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buck-buck-boose · 3 years

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I'll Love You 'Til I Die

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Summary: A Brooklyn schoolgirl fell in love with James Buchanan Barnes at the tender age of nine. With this love she made a vow, promising to love him until her very last breath.

Pairing: Bucky x OFC

Warnings: Language, violence

Word Count: 4.3k

Author's Note: I am... so sorry for taking so long. I was not expecting the start of the semester to be so hectic. I can't promise I'll go back to posting as regularly as during the summer, but I can promise that I'm not disappearing. I promise. I WILL SEE THIS FANFIC THROUGH EVEN IF IT KILLS ME. Thank you for the kind words and support while I've been MIA. Enjoy a chunky chapter.

Chapter Twenty-Four: Little Saint Lottie

October 27, 1943

“I’m worried about her, Betty.”

“I know, Gladys. I know.”

Lottie couldn’t remember the last time she’d gotten a full night’s rest. Days seemed to bleed into each other, with no slumber to distinguish today from tomorrow. It wasn’t long after arriving at Azzano that she realized that he wasn’t waiting for her. Bucky was gone. In his place, dozens of men awaited her arrival with sunken eyes and twitching lips that begged for relief, whether it be through a healing touch or a final blow to the head.

When the realization hit Lottie, there wasn’t much she could do besides throwing herself into her work; if she couldn’t help Bucky, the least she could do was help his brothers in arms. Although anxiety ate her up from the inside out, Lottie had confidence in Bucky’s abilities. He wouldn’t let himself die in some POW camp, he just wouldn’t. Because then who would take care of her and Steve? He’d fight tooth and nail to get back to them, she just knew it.

She threw herself into her work, rarely stopping long enough to have a proper conversation or a full meal; this bad habit of hers came to a halt, though, when she came upon a boisterous redhead in need of stitches. Lottie had been deep in thought while examining the gash above his forehead when the soldier cracked a grin and peered up at her without moving his head too much.

“Do I know you from somewhere?”

Lottie shook her head, “I’m afraid not, Private—” she glanced at his dog tags, “—O’Connor.”

“Ever done pinup? Maybe I know you from one of those cheesecakes we’ve got hanging up.” The man— more of a boy really, with his lanky frame and jovial smile —wiggled his eyebrows and ruined her diligent work of cleaning the blood from his wound.

The question left Lottie flustered; the idea of dozens of men gawking at her scantily clad figure left her feeling mortified, “Certainly not! I find that my talents are better suited for healing.”

O’Connor nodded and inspected her face carefully as she went to work on his gash once more. “I’ve got it!” Lottie nearly jumped away from him when he clapped his hands together, “You’re Little Saint Lottie, in the flesh!” The boy crowed his revelation, earning him glares from the other men recovering in the medic tent.

Lottie nearly dropped the needle that she’d been preparing to thread, “Excuse me?”

“Ah, it’s a funny story,” O’Connor chuckled, “Y’see, Sarge had this little photo he’d take everywhere. Always had it in his pocket, tucked in his helmet, you name it. Wouldn’t let the damn thing go. Anyway, we stole it out of his fatigues one day while he was cleaning up in some river ‘cause we wanted to see what the big deal was. Once we saw it was some dame—” Lottie shot him a look, “—lady, we started yanking his chain about it. He was just about as obsessed with that photo as my Ma is with her holy cards, so when he finally told us your name, we dubbed you ‘Little Saint Lottie,’ patron saint of the one hundred and seventh. That kinda pissed him off, but it’s not like you’re his girl, y’know? Though he sure acted like you were.”

Lottie was speechless. About halfway through his story, her mouth had dropped open and her hands had fallen to her lap. Here she was, looking dumb as an ox, while the soldier in front of her chuckled with childish glee.

“Me and the guys would even ask for your intercession whenever the chaplain came by to pray with us. Poor guy had no clue which saint we were talkin’ about. We tried to give it a place of honor in the tent but Sarge made us run laps when he found out we’d nicked it again.”

O’Connor nearly doubled over in laughter as he watched Lottie’s expression grow in horror. “Well as I’m sure Bucky— Sergeant Barnes has told you, I’m no saint. I’m just a nurse. Now hold still, unless you want these stitches to be more painful than they already are.” Before she could stop herself, the question came tumbling out of her mouth, “Speaking of Sergeant Barnes, do you know—” she fumbled with the needle as she made the first stitch, “—is he alright? Did you see him?” The soldier let out a hiss of pain, “Yeah, I got a glimpse of him while they were takin’ him away. He was battered but alright. There’s no man quite like Sarge, I know he’ll be back. He’d fight tooth and nail to get back. That’s what he said at least, ‘cause he always went on and on about how you needed him and all that. He sure talked about you an awful lot for a guy who hasn’t even asked you to go steady.”

Lottie’s breath hitched at the final comment, the mere idea of going steady with Bucky reducing her to a stuttering schoolgirl. She began to tie off his stitches, “We’ve been best friends for over a decade, it’s perfectly normal to care for each other deeply without bringing affection into it.”

O’Connor shrugged, which jostled her arm slightly, “I’ve never heard a guy talk about his best friend like that.”

Lottie didn’t respond. She gave his fully sutured wound one last glance, “Looks like you’re all set. Now don’t do anything stupid to get it infected.”

He gave her a crooked grin and wiggled his eyebrows, Lottie nearly scolded him but held her tongue, “As you wish, Saint Lottie.”

Lottie rolled her eyes and moved along to the next bed, where another soldier waited with a smile just as wide. It seemed that these men had become pleased as punch to know their patroness had come to grace them with her presence.

The USO’s visit to their camp took Lottie completely by surprise. She’d spent so much time floating from one medic tent to the next that she’d ended up completely out of the loop of the camp’s other goings-on. It wasn’t until she saw the fully-erected stage in the middle of camp that she realized. Her heart beat powerfully within her; with Steve here, she would be one step closer to finding Bucky. One step closer to bringing him home. “They say he’s gonna be here in a few hours,” Mary beamed, obviously giddy to see the Star-Spangled Man up close and in the flesh.

Lottie returned her smile, though it was weak. The weariness was starting to catch up to her, making her feel much older than a youthful twenty-three. Her stomach was in knots with anxiety; she needed to get to Steve as soon as possible.

Betty stood with them as they watched the hustle and bustle of preparations, “I’m pretty sure we’re the only ones looking forward to seeing Captain America. All these boys care about is seeing a bunch of girls dancing for them on stage, not some hunk of meat in a red, white, and blue suit.”

Nancy, who had just joined the conversation, scoffed, “It’s quite disappointing how little you think of these men and their patriotism.”

Gladys rolled her eyes, “They’re still men, Nancy. Scantily clad women or a guy singing about war bonds? They’re gonna prefer the women.”

Several hours later, Gladys was indeed proven right. Although he’d been driven off-stage with jeers and taunts, Lottie was waiting for him with a warm embrace.

“Hey, Lottie,” She could hear the smile in his voice, she felt its warm timbre as it surrounded her and reminded her of home.

“Good to see ya, Stevie.”

Steve pulled away from her and gazed around the camp, a grimace growing on his features, “Things don’t look to good around here.”

Lottie nodded, a twin grimace gracing her lips, “The hundred and seventh started out with two hundred men. Now they’ve only got fifty left. They’re barely holding on.”

Steve’s gaze shot to hers the moment she mentioned the one hundred and seventh, “Lottie that’s— this is Bucky’s—” The desperate look in his eyes made her own calm exterior begin to crack.

“Stevie, I know,” she whispered, a lump forming in her throat and tears pricking at her eyes, “I know, and I’m sorry. He’s not here. They— Those bastards took him, damn them!” For the first time since arriving at camp, Lottie cried. She sobbed and clung to Steve once more, feeling every bit like a scared little girl from days gone by.

Steve rested his hand against her back, “I’ll get him out, Lottie. He’s gotta be alive and I’ll get him out.”

She shook her head and wiped the hot tears from her cheeks, “No, Steve. You’re not going alone. I’m coming with you.”

“Lottie, you know I can’t put you in harm’s way like that—”

“Steve. I’m serious. What do you think I was doing that whole time I was with the SSR? Yes, we were making the serum, but they nearly trained us to death. I can shoot, I can use my knife. I can’t let you go without me.” Her voice was starting to crack, “We have to find Bucky together.”

There was silence between the two of them until Steve finally conceded, a wary gaze in his eyes, “Fine. But you need to be by my side the whole time.” Lottie nodded her chest warming with hope. “C’mon, we need to have a conversation with Colonel Philipps.”

The two of them jogged to his tent with their coats held above their heads to shield them from a sudden shower of rain. They entered the colonel’s tent, looking comical with their wet hair and heaving chests. Around them, soldiers and officials paced to and fro, examining maps or signing off various forms. If Lottie squinted, she could just barely make out the words. Letters of condolences; heartbreakingly clinical letters of regret for the losses of these sons, these brothers, these boys.

“Colonel Phillips,” Steve began, “Are you planning a rescue mission? For the surviving prisoners from the Battle of Azzano?”

The colonel looked back at him with a straight face, “Yeah, it’s called winning the war.”

Steve’s blond eyebrows furrowed, “But if you know where they are why not at least—”

“They’re thirty miles behind the lines. Through some of the most heavily fortified territory in Europe. We’d lose more men than we’d save, but I don’t expect you to understand that because you’re a chorus girl,” before Lottie could protest, he shot her a glance as well, “and you’re just a nurse.”

Steve’s gaze on Colonel Phillips was cool, “I think I understand just fine.”

The colonel pushed past them, “Well then understand it somewhere else. Now if I read the posters correctly, you’ve got someplace to be in thirty minutes.”

“Yes sir, I do.”

Steve grabbed Lottie’s hand and pulled her behind him, “C’mon, we’ve gotta get going. You go get changed.”

Lottie nodded; her medical uniform would impede this mission so she’d need to wear the fatigues that the government had finally issued to them. Her heart raced a mile a minute as she scrambled back to the nurse’s tent to change. She knew that Colonel Philipps would be terribly angry once he found out she’d shirked her night duties, but her loyalties to Bucky took precedence. The recovering soldiers were left in the capable hands of her peers. She swore as she nearly toppled over while yanking her boots on; it was rather hard to get dressed in such a hurry. By the time she was ready and had exited the tent, she was met with the somber faces of Agent Carter and Steve.

“Agent Carter, what are you doing?” For a moment, she feared that they’d already been caught, that the SSR was already putting an end to their mission.

The other woman pursed her lips, “I’m here to help.”

A mere half-hour later and they found themselves in the SSR’s plane, headed to Krausberg, where the POW camp was located. Howard Stark called out to them from the cockpit, “We should be able to drop you right at their doorstep.”

Fear was starting to creep into Lottie’s mind and burrowed itself deep within her gut. She heard the conversation continue all around her, but she was still processing the daunting mission before her. She and Steve up against Hydra. All alone. Even Bucky had struggled against them; he’d lost to them in the Battle of Azzano. Bucky. That’s what worried her most. It’s what filled her with the most fear. If she and Steve got through the Hydra camp safe and sound only to find that he was dead, Lottie wasn’t sure how she’d deal with it. She’d probably go mad, in all honesty. She’d end up in some institution, crying over lucky pennies and charcoal drawings while being molly-coddled by some woman in white. How tragic that would be.

Before her thoughts could become any darker, Lottie was jolted back to reality by the sound of bullets against metal. Steve grabbed his shield and her arm, urging her to join him by the plane’s exit.

Agent Carter shot up from her seat, “Get back here! We’re taking you all the way in!”

He turned to respond, “As soon as I’m clear, you turn this thing around and get the hell out of here!” “You can’t give me orders!”

A smile grew on his face, “The hell I can’t! I’m a captain!”

Steve shifted his goggles and nudged Lottie, “It’s go time. When you see me pull the chute out, you do the same.”

Lottie nodded with a quiet determination, and together, they jumped.

Entering the base was painstakingly quiet; once they’d snuck into a truck and eliminated the guards inside, Steve and Lottie were left to mouth words and offer silent support through unwavering gazes. Once they’d safely passed the gate of the base, they exited the truck and swiftly dealt with any opposition.

Steve led her across the base with caution, giving hand signals when it was safe to turn a corner and sprint across a patch of unobstructed space. The two of them traveled with the shadows, avoiding any spotlights that could catch them in the act. Lottie scarcely felt that she could breathe, it was as if one exhale would reveal their presence to the multitude of guards.

Once they entered the main building, the two of them found themselves in what seemed to be a factory. There were giant sheets of metal everywhere and huge bombs seemed to surround them. Amongst them all, Hydra soldiers transported other metal parts and containers of glowing blue material. That did not bode well with Lottie at all.

Lottie spotted some guards walking to a lower level, jangling keys in hand. “Steve, they might be guarding the prisoners.” Her whisper was barely audible, fear keeping her from speaking any louder.

“The blueprints said they were below the manufacturing level. C’mon.”

They followed the guards onto a walkway that had large circular grates that cut into the metal, each forming the ceiling of small cells that the poor prisoners had been separated into. Lottie and Steve knocked the guards out and stole their keys. The two dropped to the same level as the cells and began unlocking their doors.

One of the soldiers gazed at them through the bars of his cell, “Who are you supposed to be?”

Steve panted from stress, “I’m Captain America.” He gave Lottie an expectant look.

“I guess I’m Little Saint Lottie,” she responded somewhat sarcastically, referencing the retrospectively comical nickname that was developed by the one hundred and seventh.

Some of the men cracked grins, “So you’ve heard our prayers, huh?”

“Loud and clear. Now let’s get you out of here, yeah?”

She tried to ignore the growing horror inside of her upon the realization that none of these men had brilliant blue eyes. Not a dimpled chin in sight.

“Is there anybody else? I’m looking for a Sergeant James Barnes.” It seemed that the same horror was growing within Steve.

A man in a scarlet beret responded, his British accent prim and proper, “There’s an isolation ward in the factory, but no one’s ever come back from it.”

