay, this is just weird. Pachacamac, for those who don’t know, in the games is the warmongering echidna tribe chief who led the warriors in an assault to take the Master Emerald’s power for themselves. In the process, they enraged Chaos, the God of Destruction, who all but wiped out the Knuckles clan.

I know, I know, game and movie universes are different. The movie team has taken liberties before with certain aspects of Sonic lore, so this shouldn’t be any different.

Except it is. Canonically, Pachacamac is not a good guy. He’s not even a morally gray character. He is not an honored chief, who trained Knuckles and is now his wise spirit guide. He was the cause of the fall of Knuckles’ entire tribe, thanks to his greed and lust for power.

Making Pachacamac essentially Yoda is like changing Robotnik into a kindly grandfather figure. I mean, what??

The only thing I can think this harkens back to is Longclaw’s little hologram message from the second movie, in which she gives Sonic a quest to find the Master Emerald before Knuckles does. Which, okay, it’s a lost loved one giving a final message to help direct the character on a new path.

Except, Pachacamac isn’t a lost loved one for Knuckles. We did not see any interaction between Knux and Pach. We did see interaction between Knuckles and his father, who would have been a much better choice to send his son on a new path.

(I did, however, see this post that makes SOOOOO much sense in why Pachy appears to Knux, and instructs him to train Wade, specifically.)

~ The Master Emerald

Speaking of, WHERE IS IT? It was referenced numerous times, but never shown once. The absolute least the show could have done was show it well secured, with a Tails’ created security system in place. Show Knux meditating near it, or praying to his ancestors that they can rest easy knowing that the Emerald is safely back in the hands of the echidna once more.

The absolute lack of a presence of it is strange, considering the pursuit of it was what caused the near extinction of both the echidna and the owls. It was Knuckles’ focus for his entire life. Yet he simply leaves it behind without a second thought?

~ Wanda

OMG I hated Wade’s sister. Just, hated her. She was immature, abrasive, abusive, unnecessarily antagonistic with Wade (which seemed to be a life-long thing if the flashbacks are anything to go by) and just struck me as someone who was overcompensating for something. She’s a bully and it’s no wonder Wade is the way he is if he had to grow up with someone like her.

~ No Closure

We didn’t see them arrive back home, where Maddie would hand them their asses for just disappearing like that and not telling her. She was likely worried out of her mind the whole time. And I would have liked to have seen Sonic and Tails try to cover for Knux’s absence, in funny little brotherly shenanigans.

As I said above, I still found it fun. I loved Mother Whipple. I loved Knux’s interactions with her. I loved how Wade grew over their little trip. It was an enjoyable ride, and my whole family really had fun.

How would I have done it differently?

Well, that’s a different post.

[gerec]

2024 Fic Year in Review

Total Number Of Works:

5 new + updates to 3 WIPs (and I finished a WIP!!!)

Total Word Count:

32,719 (59,680 in 2023)

Fandoms I’ve Written In: X-Men

Pairings I've Written: Cherik, Charles/Other, Erik/Other, Charles/Shaw, Erik/Kurt Marko

Overall: I wrote less this year than what I had hoped, and made only a tiny bit of progress on WIPs but I did finish one I started in 2022! This year continues to be mostly about Erik + rare pairings, and a verse/story out of left field for Erik + Kurt Marko. Finally, I think I'm in a good place to finish Your Rightful Place next, and that's going to be my goal for 1H 2025! (Along with writing more Xavierine/Cherigan/Starles).

List of Fics Under the Cut:

NEW IN 2024

Kinktober 2024

X-Men (Alt Timeline Movies)/Cherik Prompt fills for Kinktober:

1. Charles is captured by orcs and forced to become the Chieftain's mate. 2. The King sends his young ward to become House Xavier's new concubine. 3. Kurt's relationship with his stepson Charles is an open secret.

A Welcome Seduction (Lust and diamonds remix) 

Erik is a husband and soon to be father of twins, with a bright future at the legal firm of Shaw, Frost & Associates. He's also a closeted gay man living a guilt-ridden double life. His mentor Sebastian Shaw shows him how to navigate between the family he cherishes and his own hidden desires.

Tumblr Ficlets 2024 

A collection of ficlets and snippets from Tumblr.

1: Cherik, Charles/Moira - There's nothing Charles wants more than to be Erik's mate. Erik doesn't feel the same way. 2: Cherik - Erik invites Charles to do something he considers to be deeply romantic. 3: Cherik - Erik makes a Valentine's Day card for someone special. 4: Cherik - Charles and Erik on an accidental blind date on Valentine's Day. 5: Brian Xavier/Erik Lehnsherr, Cherik - Erik has an encounter with Charles' father just after the war. 6: *NEW* Cherik, Charles/Reed Richards, Erik/Shaw - University AU; Erik and Charles have a confrontation post break-up.

WIP COMPLETED IN 2024

Bad Love 

Out celebrating with his colleagues, Erik finds himself enthralled by a sinfully gorgeous omega named Francis.

a.k.a. Married business man Erik cheats on his wife with a hot stripper.

WIP UPDATED IN 2024

My Future & Yours (WIP)

The island of Genosha offers sanctuary to mutants from all over the world; the chance to live amongst their own kind in a beautiful paradise. With no family left, Erik decides to travel half-way around the world to start a new life.

He does not expect to catch the eye of one Sebastian Shaw - handsome, charismatic, and leader of the mutant nation - and end up forcibly taken as his mate.

Your Rightful Place (WIP)

Sebastian Shaw attacks the kingdom of Genosha while its monarch Erik Lehnsherr is away at war, capturing omega Consort Charles Xavier as he flees with his subjects towards Westchester.

Shaw is determined to right a perceived wrong by taking an unwilling Charles as his mate.

NEW ADDITIONS IN 2024

FOR MY SERIES The Innocence We Lose

Vipers In Our Midst 

Pregnant and newly married to the much older Kurt Marko, Erik finds himself adjusting to life as a rich man's spouse. A wedding reception with Kurt's society friends gives Erik a glimpse of what's to come.

