#i watched the trailer for the new bridget jones movie and was like

[nemo-writes]

okay OKAY no but fr that was the last of my pre-written stuff so no more until monday ☝🏼☝🏼☝🏼

[notebookmusical]

Hi! I hope you're doing well this week. Where are you going out of town? I hope you have fun! So I only know Bridgerton from gifs but I'm sure I would enjoy it so that's cool. And I am in the middle of watching the first season of the Bear with my sister who hadn't watched it and then we will watch season 2 together. I've kinda been able to avoid actual spoilers I think besides some gifs. I didn't even know it was coming back so soon but it's exciting. The show feels very real and that's something I like about it too. I felt that way about his other show Shameless as well and they are kinda connected in my mind but maybe cuz they both take place in Chicago lol.

I also am looking forward to the new twenty one pilots album this Friday too! I'm not trying to be annoying about it or anything, but it is something I've mentioned to you before that I have been waiting for. I listened to Billie Eilish's new album and thought it was pretty good. A lot of people really loved it but I think I prefer her other albums more, but I think it will grow on me with more listens. Zayn has a new album too and it was actually a different sound from him, like more folky blues that will take getting used to as well. But I love his vocals and I still liked it overall. I think it just takes me a while to get used to new music from artists I love. I don't really ever love anything on a first listen that often and I don't know why..even if I still like it. This even happened with Taylor a little bit, but I'm hoping I love the TOP album right away.

Oh that's an interesting ranking. From what I've read, people didn't love Meet Me at the Lake as much as Every Summer After. I felt like I loved the book and it was so easy to read but looking back on it, there were a few things I didn't like in the actual plot. I could definitely see the Summer I turned Pretty connection with the two brothers part of it from what I know. This is another show on my list for sure and I just heard it's not coming back until next summer so I still have time to catch up lol. I kinda agree it didn't have a pair with Emily Henry, but I wonder if Meet Me at the Lake and Happy Place are a pair just because they are both pink books lol. I read a snippet of the new one and was picturing Blake Lively as Bridget lol. This is probably cuz of her character in the sisterhood of the traveling pants, and it kinda gave me those summer vibes so maybe it works. Then Bee also makes me think of Gossip Girl for Blair but idk if it fits the characters really or if it should be switched. I also read a snippet of Funny Story and liked it so far. But I've also seen mixed reviews for this one. It seems like some people really liked it or they didn't or just thought it was okay and i'm wondering what the reason is. I still remember you said you really like it though and I trust your opinion more. I think the other two books you paired up pretty well too.

Wow your predictions seem so good and like you put a lot of thought into it. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them were actually right too. I've heard about Stereophonic very briefly. The only thing I knew was that it has some music in it which I always love. I think you said it kinda reminds you of Daisy Jones which is interesting. Also another book and show I need to finish lol. Although why is it just a play then and not a musical? I don't know much about it which is why I ask. But I never know much about the plays in general but I guess I hope it wins then if you predicted it. I agree with some of your predictions like some of the actors but I am also less sure and don't have guesses for technical things. . I hope you enjoy the Outsiders whenever you get to it. Pippin is good and I'm glad you enjoy it so much.

The Wicked trailer is fine. At first I watched it, and it just did not feel very Wicked at all to me. When I watched it again, I got more used to it. It's hard cuz I think the movie does have potential and will be technically good mostly but idk. Like my sister said she got chills on some parts. Something just feels missing to me and I'm not as excited as I should be for one of my favorite musicals. It's also been making for years and I just don't know if it's perfect or could be better. However maybe nothing or no one would have felt right to me anyway. I'm definitely still gonna watch it no matter what..I just hope it's the kind where I don't only wanna watch it once. Unfortunately it feels like they showed the entire part 1 movie in the trailer too, but maybe cuz I'm familiar with it? I still don't get the two part thing but the first half is my favorite. I'm hoping I get more excited as it comes closer. I'm debating if I should see the show again before cuz then i'd be comparing it for sure and like the movie version less. But I hope you have fun!

idk if going in order for the tour makes sense exactly and I like Lover first since that was the last era she didn't get to perform. I actually don't mind that she combined Folklore and Evermore..it's just that she did it after the fact and had them as separate before..but it kinda makes sense I guess. So in a way it also makes sense to combine debut and Fearless together...maybe like Our Song going into Love Story, and saying something like her love of music always came from writing her own songs and how she wrote it for her talent show, and add in the these songs were once about my life speech could work. Then you could honestly go in order from each era probably but I also like that she switches it up a little. I just don't know why she's changing it halfway through the show but I'm getting used to it. I'm not sure where the new set should go but I could still see i can do it with a broken heart last since it's still a fun upbeat song like Karma and still celebrating her career in a way. I could see it next to reputation. I would probably open up with Fortnight since it is the first song..maybe have a little bit of the title song, then go into Down Bad and Daddy I love him. Who's Afraid of Little Old Me, then the Alchemy since that can be about tour and I Can Do it with a broken heart. I know it's just in order from the album but that's also why it makes sense I guess. I think it could still work with the sets..idk but it's also fine how it is too. I honestly can't think of any Anthology songs that could work, but it seems wrong not to have any either. The Black Dog, I Hate it Here, Cassandra, So High School, and The Bolter are ones I would pick I think. The rest work better as surprise songs I think, and she's already sang a few. I love that she's still doing mashups keeping it fun and making it hard to guess lol. Although I was able to guess Paris, duh, and I guessed Begin Again cuz of the music video and that's why she sang it! I also guessed the Alchemy which she sang and the Best Day for Mothers Day but she didn't sing it. Her vocals have also gotten a lot better too. What about you? What songs would you include? I hope you have a great time going out of town this week and next. Have a great rest of the month if we don't talk and don't worry about replying of course. I'll miss you but we can talk whenever you get back.

hellloooo friend!! i tagged along on my mom's work retreat/work trip! very, very happy to be back home — i've got a pretty busy few days (weeks) coming up, and am just very very happy to be at home! in my own bed! finally! after a terrible travel day! a giant fuck you to [redacted] airline! i hope you've been well <3333

i've never seen shameless! but i have seen it on my dash many times over the years <333 i do really love the bear, and am very much excited to see it come back! i am surprised i watched bridgerton season 3 as soon as i did — i kept telling myself i'd wait till both parts were out and then baam! watched all four episodes! and i even reread three of the bridgerton books — the viscount who loved me (kanthony), romancing mr. bridgerton (polin) and when he was wicked (frannie's book)! i haven't updated my little reading tracker in a hot minute, but i will eventually.

how did you like the new 21p album? i still haven't listened to it, but i finally listened to the billie album and i really really liked it! i was surprised at how much i loved it. i'll have to give it another few listens to decide what my favorites are! you aren't annoying at all!! i love hearing about what you're interested in and what you love 🤍 i also haven't listened to the new zayn album! one day i will be on top of it. rip my album a day challenge; i was doing so well. and then ... i was not.

i actually watched the sisterhood of the traveling pants movie for the first time a few weeks (two months?) ago! one of my friends loves it, and we sat down and watched it! i liked funny story a lot more than i did happy place, but didn't love it. which is fine! i think book lovers just really blew everything out of the water, and so now everything just sort of pales in comparison for me!

oh we have so much to talk about theatre wise! ahhh!! tony season is coming up so soon! i used to really nerd out over grosses and reviews and all that, but started to pay less attention to both over the years. but i still think it's really interesting and a good gauge of what will win (or not) and also how theatre is at the end of the day a business. one of my best friends saw stereophonic on friday and i am SO so jealous. i really hope it tours :( i want to see it so badly. and it does remind me of daisy jones kind of!! i believe the formal definition of a musical is that it has to have a certain amount of songs? whereas stereophonic is more a play with music, since it has fewer songs / not all songs are played in full. i really want to get more into plays, but sometimes i'm overwhelmed and unsure of where to start. maybe i will try to do a play a month for the rest of the year!

i also feel very :/ about the movie; you're not alone! i think it's going to be interesting to see how they split it up into two movies. i think the cast feels weird. i think there is just a lot about it that does not align with 1) how wicked the stage show makes me feel / what i am used to seeing + 2) what i have imagined in my head for a movie adaptation to look like. what are your wicked opinions? favorite songs, favorite characters, favorite moments? i don't think we've talked about wicked much!

ooh that's so interesting! ugh, i want a debut set so badly. i am still very bitter about that. it's fine. whatever. i don't care!!!! (i care very much!) i was shocked she didn't sing the best day for mother's day, honestly! i haven't been keeping up with eras as much lately since i've been out of town and all that, but did see that griff is an opener for one of her england shows!! i love griff, i'm so happy for her!

i think i would structure eras this way, if we're sticking to ~ 46 songs/same time length:

Act I: Lover

Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince

Cruel Summer (audience interaction/speech!)

The Man (costume change!)

Lover

Act II: Fearless

6. Fearless 7. You Belong With Me 8. Love Story

Act III: Red

9. State of Grace 10. Holy Ground 11. 22 (audience interaction — hat) 12. All Too Well (either version!)

Act IV: Speak Now

13. Sparks Fly 14. Enchanted 15. Long Live

Act V: reputation (I think this set is genuinely so perfect, and I'm not a rep girlie)

16. ...Ready For It? 17. Delicate 18. Don't Blame Me 19. Look What You Made Me Do

Act VI: folklore/evermore

20. the last great american dynasty (i really miss the theatrics of it all) 21. cardigan (on roof?) 22. betty (speech) 23. august/illicit affairs (i wanted to put the folklore trilogy together) 24. my tears ricochet 25. marjorie 26. champagne problems (speech!)

Act VII: 1989

27. New Romantics 28. Style 29. Blank Space 30. Bad Blood (fire!!!! chant time! yay!) Act VIII: Debut 31. Teardrops on My Guitar 32. Our Song 33. A Place in This World/You're On Your Own Kid mashup (was trying not to do mashups but i think a APITW/YOYOK mashup would be really sweet)

Act IX: Acoustic 34. Surprise Song (guitar) 35. Surprise Song (piano) Act X: The Tortured Poets Department

36. But Daddy I Love Him 37. Who's Afraid Of Little Old Me? 38. Down Bad 39. I Can Do It With A Broken Heart

Act XI: Midnights

40. Lavender Haze 41. Anti-Hero 42. Midnight Rain 43. Vigilante Shit 44. Bejeweled 45. Mastermind 46. Karma

i'm not super happy with it, but i think that's what i've got! hope the rest of your may is restful and lovely, and all the best for a wonderful june!! 🤍 love you!

[bridgetfm]

        chase sui wonders & she/they / nonbinary‷ watch out , bridget matusiak has crash-landed into roswell !! they look twenty-three years old and celebrate their birthday on july 25th. they are from roswell, new mexico, reside in tripp’s trailer park and are currently working as a documentary filmmaker and clerk at blockbuster video. one thing you should know about them is they wrote a semi-successful twilight fanfic in 2012 that amassed thousands of followers on tumblr‷   ( nora, she/her, 26, gmt ) bridget is single & lives in the tripps trailer park with roommate elliot liu! ( and a pair of domesticated rats called sid & nancy ).     (  pinterest.   playlist.   muse tag.   open starters. )

hello !! bridget is a really old muse of mine n i’m very excited to bring her here. this intro is gonna be hella long cos its me and i don’t do brief (sorry) but if it’s tldr think alternative edgelord artsy e-girl who spent too much time on tumblr in 2014 and wanted to be effy stonem. she grew up in roswell, then moved to a commune, then came back to roswell !! a lot of chaotic energy, i hope you like her as much as i enjoy writing her.  

NAME:  bridget matusiak.

NICKNAMES: bridge, birdie, b-roll, tootsie.

AGE: twenty-three.

GENDER & PRONOUNS: nonbinary, primarily she/her, sometimes they/them.

