The Hours (2002)

I don’t really have much of an exciting story to accompany my first viewing of The Hours, so i would say that this might be a relatively short entry... however, anyone who knows me knows that i can talk about nothing for hours on end (pun totally intended). So i’m going to play it safe, and not offer any heads up on what this one’s going to be about cuz really this could spin off anywhere.

As far back as i can remember, we have had a bit of a tradition in my family to go and rent out movies on the first week of all the school holiday breaks. Because apparently for us there was nothing better for kids to be doing than spending endless hours of sun-filled free time sitting in front of the tv watching movies. And when there’s four kids in ur family, u come home with a fucking truck load of videos.

So anyway this was one of those times—and even though i wasn’t at school anymore, my little sister and brother still were so the tradition was still fiercely maintained. Please, I aint gonna wait till end of semester to rent movies! And besides, by mid semester I’ve procrastinated so much that every movie that we own has been watched so it’s time to source some fresh material to keep the boring-ass assignments at bay. So i’m browsing my favourite section - the 7 day rent Drama shelves (new release = lame), and i see this movie, I’ve never seen or heard of it before, but apparently it has Meryl Streep in it so therefore it must be good. The other thing which ultimately intrigued me to pay the $1 rental for it, was that the cover has listed the three leading actresses - Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, and Nicole Kidman; and it has three women pictured on it also, two of which i could easily tell were Meryl and Julianne, but Nicole was nowhere to be seen!? And i’m looking at it thinking, ‘where is she? Why is her name listed but she not be pictured? Is she perhaps hidden behind the woman with the obscenely large nose?’ Obviously now i couldn’t not watch it. And i had it in my mind that i was going to be playing a Where’s Wally? like game with Nicole for the next 2 hours and was getting kinda excited for it. Needless to say all the other kids are looking at me like ‘what da hell is wrong wit chu gurl??’

GAH MA GAWD IT IS AMAZING. U know ur in for an intellectual friggin mind-trip when in the first 10 minutes the sequence of events goes - Nicole Kidman, a mentally ill Virginia Woolf in 1921 begins writing the first sentence of her novel ‘Mrs. Dalloway’: “Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself”. Cuts to Julianne Moore who plays 1950s housewife Laura Brown, lying in bed she picks up a copy of the novel Mrs. Dalloway and reads : “Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself”. Cuts to Meryl Streep, New Yorker in 2001 preparing a party for her long-time friend, she calls out : “Sally, i think i’ll buy the flowers myself”. MIND. BLOWN. O.o’’ Much of this kind of crazy intertwiningness of stories happens throughout the whole film. It’s brilliant.

As for the LGBTing which i’m sure ur waiting for me to mention (hey Brett), i love that in this film the lesbianism of the three leading characters just happens like a side note - it’s not dramatised and all emotional like how gay themes in movies usually are, it just exists. Emphasis is placed largely on how each of the characters deal with the mental illness and suicide present in their lives. The fact that they also share a common sexuality, wether it be known or not, is just not seen as any kind of a big deal next to the importance of the other issues; and it’s even seen to be that in these few moments, each character escapes briefly from the traumas of their current situations. It’s not very often that a gay tendency is the best thing to happen in ur day.

 

 

- - - FAVOURITE MOVIE MOMENTS - - -

I absolutely love the United States of Tara (don’t we all?), so seeing Toni Collette in that scene where she comes to visit Julianne at home, and she’s got all her Alice on as 50s housewife was incredible. Just made me love her even more. And her breasts?!! O.o! OMG AMAZING

So there’s that scene, the one i mentioned earlier with the opening sequence, and the one other one that i loved was another kind of mind trippy one, where Laura (Julianne) checks into a hotel with her novel ‘Mrs. Dalloway’ and several prescription bottles full of pills. The next few minutes where it flicks between her in the hotel bed, and Virginia Woolf at home deciding what the fate of her novel’s heroine was going to be, was just brilliant film making. It made me slightly out of breath just watching it. Gah.