“Alright,” Steve nodded, “The tree line is northwest, 80 yards past the gate. Get out fast and give ‘em hell. We’ll meet you guys out in the clearing with anyone else we find.”

“Wait, you know what you’re doing?” “Yeah. I’ve knocked out Adolf Hitler over two hundred times.”

Lottie couldn’t help but stare at Steve in amazement. Gone was that awkward boy from Brooklyn. He was a man now, a leader who could do anything he put his mind to. He’d grown so much, not just physically, but in his character.

While the prisoners worked their way out of the base, Steve and Lottie began their search for the isolation wards. Lottie tried to ignore the sounds of explosions and men crying out from below them while they traveled across metal catwalks. She could only hope that the cries of pain were coming from Hydra soldiers.

After turning several corners, they found themselves in an old hallway, surrounded by brick on both sides. They hurried down the corridor out of desperation; they knew they were running out of time. Lottie stopped suddenly when she heard a groan. It was close. She drew her weapon and dragged Steve into the room, her heart stuttering and her palms slick with sweat.

“Sergeant. Three-two-five-five-seven…” That voice. Oh, how she knew that voice; she loved it so. Lottie heard it whenever she found the time to fall asleep. It crept into her sweetest dreams but tore her apart whenever it wiggled its way into her nightmares.

Bucky lay in front of them, strapped down to a table; his lips moved ever so slightly as he repeated the same phrase over and over again.

She rushed to his side alongside Steve and nearly let out a cry of happiness. Had the situation not been so dire, she would’ve descended upon him with a bone-crushing embrace and great big sobs of joy by that point.

Lottie whispered a quiet, “Bucky?” His eyes were glazed over and his mouth agape, “Is that— is that—”

“It’s us, Buck,” Steve nodded reassuringly as he tore at the straps across Bucky’s chest. Bucky looked up at him, taking his face in,

“Us?”

“Me and Lottie,” he nodded, tugging her closer so that the two of them could be in Bucky’s field of vision.

Tears welled up in her eyes as she looked at him, finally feeling whole again. She’d gotten her Brooklyn boys back. Bucky only looked back in confusion, “Little Lottie, she— she’s always been here. Always. Stayed with me the whole time.”

It was Lottie and Steve’s turn for confusion. Lottie brushed the hair back from his forehead to calm him down and ground him, “Bucky, I’ve been with the SSR this whole time. We’re here to rescue you.”

Steve nodded and dragged him off the table, “I thought you were dead.”

Bucky was obviously having a hard time processing everything that was happening, “I thought you were smaller.”

Lottie listened as the gunfire intensified, “Come on, we need to move.” Steve threw one of Bucky’s arms over his shoulder and the two fell into step behind her.

“What happened to you?” Bucky grunted out, pain etched into his voice.

“I joined the army.”

“Did it hurt?”

Steve was growing agitated, “A little.”

“Is it permanent?”

“So far.” Lottie huffed, “I’d sure hope so after all that effort I put into it.”

Bucky mustered out a befuddled, “Huh?”

“I helped to create the serum that made him like that.”

“So that’s why you left without saying a word.” Bucky’s tone was only slightly accusatory.

Lottie muttered a weak “Yeah.” They’d need to have a lengthier conversation once he wasn’t struggling to walk five yards.

As they crossed the catwalks to get towards the exit, the factory below them began to combust. Huge flames erupted from the metal contraptions and triggered explosions all around them. They hastily climbed the metal stairs to get to higher ground.

“Captain America, how exciting!” A thick German accent cut through the noise of explosions and gunfire. “I am a great fan of your films!” Before them stood two men; one was a short little fellow clad in a jacket and fedora. The other was tall and wore a distinguished Hydra uniform with its menacing crest emblazoned on his shoulder.

The taller of the two gave Captain America a once over as he strode across the catwalk that separated them, “So, Dr. Erskine managed it after all. Not exactly an improvement, but still, impressive.”

“You’ve got no idea,” Steve snarled and punched the man in the face. The swift blow caused a blotch of redness to appear near his eye and a sinking feeling of realization settled into Lottie’s stomach. This was Schmidt, the monster who used the serum prototype.

Before she could say anything, Schmidt struck back and left a dent in Steve’s shield, “Haven’t I?”

There was a brief scuffle before Schmidt backed off while the other man pulled a lever, pulling the catwalk apart. With a grin, Schmidt began pulling at the skin of his face and revealed fiery red muscle and tissue beneath, just as Lottie had seen when she first began experimenting with the formula. “You are deluded, Captain. You pretend to be a simple soldier, but in reality, you are just afraid to admit that we have left humanity behind. Unlike you, I embrace it proudly. Without fear!”

“Then how come you’re running?”

Steve never got an answer. Schmidt and the other man had already boarded an elevator and left them standing on the catwalk, nearly helpless.

Another explosion went off, cueing the trio to leave, “C’mon, let’s go. Up.” Lottie instructed the men to follow her, though she wasn’t too sure how to escape the factory. All she knew was that they needed to keep ascending the stairs.

When they reached the top of the stairs, they were faced with a metal beam that led to a catwalk with an exit. It was terrifyingly slim, with only enough room to place one foot in front of the other.

“Ladies first,” Bucky murmured, “but I’ll be right behind you.” Lottie felt sure of herself knowing that at least she wouldn’t have to cross on her own.

She took a tentative first step, testing how well it would hold her weight. Lottie tried not to look down at the fiery pit below while she carefully moved along the beam. It was a comfort to have Bucky behind her with his chest nearly pressed against her back as he followed her every step. Lottie had just scrambled over the railing of the catwalk when a jarring explosion shifted the beam’s position and sent it careening downwards. She gasped in horror as Bucky leaped to grab onto the catwalk.

“There’s gotta be a rope or something!”

Steve stared at the two of them from across the pit, “Just go! Get out of here!”

Bucky slammed his fist on the railing, desperation tearing at his voice, “No, not without you!”

“Steve, please! We can’t just leave you here!” Lottie pleaded. Steve couldn’t die, not like this.

With a look of determination, Steve backed up and made a running jump to clear the gap between the two catwalks. An explosion threatened to swallow him up, but he made it over safely, although a little worse for wear.

Lottie and Bucky could only stare in amazement. Steve nodded to them both, “Let’s get outta here.”

Several ladders and a whole lot of dodging later, the trio found themselves trudging towards the tree line.

It was silent amongst the three of them; painfully, dreadfully silent. She decided it was time to break the silence, “Bucky, I—”

“Look, Little Lottie, I know you’re sorry, alright? And I forgive you. Even though you lied to my face and left without saying goodbye, I had a whole lotta time to spend forgiving you.”

Now that the fear of being caught by Hydra soldiers had fully subsided, Lottie allowed herself to let out a sob of joy and nearly threw herself at Bucky. She almost apologized for the force of her embrace since it was likely to hurt a man who’d been captured by Hydra, but he didn’t show any sign of pain. She’d need to remember that for later.

“I missed you so much, Bucky. I really did,” Lottie nearly whimpered. Gosh, she sure sounded lovesick. “I missed you too, Little Lottie.” His embrace was sure and strong, and with it, a flood of memories came back to her. Nights on her fire escape. A birthday evening spent swing dancing. A lucky penny slipped into her hand. For the first time in months, Lottie finally felt whole. Her heart that had been splintered into shards of pain and hopelessness had finally begun to mend itself back together. While she found comfort in his arms and forgiveness, she knew there were still so many words left unsaid; words that he needed and deserved to hear.

“Yeah, I missed you guys too,” Steve muttered, obviously peeved that he was being left out of their moment.

“Aw, come on, Stevie,” Lottie grinned and pulled away from Bucky a little to allow Steve to join their hug.

“And if I remember correctly, Bucky, I think it’s actually Little Saint Lottie now,” she grinned. While she couldn’t see his face at the moment, she just knew it was turning a gorgeous shade of scarlet, based on the sputtering coming out of his mouth.

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blackswaneuroparedux · 4 years

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Isabelle Huppert: The Most Dangerous Actress in European Cinema

Etre actrice, c’est avant tout faire l’apprentissage de sa liberté.

- Isabelle Huppert

At 66 years old, Isabelle Huppert has had a long, celebrated career and is regarded in the highest echelon of French actors. Among actresses, Isabelle Huppert holds the record for César Award nominations (France’s Oscar award), with a whopping sixteen. She has also had twenty of her films in competition at Cannes, more than any other actress. And she is among just four actresses who have won the Best Actress prize at Cannes twice.

Not a bad track record.

Though she has appeared in a few American productions over the years, including “Heaven’s Gate” (1980), “The Bedroom Window” (1987) and “I Heart Huckabees” (2004), her best films have all been European.

Extraordinary women marked by tragedy and surrounded by mystery — these are Huppert's trademark cinematic roles. The films of Isabelle Huppert tend to be filled with sociopaths, self-mutilators, and murderers.

There was the jealous postmaster in “La Cérémonie,” the gun-toting young bride in “Coup de Torchon,” and the prostitute who poisons her family in “Violette Nozière. “The Piano Teacher,” “Elle” and “Greta” would make a crazy triple feature. Overall Isabelle Huppert, one of the iconic dames of French cinema, has garnered a reputation for being cold and steely. The French actress, now in her mid-60s, consistently chooses roles that are morally complex and sometimes hard to watch. And yet we can’t bring ourselves to look away.

Susan Sontag, who once called Huppert “a total artist,” said she had never met “an actor more intelligent, or a person more intelligent among actors.”

Huppert has been called France’s Meryl Streep for her technical skill, but for all her shape-shifting, Streep’s strongest women have never gone so dark as the roles Huppert has played.

Huppert expresses the moods and mental state of her characters with precision and great sensitivity. Her seemingly expressionless face and sparing facial expressions have become something of a trademark.

Fiction has a tendency to inflate things, she said once in an interview with The Financial Times in July 2017. "But when I look at people on the street, I find that most of them are pretty empty in their eyes. I have to do even less." To observe, she has been taught, you have to take away, not add something.

Isabelle was the youngest of five children, born in Paris to an engineer father and a mother who taught English. Her mother is credited with spotting her talent early on, and encouraging her to develop it. She was already well on her way as a teenager, getting acting jobs while studying at the National Conservatory of Dramatic Art in Paris.

Huppert’s résumé is remarkable over five decades: Just over 140 films since her debut in 1972, for many of cinema’s most audacious visionaries, including Claude Chabrol, Claire Denis, Curtis Hanson, Hal Hartley and François Ozon.

In “Things to Come,” a wistful, funny drama by the French director Mia Hansen-Love. She plays Nathalie, a Parisian philosophy teacher whose husband leaves her for a younger woman, whose mother dies, whose publisher won’t reissue her book — and yet, who finds unexpected freedom in all of these losses. Nathalie heads toward the light and Michèle toward the dark, but both roles showcase Huppert’s great ability to derive power from vulnerability.

What directors loved about Huppert — and she prides herself on being an auteur’s actor — was her ability to convey moral complexity in the most unique ways.

Working with such auteur directors, Huppert can inhabit extreme characters — "survivors who can be victims and rebels simultaneously," says the actress. "My films give these women a voice. Because even though they live on the edges of society, they are there: women who live brutal lives. It's a brutality that they themselves never sought out," Huppert told Zeit Magazine.

Paul Verhoeven who directed her in “Elle” described Huppert as a “pure Brechtian actor,” in that she puts distance between herself and the audience, without trying to seduce it or seek its sympathy.

The actress is notorious for her illegibility - her almost Bressonian lack of expression, and the profound unrest she’s able to convey from behind the stillness of her freckled resting face. Pauline Kael, the famous film critic, once complained that “when [Huppert] has an orgasm, it barely ruffles her blank surface.” If Kael had lived to see “Abuse of Weakness,” “Elle,” or “I Heart Huckabees,” perhaps she would have come to appreciate how the stillness of Huppert’s unbeatable poker face allows her to normalize even the strangest and most perverse of characters; to make it seem as though any of their behaviors, no matter how unusual or demented, are as natural to them as we are to ourselves.

It’s a quality that European directors and audiences have embraced, but which can seem more foreign to Americans. Huppert loves American cinema, but she also knows her sensibility is distinctly French.

Huppert is known for her privacy and reserve - she generally doesn’t talk to the press about anything other than her films - and if there’s a connection between her autobiography and the roles she chooses, that’s something that only she knows.

Aware of her own enigmatic appeal, she has no qualms about exploiting it. She has even less desire to charm, although her formidable impassivity sometimes betrays a hint of vulnerability. Not that she will let the viewer get too close, however, as she is forever intent on remaining “more like a question mark than a statement”.

Isabelle Huppert is not just courageous when it comes to choosing film roles and artistic collaborators. She is fearless, and such is her integrity that we trust her instincts and follow wherever she leads. That’s what makes her the most dangerous actress of our time.

Below is a top ten list of Isabelle Huppert films. They are not in order nor are they her very best. There are simply too many films in her body of work that would deserve equal consideration. Instead the list is made up of films that given an introduction to her wide ranging talents.

1. The Lace Maker 1977

Isabelle Huppert won the most promising newcomer award for her graceful, guileless performance as Pomme in Claude Goretta’s masterly adaptation of a Pascal Lainé novel, which took its title from a Vermeer painting. Whether doing her chores at a Parisian beauty salon, playing blindman’s buff on a Cabourg clifftop with dashing Sorbonne student Yves Beneyton, trying to eat an apple without disturbing his reading or choking over dinner with his snooty parents, Huppert is mesmerising.

2. Violette Nozière 1978

The first of her seven collaborations with Claude Chabrol earned Huppert the best actress prize at Cannes. She was 25 when she played the demure schoolgirl who shocked 1930s Paris when details of her double life as a prostitute emerged following the poisoning of her father. Violette claimed he had abused her, but Chabrol thinks otherwise and exploits Huppert’s genius for switching between fragility and cruelty to counter the surrealist myth that the teenage parricide was an anti-bourgeois icon.

