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Saw JULIE & JULIA tonight and was charmed and amused and, well, to be frank - bored. Meryl Streep consumes the scenery with a gusto that Madame Child would surely have appreciated and Stanley Tucci is wonderfully understated and solid as Julia's husband, Paul. Together they create a portrait of a marriage that doubtless idealized nonetheless felt solid and real in spite of a script that more or less reduced Monsieur Child to a supportive, adoring cypher.
Julie Powell's story, on the other hand, was less compelling and possibly parallels my own frustrations a little too closely to make for an enjoyable fiction. On the plus side, I have resolved to cook more, since I've gotten terribly slack in that area lately, and possibly take MASTERING THE ART OF FRENCH COOKING for a spin. I learned to cook from watching my mother, who is a very good cook, and like most children of good cooks, have a diffident attitude towards the art myself. My last great step forward was learning to blanche tomatoes to make a tomato pasta sauce from scratch.
Then I decided that blanching tomatoes was a pain in the ass and there were probably good nutrients in the skins, so now I just dice the tomatoes, skin and all, and throw them in the frying pan.
I wonder whether or not Julia would approve... .
Meanwhile, for the amusement of those who care, a list of things I hold to be categorically wrong, based on my last reading of random fanfic:
· Gwen/Jack TORCHWOOD fic. Yes, by all means, let's homogenize our sole female character and turn her into "the girl". The only good part of the whole Gwen/Jack mess Rusty dumped on us is watching Gwen grow out of her infatuation and the real friendship that takes its place (okay, I take it back, Rusty, perhaps you knew what you were doing there).
· Songfic. All of it: excrescence. If you must refer to a song in your story, limit yourself to an epigram. Any attempt to set each paragraph to a specific verse of song punkass, whiny-tenor, emo-porn ballad should be resisted. If you absolutely cannot stop yourself, take up vidding - writing is not for you.
· Mpreg.
· Fic where Logan torments Veronica during high school because it hurts too much to be with her. This is not TWILIGHT, treating someone like shit because you OMG super-sekritly love them is not okay. It is not sexy. It is not romantic. And Veronica Mars would have Kentucky-Fried Logan's testicles with her Taser if he'd ever pulled that "it's just so much easier if I hate you" shit on her.
· That Emily Bronte does not have to answer for the misogynist bullshit passed off as "romance" by people who don't realize that Heathcliffe and Catherine Earnshaw are horrible people who ruin the lives of everyone who has the misfortune to fall into their orbit.
· The Star Trek kink meme has invented "selfcest", which is not only creepy and wrong but probably violates about seven physical and mathematical laws. I'm starting to think that Star Trek fandom is the reason we can never have nice things. ;)
· Finally, I spent my evening reading fanfic on LJ. There's just no excuse for that nonsense.
Julie Powell's story, on the other hand, was less compelling and possibly parallels my own frustrations a little too closely to make for an enjoyable fiction. On the plus side, I have resolved to cook more, since I've gotten terribly slack in that area lately, and possibly take MASTERING THE ART OF FRENCH COOKING for a spin. I learned to cook from watching my mother, who is a very good cook, and like most children of good cooks, have a diffident attitude towards the art myself. My last great step forward was learning to blanche tomatoes to make a tomato pasta sauce from scratch.
Then I decided that blanching tomatoes was a pain in the ass and there were probably good nutrients in the skins, so now I just dice the tomatoes, skin and all, and throw them in the frying pan.
I wonder whether or not Julia would approve... .
Meanwhile, for the amusement of those who care, a list of things I hold to be categorically wrong, based on my last reading of random fanfic:
· Gwen/Jack TORCHWOOD fic. Yes, by all means, let's homogenize our sole female character and turn her into "the girl". The only good part of the whole Gwen/Jack mess Rusty dumped on us is watching Gwen grow out of her infatuation and the real friendship that takes its place (okay, I take it back, Rusty, perhaps you knew what you were doing there).
· Songfic. All of it: excrescence. If you must refer to a song in your story, limit yourself to an epigram. Any attempt to set each paragraph to a specific verse of song punkass, whiny-tenor, emo-porn ballad should be resisted. If you absolutely cannot stop yourself, take up vidding - writing is not for you.
· Mpreg.
· Fic where Logan torments Veronica during high school because it hurts too much to be with her. This is not TWILIGHT, treating someone like shit because you OMG super-sekritly love them is not okay. It is not sexy. It is not romantic. And Veronica Mars would have Kentucky-Fried Logan's testicles with her Taser if he'd ever pulled that "it's just so much easier if I hate you" shit on her.
· That Emily Bronte does not have to answer for the misogynist bullshit passed off as "romance" by people who don't realize that Heathcliffe and Catherine Earnshaw are horrible people who ruin the lives of everyone who has the misfortune to fall into their orbit.
· The Star Trek kink meme has invented "selfcest", which is not only creepy and wrong but probably violates about seven physical and mathematical laws. I'm starting to think that Star Trek fandom is the reason we can never have nice things. ;)
· Finally, I spent my evening reading fanfic on LJ. There's just no excuse for that nonsense.