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The only reason I picked up the book in the shop was because Joseph Gordon-Levitt was looking devastating on the cover. There, I said it. I didn't expect the book to be amazing. I had no hopes for the film.

Sometimes, I really really love being wrong.

I read Mysterious Skin in one night. I remember staying up and having my throat aching the way it does when I'm tired. It was hot, Sydney being indecisive in summer, as I read about Brian Lackey and Neil McCormick. It was heartbreaking. There's not really anything uplifting about this book, except the occasional beauty in the language. It's about trying to find out who you were, and how you were that person. It's growing up in the most awful awful way. And it was all the anger, all the confusion, all the fucking hormones that I had, tied up and presented messily. It was the most believable story about aliens and being an alien I've ever read.

And then there's the film. I hate film versions of books (especially wretched Merchant Ivory). But Gregg Araki's film was exactly what I wanted. The dreamy music, the hick town, Brady Corbett as darling Brian, trying to remember the summer he was eight years old. Joseph Gordon-Levitt as cutthroatfragile Neil, who can't forget that summer. Even Michelle Tratchenberg was awesome. The whole movie captures that knife edge, when you know you're not quite grown up, but you so desperately want to be (I feel like I've been on that edge since I was about 7), when life feels hyper-real and the towns feel too small. It's confronting and gut wrenching. Mysterious Skin is unforgettable.

more of a response than a review

I didn't blog yesterday. I had good reasons! My computer was being crabby, and I was a bit exhausted.

Yesterday though, I went to see Precious

(here)

It broke my heart.

I knew it was going to, and that made it worse.

I don't want to write too much about the story line of the film, but the basic story line is such: Clareese Precious Jones is 16, pregnant with her second child by her father, abused by her mother. She lives in Harlem, and gets the chance to go to an alternative school and really learn.

There is always something weird about saying I "liked"/"enjoyed" a movie like Precious. It's a horrible story, it's bleak, it's humanity at its worst. But it was one of the best films I have ever seen. ever. It was perfectly acted, perfectly filmed, perfectly scored. Gabourey Sidibe as Precious was radiant, devastating. Paula Patton as her teacher Ms Rain was so patient, so gentle. Mariah Carey was so so so not Mariah Carey like, and made me cry when I thought I'd run out of tears. And Mo'Nique was fucking terrifying and heartbreaking. They all deserve Academy Awards.

Any film that deals with violence, rape and poverty risks being a caricatured farce. any actor that attempts these things risks being a caricature, not a character. We laugh when we're uncomfortable, and any movie that attempts to deal with the things Precious deals with risks that. I think that's what I was most worried about in seeing this film. But there was none of that. Not once did I want to laugh at Precious. I laughed with her, and I cried with her, for her. I was terrified of her mother to the point of physically curling in on myself every time she was on screen. There was nothing funny about any of the violence or sexual abuse, just dull bile on the back of my tongue.

This is not a comfortable film or a sentimental film, despite the basic undertone that anything is possible. This is a film about doing things yourself, putting yourself first. It's quite possibly one of the most important films I've ever seen. I could talk like the women who sat behind me* about how lucky I am, how lucky Precious was to get a chance to turn her life around. I could be all colonial and talk about skin colour, except making assumptions based on skin colour is the stupidest thing ever. But what I want to say is that I know people like Precious are worth the effort. Most humans, apart from politicians, are worth the effort. We forget that. We get comfortable, and then we talk about how there shouldn't be movies that make us uncomfortable. That's bullshit. You need to feel uncomfortable every now and then, even if it only makes you feel lucky. But, if like me, you feel the need to do something, then you can get off your fat behind and donate some time, some money, a smile, to making everyone feel loved, to making everyone feel precious.



*if there is a god, please don't let me turn into an abominable lady who lunches and talks through movies about carpet.

double-dog-dare

It has been too hot to blog. Also, my inexplicable dislike of the word "blog" sometimes turns me off. Someone fix this please, and while you're at it, do something about the words "lubricant" and "moist". Those words make my skin crawl.

(I'm watching my sister organise my books into alphabetical order. It's kind of bizarre, and vaguely slave-labour-esque. Still, she was the one who wanted to do it. I now have two bookcases, one for fiction and one for non-fiction. I was pleasantly surprised by how much non-fiction I own, although most of it is travel and music related. Or educational. At any rate, this is the most organised my books (and I) have ever been. Claudia predicts it will last a month before I knock something over.)

As it's February now, and my summer is slipping away, university looming closer like a big scary thing, I feel I should try and get back into blogging. As much as the word disgusts me. So I apologise in advance, but I've challenged myself to write a twenty five word minimum entry per day for the entirety of this month. I'm an over-talker by nature, so this should be easy. I'm apologising in case its boring. I think the problem with my blogging is that I've never been sure exactly what to write about - and when I do find something, it never comes out right.

Someone very drunk once told me that you can't ever be right, you just have to be consistent. Which makes absolutely no sense, but you know, drunk people don't have to make sense. I think perhaps what he meant is that you just have to be doing something, and that sometimes repetition is kind of helpful.

The same person also asked me to try to be more cultured.
So I've made some Bircher museli, and am waiting for the culture to set in.

No, no, seriously, some real culture for you: I'm reading A Very Long Engagement by Sebastien Japrisot, which is the novel the movie was based on. As is often the case with these things, the book is almost completely unrecognisable to the movie. The main characters, Mathilde and Manech are dealt a much harder hand than they are in the movie. You get a sense though of how World War One left no one untouched, from the stories Mathilde collects as she tries to find Manech. I haven't finished it yet, but I'm hoping the ending is similar (or better) than the movie.

I dragged Claudia to see The Princess and the Frog on Friday. Best Disney movie in years. Really. Better than Mulan and Aladdin, on par with Beauty and the Beast. There's a fully formed world, with awesome jazz and blues music, jokes on every level for everyone, a decent story line and characters who do more than wait around for fate to be nice to them. The Alligator, Louis, is awesome. And the food! I think I've talked about how much I love Southern USA food. I was drooling, and this is a cartoon. I have to convince my family we need a deep fryer so I can make beignets. Go and see it. I'll come, and bring pecan pie.


Um, all that was way more than 25 words.