Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Hating New Moon Means You've Joined The Dark Side...I have why can't you?

I never thought the mere mention of Twilight would have one of two reactions from people. Either a scream, highly annoying by the way, or a smirk that says you’re stupid for liking it. Which causes my neck to shrink into my shoulders (in guilt) until I resemble a hunch back. When I first picked up Twilight to read, it was because my sister, Elyza, had been kindly pestering me to read it. I remember when she got it from the library back when nobody knew about it and when Stephanie Meyer still had time to personally answer fan mail (Elyza did write to her and received a non-form letter). I like to believe that she liked it before anyone else. She’d long been a vampire true blue having read Dracula and studying their origins a bit. I read it and liked it, Twilight that is. I was young, what can I say? I will even admit (I’m blushing shamefully) that I cried at a point during the second book. I stand back and think what was I thinking? The books while a decent story have no lasting affect, unless you keep reading them over and over (I’ve only read them once each). They didn’t impact me in any way that I will remember them twenty years from now, such as Hawksong (Amelia Atwater-Rhodes), The Hobbit, or any of Jane Yolen’s fantasy books. The books only send one message to me. Selfish. The characters (namely Bella and Edward) only want each other, only want to be together forever, and Bella only wants to be a vampire. Me, Me, Me, must be playing over and over again in her mind. She secretly has a t-shirt stashed in her closet which features her on a pedestal and Edward is revolving around the pedestal (picture the earth revolving the sun). Edward has a message bubble, "I live only to serve Bella". Gag! I don’t picture true love being this way.

Enough about the books I want to tell you what I thought of the movie. Elyza and I did the crazy thing. We purchased tickets to see Twilight at 9 and New Moon at Midnight. You might be asking yourself why, seeing how we hate the first movie and make fun of it. Well it was more for the experience of doing something crazy and for convenience*. We spent the entire 2 hours watching Twilight riff tracking (making fun, think MST3K**). It always amazes me that each time we watch Twilight we can come up with all new comments to bash it. It was fun and I think we converted our friend to the "dark side". After hearing us in the theater she said she could see why we thought it was so stupid. :) Mission accomplished!

New Moon, sad, sad, New Moon. I had such high hopes for you. The acting was still lame, although slightly better in that there was more dialogue. I guess werewolves know how to carry on a conversation better than vampires. While I never really cared for Jacob in the books (he reminded me of a PMSing teenage girl) I felt for the guy. He had to put up with Bella and her mixed signals. If I were him, I’d run from Bella and run fast. One of the good things about the films is the cinematography. Sad thing is that you can tell they spent so much time and money on it they obviously forgot to budget acting lessons. Oh well.

My favorite part of the movie is meeting the Volturi and I was really bummed they had maximum screen time of 15 minutes...at the end. The Volturi, are what vampires really should be like. Call me creepy, but vampires should be depicted as bloodsucking, evil, hell bound creatures. Not sparkly, vegetarians...'We love Bella vampires'. And maybe they could retain their good looks, I guess. I love Aro played by Michael Sheen. He makes a good bad guy. Plus he’s played a werewolf before so it only seemed appropriate that he complete his acting career by playing their mortal (actually immortal) enemy. He had this look like he was genuinely happy, but also an evil lurking in the shadows that said I’m a psycho killer. It made you wonder do I trust him or should I worry what’s he thinking? Poor Dakota Fanning, she had very little screen time. The evil vamps truly got the raw end of the stick in this film.

Overall not much better than the first and I’m not sure I’ll be getting my hopes up with the third film. Unless the new director holds true to his promise of making it darker than the first two. Do you think you could get a better dialogue screenwriter as well? I feel sufficiently stupid now, I just spent my entire blog post talking about Twilight. Ugh...I’ll never live this down when my brother finds out. I’ve also just been accused of analyzing the film too much by a Twilight die hard none the less. What else am I suppose to do? Swoon with love for the film, I don’t think so. Did I mention people screamed every time Edward came on screen?

* We got to stay in our same seats for New Moon while some people had to change theaters. Plus we didn’t have to deal with the lines for New Moon and the people who literally jumped and ran to get seats.
** I don’t watch this show. I only know about it because of my brothers.

