#sad day for men lovers but good day for women enjoyers

[huntingrays]

me looking up the genshin archons and realizing there aren’t any male ones left: 😔

me realizing the women enjoyers get three more archons to simp over:

[hils79]

Hils Watches Fairyland Lovers - Ep 2

Aww it's my best boy Ji Xiaobing. I've never seen him in a period drama before. I almost didn't recognise him with the long hair.

Oh no he's just woken up from a 100 year cryosleep to find out his best bro/boyfriend(?) is dead and he's crying. Not sure what it says about me that this angst is more enjoyable than the silliness of the previous episode

That's the same building Lin Xia tried to jump off in the previous episode. Were they only allowed to film on the roof of one tall building?

I love that he's not even trying to hide the truth from her. He's just 'yep you met a spirit and got brainwashed into nearly jumping off a roof'

This is definitely not Bai Yu's actual voice. I'm fairly sure at least.

Short person problems. I can relate.

Oh! Well the angst didn't last long. Turns out his bro faked his death

Ohhhh! So they're supposed to take it in turns to sleep for a hundred years but he Wang Jia didn't want to so pretended to be dead

Ooh plot twist. Evil businessman isn't a spirit but apparently his assistant is.

How old is she supposed to be??? How old is he supposed to be?????

Okay is he a spirit or isn't he? I am very confused now

Wow she is so much gender

Oh my god you can't just ask someone what their gender is

They are definitely female presenting in the present day. Love me some gender fluidity

He's clearly into it

Aww it was her obsession with him that corrupted the jade and made him like that

Aww he sent her women's and men's clothes so she can choose how she wants to present herself

I love that he's only sad because she said she'd only wear women's clothes when she's met someone she loves. He doesn't seem to mind that he's courting someone who dresses like a man.

Gone to America and still dressing as a man. I love her.

By 'open-minded' do you mean pansexual?

I love these two just watching everything unfold like it's a drama while hiding under their umbrella of invisibility

Wow this has gone very quickly from mostly comedy to mostly angst

OOOH! That's why he's not a spirit! She brought him back to life using the jade

Okay, I enjoyed that episode way more than the first one. If the rest of it is like this I think it'll be good

[tilbageidanmark]

Movies I watched this week (#183):

2 by new director Shane Atkinson:

🍿 LaRoy, Texas is an excellent new homage to 'No country for old men', and to the dry, desolated land of all the forgotten small Texas towns. It's populated with loafers and small-time losers who dream about a different life. It's Coen-Brothers-Lite - That's a compliment. Down to the yellow camera filter, the twang guitar on the radio, the oddly-meandering characters, cheating wives, dirty strip joints, and a sad-sack cuckold husband who gets into serious trouble, not knowing any better. And there's this poignant melancholy overshadowing everybody's actions.

Dylan Baker is not as menacing as Anton Chigurh, but he's still terrific as a cold-blooded contract killer. There's even a good 'Where's the money, Lebowski' head-in-the-toilet scene. 💯 score on Rotten Tomatoes. (Thanks, Schlomo). 9/10.

🍿 "They all wear the same uniform! That's why it's called 'Uniform'..."

His first black comedy, Penny Dreadful (2013), likewise dealt with similar bumbling small-time crooks, who are tasked with the simple kidnapping of a Wednesday-Addams-type little girl, and fail spectacularly at it. Cute.

🍿

Limite is considered by many to be the greatest of all Brazilian films. The silent, experimental cult-drama from 1931 was considered 'Lost' until 1978, but was eventually discovered and restored. A man and two women are lost at sea in a leaky rowboat, and they think about their divergent pasts. The flashbacks are from tiny, isolated towns, and empty countryside roads. It's historically important with opaque symbolism and rich, arresting visuals. I found it quite impenetrable.

🍿

My first 2 by Czech comedy master Oldřich Lipský:

🍿 How come I never heard of the innovative Happy end (1967) and its successful director before? This is a wild, Dadaist black comedy which is told in real reverse-chronology. The protagonist, a butcher named Bedřich, starts by describing the circumstances of his birth, while his head rolls on the ground after being chopped by a guillotine. He then explains how he came to be accused of the murder of his wife and her lover. And from there, his life proceeds backward until his beginning/death. Long before 'Momento' and '5 X 2' and 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button', it's the first film that used this unorthodox approach (I think). It's weird and brilliant and funny and highly enjoyable. (Screenshot Above).

🍿 Lemonade Joe was another wild & inventive parody, one of the top films in Czechoslovakia in the '60s. Ten years before 'Blazing Saddles' (but without the beans), it's an early European-style Spaghetti Western fun-ride, and it includes a musical, satire and ridiculous adventures. Richard Lester inspired, with tinted stock, silent film pratfalls, and un-serious production. The story is of a 'Clean-living' singing gunslinger who cleans up an Arizona town run by drunks, fights with his archenemy Hogofogo and wins the love of a Brigitte Bardot lookalike love-interest. All the cliches from American Western spoofs are mixed into silly craziness about the son of the owner of the Colaloca lemonade brand. It even uses an early catchphrase like Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger: When the bad guy dies by having a corkscrew stuck in his back, our hero, 'Lemonade Joe', comments: "You screwed up!"

🍿

4 unexpected gems by Neo Sora:

🍿 Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus is a closed studio concert that the iconic Japanese instrumentalist held just a few short months before his death. The austere black & white setting of the man and his piano in an empty hall are intimate and meditative. He played 20 numbers from his long career and ended it with the soft score to 'Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence'. Another with 💯 score on Rotten Tomatoes. (The director, Neo Sora, is Sakamoto's son). The trailer.

🍿 The chicken (2020) is an understated poem about a young Japanese man visiting his cousin on a hot NYC day. The focus of the story moves from one object to another, all the while Danza Filipina plays in the background. There's a "one good-looking chicken" [as Charles Grodin said in 'Midnight Run'] playing her part. Wistful. Recommended! 8/10.

🍿 Sugar Glass bottle (2022) is wild and mature neo-noir about 2 friends who prank each other. Like 'The Chicken', it moves from one mood to another unexpectedly and with great finesse. Absolutely mesmerizing 20 minutes and highly-recommended. The best film of the week!

I want to see everything this man will ever do! 9/10!

🍿 Three Daughters (2016) is a short, powerful documentary about 3 Ethiopian single mothers, who are poor, stricken with HIV, and who still exude inner strength and positive vibes. Terrific film-making! 9/10.

🍿

2 by Israeli Hagar Ben-Asher:

🍿 In her short student film Pathways (2007), she directed herself as an oversexed young woman, a promiscuous nymphomaniac, who isn't ashamed, or afraid, of her needs. She returns to the small village of her childhood, and is compulsively driven to have sex with any man who will have her. It's raw and provocative. But it includes one sexually-explicit encounter, and it ends with a brutal rape scene.

🍿"It's the last time I fix your bike"...

Four years later, she expanded that short film into a full feature, The slut. Same village, same character, same actress, same erotic dynamics (There's even a similar scene where she sits on the stairs after a bad experience, and stuffs her face with cream cakes, which she eats mechanically as compensation for some inner void!).

Here she's a reticent single mom to two small girls, and sleeps around with 3 different men, without any attachments. It seems that she in not in control of her desires, as she gives herself to anybody who wants her. When she falls in love with a forth man, a veterinarian, her boundaries get tested. It opens with a symbolic scene of a wild horse getting hit by a car, and ends with a shocking, truly unexpected twist. But on the whole, it was shallow, and un-revelatory. [*Female Director*]

🍿

Baal is a didactic filmed stage production of Bertold Brecht's first play, with David Bowie starring as the amoral anti-hero poet-scoundrel. Made by the BBC in 1982, during Bowie's experimental avant-garde period, he plays the rebellious 'Artiste' as a dirty, nasty, anti-social, banjo-playing "genius", with an ugly mouth full of decaying teeth, and no redeeming qualities. It has a selfish Nietzsche against the bourgeoisie written all over it, it's theatrical, mean-spirited and affectatious.

I was actually planning on watching Pabst's 'Threepenny Opera' from 1931 as well, but that's about all the Brecht I could take in one week.

🍿

The mortal storm (1940) is one of the few anti-Nazi Hollywood films released before America entered World War 2. It tells of a family of a Jewish professor after Hitler comes to power. But they are not called Jews, just "Non Aryans". A political thriller, that shows what happens when fascism arrives home. But it was cartoonish, syrupy and sentimental and glossed over any edgy discussion of Nazism. However, it had 💯 score on Rotten Tomatoes.

Talking about creeping authoritarianism, it was horrifying to hear a Gestapo man in the movie says "I hope that the revolution will be bloodless". And on the same day, Fascist-American Kevin Roberts used the exact same quote to describe his vision of Amerika.

🍿

The 1956 version of Nineteen Eighty-Four, made only 6 years after Orwell's death, was "freely adapted" from the book, and partially-financed by the CIA. It was bad, and definitely worse than the later Richard Burton/John Hurt version from [1984...] Orwell's terrifying nightmare must have been too bleak and nuanced to adapt to the conformist 50's, so they had to simplify it into 'Communism Bad' language, and 'One guy against the system' trope. 2/10.

I wish someone would make it today, with today's political hindsight. (But not like Diana Ringo!).