Huppert embodies this character that’s chiefly concerned with finding love. She walks the streets at night, characteristically promiscuous, but don’t call her a prostitute. She’d refute. Throughout the film, she gives more money to the men then vice versa. At night, when she leaves her quiet bourgeois home, and finds a man to accompany her, she looks unusually bothered. The film is sometimes maddeningly ambiguous but perhaps that’s the point - Chabrol and Huppert want us to feel mixed about her.

Violette is a woman with an air of mystery around her. She’s precocious but not as clever as she thinks. Huppert gazes and kisses her own mirror reflection. She writes fictional love letters to herself as well. Huppert quietly stresses the motivation behind the character: desperate to find someone to love, or else she’ll have to love herself. Except, she can’t even love herself because she feels stifled by her home life. And as ever with narcissism, there are dangerous consequences.

3. La Cérémonie 1995

“Chabrol only ever cast me as fairly ordinary characters,” Huppert once revealed. “They just have rather particular destinies.” While she would go on to embody Chabrolian womanhood (“not victims, not fighters, somewhere in between”) in Rien ne va plus (1997), Merci pour le chocolat (2000) and Comedy of Power (2006), she gave her finest performance for him in this seething adaptation of Ruth Rendell’s A Judgement in Stone.

An upper-class family warns their meek maid (Sandrine Bonnaire) about the local mail lady, Jeanne (Isabelle Huppert). They become friends regardless. Huppert plays Jeanne as kooky, comic, and rebellious. We gradually find out more cryptic background on her character, which gives her spirited attitude a darker edge. She’s either heartbroken or heartless. Huppert portrays a character with so many contradictory traits without ever making it feel false.

Huppert performs the role cunningly. Jeanne is energised like a child, but she’s smart enough to know how to win over the maid. She’s a little silly - when she enters the family’s home while they’re away, she touches everything. Huppert balances all of this next to the near-mute Bonnaire, both slowly exacting their revenge against the upper class. Chabrol’s trademark: clash of the classes.

Huppert thoroughly deserved her first César.

In 2014, Huppert performed Jean Genet’s play The Maids with Cate Blanchett. The play was inspired, as was La Cérémonie, on the same true-story about the Papin sisters.

4. The Piano Teacher 2001

The Piano Teacher is an elegantly made film about the deranged endeavors of love. Huppert plays a buttoned-up music instructor, Erika, who attracts the eyes of an unassuming man half her age. She still lives with her mother and there’s a danger that lurks behind her carefully placed gaze. She’s been sexually repressed for such a long time; her repression and self-hatred has slowly evolved into masochism. It drives her to haunt peep shows, spy on copulating couples and mutilate her own genitals. This disturbing film really made an impact world wide.

Nobody said this film was an easy watch!

Haneke gives the spectator all the intricacies of the concept of perversion inserted in Huppert’s character of Erika, a successful piano teacher and an apparently impeccable social life. Well, that’s what Erika keeps on the surface.

Huppert declared the second of her four collaborations with Haneke to be the film she had long been searching for.

5. 8 Women 2002

There’s no validity in the truism that Huppert doesn’t do comedy. In fact she proved she could both dance and sing (the plaintive ‘Message personnel’ is a career highlight) in François Ozon’s chic 1950s musical whodunit. Sporting a tight bun, a buttoned-up twin-set, pursed red lips and butterfly spectacles, Huppert invokes the spirit of legendary farceur Louis de Funès as Catherine Deneuve’s argumentative sister. She gives an indelible display of neurotic, spinsterly bitchiness that is simultaneously piteous and hilarious.

6. Elle 2016

A successful woman enters a real ordeal after being raped by a stranger in her home. Powerful, ‘Elle’ unravels all the nuances of a character’s life inserted into a completely incongruous personal, social and psychological reality. Here, the character will demonstrate how her attitude towards the world follows a sociopathic pattern of acting, despising any form of emotional attachment and using other individuals solely to satisfy her most primitive instincts. The film earned her an Oscar nod for Best Actress, which was fabulous but also made me wonder what took so long. Certainly she’s turned out enough superb performances over her nearly five decade career to have earned this recognition sooner.

7. Coup de Torchon 1981

Having survived a seven-month stint in Montana for Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate(1980), Huppert ventured to Saint-Louis in Senegal for Bertrand Tavernier’s Oscar-nominated transposition of Jim Thompson’s pulp novel, Pop. 1280, from a small Texan town in the 1910s to west Africa on the eve of the Second World War. Although Pierre-William Glenn’s sun-scorched Steadicam imagery seems antithetical, this is a darkly droll noir that sees Huppert in an unusually skittish mood, as the abused colonial wife who forges an unlikely alliance with Philippe Noiret’s pathetic rogue police chief, who is humiliated by everyone around him, and suddenly wants a clean slate in life - but resorts to drastic means to do so.

8. Merci pour le chocolat 2000

The film follows the nuances of a French upper class family, exploring the destructive ways in which each member acts on the world. Directed by Claude Chabrol, ‘Merci pour le Chocolat’ is an interesting film, bringing a more cadenced plot that values studying each meander of the behavior of its central characters.

The movie is set in Lausanne, and that Swiss location, having an ambient sense of buttoned-up severity and menace, is an appropriate setting with a Nabokovian mien for this horrid tale of sociopathy.

Huppert dominates the film with the slightly frigid poise of a great dancer who has retired to become an exacting teacher. She plays Mika, a woman who presides wearily and almost negligently over the prosperous chocolate business built up by her late father. But however disengaged she is in the boardroom, in the kitchen she loves chocolate with a passion - concocting various types of drinking chocolate, using subtly differing recipes, with fanatical and murderous care.

There is something fascinating about Huppert's face here. In repose, it has a kind of unsettling serenity, the serenity of a cunning and covert predator who has already decided on an unspeakable course of action.

9. La Séparation 1994

Isabelle Huppert and Daniel Auteuil play a couple on the verge of a separation. The relationship’s mainstay is their child, one-year-old Loulou. Autueil gets most of the film’s focus, but he’s essentially a sitting duck, nervously shifting between passive-aggressive contempt and hopeful endearment, as he prepares for the outcome of his girlfriend’s infidelity. He says, “Never two without three.” This could be the quote-totem of the film.

The director smartly leaves the interloping lover out of the film (he’s never seen or even named). Instead, we study Auteuil’s growing impatience and Huppert’s pivotal decision. She adds a lot of depth to a character that could’ve just been the unsympathetic partner of the cuckold.

Huppert gives her character integrity and even though she’s ostensibly guilty, she never comes off as purely selfish. She’s troubled, as well, by their situation - we sense her detachment not due to ego but because she’s boggled in trying to assess the right mode of conduct. Huppert and Auteuil have great chemistry, changing gears effortlessly between vitriol and affection.

Huppert’s distinctive talent for suppressing suffering is readily evident in her slowly disintegrating relationship with Daniel Auteuil, as Huppert imparts chilling intimacy to a withdrawn hand, an unanswering gaze, a treacherous silence and a careless word in conveying the pain of falling out of love.

10. Madame Bovary 1991

Not her greatest film but certainly one of the most accessible for anyone not familiar with the talents of Huppert. Based on Gustave Flaubert’s fabulous novel, the film brings the exacerbated trajectory of a young girl who has a highly romanticised view of the world and craves beauty, wealth, passion, as well as high society. It is the disparity between these romantic ideals and the realities of her country life that drive most of the novel, leading her into two affairs and to accrue an insurmountable amount of debt that eventually leads to her suicide.

This adaptation of ‘Madame Bovary’ is perhaps the best of any adaptation to date. Claude Chabrol manages to capture even the most emblematic nuances of Flaubert’s book, elevating a unique atmosphere for the unfolding of scenes.

However, the main point of distinction between this work and the others is the presence of Isabelle Huppert as protagonist, delivering a powerful and visceral performance from the first to the last scene.

#isabelle huppert #film #cinema #french #france #culture #art #actress #acting #artist #icon #femme #huppert #french cinema

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find-y0ur-j0y · 3 years

Text

If I Could Turn Back Time, Baby I’d Save You

Hermione hadn't meant to trip. Honestly! The new robes which Ron had thoughtfully (and obliviously) sent her were a little long, but she had promised to wear them on her first day at the Department of Mysteries. Unfortunately the combination of long robes and a tall stack of books led to the unexpected outcome of Hermione Jean Granger ‘Brightest Witch of Her Year’ taking an unexpected and definitely unwelcome tumble headfirst into the Veil of Death. As she fell she heard someone call out in fear and a hand grab onto her before everything went black.

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Hermione cracked her eyes open with a deep groan in pain. Her brain felt like there was a goblin drilling into it. If this was the afterlife she wanted no part of it. Shutting her eyes tightly, Hermione hoped that in blocking out the blinding light she would be able to quell her headache.

Her peace was shattered by a sudden loud rapping noise and loud voice calling “Hermione love, are you awake yet?”

Wait a minute! She knew that voice! “Mom?!?” she croaked out sitting up anxiously.

“Are you feeling ok Mia Bo Bia?” asked her mother’s voice from the other side of a familiar door.

“Yeah, I’ll be down in a few minutes” muttered Hermione as her mind raced trying to figure out how she had ended up in this situation. Last she had checked her mother was still alive, she didn’t remember she had a daughter, but she was alive. Also if she was going to pick a perfectly happy place to be her home for all eternity, her childhood bedroom wouldn’t even make the top fifty list.

Rising from her long forgotten bed, Hermione found herself frowning when she realized she was noticeably shorter than she had been before she tripped through the veil. Was she in Hell? Being forced to spend all of eternity going through puberty a second time seemed like a bit of an extreme punishment, Hermione reflected. She had played an instrumental role in defeating a murderous madman after all, shouldn't she have achieved eternal rest for her deeds? She was going to be pissed if her eternal damnation was a result of having practiced magic in her life.

Knowing that the only way she would get the answers she needed was by going downstairs and facing the ghosts of her parents, Hermione pulled herself together and headed to the kitchen.

---

“There you are Mia” greeted her dad with a brilliant smile which felt like a sucker punch to the chest for Hermione. It had been so long since she had spoken to her parents, and even longer since she had had that particular smile aimed her way. She would never regret protecting her parents from Death Eaters, but if she had a chance to do it over she would have found another way.

Overcome with emotion, Hermione rushed forward and threw her arms around her father no longer caring if this was heaven or hell. She had her family back, and in her mind, that was worth any price, including eternal damnation.

“Hermione, what's wrong?” asked her father, squeezing her back just as tightly.

“It’s nothing,” sniffed Hermione, holding back her happy tears “I’m just really happy to see you”.

“Obviously” laughed her mom. “You feeling a little nervous about going to school tomorrow Mia?”

“That’s tomorrow?” asked Hermione confused.

“Don’t tell me you suddenly forgot?” teased her father, “I swear your first year at Hogwarts has been all you will talk about ever since that nice woman came by to explain about the school”.

“Right… Hogwarts… McGonagall…” muttered Hermione. What on earth was going on?

“Well eat up dear! You have a busy day of packing ahead of you” smirked her mom sliding a couple of pancakes onto her plate.

Hermione ate her pancakes robotically, as she tried to process everything that she had just learned. The fact that she could touch her parents and eat her breakfast suggested that she wasn't trapped in some kind of weird coma dream. The lack of torture or blissful surroundings seemed to rule out her theory on the afterlife… which left magic.

Look, Hermione adored magic, really she did! But most of the time magic seemed to cause more trouble than it was worth. Her school years had been rather formative in showing her the dangers of relying on it. That was part of the reason why she had chosen to live primarily as a muggle after graduation, well that and the rapidly crumbling governmental system. She watched as men and women who had always relied on magic to solve their problems were left floundering when faced with problems created by their own hubris.

Even with Voldemort gone the policies and governmental leaders he had put in place remained. With the war “over'' Hermione was filled with idealistic zeal to reform the political system, but as time dragged on she began to lose hope. She was dismissed for her blood status, age and gender.

The hits just kept coming for Hermione though. As if enough life hadn’t been lost during the actual war, Harry had been killed in an “accident gone wrong” in the spell creation unit of the D.O.M., which was an obvious cover up if Hermione had ever heard one. If she was being honest, Hermione didn’t think that she or Ron ever got over the death of their brother in all but blood.

There were only so many times one could be told, had the door slammed in their face or told to get coffee before they sought out other avenues. Some like Neville Longbottom, Lavender Brown, Hannah Abbot, Gianna Jones and Blaise Zabini continued to fight the unfair laws with varying levels of success. Hermione applauded them for their strength, but she was far too tired to keep fighting what she deemed a pointless battle, if only they had been able to start bringing about change before Voldemort and Umbridge had gotten their hands on the ministry. Between the blatant racism, sexism and the shocking death of her best friend Hermione just needed a break and a change of scenery.

After leaving her job in the minister’s office, she loved Kingsley but the ex-auror made a miserable minister, she traveled for a year with a group of curse breakers. She chalked it up to the Gryffindor in her blood, but she missed the level of adventure that had been constantly present since she was eleven. Using Bill’s Gringotts contacts she had found a traveling group who welcomed her with open arms. The group travelled all over the world exploring new areas and solving mysterious curses. She swore that she had never felt more alive than during that year, but word came from England that Ron and Lavender were expecting their first child and her found-family needed her support. So Hermione said goodbye to her friends and took a job in the Department of Mysteries with Luna… which led her up to a couple hours ago when she ungracefully fell face first through the Veil of Death.

Clearing her dishes Hermione headed upstairs to her room to pack for her first year at Hogwarts at the urging of her parents. Stumbling into her childhood bedroom, she closed the door and rested heavily against it with one thought echoing loudly through her mind: What on earth had she gotten herself into now?

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Hermione liked to believe that she was a rather practical person, she liked clear goals, lists and schedules. She functioned best when she had a set objective and a clear view of the facts. With this in mind, after her minor existential crisis and the resulting meltdown, she set to work clearing off her desk and pulled out an empty notepad and began detailing what she did know, the list was depressingly short.

