![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jakebe
We went to movie theatres twice this week! In the beforetimes, we were pretty avid movie-goers and it feels nice to return to the habit. The COVID protocols are reasonable, and so far we haven't had any issues with crowding -- even for the movies that are premiering that week. It's a little uncomfortable wearing a face mask for two hours, but I can't dare complain about that when there are folks like, stocking shelves on their feet for eight hours with a face mask.
The first movie we saw was "Candyman" on Tuesday, and I have to say I really loved it. It's fascinating to me how "Candyman" has been adopted as THE Black horror franchise but when you look at the story it makes a lot of sense. The titular monster's origin story is tied directly into racial injustice, and so much of the legend is tied inextricably to the way information moves in the hood. So it becomes a commentary not only on the longevity of this injustice, but the reaction of the Black American community to it.
There was a line that stuck with me -- not enough to remember it properly, so I'll paraphrase. "Candyman became a way for us to protect ourselves from the hard truths we couldn't face." So if someone disappeared one day and no one knows what happened to them, it would be chalked up to Candyman instead of a drug overdose, gang crime, police brutality, or any number of other ways you could die in that setting. I love the idea of supplanting the depressing reality of that existence with a different, fantastic horror. It's still really scary, but taking The Thousand Enemies and making a singular symbol of them is...it feels right.
The new version expands on the idea by making Candyman a vengeful spirit, rising whenever injustice has caused death over and over again. A place that has become stained by racial violence through the centuries becomes corrupted, and the barrier between worlds thins enough for terrible things to come through.
People differ on whether Candyman is horror or urban fantasy, and I could see arguments for both. Candyman as a myth-figure isn't entirely unknown to people, after all. And he doesn't ONLY kill; he has an inscrutable logic that attracts him to certain people for unknown reasons. Honestly, it makes sense that he straddles the line -- he was created by Clive Barker after all, who's made a career out of living in that pocket.
On Thursday we saw "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings", and I have to say it's a great time to be a Marvel fan right now. After capping the original Avengers saga in "Endgame", the MCU is taking huge swings to become a bigger, wilder, crazier place and this latest movie is a great marker of what we can expect moving forward. The Disney+ shows have opened up a whole new level of storytelling, with each series acting as a "limited comic series" that deepens the context some characters live in while also table-setting for significant changes in the movies. But also, we're seeing the Marvel canvas opening wider to tell all kinds of different stories.
Shang-Chi deals directly with the whole Mandarin thing from Iron Man 3 in a surprising and fun way, and it also just lets the superhero exist in an authentic world lived in by many Asian-Americans. I'm not familiar enough with Asian culture to see just how much attention to detail was paid, but I loved what I saw. Every major character was Asian, with a couple of exceptions, but like Black Panther it didn't call attention to the fact. The story just flowed, filled with engaging characters, incredible action, and a plot that was surprisingly mostly in its elegance.
It's definitely worth a look in theatres if folks feel comfortable with public settings. The third act is especially impressive on the big screen!
One line from the movie hit me especially hard: "If you aim at nothing, you'll hit nothing." Shang-Chi and his best friend Katy are relatively driftless at the start of the film, and it succinctly states the problem with that. If you want something in life, you have to be clear about what you want. You can't aim at a target if you don't have one.
I'll need to remember this when I'm telling stories. Always keep one eye on the target, right?
The first movie we saw was "Candyman" on Tuesday, and I have to say I really loved it. It's fascinating to me how "Candyman" has been adopted as THE Black horror franchise but when you look at the story it makes a lot of sense. The titular monster's origin story is tied directly into racial injustice, and so much of the legend is tied inextricably to the way information moves in the hood. So it becomes a commentary not only on the longevity of this injustice, but the reaction of the Black American community to it.
There was a line that stuck with me -- not enough to remember it properly, so I'll paraphrase. "Candyman became a way for us to protect ourselves from the hard truths we couldn't face." So if someone disappeared one day and no one knows what happened to them, it would be chalked up to Candyman instead of a drug overdose, gang crime, police brutality, or any number of other ways you could die in that setting. I love the idea of supplanting the depressing reality of that existence with a different, fantastic horror. It's still really scary, but taking The Thousand Enemies and making a singular symbol of them is...it feels right.
The new version expands on the idea by making Candyman a vengeful spirit, rising whenever injustice has caused death over and over again. A place that has become stained by racial violence through the centuries becomes corrupted, and the barrier between worlds thins enough for terrible things to come through.
People differ on whether Candyman is horror or urban fantasy, and I could see arguments for both. Candyman as a myth-figure isn't entirely unknown to people, after all. And he doesn't ONLY kill; he has an inscrutable logic that attracts him to certain people for unknown reasons. Honestly, it makes sense that he straddles the line -- he was created by Clive Barker after all, who's made a career out of living in that pocket.
On Thursday we saw "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings", and I have to say it's a great time to be a Marvel fan right now. After capping the original Avengers saga in "Endgame", the MCU is taking huge swings to become a bigger, wilder, crazier place and this latest movie is a great marker of what we can expect moving forward. The Disney+ shows have opened up a whole new level of storytelling, with each series acting as a "limited comic series" that deepens the context some characters live in while also table-setting for significant changes in the movies. But also, we're seeing the Marvel canvas opening wider to tell all kinds of different stories.
Shang-Chi deals directly with the whole Mandarin thing from Iron Man 3 in a surprising and fun way, and it also just lets the superhero exist in an authentic world lived in by many Asian-Americans. I'm not familiar enough with Asian culture to see just how much attention to detail was paid, but I loved what I saw. Every major character was Asian, with a couple of exceptions, but like Black Panther it didn't call attention to the fact. The story just flowed, filled with engaging characters, incredible action, and a plot that was surprisingly mostly in its elegance.
It's definitely worth a look in theatres if folks feel comfortable with public settings. The third act is especially impressive on the big screen!
One line from the movie hit me especially hard: "If you aim at nothing, you'll hit nothing." Shang-Chi and his best friend Katy are relatively driftless at the start of the film, and it succinctly states the problem with that. If you want something in life, you have to be clear about what you want. You can't aim at a target if you don't have one.
I'll need to remember this when I'm telling stories. Always keep one eye on the target, right?
