Fassbending. So Much Fassbending.

Potential SPOILERS for the recently released X-Men : First Class


Here is my overall impression of the film.





Hnnnggguuuuuuhhhh.



Here are some of my other thoughts about the film, but with more words.

1. Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy, two of my favourite British men ever, in the same film. It is still rather odd to see them as leading men in a summer blockbuster comic book movie, and part of my brain refuses to accept it. But still. Fassbender. McAvoy. Together. McBendering. Fassavoying. It's too much for a girl to take. Both of them are easily the backbone of the film, and carry the plot and the entire supporting cast effortlessly, while delivering fabulous individual performances and having mad, mad, mad, mad, mad, mad chemistry with each other. Acting-wise, totally solid.



2. Speaking of mad, mad, mad, mad ,mad chemistry, the gay subtext within the Charles Xavier- Erik Lensherr friendship (intentional, according to the screenwriters) stopped being subtext and became plain text about 12 seconds after the title card. Even James McAvoy in an interview expressed mock surprise that the two didn't simply get married by the end. I can attest to the fact that he's not exaggerating; the Erik/Charles slash fiction pretty much writes itself.


You see? I mean sure, there's a winged topless woman in front of them, but they are in bed together. As if the Internet needs any more encouragement than that.



3. The entire thing could have just been Michael Fassbender Wears Nice Suits And Kills Nazis While Speaking Four Languages And Doing Funny Things To My Ladyparts, and I would have been just as happy. Happier, in fact.

4. I'm still trying to figure out exactly what the plot was - it wasn't the strongest of storylines but it served its purpose, I suppose. Russians something something CIA something Cuban Missile Crisis something something mutants are DIFFERENT something something January Jones' boobs something. The important thing was that it didn't feel contrived or overly-hammed up, and more importantly, it was a heck of a lot of fun.
But most importantestly (this is now a real word, okay?), Michael Fassbender sexes sexily around the X-mansion, wearing a turtleneck. Of SEX.



5. The women in the movie aren't exactly portrayed in the best light. CIA agent Moira McTaggart is down to her bra and panties within seconds of the audience meeting her (but guys, those were her government-approved stripper club stakeout clothes, they were for WORK dammit), January Jones did nothing but walk around in tight suits with her chest hanging out. The mutant Angel chooses to join the "bad guys" almost as soon as her character is established, which means she had pretty much no lines or any development for the rest of the movie.And then there was that line about why women shouldn't be in the CIA. It's hard to tell if stuff like this was meant to reflect the rampant misogyny of the story's 1960s setting, or if it's just what it is - blatant sexism that's present in nearly all forms of modern media which goes unnoticed so much of the time. But let's forget about all that because here is Michael Fassbender in a suit again.




6. I have not seen a single episode of Mad Men, and therefore cannot comment on January Jones' acting in that show, but holy crap was she completely wooden and uncharismatic and unappealing as Emma Frost. She had a couple of pretty snarky lines that would have worked wonderfully if delivered well, but meh. But that's okay though, because while January Jones was not-acting, Michael Fassbender was providing enough intensity, complexity, vulnerability and charisma to run a nuclear power plant. If you could run a nuclear power plant on intensity, complexity, vulnerability and charisma, that is.


And on top of all that, he was also providing the HOT. Such selfless talent.



7. As Grace pointed out, the so-called villains in this instalment were one-dimensional, paper-thin and completely dispensable. Kevin Bacon's evil ex-Nazi character started off with promise but by the end had been reduced to the cartoonish "let's blow up the world" brand of super villain. His minions fared much much worse - they barely had any lines, and I don't think anyone so much as mentioned Riptide's name.



8. One-note bad guys aside, this film does a great job of fleshing out Magneto's character and origin story (cause let's face it, this is Michael Fassbender's movie and everyone else is there to be pretty wallpaper [except McAvoy, he co-owns this movie. And my heart]). Wait, what? Oh yes, this film does a great job of fleshing out Magneto's character and origin story in a way that made him somehow sympathetic and also not entirely evil/wrong. His Holocaust experiences and the way they shaped his future bitterness, anger, and his vengeful nature did not feel contrived or overdone in the slightest. And where the previous X-Mens seemed fairly contented to leave us with the Professor X = Bald and Good/Magneto = Caped and Bad dynamic, this one gives us more shades of grey, and spade upon spade of sexy.