🍿

The Man from Earth is a different science-fiction 'mystery' that came recommended from a friend. A young professor invites a group of friends for a drink before abruptly leaving town. In the little get-together he tells them that he's actually immortal, and that he had already lived for 14,000 years. The whole movie takes place in the cabin where he had been for 10 years, and them discussing if and how is it possible. Supposedly it is philosophical and deeply-intellectual. I liked the fact that it was a low-low-budget indie production, that it was all 'dialogue in a room', and that it was written by the author on his deathbed. But all that didn't help the lame, imbecile amateurism of the story. This is why I avoid SF movies, and why I never saw any 'Star Trek' episodes: A guy says 'Something in the physical world is not what we thought it was', and everybody discuss it. I struggled through 45 minutes before having to click it off.

🍿

The President’s Visit offers a fleeting glimpse of Lebanon. A meek young owner of a tiny soap shop, learns that the president of the republic intends to visit the sleepy, neglected coast town, and purchase some local soaps from him. For security reasons, he’s not to tell anyone about this secret visit.

🍿

2 silent films by early pioneer female directors:

🍿 Lois Weber was a central figure in of the 1910's movie history, who, together with Griffith, was "American cinema's first genuine auteur", the first woman to direct a full-length feature, and the first American woman to own a film studio.

Suspense (1913) is the first of her movies I saw, a truly suspenseful story about a home invasion, and a race to save a woman from a knife-wielding tramp. Possibly the first in the horror/slasher genre, it also featured an early split-screen for effect, an exciting car chase, innovative overhead shots, a-la Hitchcock. 9/10. [*Female Director*]

🍿 The Ocean Waif (1916), a story of a beautiful young woman, abused by her step-father, and rescued by a famous novelist. Another by the 'Mother of Cinema', Alice Guy-Blaché. This is a good time again for a shout-out to her Jodi Foster documentary Be Natural. [*Female Director*]

🍿

2 Eddie Murphy gigs for the first time:

🍿 After reading the new Eddie Murphy interview at the NYT, I realized that I never saw his 1987 stand-up Eddie Murphy: Raw. Even after 40 years, it's still the highest-grossing stand-up concert film, having made $50M. Good for him! It's raunchy, X-rated, politically-incorrect - and for the most part, fucking hilarious. It set the then-record for the highest "Fuck Count" at 223, surpassing 'Scarface' (207), but losing it 3 years later to 'Goodfellas' (300). 7/10.

🍿 The Nutty Professor on the other hand was not so fucking cute. This Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde story proved that Hollywood comedies in the '90s were gross, loud, dumb and inherently unfunny. The message it pretended to send was anti-fat-shaming, but the whole story was that he's extremely obese, so obese that he can't get into chairs. Also, that everybody of his fat family farts a lot. (The farting scenes were at least a parody of 'Blazing Saddles', so yeah.)

But this one-trick pony of 'Fat Man Farting' won an Oscar, made $274M, and probably inspired Obama to adapt his slogan 'Yes, We Can!' - 2/10.

🍿

"....Wouldn't have got the lettuce if I knew it wouldn't fit..."

Another original stand up performance Bo Burnham: Make Happy from 2016. I loved his 'Inside' Special, and his film 'Eighth Grade' very much. This one too is full of insightful and moving songs mixed with farts into the microphone and urging the audience to kill themselves. Genial, exuberant, funny, and highly creative, it's an easy 9/10.

🍿 

Re-watch of The Man Who Couldn’t Miss Screenings by mostly-obscure indie director Damon Packard. A.I. short from 2023 - Spread the word! ♻️.

(I still can't understand why my r/truefilm post from last month was deleted with ´out explanation).

🍿

I like cats and I like 'stones, so the adult animated show Stoner cats was exactly for me. 5 cats gets stoned when their old lady shares her medicinal delivery stuff with them.

The producers of this show were fined by the US-SEC because they sold unregistered NFTs as a means towards a pass to view the show. Cute.

🍿  

(My complete movie list is here).

[shellyb04]

And the more drama reviews I promised! Two in one week look at me go!

Kill me, Heal me (Kdrama): a man with Multiple personalities and a psychiatrist fall in love while helping him with his disorder. 8/10 I have massively mixed feelings about this one. Ultimately I liked it but I felt like it was too long and took too many unnecessary turns to melodrama and then tried to wrap things up way too quickly. Overall, I liked it. The acting is great and the characters are wonderful.

Still, Marry me (kdrama)- Two women in their thirties pursue relationships with younger men. 7/10. This would have been an 8, but it totally fumbled the ending for me. There were too many storylines and not enough time especially when they kept introducing more problems in the last ep. That was the most frustrating part. I rather liked the show and then it just fumbled. Like the last episode makes very little sense for the characters. Hae Jin's mom was too difficult.

Master's Sun (kdrama)- A woman who can see ghosts finds a man who can make them leave with a touch. 9.5/10 This is a horror romance and I do not do scary, but the way that ghosts are portrayed here is so good. They are just looking for help mostly. I could do with a bit less of the secondary characters and a bit more relationship between the leads, but overall it was excellent.

Instead of tipsy why not get drunk/Flavour it's yours: (CDrama) Guy with exceptional palate and girl who cannot taste switch their senses after an accidental kiss. 8/10. The main couple is adorable. I thought the mystery took too long and I did not care about the other sommeliers at all. Everything else was super enjoyable.

Bride of the century (Kdrama)-A wealthy family is cursed so the eldest son's first bride dies. The newest bride in line manages to find a doppelganger to take her place. 8/10 This is a very soap opera drama. It actually took me three tries to start it. Villain plotting galore and some of it is insensible. I did fast forward through a bit of the angst in some of the later episodes, but overall the main couple was great. I liked the plot twist with the curse and ghost.

Rooftop Prince (Kdrama)-Joseon era prince and friends in modern day 10/10 The silly antics of the friends balanced well with the melodrama and I actually cared about all the characters. It did take a few episodes to get into it for me.

Just between lovers (Kdrama)- The survivors of a mall collapse heal together, finding love along the way. 9/10. The grief and sadness in this melodrama are done so well. It is a slow story, but more about letting yourself move on from grief and let go than the romance. Beautiful story, although I found a few character a bit extraneous. Also may make you cry before it's all over.

The best of you in my mind (Cdrama)-High School best friends go to college and fall in love. 9/10. Basically all super sweet fluff and hot at just the moment I needed it. If you want a moustache twirling bad guy and lots of drama this one is not for you. I, however, love seeing a nice healthy couple progress together. And it was a relief to just have some simple sweet romance.

Wild Romance (Kdrama)- Baseball player gets an antifan as his bodyguard to protect him from a stalker. 9/10. If you can get past the super violent fight between the couple in ep 4 (and a lot of people can't), the main couple is hysterical. When the show started becoming too melodramatic toward the end, their awkward humor was perfect. I don't love the best friend and wife's conclusion and I wish they had built the stalker mystery a bit better so we had a reveal at the end. Overall, really enjoyable.

Lost Romance: (Taiwanese drama)-Romance editor wakes up in her latest novel and the male CEO star of the novel looks just like her real life crush. Only one problem: she's not the leading lady, she's one of the jealous coworkers. But with her knowledge of Romance novels maybe she can change things. 10/10. The first couple episodes were a little hard to get through, but this...this just hit perfectly. The two leads have AAMAZING chemistry. The only mildly draggy point was the real world stuff in the middle. Also one of the sexiest drama scenes I've watched yet. I absolutely loved it. WILL WATCH AGAIN!

[gunslingertales]

Saving grace || A.M - Chapter 2

Story summary: Arthur struggles with his guilt and his loyalty towards the people he always thought of as family. He starts questioning the life they’ve been leading lately and wonders if there’s still a place for him somewhere out there in a world that’s so quickly chaning. Then he meets a woman with fire in her eyes and gold in her heart who seems equally lost in the great unknown that’s life. 

Chapter Two: “ Dreams”  Find the other chapters on my blog under /masterlist

Chapter summary: As he rides into Valentine, Arthurs plans on having a drink or two with young Lenny and then returning back to camp. He doesn’t expect running into a familiar face. And spending the next day with that person. And learning about her childhood and her dreams.

Likes, comments and especially reblogs are more than appreciated ♥

[additional note: I am German. Sometimes I get the tense wrong or make mistakes. I am useless when it comes to punctuation. Go easy on me, please.]

The small town of Valentine is an awfully dirty place. Both figuratively and literally. You don’t even have to take two steps and your shoes are already coated with mud. Like the sweltering humidity of the Lemoyne swamps that cling to your skin or the grimy winds coming from the mines of Annesburg that settle on your lungs, the dirt lies upon the town like a thick blanket you just can’t shake off. 

Arthur thinks it’s ironic, how the people turn their noses at him and the gang and their way of living. Of their makeshift camps and on-the-go lifestyle. They scowl at the thought of their tents and bedrolls yet voluntarily move to a town like this where you can’t tell if you’re wading through mud or your neighbors’ shit. 

Then again, Arthur doesn’t care an awful lot for other people’s lives. His own is chaotic and confusing enough, what good could it possibly do to rack his brain about other people’s choices? Least it ain’t quite as bad here as it is in Saint Denis. That place is a cesspool of every single thing Arthur has an unprecedented disdain for. Too many people pretending to be above everyone else just because their jackets got fancy gold buttons.

He can’t picture himself ever living in a place like that. Though to some it might be a place of comfort, of safety, to him it only feels like a cage. And he’d rather die than give up his freedom. 

Mouse slows down to a gentle trot as they approach the Valentine Saloon. A golden glow shines through the newly fixed window of the building and laughter and song echo through the room and flood out into the streets. Lenny hitches his horse next to Mouse and gives Arthur an expectant look “Just one of two, right?” 

“Sure. Just a drink, no drama”

None of the men are getting lots of chances to wind down. Sure some of them are perpetually drunk to some extent but to really get a night off to - to have fun, that’s not a chance that presents itself very often. Living a life like they do, you always have to be alert. Life ain’t your friend so you gotta look out for yourself and your people.

