(no subject)

I'm sitting in the dim - it's not the dark, not yet, not with the sun still out, but with the shades closed and the curtains drawn, it's dark enough for vampires here.  Murder By Death's cinematic cello snakes out of the speakers, thin smoke snakes out of a cigarette.  I'm in the mood for scotch.  Maybe I'll read some more Continental Op.  Maybe instead I'll read some Agent Pendergast.

What are you doing?

Memes don't require thought.

Name a fandom you know I know and I'll tell you...

01. The character I first fell in love with
02. The character I never expected to love as much as I do now
03. The character everyone else loves that I don't
04. The character I love that everyone else hates
05. The character I used to love but don't any longer
06. The character I would shag anytime
07. The character I'd want to be like
08. The character I'd slap
09. A pairing that I love
10. A pairing that I despise

Holy God, Last Man Standing Is An Awesome Fucking Movie

I think it's underappreciated.  The gunplay is horrible, of course, and the plot can seem kind of weird - but I think the thing to realize is that this movie is not Telling What Happened.  It's not a "documentary" type of movie.  It's Retelling A Legend.  The super-badass akimbo-1911s-throw-a-guy-ass-over-teakettle-down-the-street, the hooker-staring-at-Bruce-Willis'-crotch-after-he's-killed-ten-guys, the Oh-Hello-Have-Some-Exposition - this is just telling the legend of what happened in Jericho, not actually telling WHAT HAPPENED in Jericho, do you twig it?  There are some interesting tricks with the framing - rather freshman tricks, really, but still interesting - it follows the rule of thirds, of course, and I've noticed that sympathetic characters are always shown in the right third, and bad guys in the left- and Bruce Willis is always in the right EXCEPT for when he is killing people, at which point he is shown on the left third.  I find that quite interesting.  Also, the lighting is extremely noir, it just comes off as very subtled because it's shot in color.  For example, Willis' eyes are always brighter than the rest of his face.  Things like that. 

I love this movie.

Last Man Standing, still

Nice bit:  The incidental music during the film is all period 1930s jazz.  The themes, though, are this awesome spaghetti-western-with-heavy-metal-instrumentation fuck-yes stuff. 

I find it very interesting that this is a ripoff of "Fistful of Dollars" which was a ripoff of "Yojimbo" which was a ripoff of "Red Harvest," and the makers never actually referred back to the original novel, and yet there are details sprinkled throughout that make it actually closer to Dash Hammett's story than to the Clint Eastwood movie.