Oh, Natalie :(

So, according to various sources - like CBM - Natalie Portman is only returning to Thor: The Dark World because Marvel is holding her to her contractual obligations. She didn't want to return. I mean, I know that she threw a hissy fit when Marvel didn't hire Patty Jenkins as T:TDW's director because they didn't like her vision and wanted someone who had experience with fantasy stuff, but this...

I think that Marvel should have let her go. Jane was fine but not really an integral part of the movie and to have a contrary diva on set won't be fun for anybody involved. IMHO, they should just kill her off in T:TDW and make Sif Thor's love interest. AFAIK, in the comic books, Thor falls for both of them at one point or another but ultimately, Jane fails Odin's test and she's refused immortality. (The funny thing is that Loki at one point takes over Sif's - his brother's lover! - body, heh!) So, she isn't "The One" for Thor anyway. Why not switch over to Sif right now - Jaimie Alexander loves the part! - and be done with ungrateful actors?

Oh well, I'm interested in T:TWD because of Thor, Loki, Odin and Sif anyway, Jane wasn't even a blip on my radar. Actually, even before I read this, I hoped they would off Jane in the movie. And now... eh.

A-Z meme

Stolen from ashooles!

( Let me tell you something about myself... )

Book #43

"Julius Caesar" by William Shakespeare

♦ ♦ ♦

In this drama, there wasn't one person that could be seen as honest and/or "good". I get that Shakespeare tried to show Brutus in a positive light, that Brutus helped kill Caesar for the good of all Rome - that didn't change the fact that he helped murder a man who trusted him, who considered him a friend. There was absolutely nothing positive about that. And not just that - his wife committed suicide in his absence and he wasn't moved by it at all, even though he proclaimed his love for her shortly before his departure. Eh. And Marcus Antonius and Octavian - they spouted how they wanted to bring Caesar's killers to justice, but all they really wanted was to take power away from Brutus and Cassius. Maybe I'm judging these characters too harshly but that was the impression they made on me.

Also, I didn't like the style in which the drama was written. At the beginning, there were these long, long scenes where the characters plotted Caesar's demise - at the end, the drama suddenly became really choppy, with scenes barely half a page long. It felt like the author ran out of space/time or something. Very weird.

Johnny Mnemonic

I like the movie more than the short story, as I've mentioned before. At the same time, it's my least favorite Keanu Reeves movie. The story per se sounds intriguing - unfortunately, you can see that the filmmakers blew most of their budget on the few VR scenes, everything else looks namely incredibly cheap. Also, everyone's behavior is really... manic. It's as if the director wanted the actors to be more intense or something. The result is that everybody is overplaying their part, even the veterans like Udo Kier or Ice-T.

Keanu is at his best when he's allowed to do his thing - he isn't the most expressive actor, he mostly shows emotions through body language. You can see the difference between Johnny Mnemonic and Matrix. Or even Johnny Mnemonic and Speed which were filmed around the same time. It really shows when the director is working WITH the actors and when he/she is forcing them to do as he/she says.

Also, I cannot believe that this movie was made around the same time as Speed. Here, Keanu looks so incredibly young and slim, almost malnourished! In Speed, he's so buffed up. Weird.