#please tell me you understand that both extremes are reductive readings of the characters on opposite ends of the spectrum

[nellasbookplanet]

*grabs fandom by the shoulders* please tell me you understand that the dichotomy of the 'fan favorite man who’s done nothing wrong ever how dare you imply otherwise he's just a TRAUMATIZED BABY' vs 'woman who’s a selfish bitch who should just die for not always prioritizing the male favorite and for getting in the way of my m/m ship' is bad on both sides.

please tell me you understand these kinds of readings remove complexity and agency from both the male and female characters as well as the narrative as a whole. please tell me you don’t just want to flip the dynamic. please tell me you didn’t think it was originally bad only because it was the male character who should be demonized and the female character excused. please I am begging you to develop media literacy and to step away from radfem rethoric

[thefirstknife]

I keep seeing this brought up in your posts with o14 and just want to point this out: just because someone doesn’t know/say they’re being abused doesn’t mean they aren’t. I myself didn’t know the emotional/verbal abuse I endured until after the fact and this really makes me uncomfortable when you use that point. Please understand that it is very much a thing that happens to those (not all cause everyone is different) that are abused.

You’ve brought up an important point that I am very well aware of. I am glad you sent this ask in this way and I want to address why I don’t use it as an argument.

Under read more, warning for talk about abuse:

I specifically don’t want to entertain this part of the discourse because abuse is about power dynamics. The abuser is usually someone with more power over the other person and the abused is usually someone who cannot escape the situation due to that power imbalance. And the abused person often either doesn’t have the capacity to understand the power imbalance or isn’t capable of asking for help or escaping the situation because the abuser is in some way threatening them. It doesn’t have to be a direct and physical/vocal threat (though it often is), it can be implied, but the imbalance in power dynamics is essential to identify an abusive situation. This is why abuse always features an age imbalance, economic imbalance (employer-employee or a household where only one person works and has control over all the money), family imbalance (parent-child) and so on. The abuser is the one who must have power and control over the abused. 

There is no such thing between Saint and Osiris. In no way are they ever presented as one being above the other. They are equals in every single way: age, experience, position within their respective jobs and so on. Saint does not fear Osiris, nor does Osiris have any power or control over him. Saint isn’t afraid of talking back to him and challenging him. Saint isn’t isolated from others and he isn’t afraid or incapable of asking for help (from YW, Ikora, Sagira previously...). For that reason, I cannot accept that there’s a possibility of Saint being abused but just not knowing about it. From all the available lore that I’ve poured through to compile all of the known and documented interactions between the two, there is no indication that Osiris holds any power or control over Saint in order for this relationship to be classified as abusive. 

Some people said that Osiris is being abusive by “withholding emotions” from Saint, which can definitely a part of an abusive relationship. However, I do not believe that Osiris is withholding emotional availability; this argument only popped up after Sagira’s death and their bickering in the Hangar (where Sagira was mentioned). It is explained numerous times by many different characters that Osiris does not respond to grief well. Ikora knows it, Saint knows it. This is not an abusive trait per se, as one cannot really control how they handle that sort of extreme grief. One could even argue that Saint was the abusive one in this situation by bringing up Sagira before Osiris gave him permission and a green light that he’s okay with discussing it. Same thing happened when Crow brought it up. However, I will not claim that Saint or Crow are abusing Osiris because there’s no other evidence to it. The situation is complex and not just easily boiled down to abuse. As someone who has been through abusive situations, I believe it’s reductive to call one bump in the road as abuse. It makes it harder to recognise actual abuse, both for victims and onlookers. 

Of course, maybe there’s something in the background that we don’t know about. After all, we don’t have every single Saint/Osiris interaction written out in the lore. However, considering what we do have and what we do know about these two characters, I can say for a fact that there is no power imbalance between them and Saint is not the type of a person who would sit back in fear of anyone and not know about being abused, definitely not by Osiris. There is simply no evidence. Of course, if someone just doesn’t vibe with the situation due to a personal experience and the whole Saint/Osiris argument that happened most recently in the lore is triggering for them, that is something I can respect. It’s personal, you can’t control what triggers your trauma. But that’s a personal experience, not an objective read on their relationship. People have been adamant about saying that the relationship is objectively abusive, which it is not. If it’s upsetting for personal reasons, I would absolutely recommend not interacting with the upsetting content and would implore people to tag their content appropriately.

In my original post from back a month ago or so, I specifically addressed how people tend to claim Osiris is abusive over Saint without backing it up with anything and essentially vilifying one of them (Osiris) while completely infantilising the other (Saint). It’s harmful to mlm, especially to mlm of colour because of how Osiris is treated by the community. It’s a reductive view of a long-term mlm relationship that spans centuries. The time span is quite literally incomprehensible. 

