The safety of all things old...

I haven't let modern culture affect how I view older media, I'm stuck in that in between where I see problematic language for what it is but am too familiar with it to have a completely negative reaction. But what I find in watching any show that existed prior to 2001 is, it won't contain any mention of any piece of media I've grown to despise since that year.

Pretty much all media after 2001 has been either influenced or is a basis for reference for various intellectual properties I've just been so desperate to avoid hearing about. Even shows I really want to watch I have to put up with some throwaway line at the least, or parody at the worst. And the people I watched on YouTube were either reviewing the shit, or loving the shit, or loving the bad fanfiction related to the shit, or the fandoms of the stupid shit. I really wanted to enjoy this one girl's deepdives on toxic fandoms but she got grating, and she's another of a handful of people I watch who got stuck on the phrase "surffisive to say". I don't like to harp on about words that are not words, but if you're turning a misheard phrase such as "suffice it to say" into that, it's still not a real word. I know these kids type out their scripts so I don't know how their spell checkers never picked it up. I don't want to be a hater or a corrector, because it really crushes people to be corrected, I know dumb 40 year olds make those kinds of mistakes too, I'm the last person to judge. I still get annoyed. I also end up getting annoyed at these kids being into Wattpad fan fiction that's made me so sour about being an author that I can't get attention for any original work, even if the stories are getting dunked on and criticised either in its original form or in some adaptation, it's still getting attention and that only bolsters the people who write this shit to do more. All the people my university lecturers would have had thrown out for plagiarism and juvenile crap were the ones getting publishing deals, I stuck by my integrity and got stomped. I can't sit and have fun in that space with these YouTubers, I got to commiserate with one while we were both being screwed, but her platform rewarded her with the leg-up I could never get, so I had to leave her too.

My old DVDs and shows are the safest place for me, even if they're full of un-PC language, they're okay for me, and yes I recognise this 1000% as privilege. Even with politics, this is all before Trump and Hillary, hell it predates W. Bush robbing Gore, it predates 9/11. I can't praise this period since it makes me look nostalgic for a much shittier time, where people's feelings weren't protected at all, and I don't want to go back there, it just sucks that's the place I don't have to hear about current day stuff. I'm kinda into younger kids watching Degrassi, they're really good with humorous references and commentary, I get to watch their bug-eyed responses to language that isn't appropriate if they do go back to the older series. But, and I OOOP, the person I've never seen before who was doing a reaction video MENTIONS A THING I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT.

No YouTube channel is safe for me anymore. I've actually unsubbed from so many channels I have less to watch, so when we don't have an internet connection, I throw on a DVD series, and suddenly I'm not so interested in going back on YouTube. I think if I did this for maybe six months, if I limited all my media down to pre-2000s content basically for the rest of my life, I'll be fine. Fuck, if Billie Eilish can reboot 90s fashion, if the Gen Z crowd wants to resurrect pencil-thin brows and baggy shorts, fuck it, I'm here for it. I want a full length pencil skirt but I'm too hippy for those now. Harry Styles seems to have reached his Thom Yorke existentialist phase while hiding it behind 80s synth-pop parodies and I'm here for it, I listened to it repeatedly online months ago after it blew up on TikTok but didn't bother buying it until the other day. We've left too much of the past lying around for present-day kids to ignore it. My parents' music filtered into the songwriters I grew up with and since I didn't listen to pop princesses, I knew Leonard Cohen's shit via covers. Which is fine, I didn't expect teenagers to discover the Smashing Pumpkins and resonate with it too. They're better people than I am, I want them to have their things and love them, but I'm opting to run from it and go back to all the shit I loved before I left home.