There’s quite a few people inside, drinking and eating and laughing. Sometimes Arthur wonders what his life would be like if he had married Mary and given up on the gang. Would he spend his free time here drinking away his sorrows and his feelings of inadequacy compared to Mary and all she could’ve had? Or would they wander into town every once in a while, grab a bite to eat, and enjoy each other’s company?

He shakes his head to push the thoughts away. There’s no use in getting lost in what-ifs. They’re just another reminder of what he can’t have and what he messed up.

“You,” the Barkeeper approaches, pointing at Arthur as he leans against the bar “ I don’t want no trouble!”

Arthur raises his hands in mock surrender “And you ain’t getting none from me. I was just defending myself.”

Though his eyes still hold a hint of doubt the barkeeper seems to be satisfied with that answer. Something tells Arthur that he isn’t the first person butting heads with that damn Tommy guy.

Lenny regards the exchange with a smirk playing on his lips as a shake of his head.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just … do I wanna know?”

“Nah don’t think you do.”

They share a laugh and receive their drinks and for a moment, Arthur’s heart feels a bit less heavy. For a second the weight of the world doesn’t rest inside his chest. Like he can be unbothered for just a night.

Two drinks in he leans his back against the bar and lets his eyes wander around the Saloon. Drunk fools stumbling over each other, a piano player belting out melodies, smiles upon smiles and songs, and music. 

In the furthest corner of the place, a woman sits alone by a table, a plate untouched in front of her. She seems too fancy to end up in a dump like this. Her hair is pulled up in intricate braids and her blouse has frilly lace in the front. Something about her intrigues Arthur. 

The first time he ever laid eyes on Mary an electrical current surged through his system like waves crashing to the shore. She was beautiful and smart and she spoke like she knew the world belonged to her. He never felt deserving of her and he never was but for a while she let him believe it. She was beautiful and soft and she wasn’t … she wasn’t what he’d known all his life. And maybe that’s also part of what intrigued her when it came to him. The excitement and the unknown. But that novelty wore off for her rather quickly it seems. The night she broke the engagement and his heart, he doesn’t remember that night but he does remember the pain.

Looking at the woman in the corner, he doesn’t feel the excitement or the sense that he needs to have her in his life, the way he did with Mary. That doesn’t mean he’s unaware of his intrigue. As much as he doesn’t want to get involved with other people’s drama, he sure likes to hear their stories. After all, ain’t that what our life is made of? Stories. One after another. Sometimes you’re the main character and sometimes an onlooker. Sometimes your the hero and sometimes - sometimes you ain’t.

When she lifts her head though, a strange sensation floods through him. Though the dimly lit room doesn’t allow him to get a perfectly good look at her, Arthur can immediately read the sadness on her face. It’s radiating from her. He knows it ain’t his fault, at least not entirely but still, a pang of guilt settles in his stomach. A knowledge that he ain’t innocent in any of this either. Seeing her brings back all the heaviness and the weight that rests on his heart. It floods back in and clings to him like cigarette smoke.

He wants to leave now. Just get out of here and take Mouse for a ride through the fields and valleys and relish in the great wide somewhere. But he can’t. His legs feel like they’re stuck to the ground like flies on a honeypot. He feels guilt sometimes, about his deeds. Especially when the people don’t deserve his unkindness. He’s never really felt like this before. Then again, usually, they don’t have to face their doings again.

Drinking his third beer, he tries to ignore her. He genuinely does. It ain’t his fault and it ain’t his problem. Why should he care? No one asked her to pawn off her jewelry for a mistake she didn’t commit. Maybe that’s exactly the problem though, the knowledge that she’s a good person and the fact that Arthur voluntarily chose not to extend the same kindness towards her.

A commotion from the corner pulls his attention back towards her. A big burly man with a frizzy, unkept beard stands beside her table, leaning on it for support. A bottle dangles from his fingers and the sway in his posture tells Arthur that he’s way deep in by this point.

“I’m just tryin’ to be nice Miss. Ain’t no reason to get feisty on me.”

“Can you please let me enjoy my dinner in peace?”

“Come on sweetheart, lemme buy you a drink at least. Then maybe I can take you up to one of them rooms. How ‘bout that.”

“That’s disgusting and I said no!”

Though he can’t see her eyes, he’s sure they’re filled with the same fire and wrath that had been directed at him just a few weeks ago. With every moment passing, he gravitates more towards her, ready to jump in if the man got any more stupid ideas running through his head.

There’s a special place in hell for men who can’t extend a certain amount of respect towards the fair gender. He knows that even some men in his own group, his own family, often seem to forget that and Arthur is the first to call ‘em out on it. They call him soft for it but he doesn't think that’s him being soft as much as it’s him basically being raised by two men who value women for what they are. Smart and beautiful and human beings worthy of being treated with respect. Not objects for their own enjoyment and entertainment.

“Lady, I ain’t gonna be asking so nicely no more.”

“Is there a problem here?”

May’s eyes snap up towards Arthur as he approaches the table and he catches a glimpse of the flames, passionate and … pissed off. Though as they fall on him, a kind of calmness washes over her and he isn’t quite sure if he likes it or if it makes him nervous. 

“Just a dispute between two lovers, ain’t that right Dove?  None of your concern, buddy.”

“We ain’t lovers you delusional rat !”

Arthur can’t help but let out a laugh at her insult. It fits the guy, really, though his frame is broad and meaty, he’s got beady eyes and a long face.

“You better shut your mouth you-“

As the man lifts his arm, that’s when Arthur really sees red and takes a step in between him and May who, despite her best efforts, can’t suppress the worry and fear settling on her face.

“Nah, I suggest you shut up and get the fuck out of this place. They just fixed the window and it would be an awful mess if I had to break it again when I throw you out. Of course, I could also shoot or stab you right here right now but, I don’t think that’s in any of our best interests now, is it?”

Arthur’s voice is low and deep and though that’s both a result of bad genes and chain-smoking, it does come in handy every once in a while. Mary–Beth had once told him that it gives him a sense of perpetual danger and toughness. 

The man stares at Arthur, unsure of what to do. His eyes then shift towards May, back to Arthur and back and forth one more time. Carefully he considers his next move and then — then he shrugs his shoulders in defeat, huffs out an annoyed sigh and turns around, leaving the saloon with the slam of a door.

“What a horrible horrible man.”

“Sorry about that”

May rests a gentle hand on Arthur’s arm and signals for him to sit down, which he does - reluctantly. Again she extends a kindness towards him he is severely undeserving of.

“What are you apologizing for? You ain’t don’t nothing wrong. “

“Oh, I’ve done plenty of things wrong in ma life.”

“I meant right then. What brings you here then, Mr. Morgan? Spending my money on a beer?”

Though she says it with a smirk and not a hint of malice, it still sends a sting to his chest though. He could ease his mind and tell her that he hasn’t sold the ring, hasn’t even put it in the camp’s collective. The earrings yes but not the ring. It still sits in his saddlebag waiting for — well he isn’t exactly sure what for.

“Just having a drink with ma friend over there and saving women from delusional rats it seems. What about you amiss Everly? What’s gotten you dressed up so fancy? You look like one of them ladies on the poster they hang by the theatre in Saint Denis.”

She scoffs then takes a bite of her lamb fry. “Glad you think so but unfortunately that ain’t no consolation to me.”

“What happened?”

He’s well aware that he has no right to ask her about it. They hardly know each other and yet she’s been so open and forward from the first second she opened her mouth that day he came around the Downes Ranch, it doesn’t feel strange asking her about it. It feels natural. Like the right thing to do.

“ Well since Thomas ain’t doing good and I’m looking for a new place of work I thought about finally taking a leap and making my dream come true. But, as you know, I am no woman of a big fortune nor do I come from a family of money. I was trying to get a loan from the bank of Valentine but …. no luck.”

“Huh, ‘m sorry about that.” He’s not exactly sure what he’s sorry about. The fact that Mr. Downes is dying or the fact that she wasn’t granted a loan. Or maybe both. Probably a bit of both.

“Ah,” she shrugs “I’d already expected this outcome. Some big-shot oil tycoon from Saint Denis already has his eyes on my piece of land anyway so the money is only the first obstacle.”

“Piece of land? You wanna become a rancher now?”

May lets out a sweet chuckle, “ No. I wanna be a teacher. I want to build a school for Valentine.”

“A school? What for?”

“Well … to teach. The world is changing, Mr. Morgan. We’re living in the age of progress but what good does it do us if we have machines taking us anywhere and everywhere when we can’t read even the most simple of instructions? We owe it to the children to start the progress with them.”

Arthur has never set a single foot inside a real school all he’s ever learned he learned on the road. From Dutch and Hosea. Reading and writing were never something he was particularly fond of learning but now that he’s older, even he can admit that it’s a big advantage in life.

“If you say so.”

“I do. I taught Archie to read. Edith too. I think it’s a luxury we should all be able to afford.”

“ Well, I ain’t gonna disagree with that. Let me buy you a drink.”

She takes the last bite of her lamb, then wipes up the remaining gravy with a potato, before softly tapping a napkin to her lips. “That’s very sweet of you but I should go. I have a room at the hotel for the night and I’m quite concerned that if I agree to one drink I will agree to more and then I won’t make it to my room and that’s just money wasted now ain’t it.”

For a second he wants to be brash. Wants to tell her that he wouldn’t mind making sure she gets to her room safe and sound. Wouldn’t mind joining her there. But while he lets himself think it, it just ain’t his personality to speak those words. Especially not to a woman who shows him kindness time and time again when all he ever does is disappoint and do the wrong things.

