#but couldn't put a finger on it

[oceanwithinsblog]

OMG WHAT A MENTAL TRIP !!!!!THAT'S WHERE I HEARD ROXANNE THE FIRST TIME OMG OMFG

I'm sorry you can't do El Tango de Roxanne and have it not be in my head forever

[demigodseameg16]

Bro as someone who uses a walking aid (a cane) and is disabled seeing the new trailer for Miraculous Ladybug makes me absolutely furious. I have never felt so much hatred for a fictional character before and yet here we are. I didn't like Marinette before but like, this just. This hits way too close to home and I know Astruc is going to frame it in a way that makes Marinette the good guy. But NOTHING excuses touching a disability aid without permission, especially fooling around with it and sabotaging it. And the fact that a younger generation is going to see this, I absolutely can't. I feel so bad for disabled children who will see this scene on TV and have their feelings be in the wrong, shown that they are the bad guys for getting upset, or heavens forbid being disabled. Screw you Astruc.

[emmcarstairs]

Okay, is it me or are the bloody fingers/sewing/stiching fingers strangely reminiscent of a red thread of fate??

Not to mention that she's caught in his laso during these scenes.

[varilien]

halloween idea: werewolfwood ??? :]c

okay sorry this wasn't going to be vashwood but i put on a couple random werewolf movies while working on it and they were consistently SUFFUSED with romantic themes so. coughs.

werewolfwood as ever has a cranky face but a soft little heart :)

[introspectivememories]

the funniest possible thing that could happen is if mercedes keeps hiring childhood best friends for their team and everybody's holding their breath waiting for them to tear each other apart like brocedes except it doesn't happen bc everyone else is normal about each other and brocedes is just that fucked up that they would've torn each other apart even if they were on different teams

[starryalpacasstuff]

Fire (1996): A Mostly Spoiler Free Pitch Because You Should Watch It Immediately

It's time for "An Indian QL bulldozed past my expectations and I am reeling in awe", Part Two!

A few days ago, @neuroticbookworm told me about Fire, an old lesbian Indian movie she'd been wanting to watch. Me being me, I promptly tracked it down and settled in to watch it.

Very loosely based on the 1942 short story Lihaaf, the movie follows Sita, a newly wed bride who is settling in with her in-laws, which is how she meets Radha, who is married to her husband's brother. Both in unhappy marriages, they find solace and company with each other, quickly falling in love. Length: 1 Hour 40 Minutes TWs: Homophobia, C-word mentioned once, some depictions of domestic violence Release: 1996

The is almost entirely in English, and while one generally expects Bollywood movies to be in Hinglish, it's definitely a conscious choice here, which does make me wonder if the movie was supposed to be promoted to a greater international audience. You can find it here on Youtube, most of the (very few) Hindi dialogues have hard subtitles. I think it's also available on Prime? It wasn't available in India though, which is odd, but I didn't bother investigating. Let me know if anyone can figure anything out about this!

Going into this movie, I expected a melodramatic, emotional movie with a bittersweet tone. I did not expect a biting, incredibly engaging movie with excellent satire, symbolism, discussions of chastity culture, and an incredibly sweet, beautifully written romance. And I was certainly not prepared for how incredibly horny this movie is??? Both in subtle tension and overt sex scenes. There's also partial nudity, which again, completely unexpected. If you're going taboo, go taboo all the way I suppose. It's also very well directed, and while I'm not nearly as good at identifying details like that as some of the people on here, I did pick up on some colour coding and interesting framing. It's just overall packed with little details that I think a lot of us would have a field day analysing.

Honestly, I could talk about the cultural nuances in this movie for hours. Contrary to my assumption about the reasoning behind making the movie fully in English, the movie seems to rely on the viewer's understanding of North Indian customs to deliver a lot of it's messages, particularly with its satire, more on that below. While I don't think it's necessary to enjoy the movie, it definitely does add some meat to the story. Then again, I'm a biased party, so it'll be hard to determine just how many messages may be lost to someone from outside of India without someone to compare notes with (this is me shamelessly trying to get you to watch the movie). Honestly, I'd be 100% down to write a more detailed, spoiler-including post that goes into the implicit nuances if people are interested.

There's two main selling points for the movie; the incredible way it shuts down purity and chastity ideology and the absolutely adorable relationship between Radha and Sita. The movie is set on ruthlessly tearing down and emphasizing the ridiculousness of purity culture. A lot of the messaging is indirect and uses metaphors, but there's also several explicit scenes addressing the issue. It's one of the main themes of the movie and I'm almost convinced the real reason it's titled 'Fire' is the sheer number of burns it dishes out on this subject. The romance portion of this movie is one of the thing's that completely defied my expectations. It wasn't sad and dramatic, it was heartfelt and silly and adorable. There's several scenes of the two subtly flirting, laughing together and just being lowkey in love. But that's not to say there's no emotional depth—they're also there for each other and are quite vulnerable with each other.