The only major issue I have with 80s references in current day shows is, I'm starting to feel like the reference is the starting off point, and the whole scene/episode is written around it. It's not reached organically as you're fleshing out the story, you've gone "Wouldn't it be cool to have this reference at some point? However we get there is less important." It's why I find that shit so cringey and not cool and something worthy of genuine enjoyment. Stranger Things kinda wrecked the NeverEnding Story theme in that regard, now I guess Kate Bush is wrecked for some people. (True story, I still prefer the Placebo version, I like the original but I was never a Kate Bush fan, were I to say this elsewhere I'd be strung up). At what point to we stop using these references as a crutch and start making anything genuinely new? It's something that bothered me before the 2000s, reboots were so en-vogue even then, something stupid as Dr Doolittle with Eddie Murphy had me asking, okay so when do we get new movies? Star Wars was being re-released in cinemas, the everything old is new stuff was already a problem by the end of the 80s, I'm sounding like a giant hypocrite now. I wasn't that into it, I've never liked Star Wars. I've never really liked anything. One day we might get the Last Unicorn live-action remake, it's likely now but I won't hold my breath for that or the HBO Degrassi reboot, which might be dead due to that merger. Pretty soon, nothing will not be under Disney. I'm still waiting for my company to be absorbed by Amazon.

News Radio > Friends.

For all the un-PC shit Friends trotted out, its contemporary News Radio wasn't all that bad. Joe Rogan aside, (I like his character on News Radio so I limit my appreciation to purely that while I pretend he's not a meathead antivaxxer), I haven't really seen much that would be indefensible.

Lisa and Dave flying straight into a secret relationship instead of boring us with an interminable "will they/won't they" is more fun while we wait for the secret to be exposed, and Beth's inclusion on it is more fun. The "Spanish Fly" incident is a funny twist on workplace harassment probably wouldn't work in this current environment but I wouldn't say it's egregious. Dave looking better in Lisa's dress is a reference to Foley being considered relatively hot as a woman according to his Kids in the Hall cast, and it's true. I'm still laughing at the same shit that made me laugh 20 years ago. It's more a fine wine than a mouldy cheese that claims it's delicious when it's not. Friends had its moments but I can't see myself laughing at every scene in ever episode, aside from the early Chandler and Monica stuff, and some of Phoebe's antics, it would annoy me more to sit through the shrillness and whining. Joe and Matthew might've been relatively immature but they're not annoying, this was a clever as fuck show, and it wasn't entirely dependent on Phil Hartman carrying it, he was absolute gold, and yeah it can be reasonably argued his absence affected the rest of the show in a negative way, but the entire cast was solid and fun, Stephen Root is irreplaceable as Jimmy James, I can't mentally find a better actor for any of the roles, especially Beth. They were lovable, (yes, even Joe. Again, I choose to remember him as we knew him and not how we know him now). I don't know how else you could've pulled this entire thing off with anyone else. It's a smarter show than Friends or Suddenly Susan, or even Seinfeld. It's an unappreciated gem that deserves more credit and still holds up. Yeah, there's chauvinist bollocks in it on a 90s level, it's not stupendously sexist, at least there was equality in terms of who'd dish it out and none of the men are above justifiable criticism, the bullshit war between the sexes that was prevalent back then was at least a level playing field on this show.

Sandman...

I've failed at being a Gaiman fan for so many reasons. I have a weird attitude towards him for being glib about where his ideas come from while appreciating the fact as a creator, it's a terrible question to be asked. Because where else do your fucking ideas come from but your brain, logically. That being said, his contemporary Peter Beagle at least gave credit to a particular force coming in from the ether for him to speak to Molly Grue's anger over the Unicorn's failure to find her as a maiden. Being overcome by a character when you're in the grip of it, you sometimes speak a truth you didn't know was there until you gave it a voice. And I look at what I've done and wonder why I did it. Why that? Why those people? Nothing ever goes the way I plan so I don't plan, but I like giving up some control to it, too. So, the notion of a muse at work doesn't baffle me, I believe in nothing ethereal but that. Collectively, we draw on a certain thread of myths and legends, but why do these ideas come to some and not others, that's the weird part you have to appreciate. Of course someone who's never been "visited" is going to ask, "Where the fuck do you get these ideas?" I speak very little, so if I give you a story, it's a piece of what goes on in my head, and it usually surprises people.

