Fanart, Fanfiction and Fangirling

I saw Kingsman yesterday. It was even more over the top than I was expecting, but A) I love Colin Firth and B) I am a hopeless Mycroft fangirl, so I'm not complaining too much. What I really wasn't expecting was that someone would actually mention Mycroft in the film. I think I squeaked when I heard that.

Just watched "Mercy". And I'm so glad I'm alone in the apartment right now, because I swear, I was about to cry when the story reached a certain point (not gonna spoil, if you watched the film you know what I'm talking about).

And, interestingly enough, the story has pretty much the same structure as the one I'm writing for the workshop, going back and forth through flashbacks, so I can use it as a loose template. Actually, our assignment for next week is to watch three films, analyse them and break them down on a timeline/plot structure, so it was a very lucky coincidence that I watched this movie today. I had actually planned to watch "A beginner's guide to endings", but it wasn't available on Netflix. Oh, and Netflix. Thank God for Netflix. Too bad we don't have it in Italy, I guess I'll just have to watch as many films as I can in these 2 months.

Also, I recognised Holly Valance even before she turned towards the camera. In my defense, I knew her well before I'd even heard about Alex.

I finally, finally, saw "The king's speech". I'd wanted to see it ever since it came out, but for one reason or the other I always had to put it off. Then I found out the cinema in my town was showing the original version (I actually wrote an article about it in the local magazine) and decided I just had to go. I went with two friends and, since it was in English with Italian subtitles, I brought along my mother too. I think the last time we had gone to the cinema together was in 1988 to see "Benji the Hunted". XD

After the film we chatted a bit and I was kinda shocked when a friend told me she had trouble understanding the actors. I told her "What? They had impeccable diction." And she replied "Well, I can't understand British English so well, it's better with American English." I was very surprised because it's the opposite for me. Life's just full of surprises, isn't it?

Man, I've been so busy in the last couple of days that I haven't even had the time to write an entry about the Attac Bankentribunal. I only went on Friday and Saturday, there was NO WAY I could get up at 9:00 AM on Sunday, I had very little sleep last week and just needed to rest.

Anyway, it was an intense weekend. On Friday I went to the opening with Eline and two friends of hers. First there were some readings with two actors of the Volksbühne (I found the story of the Tulip Mania fascinating), then a cabaret show with Urban Priol und Georg Schramm (I only understood half of what was going on pfff.)

The second day I followed a discussion about banks and ecology (highlight: a politician of the SPD arrived late because he had to take a taxi to go from Alexanderplatz to Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz, which are 1 U-Bahn stop apart; very smart, especially if you're going to talk about ecology), more discussions about banks and their role in the crisis (I was surprised I could understand a lot, I think that Business German course wasn't useless) and then the Bela+Olli Schulz concert and Bela DJ-set. The concert was actually just a few songs, I think they played for about 30 minutes (Ohrwurm of the day "Champagner freaks"), then Bela started his DJ-set.

I, beeing the hopeless fangirl that I am, had brought along an illustration book I wanted to give him and was waiting for the right moment, because I didn't want to disturb him. But since other people were going up to him and asking for autographs and pictures, I thought "Well, this won't be more annoying than that!" So I was standing there, waiting for someone to finish talking to him, when he glanced in my direction, smiled at me and said "Hallo!" (*insert inner fangirl screaming "OMFG he still remembers me!?*) Anyway, when he was done I went up to him and he reached out and took my hand. By the way: THE MOUSTACHE IS GONE, THANKS THE HEAVENS! Uh, yes, so I gave him the illustration book and he said "Das kenne ich nicht" (why, yes, I was coherent enough to be able to talk to him in German), leafed through it and said he could use it to find a tattoo design. So, if you see Bela sporting a new silly tattoo, sorry, that's my fault! :P Btw, the book I gave him is Superheroes Decadence, by Donald Soffritti. You can see some of the illustration on the Telegraph site.

