Seen on the silver screen: You didn't see that coming. Or did you?

I've got this file saved for a while and forgotten to publish. And the next part is almost ready. Ups...

I love the cinemas. Not a big suprise, but these dark rooms, where nothing distracts you and screen just sucks you right into another world and for few hours you live different life: plot evil plans, make billions of dollars, save the day, breathe the court manners, treat presentce of magic as obvious thing... it's addictive for me.
Watching movies at home doesn't come anywhere near that experience. There are always those intrusive thoughts like "Hey! If I put laundry in the washing machine now, maybe I'll be able to wear that Loki t-shirt tomorrow!" or "I really should be productive/studing/socializing/cleaning/doing something with my life" and whole atmosphere is gone. But cinema, oh cinema! it is a temple of film, place designed to watch, appreciate and live the film. And I honestly don't mind going there alone. Only bad productions require good company to survive and quite possibly even przemienic traumatic przezycie into an entertaining one. So, yeah, I go to cinema a lot and mostly wish I was able to see every single feature, but since I do have something poorly resembling life (and a cold) this is what I managed to catch last week:

Child 44 was supposed to be a critic against soviet system - russia banned the film as historicaly unaccurate and in my country it's known under the title "System". Except something went wrong and that political system is ironically similar to a gigantic  American corrporation in certain type of thrillers.

We get a story of a rightous man with astonishing  moral clearity and good life, who because of a vicious colleague is on the horns of a dilemma of losing everything or sacrificing his beloved wife. Having nothing left they decide to commit themselves to solve a case of children murdering, become country's most wanted and occasionally fight, so that something was happening. The system is represented by an evil guy, everybody trying to save their assed (writing reports to look better rather than be accurate is quite common action) and somebody sometimes commenting on harshness of conditions of a situation - to be clear, folks and even men with good social position should be tremendously afraid of speaking their mind and the film does not show it at all. Quite the opposite. Not to mention, that the idea of a child raised in pro-Soviet surroundings, an active security officer having almost crystally clean conscience, however with purpose of making the character likeable, is simply ridiculous and makes whole hard to be taken seriously.

 The realtionship between Raisa and Leo may be the most interesting part of the story. Motif of a hero who's in love with his wife, and yet her being with him only because she didn't have another choice is quite unusual. Shame Noomi Repace's acting wasn't nowhere close to dazzling

The other pointless thing is speaking with Russian accent. Speaking English with Russian accent. I've never understood this manner and instead of enhance the feeling that the film is set in Russia and concerns its citizens, it slows down the dynamic of expression and the whole action (dragging every word takes some time) and may give an impression that some characters are sluggish, because, let's face it, no common Russian would such clearly accent every word, especially not in a great distress.

I expected more from this production, and yet the only satisfying thing is Tom Hardy.

Bathsheba even her free time spends like a land owner should

Far from the Madding Crowd - BBC's period drama is something I have need to watch from time to time. For the beautiful pictures and dresses. This one, based on Thomas Hardy's novel, is about a woman who above anything else wanted to be independent in times it wasn't so easy (here: Victorian England) and three completely different man who declared their wish to marry her. Three kinds of love: young - full of passion and desire, loyal - based on trust and understanding, blind - coming from an elder man who could ensure her wellbeing. Charming little thing, great as a pause after stressful week.

We all know that even such mass of cyborgs isn't a threat for the Avengers

Avengers: The Age of Ultron (SPOILERS!)
So, I admit I had a great time during the screening, but then I came back come and read a few negative opinions and with broken heart agreed with most of them:
- Yes, they ignored a massive part of threads from previous productions and made this one like between the first Avengers movie there was nothing. Sadly also including not small character development of Tony Stark. And big come back of S.H.I.E.L.D. after what they've left us with in Winter Soldier is, to say the leas,t confusing,
- Yes, some jokes and punchlines were not funny and felt enforced,
- Yes, it was humongously pompous, although I think I got used to it and don't mind it anymore,
- Yes, it felt like too much, when they tried to satisfy fans of any superhero that already appeared in the universe, introduce new ones, add a love affair AND remind that Ragnarok and Civil War are coming, no wonder there was not much time to properly write the Twins and their motives
- Yes, Ultron didn't get a chance to become truly evil, there wasn't one second we would feel he's a real threat to humanity . Nothing about him made him stuck in my mind, just another metal villain trying to destroy the Earth
- Yes, there was no on-screen chemistry between Scarlett Johansson and Mark Ruffalo. I dont't have vision of a particular partner for Black Widow, but in the Marvel cinematic universe this ship must sink down,
- And yes, the possibility of interpreting Natasha's words as if the ability to have children was woman's main value shouldn't have place. For me she meant that she's a monster, because of what's been done to her in order to make her a flawless assasin, taking away possibility of barring a child as one of the actions to restrain her from getting any other part of life, any happiness.
Well, to my internal conflict there is only one cure: MCU marathon including Avengers 2. I'll let you know what I think afterwards.


