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letyourcolors · 4 years

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Analyzing Leyton in Season 1 (this is a rant, btw)

First of all, I’d just like to point out that I love Peyton, and Lucas was my favorite male character for the first three seasons. That being said, I hate Leyton and this post is not dedicated to their shippers (feel free to read it if you want, I don’t mean to disrespect anyone, I just think you’re not gonna like it lol). Also I do like Brucas but I’m not standing on the ‘they should’ve been endgame’ team, I could’ve easily accepted them not being together anymore (specially because I fully respect Sophia’s position to not wanna do those kinds of scenes with Chad anymore) - if the writers hadn’t done such a terrible job telling us ‘Leyton’ was the Real Thing.

On this post, I’ll discuss Leyton’s construction during the first season of One Tree Hill and I intend to do future posts with the other seasons as well. If you want to check out the next ones, follow the ‘anti leyton analysis’ tag (or just follow me lol I promise you I’m very nice).

Season 1

Okay so, for starters, I’ll just point out that I wasn’t actively anti-Leyton at the beginning of the show, I just didn’t mind them. They did have some cute moments together and I could understand their dynamic, it was belieavable.

(Credit: x)

I also specifically enjoy their bickering, like how when Lucas flirts with Peyton and she cuts him off by being mean (which is sort of her way of flirting back) and the opposite happens as well.

The reason why I didn’t really care for them is because I never saw anything really meaningful happening there. Their interest is nothing more than platonic. Lucas likes the idea of Peyton since he never even talked to her before; Peyton on the other hand is getting out of an abusive relationship and is just kind of intrigued by this guy who seems very different than her current boyfriend, who also happens to be Lucas’ brother (and rival). Their angst only exists because of that specific circumstance.

When there is finally nothing standing in their way and they can just be together, without the teasing, this happens:

(Credit: x)

Peyton has a change of heart only after Lucas is dating Brooke, which obviously hightens her feelings because now it’s forbidden again. To me, personally, that is not a sign of love or romanticism. That is a sign of having your ego hurt - and I don’t mean to shame Peyton, I’m only pointing out the most common human behavior ever. Feeling a little something for someone and having it a million times stronger after you can’t have them is something we’ve all been through and it doesn’t necessarily prove we have a deep connection to that person. So of course there is tension when they talk, in the first episodes she’s with Nathan and later they’re cheating on Brooke. Leyton’s angst is always a result of someone else standing in their way and never of the pure intensity of their feelings.

Even so, in theory, Leyton still seems better than Brucas. I mean, if you only heard the story, you would definitely not be a Brucas shipper because Lucas’ feelings for her apparently do not compare to what he feels for Peyton (even if it’s based on his own idealized perception of her and not on who she actually is, since they barely know each other but whatever). As a matter of fact, he gets together with Brooke right after Peyton dumps him, and that’s not exactly the best place to start off with someone.

The thing is, and that is why I already leaned towards Brucas, they have way better chemistry.

Leyton just always seems off-sync to me. For example, in 1x07, this is Peyton inviting Lucas to Nathan’s party. It’s supposedly a flirty moment and yet their faces:

(You can see the gifs here)

tbh I genuinely thought Peyton had way more chemistry with Haley (and with a lot of female characters for that matter, I didn’t get my hopes up because this show is really straight but Peyton had a very strong gay vibe):

While this is Brooke and Lucas interacting later on that same episode. Brooke is actively hitting on him and he is trying to reject her to go talk to Peyton (but ARE YOU REALLY, Lucas? I mean...

Anyway.

Now to the kisses. Lucas and Peyton’s first kiss is just very, very uncomfortable, both narratively (she only kisses him in order to piss off Brooke, which is pretty lame) and visually (just LOOK AT THAT).

I can actually feel a little pain watching this because she pushed his head with such rudeness and it doesn’t even seem like he’s enjoying it, it’s not like ‘wait what- wooooww, I like this’, looks like he’s trying to get away from that, he even pushes his arms back.

But okay, maybe that’s not the best example. Let’s get a moment where there was reciprocity.

I mean it’s fine.

As opposed to when Lucas and Brooke kiss:

(On the gifset above there are more of their kisses in season 1 which are all incredibly beautiful)

At their first kiss they are so consumed by each other’s eyes we feel like they’ll start ripping off their clothes right there. And then at the pool kiss, they both just look genuinely happy and that is another point that distinguishes Leyton and Brucas so much for me: Brucas just seems very lighter and easy-going, they always look like they’re having a good time together. We also got to see them be a couple and spend quality time together and just enjoy each other’s company.

While Leyton for me was rooted in guilt, tension and awkwardness, we barely never see them just hanging out or having cute moments.