Fassy darling, you seem to have forgotten your shoes. Don't worry though, I'll help you put them on, so you don't have to stop that intense-staring-into-the-vaguely-off-camera-distance thing you're doing so well there.


9. The focus is placed more on making it a character study of Erik Lensherr and Charles Xavier, and not so much on the flashy CGI or explosions. However, the special effects, when they did show up, were effective and suitably dignified with the proper dosage of badassitude. This scene with the missiles, for instance, was crazy hot.


I don't know how much it had to with the hundreds of phallic weapons dangling in the air right in front of him, or the fact that in this particular scene Michael Fassbender suddenly develops a very prominent Irish accent broad enough to drive several trucks through, but I wanted to bone him so hard at that moment, unflattering helmet or not.

10. I can't think of anything else to say, so here's some more Fassbender. It is a truly great man indeed, who can steal the boiling, frothing oceans of my lust away from James McAvoy.



Sweet Jesus help me.


In conclusion:

Fassbender.

Well okay, in all seriousness, X-Men : First Class, while it has its share of flaws, is a tremendous amount of fun, and in no way a waste of a couple of hours and fourteen bucks. It definitely surpasses it predecessors in terms of quality and storytelling (and hotness) and if any sequels are indeed planned, I for one will be looking forward to them. Also, Fassbender. All fangirl-style objectification aside, the man is a ridiculously good actor, and it's nice to see him (and McAvoy) get some major recognition from the masses, so people can cast him in more movies and I can go sit in dark cinemas and squeal (inwardly) for many years to come.

Excuse me while I just sit here and swoon a thousand times over.

Just a quick afterthought ; another thing that really bugged me was how Charles Xavier had to put two fingers to his temple to let us know every time he was using his mad mutant psychic skillz. Someone needs to come up with a new way for telepaths to do their telepathing, because way to be subtle, Captain Obvious.

After-afterthought : How is it that nobody in Hollywood has cottoned on to the undeniable truth that Fassbender needs to be the next James Bond? Because if he were, I would actually watch one of those damned movies. Many times. In a row. Also someone should appoint me as Head Boss Queen Leader of Hollywood because no one in that town knows what they're doing.

Let's Get Frivolous, Frivolous.

Beckeye's latest post reminded me that there really hasn't been enough shameless, fully-fledged fangirling around these parts in tooooo long a time. And there needs to be more of it, because I only have a year and then some left in my period of teenagedomhood, that blessed phase of life when you can blame pretty much everything on raging hormones and get away with it.

Here then, I present to you an epic dose of hormonal frivolity (the best kind) in the form of a dozen or so specimens of masculinity who sexed up 2009 for the BAP (and maybe a little bit of 2008 as well). And keep in mind that this isn't an All-Time Hotties list. There's no way I could ever limit that to 1o or 12 people. I've already taken liberties as it is.

Chace Crawford
Never having been much of a Gossip Girl advocate, I was only vaguely aware of the fellow's existence, somewhere along the fringes of my everyday consciousness. Perhaps as a much better-looking Zac Efron. There was that one time I watched him drive himself to to tears on E!Entertainment News, talking about how mean the paparazzi are, and I went "Awwww" for a bit and then proceeded to forget all about him. Until one fateful Saturday afternoon when I was innocently channel-surfing and stumbled upon a repeat of an old Gossip Girl episode, featuring the aforementioned Chace of the Crawfords running across a suburban street, dressed in nothing but an impeccable pair of blue boxers. That did it. Really. Never have I so fully grasped the elusive nature of the show's fanatical appeal. And I sure do not resent the fact that I can only admire his perfection from a distance, because being in such close proximity to somebody so much Prettier and Shinier than I am would cause irreparable damage to my already fragile self-esteem.