SEXUALITY: pansexual with a preference for femme-presenting people.

OCCUPATION:  documentary filmmaker & clerk at blockbuster video. (has previously worked at the bowling alley and the record store but was sacked from both. did a brief stint as a barmaid at planet 7 but left because it was lowkey making her dependent on alcohol).

ARCHETYPES: the e-girl. the soapbox sadie. the angry feminist. the valedictorian.

CHARACTER REFERENCES: janis ian (mean girls), anna (freaky friday), any angry alt girl wearing tartan in a 00s coming of age movie with a pop punk soundtrack, maeve wiley (sex education), lexie (euphoria), robin (stranger things), duckie (pretty in pink), angie (diary of a wimpy kid), jo march (little women), eric (21 jump street), coraline jones (coraline).

ZODIAC:  aquarius moon, leo sun, scorpio rising.

NEIGHBOURHOOD:  tripp’s trailer park.

RESIDENCY:  she was born in tripp’s trailer park. for a few years in the mid-2000s she lived with her dad in a commune in the rocky mountains. her aunt adopted her in the ninth grade and she lived in jupiter valley for a bit but as soon as she was legally able to live on her own again she moved back to her old trailer at tripp’s. currently lives w/ elliot liu.

TATTOOS: various constellation stick-n-pokes, an alien wearing a backwards cap riding a skateboard on her ribcage, fuck the patriarchy under-boob tat, knuckle tats that say ‘they’ on one hand and ‘them’ on the other hand.

aesthetic.

big e-girl energy, deffo has the blonde streaks in the front of her hair. wears so much tartan, olivia rodrigo’s sour tour outfits give bridget energy. her boots always have like a 6 inch chunky sole. a lot of military or leather jackets over tiny little sundresses which she’s stuck safety pins in to make them edgy. always in docs or creepers and a beret with an anarchist symbol painted on it. wears a long green trench coat covered in badges for alt punk rock bands or a red denim jacket that she hacked into a crop jacket with a pair of kitchen scissors. fishnets. smudged mascara. in-line roller blades. kate bush posters lining the walls of a teenage bedroom. an uneahlthy fixation with effy stonem. glitter smeared over her cheekbones that she’s not washed off from the previous night. speaking so fast that her brain can’t keep up. responding to any kind of criticism with ‘that’s just showbiz, baby!’

backstory.

tw mental health, tw drug abuse

its just her and her dad, and has been for as long as she can recall !! everything she knows about her mum could fit on the back of a weathered passport photo she keeps in her wallet of a stranger who shares her face -- her name’s melody, or at least tht was what everybody called her when she was working at the wild pony. she’s from argentina and dropped bridget’s dad as soon as someone w more money and a semi-existent hairline came along.

bridget’s father came to roswell in the nineties, a textbook conspiracy theorist (complete with the tinfoil hat and wax jacket) and ended up staying in tripps trailer park. bridget was born in roswell, and she’ll probably die in roswell. their trailer was full of newspaper clippings, x-files posters, alien sighting maps, and dog-eared attempts at finding bridget’s mom. for a while, bridget’s dad worked at the chavez county sheriff’s dept, before a psychotic break meant they had to lay him off. so he did odd jobs to get by, furniture upcycling, janitor work.

at school, she used to do sponsored silences and hunger strikes for kids in developing countries. she was that kid in school who was always cutting her hair off to donate it or raising money for something. i mean its kinda cute but also she just wanted the acclaim and attention so…. and most of the time it didn’t even make it to the disadvantaged kids she was raising it for, it just ended up going on new school shoes or medication for her dad.

in the early 00s, the summer between grade school and middle school, bridget and her dad moved to the sangre de christo mountains north of new mexico after he had a midlife crisis and decided they were going to join a commune and live off the fatta the land in a very lenny from of mice and men kinda way. he stopped taking his meds and instead entrusted his health to the healing power of the earth.

honestly, by this point, bridget was kind of used to this shit and was just like yeah fair whatever. her father had been diagnosed with bipolar shortly after bridget’s mom tapped out, and whenever things started to get tough, his response was to just up and run. she’d learned to carry her most prized possessions in one trunk. she’d been to more schools than henry viii had wives. she’d learned that the only consistency would be the thoughts inside her head, and so she made friends with the characters from books rather than forming real life friendships.

when bridget was thirteen she discovered twilight. she’d loved books before, but never had she been so engrossed in a fictional world. she styled herself on alice, carried herself with the poise of rosalie, spent sleepless nights tossing and turning trying to decide if she had the choice would she pick jacob or edward? but her favourite character was always jane.

it was around this time bridget started writing fanfiction. in 2010 she wrote a 60,000 word fanfic from the perspective of jane from the volturi. the response was slow, but chapter by chapter she built up a fanbase, fans from all around the world who sympathised with the volturi and wanted to hear more about their pasts, their traumas, their reasons for having such a sacred need to uphold the vampire traditions.

she soon learned that writing gave her the power to create her own friends. it let her rewrite the time she was turned down for prom in the school cafeteria so that she was the one doing the ditching. it let her turn her father into a responsible dad who attended parent-teacher meetings and signed her book reports. it allowed her to give her mother a reason to disappear so abruptly from her life --- she was a secret agent, a movie star, a lion tamer. and while her hobby for fictionalising her whole life petered off when she approached her late teens, it was a tool that helped her come to terms with the fact that she wasn’t straight when she began writing erotic fanfiction about her friends.

in ninth grade, her aunt filed for custodial care of bridget and pulled her out of the commune to live with her in jupiter valley, bridget’s father having been decreed an unfit parent by the state. she’ll never forgive her aunt for this, but at least it meant she got to go back to roswell.

she’s a strident feminist, an activist for human rights and animal rights, a vocal vegetarian and an all-round soapbox sadie. catch her in the market shouting about human rights through a megaphone. will most definitely have quizzed your character on institutionalised racism whilst inhaling nos at a party and snacking on a big bowl of cheesy wotsits

she’s an aspiring screenwriter. she has a very image-based view of memory and experience. always doing a screenplay or shooting film. her style has a lot of catholic iconography (think virgin suicides style or baz luhrmann’s romeo + juliet if it was done on a super 8 camera) bcos catholicism is one of the few things she knows about her mother. she’s never actually tried to find her mum / find out about her, jst…. occasionally channels that energy into her work.

worked a fuck tonne of dead-end jobs just to fund her passion project which is documentary filmmaking. she always has a camera on her, it’s pretty shitty but she loves that glitchy old-school laura palmer filming style. she spends a lot of her time hanging out in the cemetery because it’s where she gets her best ideas.

she got fired from the bowling alley for having sex with the work experience guy in the back room. now she works at blockbuster, but it’s so dead that she pretty much just gets stoned and watches tarantino movies the whole time she’s there.

massive film buff. she majored in film at uni also spends a lot of time at the movie theatre n probably has like a season ticket. is one of those pretentious film nerds who’re like “what do u think of goddard’s work?” but also just really into shitty horror movies.

she loves b movies and slasher flicks. at parties, she’ll occasionally try to make a horror of her own, on a super 8 camera in someone’s basement, very paranormal activity, but she’ll inevitably get bored, or too drunk and give up, like she does with most things in her life

there’s a degree of anger for anger’s sake in bridget. she likes passionate, angry music – particularly garage rock, punk and riot grrrl. she loves the slits and skinny girl diet. viv albertine inspired her to take up bass guitar. she’s forming a band called maggot rock (based on the line from jennifer’s body “he listens to maggot rock. he wears nail polish. my dick is bigger than his.” colin from jennifer’s body would probably be the only man bridget would ever consider being romantically attracted to. 

after taking up bass, bridget also learned electric guitar. she recently started playing in jaden’s band, having covered for one of the band members when they were ill and their roommate, elliott, told the band bridget could fill in. she loves jazzy twangy riffs

honestly, a bit exhausting to be around sometimes. definitely that super extroverted friend who has something wrong in their brain but refuses to see a doctor.

some ?mildly amusing? facts

is vegetarian for environmental reasons but snorts coke at parties like that isn’t shit for the environment ?? sis, it don’t add up

she’s slightly obsessed with true crime, up late watching documentaries on the manson family murders.

keeps rats as pets. loves rats. so gross.

favourite movie is jennifer’s body. megan fox made her realise she liked girls.

she’s seen all the scream movies like a million times.

a lot of her time is spent in the record store, plugged into a set of headphones, head-banging in the corner to a scratched record. music for bridget is a form of escapism. that and dropping acid in parking lots lmao.

other places you’ll find her: alien gulch skatepark & paintball, space invade arcade, graveyard, thrift store, forbidden planet, oceanarium, breaking into the air base to shoot a horror movie, dissociating in the starlight supermarket

this bitch hates capitalism and loves karl marx

plots i want that i mostly stole from the tags

muse a tries to stand up for muse b in a bar but unfortunately cannot fight for shit.

muse a works somewhere that’s open late and muse b comes in to take shelter from the storm.

‘i got in my car and you were sleeping in the backseat who the hell are you and how did you get into my car’

umm a wlw plot isnpired by san junipero ! esp this post. could have been a former fling that ended sourly !! cos i dont like ship forcing but still?? give me wlw stuff

“i just decked you in the face because i’m drunk and you were pissing me off but ow my hand really fucking hurts i think i might have broke it and oh look your nose is bleeding and now we’re both sitting awkwardly in the hospital while i glare at you from across the room. but wait are you giving me sex eyes?? stop that i’m supposed to mad at you??”

“platonically sharing a bed until i wake up and you’re curled round me and my nose is buried in your hair so i’ll pretend to stay asleep to keep this for a little while longer” plots

“highkey want a ‘someone wrote your phone number on the wall of a bathroom in my dorm with ‘call for a good time’ and i just texted you to let you know that i scribbled it out and oh wait you’re actually funny and easy to talk to and now we’re talking every day and i might have a tiny little crush on you even tho  i don’t even know your name’ plot”

goddamn its another shippy wlw plot apparently that’s all my tag is but this post

“known for being rebels without cause, muse a and muse b are synonymous to their fast cars, nights out beneath the stars, empty bottles of alcohol, and loud music. they meet by chance one night and immediately click, and embark on a careless adventure after it despite not knowing each other. it’s them against the world: after all, what could go wrong ?”

any of these sad sour unrequited love plots

‘we take the same elevator every day and due to a misunderstanding i assumed you didn’t speak english and i’ve been talking to my friend about how hot you are for three weeks and apparently my friend has known from the start but you agreed not to tell me bc you both think its hilarious what the fuck’ au

‘i accidentally dropped you while you were crowd surfing and you broke your ankle and now i feel responsible so i’m carrying you out of the moshpit’ au (phoebe)

walked in on my roommate and you screwing except i know you from class and i freaked out a little

i was hustling you in pool for money but you were hustling me for free drinks so who’s the real winner here?

drama. angst. horror. also nice bike rides please

queer parents who made them realise they were queer

[rinslove]

just saw the new spider-man in the cinema!! it was so good and i'm gonna talk more about it because i really need to freak out about it somewhere

warnings for below the cut: huge no way home spoilers, strong language, mentions of anxiety

AUNT ? MAY ?? DIED ??? i wanted to cry so hard then PLS i loved her so much and she died :( but my anxiety wouldn't let me since i was in public

OMFG AND SHE SAID IT? WITH GREAT POWER COMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY SHE MF SAID IT

ANDREWS SPIDER-MAN PLEASE HE HAS ALWAYS BEEN MY FAVOURITE yeah i see you guys who said you hated his movies switching up now after judging me for loving them don't act like you've always loved him AND WHEN HE CAME ON SCREEN OMFG IF I WAS WATCHING IT AT HOME ID HAVE SCREAMED

