The Tree of Life

Yesterday I watched Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, and after tossing and turning all night, my mind consumed with imagery from the film, I knew I had to write about it.

Before beginning this review I skimmed over the reviews that people had written on the movie's IMDB page. I only looked at the first page, but the review were pretty much 50/50, with users either rating it 5 starts, or 1.

I was prepared to jump on the Number-1-Rating bandwagon when the film first began with a quote from the book of Job, a strange glowing light and a whispery voiceover by Jessica Chastain. I was expecting it to be strange and plotless, but judging from the trailer I was also sure that the movie would be full of beautiful imagery and excellent cinematography, so I was determined to get through all 2 hours and 12 minutes, even if it killed me.

Well, I'm still alive. So many people said that this movie has no plot, and though it may be true that is it less of a chronological tale and more of a of an art form, there is undoubtedly a story, told nearly entirely through the camera. There is minimal dialogue in the movie, and for the most part I felt that this worked to its advantage. I'm a huge fan of telling important details completely through the camera, and in this movie Malick is the master of that.

The film is told through the eyes of Jack, journeying through the most memorable years of his life as a boy in the 1950s. The story is an impression of his memories: his complicated relationship with his father, his mother's love for him, and his loss of innocence. This film is a journey of faith, both for Jack and for the audience, relying on what he chooses to show us in order that we might understand him and his struggle with the two opposing forces in his life, emulated by his parents: grace and nature.

I found myself wondering how two people who were such opposites had come together. Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Inglorious Basterds) is the inventor father, priding himself on being a smart and strong man and wanting his boys to grow up the same. Throughout the film we see Jack wrestle with conflicting feelings of wanting be like his father and yet hating him at times. Pitt's character represents the world and he puts himself first.

Jessica Chastain (The Debt, The Help) is the gentle, graceful mother who showers her boys with love and affection. She cherishes the boys' childhood and reminds me a little of Wendy from Peter Pan. The film opens with shots of her character as a girl, and there are many occasions where we find her running down the street with her sons, laughing as she chases them, often barefoot and even jumping on the bed in one scene. She clings to innocence, rarely disciplining the boys but perhaps teaching them more than anyone the most important things they need to know in life.

Glimpses of the adult Jack (Sean Penn (Milk, Fair Game)) bookend the story, a troubled, lost soul who questions his place in the world. He is seen wandering through imagined canyons and through office buildings; his world is full of tunnels and empty spaces; he travels but he doesn't get anywhere until he meets his younger self near the end of the film. There are things he needs to reconcile with his past.

This movie is about so much more than meets the eye. The first half hour, images of nature and the beginning of the world, flash before your eyes as you view the rest of the film, and for that reason it's entirely necessary that the interlude is in there. It needs to be long so that it stays with you. It fits perfectly with the themes of nature and grace, and makes you think of the natural beauty and conflicting behaviour of the world, portrayed in each of the characters. The characters themselves are far more complex than they first appear to be, as so much of the story is told not through their words but through their actions. A scene in which Jack shoots his younger brother in the hand with a BB gun is followed not by his verbal apology but by the way he holds a fan towards his brother's face to cool him off, presses his fingers to his brother's lips to make him smile, and hands him a plank of wood to hit Jack if he wants. There are things that happen in glimpses, memories from childhood about a house fire nearby, an accident at the pool involving a neighbourhood boy, and the time the boys' father went away and they chased their mother through the house with a garden lizard.

For all the things I liked about this movie, no film is perfect, and there were two things that stood out to me that I didn't like so much. At times the classical soundtrack is over the top and a little offbeat, and I did find it distracting especially in the first half.

Twenty minutes into the film, during the creation interlude, we see some dinosaurs. The point of the interaction between two particular dinosaurs in this scene was to provoke this question:  What is that essence that drives us to commit heinous acts of violence one moment and act compassionately the next? This happens to the characters several times in the movie, so I understood Malick's need to provoke these thoughts from his viewers not just through the humans but through animals and nature, but I felt the CGI was an incredibly poor move. The wonder of this film comes from the fact that everything is natural. There is a scene where Jessica Chastain's character is walking down the street and a butterfly lands on her outstretched fingertips. I read somewhere that Jessica and the crew followed that butterfly for three blocks just to get that shot. And it really was perfect. It would have ruined it for me to learn that the butterfly was digital, and the dinosaurs did the same thing for me. Unfortunately, they actually turned up in the movie. This really took away from the experience for me, and I wish that they hadn't put it in. 

In saying that, this is a beautiful film, amazing because of the amount of time and effort it would have taken from all cast and crew to complete, a movie that stays in your mind for a long time afterwards. It's one of those questioning films. Not everything that comes to mind is answered by the end of the movie, but that's what life is like, isn't it? You wonder about things. You let your imagination run wild over what if and how and why?

My recommendation for watching this movie is to let everything go. Watch it with someone who won't talk too much during the movie. Turn out all the lights. Empty your mind of everything and just enjoy this experience, because that's what it is. It's not so much a movie with a beginning, middle, and end, but a expression of life and art. My final rating, only marked down for the cgi and partly for the score, is 4.5 stars.

Un-Live Blogging

Here's my thought-process throughout the lunar eclipse that happened this evening. If you've been reading posts here for a while you'd know of my interest in Lunar Eclipses due to the important appearance of one in my WIP Eloquence. So this is sort of 'fun research' if one can get away with even calling it research. 

Beginning at 11:30pm Saturday, December 11^th, 2011, the moon and the sun are opposing each other. The sun is not visible but the clouds around it are a deep red like sunset. The moon is glowing bright white, surrounded by a circle of clouds drenched orangey-red from the sunlight. 

11:40 Darkness sets in! The lower edge of the moon is fading black.

12:17 am. The eclipse has taken about 50 minutes to become engulfed almost halfway. There is red only in the clouds surrounding the moon, and the half of the moon that has been eclipsed is black, like it has been swallowed in shadow. The brightness fades in and out, partly due to the cloud cover but also due to the amount of the moon that is ‘disappearing’. 

(Having to keep changing exposure times, which may be something the photographer could comment on, depending on how deep I want to go with the technology. Will have to research this.) 

12:23. And we’re pretty much at halfway. The moon is beginning to change dark red on the shadowed side. 