And finally, another point that I will explore better in my seasons 2 and 3 analysis, how could anyone care about Leyton when we had THIS:

Even though the show didn’t focus on Jeyton that much I really like the fact that they’re a slowburn and that their relationship was just rooted in how much they liked being together. Peyton babysitted Jenny just because she wanted to and Jake found comfort in her while he was struggling with being a teenage single parent and later with Nikki trying to steal his daughter from him. Here we have better angsty because it’s not that the characters are playing games and refusing to be together out of pride, it’s not that another love interest gets in the way, and to me it doesn’t feel like it’s about their ego, they simply get more and more attached to each other and enjoy the time they spend together and actually start off as friends which I think is really beautiful.

This is what I have to say about Season 1. Even though I already didn’t ship Leyton at that point (and thought both Jeyton and Brucas had better potential), I could still see that it made sense for the show to place them together on Season 2 and it wouldn’t bother me that much. But then... (Wait for my season 2 analysis)

#anti leyton analysis #anti leyton #one tree hill #oth #brucas #brooke x lucas #jake x peyton #jeyton #s1 #rant #leyton x brucas #my texts #oth spoilers

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ayellowbirds · 7 years

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Part 13! A bit of cheating, because I actually wrote very little yesterday. There’s some of what I wrote on the 12th, and a little from today. If you missed Part 12, then click here.

Like how things are going? You can help support this project:

Keeping your eye on the Cypora’s Guide to Cementing Your Rule as an Evil Queen tag on my blog.

Look back at the tag for the original story, here; the posts from last year of the original, un-edited draft of the story can be found about halfway down this page.

Tell me about your favorite characters from the story—or draw them, if you like! You can find visual references in the art tag, or look at the stuff that inspires me, visually, in the inspiration tag.

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Got any questions about Cypora’s Guide, the characters, or the setting? Feel free to send them to me!

And now, we see a bit of what the religious life of the people of the land is like, on Qarqa. Before we do, though: I was anxious about including this. While Cypora’s Guide to Becoming an Evil Queen had bits and pieces hinting at the nature of spirituality, I tried to keep religion from being too much in focus. But the way people approach their faith can tell you a lot about them, and I didn’t feel I could leave it out any longer.

Cypora’s world is based on an old observation: that for all that most fantasy settings play at polytheism, the religion portrayed is still a very Christian-seeming one, at least from my perspective. I wanted to look at what a polytheistic fantasy world based in Jewish sensibilities might look like... and one thing led to another. As I’ve said before, i’m not religious. I was raised agnostic, and so my take on this isn’t just Jewish, but “Jew raised by a Holocaust survivor who got used to hiding his religion and then lived in Israel for years where he didn’t have to think about it and then got married to the agnostic Jewish daughter of former Socialists”-ish. I didn’t know what a Sukkah was until i was 19.

That’s part of why i identified the Jewish-coded cultures in Cypora’s Guide as “people of the land”. The Hebrew am ha’aretz (עם הארץ) has had many meanings over the millennia. It can mean “uneducated bumpkin”, or “unpious”, “lapsed from the worship of G-d”, and so forth. It’s also sometimes used as a term of pride for Jews of pagan or hippie sensibilities; you could point to the worship of the golden calf or the bronze serpent as very “am ha’aretz” things. It’s a term that some people use as an insult, and some people use as a way to distinguish themselves. And the literal English translation just felt right.

Well, with that out of the way:

“Ah, that reminds me,” Pheribee said as Lucky disappeared through the kitchen. If any of you are shomre Shabbos,* consider me your zarah.”

Alícha raised the one eyebrow over her good eye, and saw the others startle as well. It wasn’t a term you heard much, these days, especially not as a self-identifier. Zarot or zarim were “foreigners”, both in the literal and ritual sense; under the centuries of Icarian rule, the term had undertaken an insulting tone, but still had its formal place in religious literature and codes of conduct on holy days and the Sabbath.

“You don’t look,” Broke began, without finishing. Ze made an offensive gesture for ‘Icosan’, a perversion of the old Imperial Salute. Everyone else made as if to ignore it.

“For legal purposes,” Pheribee sighed, and then continued as if reciting, “the city of Wilderhaven formally recognizes the status of half-humans and other admixtures of mortal and monstrous or magical nature as having the status of people of the land, where their birthing parent or wet nurse has that status; persons whose parentage is uncertain or who are born to a parent of inhuman nature are regarded as zarim and are not subject to the laws of the divine.”

Alícha looked down at Pheribee’s hands, and her own. “Ah. Because you’re…?”

Tavi and Lodemia made sharp, sudden noises as if to shush her.

“Anaqit,” Pheribee replied, unlocking the last of the four remaining rooms. “Half giant, on my mother’s side.”

“My apologies,” Alícha said, looking at her companions’ mortified faces. “I’ve never met someone who was.”