What I know: - I tripped through the Veil of Death - I woke up in my childhood bedroom the day before I originally left for Hogwarts. - Am I dead? In a coma? Time Travel?

This level of Time Travel shouldn't be possible, even with magic. Time turners in general were designed to only go back a couple days, not a decade! But when you have ruled out all of the possible explanations, the only solution which remains, however impossible, is the truth. Deciding that she needed more data before ruling the situation as ‘Time Travel’ Hermione closed her notebook and set off in search of answers.

----

After following her parents around all day and asking them obscure questions that only they would know, she was reluctantly finding more and more evidence of possible Time Travel. The day itself had unfolded similarly to how she remembered it occurring the first time with the only changes being those that she made herself. As she fell into bed that night staring up at the glowing star stickers she had stuck in various constellation shapes on her ceiling years ago, she had to finally admit that she had likely time traveled. This consensus only brought about a scarier question: what the fuck was she supposed to do now?!?

#So I did a deep dive on Time Travel fics and was inspired to write my own.#Let me know what you think #If people are interested I will write more :)#Evie's rambles #evie writes #harry potter #hermione granger

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rachelthompsonauthor · 4 years

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The past two quarantine months have been like nothing I’ve ever experienced in my lifetime, and I turned 56 in January. So rather than regurgitate what you’ve likely read in the news or on social media, I’ve decided to share how I’ve spent my time these past two months along with random thoughts. I hope you’ll continue along with me as I share what I’m doing each week.

Books

Oh, how I’ve missed reading! With my business so insanely busy (for which I’m truly grateful) these past few years, I’ve barely had time to read little more than Slack, emails, texts, and social media updates. Not exactly satisfying for this lifelong, avid reader. This quarantine has allowed me a little bit of extra time, which I’ve put to good use.

In no particular order, here’s what I’ve read:

The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow is fantastic. Read it in one sitting because I didn’t want any of the details of this lacy, incredibly intricate work to fade. I highly recommend it. A mix of fantasy, drama, and a love story (because in the end, aren’t all stories love stories?), anyone with a working brain will love this novel.

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng is also superb. I’d heard about this book for a while, yet only got around to it because it’s also now a mini-series on Hulu (which I watched afterward – also very good, though the character arcs and the plot changed in crucial, at times startling, ways).

Curious if you’ve read the book and watched the series, what your thoughts are? I could write an entire post about it, yet I’ll only share this…

As a child, my parents hire a housekeeper. My folks both work full-time and we are not in any way rich or well-off. Neither of my folks has college degrees – Dad is an assistant manager at a chain drugstore and Mom has just completed x-ray tech school and works nights at San Bernardino County Hospital. We live in a small house on a long street in the smoggy Inland Empire of California.

There are two of us, my older sister and me. Then my mom gets pregnant when I’m nine and has my baby sister when I’m ten. My folks advertise for a housekeeper and Miss Louise answers. She’s African American and willing to work for the little they can pay her. She smokes a lot (outside only, so as “not to hurt the babies”), insists on wearing a uniform though my mom tells her it isn’t necessary and comes looking for us in her big old white Caddy if we aren’t home from school exactly 20 minutes after it lets out.

(Miss Louise’s husband’s name is George. If you are alive in the 70s and watch The Jeffersons, you understand why this is an endless source of amusement to my sister Caren and me.)

Being that young, neither Caren nor I understand what privilege means. We didn’t get whatever we wanted because my parents are always strapped, yet there is food on the table, and the lights are always on. Except for the occasional venture to Disneyland or Knott’s Berry Farm that one time (mom hated it), our vacations consist of driving to visit our Zayde (great-grandfather) in a nursing home in Santa Cruz, or some other relatives we don’t know somewhere in L.A. (I remember one great-aunt who drank. A lot.) We’d always stop at Cantor’s for a soup and sandwich (the highlight for us), and be back on the road. We don’t mind because it is anywhere but home.

Anyway – my entire point is that in Little Fires Everywhere – the show – Kerry Washington’s Mia is an artist who takes a maid job with Reese Witherspoon’s Elena Richardson’s family to keep an eye on her daughter Pearl, who is quite taken with the teenage Richardson clan. The racial and financial dichotomy is blatantly obvious: a rich family who’s seemingly got it all vs. a seemingly poor black single mother, which adds to the ‘fires’ mentioned in the title.

The book really made me think about my own privilege and despite how well my folks treated Louise, and how much we loved her, and she us, there would always be that wall. Granted, it was a business arrangement and my folks paid her for her services, and in truth, anyone could’ve answered the housekeeping ad. The fact that she was African American and we were white created a racial divide that’s undeniable.

The third book I read is Certain Cure by Jennifer Valoppi, also excellent. It’s the first in a series (parts two and three aren’t out yet, darn it). The novel chronicles the life of three generations of the Cummings family; Claire, a woman in her 70s who has been diagnosed with terminal cancer, Helene, her television journalist daughter and Justin, the teenage grandson whose adoration of his “Grams” leads him to discover the dark secret behind the miracle technology that is not only curing Claire of her cancer but tempting his mother with eternal youth, as traditional medical industries wage war against the mysterious doctor from China who threatens them all.

I had no idea what to expect with this one, and I’m glad I read it. Valoppi is a former TV journalist from NYC so she knows her stuff. I’m not particularly religious (or scientific), yet I didn’t find either the science or religious stuff bogged me down. Fascinating read. I highly recommend it.

Movies and Shows

Gosh, so many. With four of us in the house (and two teens), it’s worth it to me to pay for Hulu and Netflix, Amazon Prime Video comes with my Amazon Prime membership already, plus my internet plan comes with AT&T Direct, Showtime, HBO, and other premium channels. For the amount of entertainment, it’s worth the money.

I watch movies and shows on my iPad at night, once I’m finally off my computer. I don’t know about you, but I don’t like a super loud TV with stereo surround-sound barking at me after a long day of noise and stress. So I go upstairs to my cozy bed, surround myself with blankets and pillows and cats, and snuggle in for a few hours to watch a movie or a few episodes of something I enjoy.

Another note: not a big ‘reality TV’ watcher, mostly because, as a writer, I prefer well-written shows. I also don’t like the negativity and yelling normally associated with those shows. That said, I do watch Vanderpump Rules (on Bravo) with my daughter (age 20). We bond.

Shows

Here’s what I’ve binged these past few quarantine months, show-wise (no links because you can Google):

Ray Donovan – ggggggreat! Heard it was wonderful, yet truly had no idea how awesome. Liev Schrieber is captivating as Ray. Flawed, human, sad, and, in case you don’t know, a childhood sexual abuse survivor (church abuse). I had no idea going in this would be a theme of the show, yet it was handled with care and truth. The entire supporting cast is also amazing. Every season is great. Watch it all. I hated to see it end.

Homeland – the first four or so seasons were mesmerizing. Then, I got bored. This last season had me falling asleep and then WHAM! that ending. Worth it.

Hunters – Good, not fantastically great. The twist in the last episode will get you, though.

Upload – Loved it! Thought it would be silliness (and in some places, it was, but that’s okay – we need a little silliness right now). Had a ton of heart which I love.

Bosch – come on, it’s Titus Welliver. He’s fantastic. This last season didn’t draw me in as much as the entire rest of the series, though. You?

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel – terrific, all of it. Every season, every episode, every character.

Tales From The Loop – amazing. Anything having to do with time-travel or the bending of time, I’m a total sucker for. This hurt my brain in a good way.

The Feed – weird but good and thought-provoking.

Dark – by far, my favorite show year. A German show dubbed in English (you get used to it – don’t let that scare you off), this time-bending, decade-moving hit show spans two seasons and every episode is worth watching. And the music – my god. Amazing. Here’s a Spotify playlist link.

Movies

Parasite – thought-provoking. Took a while to get into it and then boom! It just goes full-on insanity. Well-written, well-acted, and the message of the movie is just, wow. No spoilers in case you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it.

Hustlers – loved it. Whatever issues people have with strip clubs and ‘dancers,’ get over it. These girls are amazingly talented, are in amazing shape, and work hard to make money for their families. What I loved the most about the movie is that it’s all about the women; the men are only there as a plot device. It’s a movie entirely shot through the ‘female gaze’ (though of course, men will enjoy the dance scenes which are sexy, yet not unclothed). How many movies can say that?

Memento – I think I’m probably one of the few people who had never seen this neo-noir psychological thriller starring Guy Pearce looking like Brad Pitt (who was originally considered for the role). It was great, I think? LOL. My brain still hurts.

Call Me By Your Name – Lovely, sad, gorgeous. (And I will not make a juvenile peach joke.) And the music! Oh, my.

Zombieland – I hate zombies, I hate horror movies. I hate gore and squishy sounds. This movie was cute. (Not ready for the sequel, yet.)

Music

As mentioned above, the music in Dark sent me off on a ‘who are these talented musicians?’ lark. I’ve discovered so many. Here is who I’m listening to right now (all free on Spotify) and links provided here:

Apparat (you’ll recognize the opening theme of Dark and stay for the rest).

Agnes Obel – wondrous. I’ve played her entire catalog repeatedly since discovering her music on Dark. She’s become a commercial favorite as well now. Familiar is the song used in the show that’s received the most play.

Alev Lanz – otherworldly. I’ve not heard anyone like her. Her songs on the Dark soundtrack and Black Mirror are what she’s most noted for (May The Angels, and Fall Into Me, respectively), however, I love all of her work. Her harmonies are like nothing else. One song is layered with her voice and African throat singers – it’s gorgeous (May The Angels). She’s active on Twitter and we’ve interacted a few times. She’s beautifully transparent about her love of music and it shows in all her work.

Patrick Watson – I heard this song, Good Morning Mr. Wolf, on the Ray Donovan soundtrack and immediately clicked my SoundHound app. Who is this talented being? This song, in particular, sounds so large and cinematic – I wondered – is he is a film composer? (yes). A band? (yes). And so much more. I cannot get enough of all of his music, and still, I play this one song on repeat – repeatedly.

London Grammar – I discovered this band a few years ago and still adore them. Strong is still my favorite song, though Rooting For You is a close second. Hannah Reid’s vocals are big and beautiful.

Hilary Woods – ethereal and lovely. Especially the song Kith.

Sufjan Stevens – many of us just discovered him from the movie Call Me By Your Name soundscore, however, he’s been a working musician since the early 2000s. Talented beyond.

I could go on and on, but I’ll stop here. I made a Female Rockers list on Spotify which you’re welcome to.

Thoughts on Quarantine

My Business

Living in California, I’ve barely left the house in two months, with the exception of going to the pharmacy for meds or for the occasional physician appointment for me or the kids, because of the quarantine restrictions in place. And I’m okay with that.

I’m fortunate that my business is primarily online-only: I work with authors and small businesses on their branding, marketing, and promotion, so given that all real-life events are off the table, I’ve been quite busy working with my clients to ensure their products and services are still viable.

This doesn’t mean I don’t need help as a small business. I applied for an SBA loan and couldn’t even get onto the website the first time – it was pretty ridiculous – like the end scene in Beetlejuice. You all know who those first small business loans went to, right? Not small-potatoes people like me. So the second time around, it went much smoother, and I’m grateful to have received a small loan which will definitely help me keep going with rent, insurance, and other expenses.

I still did my annual non-profit initiative for writers, NaNoProMo (National Novel Promotion Month) this year over on my business site, BadRedhead Media, yet only for two weeks instead of the entire month. Daily blog posts from experts on everything publishing-related plus amazing giveaways. It’s always exhausting, yet I find enormous gratification in helping writers.

This year, however, getting writers to comment to win amazing, FREE giveaways was like pushing a house up a hill. I get it – people are focused on putting food on the table instead of commenting on blog posts, even if the giveaways were worth $500. That’s why I wanted to do this initiative this year – to help writers who are in a jam – yet only a smattering of writers participated.

I’m seriously rethinking if I want to do it next year given the financial cost as well as the personal toll. My first therapist, who I started seeing after I gave birth to my daughter Anya (I was terrified to leave her to go back to work, given my history with childhood sexual abuse), gave me this tip whenever I had trouble deciding whether to do something:

“If you ever aren’t sure if you should do something, ask yourself this question: Is this good for Rachel? If the answer is yes, do it. If the answer is no, don’t. It really is that simple.”

Self-care, y’all.

Social Media

I’ve stopped interacting with the crazies on social media (and who knows, maybe you’re one of them so truly, no offense), but I’d rather stay safe and keep my family safe by working exclusively at home – which I mostly do anyway – than venture back into face-to-face meetings with clients. I support four people with my business and if something happens to me, four people are doomed.

So the answer is simple to me: stay home, work from home, and don’t risk dying from this virus.

I don’t buy into any of this ridiculous conspiracy crap. Sorry, not sorry. You can if you want to. Spending time arguing with people online about it takes away time from my business, my kids, my guy, and my own sanity. Speaking of which…

Mental Health

There were a few mix-ups with my meds when this all started, and I couldn’t get my prescriptions filled and delivered before I ran out, so I ended up having about a week of insomnia which I’ve never had to deal with. I was a zombie (the non-squishy kind) and it sucked.

If you have insomnia, I’m sorry. I feel for you.

It’s all straightened out now, thank goodness. My son Lukas and I donned our masks and drove to the local CVS the other day because I couldn’t wait two days for my meds to be delivered. It felt like walking into a dystopian future walking in there: everyone in masks, tape six feet apart for the waiting line, plexiglass between us and the cashiers.

I’m thankful for these measures, of course, and wonder how long we’ll need them, or if this is our new normal?

My Writing

I finished the final edits on Broken People and sent it back to my editor. She’s had some health issues, so the delay is understandable. To be honest, I’m not in a huge hurry to launch a new book right now. Here are the questions that run through my mind:

Do people have money to purchase a new book?

If they do, will they want to read my new book?

If they do want to read my new book, will they take the money they do have to read mine, and then review it?

Does it even matter in the grand scheme of life?