My only question for Mr Gaiman is: Why is Sandman represented as a graphic novel and not a novel? I don't disagree with the decision, I'm curious now seeing it as a TV series what spurred it. He's done other shorts as graphic novels to good effect, like Snow, Glass, Apples (which you can attribute to Tori referencing it in Diamonds*), and it takes such a collaborative effort to make words into pictures. I've attempted it, more as an experiment to see what people could create from my words. The Sandman is an ambitious story that would probably be laborious if it weren't a graphic novel series, now I think of it. I'm bad at reading comics because the flow of text and dialogue sometimes confuses me, I didn't grow up with any series, I had a Care Bear magazine with a small comic in it, which I loved, but I never found out what happened in the next episode as it was the only one I had, and I even wished for the next edition but by then it was already out of date. That might've been what dissuaded me. I took longer to read books but I still got through bigger novels with multiple sequels, I read a lot less now. I decided to buy the Sandman books when I was working in the city and wanted stuff to read, while I was working further out, I'd buy books on my lunch break to just tide me over, and I had an iPod back then. I bought the Sandman books and of course my ever-ignorant team leader saw me reading one thinking comics are for kids, obviously. Which Sandman is not. Plus, it's a graphic novel, bitch. Not a comic. There is a relative distinction. And something about the Sandman in this format gives it a certain gravitas. It inspired more from me, I think I wrote more for reading it, but I never revisited it, and I wish I had before the series came out.

On the other hand, it's more fun to watch when I don't remember everything, so at least I can kind of have the joy of surprise with the scant understanding of the world and characters. Casting wise they've done so well, it's uncanny, it's something that deserves the best in terms of acting. It's also got scope for the characters to have a fluidity in representation and characterisation: Death is a black woman and less "manic pixie dream girl", but no less charming and wonderful. Lucifer is neither the suave nightclub owner in the other Netflix series, or the lanky, golden-haired Bowie tribute. You get Briene Tarth from Game of Thrones, who's imposing and beautiful while still embodying the playful but spiteful nature of Lucifer. (We also see Mazikeen, but I severely doubt we'll get the actual story of her mother, as the one in Lucifer was infinitely more tame).

And Desire is non-binary, Gaiman admitting their sister/brother would have been they/them had he created them now. What this achieved then was a perfect balance within the Endless of male and female characters, and this casting choice rectifies so much in terms of representation, the show has gone to good lengths to prove casting choices should ultimately be a meritocracy. I haven't heard complaints the way other adaptations have suffered because Gaiman fans knew he was already progressive and welcoming, many people were but lacked the language we have now. It hasn't had accusations of "wokeness" thrown at it because its audience was way ahead of everyone anyway. It does appeal to the strange and estranged more than a mainstream audience, which is where it makes the show inaccessible to those less knowledgeable. I keep waiting for the other Endless to appear, I thought I saw Delirium but she's absent, Destiny and Destruction are as well, it's pointless waiting for them because they play smaller parts in the story, which is filled with other tales. Each episode seems to follow a particular chapter while sticking to Dream's overall quest of sorts, which is plagued by his own disillusionment, but for the uninitiated, you're sort of left stranded unless you pay very close attention to the dialogue. Fans will spot Death whereas non-fans have to rely on some exposition. The episodes themselves are relatively slow in their pacing but still full of so much information that can be missed. I was more captivated by one episode while others were tedious and there wasn't any variation in pace at all, just the characters were more interesting. But because I also forgot how the story started I assumed the first episode was pieced together by unseen backstory. It's been 15 odd years since I read them. I only really remember the meandering we do on the way to the end, that certain stories were self-contained for the most part, which would make for a good series for everyone were they more familiar with the series as a whole. I don't really care if this is fine for people outside the fandom, but I can see how difficult it would be for someone with absolutely no knowledge to enjoy it. And I love Patton Oswalt, but his voice really does pull you out in ways his voice acting doesn't always do, I don't hate it but I don't agree with it. 

There's more to come I haven't watched, but it's the first show I've been genuinely excited for and want to follow through. I hate a lot of shit, Better Call Saul has one more episode, after that there's stuff on I'll watch but it's for the sake of having something on while we eat, and I can't stand looking for shows to watch over dinner. What streaming services do is give you too much choice, your brain goes numb, your food gets cold, and you just put whatever shit on for background noise. At least Sandman's been something to look forward to even if they let us binge it, I think they knew the episodes would be too slowly paced for most to endure in one sitting. Stranger Things having movie length episodes was excruciating and I had to keep turning them off, I was actively annoyed even if I liked it overall. I thought by now Netflix would have a handle on episode and series lengths but it's all over the place, it sucks.

I like the Sandman. I feel like I'm getting my money's worth for the most part.