Matthew Goode
It's the accent, I tell you. That, and the special brand of aristocratically snarky British sarcasm mixed with equal amounts self-depracation. Also that vibe he gives you that suggests he may just be a tad gay. Also, his nose. I have a thing about the man's nose.




Kings Of Leon
Yes, all of them together (even the chubby one) , as one cohesive unit of sexualness. It helps, considerably, that they have all shaved, gotten haircuts and wardrobe overhauls. Also that their lyrical and musical profundity has matured beyond songs about alcohol, blowjobs, and knocking up girls. Needless to say, this lot emerged from one heck of a gene pool (thank you, Mama and Papa Followill) and I really don't care that they once had to ban their female fans from taking pictures with them because all four guys got molested so much. But hey, them Followills are the ones wearing ridiculously tight jeans and yowling about Sex On Fire. I say suck it up, be sexy and deal.


Cam Gigandet
Robert Pattinson can take his stinky axle-greased hair and face powder and go sparkle himself to death on some bleeding meadow. This man is the best thing Twilight or anyone associated with it has done for the female gender.


Alexander Skarsgard

One of the finest things to have emerged from Sweden since, like, ABBA. You may recognize him in such masterpieces of pop culture as True Blood (in which he plays a dastardly vampire)and that Lady Gaga video(in which he plays an eye-patched but still dastardly boyfriend). Kicking back on the couch on Tuesday evenings to watch Alexander being blond, bitchy, bloodsuckish and bilingual has given me a great deal of enjoyment over the last year. Lie back and think of Scandinavia, y'all.


James McAvoy
I's amazing, really, that such a small man can pack that much sex appeal into all five feet and seven inches of his frame. Talk about talent. And his eyes, folks. His eyes. The way he looks at Kiera Knightley or whatever woman it is he's supposed to be in love with in that particular movie, he gazes at her like she's the most exquisite creature he's ever seen. Intense shit. Also, infinite number of bonus points for being a Scot (not that he can help it or anything, but still).



Paul Rudd
I've always thought Paul Rudd was pretty cute for an older guy, even way back in the day when he played Phoebe's boyfriend-then-husband Mike on Friends (I loved Mike. Mike was so awesome). It was some years later until I saw him again, this time in Knocked Up, and had I been wearing socks when I watched that, they would have totally been blown off (the socks, I mean). It is stunning how the man gets gorgeouser and younger-looking and funnier every year, and if he already looks this good now, I think I'd pee myself in anticipation of what Paul will look like when he's 70.



Jim Sturgess
The big brown eyes that remind you of warm nice things like brownies and teddy bears and mudpies. And the messy brown hair. The general air of puppydogness. The voice. The voice needs to be lovingly poured into a jar, sealed with linen and homemade beeswax and sold as microwavable comfort food. One could almost forgive him for being so bloody Liverpudlian.




Sergio Pizzorno
The guitaring extraordinaire of British electro-rockers Kasabian, who has pwned the art of creating simplistic but sexy riffs, and earned my eternal allegiance by creating this song. Not to mention he is Brit of Italian descent (a species of male I already have a professed fetish for), he is a badass mofo (albeit one with a rather nasally voice) and he has the audacity to actually look hot in a bandanna.



Paolo Nutini
Another object of my Brit/Italian fetish, and this one comes with the added bonus of a Scottish brogue and a fish-and-chips joint in Paisley. The boy is obscenely gorgeous, but that is not the full extent of his appeal, because hitting the genetic jackpot is no great achievement of individual effort, and being simply Pretty with nothing else going on for you is highly unlikely to impress me much (unless you are Chace Crawford and you look really really really good without a shirt on - I think I've made that abundantly clear). Paolo, fortunately, is a pretty terrific songwriter in his own right, and for someone who wasn't even old enough to drink (in this country) until a year ago, has the voice of an almost toothless old man with a lung problem , ravaged by a diet of whiskey, cigarettes and heartbreak. Sexy stuffs.