People also never bring up Saint’s behaviour towards Osiris, such as pushing a sensitive topic in public and pressing him on it when he’s clearly not ready. These are also signs of abuse. Another sign of abuse are also threats of physical violence which Saint does in the Devil’s Ruin quest dialogue when he tells Osiris to “get off this line” to which Osiris responds with “make me” and then Saint quips with “you would not survive that.” Nobody brings that up as abuse. And they shouldn’t! It’s clear that this isn’t a serious threat. And it should be clear that one quarrel over a traumatic topic isn’t a sign of a toxic relationship. Saint also greets Shaxx with the line “I always hated you, brother” and then they both laugh. Saint is very clearly often joking in this way and people recognise it as not serious. Osiris should be given the same benefit of the doubt when he retreats into himself over indescribable grief; he’s not emotionally manipulating Saint, he is grieving in the only way he knows how.

I find it highly suspect that this whole discourse only started once the pairing was confirmed as canonical. People have been shipping them way before that and with way less information available and there’s never been any discourse about how Osiris is actually abusing Saint in this relationship. I just find it really suspicious that a mlm relationship featuring a man of colour gets labelled as abusive from the side of that man of colour specifically, only after we’ve received the information that it’s canon. It’s an incredibly common pattern in fandom spaces when a fandom favourite (in this case Saint) gets into a canon relationship with a character that’s easy to be prejudiced against. Even if that prejudice is unconscious, it’s still prejudice and it’s painfully obvious to anyone who has ever been in fandoms for as long as me (or longer). There are also literally scientific studies on this so I’m not just talking about my own experience. 

Without any evidence of abuse and no imbalance in power dynamics present between these two characters, I can’t see how someone can come to a conclusion that Osiris abuses Saint after they’ve argued once “on screen,” especially after Saint himself explains what the situation is about. He eloquently puts his reasoning into words when Amanda asks him if there’s trouble and also promises to reach out for help if he needs it. I don’t like the trend of jumping to a conclusion, especially when people who do it are highly inconsistent about it (most recent one being the person who claims Osiris is abusive, but also claims that both Osiris and Saint are grown men who can handle themselves without our help; this is a contradictory statement, as Osiris cannot be abusive to Saint if Saint can handle himself and can just leave if he wants to).

I apologise if the discourse about this whole thing is making people uncomfortable. I should’ve addressed my reasoning behind it earlier, in order to make sure that everyone is on the same page. I should’ve also tagged it with a warning for talk of abuse, but no one else did and I didn��t think to correct it, which is definitely something I should’ve done. People started talking about how Osiris is abusive and toxic without thinking that people going into the tags might be upset by it and unfortunately I didn’t think of it either.

I hope this explains it adequately. It’s a long post but I didn’t want to hold back on any of the details because this is an important topic. If there are any points that anyone believes are not properly explained, feel free to ask for further clarification.

[harrowscore]

Mikasa Ackermann, Levi Ackermann, Amane Misa, Aeron Greyjoy for the charactet ask :3

SOMEONE HEARD MY PRAYERS AND NOW MY TIME HAS COME, tysm!!!!! <3

okay, let's start with levi (my beloved):

general opinion: fall in a hole and die | don’t like them | eh | they’re fine I guess | like them! | love them | actual love of my life (THEE little feral anime man after my heart)

hotness level: get away from me | meh | neutral | theoretically hot but not my type | pretty hot | gorgeous! | 10/10 would bang (Dark, Tall and Snarky + piercing grey-blue eyes and chronic insomnia? clearly my type ❤)

hogwarts house: gryffindor (maybe....?) | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff

ugh, the hp sorting house system is way too reductive. he has qualities of gryffindor, slytherin, and hufflepuff - brave, astute, loyal to a fault, etc. so it's a hard choice. but if i really have to choose, i'd go for gryffindor. i know that his Bad Boy facade shouts slytherin, but while he has larger goals (killing all the titans, then saving the world etc.), he's got no actual ambition for himself. hufflepuff would also be a good option.

daemon (from the his dark materials series): (because i've just decided that's just way more accurate than the hp method) some kind of big feline. maybe a panther - a black panther would be the ideal - aloof, predatory, dangerous, fiercely independent.

best quality: besides his obvious strenghts as a leader and warrior, the way he cares for his comrades-in-arms. it's very hard to gain his trust and respect, but once you have it, it's forever. he's pragmatic and ruthless, yes, but he also has a huge capacity for compassion and friendship. not that he would be effusive about his affections, of course.