Anyway, in a capsule I guess I can comment on the rest of the series, which is disjointed in relation to the beginning of the series, since it's basically the second book cut across multiple episodes. It wasn't enough for ten episodes of its own but in relation to the first part, it's kind of disconnected. The Corinthian is the obvious through line but we divert from him to focus on another bad guy for two episodes then they're not really part of it, while it's in line with the books, it feels disconnected on screen. Rose is sort of introduced in 24/7 but there wasn't much of a point to that once the Doll's House storyline starts. I didn't particularly like Jed, the superhero stuff was cringy, the emotion in some portions at the end was also cringy. Rose's exit from the Vortex conundrum makes sense and isn't a deus ex machina, but I think it would feel like one to an unfamiliar audience. Visually, it knocked it out of the park, everything looked good. There's something chaotic about the graphic novel in terms of style, I find some of it incredibly ugly but it's meant to be grotesque. Representing this on screen makes it look more spectacular and visually clearer.

I'm also waiting for the complaints about Desire being a queer-coded villain when they always were in the comic. But they were also dealt with relatively quickly. Maybe next season we get the other Endless and a return of those we've seen, Lucifer's gearing up to get revenge, Dream's about to face a lot, but I'm not excited for the next series at all. Which is kind of a bummer.

I genuinely hate watching anything where I see an idea of mine visually represented by coincidence: a character with diaphanous skin with swirling colours, another character turning into a burst of butterflies, Rose's character writes a book called Into the Night. I felt bad I lifted the Adam and Eve story because I thought it was a retelling of the original version but I think the Sandman one was more original. Same time, Death personified isn't a new concept either.

I hope it made real fans happy.

Terminator 2 is a near-perfect movie and we will never have another one. End of story.

My reviews have lately been about where my developing, prepubescent mind was around the early to mid 90s. Music and movies were affecting me more than anything, and I was weirdly overcome by the Terminator theme. In terms of action themes, it's not typical, it's basically a dirge, since Terminator isn't really your typical action film.

I'm not that familiar with the original. I liked it. But I love Terminator 2. It's one of the ones I watched when I was young but held up. I fucking cried at the end, y'all did, so you can't blame me. Also, I had a three week crush on Edward Furlong, (who really does look like a little kid the more I watch this. He's supposed to be ten but I only believe it now, I didn't then) so that didn't help. Acting-wise, he could've been as bad as Anakin in Phantom Menace but he's not dreadful.

I was easily moved by good movies and good scores. I wasn't allowed to watch it when I was nine, I think 12 was the age my brother saw anything above PG, as I said, I had to follow whatever path he'd been allowed. I'm not even into action films, but you can't call this a typical action film. Shit blows up but it's purposeful for the most part, people get shot but it's not entirely senseless. It grappled with the notion of fate and morality. It delved into the idea of becoming the thing you hate. It had an amazing female lead and decent characterisation. 98% of the special effects hold up and it didn't rely solely on CGI even if what it used was groundbreaking, it wasn't abusing that and made space for practical effects, which were a little obvious on rewatch but are better than a lot of 90s action films. It's well shot, it looks amazing remastered. Dare I say it, it's a thinking man's action film. Because Bond films are not. That's purely male fantasy.

I fucking hate James Cameron, I'll never watch any of the new Avatars. He can go piss up a flagpole, he's a total jerk. But he made an almost flawless film which can't go unrecognised. You have mild comedic relief, good set up and pay off. Arnold's basically at peak Terminator, I don't think he's ever been able to give the part the same humanity.

It also had the perfect ending. There was another scene of an older Sarah watching her grandchild play which was cut out, and I agree with. The black road at night is like the absolutely perfect ending for this. I should've ended there. Fuck the sequels. All of them. Throw them in the bin, they serve nothing to humanity. Maybe Salvation might be okay but I never bothered. Genesis was apparently a wet fart, Dark Fate might have shit worth bothering with, but I won't. I did bother with the Sarah Connor Chronicles, Shirley Manson as a fucking terminator is cool but we don't need it and it again becomes redundant later. I don't feel like Cameron really wanted to do more with this. Everything after 3 felt like a shameless cash in whether it was or it wasn't. I hope they're not about to rewrite history after the last attempt, it'll just suffer from sequelitis and retcons.

Leave the Terminator franchise alone.