“Alright, Miss. You stay safe out there. I sincerely hope it all works out for you. With that school and all. “

May places her small hand on his stubbly cheek, warm from the alcohol coursing through his system and the gentle touch of a woman.

“Oh don’t make this sound like a goodbye. Our paths will cross again, I know so. Trust me, Arthur!”

He likes the way his name sounds falling from her lips. Likes her warm smooth skin on his. Like the sincerity in her eyes and the fire softly burning beneath it. He likes this girl and that’s one scary thought. Ain’t nothing good ever happened to the girls he liked.

“You have a good night, Miss Everly.”

As he returns to the bar, Lenny already fixes Arthur with a look of amusement and mischief. His eyes are glossed over from the drinks and his balance don’t seem to work quite as he’d like.

“So who was that pretty lady?”

Just the woman he hasn’t been able to get out of his head since he met her. The one he’s been sketching in his diary over and over again. The one he ain’t don’t right by. The one that’s way too good for him.

“No one. Just some girl. Now how about another drink, Lenny ma boy?”

The night goes by in a flash. It’s a blur of yelling and dancing and laughing and fighting. Of searching for Lenny, several times. Of walking into a room he has no business walking into. Of making friends and enemies. And then fade to black.

That is until the next day when the midday sun beats mercilessly down onto his tired body, slumped against the trunk of a mostly barren tree. It’s the sun that wakes him up. The sun and — her.

May stands before him like a goddess in an ancient story from a foreign country. The sun shines behind her veiling her in a golden glow, giving her a gleaming halo.

“Look at you, I told you our paths would cross again. Why are you down there?”

“Fell asleep.”

“On the floor?”

“It happens.”

His voice is rough with sleep and exhaustion from the night before. He ain’t as young as he used to be and nights like the previous one leave marks now. It’s something he doesn’t like to admit but something he has to come to terms with.

“I know it’s past noon but I can offer you some breakfast if you like,” May exclaims pointing towards her horse and the little wicker basket strapped to the saddlebag. “Well it’s lunch for me but breakfast for you. I got coffee too.”

Arthur rubs the sleep from his eyes and scratches his beard in contemplation. He’s got nothing to do today and he’s, he could be checking up on Dutch and his plans but with the way things are right now, he doesn’t really mind getting some time away from all that mess. Micah is also waiting for him in a cell in Strawberry but that’s so far down on Arthur’s list of things to do. That nasty son of a bitch can rot there for a while longer. Might do him some good, actually.

“Coffee sounds mighty fine.”

“Alright, you’ll have to follow me though. “

“Sure. Lemme get Mouse real quick. “

Arthur drags his tired body back towards the Saloon and a few minutes later he returns, now straddling Mouse and carrying a big bundle of fur on the back of his horse.

“What in the world is that,” May asks, swinging herself back onto Beans.

“Fur of a grizzly.”

“No way! You’re a hunter, then?”

The two of them fall into a slow trot next to each other with May walking just a tad in front of him leading the way.

“Ain’t much of a hunter. Just pure luck. Had help from my —“

What exactly was Hosea to him? His father, kind of but it wouldn’t feel right calling him that. He had had a father, albeit a pretty poor example of it. But he’s more than a friend. He’s family.

“ from a family member.”

“I think you’re allowed to take pride in this, Arthur. It’s a nice fur and it seems like it was one big fella. That’s something not a lot of people can do. Allow yourself to be proud.”

Pride, Arthur knows, makes men do foolish things. It makes them feel invincible. Makes them stop paying attention. It leaves them vulnerable. Pride ain’t doing no one no good.

“Whatever. Where we going anyway?”

“Oh, I’m just going to break my own heart real quick,” May says as if it’s a completely normal thing to exclaim. 

They gallop on for a short while until she stops at the top of a small hill. Slowly, not moving her eyes away from the patch of land before her, she gets off of her horse and takes the wicker basket. “Come, let’s sit down by the trees.”

A row of oak trees provides some shade from the burning sun as they sit down on the warm prairie grass. For a moment the world is still. Not silent but still. Soft and comfortable. The scent of coffee fills the air, waves along with the desert winds. The mug May hands to him, it’s warm in his hand and for the first time in a long time, Arthur feels at peace with himself and the world.

“This is it,” May announces and, arms spread out wide, gestures to the land before them.

“Well I must say, this is quite impressive,” Arthur humors her, voice laced with sarcasm.

“Oh, you big oaf. Stop making fun of me. This is the piece of land I wanted to buy. The school was supposed to sit right there. Walking distance for the children of Valentine and the surrounding ranches. Now it belongs to Mr. Robert Montgomery and god knows what he’ll put here.”

“I’m real sorry about it. I ain’t ever really had a dream like that but I bet it’s not a nice feeling. It’s a damn shame too. Can see you teaching them kids some things.”

“Yeah?”

“Sure.”

She looks wistfully across the valley, a glimpse of longing sparkling in her eyes. “It’s all I've wanted to do since I was a little girl. My daddy never had much and he wasn’t a good man but he was honest and he was a hard worker. My momma was soft and sweet like honey. She made him more gentle. Made life sweet for him. They both came from nothing but when they had me they wanted to make sure they gave me everything I needed to survive in this world. To make something of myself. Momma learned to read and write from an older lady who lived across the street and taught it to me and my daddy. From him, I learned to fish, to hunt, to skin and prepare animals. I think with the way they gave me all this knowledge they wanted me to become good at something and make that my crime. Instead, I became passionate about sharing knowledge. About giving this education to other children. That’s where our future rests, ain’t it? The children?”

She’s right. Whenever he looks at Jack. Whenever he watches Abigail or John look at Jack, all he sees is the hope that he turns out better. That his life doesn’t rest with them. That there is more for him than robbing and plundering.

“Do you have children?”

It’s an innocent question but it manages to hurt him more than any other question probably could. It reaches all the dark corners of his heart he tries so hard to ignore. He doesn’t have children, but he had. Past tense.  Ring a father, another role he failed at filling. He ain’t never been a good father to Isaac. He wasn’t there when it mattered. Wasn’t there when they killed him for a meager 10$.

“Nah.”

“Did you go to school?”

Arthur scoffs a laugh at that, imagining himself young and wild sitting in a classroom with a bunch of other rowdy kids. 

“No. Never. I was taught how to write and read by my family. Like you.”

“See, I told you we ain’t so different.”

Her smile, it sends another shiver through him. Not uncomfortable but oh so scary. She doesn’t know the kind of person he is. The one he really is. A bad person. The goddamn villain of the story.

Everything in him screams at him to go. To leave her alone. To not get in any deeper. But for one day, just this one time, he wants to allow himself to relish in a what-if. So he stays and they relax in the shade as the sun fills the valleys with rays of gold.

They stay there for so long, that Arthur is sure the sun has turned his skin a shade of red. When they get back on their horses, he notices the crown of white daisies sitting on top of Mouse’s head. A crown matching the one adoring May’s. The white flowers shine atop her flowing red locks like little stars when the setting sun is coloring the sky a blood-red but the stars have come out to play already.

Her hair is down for the first time since he’s met her and she looks beautiful. Like the wilderness and the calm all at once.

“Thanks for listening to my dreams, Arthur Morgan.”

“Thanks for sharing them, May Everly.”

Her name sounds sweet on his tongue. 

“Now don’t look so blue. We'll meet again, I know it. I was right last time, wasn’t I?”

“You were.”

And as she rides away, red hair flowing in the wind like the wings of a Phoenix, Arthur hopes she’s right again this time. He ain’t ready to let go of the way she makes him see the world and her and himself. Not yet.

[zukadiary]

Mugen Musou / Krung Thep ~ Moon Troupe 2019

Over the length of my trip I saw a pretty fair cross section of this show—way back in mid-March pre-Krung Thep changes in Takarazuka; the live viewing of Takarazuka raku with Miya’s sayonara show included; and last week in Tokyo, the first full day of Reiko’s absence with the cast changes in place. 

I solidly did not enjoy Mugen Musou. I love Tamaki’s Tsukigumi, I love Miya Rurika and was so glad I had the opportunity to see her last show, and no one’s treatment in Mugen Musou was able to save it for me. I think perhaps if you read and enjoyed the novel, and also love Tsukigumi, there’s a decent chance that you’ll like this. I did not read the novel, and it felt very much like I had to as a prerequisite. 

There was an awful lot jammed into an hour and a half. The flow of the show bothered me; there were so many scenes, they changed so quickly, and none of them felt very substantial to me. In Saito-sensei’s attempt to cover as much plot as humanly possible, I think he lost the characters; while I understood generally what was going on, I did not immediately get who many of the characters were, how they knew each other, or why many of them were doing what they were doing. 

That provided a poor setup for my biggest gripe: I recognize that I am an American, and I am not necessarily the intended audience, and that this is certainly a big part of Japanese history and culture, but in the year 2019, the whole samurai honor I-must-kill-everyone-just-to-prove-I’m-strongest thing is not very compelling to me. If accompanied by moving character relationships (which, I hear, the novel has in spades), I can definitely give it a pass; but in the absence of onstage character development, that as the standalone force driving the story was simply not interesting or relatable enough to me to be enjoyable.