High Society Life (WIP)

Erik gives birth to baby Nina, and has a hard time adjusting to his new role as both husband and parent.

[mirambles]

Rocky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahaani - An honest review

I watched Rocky aur Rani ki Prem Kahaani because everyone I know on social media and few close folks in my real life said it was very entertaining - funny, progressive, feminist , and it showed gender equality.

So I was taken aback, because the general sentiment for KJo movies should be ‘It’s so shit, but I love it’ - that is a sentiment I can live with because we all have our guilty pleasures.

KJo has his audience who love the shit he pulls off every time he ‘directs’ a film with toxic masculinity, regressive female leads , justifying infidelity (always the answer to unhappy marriages) , glorifying Indian culture, where he adds 30 mins of melodrama and lectures to make the characters redeem themselves. Kjo’s movies are as lame as they can be, but people love them. I get it - ‘this shit is so bad, it’s so good’ category of films. Guilty pleasures are exactly this!

So sell me his new offering in exactly this manner - but all reviews and social media comments were glowing words of praise of how he has addressed today’s issues and it’s a progressive film. Are people suffering from amnesia or have they not watched better Bollywood films? Because I have a whole list of films you should watch that actually deal with ‘progressive’ mindsets - way before Kjo’s time!

Rani is a feminist. A FL as feisty news anchor who gives a 5 min lecture on men’s gaze, objectification of women and rape culture, but does an absolute U-turn 5 mins later by objectifying a handsome man in front of her. This is gender equality. Tit for Tat.

Wearing open back blouses to work is sign of new age feminism (Will I get trolled for sounding old school - has KJo ever stepped inside a corporate workspace - who dresses like Rani does?) What’s next? Women CEOs wearing bikinis? And why not get all men to dress like Rocky Randhawa - that would be peak gender equality in dress code at workplace.

Infidelity is the answer to all unhappy marriages. Remember KANK? Yes, let’s repeat that here, but let’s twist it into unrequited love between the senior citizens. Then add memory loss and illness excuse to get the 80yr old grandpa smooch his 75yr old ex-lover in front of his wife and entire family. The issue is not old age love, age is never a restriction to fall in love, the issue here is infidelity. But if this isn’t cringe enough, let’s completely destroy the most beautiful romantic number in Bollywood by playing it in the background to immortalise infidelity and later lust under the garb of love.

Let’s get back to our feminism torch bearer Rani, who has now jumped from knowing the guy for two meetings to lusting over him. She is honest with herself (not with Rocky mind you, because at no point have they had any conversation about themselves) that she is in it purely for the physical attraction, it’s just a fling for her. She is an elitist , feminist, Colombian grad, Bengali Girl (who has a terrible Bengali accent) and the crude, can’t speak English well, Gucci/Fendi wearing, Ferrari driving, protein shake drinking, loud Punjabi boy doesn’t match up to her standards. Kjo’s new level of feminism - make women pull the exact shit on men that men have put women through for decades. Tit for Tat! Gender Equality.

Btw at this point I still don’t know why Rocky loves Rani - love at first sight is always about the looks and physical attraction, so convince me why he loves her - because isn’t he this walking-talking green flag just by being understanding of his grandpa’s feelings and calling out Rani checking him out. A walking green flag who gets his grandpa’s ex-lover and his grandpa together to help his grandpa get better - because love is the cure for all illnesses. All doctors and medical researchers have been wasting their time on getting degrees and super specialisations - please enter Kjo’s school of love.

So now Rani realises she is in love - when and why and what changed her feelings from lust to love - I do not know. She drives on a 4-lane highway in the opposite direction - woman should have died there for her reckless driving, but she lives to propose to Rocky on a f&*king Highway! Bollywood I love you for pulling off this shit.

This is supposed to be the pivotal point in their relationship where she professes her love to him, going down on one knee (because hey you see role reversal - she is the feminist, the alpha female) and telling Rocky everything that HE IS NOT , listing her resume and her exes’. Therefore implying he doesn’t deserve her, but she is taking the high road and still falling for him. All the reasons she lists that she loves about him are actually about his physical aspects = Lust. She doesn’t list one meaningful quality that she actually ‘loves’ about him.

It is at this point that I gave up on the film, because after this RRKPK became a collation of scenes dedicated to social media trending topics:

1. Women burdened with household work

2. Women not liberated enough to pursue their dreams

3. Women being fat shamed

4. Cancel culture

5. Men being shamed for pursuing classical dancing (KJo research FFS - 50% of India’s top kathak dancers are males right from 1940s! )

Each topic got 1-2 scenes, tweets converted to preachy dialogues uttered by our ‘feminist’ queen and zero closures or character growth.

The only thing that works in this movie - is Ranveer , not his character, but him! He is effortless in this role, his comic timing is superb, needs some work on emotions.

Alia is a shadow of her awesome self on screen post her marriage to Ranbir. It hurts to say this, cause I have loved her in all her movies except SOTY.

Can people age gracefully, I couldn’t bear to look at Shabana Azmi and Jaya B - former was gorgeous as hell in her younger days, now is swollen with all the Botox fillers! Jaya has forgotten to act completely. Dharmendra should not even be acting anymore.

What was the point of rest of the cast? Only Alia’s dad was a decent act.

The one thing I absolutely love in KJo movies is the music and songs! These were crap too. What Jhumka? Because ruining all the songs from ‘The Golden’ decade of Bollywood was not enough, so they made a terrible mashup of Badtameez Dil & Jhumka Gira Re and killed both the songs in one go! Takes some skill doing this - well done!

Why this long rant if I disliked the movie so much, that too KJo movies? I wouldn’t have written one, if the reviews and comments were honest about the movie being average, typical entertainment; but the moment people praised it to nth level of being socially relevant with feminist heroine and gender equality - they deserved to be called out for their shallow thought process thinking that KJo actually cares about any of this stuff.

Worst people think this is ‘quintessential’ Bollywood. Please watch better films - like Amitabh’s roaring 70s, the romance films of 90s, the fun comedies, the glorious slice of life films from Hrishida, the Yash Chopra multistarrers - that’s quintessential, genuine, charm of Bollywood.

