#watched the new film. which was okay but the one scene early on in honor of carlos had me crying bc it's still shocking and upsetting

[sharonaparadox]

[Images: fanart of Audrey and Jane from Disney’s Descendants. Audrey is wearing a casual white crop top with a pink and orange tie-dye pattern over denim shorts with colorful flower designs as well as a blue bird necklace and pink sunglasses that she is pushing up on top of her head. Jane has shoulder-length split black and white hair with red streaks near the front, her eyebrows similarly split with one black and white. She is lying down in a shopping cart that Audrey is pushing and wearing a baggy teal sweater with a paw print design with a small pink heart and text reading “Good Girl” over ripped white jeans. Both are turning to look at the viewer with smiles as if taking a photograph, a parking lot in the background.

The next two images are made to look like text message conversations, the time at 12:05 PM and the WiFi set to “RoyalNet” for both.

The first is a conversation between Jane and Lonnie. Lonnie asks, “Where r u?” before continuing, “Jane, FG is freaking out” and then repeating, in all capital letters, “Where R U?”

Jane responds with one word, “skipping” and then adds, “ttyl”

Lonnie reacts with “😶” (Face Without Mouth emoji) and follows up with “I’m calling Ben” before concluding with “🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬” (five enraged Face With Symbols On Mouth emojis).

The second is a conversation between Audrey and Ben, the latter with “👑” (a crown emoji) beside his name in Audrey’s contacts. Ben asks, “Hey is Jane with you?” Audrey replies, “Yep. Skipping class w us” Ben responds, “Come back now FG is 😡” (Enraged Face emoji).

Audrey says, “Cover? 🤫 (Shushing Face emoji) will be back b4 cerfew”

Ben replies, “No come back now” before sending, “Audrey?” He then sends her name in all capital letters with no punctuation before ending with “😡😡😡🤬😡🤬” (three Enraged Face emojis, one Face With Symbols On Mouth emoji, another Enraged Face emoji, and one final Face With Symbols On Mouth emoji).

The last image is made to look like an Instagram post by “royal_kingchad” with a profile picture that looks like a photograph of the actors, the location set to “Arcadia, USA” as the picture in the post is the art from the first image. Chad’s caption reads, “Summer skipping 📚 (Pile of Books emoji) ☀️ (Sun emoji) with @/royal_queenaudrey and @/thereal_janeyg! nobody tell FG 🤐 (Zipper-Mouth Face emoji)”

The post, which was made 1 hour ago, has 1,526 likes and 25 comments. Two comments are visible from Ben and Lonnie.

A comment by “mrkingbeast” reads, “FG is 😡😡😡 (three Enraged Face emojis) come back now!”

A comment by “sword_thirstieLL” reads, “Yo no invite? Come save me from ROAR practice 🥲 (Smiling Face with Tear emoji)”

End description.]

Summer Skipping

There are a lot of reasons Auradon seniors have to be in summer school. For Audrey and Chad, they are taking Remedial Goodness classes with FG under Ben’s royal order. For Jane, her perfect academic record collapsed after losing Carlos, leading to a report card full of failures and missing credits that kept her from graduating on time.

With better things to do and a beautiful day before them, Audrey makes the executive decision to skip (just this once), taking Jane along for the ride. And, after so much heartbreak and grief, maybe Audrey’s touch of bad influence is just what she needs to begin healing.

The first stop? RoyalMart for some much needed snacks and picnic supplies. Chad is behind the camera snapping this pic of his Princess and her best friend, you know, for Instagram.

[let-me-write-shit]

Hiiii! I absolutely love your writing. Could you do an imagine based off of your pregnancy one shot? Since H is incredibly private, would the couple be able to hide her pregnancy from the public and then announce it similar to like Kylie Jenner’s video diary of the whole experience? Thanks!!

A/N: Ok I was OBSESSED with this request, but for some reason I found it very difficult to write, so I’m so sorry if it’s shit. Hope you like it <3

Word Count: 2,698

Requests are OPEN! If you have a request for a blurb, oneshot, imagine, whatever, Send me a message HERE!!!

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Is Forever Enough?

From the moment Harry found out he and Y/N were expecting their first child, he knew he wanted to document everything. He had been in the habit of capturing moments throughout their relationship, mainly of big events, but from this moment on, he wanted to capture it all. Little clips of every doctor’s appointment, every craving his wife had, every heartbeat, and every little kick. He wanted video documentation of the life growing inside his wife’s belly and everything that happened during that time. They had waited so long for this moment, and now that it was finally here, he wanted to make sure they would never forget a single second of it. From telling their closest friends and family members, designing the nursery, their tiny baby shower, attended by the select few that were lucky enough to know their secret.

At first, keeping silent was a way to protect themselves in case Y/N’s pregnancy didn’t stick like their fertility doctor had warned them was a possibility. It took them nearly two years to conceive, and the thought of going through a miscarriage in front of millions of watchful eyes was terrifying. But by the time they became aware that they weren’t going to miscarry, they had gone so long without announcing it that there wasn’t a point to do it. Why ruin something that was so well hidden?

The decision not to announce their pregnancy to the public wasn’t a hard decision to make. Harry was private, anyway, and everyone knew that. He was rarely on social media and didn’t talk about his private life to many people, and those who he did talk to were very loyal and trusting. They just wanted to enjoy being pregnant without the prying eyes of strangers and it was fairly easy keeping it under wraps considering how private they were, to begin with.

The timing of Y/N’s pregnancy helped, too. The early part of her pregnancy was during the summer, so they could enjoy tropical holidays together without worrying about being seen because she simply wasn’t showing yet. But, towards the end, it got harder to conceal, like during award season in the fall when an oversized shirt or puffy dress couldn’t conceal the roundness of her bump and plumpness of her cheeks and lips. It was the first award season she hadn’t accompanied Harry to in years and people began to get suspicious.

That’s when the rumors of her possible pregnancy started. Of course, no one could prove anything. But that, along with the lack of sightings of Y/N was enough proof for some. Luckily, nothing more came of it other than whispers. Harry had stopped doing interviews when he first got wind of the rumors, so no one could catch him off guard in uncomfortable positions or having to lie to protect his wife, and he began to focus his attention back on his music, halting his pursuance of on-screen work for the time being until after their baby boy’s arrival. Instead, he was the man behind the camera.

For the most part.

There were times when certain family members or friends would pick up their camera and film some things for them, capturing little intimate moments of the parents-to-be. They even enlisted the help of Harry’s on-tour photographer, Helene Pambrun, to help film the birth of their baby. Though she focused mainly on photography, her knowledge of videography and style of filming fit exactly with what the couple wanted, and Helene was all too honored to be a part of the day.

And although the birth of their child was, albeit, a bit traumatic, they couldn’t have asked for a sweeter baby boy. Born on a frigid Friday evening on March eighteenth after twenty hours of active labor and an onslaught of chaos, Paxton Robin Styles was born, tiny, healthy, and beautiful, surrounded by family that already loved him so dearly.

The hospital staff was wonderful in keeping their attendance private, no one having a clue that they were even there. No news articles or whispers were heard of their newest addition to which they were grateful to be allowed to enjoy their first week home, getting acclimated to being new parents. They had fallen in love with him.

“Y/N!” Harry exclaimed, bouncing into the nursery on a Monday afternoon as his wife fed their son, his phone in hand, and a bright smile on his face.

Y/N looked up, surprised and slightly offended, “Don’t ever call me by my name again,” she joked, stroking their son’s cheek.

Harry laughed, “Sorry, love. But, look! It’s here!”

He held his phone in front of her face, playing the edited version of their pregnancy and birth journey in video form one of Harry’s editor friends kindly put together for them after the birth of their son. The five minute and fifty-one-second video filled with shortened clips of the last nearly ten months of their lives in becoming first-time parents. They watched it together, occasionally glancing down at their baby that had fallen asleep while eating in Y/N’s arms, in awe that this was their life.

Tears were streaming down both of their faces, and Y/N giggled, wiping her husband’s cheek with her free hand. He was an emotional being, she knew that, but she had no idea what the effect of fatherhood would be on her Harry. She couldn’t have picked a better partner to raise a child with.

“I think we should post it,” Harry said, causing Y/N’s eyes to go wide.

“Post it? Like...social media?”

Harry nodded, “Well, we can’t keep him a secret forever. People are already starting to talk. I’d rather announce it on our own terms than on someone else’s. We can still stay as private as possible, I’ve already talked to Jeffrey and my publicist about it. I just...he makes me so proud and I feel like I need to show people that.”

Y/N smiles sweetly at her husband, taking his hand that rested on the arm to the nursing chair and pulling it up to her lips, kissing it gently. “Okay. We can post it.”

Later that evening, the internet was in an uproar and their phones were blowing up like crazy, for on both of their Instagrams they posted a grey-scale picture of a name tag sticker that read “Hello, I’m: P”, captioned ‘link in bio’, where they were directed to a youtube link posted under Harry’s account.

As soon as the video began, Harry’s soft voice was heard, singing his version of ‘Lullaby’ by the Dixie Chicks in the background as unseen footage of their wedding a few years prior had fizzled into view, video of their first dance as husband and wife played while the tail end of a speech made by Harry’s mom, Anne, was heard over everything else.

“We are so incredibly grateful to have Y/N now an official part of our family and I wish you both years of love, health, and happiness….and giving me tons and tons of grandchildren,” earning laughter from the attendees, “I love you both to pieces. Congratulations.”

The video slowly changed to little snippets. Y/N running towards the beach, holding her hat tight on her head with one hand while the other was holding onto Harry’s hand that was at the bottom of the screen as the breeze whipped at Y/N’s hair and sarong, cut to a clip of the camera propped on the beach overlooking the two of them sitting in the sand, looking out into the ocean, Y/N’s head falling on Harry’s shoulder and him kissing the top of her head as the sun set.

Next was a scene during one of Harry’s tour where someone filmed Y/N at the front of the stage in a VIP area beside a few of their friends, dancing and singing along with Harry who stood in front of her, smiling and singing at her.

The next images were upsetting. When they first started trying, they recorded videos of themselves awaiting the results of their tests, hoping to capture the moment they found out on film. One after another, the video showed negative test upon negative test, wanting to document the struggle they faced in fertility, one of the main reasons they decided to post this video. If it helped just one person who struggled with infertility and gave them a bit of hope, they needed to show it.

They showed clips of Harry holding an emotional Y/N in his arms, her eyes filled with tears and a quivering lip as he kissed her forehead and stroked her hair. Until the next clip showed. A shaky still of a screen that read ‘Pregnant’ that panned up to show a reflection of Harry and his wife in the mirror, Y/N pulling the test up to her face with a smile while Harry looked down at his wife in pride, softly touching her flat belly.

Clips of an ultrasound showed, Y/N stomach looking more bloated than anything as the doctor slid the wand around on her belly, Harry filming while squeezing his wife’s hand. His voice could barely be heard over the music of the video as he cooed, “Is that it, right there? So little…”

They included a few announcements they made to family members. How they told Anne while on an end of summer family vacation with a little jewelry box that opened up to two little birds and an egg in a birds nest with a note that said ‘A little birdy told me you are going to be a Nana.’ making Anne burst into tears, hugging them. And when they told Y/N’s best friend by giving her an orange and saying, “That’s how big our baby is right now,” which caused confusion before the screaming.

Y/N had filmed mirror clips of her growing belly in the floor-length mirror that stood in the corner of their room and had gotten clips of Harry laying beside her bump, his hands rubbing her stomach, clasped on either side as he sang, or talked, or read stories.

“I can’t wait to meet you,” he could be heard saying before kissing the top of her bump, looking up and past the camera to his wife, smiling lovingly.

There were images of Christmas, Gemma having caught an intimate moment between the two of them, Y/N sat in between Harry’s legs on the floor, mugs of hot chocolate in her hands and still in their Christmas Pajamas, Harry’s cheek pressed against hers as he held up a blue Gucci baby suit in front of them, smiling and gushing about how small it was.

The couple’s silhouette could be seen in the dark light sky as they stood in the middle of the field, illuminated by the New Years’ fireworks that went off in the distance, Y/N’s belly pressed against Harry’s stomach as they kissed intimately amongst their friends.

A small baby shower inside one of their London country homes was next, littered with a few familiar faces along with some that were likely family members. Harry still sang in the background as the two of them opened gifts, smiling and laughing with each other, genuine happiness and love could be seen on everyone’s faces and a few people popped onto the screen to say a few words for the unborn baby.

“You have wonderful parents,” Y/N’s parents grinned, her mom getting teary-eyed. “I can’t wait to see the person you become.”

Anne’s bright, shining smile was next, “You’re going to do amazing things. You are so loved.”

“Hi, my sweet nephew! It’s Auntie Gemma,” she grinned, waving at the camera, “I can’t wait to meet you and snuggle you! I hope you grow up to be just as kind and loving as your parents. We are so lucky to have you in our lives.”

Harry and Y/N were seen in the background, Y/N eating a slice of cake while Harry casually kissed her cheek before stealing a bite of her food, earning a smile from his pregnant wife

Video panned over their newly renovated nursery, mostly designed to be gender-neutral with little hints of outer space; moon lights, a solar system mobile hanging above the cot, with a star blanket draped over the nursing chair. Harry moved the camera to Y/N who was hanging some onesies in the nursery closet, smiling and waving at the camera.

Next, they were laying in bed. It was dark and, but a glow from a nightstand shone and Y/N’s belly was visible, round and very pregnant, a few freckles near her navel, and the faintest linea nigra could be seen running from her belly button down towards the bottom of her belly. Their voices were barely audible over the music still sung by Harry. A little ripple on her belly cast from left to right and then her belly distorted a little as their baby boy kicked and pressed against the center of her bump, making the couple laugh and Harry’s hand appeared, softly rubbing where his son’s foot would be.

It changed. They were in a hospital now, Y/N in a grey and white spotted hospital gown. The camera was propped on a table filming Y/N  who sat on the edge of her bed, moving her hips from side to side as she breathed heavily, moaning, while Harry kneeled on the floor in front of her, his hands on her hips and squeezing to relieve some pressure. They were talking to each other, concern, and empathy clear on Harry’s face.

In the next clip, Y/N was laying back in her hospital bed, sucking on gas and air. Harry was filming this time, and his Anne could be seen this time, sitting on Y/N’s other side holding her daughter-in-law’s free hand. Y/N put the gas and air down, gave a thumbs-up, and smiled, “We’re having a baby today!” as her mother-in-law smiled brightly.

The footage faded to black before it flashed to Y/N looking at someone just out of view as the disembodied voice said, “Whenever you feel the urge to push, let us know. You’ll be meeting your son soon.”

It faded to black again, Harry’s singing more evident in these moments, louder, as the footage flashed back into focus. The camera was, once again, being propped up on a table. At Y/N’s head on either side stood Anne who was still holding her daughter-in-law’s hand, while Harry stood, back to the camera, mostly blocking the view of his wife as one hand stroked her hair and the other held her hand. The doctors could be heard saying, “Deep breath” before Y/N took a deep breath in, bringing her legs to her chest with the help of a few nurses that could hardly be seen, bearing down and pushing as the nurses counted and Harry said, “Great job, love. Keep going. You’re so strong.”

The screen went black. A doctor’s voice was heard saying, “One more big push.” Y/N could be heard taking a deep breath, and a little exasperated yelp before gasping from both Harry and Anne followed by the beautiful, gurgling cry of their baby. Harry’s sweet singing voice in the background of the video got louder and finally, the video came back into view of a little name card on the bassinet that read:

Name: P, Styles.

DOB: March 18th

Weight: 6 lbs 12 oz

Height: 20 inches

Time: 8:39 PM

The camera panned down to the top of a blue baby cap with a white embroidered ‘P’ in the center, moving as their son wiggled in his bassinet, the hushed reassuring whispers of his parents heard just behind the camera as little lip-smacking and coos could be heard from the baby.

The screen went blank as the song started to end and white words appeared on the screen.

“Welcome to the world, Baby P. We love you to the ends of the earth.

Love,

Mummy and Daddy”

------------------------------------

Taglist:

@odetostep​ , @thurhomish​

[robert-de-niro-only-fans]

Just Friends

The Deer Hunter!Robert De Niro x Reader

I’m so sorry this took so long. Hope you like pining!

TW: age gap, mention of illness, idk high word count?

