#come with me my love

[pierppasolini]

Come With Me My Love (1976) // dir. Doris Wishman

[gotankgo]

Come with Me My Love (1976)

[watching-pictures-move]

Put On Your Raincoats | Come With Me My Love (Wishman, 1976)

Come With Me My Love starts in the 1920s, when a turtleneck-sporting Jeffrey Hurst sees his wife Ursula Austin in bed with another man. When Austin is found out, she tells him, unimpressed, "You fool, I never cared about you. He's the only man I ever loved."In a burst of anger, Hurst kills them both, and then dismayed ("Even in death you're not mine"), turns the gun on himself. Flash forward to present day (by which I mean the seventies), and a woman the spitting image of Austin’s character and conveniently also played by Austin comes into the same apartment. Yet sinister (and arguably sexy) events transpire, as the ghost of Hurst (in the same turtleneck, but captured in photonegative effects) terrorizes her in sinister (and arguably sexy) ways, like having sex with her while invisible, and killing her other sexual partners. (And seemingly causing their lovemaking to be drawn out for hours. I guess he takes a one for you, one for me approach.)

Come With Me My Love is one of two hardcore pornographic features directed by Doris Wishman. Like at least a few other directors who ended up working in the genre, she apparently didn’t like it too much, and may have delegated the filming of the hardcore scenes to an assistant director. This definitely feels true to the results, as the scenes feel anonymous and mostly divorced from Wishman’s overall visual style. Of her work that I’ve seen, the premise most brings to mind Indecent Desires, where a woman is sexually terrorized by an evil loner with a voodoo doll. In that movie, Wishman’s floating camerawork finds a poetry and poignancy in these scenes, so that they carry a certain charge. Yes, we’re supposed to be enjoying this woman being stripped naked, but at what price? Here, the indifference with which the explicit sex is captured never really evokes the tension between our prurient enjoyment and the plight of heroine. And aside from maybe one group scene that had a slight Rube-Goldberg-esque configuration and rhythm, I found most of the sex scenes pretty boring, but I suppose if you like these people enough you might get something out of it. I’m watching it in 2022 through a Doris Wishman auteurist lens. Perhaps it played differently to the degenerates in the porno theatre. If one of them pulled a Fred Willard during their screening, I wouldn’t hold it against them.

This does have a pretty respectable cast for a ‘70s porno, featuring the great Annie Sprinkle as the heroine’s sexy neighbour, the great Vanessa Del Rio as the heroine’s sexy...friend (I’m not gonna lie, I didn’t pay too much attention to what their relationship was, but I’m also not gonna complain if Del Rio shows up in a porno), the great Robert Kerman, the...uh pretty good Levi Richards, Nancy Dare and Michael Gaunt, as well as the aforementioned Hurst. (Austin I’m not terribly familiar with, although apparently I’ve seen a few of her efforts.) Gaunt and Hurst have been very funny elsewhere (in American Babylon and the non-porno Sex Appeal, respectively), although they don’t really get to use such talents here. (I must note that Hurst’s mustache in photonegative makes him look like a jack-o-lantern, so I suppose he did provide a few chuckles.) I will note that Sprinkle has the great idea of trying to cheer up Austin with a bout of lesbian sex, which is always worth a shot, and in another scene wears a dress with a cute print. So she was obviously my favourite character. And in classic porno fashion, this has a pretty eclectic soundtrack, at one point channeling Henry Mancini’s Touch of Evil score and at another point regaling us with xylophone music. I assume this was the cue to the audience to pull a Fred Willard.

And if the sex scenes lack her signature, the movie is unmistakably a product of Wishman’s hand in other ways. The patchwork depiction of the opening murder, with the shot of the clenched first, the shot of the gun, and the fact we don’t actually see the gun fire, feel both abstract and tactile in ways that feel entirely Wishman-esque. This style is applied even more amusingly to another death scene, where characters are supposed to be looking at a man who fell to his death from a window, and you get two people looking to the left of the screen with their heads slightly lowered, no actual shot of a window, and a decontextualized closeup of a man's face on the pavement. (Let me pull out my protractor and see if this breaks the 180-rule.) This has a surprising amount of sync sound, or at least people moving their mouths in the direction of the camera. (I assume the sound recording budget went further with a porno.) The Wishman touch even sneaks briefly into the sex scenes, with the slow pan to the mirror to evoke Hurst’s invisibility and the slow pans back (I assume to give him enough time to hide or come out from behind cover). We also get a goofy outdoor scene to fill the runtime where some punkass kid keeps throwing snowballs at our heroine. And like many of Wishman’s movies and many porno movies, this looks to have been shot mostly inside apartments, although I haven’t been studying her work closely enough to determine if this is the same apartment as her other movies. The wallpaper is a memorably angry shade of red, although it’s hidden in the earlier scenes through the sepia-toned footage.

So yes, there is some of the classic Wishman magic here, just usually not when people are fucking and sucking. Unfortunately, that’s a good chunk of the movie.

[kochei0]

I turn to Ares.