Lastly before I wrap this up - RRKPK when literally translated is Love Story of Rocky and Rani. I spent 2.5 hours on this shit show and I still don’t know the answer to why and how they fell in love! They didn’t have one decent conversation about themselves! The latter half is about them wooing their families. The film should have been aptly titled ‘Randhawa and Chatterjee Ki Prem Kahaani’ - It’s all about loving your family - K3G Part 2!

[palfriendpatine66]

Your Pal’s (Ewan) Movie Reviews: Nora

find my other reviews here

Ewan content: this movie features his own accent and a wide variety of looks. It is an extremely smutty movie, he has many bedroom scenes with female love interest Nora, including a great view of his ass while he fucks her from behind, masturbating, dirty talk via letters etc etc. He also sings quite a few times.

The plot: writer John Joyce (Ewan) meets and falls in love/lust with Nora. They move from Ireland to Italy, which is where he starts wearing more hats, and has conflict with his muse as he struggles with feelings of inadequacy in his professional life and jealousy in his personal life.

The movie: is extremely boring for a movie with so much sex. The pacing is unfortunate. It should have been much more dramatic as basically the couple fights and fucks the whole movie but it was hard to care. I wouldn’t watch this for anything besides Ewan

[anthrotographer]

Challengers (2024) | A review w/ spoilers*

Tumblr is not going to like my review, I already know. I acknowledge this movie wasn't made for me, but I feel I give credit where it's due.

Last night I had a staggering movie going experience. I felt like I was being sold a lie a minute sitting through the agonizing commercials, the movie previews, and till the end of Challengers. Back to back promos for military branches, painting them as organizations of peace and innovation (a rally during war time). I understand there’s nothing new about that experience. Consumerism and propaganda tactics have a long tradition at the cinema. We’ve been advertised a false reality for so long it’s hard to think about our world without using the images fed to us to line that canvas. Take how modern horror treats rural living. It’s very common to see (in fact I saw) a movie trailer where a young couple vacations in a secluded part of the country to get away from it all. The idea of ruralism as a peaceful alternative to stressful urban living is benign and actually has some merit to think about in a country as urbanized and unhappy as ours. Yet the common movie trope is that there are evil forces lurking in the dark outskirts, that living ‘out there’ turns people into kooks or murderous cultists. One movie by itself with this premise can be harmless, but within a whole genre that trends this way it feels insidious. Almost like we are supposed to all fear each other. Challengers is another example of a genre movie that warps human reality into a lifeless opportunity to sell things. 

When a movie feels more like a commercial or a music video then why even bother with the movie going experience. The distinguishers between television and film are fading away over time. In one particularly unabashed scene we cut between three different product placements for Coke, Adidas, and the U.S. Open. It was shameless, the way Josh O’Connor was most likely told to hold that CocaCola label perfectly centered in the frame. Those three brands are far from the only ones displayed. Tennis, and sports events in general, flash a ton of advertising so I understand that the film’s stuck in that universe. Still there are ways to artfully sidestep brazen product placement. 

I don’t want to spend much time trying to analyze the relationship between Tashi, Art and Patrick. The film doesn’t give you enough about why these three are fatefully attached to each other besides vapid attractions. Yes all three are enamored by one another but what’s the motivation to stay in this toxic ménage à trois dynamic for so long? Zendaya plays Tashi, a master manipulator trying to mold her husband Art Donaldson into the star tennis player she was supposed to be before her injury. And her “little white boys” Art and Patrick feel like pawns that are content to be pawns. Men who don’t have any freewill and are solely motivated by their lust for this supermodel of a woman. In a way I don’t blame them. My disconnect comes because there’s a lack of depth with the characters and their relationships. Each of them seems to have a singular focus; Tashi wants vicarious glory through Art, Art wants to be loved, and Patrick wants Art’s life. But there is no depth to the desires. Time is never spent on why Tashi loves tennis more than people or why Art and Pat let their, supposedly strong bond, get broken so easily by a “home wrecker” that forecasted her own home wrecking. And look, as a seductive art piece it succeeds, for the most part, but as a story about real people it reduces its characters to their base desires while pretending they are complex. Maybe I don’t understand Romance—as I’ve been told. I am content to treat it as just a romantic fantasy and give it credit for being hot, but it was also a long drawn out tease. 

There was no reason for this experience to be more than two hours long! Half of it was in never ending slow-mo where I felt like the same tennis ball was being served for half an hour. The dreaded slow motion, which can be good for a sporty movie to capture athletic movements and build suspense, but here it was overused to a point where it left us thinking “get on with it already”.  Thank goodness some of my theater neighbors were also moaning about this because I felt alone, trapped in a drugged fugue state. So much of the film was disorienting. For a period you are meant to feel like a tennis ball being battered around through the camera. Editing wise this movie had the same problem that so many modern movies have; death from a thousand cuts. And the slowly unraveling chopped timeline executed so many arbitrary flashbacks and flash forwards. Eight weeks before, two days forward, then a five year flashback, all when you could tell this story sequentially with similar suspense building and less confusion. 

Seeing this movie was a spur of the moment, going in blind experience. I know now that I was not the target audience. Today I mentioned it to a friend and he ended up watching the trailer. The text I got back: “looked like a bit of a teenager movie”. I don’t mean to spoil the enjoyment for anyone with this review. From a certain angle I did have fun with Challengers. Sometimes simply devouring some eye candy is what the mood demands. 

If you found my writing at all interesting please visit and follow it on Substack!

[docholligay]

Hero

@amhrancas sponsered this and thank you! I was writing this the other night and here was the exchange: My wife: what are you writing? me: Review of Hero her: Oh! you love that movie! and she's right, I do.

Non-spoilery: Please go watch this movie. Even if the whole thing isn’t necessarily to your liking, it’s the sort of movie where it’s hard for me to imagine someone getting NOTHING out of this.  This actually got more spoilery than I meant to, so I guess I’ll cut it off there, but trust when I say that I would be shocked if someone called it a complete waste of their time. 