Word Count: 8.8k

"Why don't you let (Y/N) come with me? It would be a great opportunity for her to see what's it's like to film in some open locations instead of the sets here in New York. Plus she'll get to meet a great cast of actors, you know how hard we had to push to get John Cazale in the movie. She could learn so much from him." "I don't know, Robert. All the arrangements have been made for the crew's travel and lodging; I wouldn't want to make production any more difficult just so my daughter can watch you guys make a movie." "Ah, it shouldn't be a big deal. It's not too hard to buy an extra plane ticket, and she can just crash with me. Plus we could probably use the extra hands on set at some point." You can't help but feel completely giddy as you overhear Robert urging your father to let you go with him as he films his next movie. You're the daughter of a New York-based movie producer, who had gotten somewhat popular and had enough connections to know some really great actors and actresses. Your dad met Robert De Niro when he was acting in Brian De Palma's early films, and they had been planning on working together for a long time. However, Robert and your dad both stayed busy, and now Robert is a pretty big star since Taxi Driver released just last year. You got to know Robert when you were just a teenager. He would come over to your home for small get-togethers your dad liked to throw. You always liked being around him, so it was lucky for you that your dad and him became good friends. Robert is good about visiting when he has the chance to, but his visits have been less frequent lately as his career is really taking off. And that's what he was doing here today: a quick visit with you and your dad before he has to run off and make another film. The conversation turned, however, when you started discussing how you were becoming interested in working on films, particularly acting. Although most actors started younger than you, and being in your early twenties is already considered old for an actress, you decided it wasn't too late to start. Robert had a soft spot for learning and teaching acting, although his teaching came as little tidbits of advice. That's why you are shocked to hear Robert ask about you going with him for filming, while you're in the kitchen fixing everyone drinks. You walk in, carrying three glasses on a small tray and set them down on the table, then handing each of the men a glass. They both thank you as you take your seat across from them. "Sooo..." you raise your eyebrows and give your dad a hopeful smile. "Yes, (Y/N)?" "Can I go with Robert? I overheard what you two were saying." Your dad sits back and exhales a little loudly. He was trying to be stern but you could tell he was hiding a smile. He could never be an actor; he couldn't hide his real feelings very well. He turns to Robert asking, "Are you sure it's okay if she goes with you?" "Of course. I'll take good care of her," he says sweetly. You always thought he was very sweet. "Okay, sweetheart, you can go, not that I could stop you anyway, but I appreciate that you ask," your father says as a smile spreads across his face. "Dad!! Thank you so much!" He was right; you were an adult, but you had always lived with him, so you felt you needed to ask before going across the country. You jump up and give your dad a big hug. "You better start packing," Robert says with a chuckle, "we leave for Ohio tomorrow." "What kind of clothes should I bring?" you ask Robert. "What you would normally wear. Bring a few nice outfits for dinners. And we'll stop back in New York before going to Washington, because it'll be pretty cold and we'll all need warmer clothes." The smile on his face tells you he's excited about you going with him. You ask sit and talk a little longer, with Robert telling you and your dad about the general schedule about how you'll spend a several weeks in Ohio where most of the film takes place, a few days here and there in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, take a break for a few weeks, then go to Washington State for all of the hunting scenes. After that, a smaller portion of the cast and crew will go to Thailand to film the war scenes. This is also when you find out that the beard he is sporting is for the movie and not just some new fashion choice. You quite like the beard as well as his haircut, it suits him unexpectedly well. As it starts getting late, you make the move to go up to your room to pack. So you say goodnight to Robert and your dad, giving them both big hugs as a thank you for letting you go for filming, and you head upstairs to squeeze all of your clothes and toiletries into a suitcase. Downstairs, Robert stays to talk with your dad a little while longer before heading home. "Now, Robert, you said (Y/N) would be staying with you, right?" "Yes. Is that okay?" "Well..." your dad starts but he certainly doesn't want to offend Robert, "you won't, umm, do anything... with her, will you?" "Hmm? Oh. Oh! Um, no, I won't do anything like that with her. I hadn't even thought about it. I just uuhh- I just thought it would be better if she stayed with me instead sticking her in a random hotel room away from the rest of us... Most of the hotel rooms have two beds anyways." Robert tries desperately to get rid of the blush that came to his cheeks as he stumbles through what he's saying. He had never thought of you that way before, and it caught him off guard and kind of gave him butterflies in his stomach. "Yeah, you're probably right about her staying with you. She's probably safer with you than taking her chances somewhere else," your dad says with look of relief. "Yeah, well, I'm sorry I brought up the idea so last minute, but she'll be okay with me." "No, it's okay. It's a good opportunity for her. I think you guys will have a great time! Now, how do you think Michael is gonna film this thing?" Your dad and Robert discuss the production and direction of the movie for a short while before Robert really has to leave to go home and sleep. When you hear that he's about to leave, you quickly make your way down the stairs to tell him goodnight and thank him again for taking you with him. He pulls you into a gentle hug, placing one of his hands on the back of your head. "You're very welcome, (Y/N). Now, I'll be here at 7 in the morning to pick you up; I wanna take you to breakfast before we head to the airport. That'll also give us some time for someone to get on the phone and get you a plane ticket!" You had no doubt Robert would be able to get you on the plane. And with that, he left, and you went upstairs to pack the last few things you would need before trying to get some sleep, although that didn't come so easy due to the excitement you're feeling. • • • The next day goes just the way Robert said it would: he picks you up right at 7, loads your bags in the car, and takes you to breakfast at his favorite place. It's an upscale place but in a subdued way. You enjoy each other's company over biscuits, eggs, pancakes, coffee, bacon, whatever your heart desires as Robert put it. On the way to the airport, he admits that he got your plane ticket sorted out before he arrived for breakfast, and there was a seat in first class with the rest of the cast. Right next to him. But it's really no issue. He swears he didn't have to buy someone out of their seat. After checking your bags and boarding the plane, Robert introduces everyone to you: Christopher Walken, Meryl Streep, her husband John Cazale, George Dzundza, and John Savage, who everyone opted to call Savage. Meryl and John immediately took a liking to you, which you were honored. The flight was pretty packed, so the cast was all split up across first class, so everyone agreed that you should have dinner tonight to celebrate the beginning of filming. During takeoff you feel Robert put his hand on top of yours, and you quickly turn your head to face him. "You comfortable?" He asks softly. "Oh... Yeah, are you?" "Yep." You look down at his hand on yours. He strokes his thumb over your hand for a moment before pulling it away and looking out the window. You'd be lying if you said that didn't make you feel something. • • • The rest of your flight is uneventful, aside from a few people asking for autographs from the cast as you're leaving the airport. Outside, you are all met with a giant black van, and the director of the movie, Michael Cimino hops out to greet everyone and help put bags in the undercarriage. Everyone climbs inside the van, you sticking close to Robert, simply because you don't know anyone else yet. It's very comfortable and spacious inside, certainly the nicest van you'd ever seen. You and Robert end up all the way in the back, with everyone else doubling up on the seats in front of you. You've got a little bit of a drive to your hotel. Only a few minutes into your trip, everyone is chatting away, and you're finally getting to meet everyone properly, although you're getting to know Meryl and John the best because they're on the seat right in front of you. You instantly notice that John has a fantastic sense of humor; it's no wonder Meryl is so in love with him. Robert has his arm around your shoulders, but you can't tell if it's because he just wants to stretch out across the seat or if it's something else. Either way, he's only there like that for a few moments before he goes to the front of the van to talk to the director. "Guess I got stranded back here," you say with a chuckle to Meryl and John. "Oh, yeah, he's been so involved with Michael in getting this film made," Meryl throws over her shoulder to you. She turns on her seat to face you a little better, "Can I ask you a rather personal question?" "Oh, um, sure." You were certainly nervous to hear what she had to say. "Are you and Robert dating one another?" A breath of relief leaves you in the form of a small laugh, "Oh God, no! He's a friend of my dad's, so we've known each other a long time. He wanted to bring me along so I could learn more about filmmaking." "Oh, that's sweet of him. I apologize for assuming. I guess it's just, uh--oh nevermind," she gives a small smile and looks down at her lap. "No, it's okay! What is it?" "You two are just close, which I suppose that makes sense if you've been friends for so long! I just misinterpreted your relationship." A big smile stretches across her face as John chimes in. "Well if she didn't ask, I was going to, so it's probably good we cleared the air now, right?" "Right!" you respond. "Besides, I'm sure the other guys will all badger him about you, whether it's about him being a cradle robber or them trying to get with you." The three of you laugh, knowing that what John said is probably going to be true. "What are y'all laughing about back there?" Savage pipes up, breaking his attention away from the conversation going on between him, Chris, and George. "My receding hairline." John deadpans to the group in front of them. There's a long pause before everyone busts out in laughter, which then catches the attention of Michael and Robert at the front of the van. They both turn around to see what's going on, and Robert gives you a smile, scrunching his nose cutely. They decide not to get involved, and go back to their conversation. The rest of you talk in a big group the rest of the way to the hotel. • • • At the hotel, production rented out a whole floor for all of the cast and crew to stay on, with the cast kind of grouped near each other on one end. As for this first hotel you'll be at, and it is the main hotel you'll stay at while in Ohio, there are two beds in each room. A lot of the film crew picked partners and doubled up, but of course the director, executive producers, and main cast get their own rooms, with the exception of Meryl and John, and now Robert because he offered to have you with him. When you get in the hotel room, you drop your bags at the door and run to one of the beds, flopping on it and sinking into the comfort. Robert chuckles at you as you grab a pillow to cuddle up with. He drops your bags at the foot of the bed before asking, "I'm assuming you want this bed?" You look up at him lazily, "I don't really care. Do you have a preference?" "Not really; I'll take the other bed," he laughs at you again as he drops his bags near the other bed. "What are you laughing at?" You squint your eyes, questioning him playfully, still hugging your pillow. "You. And your pillow." "Mmmm... I think you're just jealous." "Jealous?! My bed has pillows too. See?" He picks up a pillow and hugs it just like you. "No no no. You're jealous of the pillow. You wish I was squeezing you like this!" "Oh you think so, huh?" He throws his pillow at you. You block it with your arms and it hits the ground. "I'm keeping that," you say sassily. "Fine with me," he says, too calmly. That's quickly broken when he charges towards you, ripping the pillow out of your arms as you burst into laughter. He picks you up around your waist, spins you around a few times and slams you both down on his bed, his arms still firmly around you. "Now I don't have to be jealous," he jokes. You wrap your arms around his head and neck, hugging him into your chest, just like you had done with the pillow. "No, you don't have to be jealous anymore." He gives you one final squeeze and then stands up. "We have a little while before we have to get ready for dinner. Any idea what you wanna do?" You groan a little, "Sleep." You smile up at him. "Well then you better get in your bed instead of hogging mine." "Excuse me! You put me here, so you'll have to move me back!" "Needy," he grumbles jokingly, picking you up and tossing you down on your bed. "You ever heard of letting someone down easy, Robert? Cuz you keep throwing me." He chuckles lowly, moving towards his luggage, "Go to sleep." You grab the extra pillow from the floor and get comfy. One pillow under your head, cuddled up to a second one, a third under one of your legs, and the duvet pulled up to your head. Pure bliss. "You look like a little princess with all those pillows," Robert's voice echoes across the hotel room. "Good. Then let me get me beauty sleep." While he's unpacking some of his clothes and stuff, he finds himself thinking about how you really don't need sleep to look any more beautiful than you already are. • • • That night at dinner, it didn't take long for John's predictions to come true. Just a few minutes after ordering food, Chris caught everyone's attention when he asked, "Bobby, you and this gorgeous young lady... What's going on with you two?" "Whaddaya mean, what's going on with us?" Robert repeats with a laugh. "Well, she's your girlfriend isn't she? I gotta say I'm a little jealous Bobby gets to bring his girlfriend, but I don't get to bring my lovely wife." "Chris, we're not dating. She's just a friend; I've known her dad for a long time." Savage butts in, practically yelling, "Of course she wouldn't date him! He's old enough to be her dad! Unless you're into that kinda stuff, baby." You turn to John and you both start laughing about how Savage managed, not only to joke about Robert being significantly older than you, but also use it to hit on you. "This again? What's so funny?!" John yells. "You had to be there," you cut back to Savage, trying not to smile, but failing. Robert cuts in, "Ya know, I just wanna say: I'm not old enough to be her dad." It kind of surprised you that he would even bother defending himself; it was clearly just a joke, but everyone laughed nonetheless. "You're only, like, 15 years older than her right?" George jokes. A little bit of a blush creeps up Robert's neck, and he bites his lip, "...yeah." This only makes everyone laugh more. Under the table, you place your hand on top of Robert's and you both give each other a small look while laughing. It's a short moment, broken by Michael walking up to the table. Everyone knew he would be late, but you still invited him anyway. Michael slides in next to Robert and asks, "What's so funny?" "Eh, you don't wanna know," Robert shoots back. You and John are trying very hard not to have another laughing fit. Luckily things are fairly calm while everyone is eating, but it doesn't last long after everyone is done. You catch John whispering in Meryl's ear before he turns to the table and says, "Alright, let Meryl and I slide out, my lady wants to dance." Pretty much everyone stands up to let them out of the booth, and Chris, noticing that Robert is once again deep in conversation with Michael, invites you to dance to "keep those other dogs off of you." George and Savage sneak off to find some nice Ohio locals to dance with. Robert and Michael slide back into the booth, chatting like they do. Meryl and John are being beyond cute dancing with one another and nuzzling noses. Chris is a real gentleman while dancing with you. He holds you close, and you maintain some casual conversation getting to know each other better. George finds sweet girl to try and romance, but Savage is having some trouble, so he simply steals you away from Chris, asking if he could dance with you instead. Chris thanks you for your time and returns to the table joining in the talk with Michael and Robert. Dancing with Savage is a little bit intense, as he lays it on thick hitting on you. At one point, he leans his head down and starts placing kisses on your cheek and even a few on your neck. This is when you catch Robert basically staring a hole in you. He stands up and makes his way over to you and Savage. Robert places a hand on Savage's shoulder, lowly speaking, "You mind if I borrow your dance partner?" "Mm... But we were having fun," Savage whines sarcastically, but gives in and leaves you with Robert. "What, you didn't like him kissing on me? I knew you were the jealous type," you snark at him. "Nooo. I told your dad I would take care of you, and a guy like him is no good for a girl your age." He wraps an arm around you, figuring that he should probably dance with you. "My knight in shining armor!" Another joke. "Oh shut up," he chuckles. • • • The next day, you all wake up bright and early to head to the tailors on location so that everyone can get their makeup done and costumes on. You had to admit Robert looked pretty funny in his flannel, puffy vest, and trucker cap. It was nothing like what he would normally wear. The first few scenes that are gonna be filmed during this first week are the first few scenes of the film, where all of the characters are seen at the steel mill and they prepare for the wedding and being drafted. The dynamic of the cast actually worked pretty well for these scenes. Everyone got along quite well, so it wasn't hard for them to act like they had been friends their whole lives. You noticed that filming goes a bit slower when it's shot on location like this, and it was made even slower by Michael Cimino. Michael was very particular about the way he wanted things, and there were lots of noises to work around as they filmed at an actual steel mill. You also spent more time in the makeup trailor than you had expected to; you found it fascinating how they made the men look like they weren't wearing any makeup at all. You and Meryl also spent a good amount of time together when she wasn't in a scene. She said that it was nice having another girl around on a predominantly male set. Of course, you weren't the only girl, but you were one of few. There isn't really a scene that Robert isn't in, so unfortunately, you don't see him much unless everyone is taking a break, or if you hang out with him while he's in makeup. But you make the most of it by getting to know everyone else. • • •

On nights after filming, the cast hangs out really often, normally in someone's hotel room, usually Meryl and John's. Sometimes you would go to a bar or a restaurant, as drinking and dancing became some of the groups' favorite activities. Hanging out in Meryl and John's hotel room usually includes wine, snacks, playing cards, and Robert's arm casually around your waist whenever you get near him. Savage still shoots his shot with you every once in a while, but if he isn't shut down by you, he will be shut down by Robert. He's just watching out for you like he promised your dad; really, it's flattering how protective he can be. • • • The second week of filming is dedicated to filming the wedding scenes. Everyone looks great in their tuxedos and dresses, and the church you'll be filming in is a beautiful Russian Orthodox Church here in Cleveland. "How do I look?" Robert asks you while he's getting his hair gelled and combed into place. "Very handsome. I really like you in that tuxedo." "Maybe he can borrow it when you two finally get married," Michael says coming into the makeup trailor. You and Robert both look at him a little shocked; Michael's never made jokes about you two before. "Oh, c'mon, I'm not allowed to make jokes too?" You both laugh a little awkwardly trying to cut any tension in the room. "I'm gonna go outside and help with all the extras," you say, swiftly leaving the makeup trailor. Outside, there are like a hundred people who showed up to be extras in the wedding scene, and you're sure Michael will probably use most of them. The people are all dressed up in their finest wedding attire, some of them getting a little makeup done or getting some items from costume to make the scene fit Michael's vision. They were told to bring empty presents as well, so that the table full of wedding presents would look realistic; however, many of them actually brought real presents for the cast and crew to keep. Filming the wedding scene was really chaotic to say the least. It felt like a party that went on for way too long, and most everyone was pretty exhausted by the end of filming with the extras that day. But you had to say, Meryl and Robert really stole the show. Their on-screen chemistry was astounding; you would've thought they were really in love or something! You loved watching the way Robert's character pined for Meryl's; his eyes always said so much. And of course, filming wouldn't have felt complete without John adding in his funny little quirks in various scenes, such as tapping his foot while waiting for the bride to walk down the aisle, and carrying Robert across the room for the group photo. Althought most of the filming with the extras had to be done in one day, the other scenes filmed that week included a couple of the bar scenes of the guys playing pool and drinking, and the scene where Robert streaks through town, which certainly had you blushing. Thank God you were filming at night. • • • Your last two weeks of filming in Ohio are spent filming anything that wasn't a hunting scene or a war scene. Production had to make a point of scheduling all of John's scenes early in the filming process, because it is no secret how sick he is. One night after filming, you all decide it would be fun to go out to one of the bars, as everyone had been pretty busy, and there hadn't been much time to. Everyone wants to go dancing again! You've had a hard time getting Robert to dance with you since your first night in Ohio. He really doesn't like to since he's so shy, even though he's very good at slow dances. That night, you dance with Chris again, and Meryl dances with Savage, while Robert hangs back at the table with John. John really isn't feeling well; it's one of his bad days, but he never lets it ruin the mood. Savage and Meryl makes their way over to you on the dance floor, and Savage asks, "Hey, can I cut in? I'd love to have a dance partner that pretty!" "Uh, sure, man," Chris answers. Savage practically shoves himself between you and Chris, quickly taking Chris by the hand and putting an arm around him before spinning him around. "Beautiful!" Savage yells, dipping Chris back, getting a round of laughs and even some applause from everyone around. You and Meryl take this as a chance to slip over to the bar, to get a break from your heels. You sit with your backs leaning up against the bar so you can keep an eye on all your friends. "Have you had fun filming with us all this time?" Meryl asks kindly, as she always does. "Oh yeah, it's been really great, and I've been learning so much about the filming process, and you're all wonderful actors to look up to!" "That's so sweet of you. The guys here have all done a wonderful job with their parts so far. Especially Robert. He's been in nearly every scene, and he's so involved with Michael and production. I don't know where he gets his energy!" "Yeah, he stays busy. I sleep in the same room as him and sometimes it seems like I don't even see him," you giggle. "Oh, but when he does get to be around you, it certainly seems you have his attention," Meryl points out, "I know you've said you two are just close, but I really think he likes you." "You think he likes me? Why do you think he likes me?" "Well, he's quite watchful of you, making sure you never get into trouble, especially around Savage. He always has an arm around you when we're hanging out at the hotel. And the way he looks at you. He looks at you... Well, he looks at you the way he looks at me when we're filming." You both look over at Robert and John. John smiles at Meryl and gives her a funny little wink. Robert turns to look when he realizes John isn't looking at him anymore, raising his eyebrows when he sees you and Meryl staring back at him. Him and John turn back to their conversation, shaking off whatever trouble you and Meryl are getting into. "You know the tension between you two is almost unbearable, right?" John says in a casual tone, knowing that this question is anything but casual. "I'm sorry, what?" Robert sputters. "You and (Y/N). It's so obvious to everyone that you have feelings for one another. Well, obvious to everyone but you and her, apparently." He gives Robert a side eye and raised eyebrows. "I mean... I care about (Y/N), but I- I don't have feelings for her. Her dad would kill me." "You don't have feelings for her, or you feel like you shouldn't have feelings for her?" There's a long silence between them. Robert looks up at John in a way that lets John know he's right. "Take it from me, Bobby. Life's too short." With that, Robert stands up, and walks over to you and Meryl, still at the bar. "Excuse me," he starts, always a gentleman, "Meryl, would you mind if I borrowed (Y/N) from you?" "Oh! No, go ahead," she says with a small laugh. "(Y/N)," there's a bit of a nervous tone in his voice, "would you like to dance with me? I know I've been avoiding it for weeks now." "I'd love to," you smile at him. He puts his hands on your hips, lifting you off of the tall bar stool and helping you to the ground. On the dancefloor, he pulls you into his chest with an arm around your waist and a hand tangled in the back of your hair. Your hands rest on his hips, and you slowly sway back and forth together, even when the song playing wasn't slow. It wasn't really proper slow dancing, but you weren't going to complain; you both enjoyed the closeness. That night at the hotel, you decide to watch a movie together before going to bed; you didn't have to be up super early for once. So you both hop into your pajamas, and Robert finds something on the TV and pats the spot on the bed next to him. "I have my own bed, you know?" you joke. "I know, but it's no fun watching a movie that far apart. Would you sit on a different couch if we were in a living room?" "I guess you have a point." You climb onto his bed, and he puts his arm around your shoulders, watching the movie which was already started, but it is close enough to the beginning. Part of the way through the movie, Robert's eyes linger down to your hand resting on your lap, although you don't notice this. In fact, you're quite sleepy. You feel his fingers gently grace over the back of your hand, and you react by turning your hand over for him. He softly traces little shapes into the palm of your hand, and he teases at your finger tips like he wants to lace his fingers with yours. You decide to bite the bullet and go for it. The next time his fingertips grace yours, you slide your fingers in between his, holding his hand. You're both way to nervous to look at each other, so you both just go back to watching the movie while he strokes his thumb over yours. • • • The next morning, you wake up surrounded by the Robert's scent, which is always very nice, but no Robert nearby. You quickly realize that you're still in his bed; you must have fallen asleep during the movie last night. You sit up looking around for your roommate, and you find him in your bed, looking up at you as if he was waiting for you to find him. The sun spilling in through the window and across his face accentuated his dimples and the smile lines around his eyes. He, too, looked like a sunbeam as he grinned up at you. "Good morning, sleepy head. You fell asleep during our movie, and I didn't have the heart to move you, so I figured we could just trade beds for the night," he says lightly laughing. It seemed like he was in a very good mood this morning. "Oh, well thank you for giving me your bed all to myself. It probably would've been way too hot if you stayed over here." "Mmm, I knew you thought I was hot," he has a smug look on his face. "No! I meant like body temperature. You're probably like a human heater when you sleep!" you argue with him. "Well, wouldn't you like to know?" he jokes, getting up out of bed to get ready to go to set. "I don't ever wanna know!" you yell as he closes the bathroom door. Just a little while later, as everyone is heading out of the hotel to get in the big black van and go to the filming location, John looks at you and asks, "So what is it that you don't wanna know?" "Huh?" you reply to John. "We heard you yell at Robert 'I don't ever wanna know!' through the walls a little while ago." You had no idea the walls were that thin, and you wonder what else they had heard. Robert butts in, "Oh, that was just (Y/N) trying to deny that she thinks I'm hot and wants to sleep with me," with a devilish look on his face. "ROBERT!" you yell, hitting him on the shoulder. "That is totally taken out of context, and you know it!" Everyone is roaring with laughter, while you blush a deep shade of pink. Robert puts all of the jokes to rest by telling everyone what really happened, but conveniently leaving out the part about you two holding hands for a while last night. • • • The next few days are pretty normal, although bittersweet, as it is the last few days of filming in Ohio. The cast spends a lot of time hanging out in Meryl and John's hotel room, and everyone goes out to the bar to celebrate on the last night on location. You go back to New York with Robert and most of the cast the day after filming wraps in Ohio. You would have a break for a few weeks before flying out to Washington for filming the hunting scenes. Everyone says their goodbyes at the airport, with John throwing in one final joke, "Invite us to the wedding if you two decide to elope before Washington!" You and Robert were used to it at that point; it was an every day thing that someone made a joke about you two getting together, but it really didn't bother either of you too much. Hell, even you made jokes about yourselves sometimes. Of course, Robert makes sure to take you home himself, or have his driver take you both to your house. You were so excited to see your dad again! You had called him several times while you were gone, but that doesn't mean you didn't miss him. You and your dad share a long embrace as he invites Robert in for a drink before he goes home. Robert kindly accepts coming in to relax for a while. Immediately, your dad notices how much closer you and Robert are, but he figures that spending a month together will probably do that to any two people. He's just glad you've made some important connections in the film industry. The two men listened intently as you spoke cheerfully of all of your experiences and the things you learned during the first leg of filming, Robert adding in some bits here or there. You both decided to leave out the jokes everyone made about you two getting together, assuming it would be an awkward conversation to have. Robert doesn't stay as long as he normally would've, because he has to be up early in the morning to go meet with other producers and directors. He stays so busy; you know you won't see him again until it's time to film. When he goes to leave, Robert pulls you up into a big hug telling you how fun it's been having you around, and that he can't wait to take you to Washington. • • • A couple of weeks go by, and everything is as it was at home with your dad. Except now you miss Robert a lot of the time, because you had been so close. You missed all of the cast; you had all become such good friends. Either way, you tried to keep busy by going to work with your dad a lot and looking into new roles to audition for, although you found yourself more interested in other aspects of film production since going to Ohio. One night, your dad calls you downstairs, because there's a call for you on the home phone. Your dad tells you that it's Robert, and he's asking to talk to you. You weren't expecting to hear from him at all, so you can't help but worry that something is wrong, especially with John being sick. "Hello?" you say into the phone. "Hey, there," Robert's tone is unreadable. "You rang?" "Yeah, I did. Um... I know this is last minute, but I wanted to know if you would come over for dinner tomorrow? My schedule opened up tomorrow night, and I gotta admit I miss you more than I thought I would." "Oh..." you silently thank God your dad had walked off, "just you and me?" "Yeah, I was thinking I could order room service for dinner, and we could watch a movie like we did at the hotel. Plus I think everyone else is probably busy, unless you want me to invite your other boyfriend," he giggles. He was referring to Savage and how he relentlessly tried to hit on you. "Oh, no. I don't think I could deal with both of you," you reply with a laugh. "That's what I thought. So, I'll see you tomorrow at seven?" "Yep. See you then!" The next night arrives quickly, and now the dilemma you're facing is that you have no idea what to where. Is this casual? Does he want you to dress up? You aren't sure, and it's too late to call him; he's probably almost here. You decide to go casual, but not sweatpants casual. Why would Robert want you to dress up to go to his apartment? Seems like Robert went for the same kind of attire, you see when he shows up. You throw a quick goodbye and a kiss on the cheek to your dad before Robert leads you out to the car with a hand on the small of your back. It's not too long of a car ride to his place, because you both live in the city; however, somewhere in the middle of the trip, Robert abruptly asks his driver to stop at a bakery up ahead. You give the man next to you a confused look, and he smiles saying, "Look, I have to start doing some pretty intense training for another movie, so this might be one of the last times I get to eat cake for a while! I was thinking we could pick something up to have after dinner." There's a brief pause between you two, then Robert quickly adds on, "You can pick out whatever you want! I'll buy it!" You can't help but laugh at his excitement, and you take his hand as he basically rips you out of the car and into the bakery. The smell in the air was incredible; it makes you want to buy everything in the shop. So you and Robert go crazy picking out anything and everything that looks good, all the while giggling like school girls with one another! You arrive at Robert's apartment with bags of desserts in tow, and almost immediately, you're placing an order with room service for dinner. Stopping by the bakery had made you both very hungry. The desserts were left in the kitchen as the two of you make your way to the couch, in an effort to avoid eating all the sweets that smelled so heavenly. Robert quickly found something on the TV, although he didn't turn it up very loud; you both knew you'd be talking anyway. He leans back into the couch, putting an arm comfortably around you. At this point, it wasn't a big deal for you two to be hanging all over one another. "I didn't think I would miss you this much," Robert blurts out, "uhh, I mean, we just spent so much time together, more than I would normally spend with anyone from set." "Yeah? You miss spending the night with me?" you joke. Robert rolls his eyes. You continue, "Miss waking up to my beautiful face every day? Or waiting for me to get out the shower?" "Oh, stop! You know it wasn't like that," Robert said with a grin, but his face quickly drops into a serious look. He reaches up and gently pushes your hair behind your ear. His eyes looked over your whole face, appreciating all of your features, before locking eyes with you. He tangles his fingers in your hair at the nape of your neck and pulls you close, placing his forehead against yours. You weren't completely sure what he was doing, but you weren't mad about it. Almost instinctively, you close your eyes and begin nuzzling your nose against his. At first just bumping the end of your nose against his, and then you feel his nose next to yours as he moves closer to you. Everything feels like it's happening in slow motion. His hand still firmly grasping your hair, a tiny giggle leaves your lips for whatever reason. You feel the hair from his beard tickle your chin, and the butterflies in your stomach go crazy as you realize he's about to kiss you. His bottom lip barely graces yours, and the doorbell rings. Room service with the dinner you ordered. Your eyes fly open, seeing Robert pull back from you and take a deep breath, washing the intense expression off of his face. "I'm sorry," he says standing up and straightening out his shirt, "I don't know what I was thinking." Before you could say anything, he was opening the door, and dinner was brought in by one of the apartment staff. You took a moment to get it together and put whatever just happened behind you. You assume Robert decided to do the same, because the rest of the evening goes by relatively normal. You both enjoy dinner and of course all the desserts you picked up earlier! Not without lots of laughs anyway, as Robert keep poking fun at you for how you lit up like a child at the bakery. "Oh, like you didn't pick out just as many, if not MORE things than me!" You shout at him, which earns you a laugh from the man next to you. "In fact, it was YOUR idea to go in, Mr. I-have-to-get-in-shape-for-a-new-movie!" He cuts his eyes at you as if to say something, but instead shoves a pastry in your mouth, smearing icing across your lips and chin. You both double over in a fit of laughter, reaching for napkins to clean your face with. Thank goodness that was the highlight of the evening, so you had something other than "oh yeah, Robert almost kissed me" to tell your dad when you got home. • • •