With a few exceptions—and this probably just goes back to the overall lack of character development—I thought most of the characters were ill fitted to their actresses. I don’t even think anyone did a poor job, everyone really gave it their best effort; my hang up lies entirely with the directorial choices, and I guess the choice of this show in general. I find Tamaki the most charming when she’s fully in wholesome ideal husband mode. I finally watched Elisabeth recently and liked her Tod a lot more than I expected also, so that was a fair out-of-the-box choice for her. The samurai with something to prove for no good reason other than that he’s embarrassed about his dad did not hit me where I want Tamaki to hit me. Otsu is not really presented with much depth; she’s pretty demure, and she spends the whole show waiting around for men to come back to her and gets sad when they break their promises. I was hoping we’d get something that would allow Sakura to show off her strengths a little more in her Grand Theater debut (although she did play the flute for real). I wanted more pining between Otsu and Musashi, but I didn’t really get it, and what there was seemed kind of one-sided on Otsu’s part. Kojiro, too, was one-note; I’m not sure what there was to him other than “the strongest dude” (oh, and he wears a cross, so he’s CHRISTIAN. That’s BACKSTORY). Miya did her damnedest, and she did manage a kind of cold sexy anime boy vibe, but again, especially for her last show, this was just not the kind of character I most enjoy seeing her play, nor did it play to her strengths in my opinion (with truly all the love in my heart for this woman, I have to say she cannot swordplay her way out of a wet paper bag). On my first viewing I thought Ari was the villain, but after the other two I don’t think there even is a villain; Ari seems to be just a stern guy from a dojo (that Musashi passed through when he was weak and thus *had to* defeat in its entirety when he got strong). Again, I don’t really know what his motivation was, and the character didn’t show off any of Ari’s charms, or challenge her in a meaningful way to try something different. Very few other people got roles substantial enough to be worth mentioning. 

I DID enjoy some specific things:

Reiko’s character, Matahachi, was my favorite, and her portrayal was my favorite. Matahachi had personality, and amidst all this very serious samurai glory business going on, he had sort of his own contrary subplot that I found much more entertaining. He’s a loyal friend to Musashi, but also lazy, kinda dumb, and utterly useless. He runs away from home with Musashi in the beginning, but while Musashi is off on his quest for ultimate strength, Matahachi pretty much gives up, spends a lot of time sleeping in a brothel, has to do manual labor for 5 minutes and gets tired of it, and eventually happens upon a dying man who is trying to carry some sort of scroll of certification to Kojiro. Matahachi is thrilled at his great fortune; he takes the scroll from the dead guy and uses it to steal Kojiro’s identity, attracting hordes of women and scaring away thugs on his “reputation.” His aging parents WALK OUT OF THEIR TINY HOMETOWN with the purpose of finding him and bringing him home, and successfully find him and embarrass him in front of all his swooning admirers. I saw Oda on the first day she took over this role, and I wish I could have seen her after a little more warmup. She didn’t have the charm that endeared me to Reiko’s Matahachi, but she sure can hold her own with the rest of the upperclassmen in terms of acting and stage presence. 

Toki-chan as Akemi, a girl who Sachika’s character took into her brothel and raised, gave me the heart-wrenching yearning I wanted from Musashi and Otsu. In the very first scene after the prologue, Akemi and Musashi are walking and talking (she’s taken a liking to him). Musashi finds a bell on the ground and sticks it into Akemi’s obi. For the remainder of the show, Akemi jingles softly with every appearance and every movement, haunted via sound by the reminder of her unrequited love for Musashi, making all of her longing looks more poignant. 

There’s a scene at the end where Musashi sees a ghost/memory of his father (Shimon). Dad is like WHY DID YOU DO ANY OF THIS? and Musashi doesn’t really have an answer. Same, dad. 

I loved Krung Thep so much the first time I saw it. Then it went through some changes, and I cooled a little on it, but still thought it was really good overall. 

It’s been a 2-act heavy year so far, and Estrellas and Krung Thep (as of me writing this 2 days before Yukigumi shonichi) have been our only revues. I thought that for the most part the music in Krung Thep was beautiful, not really in a jam to the soundtrack way like Estrellas, but in a really nice ambient way; there are a lot of bells and other interesting sounds that we don’t get as frequently. It also has a dazzling gold aesthetic, the kind of spectacle you want as a Takarazuka lover going into a revue.

There were for sure some questionable moments. The boy band number (albeit this time with Sakura at the center of the boys), which, much to my chagrin, seems to have become a revue staple regardless of director, was originally THIS SONG, which I happen to know and love thanks to this Japanese version, so I forgave its presence. This was one of the three numbers that got the axe before filming day, and they replaced it with a synth remix of the Takarazuka classic C’est Magnifique. That rendered it no longer forgivable. The chuuzume was very long and set to Shall we Dance, but like... only the chorus over and over and over and over again with varying flair. It was also turbans doing absolutely nothing to disguise Daisuke’s favorite Latin ruffles, and, if not for the King and I undercurrent, it wouldn’t have fit with the rest of the show whatsoever. A King and I medley maybe would’ve been nice?

Standout numbers:

The first or second number after the prologue (depending on when you think the prologue ends) is a Reiko vs. Ari kickboxing match. It’s hammy and ridiculous and goes on for two whole rounds, which seemed TOO LONG for how awkward it was the first time I saw it... but then when the fight ends, they break into a song about “male friendship” and how they love each other no matter who wins or loses. After that I was stoked, and on subsequent viewings appreciated every detail down to their girlfriends and trainers in the audience.

There’s a beauuuutiful barefoot duet dance between Tamaki and Miya

Mayupon in drag singing in at least 3 octaves flawlessly. There’s an alternate timeline, perhaps a brighter one, where I’m just in Mayupon’s club

Admittedly one of my least favorite revue tropes where there’s a nightclub and a girl and a terrible boyfriend and a new guy who shows up and someone gets jealous and has a gun and the wrong person always dies... but this time Ari is in hotpants

The Grand Hotel numbers in the sayonara show are probably too tough a contender, but the Krung Thep kuroenbi is not only great (messy tailcoats with rolled sleeves, mmmmm) but also almost the best little taidan gift for Miya in the whole thing. I don’t know how they’re going to splice the frames together for the DVD, but it opens with Miya singing a solo, and then she goes down into the floor as the kuroenbi is starting (making it look like she won’t even be in it). The rest of the otokoyaku dance a bit, then Miya comes back up out of the floor dressed to match, and everyone else hits one of those sexy lunges in formation, and then they all turn their heads to look at her in unison. Ugh.

I’m gonna miss Miya!!!!! And I hope Reiko is doing ok.

[kelvintimeline]

i havent seen it 2 & haven't read the book, what happens?

i’m just gonna list everything bad about it here because i need to vent again, lmao

it spoilers, obvioously, but also triggering talk about a LOT of content like seuxal abuse, gaybashing, domestic violence, fatphobia, and suicide

movie starts with some flashbacks and then goes into an extreme gaybashing scene where a man has his face literally beat in while his lover is pinned down by teenagers, forced to watch, and then is thrown into a river. he is eaten/dismembered by pennywise. i’m assuming his lover is too after he discovers his body

all implied and/or canonically gay characters are ~sassy and ~witty and that’s like... their main trait. in 2019 the gaybashing victim makes a meg ryan joke.

bill hader’s character never actually says he’s gay, he just writes R+E into the wood which YES is confirming he’s gay but that’s literally only revealed after eddie dies on top of him. and after he’s called a f*g and mocked for being gay and told his “secret” is ugly NUMEROUS times. eddie is never implied to be gay, they just mock him for having a fat wife

fatphobia is EXTREME in this movie--ben loses weight but pennywise mocks him for still beig fat and unlovable. eddie’s mom and wife are mocked for being fat. everyone mocks ben for the fact that he used to be fat but “he’s hot now.” i feel bad for his child actor tbh

stanley, the jewish character, commits suicide early in the film beore reuniting with the others. the cast COMPLETELY forgets about him for large swaths of the film and drops him to just be sad about eddie being dead even though stanley only died two days earlier.

he commits suicide and writes a letter about it to the losers and it’s basically “i killed myself to protect you! i was weak and too afraid to confront pennywise and would just be a burden on you! it’s actually good that i died” and this narration plays over the happy ending montage of eveyrone moving on with their life.

bev talks about how she had visions of everyone dying and she knew stanley would die and it’s revealed that if they don’t defeat pennywise, tehy’ll all die. which bascially means stanley’s suicide was inevitable, fate, and couldn’t be helped. while they sob and hold each other about eddie, they just have a couple scenes where it’s liek ‘damn this sucks’ about stanley and then use his dead body for body horror

also, i don’t know what it’s called, but when stanley was giving a speech about becoming a man in jewish ritual, he uses it to just talk about being a loser and it felt...... like a really ugly use of jewish tradition? i can’t go in detail about it because i’m not jewish but it was uncomfortable and used for comedy and it felt inappropriate??

mike literally only exists in the film to bring the group back together and to introduce native american brand mysticism. like he’s literally just the magiacl black man trope. no one ever expresses ANY fondness towards him at like... any point in teh film, most of the time they’re just pissed at him and it feels really ugly. i couldn’t tell you what his personality was besides “obsessed with stopping pennywise” and “on ~magical hallucinogens from the natives who only exist as backdrop to explain why a clwon demon exists”

there’s lots of flashbacks of each character bonding with each other and ZERO flashbacks of anyone bonding with mike. despite being the reason the movie exists, the movie doesn’t care about him literally at all

bev experiences domestic violence and an attempted rape and like... for no reasons besides to demonstrate she never escaped her abusive father. she is flung at both bill and ben and kisses both and has no reason to exist besides being both a sort ~inspirational pixie girl AND being a damsel in distress. she’s victimized to make ben seem less pathetic for still having a crush on her 27 years later.

bev has lots of hallucinations of her abusive father and it’s all framed around her still being her ‘little girl’ and ben’s crush on her is framed as missing her as a teenager still (as that’s all he knows of her) and it’s just... a bad parallel but he “wins” her in the end so

but not until bill cheats on his wife with her? but it’s okay because... his wife is a bad woman for uhhhhhh not liking his book ending. women who dont support their men are bad :S this is never touched on, just like bev’s domestic violence is never brought up again besides to torture her

also the cgi was fucking garbage and while it WAS funny and WAS scary and outright enjoyable a lot o the time, these flaws drag it down. the movie literally ends with the reading of the suicide note being celebrated a a good thing and it literally made my stomach drop and i felt sick to my stomach :S anything good that happened int he movie was nullified to me

[impracticaldemon]

That Scottish Play, or Beware the Bard : Halloween Fic Exchange

by Impracticaldemon  for @siriusly-random  ~ HAPPY HALLOWEEN!! @fic-writer-appreciation 

Words: ~ 3400 | FFnet | AO3 (link coming shortly)

A/Note: This story is written as a gift for @siriusly-random for the  Fairy Tail Halloween Fic Exchange.  [Graylu]

With apologies to Shakespeare (Macbeth, Hamlet, As You Like It, Othello), my readers and well... you'll see. I honestly have no idea where this story came from. It may have been inspired in part by Terry Pratchett's brilliant stories. The opening certainly is.  I hope you will enjoy the madness within! .