PS Galavant got the second season, what makes me happy. CW is releasing a new musical tv series Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, but somehow I doubt I'll whatch more than two episodes. What can I say? I am a fantasy girl

Political correctness - censorship or treating people with respect?

Today for something more serious, I present my opinion of political correctness (I know: ouch!).

People tend to use term ”political correctness” so often, it starts to lose its inital meaning and becomes an oncoming, alarming danger to known order and our freedom of expression. Is it our real enemy or are we just afraid of changes?

Maybe it would be useful to explain what political correctness actually means: it i san attitude when we use such language that will not offend the person we talk to. So we have changed a bit the way we speak about people of colour and with various disabilities, and some have impression there is pressure on them to produce sentences that won’t offend absolutely anyone and that there freedom of speech has been violeted, because it is very hard – in many situations nearly impossible – to please everybody with our choice of words, mostly because everybody’s preferences are different. Neil Gaiman proposed that we changed the term ”political correctness” to ”treating people with respect”, which substantially should be the very purpose of existing and promoting the idea of political correctness. This interpretation is much easier for me to apply as a way of thinking. Everybody deserves respect, but that does not mean that their opinions or actions cannot be criticized.

There are three very common motives , compulsorily present in all movie blockbusters, so I am sure you noticed tchem as well:

1. strong woman – pretty and in love with the leading white male character
2. homosexual/trasexual best friend (often blended with funny black guy)
3. that funny black guy/sarcastic bitch

These patterns are so popular, they became stereotypical and watching how many film producers use tchem is frankly frightening.

In this industry appears an universal fear of rage of the most noticeable activist groups. It is understandable nobody wants to be proclaimed as a chauvinist, but it doesn’t justify taking the easy way out and mass producing schematical characters instead of taking the effort of actually writing them as interesting and differentiated human beings.

I came across two main attitudes towards political correctness, but the negative reception seems to significantly dominate. The term makes people imagine that certain manner of filmming is enforeced and therefore creators’ freedom is limited. In fact, many may be afraid to touch controversial topics, but it is – and always has been – matter of the courage of filmmakers and their ability to capably present a sensitive subject. It is worth remembering that somebody always will feel offended – it’s unavoidable, but shouldn’t affect efforts to bring out the picture possibly closest to reality or to bold some meanigful aspects, though it may not be compatible with point of view of many.

The good thing that comes from the phenomen of political correctness is that it develops the feeling in both, creators and audiences, that deversity should be present in productions. That it is important everybody would feel represented in a fictional universum and that choosing a multicultural location as a background for a stroy commit to involve characters of many origins, not only white.

An example of a character, who may be considered as the added to the plot just to fulfill current expectations put on by political correctness is Tauriel form The hobbit trilogy. It is simply impersmissable that the year’s biggest feature does not involve any female (Galadriel appearence was barely episodical, so it’s hard to call her a protagonist of The Hobbit) and in the same time, her character doesn’t bring anything new to representation of women in the cinematography (nor LOTR universum as a matter of fact). But queries like if a black Bond or female Doctor is acceptable have nothing to do with political correctness, just the readiness of fans to walk out on what they are used to, as the characters are completely fictional (and in addition, one is an alien). Different case is Exodus: Gods and Kings telling story of Moses set in ancient Egypt (let’s say it very clearly: pure, ancient Egypt , located in Africa), however all actors playing leading roles and most of the cast are white, which is unthinkable considering that America does not lack actors of the suitable origin and proper casting wouldn’t be a problem. I cannot imagine that somebody thought of Moses and saw Christiane Bale. How??

So, political correctness may be vexing to many, but it shows an important message: racism is not cool and we must fight. Maybe soon we realise that less than censorship it may be more a treatment to show a world closer to the reality and put an end to the exclusion of few in the cinema, and that nothing is black or white, which make life so confusing and movies so needed.

PS In the case of James Bond it's not the matter of black guy playing the famous agent, it is about Idris Elba playing the role for which he perfectly suits - he is a born 007: his manners, looks, class, charm and self confidence. So just finish tallking and let his destiny be fulfilled.