Ryan Kwanten
Ryan spent most of his screen time on the first season of True Blood being dumb, drunk or shirtless. He is a fairly decent actor and I know hardly anything about him, really, except that he is Aussie and that like Chace Crawford, he looks really really really ridiculously good with no clothes on. Someone also needs to make it clear to them True Blood writer people that the dude is not allowed to wear anything with sleeves ever again. Ever.



James Franco
This guy is an example of one of those celebrity crushes I genuinely respect far too much to really want to do anything dirty to. Honest. To paraphrase Beckeye, I'd rather bang his soul more than anything else. In fact, out of all the guys on this list, the only one I'd totally jump on and molest without a second thought, if given the chance, would be Chace Crawford (and maybe Ryan Kwanten- but that's about it). I mean, Franco is taking up a double master's course at UCLA, he reads James Joyce during breaks on set and knows how to spell Dostoevsky, he writes and paints and is funny and gorgeous to boot, not to mention he's also Seth Rogen's soulmate. Thank goodness it's all balanced out by the fact that he is just a tad vertically challenged, or else I'd be harbouring a great deal more resentment towards the Creator and Its evident favouritism policies.


You wouldn't believe how therapeutic that was.

Klutz-illa and Baby Blues

This morning, I fell flat on my face in front of the entire school at morning assembly.

Well, not really. I didn't fall on my face, and only about 4% of the female population in school saw what happened at all. But I did scrape my knee like hell, and my elbow isn't looking too good either. It's quite literally bloody awful. So now I'm sitting here, with yellow disinfectant gloop slathered on my poor knee, pondering on my seeming inability to stand upright for more than 30 minutes at a time.
I detest being clumsy. Some people embrace their klutziness, they love it. They're adorably proud of themselves when they fall off a chair or knock something off a table or step into a drain. And people watch them and laugh affectionately. They can turn a painful and embarrassing situation into a charming and endearing personality quirk. I can't do that. Mainly because I have an ego that's only just a little larger than the size of the average male African elephant. I don't think it's cute when I miss a step and trip up the stairs, or when I walk into a wall ( it has happened, and in my defense, it was dark) or when I bang my head trying to get out of the car, or especially when I crash into furniture. In my own house.
In broad daylight.
Which happens quite frequently.
It hurts, not only my physical body, but also my exceedingly sensitive ego. I am the Ultimate Awesomeness. I should have exemplary levels of balance and coordination. This just isn't right. It messes with my cool mojo.


On a more positive note, I have finally watched The Last King of Scotland. And it wasn't just so I could look at James McAvoy.

Blue blue blue eyes. Dammit why do they have to be blue? Have you no mercy, God or Whoever You Are?

A proper review is in order once I have recovered the necessary brain function, and also once I have removed all the drool from my long-suffering keyboard.

We Can Never Have Enough Posts About Pretty Boys

Since my first ever self-created tag went down so well with my small group of blog buddies (with the exception of Hannah, who never updates anyway) I thought I'd take this meme one step further and create..


bloody awful poetry's 15 sexiest men on the big screen

You guys already know what sort of male specimen I am into, so kindly prepare yourself for more pale, dark-haired skinny asses. Also this post is a hell of a lot shallow-er than my 15 sexiest men in music.


1. James McAvoy


(scottish sex god #1/mr.tumnus/ i want to get in his pants/the last king of scotland)

I loved him from the minute I saw him as a goat-man in the Chronicles Of Narnia. And then as Tom Lefroy in Becoming Jane, appearing all topless and covered in blood and what-not, reducing me to pile of grinning blubbering drool.The guy is only five foot seven but has the presence of a much taller and stronger-built man. Plus he's such a genius at playing the cocky bastard. I love the cocky bastards! And do not even get me started on his dear-god-bejeezus-eyes. Big round cornflower blue eyes. *sighs* My next project is too fulfill my kinky side by watching him play a Scottish doctor in The Last King Of Scotland. I'm not feeling too well-disposed about Atonement, seeing as how he's snogging Kiera Knightley in that one.
Also (this is gonna sound sooo-oo-oo fangirly) when he smiles I forget to breathe. *grimaces* Yep. I got it baad.


