glitter_n_gore

I missed seeing Jordan Peele's previous horror film in theaters, and I was not about to make that mistake again--even though this is a little after the initial release. Also, half my workplace has been going, "Have you seen Us yet???" for weeks because I'm one of the known horror aficionados there. I'm excited to finally gush about it.

Us, in a nutshell, is about a family of four being stalked by another family of four who look exactly like them. As plot hooks go, that's enough to get an audience into seats. But, as you can imagine, there is a lot more going on under the surface. I'm still struggling to make sense of it. I mean that in the best possible way.

"Us - Official Trailer [HD]" (Watch on YouTube)

( Once upon a time, there was a girl. . . )

This is one of the best, possibly THE best, comic book movie I've ever seen.

First of all, I'd like to thank the Internet in general for keeping all the spoilers under wraps. My mind was completely blown, over and over, and that's entirely due to how little I knew going in.

That said, I know I'm late to the party here. All my fellow reviewer folks have been collectively singing the praises of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse for months, and I'm just lucky I could find a theater where it was still playing this week. AND now it has an Oscar for Best Animated Feature. Nobody needs me to tell them how great this movie is, because chances are you know. What I didn't know was how emotionally affecting it would be. I'm going to try to dive into why without spoiling things.

"" (Watch on YouTube)

( Read more. . . )

Here's how predictable I've become at my library: when my hold for this DVD came in, my coworker handed it to me with the words, "Your Chris Hemsworth is here." Yeah, it's pretty obvious why I put this on my list. I have been waiting to make a joke about a "Royale with Extra Cheese" for MONTHS, saving it for when I finally got the chance to watch this movie, because I was so sure it would be a trashy, fun, violent, action thriller in the vein of Versus or Turbo Kid. Turns out, I can't, because Bad Times At the El Royale has a lot more to offer than pulpy goodness.

So, seven strangers arrive at a rundown Lake Tahoe hotel that straddles the state line between California and Nevada. Only a handful of rooms are furnished and clean, there's exactly one staff member handling the check-in, housekeeping, food service, etc., and everyone who signs the guest registry is almost certainly using a false name. As you'd expect, there are secrets here, including a mysterious bag of cash with questionable origins. Everything else took me completely by surprise.

"Bad Times at the El Royale | Official Trailer [HD] | 20th Century FOX" (Watch on YouTube)

( Red or Black )

(Cross-posted to rhoda_rants.)

The Final Four! First, I want to send out a huge thank-you to everyone who participated in the polling process. It was a new experience for me, and I think it would go smoother once I have a better handle on exactly how to rank things. All things considered, I feel good about the way this countdown turned out. I hope you've all enjoyed reading my thoughts on these episodes as much as I've enjoyed watching and recapping them.

Without further ado, here is the final batch, numbers 10 through 13!

( Hell is just Heaven for bad people. )

Everyone take care of yourselves this coming Halloween. And if you're in the US, VOTE!

(Cross-posted to rhoda_rants.)

Hey gang! I am not caught up entirely, but I have been introduced to Jodie Whittaker's Doctor, and I loooooove her! Not surprised, but very much impressed. I have a good feeling about this coming season. I hope it doesn't let me down. So far though, so good!

But we're here for a countdown, so let's get into it. This was where it started to get tricky. There were a lot of episodes on the lower end of this list where the numbers were tied, and I had to make a decision. Tried to stay as unbiased as possible, but it wasn't easy. That said, here's 7 through 9!

( He is awake. )

Next time: The Final Four!

(Cross-posted to rhoda_rants.)

It is Gothmas season once again, and I'm doing something a little different this year: tallying up the 13 Scariest Episodes of Doctor Who! Why 13? Because we're up to 13 Doctors. (Yes, technically fourteen because of timey-wimey stuff, but never mind that right now.) I polled people on Twitter, and Dreamwidth, and at my work, and this is what we came up with. All episodes were suggested by others and then ranked by vote. I spent the past several weeks reacquainting myself with episodes I already knew and loved, and catching up on the ones I hadn't seen yet.

Note: I didn't specify episodes from the 2005 reboot onward, that's just what people replied with. Which is fine I guess. The older show was playing to a different demographic, even though some episodes were definitely terrifying, shoestring budget effects notwithstanding. (Am I the only one who really loves "Paradise Towers?" Anyone else? Just me?) I might have to do another list at another time just for Classic!Who.

As always, remember that fear is a subjective emotion, so while there is some consensus here, a lot of this is based on individual tastes, phobias, and stuff with a Gothic flavor that's just inescapably cool. Because I did this by polling instead of going with my personal favorites, some that I would've put on my own Top 13 list didn't survive the elimination rounds (such as "The Crimson Horror" and "Under the Lake"), while others wound up a lot higher ranked than I expected.

There were a few clear frontrunners, so I put those at the top of the list. We'll get into the more obscure choices later. Obviously these posts will include SPOILERS spanning all of the New!Who era, although I won't be giving the actual endings of individual episodes away.

All right, let's do this!

( Are you my mummy? )

I'll be back next week with numbers 4 through 6. Happy October, everyone!

A couple days late, but who's counting?

When I first saw this movie back in November 2017, this is what I had to say:

“Ragnarok is a queer space opera pride fest made of rainbow fireworks and lightning and I need to see it ten more times.”

Having achieved that (I think--I lost count of my rewatches at 7), I am still not tired of this movie, I still love it to bits, and I want to live in it.

But what I was going to say has been slightly overshadowed by one Tessa Thompson, aka Valkyrie, aka Real Life Badass Warrior Queen, COMING. OUT.



GIF Valkyrie power-walking down the rainbow bridge as fireworks go off behind her
Source.

