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It's like some broken fascination—I can't make it go away
I have not seen many films by Ang Lee. Based on Lust, Caution (2007), which I saw this afternoon with Naya, perhaps I should. This one was tremendous. It is an old-fashioned movie, in many respects: I think its closest cinematic cousins are Hitchcock's Notorious (1946) and Vertigo (1958), which the film acknowledges with occasional clips of Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman, a poster for Suspicion (1941) in a movie theater's lobby; an onscreen murder is as ugly and inefficient as anything in Torn Curtain (1966). It also contains the kind of sex scenes that most people only write, by which I mean that the characters make love like actual people, not like carefully cropped sculptures, and integrally to themselves. And to the story, which is the farthest from gratuitous as possible—without their detail and physicality, the audience would have only the characters' words to rely on: and this is the kind of movie where dialogue is almost always deception. I might not watch it again anytime soon. But I would certainly wait for whatever comes next.
It is cold and raw outside, like real October; the wind is full of wet leaves. I have nuked the sheep.* Having finished Phyllis Gotlieb's Birthstones, Emma Bull's Territory, and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ellen_kushner's The Privilege of the Sword, I am reading Andre Norton's Witch World for the first time since high school. (I meant to post about Nabokov's Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle, which I picked up and finished last week, but now is not the coherent enough moment.) If only I don't have to get up early . . .
*The amazing herbal hot-pack from my brother and his girlfriend, which is heated in the microwave. The name is inherited ultimately from a hot water bottle I had as a small child, which came in a sheep-shaped cover, complete with fleece and ears and a woolly tail; it has since become the default term for anything that can be used as a bed-warmer, no matter that the current object resembles a sheep only in the sense that it contains some vegetation. I love family dialect.
It is cold and raw outside, like real October; the wind is full of wet leaves. I have nuked the sheep.* Having finished Phyllis Gotlieb's Birthstones, Emma Bull's Territory, and
ellen_kushner's The Privilege of the Sword, I am reading Andre Norton's Witch World for the first time since high school. (I meant to post about Nabokov's Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle, which I picked up and finished last week, but now is not the coherent enough moment.) If only I don't have to get up early . . .*The amazing herbal hot-pack from my brother and his girlfriend, which is heated in the microwave. The name is inherited ultimately from a hot water bottle I had as a small child, which came in a sheep-shaped cover, complete with fleece and ears and a woolly tail; it has since become the default term for anything that can be used as a bed-warmer, no matter that the current object resembles a sheep only in the sense that it contains some vegetation. I love family dialect.
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Except The Hulk.
But The Ice Storm was the first of his I saw, and it blew me away.
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(Of course, I refused to see Hulk...)
I really want to see Lust, Caution. I'm not sure I can drag S with me. Maybe if I promise to see Elizabeth with her. Hrm.
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And you've reminded me that I wanted to read Ada. I had a friend who absolutely raved about it.
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I've seen three Ang Lee films — Brokeback Mountain, The Ice Storm, and Sense & Sensibility. I didn't see Hulk, but somehow I can't imagine that even with excellent direction it would quite match up to any of his other films.
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I've not seen heaps of Ang Lee's films, but what I have seen I've liked. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was splendid. And I liked Ride With the Devil quite a lot, and not just because a friend of mine did some of the music and was in the wedding scene. (John Whelan. He was the guy playing the strange mid-19th century accordion.)
It's real October here as well, now. About time. ;-)
Enjoy Witch World!
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Of the Witch World books, The Jargoon Pard (1974) and the collections Spell of the Witch World (1972) and Lore of the Witch World (1980). Otherwise, probably The Zero Stone (1968), The White Jade Fox (1975), and Perilous Dreams (1976), or at least so I remember. I haven't read anything of hers in about ten years.
I had a friend who absolutely raved about it.
It's worth raving about.
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I need to see that again. I saw it maybe a year after it came out with someone who didn't like the movie at all, and all I remember is Alan Rickman.