I said in the non-spoilery intro to this that it was hard for me to imagine someone getting nothing out of this movie whatsoever. I do believe that. In this, it’s sort of a rare movie for me--very often I like movies that I understand people hating. Pan’s Labyrinth, The Green Knight, the Rider, among others, all of these I would accept, for various reasons, people saying that there was nothing there for them, but with Hero there is such a light touch on everything it draws in, and yet it touches so much, that while someone may not find it their favorite, I have yet to find someone who thought it had nothing for them. It is the martial arts film I recommend to people who don’t like martial arts films. In the way that Sword hoped for China to be united under Qin, there’s something to be said for this movie as a unifier of viewers. 

For those who love cinematography, and movies as art pieces, this is a feast for the eyes. It reminds me of highly stylistic directors like Del Toro, Aronofsky, or especially Luhrmann; not in a  strict visual similarity, but in the way that visuals bend to the story, and reality is in thrall to the passions of the listener. Things are not as they were, or are, but are as they feel. I am in love with this style of directing and visual communication in movies. It turns movies into lush works of emotion, engaging the senses with the dreamlike and the improbable. 

One of the most striking uses of this is in the retelling of the ends of Broken Sword and Falling Snow, where in each telling of the story, the colors change with the feeling of the story. In the first telling, all passion and jealousy and war and heat, tones of red and orange fill the screen. Broken Sword and Falling Snow’s hair is rumpled and falls to their necks in sloppy loops, tendrils running over eyebrows and cheekbones. Gowns are loose and ill-tied. Arrows fly recklessly, and kill aimlessly.  The first retelling revels in the messy nonsense of love, and lust, and hate. This is the story Nameless chooses to tell the king, and it makes sense: It is compelling in its excess, a moral tale wrapped in a love story, the foolishness of great passions. 

The second story is all cool blues, reasoned and rational, the swordplay crisp, the school neat, the hairstyles well-appointed and glossy. This of course would be the story the king, a man of tactic and idea, would tell, because it is the dream that he would have. Every end is sewed up, every strategy thought of. Even in the fight between Sword and Nameless after the death of Snow, it is a ballet of precision and of respect, two fine soldiers dancing about each other. It is not without love, but always with restraint, and we see that from the first shot, in those chill hues. 

But of course none of that is what it means to be real, and we see it continue to be played out in Nameless’ retelling that we take to be truth, though, still being a story told by another, we see color used richly here, as well: The green to signify the beginnings of life between Sword and Snow, where all of this came to be; the white as Snow and Sword fight each other, both blameless in their fervent belief in the things that they fight for. All this against the blacks and greys, steadfast as the calligraphy that will write this history, of the palace. I am in love with this use of color as a sense of feeling, a dramatic setting of tone reminding us always that we are within a story, we are a part of that blend of legend and fact that truly makes up a history.  

I love fight choreography, particularly in long shots where you can see an exceptional amount of skill and timing. For people like me, it doesn’t get much better than the fight between Long Sky and Nameless. Jet Li and Donnie Yen are absolute masters of their craft, and their fight is the best in the whole movie for pure fight choreography enjoyment. This isn’t to say that the other fights are unskilled in any way, only that the other fight scenes are more violence as a incidental fact of the story, rather than the focus of it; they are more ballet than battle. But the fight between Sky and Nameless is so well-done that anyone giving the movie a shot beacuse they do love martial arts movies is going to be pleased. 

To that point, I’ve said earlier that the violence in this movie is incidental, and part of what I meant by that is that this movie lives in the world where everything is game of chess. And you might realize that you are the pawn, and to die yourself is the greatest move you can make. For a movie called hero, it is very little about what the standard American ideal of heroism is. Sure, you are willing to die for an idea, but are you willing to die for an idea in a way that is not at all glorious? Are you truly willing to die in service to that idea, and not in service to yourself? Because nameless makes that calculation, and decides that the king is right, and chooses to die as a villain but be buried as a hero, because the king recognizes this too. Sometimes the willingness to reconsider your values is as powerful as anything else. 

. Sorry, I have to be me at all times, but the fight between Moon and Snow in the red retelling gives me the most Michiru vibes of anything on earth, I love it so much, the casual disregard for Moon, her cool lack of engagement in her pain and anger. The way the leaves and wind themselves bend to her will, fight Moon on their own, and never does she betray any emotion at all. Even as Moon dies, Flying Snow keeps her back to her, not dignifying her with a glance. Incredible. It’s not only beautifully choreographed, it’s beautifully acted. Zhang Zhiyi makes failure look easy, but in reality, it’s not. The way she manages to make it look as if she’s struggling against impossible forces despite being an incredible talent in her own right, because this is not a movie that’s about the individual ego of the actors, but a movie that’s about what desire and failure can all mean, is exceptional to me. 

But also the idea of story as truth. All of these stories are true, in their way. The facts of the matter are important, of course, but what is more important is the truths as they are revealed on a personal level. The red retelling is only wrong because the king cannot live with it as an answer, because it does not fit with his understanding of the world. He balks at the idea that the Sword and Snow he saw could be so petty. I even have my doubts the the white retelling, the ‘true’ retelling, is all true. It is maybe the easiest to understand, the most palatable, of them all, but I’m not sure I understand any of it as “factual” 

For me, this movie is carried by Maggie Cheung as Flying Snow and Tony Leung as Broken Sword. Jet Li is not bearing any emotional weifght here. I know it’s ostensibly about Nameless and the king, and I will agree that at the end of the day, between Moon and Sword and Snow is irrelevant to what is happening in the throne room, but the soul, the emotional weight of this story, is: How do you carry a love that spans an ideal? And though that Ideal is different in every retelling, it is always tragic, and it is always with cost. The only ‘good end’ for Sword and Snow is to hold themselves to nothing at all, and of course that is impossible for them. The jealousy of the red retelling, the calculation of the blue, the honesty of the white (Every time Sword says he did not block so Snow would believe him, I die. It’s so beautiful and romantic in the eact way I like it. Romance like a thunderstorm, romance like a warning.) And their looks are intentionalyl contrasted as well. I have no idea what’s going on with Tony Leung’s face, but there’s something about it I find so drawing, despite it all, and they have Maggie Cheung so pale, and so delicate, it’s so easy to immediately see that these two people are not on the same page at a core level. I’m not sure it’s something I would have thought for myself despite absolutely loving it. 

