Sunday Reviewing

[amoama]

I'm at my mum's house, in the sunshine, quietly contemplating applying for new jobs. Nice, nice.

I finished Mirror Dance in the early hours of Saturday. I can't express how much I loved it. The series really paid back every moment invested in it with this one. I would never expect anything gratuitous from Bujold but considering how dark this one got, how painful, I still tensed for that sense of the writer getting carried away with the subject matter without true developmental purpose but that just never happened, every tight, torturous sentence served the characters and the purpose. I'm reeling with the integrity of an author flaying her characters open, testing them from so many angles, and still keeping it all bent to her strict storytelling purpose. Reeling too from the genius of having Mark - not only as an evolving, compelling character in his own right, but how his presence and his differentiation from Miles also revealed more of Miles in the comparison and gave me a deeper understanding of him. Also it was lovely to have a bit more Cordelia in the picture. Hoorah!

I also finished David Grossman's Writing in the Dark this week which is one of the best collection of essays I've ever come across. Grossman's an extraordinary writer and to read his thoughts and approach to writing, rather than being formidable and leading me to question why I would write myself, is instead utterly motivating and affirming.

I've now seen Iron Man 3, Star Trek and The Great Gatsby!
Iron Man 3 was very enjoyable. I laughed my head off at the opening credits - I'M BLUE DABADEEDABADI!!! Jeez, it took me a decade to get that song out of my head I've no idea why it needed to be brought back now. I was getting so confused by all the bemusing cultural-shmooshing of terrorist iconology that the Villain Twist came as a great relief. I mostly felt short-changed by the under-use of Rebecca Hall's character and her easy dismissal at the end.
Star Trek Into Darkness was also super fun, although all very Boys Club. I still loved all the Kirk/Spock stuff - their relationship arc was lovely. I didn't really need all the ominous music accompanying Benedict around though, I laughed out loud a couple of times at him being so sign-posted as Villainous all the time.
The Great Gatsby, another film where subtlety just wasn't the order of the day. The typing on the screen was the low point of that I suppose. And just far far too much voice over in general. I liked Carey Mulligan as Daisy much more than I expected to and when it came to Gatsby and Tom fighting over her it worked well in showing just how little to do with it she really was and how trapped she felt. I liked that. Leo was golden of course, but just didn't seem to have enough to do. The music was mostly incongruent and distracting and I was quite bored watching some of the party scenes.