Addendum 2023: I saw the original available to watch and decided I wanted to do a double-header, only the shitheads working on my concrete walkways decided to pick a public holiday to do their noisy-ass nonsense again (I thought they were done) so I couldn't start T2 until they were gone. The Terminator has a 100% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes and I don't agree. The acting's pretty awful, it really does depend on originality to carry it. Where I said the Sarah Connor Chronicles fails to be relevant comes from a line Kyle Reece says about nothing being able to go back, they're clever about not making him an expert about it, just a grunt, but the show suffered from the portal being more like an open door for rando characters to just show up. The other issue is, Arnold's too expressive as the Terminator. Really by the time Sarah's killing it, he's been replaced by the stop-motion chassis. I think since his English improved between movies, he understood what he was supposed to be going for and perfected it. The other men in the film are comic relief, I like the psychiatrist gets introduced then basically plays Sarah's real nemesis. It's a movie that didn't have to impress a lot of people, so when it did, we got a better sequel. According to RT, however, Arnold not being fun as a good guy and the plot being an unending chase sequence brought this down to 91%, but it still has a better audience score. Again, I get Furlong's acting isn't stellar but he is not the absolute worst as far as child actors go. (I can't tell you what made me crush on him at 12 but it rightfully didn't last long).

I don't know what the fuck y'all talking about Arnold's a million times more entertaining in this movie. STFU. He's like a big, dumb dog you don't want to see put down at the end of the movie.

Eyes Wide Shut

I was about to say I'm not a Kubrick fan until I realised he directed Clockwork Orange and Dr Strangelove, both of which I did like, not loved, but enjoyed mostly. The Moon Landing was pretty rad too. (J/K)

I hate the Shining, however. I absolutely couldn't stand the kid, Shelley Duvall is too overwrought not to be borderline comical, and while Nicholson basically carries the film, I still don't like him as an actor. Full Metal Jacket was fine but again I'm not into war movies, I wouldn't sit through it again because his movies are lengthy if you're not enjoying them. I don't think I'll see 2001, I've had that wrecked by references as well, I may attempt it.

He's an amazing visual storyteller, I wouldn't fault his technical abilities, and high def remasters really can bring out what was intended with his films. I just don't like the way he directs his actors in some cases. Eyes Wide Shut is one of those examples.

Now, you can look at this movie from many significant angles. It's Kubrick's last film, it's the vehicle that could have saved Nicole and Tom's marriage and finally disengage him from Scientology, it contained explicit moments between the pair that were blown way out of proportion compared to the rest of the film. Nicole couldn't defeat Scientology, sadly. I do feel sorry for her. Allegedly a sex therapist was involved to make their sex scene appear natural (it's not even that, they kiss naked in front of a mirror for half a minute and that's it, and soooo much hype was generated around that, we wanted an actual sex scene). A tabloid was sued over this, as it didn't happen. There was too much made of their pending separation for this to save everything. Scientology's absolutely to blame for this, like if he had some sense of critical thought and wasn't so easily led, I think he'd have been able to break their hold. Being on set seemed to be a way of keeping Tom absorbed and out of reach of the church but he doubled down later, whether he felt betrayed or the church's promises were too tempting.

But I don't get Nicole's performance in parts. She's very capable but she can't act drunk or stoned. When she's in a fit on the floor, it looks like first year actor's interpretation of a stoner during an improv performance. When she's drunk at the party, she's - well, see above. She has amazing moments when she's just being a bored housewife. I think she sucks at the other stuff. The scene she admits to wanting to leave the husband for a naval officer, which precipitates the whole mess, I really hate the way she stumbles around and casts aspersions, even when he's like, oh honey, of course other men want to fuck you you're amazing, I think she'd have been better off taking the fucking compliment. I feel like this is a story of mutual infidelity and how fucking pointless it is. It really feeds into an idea married couples don't fantasise of other people. 