That Scottish Play, or Beware the Bard [Part I] - Death by Shakespeare

"When shall we three meet again?" asked the red-haired witch, swirling her black cloak dramatically about her with obvious enjoyment.

"How about next Tuesday?" replied the smallest witch, whose blue hair matched the inner lining of her own cloak, which hung very nearly to the floor. Heedless of pretty satin, she turned to pick up her white feline familiar. The fact that her familiar was also wearing a black hat and cloak didn't seem to disturb the other two unduly.

"I can't do Tuesday," said the third witch, pushing her pointy hat back at a rakish angle and scrubbing at her forehead with the back of her wrist. "It's Halloween, and I promised to stop in at the Strauss' party. In fact—aren't the two of you supposed to be there as well?"

Erza frowned, the thespian fervour dying from her eyes. She dearly loved rehearsing and putting on plays, but friendship came first. At least Halloween was a chance to dress up; naturally, she'd already chosen her costumes. As an extraordinarily talented Requip Mage, Halloween was a chance to show off some new designs.

"Oh, that's right," murmured Wendy, neatly replacing her hat into its allotted box. "It's come up faster than usual this year, it seems."

The three young women finally got their costumes stowed away—not without reluctance on Erza's part—and left the backstage area in which they'd been practising. Sounds from the main hall area filtered through the heavy curtains, bringing them even more solidly back from ancient Scotland and the Castle of poor murdered King Duncan. In the end, Erza agreed to Wednesday, and she and Wendy parted from Lucy not far from the guildhall.

Once all her farewells had been said, Lucy began the familiar walk back to her apartment, her coat tucked snugly around her against an unusually chilly October wind. The wind seemed to bite even deeper as she drew closer to the canal, and a sheen of icy moisture along the low wall discouraged the mage from her customary balancing act by the water's edge.

The glitter of ice reminded her of Gray, and for at least the tenth time that day—probably more—she wondered where he'd gone. He'd taken to walking her home from the guildhall, and then coming in for tea or hot chocolate, and she'd thought that they'd reached a fairly satisfactory understanding. The last time she'd seen him—over two days ago now—they'd curled up together on her couch with their drink, and he'd kissed her at the door on his way out. It had been very sweet… and she hadn't seen him since.

The wind picked up, and Lucy was surprised to see mist rising from the canal. That made no sense—the wind should be tearing the rapidly-accumulating fog to shreds.

Unable to help herself—in the sense that it was far too good a chance to miss, and they'd just been practising—Lucy murmured one of her lines as the Second Witch in Shakespeare's Macbeth:

"The weird sisters, hand in hand, Posters of the sea and land, Thus do go about, about…"

She was very startled, but somehow not wholly surprised, when a cowled figure stepped out from the mist—which is to say, out of the canal—just ahead of her. She took a few steps closer and then stopped, one hand hovering over her keys.

The cowled figure laughed harshly and then recited:

"All hail, Heartfilia! Hail to Thee, Celestial Lady! All hail, Heartfilia, hail to thee, Golden Lady! All hail, Heartfilia, thou shalt be queen hereafter!"

Lucy took a cautious step backward at that, but responded: " Speak, if you can: what are you?" Then she laughed, because the whole thing was so obviously staged. "Although that's backward and besides, you spoke my lines! I'm Second Witch, not Mac—I mean, not the Thane of Glamis." Erza had given Lucy a hard time just the other day for saying the name of 'the Scottish Play' too freely. Lucy and Gray had laughed about it later—Erza always took things so seriously, including theater superstitions.

"Good lady, why do you start, and seem to fear, things that sound so fair?"

"Um… now you're Banquo? Although I suppose that's better than being the Ghost of Banquo." The person—Lucy still couldn't place the rough, gravelly voice, although she assumed it was one of her friends playing Halloween tricks on her—seemed to ignore this entirely. There was a short pause, during which Lucy shifted uneasily and the mist grew even thicker.

"All the world's a stage," the figure told her earnestly. "And all the men and women merely players; they have their exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts. At first the infant… And then the lover, sighing like a furnace, with a woeful ballad made to his mistress' eyebrow."

Lucy was thoroughly bewildered. "That's… As You Like It, isn't it? I mean, it's a completely different play."

"At first the infant, … and then the schoolboy, …and then the lover…" There was frustration now in the raspy voice. Another pause and then, somewhat triumphantly: "The Lord of Ice greets you, Lady. And he requires your haste-post-haste appearance. Even on the instant."

"Nope, no idea. You've lost me." The mist had become so thick that Lucy could no longer make out the canal. She had almost been home, but only the barest outline of her building could now be seen. Whereas before there had been the gentle sound of the water and the overpowering bluster of the wind, now it was deathly quiet, with the exception of her Shakespeare-addicted visitor. It was eerie, and she was beginning to feel as though the whole thing was more than a convoluted prank. Probably.

"Wait a minute—did you say Lord of Ice?"

The cowled figure had already gone on: "It is the cause, it is the cause, my lady. Let me not name it to you!" The speech had become impassioned—although the person now sounded as though they were fighting for breath—and Lucy frowned in concentration. She was starting to get a very strange idea about all this. As she racked her brain for more Shakespeare, she heard: "Put out the light, and then put out the light. If I quench thee, thou flaming minister, I can again thy former light restore." The words were spoken in a whisper; the voice sounded sad.

"Of course—Othello! One of my favourites—Iago was just so much more intelligent than most villains! Sorry, sorry, okay, just wait a minute. Did you refer to the 'Lord of Ice'?"

There was no answer, only a horrible choking, gasping sound, and Lucy suddenly shivered from more than cold. Steady, she told herself, you can do this.

"Who's there? The Lord of Ice?" She hoped she was remembering the line correctly—although of course poor, innocent Desdemona had been asking about her husband Othello, not a missing ice mage.

The reaction from the—whatever it was—came immediately.

"Ay, Golden Lady. If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly!"

Aaaand we're back to Macbeth again. Lucy felt sweat prickling her forehead in an unpleasant contrast to the damp, chilling mist. Think!

"The Lord of Ice requires me haste-post-haste?" Hopefully a slightly summarized version of a line would be acceptable.

"Even on the instant." It was pleading with her now, she thought. The next words frightened her, although she wasn't surprised—after all, why miss out on the Bard's most famous monologue? Besides, the setting suited Hamlet just as well as… The Scottish Play. Heavily robed arms reached out toward her, the dark folds of velvet slipping back from pale, pale hands. "To be, or not to be? That is the question… To die, to sleep. To sleep, perchance to dream—ay there's the rub. For in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause."

Lucy stared at the hands, transfixed. They were Gray's hands, but white as snow and strangely clammy-looking. He can't be— She wouldn't even admit the word into her mind. When she couldn't find fresh words, the person spoke again:

"I must weep, but they are cruel tears. This sorrow's heavenly, it strikes where it doth love."

Gray's voice, thought Lucy numbly. Now that she was listening for it, it was Gray's voice as if he'd gone back to his old smoking habit, but distorted with horror and despair. And he seemed to be telling her that he didn't want to, but he was going to… kill her? But, but—come on, Lucy, think it through!—he'd also been trying to give her a message, maybe some way to stop things? Except that she was more and more convinced that he could only hear her when she quoted Shakespeare. This was like the worst English exam of all time.

There was no sound at all now, except for her own laboured breathing—and his. Lucy could see nothing but thick white fog all about her. She felt panic bubbling up inside her but forced it down. They'd been in worse spots. Right? She took a deep breath and abruptly closed the distance between herself and the weird, cowled figure, thrusting out her hands and forcing the deep hood down off the being's—the person's—head. She had intended to do more, but recoiled in shock at what she saw.

It was Gray, but a slimy rope festooned with rotting strands vegetable matter was slowly tightening about his neck; it was already so tight that it seemed as though he should already be dead. His face was a strange mottled combination of livid bruising and ghostly white; his tongue protruded slightly, and his dark, dark eyes appeared to be starting from their sockets. Horrified, Lucy found herself unable to move, although tears started in her own eyes.

"Was the hope drunk wherein you dress'd yourself?" Gray whispered, fighting to breathe. "Hath it slept since? And wakes it now, to look so green and pale at what it did so freely?"

