the Dalaverse

Can I just state once again, for the record, how awesome it is that I am writing a paper about Star Wars? Not even a serious scholarly essay with Joseph Campbell and Akira Kurosawa -- it is really just an exploration of why I love it so damn much. My basic answer: I was twelve years old and a geek. (Twelve when it was rereleased in theaters -- the first time I ever saw it was on the big screen, even though I was born nearly a decade after it was made).

I got an e-mail from my dad this morning titled "Yeah." The body was thus: DYLAN IS BACK!!! only with way more ! that I am too lazy to type out. Apparently he bought the new album yesterday. Hee. My dad is a fangirl.

Since I've just now noticed that my paper isn't actually due until midnight, I will now regale you with thoughts and mini-reviews of movies I have seen since I've been back at school.

Outside of class: Yes, this was seriously the first time I'd ever seen it, and having the beautifully restored DVD isn't too shabby a first experience. I wanted to watch it because it gets cited quite often in my Film textbook, and because, well, it's GWTW. I quite enjoyed it, for all that it is really, incredibly long. It's melodrama, but high-quality melodrama. I loved Scarlett as a character and Vivien Leigh's performance with an unreserved passion. Her right eyebrow should've gotten its own credit. I love Scarlett in all her selfishness and shallowness and greed and pride and beauty. I adored Rhett, too, even if the march up the stairs was a little too close to spousal rape for comfort. That made me uncomfortable, but not so uncomfortable that I couldn't let it go. The dynamic between them, where it seems nobody else can match them for wit and that's the basis of the attraction...yeah.

Olivia de Haviland as Melanie is...well, Melanie bugs. She would bug irredeemably if there weren't two scenes of the steel beneath the saintliness: when she comes down the stairs lugging a sword after Scarlett shoots the Yankee intruder, and when she immediately gets into the concocted story about the raid on the shantytown. I wanted to slap her a lot of the rest of the time -- but I wanted to slap Ashley ALL of the time. God, I hate him. I hate him almost as much as I hate Paris, and I hate Paris more than any other character in literature. He's just a big useless lump, deserving of neither Scarlett's nor Melanie's love, and I wish Mammy would hit him over the head with a frying pan for letting Scarlett insinuate herself into his life instead of just leaving and saving them both a deal of trouble and heartache. Ashley Wilkes sucks.

Initially I was quite put off by the portrayal of slavery, the races and the South, but most of that discomfort was eaten up by "Birth of a Nation" a few days later, so I will just say this: Prissy is a horrendous stereotype and I cringed whenever she was onscreen. But at least Selznik took out the Klan.

Starbucks can produce as many movies as they want. This was adorable. Rent it.

Goes through the latter part of her reign. Helen Mirren was terrific, playing Elizabeth as a woman of violent passions, from the love she tries to suppress from the temper she generally lets fly. It was certainly more historically accurate than other recent Elizabethpics. Elizabeth's advisors were top-notch, especially Patrick Malahide as Walsingham. But...Ian McDiarmid (Burghley) talks, and he's Palpatine. No one else. I kept making the sign of the cross by reflex whenever he opened his mouth.

Jeremy Irons played Leicester, and did a good balance with his affection for Elizabeth and his ambition. However, he played the role almost exactly as he played his characters in "Kingdom of Heaven" and "Casanova." I will admit that I haven't seen any other Irons movies (except for "The Lion King," of course), but, er...it was odd.

Hugh Dancy, quite simply, blew me away. I did not know the pretty boy could actually act. He owned Essex. Also, who knew Hugh Dancy and Helen Mirren made such a smokin' couple? I'm completely serious. I was squicked out a bit at first, but then they started making out and dude, what can I say? It was hot. Don't judge me.

I'll get to the film class viewings later.

Um. Anniversary. I do not have anything to say, but here is Jon Stewart on Youtube, the first "Daily Show" after September 11, 2001.