I’m also taken by this idea of the king of Qin, and peace at the point of a sword. I don’t know that I think of this in the same way the movie does, but that’s not me thinking the movie is all wrong. I see the temptation of my own thoughts in the King of Qin. And frankly, he’s not wrong when he goes, “twenty ways to write the word sword? That’s the dumbest bullshit I’ve ever heard of. When I take over everything, we’re getting rid of that shit” and despite being where I sit in this world, I was thinking, “You’re right! It is dumb!” and I hated myself for it, but also I loved that the movie was like, “there are a lot of ways to feel about this! Go nuts! But it definitely happened, so you’regonna have to deal with it.” I am annoyed by how much I identify with the king, and how proud I find him but not in a negative sense. 

If I were going to offer a criticism of the movie, it would be that I don’t love that the thesis statement of the movie is stated in the opening credits. It’s not a very hard narrative to interpret, and I say that loving this movie very much. And I think the statement almost understates the real thrust of the movie, which not only that there are ideals someone will kill and die for, but there are ideals for which a person will allows themselves to die ungloriously. We veyr much have a visual of what “dying for your beliefs” looks like, and Hero turns all of that on its head, it refuses to let you have, with any of them, that beautiful moment of realized bliss. Hero instead asks: What if you realized you were a pawn in the chess game, and by sacrificing yourself you could do far more than anything else? While ALSO not allowing these pawns to be unknown to us. 

This is a movie that I alwya try to talk people into watching, because I really do think it’s worth it. Whether it’s an appreciation for the cinematic style, the incredible fight scene between Donnie Yen and Jet Li, the grand sweeping romance of Broken Sword and Flying Snow, or the idea that there are things that are worth dying for, things worth failing for, and things worth being unimpressive for, there are things to attract almost any person into movies broadly, unless they are dead set on hating it.

[mydarlinginej]

read my full review of hello stranger by katherine center here.

Love isn’t blind, it’s just little blurry.

Sadie Montgomery never saw what was coming . . . Literally! One minute she’s celebrating the biggest achievement of her life—placing as a finalist in the North American Portrait Society competition—the next, she’s lying in a hospital bed diagnosed with a “probably temporary” condition known as face blindness. She can see, but every face she looks at is now a jumbled puzzle of disconnected features. Imagine trying to read a book upside down and in another language. This is Sadie’s new reality with every face she sees.

But, as she struggles to cope, hang on to her artistic dream, work through major family issues, and take care of her beloved dog, Peanut, she falls into—love? Lust? A temporary obsession to distract from the real problems in her life?—with not one man but two very different ones. The timing couldn’t be worse.

If only her life were a little more in focus, Sadie might be able to find her way. But perceiving anything clearly right now seems impossible. Even though there are things we can only find when we aren’t looking. And there are people who show up when we least expect them. And there are always, always other ways of seeing.

my review:

A bit of a backwards experience, but I requested this book without having read anything by this author and then went and read another book by her (The Bodyguard). I unexpectedly had a lot of fun with that book, so I was excited to read this one! Hello Stranger was such a fun, cute romance that I couldn’t put down.

Sadie Montgomery is a portrait artist and just found out that she placed as a finalist in the North American Portrait Society competition. When she goes out to celebrate, she’s almost run over by a car—but saved by a Good Samaritan at the last moment. During her recovery, the doctors tell her that they discovered something in her brain that she’d need surgery for, which she reluctantly agrees to. Unfortunately, afterwards she acquires prosopagnosia—face blindness— that may or may not be temporary. As she struggles with what this means for her career, she meets her cute vet yet can’t stop running into her annoying neighbor, Joe.

This book was just a lot of fun! I appreciate this author’s ability to make her characters a little quirky (which I mean in a good way! like how female leads always are in rom-com movies). Sadie has a lot of funny inner monologues while also getting quite emotional about her grief over her deceased mother and her bad relationship with her emotionally unavailable father.

read my full review here.

[greensparty]

Movie Reviews: Sasquatch Sunset / Challengers

This week I got to review a knockout...and a letdown.

Sasquatch Sunset

movie poster

I'm just going to do a brief mini-review of this one. When I heard there was a sasquatch movie that starred Jesse Eisenberg and Riley Keough, both great actors, I was intrigued. When I saw the movie Sasquatch Sunset about a sasquatch family over the course of a year with no dialogue but tons of sound effects and scatological humor, I was bored out of my mind. It could have been anyone under that costume and makeup. It felt like a bizarre stoner student film that plays well with an audience at midnight based on the audience making fun of it. I wanted to like this and I was highly disappointed.

For info on Sasquatch Sunset

2 out of 5 stars

Challengers

Every sport has it's official movie, the one that is consider to be the best [insert sport here] movie of all time, i.e. for hockey it's Slap Shot, for basketball it's Hoosiers, etc. But there really hasn't been an official tennis movie. Wimbledon? Not really. I consider the best tennis movie until now to be The Squid and the Whale because the opening scene of the family playing tennis told you everything you needed to know about the family through their playing in that game. But now Luca Guadagnino has made the best tennis movie of all time with Challengers. What got my attention about this movie wasn't the director of Call Me By Your Name or the Suspiria. Or the star being It Actress of the moment Zendaya. It was that when they were filming it in Massachusetts in 2022, they filmed a key tennis location at Wedgewood, a private tennis and swim club in Bedford, MA. I grew up in Bedford so the fact that a big Hollywood movie was filming there got my attention. When I was 10, a friend whose family were members of Wedgewood invited me to go swimming with them. Can't believe that same place was now a key location for a tennis tournament. But I digress!