12:37. Rather disappointed at the cloud cover that is ruining the latest shots. It’s far too dark now to get a good photo. Might wait it out a bit to see if the clouds clear before we reach totality, but if it’s not any better by 1am I’ll have to retire. Also the laptop battery is low. 

12:40. A blanket of cloud is threatening to suck the moon in. The brightest thing now shining on my camera lens are the lights from the endless stream of taxis that keep coming down my street to pick up all the drunk people partying across the road. 3 minutes of battery life remaining. This could be it, folks. 

12:42. No moon to be seen. Lame. 

12:43. I can see a sliver of moon struggling to break through the clouds, but it’ll soon disappear what with this being an eclipse and all….

12:52. Just plugged the laptop back in after it died on me. Camera packed up now and doors locked so seeing the totality was not to be tonight. Guess I’ll have to wait until 2014! A tiny part of my soul expects that Eloquence will be finished by then, but with the amount of ideas in my head, who knows? Snuggled in bed now with clean sheets and a nice sleepy feeling, so I guess it’s a happy ending anyway. Will post pictures tomorrow if I get a moment! 

Sometimes, things stop working.

I've been having trouble with the opening scene of my novel for several weeks now. I've known for ages that the problem is my main character's behaviour. Every time I attempted to write the scene she would just stand around and not do or say anything productive to move the story forward.

Tonight, I finally figured out the source of this problem. I've recently made a lot of changes to the character, particularly her backstory. I knew that this would result in some major personality changes, which is what I wanted, but all in all she would still be the same 'person', if you will.

That's what I thought, anyway. Turns out I've been trying to write this scene with two conflicting ideas - one being the idea of what the character must be, and the other being what the character actually is. So I ditched all ideas about how the scene was "supposed" to play out and gave my character back her free reign.

This might sound strange, especially to non-writers - how does the author give the character free reign, you ask? Surely you're always in control of the character - after all, they're fictional! They don't have real brains!

Of course they don't. When I talk about my characters like that, I mean I've let go of the boundaries in my head. I've dropped ideas such as "the scene MUST start like this" or "she HAS to do that before this happens". I went back to old drafts, rereading scenes where my character was present. I searched for her voice again - the voice that I had lost during the changes. I reminded myself how she acted, thought, and reacted, and then I went head-first into the new draft. I wrote without thinking about what had to happen, and simply let my character do what she does. And voila! 900 words!

Letting the characters be themselves and do what they want works wonders for the word-count.

Okay.

Laptop? Check. Notebooks? Check. Markers and highlighters? Check. Flashcards? Check. 

Three-Act Plot Guideline? Check. Juicebox? Check. 

Let's finish this plot planning once and for all. 

In the name of fun.

Kristy and I are going to see Twilight: Breaking Dawn, Part One on Tuesday night. I just read a review that said the honeymoon scene is 45 minutes long. We're going to need a LOT of soda.

Speaking of food and drink, here is my edited version of a Breaking Dawn drinking game.
Most of this is off the internet but some are my own. I expect that taking this list will improve the entertainment value that the movie provides by 100%.

Take a sip of your beverage:

• When Edward bites a human
• When there's a toast at the wedding
• When the movie tries to justify Jacob's impending imprint
• For each of the bruises Edward find on Bella
• When the camera pans to Jasper
• Charlie ignores the obvious signs that his daughter is in a really bad relationship
• When someone turns into a werewolf
• When Alice makes that stupid smile of hers
• Every time Bella stammers
• Every time a camera shot lingers too long
• When someone compliments Bella

Take a huge mouthful: 

• When the creator of this monster makes her painfully obvious cameo appearance
• When Edward breaks the headboard (good grief, I feel disturbed just typing that)
• The getting-ready-for-the-sex montage occurs
• For each transition between horror and soap-opera that the movie takes

Chug for the duration of: 

• The wedding kiss
• Any vampire sparkling
• The wolf telepathic pow-wow (I've heard you might stop breathing if you try to chug through this scene, but we'll give it a shot anyway...)
• Bella drinking blood

Empty the bottle for: 

• THE IMPRINT

I don't know if I'll come back alive, even without alcohol....

I've never felt this way before....

So, the trailer for The Hunger Games was released today or yesterday, or something. Kristy posted it on facebook this morning and I've watched it three times now. 'One of those goosebump trailers' as Justin called it - the kind of trailer that has big swells of music between the different mood changes that gets you all excited. I was totally excited watching this trailer, and not just because they cast Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson, heh. Here it is:

Yeah, you get where I'm coming from with the whole goosebumps thing? It's a good trailer.

The problem is, I didn't like the book.

Now, before any of you Hunger Games fans freak out ... well ... nah, whatever. You can freak out. I'm about to explain the problem that I found with the book, and I don't really have anything to tone it down with, or a "however" or an "on the other hand" to conclude with, so if you feel insulted by the above statement feel free to look away now. I would hope that you're more curious than that.

Anyway, I purchased a copy of the book in 2010, because I was in America at the time and ever window and shelf in Barnes & Noble was covered in Mockingjay, the conclusion to the trilogy. So I thought, what the hey, I'll see what all the hype is about. I'm pretty slow on the uptake when it comes to  fandoms (see this post). The copy at B & N was about $23.97 or something ridiculous, so I went to Walmart and got a cheap paperback version for $6.90. Much better. I read it over a few days on the back porch at my Grandpa's house, but after the first few chapters it hadn't really grabbed me. Reading material was scarce however, so I kept going to the end.

The problem I had with the book was partly the writing style, but to be more specific, Katniss' voice and her emotional detachment to things. I'm gonna pull a Dana here and quote directly from the book to give you some examples of what I mean:

We [Katniss and Peeta] turn back to face the crowd as the anthem of Panem plays. Oh well, I think. There will be twenty-four of us. Maybe someone else will kill him before I do. (pg. 33)

The boy from District 1 dies before he can pull out the spear. My arrow drives deeply into the center of his neck. He falls to his knees and halves the brief remainder of his life by yanking out the arrow and drowning in his own blood. (pg. 233)

She's rather factual, isn't she? Sure, I get that they have to kill each other to survive. Yes, Katniss will just have to get over the idea of killing people to save her own life and not worry about who is dead. But that's just the problem! There seems to be no shock for her about the brutality of these games. She doesn't get used to it - she already is. I understand that she would have seen the games beforehand, so she knows what to expect, but I as the reader have not. I wanted to be able to grow with Katniss as the story progressed, not catch up to her. A reader should either be ahead or on par with their narrator, and on for the emotional part of the story, I felt like I was being left behind. 