MOVIE : :D !!!

HOTTNESS OF CAST : 6 fabulous ladies?! Yay ;)

CRY FACTOR : 0 tears

A Single Man (2009)

Before I start this one - I have to give a huge shout out to my wonderful and dear friend Brett, who, at the time that I am writing this, is (and possibly will be) the one and only person reading my blog. If there was anyone who deserves a massive hug which passes beyond the point of awkwardness, it is you. xx

Confusion began in seeing Tom Ford’s A Single Man, apparently before we even got there. I facebook’d Matt after i saw the trailer and was like ‘omg we have to see this!!’ Even better was that it was showing at the Palace Centro - which is like one of the few Brisbane theatres which shows all the kinda foreign/art house/alternative films, and is like one of my favourite places to be. So Matt’s like helz yes! I tell him what day and time and off we go. So we get to the ticket counter and I just casually mention something about Colin Firth or something, and Matt’s like ‘wait… whaaa?’ and I’m like ‘..??’ and he’s like ‘what are we seeing again?’ and I’m like ‘A Single Man? Tom Ford… Colin Firth… yes?’ and he’s like ‘Ooooohhhhhh. I thought we were seeing A Serious Man’. And I’m like ‘what the hell is A Serious Man?’ and he’s all just like ‘I have no idea, it looks kinda shitty - but it was Oscar nominated so I thought that’s why we were seeing it..’.

At this point the man selling tickets interjects, looks us up and down and says ‘boys, for u I would definitely suggest A Single Man. You will love it infinity times more than A Serious Man’. We were both totally sold and got tickets.

OMG IT WAS AMAZING!! Beautiful story line aside - when u see a movie by Tom Ford, u know it’s going to look better than sex. You could freeze frame literally any second of the movie and put it on your wall if u wanted. As a visual learner myself, watching this was like being in this continuous orgasmic state that u never want to end. Obviously, I am single.

As for the plot - even though I’m kinda not for the whole teacher/student; like as a student myself, I could never go there. I know I talk a big game but deep down, I know it’s sorta wrong. So I was kinda like ehh about that. But from the teacher’s perspective, like I felt like I could totally in some way identify with him, imagining myself in his situation. This kid was so nice, HOT and interested!?! How could you not?! A tree would come to life and do him if it could. And like it was college so he’d be over 18 so it’s not like it illegal or anything. How quickly we as the viewer forget about this poor man struggling to come to terms with his long-time partner suddenly getting killed, in the hopes that we’ll see a hot sex scene. So then u sit there for the whole movie kinda waiting for them to get it on - and then of course by the end u feel really bad cuz he resists temptation, and we’re left there questioning our apparently appalling morals - ‘would I have actually gone there? How could I even think he would just rebound with a kid like that?? And then so ur really glad that he didn’t get with the student cuz u hope deep down that u would do the same. Well this is what I was feeling anyway.

 

 

- - - FAVOURITE MOVIE MOMENTS - - -

When George (Colin Firth) goes over to his best friend Charlotte’s house (the fabulously beautiful Julianne Moore) for dinner, and they get drunk and dance in her living room. I love moments like that with ur fag hag. They make life great :)

I also loved the way that, in scenes where George’s depression slipped away a little bit, when he saw beautiful things, the colour would be highly intensified. I found it was a really effective way of communicating those emotions, and such a Tom Fordy way to have done it.