After that I just enjoyed the rest of the evening, even if Bela played a few weird and not really danceable songs. (Question: who sang the song whose chorus goes "In the heat of the night / I want more, more, more"? I've already heard it many times but I can't figure out who the singer/band is! It's frustrating. EDIT: Wrong lyrics. But Eline reads my mind. Thanks. :3) When his DJ-set was over (uhm, it was a coincidence that his girlfriend had whispered something in his ear just 5 minutes earlier, right? *cough*), we went back to the Großer Saal... and saw they had transformed it into a huge disco! With a massive disco ball made with projectors hanging over the stage. I felt like I was at a techno meeting.

Anyway, after a while we went, as we were all pretty tired. The next day I had to meet a friend, we spent the afternoon together and spontaneously decided to go see Alice in Wonderland in 3D that evening (13€ WTF!) The ending was waaay too modern, but I love Tim Burton's imagery.

That's what I call a busy weekend! :)

Here, have a few pictures.

Olli Schulz is fucking crazy. In a very good way. :)







Disco, baby!

As I predicted, "The boat that rocked" was fucking brilliant. It's probably the best film I've seen this year (all right, I don't go to the cinema sooo often), but really, it made me want to raid my CD collection and just listen to '60s music for hours. (And there's a character called "The Count", come on!)

Today I've been listening to Suede, Pulp and Menswear instead and getting all nostalgic. Ah, my youth. I'm so tempted to accept a friend's invite to London, I haven't been back to England for far too long. But no, I'd better save up for September and next autumn.

I've been translating random technical stuff into German all day, I'll consider this a "warming up" for the Business German course...

OMGWTF moment #1: Watched Star Trek last night. I LOVED IT!!! I was with Vica, who is a fellow Trekkie, and her boyfriend, who hasn't seen a single episode of any series. XD I was geeky enough to recognise the characters before they were introduced (thanks mum for making me watch the classic series when I was a kid) and catch the "Enterprise" reference (as in, "Enterprise" the series, not the name of the spaceship), even if I only ever watched a few episodes. Also, I love Spock and I think Zachary Quinto did an excellent job. :3

OMGWTF moment #2: Bloody hell. This morning my father put a thermometer in the sun. Temperature: 42°C! :O And we're still in MAY! Thank God it's not humid, otherwise I'd die. Actually, when I went out this morning it was like being at the seaside, because of the dry air and light breeze. If the weather remained like this it would be perfect, but it always gets awfully sultry in June/July/August. D:

OMGWTF moment #3: Is it just me being blind until now, or did Bela get a new tattoo? More specifically the shark from the "Jaws" poster image on his right wrist? See photo evidence below:

( Jaws? )

All right, now I can go back to editing the photos I took at my friends' gig. The theme of the gig was "Spring", so they printed a life-sized Venus from the Botticelli painting (but pasted the face of the bassist on it) and played the first song wearing blond wigs. They opened the concert reading the Italian translation of Bananarama's "Venus" (and I was the only one in the audience who got it, WTF) and closed it with "Enter Venus": the lyrics from the above mentioned "Venus" sung on the music from Metallica's "Enter Sandman". They are crazy. XD

I met up with a few friends to watch a dvd last night, we didn't know what to see, but in the end we chose "Hoodwinked!" (Italian title: "Cappuccetto Rosso e gli insoliti sospetti"), an animated film from 2005. I had heard it was good, but I didn't think it would be so good, we laughed all through it. If you still haven't watched it, go on and buy/rent/borrow it, it's great! Our favourite character was Japeth the Goat, my God I still have his song stuck in my head.



Other than that, I finally bought a backpack for my laptop. I've always refused to buy a backpack because I thought "The laptop isn't even mine, it belongs to the society I work for, I'll just use the bag they gave me to carry it to work." But carrying it on one shoulder every day was killing my back, I tried carrying it by hand but the situation didn't get much better - and I got calluses on my hands! - so this week I made up my mind and bought a backpack. The real reason why I didn't want to buy it before was that I was hoping I would get another job and wouldn't need it anymore, but it looks like that's not going to happen anytime soon. And, even if a miracle happened and I really got another job, I will eventually buy a laptop of my own, so I'll need it. And it was only €30 anyway.