Not to mention there's a weird/lame fake-romance storyline that develops in the second half of the book. Not sure what I thought of that. 

I enjoyed the concept of this novel (even though the whole dystopian thing wasn't much explained), but  found it hard to connect with the characters. 

NOW - here's the clincher. The reason why I started this post in the first place. We have a movie coming out. And unless a movie is really, really bad, if you like stories, you're more than likely to get emotionally involved with one. Movies can quite often be much better at emotionally involving the viewer than a book can, simply because it's visual (and there's epic background music). A film is able to capture more of your senses than a book can. Don't take me wrong, I love books. That's why I'm feeling a bit weird about this.... 

I've never felt this way before.... 

Is it possible that I could enjoy the movie more than I enjoyed the book? 

Is it even possible for a movie to be better than a book? 

March 23rd, folks. March 23rd will reveal all. Stay tuned. 

So, I got a little sidetracked...

...and thanks to Kristy and Jessie my main characters have dress styles. Hee.

Hayden Connors

Sienna Hawthorn

Jordan Elliott

Josh Elliott

Thompson Lewis

Lily Bryce (the antagonist) VS. Marcus Kitch (her shapeshifter disguise)

ARLKSJDKLASNBIAMEXCITEDFORMYWRITING.

Flipping holidays can't come soon enough! Holiday time means writing time (and friend time, but that's not what this post is about...).

Having one of those moments where the story idea in my brain is positively bursting with AWESOME and I just want to write it. As you've probably heard I'm revisiting my superpowers story, and revamping the characters that have been with me since 2008. It still shocks me that they've been around that long. Finally, I think I've figured out what their story is supposed to be. And who doesn't belong in the story. Many a character has been scrapped. Also many have died. But that's a different novel, to be written one day when I'm famous and my readers are begging for the backstory....

Totally pumped for the epicness that will be this book! I'm using NaNoWriMo to bust out 50k for it, which is kind of cheating since I've already started the story, but seeing as NaNoWriMo is made for personal gain, I guess I can use it for the best benefits possible. Right? Heh. We're all NaNo rebels sometime or other (or every time if you're me...).

I was talking to Keira yesterday about the authory things that I wish I could do but don't yet have the skill. Number One is better foreshadowing. I wish I could master foreshadowing for a huge series like Harry Potter. JK Rowling is a genius. Don't believe me? Go read The Prisoner of Azkaban again.

The second thing is pushing my characters one step further in the way of er ... torture. I don't know how else to put it. Basically, when you write a story your character has to get past many bad obstacles, and each time they escalate, pushing the character to their limits. I can never seem to get my characters to the step that breaks them, or nearly breaks them, depending on your character. A perfect example of this is Amy in The Doctor's Wife. While she and Rory are lost inside the TARDIS (I still don't know if I'm supposed to capitalise all the letters or not!), Rory gets shut behind and door and Amy finds him only seconds later, or so she thinks. Turns out for him it's been hours. That's step one. Step two is when she's tricked into thinking Rory has waited his whole lifetime for her, and to her horror she finds an old Rory still sitting behind the door. Now, if I had written this episode, that's as far as I would have taken it. The genius bit comes in step three, the moment that breaks Amy. The moment that pushes her over the edge, and gives us a real insight to her character, and makes us care. Because we knew that the old Rory was just a fake one put there by the badguy, so now that the scene is over we don't care anymore. The writers need to scare us. To make us feel what Amy feels. So when Amy next turns the corner she sees DIE AMY DIE graffitied all over the walls and the dead skeleton of her husband Rory, and she just breaks down. Now don't lie, your stomach twisted when you watched that didn't it? You felt it that time. Now the writers have got you to care. And when the real Rory comes around the corner, perfectly fine, confirming that what Amy saw was just a hallucination, the relief that you feel is the WIN for the writer. Yeah that's right, they've got you to love their characters. And THAT is what I want to master. Not everyone realises how important step three is in pushing your character to the limits. It's the final hurdle. Right when you think everything is going okay, something ten times worse gets in the way and you groan at the TV or shake your book in frustration because you just want the character to get through and be all right! You care now. I want to make my readers care like that.

Anyways, the post just sort of became a rant and ended up twice as long as I thought it would. So I'm going to go now. Off to continue this stupid plastering. Have a lovely Sunday!

P.S Had a ridiculously long conversation with Keira last night about names. We came to the realisation that Karen Gillan is a really, really terrible name (especially when you add that her middle name is Sheila! What is wrong with her parents?) and that Amelia Pond is a beautiful, wonderful, roll-off-the-tongue name. I love writers and how much thought they put in to names. :)

Bored girl is bored.

Enter random blog post about a random subject!

I'm literally waiting for plaster to dry (on my model for a TAFE project), so what better way to pass the time than to blog about something. I was thinking of just posting this on tumblr and making it short and snappy but hey, we all know that's just a dumb waste of time. Let's make something of this.

This post is about: My Favorite Voices on the Planet.

This blog post is brought to you by (in no particular order):


1. JJ Field

You might know his voice from movies such as Death on the Nile and Captain America. Just listen.




2. Armie Hammer 

You would have seen him twice in The Social Network. A little disappointing there's not really two of him, right? He probably has the most beautiful American accent in the world.




3. Emily Blunt

Best known for The Young Victoria and The Devil Wears Prada. A little trivia: she appeared in Death on the Nile alongside JJ Feild. I wish I sounded like this. And as I side note, I couldn't help myself and had to pick one of her interviews with Rupert Friend.




4. Alan Rickman

Obviously.




5. Emma Stone

If you are unfamiliar with films starring this girl, you need to crawl out from under your rock and watch Easy A and The Help, RIGHT NOW. I've heard some people say her voice is weird or that it's a put off, but it must be the American in me because I love it. Aaaaaand I'm so excited for this movie. SO EXCITED.



And speaking of Spiderman....

