The Seated View

My mother has abandoned me.  Last night, she notified me that she had no intention of watching the Academy Awards with me on Sunday. And I don’t really blame her, because let’s face it, the Oscars are usually deadly dull. What makes it fun is watching it with someone and sharing snarky/admiring comments about the clothes, the speeches, and the presenters. Every now and again, they do something that livens things up. And then they go back to the same old thing. Take last year. There were one, maybe two of the major awards at the very beginning, followed by two hours of interminable dullness, and then they rushed the rest of the major rewards into the last 20 minutes. Who was responsible for that abomination? Yet I watch every year in the hope of something unique, entertaining happening, and of course of my favourite movies winning. To that end, I spend some time watching all the Best Movie nominees before the big night. Oddly enough, I also develop opinions abou...

Cake is a movie about a woman who lives with chronic pain.  Claire, played by Jennifer Aniston, has the kind of pain that makes it difficult to move and difficult to be polite. She is cranky and bitchy and incredibly honest. She is also dealing with a great deal of emotional pain, although it takes most of the movie to find out why (actually, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out what happened way ahead of the dénouement). One of the ways she “deals” with that is by popping pills and drinking quite a lot. Claire alienates everyone around her, getting kicked out of her pain support group, is fired by her physiotherapist, and is in the final stages of a divorce. Her only support and friend is her maid Silvana (a wonderful Adriana Barraza). The movie is about Claire finding a way through the pain. She’s also trying to find a way through the suicide of a fellow member of the pain support group and in the process, figuring out whether she wants to liv...

    Last summer, I immersed myself in Stieg Larsson’s Millenium universe and loved every minute of it. I wish I could read these books again with that fresh sense of discovery, but alas, this is not possible. Instead, I've been watching the movies and although I know the storyline, there is still a feeling of surprise when you see how they approach the story. The American remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has been in theaters for a while now and I admit I often don't see the point of remakes. What's wrong with the first version? Anyway!. Today is not about a rant, it's about good movies. I've seen both versions now, the the Swedish original  and the US remake and as a break from posts about fatigue, disability politics and more fatigue, I thought I'd contrast and compare. And for those of you who haven't read the book(s) or watched the movies, I'll do my best to keep spoilers to a minimum, but it's inevitable that there will be so...