Popcorn Review! - Constantine (2005)

The Film/ TV Adap: Constantine (2005.)

The Bookish Inspiration: The 'Hellblazer' graphic novels.

Main Cast: Keanu Reeves, Shia LaBeouf, Rachel Weisz, Tilda Swinton.

Director: Francis Lawrence.

BBFC Rating: 15.

Amazon: USA.



Opening credits:

Perhaps unfairly, this film flies under most people's radars. Maybe that's appropriate - Hellblazer, and Constantine, has always appealed to a small cult audience, rather than being mainstream.

This is also my best friend's favourite film. So I've seen it more than once. Because we have to support each other's insanity, obviously.


Premise:

John Constantine is a demon-hunter and exorcist trying to avoid eternal damnation (as you do >.<).

Angie Dodson's sister is found dead. Is there more here than meets the eye?

Something's coming. Are they ready?


Best bits:

There's a louche gothic-ness here that wraps you in its intricacies. The horrors are harsh. Constantine is bitter: he smokes, drinks, and takes far too much cough medicine. And somehow you end up just loving it.

Keanu Reeves, taking the lead role, delivers what can only be described as an excellent performance. But it's Tilda Swinton's brief scenes (though you will love to hate her in this film,) that will stick with you; along, of course, with the fiery and rusted vision of hell.

The effects are great - though many will find them disturbing. And the whole thing has an awesome gritty feel to it that will please fans of horror films, as well as those who like things that are a little out of the box.


Not so great bits:

There's a lot of discussion of heaven and hell, demons, mental health, cancer, and suicide. I'm sure there will be a significant portion of people that aren't in the right place to be watching this film.

It also gets somewhat graphic in terms of violence and gore, with suicide scenes that could definitely shock many people.

Don't get the wrong impression - it's not gratuitous, but then, neither does it shy away from the physicality of the thing (hard to say any more than that without getting into dangerously spoilerific territory.)


Popcorn Worthy?

This is definitely worth breaking out the popcorn - great for evening viewing, but maybe not one to watch alone at 3am with the lights off. Unless you want to, of course, but I warned ya!


Buy Now USA - IMDb



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Nerd Church - Just For One Day

This week, we lost people who we felt we knew.

True, most of us had never met them - but does that matter? We admired them. We respected them. In our way, we loved them.

I think that the world will always need heroes - whether real or fictional. And sometimes, when the actor is passionate enough, the singer unique enough, their image becomes inseparable from their creations.

David Bowie re-formed his own image so many times that he may well have been a timelord of sorts. We didn't know him, true. But we were given enough of a glimpse of the man to know we admired him; and his characters.

The people that he managed to become through his music and costume showed us all that we really needed to know.

Don't get me wrong - I don't think he was actually Ziggy Stardust, or the Thin White Duke, or any of his other personas.

But they were a part of him, and he a part of them: and they enchanted us, spoke to us, told us something about ourselves.

And then there's Alan Rickman. We will never be able to imagine Snape without Alan Rickman's heavy silences, meaningful looks, or deep and powerful voice.

To me, Snape's memory from the last Harry Potter film is a class in 'how to act,' - that scene stole the show. It's already iconic, and I'm sure it'll only become more so in time.

So yes, we mourn people we did not know personally - because we know how beautiful they were. We know that the world has lost incredible men. We mourn them because they spoke to us, in one way or another.

Nerd Church is a weekly post discussing moral, ethical, and topical issues in a friendly, nerdy, and non-denominational, setting (non-nerds also welcome.) Feel free to write your own posts - on this or any other topic (but please link back to this blog.) 


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The Writer Diaries (or, 2016, I'm Gonna Getcha)

As I've mentioned on probably more than one occasion, I love both reading and writing.

Of course, I consider this blog writing - I'm here putting the words from my head into type, aren't I? But I'm also keen to up the amount of writing of various other sorts that I do.

I've decided that I'm going to make myself write more in 2016. Not in a loads-of-pressure, have-to-do-this-or-else kind of way: because that sucks. No, this is in a 'wow, this is fun! And I can do this, and then that, and then...' kind of way.

So yeah, I'm gonna have fun, I'm gonna write stuff, and lord knows what I'll do with said stuff once I've written it, but that's a problem for the future (I'll jump off that bridge when I come to it.)

Expect more 'Writer Diaries' posts in the next few months!



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Friday Fics Fix! - FrostIron Strikes Again!

I have a serious FrostIron problem - as regular readers of this blog may have noticed. I can't help it, ok? I ship the ship.

I ship. The ship.

(Fangirl translation for the non-fangirl/fanboy fluent:

A ship is a wished-for romantic, often sexual, relationship, between two characters. Usually, these are characters of the same gender.

Occasionally there's a straight relationship in fanfiction - but it's not common.

'I ship the ship' means that I have bought into this relationship to what is probably an unhealthy level.)

So, yeah. FrostIron is Tony Stark and Loki's fandom relationship. I read far too many fics of this ship. It may even be my otp.

(Translation: 'One True Pairing' - that one (or many) ship(s) that you will defend and obsess over to your dying breath - melodramatic, yes. But this is fandom.)