6. Andrew Garfield

Because I just love everything about him ok? And his little salute is so cute. *fangirls*

Maybe it's just the lack of Christmas vibe? Or the lack of a Pond....

I was possessed by some weird compulsion to rent the Doctor Who Christmas Special when we were up getting movies tonight at Network video, despite a little voice in my head (possibly Keira?) telling me that it was terrible compared to the rest of the series. I got it anyway and now I'm sitting here watching it and kind of wishing it was over. Yet for some reason I can't turn it off. Maybe because the only thing I'm paying attention to is that glorious little bounce in Matt's fringe....

Fact drawn from this experience: Doctor Who is boring without Amy.

Conclusion drawn from this fact: Matt Smith and Karen Gillan cease to be amazing without the other, and hence should get married and have babies with epic hair.

Concluding conclusion drawn from this conclusion: Doctor Who might cease to interest me without the epicness of both Eleven and Amy. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it....

On another note, I also watched Sunshine tonight, and am happy to say that my love for Danny Boyle continues (he's also the director of Slumdog Millionaire and 127 Hours, which were even more amazing). All the sound effects and subliminal frames were really cool. Go watch his movies!

Can I have your hair? Can I have it?

I hear climax music and a Scottish accent coming from the TV so I'd better return my attention to the Doctor and see what I'm missing! Tata.

So I've been watching Matt Smith run around in a bow-tie: A Doctor Who Review, Part 1

Did I say that out loud? 

Well, not really. I typed it. But yes, you read that right. I have spent the last week watching Series 5 of Doctor Who, starring Matt Smith and Karen Gillan aka Lily Evans.

Why, you say?

Why, after all this time, do I suddenly show an interest in the TV show that I've previously bashed?

Here's my explanation. I follow a lot of people on tumblr who love Harry Potter. A lot of people who love Harry Potter simultaneously love Doctor Who, and for the past week or so my dashboard has been bombarded with images from the recent episodes, a lot of which look exciting and pretty. Especially Matt Smith and Karen Gillan's hair. Here is one example of what I have been seeing:

This looks strangely intriguing! I said to myself. Indeed, I felt there was something different about these pictures/GIFS from the latest episode (or possibly episodes) than others I had seen. A new director, perhaps? A bigger budget? Maybe even just extra good graphics by the tumblr gang. Whatever it was, the TV show seemed to have a new spark, something that wasn't there before. Maybe something just sparked in me. Actually, if I'm honest I think the cinematography is what hooked me.

I wanted to watch whatever episodes everyone else was watching, but I realised that I couldn't do that without at least a little context. So last week I marched up the street and rented the first three discs from Series 5. And here, my friends, is my review. My personal opinion on the first 9 episodes with Matt Smith as the Doctor.
I will not be watching any of the previous series', but I might continue on after these episodes. What you must know, is that my current opinion on Doctor Who is based solely on these 9 episodes alone and that I do not intend to extend my opinion back to anything before Matt Smith. I have kept my viewing of Doctor Who a secret so as to avoid things such as "oh, but David Tennant was so much better", or "but you don't know any of the story before this!" or, "oh my gosh Erin like Doctor Who. WE MUST MAKE HER WATCH IT ALL".

Therefore, now that I have revealed this to you, I allow you to give comments, but not to drown me in all the goodness of Doctor Who fandom. Matt Smith and Karen Gillan hair fandom is accepted. 


Each brief review will be followed with my "Current Doctor Who Status" which is how I feel about the show based on the episodes that I have watched, and this status will evolve with the build up of each episode.

So folks, here it is. The opinion of me, the girl who once bashed Doctor Who, on Doctor Who.


Episode 1 - The Eleventh Hour


I was worried that I'd gone mad as I popped the disc into my computer and flopped down with Justin to watch the tardis (TARDIS? Tardis? Is capitalisation important?) fly crazily through the skies of London, but once the Doctor sat down in front of Amelia Pond with a bowl of custard and some fish fingers and said, 'Look at you. Just sitting there!' I felt a little better about just sitting there, watching Doctor Who... Especially since I knew about the whole custard and fish thing from Charlie's video.

Terrible graphics and dorky badguys are pretty much a given for Doctor Who, so I was prepared. However, when Amy stepped into the room that she didn't even know existed (emphasis for effect) and that freaky serpent thing nearly snapped her neck, I was actually rather impressed. Especially when it transformed into a human using a dormant mind and the man and the dog moved and barked together because they were the same life form. That was actually pretty cool. The suspense built up as the episode continued, we met a cute nurse named Rory, the freaky serpent turned into a freaky woman with freaky twins, Amy collapsed, the freaky serpent turned into itself, and the Doctor saved the world and whatever. Not bad for a pilot episode.

Current Doctor Who Status: Doctor Who is not that bad. 


Episode 2: The Beast Below


The episode that follows the pilot of a TV series is never very good, so I admit that my expectations weren't as high as before. That said, this episode really let me down. Honestly, it reminded me why I didn't watch Doctor Who. All the melodramatic music, the plot devices that spiralled into uselessness, the Queen that took herself (or her acting?) too seriously, and that sad story about the Star-Whale and the fact that it loved all the little children and blah blah blah. Not to mention the Doctor got really upset with Amy over the video and the beast saving thing. They barely know each other! I though he was a bit unfair. And she was a bit stupid. In short, this episode was lame, and I have nothing more to say.

Current Doctor Who Status: Doctor Who is so cheesy it hurts.  


Episode 3: Victory of the Daleks

In an effort to continue my effort and salvage my low opinion of Doctor Who, I continued on to episode 3. I can't say that seeing the word "daleks" in the title was very encouraging, but hey, I was watching Doctor Who. It's inevitable. At this point, Mum came into the room and saw what we were watching a groaned, but I found out later that she's never seen a single episode.

Going back in time is always an improvement from going into the future, in my opinion. Important things have already happened that the viewer might care about, and the real past is always less cheesy than the imagined future.

Winston Churchill and his army of daleks was much more interesting than the space whale. I found myself a little bored with bits of this episode, particularly the Doctor's lengthy speech and random outbursts over the daleks. I was a bit confused. Possible this is because of my ignorance of the previous episodes, but also possibly because the daleks were ridiculously stupid and couldn't tell a detonator from a shortbread biscuit. I also have a big problem with the daleks' arms. They're just not scary. It's like they've got a whisk on one arm and plunger on the other (they probably did for real in the 1960's). Not very gripping in my opinion, no pun intended.