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That would be it!
(And necessarily so, too.)
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My brain has clearly been on Pluto. I saw that last year and loved it. And somehow managed not to realize it was Ang Lee's. Gah.
And it seems like everything he makes -- whether you like the film in the background or not -- is just gorgeous to look at.
Yes. Visually, Lust, Caution is immensely rich. All my comparisons are to prose styles!
I really want to see Lust, Caution. I'm not sure I can drag S with me. Maybe if I promise to see Elizabeth with her. Hrm.
If so, you will have to tell me how it is. I am not familiar enough with the late sixteenth century to tell from the trailer whether it would be historically accurate or Armada porn.
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I will see that. I've received several recommendations for it in this post so far.
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I want to see all of these now.
I'm really looking forward to Lust-Caution (which has yet to open over here).
I hope it opens soon; I will be curious to hear what you think!
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That's wonderful.
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That's still very cool!
Enjoy Witch World!
I am, actually. The last time I read the book was far enough back that I can still feel the overlay of perceptions and attitudes from that time, but I don't necessarily find them in the text anymore. It's a little like reading through my old brain. It's fun.
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Nine
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I remember picking up The Jargoon Pard, but can't remember whether I actually read it. Foolish brain.
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I have not read that one. (Steel Magic / Grey Magic, yes. It was probably one of my early exposures to Arthuriana.) How so?
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The problem withLavender Green Magic--which wasn't a problem for me as a kid--was that the famiy was black, and as an adult reading the book, I felt uncomfortable that a white author was writing a story about a black family. Silly, huh--or, I don't know. I guess it felt presumptuous. But whatever--I mean, the story I just wrote is about Japanese people (but then, I lived in Japan--but maybe it's a similar thing).
I don't know; I don't think things should ever be off limits--I mean, men can write about women and vice versa and so on... so I wish I hadn't felt uncomfortable as an adult, noticing that fact, but anyway.
The story was still great, really great. And as I say, as a kid, I just didn't even notice or pay attention to the race thing at all--I guess that's part of why I was surprised when I read the story as an adult.
...so I guess that's not "a few things"; it's just one thing.
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Oddly, I seem to have it exactly the opposite of everyone else. I find Eat Drink Man Woman utterly fascinating on just about every level, and The Hulk is good, stupid turn-your-brain-off mindless-action fun. (But then, I have had a man-crush on Eric Bana ever since Chopper. I mean, I even sat through Lucky You. Sheesh.)
Then there's Crouching Tiger, Over Hyped, which is intensely boring (despite having an incredible cast) if you've seen any two other (superior*) wire-fu flicks. And The Ice Storm, which managed to pack in almost every actor working in Hollywood today I absolutely adore and still managed to not gel. That said, I have a serious, intense loathing for the guy who wrote the book, which probably colored my vision of the film more than a little. But when I can't get into the idea of Sigourney Weaver as a swinger? Something's way wrong.
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Any particular recommendations anyway? All I have seen is Hero (2002), which didn't blow me away philosophically, but I loved the nested flashbacks and retellings and the color palettes.
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Well, good wire-fu.
As shockingly awful as Unleashed (which ain't wire-fu) is shockingly good.
Yes; I saw Unleashed because of Bob Hoskins and I was curious about Jet Li, and I loved it.
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The haybag, we call it in my family. Not hot water bottles, but any of those bags stuffed with rice or barley or herbs that you microwave, and then it comes out smelling like hay and oatmeal and rattling streams of grain in a barn. Or my mom does, at any rate; I don't think any of us kids have gotten around to acquiring our own. I fully intend to keep up the name if I do, though.
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Awesome. This one is filled with improbable herbs like lemongrass, valerian, willow, and yarrow, which means that it smells mostly like a mad new age cup of tea.
I don't think any of us kids have gotten around to acquiring our own. I fully intend to keep up the name if I do, though.
Yay!