AND WHEN HE SAVED MJ?? and he got so emotional because he saved mj and meant peter didn't have to go through what he went through with gwen :(

DOCTOR STRANGE TELLING PETER TO CALL HIM STEVEN BEFORE HE CAST THE SPELL AND THE WAY HIS EYES WERE WATERING :( HE CARES SO MUCH FOR PETER I CANT :(

okay this is genuinely my only complaint about the movie: how much it felt like a romance. i don't mind romantic movies — well, the original romantic movies like bridget jones' diary and love actually and all of those ones. but i came here for action i didn't come here for all this romantic emotional stuff i wanna see him fight people

it didn't feel like two and a half hours? like at all? i was sitting there and the credits started and i was like? there's no way it was that simple to take out the villains. it couldn't have been that easy. but it was? it felt like it went by in a flash

VENOM?? OH MY GOD BROCK WAS IN THE UNIVERSE AND HE LEFT BEHIND A LITTLE BIT OF VENOM DHSKSJDH SHIT OMFG ngl at first i thought it was lego

THE DR STRANGE TRAILER AS WELL IM HDJSHDHD IM SO EXCITED

i can't think of anything else to be completely honest but when i went to take a drink from my can of irn bru i spilt it on myself so that happened. not about the movie i just wanted to share that piece of information with you guys. that happens every time i drink from a can i wish i was kidding i do it at work all the time i should invest in straws

overall i loved it. it was nice being in the cinema again after two years lol. social distancing is still employed so we werent next to anybody which made it more spacious. the only issue with that for me was that it set off my anxiety a little (worse because everyone there was from my school unfortunately), but you can't always win i guess lmao

[scifigeneration]

3 ways that big data reveals what you really like to watch, read and listen to

by Anjana Susarla

Generating new entertainment data. MinDof/shutterstock.com

Anyone who’s watched “Bridget Jones’s Diary” knows one of her New Year’s resolutions is “Not go out every night but stay in and read books and listen to classical music.”

The reality, however, is substantially different. What people actually do in their leisure time often doesn’t match with what they say they’ll do.

Economists have termed this phenomenon “hyperbolic discounting.” In a famous study titled “Paying Not to Go to the Gym,” a couple of economists found that, when people were offered the choice between a pay-per-visit contract and a monthly fee, they were more likely to choose the monthly fee and actually ended up paying more per visit. That’s because they overestimated their motivation to work out.

Hyperbolic discounting is just one challenge of operating in a creative industry. Tastes are highly subjective, and the elements of plot and narrative that make one movie a tremendous hit could easily make another a critical and commercial failure.

For decades, advertisers and marketers struggled to predict the consumption of leisure products such as movies and books. It’s equally challenging to decide the timing. Which weekend should a studio release a new movie? When a publisher releases a hard copy of a book, how do they decide when to release the e-book version?

Today, big data offers new visibility into how people experience entertainment. As a researcher who studies the impact of artificial intelligence and social media, there are three forces that stand out to me as especially powerful in predicting human behavior.

1. Economics of the long tail

The internet makes it possible to distribute entertainment products that are less popular than mainstream successes. Streaming shows can acquire a larger audience than what is economically feasible for distribution through prime-time television. This economic phenomenon is referred to as the long tail effect,

Since streaming media companies such as Netflix do not have to pay to distribute content in movie theaters, they can produce more shows that cater to niche audiences. Netflix used data from their individual customers’ viewing habits to decide to back “House of Cards,” which was rejected by television networks. Netflix data showed that there was a fan base for movies directed by Fincher and movies starring Spacey, and that a large number of customers had rented DVDs of the original BBC series.

2. Social influence in the era of artificial intelligence

With social media, people can share what they are watching with their friends, making otherwise independent entertainment experiences become more social.

By mining data from social sites like Twitter and Instagram, companies can track in real time what moviegoers think about a given movie, show or song. Movie studios can use a treasure trove of digital data to decide how to promote shows and release dates for movies. For instance, the volume of Google searches of a film’s trailer during the month before its premiere is a leading predictor of Oscar winners as well as box office revenue. Movie studios can combine historical data about movie release dates and box office performance with search trends to predict ideal release dates for new movies.

Mining social media data also helps companies to identify negative sentiment before it spirals into a crisis. A single tweet from an unhappy influential customer can go viral, shaping public opinion.

In a study I conducted with Yong Tan of the University of Washington and Cath Oh from Georgia State University, we showed how such social influence determines not only which YouTube videos become more popular, but also that videos shared by influential users become even more widely viewed.

One study shows that when studios pay attention to social media buzz before a movie’s release, the difference between the predicted revenue and the actual revenue, known as the forecast error, reduced by 31 percent.

3. Consumption analytics

Big data provides better visibility into what books and shows people actually spend their time enjoying.

Are you going to finish that? diego matteo muzzini/shutterstock.com

The mathematician Jordan Ellenberg pioneered the use of the Hawking index, a measure of the average page number of the five most highlighted passages in a Kindle book as a proportion of that book’s total length. The Hawking index shows when people give up on a book. If a 250-page book’s average Kindle highlight appears on page 250, that would give it a Hawking index of 100 percent.

The theory gets its name from Stephen Hawking’s “A Brief History in Time.” While this book still sells millions of copies a year, it is also seldom read, with a dismal Hawking index of 6.6 percent.

When a company such as Amazon decides which books to recommend to potential readers or which Prime shows to produce, they look at detailed digital traces of which plot points engaged audiences and which did not. This might help them to promote an upcoming release or to make better recommendations to individual users.

What’s more, new types of artificial intelligence can investigate what makes people engage with creative content. For instance, a company named Epagogix pioneered an approach using a neural network – an artificial intelligence tool that looks for patterns in very large amounts of data – on a set of screenplays rated by experts in the entertainment industry. The computer could then predict the financial success of a movie. According to some reports, such artificial intelligence can predict up to 75 percent of films’ actual opening grosses.

Given new big data insights like these, entertainment companies may soon know what exactly Bridget Jones would like to do with her leisure time better than Bridget herself does.

About The Author:

Anjana Susarla is Associate Professor of Information Systems at Michigan State University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. 

[day-trippin-dreamer]

tinaaa im sorry for the late reply. just got busy for the past days, but anyway! im here again to bother you aha 😌👉🏻👉🏻

i get what you mean! growing up, hugh was in almost every movie i have ever watched like.. because yknow my mom’s into romance and all that. what’s your favourite movie of his? (if u have!). ngl i was shocked by the third installment, i was like why is there a different guy and not hugh haha. his character was such a chick magnet. but yes!!!! me and my mom are both rooting for mr. darcy like dude veiduhcfhdjd. we have a lot in common oh my god. what’s your mbti if you dont mind? im an infp.

thank you so much, tina!!! i’ve been thinking about if i really belong to this program bc i wasn’t fully excelling at it and my classmates are really good and i feel like they have a bright opportunity for the future. so yeah theres that.. but your message? ugh thanks for believing in me even if i was just a stranger! thank you. i dont know what state or mood you are currently in, but i wish the best for you and i believe in you as well <3

that’s nice. are you cool with your current job? i hope you stay safe wherever you are.

hopefully i can try the latte oh my god. what’s your habit of drinking coffee? bc the coffee posts you reblog are funny to me!

yes! i mean presents. sorry to confuse you.

and don’t worry about converting it to fahrenheit, our standard is celsius as well so i got it! :)

how has your day been? 💖

aah hii bestie!! don't worry about it!! i'm happy that you're back because we didn't finish talking and i missed you 😭

so true!! he was constantly on tv lol!! my dad hates him for that it's so funny 😭 my favourite (from the ones I've watched) is probably Bridget Jones' Diary lol! I've seen a lot of his other ones, but that one is just a classic and it's his best era (imho lol)!

i was shocked about that too!!! i haven't seen the movie itself yet (partly because of that) but when i saw the trailer i was so confused haha!! yesss Mr. Darcy!! It's so funny to me he's also been Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice??

We do!! This is adorable!! I'M ALSO AN INFP WHAAT 😱🥺 rip it's a struggle to be on one tbh but at least we're cute 😌

of course i believe in you!! everything will fall into place, i'm sure, don't compare yourself to your classmates because everyone is on their own path i believe and just try to enjoy your program 🥺 and hopefully find some cool, like-minded people!! aah and thank you for all your kind words 🥺💗

i'm cool with my current job yeah lol 🥺

i hope you can!! my habit of drinking coffee is, as ed sheeran recently sang, a bad habit lmao. i drink every day because my body has definitely developed an addiction but for now i'm okay with that because i like coffee lol.

haha, it's okay! I don't really want anything this year, like there's nothing I've been saving for or hoping to get. Maybe a new tattoo lol?What about you??

Celsius FOR THE WIN!! seriously Fahrenheit is so lame ugh 🙄 (american mutuals dni lmao)

my day has been eh :// i didn't get much sleep last night so i can't wait to get home and catch up on it!! maybe watch a movie 🥺 how have you been?? i hope you stay safe as well and thanks for stopping by!!

p.s. are you my joey anon? 🥺🥺🥺

[beckettsthoughts]

get to know the blogger. 33 & 38 please :) btw I love ur blog. Have a great day :)

Thank you so much for asking, I’m glad you enjoy my blog! I hope you have a fantastic day as well

33. What TV show or movie do you refuse to watch?

While I know it’s not been released yet, I am up in arms and very serious about boycotting Paramount’s new reboot of Heathers. I genuinely liked the original movie- recommended to me by a friend in secondary school who told me “it’s got Winona Ryder and shoulder pads, you’d love it”- and even though I’ve never been involved in the fandom, I’d heard word of a reboot and was even kind of excited. As soon as the trailer was released, I soon realised that my excitement was a dire mistake. Just, it’s hard to describe exactly how much I hate about this trailer. From the vilification of minorities to the tonal switch that makes it come across more like a Riverdale-style drama with the comedy of Mean Girls rather than a true black comedy, it just completely misses the mark of what I like about Heathers. 

I can’t think of any movies that I straight up refuse to watch, although there are many genres that I do my best to avoid. There’s one genre, a group of films that I pettily refer to as “the shallow comedies” that I truly dislike- and that’s comedies along the lines of The Hangover and Bridesmaids. A lot of 2000′s romantic comedies fall under this bracket as well, I find. That said, I can’t deny the sheer amount of times I’ve watched Bridget Jones’s Diary, but that might be a result of the British style of humour more than anything else.

I also avoid horror movies and television series, because they’re often pretty graphic. However, when something fairly safe like Stranger Things comes along, I will watch it eagerly.

38. What’s your favourite book or movie genre?

Oh god, there are two very clear genres that stand out to me in this regard. The first, relating to my taste in modern literature, is fairytales and urban fantasy. I have a really strong love of magical realism, of stories that explore folklore in modern and contemporary settings. A lot of the stories I write are based in fairytales, and many of my favourite stories and poems are folkloric as well. For an example of this I would refer you to the novels of Maggie Stiefvater, as well as books that create their own mythos such as Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere or The Ocean At The End Of The Lane. If you happen to be into folkloric fanfiction, however, then there is nobody better to refer you to than my good friend @shark-myths- known on AO3 as “scarredsodeep”- who is a veritable master of magical realism. Every fairytale she writes blows me away, and I will never stop raving about that.

Secondly, the other genre I really love is bildungsroman, or “coming of age” stories. This one particularly applies to my taste in movies as well, considering the fact that I have long cited “The Breakfast Club” as my favourite film. Aside from my love of the works of John Hughes and the “Brat Pack” films in general, “coming of age” stories often provide interesting narratives exploring various youth cultures and subcultures. Youth subcultures are a long-running special interest of mine and therefore these kind of narratives are a surefire way to pull me in. From classics such as The Catcher in the Rye to the aforementioned “Brat Pack” films, bildungsroman will always be a genre I admire.