And, as a side note, if I were Amy I would've freaked out when the Doctor disappeared in the tardis to meet the daleks while she stayed with Winston. Amy, if you don't remember, he didn't come back for 12 years the first time!

Current Doctor Who Status: Doctor Who could be bit a more scary. 


Episode 4: The Time of Angels

I asked for more scary, I got more scary. Don't Blink is the only good episode from the David Tennant series that I've seen (made a billion more times awesome by the appearance of Carey Mulligan), so I was pretty excited that the angels were returning.

During the episode, I got so excited I nearly wet my pants. Who knew a BBC science fiction show starring a man in a bow-tie could be so frightening?!

First, the angel comes out of the TV while Amy's trapped in the room.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any scarier, Angel dust comes out of her eye.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any scarier, they enter a giant cavern full of statues to hunt down the angel.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any scarier, ALL THE STATUES ARE WEEPING ANGELS.

And just when you thought you would probably die if it got scarier, the voice on the radio is actually the solider who has been killed by the weeping angel. Justin nearly cried.

Just when you thought the characters were going to get out alive and you were going to start breathing again, Amy's hand turns to stone and the Doctor's torch is going out!!!!!


They get free, but then they get trapped. And the episode ends. And you're lying there waiting for your lungs to expand for the first time in 45 minutes. Then Justin rolled over to face his bedside and saw this:

And freaked out like I've never seen him freak out before. I was in some crazy headspace between total horror, total hysteria, and total oh-my-gosh-that's-the-funniest-thing-in-the-world.

Current Doctor Who Status: Doctor Who is scary and awesome. 


Episode 5: Flesh and Stone

Glad that episode 5 continued on with the Weeping Angels, the next morning I kept watching. The fear factor had dissipated slightly now that it was 11am rather than 11pm, but built up again once Amy starting counting down from 10 ... Justin figured out what she was doing by the time she said 9, so we waited in tense anticipation for the Doctor and River to figure out what was going on. I must admit that the Weeping Angels are probably the best monsters ever invented, because you have to keep your eyes open to stop them coming at you, but if you look into their eyes for too long you can't open yours! It's brilliant. Unless you're the Doctor, you can't win.

That said, this is my honest opinion on everything, so I have to add that there were a few dramatic moments that bothered me a bit - particularly the piano score playing in the background while the Doctor gave his "you have to start trusting me" speech to a sightless Amy. I want to throw something at the TV and yell, "stop taking yourself so seriously you stupid show!" They're too low budget for that sort of thing. It sounds like a soap-opera.

Speaking of bad things, I just remembered there was a kissing scene at the end. I was very confused. And it wasn't even because I don't know what happened before this series. The end of this episode was just ... confusing all together.

Anyway. It wasn't all bad, as I said. That's a couple of bad bits in a lot of good bits, so we're still going good!

Current Doctor Who Status: Thanks to Matt Smith, I'm actually enjoying Doctor Who. 




Episode 6: Vampires in Venice 


The cute nurse from episode 1 is back! I spent most of this episode going, "poor Rory" which annoyed Justin a little bit. Thankfully the Doctor was nice about the whole thing and brought him along and Amy got nicer as the episode progressed. So maybe the fish things were a bit lame, but I must admit I liked the fact that the vampires weren't really vampires. It was a nice twist and it made me forget about the usually bad graphics that Doctor Who is known for ... oh, except for the when the sky starting boiling, or whatever. That was a very sad-looking effect. In fact, that whole scene was a bit sad. Was the rain actually boiling hot, or something? The regular citizens seemed to think so, but the Doctor and his companions weren't very bothered ... I was a bit confused. 


For me this episode was marginally above what my original expectation of a Doctor Who episode would be, so I was still interested to see more. 


Current Doctor Who Status: I am uncharacteristically eager for more Doctor Who.




Episode 7: Amy's Choice


 I was really angry at this episode when it first started because it appeared to have skipped five years in the characters' lives for no apparent reason - that is, until it was revealed that it was possibly a dream. Then it became awesome instead of stupid.


This was probably one of the more exciting episodes because there was the suspense factor of not knowing which 'world' was the real one. Although that dream guy and the fake ice on everyone's faces were a bit lame. I'm also unsure on my feelings towards Amy's character, because on one hand I kind of like her sarcasm because it adds humor, and on another she can be a bit annoying. She and Rory are also a bit cute, though. 


And if you're going to add interesting plot devices such as the TARDIS (Tardis?) floating towards a cold star, can you at least explain a little more about this? Because it turned out that the cold star WAS in the real world and yet that's what had made them think maybe it was the dream world, and so then the star was real but then was it real? And why was it cold? Yeah. Confusing.


Current Doctor Who Status: Confused. Why am I finding so many little things to pick apart and yet I still want to keep watching?? 




Episode 8: The Hungry Earth


This episode was honestly a bit boring. I mean, I didn't really care about any of the other characters except the Doctor and his companions, and we'll all know they'll be fine... right?

I took note of the engagement ring foreshadowing at the start of this episode, because no TV show spends precious minutes on that sort of thing if it's not important, so I knew it would mean something.

So, the ground attack some miners really wasn't that exciting. It got a little better when we found out there were actual bad guys, but the episode's minor (note the difference in spelling) characters were all a bit annoying and boring. Especially the wife. Urgh.

Current Doctor Who Status: Oh, poo. It's a double episode. Guess I haven't got a choice but to keep going. 



Episode 9: Cold Blood 

So the Doctor goes down into the earth and finds some weirdo reptilian civilization who claims to have owned the world before humans. Big whoop. I got a bit more interested when Amy nearly got dissected, though. That's the kind of suspense I like! And to top it off, once the lizard-man got distracted she took his unlocking remote thing. Now we're getting somewhere.

It was terribly predictable that Mrs. I Just Want My Family was going to kill the captured lizard-woman on the surface, so can't say I was freaking out there. Just looking at the screen going, 'You're an idiot.' And then turning to Justin and going, 'She's an idiot.' And then looking back at the screen saying, 'This is stupid.'