I’m an author just like any author – I want to get my work out there so people can read it, engage with it, connect with me. I hope they’ll like it, feel something, reflect on their own lives, learn something new, particularly about being a childhood sexual abuse survivor. It’s a weird limbo to be in right now.

Our New Normal

This phrase is bandied about quite a lot yet let’s face it: it’s life as we know it, now. The anxiety is real, too. I haven’t hugged or kissed my elderly parents who live two miles away in two months. I bring them toilet paper and cookies from our favorite bakery (drive up and trunk drop off, pay online only) and drop it on their porch.

All these scenarios run through my mind: If I go to do this, what happens if? I know I’m not the only one. And yet, we can’t predict anything. So I sit here, writing this post, safe inside my little house bubble, grateful I can pay my rent, put food on the table (delivered by Instacart, thankfully), and everyone around me is healthy.

What’s your new normal? What have you been reading, watching, and listening to? If you’ve stuck it out this far, I thank you. Would love to hear your comments! Safe hugs, y’all.

***

Read more about Rachel’s experiences in the award-winning book, Broken Pieces.

She goes into more detail about living with PTSD and realizing the effects of how being a survivor affected her life in

Broken Places, available in print everywhere!

The post This is How To Spend Quarantine With Me appeared first on Rachel Thompson.

via Rachel Thompson

#IFTTT #Rachel Thompson

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lucyreviewcy · 5 years

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Hobbs and Shaw (2019) Dir. David Leitch

Let me begin by saying that I am incredibly biased in favour of this movie because it was apparently made just for me. Personally. I have never seen a movie more obviously tailored to my tastes, so don't expect me to treat it fairly when someone clearly spent a long time monitoring my Facebook page to figure out how to make the perfect movie for me. Honestly when I rewatched the trailer before viewing, I legit teared up. And people say there’s no benefits to owning a Huawei phone.

Also, just an FYI, it was directed by one of the co-directors of John Wick and that’s why the fight sequences are brilliant but it still makes sense.

It could be very easy for this film to be a total hot mess. It is also very easy to engage with this film with an ironic eye-roll and be like “I mean it’s stupid but I guess that at least it knows that.” Please don’t do the latter. This is a big budget action flick, if you’re embarrassed to watch a big budget action flick then… why? These movies are fun, and while the storylines and action sequences might be preposterous, they’re consistent with the world of the movie and the franchise in general.

It’s established pretty early on in the franchise that if you can drive a car you’re essentially an invincible wizard. Learn that truth, remember it, and the films will make sense. This is a series of movies that is 80% redemption arcs, with villains turning into heroes all over the shot, and the occasional storyline retcon to bring back a dead hero that was a fan favourite. These movies have been being made for almost two decades, so they’re not without fault (they’re actually quite useful as a chronicle of shifting social values over the last 19 years. Compare Vanessa Kirby’s character Hattie in Hobbs and Shaw to Mia in The Fast and Furious for just one example of the progress that’s been made within this franchise.) These movies are imperfect: all I ask is that people don’t act surprised that they enjoyed a movie that’s mostly enormous men solving crimes and kicking ass, because guess what: millenia of culture have taught us that HUMANS ENJOY THIS STUFF.

It took four films for the Fast and Furious franchise to really nail its format, and this is a whole new ungainly arm for the brand to try and control. However, the film begins with clear, concise exposition of the stakes, the villain and the characters involved. Vanessa Kirby as the fantastically ruthless Hattie, an MI6 agent, injects herself with a supervirus in order to keep it out of the hands of big bad nasty organisation Etheon. Etheon then try and catch her. Meanwhile, security services from the US and UK team up to catch Hattie who is being framed for the deaths of her team. As a result, Hobbs and Shaw must work together. Oh and they’re also being pursued by half-robot super soldier Idris Elba, who wins all the prizes for living up to the most surprisingly evil character name: Brixton Lore. Why does that combination of words even sound evil? It should just mean “the myths surrounding an area of South London…” My friend lives in Brixton and I don’t know if there’s any kind of special Lore there, are there Brixton kelpies that come out after dark and help you avoid puddles of vomit on your walk home? I’ve gotten sidetracked…

A movie with Dwayne The Rock Johnson is now pretty much officially a movie that makes bank. Skyscraper (a.k.a. Big Die Hard) was an absolute corker. Pairing Johnson with Statham, star of The Meg (a.k.a. Big Jaws) can only mean one thing: this movie is going to be BIG. It doesn’t disappoint on that front. The team travel the globe at an impressive pace, each big fight is set against an exciting new location, ending with an elegant showcase of Samoa. I don’t know how Samoan people feel about the way their country is represented in this movie, but if it’s anything like how I feel about the way they’ve represented London then it’ll be “Huh, sure is less traffic in their version of Samoa.”

As we travel with our enormous be-muscled pals, we’re given the chance to get to know Vanessa Kirby better.

Reader, I loved her.

As I’ve already mentioned, I like to think that the Fast and Furious films are a really good chronicle of how far Hollywood has actually come with things like gender representation. And while there’s a slightly awkward forced love story in this movie involving Hattie, and she’s definitely about 17 years too young to have been a child at the same time as Jason Statham (FYI he was doing this when she was literally two years old), but in movies you suspend your disbelief. My disbelief duly dangling from the ceiling, I loved the way that Kirby’s character was put together. It is her choice, at the start of the movie, to inject herself with the virus and risk her life to save humanity, that drives this entire plot. She gets Hobbs and Shaw out of multiple sticky situations. She’s rude, she’s deadly, she’s a lot more than you would have expected a female character in this kind of movie to be even as recently as 2009. We also see no more of her flesh than we do Statham or Johnson’s: WHAT A TREAT.

There are of course the obligatory random shots of ladies’ butts at a party but anyone who is a fan of the franchise knows that unfortunately this is a trope of the genre, I hope they grow out of it one day.

This movie, for me, has everything: car chases, big fights, mad stunts, a bit with a recognisable brand name from my country that made everyone in the audience go “Huh, yeah, Greggs.” The storyline is clear and concise, the characters explain what is going on regularly enough that you don’t lose track (this is why I love a 12a, they keep reminding the kids what’s going on between all the explosions and jokes they don’t quite get).

TO SUM UP: I enjoyed this movie so much, but that was a given. I didn’t expect to love Vanessa Kirby as much as I now do, and the cameos that I will not spoil literally made me so excited I made squeal noises.

#Hobbs and Shaw #movie #review #fast and furious #vanessa kirby #jason statham #dwayne the rock johnson #david leitch

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humanrightsupdates · 6 years

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More than 530,000 Rohingya men, women and children have fled northern Rakhine State in terror in a matter of weeks amid the Myanmar security forces’ targeted campaign of widespread and systematic murder, rape and burning, Amnesty International said today in its most detailed analysis yet of the ongoing crisis.

‘My World Is Finished’: Rohingya Targeted in Crimes against Humanity in Myanmar describes how Myanmar’s security forces are carrying out a systematic, organized and ruthless campaign of violence against the Rohingya population as a whole in northern Rakhine State, after a Rohingya armed group attacked around 30 security posts on August 25.

Dozens of eyewitnesses to the worst violence consistently implicated specific units, including the Myanmar Army’s Western Command, the 33rd Light Infantry Division, and the Border Guard Police.

“In this orchestrated campaign, Myanmar’s security forces have brutally meted out revenge on the entire Rohingya population of northern Rakhine State, in an apparent attempt to permanently drive them out of the country. These atrocities continue to fuel the region’s worst refugee crisis in decades,” said Tirana Hassan, Crisis Response Director at Amnesty International.

“Exposing these heinous crimes is the first step on the long road to justice. Those responsible must be held to account; Myanmar’s military can’t simply sweep serious violations under the carpet by announcing another sham internal investigation. The Commander-in-Chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, must take immediate action to stop his troops from committing atrocities.”

Crimes against humanity

Witness accounts, satellite imagery and data, and photo and video evidence gathered by Amnesty International all point to the same conclusion: hundreds of thousands of Rohingya women, men, and children have been the victims of a widespread and systematic attack, amounting to crimes against humanity.

The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court lists 11 types of acts which, when knowingly committed during such an attack, constitute crimes against humanity. Amnesty International has consistently documented at least six of these amid the current wave of violence in northern Rakhine State: murder, deportation and forcible displacement, torture, rape and other sexual violence, persecution, and other inhumane acts such as denying food and other life-saving provisions.

This conclusion is based on testimonies from more than 120 Rohingya men and women who have fled to Bangladesh in recent weeks, as well as 30 interviews with medical professionals, aid workers, journalists and Bangladeshi officials.

Amnesty International’s experts corroborated many witness accounts of the Myanmar security forces’ crimes by analyzing satellite imagery and data, as well as verifying photographs and video footage taken inside Rakhine State. The organization has also requested access to Rakhine State to investigate abuses on the ground, including by members of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), the Rohingya armed group. Amnesty International continues to call for unfettered access to the UN Fact-Finding Mission and other independent observers.

Murder and massacres

In the hours and days following the ARSA attacks on August 25, the Myanmar security forces, sometimes joined by local vigilantes, surrounded Rohingya villages throughout the northern part of Rakhine State. As Rohingya women, men, and children fled their homes, the soldiers and police officers often opened fire, killing or seriously injuring at least hundreds of people.

Survivors described running to nearby hills and rice fields, where they hid until the forces left. The elderly and people with disabilities were often unable to flee, and burned to death in their homes after the military set them alight.

This pattern was replicated in dozens of villages across Maungdaw, Rathedaung, and Buthidaung townships. But the security forces, and in particular the Myanmar military, appear to have unleashed their most lethal response in specific villages near where ARSA carried out its attacks.

Amnesty International documented events in five such villages where at least a dozen people were killed: Chein Kar Li, Koe Tan Kauk, and Chut Pyin, all in Rathedaung Township; and Inn Din and Min Gyi, in Maungdaw Township. In Chut Pyin and Min Gyi, the death toll was particularly high, with at least scores of Rohingya women, men, and children killed by Myanmar security forces.

Amnesty International interviewed 17 survivors of the massacre in Chut Pyin, six of whom had gunshot wounds. Almost all had lost at least one family member, with some losing many. They consistently described the Myanmar military, joined by Border Guard Police and local vigilantes, surrounding Chut Pyin, opening fire on those fleeing, and then systematically burning Rohingya houses and buildings.

Fatima, 12, told Amnesty International that she was at home with her parents, eight siblings, and grandmother when they saw fire rising from another part of their village. As the family ran out of their house, she said men in uniform opened fire on them from behind. She saw both her father and 10-year-old sister get shot, then Fatima was also hit in the back of her right leg, just above the knee.

“I fell down, but my neighbor grabbed me and carried me,” she recalled. After a week on the run, she finally received treatment in Bangladesh. Her mother and older brother were also killed in Chut Pyin.

Amnesty International sent photographs of Fatima’s wound to a forensic medical expert, who said it was consistent with a bullet wound that “would have entered the thigh from behind.” Medical professionals in Bangladesh described treating many wounds that appeared to have been caused by gunshots fired from behind –matching consistent witness testimony that the military fired on Rohingya as they tried to run away.

In Chein Kar Li and Koe Tan Kauk, two neighbouring villages, Amnesty International documented the same pattern of attack by the Myanmar military.

Sona Mia, 77, said he was at home in Koe Tan Kauk when Myanmar soldiers surrounded the village and opened fire on August 27. His 20-year-old daughter, Rayna Khatun, had a disability that left her unable to walk or speak. One of his sons put her on his shoulders, and the family slowly made its way toward the hill on the village’s edge. As they heard the shooting get closer and closer, they decided they had to leave Rayna in a Rohingya house that had been abandoned.

“We didn’t think we’d be able to make it,” Sona Mia recalled. “I told her to sit there, we’d come back… After arriving on the hill, we spotted the house where we left her. It was a bit away, but we could see. The soldiers were burning [houses], and eventually we saw that house, it was burned too.”

After the military left the village in the late afternoon, Sona Mia’s sons went down and found Rayna Khatun’s burnt body among the torched house. They dug a grave at the edge of that house’s courtyard, and buried her there.

Rape and other sexual violence

Amnesty International interviewed seven Rohingya survivors of sexual violence committed by the Myanmar security forces. Of those, four women and a 15-year-old girl had been raped, each in a separate group with between two and five other women and girls who were also raped. The rapes occurred in two villages that the organization investigated: Min Gyi in Maungdaw Township and Kyun Pauk in Buthidaung Township.

As previously documented by Human Rights Watch and The Guardian, after entering Min Gyi (known locally as Tula Toli) on the morning of August 30, Myanmar soldiers pursued Rohingya villagers who fled down to the riverbank and then separated the men and older boys from the women and younger children.

After opening fire on and executing at least scores of men and older boys, as well as some women and younger children, the soldiers took women in groups to nearby houses where they raped them, before setting fire to those houses and other Rohingya parts of the village.

S.K., 30, told Amnesty International that after watching the executions, she and many other women and younger children were taken to a ditch, where they were forced to stand in knee-deep water:

“They took the women in groups to different houses. …There were five of us [women], taken by four soldiers [in military uniform]. They took our money, our possessions, and then they beat us with a wooden stick. My children were with me. They hit them too. Shafi, my two-year-old son, he was hit hard with a wooden stick. One hit, and he was dead… Three of my children were killed. Mohamed Osman (10) [and] Mohamed Saddiq (five) too. Other women [in the house] also had children [with them] that were killed.

“All of the women were stripped naked…They had very strong wooden sticks. They first hit us in the head, to make us weak. Then they hit us [in the vagina] with the wooden sticks. Then they raped us. A different soldier for each [woman].”

After raping women and girls, the soldiers set fire to the houses, killing many of the victims inside.

Deliberate, organized village burnings

On October 3, the UN Operational Satellite Applications Programme (UNOSAT) reported that it had identified 20.7 square kilometres of buildings destroyed by fire in Maungdaw and Buthidaung Townships since August 25. Even that likely underestimated the overall scale of destruction and burning, as dense cloud cover affected what the satellites were able to detect.

