A couple of weeks ago I set out to find an air-conditioned escape from my 90 degree house (hooray for no a/c in the desert!), and lo-and-behold, I ended up at that frigid complex known as “the movie theater.” I faced the daunting decision of choosing a movie I knew little to nothing about in order to eat junk food and not turn into a puddle of sweat on my carpet.  It came down to “Despicable Me” versus “Inception,” and once I took a look at each of the trailers it was clear: Ellen Page for the win.

So there we were: Leonardo DiCaprio, Tommy from 3rd Rock, Juno, and me.  And it was cool, and it was action-y, and it was not overtly disturbing or offensive.  So I walked out cool, happy, and jonesing for an Ellen Page marathon.  This probably doesn’t bode well for the impression that Inception itself made on me, eh?

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My introduction to Felicia Day came when one of my favorite geeks, Wil Wheaton, posted the trailer for Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog on his website and told me to watch it. I did. I even waited up with anticipation waiting for the final installment.

The Trailer:

It was (and is) easy to love Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. It’s a well-written, well-acted, well-produced 45 minutes of entertainment. It was also rather groundbreaking in the fact that it was independently produced by highly-respected professionals and proved that you don’t necessarily need the big studios to make something good or profitable.

Dr. Horrible also spawned a lot of discussion, most of it surrounding the character of Penny (played by Ms. Day), and the role she plays in the story.

(If you haven’t seen all three parts of Dr. Horrible yet, you should be warned: there will be spoilers.)

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While Stieg Larsson’s literary Girl trilogy has received generally positive reviews, reactions to the Swedish film have been mixed.  Having finished the first and second books, and now having viewed the film, I feel ready to throw my two-cents out there.  But first, the disclaimer-y stuff: There are certain to be spoilers, but I’ll try to keep it to book one and the film.  Also, be aware (if you aren’t already) this series contains graphic depictions of violence against women and sexual assault.

I’ll start with my summary and conclusion in case you’re using this to determine whether or not to read the series or watch the film:

If you’re the kind of person who likes psychological thrillers, non-slasher horror films, and murder-mystery style suspense, you’ll probably like this series.  If you like those types of things AND choose to view the themes of the series through a feminist lens, you may well be impressed.  But if you can’t handle violent films on the principle of the matter, this film will overload your system.  If you can’t handle violent films AND choose to view the themes of the series through a feminist lens, you’ll probably be pissed.  And revolted.

Let’s take a look at the first installment in the series. Read the rest of this entry »

Splice is a sci-fi horrorish film that is in many ways a modern retelling of the story of Frankenstein.  What Splice does differently from most sci-fi horrorish films is to incorporate complex, intelligent female characters and examine (both directly and indirectly) female emotional and sexual development in an extreme situation.  Until it blows it at the end.

Also, I have never seen so many people stand up and exit the theater so quickly when the credits started rolling, but that might be a Utah thing (more on that later).  If anything, the strong reactions of my fellow theater-goers only made me more thoughtful about this unusual movie.

Here’s what you need to know: Clive and Elsa are a couple (literally) of scientists who have been working on splicing together DNA from different animals to create new species in the hopes of developing cures for livestock diseases.  They think it would be a good idea to take this to the next level – the human level – in order to find cures for human diseases, and pretty much just to test their theory about how awesome they are.  They’re told no, but they do it anyway.  What they end up creating is first a creepy slimy thing, which evolves into a cute rabbitish thing, and finally into a human chimera thing.  Although Clive was recently trying to talk Elsa into kids, she wasn’t interested.  Now she has become very attached to their creature, Dren, and he’s the one with serious second thoughts.  Spoilers ahead. Read the rest of this entry »

As an anti-Twilight-ruining-classic-mythology tribute, here are a bunch of my favorite werewolf-respecting videos.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll

TV on the Radio - Wolf Like Me

Michael Jackson - Thriller (Ok, so it’s more about zombies, but it’s classic.)

And finally, to remedy the damage done to your brain by Twilight, go watch Ginger Snaps.

I feel better now.  How about you?

I caved and watched the second installment of the Twilight series this weekend.  I thought I hated the first one, but my inner adolescent still compelled me to watch it twice.  New Moon, on the other hand, I could barely stomach just the once.  Because from what I can tell, the Twilight series is entirely about construing relationship violence, control, manipulation, and disempowering women as “romantic.”  Which, to me, means that Stephanie Meyer either has a much sadder background than we know about, or that she has been so privileged and pampered (and brainwashed?) that this kind of thing is the stuff of her fantasies.  And she thinks that we should pass this on to our youth.

Anyone who is reading this probably already knows the plot (and probably has stumbled upon this in a search for more fanaticism about their favorite Robert Pattinson and the Glory of Twilight), but in case you don’t here it is:

Edward’s family throws a B-day party for Bella, who gets the mother of all paper cuts while opening her presents (for serious, who has ever paper cut herself so seriously on WRAPPING PAPER that BLOOD DROPS ON THE CARPET?).  The youngest vampire in their little friendly foster family goes wild and Edward throws Bella into a glass table.  Resulting in more blood.  So Edward dumps Bella the next day under the pretenses that she’ll be safer if they go on as if they’d never met.  Which is a nice way of saying “my family wants to eat you so we (a family of vampires) are moving to Florida.”  Also, “I am a boy and I’m hurting you because I love you so much and I know so much better about your own welfare than you do.”  But not “sorry I threw you across the room into a glass table last night.”