And then RORY DIED. And then I was sad because that was the reason for the engagement ring foreshadowing. And then Amy forgot him. And then the Doctor couldn't tell her. And then he realised that the piece he pulled out of the crack WAS PART OF THE TARDIS. Ohmygoshaspoasleblasyahilkbelbeasojlkenrl.


Current Doctor Who Status: I have a confession to make. When we were at Engage (so Kristy, Oliver and Dan, I'm talking to you) and you guys said that Doctor Who was on the next night, I texted Justin and told him to tape it so we could watch some of the recent episodes when we're up to them. So you know what this means. I like Matt Smith and Doctor Who. But not David Tennant. I'm sorry I'm weird. And I didn't tell anyone because my decision on the show wasn't finalised. But I guess I just have to say it... I ... like ... Doctor Who. The end! 


So there you have it. You're probably just as shocked as I am. When I can get my hands on the next few episodes I will probably write another post. For now, I leave you with some hair eye-candy.

Admit it. You're staring. 

Well.

I haven't written in here in a month. Thankfully, I've still been writing a bit. Though this blog has become a little neglected. Never fear, I have an interesting review post that I am queuing ... and I know there's quite a few of you who will find it interesting....

So...

There's a chance that some people can get into Pottermore early. The site says "come back on the 31st of July".

I finish work at midnight tonight.

Guess what I'm checking as soon as I get home?

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2

 Of course, it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it's not real?

- Albus Dumbledore

So, seeing as I'm in the mood for blogging today, I thought I'd do a post about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. I did part one last year, so it seemed fitting to follow it up. Plus, I've already seen this movie twice :) 

SPOILER WARNING: If you haven't seen DH2 yet, I suggest that you don't read this. Unless of course you're not worried about ruining bits of the movie, then please proceed! 

Last post I skimmed over my favourite scenes of the movie, so this time I thought I'd do a best/worst moments kind of post for different categories: 

• 4 Best/Worst Scenes
• Best/Worst Dialogue
• Best/Worst Cinematography  

All right, let's start with the top 4 best and worst scenes. 4 seemed like a nice number so this is my opinion on the two best scenes in the film and the two worst. 

Best Scene Number One - Escaping Gringotts

Not only is this scene epic because of the music score and the dragon climbing up the underground cliffs with Harry, Ron and Hermione clinging to its back for dear life, the opening of this scene is also brilliant thanks to Helena Bonham Carter playing Hermione in Bellatrix's body. 

When Helena first walks up on the beach as Hermione, she's already captured all the little gestures that Emma Watson brings to Hermione. Watching her facial expressions, the little shoulder shrug, and the way she tucks her hair behind her ear, my brain was totally convinced that polyjuice potion actually worked. 

The second time I watched DH2 was in 3D, and the winding, rickety roller-coaster that is Gringott's mine-cart track was so much fun. After snatching up the Hufflepuff goblet, the trio escapes on the back of the dragon who smashes through the ceiling and flies them to safety. Wicked. 

Best Scene Number Two - Preparing Hogwarts for Battle

Someone give Maggie Smith a trophy for being such a badass McGonagall. She, and the special effects, made this scene so epic and emotive. I can't even describe it. 

It made me think back to Harry and Ron arriving in the little boat on the lake in the Philosopher's Stone and getting their first glimpse of the castle. You're watching the place that you've grown up in have to fight for its survival. You're watching all the characters you've come to love be forced to defend their lives. You're freaking getting all teary in the movie theatre because this is JK Rowling's epic series ending in front of your eyes. Someone get me a box of tissues..... 

Thought those scenes were too good to be true? Well, you were right. Here come the worst two scenes in the movie. 

Worst Scene Number One - Molly VS. Bellatrix

I almost don't want to get started on how much rage I felt at the crappy portrayal of this incredible duel. In the book, Hermione, Ginny and Luna are duelling Bellatrix, who is almost beating them because she's holding not only her own wand, but the wands from two wizards that she's just killed. That's epic in itself!! 

Then, a killing curse narrowly misses Ginny's head and sends Mrs. Weasley into a protective mother storm. She shoves the girls out of the way, screams her famous line and duels Bellatrix Lestrange to the death. Oh, and did I mention that in the book this scenes takes place IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROOM WITH EVERYONE ELSE WATCHING?? It's supposed to be amazing. So I'm sorry, but that bit off to the side where Bellatrix flicks a curse at Ginny, Mrs. Weasley steps in the way and says her line in an undertone, then turns Bellatrix to dust with a few snaps of her wand while no one else is watching? Yeah, I don't even know what the hell that was. 

Worst Scene Number Two - The Prince's Tale

 

There's a lot of scenes I could have put here, but none that bothered me so much that I wanted to write about them. What I've chosen is kind of a small thing, but it REALLY annoyed me. The bits of the Prince's Tale flashback that included Alan Rickman weren't so bad, but the childhood bit was awful.

Snape says, 'look at me' to Harry, because we all know that he wants to look into 'Lily's' eyes before he dies. Then we get a shot of Dan Rad's eyes and grudgingly forgive him once again for his stupid allergic reaction to green contacts. But it gets worst. The very next shot is of Lily as a child, and she looks like this: 

I'm sorry, but how does that kid look anything like Lily? At all? She has dark brown eyes for goodness sake! It's a small detail, I know, but I can't even begin to explain how annoyed I feel by it. 

Oh, and that indie shot of Severus and Lily lying in the grass? Um, can someone say Twilight? I was cringing in my chair. It's not cute. It's cliche. Now get out. 

Anyway, that brings me to the best and worst dialogue in the script.

Best Dialogue: 

(Ginny runs in and sees Harry, Ron and Hermione with Neville)

 

Ginny: Harry! 

Harry: Hi there. 

Ron: Six months she hasn't seen me, and it's like I'm a frankie First Year. I'm only her brother... 

Seamus: She's got lots of them, but there's only one Harry. 

Ron: Shut up, Seamus. 

I lol'd. 

Worst Dialogue: 

Ginny (after kissing Harry): I know. 

What? She knows what? That was so dumb. Not to mention that's a pretty awkward kiss.

