We’re on daylight savings three weeks early, by government fiat, so today is a day of confused computers and general brain-lag because all of a sudden it's an hour later than it should be. Luckily my Mom called yesterday to remind me it was happening (she knows that, having been raised in a sane place, I tend to forget these arbitrary time changes).
I’ve just been accumulating links for the past few weeks and saving them for a day where there is nothing else particularly of interest. And that day is here!
We went to see 300 yesterday. I liked it, but I think R:tAG liked it more than I did. I think the movie appeals especially to something in the male hindbrain even though visually this is a movie for the ladies, what with all the leather posing pouches and the CGI enhanced abs* and all. We did get a few giggles from one scene where the narrator describes Leonidas as standing in front of the Persians with his 300 men behind him… and what’s actually behind him is this little turtle of about 15 shields. I started snickering and R:tAG whispered “Maybe they’re all in a hole” which made me snicker even more**. And poor Ephialtes… it’s not enough that his name was already synonymous with Benedict Arnold, he gets portrayed as a deformed monster? And Xerxes? The hell?***
We also saw Ghost Rider last weekend (which was powerful weak IMHO and others’) and Talladega Nights, which was funnier than I thought it would be. It’s sort of unfortunate, though not really, that the two movies are getting blended together in my head. I mean, both have racing guys in suits covered in logos (with pornish girlfriends and good ol' boy sidekicks) screaming about being on fire… I’m not crazy, it’s true!
Anyway, on to these links!
Person Cosy - I have so had days like this.
Huggies Thongs
The Awful Guide to Graduate School
Squee! - They’re making a “The Dark is Rising” movie, and it’s got Christopher Eccleston in it!
Scott Adams’ Happiness Formula - Similar to the old “Good, cheap or fast; pick two” axiom.
Bulwer-Lytton 2006 Fiction Contest - the long-running contest for the "best" (i.e. worst) opening sentence of works in various genres.
NFCTD - So, so pretty
Order of the Stick - This is always funny, but Mr. Burlew has really outdone himself with this one (no background required)
OK, these last two are knitting-related, sort of, but they’re so ridiculous that I think they’re of general appeal:
Scarf - This is a pattern. INSTRUCTIONS for wrapping a hank of yarn around your neck. For when actually making anything from it is just too much work
High Fashion Knitting - This just made me stare and laugh. The sixth picture in particular. How much would you have to pay someone to wear that?
* Really, it was excessive. At one point I thought it looked like nothing more than a parade of McRib sandwiches in red cloaks.
** The other time I snickered was when a Spartan referred dismissively to the Athenians as “lovers of boys.” O RLY? Though I did appreciate that they kept a few indicators that the Spartans continued homosexual relationships into adulthood – i.e. that the dismissive remark was on the order of “They are lovers of boys… we are lovers of men!”
*** My biggest problem with the movie was how much it felt like thinly disguised Republican propaganda... the small group of Manly Aryan Men (are there that many blonde Greeks?) bucking the cowardice of the (old and/or diseased and/or corrupt) opposition and going to defend themselves against the evil and degenerate threat from the Middle East... eeesh.
Gosh. Test swatches for gauge really *are* important...
I *know*! I just can't imagine a pattern with a gauge of inches per stitch...
I can't believe you're falling into that "Thinly disguised republican propaganda" trap. I've seen similar things said in reviews. Yet they seem to completely forget that the graphic novel was written in 1998...
I can't believe you're falling into the "ignorance of history" trap. Desert Storm happened in 1990.
I haven't read a single review of the movie. I also haven't read the comic. I'm just callin' it like I sees it.
"Ignorance of history"? Which of us is forgetting this happened 11 August 480 BC? I think that trumps Desert Storm by a bit...
But so far my funniest review claimed this film was promoting Aryan ideals by not having minorities amongst the Spartans. *cough* Yeah, let me get a time machine and fix that for you... :P
And I haven't seen the movie yet, so I don't know if it's different, but in the graphic novel, things like the two story elephants, and other inconsistancies are clearly explained by showing you, at the end, that the whole thing is a storyteller telling the story to his people. Of course the men are "MEN" and the Spartans are perfect, the Persians horribly corrupt and the betrayer Ephialtes was a twisted monster. Duh.
Rather than snickering that he's only got 15 shields behind him, you are supposed to realize that the movie flows irregularly to represent that it's far from a documentary or factual retelling. It's an idealized retelling.
It's sad that so many people are saying "It's not real" instead of realizing it's deliberately not supposed to be 'real'. The Spartans are not wearing historically accurate clothes, the weapons are not historically accurate... The only point is that 300 men held off many times their number, and they did so heroically. The rest is just making it a good story.
""Ignorance of history"? Which of us is forgetting this happened 11 August 480 BC? I think that trumps Desert Storm by a bit..."
What the hell are you talking about?
I'm saying that *THIS* retelling, Frank Miller's retelling, of the battle of Thermopylae occurred *after* America, as led by the Republicans, started becoming directly and controversially involved in the Middle East.
(You seemed to be saying that this movie can't possibly be propaganda because the book on which it was based was written before the *latest* Iraq war.)
Of course this movie isn't history. Of course it's stylized. Everything is its own archetype. It's not that I don't understand that. But the values that Frank Miller is choosing to glorify to "tell a good story" disturb me. That goes for "Sin City" too.
"Rather than snickering that he's only got 15 shields behind him, you are supposed to realize that the movie flows irregularly to represent that it's far from a documentary or factual retelling. It's an idealized retelling."
That moment had nothing to do with irregular flow (and the movie does *not* flow irregularly; it's very linear) or idealization. That moment was a huge disconnect between the story being heard and the visuals, and it stood out because it was just about the only one in the movie. Everything else matched; the arrows darkening the sky, the "monsters" from Africa (loved that; the voice-over called them "horrible monsters from the far reaches of the empire"; the visual was still scary and fierce but recognizably a rhinoceros). The little turtle didn't match, so it was funny.
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Re: High Fashion Knitting. Those knitted objects are eating those women's heads. Should we *do* something?!?
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I like that the scarf "pattern" has 20 words in its instructions, and 2 of those are misspelled.
Awesome.
Gypsyhick: Knitting is not fluff; arguing over movies is fluff. Knitting is content!
Drang: Well, as much as it pains me to defend the perpetrators, it is translated from the Italian.
See the movie Terry, especially since you've read the comic. What they chose to add, leave out or emphasize is chilling when you consider the timing of the release of the movie, and the political tensions of today. Honestly, If they said "freedom" one more time, I was going to start looking for Mel Gibson and a bunch of anachronistic highlanders.
Don't get me wrong, the movie is amazing. It just would have been more amazing, a cinematic classic, if they hadn't editorialized so blatantly.
"Honestly, If they said "freedom" one more time, I was going to start looking for Mel Gibson and a bunch of anachronistic highlanders."
Hell yes! And it totally didn't help that Gerard Butler (Leonidas) had a Scottish accent. I also was having "Braveheart" flashbacks.
Most of those high fashion knit things look like smaller objects that have been Photoshopped into the pics. Number 4 in particular looks like it's actually the size of a cheese bun.