The movie used a lot of metaphors, but my favourites were the almost satirical representation of mythological stories. In a religion as diverse as Hinduism, every holiday has two dozen stories behind it and each story has two dozen versions, so it's to be expected that you'll find a number of problematic or otherwise kind of ridiculous stories in the mix. The stories were told completely seriously, but the context of the movie highlights their absurd facets in a truly brilliant way. I'm not going to give too much away, but I will say, it was a delight to watch the juxtaposition of the myths and the storyline of the movie, particularly it's ties to the purity culture discussion. You'll understand when you watch it. I'm not turning this into a Hindu mythology lesson (yet) but one interesting tidbit is that Radha and Sita are both names of mythological figures; namely the partners of two of the most worshipped avatars of the god Vishnu: Krishna and Rama respectively. And I was overjoyed to find that their names do have relevance to the metaphors in the story, particularly Sita's.

When the movie was first released, there were massive protests against it, I'm talking hundreds of people storming into theatres to destroy them and drive away audiences. I don't know what to say here beyond this, but what I will say is that I think Fire is an amazing movie that absolutely does not deserve to be lost to the sands of time. I hope you give it a shot, and if you do, tag me in any posts you make about it!

Tagging people who seemed interested in recs from my last post, let me know if you'd rather I not tag you!

@lurkingshan @impala124 @bengiyo @letgomaggie @winnysatang

@watertightvines @nutcasewithaknife @blorbingqls @twig-tea

@waitmyturtles @cryingatships @benkaben @usertoxicyaoi

@befuddledcinnamonroll @flyingrosebeetle

[bbnibini]

I find it so painfully heartbreaking that Solomon just...laughs off all the derision, the name-calling, and possibly even did "evil" things on purpose because it's expected of him at this point. (He had not always been like this as Thirteen pointed out before). There was a time when he was "innocent". When his soul sparkled. When it resembled the kind of soul everyone in these god forsaken (pun intended with spite) three realms seemed to associate with the ever loved MC. He's just...worryingly carefree. And because he's like that, he feels even more of a tragic character to me.

Sometimes it even seems that he himself would seemingly make up excuses on why he's hated. Oh, it's because I'm a sorcerer this. I might have won a war against Devildom single-handedly this. I have forgotten. But maybe, I did something bad, that. Hon, you were doing that to SURVIVE. You don't have to be a faultless person to deserve compassion. You don't have to be MC to deserve to be loved.

[vergina-spva]

I love Cavendish because he's a shojo character lost in a shonen anime.

[bardic-inspo]

I'm becoming more and more enamored with the idea of Ascended Astarion becoming an accidental/unintentional service dom because either:

1. If you enjoy the vampire bride/groom lore/angle, Astarion's happiness becomes partially dependent on that of his consort (potentially with a more direct mental link), and he learns making them happy isn't actually that hard, and when he does, it hits him like cocaine and he ends up spending all of his time chasing that high.

2. If you don't subscribe to that lore, there's also the angle of love being twisted into obsession for vampires. He will be taking over the world, of course, but first, he MUST make sure his consort has the prettiest outfits. Every single day. (He has an eternity to dominate the universe, what's the rush?)

And in either scenario, coupled with his smooth brain/lack of strategic planning, he never really does fulfill the big bad evil villain endgame because he's too busy conquering his consort's every whim (the exception being any request for becoming a 'true' vampire, which I just don't see him entertaining, but that's just me!). But if you prod him about his big evil plans, he'll become very grumpy and mutter something about how his grand plan is definitely in motion, you don't even know!!

(This all makes me think of the A!A epilogue dialogue if you ask him about freedom, and he rants about all the things he's made sure you have/how he'll see you living your best life no matter what). 👀

[aquilamage]

bad and naughty iterators get put in the microwave to atone for their crimes

[missmungoe]

ik you said no more live action stuff but look!look! Shanks but better quality!

Not to sound like a thirsty barmaid but:

Oh.

[storybounded]

I'm popping in for only a brief moment to place down this cursed knowledge. Have fun.

[elysiarte]

i love viktor in the same way that i love dream of the endless

[nerdalmighty]

"You are perfect-"

WHEN?!

"-every time 😈"

[dmitryanya]

my sketchbook doodles ft. jack kelly letting out a genuine laugh and everyone in a ten foot radius immediately having a fanfic 'oh' moment.

[metamorphesque]

I was today years old when I found out that the song "all by myself" by Eric Carmen (later recorded by Celine Dion) is based on the 2nd movement (Adagio sostenuto) of Rachmaninoff's piano concerto No. 2 in C minor, opus 18