Racebending on Star Trek Into Darkness
Regular readers of this blog may have noticed that I’m a big fan of the Cumberbatch, and I thoroughly enjoyed his performance as the villain in the latest Star Trek movie so long as I could forget his character’s name:
SPOILERS!
Friday Hoyden Quick Hit: Women Who Direct Films
With the Oscars mired in their annual refusal to see directing talent in anyone who doesn’t remind the Academy members of themselves, resulting in another disgraceful exclusion of any female directors from the Best Director nominations for yet one more predictable, narrow-minded year (I see no reason to hold back on this topic), here are some links to discussions, links and clips of movies made in 2012 that were directed by women.
Friday Hoydens: Chihiro, Ofelia and Coraline
Last night my family sat down together to watch Coraline, and I found myself instinctively grouping it with two other films centred on little girls navigating dark and strange fantasy lands, Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away and Guillermo Del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth.
Film review: Silver Linings Playbook
This is a feast of a film, a comedy-drama-romance of families, friendships and forgiveness which sparkles with subtly dazzling restraint, studded with troubling emotions and snort-out-loud humour.
Quick Hit: Latest from the Geena Davis Institute
The latest report from the Geena Davis Institute is the very detailed “Gender Roles & Occupations: A Look at Character Attributes and Job-Related Aspirations in Film and Television”. Most people are aware that women and girls are underrepresented as speaking characters in film and television, but you may still be shocked by how much.
Cowboys and Aliens: mismanaging audience expectations
James Bond and Indiana Jones in the Wild West versus aliens with frickin’ lasers – but what was missing?
Sunday Star Wars: I find your lack of dancing…disturbing
Darth Vader vs Emperor Palpatine dance-off – this is a thing now. Please treat this as a general whimsy and weirdness thread – what have you spotted in the wild recently that you feel you just have to share?
Duelling Fairytales
Which way is a studio to go when reaching for a Grimm retelling? Bubbly comedy with family dysfunction, or dark fantasy with evil mayhem?
Quote OTD: Freedom, Rights and Accountability – the denialism of fools and knaves
It is depressing to have to point out, yet again, that there is a distinction between having the legal right to say something & having the moral right not to be held accountable for what you say.
Me and my suspicious mind
I just really hope that the film producers planning to turn a profit by telling of the horrors visited on one group of disadvantaged children had the grace to pass on those very robust film set buildings that they were so very proud of to people who could turn them to good use for other disadvantaged children.
A 1950s Alternative Universe
on Saturday night I found myself watching a late-night 1950s black and white movie – something I haven’t done much of since the demise of Bill Collins and Ivan Hutchinson’s shows. Oh, how I used to love those old black and white movies (cue massive eyeroll from the kids). Some of the interest lies in a mixture of plot points which appear to have been written while dropping acid combined with gender and class expectations which are all too real.
Reasons why you should see Made in Dagenham
(1) It is a story about women, in a world where there is a dearth of stories about women.

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