February Joys
I’m so happy to leave February behind and welcome the flowers of March. February was hard. I have no way to explain it other than when February first rolled around, a giant thumb came on the horizon and squashed me underneath it. As soon as I would manage to lift the thumb up, squeeze my head out, and squeak out a sigh, I’d be shoved right back down again - whether it was work, an ice storm, exercises out of my comfort zone, or family drama - doing the shoving.
It took a lot of work to hoist myself out from under the weight of everything February threw at me but here we are. It’s March! I’m tired, but I’m out from under the thumb and looking up at the light. I’m still waking up early, listening to my Chani meditations, watching the woodpecker in the tree outside my kitchen window every morning over coffee, and buying my son whatever toy he wants because life is hard and I’m trying to find the flowers every day. I received the lessons of February - trust me. But now I need the levity of spring. I need the renewal. Instead of a thumb, I need an open palm to dance on in the rain.
Despite the trials and tribulations of a short month, we were able to watch quite a bit of movies! I guess it’s easy to do when you’re looking for an escape ;)
What We Watched
I made the decision to leave Twitter last December (not me bragging) and it takes me a few days now to hear about the daily drama, but as soon as I heard about the Andrea Riseborough controversy I knew we had to watch To Leslie ASAP. I came in with high expectations for what I assumed would be a standout performance and left thinking, “Well…that was…fine?” I wasn’t as blown away as the tweets had led me to believe. Who would imagine I would be let down by Twitter once again?
It’s not to say that To Leslie is a bad film or that its story isn’t worthwhile or any less harrowing. My issue was primarily with the storytelling choices that were made. The presentation of Leslie’s story, and the rollercoaster of winning and losing over and over in life, felt told in a way that was meant for an older, whiter, audience that discusses “the problems with society” on the drive home from the theater back to their nice house and then forgets about the whole thing altogether because you know, these things have a way of working out for everyone. It just didn’t feel edgy or authentic enough for me, it felt…obvious. It felt surface-level for a film about addiction.
Even Riseborough’s performance, though dynamic, is too rehearsed. I felt as if I could see every mental calculation for every slammed fist on every stick bar top. Or every step count for every drunken shuffle out of Leslie’s motel room door. This calculation doesn’t carry the same weightlessness of a performance as, say, something like Gena Rowlands in a Woman Under the Influence (maybe not a fair comparison, but the only one I can make nonetheless). The audience is just expected to feel bad for Leslie, and expected to buy into her and Marc Maron’s romance, and expected to laugh at certain moments, and expected to feel inspired when the Hare Krishna music signifies Leslie’s renewal (eye roll). The climax of the movie - Leslie finally realizing it’s time to get her life together and live her dream - takes place in a literal broken home for god’s sake. It wants you to know and not question how deep it is because everything in life always has a way of working out! It doesn’t need to go any deeper than that.
And there are moments when I wish it would go deeper. I thought Owen Teague gave such a measured and heartbreaking performance as Leslie’s son James, but instead of exploring that dynamic more, the film tragically bookends him at the beginning and end of Leslie’s story and doesn’t invest anything more than a few moments in their broken relationship (once again, it’s just assumed they were bad before and assumed they’ll get back on track). Or dive in with Allison Janney’s Nancy, who, in my opinion, was more effective in her brief finale monologue than the whole of Leslie’s last-half redemption tour. There’s depth in the film that could have been, but instead, To Leslie plays it safe and predictable, not trusting its audience to be able to handle some of the familial trauma it keeps on the edge of the screen.
One of the most beautiful documentaries I and Wes Anderson have ever seen! Fire of Love is a gorgeous meditation on love, legacy, and humankind’s place among the natural giants in the universe. I loved Katia and Maurice’s relationship, I loved witnessing and meditating on their helplessness for the threshold of death and the mysterious eternity that lies beyond. Through the incredible footage they captured over the years, you can see how treasured and magical volcanos were in the Kraftt’s eyes. The volcanos aren’t presented solely in a matter-of-fact, scientific fashion, but poetically, movingly. The Krafft’s capture every crevice, every gush, every gigantic silhouette, and every horror. It’s breathtaking and I enjoyed every minute of it.
There is nothing I love more than watching an English movie on a bad day sooo…let’s throw on Lady Chatterley’s Lover and escape baby! I wouldn’t consider this in my top 10 list of “Escape to the English Countryside with my Scoundrel Lover and a Big Book” Romance Movies, but it did the trick of taking the blues away!
