Yet more holiday reviews

[petronia]

Went to see Peter Pan with my sister and her fenchurch, and I rather think I'm one of the first in tECoB, as neither flist nor fflist has exploded with comments like "Daniel Radcliffe who?" yet. XD Thus I get to tell everyone to go see it. Hmm - if you're a book-purist you'd have fodder for complaint, I suppose, to the same extent and of the same general tenor as the complaints book-purists make about Lord of the Rings. (I am, at the heart of me, a canon weenie and a book-purist, so I could tell you exactly which lines are missing and which have been switched around, and what changes I violently disagree with. My policy, however, is not to waste your time thusly on my neuroses.) However there are comparatively far fewer book-purists for J.M. Barrie than there are people who know only the Disney version ("Leave It To Beaver In Neverland") and think it a saccharine fairy story for kiddies, and this movie will at least spare me from having to... *cracks knuckles* disabuse as many people from that notion as I formerly did. I'll call it a Pullmanesque reading of the original text, and once a few more of you have seen it you can come discuss my conclusion with me. *g*

More thoughts: very pretty, all visual quotations of Victorian art history. Obviously not as lavish a budget as the Harry Potter movies, say, but the pirate ship and ever-mutable lagoon sky are straight out of Turner, and the mermaids a finnier version of Waterhouse's nymphs... Also, omgwtf so much doujinshi potential as if the Japanese weren't obsessed enough with Peter Pan already, thank you very much, creators. Whoever you are. >_>

(He has the smile! The dreamy smile...)

I went into the theatre thinking that I'd know the film was well-made if it could make me cry like the book does, and it did - several times. That's all there is to it, really.

***

And now I start my Neverending Download Queue and toddle off to read Peace Maker Kurogane. Wow, it's amazing how much more sense all these scenes make when they're in the right chronological order. >____<

EDIT -- About two chapters into vol.2, right after the Kamo assassination flashback. Methinks that's about as much as my brain can take for tonight; I have to read this'un with a dictionary close to hand, as the dialogue runs heavily to old-fashioned polite Japanese at points. Not to mention Osaka Kyoto dialect, Tosa dialect, Saitou spouting Bouddhist philosophy and Sakamoto Ryoma spouting Engrish. -_-; It really is the concept of Engrish for which Kurono's aiming, not merely accepted transliteration of foreign pronunciation - first time I've seen hiragana/katakana perverted to such effect. ^^;

(And it really says everything there is to say about Tatsu-nii, that he'd probably be executed if he let it be widely known that he speaks English... but is nevertheless compelled to correct other people's usage.)

Comments

[serendip.livejournal.com]

You almost make it sound like it's going to cause a mini-revol ala PotC. XD

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Hey, if enough of the PotC fandom goes to see it on the basis of it having Pirates Innit (and even a tiny sliver of the HP fandom goes to see it on the basis of it having The Guy Who Plays Lucius Malfoy Innit), it just might. ^_^;; I'm not sure if I'd want that, to be honest. If it happened I'd have to hang around the edges and be vastly disturbed by the fic, like I do with LotR.

But seriously, the boy they got to play Peter is incredibly fooking pretty, and the entire thing is about how both pubescent girls and grown men want to molest him. And I'm not even saying this metaphorically.

[serabut.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, the classic that is chockful with psychological issues.

And Peter is very pretty. And I'm feeling faintly dirty.

And I'm not even saying this metaphorically.
Word.

[serendip.livejournal.com]

It does sound like something that would appeal to me, which is sort of odd. The Disney version did throw me off, to say the v. least. Would you recommend reading the original book?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I would recommend everyone read the original book. ^_^ (Indeed, you like the classy children's lit, do you not? Though Peter Pan may be best grokked by an adult - I'm never quite sure. As serabut points out above, it's chock full of psychological issues.)