Amnesty International’s own review of fire data from remote satellite sensing indicates at least 156 large fires in northern Rakhine State since August 25, also likely to be an underestimate. In the previous five years, no fires were detected during the same period, which is also the monsoon season, strongly indicating that the burning has been intentional.

Before and after satellite images strikingly illustrate what witnesses also consistently told Amnesty International – that the Myanmar security forces only burned Rohingya villages or areas. For example, satellite images of Inn Din and Min Gyi show large swathes of structures razed by fire virtually side by side with areas that were left untouched. Distinct features of the untouched areas, combined with accounts from Rohingya residents as to where they and other ethnic communities lived in those villages, indicate that only Rohingya areas were razed.

Amnesty International has noted a similar pattern in at least a dozen more villages where Rohingya lived in close proximity to people from other ethnicities.

“Given their ongoing denials, Myanmar’s authorities may have thought they would literally get away with murder on a massive scale. But modern technology, coupled with rigorous human rights research, have tipped the scales against them,” said Hassan.

“It is time for the international community to move beyond public outcry and take action to end the campaign of violence that has driven more than half the Rohingya population out of Myanmar. Through cutting off military cooperation, imposing arms embargoes and targeted sanctions on individuals responsible for abuses, a clear message must be sent that the military’s crimes against humanity in Rakhine State will not be tolerated.

“The international community must ensure that the ethnic cleansing campaign does not achieve its unlawful, reprehensible goal. To do so, the international community must combine encouraging and supporting Bangladesh in providing adequate conditions and safe asylum to Rohingya refugees, with ensuring that Myanmar respects their human right to return safely, voluntarily and with dignity to their country and insisting that it ends, once and for all, the systematic discrimination against the Rohingya and other root causes of the current crisis.”

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thechasefiles · 5 years

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The Chase Files Daily Newscap 3/4/2019

Good MORNING #realdreamchasers! Here is The Chase Files Daily News Cap for Monday 4th March 2019. Remember you can read full articles for FREE via Barbados Today (BT) or Barbados Government Information Services (BGIS) OR by purchasing by purchasing a Daily Nation Newspaper (DN).

AG: KEEP TIPS COMING – Attorney General Dale Marshall is urging Barbadians not to be quiet on crime and violence, as no corner of the island is off limits to the scourge. He made the plea on Saturday night during a cocktail reception to celebrate the tenth anniversary of Crime Stoppers Barbados at the Southern Palm Beach Club in St Lawrence Gap, Christ Church. Pointing out that the longest journey on the island, from South Point in St Philip to North Point, St Lucy, took under an hour, Marshall contended that all Barbadians were at “risk” and therefore did not have the luxury of saying that crime did not or would not affect their community. Making reference to Bathsheba in his St Joseph constituency, he revealed that the once peaceful village was also reeling from the upsurge of violent crime as “young men are threatening law-abiding neighbours with guns”. “So when you think that what confronts us today is limited only to inner City neighbourhoods like Chapman Lane and the New Orleans, it only takes a Bathsheba bus to get from Town to the East Coast of our country,” Marshall said. (DN)

SHAKE UP COMING – Barbados’ education system is in for a major shake-up. Minister of Education Santia Bradshaw made this promise yesterday as she acknowledged that too many children were leaving school without adequate literacy and numeracy skills to enable them to function effectively in the workplace. She said these shortcomings were manifesting themselves in students from the primary level, yet not enough was done through the years to deal with these problems at that early stage. So the children go through secondary school and leave without these basic deficiencies addressed. “This can no longer go on,” said Bradshaw, as she explained that based on the ministry’s files, this phenomenon was recognised yet little was done in the past decade to effectively address it. The St Michael South East representative declared that under her watch the changes necessary to rectify this trend must begin in order to look after the welfare of the children and Barbados’ future. (DN)

CLEAN UP AT THREE SCHOOLS – New-look surroundings will greet teachers and pupils of the Ann Hill, Irving Wilson and Wilkie Cumberbatch schools when they reopen today. Ann Hill School, on Pine Plantation Road, St Michael, was closed last week for emergency remedial work on the roof and ceiling, while Irving Wilson and Wilkie Cumberbatch schools, also in the Pine, were shut on Friday evening to allow for a clean-up. Yesterday, under the watchful eye of Minister of Environment Trevor Prescod, general manager of the National Conservation Commission (NCC), Keith Neblett, and other NCC officials, heavy-duty equipment was brought in to clear the overgrown bush, which had been causing skin irritation problems for students and teachers. “The Ministry of the Environment, through its agency, the NCC, has entered into a contract with a company in order to get this work done within a short space of time. We have to complete this work by Sunday evening, which is the cleaning of the entire area,” Prescod said. (DN)

FROM BOTTOM TO BOULEVARD – Move over Waterford Bottom; make way for Waterford Boulevard. The familiar and busy artery into Bridgetown, one of the favourite spots for illegal dumpers, is being given a facelift. And with more improvements to come, Minister of Environment and National Beautification Trevor Prescod said the days of rusting fridges, mattresses and smelly bags of garbage should be over as people viewed the area in a new light. He added he believed the beautified area would be, in itself, enough deterrent to would-be illegal dumpers. “People treat the environment the same way you treat them. I am telling you what we intend to do in Waterford Bottom, you would not see that because we are going to transform it into a boulevard. Nobody would do the things on a boulevard that they would do in a bottom. So Waterford Bottom would be treated according to how people perceive it. “And when we transform it into a boulevard, they would treat it how they normally treat a boulevard.” (DN)

NO MEASLES OUTBREAK IN BARBADOS - Contrary to a report carried elsewhere in the media on Friday, March 1, the public is advised that Barbados is not experiencing an outbreak of measles. According to Senior Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Karen Broome, Barbados has not documented a case of measles since 1990. Outbreaks of measles continue to be reported in North America, the United Kingdom, Europe and the Americas. (BT)

FEELING ‘LEFT BEHIND’ – THE MAJOR GROUP in Barbados representing the disabled is feeling decidedly left behind. This, said president of the Barbados Council for the Disabled, Maria Holder-Small, despite the island’s signing on to the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and its ratification of the Convention On The Rights Of Persons With Disabilities. The agenda pledges that “no one will be left behind”. Holder-Small said yesterday: “Over the past four years I have been making endless pleas, and so have many of my predecessors, for society to pay attention to the continued exclusion of persons with disabilities. We have seen some successes, but more often than not our inclusion has often been seen as an afterthought. “Our community is indeed saddened when policy-makers continue to make the same mistakes by not creating that inclusion and equality for persons with disabilities. It is even sadder when a building earmarked for the National Disabilities Unit could be simply given to another department, which leaves the present unit still located up two flights of stairs, totally inaccessible to persons with disabilities,” she lamented. (DN)

GOVERNMENT TO TACKLE POVERTY - Government is taking steps to identify the most vulnerable in Barbadian society to ensure that they receive the help they need. Minister of People Empowerment and Elder Affairs, Cynthia Forde, made the announcement on Wednesday as she delivered the feature address at the opening of the National Strategic Consultation on the Social Response to Crime in Barbados. Minister Forde told the audience that her Ministry had been mandated by Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley to undertake a household rapid poverty assessment aimed at “gathering information on the living conditions of the poor and vulnerable in society and ranking them according to the most needy, in order to offer them the necessary assistance”. She said this survey would complement other initiatives being undertaken by the Ministry and would also inform the further development of social policies as Government pursued its goal of a society with opportunities for all. The Minister of People Empowerment highlighted two projects within the Ministry targeted at inter-generational poverty. These projects, one funded by the Barbados Government and the other funded by the Inter-American Development Bank and the Government of China, aim to “identify, stabilize, enable and empower the most vulnerable in society”. Minister Forde stated: “The intent is to ensure that such persons are removed from abject poverty to become self-employed and employers rather than employees.” Noting that “an unprecedented period of change” was taking place in Barbadian society, she said that in response there was a need for mechanisms to be developed, which would engage the perpetrators of crime, regardless of their age, status and gender. The Minister submitted that there was a need for a cohesive, holistic, innovative, integrated approach to the crime challenge in Barbados. She told participants: “For this goal to be realized, the crime preventive measures which you recommend must, of necessity, address not only economic development, but good governance and the rule of law.” The consultation, which aimed to develop an integrated social response plan, brought together representatives from the public and private sectors, the faith-based community, non-governmental organizations, service clubs and the media. (BT))

WANTED: KAREEM O’BRIAN CLARKE – The Royal Barbados Police Force is seeking the assistance of the public in locating a wanted man. He is 19-year-old Kareem O’Brian Clarke who goes by the alias “Frog”; whose last known address is Johnson Road, Workmans, St. George. He is wanted for questioning in connection with a serious criminal matter. Clarke is approximately 5 feet 11 inches tall, with a dark complexion, and a slim build. He has average eyes, a short bulbous nose, average ears and thick lips and acne on his face. Clarke is advised that he can present himself to the Oistins Police Station, Oistins, Christ Church accompanied by an attorney-at-law of his choice. Any person, who may know the whereabouts of Kareem O’Brian Clarke, is asked to contact the Oistins Police Station at 418-2612 or 418-2606, Police Emergency at 211, Crime Stoppers at 1-800-TIPS (8477), or the nearest police station. The public is reminded that it is a serious offence to harbour or assist wanted persons; any person caught committing this offence can be prosecuted. (DN)

BCA BEHIND CAMERON – The Barbados Cricket Association (BCA) will definitely be coming to the crease for incumbents Dave Cameron and Emmanuel Nanthan to continue to lead Cricket West Indies (CWI). BCA president Conde Riley made the revelation in an interview with NATIONSPORT yesterday. Riley also no-balled charges that the BCA didn’t allow Cameron’s presidential opponent Ricky Skerritt and his vice-president running mate, Dr Kishore Shallow, to address its members in the lead-up to the CWI’s electoral nomination process. In defending the BCA’s position, Riley said shortly after receiving the letter from Skerritt and Shallow, a vote was taken at the association’s monthly meeting on February 12 to support Cameron and Nanthan in their bid to be re-elected as president and vice-president, respectively, for another two-year term. “Once the board decided that they were supporting the incumbents, that was it. You can’t come out and go against something that has been agreed on a vote by the full BCA board,” said Riley while making it abundantly clear that it was a board decision and not a personal one. (DN)

HAYLEY MOVES UP TO CAPTAIN – Exciting West Indies’ all-rounder Hayley Matthews has been elevated to the captaincy of the Barbados women’s team for the first time. Matthews, who is the vice-captain of the West Indies side, takes over from the experienced seamer Shakera Selman for the upcoming Regional Women’s Super50 and Twenty20 Blaze tournaments in Guyana, from March 14 to April 4. Apart from Matthews and Selman, there are four other West Indies players in the 14-member squad. They are explosive all-rounder Deandra Dottin, fiery fast bowler Shamilia Connell and the Knight twin sisters, Kycia and Kyshonna, who is making a return after undergoing leg surgery. In an interview yesterday, head coach Ezra Moseley told NATIONSPORT that once the conditions in Guyana were good for cricket and the tournament was not affected by rain, he expected Barbados, with six Windies players, to emerge champions. (DN)

GOLD CUP UPSET - Horse number 1 Celestial Storm produced a stunning upset at odds of 14 to 1 to win the 38th running of the Sandy Lane Gold Cup in front a large crowd at the Garrison Savannah this evening. The 2018 champion jockey Rasheed Hughes who was tasting his first win in the Gold Cup settled the grey five-year-old mare in the centre of the pack behind pacesetters Infrared and Night Prowler. Then the mare produced a blistering turn of foot in the final furlong to overtake the pacesetters stopping the clock in a quick 149.4 to win her first nine-furlong race in the process. Infrared, who had won this year’s Coolmore Home of Champion Stakes defeating Celestial Storm, ran on to be second improving from his third place last year. Winning trainer Roger Parravicino who won the Sandy Spa Sprint with Celestial Storm last year celebrated his first win in the Caribbean's most prestigious race. It was a race Roger would never forget anytime soon as the smart mare was owned by his late father Nick, who passed away last year. The Bills Inc.-owned locally bred Brave Star had his record of seven wins and three second places from ten starts broken when he finished fourth. But this was no disgrace as it was the first time he was running with the top rated horses. Jalon Samuel, the Sandy Lane Gold Cup winning jockey for the last three years, had to settle for third this year with his mount Night Prowler. The forecast paid $89.90, trifecta $581 .10, superfecta 1-4-5-6 $4,368.40. The first prize winner received $133, 750. Trainers Victor Cheeseman and Liz Deane were the most successful on the day winning three races. Eleven different jockeys won on the 11-race card. Next race day will be March 16th. (BT)

LISA IS LIVING HER BEST LIFE – Lisa Ruck loves travelling, teaching and her hometown Barbados. And she is looking to one day combine those loves and create her dream job. She’s a 36-year old bright and bubbly Bajan girl living her absolute best life in Rome for the last eight years. “I love my job; it’s perfect. I did a short course in teaching English as a second language, so now I teach legal English and business English in Rome. I still do one or two business courses but at my pleasure,” she said proudly. However, when she left Barbados, teaching was not the plan. Interior design was her focus. “I was a primary school teacher in Barbados. And I always wanted to study interior design. I told myself I needed to take the chance now and go before I had more responsibilities and things tying me down. I decided to do a master’s in interior design in Italy,” she explained. And she ended up staying in the country. But Lisa couldn’t stay away from the classroom for long. The passion for teaching was too strong. “I did some internships while I was there in interior design but the market was so saturated. But in Rome there’s such a demand for English speaking teachers, so it made more sense to go back into the classroom. I missed the classroom a lot as well,” she said with a laugh. And she also speaks Italian fluently now. (DN)

For daily or breaking news reports follow us on Instagram, Tumblr, Twitter & Facebook. That’s all for today folks. There are 303 days left in the year. Shalom! #thechasefilesdailynewscap #thechasefiles# dailynewscapsbythechasefiles

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coffeelevel1-blog · 5 years

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There?s No Way Louis C.K.?s New Movie Can Happen Now

Louis C.K.'s I Love You, Daddy was already the world's most terribly timed movie. It's a would-be provocative comedy about how a man's Woody Allen?esque hero starts pursuing his 17-year-old daughter ? and was, at the time of writing, still scheduled to open right in the middle of our current maelstrom of stories about decades of Hollywood predation. In the wake of Thursday's New York Times report on C.K.'s own long-rumored sexual misconduct, in which multiple women accuse the comedian of forcing them to watch or listen to him masturbate without their consent, The Orchard announced that it was canceling the release. It's a film, however, that should never have come out at all, unless it was going to be used as a primer for how conversations about power and consent get mishandled, muddied, and ultimately used to excuse or obscure abusive behavior. In the movie, C.K. plays a successful but no-longer-on-his-game television producer named Glen Topher. John Malkovich is Leslie Goodwin, a revered 68-year-old director, unapologetic luster after teenage girls, and rumored child molester. If that doesn't make clear that he's intended to be a Woody Allen stand-in, then the reverence with which C.K.'s character treats him should. "He's a great artist! Probably the best writer-filmmaker of the last 30 years or more," he yelps when his daughter, China (Chlo� Grace Moretz), brings up Goodwin's reputed pedophilia and known track record with much younger lovers. Then he scolds her for judging someone on the basis of what she's heard rather than what she can know for sure. "His private life, that's not anybody's business," Glen says, in a variation on a familiar, nauseating rationale that people have used to defend their problematic (right up through potentially criminal) faves for time eternal. http://bit.ly/2PkrD4J 's a rationale C.K. has employed on his own behalf, dismissing talk of his own then-only-rumored misconduct in the New York Times in September by saying, "If you actually participate in a rumor, you make it bigger and you make it real." He went on to say, "The uncomfortable truth is, you never really know. ... To me, if there was one thing this movie is about, it?s that you don?t know anybody."