[everlarkbirthdaydrabbles]

Happy Birthday titaniasfics

Happy birthday @titaniasfics! To help you celebrate in style, here’s a little bit of Everlark PwP, just for you. Enjoy! And thank you @thegirlfromoverthepond for the request.

Campfire

rated E

This is not camping.

This little slice of dirt, surrounded by giant trailers and caravans, with their generators humming and televisions flashing. That’s not camping! Who comes out to the ‘wilderness’ just to watch TV anyway?

Nothing about this trip has gone according to plan. The tent I borrowed from Gale can hardly be called a tent at all, ‘pop-up coffin’ might better describe it. My sleeping bag fits in there. Sort of. But nothing else. He, of course, has the huge tent we usually share, and a mattress on a stand, because heaven forbid Madge soil herself by sleeping on the ground.

Madge.

I should have realized, when Gale suggested inviting a bunch of friends along on our annual trip to the woods, that what he really meant was he wanted to bring his new girlfriend. And the red flags should have been flying when, instead of our typical backcountry camping, he suggested a drive up site. “But it’s right on the lake,” he’d insisted. “We can swim and fish, it’s going to be amazing!”

I guess his girlfriend prancing around in high-heeled sandals and a bikini about as big as a bandana, while refusing to actually go in the water (it’s not chlorinated!) is his definition of fun.

Who am I kidding, of course it’s his definition of fun. He looks at her like she hung the moon.

I’m not jealous, or at least, not in the way you might think. It’s just that Gale and I have been friends since we were kids. A brotherhood of sorts. Partners in crime like that are hard to find.

“What did that log ever do to you, Everdeen?” Peeta chuckles behind me. I lodge my hatchet in the end of a stump, and turn to scowl at him, but I'm pretty sure it's unconvincing.

Peeta's been, by far, the best part of the day. When Madge declared the hiking trail too long and too hot, Delly was quick to agree. Gale and Jo were more than happy to escort their girlfriends back to camp. But Peeta insisted on continuing, just him and me.

And it was amazing. I had so much fun wandering the woods with him. Chatting, or just listening to the steady racket of him stepping on every leaf and tripping over every root behind me. With anyone else it would have driven me insane. But it's hard to be annoyed with Peeta Mellark.

We went to school together, he and I, but we never talked much, never ran in the same circles. That changed when his friend Delly started dating my friend Johanna a few months ago. Since then, we've gotten to know each other over weekend gatherings and pub nights with our common friends.

And the more I get to know him, the more I get to see of his kind and generous nature, the more I like him. I don't make friends easily, but with Peeta it just feels effortless. He’s sort of snuck up on me.

“I think that tree is dead now, Katniss,” he laughs. It’s true; instead of kindling, I’ve reduced it to matchsticks. I shrug.

“Doesn’t matter anyway. Everyone is going to the amphitheatre to watch a movie instead of having a bonfire.” Another reason I’m pissed off. A movie? Who wants to spend two hours watching Bridget Jones whine and stuff her face when we could stare into the flames, contemplate our existence in the cosmos while watching the sparks float into the night sky?

“Not a movie fan,” he asks, but before I can yell I see his smirk, and I know he’s teasing me. “It is a little strange,” he says softly. “To come out here, only to to be glued to a screen. As if we’re still in the city. Such a wasted opportunity.” He looks up into the dusky sky, streaks of orange split the shades of blue and violet. The first stars stealing through.

I shrug. “I like movies, honestly,” I tell him. “But… I don’t know. I look forward to this trip every year. And this year it’s just been…”

“Disappointing?” he supplies. He’s still looking up at the sky, but he looks sad. As if it matters to him that I’m disappointed in the trip.

I’m not, or not exactly anyway. True, it’s been nothing like I’d planned, nothing like I’m accustomed to. But there have been some bright spots. All of which have involved Peeta. “Not disappointing,” I murmur, and my soft tone makes him glance my way. “Just different.”

He flashes me a smile that seems so genuinely sweet with just the right touch of shyness that unexpected warmth rushes through me. “Different can be good,” he says. And I smile.

“Different can be good,” I agree.

He reaches for my hand. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes,” I answer without hesitation. Apart from my sister Prim, Peeta might be the only person I'm certain I can trust. He twines our fingers together and tugs me away from the campsite, pausing only to grab his backpack. We head down the dark path that I know leads to the lake.

The moon hangs low in the sky, spilling across the water in glossy silver waves. He guides us along the shore, remarkably surefooted for a guy who couldn't traverse the woods in broad daylight without banging into every branch. Finally, he stops at a rocky outcrop where a tidy stack of split firewood waits. “What's this?” I ask.

“Campfire,” he grins. And I laugh. But something warm flares in my chest, and I have to glance away before I do something stupid like kiss him.

Peeta's a whiz with fires, coaxing a spark into a roaring flame within a few minutes. He rifles through his pack, pulling out an old camp blanket and spreading it on the rock. There's barely room for both of us, but I find I don't mind sitting pressed against him. I don't mind at all.   

We watch the flames for awhile, not really talking. Then he reaches into his pack, pulling out a bag of Jet Puffed marshmallows. “Not even homemade,” I tease. “You’re off your game, Mellark.”

He affects a mock wounded expression, and then reaches back into the bag for a tupperware container. When he pops the corner of the lid I melt.

Homemade graham crackers. Of course.

He has thin bars of chocolate too, not the crappy stuff I usually buy, but good Ghirardelli chocolate, dark and rich.

It's sweet, sitting side by side, toasting marshmallows in silence. Flickering firelight plays across his handsome face, highlighting his straight nose and sharp jaw. But it's his eyelashes that I'm a little fixated on, so pale you don't normally notice them, but golden in the fire’s amber glow. And so long I can't figure out how they don't get all tangled up when he blinks.

He catches me staring, but he doesn't tease me. He just smiles.

He's perfectly controlled, turning his marshmallow precisely until it's golden on every side. I rush; mine ends up partially charred and only half melted. “How do you do that so perfectly?” I mutter as I yet again blow out the sugar-fuelled inferno on the end of my stick.

He laughs, just softly. “I think you'll find I'm a very patient man, Katniss,” he says, and his eyes twinkle. And I can't help thinking we're not talking about marshmallows anymore.

Of course, when he slides his bit of liquified sugar perfection off the stick and onto a chocolate-ladened cookie, he holds it out for me to take.

There's something in the way he's looking at me, smiling eyes soft and affectionate, that emboldens me. I take a chance and lean in, guiding his hand towards my face, encouraging him to feed me the delicacy himself.

I hold his gaze hostage as I wrap my lips around the decadent treat, watching the firelight play across the dark oceans of his eyes. I groan as the rich chocolate and gooey sugar caress my tongue, and Peeta swallows hard. When I pull back to chew, strings of glistening white marshmallow cling to my chin. His nostrils flare, and he reaches for me, almost as if his hand has a mind of its own.

He tries to wipe away the sticky bits but really only succeeds in making it worse. But I don't care; the feeling of his large, warm hand on my face is making my heart pound in the most thrilling way. My eyes slip closed, and when I can pry them open again his are fixed on my mouth, where my tongue collects the sweet chocolate remnants of our treat. I don't know how we got so close, his every breath whispers across my lips.

He starts to pull his hand away, but I wrap my fingers around his, keeping him in place, nuzzling his hand just a little. “Katniss?” My name is a question, and I answer it the only way I know how. I close the gap between us.

His lips are soft, softer than any man’s have a right to be. And after a shocked little half inhale, they move against mine eagerly.

And it's incredible.

The cookie gets tossed aside somewhere and his other hand tangles in my hair. I groan at the twin sensations of his fingers carding through my hair and his tongue stroking my own sensuously. Even his kisses are methodical, measured, as he learns what makes me whimper. He pulls back just an inch. “Is this real?” he pants. “Please tell me it's real.”

“God, I hope so,” I moan, then kiss him again. He smiles against my lips.

His arms move to engulf me, warm and steady, even as he continues to kiss me. “Do you have any idea,” he whispers as our lips part just enough to drag in gulps of clean night air. “How long I’ve wanted this?” His lips trail along my jaw, nibbling at a spot just under my ear that makes me gasp. “How long I’ve wanted you?”

I shiver, his lips and his words ignite a fire low in my belly. I lie back on the blanket and tug him to follow, until he’s hovering over me, thick forearms braced by my head. His eyes are cautious, but his pupils are blown wide and I can feel his excitement pressed against my hip. “I want you too,” I whisper, and his smile lights up the night.

Unlike other guys I've fooled around with, Peeta takes his time. He kisses me languidly, trailing his fingers over the soft skin of my belly, but no further, teasing me until I'm squirming and arching, wordlessly begging for more. I try to pull him into the cradle of my thighs, desperate to feel him hard where I need him, but he resists, smiling against my skin. “Patience,” he chides gently. “I've waited so long. I want to savour you.”

“Please touch me,” I whimper. His sharp little intake of air encourages me, I grab his wrist, loosely, so he could pull away if he really wanted to. But he doesn’t, letting me drag his fingers under my shirt until I shyly release them just below my bikini top. It’s all the encouragement he needs, that large, warm hand cups my breast and I moan.

“Oh shit, Katniss,” he gasps, his hand squeezing convulsively. “You are perfect. You are so fucking perfect.” Hearing those foul words fall from Peeta Mellark’s sweet pink lips might be the biggest turn-on of my life. Knowing it’s me making him lose control.

I throw caution to the wind and wriggle my t-shirt off entirely. Peeta’s eyes are wide in the moonlight as he gazes down at me. I’m still wearing the simple bikini top I was wearing earlier at the lake. It's nothing special, not like Madge was wearing, and I certainly don't fill it out the way Madge fills out hers. But Peeta looks at me as if I'm something exotic. He shudders, a low groan rumbling from his chest. Then his head descends, and his tongue traces the slight swell of my breast just above my bikini.

I thread my fingers through his soft golden curls, and surrender to his maddeningly slow exploration. His lips and tongue and teeth worship my small mounds before finally - finally - he nudges aside my top and exposes my tight nipples to the night air. When his lips close over one aching bud I swear I see stars. I moan and writhe, tug his hair and arch into him. I can feel his smile against my skin.

My hand sneaks up under his shirt, finding taut muscle that flexes under my fingers. Peeta’s not ripped, but he’s strong and lean and hard in all the right places. He's perfect.

His own hand slides up my thigh, slipping under my shorts to palm my ass. I'm so aroused, and seconds away from begging.

The sound of laughter and splashing comes from down the beach and we both freeze. “Shit,” Peeta gasps, angling his body to shelter mine even though no one can see us here. Protecting me. Something warm flares in my heart. “I'm sorry,” he says, tugging my top back into place. “I shouldn't--”

“Can we take this back to your tent?” I interrupt. The look he gives me is smouldering.

It's takes a few moments to smother the coals of our forgotten fire and toss our snack back into Peeta's pack. Then we're rushing hand in hand along the dark path, back to our site.

We sneak up carefully, but the others haven't returned. Thankfully. No distractions.

We crawl into Peeta’s tent, more than three times the size of my little coffin and with a comfy looking double-sized inflatable mattress in the middle. I ditch my boots, shoving my striped hiking socks into the toe, then sit on the edge of his bed before my nerves can get in the way, wrapping my arms around my knees.

Peeta creeps towards me, chuckling. “What?” I ask. In answer, he grabs my foot, pressing a kiss to my toes as I squirm.

“My favourite colour,” he says, stroking my orange-painted toenail.

“I know,” I admit with a half smile. His expression darkens, with a last kiss to my ankle he sets my foot down and cups my face in those huge hands. And then he’s kissing me, not slowly, not any more. He kisses me with barely restrained passion, stealing my breath and my senses with every shocking sweep of his tongue. It’s electrifying. It's magic.

