rose_griffes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rose_griffes) wrote2024-01-21 12:42 pm
rose_griffes) wrote2024-01-21 12:42 pm
2 movies and a tv show
In December a friend and I watched the new Hunger Games prequel movie, A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Unlike the previous HG movies, I hadn’t read the novel before seeing this film, and my vague impression was “... something about Snow?”
I did figure out fairly quickly that this story would be a villain arc. I should have mentioned it to the friend watching it with me, even if it would have interrupted her concentration, because she was, er, taken aback.
At any rate, it was aesthetically pleasing enough and featured visually-interesting people who acted well, and yet… still lacked something for me. I’m willing to bet I’d find it in the novel version. Nonetheless, it’s a haunting enough story, as it should be, watching Coriolanus Snow step towards becoming President Snow of the book trilogy.
In January I saw the Wonka movie prequel, which was airy like a meringue, and which lasted as long in my memory as a meringue would. Meringues have their place! Even the movie version of them! At the same time, it’s still a bit disconcerting to see all of that money invested on the (beautiful!) final product and realize later that you can’t recall much more than a vague outline of the story and the characters. Not even an ear-worm song remains!
I started watching the new Disney+ Percy Jackson series. Housemate A likes it, so it’s something we can watch together. The first two episodes didn’t really catch my attention, but since I was watching with someone else, I persisted enough for the pay-off. Which is to say: I’m now really enjoying the season, five episodes in.
I read book one of the series YEARS ago, and I recently-ish saw a stage version of The Lightning Thief. So I have only a very vague sense of where the story is going. Not sure if that makes it more or less enjoyable than knowing the main plotlines from the books.
Having actual young people play the lead characters sometimes leads to a bit of stilted acting now and then. However, my one real complaint is that the musical cues are too heavy. Those child actors aren’t perfect, but it’s still frustrating having such heavy-handed musical cues to tell me how to feel.
I did figure out fairly quickly that this story would be a villain arc. I should have mentioned it to the friend watching it with me, even if it would have interrupted her concentration, because she was, er, taken aback.
At any rate, it was aesthetically pleasing enough and featured visually-interesting people who acted well, and yet… still lacked something for me. I’m willing to bet I’d find it in the novel version. Nonetheless, it’s a haunting enough story, as it should be, watching Coriolanus Snow step towards becoming President Snow of the book trilogy.
In January I saw the Wonka movie prequel, which was airy like a meringue, and which lasted as long in my memory as a meringue would. Meringues have their place! Even the movie version of them! At the same time, it’s still a bit disconcerting to see all of that money invested on the (beautiful!) final product and realize later that you can’t recall much more than a vague outline of the story and the characters. Not even an ear-worm song remains!
I started watching the new Disney+ Percy Jackson series. Housemate A likes it, so it’s something we can watch together. The first two episodes didn’t really catch my attention, but since I was watching with someone else, I persisted enough for the pay-off. Which is to say: I’m now really enjoying the season, five episodes in.
I read book one of the series YEARS ago, and I recently-ish saw a stage version of The Lightning Thief. So I have only a very vague sense of where the story is going. Not sure if that makes it more or less enjoyable than knowing the main plotlines from the books.
Having actual young people play the lead characters sometimes leads to a bit of stilted acting now and then. However, my one real complaint is that the musical cues are too heavy. Those child actors aren’t perfect, but it’s still frustrating having such heavy-handed musical cues to tell me how to feel.