I actually wrote this post 3 days ago, but lifes been a little chaotic.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Mail and Temptation

It seems to me that the small things in life tend to bring the greatest delight. Mail. It is a small thing, but I absolutely love walking to the mailbox and discovering I got a letter or package. (Please no bills, thank you.) The mail had lots to give yesterday. A large envelope all the way from jolly ole England and a Borders box. England or rather Persephone Books sent me their catalog. Oh great just what I need more temptations to spend all my cash on books. Between the Bloomsbury’s new set of republished books and now Persephone’s pages of sigh worthy books, I’m ready for desperate measures. How much could I get for a kidney on the black market? I think I need to come up with a system...reward system for purchasing books. I was thinking maybe for every book I read from my own shelves I could put back a buck or two. It still doesn’t really suffice for washing away the give into temptation and raid every possible hidden money place in my house. I wonder how many there are? Not many really. Oh well...

Borders had Christmas presents (for other people) and (squeal*) Whip It soundtrack. Talk about great music. I know it will be on constant repeat for some time. That’s not all, though. Books! Books for me! I know I shouldn’t, really shouldn’t have, but I did. What else am suppose to do when Borders throws temptation of here are Borders bucks that you need to spend and plus a coupon? Ahhhh...the misery (not really). Lament and Ballad by Maggie Stiefvater**. Elyza gets to read Ballad first and I’ve already Lament, but I wanted to own both.

Sometimes my mind explodes with the amount of books I have to read. The ratio of read to have not read continues to get out of hand. So many books to read and not enough time***.


* I squeal too much...actually not really.

** For the record I did attempt to hand over the books to mom. I told her I could ‘forget’ I got them and she could give them to me for Christmas. She said no. I tried.

*** I almost said too many, but that is a swear word in my dictionary.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

NaNoWriMo and Women Unbound

I had thought I would try my hand at NaNoWriMo. This is the first year I have ever heard of it and I very intrigued. Writing a novel in a month, what a challenge to anyone’s skills let alone my own (which aren’t much to shout about). However, I’m always good with excuses and procrastinating. The idea I have, involves too much research to commit to writing it in a month. I really need a good book on Welsh history and Crimean War. The rest I think I can get by with what’s in me head already. Oh, but wait another excuse and a much larger hurtle to jump (more like a wall). I lack confidence. I look at my writing and see nothing, but boring rubbish that anyone out there could write, nothing special. Do they have pills for confidence, maybe procrastination too? Or while your at it a write a bestseller pill...yum sounds good. That said no NaNo this year. I can’t promise, but maybe next year.

My disappointment was squelched a little when I came across A Work in Progress’s post about the Women Unbound reading challenge. I’m always up for a good book reading extravaganza. At least with this challenge I have a year to complete it. For Women Unbound you are suppose to read books about women studies* (my mind immediately says feminism, but I know that’s being completely unfair). I can’t claim much knowledge when it comes to this genre, in fact (excuse the term) I’m pretty much a virgin. There really isn’t a feminist bone in my body. ** That’s why I thought why not try something different and new. Besides it isn’t really stimulating to the mind to continually read the same types of books all the time. I was thinking I would attempt the highest level, suffragette (If I’m going to take a bite why not a big one...right?). Only one problem really, lack of reading material. Oh I own plenty of books, but not any about women studies. I need to read both nonfiction and fiction. I quickly consulted my LibraryThing to see what I had at the ready. Two? I only have 2 and one I’ve already read. Louisa May Alcott’s Behind a Mask (very good by the way) and The Awakening by Kate Chopin. Now to find 8 more, because as much as I liked Alcott’s, I want to read ‘new’ books. I checked the shop and we do have one there, Unveiling a Parallel: A Romance by Alice Ilgenfritz Jones and Ella Merchant***. Two down, 7 more to find. I’m taking suggestions (you in the back there, what? No sorry no Virgina Woolf...I’m teasing.). I’m hoping for suggestions honestly. Another reason I felt this would be a good to participate in, was because it might be interesting to have an opinion from the opposite side of the spectrum. I know I give myself too much credit (I can be rather pompous at times). Enough said I’m reading for the Women Unbound challenge!

...................................

Almost forgot, I finished Cranford. I loved it and think I will read it again. I feel I owe it to Mrs. Gaskell. Seeing how I took so many breaks from reading Cranford to read other books...sorry.
 


*Participants are encouraged to read nonfiction and fiction books related to the rather broad idea of ‘women’s studies.’ (quoted from their website)

** I feel I'm making quite an idiot of myself. If I were speaking all of this out loud I have a feeling I would be stuttering.

*** This book has actually been calling to me since we purchased it for the shop. It has a very pretty cover...I know guilty as charged.
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