Reviews - various
Apr. 2nd, 2006 10:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearI seem to bave been neglecting my poor journal a bit lately. I can't use the excuse that I've not seen any films or read any books lately, because that's blatantly not true, though the reading of old Empire magazines has cut into my book-reading time somewhat, and it's difficult to review those!
So, time to catch up!
It's been a while since I went to see V For Vendetta in the cinema, and several other people have reviewed it since, but I'm going to do it anyway, just because.
The casting was good, as expected. Hugo Weaving was compelling - I loved the way he moved and the way he spoke. His dialogue was criticised in the Empire review as rather impenetrable, but I thought it was perfect for the character and I always enjoy it when it sounds like people have swallowed a dictionary (I can relate!). Accent aside, Natalie Portman also did a great job portraying the arc of Evey's development from fragile victim to steely anarchist. Stephen Fry was a surprise, since I didn't know he was in it, but I thought he was very effective too.
Obviously, a lot was cut and changed from the graphic novel - I actually missed some of the more shocking/unpleasant bits - but overall I liked the changes and I thought it was put together very well. It had impact, which it was supposed to - I loved the dominoes and the flood of masked people turning up at the end.
It was a shame they didn't have Evey taking over the mask, but then I suppose their point was that V's ideals had infected the whole country and they didn't need a single representative figure any more. That worked for what they were doing with the film, but I thought it was a shame they didn't bring out the destructor/creator idea from the novel.
The only thing I had a problem with was the incongruity of the completely normal modern-day London with the altered aspaects of it. The fact that the TV studio and the police headquarters could have come from any present-day TV show jarred against the facist regime's spotlit conference room and V's gloriously jumbled home. I guess the point was supposed to be that this could happen now, but I didn't like it.
One aside - as we driving home from Lyme Regis yesterday, we passed a sign for Larkhill military camp - scary.
My brother gave me To Kill A Mockingbird on DVD for Christmas and I finally got around to watching it with him and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cholten99 on the last night of our holiday.
It was excellent - intelligent, well-paced, beautifully acted. The little girl who played Scout gave a standout performance and I loved the portrayal of her relationship with Atticus. Having the whole film from the point of view of the children was very clever, giving everything a slightly different slant than it would otherwise have had. Despite the message that things don't always work out as they should and that people can't be trusted to be objective, it gave the whole thing a much more black-and-white feel (morally rather than literally), which actually accentuated the injustice of the Tom Robinson trial rather than simplifying it.
The "classic heavy drama as horror movie moment" freaked me out completely though, even though it wasn't supposed to be there at all and was just a product of my easily disturbed brain. However, the madman hiding behind the door scared me so much that I didn't want to go to bed afterwards, which just goes to show how much of an idiot I am.
All in all, an excellent experience, though - highly recommended to anyone who hasn't already seen it.
I took several old favourites on holiday to read, two of which were Phule's Company and Phule's Paradise by Robert Aspirin. Now, I'm not a huge fan of his books in general, but I love these two. They're short and they're silly, and they have very predictable overall plots (charismatic commander takes useless military company and crafts them into a loyal, tightly-knit cract unit, which then triumphs against ridiculous odds).
However, the range of characters, the methods of plot execution and the feelgood nature of the narrative makes the books well worth reading. They're certainlyl not classic literature, but they've been in my collection for well over a decade and I must have read them both at least five or six times each.
There is a series of books that are collections of essays by writers/scientists/psychologists, etc about popular sci-fi/fantasy TV shows and books. I have read the one on Firefly and the one on Stargate, both of which are extremely good - and I recently got Mapping the World of Harry Potter, which has the added bonus of being edited by one of my favourite authors, Mercedes Lackey.
It's an interesting range of speculative and analytical articles, on a selection of subjects like sexism, trauma, the nature of heroes and what will happen in the last book. Also, there is finally some acknowledgement of the impact and vast range of fanfiction out there, though the actual subset of fanfic discussed is not one that interests me.