2. Gaspard Ulliel


(ze ultimate french sex god/i je t'aime you/leather jackets)

Excuse the fact that I have yet to watch a full movie with him in it. Grace digs him. Very much. And I happen to agree with her that's he's just far too beautiful to live. Die, Gaspard, die. And take me with you.


3. Gerard Butler


(irish/omfg/this! is! spartaaaaa!)

He's hot. He's Irish. No wait--he's Scottish. No actually I don't care, I just dig his accent. But I'm pretty sure he's Scottish. I have a thing about Scots. But if he's Irish that's ok. I have a thing for Irish people too.


4. Jake Gyllenhaal


( *droooooools*)

It's a pity his sister didn't get quite the same share of the Gyllenhaal hawtness gene as he did. I didn't even know he was in Donnie Darko! Or that Bubble Boy flick. That was him too, wasn't it? The first time I noticed the sexiness of the Gyllenhaal was in Day After Tomorrow, where the guy was always fully dressed. Then along came Jarhead (which is a great movie in its own right) where the women of the world (or at least women who share my taste for pale skinny asses) rejoiced at the opportunity to watch Jake Gyllenhall half naked for like, 15 minutes at at time. Also, I've seen his interviews, and he seems like a pretty decent guy with a sense of humour and a willingness to take jokes at his own expense. That's sexy, baby.




5. Zach Braff


(adorkable/aww!/chicken little/squee!)

Annmarie scoffed at me for this choice. Sooo he isn't the studliest of dudes I could have picked. But the fact remains that I find Zach Braff sexy. He's smart and funny and a great actor/director/writer with splendiferous taste in music. He's a dork, but he's my dork. And he's pretty sexy in his own nerdy way.





6. Al Pacino in 1975


(attica!!/i did it for my wife/too bad he's old now)

Right. I am going to get a lot of weird looks for this one. But I genuinely think that Al Pacino was pretty sexy in 1975's Dog Day Afternoon, which remains one of my favourite movies of all eternity. And he's old enough to be my grandpa and all, but he still is pretty sexy in his own special Al Pacino-ish way. *shrugs* Laugh if you must.


7. Joaquin Phoenix


(me can't thinks of anythings to says)

It's just a sexy family, man. The guy scares me a bit. There's something so insanely intense about every character he's played to date, and some may say he's being repetitive or typecasting himself to play the insane, disturbed, deranged and flawed jerks, but the fact is that he plays those roles so well he makes it sexy. Have you even watched Signs yet?


8. Matthew MacFadyen


(mr.darcy/gah/omgf/sjdkajkladfjkl)


He's Scottish. I don't care what anybody says. He's Scottish. *sighs* If only Jane Austen were alive to see this.



9. Sean Biggerstaff


(oliver wood/scottish sex god #4/get me in his pants please)

It was a sad sad day when his character was cut from the Harry Potter movies. His accent was the only thing that made the first two movies even slightly bearable. I will never forgive Warner Brothers for this act of sacrilege.
Pale.
Skinny assed.
Just the way me likes 'em.


10. Jonathan Rhys Meyers


(*wipes drool off keyboard*)

All this sexiness is robbing me of normal female functions. I don't think I can make it to 5 more.


11. Jim Sturgess


(unforgivably liverpudlian/hey jude/strawberries*giggles*)

He's already in my sexiest musicians list. I'm cheating. I don't care. I don't need an excuse, do I?
He's almost 30, which is sad. I wish he were a bit closer to the side of the twenties. Traces of John Krasinski-ness. It's sexy.
*snort* Yeah. Like I'm gonna meet him anytime soon. He can have all my loving in my dreams then.


12. Hugh Dancy


(orlando bloom's evil twin)

I dig this guy because he's a mucho sweet cookie. I also dig him because he looks like Orlando Bloom but he isn't Orlando Bloom.
If that makes sense.
Also because he looks rather fit in really really tight bicycle shorts.
I remember this one time I was walking around KL with my mom, and there was this effing-normous Burberry ad with Hugh in it. And I was so busy staring at it -it was too pretty not to look at. In black and white, too- I walked straight into my mom. And she saw what I was ogling at and joined me in ogling. She was charmed by his soft curly hair, apparently. So mother and daughter had a brief bonding moment, staring at Hugh Dancy's Burberry ad in the middle of a pavement in KL.
*sighs* Aaah. Memories.