This time, he’s the one who lays me back, and then he crawls between my thighs, the hard length of him pressing against me. I can’t help but groan, the twin sensations of his tongue thrusting in my mouth while he grinds against me are almost enough to send me spiralling over the edge already. And it’s not just that he’s so damned sexy, or so damned good at this. It’s that it’s him, Peeta Mellark. The only boy who ever caught my eye in high school, the one I thought about all through college.

I claw at his shirt, trying to pull it off, to feel the broad expanse of his sun kissed skin under my palms. He kneels over me, whipping the shirt off and affording me just a moment to appreciate his firm chest and sculpted abs, a masterpiece in the moonlight. He's beautiful, strong and broad and perfect. Then all of that glorious sun-kissed skin is pressed against me, warming me even as his lips and tongue and wandering fingers set my blood to boil.

He’s so patient, so controlled in the way he touches me, but there's nothing boring about it. He reads me like a book, and each time his mouth and hands coax me right to the brink of begging, to the point where I think I can take no more, he somehow understands, pushing further, delighting me anew.

My bikini top disappears into the dim, the rasp of his stubble on my sensitive skin in sharp contrast to the featherlight kisses he presses everywhere as he slides sinuously down my body. Then he's tugging my shorts and bikini bottom off, baring me to his greedy eyes. I pull at his shorts with far less finesse, and he acquiesces to their removal, but when I reach for him, aching to weigh the hot length of him, he retreats. “Not yet,” he whispers, and the sound is so raw, so needy, I know how desperately he wants me to touch him.

Almost as desperately as I want him to touch me.

He pushes me gently back, spreading my thighs wide. I can't even feel shy about what I think he's planning to do as he stares at me, unblinking and licking his lips. “Please,” I beg.

He locks eyes with me just briefly, just  long enough for me to see his desire, desire I'm sure is mirrored in my own expression. But still he takes his time, pressing tickling kisses along my thighs, making me squirm. When those thick fingers finally part my folds, I almost come. “Fuck,” he groans, and I shiver. “You're so wet.” My retort is lost in a strangled cry of his name as his talented tongue laves a hot trail along my slit.

Never once had I ever imagined Peeta's silver tongue painting masterpieces across my aching flesh. And now that I've experienced it I know I'll never forget. That the soft groans he presses into me as he thrusts into me with his tongue and laps up my arousal will be the soundtrack to my every future fantasy. Every hot flick of his tongue guides me higher, higher than I've ever been. His lips curl around my sensitive little nub and he hums; I can do nothing but wail invocations to the nylon sky as the rapture rises up to claim me and I'm forever changed.

I'm still whimpering and pulsing with the last waves of the most spectacular orgasm of my life when he crawls up my body, pulling my boneless limbs into his warm embrace. “That was so fucking hot,” he murmurs against my temple. I can feel him hard against my hip, a bead of pre-come slick against my skin. I want him. I want more.

“Please tell me you have a condom,” I pant, and he nods, pushing himself up onto his knees. A shaft of moonlight illuminates his cock, proudly jutting out, long and thick and mouthwatering, as he shuffles not to his discarded shorts for his wallet, but to a side pocket in his backpack. The same backpack he'd packed for our campfire.

Only when he returns to me does he seem to realize the implication. “I, uh. I didn't mean… I mean, I wasn't planning--”

“I'm glad you have them,” I tell him, pulling him back down for another blistering kiss. “I want you, Peeta.”

His teeth glow white in the dim as he grins. “I've waited years to hear you say that,” he says. At my incredulous expression, he chuckles. “You have no idea, the effect you have.”

I have no answer for that, so I kiss him. I've always been better with actions than words.

He pulls back to sheathe himself, then crawls over me. His eyes are almost electric in the dim, huge and excited. And even still he's infuriatingly patient, taking himself in hand, teasing me with his latex-enrobed tip until finally I grab his ass and pull him against me. I moan at the feeling of him nestled between my folds, not entering me, not yet. Just sliding in all of the wetness. He must like it too, because he swears softly under his breath and thrusts against me.

Peeta kisses me softly, tracing my lips with his tongue as he rocks with me, each deliberate stroke making me gasp and mewl.

Finally, after a groaning, shuddering eternity, he shifts and positions himself at my entrance. He's big, and it's been awhile, but I'm so turned on and he's so controlled. He fills me in one long stroke, and I feel everything in me stretch - my body to accommodate his, my heart with a swell of affection for this man, this kind, beautiful, gentle man.

When he's completely buried in me he stops, head tipped back, eyes closed. I can feel the tension in his body, see how his neck muscles strain, sharp in the moon’s silver glow. “What's wrong?” I whisper.

His eyes flutter open, hooded and lust-hazed. “You feel so good,” he groans. “I just want to freeze this moment and live in it forever.”

That stirring is back in my chest, warm and curious. I want to tell him okay, that I'll allow it. The idea of being with Peeta this way forever is awfully appealing. “Please move,” I whine instead.

His face lights up, a cocky smirk replacing the awe. “You want me to move?” he teases. “Like this?” He pulls back achingly slowly, until just the tip of him is still inside me, and I wrap my legs around his thighs, trying to prevent his escape. His smile only widens. “Like this, Katniss?” He's pushing in and pulling out, just a fraction of an inch at a time, just enough to drive me absolutely mad. “Is this how do you want me to move?”

“Hard,” I groan. “I want you hard.” I swear he laughs, pulling out completely, teasing me again with just the tip of his dick, tracing my sensitive folds.

“I don't know,” he says. “I'm pretty hard already.”

“Dammit, Peeta, I want you now,” I growl in frustration, and the amusement in his expression morphs to something more carnal.

This time he fills me in one hard thrust, and I cry out. His moan is softer, but just as passionate.

This time there's no teasing, no slow exploration, no caution. This time he sets a blistering pace, and I love it. He kisses me, swallowing my cries, grunting against my lips as I arch, gripping fistfuls of his sleeping bag and locking my legs around his back.

I'm already climbing when I hear it, the telltale high-pitched prattle of Madge heading back to camp. Peeta hears it too, but he doesn't stop, doesn't even slow. Instead, he reaches up to cover my mouth with one huge hand, his lush lips next to my ear. “Can you be quiet, Katniss?” he whispers.

I lock eyes with him, molten blue irises almost obscured by fat black pupils. And I shake my head, helplessly. I'm not usually so loud. But sex has never been this good before. And even knowing our friends are returning, I don't want to stop. I'm not sure I could.

His hand stays clamped over my mouth, muffling my moans, as he pants filth into the crook of my neck. Angelic Peeta Mellark is a dirty talker. I never would have guessed, and it's the hottest thing imaginable, his words in my ear and his hand on my mouth, and the rough way he slams into me over and over.

I bury my hands in his downy curls, tugging firmly and he bites my shoulder. It's so hot and so unexpected, my orgasm hits me like a shockwave, radiating pleasure from my core to every inch of my body.

Peeta slows, prolonging my climax, wringing every drop of pleasure from me until all of my muscles slacken. Only then does he remove his hand.

He's still panting in my ear, only now the words are soft, sweet. “You are so beautiful,” he murmurs. “So much better than my fantasies.” And when he comes, it's with a shuddering whimper of my name.

We lay together, boneless and breathless for a long time, listening to the crickets’ lament and the low murmur of our friends chatting just a few yards away before Peeta pulls back just enough to discard the condom. Then he wriggles the sleeping bag free to wrap around us both and gathers me in his arms again, kissing me softly until I fall asleep.

o-o-o

Birdsong filters through our nylon ceiling. A silver-grey dawn is fast approaching. I try to wiggle out of Peeta's arms, but his grip tightens. “Don't go,” he murmurs, mostly asleep, and my heart clenches. I know he doesn't mean it. Everything is so much clearer this morning; the way we snuck back to his tent like thieves in the night, how he kept me quiet, swallowing my moans even as he pumped into me. This is just a secret dalliance. It’s a cliché, really, the two single people in the group hooking up. Expected, I guess, but temporary. Better to slip away now, save us both the mortification of a walk of shame in front of our friends.

“The others will be up soon,” I whisper. I’ve never had a one-night stand before, but I’ve been roommates with Johanna for years, I know how they’re supposed to go.

His sleepy blue eyes search mine, the flare of pain unmistakable. Bewildering. “Katniss?”

“I, well. I thought you’d want me gone by then.”

“Why on earth would you think that?” I try to scowl at him, but it's hard to to appear indifferent when his very naked body is pressed against my equally bare skin. When I can still taste him. I shrug.

“I guess, I mean, well. You didn't want anyone to know. And I get it.”

“Katniss,” he breathes, all vestiges of sleep gone. “I didn't want the others to hear us last night because I know how private you are. How… pure.” He shakes his head. “This… I want so much more than just one night with you.” He cups my cheek in one large, rough hand. “You have to know that? I'd like to tell the planet about us. I would put it on a billboard or tattoo it across my chest, if you'd allow it.”

He's so earnest. So open. My doubts start to melt away. I want that too, to see where this could go. To see more of his smile, hear more of his laugh. “Okay,” I murmur.

“Okay?”

“Maybe not the tattoo,” I smile. “But the rest… I'll allow it.”

“Yeah?” he grins.

“Yeah. I really like you, Peeta.” His soft laugh dances across my cheek as he tilts my face to kiss him.

“I really like you too.” And snuggled together, we slide back into slumber.

[narcisbolgor-blog]

Is big-budget television threatening cinema? – BBC News

Image copyright Alex Bailey/Netflix

Sitting in a trailer on the set, the producer of Netflix's The Crown declines to tell me how much it all costs. But a member of the crew later chortles that they "spent 750,000 yesterday".

It looks like a film, costs as much as a film and, according to executive producer Andy Harries, is "filling a big gap in the market".

But one of the leading film producers in the UK, whose work includes Bridget Jones and Love Actually, says super-TV has made his job more difficult.

Andy Harries says he is creating a "viewing experience that is somewhere beyond top-end television and much nearer to big-budget feature films".

Image caption The set of The Crown at Elstree Studios in north London

It is filling a gap in the market, he says, created by "traditional Hollywood's" focus on the teenage market.

"The kind of dramas we make for Netflix and for Amazon are filling a big gap in the market; people who used to go to the cinema but don't much nowadays."

'All the money goes on screen'

"Cinema watching in the traditional way is definitely in decline. Television is growing partly because of the physical quality of televisions these days. Plus the combination of programmes made with proper production values so you can have a proper experience at home."

At Elstree studios, where the series is being filmed, the backlot is littered with slices of Downing Street and Buckingham Palace. The Oscar-nominated director of the series, Stephen Daldry, says it is "bigger than a film set".

"All the money goes on the screen."

But in a rare display of thrift, I watch Ghana Airways steps being spun around to show American Airlines branding on the other side.

Is this a threat to cinema? Is the talent rushing to work for the small screen instead?

Tim Bevan, co-founder of Working Title, the UK's largest film production company, says his job has been made more difficult.

He says Netflix and Amazon have arrived in the marketplace "aggressively". They are commissioning dramas "that actors, directors and writers are finding very attractive", he says.

His films have been "squeezed by the availability of acting talent" because of these series.

"The area of film business that Working Title works in, which is the quality medium budget movie, has certainly been impacted by this. Because they're telling similar stories but also it's become competitive", Bevan says.

He also notes that almost every critically acclaimed screenwriter has a television series in the works.

'Scale doesn't matter'

But for Matt Smith, who plays Prince Philip in The Crown, it's not about size.

"The scale of it doesn't matter. It's always about the quality of the writing."

These programmes are "attracting a better quality of people than before because of the time and the format that you can tell a story in television. It is enticing for people who are auteurs," Smith says.

"If you could make Doctor Who for 10m an episode or 20m or 50m will it make it any better? For me it's not any different."