“Huh, really?” Pheribee said, though whether she believed it or not, Alícha could not tell. “I mean, there’s lots of us around. My mom had forty-nine kids.”

Nightfall came, and with it, a variety of impromptu prayers together held together with Lucky, who did not seem to fuss over keeping to traditional order. As had become familiar, each of Alícha’s companions showing signs of more favor for a particular deity than was strictly proper. Broke, for General Yodlebeymer, apparently a habit from travels in the colder reaches of the north. Both Tavi and Lodemia offered a bit more attention to Baal Tsachor and the Queen of Heaven, while Alícha supposed she lingered longer than she ought to on reflecting on L’vanah. It only seemed right to count the blessings that the Goddess of The Birch-White Moon gave; easing of the tides, ensnaring of the Icosans upon the surface of the moon, and in general, favoring of all women, regardless of their nature. She had always thought that last part was important, for someone who had been mistaken for a boy at birth.

Pheribee continued to work at things throughout, tending to the gas lights, arranging things in the rooms that Alícha’s party were using—apparently left vacant for a good few weeks, the lower levels being more popular—and occasionally disappearing to the other halls on the floor. Despite this, Alícha could hear her whispering prayers when she passed. Zarah, yes, but also still of the people of the land.

Lucky seemed to prolong his prayer to Q’dushah, though Alícha could not tell whether the favor towards The Holy One was intentional, or an accident of canine accent drawing out the sounds. She couldn’t figure any reason a talking dog would give special notice to a goddess embodying death, and his prayers were too murmured to pick out amidst his shokeling.†

As the night went on and they picked at prepared foods—mostly things Alícha and the others had taken as travel rations, mixed with a bit of what had been cooking already in the kitchen—Alícha tried to untangle a bit of the nature of the Sapir-Wirth Tower and its residents.

“Mister Sapir was in the export business,” Pheribee said as she ladled out some bowls of soup, while Lodemia passed around a second loaf of challah. Alícha took more of the bread than the fatty chicken broth; she still wasn’t used to what northerners considered a suitable meal for the Sabbath. “When the dungeon rush started, people were looking for ways to sell off their treasure. He got into selling stuff to other continents, a lot of it just, what’s the word, repatriating stuff.”

“Not much profit to be made in that, is there?” Broke asked around a mouth half-filled by a spoon.

“If you do it right,” Lucky corrected, “Dov Sapir did not become a businessman by making gifts alone. Each shipment of treasures returned to their rightful owners had ten times ten as much weight in goods for sale or trade. And so? He made money and good will at the same time.”

“Which is where Mister Wirth comes in, being in the adventuring trade and looking to make a kind of guild,” Pheribee picked up the thread, saying, “he wanted something a little more stable, near to a dungeon that was gonna keep producing more. Somewhere people could stay for a few months, years, even, going into a dungeon like it was regular work.”

Lodemia made a little “hm!” of surprise. “What’s so special about #19 that it lets people do that?”

“The Foundry is a fitting name for more than one reason,” Lucky replied, looking out to the window. Not too far in the distance, up a road that curved out of the city itself and onto a hill, smoke rose from numerous stacks, visible even in the distance with the moonlight. Lights gleamed from there. “That dungeon still does the work it was made to, and more. The magaracs and haints that control the dungeon work it as much as dogs and humans did before the changes, producing strange steel and making stranger things out of it. Sapir might not distribute many old treasures now, but few else remain in the business of Icarian steel.”

Alícha skimmed some of the oil off of her soup, and spread it onto a piece of challah. She stared out the window at the moon, thinking again about L’vanah, Baal Tsachor, and red-skinned Layli, night herself. And then she thought about smoke, and steel.

* Strict observers of the Sabbath. On Qarqa, this means avoiding a variety of things widely counted as “labor” in favor of prayer and contemplation of the many aspects of the divine, as part of the ancient covenant forbidding the people of the land from holding any one deity above another.

† Ritualistic rocking or swaying during prayer. Lucky’s ears bobbed when he did so, which was a distraction from everyone else’s prayers. An adorable distraction.

#Cypora’s Guide to Cementing Your Rule As An Evil Queen #long post

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mredlich21 · 7 years

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I am trying to keep each of these posts to around 2,000 words, just seems like anything more would be too over-whelming! Which means I had to break Ranbir off from his Dad. But, as a bonus, I am tossing in his youngest uncle (not much to say about Rajiv). And I will be back on Thursday to deal with the “other” Kapoors, Anil and Sonam and their clan. (part 1 here, part 2 here, part 3 here, part 4 here)

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: These are not “facts”, or “true”, or maybe they are, I have no way of knowing! I don’t know the Kapoor family personally or anything like that. But if you are just beginning to get into the films, I want to give you a sense of the background that most people have for the Kapoors, what is behind all the allusions in film articles and odd comments in interviews.