Overall, well-written and interesting to anyone who is a fan of the Harry Potter universe.
Phew! Well, that's it for now! :o)
So, time to catch up!
It's been a while since I went to see V For Vendetta in the cinema, and several other people have reviewed it since, but I'm going to do it anyway, just because.
The casting was good, as expected. Hugo Weaving was compelling - I loved the way he moved and the way he spoke. His dialogue was criticised in the Empire review as rather impenetrable, but I thought it was perfect for the character and I always enjoy it when it sounds like people have swallowed a dictionary (I can relate!). Accent aside, Natalie Portman also did a great job portraying the arc of Evey's development from fragile victim to steely anarchist. Stephen Fry was a surprise, since I didn't know he was in it, but I thought he was very effective too.
Obviously, a lot was cut and changed from the graphic novel - I actually missed some of the more shocking/unpleasant bits - but overall I liked the changes and I thought it was put together very well. It had impact, which it was supposed to - I loved the dominoes and the flood of masked people turning up at the end.
It was a shame they didn't have Evey taking over the mask, but then I suppose their point was that V's ideals had infected the whole country and they didn't need a single representative figure any more. That worked for what they were doing with the film, but I thought it was a shame they didn't bring out the destructor/creator idea from the novel.
The only thing I had a problem with was the incongruity of the completely normal modern-day London with the altered aspaects of it. The fact that the TV studio and the police headquarters could have come from any present-day TV show jarred against the facist regime's spotlit conference room and V's gloriously jumbled home. I guess the point was supposed to be that this could happen now, but I didn't like it.
One aside - as we driving home from Lyme Regis yesterday, we passed a sign for Larkhill military camp - scary.
My brother gave me To Kill A Mockingbird on DVD for Christmas and I finally got around to watching it with him and
cholten99 on the last night of our holiday.It was excellent - intelligent, well-paced, beautifully acted. The little girl who played Scout gave a standout performance and I loved the portrayal of her relationship with Atticus. Having the whole film from the point of view of the children was very clever, giving everything a slightly different slant than it would otherwise have had. Despite the message that things don't always work out as they should and that people can't be trusted to be objective, it gave the whole thing a much more black-and-white feel (morally rather than literally), which actually accentuated the injustice of the Tom Robinson trial rather than simplifying it.
The "classic heavy drama as horror movie moment" freaked me out completely though, even though it wasn't supposed to be there at all and was just a product of my easily disturbed brain. However, the madman hiding behind the door scared me so much that I didn't want to go to bed afterwards, which just goes to show how much of an idiot I am.
All in all, an excellent experience, though - highly recommended to anyone who hasn't already seen it.
I took several old favourites on holiday to read, two of which were Phule's Company and Phule's Paradise by Robert Aspirin. Now, I'm not a huge fan of his books in general, but I love these two. They're short and they're silly, and they have very predictable overall plots (charismatic commander takes useless military company and crafts them into a loyal, tightly-knit cract unit, which then triumphs against ridiculous odds).
However, the range of characters, the methods of plot execution and the feelgood nature of the narrative makes the books well worth reading. They're certainlyl not classic literature, but they've been in my collection for well over a decade and I must have read them both at least five or six times each.
There is a series of books that are collections of essays by writers/scientists/psychologists, etc about popular sci-fi/fantasy TV shows and books. I have read the one on Firefly and the one on Stargate, both of which are extremely good - and I recently got Mapping the World of Harry Potter, which has the added bonus of being edited by one of my favourite authors, Mercedes Lackey.
It's an interesting range of speculative and analytical articles, on a selection of subjects like sexism, trauma, the nature of heroes and what will happen in the last book. Also, there is finally some acknowledgement of the impact and vast range of fanfiction out there, though the actual subset of fanfic discussed is not one that interests me.
Overall, well-written and interesting to anyone who is a fan of the Harry Potter universe.
Phew! Well, that's it for now! :o)
