The Weekend's for Movies

[misura]

Spent a gloriously unproductive weekend wasting time playing games on my computer and watching three movies I acquired at one time or another:

High Strung (2016): opens with a guy playing the violin without his shirt on while a voice-over solemnly declares something like: 'the music has always burnt inside me. I don't know where it comes from. all I know is that if I don't let it out, it would consume me'. as far as introductions go, this feels fair: the rest of the movie has more shirtless violin-playing, people being Dramatic about violins, people being Dramatic about dancing, a so-so romance, some meh dialogue, a Dramatic But Delightful violin-off, some so-so plot, and some pretty cool music/dance scenes. Oh, and a scene with shirtless boxing, just to shake things up, I guess? I liked-to-loved it, but it feels like a movie you need to be in the right mood for.

Someone Like You (2001): romcom, so uh, romcommy? recommended if you like romcoms, a young Hugh Jackman (shirtless in some scenes) and/or Ashley Judd doing a cheerleading routine in her underwear. Or uh cows, I guess (but not like that!)

The Brothers Bloom (2008): two co-dependent conmen brothers walk into a movie: one of them wants to quit, no for real this time, he means it; the other one talks him into one last job. depending on your pov, it ends terribly or with a happy ever after. recommended if you like ... conmen? Card tricks? Rachel Weisz? It's not all fun and games, but it's also not not all fun and games, so.


Bookwise, I'm rereading Melissa Scott's Silence Leigh trilogy because I was in the mood for some classic SF with weird space-travel rules/terminology and (almost?) canonical polyamory?

Comments

[eglantiere]

if you would really love some brothers bloom au fixit, i can't recomment rose lerner's true pretenses enough!

[misura]

thanks for the rec! I might need to check out the first book in the series too, given that it comes glowingly recommended by Alexis Hall. (I had somehow osmosed these books as 'first person pov historical lady detective solving murders' oops?)

[eglantiere]

nope, they're 'somehow unusual class combinations, slightly more grounded in historical reality' romances with a dash of politics! like a lot more realistic (or "realistic", i don't know enough to really check her chops) courtney milan where the overall vibe is progressive but the characters are plausible for their time. it's really really good, lerner is one of my favorite histrom authors.

[sandrine]

I watched "Someone Like You" back when it hit the movie theatres. I'm not much into romcoms (actually, I was less into romcoms then than I am now, so maybe I should rewatch it at some point), but I was VERY into Ashley Judd back in the day. :D And I remember that the whole 'new cow theory' thing was thoroughly weird and oddly charming.

[misura]

Tragicomic story: I picked up this DVD because (a) I'd gotten Greg Kinnear and Dylan Baker mixed up in my head and I liked the idea of seeing the latter in a romcom and (b) I was into OT3s at the time and the cover suggested this movie might have potential in that direction. Neither was at all correct, but ah well. :D

Thoroughly weird and oddly charming, indeed! Also kiiind of maybe an accurate portrayal of me and fandoms: revisit an old one or hit up this brand new one I just got my hands on? Unless I need to do canon review for an exchange, I'm going for the new cow!

You have a cow icon! :D

[sandrine]

I vaguely remember that Greg Kinnear was so unlikable in the movie that it took me until "The Matador" to be able to stomach him again, so nope, definitely no OT3 possibilities. ("The Matador", on the other hand... :D)

Also kiiind of maybe an accurate portrayal of me and fandoms: revisit an old one or hit up this brand new one I just got my hands on? Unless I need to do canon review for an exchange, I'm going for the new cow!

Oooh, interesting. New cow theory in action! It works the other way around for me. I've had the hardest time getting into new fandoms in the last 5 years or so (and then in 2021 I unexpectedly got into two, even! *\o/*) and kept returning to my old comfort fandoms.

The cow icon is from Fringe! They had a random cow in the lab, for some reason that I'm not sure was ever explained. (It wasn't, like, being experimented on. It just lived there. :D)