In my last section, I dealt with the somewhat toxic and dangerous situation in which Ranbir grew up, what with his father’s drinking and abuse of his mother. Of course, that isn’t true now, Rishi seems to have straightened up and gotten better and he and Neetu are more in love and happier than ever. But when Ranbir was little, it was really not great. And maybe that is why he ran off to New York as soon as he was old enough.

In New York, Ranbir studied at the School of Visual Arts, a for-profit film school. And the Lee Strasberg institute. And while there, he made a couple of short films.

This is me being pedantic for a second and translating these credentials from how they are perceived in India versus America and what they mean in the real world. In India, Ranbir is occasional referred to as “studying film in New York” in hushed tones, like this is an amazing credential. I think there may be some lack of clarity between “studying film in New York” and “studying film at NYU”. New York University has one of the best film programs in America, highly competitive, being accepted and completing it really means something. Both of the schools Ranbir studied at are open to pretty much anyone who applies. But what matters (especially in terms of the Strasberg institute) is what you do with it.

(Talia Balsam, for instance, took her Strasberg training and married George Clooney and then John Slattery. If only all their graduates could be so lucky!)

Both schools (especially the Strasberg’s, of course) have rolls and rolls of distinguished alumni. Who worked hard and learned all they could, and then went out into the real world and proved their abilities. Proved them in the way a “real” NYU graduate might not need to, they might be able to get by on the diploma and the connections, whereas a School of Visual Arts student really has to scramble and get there on their on merit.

And so here is Ranbir, who has the kind of technical training you get in an American film program, and the method acting training you get at the Strasberg institute. And the Kapoor credentials. And a seriously messed up childhood (which is also kind of a Kapoor credential).

(Messed up! Lots of servants, but messed up. See little Ranbir on the floor in the background?)

One thing I really respect about Ranbir is that he has been upfront about rejecting his New York training in favor of the desi style training he got in India. He says that he realized the filmwork in New York was useless after a few years, and came back to work as a utility apprentice for Sanjay Leela Bhansali and “really” learn the business.

This is the training his father and uncles and grandfather, even his great-grandfather Prithviraj, all got. Prithviraj worked at Bombay Talkies studio, where it was expected that everyone would know a little of everything. Acting, editing, directing, sweeping the canteen, whatever job was needed, you had to be able to leap in and do it.

Raj of course grew up with this attitude, and was treated like an employee backstage at Prithviraj Theaters, and so did Shammi and Shashi. Raj may have been the only big deal successful producer/director as well as star out of all of them, but Shammi and Shashi both tried their hands at directing in later years and did a decent job of it. Neither of their films were huge popular successes, but the critics liked them and Shammi’s Manoranjan is a bit of a cult fave (if you can find a copy, watch it! Super fun).

(Manoranjan is a remake of Irma La Douce, but with a Desi touch)

Rishi had his own directing attempts, helping his brother Randhir finish their father’s incomplete last film (Henna, generally accepted as India’s first cross-religion romance), and later making his own movie Aa Ab Laut Chalen in 1999, with the assistance of his 16-17 year old son Ranbir (and staring 26 year old Aishwarya Rai. Now think of their sex scenes in ADHM and cringe).

I’m not saying they were great directors, but all the Kapoor movie stars who came before Ranbir had the training and ability to direct. Not because they “studied in New York”, but because it was just something you were expected to know if you were going to be a major star. How can you pick scripts and films and keep your “brand” alive, if you don’t know every part of the filmmaking process?

And so Ranbir worked for Sanjay Leela Bhansali for a year, and then received the kind of grand launch that no one in his family had ever really received before. Randhir was expected to direct his own first movie, Rishi was shoved out to earn money for the family, and Raj and his brothers just sort of stumbled into a film and finally found their feet several films later.

Unfortunately, Ranbir stumbled too. His first movie Saawariya had him playing a kind of strange imitation of his grandfather’s young innocent role, in this weird Blue world, in a plot borrowed from Russia without nearly enough alternations to fit India. It didn’t have the “Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani” that Ranbir’s grandfather taught us was needed to make an Indian film work.

(They tried to call back to Raj Kapoors umbrella, but even that couldn’t save it. Also, it’s really really boring)

As damaging, possibly, Ranbir was shoved out into the world of the Indian press already tagged with the “Kapoor womanizer” label. “Everyone” knew that he and Sonam had started a romance when they were first assisting together on the Black set, that it had continued through filming Saawariya, and that she had left him because he cheated on her. These rumors are so strong that I am inclined to believe them, but it is also a bit unfair that Ranbir barely had time to find his legs as a public figure and we all had already decided he was another serial womanizer like his father, his grandfather, and all his uncles (except Shashi).