Now, I don't know if the implications were set up that the doctor is a womaniser, he was about to go off with two models, he wasn't dissuading them at all. I'm assuming from how their relationship is set up from their boring apartment life to the lavish party where they're both seduced by other people, that he's already capable of cheating and has done. It's more obvious she's having fun flirting with someone, she's seen him, he's seen her. They can't write it off as a mutual transgression and admit their hypocrisy and move on, not until the end really. She has to prove in some obnoxious, overblown way, that women have fantasies about men, because he ignorantly assumes otherwise. Her execution is so ludicrously childish and pointless, but the point is she admits to wanting to leave him, so he finally gets jealous, just as she always wanted, and goes out with the intention of cheating, only to make a bunch of really stupid decisions. I feel like a certain maturity and sober discussion might've prevented all this, but then you wouldn't have a movie.

Yes, it's a movie about secrets and deception, maybe with a dash of class disparity. But that particular scene bothers the shit out of me. It's terrible. I don't think Tom's performance is bad, it's Nicole being too theatrical at the start. Oh, and her Australian accent really slips out later on, it's really there when she's upset. The scene where she's recounts her dreams is better acted, she carries this through until the final scene. I just can't believe she hasn't ever been stoned enough to know how to act that way. You see their humanity when they're exhausted and keeping up appearances for the daughter. What I think people wanted was a return to the chemistry they had in Days of Thunder, but it's really not there, just the gut-wrenching sensation it's all going wrong.

The only other thing that irks me is Tom playing doctor in such a stupid manner when he's dealing with the hooker passed out from a speedball. All he does is nudge and cajole her into opening her eyes, which she does. When we cut back to the bathroom, she has a blanket around her and she's feeling better. I don't know what else you should do, I understand he's there in lieu of cops/paramedics/causing a scene/covering up the host's transgressions. But at least in Almost Famous, we see the stomach pump, we see the ugliness. I have a feeling Tom didn't want to touch a naked lady. He tells the host to keep her there and get an escort home since the host was kinda hoping the good doctor would take out his trash, he tells her to give up the drugs and that's about it. She's integral to the story. So's Vinessa Shaw's character, who's great and sadly I've never seen her in anything outside Hocus Pocus. 

He's never bad in this but I think he could've done better. I have no idea what he was thinking during this performance and what it would mean for his marriage; superficially all I can assume is he loved her and thought the church was best for them, and she couldn't leave her family for him, why would you when they are literally attacking her and it seems to me Tom did little to defend her. (Attacking her father just because he was a mental health professional was so underhanded and sick). Tom's kinda all over the shop.

Speaking of shops, the costume shop scene is also ridiculous and I don't know if this is for comic relief or tension building, it is in the original story. Tom's also supposed to be the sexiest guy in the world and every woman/nubile child (the costume store owner's daughter)/obviously gay coded hotel receptionist wants to fuck him. He just obsesses over his wife fucking the basically mythological naval officer, who in reality could be absolutely anyone, including a gay guy. I think the story, which is an adaptation, has potential that's a bit wasted on this version in some parts. I think the draw card was having Nicole and Tom, and another couple, whether married or not, wouldn't have created the media stir that brought this to the mainstream. They were interested in a more Harrison Ford looking male lead, the culmination of Kubrick working with Tom and Nicole adds such a significant layer to the film. Other versions existed in Kubrick's mind given he'd had the rights since the 60s. Baldwin and Basinger were considered, she would be appropriate in terms of sex appeal. Jennifer Jason Lee and Harvey Keitel were filmed but had to leave for other projects, so it seems understandable Kubrick wanted Tom and Nicole to commit to this until its completion.

It's a clean and well-funded art house film that I don't think would've worked without Kubrick's eye in some places. However, his use of quick zoom ins for dramatic effect seems incredibly corny and dated by this point, the weight of the interrogation scene is diminished by the acting as well, everyone's using theatre voices. The sense of danger almost feels real, yet not completely. He's sweating bullets but I feel like someone needed to pull a knife or gun, the woman being taken away for "sacrifice" isn't quite ominous enough to me. Even the slowly executed ritual with the incense and Latin chanting was more mysterious than threatening.

It was hard then to put erotic thrillers out in large distribution without some controversy and blowback, However, the argument is it's not that at all, based on the fact it's missing the level of eroticism and "steaminess" needed for that category. So it's really a psychological thriller. The orgy scene is pretty sedate compared to scenes like in the Witcher and True Detective season 2. Basically, if you're doing more than the average film goer's conception of "erotic" then it's over the top, but it's not a sexy film. I think this disappointed that crowd as much as other mainstream films promising the same in their marketing. Oh, but you get a couple of guys slow dancing later, so progressive! More women are doing stuff with other women, of course. There were complaints about the women being more naked than the men, nudism should be an equal opportunity role, obviously, but most male directors aren't that keen on having a lot of peen on screen, and I'm sure there's a level of insecurity involved there. If you want that, go watch Game of Thrones. Hell, the new Queer as Folk had a split second of transpenis, if you're into that.