And I love H&M. I paid €16 for 2 short-sleeved shirts (one black with little white stars, one emerald green with little white black stars), 1 T-shirt (white with black stars) and a pair of bright pink fishnet tights with a star pattern. Why, yes, I like stars.

Jag älskar Sverige!

I've just watched the Teeth trailer and can't stop giggling. Is that supposed to be a horror film? I mean, sure, that's the ultimate male nightmare, every single man in the audience will be crossing his legs throughout the whole film, but really, I couldn't take it seriously. It may be the first case in the history of horror movies that men actually find a film scarier than women.

I should really be packing up, as I'm leaving tomorrow night, but I don't feel like it at all. I'm not even looking forward to leaving. What's wrong with me?! Two weeks away from the pervy office of doom, two nice cities to discover, two Ärzte concerts and I'm not looking forward to leaving? WTF?!

Watching '50s horror films really gives you an idea of how the art of film-making has developed over the years. We were at Ste's place last night, browsing through his flatmate's huge DVDs collection trying to decide what to watch, when we saw a DVD labeled "L'esperimento del Dottor K." ("Doctor K.'s experiment") It sounded like an old horror/sci-fi film, so we gave it a go. It turned out to be "The fly", the original film from 1958. We had all seen the '80s remake, plus the Simpsons Halloween special of course, and were quite curious to see the original. Some parts were just plain funny, because it was so '50s, but some other parts were brilliant. I couldn't watch the spider scene though, damn arachnophobia. =/

We also watched the trailer of "Fantastic Voyage", I saw the film a few years ago and loved it. Yes, I have a thing for retro sci-fi.

And a picture from Friday's party:

( A ring to rule them all... )

Damn, the connection is so slow today, it makes me want to kick something. I would get DSL, but I can't for a series of reasons. DAMN! >:O

Man, what an exhausting Saturday. First I took my parents to the station, then I met Demi and we walked in and out of shops all day. In the morning the bigger shops were packed, around 11 there were already long queues of people in front of the counters, it took us almost 3 hours to see just a couple of shops, it was insane. Luckily in the afternoon things got better, we steered clear of the most crowded streets and were able to buy a few things in relative peace. Demi bought a lot of things, I bought only a few but I'm very happy with what I found. Especially because I found these:

( YAAAY!!! )

I literally gasped when I saw them, I hadn't seen them around before. Sadly the first 2 shops that sold them didn't have my size (damned big feet), but the third one did. Hah, I hadn't worn a pair of Converse since my first year of high school. I still think shoes are too expensive, though.

And the rest of my shopping was a bit "teen-oriented" as well.

( Clic for evidence )

No wonder people think I'm still 19. But hey, there wasn't all this cool stuff around when I was 16, so I'm buying it now.

In the evening we went to Demi's place and had dinner while watching the football match, then Demi's boyfriend came around, but we were all too tired to go out, so we watched a few episodes from "The Twilight Zone" DVD. I had never seen the series before, but now I understand why it's so famous. We only saw three episodes, but it was very clear that series is a milestone, there were situations or techniques that are still used nowadays. Like, there's someone at the wheel, he/she moves the rear-view mirror and sees someone sitting in the back seat. How many times has that been used? They didn't just invent a genre with that series, they invented a whole new part of the cinematografic language.

And it was very interesting to see how people in the '50s thought of the future, the idea of space-travel, the looming shadow of a nuclear war. It all reminded me of Philip Dick, who wrote some science fiction classics around that time and is one of my favourite authors.

But I was too tired to stay and watch more and I'm also easily frightened, so I called it a night around 1.30 am. I'd really like to watch some other episode, but not so late at night. :P

And it feels damn good to play piano after such a long time. *sigh*