worst quality: none, he's absolutely perfect ❤ jklsdfhjk jokes aside, he really struggles to open up (a serious understatement), idt he ever talked about his traumatic past with anyone. i mean, maybe he mentioned it to hange and erwin (erwin knew him when he was still an undergound thug, so...), but... he's not great with feelings. despite his apathetic, intimidating mask, he feels and cares deeply, but he has a long history with losing the people he loves, so he tries to not personally care about his squadmates, which can be both a strenght and a weakness. of course, he spectacularly fails at this.

ship them with: well, it's not a secret that i'm a huge rivamika fan, this ship is almost literally consuming my waking thoughts lmao. imo they're perfectly compatible: very similar personalities (stoic, the strongest warriors, absolutely terrifying on the battlefield but with a soft underbelly), very similar pasts/experiences, so many parallels that it's actually ridiculous, etc. i love how they're both each other's equals and likeness (yes, i took it from jane eyre. no, i don't regret anything lmao). a lot of tropes i love, too: Terrible First Impression (the Pride and Prejudice vibes are so strong with these two, you have no idea), Kindred Spirits/Mirror Images, Veteran/Young Prodigy, The Last of Their Kind, even Height Difference lmao. i could write a whole rivamika manifesto, but this is already too long. (maybe for some other time 👀) i would've loved for their dynamic to be more explored in canon but alas, isayama clearly didn't give a shit about the ackerman legacy, he just used it as a plot shortcut to give them conveniently unique powers, since they never really talked about it 🙄 (and before some troll comes into my askbox shouting "you iNcEsT fReAk!!!!1!!", they're only very distantly related. we know shit about the ackermans but we know for sure that they've got at least several generations between them. biologically their shared DNA is 0%, obviously they don't see each other as family, all the eldians have a dead ass common ancestor from 2000 years ago so they're all basically ⁓related anyway. if you really wanna scream about i.ncest, go watch got/dark/the borgias and shut the fuck up please. or alternatively go outside and touch some grass) sorry for the rant, uh. anyway, i can also see levi/erwin. idk if i'd ever care enough to read a fic about them (i'm usually a huge multishipper, but for some weird reason not when it comes to rivamika? same with braime and kastle tbh), but still, i can see it.

brotp them with: hange and erwin, obv. veteran trio >>> ema trio, sorry not sorry (at least h. and e. died before yams had the chance to ruin their character arcs)

needs to stay away from: ...uh, filth, i guess? lmao

misc. thoughts: besides the stupid teenage fangirl crush i have on him, i'm genuinely fascinated by the man himself. he's a huge mess of a contradictions, and yet somehow it works: he's violent and brash and kind of an asshole, but also has a strong moral code and integrity; he's obv very skilled at all the killing/torturing stuff and yet he has a huge respect for life; he's got a potty mouth to say the least, and yet some very aristocratic manners/tastes (the way he sits, his preference for tea and usually refined clothes); he comes from what's supposed to be an illustrous bloodline, he's methodical and very precise, and yet he was born and raised in the underground, he's been used to filth and blood and poverty since he was a child, kenny of all people was his father figure, and probably has known no other life than a perennial survival mode existence. he's "humanity's strongest soldier", but while well-built he's also small, the david to the titans' goliah, and probably not what people would assume a born warrior looks like. he's also one of the few characters who stayed true to himself and his original characterization until the end, bless you smol king ❤

(okay, this is getting long!)

mikasa:

general opinion: fall in a hole and die | don’t like them | eh | they’re fine I guess | like them! | love them (so much. she deserved better ❤️) | actual love of my life 

hotness level: get away from me | meh | neutral | theoretically hot but not my type | pretty hot | gorgeous! (stunning lady ❤) | 10/10 would bang

hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff

this is actually easy: mikasa belongs to hufflepuff and no, i won't take criticism (just joking lol). enough with this "hufflepuffs are fluffy puppies/Cinnamon Rolls <3" thing: mikasa values loyalty and duty more than anything else. she's also hardworking... and fierce, strong, lethal. yes, hufflepuff and lethal are not mutually exclusive concepts.

daemon: (finally the better option) a she-wolf, fiercely protective of her pack.

best quality: loyal, brave, incredibly strong (alongside her more fragile qualities). practical and level-headed on the battlefield, at least when eren is not included in the picture.

worst quality: struggles to let go of the past (understandable, considering her trauma). tunnel-vision when it comes to eren, obv. extreme levels of delusions ("if only i spoke openly about my romantic feelings for him - as if i didn't made them abundantly clear in ⁓6 years - he wouldn't kill 80% of humanity :(((" lmao okay. just. okay), but that's more on the writing. she's sadly more static than any other main character throughtout the whole series.