Also the ADR department had to work overtime with all the loud music and masks.  (Weirdly Cate Blanchet did the overdub for the speedball woman when she was in the mask, she said very little in the scenes you see her face, and I was more surprised Tom's character doesn't recognise her by her tits). That's reasonable but very noticeable. The interminable piano score for the second half of the film is very draining in terms of dragging out the tension, which is a Kubrickian thing, for sure. One thing I do despise is a drawn out denouement. The ending still feels very abrupt however, I can't even say what I was expecting, but Nicole and Tom in a toy store at Christmas deciding what to do about their failing marriage is kind of hilarious. Apparently Christmas is important in terms of symbolism (desire for toys is similar to a desire for sex) but seriously I think that's a little stretchy. There was a bit more to the final scene, which does tie everything together, but the tragedy of their separation in real life is playing out in Nicole's face so much at this point, and she nails it here, this is actually heartbreaking and real in the context of their failed marriage, something you'd not get from two actors not going through this.

The whole idea of the doctor getting in over his head is diminished if you consider this is some shallow threat to him, which is mentioned, the dead speedball woman is still dead, she's an expendable to the bad guys. We're supposed to identify with a guy who's realised he's crossed too many boundaries. The way he's gaslighted and left to question his experiences ties into the theme of the lines between dreams and reality being blurred.  But until this point, he hasn't done anything that redeemable for me to care what happens. If maybe he hadn't been acting like a womaniser from the beginning, if his wife was less sympathetic and perhaps actually cheated, and he's a broken man over it, okay, sure. You feel more sorry for the woman who sacrifices herself, which she only does in return for him treating her overdose. Man also shows up with a fuckin' taxi out the front, I'm sure that's not allowed. He chases this idea and gets a bunch of people in trouble and I can't say I feel sorry for the fuckin' idiot. If the implication is this is all completely real, the doctor doesn't seem so long suffering to have such a knee-jerk reaction to his wife fantasising of other men. He goes back to Vinessa Shaw's character again when he thinks his wife is just dreaming of other men. A dead body is what it takes for him to stop fucking with his life and fix his marriage.

I understand the themes involved, I'm not confused about anything, I don't know why other people were, shit it's not a film by Lynch but I'd watch his interpretation for sure. This movie's fine, it's interesting, I don't hate it but I wasn't largely impressed by it either.

 

 

Freaks and Geeks. Why not both?

Some reason my last watch of Freaks and Geeks wasn't a good one and I maybe got bored and quit watching the DVDs. Out of boredom I went back to it on streaming and I have to retract that it was boring, it really wasn't. Like it's shameful it wasn't given a shot. I also have to remind myself just because Paul Feig knocked it out of the park with this show, it doesn't make his rants on Twitter re: Ghostbusters and "hatin' on women" valid in anyway. People running to the defense of a bad movie on the basis of "you're picking on women" and for no other reason bothers the shit out of me. Please stop using gender as a defense against legitimate criticism. (See also: Wonder Woman, it was okay, it wasn't more amazing for what you bolstered it up for). Now I've seen the look Paul Feig gave Linda Cardellini during one episode I kinda wish someone had thrown that in his face recently. Yes, she was an adult (like 25 which is nuts considering she was meant to be 17) but her character wasn't and his character clearly was, so there's no argument. (There were a couple of "oh, you're super pretty" moments a lot of male writers give to female protagonists).

