Suspense Junkies Anonymous

Hi, my name is Ani, (audience: hi, Ani) and I’m addicted to suspense.

I guess it started when I was a kid, with the terrible cliffhangers attached to the commercial breaks of the old Wild Wild West TV show. With every commercial break I would wonder: “Oh, will West make it out this time?” and there’d be a glorious tightening of something in my chest, just below my sternum and I’d revel in that suspense.

I seek it out in film and literature and read/watch those suspenseful parts over and over, trying to suck all the delicious amounts of fear—the good kind of fear—out of it. I watch/read it until I don’t get that feeling anymore and have to move on.

Beyond this, I have a friend who hates suspense and insists I tell her what things are going to happen while watching television (example: Is the Cyberman gonna wake up?) which I just don’t get. How can someone not enjoy that tightening feeling? What’s wrong with suspenseful moments? Aren’t they fun?

Gertrude

Yesterday, Dad phoned me up while I was sitting at the computer and bashing my head against the desk, hoping I could somehow force inspiration through violence. “Hey, do you want a birthday present early?”

“Yes, please!”

I knew it could either be one of two things: a more compact phonograph or a typewriter, because these are the things he was hunting down for me.

Somehow I never expected the beautiful, lovely Underwood No. 5 that he sat down in front of me and, after telling me which do-hickey did what thing, he leaned over my shoulder and insisted I write: I love this typewriter on it. Which I did.

I’ve named the typewriter Gertrude. I’ve never loved an inanimate object so much as I’ve loved as this No. 5.

-Ani

I love you, Gore Vidal

I love you, Gore Vidal. You speak quotations that are wonderfully true and incredibly amusing. Never will I need to quote anyone else but you, dear beloved Gore. You give us many gems of written word:

The four most beautiful words in our common language: I told you so.

It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail.

Every time a friend succeeds, I die a little.

As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests.

In writing and politicking, it's best not to think about it, just do it.

Some writers take to drink, others take to audiences.

There is no human problem which could not be solved if people would simply do as I advise

Today's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books, and there is some evidence that they can't read them either.

Write something, even if it's just a suicide note.

Wherein I Reveal My Geeky Soul

To fully appreciate my mind set whilst reading this, please turn on Blur, preferably either the song “Girls and Boys” or “Song 2”.

I’ve been on a Doctor Who kick for the past week and some. It’s such a fun and campy show, and classic. The show, since being resurrected by Russell T Davies in 2005, elevates its actors statuses to that of house hold names.

I originally got into the show in summer 2007, though I’d caught glimpses of it before that didn’t interest me. Mostly because of Christopher Eccleston’s more brooding take on the classic character. Anyway, I was on vacation with my family, godparents and best friend—who that day was annoyed at me. So, I sat down, and with nothing else on except Deadliest Catch, I began watching the Doctor Who marathon on the Scifi Channel.

And I fell in love with it.

Oh, yeah, I’ll be honest, it wasn’t immediate. I had to get used to it. But David Tennant’s Doctor’s energy is infectious and makes the show fun. It initially reminded me of younger Michael Shank’s character of Daniel Jackson, though please don’t ask me why. Perhaps the glee surrounding new and different cultures and things.

I recently had the pleasure of watching Doctor Who with a child. Namely, a nine-year-old boy called Quinn, who during ‘Blink’ bit both of his thumbs, hid his eyes, pulled at his dirty, tangled hair and cried, “Don’t blink! Don’t blink!” at the computer screen. It was terribly fun and I suddenly understood that whole “hiding behind the sofa” thing.

Recent Googling of our late Doctor’s name (by now I assume EVERYONE knows that Matt Smith is the new Doctor) came up with some excited comments all over the internet about him being interested (and apparently everyone else being interested) in him being The Riddler in the next Batman flick.

And here comes the confession: I am quite possibly the only person left on the planet (nay! the universe!) who has not seen The Dark Knight. It’s on my to-do list. On top of this, I am a child of the nineties and when you say Riddler, I say Jim Carrey…and spandex (shiver). I always disliked his version of the Riddler as I can't help but think of the character as a bit of a tranny in all that glitter.

I have trouble seeing comic books as anything beyond campy, fun junk food for the mind (and I grew up surrounded by a lot of Superman and Star Wars comics). So this new rise in comic books films and also Nolan’s ability to turn campy comic villain into full-blown, frightening, multi-facetted, three-dimensional characters with the ability to do the worst things is a bit unnerving for me.

Let me be clear: I think Tennant would do a brilliant job, as well as the other rumored pick, Johnny Depp, though he’s a bit overused these days. I think I’d only be able to say “that’s Johnny Depp”, not “that’s The Riddler”. I think Tennant’s manic energy he puts into the Doctor could easily be manipulated to make a very scary Riddler, but I wonder if the Riddler (along with the Penguin) might be too camp for these new Batman films. Though, if you would have told me that commercials featuring The Joker would frighten two years ago, I wouldn’t have believed you.