Given those "rumors" about C.K. ? and the "rumors" that also swirled around Weinstein and Brett Ratner and Kevin Spacey and others before victims recently came forward to confirm allegations to the press ? the astonishing convenience of this stance is galling. (As is the way the film coyly winks at the stories about C.K. by having a character mime jerking off in a room with his coworkers.) You "never really know" only if you're willing to consign accusations of sexual misconduct to the realm of gossip and hearsay, to pretend these stories get whispered about only because no one's sure if they're true, rather than because the consequences of speaking up can be so punitive. As the post-Weinstein fallout consumes Hollywood, spreads through other industries, and provides hope that we may be headed toward actual (maybe) systemic (maybe) change, I Love You, Daddy isn't just tone-deaf. http://ow.ly/T08v101nKxY 's stunningly hubristic, pushing an argument that's been used to silence people for decades. And it unfolds entirely within what now feels like a very telling blind spot for its writer, director, and star, in which the answer to questions about consent is inevitably an alarming "it's complicated.?

I Love You, Daddy is the first movie C.K. has directed since Pootie Tang in 2001. In the years since, he's built up a career as one of the most respected stand-ups in the business; created Louie, an acclaimed, uneven FX show that helped spark a slew of other raw, form-pushing dramedies like Atlanta and Master of None; and self-funded Horace and Pete, an impossible to describe play-as-TV-drama-as-web-series that featured some genuinely great writing and acting. C.K. casts himself in the role of an industry hack in I Love You, Daddy, but as a real-life creator, he's been self-funding his projects in order to make them without outside interference. All of which makes the film more enraging and disappointing, coming after so much work that's grappled with other risky subject matter with empathy and humanity.

But he's been dicey on the topics of sexual violence and coercion before. In Season 4 of Louie, his character pushes himself on a resistant Pamela, played by longtime collaborator Pamela Adlon (who also appears in the new movie). During the ensuing struggle she snaps, "This would be rape if you weren?t so stupid!" And C.K. has talked about male violence against women in his stand-up, but when he's intentionally portrayed sexual coercion onscreen in the show, he's tended to role-reverse, allowing himself to get forced into oral sex by Melissa Leo or dressed in makeup and penetrated by Adlon. Given that he comes out of these encounters asking to see these women again, these scenes seem more intent on his character's humiliation than on showing any degree of understanding regarding consent. I Love You, Daddy doesn't just continue to muddy the waters around those issues. It is in itself an example of a powerful comedian proving himself incapable of confronting the transgressions of another man in the industry he admires. Which isn't remotely surprising ? in the Times article about C.K., estranged collaborator Tig Notaro goes on the record, but none of C.K.'s male colleagues do. Allen's a formative influence for many comedians, and he's clearly one for C.K., who's acted in one of Allen's movies and who includes multiple homages to Allen's Manhattan in I Love You, Daddy. But after raising the possibility of the sexual assault of a child, the film swerves to focus instead on the gray areas surrounding older men who try to sleep with teenage girls. It's a deflection that's crushing, not just because C.K. chooses not to confront the possible misdeeds of another powerful male comedian, but because he opts instead to pick and choose from the rumors, then argue that maybe some of these troubling choices aren't all that bad. To describe this as an unasked-for argument would be putting it lightly. Yet the film makes it nonetheless, by sidelining the rumors of Goodwin?s pedophilia (something that even the noncommittal Glen can't rationalize away) as a ?really personal story? Goodwin promises to explain over drinks. As Goodwin is shown grooming China, accompanying her as she tries on bikinis at a department store and taking her to Paris, Glen hovers indecisively, wanting to put a stop to what's happening but unwilling to put his foot down and confront either his doted-on child or the artist he so admires.

It's "As the Father of a Daughter": The Movie, but C.K. isn't interested in exploring and critiquing the mindset of men whose empathy for women seems entirely dependent on being a parent to one. In lieu of that, he makes a woman, his love interest Grace (Rose Byrne), present talking points about sexual maturity and why what he suspects is happening between Goodwin and his daughter might not be so bad. These are words C.K. clearly feels too uncomfortable having Glen speak; Grace shoulders the unmanageable burden of defending why teenagers should be able to have sex with adults while Glen halfheartedly recites reasons why it's wrong. She's positioned as the sophisticated third-wave feminist actor to his agency-denying rube, whom she scolds for describing the relationship she had as a teenager with a fiftysomething as rape. "So when a girl does feel lust and desire, then she's got to be with a fucking boy?" she snaps. It's a conversation the movie presents as reasonable, when it's actually queasy and dangerous. C.K. wants to present sex and attraction as things that are too messy for broad rules or generalizations. But it's impossible to do that if you're also going to willfully ignore or remain oblivious to the central issue ? how the massive power imbalance innate to this kind of relationship makes it ripe for abuse, the way power imbalances enabled and protected abuse in all of the stories currently spilling out of Hollywood at the moment. It's Adlon ? tasked as she so often is in C.K?s work with being the voice of reason and sanity ? who comes in as Glen's salty ex-girlfriend, socks him in the arm, and tells him he has to take action, even if it makes China hate him. In doing so, she provides C.K. with an escape hatch. He's able to turn the movie into one about his character's personal failings, rather than follow through on the incredibly troubling arguments he raises and then runs away from.

Woody Allen, like the character Leslie Goodwin, was accused but not charged of sexually abusing a child. His alleged victim was his then 7-year-old adopted daughter by then-partner Mia Farrow. Dylan Farrow reiterated the allegations in 2014, mincing no words in calling out those who continue to work with and support Allen, writing that "Woody Allen is a living testament to the way our society fails the survivors of sexual assault and abuse." Allen has, of course, continued to work anyway, becoming an enduring symbol of Hollywood?s ability ? up to this point ? to treat sexual misconduct allegations as a mere inconvenience. He continued to work after marrying another of Mia Farrow's adopted children, a woman who is 35 years his junior, whom he met when he was dating Farrow (a relationship that caused a scandal, but wasn't illegal). The same can be said for the relationship between Allen?s 42-year-old character Isaac Davis and the 17-year-old Tracy (Mariel Hemingway) in Manhattan, traces of which ? from the New York City setting to the black-and-white cinematography down to the fact that China is the same age as Tracy ? are all over I Love You, Daddy. (Times have changed, but Allen's attempts to normalize these relationships continue with the film he just finished shooting, A Rainy Day in New York, which reportedly features a sexual relationship between characters played by Jude Law, 44, and 19-year-old Elle Fanning.)

Hemingway herself was 18 when Allen tried to whisk her off to Paris the way Goodwin (Malkovich) does with China (Moretz) in I Love You, Daddy. Unlike China, Hemingway chose not to go ? in her 2015 memoir, Hemingway described turning him down over uncertainty about the sleeping arrangement, saying, "I'm not going to get my own room, am I? I can?t go to Paris with you." Who knows if C.K. was aware of this anecdote when writing I Love You, Daddy (he declined to comment for this piece; C.K. responded to the allegations in the Times story with a written statement in which he says "These stories are true.") ? but it feels like something that could have informed his film, especially in the way Hemingway describes her parents reacting to Allen's offer. "I wanted them to put their foot down. They didn?t. They kept lightly encouraging me," she wrote. C.K.'s insistence, in his own movie, on keeping the focus on parental permissiveness rather than the predatory nature of a decades-older celebrity trying to erode a teenager's boundaries enough to fuck her, serves as its own kind of normalization. And so I Love You, Daddy ends up being a tribute to Allen in ways C.K. probably never intended. "We?re at the bleeding edge of 'That?s not OK to do now,' but those people are still around," he told the Hollywood Reporter. "That?s a very interesting line to be on." He doesn't just let Allen off the hook ? he lets himself off as well.

C.K. has described I Love You, Daddy, which he shot on the sly this summer, as a film he expected would piss some people off. But in light of C.K.'s alleged past behavior, and the fumbled apologies he reportedly made to some of his victims in the years since, the movie plays more like a stroke of self-immolation. It?s the work of a man who's been expecting consequences to come calling, and who decided to lean into the coming anger with a have-to-hear-all-sides affront that inadvertently echoes so many of the excuses and denials that men adjacent to or accused of misconduct have offered up in the past few weeks.

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lynthelazy · 6 years

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Book Club Picks - Spring 2018

My book club is on hiatus at the moment so I've just been reliving the HP series via audiobook lately, but that doesn't mean I'm not continually adding to my list of books that I want to read with my two buddies once we get back going again. I thought I'd share my last 10 additions to the list with you all. Just FYI, the descriptions below are from GoodReads.

Annhilation by Jeff Vandermeer: Area X has been cut off from the rest of the continent for decades. Nature has reclaimed the last vestiges of human civilization. The first expedition returned with reports of a pristine, Edenic landscape; all the members of the second expedition committed suicide; the third expedition died in a hail of gunfire as its members turned on one another; the members of the eleventh expedition returned as shadows of their former selves, and within months of their return, all had died of aggressive cancer. This is the twelfth expedition. Their group is made up of four women: an anthropologist; a surveyor; a psychologist, the de facto leader; and our narrator, a biologist. Their mission is to map the terrain and collect specimens; to record all their observations, scientific and otherwise, of their surroundings and of one another; and, above all, to avoid being contaminated by Area X itself. They arrive expecting the unexpected, and Area X delivers—they discover a massive topographic anomaly and life forms that surpass understanding—but it’s the surprises that came across the border with them, and the secrets the expedition members are keeping from one another, that change everything.

The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton: Camellia Beauregard is a Belle. In the opulent world of Orléans, Belles are revered, for they control Beauty, and Beauty is a commodity coveted above all else. In Orléans, the people are born gray, they are born damned, and only with the help of a Belle and her talents can they transform and be made beautiful. But it’s not enough for Camellia to be just a Belle. She wants to be the favorite—the Belle chosen by the Queen of Orléans to live in the royal palace, to tend to the royal family and their court, to be recognized as the most talented Belle in the land. But once Camellia and her Belle sisters arrive at court, it becomes clear that being the favorite is not everything she always dreamed it would be. Behind the gilded palace walls live dark secrets, and Camellia soon learns that the very essence of her existence is a lie—that her powers are far greater, and could be more dangerous, than she ever imagined. And when the queen asks Camellia to risk her own life and help the ailing princess by using Belle powers in unintended ways, Camellia now faces an impossible decision. With the future of Orléans and its people at stake, Camellia must decide—save herself and her sisters and the way of the Belles—or resuscitate the princess, risk her own life, and change the ways of her world forever.

The Red Sister by Mark Lawrence: At the Convent of Sweet Mercy young girls are raised to be killers. In a few the old bloods show, gifting talents rarely seen since the tribes beached their ships on Abeth. Sweet Mercy hones its novices’ skills to deadly effect: it takes ten years to educate a Red Sister in the ways of blade and fist. But even the mistresses of sword and shadow don’t truly understand what they have purchased when Nona Grey is brought to their halls as a bloodstained child of eight, falsely accused of murder: guilty of worse. Stolen from the shadow of the noose, Nona is sought by powerful enemies, and for good reason. Despite the security and isolation of the convent her secret and violent past will find her out. Beneath a dying sun that shines upon a crumbling empire, Nona Grey must come to terms with her demons and learn to become a deadly assassin if she is to survive.

Renegades by Marissa Meyer: The Renegades are a syndicate of prodigies — humans with extraordinary abilities — who emerged from the ruins of a crumbled society and established peace and order where chaos reigned. As champions of justice, they remain a symbol of hope and courage to everyone... except the villains they once overthrew. Nova has a reason to hate the Renegades, and she is on a mission for vengeance. As she gets closer to her target, she meets Adrian, a Renegade boy who believes in justice — and in Nova. But Nova's allegiance is to a villain who has the power to end them both

War Cross by Marie Lu: For the millions who log in every day, Warcross isn’t just a game—it’s a way of life. The obsession started ten years ago and its fan base now spans the globe, some eager to escape from reality and others hoping to make a profit. Struggling to make ends meet, teenage hacker Emika Chen works as a bounty hunter, tracking down players who bet on the game illegally. But the bounty hunting world is a competitive one, and survival has not been easy. Needing to make some quick cash, Emika takes a risk and hacks into the opening game of the international Warcross Championships—only to accidentally glitch herself into the action and become an overnight sensation. Convinced she’s going to be arrested, Emika is shocked when instead she gets a call from the game’s creator, the elusive young billionaire Hideo Tanaka, with an irresistible offer. He needs a spy on the inside of this year’s tournament in order to uncover a security problem . . . and he wants Emika for the job. With no time to lose, Emika’s whisked off to Tokyo and thrust into a world of fame and fortune that she’s only dreamed of. But soon her investigation uncovers a sinister plot, with major consequences for the entire Warcross empire.