Ranbir leaned into this “womanizer” image, and the family heritage, with his second film and his first successful film, Bachna Ae Haseeno, the title (and title song) coming from his father’s famous song in Hum Kissese Kum Nahin.

But he followed it up with something completely different, which finally let him make his mark as something a little different than the Kapoors who had come before, Wake Up Sid. This is also his first collaboration with Ayan Mukherjee. If you haven’t heard of Ayan and Ranbir before, just think of it as Ayan-Ranbir=Karan-Shahrukh. They are best friends, they go everywhere together, and Ayan is also a brilliant scriptwriter/director who can perfectly capture Ranbir’s talents onscreen. Oh, and Ayan is Kajol’s cousin on her father’s side (the Mukherjee family is a whole other Hindi 101 lesson). Woman may come and go, but take it as a given that Ayan will always always be in Ranbir’s life, and is his “life partner” in a way no woman ever has been.

(Also, they are really cute together. I honestly don’t think it is a romantic partnership, but I would be soooooooooooo happy for them if I found out it was. Seems like the healthiest relationship Ranbir has ever had in his life)

His brilliant performance in Wake Up Sid, unfortunately was over-shadowed by more “womanizer” stories, as we all learned that his co-star from Bachna Ae Haseeno, young previously unsuccessful starlet Deepika, was now his serious girlfriend and had even had his initials tattooed on her neck. And then shortly afterwards learned that she had broken up with him for, once again, cheating on her.

(most scandalous and exciting version of this story: Ranbir and Kat start fooling around on the sets of Ajab Prem Ki Kahani. He flies her over to New York so they can continue their affair while he is filming Anjaana Anjaani with Priyanka. Priyanka calls up Deepika and tells on him. Deepika breaks up with him. And is either grateful to Priyanka, or a little mad at her along with everyone else for using the situation to her advantage, depending on which source you read. Or, a couple of rare sources say, he was cheating on Dips with both Kat and Priyanka, and Priyanka only spilled the beans on Kat out of sour grapes when she found out she wasn’t the only one)

Maybe if Ranbir’s films had been more consistently successful, the press would have focused on them instead of his affairs. Or maybe because his films were such flops, Ranbir used the publicity around his personal life to stay relevant. Either way, it got to be a bit of a toxic cycle. 2010 through 2013 he had flop after flop (with a brief intermission for sort-of flop Barfi!) and all of India was captivated by watching him bounce from Sonam to Dips to Kat. Including one of the all time great Koffee with Karan episodes in which Sonam and Deepika were on together and just about ripped him to shreds.

(This is them laughing at their ex-boyfriend together on international TV. Fun for Ranbir, I’m sure!)

And then he finally had a hit in 2013 with his second Ayan Mukherjee collaboration, Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani. Which is also the first time he has co-stared with Deepika post-messy break-up. And suddenly people were talking about his acting and his star power instead of his personal life, for once. Okay, they are still talking about his personal life, but not in a way that makes him look particularly bad.

In 2013, a photo surfaced of Kat and he on a beach together on vacation, her in a tiny bikini. I am still not entirely clear on what the problem was with this photo (the bikini? The vacation together?) but the Indian press went mad for it. There were all these stories about how Rishi and Neetu disapproved, the scandal, this that and the other thing. Ranbir rode it out without really saying anything, poor Kat got caught in the center of the storm while on the Dhoom 3 press tour, but luckily Aamir was there to be the consummate gentlemen and take the heat off the questions. And Salman her ex also stepped in to make some comments in support (one of my favorite things Salman has ever done).

(These are the photos. I’m still not seeing the scandal. If anyone in the comments can explain it, please do!)

The “photo” stories finally died down, and instead we started getting stories about how Kat and Ranbir had moved in together, how an engagement was in the works, etc. etc. These stories started ramping up as his career took another nosedive. Again, I don’t think his PR machine was using his personal life to keep him relevant, but I do think the Indian press knew that the Kapoor name sells newspapers, and if he didn’t have a good movie to write about, they would write about his personal life. And so, as Besharam, Roy, Bombay Velvet, and Tamasha all slowly cranked out and died sad deaths, we learned about Kat and him throwing a housewarming party, Neetu shopping for wedding cards, the hunt for venues, what Rishi thought about all of this, and everything else the press could invent.

And in the middle of this desert of film failures, bam! Biggest Ranbir personal scandal of them all hit the news! Months before the wedding was rumored to happen, after the engagement had been officially announced, it was over. Ranbir moved out of their shared apartment and back into his grandmother’s house, Kat started looking for a new place to live and (supposedly) spending time with her ex-Salman.