While on the subject of bad dialogue, Neville's speech in front of Voldemort was pretty crappy. I mean, they've got the incredible dialogue that JK gave him from the book, why not use it? I was so excited to hear Neville shout to Voldemort, "I'll join you when hell freezes over!" Not to be, apparently. 

On to the cinematography! 

Best Cinematography: Wide Shot in the Chamber of Secrets

Pretty much just this shot. Out of the whole film it's my favorite shot. It's brilliant. It tells so much; reminding you Ginny and Harry in the Chamber of Secrets years ago, how a horcrux was destroyed once before in the exact same place. It shows the magnitude of what Hermione and Ron are about to do, and it makes you take a deep breath in and hold it before Hermione brings the fang down on the cup and Voldemort's angry dark piece of soul floods the chamber. 

Worst Cinematography: Following Crane Shot After Escaping Gringotts

Excuse me, Mr. Cameraman, WOULD YOU PLEASE STOP MOVING!? 

To avoid the awkwardness of Dan and Rupert's bare chests and Emma trying to look like she's doing something because she can't strip off her wet clothes like the boys, they thought it would be better to give the audience flipping motion sickness so that they wouldn't notice. If you have to go to such lengths to try and 'fix' a scene, maybe you should take the hint and not do it like that at all! 

Heh, anyways. In conclusion, if you look that this movie as nothing more than a film and don't compare it to the books, it's really great. If you're going to pick it apart and compare every little detail to JK Rowling's writing then don't bother seeing it because you'll come out feeling like you want to shred something (but not the Harry Potter books, of course). 

I still stand by The Prisoner of Azkaban as the best Harry Potter movie ever. 

Hacking at the Plot

I've written about 700 words this morning, which is pretty nice. Not a lot, but still good. I'm happy with that.

I've realised that writing with an underage princess is no longer going to work, because I've decided to cut out a huge chunk of the plot and not have a regency. Elaine, you're now officially eighteen at the start of the story. The only thing bothering me about this is that I was going to have an epic steampunk masquerade party for your birthday, and now I'll have to figure out how to get that in the story without the excuse of a teenage royal coming of age. We'll work something out.

Sigh ... the things I must do to avoid a regency....

The Queen's Ladies

Good morning!

I don't have class until 5pm today so I decided to kick off the morning with a quick room-clean and then hit the keys for a good crack at Chapter Four. Normally I'm a bit OCD when it comes to cleaning my bedroom but I surprised myself by becoming so eager to get writing that there are still two large piles of clothes in here and dozens of books and papers scattered everywhere. Right now, I don't care!

I've been struggling with how to start Chapter Four. Elaine is supposed to meet with the House of Lords and make her little 'Now that I'm Queen...' speech, but I felt like that was too confronting an opening. I've finally come up with something that I like, and I get to hit two birds with one stone.

Throughout the other chapters I've had hopeless, brief mentions of Elaine's lady-in-waiting Evangeline, and yet I want her to become a strong supporting character later on. So far she isn't working; but I was  watching The Young Victoria (top of my list for ways to get inspiration for my story) and remembered how Queen Victoria's companion was at first her childhood governess, and when she became Queen she switched over to a brand new team of ladies to wait on her. I'm going to take this concept and scratch out all Evangeline's mentions and give her her very own introduction in Chapter Four. It will be much smoother and the subject will aid the introductory conversation between Elaine and Lawrence. Perfect!

Right, off to get this lovely idea out of my head and into my book. Ta ta for now.

Lockdown.

As much as I love sharing the writing that I am proud of ... that's just the problem. I can't let anyone read it unless I'm proud of it.

So, unfortunately for a couple lovely people who have been reading the first few chapters of Eloquence, I have to go into lockdown and say that I can't let any more of the story out for reading until I get a acceptable way through the first draft of the novel.

I hate to say it, but I'm becoming a perfectionist. This scene isn't supposed to be like that and that character isn't meant to talk like that I don't want the reader to get that impression or read this bit without knowing that.... And the list goes on. I'm not writing because I'm too bogged down in trying to get it right on the first try.

I'm telling you, self, it's just not possible!

I finally finished Chapter Three today. It's not perfect. I'm not happy with the sentence structure or the writing style or the character development, but hey, I wrote the first draft! And now I can keep going with the story. Yayness!

Exciting thing of the day:

The proof copy of Seven Stones, my fantasy novel, came in the mail today. Thank you, Createspace! It will now sit on my desk as a trophy, to remind me that I CAN write a book because I've already done it! Now I just need to write a much better one.

I will do this!

Ugh.

So I'm having an awful moment where I'm looking at my writing and thinking, this is all terrible! This is going to need so much editing to be any good!

But then I remember that I need to push those thoughts aside and save them for later. I'll never finish the first draft if I keep going over the first two chapters again and again.

So I changed my desktop picture to give me a little reminder. It's now a white background with the words 'Just tell the story' in the middle. That's my new motto. Just tell the story. Don't worry about the sentence structure or the description or your voice, just get the story out on paper. The other things can be fixed later.

Ugh. Sometimes I consider just forgetting this whole 'writing' thing, but then I think of the finished project that I so desperately want to have and I keep going.

Onwards!

I've already decided that if I haven't finished a first draft by November (which is, unfortunately, likely) that instead of writing a whole new novel for NaNoWriMo I will set my own personal goal and try and write 50,000 more words of the story in November. And if in the (also unlikely) even that I run out of story before I reach 50,000 in November, I'll just started editing.

Anyway. Back to Scrivener I crawl go.

I'm on a mission!

Well hello there! It's been almost a month since I last blogged, but in that time I have come to a decision.

As most of you know, I really, really want to be a writer. One that gets things published. And I have come to the conclusion that this will not happen unless I (at least attempt to) stick to one project. Ever since I finished my one book back in 2008, I've been working on numerous projects. Fat Beagles Are Unattractive, Veridical, and Eloquence are and have been some of my biggest works, but I haven't completed any of them.

Yet.

When I wrote my fantasy novel it was the only book I worked on. I wrote it from start to finish, and then continued with a good nine or ten chapters of the second book, intending for it to be a four-book series. That is, until I discovered that my writing was actually not as good as I thought it was and I would need to work hard to make it better, and the best way to do that was to start a new project.