The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore: The incredible true story of the women who fought America's Undark danger. The Curies' newly discovered element of radium makes gleaming headlines across the nation as the fresh face of beauty, and wonder drug of the medical community. From body lotion to tonic water, the popular new element shines bright in the otherwise dark years of the First World War. Meanwhile, hundreds of girls toil amidst the glowing dust of the radium-dial factories. The glittering chemical covers their bodies from head to toe; they light up the night like industrious fireflies. With such a coveted job, these "shining girls" are the luckiest alive — until they begin to fall mysteriously ill. But the factories that once offered golden opportunities are now ignoring all claims of the gruesome side effects, and the women's cries of corruption. And as the fatal poison of the radium takes hold, the brave shining girls find themselves embroiled in one of the biggest scandals of America's early 20th century, and in a groundbreaking battle for workers' rights that will echo for centuries to come. Written with a sparkling voice and breakneck pace, The Radium Girls fully illuminates the inspiring young women exposed to the "wonder" substance of radium, and their awe-inspiring strength in the face of almost impossible circumstances. Their courage and tenacity led to life-changing regulations, research into nuclear bombing, and ultimately saved hundreds of thousands of lives.

Wicked Wonders by Ellen Klages: Inside of these critically-acclaimed tales are memorable characters who are smart, subversive, and singular. A rebellious child identifies with wicked Maleficent instead of Sleeping Beauty. Best friends Anna and Corry share a last melancholy morning before emigration to another planet. A prep-school girl requires more than mere luck to win at dice with a faerie. Ladies who lunch keeping dividing that one last bite of dessert in the paradox of female politeness. Whether on a habitat on Mars or in a boardinghouse in London, discover Ellen Klages' wicked, wondrous adventures full of brazenness, wit, empathy, and courage.

Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman: In the medieval kingdom of Goredd, women are expected to be ladies, men are their protectors, and dragons get to be whomever they want. Tess, stubbornly, is a troublemaker. You can't make a scene at your sister's wedding and break a relative's nose with one punch (no matter how pompous he is) and not suffer the consequences. As her family plans to send her to a nunnery, Tess yanks on her boots and sets out on a journey across the Southlands, alone and pretending to be a boy. Where Tess is headed is a mystery, even to her. So when she runs into an old friend, it's a stroke of luck. This friend is a quigutl--a subspecies of dragon--who gives her both a purpose and protection on the road. But Tess is guarding a troubling secret. Her tumultuous past is a heavy burden to carry, and the memories she's tried to forget threaten to expose her to the world in more ways than one.

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng: In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is meticulously planned – from the layout of the winding roads, to the colours of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules. Enter Mia Warren – an enigmatic artist and single mother – who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenage daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than just tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the alluring mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past, and a disregard for the rules that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community. When the Richardsons' friends attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town and puts Mia and Mrs. Richardson on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Mrs. Richardson becomes determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs to her own family – and Mia's.

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi: Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zelie’s Reaper mother summoned forth souls. But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were targeted and killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope. Now, Zélie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good. Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to control her powers—and her growing feelings for the enemy.

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? Also, let me know what you (and your book club, if you are in one) are reading these days in the comment section!

#top ten books #Top Ten #books #reading #Book Club #Books Booze & Bajingos Book Club #GoodReads

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caveartfair · 7 years

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Controversy Continues around Dana Schutz Painting—and the 9 Other Biggest News Stories This Week

Catch up on the latest art news with our rundown of the 10 stories you need to know this week.

01 A painting by Dana Schutz on view at the Whitney Biennial has caused a firestorm of controversy over the white artist’s use and depiction of Emmett Till as a subject.

(via Artsy, Black Contemporary Art, artnet News, and The Guardian)

Schutz’s Open Casket (2016) is an abstracted painting of Till, the 14-year-old African-American boy who was tortured and lynched by two white men in Mississippi in 1955 for reportedly flirting with a white store clerk. Till’s murderers were promptly acquitted. The day the Whitney Biennial opened to the public, artist Parker Bright stood in front of Schutz’s painting wearing a shirt that read “Black Death Spectacle,” blocking the work from view for several hours. The British artist Hannah Black subsequently published a public letter calling for the piece to be removed and destroyed, writing that “it is not acceptable for a white person to transmute Black suffering into profit and fun, though the practice has been normalized for a long time.” The biennial’s curators, Chris Lew and Mia Locks, rejected calls to remove the work because they “believe in providing a museum platform for artists to explore these critical issues.” Schutz has also stood by the piece, although this week a widely-circulated fake letter (purportedly penned by the artist herself) requested its removal from the biennial. In The Guardian, Schutz responded, “I don’t know what it is like to be black in America, but I do know what it is like to be a mother. Emmett was Mamie Till’s only son.” But as Antwaun Sargent wrote for Artsy, “the controversy surrounding this work is, at its core, about the failure of the art world to truly represent black humanity, despite its recent insistence on ‘diversity.’”

02 Art Basel and UBS released a new report on the art market Wednesday at Art Basel in Hong Kong, finding that overall sales for the global art market fell 11% in 2016, to $56.6 billion.

(Artsy)

The U.S. remained the largest market for art, with a market share of 40% (down three percentage points from the prior year). The U.K. was second with a 21% share, with China breathing down its neck at 20%. Still, the U.S. suffered a 16% decline in sales in 2016 to $22.9 billion, due largely to lower auction results. The report, titled The Art Market | 2017, was prepared by longtime arts economist and founder of Arts Economics Clare McAndrew, whose research, previously for the TEFAF Report, has been a guidepost for the art market. McAndrew highlighted several risks to the art market that could be exacerbated by the increasing dominance of the ultra-wealthy and thinning ranks of more modest collectors who help support the emerging end of the market. “Since 2009, we’ve really seen the top end pull away and get more disconnected from the everyday businesses of the market,” she wrote. In this year’s report, she links that trend to growing wealth inequality.

03 The fifth edition of Art Basel in Hong Kong opened with 242 galleries from 34 countries participating.

(Artsy)

The art world has placed an ever-increasing focus on Asia over the past half-decade, with a flood of new collectors from China and Southeast Asia entering the market. At Art Basel in Hong Kong’s opening day, a sense pervaded that the pivot of the industry’s attention to the region was complete—and that this fair now stands on equal footing with its sisters in Basel and Miami Beach. “This is a milestone year for the fair,” said Art Basel Global Director Marc Spiegler, reflecting on the five years since his fair purchased Hong Kong art fair ART HK, which was five years old at the time. Many galleries have moved to or expanded in the city in the time since, and the fair itself has increased in visitorship from just 20,000 attendees in 2008 to 70,000 in 2016. This year a similarly sized crowd is expected. “I don’t think any of us imagined the show would gain so much attention so quickly,” said Spiegler. At least according to early results, that attention is ever more quickly turning into sales.

04 Trisha Brown, the boundary-pushing postmodern choreographer and dancer who revolutionized her medium, has died at age 80.

(via the New York Times)

Brown passed away in San Antonio, Texas on March 18th; she had been undergoing treatment for vascular dementia since 2011. Her pioneering body of work includes several seminal works of choreography and solo and group performances that eschewed theatricality and formalism in favor of experimental movement. Further innovations included the removal of music from her compositions, letting the sounds of her dancers’ moving bodies score performances instead. Several of these works were presented in famously unconventional settings: Walking on the Wall (1971) featured seven dancers suspended from the Whitney’s ceiling and striding vertically across the gallery walls as if defying gravity; Roof Piece (1971) saw dancers scattered across 12 Soho roofs. Brown was a fixture of the 1970s and ’80s New York avant-garde community and is known for collaborating with artists outside dance—including Donald Judd, Laurie Anderson, and Robert Rauschenberg—on sets and other aesthetics. She was named Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres by the French government in 1988 and a MacArthur fellow in 1991. In 2012, Brown announced that she would no longer create work; since then, aspects of her influential oeuvre have been presented at the Donald Judd Foundation, BAM, the Getty, LACMA, and more. Countless choreographers and creatives who came after her, such as David Gordon, Mark Morris, and Stephen Petronio, have cited Brown and her work as an essential influence.

05 A new study has found that women museum directors are both underrepresented and underpaid in comparison to their male counterparts in the United States.

(Artsy)

The new study, released Wednesday by the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) revealed the disparity remains particularly acute at wealthy institutions, despite incremental progress in narrowing the gap. The AAMD found that 48% of the 210 museum directors who responded to the 2016 study were women, up 5% since data was last gathered in 2013. Across all institutions, women directors earned an average of 73 cents for every dollar paid to men in the same position. Wealthier museums—defined as those with operating budgets over $15 million—revealed more dramatic gender inequity. Roughly 30% of such institutions are directed by women; by comparison, women helm 54% of museums with budgets under $15 million. And the gender gap at wealthy institutions actually widens as their coffers deepen. Of the 13 highest-budget institutions in the United States, 12 have male museum directors. As such, the study bolsters calls for New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art to appoint a woman as director, following the resignation of Thomas Campbell.

06 Art supply sales spiked in January as protesters crafted signs for the women’s marches held across the United States.

(via the New York Times)

Consumer research group NPD reported that, in the week leading up to the Women’s March on Jan. 21st, sales of poster boards jumped by 33% and foam boards by 42% over the same week last year. In all, more than 6.5 million poster boards were sold during the month of January. Other poster-making materials were also in greater demand between Jan. 15th and Jan 21st, including glue (up 27%), specialty markers (up 24%), and permanent markers (up 12%). The boost in sales led to a shortage of art supplies in certain areas—a Washington woman who organized a sign-making event recalled “calling around for posters, and everyone was sold out for a five-mile radius.” One D.C.-based organizer even picked up bedsheets and pillowcases thrown away by hotels as an alternative to poster board.

07 A British man has been charged for attacking a more than two-hundred-year-old painting by Thomas Gainsborough in London’s National Gallery.

(via The Guardian)

Last Saturday, March 18th, 63-year-old Keith Gregory entered The National Gallery and slashed The Morning Walk (1785) by legendary Romantic-era portrait and landscape-painter Thomas Gainsborough with a screwdriver. The following day, London police announced that Gregory, who has no fixed home, was charged with causing criminal damage. After last week’s attack, museum staff evacuated the wing where the large-scale painting hung (and which was also featured in the James Bond film Skyfall) for two hours. The masterpiece was swiftly removed from the wall and was, as of Sunday, in the process of being examined by the museum’s on-staff conservators, who have confirmed that damage “is limited to two long scratches which have penetrated the paint layers but not the supporting canvas,” said a spokeswoman for the museum. As of this Friday, the motive for the attack remains unknown.

08 Following the resignation of Met director Thomas Campbell earlier this month, interim chief executive Daniel Weiss has detailed a plan to close the museum’s $15 million budget deficit.

(via the Wall Street Journal)

In what is being construed as a bid by Weiss for a permanent appointment to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s top job, the former college president laid out a plan to close the rapidly ballooning deficit over two or three years. The strategy slows spending without sacrificing growth by tripling the revenue from gift shops and moving forward consecutively with costly building projects rather than tackling them simultaneously. A $600-million expansion of the museum to house its contemporary art collection has also been mothballed. The Met first announced a deficit last year and enacted several measures to eliminate it, including a string of nearly 100 layoffs. The overall logic of Weiss’s plan isn’t a substantive deviation from Campbell’s previous proposals, although the interim chief executive has said there will be no additional layoffs.

09 An international fund to protect cultural heritage in conflict zones has launched with an initial sum of $75 million—including $1 million donated by a U.S. art collector.

(via The Art Newspaper)

The fund officially launched on Monday and has already raised three-quarters of a planned $100 million total. France and the United Arab Emirates spearheaded the initiative, which was modeled off a similar project aimed at combating AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. The two countries were also responsible for a large portion of the contributions thus far—$30 million from France and $15 million from the UAE. This money will go towards safeguarding heritage in conflict zones and combating looting, in parallel to efforts by UNESCO, which will be represented on the fund’s board. Private donors from the United States have also been key to its development; the Mellon Foundation and World Monuments Fund both contributed, as did Thomas Kaplan, a billionaire and art collector connected to the Gulf region, who gave $1 million.

10 An artist who created an incendiary anti-Trump billboard in Arizona has reported receiving death threats over the work.

(via The Hill)

Last Friday, a billboard depicting a scowling President Trump surrounded by atomic explosions and dollar signs resembling Nazi swastikas went up on Grand Avenue in Phoenix, Arizona. Karen Fiorito, the California-based artist and activist behind the public artwork, expected it would stir up controversy. She didn’t anticipate, however, the menacing calls and death threats that have harassed she and her husband since the billboard was erected. “I've been called a communist, a Satan worshiper. I've been told I'm a very, very sick person,” she said. The back of Fiorito’s billboard, which shows five hands spelling the word “unity,” is less provocative. According to Fiorito the piece is “a form of resistance, a form of protest” but also a “call for people who feel like they’re in the minority to come together,” she said. Phoenix gallery owner and arts patron Beatrice Moore, who commissioned the artwork from Fiorito and owns the billboard, stated that the billboard would stay put as long as Trump is president.

—Artsy Editors

Cover image: Dana Schutz, Open Casket, 2016. Collection of the artist; Pretzel Gallery, New York and Contemporary Fine Arts, Berlin. Photograph by Bill Orcutt. Courtesy of the Whitney Museum of American Art.

from Artsy News

#Artsy News

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