As you would've guessed, you didn't see Robert again until you were headed to Washington. You sit with him on the plane again, but this time, a lot of the cast had different flights, traveling in from other parts of the world. The flight takes most of your day, as it's definitely the evening by the time you are picked up at the airport. Up in the mountains, it is freezing, first of all. Luckily you're from New York, and Washington isn't much further North, so you know how to handle the cold. Second, they have the whole cast and crew staying in cabins that are scattered along the mountain side. It is already pretty dark, but from what you could see, it's beautiful up on the mountain range. You don't have much to do that night, and all of the cast is arriving at different times, and production setup is running behind (the norm with Michael Cimino), so the cast all agrees to have lunch together the next day before shooting kicks off this week. Robert takes you into the visitor's center that presides over the cabins to pick up keys, and the staff even gives you some warm bowls of soup to take up to the cabin with you. Up in the cabin, you quickly cut the heater on, shivering while you wait on the room to warm up a bit. Robert sets down his bags and the soup, and walks up behind you, putting his hands on your arms and rubbing them vigorously. It warms you up pretty well, especially when he puts his warm hands on your neck. "Mm, thank you," you let out in a moan. "It's no problem, honey," Robert says lowly, almost in a whisper. "You okay?" you ask him. "Mhmm... Just sleepy and thinking about that soup," he says wrapping his arms around you and nuzzling into your neck, "Feel any warmer?" "Well, I stopped shaking," you sink back into him, and place your cold hands on his warm ones. He moves to put your hands under his, stroking the back of your hands with his thumbs. You stay like that for a few minutes before you break the silence, "You wanna eat that soup? Seemed like you were hungry." "Hmm, yeah." He pulls away from you, rubbing your arms a little like he did before, and walks into the little kitchen to get his soup. The room is a few degrees warmer, but this cabin must have horrible insulation or something, because it's still freezing even with the heater on. By the time you head over to the kitchen, Robert is bringing your soup over to the table. You both quickly dig in; Robert because he was hungry, and you because you're so cold. The soup warmed you up pretty well. The rest of the evening, there wasn't too much to do. Robert watched some TV, you went through your clothes making sure you had enough warm stuff before changing into pajamas and climbing into bed. You figured you should go ahead and try to warm your bed up sooner rather than later. A while later, you're still sitting in bed shivering a bit; Robert stands up and chuckles at you before heading out of the room to change clothes. He comes back in sweatpants and a t-shirt and climbs into his bed. "How are you wearing that to bed?" you ask him bewildered. "Um, just like this," he pulls the blankets up over his shoulders. "It's literally freezing in here. You're not cold?" "Nope, are you?" he has that devilish look on his face, knowing the answer to that question. You shoot him a deadpan look and turn over, ignoring him and trying to get warm. "Goodnight, then," Robert laughs. "Goodnight." You both lie there in silence for a while. Robert watches you tossing and turning, bunching the covers up on top of yourself, and still shivering the whole time. "(Y/N)." "What?" You turn to look at him under your huge pile of blankets. "Come here." "What do you mean, come here?" "Come get in bed with me," he says sternly. "Ooooh, no! You're not gonna get to joke about me sleeping with you all week." "(Y/N), you're freezing, and you're not gonna get any sleep like that. Just... Let me keep you warm." The look on his face was one of concern and sincerity. "You won't make fun of me?" you ask sheepishly. "I won't make fun of you." There was a small pause. "You promise?" "Oh my gosh, yes! I promise," he says with a big smile and an eye roll, "Will you get your ass over here already?" You stand up, and he holds the blankets up for you. You sit down and scoot in close to him. Robert drops the blankets on you, before grabbing you and pulling you into his chest. You make a move to protest, until you realize how warm he is. You resign to stay cuddled up to him and tangle your legs with his. You start to drift off to sleep feeling his breath gently on your forehead and his fingers tracing shapes in your back. "I knew it. You are like a human heater," you joke quietly. Without opening his eyes, Robert groans then whispers, "I knew you thought I was hot." • • • The next morning, you both wake up to the sound of the alarm clock. Robert quickly rolls you onto your back and reaches across you to turn off the alarm. You look up at him as he lingers above you for a moment. He gives you a sweet smile before leaning in and pressing his lips to yours. It catches you completely off guard, and it's over before you even realize what he has done. He looks into your eyes, and you place a hand on his cheek. It was like a dam broke. You both smash your lips into one another's kissing passionately, hands exploring each other. Robert catches your hand in his, lacing his fingers with yours and pushing your hand up above your head on the pillow. His other hand finds your hair as he continues to move his lips against yours. Your free hand roams his back, while your feet gently rub against his legs underneath the sheets. He pulls away from you slightly, breaking your kiss, both of you breathing heavily. He flashes a toothy smile at you, knowing he looks good, and breathes out, "Good morning!" You giggle and tell him, "Good morning," too. "Hmmm," Robert hums, nuzzling into the crook of your neck leaving little kisses there, "it *is* a good morning..." "I guess everyone was right about us, huh?" you point out. "Oh, who cares what they think?" "I think you do, cradle robber." You both try to look at each other seriously, but that always ends in laughter. Luckily it was a slow morning so you could spend some time together, kissing and figuring out whether or not you wanted to tell everyone at lunch. Just before time to leave, Michael came by to check on both of you and tell you that the van was ready. "Alright, we'll be out in a few minutes," Robert told Michael. "See you at the van!" Michael called out as he closed the door to your cabin. Robert turned to you and snuck his hands up the sides of your jacket, just enough for his fingertips to make contact with your skin. You placed one hand on the back of his neck and the other in his hair, while he leaned into you for one last little makeout session before heading out. You felt your back hit the wall lightly, as the door bursts open and John yells, "What's up, lovebirds--OH!" You and Robert turn to see Meryl and John at the front of your cabin giggling, the rest of the group rushing up to see why John shouted so loudly. You quickly push Robert off of you and blush a deep shade of red. Everyone starts laughing, and John looks at the two of you with a huge grin on his face, and says, "Oooh, you two are never gonna hear the end of this."

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Michael in the Mainstream: Artemis Fowl

Since the early 2000s, Artemis Fowl has been languishing in development hell, and it really is a mystery as to why. The series has everything you could possibly want for a blockbuster young adult franchise: it’s a charming blend of science and fantasy with rich worldbuilding and mythology, it has enjoyable and even complex characters who go through great character arcs over the course of the series, it has an enjoyable major antagonist, an insufferable smug villain protagonist who goes through a stellar redemption arc over the course of the series, and tons of crazy heists that combine scheming and fairy magic. There was no reason this couldn’t have existed as a competitor to the Harry Potter series, but alas, it was not to be. The young adult fantasy franchise languished for decades in development hell, until finally Disney pulled it out and put Kenneth Branagh at the helm. Finally, we were going to get the Artemis Fowl adaptation we deserved!

Except we didn’t.

Artemis Fowl is legitimately one of the worst adaptations of any work of fiction ever. It has been held up alongside The Last Airbender and The Lightning Thief as part of the Unholy Trinity of terrible adaptations, and I’m not even going to try and pretend that this “Honor” isn’t well and truly earned. This film is an utterly abominable bastardization of the beloved franchise, to the point where this feels like an entirely different story that had familiar names slapped on it at the last second. If you want to know what horrific extents this film has butchered the story and characters, read onward, but there’s no way I’m going to pretend this film isn’t awful right off the bat.

There is literally nothing in this film that works. Nothing at all. Starting from the opening scene, the establishing shots, you can tell things are wrong – there are news people around Fowl Manor? Mulch is being interrogated? What is going on? The film from the word go is simply making one thing absolutely and abundantly clear: this is not the Artemis Fowl you know. The film goes out of its way to do the opposite of the franchise, merely using names and vague concepts in an attempt to sucker fans into watching it. Butler’s first name, an emotional reveal from the third book, is common knowledge; Opal Koboi, a cunning and threatening major villain who was the antagonist for almost every novel starting with the second, is here reduced to basically a personification of the voice on the phone from Scream; Root, once a short-tempered man who was hard on Holly as a method of tough love to push her to be the very best LEP had to offer to prove women belonged on the force, is here a woman who, while just as angry as ever, robs Holly of a major part of her arc and reduces her to plucky female sidekick. And even outside of that, as its own thing, the movie is just utterly incomprehensible. The story is rushed and confusing, with lots of exposition and action but with no context or cohesion. Things happen and things go from scene to scene, but none of it makes any sort of sense. A character will switch allegiances within a few minutes, characters will somehow find a way to survive deadly attacks offscreen… the worst offender is a character death they try to push off as emotional, despite there being no reason to care for this character, and when all hope seems lost, a deus ex machina saves the day! My wife, who is unfamiliar with the series, and I, a huge fan, both struggled to figure out what was going on at any given point; the movie is really that bad at communicating what is happening, which is even more baffling because the film is a pathetic hour and a half in length, a distressingly short amount of time to establish a new science-fantasy franchise of this scale.

The characters are almost all terrible. Artemis is the standout with how awful he is; no longer the cunning criminal masterminds of the book, Artemis here is more of a somewhat smug little brat who is overly emotional and, worst of all, NICE. He’s so nice in fact that by the end of the film he has managed to speedrun his character development and arcs with Mulch and Holly, who consider him their close friend and ally. Butler is pretty bad here as well, mostly because he is given almost nothing to do and is seemingly only there because he was in the book. In fact, his crowning moment – when he took on the troll – is instead given to Artemis and even Holly, with Butler ending up severely injured. It’s a bit nasty that they changed Butler to be black and then had his (white) master steal his greatest moment; it’s giving me flashbacks to Kazaam. Opal is hit pretty bad as well; being made the big bad of this loose adaptation of the first book’s plot – which is amusingly one of the few books she had absolutely no role in – wouldn’t be so rough if she was more of a presence and not just some vague, hooded figure who threatens Artemis over the phone and generally does nothing to warrant being an adaptation of the baddest bitch in the series. She’s rather ineffectual and they even try and give her a sort of sympathetic motivation, one where she resents humans for pushing her kind underground. It really is a disgusting waste of a character who could easily rival heavy hitters like Voldemort in the awesome and theatrically evil department.

Holly is almost okay, but her entire arc and a big chunk of her narrative purpose is robbed by making Commander Root a woman. Root, played by Judi Dench, is honestly one of the better characters since Dench has Root dropping lines like “Top o’ the morning to ya” with gravelly deadpan seriousness which makes the character unintentionally hilarious, but the cheap laughs don’t really make up for butchering the story of one of fiction’s finest ladies. As a side note, they have made Holly 100% white despite her skin being described as nut brown rather frequently in the book, and the now white Holly together with Artemis steal away Butler’s biggest moment. And that’s not even getting into how they neutered Juliet, who has also been race lifted but was turned into a child who barely appeared in the film. I’m not usually one to toss about racism accusations, but there’s a lot of red flags here that Branagh’s usual colorblind casting just doesn’t excuse.

The most consistently enjoyable performance is Josh Gad’s as Mulch. From the moment he was cast, I knew he’d do a good job and capture the spirit of the character, and he does! ...sort of. The decision to have Mulch be a giant dwarf and narrate the story in a crappy Batman impression while also violating literally the most important law of fairy culture (don’t tell the humans anything about us) by spilling the beans to M16 is unbearably stupid, and a lot of his jokes are just relentlessly unfunny. But I think that Gad does leak a bit of that Mulch charm at a few points, and it’s apparent he at least somewhat gets his character, which is not something that can be said for anyone else in this film. Sadly, much like his standout performance as Lefou in the live action Beauty and the Beast, he can’t possibly save the trainwreck of a film he’s in.

I guess I’m not entirely surprised by this film. I mean, a lot of quality young adult literature from the past two decades has been horrifically mangled in the wake of Harry Potter – Inkheart, The Golden Compass, The Lightning Thief, Ender’s Game, and Eragon – so this movie really isn’t an anomaly. But it is the culmination of a horrible trend. This is the zenith of horrible young adult adaptations, or perhaps I should say the nadir of adaptations as a whole? For all the flak I could give those other adaptations, on some fundamental level they still understood something about the source material. Ender’s Game still understood it could not erase the ending where children are revealed to be being conscripted to perform the ethnic cleansing of an alien race. Eragon couldn’t completely ruin Saphira, try as it might. The Lightning Thief… well, I mean, I guess the Medusa scene was mostly faithful. But Artemis Fowl? Artemis Fowl goes out of its way to be the opposite of its literary counterpart that there is no way to justify even saying it is based on the book by Eoin Colfer; it would be like having a movie about kids hanging out at the mall and doing mundane stuff, except they’re all named Jesus and Peter and Paul and then saying it’s based on the Bible. Just using names doesn’t mean anything, you actually have to use the themes and characterizations too, and this movie does none of that.

This movie is most comparable to The Emoji Movie. Neither of these works really deserve to be called a “Film” since they are basically whatever it is they’re trying so desperately to be stripped down to the bare essentials. The Emoji Movie is the most basic, by-the-numbers animated adventure film with a “be yourself” message you could ever hope to see, with a story so absolutely basic that just watching the trailer will allow you to predict the every motion of the plot. Artemis Fowl on the other hand is the most cliche-ridden fantasy epic franchise-starter you could imagine, and that’s if you’re able to penetrate the ridiculously dense and cluttered story and are able to make sense of what’s going on. I can think of absolutely no one this film could ever appeal to. There’s not a single redeeming thing about it. The movie is flashy, trashy junk that should never have been released, and Disney honestly did the right thing by releasing this on their streaming service because it would be outright disgusting to charge movie ticket prices for this tripe. The fact Disney has more faith in the eternally-delayed New Mutants theatrically speaks volumes about the quality of this film.

I can’t in good conscious say that this is the worst film of all time. F4ntastic is probably a much worse butchering of characters than this film; Disaster Movie is much more horrendously offensive and unfunny than this; hell, Chicken Little is probably a worse Disney movie because as awful as everyone in this film is, at least they aren’t Buck Cluck! But I don’t think there’s a single movie I hate more than this one. Lucy can finally move over and sleep easy knowing that the fact it’s not based on a pre-existing work has finally saved it from the #1 spot on my worst list; Artemis Fowl is now the reigning champ. Kenneth Branagh should be ashamed of himself for making and releasing this (and doubly ashamed for having the gall to unironically compare his slaughtering of Artemis Fowl’s character to Michael Corleone), Disney should be shamed for putting more money into this film than they did into BLM charities, and I hope that Eoin Colfer finds whatever he was paid worth it to see his greatest creation butchered and disrespected like this.

[fairy-writes]

FairyTailWzard’s New Annual tradition!

2020’s Top 10 List Part One!

So here’s a list that no one asked for of the top 10 anime series I watched this year. I wanted to put this in no particular order but I figured I might as well.  I’ll also be doing my top 10 fanfics from this year and my top 10 books I read this year so stay tuned for parts 2 and 3!

10.) RWBY

Uuuggghhh I really didn’t wanna put this on here… but I really didn’t watch much this year so I had to I guess :(((

I’m really not liking this right now… if my blog wasn’t sort of popular because of my rwby oneshots I’d consider just dropping the anime all together….

(I’m seriously debating on whether to watch the new season or not)

Honestly, the only thing bringing me back is my unhealthy love for Ozpin, Torchwick, and Ironwood.

Honestly, I’d give this show about a 3 or 4/10…

I used to love it so much but I think the quality of writing is going down and the show is trying to be too many things at once that I’m just losing interest.

9.) My Hero Academia

Why is this so low you may ask? Well, cause I think my main hype coming from this is the manga.

Yes I love the show, the animation studio is freaking amazing and the quality of animation never ceases to amaze me. But I love the manga a bit more.

This will probably jump up in rating around season 5 or 6 but for right now I’ll leave it in the 9th spot :)

8.) Sirius the Jaeger

Oh my GOSH, I want a second season so bad. One of my favorite OC’s I’ve ever made was for this anime (it’s Idris Tana btw) and I actually commissioned artwork for her recently and it’s SO PRETTY.

Anyway getting off-topic, the animation of this show and again with the dark and grittiness of it is what drew me in.

Actually, my late grandma and also my great aunt tagged me in a Facebook post with the trailer when it first came out cause they saw vampires and thought I would like it and that's what got me into this show in the first place.

So thank you grandma and auntie!

But I absolutely adore the soundtrack, the mix of orchestral pieces mixed with the more electro-kinda-vibes is my life (seriously go listen to “The Beginning of the Hunting” it changed my life, as an orchestra and cello geek it made my heart so happy)

7.) Tokyo Ghoul season 1-3

Ok, I’m currently reading the manga after I’ve seen the anime and lemme tell you I wish they didn’t censor the anime so much.

I can’t even find an uncensored version anymore and it makes me so upset.

The darkness and goriness of the manga is what appealed to me in the first place (yes I get weird looks for it, no I will not change my mind)

Kaneki is my CHILD and he CANNOT do any wrong. I don’t care who you are I love him

6.) Ajin: Demi-Human

Uuuggghhh to be honest the anime is kinda meh but my love for the manga is so great I am legally obligated to put this here.

Don’t get me wrong, the animation and soundtrack for this show is phenomenal and I think they got Satou down pat.

But they did dumb down and cut out a lot of interesting scenes. Scenes like how Satou takes down some of his opponents (which I can see why... many American viewers would most likely get offended by it… you manga readers know what scene i mean)

Nagai Kei turns into a bit of a whiny character instead of the smart but exasperated teenager I know and love in the manga is the anime version of Kei going to bite off his own fingers in order to climb a wall into a military base?? Definitely not. Would manga-Kei do that? Well, he already did… so... yes..,

Nakano Kou is still kind of funny but he is so much more fascinating in the manga (his backstory breaks my heart).

5.) Bungou Stray Dogs

Another new one that I was actually recommended by my friend @bright-like-the-sun-00 :) I ended up watching it originally in dub but then went back and rewatched it in sub because I love my children so much.

Chuuya is my bean and I love my OC that I created Charlie Dickens :)

(if you guys could go read her story I’d be eternally grateful).

Anyway!

This show has a fantastic cast in both Japanese and English and the music score is one of my favorites. The characters are so wonderfully hilarious and interesting and fhajxbqbaka I love this show okay??

4.) Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba

I actually put this off for YEARS because my oldest step-brother kept saying I should watch it. At this point, I was refusing out of spite cause I’m petty like that. But I finally started watching and-

HOLY-

GUYS

I have never gotten so attached to a character (cough cough Giyuu) so quickly.

I have been listening to Gurenge and Kamado Tanjiro no Uta on repeat for literal weeks now and I still grin like an idiot when listening to them. I also have a potential OC/crossover coming out soon sooooo…. stay tuned??

I also broke my sister cause I showed her a post that said national donut day and had a picture of Rengoku on it… I didn’t understand it until she explained it to me and now I cackle every time I think about it.

3.) Jujutsu Kaisen

@plusultranerd​ got me into this blame her for the future spamming of your dashboards

GUYS GOJO SATORU IS MY LIFE NO QUESTIONS ASKED

He could literally murder me and I’d thank him. He is the prettiest anime character I have EVER SEEN and I love him so much.

Anyway anime. The show got my attention from the get-go. Itadori is such a fun main character and Megumi is me cause you know dogs.