ship them with: see above :) but recently i've also started to be intrigued by mikasa/annie and mikasa/sasha. also, i'm sympathetic to jeankasa fans, though i don't actually care for the ship.

brotp them with: EMA trio, especially armin+mikasa. their friendship is so beautiful and special. also sasha.

needs to stay away from: ...... eren, at least romantically. again, that's more on the writing than anything else, but e.remika unfortunately encompasses many tropes i loathe with all the strength of my old shriveled heart: childhood friends-to lovers where the (male) childhood friend doesn't acknolewdge/is completely indifferent to the other (female) friend's romantic feelings, she hopelessly pines for him for years without anything more than a cold shoulder... until in the last chapter it's revealed that he loved her all along and doesn't "want other men to have her!!! :((" (then why did you have no reaction whatsoever to jean's years-long crush on her while she was jealous of any vaguely female-shaped human being you were friendly to, including hange? are you that dumb, man?); the female character's development and entire arc 100% revolves around the male protagonist - she has no goals, no dreams of her own except staying with him forever and ever; the romance is based on an idealized childhood dream, therefore reaffirming those childish illusions would make the character regress, not actually grow up (and nope, epilogue!jk doesn’t count; that also lacks build-up - i would’ve said the same about rm as well, so it’s not about shipping, guys, it really isn’t - and mikasa needed an inner change; getting married to another man but still praying to eren’s shrine is not substitute to actual development lol). post-time skip she's never really frustrated/angry with him, they never get a confrontation about him becoming a, y'know, mass-murderer of gigantic (pun intended) proportions; she puts him on a pedestal, and never stops idealizing him/never sees him for what he actually is (the narrative framing him as some kind of tragic martyr/saint eren from paradis with zero agency and basically... no clear motivation for the abovementioned mass murder, and not the actual complex tragic anti-hero/villain motivated by revenge and righteous fury he deserved to be, does not help). it lacks a good or even decent build-up - it's basically all tell and not show. now, if they'd actually been childhood friends to enemies to lovers/mutually co-dependent... it could have been interesting. sadly, it's not my cup of tea. of course this is just my personal preference, no hard feelings to the shippers.

misc. thoughts: enormous potential. she's been my fav female character since s1 - and ah, i miss s1!mikasa, when she had actually other stuff to do besides mothering eren. i love that she's the strongest warrior (second only to levi, obv), that her skills are never called into questions despite her gender, i love how she stands up for herself and the people she loves, that she may seem cold and stoic and yet has a such a huge heart, that she's not perfect but also sometimes awe-inspiring. sadly, she never really gets out of eren's shadow; what she lacks is an arc focused on herself. that's why imo getting deeper into the ackerman lore would've helped (also, you cannot make the main female character and the most popular male character descend from the same Unique Bloodline or whatever, and never really make them acknowledge it out loud; as a writer, you just can't lol). my spite is so strong that i'm currently writing a ridiculously pretentious fic that's 70% development for her character, to give her a voice, and 30% ackerthirsting. (yes, that's the fic i'm always vagueblogging about lmao, rip @ my brain). if any other rivamika fan is interested… mind you, it’s in italian tho, and idt i have the skills to translate into english.

misa:

general opinion: fall in a hole and die | don’t like them | eh | they’re fine I guess | like them! | love them | actual love of my life 

hotness level: get away from me | meh | neutral | theoretically hot but not my type | pretty hot | gorgeous! | 10/10 would bang

hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff

daemon: mmh, maybe some kind of butterfly? beautiful, colorful, and short-lived.

best quality: glorious fashion sense, more inventive and ingenious than fans actually give her credit for.

worst quality: shallow, impulsive, and obv her dependence on/obsession with light (which stems from trauma btw, but still… the very opposite of a relationship between equals).

ship them with: rem, kinda (monster/human ftw!). also weirdly enough mogi, a little bit? she deserves someone who actually respects her… though she’s far from being a perfect angel. she may actually be crazier than light on some aspects. but in this house we stan evil ladies anyway, so i have no problem with that <3

brotp them with: uh, idk, maybe matsuda?

needs to stay away from: obv light. also takada.

misc. thoughts: a tragic victim of sexist writing. she may be… unhinged to say the least, but she didn’t deserve the abuse she got from light (and from the fans). the female characters’ writing in dn is so bad that idk if it’s on purpose, to kinda mirror the reality of women in a patriarchal society (dependent on men, housewives whose life entirely revolves around their husband/boyfriend etc.), or just casual misogyny lol. it’s even more baffling since we don’t know the author’s gender (they may be a man, a woman, nb, anything really). i tend for the latter option tho.