The film is about a love triangle set in the world of tennis over the course of thirteen years. We start in 2019 at a regional tennis tournament where Tashi (Zendaya) is watching her husband Art (Mike Faist of the 2021 West Side Story remake) compete against Patrick (Josh O'Connor of The Crown). Back in 2006 Art and Patrick were best friends. After a tournament they meet Tashi who was a tennis prodigy at the time. Both guys are attracted to her. She has a relationship with Patrick and later is married to Art, who she is now coaching. That's about all I can say without getting into plot spoilers.

actual movie poster and the photo booth poster where Zendaya is watching me!

As intense as the tennis scenes are, the genius in this movie is that it's really about the love triangle and these three characters. They each have their own motives towards the others, what they want and how they want the other(s) to go along with that agenda. It's not just two guys lusting after an attractive woman, it's also two guys manipulating each other at various times in their life. But it's all in the eyes, especially Zendaya, who is keeping a poker face most of the time. And it's sexy as hell without a single sex scene in the entire movie. Serious credit goes to Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross's score, which is their best film score since Gone Girl! Without getting into spoilers, the ambiguous ending is going to piss off some viewers. I didn't mind it as it was a film more about the journey and not so much the ending. At over 2 hours and 11 minutes it is a little longer than it needs to be. But let's just celebrate the return of the sexy grow-up movie which has been away for a while from Hollywood!

for info on Challengers

3.5 out of 5 stars

[widenyourworlds]

Review I wrote for school back in 2021.

Maurice.

Written between 1913-1914 (first published in 1975, five years after the author’s death), the book MAURICE is about the titular character of Maurice Hall in the Edwardian era of England (1901-1910). The novel is written in the third person and follows him from a young boy to a young man. The main centre of the story is Maurice and his internal struggles with personality and sexuality. Maurice is homosexual but it is never outright stated- words such as ‘queer’ are used to describe it and at one point Maurice describes himself as one of the ‘unspeakables of the Oscar Wilde sort.’ Oscar Wilde was a gay writer who was sentenced to hard labour for ‘gross indecency’ in 1895 after his love affair and letters to another man (Lord Alfred Douglas who himself was a poet; “the love that dare not speak its name.”) was exposed to the public. For more about this, I recommend the 1997 movie Wilde starring Stephen Fry.

The main focus of the book is Maurice’s sexuality. It opens with a school teacher explaining missionary sex to Maurice and the anatomy of the vagina; drawing it on the sands of the beach on which they had been walking, as Maurice’s father had died and it would be ‘inappropriate for his mother to have such a talk with him. But it all is something that comes to have little meaning for Maurice as he grows up and finds himself lacking any interest in women; even coming to hate them. Not in a typical way you’d expect of an Edwardian man- the hate seems to stem more from his sexuality and attraction to men. As a well-to-do man in the 1910s, he is expected to marry a woman and have children; something which Maurice absolutely does not want or have any interest in. So the heavy societal expectations put on his shoulders makes him hate and detest the women he is forced to love. The women in his life never become more than familial and distant, even the women he lives with (his mother and two sisters) are someone he grows to hate, and they him. He had a fleeting relationship with a woman with prospects of engagement and marriage but it never comes to that; possibly because the woman senses Maurice’s veiled disinterest. 

(“Both were misogynists, Clive especially. In the grip of their temperaments, they had not developed the imagination to do duty instead, and during their love women had become as remote as horses or cats; all that the creatures did seemed silly.”)

Maurice plays the role of a well-liked, well-off, English man well. He detests the society he lives in and hates the role he has to play, but it doesn’t show.  He wishes to lose himself to the desires of male love but can’t risk the fall it would take; male homosexuality is illegal. He could face financial and social ruin and at the start of the book, when he first discovers his sexuality, the thought frightens him. But then he meets Clive Durham- who introduces him to ancient Greek writings through which Clives eludes to his love of men and the two fall in love and spend the next few years of their lives together in love as they get their degrees from Cambridge. But they have a falling out after Clive declares that he has become ‘normal’, that he is no longer attracted to or in love with Maurice and that he is to be married. (“Against my will I have become normal. I cannot help it.”). And though they get into a physical altercation, and Maurice threatens to kill himself, they remain friends- though that is something that is hard for Maurice, who still is in love with Clive.

(“While he had love he had kept reason.”

“He hadn’t a God, he hadn’t a lover—the two usual incentives to virtue.”)

The book moves on to follow Maurice’s struggles with his love for Clive, lust for men, and the growing desperate to be ‘normal’ too- and the fateful meeting Maurice comes to have with Clive’s under-gamekeeper Alec Scudder.

(“O for the night that was ending, for the sleep and the wakefulness, the toughness and tenderness mixed, the sweet temper, the safety in darkness. Would such a night ever return?”)

The author of this book, E.M. Forster, lived in a time where male homosexuality was illegal. Where it was viewed as a mental illness and a crime- a great sin once done could never be righted. It would be absolutely life-ruining (as seen with Oscar Wilde) if it came out that you even had the inclination of affection for your own sex. Forster himself was gay, but not publicly so, and he never married (how could he?) but instead had a series of lovers during his life. He was friends with other authors and writers, including other gay men such as Christopher Isherwood known for his novel ‘A Single Man’, and it was through his friendship with poet and philosopher Edward Carpenter and his partner George Merrill that he got the inspiration to write Maurice. In 1987 a film adaptation of the novel was released, directed by James Ivory and starring James Wilby as Maurice. It was made by the same production company (Merchant Ivory Productions) that in 1985 had adapted A Room With a View, another of E.M. Forster’s works.

I can easily say that I absolutely fell in love with this book. Though I have never been much into romantic novels or works centred around a relationship; I am a sucker for historical pieces, especially if it revolves around LGBT+ characters. It makes it so much more interesting (and relatable) than your ordinary, run-of-the-mill, heterosexual nonsense. The book (and movie) moved me and pierced my heart several times in the span of however long it took me to read it. The subject matter was delivered both bluntly and eloquently; Forster wrote beautifully and bravely about male homosexuality and sensuality- treating it as normally as you could in the time and setting of the Edwardian era. Maurice was the first book of Forster’s that I have read but now, after this, I am buzzing with excitement to read his other works.

