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Jun. 13th, 2004 11:42 pmI haven't written much lately out of frightful boredom.
Classes started last Monday. David Jones' class so far is a lot like freshman year high school English (we're starting with Romeo & Juliet and Frankenstein, both of which I also read back than), except with more films. Three versions of R&J, the last one tomorrow, and then Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein. Then we're moving on to things I haven't read before, with the exception of The Wasteland, which I have read, but not for class.
The first movie we watched was the 1936 R&J directed by George Cukor. I never want to do that again. The costumes were ugly, I quit caring halfway through, they took forever to die, and I wanted to stab Mercutio, who is normally my favorite character. The actor playing Mercutio trilled every goddamned R in every speech. Not just a tap, but a full out trill. It was horrid. The next day we watched the Zeffirelli version, which was much better. And better than I remembered it being. Although, I really only remembered Juliet's laugh which was not as jarring this time, and Romeo's ass, which was about the same. I'd forgotten Mercutio, but he was excellent. Tomorrow we'll watch Baz Luhrman's version. I bet Angie will dislike it, as she disliked David's production of Hamlet from several years ago; both are updated versions of Shakespeare. (Personally, I think that's pretty darn cool, because Shakespeare can take that sort of thing. But then, I pretty much like any flavor of Shakespeare, straight, modernized, whatever. As long as it's all in one language, really.) As I remember, Luhrman's R&J has a decent Mercutio. I realized last week that, since Mercutio and the Prince are portrayed as black, Paris should be too, because all three are kinsmen. But I guess they figured it would be going to far to have even an unrealized interracial marriage. (As if Shakespeare himself hadn't written such a thing in a different play!)
The Tolkien class is going pretty well, although there are a couple people - or perhaps it's a single person, just as annoying on the forum as he is in class - who annoy the crap out of me. One guy in class, when we were talking about Gandalf in The Hobbit starts bringing up all sorts of other stuff about the wizards that really wasn't relevant to the topic at hand. He was pretty much just showing off how much he knows. Well, I've got news for him: the Blue Wizards do have names, and I know what they are. He's not the hot shit he thinks he is. Feh. And then on the forum, there's one character who tries to be controversial but ends up just being annoying. This person started two separate threads about the same thing - women in Tolkien - and then in another thread (about the movies) double posted something about racism. Grr to double postings. Also, shut up, bombur.
Classes started last Monday. David Jones' class so far is a lot like freshman year high school English (we're starting with Romeo & Juliet and Frankenstein, both of which I also read back than), except with more films. Three versions of R&J, the last one tomorrow, and then Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein. Then we're moving on to things I haven't read before, with the exception of The Wasteland, which I have read, but not for class.
The first movie we watched was the 1936 R&J directed by George Cukor. I never want to do that again. The costumes were ugly, I quit caring halfway through, they took forever to die, and I wanted to stab Mercutio, who is normally my favorite character. The actor playing Mercutio trilled every goddamned R in every speech. Not just a tap, but a full out trill. It was horrid. The next day we watched the Zeffirelli version, which was much better. And better than I remembered it being. Although, I really only remembered Juliet's laugh which was not as jarring this time, and Romeo's ass, which was about the same. I'd forgotten Mercutio, but he was excellent. Tomorrow we'll watch Baz Luhrman's version. I bet Angie will dislike it, as she disliked David's production of Hamlet from several years ago; both are updated versions of Shakespeare. (Personally, I think that's pretty darn cool, because Shakespeare can take that sort of thing. But then, I pretty much like any flavor of Shakespeare, straight, modernized, whatever. As long as it's all in one language, really.) As I remember, Luhrman's R&J has a decent Mercutio. I realized last week that, since Mercutio and the Prince are portrayed as black, Paris should be too, because all three are kinsmen. But I guess they figured it would be going to far to have even an unrealized interracial marriage. (As if Shakespeare himself hadn't written such a thing in a different play!)
The Tolkien class is going pretty well, although there are a couple people - or perhaps it's a single person, just as annoying on the forum as he is in class - who annoy the crap out of me. One guy in class, when we were talking about Gandalf in The Hobbit starts bringing up all sorts of other stuff about the wizards that really wasn't relevant to the topic at hand. He was pretty much just showing off how much he knows. Well, I've got news for him: the Blue Wizards do have names, and I know what they are. He's not the hot shit he thinks he is. Feh. And then on the forum, there's one character who tries to be controversial but ends up just being annoying. This person started two separate threads about the same thing - women in Tolkien - and then in another thread (about the movies) double posted something about racism. Grr to double postings. Also, shut up, bombur.
