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Rarewomen Dear Author letter
Mar. 3rd, 2013 10:56 pmDear Author,
Thank you so much for offering for one of my fandoms! That we were matched means you have at least some interest in some combination of shounen-like Chinese historical fantasy, masked lady demon hunters, gothic horror about women and their relationships with haunted houses, lady paranormal investigators, and haunted turn-of-the-century houses. If you have a lot of love for all of the above, we really need to talk.
( Onward to fandoms! )
Thank you so much for offering for one of my fandoms! That we were matched means you have at least some interest in some combination of shounen-like Chinese historical fantasy, masked lady demon hunters, gothic horror about women and their relationships with haunted houses, lady paranormal investigators, and haunted turn-of-the-century houses. If you have a lot of love for all of the above, we really need to talk.
( Onward to fandoms! )
recent movies
Mar. 26th, 2012 09:48 pmThe Awakening: There are several movies by this name, this one is the 2011 horror movie with Rebecca "I'm the only decent thing about the 2006 version of Wide Sargasso Sea" Hall, Dominic "In-canon, I've been accused of only being hired for my pretty face" West and Imelda "I'm in half the period dramas you've seen, you just didn't notice" Staunton. Set in England in 1921, Florence is a GHOSTBUSTER who has published books and goes around exposing supernatural frauds. She also has a repressed angsty past, because she's a badass horror movie heroine and they just do. She gets hired to take care of a ghost at a boarding school where all the teachers appear to be PTSD-ridden war vets. Because there's no one better to take care of children than men who regularly have battlefield flashbacks, seizure, engage in self-mutilation and are prone to ranting about how they must train the boys to survive life via corporal punishment, and lots of it. Because he has a pretty safe that's perfectly designed for angsty brooding, Dominic West is there as Robert, the more sympathetic war vet with PTSD who spends a lot of time staring at Florence. There's also Maude, the overly-intense matron who is a huge fan of Florence's and likes to scold people for not respecting her enough.
Seriously, though, this is, largely, a pretty good horror movie. It's creepy and twisty and has good actors playing interesting characters. The last half hour gets seriously weird and the end is a bit confusing, but it worked for me (though there was one part where I was going to completely revise my opinion of the movie if it had gone somewhere, but it didn't) despite my going "this is getting seriously messed up." And there is an evil creepy dollhouse! And possibly the creepiest stuffed rabbit ever.
Beastly: This is based on a book I've heard good things about, but this movie is simply awful and I really hope they don't talk that way in the book. It is also extremely entertaining and everyone who was ever a 13-year-old girl should watch it just so they can think about how they would have thought it was wonderful then even though it's kind of weird and creepy and BWAH WHAT??? as an adult.
The Forgotten: A very fun movie with good actors forgetting how to act in which a woman is told she's going crazy because everyone is forgetting that her son exists. Fun and spooky and not obvious and somehow very endearing with the bad acting and everything. Not as good as The Awakening though. However, both have Dominic West and I was a bit thrown by that, simply because he was in 2 horror movies that I watched in a row (well, I watched a lot of stuff in between, but not horror movies) and I somehow don't associate him with horror movies.
My Week With Marilyn: This was more dude-centric than I was really expecting, but pretty good nonetheless. Somehow I went into this largely oblivious to who was in it (save that I'd somehow picked up on Julia Ormond being in it, though her role is small) and spent the whole movie getting distracted from the plot by going "oh it's x from y." It didn't help that some were made up to look like the people they were portraying so it took a bit to realize who they were. (But kudos to Eddie Redmayne for managing to tone down the intensity enough that I wasn't all "He may be a stalker! Look at his staring! Run aaaawwwwwwaaaaayyyyyy!!!") Though I actually found the most interesting part of the movie to be the actual filming and in-movie moviemaking. It also made me realize that I've absorbed Marilyn Monroe via cultural osmosis, but I don't think I've actually seen any of her movies. I should fix that.
The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake: 2011 movie about Qiu Jin, the feminist, revolutionary and writer who was executed in 1907. The movie begins with her arrest and then flashes back to her childhood, telling the main plotline linearly and flashing forward to her trial at various points. Unlike most movies about historical women, it doesn't focus on any real or fictional romantic relationship she had (her husband is there, but only has a few scenes) despite most of the relationships she has being with men, as the movie largely focuses on her political career. Pretty good movie, though I kept wanting it to show more of her relationships with other women. (Not that they were completely absent, I'm just biased.)
Seriously, though, this is, largely, a pretty good horror movie. It's creepy and twisty and has good actors playing interesting characters. The last half hour gets seriously weird and the end is a bit confusing, but it worked for me (though there was one part where I was going to completely revise my opinion of the movie if it had gone somewhere, but it didn't) despite my going "this is getting seriously messed up." And there is an evil creepy dollhouse! And possibly the creepiest stuffed rabbit ever.
Beastly: This is based on a book I've heard good things about, but this movie is simply awful and I really hope they don't talk that way in the book. It is also extremely entertaining and everyone who was ever a 13-year-old girl should watch it just so they can think about how they would have thought it was wonderful then even though it's kind of weird and creepy and BWAH WHAT??? as an adult.
The Forgotten: A very fun movie with good actors forgetting how to act in which a woman is told she's going crazy because everyone is forgetting that her son exists. Fun and spooky and not obvious and somehow very endearing with the bad acting and everything. Not as good as The Awakening though. However, both have Dominic West and I was a bit thrown by that, simply because he was in 2 horror movies that I watched in a row (well, I watched a lot of stuff in between, but not horror movies) and I somehow don't associate him with horror movies.
My Week With Marilyn: This was more dude-centric than I was really expecting, but pretty good nonetheless. Somehow I went into this largely oblivious to who was in it (save that I'd somehow picked up on Julia Ormond being in it, though her role is small) and spent the whole movie getting distracted from the plot by going "oh it's x from y." It didn't help that some were made up to look like the people they were portraying so it took a bit to realize who they were. (But kudos to Eddie Redmayne for managing to tone down the intensity enough that I wasn't all "He may be a stalker! Look at his staring! Run aaaawwwwwwaaaaayyyyyy!!!") Though I actually found the most interesting part of the movie to be the actual filming and in-movie moviemaking. It also made me realize that I've absorbed Marilyn Monroe via cultural osmosis, but I don't think I've actually seen any of her movies. I should fix that.
The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake: 2011 movie about Qiu Jin, the feminist, revolutionary and writer who was executed in 1907. The movie begins with her arrest and then flashes back to her childhood, telling the main plotline linearly and flashing forward to her trial at various points. Unlike most movies about historical women, it doesn't focus on any real or fictional romantic relationship she had (her husband is there, but only has a few scenes) despite most of the relationships she has being with men, as the movie largely focuses on her political career. Pretty good movie, though I kept wanting it to show more of her relationships with other women. (Not that they were completely absent, I'm just biased.)
