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Surfacing again
Jun. 3rd, 2011 06:33 amI had an extremely busy week, but also a successful one in real life terms. Which means I can reward myself with pure indulgence. In this case, an imprompt few days in London. Off to the airport this afternoon, and I'm determined to somehow aquire a Much Ado ticket on the spot. Speaking of Shakespeare and favourite actors, I hear the BBC is doing to do the histories including a Richard II with Patrick Stewart, David Morrisey, Lindsay Duncan and James Purfoy, which sounds lie must watch tv to me.
(The other day someone inflicted the Anonymous trailer on me again. Oh Derek Jacobi, why?)
I missed The Borgias this week. It's going to be a long year till the second season. Having warmed up a bit to the Games of Thrones tv version, I still can't bring myself to love it, so that doesn't fill my messed up three dimensional characters and their schemes shaped hole. Also, the last episode had the most ridiculous sexposition scene of the season, which is saying something since not only GoT uses that device. (Otoh, tv GoT does so much better by Cersei, and Peter Dinklage is awesome as Tyrion, so there is that.) Since I believe in constructive criticism: a sexposition scene which manages a) exposition, b) a point about the characters involved in the scene, b) being actually erotic as opposed to looking like staged gymnastics would be Valmont writing a letter on Cecile's back (to another woman) while in bed with her in Stephen Frears' version of Dangerous Liasons. Now, the original novel consists solely of letters and the Christopher Hampton play the film is based on still has a lot of letter writing, and I imagine Frears and Hampton (who also wrote the screenplay) had the same problem HBO had, to wit, wanting to get information across without boring anyone and making it look too stagey, and wanting to offer the audience some attractive nudity (in this case, young Uma Thurman). Which the scene in question does provide, but it never feels gratuitous. The content of the letter, which Valmont recites out loud, is just one part of the information conveyed there. It also shows you someting about Valmont as a character, about the way he uses sex and language both, about Cecile at this point and how her seduction is changing her, and about the absent Madame de Tourvel. If you can do it like that, go ahead; if not, find another way of leave the scene out altogether, especially since the GoT one didn't tell us anything we didn't already know and required some very ooc behaviour from one character for it to work.
(The other day someone inflicted the Anonymous trailer on me again. Oh Derek Jacobi, why?)
I missed The Borgias this week. It's going to be a long year till the second season. Having warmed up a bit to the Games of Thrones tv version, I still can't bring myself to love it, so that doesn't fill my messed up three dimensional characters and their schemes shaped hole. Also, the last episode had the most ridiculous sexposition scene of the season, which is saying something since not only GoT uses that device. (Otoh, tv GoT does so much better by Cersei, and Peter Dinklage is awesome as Tyrion, so there is that.) Since I believe in constructive criticism: a sexposition scene which manages a) exposition, b) a point about the characters involved in the scene, b) being actually erotic as opposed to looking like staged gymnastics would be Valmont writing a letter on Cecile's back (to another woman) while in bed with her in Stephen Frears' version of Dangerous Liasons. Now, the original novel consists solely of letters and the Christopher Hampton play the film is based on still has a lot of letter writing, and I imagine Frears and Hampton (who also wrote the screenplay) had the same problem HBO had, to wit, wanting to get information across without boring anyone and making it look too stagey, and wanting to offer the audience some attractive nudity (in this case, young Uma Thurman). Which the scene in question does provide, but it never feels gratuitous. The content of the letter, which Valmont recites out loud, is just one part of the information conveyed there. It also shows you someting about Valmont as a character, about the way he uses sex and language both, about Cecile at this point and how her seduction is changing her, and about the absent Madame de Tourvel. If you can do it like that, go ahead; if not, find another way of leave the scene out altogether, especially since the GoT one didn't tell us anything we didn't already know and required some very ooc behaviour from one character for it to work.