aegon greyjoy (now, i wasn’t expecting him lol):

general opinion: fall in a hole and die | don’t like them | eh | they’re fine I guess | like them! | love them | actual love of my life 

hotness level: get away from me | meh | neutral | theoretically hot but not my type | pretty hot | gorgeous! | 10/10 would bang

hogwarts house: gryffindor | slytherin | ravenclaw | hufflepuff

i’m so sorry, i haven’t the slightest idea lmao. maybe gryffindor? mind you, it’s been a long time since i’ve re-read the books, so i don’t have many thoughts about him.

daemon: maybe it’s cliché, but some kind of fish/squid lmao

best quality: ugh, i really can’t remember much from his chapters :(( he’s not a coward, i guess? (lame answer, sorry!)

worst quality: definitely his religious fanaticism.

ship them with: no one.

brotp them with: uh… his family, ig? except euron.

needs to stay away from: obv euron. brr ://

misc. thoughts: i genuinely like the greyjoys chapters, though i vastly prefer the martells (with the exception of theon and asha, bcs i love them). yes, they’re deranged. yes, victarion is… well, victarion lol. but the drowned god religion is actually interesting, grrm knows how to write trauma - every time aeron mentions euron and that freaking door i’m like… :// - and the tragedy of it all… just great writing all around.

okay, that’s the end lmao. thank you so much, love!!! ❤❤

[lyannas]

No, I don’t hate GRRM, and I don’t hate ASOIAF.

It seems whenever I offer a criticism of ASOIAF and the way it’s been written, I receive a flood of messages asking me, “do you even like ASOIAF?” or “if you hate GRRM so much, then why do you read his books?”

Both types of questions are annoying and willingly ignorant.

I, along with many other people in this world, consume media critically. I search for flaws the same way I search for highlights. I make lists of what I like and don’t like. There’s a good chance that if I’m still talking about it months (or in ASOIAF’s case, years) after I had initially seen/read it, there is something about it that I liked enough to have latched onto it.

As a beginning ASOIAF fan I was extremely uncritical. I found nothing in particular to complain about except maybe a few minor grievances here and there. I romanticized ships like Rhaegar/Lyanna, I thought Jon Snow was a flawless character, I found every protagonist to be pleasant enough and every antagonist to be unpleasant enough.

As time (and GoT seasons) dragged on, some things I did not consider before were called to my attention. I read some meta. I browsed tumblr and reddit. I became more enlightened through reading these opinions and thought pieces until I slowly began to embrace some of these ideas and formed my own opinions around them.

I soon found myself bothered by the romanticization of Rhaegar and Lyanna. I found myself bothered by how often rape and sexual assault were introduced in the books. I found myself bothered by the depiction of the Dothraki, then later of the Dornish, Summer Islanders, and other characters that were depicted as PoC. When I was able to put those feelings to words, I received feedback both positive and negative. People agreed with me. People disagreed with me. I was corrected many times, I shared many back and forth constructive conversations, until I’ve reached where I am now, still sometimes wrong but a person with my own opinions and grievances on this book series I latched onto.

Why did any of this happen? Why I read and reread and learn and grow? Why did I introduce my criticism? Why did I bother at all? Because I love ASOIAF. I fell in love with the story, the characters, the complexity, the details, the worldbuilding, all of it, and I was not satisfied with the books alone, so I sought out more writings, more fans, a community where there is an exchange of ideas and where I could delve even deeper into the series than ever before.

The first thing I ever wrote that I tagged as “my meta” was a criticism on how GRRM wrote misogyny and sexual assault into the narrative but failed to address those issues within the narrative. I wrote that three years ago and I still can’t believe I did that, I can’t believe it got 100s of notes and that I got a dialogue going. The response was encouraging, because it told me that people are listening to me, people agree with me, there are others out there who love the books as I do but are also bothered by the same things as me! That’s crazy!

Yet somehow, this criticism of GRRM’s writing is often translated into: “oh, so you must hate GRRM”. No! I don’t! I hate how he wrote some parts of this story, but do I hate him personally? No! Why would I? I don’t know him. I’m irritated at his writing choices, particularly with how he wrote race and sexism. Those two things are real things people like me and millions of other deal with everyday, so when one of us say “hey, I’m bothered with how he wrote the Dothraki as a dark-skinned barbaric horde with no personality traits except Rape and Violence” it is not the same thing as saying “I think GRRM is toxic waste, should be sealed in a lead drum and buried 20 feet underground”. Stop translating criticism, especially that which comes from a personal place, as some sort of thesis on the man himself. It’s insulting and reductive and just says to me “hey, your points make me uncomfortable and/or I don’t understand it, but I did see you mention GRRM a few times in your writing so it looks like you have something against him”. It tells me that you missed the point completely.