I think I saw an ad for it and since I have Crunchyroll I figured why not and fell in love with it

AND THE ENDING SONG

BEST ENDING EVER YOU CANNOT CHANGE MY MIND

I put it on sometimes so me and my sister just start jamming out to it and we get the stupidest looks and it is amazing

2.) Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

Another anime that I will rewatch over and over again until literally the end of time. Also, another series that I’ve already read/or am reading the manga.

Alphonse Eric is my cinnamon roll you can pry him from my cold dead hands.

I have cold hands and no heart by holy heck my BOY

I actually am buying the special edition hardback manga covers that are coming out and I LOVE THEM

THEY ARE SO PRETTY

Am I talking about the characters or the manga?

My answer is yes

Anyway, all of the characters in this are so wonderfully complex and have motivations and i fall in love with 99% of the characters (except for Shou Tucker, I even like Father actually)

1.)  Death Parade

This has got to be one of my top favorite anime of ALL TIME.

I rewatched it early this year and this is one of the very few anime that will get me to cry and this makes me cry every freaking time.

The music is stunning, the animation is magnificent.

For being based on an animated short film, this has such potential for a second season and such a complex storyline was packed into 12 episodes.

I will forever recommend this anime to literally anyone who is looking for something new to watch.

I’m also noticing I have a thing for white-haired male anime characters with really pretty eyes….. Kaneki… Gojo… Decim...

Honorable mentions!

Darker than Black

I didn’t rewatch the whole thing this year but this anime is literally my life. Hei is such a bean and I love him.

Hunter x Hunter

Another anime i didn't rewatch completely but still adore :) I heard they’re continuing it and I’m excited for the dark continent arc!

Dororo

Technically i watched this late 2019 but whatever; I do what I want. The animation was absolutely gorgeous and I loved the gritty darkness of it. Mio will forever be my favorite character; you cannot change my mind. Some parts I did find a bit boring but overall I’d rate this a solid 6/10!

The Devil is a Part-Timer!

I rewatched parts of it and not the whole thing, I also have the first two volumes of the light novels and I forget how funny it is until I actually watch it. It has me laughing every time and never fails to put a smile on my face :)

[iamcinema]

IAC Reviews #016: Captives / Mama’s Home (1988)

It’s almost funny how things happen sometimes. You’re just going about your day, and something will just pop up in your thoughts or memory that you forgot about a long time ago. When you decide to follow it to see where it takes you, and when it finally decides to turn up, it completely chucks all your original plans out the window and you have to see it to believe it. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, we need to finally, after so long, get around to talking about Captives aka Mama’s Home. And, oh boy, we have a lot to cover here.

As a side note to make this easier, I’ll be referring to the film as Captives for the duration of the review when discussing Gary P Cohen’s original film. However, when I’m discussing the release by the original production company, Majestic Home Video, I’ll refer to it as Mama’s Home to help clear up any confusion since I can’t even call them the same movie. _______________________________________ 

Captives is 1988 horror-drama revenge SOV film directed by Gary P Cohen, who is best known for his Video Violence films that were made just before and after this. To quote VHS Meltdown on the plot, it goes as such;

“Three weirdos invade the home of a well-to-do family while the husband is at work. They aren’t there to steal anything; they have a video they want to show the wife. On it is the past life of her husband, something much more violent and drug-fueled than she ever could have expected. When things go wrong for the invaders and blood gets shed, the wife must reconcile what she has seen and what she knows, and her new knowledge of the past makes her future unthinkable.”

According to Cohen, this was intended to be a serious commentary about violence, which was tonally different from the sort of black comedy nature of the Video Violence films. He originally pitched the film to Camp Video, who turned down Captives, but took in Video Violence 2 after distributing Video Violence the year before. So, Cohen turned to Majestic Home Video for help, and they took the film in for release.

Well, what happened to the film was beyond a travesty and feels criminal.

If you want to learn more about that, I highly recommend seeing Paul (Analog Archivist/VHS Collector)’s review of the tape because he goes more into the history of the film and included Cohen’s interview where he discusses the treatment of Captives; which included large chunks of dialogue being manipulated, bad amateurish editing, and loud music being played over the dialogue scenes. It’s just a shameful butchering of the film, but this does sort of have a happy ending because Camp Motion Picture picked the film up in 2011 to be showcased on The Basement: Retro 80s Horror Collection; which included Timothy O’Rawe’s The Basement (1989), another SOV horror film that was widely considered lost for nearly 20 years. Copies of Mama’s Home are considered extremely rare, with one user saying they saw a copy of it go for over $335USD.

The film stars many of the actors from the first Video Violence film, including Cohen himself. So, if you’re a fan of the film, then you’re in for a bit of a treat. But, if you’re in the other category that hated the film, then, well, you’re in for something. Plus, I don’t think the notoriety of Mama’s Home helps much either as far as what you think you can do with your expectations. It’s going to be a rough ride for some of you, I’m sure.

VHS Collector | Mama’s Home Review:

So, now we’ve been finally given the opportunity to see Captives and all it’s glory without the cloud of shame that Majestic put over us. It’s been a long, long time coming to see Cohen’s true vision unearthed - even if I’m about ten years too late for the viewing part.

Captives (1988) in One Gif:

Oh. Okay, then. So, let’s really dig into this one. _______________________________________  

First, I think I should comment on what VHS Meltdown said as the plot summary since there’s a bit more to it than that. The primary thing is who our “three weirdos” are, which are that of Nikki, Chick, and Paulie whom we learn have a personal vendetta to some degree with Ellen and her family - more specifically her husband, Barry. So, I don’t know, the vague descriptor can make the invasion seem a bit less personal.

Speaking of which, let’s talk about our guests of honor more.

The ringleader of the group is Nikki, who has more stake in the home invasion and a motivation for revenge due to her treatment and abuse by Barry and former mother in-law, Estelle. She’s accompanied by her brothers, Chick and Paulie. Chick is the arms of the group, having a hot temper and seems to take the most pleasure in the violence and madness. Paulie is, for a lack of better terms, the slow “idiot” brother of the group and he’s a trope you’ve probably seen in other slasher films of the time like Mother’s Day, Redneck Zombies, and Cannibal Campout. He’s the docile one of the team and only tagged along because he cares about his sister and was pressured into it, not because he’s out for blood or vengeance.

If you’re a fan of Video Violence, then you probably already recognize Art and Jackie Neill right off the bat who are playing polar opposites of their other characters. It makes for an interesting watch to see them relish in the violence they cause, rather than be repulsed by it. On the opposite side of things, we have Ellen, Estelle, Barry, and little Zach.

There isn’t a whole lot to really say about them. Ellen is the unsuspecting housewife, Estelle is the loaded mother in-law that would do anything for her son, Barry is a two-faced, mama’s boy husband with a secret double life, and Zach is, well, a baby that links them together in a few ways. Much like their co-stars, some of them were also in Video Violence with a similar take on things. Seeing as how this (or Video Violence) was their first acting role, and one of their only ones point blank, you can expect something mostly amateurish and nothing too special. If I had to name any specifics, I’d say the trio is the best in their own right; Chick being a great sleazy dirtbag, Paulie being sympathetic, and Nikki being almost justifiably unhinged with the lengths she’d go to for revenge.

Plot wise, it’s not all that bad and it’s not to see something that isn’t like Blood Lake where the motive isn’t sloppy or feels like a complete after thought. It’s a bit shocking to say the least to see a topic relating to child death or murder done this way, something I don’t think I’ve really seen in some time since Las Vegas Bloodbath or Beware! Children at Play. It’s a bit of a slow burn after the trio makes their motives known to Ellen, with the occasional burst of violent mayhem and the trio trying to figure out an exit plan when things don’t go as they planned. We also get some occasional cut scenes with what Barry’s doing with his time, but they’re brief and only add to what kind of a picture Nikki paints for us of him.

As far as the violence goes, it’s not all that bad. However, some of it was a bit hard to make out what was going on because the quality was on the low end. But, that’s kind of how it is with SOV some times, so it is what it is. There’s also not a whole ton of blood either, so don’t expect a total massacre. What we do get isn’t too shabby or rough around the edges either, which is a really nice surprise. There’s some general torture, humiliation, and sleaze scenes too, and those are also nice when it comes to adding a bit more grime to the mix; including a really bizarre moment where a drunken Chick is groping and coming onto Nikki (and she may or may not be into it) and we see what Barry is doing when he’s not at work.

If I had to say something that really hinders this, it’s the sound and music aspect.

Just like with Mama’s Home, there’s moments where the sound mixing doesn’t feel right, so the dialogue is a bit drowned out by the music. On the bright side, it’s a bit better here with Captives than Mama’s Home since you can at least make out most of the conversation that’s going on and I had to do a side by side comparison with this and the clips Paul included as a reference to be sure I wasn’t hearing things. If it’s not that, it’s how the music robs the tone and mood of the film.

As I said earlier, Cohen intended for this to be a serious film about violence, and having this audio track in the background for so much of it kills the mood for me and it unintentionally brings it back to Video Violence with it being a dark comedy. On the flip side, the tracks on their own aren’t that bad and are exactly what you could expect for a low budget SOV trash flick from the time period. So, if you’re like me and you have a guilty pleasure for this type of thing, you might have some fun with it. I’d like to hope that Cohen still has the masters for these somewhere and would be open to releasing them if they weren’t included on The Basement: Retro 80s Horror Collection.

The film ends on a weird open ended note and since there’s no post credit scene, we’re largely left to wonder if Ellen is able to follow through with her choice given what she’s seen and learned and she’s able to escape. I think it was probably for the best as well since it plays into this being a revenge flick as well, but I’d like to hear Cohen’s thoughts and what he thinks happened after the final scene.

________________________________________

So, where are we at now with this?

I’m a bit disappointed that it took me so many years to finally get around to seeing this, and I was initially nervous going into this given all the things I heard about Mama’s Home. As excited as I was, I wasn’t sure if I was going to waste my time with this and I was prepared for the let down early on thinking I was just getting a hybrid of Captives and Mama’s Home.

In a lot of ways, it was worth the wait to see what I was missing all these years, because if I found out it got taken down yesterday, then I knew it would be a long time until I would have this chance again since the box set from Camp Motion Pictures is currently out of print. If you told me that it would stay online and it wasn’t going anywhere any time soon, then I’d say I wouldn’t really rush to seeing it or writing this mock up with what I know now and shift my focus onto the other really obscure SOV material that I wouldn’t know about if it wasn’t for SOVHorror, A Slash Above, or SRS Cinema having bits and pieces of them up. In this case, I could probably go a few more months or so before I’d get an itch to hunker down for it.

Is it worth a watch? Sure.

If you’re a sucker for SOV films, then you should consider crossing it off your list since it feels like not everybody has seen it, let alone is aware of it. If you liked the Video Violence films, then I think you’ll have an alright time with this one. It’s probably the ToeTag fanboy in me saying this, but I’d like to think that this is another one of those proto August Underground movies with how it wanted to push the envelope with the brutality and humiliation, something I still feel would have been better if the incidental music was toned down way more. Nonetheless, if you find this type of thing boring and uninteresting, then you aren’t going to feel like you missed out on something amazing or mindblowing. It’s another run-of-the-mill horror-esque low-budget tier SOV flick from the time, just with an emphasis on revenge. Don’t be too dismissive, but don’t expect anything too impressive.

Rating: 4.5/10

[bee-kathony]

Donuts, Drives, and Dinnertime | Sam & Cait AU

a/n: inspired by this picture of Sam and Caitriona at dinner after work, I love when they hang out sort of personally. thanks @raelovesoutlander for the help! 

The past week had been hectic. In all honesty, the past couple of weeks had been a lot to handle. With multiple trips to London, and filming in between, Sam and Cait were both spent. On Sunday, Caitriona had to be on set early in the morning to film a new scene Diana had written. Unfortunately that meant she would be going into work alone — without Sam. But, it was a scene set in the 1960’s which meant one more time to wear Claire’s iconic clothes and don the driving glasses she wore.

Meanwhile, Sam stayed behind in London to work on a few new business projects. He also needed to sign scripts for the Omaze campaign donors. Sam and Caitriona weren’t one of those couples that needed to spend every second together. Especially since they worked together practically every day. But it didn’t make the time and days apart any easier. They were each other’s calm centers.

Tuesday rolled around, and finally, a day off. Well, not exactly a day off. They were filming south of Edinburgh tomorrow and they needed to be at location tonight. It was a two hour drive and they would be there for the remainder of the weekend. Sam and Caitriona decided to drive themselves.

“Should we pick up something to eat on the drive?” Caitriona asked, putting her overnight bag into the back of their Audi.

“It’s only two hours, but if you want,” Sam smiled, sliding into the driver’s seat. He’d gotten in from London just yesterday afternoon. Spending hours in the car with Caitriona after a busy couple of days was just what Sam needed.

Pulling out her phone to check nearby food options, she found a donut shop. “Tantrum Donuts? It’s just a few minutes drive down the road, unless of course you’re staying away from sweets again?”

“I don’t think one donut will be bad,” Sam shrugged. “I’ll leave the other eleven for you,” he laughed.

“You make me sound like a pig,” Caitriona squinted her eyes at him as she buckled into the seat.

“You know I’d be eating at least six donuts with you if I weren’t trying to get back into marathon shape,” Sam said and reached for Caitriona’s hand across the dash. “Which reminds me, I really should go for a run later or something, my schedule has been so out of sorts.”

“I’ll come running with you,” Caitriona said and when Sam looked over at her, surprised she started to laugh. “Just kidding. One marathon was enough for me. I think it’ll be a few more years before I attempt another.”

“But you did so well the last time, babe,” Sam squeezed her hand. “I’m still really proud of you for that, you know?”

Blushing, as she always did when Sam complimented her, she squeezed his hand back. “I know. Just like I’m proud of you for signing up for another. You really are the energizer bunny.”

They drove down a few streets, ending up at the donut shop Caitriona had found.

“I’ll just pop in and pick up a dozen? Too many?” She asked, but not waiting to hear the answer before she closed the door and went inside.

The building was really cool, and she’d never seen it before. They had so many different flavors, it was hard to choose, but she picked out some she liked and a few she knew Sam would enjoy.

“That place is bloody amazing,” Caitriona said and opened the box for him to look. “You would not believe the smell.”

“Alright, maybe two,” Sam laughed and reached for a chocolate frosted donut, pulling out onto the street.

During the car journey, they were mostly quiet, enjoying each other’s company. It wasn’t often that they had a chance to drive long distances together. Caitriona was in charge of the music, switching between her favorite bands and then to classical music which Sam said put him to sleep.

“Should we stop by your mum’s house when we head back to Glasgow on Thursday?” Caitriona asked. “It’s on the way right?”

“Yeah it is,” Sam nodded. “I’ll call her tonight and see if she’s free to meet up, she’d love to see you. She was gutted she missed you at the Stirling graduation.”

Sighing, Caitriona let her head fall back on the headrest. She had to work on the day Sam was receiving his first honorary doctorate. But, that didn’t stop her from keeping the livestream up on set and making sure to see him honored.

“I know, I can’t believe I couldn’t leave for a few hours. But someone’s gotta keep the show running,” she poked her tongue out at him and he grinned.

“How’d your filming go on Sunday?” Sam asked. “I forgot to ask you.”

“It went well,” Caitriona nodded and reached at her feet for the donut box, picking up half a donut she had started earlier. “I do love wearing those costumes, and God, the cars! They’re so cool.”

“Alright, alright,” Sam chuckled and glanced over at her.

“I mean,” Caitriona swallowed. “It was horrible and not fun at all.”

Smirking, Sam moved one hand to settle on her thigh. “But really? It was okay?”

“Oh yeah, the scene will be great. It was sort of weird to be filming those kind of scenes, almost like I was back on season three,” she said.

“When we were apart,” Sam made a frowning face and Caitriona reached up to pinch his cheek.

“Yes, exactly,” she laughed.

Another hour in the car later and they’d finally arrived near where they’d be filming. They would be filming some scenes at the Manderston House and they need to be up early.

“Do you want to go for dinner in,” Sam checked his watch, “Thirty minutes or so?”

“Sure,” Caitriona said, following Sam as he walked into the hotel. It was a small charming place.

“I might try and go for a run later, that is if I’m not too full,” he rubbed his hand over his stomach. Caitriona shamelessly admired him as he stood at the check-in desk. He worked so hard on his body, and she got to reap those benefits.

When they reached their room, they both went into unpacking mode. Only staying for a few nights meant light packing, since they’d be on set most of the time in costume. After changing out of their car clothes and into something not so casual, they both headed out for dinner.

They settled on a restaurant across from their hotel, not wanting to venture out too far.

“How are you holding up?” Caitriona asked him once their food arrived. “It’s been a busy couple of weeks and I know you haven’t really had any time to stop.”

Sam took a big bite of his vegetarian pot pie, a bit of comfort food. “Suppose I’m just stressed and a wee bit tired.”

“Wee bit,” Caitriona smiled softly. “I’m sorry about the Henley festival too,” she said, looking down at her plate. “And about that photo we had to take.”

It had nearly been a disaster. Caitriona and Sam were going to go alone, but then she got word that she had to bring a plus one.

“It’s alright, just for looks,” Sam took another bite. “Managed to spend all night with you anyway,” he said and reached for her hand across the table.

“I just know it stresses you out,” Caitriona said. “Him… being there.”

“We can’t really do anything about it, babe,” Sam stroked her palm with his thumb. “But I appreciate your concern. I do, and,” he smirked. “I know how you can make it up to me later.”

“Is that so?” Caitriona matched his smirk.

They finished dinner and headed back to their room. Sam ended up laying down on their bed and falling asleep. But, he woke forty minutes later, hair messy and eyes puffy.

Yawning, he sat up and looked over at Cait. She was laying beside him, reading a book, her glasses perched on the end of her nose.

“You look so studious,” he smiled.

“I didn’t want to wake you, so I thought reading would be quiet,” she smiled and leaned over to kiss him, running her hand through his hair. It had been growing longer, which she loved — something to hold onto.

“What time is it?” He asked, looking around the room for a clock.

“Almost nine,” she answered.

“Jesus,” he ran his hand over his face. “I really do need to go for a run, I’ve been aching to get out and do something.”

“Go now, the sun’s not set yet,” Caitriona nudged his leg. “You’ll regret it if you don’t.”

Knowing she was right, Sam got up and changed into a blue long sleeve shirt and a pair of shorts. A quick run would be just the sort of thing to get him out of his fog.

“I’ll be back soon, shouldna be a long run,” he said and kissed Cait on her forehead as he left.

Whenever he was tired, or drowsy after lovemaking, his accent always sounded thicker. It was like music to Caitriona’s ears.

While he was out on his run, Caitriona decided to hop in the shower.

She loved being on location and getting to stay somewhere new. Of course, she missed Eddie and her own bed, but it was nice every now and then to get away. Stepping into the shower, she sighed as the water ran over her body, washing away the day. She didn’t bother washing her hair, since it would be hidden under a wig tomorrow.

Lathering up her arms, she rubbed the soap all over her body — down over her stomach and back up over her breasts. She hoped Sam wasn’t too tired after his run, normally he came back energetic and sometimes even aroused.

Caitriona turned off the water, and stepped out into the bathroom. She reached for a white fluffy towel and wrapped it around her body, tucking it in the front so she could use her arms. If Sam was full of energy when she came back, there certainly would be no need for clothes, so she kept her towel on and went back to sit on the bed.

He’d been gone for fifteen minutes, and he said it would just be a quick run. Having nothing else to do, Caitriona grabbed her phone and flicked through her socials. Once she had checked and liked a few photos, she heard her stomach growl.

“I’ll burn this off later,” Caitriona said as she stood up and grabbed a blue icing covered donut from the box.

Just as she went to sit down on the bed, the door opened and Sam walked in. He was covered in sweat, and he laid his phone and keys down on the table.

“Have a good run?” She said through a mouthful of donut.

“Aye,” he grinned, still breathing heavily. “I drove a bit down by the water and ran, twas beautiful. I’m really glad I went and did it.”

“Well, good!” Caitriona grinned and Sam laughed, noticing her teeth were covered in blue frosting.

“You’ve got a little something there,” Sam pointed to her mouth and came to stand in front of her.

Caitriona could smell him. That primal scent of musk and salty sweat. Her face was eye level with his crotch and she thought she saw the slightest bulge. She went to take another bite of the donut, but Sam grabbed it out of her hand.

“You weren’t going to eat this whole thing by yourself were you?” He asked and took a bite. As he did, a glob of bright blue frosting dropped onto her thigh.

“I just showered!” She complained.

“I can see that,” Sam said and set the donut aside. She was about to wipe it off with her finger, but suddenly Sam was getting onto his knees before her. His hand went to her thigh, gripping it firmly.

“I’ll clean it up, babe,” Sam said softly.

Caitriona could still see the light sheen of sweat on his forehead and through his shirt. She watched as Sam bent his head and then his tongue was on her, flat and wet, licking up the frosting. Shivering, Caitriona fell back onto her elbows.

He pushed the towel further up her legs, licking and nibbling her inner thigh as he went. The frosting was long gone, but he wasn’t stopping. Caitriona ran one hand through his hair, gripping onto the back of his neck. He took one long swipe from middle thigh to her groin, earning a quiet whimper from Cait.

Covering her mouth with the back of her hand, Caitriona bit down gently on the skin as he  began to part her legs.

“No,” Sam said and pulled her hand away. “I want to hear ye.”

“We’re in a hotel,” she chuckled.

“So,” he shrugged. “Let them hear.”

Reaching up, Sam pulled at the tuck of her towel and it came undone, falling back onto the bed. His hand cupped her breast, kneading and flicking her nipple with the pad of his thumb. He hadn’t even touched her where she needed him most, but she felt fit to explode.

Sam grabbed her waist and pulled her to the bed, lifting both her legs to rest over her shoulders. She was about to say something, but was silenced whenever his tongue touched her pussy. He was holding her against this mouth, not letting her even move her hips.

“God,” she moaned and flexed her legs, her heels hitting his back.