You can hear more on BBC Radio 4's Broadcasting House Sunday morning at 09:00 GMT.

More From this publisher : HERE

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[dandelliongirl]

Summer is here

and I’m living my best life. ♥

So my last post was from my birthday week literally two months ago! Whoops.. In my defense May was crazy busy.

So I celebrated my birthday with lots of friends. I went on a picnic on my birthday and to a restaurant and for a walk the day after. Me and my friend got to celebrate our combined 50th birthday (25+25) with pizzas and free dessert. My guy got me a glass nail file, some cute lingerie and a DVD of the first season of Miraculous Ladybug for my birthday! ♥

The week after my birthday we celebrated May Day at our place. We had three friends come over, we made doughnuts, talked, ate lots, played Captain is Dead and Spyfall. Spyfall was surprisingly fun and I was pretty good at it. I’m generally not good at games that require roleplaying, creativity and spontaneous storytelling but it was nice to be rewarded for going outside my comfort zone.

All of May was super busy with housing board meetings, last minute ballet rehearsals, lots of stuff to do at work, dance rehearsals for graduation, ballet recital and finally graduation weekend. On the 12th we had a mother’s day lunch with my mum, grandmum, grandpa and uncle at our summer house. They also got to see my new cottage that grandmum and grandpa have been such a big influence in designing and decorating.

The week of ballet recitals was really busy. I went on a work trip from 4am until 9pm and had my only dress rehearsal right after that. My guy’s sister came over and she’s had some big life changes happen to her lately so it took a while talking with her and catching up. I tried out an Abs & Booty class and a HIIT 45′ class that week since ballet classes ended and I ended up really liking the HIIT class. I mean - it was really painful and hard but that kind of made me really motivated to get better at it. I felt like I did so much more than I thought I could and really drove myself to my limits, so although it isn’t as fun as BodyCombat I still felt really motivated! Besides it’s only 45 minutes and a really effective workout. On Saturday me and my guy had graduation dance rehearsals from 12 to 3pm, and my ballet recital started at 3pm. I didn’t go on stage until before 4pm so I made it there well on time. It was pretty nerve racking to go on stage without a proper dress rehearsal since I had to skip the morning sesh, but nothing awful happened and all went well. On Sunday I had two more recitals at 3pm and 6pm. The weather was amazing and I felt really sad staying inside all weekend though.. Especially since the next week was pretty rainy and cold.

The last weekend of May was filled with graduation. Friday morning started with the last dance rehearsal for the dinner ball. Then we rehearsed the actual confermement ceremony. I got out at 3 and starting at 5:30 pm me and mum went to the garland weaving ceremony and dinner. Mum made my garland for me and we had tons of fun at the ceremony. The food was really good as well, and having mum weave my garland for me felt really special. She can now say she made both the graduate and her garland. ♥ ♥ After the garland weaving I went with mum to spend the night at home. I got barely any sleep at all because I was so nervous I’d oversleep and/or screw something up at the confermement ceremony.

On Saturday morning I got dressed and put on my makeup at home. My stomach was incredibly upset and I even lost some weight just from having such a bad nervous stomach. My skirt felt like it was falling off of me. I had to be at the university by 11:15 am and the ceremony started at 12 with a procession into the hall. We had to unpin our garlands from our jackets and walk on stage to have the garland put on our heads and our rings touched before bowing to the professor, turning around and bowing to the principal and walking off the stage. It was really scary but nobody tripped. A few of the doctors almost had their hats fall off when they bowed but other than that it went off without a hitch. There were about 100 masters and 100 doctors though so the whole ceremony took a good 3 hours. Grandmum came to watch me graduate, which was really special. ♥ After the ceremony we were supposed to have a procession to the city church but the weather was pretty rainy and so we had a bus drive people there. I stayed at the uni main building to take graduation photos with my family and grandmum. Dad’s friend, who’s a photographer by profession, took my photos and they turned out really nice. Especially the pictures with my family and grandmum. ♥ I can’t wait to have them printed out.

I was done with the photoshoot around 5 pm and came to the apartment to get changed and eat a bit. Me and my guy went to the dinner dance at 6 pm to get our photo taken and settle down for dinner. It was a really formal dinner with lots of scary etiquette and several utensils for different dishes and I felt really awkward because our table was also a pretty quiet one but we had an enjoyable evening nonetheless. There were a lot of speeches, a really cute poem and some pretty decent food. Obviously dad would’ve made better food but that was fine. At 11pm it was time for the dance. It went pretty well considering people had had some alcohol by that time and we never rehearsed at the actual venue. The photographer came and messed up my guy’s steps a couple of times since we were in the front row, but other than that we did pretty well! Later on they carried a lot of important people on a carrying chair and the doctors formed a guard of honor with their swords that the professor went through. It was all very special and traditional and we stayed up all the way until the speech for the rising sun at 2 am. Then we walked home and I was glad I took my running shoes with me since I had been wearing the same heels since 10am that day. It was quite the weekend and I can’t believe how some people managed to attend Sunday’s cruise, lunch and the after party because I was completely wrecked from just two days of festivities. Also the sleep deprivation from that weekend meant that I was pretty much out of it the entire following week. I’m glad I took a day off on the 31st so that I got a 4 day weekend the next week.

We had a swelteringly hot last few days of May and beginning of June. On the 30th me and my friend both escaped work early to go on our traditional spring picnic and it was +30 degrees Celsius outside. On the 1st of June I watched two movies (Pretty Woman and Bridget Jones’s baby) with my friend from kindergarten. It was so good to see her again and hear about her busy summer plans. Her boyfriend applied for sports biology at the uni and it’s an insanely hard field to get accepted into with all the physical entrance exams, so he spent the entire evening exercising. Keeping my fingers crossed for him!

The next weekend my guy drove me to granny’s place on his way to work. I spent the day with grandmum helping her out with various little tasks and talking a lot. In the afternoon we picked up my childhood bed from my uncle’s storage and drove it to my cottage to be put together as a sofa and two extra guest beds. We missed 3 parts of the edges that have been lost somewhere but otherwise all parts were there and mum and i put the bed together over the weekend. I love having pretty much all my childhood room furniture in the new cottage. It’s been even more emotionally important than I ever thought since my room back home has been renovated and looks nothing like it did back when I lived there. I’ve gotten a piece of my childhood back and I wouldn’t change it! It’s perfect and I love my cottage more than almost anything else in the world. I’m already dreading autumn and the upcoming winter... I want to spend every waking minute at our summer house to get the most out of this summer. ☼

So holy wow - E3 and Nintendo Direct happened. At first I had the same reaction as a lot of the Animal Crossing fandom did with the trailer for New Horizons dropped. First of all I’m not in love with the whole island idea for a game that’s called Animal Forest. Secondly, I really don’t like how muted and blown out the textures on some of the items and terrain look compared to New Leaf. Also I’m still not sure about the whole paywall of Nintendo Online.. Also crafting and the Nook miles thingy seem really iffy as gameplay mechanics.. It really depends on the way they execute online and if a paid subscription is required to use any online features or not if I want to buy the game (and a whole ass console for it) in March. A lot of my concern for how I’m going to live through next winter was brushed aside with “At least I have Animal Crossing Switch to look forward to”, and not for a moment do I believe Doug Bowser’s excuse of “we don’t overwork our devs at Nintendo” and “we believe in a good work life balance for our workers”. Hello?!? Nintendo is a Japanese company and I really doubt it’s 100% because of localisation in the Treehouse team that the game has been delayed.. Anyway a 3 month wait isn’t really a big deal and it’s not like I didn’t see it coming. It’s still disappointing though, but I hope those 3 months help the team add some contrast and texture to the game because DAMN... Fingers (and animals) crossed.

On the 15th of June me and dad made a most important purchase. We split the cost of a 300€ SUP board for the summer house and I haven’t regretted a single cent of that price. I’ve spent literal hours standing, sitting and laying on the board, exploring the lake and even doing planks and downward dogs on it. There aren’t many things I love more in this world than SUP boarding.. ♥ ☼ Dad made his first fish, crepes and paella on our new barbeque/firepit and we got to enjoy some delicious food. I also bought my first set of Sylvanian Families (Calico Critters for the US I think?) toys and furniture. I’ve wanted some for years but couldn’t justify buying any because I had no space to store them in. Now that my childhood dream has come true with the new cottage I decided I’d finally start my own dollhouse collection over there with Sylvanian families. I bought a second hand house for them and borrowed some furniture from my boyfriend’s sister’s dollhouse. I can’t wait to take them over to the cottage!

Last Monday the student services at my uni took a summer trip to a national park. We took a bus to a little port, a boat where we had some fish soup and then we went on a hike on top of a mountain to a viewing spot. There were a ton of mosquitoes there so my hamstings looked like a pincushion after the trek but the weather was hot, the sun was shining and I enjoyed the exercise. We had some food back at the campsite and some brave souls took a dip in the lake. Then we took the boat back and drove to town. I pretty much slept on the bus because I was exhausted from all the food and fresh air. It was midsummer week so we only had Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to work.

I’m glad I got a 3 day weekend, because I got to drive over to our summer house early on Thursday and spend the evening on the SUP board. I even swam for the first time this summer since it was such a hot day. ☼ I can’t remember the last time I’ve swam before midsummer! Dad made pizzas on the barbeque, my guy came over after work, we went to the sauna and spent the night in my little cottage. On Friday we had breakfast at my summer house and then drove over to his summer house to see his extended family. We spent the day making doughnuts, I raided (and cleaned up) my guy’s sister’s dollhouse, we had some quality time with my guy’s cousins and their partners, raised the flag for midsummer, went to the sauna, swam, started a midsummer bonfire and went to bed at 11-ish to drive to my friend’s wedding on Saturday. We started off after 6am so we got very little sleep.

The wedding was nice. We drove over with a friend and after a lot of searching for an actual gas station with bathrooms we managed to find a campsite/nature trail place with changing rooms, saunas and bathrooms to get changed in. The wedding took place in a fortress on an island so we had to be at the harbor an hour before the actual wedding. We had plenty of time to take a ferry, buy a quick snack and eat it on our way to the church. The ceremony was short and sweet, and after the ceremony we walked over to the venue. It was a cute rustic tile basement used originally for storing gunpowder. It was really nicely decorated with fairy lights and they had a super cute recycling/eco/nature theme going on (partially because transporting actual dinnerware on an island would be really hard and they were on a budget). It was a really sweet and cute wedding and much better than the previous one I went to. Still, I would’ve loved to know a bit more about the guests there as well as the couple since I basically don’t know the husband at all. There were a lot of things I would’ve done differently, and having been to two weddings now it increasingly looks like I would never want to bother organising one. It seems like so much work for one day, and people aren’t even going to enjoy themselves a whole lot... I would really want to involve my family and friends in the planning and the actual celebration, have lots of activities and take friends into consideration more as they know none of the relatives there.. Anyway right now it doesn’t look like I’ll ever get married - or that I’d even want to. Regardless it was really nice to get to be a part of my friend’s special day and I wish her the best. ♥ We drove back the same night with one stop for dinner on the way. I was back home at 1 am and in bed around 2 am. Sunday was spent shopping for groceries, napping, cooking and recovering from the midsummer festivities.

In the spirit of my return to childhood I started rewatching H2O Just Add Water for the first time in years. I love how it brings me back to being a preteen, waking up in the summer mornings to watch TV and spending endless vacation days swimming and hanging out with dad at home. It makes it truly seem like summer and like I’m on vacation even though I’m at work.