All this while Ranbir’s most public former relationship, Deepika, was gloriously triumphantly happy in her personal life and professional life. And his second most famous ex, Sonam, was too. Sure, there were stories that Kat left him because he was tomcatting around again, Alia (of all people!) was mentioned. But based on his recent Koffee With Karan appearance, and his strict focus on work and work relationships (months and months spent working on ADHM, more months spent now on the Sanjay Dutt biopic), Ranbir is breaking off from that loverboy image once and for all. Or at least trying to. He wants to go back to being known as the serious actor of the Kapoor family, and he is trying to go back to being the “filmmaker trained in New York” Kapoor, with his co-production on Jagga Jasoos possibly showing the way towards making RK Studios the premiere house in Bombay again, instead of just a large physical plant rented by other studios to shoot their own films.

Ranbir is the future of RK Studios and the end of the Rishi Kapoor line, but there is another Kapoor who is sadly trapped in the past.

I talked about how Randhir and Rishi both suffered from alcohol in different ways (at least, so it appears from the outside). And then there is their brother Rajiv, who drowned in it. Or drowned in something, poor Rajiv just never really made it. He was the youngest brother, by 10 years. And the last Kapoor to get a “launch”. Well, kind of a launch. More along the lines of his brother Rishi, they needed a cheap young actor to do a role no one else would touch, so they looked to family. He had even acted in a few films already, but none of them had made much of an impression on the audience, so his first RK Studios film is generally thought of as his “first” film.

Rajiv’s only movie with his father, and only big hit, was Ram Tera Ganga Mali. Which is mostly memorable for being, well, something akin to softporn. Mandakini, his 22 year old co-star, wore a see-through sari with no blouse, “breastfed” onscreen, and had a surprisingly sexual childbirth scene as well.

(Notice Rajiv is not visible anywhere on the DVD case. Also, interesting, it is Mandakini in this movie that is referenced in Kapoor and Sons, a movie starring Rajiv’s older brother)

It was a massive hit, and Raj Kapoor’s last film as a director (as mentioned in Rishi’s post, Raj’s final film was unfinished, Henna, completed by his sons after his death).

Rajiv went on to act in a casual way, doing one or two films a year for the next few years. And then he started producing, helping on the production of his father’s last film. Trying directing in a movie with his brother and Madhuri Dixit (hanging out on this set as a recently pubescent boy was the beginning or Ranbir’s crush on her which eventually lead to her cameo in Yeh Jawaani). That failed, and then a few years later he helped out on his brother Rishi’s film, which also failed.

(The film was Prem Granth. And look at her! What 12 year old boy wouldn’t get a bit of a crush on her, even if she was filming love scenes with his Dad directed by his uncle?)

In 2001, at age 40 and after failing to make his mark as an actor, director, or producer, Rajiv was married to an architect. A few years later that failed as well. And so he is the youngest Kapoor brother, no children, no success, spending his days hanging around the RK Studios sorting through rental receipts for the space his father built, and keeping track of copyrights and DVD releases for the films of his more famous relatives.

(Randhir, Rishi, and Rajiv last year)

He is so harmless, that he is the one Twinkle Khanna picked on her most recent Koffee appearance, “Chimpu” Kapoor. Which reminds me, I can’t leave off the “real” Kapoors without a nickname rundown. These are private family names, but when you are a Kapoor, nothing is private. And so the media has adopted them as well.

Raj=Raju

Shammi=Shammi (his real name was “Shamsher”, but no one remembers that)

Shashi=Shashi (real name is Balbir Raj)

Randhir=Dabboo

Rishi=Chintu (thus his twitter handle “@chintskap”)

Rajiv=Chimpu

Karisma=Lolo

Kareena=Bebo

Ranbir=Ganglu (but it isn’t as publicized. Supposedly it is what his grandfather Raj called him when he was little. Awwww!)

And that’s it for the “real” Kapoors! At least until Navya Naveli has her launch, or unless either of the Jain boys finally make it big. However, there are the “other” Kapoors, the distant relations who were about 50 years behind the “real” Kapoors, but are rapidly making up for lost time. Come back on Thursday for Anil, Boney, Sonam, Arjun, Sanjay, and Sridevi!

Hindi 101: The Kapoors, Part V, Ranbir Arrives, Plus the Last Kapoor Brother I am trying to keep each of these posts to around 2,000 words, just seems like anything more would be too over-whelming!

#Bachna Ae Haseeno #Deepika Padukone #Hindi Film 101 #Katrina Kaif #Rajiv Kapoor #Ranbir Kapoor #Sonam Kapoor

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larsbjorge-blog · 5 years

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This Is Me, Tagged

Okay, get comfy – I got tagged twice, by talented Flickrites Mysi Anne and Sina respectively, so I’ve decided to do two sets of sixteen. The first set is mostly photography-related, and the second set is more personal. I tend to fill these things out thoroughly, so there’s a lot to read here, but since the internet gives most people the attention span of a flea on meth, I put some extra cleavage on display for those who feel the text is tl;dr. I hope you enjoy one or the other, or both. —–

1. My favourite photographer in recent years is Nuri Bilge Ceylan. It was his work that made me believe it was possible to photograph Turkey in the way that I wanted to. I was sick to death of tourist-bait pictures of whirling dervishes, hookah bars, and belly dancers, because Turkey isn’t about any of those things.