13.Christian Bale


(he's bringing the sexy back)

I love him. I am going to marry this guy. I soo am. His hotness is beyond words. I adore that scene in The Prestige when he chops his own fingers off. Mucho morbidity.
Also Grace says he looks a bit like Michael Johns. It doesn't hurt, really.



14. Matthew Goode


(*speechlessnesses*)

Once upon a time there was this really really lousy movie. With Mandy Moore as the leading lady. She sucked. The script sucked. Everything sucked carrots. Except that guy up there. I have no idea where he is or what he's doing now. But thank the gods of Sexiness for his existence. I hope he's happy and content and not sucking carrots, whatever he's up to these days.


15. Johnny Depp


(say hello to God)


Duh.
The only current Hollywood actor, imo, who can honestly be called a genuine genius. I worship you, Mr.Depp. Also his wife's name is Vanessa. *smirks* He sure knows how to pick a lady with a spectacular name eh?



Well let's make this a tag too, shall we? Again, i'll be nice, you absolutely don't have to do this if you don't want to. But if you do, I'll be most pleased. So get cracking eh? You know who you are by now. But just in case; Beckeye, IM and Celine. Oh and Grace too. I won't bother with Hannah.
Please feel free to take your own sweet time on this one. We all know that too much sexiness within just two days can be seriously detrimental to your mental functions.

Oh gosh.
All 15 of them look the same, don't they? I seriously need some blonde action going.

"My characters shall have, after a little trouble, all that they desire."

I just realized last night, while I was in bed, twisting my hair into knots and waiting to fall asleep, that within the last month alone, I have watched not one, but two movies about Jane Austen. Note, the movies were about Jane Austen and not adaptations of her novels. Therefore a blogseed was planted in my brain, and after that I took another two hours to stop my brain from thinking and to feel even remotely sleepy again.



The Jane Austen Book Club (2007)



Six very different Californians start a book club to discuss the works of Jane Austen, only to discover that each of their lives, personalities and relationships begin to resemble that of each Austen novel they have chosen for themselves. There is Sylvia, whose husband dumps her and then keeps popping up in her life, Prudie who has marital problems, maternal issues and is lusting after a student of hers, and sci-fi buff Grigg, the only male member of the book club, who--well,you can imagine. The cast includes Hugh Dancy, Emily Blunt, Kathy Baker, Amy Brenneman( you know...that lady from Judging Amy), Maggie Grace, Lynn Redgrave and Marc Blucas.
[drama/romance/feel-good-chick-lit-with-dialogue-you-don't-have-to-think-too-hard-about-to-figure-out]
Based on the novel of the same title by Karen Joy Fowler.


What I Liked About The Jane Austen Book Club

* The soundtrack includes the likes of Paolo Nutini, Aimee Mann, Snow Patrol and Feist. That merits a major thumbs up from yours truly.

* The book club, naturally, discusses some of my favourite Austen novels (I won't lie though; I have yet to read Northanger Abbey or Mansfield Park. Or Persuasion.) and bring up points and reflections and themes in the books that I never thought of before.

* Emily Blunt. She is a masterclass at playing neurotic basket-cases with possible undiagnosed personality disorders and a massive inferiority complex. In fact, her character was the only one I found even remotely interesting, with any amount of honesty and depth, and genuinely cared about by the end.

*Hugh Dancy, despite his general air and appearance of Orlando Bloom-ness, is actually pretty darned adorable. I wish they'd have let him keep his accent, though.