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The adolescent goth kid in me has nothing but love for Christina Ricci after all these years, although I probably haven’t kept up with enough of her films to really be qualified to defend that position.  Memories of Casper and The Adams family mixed with impressions from Prozac Nation and Penelope leave me excitedly awaiting Ricci’s newest film, After.Life, despite only having known about it for a few days (via i09) and not being the biggest fan of the horror genre.  Although I have some hesitations about After.Life, particularly as a feminist, I’m a little excited.

The possible good: Christina Ricci.  Escaping bad dudes.  Some sort of metaphor for being robbed of power and then empowering oneself.

The possible bad: Little red nightie, sexual objectification.  Misogyny, kidnapping, violence against women.  Damsel in distress, dude to the rescue.

So I’m torn.  My feminist conscience is certainly skeptical, but something in me remains curious.  Although I really hate slashers and torture-porn-esque films (a la Saw series and its bretheren), I have an inkling that this is more of a psychological thriller (a la Hide and Seek), which I am actually kind of into.  It could go either way, and I’m certainly willing to give this one a try (even if I can’t entirely justify it to myself), but I’m not holding my breath that it’ll come to my community as it’s not yet scheduled for wide release and our one and only cool little indie theater closed about six months ago.

What are your thoughts on Christina Ricci, After.Life, and the status of women in horror films today?  Anyone seen this film or know more about it?

About a month ago I was contacted by a promising young filmmaker in New York – not bad for a lil’ ol’ blogger out here in the wild west.  Katie Madonna Lee describes her film as follows:

When her mother is murdered by her father, Julie Ann Mabry is confronted by a life of hardship and poverty. Taken in by her Evangelical relatives, she begins to adopt new convictions in an effort to reconnect with her mother. Slowly, the threads of her new life begin to unravel and Julie Ann is sent to prison. It is there she finds the freedom and community she had sought so long, yet it does not come without a price.

Woman’s Prison is a tragedy through and through.  It is filled with the consequences of poverty, people stuck in cycles that they can’t break out of without the help of mankind, which all too often turns a blind eye to the needs of others.  Julie Ann’s life is punctuated by moments of beauty, in her relationship with her mother and with her cousin Britney – two people who genuinely love and accept her as she is.  The rest of her life is filled with pain, suffering, and people who use and discard Julie Ann.  She never has a chance, spends the majority of her life in jail, and eventually faces the death penalty.  She becomes the epitome of the the poor and untouchable that our society sweeps under the rug.

Woman’s Prison is a story like so many others that most of us would rather ignore.  That is exactly why it is so important for us to face.  You can find out more about the film at its official site.

I’ve mentioned before that I’ve always loved Alice in Wonderland, so of course I was excited to finally get to the theater and see Tim Burton’s new adaptation.  I was a little hesitant – Tim Burton has become rather cliche and tends to just remix his Hot Topic costumes and “eccentric” casts.  However, I was really impressed with the film, an pleasantly so.

The story complements the original well without retelling a familiar tale too redundantly, nor taking artistic license overboard.  Alice fluctuates between her initial childlike-obedience (eating what says “eat me,” drinking what says “drink me,” and following the directions of a vast array of curious creatures) and taking ownership of her behavior (“it’s my dream after all”).  She bravely and cleverly dupes the Red Queen into thinking her a friend, allowing her to rescue her friend and find an important sword that will allow her to fulfill her destiny – Alice is not just a girl on an adventure, she’s a woman champion come to save Underland from the Red Queen’s rule and defeat the dreaded Jabberwocky.

Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter was the least enjoyable part of the film.  Depp remixed all of his other “eccentric” characters and put on a funny wig for this part.  What was even more disturbing was the deep, emotional connection alluded to between the Hatter and Alice.  First of all, it will be hard to top SyFy’s take on that dynamic, and secondly, Depp’s Hatter is too old, too mad, and too creepy for some sort of… whatever with a nineteen year old girl.  Creepy and irritating.

At the very least, however, this film portrays strong female leads, protagonists, and antagonists with little to no emphasis on romance as a plot device.  Alice is clever, strong, and charismatic and rises to the occasion, allowing her newfound courage to launch her into an adventurous career rather than a miserable marriage.  Plus, it was fun, and it looks cool – although maybe not quite as cool as this:

You can read some other great perspectives on the film at Adventures of a Young Feminist, Autostraddle, and Gender Across Borders.

Released in 1999, I had never seen The Cider House Rules until a few weeks ago.  I’m not usually into period pieces or Tobey Maguire, so I didn’t expect much.  However, there were some powerful lines about the importance of a woman’s right to choose and to have safe medical treatments available to her once she’s made her choice.  Furthermore, there were some powerful examples of times that removing that choice is truly cruel, regardless of your political beliefs on the matter.

The Cider House Rules is the story of Homer, an orphan boy who never made it out of the orphanage, and has been trained as a doctor by his mentor and father figure, Dr. Larch, who runs the orphanage.  In addition to delivering the babies of women giving their children up for adoption, Dr. Larch offers safe medical abortions to any woman who asks for it.  He doesn’t advertise this service (as it is illegal), and he doesn’t suggest it to women no matter how many times he’s delivered their unwanted babies, but he won’t turn away a woman in need.  When Homer accuses him of playing God in this way, Dr. Larch responds:

Dr. Larch: I have been given the opportunity of playing God or leaving practically everything up to chance. Men and women of conscience should seize those moments when it’s possible to play God. There won’t be many. Do I interfere when absolutely helpless women tell me they simply can’t have an abortion – that they simply must go through with having another and yet another orphan? I do not. I do not even recommend. I just give them what they want.

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