2. If you asked me to name ten other photographers whose work turns me on, most of the names would be people whose work I discovered on Flickr. You don’t have to be famous to rock me.

3. I chuckle at equipment snobs and their strutting and posturing about what snazzy gear you "must" have and what techniques you "must" use, because for all their official know-how, 95% of the time their oh-so-technically-perfect shots leave me bored. Although I like buying new equipment as much as the next person, it’s certainly not required to take good pictures. There’s a person in my Flickr contacts who takes the most amazing photos with his mobile phone, and another who rocks my world with his Lomo. Some people never get it through their heads that it’s not about the camera. In the industry we call this "having more money than sense."

4. I also laugh at people who think that digital post-processing isn’t part of photography, or is "cheating." What, you think film photographers of the past didn’t post-process? Please, do your homework – half an hour of research on the web will wipe out that little fantasy. The great majority of tools in Photoshop are just computer adaptations of manual darkroom techniques that have been widely used for many decades by just about every photographer of note. I’m not saying it’s necessary to process the hell out of every photo you take, but refusing to use all the tools available to you because of some weird misinformed pride seems silly to me.

5. I have this strange skill for remembering exactly where I was standing when I took any given photo, even if I took it 20 years ago in a place I only visited for a day. This has made geotagging a lot easier.

6. If post-processing fell off the face of the earth tomorrow, I’d probably lose my interest in digital photography pretty quickly. If I’m out shooting and it’s going really well, my chief thought is always, I can’t wait to get home and play around with these.

7. On the other hand, I almost never post-process film shots, because most of my film cameras are ones that are known for their specific effects (Soviet cameras and so forth), and I don’t feel the need to mess with that. I will fix cracks and damage in old prints, unless the damage makes the photo more awesome, which it often does.

8. Go ahead, gasp in horror if you want… I don’t really like B&W photography, except in cases of faux-vintage or actual old photographs. That’s not to say that I can’t appreciate the beauty of B&W photos or the talent that goes into making them, and a few of my favourite photographers do shoot primarily in B&W, but when people post a B&W and a colour version of the same photo, I always like the colour one better. I hear people say how they think B&W tells a more dramatic story, but I just don’t see that at all.

9. I don’t keep multiple versions of the same photo. I find it unnecessary, and potentially confusing, as I only ever process a photo one time, and then I’m done with it forever. I trash both my raw files and my PSDs when I’m certain have the final version of the photo. I have never, ever felt the desire to rehash old, stale raw files that have already been done. I always take a fresh supply of new shots if I want something to work on.

10. I have a huge offline library of both digital and film photos from years past. This year I’m going to work on getting them all up on Flickr.

11. My eyes are black, and although I think they look nice in real life, in photos they tend to look like lumps of coal shoved in my eye sockets. So I almost always level them up in post. I also enjoy playing around with the colour of them – I don’t think making eyes green or blue in a photo is any different than people wearing coloured contacts for fun certain days of the week. This is one of the few photos where my eyes are completely natural, because I thought the lumps of coal thing worked well in that particular shot.

12. Some photographers get arrested for the photography itself… I’m more likely to get arrested for associated breaking and entering. If I see a place that I want to get to to take photos, I get like a pit bull about it, and regardless of locks or restricted access, it’s very unlikely that you’ll convince me not to break in there. I’ll just politely agree with you that it’s a bad idea, and then I’ll wait until you fall asleep and I’ll sneak out. I’ll be back before you wake up, with a memory card full of awesome. Or, you’ll get woken by a phone call and have to come bail me out. Whichever.

13. I don’t wear makeup except on very special occasions, so if you see makeup on me in a photo, you can be 100% sure it was post-processed. I can’t stand having all that chemical gunk on my face, but I do think it looks nice, especially in pictures.

14. I love it when my female friends e-mail me a snapshot of themselves and ask me to "please fix it up." I don’t think photos of women (or any other subject) always have to be about concrete reality – a little fantasy is nice sometimes. The women I associate with are smart enough not to compare themselves to an edited photo, or even to want to look like that in real life. We can teach young girls those same values without having to resort to censorship. It’s good for kids to see and learn the difference between fact and fiction, and to appreciate the merits of both. If we start banning things, they won’t get the opportunity to learn to distinguish.

15. If you gave me a $1,000 gift certificate from my local camera shop, I’d buy an old-skool original Lensbaby, a Sigma 10-20mm, and the new Nikkor fiddy (the 1.4 – G, not D).