He was speaking Lady Macbeth's lines, Lucy realized—the woman's harsh words to her husband intended to shame him back into resolution and courage. If you ignored the fact that she was inciting him to murder, Lady Macbeth was actually a very supportive wife—in a manipulative, scary kind of way. And what came next? Lucy cleared her throat, and gritted her teeth.

"Prithee, peace!" she ordered, holding Gray's anguished gaze. "I dare do all that may become a… woman; who dares do more is none." Gently, she raised her hands to the contorted face. He was very cold, much colder than usual. She chose her words quickly, ignoring the rope, putting together key lines from both of the doomed Macbeths: "Screw your courage to the sticking point, and we'll not fail. I am settled, and bend up each corporal agent to this terrible feat."

"Lu-cy…"

Blinking back tears, Lucy switched back to Hamlet: "What art thou that usurp'st this time of night, together with that fair and warlike form, in which the majesty of… noble Fairy Tail did sometimes march? By heaven, I charge thee, speak."

Gray responded quickly, and Lucy thought she saw the rope loosen a fraction: "It is offended. See, it stalks away."

"Stay! Speak, speak! I charge thee, speak!" No Horatio, shocked by the sight of his dead king's ghost, had ever spoken his lines with more determination. Gray drew a shuddering breath as the coils retreated further.

Just as before, he cried out: "It is the cause, it is the cause, my lady. Let me not name it to you!"

"As you like it." Okay, so that was actually a title, not a line—hopefully it would do.

Lucy thought quickly. It was now clear to her that against all reason, she and Gray had indeed brought a curse down on themselves by casually using the name of The Scottish Play in advance of its performance in late November. Not to mention the way they'd mocked all the superstition around it. It's ironic, really: neither of us would normally have been like that, but we were anxious and embarrassed and it was a handy way to keep things light. Well, if it somehow turned out later that their guildmates were behind this, then she and Gray could plan a suitable revenge at that time. Right now Lucy was going to take it all perfectly seriously. With great care, she spoke the lines that completed the quote that had begun this strange encounter:

"Thrice to thine and thrice to mine

And thrice again, to make up nine. Peace! the charm's wound up."

There was a moment of absolute stillness, and then Gray's arms wrapped around her and the world went wild. She could hear him shouting into the tempest, but she couldn't make out the words. She felt safe, however; Gray appeared to know his Shakespeare rather thoroughly now.

With a final crackle of lightning and a sudden, drenching downpour like a bucket of ice water had been flung over their heads, the storm faded and then dissipated, taking the strange mist along with it. They were huddled together in the middle of the road, Lucy held protectively against Gray's bare chest. His skin felt much warmer than it had earlier, she thought muzzily. Despite the urgent need to get somewhere warm and dry, Lucy tilted her head back and immediately received an almost brutal kiss on the lips from Gray. He was trembling, she realized; then again, she hadn't noticed that she was crying, or that Gray's throat was savagely bruised and much of his face remained mottled.

They somehow made it up the stairs and into Lucy's apartment with their arms still wound about each other. As soon as the door was closed and the warmth hit them, they stopped moving and just stood together, their bodies pressed as tightly against each other as they could manage. Lucy could hear Gray's heart hammering in his chest.

"It was the damn play," Gray said at last. His voice still sounded very rough. "Although… it would've gone worse if you hadn't come along like you did…"

"Are you sure—"

Gray didn't let her finish. They were both still dripping wet, and even Gray felt cold, but he wanted to get it over with.

"Let me tell you what I can now… and then I don't want to talk about it all for a while. Okay? Sorry to keep you standing like this, but I"—he buried his face against her hair for a moment—"I just need to not move for a few more minutes."

"Sure." Lucy was glad that at least he wasn't speaking in early seventeenth century idioms anymore. Besides, her skin was still clammy and her clothes were wet, but as the shock receded a little she found that standing like this, with her face against Gray's chest, was warming in other ways.

"When I left that night—you know—after I finally got up the nerve to kiss you goodnight, I was in a pretty good mood." His tone was wry, but he sounded a little more like himself. "That lasted until I stepped out onto the street. Hadn't gone more than a few feet when this weird fog rolled in and then, I don't know exactly…" He swallowed painfully. "I did try to fight it—or them—but there wasn't exactly anything to fight. Just jabbering voices and a deep feeling of anger and just… I don't know, something really old. Anyway, I struggled to stay conscious, but must've lost at some point. Next thing I knew, there was this slimy thing around my neck and the jabbering all made sense to me—well, I knew what most of the individual words were. After that, it all got kind of hazy."

Privately, Lucy doubted it had gotten hazy enough for him. She could hear the edge of fear and panic—and pain—in his voice. But he didn't want to talk about it right now, and she could respect his need to pull himself together.

"Anyway, not sure how long I was—well, wherever I was. Then I heard your voice, reciting Shakespeare right around the spot I'd gotten kidnapped—or whatever—and I got really afraid and really hopeful at the same time. See… they actually wanted you more than me. But apparently I was more trouble to hold onto than they expected—which helped my self-esteem, in case you were wondering—so they didn't go after you. And they needed to, um, finish whatever they were doing before All Souls' Eve—Halloween, I guess. But you came along, and you said the right words in the right place so that I could reach out to you and… here we are." Lucy heard a long sigh and a hitching cough. "You're so smart. And brave. They were going to make me kill you, and… ugh. My throat really hurts you know."

"How about I get us both something hot to drink?"

"Um.. yeah… but I don't have anything dry to wear and—your furniture and all."

"Can you live with a towel for now?" Lucy blushed faintly, but smiled. "It won't take long to dry at least your boxers and you practically live in them anyway. Unless… you don't want to go home yet, do you?"

Gray blinked at her and then shook his head. There was a touch of red in his own cheeks, but he didn't say anything.

Eventually, Lucy changed out of her wet things and into flannel pyjamas; it was an indescribable comfort to be dry. As promised, she fetched Gray a towel and even found a t-shirt he'd left at her place at some point in the past—she tried not to be disappointed by that. More or less wordlessly, they chose to forgo the hot drinks and curled up on the wide couch together, deciding that touches and kisses were what they both wanted most of all.

[Part II] - Recovery

It was very late, or more likely very early, when Lucy woke up to discover that Gray had tucked her into bed at whatever point she'd finally fallen asleep. She felt a brief moment of panic, and then realized that the extra weight around her waist was Gray's arm; she was curled up against him, and could only be glad—mostly—that he'd taken the time to at least put on his boxers. The t-shirt, on the other hand, appeared to be missing.

Lucy's eyes turned to her window, through which she could see the night sky, including the nearly-round white-yellow disc of the setting moon. It would be a full moon for Halloween tomorrow. She instinctively started to tell herself that full moons were no different from any other moon, but then shivered: it would be a long time before she messed with long-standing superstitions again.

"I'm sorry I didn't ask." Gray's voice was blurred by sleep and still marred by the bruising.

"I'm glad you're here."

The hand at her waist came up to stroke her hair, strong fingers first caressing and then gently running through her tumbled locks, taking care not to pull. His touch was cool, but no longer cold or clammy as it had been before. Lips roughened by his recent ordeal still felt soft as he kissed the back of her neck.

"I'm going back to sleep," Lucy said, trying to sound severe and failing utterly.

"That's fine." Gray carefully turned her so that he could kiss her. As her eyes closed, he kissed her more deeply, and then with increasing passion. When the kiss broke, his body was partly over hers, the weight surprisingly comfortable, as well as arousing. "Just one more kiss?"

"I think just one might not be enough, but we can find out."

"I love you, Lucy. I don't want to lose you."

"Hey—you're the one who disappeared for two days and almost didn't make it back from… wherever that was."

Gray stared down at her. "I'll try not to do that again. I hope you don't mind if I don't quote Shakespeare to you for a while though."

"Deal." Lucy cleared her throat. "Um. I love you, too."

She could make out a faint smile in the dim light. "I'm really happy to hear that," Gray told her. "I'd hate to strangle to death on incomprehensible old poetry for nothing."

[END]

A/Note: All comments and reviews are much appreciated! Thank you for reading.

@nalufever @shell-senji  @eliz1369  @gsut  @hakusaitosan  @sassyhazelowl

@kazama-hime  @sabinasanfanfic  @hidetheremote  @moon-faced-pear-shaped  @gheleonsdemise  @hakuouki-or-hakuoki @very-x-vice

[friedmanjake]

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Premature Ejakulation

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Does Sertraline Work For Premature Ejaculation

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[jeromebrooke1991]

Vitamins To Make You Last Longer In Bed Wondrous Cool Tips

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[disappointingyet]

This is a list of my favourite films of the year. That sounds like a simple statement, but in some quarters the long-running arguments about what is and isn’t a film got very heated in 2017. Even the year bit of that can get very messy.

But for at least this one last time, I’m keeping things simple: these are the films I enjoyed most out of the ones that were released in UK cinemas in 2017.*

There were plenty of films I didn’t see: some I wanted to but didn’t get round to – Colossal is the one that stands out. Others I just wasn’t drawn to – Detroit, Dunkirk (give money to Christopher Nolan and he’ll only keep making movies) and the critically adored Call Me By Your Name (the super-annoying title probably didn’t help).

There were lots of movies I did see and like, though, and that’s what we’re here to talk about…

*This decision was made simpler because I didn’t love any of the films that Netflix streamed without even giving a token cinema release, which included Noah Baumbach’s The Meyerowitz Stories (New And Selected) and Sundance favourite I Don’t Feel At Home In This World Anymore. The best of the bunch was The Incredible Jessica James.

