#me like... ah yes. streets of fire + empire records + young soul rebels + kamizake girls... good vibes

[variousqueerthings]

@yugiohio #op youre in good company as most people interpret this film as a queer coming of age film. myself included.#i saw it for the first time in my early teens and it impacted me in a way i have never been able to articulate.#ive reserved it from the library so many times. i have the movie downloaded to my computer. i made myself posters.#im still trying to find the dvd. im still trying to find the novel and manga. i love these girls and the way they love each other so much.#anywayyyyy you didnt ask for any of this but this movie is just so important to me and I'm so so so happy youve discovered it#and that youre posting content from it

hope it's okay to put this here, if not will edit the post, buuuut i usually do a little post-movie decompression and your tags are a great place to start it:

i have had this on my letterboxd to watch for awhile, and was tipped over the edge when the director of a play im in said "so there's a biker gang and one of the girls is obsessed with rococo" i cannot tell you what about that description charmed me so much i had to watch it immediately, but hey, sometimes you know that It's Time

i was kind of expecting a really serious film, and it turned out much more like a sweet queer romcom of that early 2000s lesbian flavour (meaning that most of them don't end up more than subtext, but the text in this one is... very text. they pretend they're about to kiss in the end-credits sequence type text)

was fun to accidentally land on another film that's about Style and Taste and The Soundtrack Being Cool, because i watched empire records and then young soul rebels these last couple of days, so clearly that's the theme of this little unexpected watching time

but seriously this film is really Cool, first and foremost, and it's got a fascinating set of philosophies in it about style (especially clothes) that surprised me, because you don't get a lot of cinema celebrating style without at least giving a cautionary "but watch out lest you become Shallow!" i really enjoyed that the arc of this one was "actually i am great at making clothes and im really capable actually, but i'd much rather buy clothes and look pretty in order to be a true rococo woman! the most important thing is dedication to Style! (and ichigo)"

like, her ethos really is high femme camp -- she's there to look beautiful and she enjoys that and she does it on her own terms, and specifically the only person she enjoys making for is... ichigo

and consequently, while she absolutely dresses for herself, there is also a sense that the only person whose opinion she values is also ichigo, and ichigo treats her exactly how she wants to be treated -- when momoko faints, she runs to her and cradles her head, she takes her out on her bike at the end, she's the strong badass to momoko's sweet prettiness

but then in another fun subversion, momoko is the one constantly looking out for ichigo -- she has the clothes she needs (and sells them for cheap), she embroiders her jacket after going a full day on a search for a person we later find out doesn't exist, she wins all the money, she comes for her when ichigo is in danger of getting seriously hurt and saves her, she gets offered a job based on her competencies that later on gives ichigo an opportunity (ironically to look pretty, which... she really really is beautiful) (although they both turn them down after getting a taste of it, they'd much rather roll around on a bike together). ichigo says at the end that she'll simply never be out of her debt, and that makes momoko smile, like yeah, that means they'll have to stay together forever

idk this movie is just so Cool and so Fun and soooo so gay

i also note that the single mild no-homo is so immaterial that watching it i wasn't actually sure if it wasn't about akimi, who was introduced as this beautiful vision that changed ichigo's life back in the day and now it turns out that not only is she engaged to this man, she's pregnant and leaving the gang, shifting ichigo's whole axis -- the framing is on her, she was introduced with the In Love/Lesbian Awakening Gaze, she's the reason ichigo is who she is, and the catalyst for why ichigo eventually leaves the gang (the other catalyst being momoko + the slightly less focused-on one of "not liking the direction it's going in"). it's got such a "im a teenager and upset about this but i cannot say why, it must be because im in love with this guy i barely know and because uh... i don't respect the new leader's vision!"

i think this film also carries a certain kind of vibe that reminds me of streets of fire, that is, in some ways it feels much more like a myth or a fairytale, because everything is so extravagant and yet slightly vague (and i mean that positively). we're being introduced to the origins of a myth of these two people who travel the roads in cool clothes and set biker gangs right, like. Urgh it's so Cool!

and the animation i didnt even mention the animation but it's got Cool Animation too!!!!

it's funny, i tend to land hard on the "gets obsessed with more masc characters" (wow wonder why) but in this one -- while of course they're both great and that's the point -- i was absolutely enamoured with momoko. her casual cynicism, her confusion about why she suddenly cares about one (1) person, her absolute dedication to The Vibe that is her whole being, her seemingly being completely unaware of just how easily she can draw people to her. just, the Power that is momoko (and now she's got the muscle of ichigo, nothing can stop them)