A chuckle came from his chest, and he moved one hand to open her lips, finding her clit with his tongue and sucking on it.

“Fuck,” Caitriona cursed, and grabbed onto his head. His head was bobbing — moving quickly against her and she already felt swollen. One long digit eased into her and she cried out, her body jerking involuntarily.

“That’s it,” Sam said from between her legs. His grip tightened on her thighs and he began move her body against his face. Hot puffs of air touched her skin between every lick and she knew he probably couldn't breathe — not that he seemed to mind.

Caitriona started to grind against him, her hips lifting off the bed as he held her up to his mouth. His tongue flicked out on her clit, causing her to groan. The sound of her, the taste of her — it was driving him mad. One hand left her thigh and when Cait opened her eyes to look at him, she saw he was now gripping his cock, slowly pumping it back and forth.

The sight of him between her legs, taking pleasure from her was all it took to send her convulsing around his tongue and fingers.

“Oh fuck,” she moaned, her body trembling.

He didn’t wait long before pushing her back onto the bed. His shorts were already in the process of falling down his legs and he stepped out of them, reaching behind him to pull off his shirt. As he moved on top of her, Caitriona’s hands came up, running over his sweat soaked chest.

“I do always like it after you come back from a run,” she commented, biting her bottom lip.

“There’s something about seeing you covered in sweat,” her hand moved down over his stomach and finally wrapped around his hard cock.

Sam groaned, his eyes briefly shutting. He had both hands on either side of her head, holding himself up above her. Beneath him was a gorgeous woman, her eyes locked on his and her hand gripping him in only a way she knew how.

“I want you to fuck me, Sam,” she said, emphasis on the fuck.

“I recall ye said ye would make up the Henley festival, no?” He grinned and rolled over onto his back, pulling her to straddle him. His hands were on her waist, pushing her down against his length.

Caitriona began to gently rock her hips, not taking him inside of her yet, but rubbing her pussy over him. Even his cock was sweaty, and she reached between them, squeezing his balls in her hand, and watching as his face screwed up in pleasure.

He liked to watch her ride him, holding her hips and thrusting up into her. Her breasts bouncing and her face contorting in the most delicious ways.

Slowly, Sam slid his hand up and over her stomach, then cupped one breast, squeezing it as she moved her hips. She likes for him to be rough sometimes and so he squeezes hard, pulling on her nipple.

With one hand on his chest and the other between their bodies, Caitriona takes hold of his cock and sinks down onto it. They both simultaneously moan, a feeling of relief washing over them. Caitriona begins to rock because she can’t help it, the feeling of his cock touching her so deeply she can’t think straight.

Sam moved both hands on her ass to help move her, grinding her down on his cock. It’s almost too much — to see her lose all abandon, to lose all senses as she gyrates her hips. He loves watching her come undone, loves being the reason for it.

“Faster,” she begged and that’s when Sam leaned up and grabbed her, turning and pushing her back flat on the bed and thrust into her, making her cry out. Her leg wraps around his hip and then he’s fucking her balanced on one arm. His hand moved between their bodies, massaging her pussy as he slides into her.

He doesn’t know how much longer he can last, and he can feel his balls tightening. He lowers his body, trying not to crush her as he closes his mouth over hers. The kiss is hungry, wet and desperate. Caitriona practically claws at his back, anchoring herself to him.

The bed is moving with every thrust, but he’s not even worried about being quiet. He only wants to see and feel her come around his cock. With every bit of self-control in him, Sam pulls out until just the tip is inside of her. She barely notices before he slams back into her, jolting her body.

Sam kissed her again, their tongues meeting in the middle and then she’s bites down on his bottom lip, close to drawing blood as her body trembles underneath him.

“Shit, shit, shit,” she mumbled and she comes with her whole body, the sound of her moans filling the room. Sam thrust into her one more time, feeling her pussy clench around him and then he comes, fast and hard.

Rolling onto his side, he slipped out of Caitriona, one arm still laying across her stomach. He hadn’t even been breathing this hard after his run earlier.

“I think I’ll need another shower,” Caitriona said and looks over at him, laughing. “You’ve got a bit of blue frosting in your hair.”

“Oh do I?” Sam sighed and reached up, touching it. “I wonder how that got there?”

Caitriona snuggled up close to him, pulling his arm around her and they laid there, feeling safe in each other’s warmth. At some point they fell asleep, only waking hours later to both of their alarms going off.

++++++

The next day was work as normal, filming scenes, waiting for the next shot. Every now and then before the director would call for rolling, Sam and Cait would exchange a look and burst into a fit of giggles. They knew everyone around them hated them for it, always laughing like children.

Once work was over, they changed into comfy clothes and headed in search for something to eat. They found a small pub called Atelier and went in, looking for good food and a few drinks.

“Want to do a cheese board?” Caitriona asked, looking over the menu. She was starving, and they hadn’t eaten too much on set.

“Sure, looks good. Dinna have to drive tonight, so I’ll get some gin too,” he smiled. Sam reached his hand over the table, interlacing his fingers with Cait’s.

“Excuse me?” Came a voice from behind them and Sam nearly jumped, letting go of Cait’s hand. They both looked over to see a man and a woman, holding a phone. “We’re such big fans of the show, would you mind taking a photo with us?”

“Of course!” Sam smiled. “It’s so lovely to meet you, are you from around here?”

“Aye, we live just around the corner, just came from a work meetin’, I canna believe we ran into ye both!” The woman smiled and then they posed for the picture. They all talked for a little bit before parting ways and Sam and Cait went back to their table.

“Well, shit,” Caitriona said under her breath.

Sam laughed and sighed. “We can’t hide forever, Caitriona.”

“I know that,” she said and ran her hand back through her hair. “Any chance they’ll just keep that picture to themselves?”

“Not a chance, Balfe,” Sam grinned. “Let people have their fun, it’s just dinner, aye?”

Caitriona smirked and reached for his hand, squeezing it again. “Sure, just two friends out for dinner after work.”

[occasionalfics]

hi so i haven’t made any real posts in a while bc i haven’t really been writing that much but i wanted to just post SOMETHING for y’all to interact with

anyway, if you don’t know, i have a youtube channel and i’ve been watching (almost) every movie that chris evans is in because i love him and reviewing them for my channel and i thought i’d give a rundown of the movies i’ve seen so far (including ones i haven’t rewatched for the channel yet because i’m not gonna link to the videos - if you really want to watch, message me) so maybe you could decide which ones are worth your time and/or money 😂

for this, i’ll give a brief description, my general thoughts, and a score from 1-10 (1 being unwatchable and 10 being PEAK cinema)

i’m keeping things very light on spoilers, meaning there might be one or two overall but not for every movie.

so here we go:

The Newcomers (2000) - some indie movie with no theatrical release about a family that moves from boston to vermont because of money troubles. chris is in it for like 5 minutes and he’s honestly the second best part (second to a dog only). 3/10, mostly boring but not offensive.

Not Another Teen Movie (2001) - i feel like everyone has seen this. it’s a spoof of 80′s and 90′s teen movies (namely she’s all that and cruel intentions). chris plays the main love interest and he’s definitely funny enough to pull off the part but it’s not really my thing. 4/10.

The Perfect Score (2004) - this is the first time chris and sc*rj* worked together. 6 high school kids fail the SATs so instead of retaking them, they sneak into a government building and steal the answers. it’s an mtv movie and it’s...fine? not great, not special, but...very early aughts mtv for sure. 4/10

Cellular (2004) - an action flick where chris plays a regular dude who gets a call from a woman who’s been kidnapped, and then has to keep communications up with her in order to save her and take down some corrupt cops. surprisingly funny, i had a great time watching, would recommend! 7/10

Fierce People (2005) - i think this was another indie movie without a theatrical release. based on a book that, from the reviews of both, is identical, i think because the author of the book was also the screenplay writer. and that’s probably why this movie sucked. bby anton yelchin (rip) gets caught scoring drugs for his mom, and because she has connections to this super rich dude, they end up going to live in new jersey with his weirdass family instead of bby anton going to jail. chris’s character is not who you think he is. content warnings for drugs, rape, and murder. overall boring, not what it thinks it is, 4/10

Fantastic Four (2005) - okay everyone’s seen these. i actually hate both of these FF movies, but chris as johnny storm is the only shinning light in either. reed is the WORST and sue is treated like eye candy. 4/10 for johnny storm alone.

London (2005) - literally the worst movie i have ever seen. i hate london. also an indie movie, very misogynistic, very pretentious and self-important. lonely emo boy does drugs with random people in a bathroom at a party he was not invited to INTENTIONALLY, in the hopes that he will win over his ex girlfriend, who he repeatedly emotionally abused while they were together, even though the party is literally in honor of her moving across the country. and she didn’t want him there. please never, ever bother watching london and talking about it online - fuckbois will attempt to tell you that you know nothing repeatedly. 1/10, worst film ever made.

TMNT (2007) - does this need an introduction? chris plays casey, but the movie’s really about the turtles. honestly the writing kind of relies on you knowing a lot about the turtle lore and overall it’s a boring but ultimately harmless film. it’s just really not worth your time. 2/10

Sunshine (2007) - ONE OF THE BEST MOVIES I HAVE EVER SEEN, I HAVE NOT  STOPPED THINKING ABOUT SUNSHINE IN OVER A YEAR. 8 astronauts are on a mission to ignite a nuclear bomb into the dying heart of our sun. but it’s a space film so shit goes wrong and, one by one, they start dying. very tense, very sad. the biggest complaint all around is that the first 2/3s of the movie are one genre and the last 3rd is a completely different movie, and yet it’s STILL amazing. please watch (if you can handle a space thriller)! 8/10

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007) - a very bad follow up to a very bad origin movie. not even andre braugher could save this one. reed is really mean to johnny for no reason and i hate his guts. 3/10

The Nanny Diaries (2007) - second time appearing alongside sc*rj*. she’s the main character. an anthropology student takes on a nannying job for an upperclass family in new york, but the job ends up being more than she bargained for. chris plays harvard hottie, her upstairs neighbor who is THE BEST BOY. i loved this movie. 8/10

Battle for Terra (2007) - a very weird but very good animated movie about humans attempting to colonize an alien planet because we were stupid enough to destroy earth, venus, and mars. lots of big names on the cast list for a movie that not many people saw, but it goes ham in the “fuck colonizers” theme. overall, a surprising joy. 6.5/10

Street Kings (2008) - well this was directed by david ayer so my friend and i went into this with very low expectations and it didn’t even meet that bar. keanu reeves plays a sad and angry corrupt cop who almost kind of gets framed for killing another cop, and then spends a good chunk of the runtime just hunting down other corrupt cops without doing anything about his own corruption. it’s copaganda, but very bad copaganda. also chris dies. fuck this movie, don’t waste your time. this is another one where the fanboys will come for you if you say a bad thing about it on the internet, 2/10

The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond (2008) - another indie that apparently caught the eye of kevin fiege? i don’t really know why because chris’s character is very bland and the movie overall is nothing special. tennessee williams wrote the screenplay before he died in the 80′s and then this was made and nothing about it was changed. it’s basically straight people in the 20′s in the south being weird and rude. a rich girl pays a hot poor boy to escort her to parties after a huge scandal was caused by her father. she loves the poor boy but he doesn’t return the feelings and everyone’s sad, dying, or mean. skip it, honestly. 4/10

Push (2009) - honestly, an underrated movie that so often gets shit on because of x-men. push is so good! a telekinetic man meets a young girl who can see the future, who tells him that if he helps her find her mom, they’ll also come into $6 million. they run into his ex and the government department trying to control people with powers, and shit ensues. chris’s chemistry with dakota fanning as big brother/little sister is adorable and i need more people to talk about it. 8/10, very worth your time.

The Losers (2010) - apparently went up against some other star-studded action flick with a similar plot at the time of release and suffered for it, but other than that, this is a fun romp with lots of character. a team of militiamen are framed for an international scandal and forced to go underground until a mysterious woman helps them exact revenge on the billionaire who framed them so they can go back to their families. chris plays one of the secondary characters and he’s PERFECT. best character in the whole movie! you’ve probably seen the “don’t stop believing”/”lethal killing machine” scene around tumblr before - that’s just how his character is the whole movie and it’s great. definitely recommend! 7/10

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010) - we’ve all seen it. lucas lee is the best. there are lots of problems in the word choice and some of the moral quandaries but overall, an enjoyable ode to videogames and comic books. 6.5/10

Puncture (2011) - once again, an indie film with very little theatrical release. WHOOOH though. this movie. SO GOOD! two personal injury lawyers take on a case when a nurse is accidentally pricked on the job and contracts AIDS. they take on a huge pharmaceutical supply company in the hopes of manufacturing and creating a legal standard for using safety needles to protect frontline medical workers, all while chris’s character is dealing with being an addict. based on a true story, honestly   one of chris’s best performances (and that’s across the board). you can  rent it cheap from youtube and it’s totally worth it. 7.5/10

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) - i mean. it’s cap. honestly this movie feels a little long even though it’s not. overall it’s a good, enjoyable movie and watching it all the way through reminded me of why bucky was so important. 7/10

What's Your Number? (2011) - okay honestly i love this movie? a woman is slutshamed by her sister’s friends and then embarks on a journey through her past relationships to find her soulmate, only to realize that it doesn’t matter how many men she’s slept with because the right one really won’t give a damn and neither should she. everyone’s seen naked collin around tumblr. he’s a good boy. mostly. 7/10

The Avengers (2012) - so i can appreciate that this was like THE event movie of the summer of 2012 but it is LONG and there’s still so much spy shit i don’t understand. my friends and i also think that j*ss wh*d*n oversimplifies most of the characters, and ultimately the writing isn’t super strong. the performances are, for sure, but it’s still not as great of a movie as i thought it was when i was a senior in high school. 7/10

The Iceman (2012) - also an indie? based on a true story. a man (played by michael shannon) is recruited by the mob to be a hitman, and then something happens where they don’t want to pay him or something, so he starts doing a shady job with another hitman (played by chris) to support his family. overall it’s a boring film but michael and chris were both really good! watch it if you like dark mob movies, michael shannon, or winona ryder. 3/10

Snowpiercer (2013) - this movie, no pun intended, is a RIDE. poor people at the back of a train containing the last living human beings revolt against the bourgeoise. everyone’s dirty and tired and hungry. weird shit happens, but ultimately, this was SO worth the watch (and the money i spent on the blu-ray)!  7/10

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) - still my favorite cap movie. excellent characterization, maybe the only time i cared about natasha. the plot should be an avengers movie given that shield is a team concern, but i will stand by the winter soldier aspect of this movie til i die. 8/10

Before We Go (2014) - an indie movie that chris directed (his directorial debut)! it’s...cute, i guess. it’s not harmful in any way, but also not special in any way. flustered woman misses her train, cute musician in the station offers to help her navigate NYC. they talk about feelings and their pasts and what they’re running from and toward. it’s fine. 6/10

Playing It Cool (2014) - indie? i don’t know?? screenplay writer (chris) wants to write action films but keeps getting hired to write romcoms, then he finds himself IN a romcom. it’s okay. some people think it’s terribly misogynistic which i didn’t find it to be, but it’s also just...kinda bland. 4/10

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) - my least favorite avengers movie. i genuinely hate how ultron was handled and this movie has never once made me sympathize with the maximoffs. except for when steve defends their choice to allow experimentation to be done so they could defend their country. uh the party at the beginning is the best part, full stop. 3/10

Captain America: Civil War (2016) - this isn’t a cap film. he has no character growth. this is an avengers film at best. i also take issue with how much of this movie is really just two movies forced into one. bucky gets the short end of the deal in the overall mcu and this is really where that starts. 5/10

Gifted (2017) - PLEASE. WATCH. GIFTED. a former philosophy professor gives up his career to raise his niece, but when his mother attempts to gain custody, he has to fight for the person he loves most in the world. one of the most heartfelt, genuine movies ever. chris and mckenna grace have SUCH good chemistry. bonus octavia spencer (also in snowpiercer). 10/10

Avengers: Infinity War (2018) - probably my favorite avengers movie. great stakes. amazing acting. THE BEARD!!! 8/10

Knives Out (2019) - WHOOO BITCH. TOP TIER. ransom drysdale could do whatever he wants to me and normally, i don’t “date” villains. 9/10

Endgame (2019) - the lesser infinity war. i’m not a fan of time jumps and also hate fatphobia. thor was mistreated and i can’t forgive that.

[letterboxd]

Life in Film: Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers & Kathleen Hepburn.

“We didn’t want it to be about the one-take, so we were actually kind of hesitant to speak about it before we released the film, because it wasn’t a gimmick.” The co-writers and directors of Canadian break-out feature The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open (now streaming on Netflix) talk single-take filmmaking, Indigenous representation, and identifying with Edward Scissorhands, as they answer our life-in-film questionnaire.

New Canadian feature film The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open, which landed well at Berlin and TIFF and was picked up by Ava DuVernay’s Array Releasing, follows two Indigenous women with very different stories who come into each other’s lives on one fateful afternoon in Vancouver.

When Áila (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers) encounters the pregnant Rosie (Violet Nelson), bruised and barefoot on a damp footpath attempting to evade her abusive boyfriend, Áila whisks her away to her apartment and encourages her to seek help. But Rosie is paralyzed by a dearth of realistic options.

Tailfeathers, who also co-wrote and co-directed the film, is Blackfoot from the Kainai First Nation (Blood Reserve) as well as Sámi from northern Norway. Nelson is a member of the Kwakwaka’wakw First Nation (Kingcome Inlet, Quatsino).

With cinematographer Norm Li (who filmed Beyond the Black Rainbow) shooting in real time over a series of extra-long takes on Super 16mm, The Body Remembers… is designed to appear mostly as a single-take film. The supposedly hidden cuts are “impossible to spot”, writes Sean Baker. “This is absolutely not ‘just a gimmick’,” agrees Olivier Lemay. “The feature-length shot worked wonders at taking us on this real-time journey with the characters that became uncomfortably immersive.” The result is a grounded and intimate portrait of two unique members of a group vastly under-represented in cinema. “It feels based deeply in character and never exploitative,” writes Milly Gribben.

Sitting down with Tailfeathers (who goes by ‘Máijá’) and her co-writer and co-director Kathleen Hepburn, we wanted to know more about their filmmaking technique, and the films that have inspired them.

Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers (Áila) and Violet Nelson (Rosie) in ‘The Body Remembers…’.

What was the impetus for telling this story? Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers: The film is inspired by an experience that I had in East Vancouver, where the film takes place. Like in the film, I encountered a young woman who had just fled her abusive partner and she was literally standing barefoot in the rain and was very pregnant. I spent a few hours with her and it was a transformative experience. Sometimes we are lucky enough to have these encounters with strangers that fundamentally alter us. I carried that experience with me for a number of years wondering what to do with it, wanting to honor her story, and just kind of was left with the question of what happened to her because I never saw her again. Ultimately, I decided I wanted to turn it into a feature film and honor her experience and our experience and what happened in that short time we’d spent together.

Most of my experience with directing has been through documentary, and then my experience with narrative film has been through acting. Knowing that I wanted to make a feature in real time, having never made a narrative feature before, I figured it would be a good opportunity to collaborate with someone with more experience. And the way that I learned as a filmmaker has always been through collaboration. Kathleen has been a friend for a number of years and I so deeply admire her work and just her as a person. Her feature debut Never Steady, Never Still, it’s a phenomenal film. I reached out to Kathleen and proposed the idea of co-writing and co-directing and doing this together and that’s how it happened. Kathleen, how did you respond to Máijá’s proposal? Kathleen Hepburn: It was a very immediate response. She told me what had happened in the real life experience. It just felt like such an important, rich story, very complex and also artistically quite challenging to tell a real-time story. We decided to do it in one continuous take. It felt like a really wonderful honor to be a part of this project and an amazing challenge that I was really excited to participate in.

Co-writer, co-director and actor Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers.

This film is putting characters on screen that haven’t seen a lot of representation. Was that part of the motivation? E-MT: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the two women you see in the film are so familiar to me as an Indigenous woman. I know these women, so in so many ways they’re by no means unconventional. They’re just very real people who exist who, like you said, haven’t been represented on screen very often.

In terms of Indigenous cinema and Indigenous representation, there’s this long history of misrepresentation and people who aren’t Indigenous telling our stories and getting it fundamentally wrong. This was an opportunity to explore a very simple story that embodies all of these larger themes in such a nuanced way. It was an opportunity to speak about issues of class and various forms of privilege that exist within the Indigenous community based on lived experience. It was also an opportunity to, yeah, explore these larger systems of oppression that impact Indigenous in very different ways on a daily basis in Canada. There’s so much richness to both of these characters and so many opportunities to explore these larger themes through their lived experience on screen.

Although this breaks a lot of new ground, were there cinematic precedents that you had in mind? KH: One film we looked at in the writing process was Frozen River. In terms of style and tone, we were also looking at Andrea Arnold, Fish Tank. Wendy and Lucy, Kelly Reichardt’s film. But in terms of representation…

E-MT: I think Frozen River kind of set a precedent in terms of Misty Upham. She’s also Blackfoot. I’m a Blackfoot. She passed away very tragically, but seeing a woman like her on screen in a film that American audiences gravitated towards was pretty transcendent. Knowing that a character like that could hold space on screen in a way that drew American audiences in, I think kind of set maybe a bit of a precedent for this. Because we wanted Rosie’s character to be raw and real and vulnerable. When we found Violet Nelson, she embodied all of that and we wanted to present the world with a complicated individual who you would believe the world has not been kind to. Violet was all those things and she just delivered such an incredible performance and she was kind of like the light of our film. She carried so much of the film.

What precedents did you have in mind when you were thinking about shooting these long, real-time takes? E-MT: There were a lot of things to consider. One thing I think that was obviously most important for the process was supporting Violet’s performance, and coming from an acting background I really appreciate the rehearsal process, especially with theater. You get to sit with the work and be with it for weeks before you go to the stage. There’s a really incredible momentum that builds and being able to do the performance from beginning to end in one go on stage.