So please folks. I beseech you. Stop doing that. Stop derailing. Stop believing that those of us who criticize ASOIAF are part of some crusade against this 69 year old white dude. He’s never harmed us personally, I assure you. He wrote some amazing literature that we have all eaten up and eagerly have been waiting for more, we’re all a little bored here, and he’s given us lots of time to reflect on the flaws and isms of his writing. Let us do that without assuming that we’re all waiting with pitchforks outside of house ready to skewer him Oberyn-vs-Mountain style because of something we didn’t like.

Moreover, if you read something that you disagree with, don’t take it personally. Either build an argument in return or let it go. Stew over it with your friends or alone, idc. Just don’t go stomping into inboxes derailing the OP’s post with ad hominems and red herrings, okay?

I once joked that I love the books so much that sometimes I hate them. ASOIAF is like that best friend I get along with really well, but then they say something racist or catcall a woman on the street, I have to yell at them until they learn to behave again.

Anyways, thanks for reading, and please don’t make me write another post like this again. Please.

[spryfilm]

“The Big Sick” (2017)

Comedy

Running Time: 124 minutes

Written:  Kumail Nanjiani & Emily V. Gordon

Directed by: Michael Showalter

Featuring: Kumail Nanjiani, Zoe Kazan, Holly Hunter, Ray Romano, Adeel Akhtar and Anupam Kher

Terry: “Let me give you some advice, Kumail. Love isn’t easy. That’s why they call it love.”

Kumail: “I don’t really get that.”

Terry: “I know. I thought I could just start saying something and something smart would come out.”

This has not been the greatest years for comedies; they have been high on concept but low on results. The laughs this year seem to have been delivered by action films with comedic moments, the funniest arguably being “Spider-Man: Homecoming” (2017) as well as the recently released “Thor: Ragnarok” (2017), that is until now.

“The Big Sick” (2017) is a love story, comedy with drama sprinkled over the top, to give it some risk as well as peril for its cast of characters. Oh yes, its also based on a true story, being written by real life couple Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon. This is a film that focuses on their real life relationship, their meeting and the realities of a mixed culture relationship, that had real consequences for both of them – it makes compelling story-telling as well as reliable and constant laughs throughout this movie. It is also expertly directed by Michael Showalter whose last film was the excellent Sally Field starrer “Hello, My Name is Doris” (2015) – he is also a talented and in demand television director.

The movie revolves around Kumail is a comedian living in Chicago trying to make it in the industry while driving for Uber in his spare time. His entire family is from Pakistan, so they are Muslim and regularly set Kumail up with various Pakistani women in hopes of continuing the tradition of an arranged marriage, much to Kumail’s annoyance. During one of his shows, he is heckled by Emily, a woman in the audience. After the show they hook up and begin to date.

If you have never heard of the principal Kumail Nanjiani who hear plays himself in the movie, you are missing out on an excellent stand-up as well as a very accomplished character actor, he can be seen on the HBO hit comedy “Silicon Valley” which is in now in its fourth season, and there he plays Dinesh Chugtai, one of the mainstays of the how. Nanjiani has also appeared in many other television shows as well as movies, he is extremely talented as well as a podcaster. In fact he hosted a podcast about the X-Files that he is a self confessed fan of, he even appeared in an episode of the revival series. This is heighted in “The Big Sick” in really nice ways that act as a homage to this love. However in his first real starring role as a Chicago based Pakistani stand-up, playing a version of himself he hits it for six.

Seeing this film described as romantic comedy as I have read is a bit if a misnomer as it is so much more than that, it has elements of comedy as well as romantic tropes, but it also contains a hefty bit of drama as well as, of course, biography. So it is reductive to describe it or limit it to one genre as this film is so much more than a typical romantic comedy – this actually elevates the genre to a new level as it also combines what it is to be stranger in a strange land as well as being seen as not only the eternal outsider but possibly some enemy of the state, that is always seen as the metaphorical ‘other’ in society.