I also read far too much Omegaverse for my own good/sanity/chances of not losing my soul to the fandom (yay!) I've explained Omegaverse before, so please read that post if you want to know more.

I am not explaining that again.

This week's fic then isssss (dramatic pause...)

of hormones and tinfoil hats by Arvensis5 and plumadesatada

This (oddly enough, given what I've been harking on about for the majority of this post,) is FrostIron Omegaverse. It is also excellent.

Given that my definition of 'excellent' when it comes to fanfiction has become a little blurry (you try reading this much warped fanfiction and not becoming just a little lenient and/or lightheaded!) it is still very good by any standards.

Seriously, this has been thought through, carefully executed, and well-written (barring the odd typo.) And it definitely makes you want to give Loki a big ol' hug!!! (Sigh, the feels.)

It also includes some pretty rockin' corresponding fanart.

Given that it's Omegaverse (and fanfiction in general,) there's a refreshing lack of explicit sex; there are a few depictions of the aftermath of torture though, so reader beware.

Given the title, I really would've loved if there were more tinfoil hats involved. But oh well, beggars can't be choosers and all that jazz (yay, mixed clichés!)


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A Tribute - Alan Rickman

We've lost another hero.

Alan Rickman will be known to most for his brilliant performance as Severus Snape. For many of us, he was Snape.

I leave you with a beautiful fan-video made by MsSardonicus in 2012 as my small tribute.

Comics Wrap Up - Calling Out For a Hero

TV Trailers

I don't actually watch Daredevil (I don't have Netflix, dammit!) but this trailer looks pretty damned cool.

Film Trailers

This week gave us a triple dose of teasers from the incredible, impossible, Deadpool. I love Deadpool. I know I say that a lot - but it's no less true!!!!!

Film

My very first popcorn review was on suitably comic-based fare.

Batman (1989) (UK - USA) was the first of the run of Batman films, previous to Christopher Nolan's more recent Dark Knight trilogy (UK - US.)

You can read my review right here.


Graphic Novels

This week I read STARVE Volume 1 (UK - US) - and oh boy, is it a doozy! Hard to summarise, but basically - wow. Never looking at chefs and reality shows the same way again!

Keep an eye out for my full review, which will be with you within the next week or two my lovely people!

I also read Adulthood is a Myth: A 'Sarah's Scribbles' Collection (UK - US) - my review for that will be posted in February (I know, I know, that feels like a million years away - but this is what happens when I read eARCs people; I loved it, I can tell you that!)

Other Stuff

I reviewed the non-fiction book Death, Disability and the Superhero by Jose Alaniz (UK - USA).

This is a study of the representation of death and disability in superhero comics (as the title implies >.< ) and you can read my full review here.


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Are We Losing Our Imagination?

You may think - wtf are you talking about C R? Our imaginations are fine and dandy.

But are you right? Studies have shown that kids have less imagination than they did in the 1970s.

Are we losing our ability to imagine things?

Shakespeare's plays were originally performed in broad daylight. There were no microphones to boost the actor's voices. There was no set design to speak of.

Effects were limited to the most rudimentary of noises and props that could be flung together on a relatively small budget in the 1500 and 1600s.

Needless to say, there was no soundtrack, no opening credits, and very rarely was there scenery.

This wasn't the case simply for a few rich snobs who thought they were chocolate because this was 'art' and they could afford theatre tickets - oh no, this was the entertainment of the masses.

The audience had to imagine more.

So, without all of the bells and whistles, the audience had to engage more with the story, and with the acting, albeit they had were quite harsh critics (throwing rotten vegetables at bad actors - an early way to lessen food waste >.< )

Imagination is a muscle.

Imagination has been compared time and time again to a muscle. If you use it, it grows and develops; if you don't, it wastes away.

People in the 1800s didn't 'scare easy,' when they found Dracula and A Christmas Carol terrifying - they just had imaginations that were far more active than our own.

Likewise, visual effects that seemed realistic and cutting-edge in the mid-20th century now look unbelievable and, often, a little sad.

People weren't more gullible in the past, their imaginations just did the work for them.

We feed our imaginations on junk food.

No-one minds a bit of junk food now and then: but all day, every day? No wonder our imaginations are feeling the strain (and yes, I'm mixing metaphors - and I don't care!)

It's not only our imaginations feeling the effects of our instant gratification culture - our attention spans, lets face it, are down-right atrocious.

So, letting the media we consume (and let's face it, we consume a lot of it,) constantly do our work for us, is not good for either our attention spans or our imaginations.

But neither do we have to be saintly lords and ladies from the days of yore (you know, yore, what a bore, yore! Yes, I heard it. Clearly this is another side-effect of too much interwebs... and there may have been coffee... again.)

No, we don't have to act like we rolled out of bed in the 1500s complete with skirts and/or codpiece (I'm not here to judge.) I just think we need to cool it occasionally, and make our brains actually work for those yummy hits of dopamine.

In the long run, you'll be better off for it.

But don't let me have all the opinions! Do you agree? Disagree? Somewhere in between?

Do we need to rescue our imaginations from the pit of quick video-clips and reality TV? Or is it good riddance to bad abstract nouns?


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