1. Manchester By The Sea

Back in October 2016, I wrote: ‘If a better film is released in the UK in 2017, I’ll be very impressed.’ Well, I have been impressed by the excellent movies below on this list, but none of them beat Manchester By The Sea as far as I’m concerned. In outline, it sounds like nothing special: a story of some grim stuff happening to a fairly ordinary family, in particular a bloke who likes to pick fights in bars and his teenage nephew. But writer-director Kenneth Lonergan turns the ingredients for a predictable drama into something very special, not least by lacing this grief-laden story with lots of (appropriately) funny moments.

Full review here

2. The Handmaiden

A lot of the films on this list are fairly light on plot, so if you want a movie with scheming, counter-scheming and deception, not to mention pretty costumes, sex, cherry blossoms, perviness (its 18 certificate is richly earned) plus differing Korean views of their Japanese occupiers, this is the one. It’s directed by Park Chan-wook, best known for Old Boy, and loosely based on Sarah Waters’ Victorian-set melodrama Fingersmith, which turns out to be perfectly suited to Korea in the 1930s.

Full review here

3. Certain Women

Resolutely low-key collection of three slightly overlapping short stories set in wintery Montana. It’s a character piece, with Laura Dern, Michelle Williams and (the excellent, previously little-known) Lily Gladstone leading each segment. Director Kelly Reichardt knows exactly who these women are, and how the place they live shapes them. It seems modest at first, but it stuck in my mind long after flashier films had faded away.

Full review here

4. Moonlight

So much of what I read about Moonlight made it sound so much less interesting than it is. Around awards time, you could have easily formed the impression it was a heart-tugging issue movie, not helped by the campaign to get Naomi Harris an Oscar (‘Look! Pretty woman getting grubby to play junkie skank!’)**

What makes it a remarkable film – and it is a remarkable film – are the extraordinary cinematography and the telling of the story via often fragmentary scenes, and how little is explained, at least until the much more conventional, even theatrical (and thus slightly disappointing) final segment. Great moviemaking is about the how, not the what.

Full review here

**The classic awards-season tendency to grade performances by perceived difficulty points led to people talking about Harris rather than the way better Janelle Monae.

5. The Happiest Day In The Life Of Olli Mäki

Lovely, bittersweet based-on-real-life tale of Mäki, a small man who was Finnish boxing’s big hope in the early 1960s. It’s not really a boxing film, more a story about two decent young people trying to work out what they want. Which probably doesn’t sound like the most gripping core of a film, but it works. My favourite Finnish film of the year, narrowly shading…

Full review here

6. The Other Side Of Hope

Why should social realism be the only way of looking at problems like the refugee crisis? Aki Kaurismäki brings his taste for dramatic lighting, deadpan acting and vintage rock’n’roll to this story of a young Syrian braving bureaucracy and street racism in Helsinki. Less funny than most Kaurismäki films, but I found it very moving.

Full review here

7. Spider-Man: Homecoming

I’ve had enough of super heroes on screen – Marvel’s The Defenders on Netflix was the last straw. I’m voting for a moratorium on them*** and gangsters. So it took a lot to persuade me to see yet another Spider-Man reboot. ‘Don’t think of it as an action movie, think of it as a high-school comedy,’ said my friend Jess, and she was right. It’s nimble and funny and doesn’t take itself too seriously – the best surprise of the year.

Full review here

***I’m totally prepared to believe that Thor: Ragnarok is enjoyable in a bonkers, proggy kind of way, but I’m not risking it. Too many people insisted Captain America: Civil War was good.

8. The Death Of Stalin

After dealing with the (by comparison small) monsters of the Blair era in The Thick Of It, Armando Iannucci turns to the worst – by at least one measure – men in history: Beria, Molotov and Uncle Joe himself. 

I don’t think by portraying the farcical nature of the days after Stalin’s death the film is disrespectful to all those who died. I think humour has always been part of how we confront the horror. 

The Death Of Stalin has the best ensemble cast of the year – Jeffrey Tambor as Malenkov, Steve Buscemi as Khrushchev, Jason Isaacs giving the performance of his career as Marshal Zhukov, and – best of all – Simon Russell Beale as Beria. And, crucially, it’s definitely a film, not a bit of TV that has snuck on to the big screen.

9. Daphne

Essentially, a classic US indie movie transplanted from Brooklyn to Walworth. The title character is a pretentious and self-centred 30-year-old failing to get her life together – she’s just like women I used to meet at parties in south London 10 or 15 years ago. That could make for a dull film, of course, but the writing, the feel for the place and Emily Beecham as Daphne make it funny and involving.

Full review here

10. After The Storm

Once promising writer with a gambling problem becomes low-rent PI and uses his new skills to keep tabs on his ex. If you think you can imagine how this film goes from that description, you’re probably miles from Hirokazu Kore-eda’s typically patient, generous-spirited and occasionally funny family drama.

Full review here

11. A Ghost Story

Or that one with the white-sheet-with-eye-holes phantom. A Ghost Story is definitely a film you either buy into or you don’t, an austere tale about grief and loss. I did, and found it sad and moving and pleasingly different. 

Full review here

12. Neruda

It’s a playful movie about a playful title character – the Chilean poet and dilettante politician during his dramatic time on the run from the authorities –  but Neruda has a melancholy underlying mood that rises to the surface as the film goes on. It’s a smart, complex and entertaining film.

Full review here

13. The Florida Project

A group of small kids living in a low-rent long-stay motel have adventures and misbehave a bit. And that’s mostly it, with a few dips into the struggles of the mother of one of the kids, plus a sense of the endless patience and generosity of spirit of the motel manager (Willem Dafoe, the sole big name in the cast). What’s impressive is the way Sean Baker maintains a tone that manages to dodge both ‘look at what grindingly terrible lives poor folk lead’ and being a whimsical adorable-kids-running-wild picture. It does drag a little about three quarters of the way in, but the ending pulls it back.

14. La La Land

First it was an instant masterpiece that was going to change the game, then it was a deflating bubble as the haters managed to shout louder than the lovers. So which take on this nostalgia-soaked showbiz musical do I agree with? Well, there are problems with the film – mostly to do with director Damien Chazelle’s continuing attempts to foist his rotten ideology of music on the rest of us via his movies – but I think the people who were swooning were closer to the truth than the raspberry blowers.  

Full review here

15. Lady Macbeth

Bracingly bleak and at times hard to watch, this is very much in the anti-heritage industry counter-tradition of British period dramas. It’s about the rebellion of a young woman against a grim arranged marriage in Victorian Yorkshire, a struggle that makes strange and grim turns. Unpleasant, but an impressive and memorable piece of filmmaking.

Full review here

16. Blade Of The Immortal

‘Blood-drenched’ would be an understatement when it comes to this gleefully violent supernatural samurai tale in which an almost unkillable ronin is hired by a young girl to revenge her father’s death. If it doesn’t match up to veteran director Takashi Miike’s kinetic 2010 masterpiece 13 Assassins, Blade Of The Immortal is still full of staggering set pieces. Not for the squeamish.

Full review here

17. I Am Not Your Negro

In a variant on the title of this blog, I’d describe this documentary as kind of unsatisfactory yet powerful. It’s got a curious premise: it’s an ‘adaptation’ of a book that was only vaguely started: James Baldwin’s look at the meaning of the lives and deaths of Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. 

The result is a slightly rambling wander through what Baldwin wrote and said about black lives in America. The clips of Baldwin on TV and at the Oxford Union are electrifying. The chunks of his writing are beautifully read by Samuel L Jackson in a warm, wise deep oak-aged voice than sounds precisely nothing like either Samuel L Jackson or James Baldwin. 

Dropped in around the place are news stills from the last couple of years by way of saying, ‘Yes, Obama made it to the presidency, but otherwise things are still fucked.’ That’s a bit clumsy and crude. What makes the film is Baldwin himself – a great writer (I’m still annoyed that someone nicked my copy of The Fire Next Time in 1991) but also a figure who confounds our condescension of past times: here was a black gay man who was an international public intellectual in the 1960s.

Best old films I saw on the big screen

Scarface

Not every rapper’s favourite movie – this is the terrific 1932 original, a ripped-from-the-headlines account of the rise of a ruthless Chicago gangster that’s as electrifyingly urgent as current organised-crime dramas are weary. 

Full review here

Un Flic

Jean-Pierre Melville, whose career stretched from the 1940s to ’70s, made some of my favourite films ever – Bob Le Flambeur, Le Samurai, Army Of The Shadows – and the BFI showed all of them in a splendid full retrospective this autumn. Of the ones I’d never seen before, my favourite was Un Flic, his last film, a bleak, minimalist film in which a laconic, sadistic cop (Alain Delon) slowly gets on the trail of a heist crew. Moody, stylised and very cool.

Full review here

The Cobweb

Over the top, and unashamedly so, Vincente Minnelli’s undervalued mid-’50s melodrama is set in a psychiatric clinic, has a great cast and a plot in which the choice of a set of curtains causes all manner of scheming, bitching and betrayal. 

Full review here

La Vérité

An uncharacteristically meaty role for Brigitte Bardot is at the centre of this courtroom drama from Henri-Georges Clouzot. BB plays a beatnik girl on trial for murder, but what made her do it and can a patriarchal justice system treat her fairly? I suspect this felt dated when it appeared in nouvelle vague-era Paris, but it seems pretty relevant now.

Full review here

Salesman

Extraordinary documentary about a group of travelling salesman doing their damnedest to flog absurdly overpriced Bibles to low income Catholics in a late 1960s US where the Age of Aquarius most definitely isn’t in effect.

Full review here

And DYB’s films of:

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011