Work is really busy and we’re under a lot of pressure right now with people going on holidays and sending millions of emails and support requests daily. I don’t mind it too much, I’ve reached a chill place of “this is just work and I do what I can without compromising my freetime and wellbeing” and I’ve learned to let a lot of things go. I’m excited to see where we’ll be at on the 1st of August when everything should be ready to go with the new data system. Right now it looks pretty bad but we don’t want our end users to know that. Heh. I’m starting my holidays in pretty much exactly two weeks and my colleague and boss are starting theirs tomorrow. I’m excited to have a chill few weeks by myself. I’m also really looking forward to going on a road trip with my guy to hopefully go buy more stuff for my Sylvanian chocolate bunny family! I have so many things to look forward to this summer.. ☼ ♥ I just hope the weather stays nice so I can get a lot more swimming and SUP boarding in before autumn comes. I need full batteries to survive the winter.

I went rollerblading with dad today for the first time this summer and it was a lot of fun! I can’t wait to do more of that. My guy came home since he has a day off tomorrow and had Kendo practise tonight. I’m going to go edit some of the wedding photos so that I can share them with my friends and especially the bride. I’m hoping to stay more up to date with blogging now that life is more chill and I’m on the PC after work a bit more often. I won’t stress about it though, I just really like to record my life and thoughts every now and again, and I start feeling all scattered if I don’t do it for a while. Also I dislike these mega long posts because I always miss important details and it’s a whole ordeal that takes hours to write down. Anyway going to watch Mischa play Twilight Princess and edit photos. I just cried hearing the Wii start screen music for TP and realized what a truly lifechanging experience this game was for me, and how nothing else can really take it’s place. I’m excited to watch someone experience it for the first time. ♥

[recentnews18-blog]

New Post has been published on https://shovelnews.com/11-new-films-coming-to-netflix-in-august-that-are-brilliantly-weird-iconic/

11 New Films Coming To Netflix In August That Are Brilliantly Weird & Iconic

With this insane heatwave still blazing, there is a lot to be said for staying in the cooler and more shady safety of your own home. It’s gotten so hot that literally nobody would judge you for staying inside in your pants watching telly (and nor should they ever judge you for that). But maybe you have already rinsed your Netflix account? Well, if you have, good news is that there are lots of new films coming to Netflix this August Thank goodness, I hear y’all squeal.

I’m pleased to report that Netflix has its usual blend of classics, oldies, newbies, guilty pleasures, and ones you could watch a thousand times over on the menu. This means that I for one will be one happy (if incredibly sweaty) bunny this August. Who’s with me?

Oh. Did someone say stick your phone on do not disturb and get some very much needed you time? Yep, it was me. Do it immediately because the latest selection of cinematic delights is going to make sure that this August is going to be pretty awesome for nights in. So all you need now is some extra cold drinks, a fan, a TV/laptop/tablet, and some peace and quiet to get down with the movies.

Here are my top picks of the new films coming to Netflix in August. Enjoy.

1‘Pride And Prejudice’

Movieclips Classic Trailers on YouTube

This film version of arguably Jane Austen’s best known novel was a mega hit when it came out in 2005. Keira Knightley plays an uber independent, intelligent, and sassy Elizabeth Bennet. Lots of lovely costumes and beautiful scenery takes you away to a time when it wasn’t how many insta likes you had that mattered. Instead, it was a time when women were expected to mind their Ps and Qs, but our Lizzie just did what the eff she wanted. What she wanted is of course was a certain Mr Darcy who is super conveniently rich, so all’s well that ends well.

This story just never gets old and this version is so great and makes you feel all sappy and gross but you know you love it.

2‘Bridget Jones’s Baby’

Universal Pictures on YouTube

The third instalment in the Bridget Jones series sees cute as pie, lovable twit, and huge pants wearing Jones going onto the next phase of her life; motherhood. Gulp.

With a love life as torrid as can be and a seemingly endless supply of ridiculously handsome suitors at her disposal, our Bridge isn’t doing too badly now is she? However, when two romantic dalliances occur within close proximity of each other and a pregnancy test proves positive, the race is on to find out who her baby daddy is. The race is also on to see if her and her very own Darcy (hello Pride And Prejudice) end up happily ever after.

3‘Meet The Blacks’

Movieclips Trailers on YouTube

Meet The Blacks is a parody comedy about a dystopian America, where an annual 12 hours of complete lawlessness takes place.

It is the story of the blacks, an African American family who have fled a life of crime in Chicago to a largely white neighbourhood in Beverly Hills. Unfortunately they move just in time for the annual purge and their house is invaded by several masked assailants.

Lots of hilarity ensues in this dark comedy, that hits the guilty pleasure quota 100 percent.

4‘Ouija’

Movieclips Trailers on YouTube

Feel like scaring the bejesus out of yourself this summer? Well you’re in luck.

Ouija tells the story of a young gal who finds a ouija board in her house and does the right thing and chooses to play with it with her mates on Halloween. Nice one, mate. Eye roll.

It’s super jumpy and will have you covering your eyes but also, like any good horror film, leave you wondering why these people are so flipping dumb.

5‘Last Vegas’

Movieclips Trailers on YouTube

Four legends of the silver screen come together for this film about four older men having a bit of a youth renaissance. Starring Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman, Robert De Niro, and Kevin Kline, the lads plan an outrageous stag do for Douglas’ character Billy ahead of his marriage to a woman half his age.

The film features them as young guys too, with genius edits to them as children throughout the film which is super charming.

Think The Hangover meets Grumpy Old Men and you got it.

6‘Selfie From Hell’

New Trailer Buzz on YouTube

Another creepy AF film, this movie sounds super silly and guess what, maybe the concept is, but this movie knows that and does a great job of being silly but pillow-grabbingly terrifying too.

The idea is a bit sort of like The Ring in that it is relating to a craze which people are warned not to do, but do anyway because people in horror films are so dumb I can’t even.

This film is based on a two minute Youtube video that went viral and will literally leave you with chills.

I’ve said too much already.

7‘Bad Moms’

STX Entertainment on YouTube

Bad Moms is basically the antidote to all those laugh out loud funny films about guys having a wild time. This movie sees mums getting to go and be wild as well.

This film shows the ridiculous pressures a lot of mums are under to be perfect and make sure everything their children do and digest is exactly right. When three mums crack, the craic ensues.

Lots of shots being imbibed and really fun parties that you kind of wish you were at, as well as a perfect self-righteous mum played by Christina Applegate means this is one for us gals.

8‘The Secret Life Of Pets’

Illumination on YouTube

Who doesn’t love computer animated films? And who doesn’t love pets? Bingo; this film ticks both boxes. One to watch with your pets because let’s be honest, they are the best movie dates.

The Secret Life Of Pets is one of those heart-warming, funny films that will actually leave you wondering what your pets are up to while you’re out and about.

Starring an insane number of mega stars including Lake Bell, Ellie Kemper, Steve Coogan, and SNL alums Dana Carvey and Jenny Slate, this one will have you rolling on the floor laughing but also looking suspiciously at your pets for days.

9‘Public Schooled’

TRAILER CITY on YouTube

Made in Canada, this movie is the story of a home schooled teenage boy who sees what actual high school is like after visiting one for an exam. He spies a girl who he really fancies and in that moment, chooses to flunk his exam so he can get into her school and get the girl.

Judy Greer gets well deserved pride of place in this film about an over protective mother struggling to let go of her son but also encouraging him to rebel, with her guidance and support.

It is super funny, heart-warming, and will have you laughing and saying “aww” in equal measure.

10‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’

Movieclips Classic Trailers on YouTube

Movie classic and one you could watch over and over, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is about the adventures of a flying car brought back to life by the wonderfully eccentric widowed inventor Caractacus Potts after his children Jemima and Jeremy beg him to.

Starring Dick Van Dyke, this family fave is up there with Mary Poppins in terms of classic status. Special note for the still incredibly creepy bad guy, The Child Snatcher, who still makes my skin crawl.

11‘The Party’

Madman Films on YouTube

It’s not often you see a modern film made entirely in black and white but this cinematic treat is everything you want from a British comedy.

It tells the story of a politician, promoted within his party who reveals an enormous secret to close friends who have gathered to celebrate his nod.

Hilarity ensues in this black comedy with each character revealing shocking truths and the party turning into an hilarious disaster.

A must see for fans of dark British humour, starring an array of acting legends including the very dishy Cillian Murphy and British legend Timothy Spall.

With options like this, I can’t wait for July to end so I can get down to ingesting some brilliant films. Thanks Netflix. We love you.

Source: https://www.bustle.com/p/11-new-films-coming-to-netflix-in-august-that-are-brilliantly-weird-iconic-9891556

[theconservativebrief]

The first 30 seconds of the trailer for Insatiable, a new comedy series coming to Netflix on August 10, introduces the story of a chubby high schooler grappling with bullies, unrequited crushes, and the FOMO that comes from nights spent on the couch eating ice cream.

It’s all a fairly standard setup for what looks to be a show about modern teens — perhaps even one that, like Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade, is benefitted by the fact that its lead looks more like an average high schooler than the glamorous 20-something stars of shows like Riverdale.

But then the trailer takes a turn. Patty, our main character, gets punched in the face, has her jaw wired shut for months, and thereby loses so much weight that by the time she goes back to school in the fall, she’s a bonafide (thin) hottie. It’s with this newfound power that she can apparently get her revenge on the kids who’d excluded her in the past.

[embedded content]

Because no one has officially reviewed the show yet, the trailer is all that we have to determine what the rest of Insatiable will look like and what themes it will deal with. But based on that one minute and 30 seconds, the reaction has been … not great.

Critics on Twitter and elsewhere have called the premise of the show fatphobic, triggering to people with eating disorders, and a regressive lens through which to view fat people’s stories. The Good Place star Jameela Jamil, who has advocated for body autonomy in the past, tweeted about how there’s a problem with implying that the only way to “win” in life is to diet:

Kids who bully are just miserable, badly raised arseholes. It is not, and should not ever be YOUR problem that they have a problem with you. You don’t have to conform. You don’t have to placate. Revenge isn’t a good use of your time and energy. And starving yourself is

— Jameela Jamil (@jameelajamil) July 20, 2018

Writer Roxane Gay also noted the trailer’s flawed logic that fat women can’t stand up for themselves and must undergo physical trauma to become their best, skinny selves:

Ahhh yes, a fat girl could never stand up for herself while fat and of course she has to be assaulted and have her mouth wired shut before she becomes her best self, her skinny self. Good to know!

— roxane gay (@rgay) July 22, 2018

There’s now even a Change.org petition that, as of publication, has garnered more than 145,000 signatures to stop Netflix from airing the show, on the grounds that releasing it will be damaging to young girls’ self-esteem and cause or trigger eating disorders.

One day after the trailer premiered, on July 20, Insatiable’s writer and producer Lauren Gussis defended the show against critics, writing that the inspiration was based on her own experience with an eating disorder as a teenager, and that comedy is a means of dealing with our vulnerabilities.

Star Debby Ryan, a former Disney Channel actress, took to Instagram to defend the show, writing that it was a satirical look at “how difficult and scary it can be to go to move through the world in a body,” and assured viewers that the humor is “not in the fat-shaming.” Alyssa Milano, who also appears in the trailer, said in a 30-minute Twitter video that she “totally gets” the backlash to the trailer, but hopes people will wait to see the full show before judging it.

This, above all, is what the creators and stars are attempting to communicate. But for people who are so accustomed to seeing their stories told onscreen via the same harmful tropes, the Insatiable trailer could be seen as just another exhausting example of the negative ways TV and movies portray fat people.

To understand why the Insatiable trailer hit such a nerve, you have to look at pop culture’s terrible track record of telling fat people’s stories.

On July 23, artist and writer Kiva Bay asked his Twitter followers to name the fat-hating moment in media that has stuck with them, starting with the scene in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets when Aunt Marge inflates to such great proportions that she literally floats away.