*Hugh Dancy, or Grigg, as he is in the movie, is a massive fan of Ursula le Guin, who is widely considered to be the woman who wrote the "first" Harry Potter over 30 years ago. The man knows his adventure/fantasy authors!! *claps*


What I Didn't Like About The Austen Book Club
he Jane
*Predictability and blandness. The actors are all so squishy-comfy in their respective roles, which in themselves are so generic, that you never have any doubt that after a minor difficulty or two, everyone will wind up happy and content, together with the person they're meant to be with, and at the end they'll be toasting each other with glasses of champagne and joyful laughter and good-natured ribbing. Again I say that Prudie (Emily Blunt) was the only character I actually liked and wanted things to work out for, and even until the last 10 minutes or so you're not quite all that sure which decisions she is going to make (being the head-case that she is) even when you can smell the happy ending from miles away. It's that kinda movie after all.

*Amy Brenneman. She -and her character Sylvia- just annoy the crap out of me. Heck, she even annoyed me when she was on Hallmark. But I watched her anyway. Just so I would be annoyed.

*Not enough Emily Blunt. Seriously. When you have a genius on hand, you use her. If I were the director, I'd have scrapped everybody else and just made the whole thing about Prudie and her neuroses. Of course then it wouldn't be called "The Jane Austen Book Club". It would have been called something like "The Trials and Mental Tortures of the Californian Headcase, Prudie Drummond".


Favourite Quote/s

Editor: Dear Ms. Corrine Mahern, we regret that we must decline to publish the three short stories you sent to us. 'Benny's Basketball' is strong narratively, but the depiction of your penis-waving retarded boy felt a little unkind. And isn't the title 'Separating Eggs For Flan' a bit obvious as a metaphor for your parents' divorce? Yet we confess that 'Skydiver' puzzled us most. Why would a beautiful, self-centered young lesbian jump out of a plane?



Becoming Jane (2007)



A somewhat biographical (with plenty of liberties applied) take on the 20 year old pre-literary fame Jane Austen, and her brief but passionate affair with a roguish, seemingly arrogant Irishman, Tom Lefroy. The cast includes Anne Hathaway, James McAvoy, Maggie Smith (Professor McGonagall!!) , Julie Walters, Jessica Ashworth and James Cromwell.
[biography --*snort*--/drama/romance/one-of-those-movies-where-you-get-to-see-almost-full-nudity-at-least-from-the-back]
Based on Jane Austen's Letters.

This flick gave me a whole host of trouble before I even finished watching the opening credits. The Everlasting Awesomeness that is Grace dropped by while I was out on Sunday evening, (you should have called, dude!) and left behind a mix CD and a "copy of James McAvoy's bum", as she put it. And so on Monday morning I settled down with a cup of Milo and popped the CD into my player, and as luck would have it, the audio was about 8 seconds behind the video, which was insanely infuriating, because watching a movie in that condition calls for reserves of brainpower and concentration which most of the human race do not possess at 9.30 on a Monday morning.
And so poor me, I spent an hour (or maybe more) troubleshooting the bloody thing; adjusting sound settings, checking for other programmes running in the background, even resorting to manipulating the movie itself, frame by frame, so the sound would somehow catch up with wherever it was supposed to be. I must admit, I was pretty good at it. It took me ages, but I managed to reduce the audio/video delay to just 4 seconds or thereabouts.
Aaaah but then my DVD drive went nuts, and refused to acknowledge its own existence. It claimed to have never been installed. As far as it was concerned, it wasn't there. Even though I could see it, in plain sight. It refused to do anything. It was going down, baby, and it was taking Grace's movie with it. Then of course, in my already flustered state, I panicked, and sent Grace an apologetic text message, saying I was sooooooooooooooooo soooooooo sooooooooo so so so sorry but I think I killed her movie and I'd totally buy her another copy of James McAvoy's butt and replace the one my demented DVD drive swallowed up and didn't want to spit out.
It was then that I had the brilliant and very belated brainwave of simply shutting everything down and coming back later when my DVD player had recovered its senses. So that's what I did.
I had lunch, I watched Music and Lyrics. I watched the Ellen DeGeneres show. I finished reading Queen Of Babble. I came back and tried again.
And it was perfect
Not a hitch or a glitch.
Not even the slightest sign of any disagreement the audio may have had with the video.
Technology works in mysterious ways.
And now I shall get to the point.