I wish it had been a little steamier, I was way too worried about ticks while they were out naked in those hayfields, and it did make me wistful for a time in my life when I watched Skins. The score for the film is all over the place, using weird “DONGS!” in inappropriate moments that jolt you out of the rushing feeling you feel you’re building up to, but that was my only real complaint. Emma Corrin performs some incredible eye acting - easily gliding from surprise to lust to enrapture in a literal blink - that starts to border on camp towards the end of the film.
I think this film’s biggest fault (besides the score) seems to be that it can’t decide what it wants to be (sexy? not sexy? romantic? but empowering?) it falls short of not delivering what the audience really wants: hot people in cool costumes making out in castle surrounded by lush green fields.
Bablyon is a funny one and to be honest, I’m having a hard time writing about it without going into a pages long essay! It’s batshit insane, it’s full of every offensive thing known to today’s modern audience, it’s way too long, it’s too self-indulgent, but I loved it? And I’m still thinking about it? I don’t know!
However, I did have two huge issues with certain words that were used in the film and the way that Jovan Adepo’s character was unnecessarily utilized in one particular scene. I wish I could find deeper conversations about these two issues I could share here because I don’t feel I’m the right voice to speak on these particular conversations, but I would be remiss if I didn’t address how uncomfortable I was with these two particular instances (if you’ve seen the film you probably have a good idea which parts I’m referring to and I won’t go into detail for those who haven’t) in an otherwise electric and exciting movie.
But, gently tabling those two issues aside, for now, the pacing and the comedic timing of Babylon are what hooked me. The timing for the jokes, for the breaks in the intensity, for the character’s speeches, for the film shooting sequences, for the humor, for everything was executed perfectly on a high-speed locomotive that had no other inevitable conclusion but to crash hard at the end. I wish some other directorial and editing choices had been made, but I still enjoyed (mostly) every second of the wild ride. As I said - it’s a funny one!
“None of us have ever asked the men for anything,” Agatha states. “Not a single thing, not even for the salt to be passed, not even for a penny or a moment alone or to take the washing in or to open a curtain or to go easy on the small yearlings or to put your hand on the small of my back as I try, again, for the twelfth or thirteenth time, to push a baby out of my body. Isn't it interesting,” she says, “that the one and only request the women would make of the men would be to leave?”
*chef’s kiss*
A fine film that really milks the footage they got of children playing in a field one day. My heart aches for the women that went through this real-life tragedy (content warning for this article) and I do appreciate that their story is told in a considered, compassionate manner. But it is tiring to watch another “not all men” movie in 2023 while we are faced with an onslaught of horrors toward trans/BIPOC/women’s bodies on a daily basis. Yes, I understand what the film is saying, because I read the stories of those who are living under it as we speak.
The beginning of the film states that “what follows is an act of female imagination” and I so wish we could have seen the imagined future where the women and children land. Just once, let us imagine what our communities would look like if everyone were given access to safe, healthy, open environments. If it’s an act of imagination, let us play these foundations of love for just a moment - even if it’s only in our dreams.
What Brought Me Joy
Sarah Paulson’s AD Tour. Sarah Paulson once again proves she is Mommy and living my dream of one day giving a tour of my beach house in oversized clothing. I just adore her style, her gorgeous pink bathroom, and I especially loved the thought and story behind each room in her home - especially her kitchen and the Sam Shaw print from A Woman Under the Influence.
“Endure and survive.” “That' shit’s redundant.” My favorite episode of The Last of Us by far. This quote felt particularly helpful for me this month and always makes me chuckle.
Some music-related things:
I overheard this Sans Soucis song while I was shopping at The Dime Store, asked for its name, and listened to it three times in a row on the way back home. Just a lovely little song that can perk up any day!
I also enjoyed listening to Sudan Archives' Natural Brown Prom Queen album and Wet Leg’s self-titled album this month as well.
Finally, on the last morning of the winter storm week, when the sun finally came out and the ice started to melt and the birds started to excitedly sing and chirp outside, I took a walk down to the trail near our house and saw a vulture sunning its wings on an electric pole in the light. I’d never seen anything like that before and it felt like a kismet connection. Here we both were: out in a field defrosting. A few days afterward witnessing this moment, a committee of vultures started to roost in our neighbor’s backyard tree and their roosting quickly became the talk of our neighborhood Facebook group. I love vultures. I think they get a bad rap and there isn’t enough known about how cool and integral they are for the environment. It was really special to get to witness the committee sunbathe in the tree together every morning and come back together every night. My neighbor shared this photo they took of one of the vultures sunbathing one morning and I’m using it as my main inspiration for this spring. Here I am welcoming it with open arms! (Or wings!)
(photo credit not mine, thanks to our kind neighbor for sharing this!)
Wishing everyone a wonderful March. Lots of love.