THAT'S how you drop a mic at the end of Pride Month.

( Read more. . . )

Back to the Pride Watch! Today I'm talking about The Neon Demon.

Watch on YouTube

There's a scene in the beginning of this movie where our four central characters--Jesse (Elle Fanning), Ruby (Jena Malone), Sarah (Abbey Lee), and Gigi (Bella Heathcote)--are discussing lipstick colors. Ruby says that, according to market research, women are more likely to buy lipsticks if the name evokes either sex or food. They then ask Jesse what her color would be: "Are you sex, or food?" This is more on the nose on the second watch, by the way.

But just for fun, let's go through Rhoda's favorite lipstick colors and see if this is true:

-Air Kiss (hot pink, glossy)
-Pink Passion (Barbie pink, glossy)
-Red Velvet (classic red, matte)
-Sugar Plum Fairy (deep purple, matte)
-Dare Devil (black, glossy)
-Cherry Bomb (classic red, glossy)
-Gladiolus (classic red, glossy)

...and one with the label worn off that I can no longer read. So, about half and half. Although, fun story: I once got a pack of lip gloss that had NO names, and immediately went through them and gave them names like, "Victorian Seance" (iridescent gold), "Ectoplasm" (no-tint shimmer), and "Carrie's Prom Dress" (shimmery pink). I am still searching for a red lipstick called "Blood of My Enemies." It's out there somewhere. I shan't give up!

This movie's . . . weird. However, I think it’s pushing the proverbial envelope about half as far as it could have. That line where Jesse talks about being a “dangerous girl” is mostly symbolic in context. She’s “dangerous” not because of anything she’s done, but because people become envious, insecure, possessive, and suspicious just by her merely existing as a stunning natural beauty. In other words, Jesse has very little agency. She’s young and beautiful, and people react to her being young and beautiful. Which disappoints me, because I was hoping for a Dorian Gray or Elizabeth Bathory type situation where she had done something unspeakable--and possibly supernatural--to stay that way.

The queerness comes into it when Ruby confesses her feelings for Jesse, but then Jesse doesn’t reciprocate, and that’s when it starts to get ugly. Which is so disappointing, because I was hoping they would actually get together, and I don’t know why director Nicolas Winding Refn decided they shouldn’t. To be fair, changing Ruby and Jesse’s relationship so the attraction isn’t one-sided would completely change the ending, and I do rather like the ending, but here’s the other thing: I’m convinced there are at least two movies in this movie. One is about a young girl trying to make her way through the cutthroat fashion industry, and finds happiness in a sweet romance with a tough and wise makeup artist. The other is about a struggling but ruthless supermodel who devours her competition to stay on top. Literally. I would watch, and love, both of them, but I’m not sure they belong in the same movie.

The Neon Demon is highly stylized and was met with sharply divided opinions when it came out. I’ve watched it twice and I’m not done unpacking it yet. Check it out, and see what you think.

God, this movie. . .

Where to begin? It's The Craft, but with dudes. Underworld, but without vampires or werewolves. Supernatural, but not funny. It's also the only chance you'll get to see Gambit fight the Winter Soldier. I have watched this hot mess five times. As a result, this review is probably five times longer than it needs to be.

Watch on YouTube

The story is compelling enough on paper: Four founding families of the Ipswich colony in Massachusetts, plus one that was banished for ~Reasons, are powerful witches who created a covenant of secrecy around their powers so they wouldn't be hunted and burned at the stake. The present day descendants of these founding families all happen to be uniformly good-looking teenage boys all nearing their 18th birthday, after which they will "ascend" to their full powers. This would all be fine except for two things: 1) Magic is highly addictive and takes a physical toll every time they use it, and 2) The descendant of the long-lost banished family is back, and out for revenge.

( Read more... )

Happy June!

I’m actually taking this month off from most social media stuff for several reasons, but I do have a watch list, and many things checked out from the library or queued up on NetFlix, so we’re going to have a marathon.

First up: Pariah. Directed by Dee Rees in 2011, this movie is a coming-of-age / coming out story for Aleke, aka “Lee” (Adepero Oduye), who knows she’s a lesbian but doesn’t know how to live her truth yet. This hits a lot of familiar beats for a coming out story--the homophobic parents, the experimentation with someone who wasn’t really that into it in the first place, the struggle with what to tell people at school--but it also feels fresh and organic. We have dozens of coming out stories. But we don’t have another one quite like this.

Watch on YouTube

More specifically, we have a lot of coming out stories centered on white, cisgendered men. The fact that Lee is a butch lesbian from a Black family with traditional Christian roots creates additional nuance and texture for her background. There are expectations on her that I didn’t have put on me, being a white kid from a middle class family. Although I will say that the struggle to choose my own clothing is . . . ongoing. What is this thing certain parents have against tom boy type clothes? Lee sneaks different shirts, hats, and jackets into her school bag to change as soon as possible, and fights for her right to wear pants instead of skirts, and I feel her frustration.

Lee’s also a writer trying to find her voice. Her favorite teacher is incredibly supportive and encouraging, and she pushes Lee to go further, dig deeper, try harder. One of the best pieces of advice I ever got writing-was to write about what scares you. Finding your own voice, owning it, and sharing it with the world is scary. That’s what Lee does in the end, and while it does scare her, it also brings her joy and purpose.

Now honestly, I was half-dreading watching this that something irreparably awful would happen. I always have this fear watching new-to-me movies with explicitly queer characters, because it seems to be inevitable so much of the time. And while there is definitely a fair bit of angst and some tense family scenes that are difficult to watch: this has a happy ending. This is a burst of positivity and light. If you haven’t seen it yet, add it to your watch list.