Now while this is a story about a relationship, as well as family, the acceptance of new cultures as well as how people behave when they are trying to please almost everyone else but themselves, this story is also exclusively told from the point of view of Kumail, and almost nobody else, in fact everyone else’s experience is told through Kumail eyes so we are only seeing what he sees and everything else is really a mystery. This is a vital difference between other films with similar narratives as we really begin to understand why Kumail keeps the different strands of his separate, he has commitments to his family which he is being dishonest about as well as trying to keep up with some kind of commitment to Emily, who he is also being dishonest to. This becomes important as the story takes hold and we start to see the kind of scrutiny and pressure that Kumail has been put under but also the kind of pressure he has put himself under. At times it is not an easy watch to see the main character come under real threats emotionally but this story does have a happy ending – and if you have missed it this is co-written by Kumail and his wife, Emily.

The director of this feature is Michael Showalter who has been given a cracker of a script, so he does have his work cut out for him, in fact the director whose last film was the excellent “Hello, My Name is Doris”, does something here he did there, that is build the film around an untested leading man by giving him some great supporting actors to work with who know how to play drama as well as extremely funny comedy. At the top we have Zoe Kazan who inhabits her role as Emily, who never seems out of her depth playing her part, then we have Ray Romano and the great Holly Hunter as her parents. Hunter and Romano both play their parts with equal part humor as well as dramatic as any part could be. Hunter you would expect to be great, but Romano is the one that is the real surprise as a typical clueless Father who relies on his wife for answers as well as decision making, a typical male who befriends Kumail while everyone else shuns him. Adeel Akhtar who plays Kumail’s brother Naveed has little screen time but when you see him he is nothing short of fantastic – over the years Akhtar has been stealing movies in everything he has appeared in, this is the case with “The Big Sick”, he is priceless as Kumail’s traditional Muslim brother – who really only wants what’s best for the entire family, even if its at Kumail’s expense.

“The Big Sick” deals with many issues that face not only Muslim Americans, the interaction of mixed cultured relationships, the politics of the present in the US as well as what it means to be a man, and a child of immigrants – surely the most American of stories. What is great about this film is that it doesn’t answer any of those questions, instead it asks those questions of everyone within the film. What this film may be trying to say is that there are no easy answers to these and more of societies problems, but there does need to be understanding in the way we as a society look at each other no matter religion or politics. There is also something to be said for the way we look at what is the truth, as well as how as people we react when the truth comes out. This is no more apparent in “The Big Sick” than when Kumail’s family history comes out, he reacts in a way that is familiar to all – he gets mad, in so doing destroys the relation ship that means something to him – this will be familiar to all I am sure.

This is a very good film, one that contains many different messages as well as a very healthy amount of humor, which will appeal to most people. Not only that the situations that occur between Kumail, Emily as well as their respective families will be familiar to all, because if you have not been in their situation you are probably aware of people who have. In short this has some universal truths about not families as well as how we treat them but how we view each other. I can recommend this to all and you will have a great time sitting in an audience watching this film – it is also a great antidote to the bloated US Summer movies that are hitting our shores as I write this. Go and search this out you will not be disappointed.

“The Big Sick” is out now on DVD & Blu-ray.

DVD & Blu-ray review: “The Big Sick” (2017) “The Big Sick” (2017) Comedy Running Time: 124 minutes Written:  Kumail Nanjiani & Emily V. Gordon…

[spryfilm]

“The Big Sick” (2017)

Comedy

Running Time: 124 minutes

Written:  Kumail Nanjiani & Emily V. Gordon

Directed by: Michael Showalter

Featuring: Kumail Nanjiani, Zoe Kazan, Holly Hunter, Ray Romano, Adeel Akhtar and Anupam Kher

Terry: “Let me give you some advice, Kumail. Love isn’t easy. That’s why they call it love.”

Kumail: “I don’t really get that.”

Terry: “I know. I thought I could just start saying something and something smart would come out.”

This has not been the greatest years for comedies; they have been high on concept but low on results. The laughs this year seem to have been delivered by action films with comedic moments, the funniest arguably being “Spider-Man: Homecoming” (2017), that is until now.

“The Big Sick” (2017) is a love story, comedy with drama sprinkled over the top, to give it some risk as well as peril for its cast of characters. Oh yes, its also based on a true story, being written by real life couple Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon. This is a film that focuses on their real life relationship, their meeting and the realities of a mixed culture relationship, that had real consequences for both of them – it makes compelling story-telling as well as reliable and constant laughs throughout this movie. It is also expertly directed by Michael Showalter whose last film was the excellent Sally Field starrer “Hello, My Name is Doris” (2015) – he is also a talented and in demand television director.

The movie revolves around Kumail is a comedian living in Chicago trying to make it in the industry while driving for Uber in his spare time. His entire family is from Pakistan, so they are Muslim and regularly set Kumail up with various Pakistani women in hopes of continuing the tradition of an arranged marriage, much to Kumail’s annoyance. During one of his shows, he is heckled by Emily, a woman in the audience. After the show they hook up and begin to date.