[E.M. Forster- “Dedicated to a happier year”]

[luc1ferian]

Introduction (WIP)

Welcome to the Inferno :)

ur-local-lunatic -> your-local-lucifer -> luc1ferian

Please please please check out my Carrd for everything

•~~~•

•~About Me~•

Hey! My name is Lucifer and I am a Minor (13+)! I would love if you could Ask for my Pronouns as I am Genderfluid. I am also both Omnisexual and Indian with an INFP personality type :)

On my main blog I basically just reblog things with the occasional random thought every once in a while.

THIS BLOG IS A SAFE SPACE for anybody validly queer, coloured, and disabled!!! <3

I will NOT hesitate to block blogs I don't like

Feel free to @ me in tag chains (including picrew and uquiz) any time as long as I know who you are (mutuals, me following you, you following me)

•~~~•

•~DNI~•

•Basic DNI criteria (Racist, Homophobic, Sexist, Proship, ect.)

•You are -11 or 17+ (I'll only make a few exceptions, just no private conversations with me)

•NSFW creators/consumers

•Extreme anime fans (Otakus and Weebs)

•Most Gacha Life/Club creators

•Hard stans

•Those who ship real people/problematic pairings

•People who seriously say "KYS"

•Generally problematic people

•~~~•

•~Interests~•

(Note: These are just my extreme interests, I like more things noted in my Carrd)

•Pressure •The Fly (1986) •Lemon Demon •Will Wood •The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy •Jekyll & Hyde (and other such adaptions) •Fish in a Birdcage •The Good Place •"Weird Al" Yankovic •The Stanley Parable •Casino Cups / Lil' Lucifer •The Metamorphosis •The Cuphead Show •Pinky and the Brain •Tally Hall

•~~~•

•~Tagging System~•

•#lucifers inferno: Original posts •#lucifers lust: Things about me and updates •#lucifers gluttony: Fandoms, Interests, and Hyperfixations •#lucifers greed: Stuff I Made •#lucifers sloth: Specific posts that either feature multiple reblogs or multiple medias (text, photo, video, ect.) •#lucifers wrath: Rants and vents •#lucifers envy: Answering asks •#lucifers pride: Random thoughts and stories •#lucifers humility: Memes and jokes •#lucifers kindness: Wholesome Posts •#lucifers forgiveness: Stupid Shit •#lucifers diligence: Long rambles •#lucifers charity: Mentioning/Celebrating Important Dates and Stuff •#lucifers temperance: Reviews on shows, movies, books, ect. •#lucifers chastity: Queued Posts

•~~~•

[thebuzztrack]

A Review of David Lynch’s ‘Blue Velvet’ (1986)

David Lynch plunges into the dark and twisted underbelly of a seemingly idyllic American town called Lumberton with his fever dream of a movie, Blue Velvet (1986). The film follows Jeffrey Beaumont (Kyle MacLachlan), a college student who returns to his hometown after his father suffers a stroke and has to be hospitalized. He stumbles upon a severed human ear in a field near his home and becomes obsessed with solving the mystery behind it. He meets Sandy Williams (Laura Dern), a high school girl whose father is a detective working on the case. Together, they peel off the layers of crime, corruption, and perversion involving a sadistic drug dealer Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper), and a mysterious nightclub singer Dorothy Vallens (Isabella Rossellini).

This is a film that defies easy categorization. It is part noir, horror, comedy, and surrealism. It is a film that challenges the viewer’s expectations and morality. It is a film that exposes the hidden violence and depravity that lurks beneath the surface of everyday life. It is a film that contrasts innocence and purity of love against the brutality and corruption of lust. It explores the themes of voyeurism, identity, duality, and power.

Blue Velvet is also a film that showcases Lynch’s unique cinematic style and vision. It is full of striking images, sounds, and symbols that create a dreamlike atmosphere and evoke strong emotions. The film uses color, lighting, music, and sound effects to create contrast and tension. For example, the film uses blue to indicate mystery, danger, and desire, while red represents violence, passion, and blood. The film also uses lighting to create mood and suspense, such as using shadows, darkness, and neon lights. The film features memorable performances from the cast, especially Hopper, who delivers one of his most iconic and terrifying roles as Frank Booth, a psychotic criminal who inhales gas from a mask and abuses Dorothy sexually and emotionally. The film also has an unforgettable soundtrack that includes Roy Orbison’s “In Dreams,” Bobby Vinton’s “Blue Velvet,” and Angelo Badalamenti’s original score, which create a contrast between the nostalgic and romantic songs and the disturbing and violent scenes.

The film has influenced many other filmmakers and genres, such as neo-noir, indie cinema, and psychological thriller. It has been widely praised by critics and audiences alike. And it has been recognized as one of Lynch’s masterpieces and one of the best films of the 1980s. It deserves to be seen and appreciated by anyone who loves cinema and wants to experience a unique and powerful vision.

Blue Velvet is like a fever dream nightmare you cannot wake up from. It is like a wound that never heals. It is like a song that haunts you forever.

[nfr-reviews]

NFR Reviews #15: Applause

Released 1929 / Inducted 2006

Watch film here

Her character Kitty Darling is late 30s minimum, but Helen Morgan was only 29 when she starred as a middle-aged burlesque star whose driving conflict is being washed-up and out of time to accomplish any semblance of a successful Broadway career. She’s doomed from the minute she gives birth and her coworkers form a line around her in a shot resembling people staring at a body at a funeral viewing. Burlesque, or at least the American variation of it seen in the movie, was a type of variety show encompassing parodies of either the upper class or “high art,” circus acts, minstrelsy, musical numbers, and sexualized performance art. Its sister industry, vaudeville, declined in the 1920s due to talent poaching and competition for audience attention from movie theaters. Over the course of its history, especially in the 1910s and '20s, burlesque relied more and more on sex appeal and revealing striptease outfits to draw in crowds. Stage runways, as seen in the movie, came about in the early 20th century so the audience could look at the performers up close. Modern “neo-burlesque” revivals retain the sexuality but attempt to re-emphasize the social commentary and comedy elements while being more inclusive of different ages and body types. The movie details a situation where use of sex appeal for profit generation instead of self-expression results in a narrow youth-obsessed beauty standard. This contributes to both Kitty being thrown to the side and her daughter (possibly because young people are perceived as easier to manipulate) being preyed on by older men.