16. If you sent me on a slow trip around the world and told me I could only take one camera and one lens, I’d be perfectly happy with my D40 and the 18-200mm VR. I don’t need anything fancier than that for traveling, and I sure as hell don’t need anything heavier or larger.

—-

1. Photography is something I enjoy doing, but I’m not a particularly visual person. Music is who I am. I made my debut as a professional pianist at the age of 9, and as a professional singer at the age of 14. My major in university was music composition, and the second time I went to uni I did a degree in recording arts with a specialty in critical aural analysis.

2. I’m left-handed, but I don’t write in that weird, contorted, hand-twisted-backwards way that most left-handers do. I write like a normal person, just with my left hand instead of my right.

3. You wouldn’t know it from my public presence on the internet, but my language habits in everyday life would make a sailor blush. You know how Debra in Dexter talks? Yeah, pretty much like that. I always laugh at that antiquated line about how people who swear a lot do so to cover up for a poor vocabulary. That’s a crock – believe me, I know plenty of words, and I know how to use them correctly. Many of them begin with C or F, so what?

4. I’m going to be 36 this month, and I think I’m better-looking and more attractive now than I have ever been.

5. Five years ago at this time I weighed 265 pounds. Don’t ask me for the magic secret, because you already know there isn’t one. If there were, everyone would have done it by now, and there would never be any fat people in the world.

6. I’ve traveled to four continents, and lived on three of them.

7. I’m compulsively goal-oriented, and one of my goals for 2009 is to buy a new outfit every month, as I haven’t had any new clothes at all in almost five years. The ensemble you see in the photo is my outfit for January.

8. A few years ago I tore my ulnar collateral ligament, and was told that without surgery I would never regain the use of my thumb. I decided to trust my gut feeling instead of the doctor, and didn’t have the surgery. My hand is fine now, and aside from some minor twinges in humid weather, I can’t tell the difference between the hand that was injured and the one that wasn’t.

9. I have the kind of hair that makes people want to punch me. I get it cut once a year (I’m almost due for my yearly salon visit), I wash it twice a week, and I don’t even own any styling products or tools. The last time I used a brush or comb was sometime during the Reagan administration. I don’t even comb it after I wash it. It just doesn’t tangle, and it looks however it looks straight out of bed. Some days it’s mostly straight, and other days it’s quite wavy. I never do anything to it in Photoshop aside from the occasional colour change for fun. What you see in the above photo is 100% natural.

10. I don’t think I’d ever have elective cosmetic surgery, but if you held a gun to my head and forced me to have something done, I’d get my lips plumped. It’s kind of a strange thing to say, because every time I plump them up in Photoshop, I think it looks stupid and I undo it. But when I look in the mirror, I think I wouldn’t mind if they were just a little more… robust.

11. I find cooking soul-destroyingly boring, not to mention a gigantic hassle. I avoid it whenever possible.

12. I’m a winter girl all the way. I absolutely do not see the appeal of summer, unless you have a fetish for sweat or stinky people. Or unless you live in a place where the summers are reasonable, like England. I did love summer in England – it’s one of the things I really miss about living there.

13. I’ve lived a stone’s throw from the beach for almost five years, and I’ve been down there maybe twice. I’m more into swimming pools – sticky salt hair and a crack full of sand just isn’t my idea of a good time, sorry. I do like going to the beach to take pictures, though.

14. I have a raging sweet tooth that cannot be tamed. When I come to your country, the first thing I want to see is the array of desserts your people have to offer me. So far, Italy has been the most spectacular in this respect, though it should be mentioned that I have not yet visited India, where I understand they start by making normal desserts for mortals and then soak them in syrup. Win.

15. I’m not into politics whatsoever, but it’s nice that the Obama administration is the first government that hasn’t implied I’m a filthy un-American traitor for choosing to live somewhere else. In fact, Obama’s web site has a whole section devoted to Americans abroad, and I was shocked to discover that they weren’t just talking about soldiers or people who were sent away to work for American companies. They mean everyone abroad, including me.

16. That said, if I were forced to go "back where I came from," I’d more likely go back to Europe than the United States. I don’t feel that preference shows any indication of a diminished love for the US. I’m just enjoying living on this half of the planet, that’s all. I don’t have any hate for the other half.

2009.187

Posted by Melissa Maples on 2009-02-03 15:24:39

Tagged: , antalya , turkey , türkiye , asia , 安塔利亚 , 土耳其 , 亚洲 , nikon , d40 , ニコン , 尼康 , nikkor , af-s , 18-200mm , f/3.5-5.6g , 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6g , vr , 1:1 , square , me , melissa , maples , self-portrait , woman , brunette , brown , window , long hair , brown hair , cleavage

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