Thanks to Tyler Miles Lockett who allowed me to draw inspiration from his ARES piece for page 2! Look at his etsy page it's SICK

⚔️ If you want to read some queer retelling of arturian legends have a look at my webtoon

[inkskinned]

because sometimes there are invisible tests and invisible rules and you're just supposed to ... know the rule. someone you thought of as a friend asks you for book recommendations, so you give her a list of like 30 books, each with a brief blurb and why you like it. later, you find out she screenshotted the list and send it out to a group chat with the note: what an absolute freak can you believe this. you saw the responses: emojis where people are rolling over laughing. too much and obsessive and actually kind of creepy in the comments. you thought you'd been doing the right thing. she'd asked, right? an invisible rule: this is what happens when you get too excited.

you aren't supposed to laugh at your own jokes, so you don't, but then you're too serious. you're not supposed to be too loud, but then people say you're too quiet. you aren't supposed to get passionate about things, but then you're shy, boring. you aren't supposed to talk too much, but then people are mad when you're not good at replying.

you fold yourself into a prettier paper crane. since you never know what is "selfish" and what is "charity," you give yourself over, fully. you'd rather be empty and over-generous - you'd rather eat your own boundaries than have even one person believe that you're mean. since you don't know what the thing is that will make them hate you, you simply scrub yourself clean of any form of roughness. if you are perfect and smiling and funny, they can love you. if you are always there for them and never admit what's happening and never mention your past and never make them uncomfortable - you can make up for it. you can earn it.

don't fuck up. they're all testing you, always. they're tolerating you. whatever secret club happened, over a summer somewhere - during some activity you didn't get to attend - everyone else just... figured it out. like they got some kind of award or examination that allowed them to know how-to-be-normal. how to fit. and for the rest of your life, you've been playing catch-up. you've been trying to prove that - haha! you get it! that the joke they're telling, the people they are, the manual they got- yeah, you've totally read it.

if you can just divide yourself in two - the lovable one, and the one that is you - you can do this. you can walk the line. they can laugh and accept you. if you are always-balanced, never burdensome, a delight to have in class, champagne and glittering and never gawky or florescent or god-forbid cringe: you can get away with it.

you stare at your therapist, whom you can make jokes with, and who laughs at your jokes, because you are so fucking good at people-pleasing. you smile at her, and she asks you how you're doing, and you automatically say i'm good, thanks, how are you? while the answer swims somewhere in your little lizard brain:

how long have you been doing this now? mastering the art of your body and mind like you're piloting a puppet. has it worked? what do you mean that all you feel is... just exhausted. pick yourself up, the tightrope has no net. after all, you're cheating, somehow, but nobody seems to know you actually flunked the test. it's working!

aren't you happy yet?

[secretmellowblog]

People who try to analyze what happened on Tumblr on November 5th, 2020, often really overstate how much it was actually “about” Supernatural. As someone who has never been in the supernatural fandom ever but dID join in on the hysterical destielposting—it was really more about the stress of the pandemic and the 2020 presidential election.

The two biggest Youtubers I’ve seen try to dissect “what happened that November 5th” in video essays both weren’t American—- and I think that explains why they both tried to explain the hysteria primarily via analyzing the Supernatural fandom/the original show, rather than through the lens of the election. And while those videos are cool, valid, informational, and make lots of really well-considered interesting points— I can tell you that me and almost all my mutuals had literally no knowledge or interest in the fact that “oh supernatural had made nods at the ship in the past but the creators were adamant that I wouldn’t be canon” or etc etc etc etc. the first time I learned about any of that context was way later, watching videos where people claimed that fandom history context (that I did not know anything about) was the actual reason for the hysteria.

But the reality is that people latched on to the Destiel stuff because it was a piece of big useless inane zero-stakes fandom news in a time when we were desperately waiting for serious high stakes election news. We were latching onto a “positive “ piece of inane stupid fandom news in a time of great stress, with all the desperation of a drowning man who latches onto whatever piece of wood will keep him afloat.

The core of the hysteria was that Americans (who make up a huge chunk of tumblr’s userbase) were currently glued to their laptops watching the live presidential election vote counts come in. These vote counts were taking an extended amount of time due to the pandemic causing high numbers of mail-in ballots, resulting in a constant state of Election Day Stress for multiple days straight.

This was also during the height of the Pandemic. People had predicted Trump’s presidency would be bad; no one had predicted it would be this apocalyptically bad. No one had predicted pandemics and lockdowns and hospitals overflowing with bodybags. remember Trump spreading Covid lies and conspiracies?? There were so many Qanon conspiracies about democrats being Satanic child traffickers who had to be put to death, and coup threats were mounting from the right wing side. It seemed like this election was a choice between ‘centrist democrat’ and “apocalyptic right wing conspiracy theory authoritarianism,” in the midst of pandemic conditions that people feared would never ever improve— and it seemed like a close election.