Responses ranged from Bridget Jones being consistently described as fat (in the books, she weighs 130 pounds) to pretty much the entire premise of Pixar’s Wall-E, which depicts a futuristic dystopia in which everyone isn’t just overweight, but share the negative characteristics associated with being overweight: that they are lazy and stupid, and that all they care about is passively consuming whatever’s in front of them.

The problem persists even in media that’s often held up as progressive — many people in the thread called out Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Parks & Recreation’s recurring fat jokes, while others brought up the inherent fatphobia of shows like Gilmore Girls and 30 Rock in which objectively thin main characters have an obsession with unhealthy food.

A 2009 Jezebel piece described the “skinny glutton” phenomenon as “a sure indicator to the audience that these women are Single, Quirky and, (because they’re thin, only gently) Sad” because casting an actually fat actor in the role would, the thinking goes, be too pathetic.

The Insatiable trailer also reprises an especially troubling Hollywood practice: the fat suit. When a character actually is meant to be fat, instead of casting a bigger actor in the role, often a thin actor will wear a fat suit.

We tend to see them used in flashbacks to a time when a now-thin character was fat, like Monica in Friends, Schmidt in New Girl, or Ryan Reynolds in Just Friends. The “humor” comes not only from seeing actors wearing a silly costume, like Eddie Murphy in Norbit or The Nutty Professor, but also from the ability to crack jokes at a past character’s fatness with the knowledge that the present character is laughing now, too.

Few uses of fat suits, however, are more controversial than the 2001 film Shallow Hal, in which Jack Black plays a man who has to be hypnotized to find Gwyneth Paltrow in a fat suit sexy enough to be his girlfriend. Not only is the entire premise pretty gross, but, as a Telegraph piece noted after comparisons were drawn to the recent Amy Schumer film I Feel Pretty, the movie consistently uses fat bodies as punchlines:

“The camera linger[s] over every dimple and crease on the physical form of Ivy Snitzer, Paltrow’s body double, and contrasting the sight of Paltrow in revealing booty-shorts with a large woman spilling out of her clothes. Jokes are endlessly made about her appetite, while every chair Rosemary sits on appears perilously close to collapsing (it’s a sight-gag that is repeated twice on-screen, along with a deleted scene involving a caved-in bed).”

That contrast — the visual of the character wearing a fat suit versus the character without it — can have the effect of implying that fatness, when constantly compared to the superior thinness, is grotesque and deserves to be laughed at.

That’s the history Insatiable is drawing on when it puts Debby Ryan in a fat suit, regardless of intention.

And there is yet another pattern that Insatiable seems to fall into: the idea that weight loss is the road to happiness. Friends’ Monica and New Girl’s Schmidt are both characters who don’t accomplish their goals until they lose weight. The entire wellness industry is based around this false promise — that losing weight is the key to getting whatever you’ve always wanted, whether that’s love, money, or revenge. (See: Khloe Kardashian’s extremely on-the-nose reality series, Revenge Body.)

In an essay for Medium titled “To the writers of Insatiable,” fat activist and writer Your Fat Friend wrote about the problem with this narrative, pointing out that not only do 97 percent of dieters gain back what little weight they lose (or more), but that weight loss is often the only narrative that fat people get to have.

She continues:

I have never seen a fat life like mine on screen. I have not seen fat people recklessly, happily in love, as I have been. I have not seen thin partners struggle to accept their own attraction to fat people. I have not seen fat people getting promoted, getting fired, working hard, succeeding. I have only seen fat people fail. Anything else, I have learned, is reserved for the penitent thin.

In short, fat characters are defined entirely by their fatness, and only get to become multi-dimensional once they lose the weight. It’s a trope that the Insatiable trailer even touches on in a meta way: When Patty returns to school, newly thin, she muses, “Now I could be the former fatty who turned into a brain, or an athlete, or a princess,” as if these character traits can’t apply to fat people because their main identifier is already “fat.” Until we see the show, it isn’t clear where this strain of self-awareness’s endpoint lies, or how far the series will take its meta-understanding of fat tropes, but it could be a promising sign.

So yes, the Insatiable trailer, as of right now, is still just a trailer; there’s still a whole show to come and be watched and discussed, starting on August 10. But many viewers are worried that the groundwork seems to be laid for a series about the same stories of fat people we’ve seen thousands of times over.

And though its stars and creators promise the show is an empathetic look at the pressures modern teenagers face surrounding body image, well, don’t we already sort of … know them? Above all, what’s necessary is an empathetic look at fat people in general: one that ideally doesn’t involve weight loss — and certainly no fat suit.

Original Source -> Why 150,000 people are calling for Netflix to cancel the teen comedy Insatiable before it debuts

via The Conservative Brief

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12 Simply Luxurious Holiday Films to Enjoy Every Year

Each year once Thanksgiving has passed, I begin to make a mental list of the films I reserve to watch during the final month of the year. Now don’t get me wrong, there are a few on the list you will notice below that I will gladly watch any time of year, but most definitely, I savor them immensely in December leading up to the new year.

For the first time here on the blog, I wanted to make a list of my favorites and highly recommended films you may want to watch this holiday season. In the description of each, I’ve tried to share what mood you may want to be in to watch the film as much like the book we choose to read at night, my mood dictates the film I want to watch or simply have in the background while I putz around the house.

Whichever films pique your interest, I do hope you enjoy. Happy holidays!

1. The Apartment

While not necessarily marketed as a holiday film, The Apartment, starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley Maclaine is brilliant. The first time I watched it, I was blown away by the co-stars’ comedic chops and playful repartee. Set during the holiday season, a snaffu ensues which brings Maclaine’s character to Lemmon’s apartment, and the plot begins to unfold. It is lovely.

2. Holiday Inn

Starring Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, this is the film in which “White Christmas” actually debuts. An Irving Berlin musical, the plot revolves around the trio, Crosby, Astaire and Marjorie Reynolds (Lila), and yes, a love triangle creates the conflict. Set at an inn at which the trio’s entertaining talents are showcased to guests only on . . . you guessed it . . . the holidays.

3. The Shop Around the Corner

The source of inspiration for Nora Ephron’s film You’ve Got Mail, the Jimmy Stewart classic The Shop Around the Corner, has a similar, but, in one very important way, distinct, welcomed difference – Jimmy Stewart doesn’t put Margaret Sullavan out of business (my only complaint about You’ve Got Mail – otherwise I adore it). Stewart and Sullavan’s characters are employees at the same mercantile shop in Budapest and are constantly at odds. However, both of them have a correspondence with a pen pal with whom each are beginning to fall for. Little do they know, they are each other’s pen pal.

4. Love, Actually

The all-star cast, the multiple plot lines that weave together just so wonderfully, the setting in London and the English countryside, the soundtrack, Hugh Grant dancing (in a recent interview, he shared he was not confident about doing that particular scene – don’t worry Hugh, you nailed it! One of my favorite scenes.). I love Love, Actually.

5. The Family Stone

Another all-star cast in an original story. While yes, with a heartbreaking family truth regarding Keaton’s character, the family chemistry, the chaos, the humorous scenes with Sarah Jessica Parker’s character, all come together for a lovely holiday film full of worthwhile life lessons about love and letting one’s hair down.

6. Home for the Holidays

Not many know about Jodie Foster’s film Home for the Holidays, but it is worth taking a look. Directed by Foster and released in 1995 if you are looking for a less rosy film, more realistic, honest film about life struggles and family frustrations when it comes to the holidays, perhaps you will enjoy Holly Hunter’s starring role in Home for the Holidays. Take a look at the trailer below.

7. Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Since childhood I have always been drawn to the classic holiday cartoon of the Grinch. Perhaps it is his tranformation, perhaps it is the kindness and resilience of the villagers or maybe it is the Grinch’s sidekick that endures far too much, but ultimately gets a feast in the end. While I do enjoy Jim Carrey’s version of this story, sometimes a cartoon is quite nice.

8. A Charlie Brown Christmas

Speaking of cartoons: A Charlie Brown Christmas. I love the soundtrack. I love the short cartoon story. A classic.

9. Bridget Jones’ Diary

Yep, a holiday film must-see. Remember the holiday party with the glorious festive sweaters? But more importantly, the beginning and ending are set with New Year’s in the backdrop. Hands down, a holiday film indeed. Enjoy!

10. When Harry Met Sally

I have watched this film multiple times this holiday season already. While the film covers the course of the 12 years Harry and Sally have known each other, there are multiple scenes of either Christmas tree shopping or New Years’ Eve/Year parties (the last scene – Harry running, Sally about to leave, yep – a holiday film) that most definitely qualify it as a holiday must-see.

11. While You Were Sleeping

I hadn’t realized how long ago While You Were Sleeping was released (1995), but as I watched the film for the first time in a long time this past weekend, I was reminded why I enjoyed it: Bullock’s character is an intelligent, sincere woman who doesn’t put up with silliness, but at the same time, gets in her own way at times. However, as rom-coms go, her mistakes eventually lead her to exactly where she is supposed to be. Cheesy, but a fun movie to watch.

12. The Holiday

Don’t worry, I did not forget Nancy Meyers’ perennial classic holiday film: The Holiday. Need I say more?

Happy viewing, relaxing and enjoying. And happy holidays.

~View more TSLL Seasonal posts here.

12 Simply Luxurious Holiday Films to Enjoy Every Year published first on http://ift.tt/2pewpEF

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Image copyright Alex Bailey/Netflix

Sitting in a trailer on the set, the producer of Netflix’s The Crown declines to tell me how much it all costs. But a member of the crew later chortles that they “spent 750,000 yesterday”.

It looks like a film, costs as much as a film and, according to executive producer Andy Harries, is “filling a big gap in the market”.

But one of the leading film producers in the UK, whose work includes Bridget Jones and Love Actually, says super-TV has made his job more difficult.

Andy Harries says he is creating a “viewing experience that is somewhere beyond top-end television and much nearer to big-budget feature films”.

Image caption The set of The Crown at Elstree Studios in north London

It is filling a gap in the market, he says, created by “traditional Hollywood’s” focus on the teenage market.

“The kind of dramas we make for Netflix and for Amazon are filling a big gap in the market; people who used to go to the cinema but don’t much nowadays.”

‘All the money goes on screen’

“Cinema watching in the traditional way is definitely in decline. Television is growing partly because of the physical quality of televisions these days. Plus the combination of programmes made with proper production values so you can have a proper experience at home.”

At Elstree studios, where the series is being filmed, the backlot is littered with slices of Downing Street and Buckingham Palace. The Oscar-nominated director of the series, Stephen Daldry, says it is “bigger than a film set”.

“All the money goes on the screen.”

But in a rare display of thrift, I watch Ghana Airways steps being spun around to show American Airlines branding on the other side.

Is this a threat to cinema? Is the talent rushing to work for the small screen instead?

Tim Bevan, co-founder of Working Title, the UK’s largest film production company, says his job has been made more difficult.

He says Netflix and Amazon have arrived in the marketplace “aggressively”. They are commissioning dramas “that actors, directors and writers are finding very attractive”, he says.

His films have been “squeezed by the availability of acting talent” because of these series.

“The area of film business that Working Title works in, which is the quality medium budget movie, has certainly been impacted by this. Because they’re telling similar stories but also it’s become competitive”, Bevan says.

He also notes that almost every critically acclaimed screenwriter has a television series in the works.

‘Scale doesn’t matter’

But for Matt Smith, who plays Prince Philip in The Crown, it’s not about size.

“The scale of it doesn’t matter. It’s always about the quality of the writing.”

These programmes are “attracting a better quality of people than before because of the time and the format that you can tell a story in television. It is enticing for people who are auteurs,” Smith says.

“If you could make Doctor Who for 10m an episode or 20m or 50m will it make it any better? For me it’s not any different.”

You can hear more on BBC Radio 4’s Broadcasting House Sunday morning at 09:00 GMT.

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