glitter_n_gore

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

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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.

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.

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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.

Greetings! We are in our second week of Pride Month and I’m talking about Remus Lupin--more specifically, the question of whether the character is bisexual.

Since Lupin is the only one of the werewolves on my list who is not explicitly confirmed in the text as bi, I took a poll. Here's what it looked like:


Screenshot of Twitter poll with question “Is Remus Lupin Bisexual?” and results
Yes = 63%
No = 13%
Not Sure = 13%
Whatever JK Says = 11%

I asked more informally on my regular blog as well. As you can see, results were mixed. More so than I had anticipated. This is why I wanted to start here. More often than not, LGBT fans do a lot of guesswork to figure out if there are any non-straight, non-cisgender people in the fictional universe we're being shown. Unless it's a world that's helmed by a writer/director/producer who's actively trying to create more diversity in that particular area, it’s down to the audience to interpret what we’re given.

( Read more. . . )

Since I did a similar thing last year for Pride Month *just* before running out of time, I'm counting down my Top Whatever Queer-Friendly Movies/TV Shows.

Also like last year, I'm narrowing this down a touch to reflect the sort of things I actually watch. Matter of fact, when I started thinking about this I actually had to scale it back some. I'm choosing to see that as a good sign. Here are my parameters:

A) Visual media with canonically LGBT+ characters, as opposed to that awful, pandery bullshit known as queerbaiting. So no Supernatural, BBC Sherlock or Hannibal*. This tends to happen a lot with geek-centric shows trying to catch fans of SFF and Horror.

B) Completely fictional stories, as opposed to ones based on real-life events, which disqualifies Milk, The Normal Heart and The Imitation Game. (Although I highly recommend all three.)

C) Things I've actually watched and enjoyed, which disqualifies Lost Girl, The Legend of Korra and The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but they are all on my list.

*I do enjoy Hannibal, but the only canon gay character we've seen so far is Margot, and she wound up in a hetero sex scene. So no, I'm not including it for *this* Top Whatever list.

First, an honorable mention:

The Dreamers
This is one of only two NC-17 movies I've watched multiple times (the other is the original Evil Dead, obviously), and one of VERY few romances I've actually enjoyed. It reminds me a lot of Before Sunrise--it has the same casual pacing and naturalist dialogue, only with lots more nudity. I got the impression very quickly that Michael Pitt's character, Matthew, is bisexual, but I've seen arguments made that Matthew is only romantically involved with Eva Green's character, Isabelle. You could read it that way, since all the "romance" between Matthew and Theo is implied, never shown, but I disagree. The book this was based on had a polyamorous triad as the central relationship, and was very much present in the original script. That said, it's ambiguous enough that you could go either way here.


(20th Century Fox)

I just realized two of my choices here include Eva Green. Interesting.

( Moar! )

That'll have to do for this year. At least it's still June. Happy Pride Month, everyone!

*throws rainbow confetti*