Another major point was that Trump voters were more likely to be antimaskers/Covid deniers, while Biden voters were more likely to take the pandemic seriously— so Biden voters were more likely to send in mail-in ballots instead of risking the in-person voting crowds, which meant their ballots would take much longer to count. And so, in many state electoral vote counts, it would initially seem like Trump was very far in the lead— only for Biden to slooooowly build up an agonizingly small lead as the mail in ballots came in, and then defeat Trump at the very end.

So you’re just watching these news sites giving live election updates, refreshing the page every 2 minutes to see if you’re going to live under a spineless centrist democrat or a literal Qanon Dictatorship. And then you go on tumblr to distract yourself, and there’s more election posting, and more agonizing over the votes, and more stress and despair—-

And then it’s been days and we’re right at the crucial tipping point where it’s anyone’s game and the next few hours will determine whether Trump will win, so you need to keep your eye on the vote count, because the next hours will determine the future of the pandemic and your country and your plans for your entire life—

And then stupid Destiel becomes canon! And it becomes canon in the silliest way possible!

If Destiel had become canon at any other time, it would have been a big goofy tumblr celebration? But we wouldn’t have gotten the insane explosion of hysterical interaction.

The entire core of it was the contrast between the inane meaningless stupidity of fandom news vs the actual stressful election news you wanted to hear! It really is best conveyed in that meme where Castiel says “I love you” and Dean indifferently responds with a piece of important election news.

It’s about the contrast between the low-stakes inanity of fandom and the massive life-destroying stakes of a terrifying election. There really was no reason it had be Supernatural specifically, except that Supernatural was a thing everyone knew basic things about from dashboard osmosis— it could’ve been any other equally huge silly fandom ship news about a ship everyone *knew of* but might not necessarily be invested in (ex. Stucky becoming canon, Johnlock becoming canon, Kirk/Spock becoming more canon somehow, etc etc etc.)

I think it’s true that people who weren’t paying agonizingly close attention to the American election news got swept up in it, and that non American Supernatural fans also were extremely excited for purely fandom reasons — but the entire reason it blew up to an unprecedented degree was because of that core of stressed out terrified Americans glued to their computers watching election results and suddenly receiving stupid fandom news instead, and deciding to just hysterically parodically hyper-celebrate this absurd useless zero-stakes news.

I think it was also all elevated by the fact that, as I said before, this happened at the crucial “tipping point” of the election where the next few hours would determine the winner. The fact that Biden began to slowly develop a lead in the hours after made it feel, hysterically, as if the hours after Destiel became canon was somehow the turning point where he began to win; so celebrating Destiel felt like celebrating that slow turn towards victory.

The tl,dr is that it’s so important to Remember the Fifth of November …..in preparation the inevitable hysteria that will happen in the presidential election on November 5th of next year. XD. Personally I’m rooting for Johnlock or Frodo/Sam to somehow become canon in the eleventh hour right before the democrats win

[tempo-takoyaki]

Listen, I love the "XL helps HC to see how beautiful he is" scenario as much as the next person... But I also see it like this.

[bajaja-blast]

you dislike Luke Castellan because he disagreed with an oppressive government system and actually took action to change the abusive ways him and his peers have been forced to follow for millennia.

I dislike Luke Castellan because in the Titans Curse he manipulated Annabeth, who he raised as his little sister, into holding up the sky, the FUCKING sky, for over 20 hours and had the audacity to walk away as though he was completely apathetic towards it while she begged and pleaded with him to help her.

we are not the same.

[hinamie]

unconditionally

[deep-space-lines]

IT'S FINALLY FUCKING DONE. I'M FINALLY FREE

UNTIL FRAUD COMES OUT

Tumblr shrinks it down pretty bad so please. please. I am begging you. look at the full sized image and zoom in. This art piece made my friends worried for my mental health I need someone to witness the amount of detail and effort I put into this

also the original sketch under the cut bc I think comparing them is really funny

[sandushengshou]

[egophiliac]

was this anyone else's first thought, or

[huachengsromcom]

People call Heaven Official’s Blessing / TGCF a slow burn but Hua Cheng is literally courting Xie Lian like they are DATING. Slow burn who??? They’re sleeping next to each other on straw mats and Xie Lian’s offering to cook him dinner and they’re bantering across THE HOME THEY SHARE like a bunch of desperate hussys

San Lang LEAVES XL WITH A KEEPSAKE OF THEIR TIME TOGETHER SLOW BURN WHOMST

They have A DATE in HC’s armoury where they HOLD HANDS and XL pets San Lang’s quivering sword I-

Hua Cheng basically throws himself at this man he’s like you want a sword?? All of them ?? You want ALL THE SWORDS?? Fuck it take the whole room THE WHOLE ROOM JUST COME VISIT I WILL CLEAN THEM FOR YOU

Like he isn’t the king of a whole realm with shit to do

And this is just the first half of the first book—again I ask the world SLOW BURN WHOMST

[thatonedudeinthecorner]

Obsessed with the fact that the spideypool dynamic can be watered down to “miss you pookie bear” “oh lord” mindset

[hypurbee]

Make Gus a marriageable candidate challenge (IMPOSSIBLE)

[lawvno]

My pretty ghost princess💕