And there’s kind of this palpable energy that builds also with the audience because it’s an experience you’re all having. We wanted to bring that energy and that process into the film. We rehearsed for four weeks, and also rehearsed with our crew for five days and carefully choreographed everything. Our cinematographer, Norm Li, and the rest of our crew, were all just fully on board for this wildly experimental challenge.

KH: I mean, obviously we were inspired by films like Victoria, but I think for us, we didn’t want it to be about the one-take, so we were actually kind of hesitant to speak about it before we released the film because it wasn’t a gimmick. It was more to give the audience the same emotional experience as the actors.

We’d like to ask you about your life in film. What movie made you want to become a filmmaker? E-MT: I think for me it was Alanis Obomsawin’s Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance. It’s kind of her most seminal work. She’s the grandmother of Indigenous cinema in Canada and also kind of around the world. She’s Abenaki, she’s 85 years old and she’s still making films. She just had a film at TIFF. She’s made over 50 films. Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance is about the Oka crisis that happened in the early ’90s in Canada. It’s one of the most important works of cinema in Canada, and just knowing that an Indigenous woman made that film, that still is so incredibly important. I think that was the one that kind of motivated me to make movies.

KH: I think In the Mood for Love was probably the film where I was actually like, “Oh, okay, this is what filmmaking is like and can be like”.

Kathleen Hepburn, the co-writer and co-director of ‘The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open’.

What’s your go to comfort movie? E-MT: I could watch Moonlight over and over and over and over again. I don’t know if it’s a comfort movie, but there’s just something so splendid and beautiful about that experience and I actually crave watching that film. I probably watch it once a month. I’ll just sit down and watch a section of it.

KH: This is a more recent film, but one that I just loved so much is Toni Erdmann. Just everything about it is so inspiring. It’s hilarious and heartbreaking. But I don’t watch it once a month.

What movie, or movie scene, makes you cry the hardest? KH: Oh, I know this one. My Girl. When Macaulay Culkin dies, the funeral scene. “He needs his glasses. He needs his glasses.”

E-MT: God, that’s going to make me cry.

As a teenager, what movie, or movie character did you feel closest to? E-MT: For sure, Now and Then. That was something I connected with, but that’s when it was twelve years old or something.

KH: I was a tomboy growing up, so there was an Elijah Wood film called The War. For some reason, that one always stuck with me. I don’t know. I wanted to be those little boys, I think.

E-MT: Edward Scissorhands. I so connected with Edward. It’s just such a wild, bizarre, beautiful story of this outsider, but no, I’m not a fan of Johnny Depp now.

What film do you have fond memories of watching with your parents? E-MT: Oh man. Growing up we didn’t have a lot of money, but something that my parents always did was take us to the cinema and my dad, especially. On the weekends we would go and see double bills, sometimes not paying for the second movie. My dad was such an action movie guy. I grew up going to action movies with my dad. I remember, actually, my mom is the biggest Jackie Chan fan. Rumble in the Bronx, I think, holds a special place in my heart. It’s set in the Bronx, obviously, but it’s shot in Vancouver.

Then there was this Canadian TV show called North of 60, which was set in the north in Canada in this Indigenous community. It was kind of this show that we tuned into every week. I would say Tina Keeper, she’s an actress and also she’s a producer now, but she played a cop, an Indigenous woman. For me as a young person seeing her on screen was pretty transformative because she was an Indigenous woman who held a position of power and was a real person and was complex and beautiful and not framed within this overwhelming trauma that you often see Indigenous people framed within. That was pretty important just for me as in terms of representation, and then also for our family, we just tuned in every weekend. I don’t know if it’s even a good show. I can hear the theme song in my head. It was a CBC show.

Violet Nelson plays Rosie in ‘The Body Remembers…’.

What filmmaker, living or dead, do you envy or admire the most? E-MT: Right now, Tasha Hubbard. She’s a Cree filmmaker from Saskatchewan and she made a documentary film called nîpawistamâsowin: We Will Stand Up. It was about the murder of Colten Boushie, a young Cree man who was murdered by a white farmer named Gerald Stanley. Gerald walked away from all charges and is a free man, and the film is winning all sorts of awards across Canada and it’s so brave.

Tasha grew up with a white family, she was adopted. She grew up in this white farming community and she’s an Indigenous person who has experienced both of those realities. Racism on the prairies in Canada is very prevalent and in-your-face and violent. As a person who comes from the prairies—and I have an intimate knowledge of that reality—just the courage that Tasha took to make that film and to fully invest herself in such a challenging process. Yeah, there’s no words to sort of describe the respect that I have for her and what she’s done.

If you were forced to remake any classic, which one would you choose? E-MT: Well, this isn’t a classic, but one film that I’ve watched recently that just blew my mind is Happy as Lazzaro, the Italian film. It has such a high level of understanding about the world and the complexities of society, but it’s also just this beautiful film that tricks you into coming to an understanding that you don’t realize you’re having as you go through the film. I don’t have that sort of mind that can handle that kind of structural complexity.

‘The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open’ is the fourth acquisition of 2019 for Ava DuVernay’s Array Releasing, after acclaimed Ghanaian gem ‘The Burial of Kojo’, Hepi Mita’s documentary about his trailblazing Māori filmmaker mother, ‘Merata’, and Tribeca Film Festival award-winner ‘Burning Cane’ by nineteen-year-old Phillip Youmans. All are streaming on Netflix. ‘The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open’ is now in select theaters in New York, Los Angeles and Detroit.

[lostsummerdayz]

Sonic The Hedgehog Movie Review

“Blue Blur or Blue Devil, this speedy flick is very ‘Omoshiroi~!’ indeed!”

By Nay Holland

The Sonic The Hedgehog movie had quite the hype and history leading up to its eventual release. It was around this time last year that the general audience saw first hand what Sonic would look like on the big screen. Needless to say, they were not happy with the design choice. Several months later, a new design for Sonic was revealed to greater approval. The slated November 2019 release was pushed back to a February 2020 release due to the resulting backlash.

Sonic’s design was just the cherry on top for most skeptics at the time. Fans of the classic Sonic animated series will remember Jaleel White as the iconic voice for Sonic. Many of said fans wanted him to reprise his role for the feature film. Ultimately, that role fell on Ben Schwartz of Parks & Recreation fame.

Throughout the trailers, the absence of many other iconic characters from the universe wasn’t ignored. Many had thought that Jim Carrey’s role of Eggman Dr. Robotnik would be the only bright spot in this film of uncertainty. The reputation of video game movie adaptations in the past also preceded any major hope savvy fans would have as well.

However, with the release of Detective Pikachu, I had newfound hope for Sonic The Hedgehog. Detective Pikachu was a movie with an original yet at-times nonsensical plot fueled by star power. Ryan Renolds played the titular character as well as one would expect, though the supporting cast were passable.

Still, compared to the terrible era of horrific fighting video games to movie adaptations earlier on in the decade, Detective Pikachu was a breath of fresh air. It was a fun movie littered with references that fans of Pokemon will catch, yet it was never over-reliant on them. The movie was able to provide its own form of momentum from start to finish. It wasn’t perfect, but it got the job done.

It may seem like I was giving a mini overview on Detective Pikachu, but the same thoughts can be applied to Sonic The Hedgehog as well. It was a fun movie with an original, yet highly nonsensical, plot. I’ll excuse the plot on the grounds that it’s Sonic The Hedgehog. Sonic was never quite known for intricate stories.

I am aware that this game exists, but, this is the exception rather than the rule.

Look who developed the game guys. C’mon.

Whoever was in charge of the script could have watched the entire first season of Sonic X for all I know and based some of their ideas for the film.

My point is, while there is a reason for Sonic to arrive on Planet Earth via his backstory, it’s not the main attraction of the film. The fuel that powers this movie are two dynamics.

The first is the dynamic between Sonic and Tom, the human protagonist of the movie. Remember when I joked about inspiration from Sonic X? The punchline punches itself.

Okay I know I’m not being fair in comparing a kid to a grown police officer but it’s the same energy!

Oh, right. The human sidekick is a police officer from a small town in Montana. Wanna know the name of the town?

Green Hills, Montana! Get it! Green Hill? The introductory zone that will never

Ever

Ever

EVER

Go away in some way shape or form?

I’m not gonna lie I looked it up just to see if such a place exists in Montana. I was sad to discover that was false. Bummer.

Sonic and Tom share most of their screen time together and you have some classic tropes. The “we’re a family!” trope, the “trying to understand someone different than you” trope, and the classic “ROAD TRIP!” trope.

The cliches aren’t bad however. They only seemed to enhance the dynamic that these two characters have with each other. Sonic is filled to the brim and armed to the teeth with pop culture references for centuries. Any reference you can think of is there. 

Several speed puns involving his collection of Flash comics including the movie, Speed, itself? Check. References to The Fast and The Furious? Also check. References to modern gaming such as live streaming and...a certain dance that is honestly dated at this point? Checkmark.

Sonic’s personality is unique to this movie yet key components remain. He’s still very much so impulsive, adventurous, and bold as his other counterparts. One thing I feel the movie does right is his development. He doesn’t know the power of his own strength or his own powers. Sometimes he overestimates his abilities, which leads to trouble for both Sonic and Tom. Other times, he feels out of place and yearning for family. By the end of the movie, however, there are enough seeds planted to promote further growth in the inevitable sequel.

The human protagonist, Tom, was surprisingly as interesting. We’re introduced to his character as a wise-cracking police officer who would fit the role of a cocky protagonist in any other movie. At times he tries to play the straight man to Sonic’s antics, but after a certain part in the movie, he’s not that far from Sonic in terms of impulsiveness.

Marsden, who plays the role of Tom, is no slouch either as he delivers his one-liners, matching the same energy as Sonic. Most importantly, he is able to stand on firm ground with Jim Carrey’s Robotnik. I honestly loved seeing them both on the screen as they tried to show who was the bigger smartass.

Ah! Jim Carrey! The main reason why everyone’s interests were piqued to high levels. This leads into the second dynamic. The man with the master plan! He is the Eggman Doctor.

In trailers and in promotional images, Carrey never looked better. In this movie, it is my honor to say that Carrey looked in rare form. The quirky and zany antics of Dr. Robotnik portrayed by Carrey felt nostalgic, harking back to the days of Liar Liar and The Mask. The hair-triggering jerk reactions, the body language, and the endless amount of quips made Carrey a perfect role for the Egghead. I could literally fill this review with all of his one-liners and dialogue. That’s how subtle yet powerful they were.

Remember when I said that the plot was a tad bit diluted? I’d say that Robotnik’s introduction is where the movie begins to take flight and he’s introduced fairly early. If you look at the movie as an hour and some change of Tom and Jerry style antics, with Robotnik and Sonic respectively, then you’ll get the most mileage out of the film.

Finally I’d like to mention the miscellaneous. The attention to detail to Sonic’s design is amazing, from his fur to his beat-up footwear. The method in which he received his iconic kicks was also adorable.

The special effects were also spot-on. There are two moments in the movie where Sonic is using his speed to get himself out of a disadvantageous situation. In both of these scenes, the rate of speed is exaggerated by a still frame of his surroundings. 

For those familiar with “bullet-time” and “slo mo” effects in video games, these are how the scene plays out. Seeing Sonic manipulate the environment around him only for time to regulate into “normal time” was one of the better touches of the movie from a design standpoint. I honestly wished there were more scenes like that in the movie. 

As mentioned earlier with “Green Hills,” there are several in-universe references as well. I won’t mention them all, but my favorite had to have been the “Hill Top Road” street sign.

This obviously refers to Hill Top Zone from Sonic 2.

There are also references to his moves, from the iconic spin dash, to other niche ones such as his wall kick.

For a ninety-minute movie, Sonic The Hedgehog cuts to the chase, pun intended, with no filler. Post opening credits, every scene in the movie had a purpose for progression. Nothing ever seems to overstay its welcome. 

For a film geared towards the younger audience, it’s enough to keep their attention span with enough content to keep the fans of Sonic in their seats. For the parents of said younger audience, the appearance of Jim Carey in rare form is a treat in itself to see. It’s not a perfect movie, but it is far from the dumpster fire that everyone feared it would be. It is, however, more than good enough to check it out. 

Sonic the Hedgehog is now showing in theaters. This Valentine’s Day weekend, take your Amy Rose out on a movie date and enjoy a fun movie after dinner!

And park your butts in your seats after the credits for a surprise! Don’t leave the theater!

[somethingusefulfromflorida]

So, I learned something recently...

Mary Kate Olsen (the top billed twin; I feel kinda bad for Ashley) is married to a man 17 years her senior, who also happens to be the half brother to the former President of France.

That sounds like the plot to one of their movies! Like, there’s a foreign exchange student at their school and they discover that he’s secretly foreign royalty.  I can picture the whole thing in my head, I’ve thought about this a lot:

It has a late 90s/early 2000s aesthetic; kinda grungey and “totally radical, dude!”

Twins Mary Jane and Kelsey are just your average upper middle class teenagers living in multi-million dollar beachfront property with their widower dad, a security guard with dreams of being a detective.  His firm just got a big contract to provide security for the visiting diplomats of the vaguely Eastern European kingdom of Slovotia (it’s generically foreign; funny accents, weird customs, offensive Slavic stereotypes, the works. The writers based it on Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Austria-Hungary, Ruritania, Backwardistan, etc)

At school, the girls are introduced to hunky Slovotian exchange student Nico.  He’s, like, SO cool, but he doesn’t flaunt it.  He’s quiet, tries not to make waves, and sneaks away at lunch to be by himself; the girls follow him and find him talking to a a burly bodyguard.  Turns out, he’s the Crown Prince of Slovotia!  His uncle, Count Bartok (who is clearly the antagonist but SHHH don’t tell anyone, we don’t know that yet) is visiting America as part of the Slovotian delegation; his brother, the King, wants to normalize relations with the west, but the Count doesn’t really like America.

Nico and his bodyguard Dolf (a hulking man of few words) ask the girls not to reveal his secret; he just wants to live a normal life, and be a normal teenager.  The girls decide to show him around town and introduce him to hip American concepts like the mall and beaches and fast food.

They buy a hot dog from a street vendor, and Nico looks appalled.  “My uncle, he say Americans, they are dogs, but I did not know they were to be eating them, yes?”

“They’re not really made out of dog, Nico!  Try it, you’ll like it.”

He takes one bite, and is enraptured.  “This is best thing I have ever to be eating!”  He walks over to the vendor and offers to buy him out.  “You there, meat monger. This dog that is hot, it is food fit for king!  I buy your shop, I pay ten million Slovotian Kronle, good price yes?”

“Sure thing, whatever you say boss!  Good price!  Great price!  My ticket’s finally come it, it’s easy street from here on out!”

They show him around “the city.”  It’s never specified which city that is though; they live on a beach and go surfing, so it might be LA, but there are hotdog vendors and people with Brooklyn accents, so it could just as well be New York.  Maybe there’s a shot in the middle of the film where the bad guys are looking at a satellite map of the USA, and the camera zooms into the center of the country, or there’s a blinking red dot somewhere on a random coast.  The point is that there is no definitive location; it’s just meant to represent whatever city is closest to the viewer’s hometown (the writers didn’t put that much effort into it because this is a no budget direct-to-VHS Mary Kate and Ashley movie.  What did you expect?)

Dolf follows them everywhere they go, and Nico complains that he wants to have some privacy.  “You do not be seeing other kids with bodyguards, yes?”  Wacky hijinks ensue as the trio try to evade him; there’s definitely a chase scene set to a punk rock song like SR-17′s ‘Right Now’ or something by Bowling For Soup.  They sit on a park bench reading newspapers as Dolf runs by, then hightail it in the opposite direction.  They casually steal hats and sunglasses from passersby to blend into the crowd.  They walk in line behind a couple buys carrying a sofa.  The chase ends with them hopping into a taxi and laughing with one another as we see Dolf give chase for a second before giving up in frustration.

Nico confides in the girls that life as a prince is not easy.  His father, King Vladimyr XVI, is always telling him how big a responsibility he has, how important he is to Slovotia’s future.  “My father, he tell me, Nico, you will one day be King, so you must to be acting like one, yes?”  It’s so hard to be royal, he can never just be himself, he has to act a certain way to make his parents happy.  The girls tell him that they know exactly what he means; high school isn’t all it’s cracked up to be either.  They have homework and chores, and they too have to act a certain way or the cool kids will think they’re a couple of losers with a capital L (Nico doesn’t understand what the word cool means, “what does temperature have to be doing with this?”)

Suddenly, the trio is attacked by some dude in a track suit and gold chains with a jersey accent; he tries to kidnap Nico, and just when all hope seems lost Dolf appears from nowhere and lifts the would-be abductor up by the collar.

They interrogate him; Dolf holds him by the ankles from a second story window.  “I ain’t sayins nothin, youse will never get a word outta me.”

Dolf says that if he doesn’t start talking he will disappear.  “Maybe you wake up in gulag, yes?”

He sings like a canary.  He was hired by Count Bartok to kidnap Nico.  Bartok hates America and thinks his older brother Vladimyr is foolish for trying to normalize relations with them.  He hoped that by having Nico kidnapped, he could blame the American government and end the diplomatic mission early.  If anything were to happen to the boy, Bartok would become next in line to be king!  He’s going to blame the girls’ father for Nico’s disappearance because he was supposed to be head of security.

“That’s everything I know. Hey, I’m sorry, okays?  I just needed the money, ya know? I ain’t a bad guy, I’m just in a bad sitchy-ation.”  The girls tell Dolf that he can let the kidnapper go, but he takes this literally and drops him out of the window (onto a bush! He’s fine)

They have to race to city hall to meet the Slovotian delegation and stop Bartok from doing anything drastic.  Mary Kate plays the edgy tomboy, so she teaches Nico and Dolf how to skateboard so they can get across town super fast.  This sequence is filmed with a fish eye lens so it looks “totally bodacious.” As the group barrels down the crowded sidewalk, pedestrians leap out of their way.

They make it just in time to be locked out of the ceremony.  Bartok is giving a big speech condemning the Americans for kidnapping his poor nephew, and the girls have to watch helplessly as their dad is taken away in handcuffs.  Dolf uses his espionage training to break into city hall and get the trio into the sound booth undetected.

“Hey Dolf, where’d you learn to do all this stuff?”

“I have many skills” (he is implied to be ex-KGB and it’s played for laughs)

The girls interrupt Bartok’s speech with video they took of the kidnapper revealing his entire plan.  Bartok denies it, but the girls’ dad pulls some as-yet-unseen sleuthing skills out of his ass to prove that Bartok is lying, finally living his dream of being a detective.  Nico bursts into the room and orders the Slovotian guards to arrest his uncle, but Bartok pulls a pistol and holds one of the twins hostage.  Nico uses some of the American skills he learned to free her (he kicks his skateboard towards Bartok’s feet, and he slips on it)

Bartok is taken away, screaming that he would have gotten away with it were it not for those meddling twins, and the girls break the fourth wall by making a Scooby-Doo joke to the camera.  Nico delivers a heartfelt speech to the gathered crowd at city hall about how much he has come to love America and how he’s proud to be representing Slovotia and normalizing relations with the west.  He wants to open malls and hot dog stands and skateboard parks in Slovotia, and he gets a standing ovation as the mayor awards him the key to the city.

The girls are so proud of their dad, and he is just as proud of them.  Just then, King Vladimyr and Queen Anastasia themselves make a live appearance, apparently having flown all the way from Slovotia (it’s never explained how they got there so fast).  They thank the girls for helping their son, and award their father their kingdom’s highest honor. They even offer him a job as Dolf’s second in command, but he declines, saying he’d rather remain at his humble career and raise his family in the states.

The girls encourage Nico to tell his father how he feels.  He knows he will be king someday, but that is very far off, and he would like some time to just be a kid instead of a prince all the time.  The King decrees that Nico may stay in the United States and have a normal high school experience, “you are to be having twelve bodyguards instead of twenty now, good compromise, yes?”  The girls roll their eyes and laugh; Nico’s dad still has a lot to learn!

Nico tells the girls that they are “very cold” (he meant “cool,” but it’s the thought that counts)  He and Mary Kate kiss, and Ashley jokingly asks if he has a brother.  As it turns out, there’s a nerdy kid at school who is played by the same actor as Nico who’s had a crush on her for years, so she gets with him instead (once he takes off his glasses)

Freeze frame

THE END

Roll credits

80 minute run time

Return the tape to Blockbuster and never watch it again

[lurafita]

Petvengers Chapter 4

Read chapter 1 here: Chappy 1

Read chapter 2 here: Chappy 2

Read chapter 3 here: Chappy 3

 Bruce/Hulk

If anyone were ever to ask Peter, what it had been like the very first time he met Dr. Bruce Banner face to face, he would tell them that he was the embodiment of sophisticated professionalism, and not at all embarrassing.

If they were to ask anyone else that had been present at the time, however, they would tell a quite different story.

 - (about 2 years ago) -

“I'm really not sure about this, Tony.”

Bruce said, as he was led through the halls of the tower's common floor, by the far too excited engineer.

Tony just grinned.

“Relax, Brucie Bear. I'm telling you, you are going to love the kid. Fair warning though, he can talk. Like, boy, can he talk. If he starts rambling, don't try to get a word in edgewise, just let him get it all out. He will run out of oxygen at some point, and that's when you seize the opportunity to get the conversation back on track. Because, believe me, Pete will somehow manage to totally derail the topic. Like yesterday, when he came over after school, he started out telling me about his and his friend Ted's AP chemistry project, and suddenly we are in a deep, philosophical discussion about the representation of real life issues in children's cartoons. By the way, you should absolutely watch more cartoons in your free time. Some are surprisingly deep. Did you know that Sailor Moon was way ahead of the curve on LGBTQ relationships? And considering the time period in which it first aired, that's saying a lot. And Captain Planet was actually taking on AIDS hysteria in 1992. Not to mention the fact that in Steven Universe, child heroes have to deal with trauma, instead of things just getting swept under the table. Really, this stuff is more educational than you might think.”

Bruce side eyed his friend.

“So the kid goes off on a tangent suddenly and just keeps going, huh? Completely disregarding the topic you were just talking about right before, huh? Wonder where he gets this from. This sounds in no way familiar. At all.”