What I Liked About Becoming Jane

*James McAvoy, the Skinny Scottish Sex God.

*James McAvoy's bare posterior.

*James McAvoy going around dropping sexual innuendos all over the place, which ensured that I constantly had a big goofy grin on my face.

*James McAvoy's accent. Not quite in its full Scottish glory, but I'll take what I can get.

*Did I mention that James McAvoy is in this film?

*James McAvoy doesn't have a shirt on when his character is first introduced. He is also covered in quite a bit of blood. In a sexy way, of course.

*The dialogue sounds lovely. Like it was written using the actual employment of brain cells.

*The setting, costumes and cinematography resembles Pride&Prejudice(2005) most of the time, which I suppose is a good thing.

*The soundtrack is gorgeous. All them purdy swirling violins.

*I adore the ending. It isn't executed all too well, but the fact that it isn't a case of happily ever after does a great deal to redeem this from being a mere third-rate Pride&Prejudice rip-off. Also the fact that neither Jane Austen nor her lover are perfect characters. No--most importantly they aren't typical or generic. Thumbs up for that. It even managed to get me a little teary. I mean, she never ever married anyone after that, and he named his eldest daughter Jane. *sniffs* I will never read another Austen novel in quite the same way ever again, as Grace so aptly put it.



What I Didn't Like About Becoming Jane

*Anne Hathaway. Don't get me wrong, I really am quite fond of her. She's beautiful and charming and funny and likable and totally the Julia Roberts of my generation and all that. It's simply that, for one thing, she's way too gorgeous to be Jane Austen. What happened to all that brains-over-beauty thing huh? Also, her English accent, never too convincing to begin with, often teetered dangerously on the brink of going back to the good ol' American drawl. It made her speech sound (to me, anyway) rather halting and unnatural, and the wittiness and the uhm, cutting-ness of the dialogue never quite translated to the desired effect, on Hathaway's part, at least. Another gripe of mine is that she never comes quite close to the charm, charisma, energy, intelligence and presence of Kiera Knightley's Elizabeth Bennet, the kind of which we know Anne Hathaway is capable of producing. Forgive me for all the comparisons to Pride and Prejudice, but the two movies are so insanely similar that it makes it impossible not to. Or maybe, as Grace said, having Mia Thermopolis play an English literary icon is really waaay far out.
Hey you know what?
They should have cast Emily Blunt as Jane Austen.

*The movie lagged just a little bit around the middle to the three-quarter point, where either nothing seemed to happen, or things started happening for no particular reason.

*I didn't feel any sort of connection or fondness for the characters, with the obvious exceptions of Jane Austen, Tom Lefroy, Mr.Wisley and Jane's deaf/mute brother. In fact, I'd be hard-pressed to remember the names of Jane's siblings from the movie. They just never made any sort of impact. Which is a pity.

*My research shows that Jane Austen lived only till the age of 41, but the very unconvincing "old people" makeup at the end -whitish hair, wrinkles, slight jowly quality about the face- makes her look more like somebody's grandmother rather than a woman barely in her 40s.

*There wasn't enough of James McAvoy in it.


Favourite Quote/s

*Tom Lefroy: Good God. There's writing on both sides of those pages.

*Mrs. Austen: JANE!
Lady Gresham: What is she doing?
Mr. Wisley: Writing.
Lady Gresham: Can anything be done about it?

*Jane Austen: Cassie, his heart will stop at the sight of you, or he doesn't deserve to live. And, yes, I am aware of the contradiction embodied in that sentence.


The Conclusion
I have a thing for both period/historical romantic dramas and James McAvoy. Therefore, Becoming Jane wins my affections by just a hair's breadth. Although I wouldn't not recommend both movies. Neither Becoming Jane nor The Jane Austen Book Club are lousy in any way, but neither are they particularly brilliant pieces of flim-making. They are just a couple of really fun, interesting and somewhat intelligent methods to pass the time. I'm not walking around quoting lines from either movie at people, like I did with V For Vendetta and Juno (which I haven't even watched yet).
And if you will excuse me, I am now going to go paint my fingernails green.