All that crap aside, Freaks and Geeks was a great show. It deserved better. I wanted to be Lindsey. Watching it I realised I was basically her. I was stuck in the middle of everybody, too smart but not smart enough grades-wise for my teachers to believe it or be put with the smart kids*, too nice but not nice enough to people who deserved better. I didn't fit. I went through the lengthy process of laying this out for a new psychologist and there wasn't a lot of opposition to what I said. I definitely got used by people who knew if they were nice to me they could exploit it, but I went through periods of being mean to the geeks as well, whoever was getting dogpiled on the most by everyone was a good scapegoat for the kids only slightly off the bottom rung. But I believed in the social ladder way too early. I hung out with the freaks who would've gotten me suspended, I hung out with the geeks who gave me shit for being a girl but were quite happy to flirt if they thought there was the slightest chance of getting in my pants. Lindsey's a lot like Veronica from Heathers by being forced to choose between two worlds but Lindsay won't unite them either. Lindsay's "Betty Finn" Millie doesn't get the short end of the stick, but Lindsay's brother Sam has to suffer some of her lack of consideration when she's inducted into the Freak Squad.

Going through the show even with all its great moments and great acting, which was mostly age appropriate but not entirely, the only one who looks completely misplaced is Jason Segel, however he was 19 and Linda Cardellini was 25, she was the one who looked age appropriate. Seth Rogan is pretty lackluster so he suits having a role with little to say but he got his shit together later, and you can see evidence of a guy who could be pretty great as an actor. (I hate his stoner laugh as much as everyone but I don't hate the guy, they give him a relatively mature topic to deal with and it's handled really well). It wasn't a crime to cast adults as teens, it was easier to cast boys since they could look a lot younger even as teens. Degrassi really was the only show that did it right. But I don't know where else the show would have gone after season 1. There are plenty of moments you can relate to on the cringe scale but it was also full of hilarious moments. It might have been repetitive eventually if they only focused on social stigma stuff and not teen issue stuff. That was the point, it really wasn't making any statements, it was just horribly relatable in an enjoyable way, and some moments were mortifying, like Degrassi could be. It did deserve better but what they would've done with a longer stint, I have no idea. I vaguely remember the episode one of the kids finds out his dad's a cheater, and I forgot the adults played more of a part in the show in terms of how they got involved with the kids, (including gaslighting and unfair assumptions) which gave it more of an adult feel, or it was appreciated more by adults as it was pitched at 20 somethings. The teachers were great characters which were fun to laugh at but still human, the coach isn't a total hard-ass and comes through for Bill and Sam. The guidance councellor isn't a total hippy. It did have some potential that could've really gone somewhere. Oh, and Tammy from Election has a part as Seth Rogan's love interest, so yay. (She's also the same age as me and so's Seth Rogan so them dating on the show is fine).

I realised how much it leaned on the Wonder Years (it basically was without the obligatory narration by the adult version of Fred Savage), but it was like a funnier, dirtier Wonder Years which was actually a lot more enjoyable and gritty.

*I beat the smart kids by opting to take English over English Lit,  everyone assumed I would because I was slightly better read and a good writer. I didn't expect to do well in English Lit and wanted to study movies and other mediums as well, I took the easiest way out for my entrance exam score. Turns out, English Lit that year was based on a bad curve, (sadly the curriculum council didn't report before 2001) as it was ranked by all the schools in the state. I had kids from that class come to my door asking for me to sign some petition the smart kids had to put forward because their total scores had been dragged down and it did screw with their results. Looking back, I could've been more sympathetic, but it probably wouldn't have fucked my score so badly since my entrance requirement was low, I know the other person it didn't affect and I don't blame them for telling those other kids to get stuffed. It must've made a difference to everyone's scores by a small but significant margin, which would've been fucking horrible. It's why as adults most of us say to kids now, don't base your whole identity and future on a fucking number. But yeah, I didn't think my decision would actually be that significant, it's another great example of how I went against expectations off my own instincts and it paid off. I couldn't have possibly brought the Lit grade up on my own, I got in the top 1 percentile in the end and I only got B's for the last two years of school for English. (Some reason I don't have the piece of paper with my actual score but it was like 77 and I only needed 67. It was a comfortable score). It was also something I was actually confident about, my mum decided to still say, "Oh, we'll see if you got in when you get your results". I don't remember her eating her words. I also got a High Distinction at the end of my first year of uni despite blowing out psychologically and having to defer. I told one of the nurses I hated in hospital when I saw her at the outpatient clinic, and she literally said: "That's not fair." So, me being a complete psychological mess means I should have also fucked up my entire year. I didn't. At least my mum later acknowledged she was amazed I got through it despite everything.

Anyway, here's proof I survived high school in terms of grades at least.