Tony either didn't catch the sarcasm, or ignored it, and nodded.

“Beats me. Can't be his aunt, that woman is scarily on point. She never let's you forget, or talk your way around anything. She is just like Pepper in that regard. I think its the Italian blood in May.”

Before the billionaire had the chance to get lost in that particular line of thought, Bruce cut in.

“Look, Tony, I'm not worried about whether or not I will like Peter. From all the proud dad raving you have been doing since I got back, I already know that he is a great kid.”

 (“Excuse you! I do not rave! Least of all proud dad like!”)

“I'm far more concerned about the kind of impact standing in a room with the man who turns into a giant, green rage monster at the drop of a hat, will have on a 15 year old. I'm really not looking forward to watching the kid run away in a panic.”

Tony scoffed.

“Oh please. If you turned Hulk at 'the drop of a hat', my tower would have crumbled years ago. Also, the kid is a superhero. He fought a maniac with alien weapons and a metallic bird suit. I'm gonna eat my 1.500,00 $ Italian leather shoes, if the Hulk scares Pete even a tiny, little bit.”

Bruce would have balked at the money that Tony spent on footwear, but at this moment, the two men stepped right into the living room. They were greeted by the sight of Steve, Bucky, Natasha, Colonel Rhodes, and one brown haired teenager. Which might have been a normal enough scene, if said teenager wasn't sitting cross legged on the ceiling, clutching a bag of marshmallows to his chest and alternating between stuffing one into his mouth, and trying to convince both Steve and Bucky that it counted as a healthy snack, since it was blackberry flavored.

And even though Bruce wasn't 'that kind of Doctor' he couldn't help but clear his throat.

“Actually, since the manufacturers have most likely resorted to using artificial flavors and food coloring, you probably have about the same health benefits from those, as if you just ate the sugar straight out of the container.”

Everyone turned to look at the two newcomers, and as the adults all smiled and stepped forward to welcome their friend, a wide eyed Peter lost his grip on both the bag of marshmallows and the ceiling, and fell to the ground in a heap. Before anyone could start panicking though, he was back up and with a kind of chocked off, high pitched scream/gasp, pointed his finger right at Bruce, and exclaimed “Don't move!” Then he ran out of the room.

And while Bruce had mentally prepared himself for just such a reaction, it still left him feeling rather disheartened. A quick glance around at the other people in the room showed three very confused Avengers (they had evidently not expected that reaction out of the boy), one Air force Colonel who was trying very hard not to laugh, and a grinning Tony Stark.

“So, should I be getting you some water to wash your ridiculously expensive shoes down with?”

Bruce asked the billionaire with a dispassionate sigh, but Tony was completely unconcerned.

“Just wait for it.”

They didn't need to wait even a second more after Tony had spoken, as Peter came running back into the room, arms overloaded with books, stacks of papers, and what looked like posters, which he all dumped onto the nearby couch table. Then the teen was suddenly right in front of Bruce and vigorously shaking his hand.

“Oh my god, Dr Banner, this is such an honor. You are like my favorite scientist ever! (Tony's indignant “Hey!” went ignored) I have read every one of your published papers and my friend may have hacked into your old university and found some of your papers that you didn’t publish, and now I realize that that’s not something I should tell you probably, please don’t sue us, but can you please sign everything I own and oh my god I’m shaking your hand and I’m never gonna wash that again ever. And can I get a photo, oh my god Ned is gonna be sooooo jealous!”

All the while Peter had been holding his phone in his other hand, blindly dialed a number and waited for the other person to take the call. Then he pressed the phone excitedly to his ear.

“Ned! Ned! You will never believe who I'm talking to right now! Think of the greatest scientist you know!... Okay, the greatest scientist you know who is currently alive... EXACTLY! (Once again, Tony's “It's like I'm invisible”, was ignored) Dude, I'm looking right at him. I'M SHAKING HIS HAND! … No, I'm not being a creepy fanboy... No, I have not yet let go of his hand...”

Rhodey laughed, Tony was jealously grumbling under his breath, Steve fondly shook his head, Bucky smirked, Natasha examined the impressive pile of things the teenager had brought for Bruce to sign, Peter continued shaking the scientists hand, while staring at him with awe-filled eyes and all but screaming into his phone, and Bruce... Bruce smiled.

 - (back to the present) -

It was one of the rare, lazy, late afternoons on a weekday, that found most of the Avengers hanging out on the newly built terrace behind the tower. The strangling hold that the high temperatures of summer had held over New York city for the last few days, was finally ebbing away and Peter had seized the opportunity to take Hope for an extended walk. (Steve had declined Peter's invitation to tag along. Colonel, Bucky and him had risen early as ever, and already run a few miles) He had also somehow managed to ensnare Bruce in a discussion about something that had gone over the collective heads of everyone around (Tony was still stuck in a board meeting that Pepper had dragged him to), and the dark haired scientist had seemingly unwittingly followed the teen and dog out of the tower.

The two super soldiers had curled up together in the porch swing, Bucky carefully keeping track of Arthur's progress, as the little raccoon tried scaling the garden table that held the snack food. Steve with a sketch pad in his lap, drawing the image of Eames the cockatoo, hopping around said table while chanting “Posh tosser, bloody wanker”, and occasionally dropping down a blueberry to Colonel, who was happily waving his tail at the treats.

Sam, for some reason, found his bird's antics endlessly funny, and was filming the whole thing with his phone.

Clint and Laura had spread a brightly colored blanket over the grass and were having a picnic with Nathaniel and Lila, while Natasha was showing Cooper some easy self-defense moves a few feet away.

When Hope's familiar barking and running feet were heard, the assembled group knew that Bruce and Peter had gotten back from their walk. The over eager Pitbull ran out on the terrace, greeting everyone in turn with happy licks and a wagging tail (he jumped first into the laps of the two super soldiers, let himself be scratched behind the ears, then ran right at Sam, nearly forcing the man to lose the grip on his phone when he licked him right across the face, then launched his furry body onto the blanket with Laura, Clint, Lila and Nathaniel, and patiently waited until all had pet him at least once, and finally trotted over to Cooper and Natasha to join in on their play fight.)

This had been expected.

What was not expected was watching Peter come walking out to the terrace, carrying a huge tortoise (about 25 to 30 inches in length), and grinning widely when setting the reptile down on the grass. Bruce was following close behind the teen, his face a curious mix of shell shocked and confused.

Peter straightened up from his crouch and addressed everyone, while Colonel and Arthur (who was riding on the dogs back), came over to examine the new, slowly moving animal.

“Everyone, meet Bruce's new friend, Speedy Gonzales!"

“She is a 33 year old Sulcata Tortoise. Sulcata Tortoises can live up to 70 years and above, and weigh up to 120 pounds. Speedy isn't that big yet, though. She did grow a bit too big for her previous owner, and the guy was too cheap to invest in a bigger terrarium, because she needs hot temperatures to stay healthy. She will be okay to roam freely during the summer, but we will have to turn one of the guest rooms into a heated enclosure for her when it gets colder.”

The still completely baffled looking Dr. Banner turned to face his friends and coworkers (the Barton's and Natasha had come closer to inspect the newest addition to their home).

“...I don't even know how that happened. … We were talking about the latest research on cross-species genetic transfers, and all of a sudden I'm standing in an animal shelter and signing adoption papers for a tortoise. … I didn't even know shelters had tortoises...”

Sam, Bucky and Steve, who had already been victims of Peter's crusade against a pet-less existence, held up their glasses in a silent salute to the doctor. Natasha proudly nodded at Peter's accomplishment, and he respectfully bowed to his Sensei. Eames had landed on Speedy's massive back, and was seemingly taunting Arthur from his perch. The little raccoon shot the bird a nasty look, and climbed up into Lila's embrace. Cooper and Clint both seemed fascinated with the size of the tortoise, while Hope jumped between the father and son to get back rubs. Nathaniel laughed happily as his mother helped him feed a banana to the reptile.

Speedy Gonzales brought honor to her species, by patiently tolerating the chaos all around her, and chomping down on the yellow fruit.

-

 Bonus: The Hulk!

"Uff!"

Spiderman shook himself free of the last remaining dust particles from the pile of debris he had dug himself out of, only a few minutes ago. All around him were the webbed up enormous bodies of the mutated rats. Some of them were twitching against their spidery cocoon, trying to get out of their bindings. Peter had done his best not to kill any of them, knowing that the animals had been victims of the illegal experimentation of the deranged Professor Stollack.

It wasn't everyday that a hoard of wild, three feet tall, rabid rats tried to take over Brooklyn. The whole team had been called in for some extreme pest control.

While Black Widow and Captain America had gone in search of the perpetrator behind this particular madness, Iron Man, Hulk, Falcon, Hawkeye, Thor, the Winter Soldier, Antman, the Wasp and Spiderman had taken to the streets and taken care of the mutated and very dangerous vermin.

Peter really felt sorry for the rats. While they weren't exactly among his favorite animals, they weren't evil. No animal was. And they didn't deserve to be experimented on and used like this, for one madman's twisted plans. He really hoped they could be returned to their original forms, and not have to be mercy killed.

/"Widow and me have taken the Professor and his underlings into custody. Everyone alright? Status report!"/ Came the Captain's voice over the comms that kept the team connected during battles.

/"I'm good, so is Feather-head."/ It was impossible to miss the smirk in Bucky's voice.

/"You won't be good for much longer if you keep it up with the nicknames, Frosty."/ As long as those two still argued, they were okay.

/"I'm fine, though Legolas might need to be checked for rabies. One of those things got a bite out of him."/ Peter would be way more worried, if Tony wasn't laughing as he said it.

/"My pants, guys, don't worry. No skin was breached. Mighty Mouse over there tore a fucking hole in my pants."/ Came Clint's answer.

/"His ass region, to be more specific. If anyone was wondering, Robin Hood is wearing Paw Patrol undies today."/

/"Look, Nathaniel likes the show, okay? How about we move things along?"/

/"Paw Patrol is cool. Call me when you watch it! I will bring Cassie!"/ Scott's joyful voice sounded.

/"Cassie only watches to keep you company, you know? By the way, Antman and I are both fine."/ Trust The Wasp to keep things under control.

/"I do not know this 'Paw Patrol', but I will gladly join you and your son for a viewing, if it is impressive enough for you to decorate yourself with."/ Fighting alongside the God of Thunder would never be not cool.

/"I'm okay, and I'm totally joining you for Paw Patrol. Got a bunch of the rats webbed up. Maybe Bruce can find a way to turn them back to normal. You know, once he has turned back to normal."/ Peter finally chimed in.

/"Speaking of, does anyone have eyes on the Hulk?"/ It was sadly impossible to equip the green guy with an earwig.

Spidey took a careful look around himself.

/"He was with me for most of the fight... Wait! I see him!"/

He had spotted the big guy a little ways away from his position, seemingly crouched over something. The part-time Avenger and full-time vigilante quickly swung his way to the Hulk.

/"Just... be careful, Spidey."/ Steve's cautious warning almost made Peter roll his eyes. He knew the team worried about his easy and unconcerned interactions with Hulk, and he couldn't really fault them. After all, the Hulk was the embodiment of Dr. Banner's uncontrolled anger, and was therefore, dangerous. But Peter's Spidey-sense never went off when he was around the big guy, or rather, it never went off because of the big guy, so Peter didn't worry. He knew though, that Tony was probably already on his way to them, just in case.

He landed beside the hulking giant.

"Hey buddy! You okay? Something wrong?"

The Hulk looked at him, and then slowly turned, so that Peter was able to see what was before him. The teenaged vigilante paled behind the mask.

On the ground before them laid the remains of what must have been a carton box. One of the pieces was large enough to read the handwritten 'Free to a good home', scribbled on it. Some of the carton pieces were drenched in red. And tiny bones could be seen among them.

Hulk's grumbling voice thankfully pulled him away from the grizzly scene.

"The evil mice were eating them... Hulk was too late to save the others."

Then Hulk turned further, and revealed a small, softly mewling kitten in his palm. The giant, green hand, made the little kitten look even tinier than it probably was. And Peter's heart just melted.

"I'm really sorry, bud, but you managed to safe this one! That's great! You are a hero! Do you mind if I took it for a minute? Make sure it isn't hurt anywhere?"

The Hulk grunted his agreement, and with a gentleness few would ever associate with the big guy, handed the little kitten over. Neither of the two turned around when Iron Man landed just a couple of steps behind them.

"Hey there, big guy. Spidey. You both good? You know, because you might want to let the team know that you are both good. So that the team doesn't worry."

Instead of answering his adoptive father, Peter addressed Hulk.

"She looks fine to me. But we might want to let a doctor check up on her. Just to make sure nothing is broken."

He placed the little kitten carefully back into his green friend's big hand, and the little fluff ball immediately curled up and started purring. Peter pat Hulk's shoulder in congratulation.

"She likes you!"

Iron Man had come closer.

 "Is that a cat?"

Hulk smiled.

"Hulk likes her, too. She is tiny... Like Bug-boy. Hulk likes Bug-boy."

"You know, big guy, I don't even mind you calling me that. I like you, too."

 "No, seriously, where did the cat come from?"

"Puny Banner is a doctor."

"Well, I was thinking more along the line of a veterinarian, but Bruce should be able to tell if anything was wrong with her. Especially with the equipment at the tower. And if all else fails, there is still Helen. She is the best doctor ever."

 "Okay, one, Bruce would throw in that he is 'not that kind of doctor', right about now. And two, what is the deal with the cat?"

Hulk grunted.

"Hulk will go now. So that puny Banner can take care of her. Bug-boy tell puny Banner that Hulk is keeping her."

Peter nodded enthusiastically.

"Great! What do you want to name her?"

 "Am I invisible to you people? What the hell is the deal with the cat?"

Hulk looked down at the purring kitten in his palm, a thoughtful look on his face.

"Little Smash."

Peter grinned.

"That's a great name!"

 "Seriously, am I invisible? Did I die without noticing and am roaming the streets as a ghost now? Were those rats magic? Is this a curse?"

When the Hulk shrank back into his other half, Bruce found himself even more confused than he usually was after a transformation. Beside him, Peter, in his Spiderman suit, was trying to calm down a comically panicking Tony, who was still in his Iron Man armor, and apparently convinced that he had been turned into an astral projection of himself.

He was standing in the middle of a street in Brooklyn (in only his thankfully very stretchy pants), there were big, twitching web cocoons some feet away from them on the ground, and in his hands was a sleeping little kitten, purring up a storm.

Peter paused long enough from reassuring Tony that he was, indeed, both visible and audible, and definitely not a ghost, to quickly address the confused Bruce.

"That's Little Smash! She is Hulk's! He said to take good care of her! Oh, and she might need an x-ray."

Then he was back at pointedly not ignoring Tony.

Bruce looked down at the sleeping kitten in his hands and sighed.

Oh well,... at least she was cute.

[angelofberlin2000]

"A fight scene can’t be just kill, kill, kill...You're telling a story."

Jeremy Price

May 17, 2019

John Wick

Not everyone appreciates the subtleties of ramming a pencil through an eardrum. Jonathan Eusebio does.

“A fight scene can’t be just kill, kill, kill,” he says. “There’s a rhythm, an emotional arc to it. You’re telling a story.”

Eusebio is a core part of 87eleven Action Design, the team of martial arts virtuosos behind the John Wick films. With director (and black belt) Chad Stahelski at the wheel, 87eleven has crafted an action series that masterfully combines the balletic elegance of The Matrix with the gut-wrenching savagery of Fight Club.

Keanu Reeves stunt double Jackson Spidell in Chewbacca mask and Keanu Reeves

Jackson Spidell

It’s an aesthetic of violence that’s truly in a class of its own—brutal, beautiful, and undeniably badass.

So with John Wick: Chapter 3—Parabellum hitting theaters today, Maxim reached out to the stunt professionals behind the series to find out how they train for and execute some of the most daring stunts and combat sequences ever captured on film.

Jackson Spidell, stunt double for Keanu Reeves in all three 'John Wick' movies

Keanu Reeves and Jackson Spidell - Jackson Spidell

At the beginning of John Wick: Chapter 2, John gets hit by a car. What was it like to execute that stunt?

We in the stunt business have a funny saying, kind of a running joke. We say, “Well, gotta pay this rent”—and then we just go for it.

For this one, Chad [Stahelski] wanted the hit to be as blind as possible. He was like, “I understand if you have to look right before it hits you—just don’t react too early.” And I was like, “Okay, I’m not looking at that car at all.”

The car was driven by Danny Hernandez, one of my teammates. I was the first person he'd ever hit with a car on film, so we're getting ready, and he's like, “You good?” I was like, “Dude, just put that fucking gas pedal down.” We bump fists, give each other hugs, and slap each other in the face.

Jackson Spidell (top) Oleg Prudius (holding Spidell over his head)

Jackson Spidell

[So we go to film it.] I was looking at the person in front of me, using my peripherals, and then—bam!—got cleaned out. Danny was kinda booking it, probably going 15 to 17 miles an hour. I ride the hood, he brakes, I roll off... and they’re like, “Cool. Moving on.”

The funniest thing about that take was that there was a huge stunt pad in the back of the shot that someone forgot to move. Chad was like, “The take is too good... We’ll have to paint it out.” He goes, “Someone [just made] a multi-thousand-dollar mistake. Thanks for that.” And I was like, “Well, I'm gonna have to thank the visual effects department for making it so that I don't have to get hit by a car again!”

Jonathan Eusebio, fight coordinator for 'John Wick' and 'John Wick: Chapter 2', stunt coordinator and fight choreographer for 'John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum'

Jonathan Eusebio (left) training Keanu (in beanie) - Jonathan Eusebio

What was it like to train Keanu for his role as John Wick?

He’s an absolute workhorse. Usually, we take like eight weeks to train for a movie. But he’ll train eight hours a day for like six months. It’s amazing. He’s over 50, and he can do things that some stunt guys can’t do.

If you watch Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, or Bruce Lee fights, it’s all long, beautiful shots—you can see all the choreography, and that’s because they can physically do all those moves. Sometimes you have to cheat if [actors] can't do the stuff—[the camera] goes to a close-up, or to the back of the double. But there’s no reason to turn the camera away from Keanu, because he does 98% of everything—and the other 2% are things that insurance won’t let us do.

As for the martial arts training, we made judo and jiu-jitsu his base styles. For his empty-hand stuff, we used a lot of karate-based blocks and strikes. We were also using sambo and shoot wrestling, and then the knife stuff—and the pencil stuff—was from our training in kali, a Filipino style.

In this new movie, John is fighting many different types of opponents. Chad [Stahelski] wanted to see his judo and jiu-jitsu versus kung fu, versus karate, and versus silat. So the [question] was always, how does someone with that skill set deal with these other, equally lethal skill sets?

In the first [two movies,] John was mostly fighting one-on-one, but this time he's fighting multiple opponents at the same time. So we also used a lot of aikido-esque movements—a lot of circular movements and wrist locks, not as much striking. There’s a lot of absorbing force and redirecting it, so the footwork and evasion tactics are very smooth.

At the end of the day, fight choreography and dance choreography are all the same. You have movements that have to be matched by both partners—it’s a dialogue, a whole visual language. So when [Keanu learns] the choreography, it’s just as important for him to get the mindset or the intention of what he’s doing, because that's what people are drawn to.

Jon Valera, fight coordinator for John Wick and John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum

Jon Valera

In Parabellum, Halle Berry’s character fights alongside combat-trained canines. How does it feel to be attacked by a dog?

So you wear this pad on your chest—almost like an impact vest—and the trainers tie this fluorescent green tug to it, which is like a chew toy. Then you stand in front of the dog, the trainer taps the tug, and these dogs, Belgian Malinois, have to lock eyes on it. But some of them zeroed in on your eyes instead, which was kind of scary. One of the dogs was named Sam, and they said he had ADD because he was always looking around everywhere. But when the dogs [are preparing to] attack, their eyes can’t wander—they have to stay locked on the tug. So if Sam started looking around, the trainer would go back to the tug. He’d go, “Sam,” tap, tap, tap, “keep your eyes here.” Now the dog is basically a missile—the [instant] you see them leave the ground is literally a second before you get hit. The trainer always told us, “When you feel the hit, go with it. Don’t stonewall or try to fight it, or you could hurt the dog.” They think of it as play, so if they get hurt, they won’t want to attack again.

Jon Valera (wearing shorts), Jonathan Eusebio (spiky hair), Jackson Spidell (gray hat).jpg - Jon Valera

The tug is tied and reinforced so that when the dog clamps down on it, he can't get it off, and it looks like he’s really ripping into us. Then once they yell “Cut,” the trainer throws a bouncy toy, and the dog goes after it. There were also groin hits, so all of us invested in steel cups. [Fortunately,] the tug for those hits was not right at the groin, but just below the beltline. And the trainer would be sitting there tapping it: “Right here, right here…” I’ve had my fair share of injuries in stunts, but for some reason my fear just turns off on set. And we had already trained with the dogs for two months, so I treated each one like just another training partner. Like, “Hey, I trust this guy.”

I’m just so proud and honored to be a part of this movie… Wait till you see it. You’re gonna be blown away.

[dongboner2999]

Strangers ch. 26

You see Xiumin again, and the drama is off to an interesting start.

Pairing: Yoongi x (female) Reader

Word count: 2.4k

Genre: Fluff

|mlist|

<–– Prev   Next ––>

Yoongi freezes. “Wh-what?”

His bewilderment is so adorable that you can’t possibly keep from laughing. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding, oh my god.”

Yoongi exhales loudly, as though he had been holding his breath. “Dumbass, you scared me.”

You pout. “Is the idea of kissing me that terrifying?” You’re joking, of course.

When Yoongi speaks his voice is low, half strangled.

“I mean, we’ll both only be acting, right?”

You blink once, twice. “Right, only acting...” you scratch your head, chuckling weakly. His flat tone is off-putting somehow. “Man, once this drama starts your fans are gonna keep going off–”

“Keep?”

Uh-oh. You instantly realize your mistake, backpedaling clumsily.

“I mean, I just meant, uh... you know, I guess ARMYs can be kind of... harsh? I’m only assuming,” you rush to add.