If you have never heard of the principal Kumail Nanjiani who hear plays himself in the movie, you are missing out on an excellent stand-up as well as a very accomplished character actor, he can be seen on the HBO hit comedy “Silicon Valley” which is in now in its fourth season, and there he plays Dinesh Chugtai, one of the mainstays of the how. Nanjiani has also appeared in many other television shows as well as movies, he is extremely talented as well as a podcaster. In fact he hosted a podcast about the X-Files that he is a self confessed fan of, he even appeared in an episode of the revival series. This is heighted in “The Big Sick” in really nice ways that act as a homage to this love. However in his first real starring role as a Chicago based Pakistani stand-up, playing a version of himself he hits it for six.

Seeing this film described as romantic comedy as I have read is a bit if a misnomer as it is so much more than that, it has elements of comedy as well as romantic tropes, but it also contains a hefty bit of drama as well as, of course, biography. So it is reductive to describe it or limit it to one genre as this film is so much more than a typical romantic comedy – this actually elevates the genre to a new level as it also combines what it is to be stranger in a strange land as well as being seen as not only the eternal outsider but possibly some enemy of the state, that is always seen as the metaphorical ‘other’ in society.

Now while this is a story about a relationship, as well as family, the acceptance of new cultures as well as how people behave when they are trying to please almost everyone else but themselves, this story is also exclusively told from the point of view of Kumail, and almost nobody else, in fact everyone else’s experience is told through Kumail eyes so we are only seeing what he sees and everything else is really a mystery. This is a vital difference between other films with similar narratives as we really begin to understand why Kumail keeps the different strands of his separate, he has commitments to his family which he is being dishonest about as well as trying to keep up with some kind of commitment to Emily, who he is also being dishonest to. This becomes important as the story takes hold and we start to see the kind of scrutiny and pressure that Kumail has been put under but also the kind of pressure he has put himself under. At times it is not an easy watch to see the main character come under real threats emotionally but this story does have a happy ending – and if you have missed it this is co-written by Kumail and his wife, Emily.

The director of this feature is Michael Showalter who has been given a cracker of a script, so he does have his work cut out for him, in fact the director whose last film was the excellent “Hello, My Name is Doris”, does something here he did there, that is build the film around an untested leading man by giving him some great supporting actors to work with who know how to play drama as well as extremely funny comedy. At the top we have Zoe Kazan who inhabits her role as Emily, who never seems out of her depth playing her part, then we have Ray Romano and the great Holly Hunter as her parents. Hunter and Romano both play their parts with equal part humor as well as dramatic as any part could be. Hunter you would expect to be great, but Romano is the one that is the real surprise as a typical clueless Father who relies on his wife for answers as well as decision making, a typical male who befriends Kumail while everyone else shuns him. Adeel Akhtar who plays Kumail’s brother Naveed has little screen time but when you see him he is nothing short of fantastic – over the years Akhtar has been stealing movies in everything he has appeared in, this is the case with “The Big Sick”, he is priceless as Kumail’s traditional Muslim brother – who really only wants what’s best for the entire family, even if its at Kumail’s expense.

“The Big Sick” deals with many issues that face not only Muslim Americans, the interaction of mixed cultured relationships, the politics of the present in the US as well as what it means to be a man, and a child of immigrants – surely the most American of stories. What is great about this film is that it doesn’t answer any of those questions, instead it asks those questions of everyone within the film. What this film may be trying to say is that there are no easy answers to these and more of societies problems, but there does need to be understanding in the way we as a society look at each other no matter religion or politics. There is also something to be said for the way we look at what is the truth, as well as how as people we react when the truth comes out. This is no more apparent in “The Big Sick” than when Kumail’s family history comes out, he reacts in a way that is familiar to all – he gets mad, in so doing destroys the relation ship that means something to him – this will be familiar to all I am sure.

This is a very good film, one that contains many different messages as well as a very healthy amount of humor, which will appeal to most people. Not only that the situations that occur between Kumail, Emily as well as their respective families will be familiar to all, because if you have not been in their situation you are probably aware of people who have. In short this has some universal truths about not families as well as how we treat them but how we view each other. I can recommend this to all and you will have a great time sitting in an audience watching this film – it is also a great antidote to the bloated US Summer movies that are hitting our shores as I write this. Go and search this out you will not be disappointed.

“The Big Sick” is out this week only in cinemas.

Film review: “The Big Sick” (2017) “The Big Sick” (2017) Comedy Running Time: 124 minutes Written:  Kumail Nanjiani & Emily V. Gordon…