MOVIE : ORGASMIC

HOTTNESS OF CAST : ORGASMIC

CRY FACTOR : 0 tears

Milk (2008)

I saw milk in what I believe has been the best period for movies that I’ve been alive for - that being the 2008/09 sorta time. This is quite possibly due to the fact that this was the time that me and my bffl Matt, initiated a bit of a movie crawl around the theatres of Brisbane. It was really sort of the first time that I’d taken a real interest in what movies were coming out and tried to go and see as many good ones that I could; and we saw so many good ones that year - Milk, Doubt, and Changeling were a few. All this goodness was then followed up by the very first instalment of our now annual Oscar's Party at Matt’s house, with what has been still the best Oscars that I’ve ever seen! Hugh Jackman hosting, and omg that Hollywood Musicals number he did with Beyonce!!?! AMAZING!!!! Zefron and Vanessa - kinda random but loved you anyway. Dustin Lance Black - adorable, Kate Winslet FINALLY winning best actress and her beautiful acceptance speech. Sophia Loren—as leathery as ever and in that tragic yellow dress that made her look like one of those toilet dolls. Classic good times. Just the way that they did everything was wonderful, and has yet to be beaten. And just as a side note - this years generally sucked. By far the highlight was Angelina’s leg moments, so fabulous. For those who haven't beared witness to this -  http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/angelina-jolies-leg

Ok enough of this reminiscing, to MILK!

Before this I had actually never heard of Harvey Milk and the plight of the Castro gays. In fact I don’t even think I knew what we were seeing when we arrived at the cinema. Matt was like ‘come with me we’re seeing milk’. And I was like ‘ok! I love milk, yum!’ sigh - u can’t judge me on this.

The film - amazing. Beautifully shot, costumes and sets - amazing, acting - amazing (Oscar for best actor Sean Penn - well deserved), James Franco - hot. That guy from High School Musical - what was his purpose? I mean it was great to see him an’ all, getting out into the big world of gay cinema - it actually wasn’t until the other week when I watched Milk again, did I do my usual imdb / wiki research of the characters in real life that I actually realised what he was doing. I love reading up about characters in movies afterwards when they’re true stories :) especially when u find out that the actual people had random cameo appearances throughout the movie, and u have to go back and search all the crowd scenes to find them - endless hours of fun!! … ah I have no life.

The only thing I’ve been confused about and slightly ehh about, in both times that I watched it, was the way that he talked. Like was Harvey actually a little bit simple? Was Penn just always drunk on set? These are questions which I guess will never be answered.

All in all though, I would definitely recommend this wonderful piece of film making. Totally makes me wish I was a struggling gay in San Francisco during the late 70’s / early 80’s. Protesting, fighting the police, and just being generally fierce to everybody.

- - - FAVOURITE MOVIE MOMENTS - - -

That scene when we are first introduced to Harvey’s new campaign manager, Anne Kronenberg.

Cleve: I was telling Harvey we needed some tough dykes around here

Anne: Well, you got one.

There’s an amazing scene in the film where, while they’re fighting to appose Proposition 6, an initiative that would require that all California state public schools fire any gay or lesbian teachers or counselors, the people in Wichita, Kansas began repealing their city law protecting homosexuals against discrimination in jobs and housing due to political persuasion from bitch Anita Bryant. Anyway so Cleve calls up Lawrence, saying that they’re losing Wichita and that there’s going to be a rally that night; and so Lawrence calls up someone and Cleve calls up another guy, and then all of a sudden there’s like this huge queer network of phone calls flying around everywhere, resulting in this massive group of crazy gays who show up for the rally, march to city hall and start a bit of a riot. It’s like there’s this insane underground community of people who are willing to fight to the death to defend one of their own. And there’s drag queens and lesbians and fucking everyone is out there, when like a minute ago most of them were probably just chillin at home watching tv or baking or some shit; and it’s like the gay teachers in Wichita are in trouble! We don’t know them BUT WE WILL KILL FOR THEM!! It’s a very comforting feeling to know that we belong to this crazy-ass community. I know if one of my gurls were getting shit, all kinds of super bitch would surface and rage (I know this because it has). The bonds of the gay sisterhood are incredibly tight - you do not want to mess with us, cuz we will fuck. you. up. Remember that.

MOVIE : Really quite lovely

HOTNESS OF CAST : Yay ;)

CRY FACTOR : 1 tear