“Y/n... have you been getting hate from our fans?”

You gulp. Yoongi doesn’t follow you on Twitter, since he’s only online with the BTS account. If he hears the type of comments you’ve been receiving, he’ll worry, and his dorky ass might actually try to do something about it.

“Are you kidding? Of course not. I’d tell you if anything was bothering me,” you laugh, booping his nose playfully. The falsehood tugs at you, wrestling with your conscience, but you refuse to let it get to you. Of every lie you’ve told, this one isn’t bad.

“Anyways, I have hella homework and now that I have, you know, my own bed again...” you shift your weight from side to side. “Thanks again for letting me stay with you by the way.” I was in a bad place, the worst place, and you gave me everything. “I really appreciate it.”

Yoongi reaches out and rubs his thumb against the Starry Night bead resting at the hollow of your throat. “Of course, y/n, what are friends for?”

“Nerd.” You smile widely before shoving your hands in your coat pockets. “I’ll see you later then?”

“Yeah.”

Too jittery to ask for a ride, you turn and begin walking the familiar road back home.

“Y/n, wait!” You feel Yoongi grip your elbow and when you turn around, you very suddenly find your face an inch from his, his eyes devouring you, and his lips so, so, close...

Yoongi smirks. “Kidding. Catch you later, y/n.”

You swallow. “Right. Later.”

You spin on your heel and hightail it back to your apartment. What was that? Did he try to kiss you? Was he getting you back for teasing him earlier? And why, oh why did some very small part of you really want to kiss him, want to press your lips against his and–

Idiot. No. No no no no. If anyone in the whole wide world is off limits, then it’s him. Yoongi. The man with the big “DO NOT TOUCH” on his heart, so to speak. You can’t like him, never ever, and certainly not now, at the peak of his career.

Besides, you only felt that way because he was an idol, right? Right? Up until you met the guy, all you wanted was to marry him. And, of course, after acting out that scene for the audition– it’s only natural.

You shake your head, remembering the shiver that ran down your spine when his lips neared yours. What was happening to you? As you lie in bed, half asleep, your thoughts drift to what your life has become.

“Bitch.”

“Slut.”

“Whore.”

“Talentless, worthless, pathetic.”

The voices swirl around you, the insults flying like gusts of wind, and they tear at your frame, shoving you, forcing you to your knees and when you try to speak it feels like your words are sucked straight out of your lungs.

“Stop it!” You try to scream, but no noise leaves your mouth. “I didn’t do anything wrong! Stop it!”

“You touched him.”

“You talked to him.”

“You kissed him.”

“He’s ours!”

“Ours, ours, ours, ours, o-”

“Fame, flashlight– gi-give it to me!”

“Aah!” You bolt upwards, chest heaving, your forehead damp with sweat. You reach for your phone to shut off the alarm– your neighbors probably hate you by now.

Ugh, you’re sleepy, but you’ve got things to do. What else is new? It’s been... what, the third day in a row that you’ve gotten four hours of sleep? As you stand up, you feel a sudden dizziness. A few seconds later it passes, and you can go about your day.

And by day, you mean coffee. After you quit working at the cafe, your daily dose of caffeine had become more expensive– to the point where you finally gave in and bought a cheap coffee machine. Which, of course, has suddenly decided to stop working.

You watch the machine sputter and gasp, resulting in two drops of coffee and one headache. Great. You start filming for Moon Over the Sea today and you really can’t afford any mishaps. Especially if you’re filming with Yoongi. 

No mishaps means caffeine. Caffeine means cafe. Cafe means...

Xiumin.

You shake your head and breathe deeply– you’re going to have to see your ex eventually, and your old cafe is on the way to the studio. It’s the only place you can stop if you want to get there on time.

The familiar bell jingles and you’re once more drawn into your old life– a life before you met Min Yoongi; a life when your love of BTS stemmed from music videos and interviews, not games and banter; a life when you were only an overworked acting student and not despised by thousands of ARMYs. A life when Xiumin was nothing more than a friendly coworker.

You walk to the counter, where a painfully familiar head of hair is making a drink.

“Hi, can I help y- oh.” His voice makes your heart stutter, because it’s Xiumin, he made you breakfast and visited you in the hospital and cheated on you with a girl he called beautiful...

In your head you’re punching him. Out loud, you merely steel yourself– “Hi, can I get a double espresso?” No please. He doesn’t deserve a please.

“Uh...” Xiumin swallows nervously, and you feel a small rush of satisfaction. “Yeah. It’s been a while, huh?”

Your smile remains frozen on your face. “My double espresso?”

Xiumin doesn’t move. “Y/n, come on, talk to me.”

“There’s nothing to talk about. My espresso would be nice though.”

“I miss you.”

At his words you expect pain, you expect longing– you expect to want him back. And yet...

Your mind wanders to Yoongi. When you told him what happened with Xiumin, you saw his face: pure rage was reflected in those dark eyes.

“You deserve better,” he’d said during one of your long winded, alcohol-fueled rants.

He was right; you did deserve better. Is that why, now, you don’t feel a twinge in your heart on seeing your ex?

“Y/n, please, come back to me. Things can be just like how they were.”

His voice shakes you from your stupor, and your careful grip on your emotions loosens.

“How they were? Tell me, Xiumin, how exactly were things? Because I seem to recall a supposedly monogamous relationship in which we told each other everything, and I’m guessing you only recall how desperate you were to get your dick wet.”

Xiumin opens his mouth and you raise your eyebrows in response. “Answer me, I dare you.”

“You know, I could sue you for my birds,” he growls finally. “And my car. That’s property damage. I could sue you for every penny you’ve made from those ads, and that music video.”

You pause. What is he talking about? “Property damage?”

He scoffs. “Don’t act like you don’t know. You ruined my car!”

Delusional. “Whatever you say, Xiumin. Can you actually do your job and give me my coffee now?”

With an icy glare, he thrusts your espresso into your hands. As you saunter out, you turn and call to him: “Enjoy losing the one person in your life who could actually remember your name!”

He flips you off in response and, with that weight off your shoulders, your gait turns sprightly as you make your way to the studio. You arrive at 8am on the dot, and spy a familiar figure among the many milling around and awaiting direction.

You approach and tap him on the shoulder. “Yoongles~”

“Huh?” He turns around and it’s not him, it’s a face that’s very much not your Yoongi, it’s someone else, and you called him Yoongles–

“Oh! I’m, uh, sorry!” You turn and scuttle, cheeks flaming; you just bothered what must have been Yoongi’s body double, you’re such an idiot.

“You too, hm?” You hear a low chuckle and notice the real Yoongi leaning against a wall. “You’re the fifth person who thought he was me. Shit, I was confused when I saw the guy!”

You laugh with embarrassment. “Some friend I am.”

“Hey,” Yoongi leans forward and boops your nose. “You’re a good friend. Really.”

You blush. A world famous idol thinks you’re a good friend, even when all you’ve done is lie and pretend. How did you get so lucky? “Shut your face hole, nerd,” you reply, poking him before you get too sappy.

Yoongi opens his mouth to reply when you hear two loud claps echoing through the loud studio.

“Okay! Hello, cast and crew of Moon Over the Sea! I’m your director, Avery.” An elegant women with a curious accent speaks over the general chatter.

“You may notice I have an accent– that’s because I was raised in America. Now, we’re on a tight schedule so I expect all of you to work hard and productively for the next for months to make this drama the best it can be!”

The present company claps politely. “She seems nice,” you whisper.

“Here’s to hoping,” Yoongi murmurs in reply.

Avery consults a clipboard. “Now, for the scenes today I will need the following actors.” She reads aloud a list of names and you only tune in at “...Min Yoongi, and l/n y/n. The rest of the cast may go home– we’ll need everyone tomorrow, so be here bright and early.”

The studio empties out and the hair and makeup crews retreat to their respective areas. There are several extras and about a dozen named actors left after the movement ceases. Some of them you even recognize. You feel more than a little starstruck– you’re definitely the least attractive person here.

“As you know, this drama is inspired by the time-honored classic of Pride and Prejudice,” Avery continues. “Our leads will be played by Park Bo-young and Park Hyung-sik–” she nods at the familiar-looking actors and you blink hard, half blinded by the physical perfection. “– but the rest of you still have important stories to tell.”

You nod along, enraptured, and you see Yoongi smirk at you. He’s probably used to all the glitz and glam, but you’re savoring it– who knows how long it’ll last?

“For that reason, we’re filming Kim Ji-woo and Moon Sung-min first.” You jump at the summons of your character. “The scene is set for their first meeting, at the Sung family ball. I expect all actors and extras to be in costume and in character in the next half-hour. Go!”

Half an hour later you find yourself well dressed and slightly out of breath in a very realistic studio ballroom. Yoongi, infinitely more well dressed and not at all out of breath, nudges you.

“You look pretty,” he whispers.

“Not in comparison to literally everyone else,” you reply.

Yoongi looks like he’s about to say something  when Avery approaches, barking orders at extras. “You and you, there. You, go there. Bo-young, you play Hyeon, and you’re y/n’s younger sister, so stand a bit behind her. You know your lines, yes? Good. Let’s start with Bo-young’s line. Ready, and... action!”

There’s a clap and the cameras begin rolling. In the grandly decorated ballroom, the extras talk quietly amongst themselves. You and Bo-young stand tall in your dresses.

“I do believe Moon Sung-min is looking at you, sister,” Bo-young says teasingly.

You glance up momentarily and catch Yoongi’s eye. He’s gazing at you intensely, eyes alight with interest. 

You quickly blush and look away. “You’re mistaken. He’s far above us–”

“Which is why you should talk to him. Imagine the look on Mother’s face when she sees you with one of the wealthiest men here.”

“Hyeon!” you laugh. “Please, I could never!”

“Doesn’t seem like you’re going to have a choice, Ji-woo. He’s coming over~” Bo-young sings. “I’m going to go dance with the others. Have fun!”

“Sister–”

It’s too late, the fake crowd has swallowed her whole, and suddenly Yoongi is right in front of you and every cell in your body feels tense, nervous, as if it really is your first time meeting him.

“Hello. Miss Kim, yes?”

You feel your cheeks heat up at his voice.

“Y-yes,” you reply, sweeping your skirts in a deep curtsy. “And you must be Mr. Moon Sung-min. Are you enjoying the ball?”

Yoongi’s voice dips low, laced with longing. “Much more now, I think.”

“Cut! Great, guys.” Avery’s voice draws you back to reality, back to a world where the man in front of you isn’t meant for you. “Let’s take it from the top– that chemistry was crackling. I’m sure we’ll get it perfect in the next few takes.”

Suddenly an assistant holding a buzzing phone scurries up to Avery and hands it to her. With a nod of apology to the cast, she answers.

“Hello? Yes, this is she... What? Hang on, we have that area scheduled for filming on those dates. Who–” Avery’s voice turns icy. “I understand. What other times are available...? Oh, you’re kidding. Okay. Okay. Yes, crystal clear. Thank you, goodbye.”

As she hangs up she sighs deeply. “This is gonna mean a lot of emails.”

“What happened?” You ask.

“We have a number of outdoor scenes scheduled in a few weeks and we reserved an area for filming, but someone bought out the space. They can move our time, but... it’s a pain. We’ll have to redraw the filming schedule and move those scenes forward.”

“How forward?”

Avery grimaces. “Starting tomorrow. Congrats, Yoongi, y/n– we’re filming your first kiss tomorrow. Alright everyone, let’s get back to work!”

[levelstory-old]

Top 5 E3 Announcements

The Electronic Entertainment Expo, more commonly known as E3, is a yearly event that showcases what is up and coming in the video gaming industry. Gamers across the world get hyped and this year packed a huge punch.

To be honest, I never pay close attention to E3 because most showcases tend to look very samey (i.e. watch the Bethesda showcase). I'm not all that interested in the "dark and gritty" genre of games and so I usually hang back and let twitter fill me in on the hype. I didn't expect much.

Sure I expected to get excited by some things, but I was caught off guard by the several moments that blew me away, surprised me, and even made me tear up a bit! Here is my top 5 list, 1 ranking as least exciting (even though least exciting is still really freaking exciting) to 5 ranking as the most exciting (the G.O.A.T. of E3).

Number 1: Ni No Kuni Coming to Switch, Remaster Coming to PC & PS4

Originally released on the Playstation 3, Ni No Kuni is a game that stands out due to it being animated by the renowned Studio Ghibli. Since I never owned a PS3, I never played the game. After the sequel came out, I had high hopes that the original would port to the PS4 but no such announcement ever came. I was starting to give up. In fact, only days ago I went so far as to look into emulating the game on my PC as I've been dying to play it.

This news has come at a perfect time! The game is releasing on the Switch, PC, and PS4. But there is a catch. The game has been remastered for all systems but the Switch which will be receiving the original port of the game. Now I will have to decide if I want the game on the Switch or PS4. I enjoy playing games more on the Switch but also want the remastered version. Decisions decisions.

Number 2: Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair

I still have yet to finish the original Yooka-Laylee game (read about my experience with the game thus far in the first issue of Level Story) but now it seems I have reason to be excited to play it some more. The announcement of the sequel to the highly successful modern platformer came as quite a surprise to me. While a sequel has certainly been on my radar, I didn't quite expect one so soon.

What really excites me about this sequel is how it appears to capture the spirit of the first game while also moving in a completely new platforming direction in the side scroller. Several commenters wrote that the game looked similar to DKC Tropical Freeze and that is a pretty nice complement. Waking up to this news was just a treat.

Number 3: Banjo-Kazooie in SMASH

Okay, confession time. I don't like the SMASH games. I've never gotten into them and haven't had the desire to change that. Seeing all the hype for the recent Switch release got me excited in a very removed sense. Watching other people get excited about the game (and about Joker from Persona 5 being in the game) made me excited even though I knew there was very little that would persuade me to shell out my money for this title.

Throughout this time, rumors were strewn about twitter saying that Banjo and Kazooie might be announced as the next characters in SMASH. Banjo-Kazooie is a game I grew up playing all the time and I have a strong connection to it. While I had no connection to SMASH, I had a strange desire to see the bear and bird get their dues since they haven't really had much luck since being bought by Microsoft.

Their announcement brought tears to my eyes. Perhaps nostalgia had taken over, or maybe it was the fans joyful reactions that made me emotional, but I finally have a reason to pick up this game. Whether that will actually happen or not is still to be decided. But after watching that trailer, how can you not be hyped for this?!

Number 4: Final Fantasy VII

Final Fantasy VII is one of those celebrated games that I hear about all the time yet somehow I am so separated from it that I only know that it is considered a good game and literally nothing else. I didn't have Playstation growing up and never had an interest in Final Fantasy games so just never played it.

But since my love for the Kingdom Hearts series has pushed me to enter the realm of Final Fantasy and since I am just generally interested in stories told in games and FFVII is said to have an amazing story, I have decided to put a bit more stock in FFVII. I have just started to play the ported game on my Switch and have watched closely for updates about the remake.

And turns out, this new interest has paid off because wow does this game look really good. Square Enix really stole the show when they premiered the full length trailer at E3. Everything looks so polished and beautiful. While I imagine there will be changes from the original, I still think this game looks amazing and I look forward to real time action gameplay vs. the original turn based combat.

Number 5: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Sequel

Okay...let me set this up for you. I did not grow up playing Zelda. My cousin gave me a hand-me-down copy of Ocarina of Time and I just didn't play it all too often (yes, I regret my adolescent decisions). Breath of the Wild is technically my first Zelda game and it is hard to put into words how much I love it. I've put in over 150 hours of play time and when I finally beat the final boss this past Sunday, I was happy but also sad that the game had come to an end.

My biggest wish was to explore Hyrule some more post beating Ganon (when you beat the game, a star appears on your file and you are placed at the point right before beating Ganon). Then, a few days later, this sequel was announced. This is the GOAT for me. I am on the Breath of the Wild hype train. There is no release date for the game yet which kind of gets me down but I am too excited for this game to care! This was easily the best announcement at E3.

And I can't finish this article without an honorable mention….

Kingdom Hearts 3 DLC

Kingdom Hearts is my all time favorite franchise. Despite its existence in the absurd and the blatant examples of bad storytelling, I always find myself coming back to these games and having a blast with them. It is a series I will stick with through and through.

DLC for Kingdom Hearts 3 has been on the horizon ever since the game was released back in January of this year. Fans of the franchise know the "vanilla" KH games are only the starting point. Almost every title has come out with a re-release known as "final mix" where new content is added including cut scenes, gameplay scenarios, additional mechanics, and more. Back in the early 2000's, final mix was a pretty unique concept. Today, final mix is just DLC. Yes, I know, KH was ahead of its time.

The new trailer showcasing what is to come in the new paid DLC has got me very excited. It looks like we will get to play as new characters, have new keyblades, and there will be a ton of convoluted plot dump that only KH can bring.

While this would have been a highlight for me, I thought Square Enix gave zero hype to this. The trailer was originally shown at the KH Orchestra concert in LA and director Tetsuya Nomura told the audience not to film it or there would be dire consequences. Someone filmed it and now the conspiracy is that this person made Nomura angry. While I don't think this person should have filmed the trailer, I also think it is kind of sick that Nomura can put out a threat like that and KH fans tweet out, "you upset Nomura. Thanks a lot."

Speculation went about saying that Square might have been planning a longer trailer at E3. Whether this was correct and Nomura pulled it due to his "dire consequences", or the E3 and Orchestra trailer were the same all along, we will never know. Either way, the trailer was exciting to see the first time but didn't do much to get me really excited like the 5 announcements I talked about in this piece.

What Did You Think?

So what did you think about E3? What were some of the highlights and your favorite announcements? Let me know in the comments!

[silverleafnightshade-blog]

The Exorcist

William Friedkin’s horror masterpiece, released 45 years ago this holiday season, was largely set in the collegiate Washington D.C. neighborhood of Georgetown. The Georgetown of the early 1970s was a bit less posh than the neighborhood today, but even at the height of the eponymous school’s frattiest years, the area was chockablock with Federal-style and early American architecture. The university itself is heavily featured in both book and film (author William Blatty was an alumnus), as are establishing shots of the Key Bridge (formally, the Francis Scott Key Bridge, built in 1923) that spans the Potomac.

The infamous “Exorcist Steps,” which run from Prospect down to M Street, were even honored as such by the city in a 2015 ceremony.

As previously established, I was raised Catholic-lite: First Confessed but barely Confirmed, aka Catholic enough to be disturbed by the Exorcist but not Catholic enough to have picketed the movie. Although in 1973 I was but one year old, and that would have been a very tiny and cute picket sign in my chubby fists, maybe “Former Fetuses Against Friedkin” or something like that. Anyway! I first watched the Exorcist with my atheist-raised high school bestie, and at the time we both agreed that it was just unsettling enough to raise some doubts about God and the Devil. Also about the wisdom of fucking around with a Ouija board.

No girl! Captain Howdy is not your friend, ma petite.

My second viewing of the film was as a full-grown adult, when the director’s cut was released in 1999. I now realized the true horror of this story was just under foot: the ugly carpeting in that awesome Federal-style townhouse!

The MacNeil residence’s main floor has herringbone parquet in the kitchen, dining nook, and study, but the rest of the house is covered in that ugly-ass, low-pile fuzz bomb. I could barely register Regan’s infamous spider walk down the stairs, I was so distracted by that gross carpeting.

I couldn’t stop thinking about it. Why would you ruin such a historic property? How could you commit such high crimes against the herringbone? But then I did some research, and sigh, I was all wrong. You see, the Exorcist house, aka the MacNeil Residence, wasn’t built until 1950.

Thus, that carpeting makes total sense, as does Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn)’s bedroom style.

The furniture is Federal-style but the wallpaper and (blech) carpet are definitely 20th century.

Regan doesn’t seem to be into carpeting much, either, given her tinkle on the Persian rug. I just love the reaction expression on Father Dyer’s face after Regan pisses the floor. By the way, that character was played by a real live priest, Father William J. O’Malley:

Speaking of priests, Father Damien Karras (Jason Miller) pretty much wiped out any remaining Catholicism lingering in me. I never met a priest half as handsome, and thus that confirmed that there must be no God.

Mon dieu, he is a tasty sacrament. O la la...

There was so much myth and legend surrounding The Exorcist, it’s sometimes hard to remember there was some bona fide weird shit happening as well. An actual serial killer makes an appearance in the film (okay, alleged serial killler, but convicted murderer). Friedkin shot the hospital imaging scene at New York University Medical Center, and used an actual neurosurgeon and his team as extras. Paul Bateson was an X-ray technician on staff at the hospital and made it into the scene, with a line to boot.

Bateson was arrested in 1979 for the murder of film critic Addison Verrill (an act committed during a date gone terribly wrong). While incarcerated at Riker’s, Bateson boasted to other inmates that he had murdered at least six other gay men. The details he provided were eerily similar to the “Bag Murders” that had terrified the NYC gay community in 1977 and 1978, when the bodies of missing queer men turned up in the Hudson River. The victims were all dismembered and disposed of in plastic bags, just as Bateson described. The police were never able to assemble enough evidence to charge Bateson, so he instead only served his sentence for the death of Verrill. William Friedkin had already been approached earlier to shoot a film based on the 1970 novel Cruising, but he passed on the offer until the Bateson arrest. Friedkin was so disturbed and intrigued by this story and his own connection to the murderer, he ended up making the film.

There are a lot of other fables about the Exorcist curse, which are mostly explained away easily. I personally was a bit haunted when doing my research, thinking about Georgetown Preparatory School and this past year’s shitshow Supreme Court nomination hearing. Even though Georgetown Prep separated from the University and moved to Bethesda, MD in 1919, the name is still triggering. Dr. Christine Blasey Ford still cannot live in her own house, due to death threats, and the accused sits clear and free on the highest court of the United States. Believe women. Why the fuck would we go through this torture a second time, if we weren’t telling the truth?

Here’s to hoping for a better 2019. I made it through a year of blogging about my special obsession, hurray! I’m going to keep this going as long as there are interesting architectural examples in 1970s horror movies. January is going to get weird, so stay tuned. I love you all, you sexy demons. Tabernak!