That's when Veridical was started. It too was a bit of a failure and though I wrote over 40,000 words with my ensemble of six characters I struggled with the chronology of the story and after a couple of years, ended up with a huge pile of inconsistent plot and three or four Mary-Sues. Some of the scenes I wrote in that time are still in my mental list of Best-Scenes-I've-Ever-Written, so once again I'm happy with what I did but not nearly satisfied.

And so we come to the now. I have an amazing novel in my mind. A murder mystery set in a mild-steampunk world based off 19th century England, with a huge dollop of political drama and class/status epic thrown in. It's the story I've been dreaming I could write since I penned my first six pages of fiction at age seven.

I adore my characters.

I love the mood and the genre.

I'm still excited about the plot two years after I began to develop it.

Yet I'm struggling to get this story on paper.

Why?

I get the feeling it's because I have not disciplined myself enough when it comes to my writing. This is because of two things. One is that I do not have a proper schedule, and so I can go days without writing and then hate myself for it later on. This will be fixed. I plan to come up with a proper schedule in the holidays. The other reason my story is not getting written is because when I do write, I distract myself from my main story with other ideas, like super powers and rewriting Fat Beagles and numerous other things that come into my head. When I get a good idea I get the urge to write about it immediately. I've decided that this is not the way to do things anymore. Now, when I get a good idea I will write it down and store it away in my filing cabinet for later, and knuckle down and solely writing Eloquence until the first draft is complete.

Ha, easier said than done.

Wish me luck. I really, really, want to do this. I hope I can manage it sooner than I think.

Yes, it's all in my head....

Good afternoon!

I'm supposed to be doing homework right now but I keep getting distracted and start doing fun things with Photoshop and After Effects instead of the boring homework that has been assigned. I've just discovered how to make GIFs with AE and so now I'm going GIF crazy on my tumblr. Yay for procrastination!

I'm loving the confidence I've gained in Photoshop recently; we're not doing a lot of it in our classes but I have been using it a lot and so I'm doing new things that I haven't been able to do before. One thing I did was make a painting out of photographs for a story.

Keira and I have been doing a writing exercise together - we've each created a character and written letters back in forth as those characters, creating back stories and jobs and interests and friends for them. It's quite interesting what we're coming up with. I love it.

My character, Sophie, is a young artist living in New York. She's been corresponding with Jasper Clancy, a uni student living in Sydney who does acting in his spare time. Jasper found a collection of artworks that belonged to Sophie's grandmother that had been left behind in Sydney airport, and they've been writing back and forth to each other ever since.

Sophie told Jasper that she was going to paint her brother Alan, a cellist. In one of Jasper's recent letters he asked Sophie if he could see her artwork, and so I thought, why not?

I'd had an idea in my head since creating Sophie what her art would be like, and at first I started googling paintings of cellist to see if I could find something that would resemble her art, but I got nothing. Decided just to make my own 'painting' instead, and so I launched Photoshop and started googling for a cellist that looked like Alan.

I found these three images and got to work, turning them into this:

At least now it looks like a painting! I kind of would have liked it to look more like paint, with more thick drips and what-not but that's sort of hard to do ... for the half hour I spent in Photoshop I'm pretty happy with the outcome, especially because it's very close to how I'd pictured Sophie's art style and the cellist actually looks quite a bit like how I had pictured my character Alan.

Fun! Anyway, I've done more than my fair share of procrastinating today so I'd better get stuck into Flash.... Tata. :)

"I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there is some sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their pefect readers." - Dawsey Adams, to Juliet Ashton

I was going to write a review about how much I enjoyed this darling book, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, but I think what I wrote to Jessie (and the comments that followed) about the book sums it up:

If there is any book in the world that will leave you with an overwhelming desire to tell others to read it, it's this one.

"The moon's an arrant thief, and her pale fire she snatches from the sun." ~ William Shakespeare

And my teacher just told me she's dactylic!

I love discovering new music. It's so exciting, don't you think? Well I had recently discovered Ben Folds and on a random impulse bought tickets with Hannah in the middle of Flash class back in April. We were surprised there were still some good seats left. Anyway, I nearly didn't go to the concert because I was starting to regret making such a big dent in my wallet for it, but in the end I wound up inside the State Theater drooling over the loveliness of the building.

My camera really doesn't do it justice....

Anyway, we got in there and from out seats we could see this:

Which looked like a pretty good view to us! Aside from the smokiness in the air from the crew obviously testing the smoke-machine before the audience came in.... It added significantly to the lighting later on :)

So first off Kate Miller-Heidke came out as support, and I wasn't really too keen on her performance because I'd never heard her before. Hannah told me she was pretty good, and she's a trained opera. Opera? I thought. Who listens to opera? No wonder she's turned to pop. So yeah, that was me initially being all skeptical and prepared to be bored, because I have had several bad experiences with support acts....

I short, I really loved her. I am no longer skeptical about the opera thing. Seeing her live, singing normally one moment and then bursting into this bit of vocal awesomeness in the middle of her songs was pretty rad. This song in particular that caused me to have a little spasm in my seat and think omgihavetogetthecd. Hee.



I get particularly excited when I discover a new female singer, because if you look at my ipod my top artists are Mumford and Sons, Coldplay, Ben Folds, Jack Johnson, John Mayer, Jason Mraz, Newtown Faulker, Peter Murray, and U2. ALL MEN. The only two female singers that I listen to a lot are P!nk and Regina Spektor. And bonus points, Kate Miller-Heidke is Australian! She has a Vegemite product placement in her video clips and sings humorous songs about Facebook and Southern Cross tattoos. And we get it. It's great.

Anyway, onto the star of the show! Ben Folds can really rock the piano. That was awesome. We got a couple good photos of him smashing some stuff out on the grand piano, accompanied by drums, tambourine, bass guitar and french horn. Um, cool or what?!

As I said, the lighting was an entertainment in itself.

So yeah. I love concerts and discovering new music and that is the point of the post. The end. :)

P.S Here's a couple videos for you.

One that I took of Kate and Ben's duet at the concert. Like hello! How does she even do that with her voice???

And if you haven't watched Charlie's music video for Ben Folds and Nick Hornby's Saskia Hamilton, you must. Right now.



And this song is on the Kate CD that I now own. I really like the video clip and the song is just AWESOME because it's about not being able to dance, and I can't dance. So yay. Watch it :)