Much of the narrative tension revolves around whether Kitty’s teenage daughter April will meet a similarly tragic fate in show business. Her presence creates conflict in her daughter’s coming-of-age process despite how she desperately wants the best for her. Normally, this character type would be a domineering force who views her offspring not as a separate human but a chance to vicariously live out her lost youth and failed ambitions. They don’t go that route; instead the main manipulator is Kitty’s boyfriend. She’s a victim of his abuse, but is also so caught up in the fantasy of a happy family she fails to notice him lusting after her daughter. With all the instability in her career and relationships, she struggles to be stable enough to give April the support she needs. It’s often April who’s second-guessing her own major life choices to emotionally support her mother, such as when she rethinks getting married after her mom’s career falls apart because she’s scared for her well-being. Even the sound design argues April shouldn’t follow her mother’s path of trying to make it in the big city. It conveys a chaotic but mechanical and impersonal landscape with its clangs, crashes, and car horns. She may be surrounded by crowds when arriving in New York for the first time, but most people are wrapped up in their own lives or only out to exploit her. The sounds chosen to overlay Kitty’s overdose scene are machinery noise from outside the window (possibly construction work or cars revving) preceded by a ticking clock. 

If her mother represents one potential future, another option arises when April falls in love with a sailor who wants to take her back to his Wisconsin farm. The narrative positions settling down and marriage as the safest option for its central women, implying Kitty’s life would’ve been better if, instead of focusing on an independent career, she’d taken up a marriage offer from a coworker who instead disappears from the narrative after the timeskip of April’s childhood in the convent. This life path has risks in its own right, especially since April is 17-18 and considering a marriage to a man she’s known for less than a week. To be fair, there are some interesting ideas raised by the romantic subplot. It gives April a chance to exercise agency. Most of her circumstances have been decided for her, but this is one she made herself–not her mother, not the convent nuns and their peaceful but sheltered environment, and definitely not the abusive potential father-in-law. The scene where she breaks off the engagement and he leaves on a train is also very well-done. It captures the clarity regarding a previously tough decision that arrives precisely after you’ve seemingly irreversibly chosen wrong. I think it’s because she has some semblance of control over this potential relationship that she nearly self-sabotages it. Her mother’s life is falling apart, and April's plan to abandon him to stay with Kitty feels like the only action she can do even if it’s not even helpful or what Kitty wanted. However, the sailor's initial proposal falls flat for me when he singlehandedly decides to marry her or else he’ll jump off a high building. The actors play it as joking banter not meant to be taken super literally, but he’s still prioritizing his own wants over her feelings even if he’s not directly forcing her into anything. In some genres, it’s easier to suspend disbelief about instant romances; fairy tale adaptations, for example, don’t need to be scrutinized according to real-world logic. But in a setting grounded in reality and often cynical, it comes off as her knowing show business will make her miserable and rushing into this as an escape attempt.

The large mechanized city, and especially show business, are portrayed as so fast-moving it’s inevitable people will get left in the dust. The obvious example is Kitty running out of time to succeed in her career, which hampers her mental health and ability to support April despite having more moral integrity than most “stage mother” characters. This also complicates April’s journey of coming of age and deciding what she wants in life. She avoids a stage career, which was her mother’s wish even if she never got to see it happen. The other option was asserting her agency and marrying a man that could make her happy and who she genuinely likes, even if they’ve known each other for a short time and some aspects of the romance subplot have aged poorly. She manages to do the best she can with the circumstances given, leaving her future uncertain but not an unambiguous tragedy like her mother’s.

Sources

https://www.cinema.ucla.edu/events/2013-10-18/applause-1929

https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2007/great-directors/mamoulian/

https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/the-strange-case-of-rouben-mamoulian/

https://soar.suny.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.12648/14533/4001_theresa.oquinn.pdf?sequence=1

https://www.backstage.com/magazine/article/neo-burlesque-just-booty-shaking-55359/

https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2002/cteq/applause/

https://sites.arizona.edu/vaudeville/burlesque-the-other-side-of-vaudeville-by-sidney-pullen/

https://muse.jhu.edu/article/846009/pdf

Toil Beneath the Footlights: The Spectacle of Female Suffering and the Rise of Comedy by Desirée J. Garcia

[northseatarot]

Movie Night Review

18th of January was a weird day (for me)

Firstly, the vibe felt completely off, so I checked the astrology (see previous post).

However, throughout the day, I had a massive energy slump. The kind that makes you think, "Oh no, is this covid/flu. But later on, my energy came back and balanced itself out.

So, having got little housework done on my day off. I decided to admit defeat. The duvet was out, and so I started scrolling through some movies.

My choice today on Freeve

Proximity

This was like all sci-fi movies rolled into one, including a matrix twist and a religious aspect towards the end (I want to add a brief doctor who moment). Please note that the soundtrack isn't great at first, and you will question your choice - however, stick with it, if you like quirky films.

This movie made me think about all the drones and all the discussion around possible disclosure. I was not prepared for the religious aspect, but it provided some food for thought. Again, I recall something across media linking church and aliens, so it didn't surprise me this was in them film.

I then watched Apparitions - Episode based series

This covered daily life problems such as domestic and sexual abuse, lust, and crimes, including problems within the church itself.

The key takeaway was how demons attacked and harmed everyone that a priest loved. Because they wanted to stop him from doing good in the world (excorcisms). Literally, life became his enemy, even the Catholic church. (2 episodes in).But he continued to do God's work regardless. Freeing those who harmed him . I'll be finishing at a later date.