So, here’s hoping that I like The Dark Knight when I watch it because a) I’ve just been informed by my brother that it is un-American not to like it and b) I think I might agree. Here’s also hoping for a gangly, Scottish Riddler.

-Ani

Conquered?

I told the map on my wall last night, "I am f*cking conquering you!"

It didn't beleive me.

Bröderna Lejonhjärta (The Brothers Lionheart)

So, I feel like blogging about this despite the fact that it isn’t inside my usual blog-subjects. But—oh, well.

So, I’ve been a huge Astrid Lindgren fan for a long time. It started out with Pippi Longstocking and watching all the badly-dubbed old movies where Pippi somehow has a Brooklyn accent (go figure) and Annika sounds like she has a perpetual cold. Despite this, I wanted to be Pippi when I was a kid.

So, I’ve been meaning to read The Brothers Lionheart for a longtime, but the trouble with that is I can’t find it at my library and also I’m a purist. I don’t believe in changing characters’ names and such when they are translated out of one language and into another. The fact that Skorpan is named Scotty in the English books irritates me no-end.

But I digress: I watched Bröderna Lejonhjärta last night…in Swedish (with my limited knowledge of Swedish) and loved it. So, Bröderna Lejonhjärta is the story of young Karl “Skorpan” Lion and his older brother, Jonatan (in the book they’re ten and thirteen, in the movie they’re like ten and twenty). Skorpan is dying slowly of an illness and to quell his brothers fears Jonatan tells him stories of Nangijala (or Nangiyala in the English version), the land beyond the stars where all stories come from and where you go when you die.

While Jonatan is out one day, they’re house catches fire and Jonatan races inside to save Skorpan. He gets his younger brother on his back and jumps out the window in an effort to save him. Skorpan lives, but Jonatan dies in the fall.

A little while later, Skorpan dies of his illness. He wakes up in Nangijala and finds Jonatan there, fishing, and then they have a great time together and are happy and it’s all very lovely. But all is not well in Nangijala! The evil Tengil has taken slaves of the people, forcing them to build his castle and is keeping them in fear with a big dragon named Katla (built in England for 100,000 Swedish crowns and looking kinda corny, but whatever this movie was made in the 70s). When Orvar, the leader of the resistance movement Jonatan is part of, is captured by Tengil and imprisoned in Katla’s cave, the brothers set out to free him and save Nangijala.

***SPOILERS***

Okay, the movie can be looked at as a straight-up children’s movie, except for all the death. The book itself was disliked by some because of its dark themes and its use of suicide (I’ll get to that in a bit). Though, apparently, Astrid Lindgren said that she got the quickest and most excited response from this book more than any of her others.

So, in the end, the brothers go to destroy Katla after beating Tengil. Jonatan calls it to him with the horn that Tengil used to control it. And…it breathes fire on him. So, yes, they are able to defeat Katla, but Jonatan is injured. At the campfire that night, Jonatan tells Skorpan, “Katla burned me. I’m becoming paralyzed. I can’t feel my legs and, soon, I won’t be able to feel my arms.”

Sidenote to reader: Dragon burns make you paralyzed. Also, my online translator is crappy, so these translations aren’t spot-on.

Skorpan: Won’t you get better, after you rest a few days?

Jonatan: This isn’t something you better from. [pause] Do remember the fire?

Skorpan: I never forgot it.

Jonatan: Remember when we jumped out the window, and I came to Nangijala [i.e: died]? I was thinking we could do that again, off that precipice over there, to go to Nangilima.

Skorpan: [blahblahblah something about the spirit of Nangijala] Then I will do it, like you did for me, so it’ll be like-wise.

Jonatan: Do you dare, Skorpan Lionheart? [or perhaps: Dare you, Skorpan Lionheart]

So, yeah, they jump and as they’re falling Skorpan shouts: “I see it! I see the light, Jonatan! It’s Nangilima!"

I really like this movie, despite the fact I had no idea what people were saying most of the time. You really didn’t need the words. I understood that the brothers really, really loved each other and I got that we had to save Orvar and that Tengil was bad and Katla was fearsome.

In the end, I really was moved by the fact that Skorpan chose to sacrifice himself, like Jonatan did for him in the beginning, so that they’d be together in Nangilima. I disagree with the critics who argue that this makes it seem that suicide is okay, because that’s not the point. The point was that they loved each other, and that love trumped everything, so that nothing else mattered. I think that’s an amazing thought, an amazing point: love is better than life. If goes beyond our own selfish desires. I love that.

Fortress of Solitude?

These caves can be found in Mexico. I first saw this photo in a National Geographic article. I think they're amazing. Somehow, though, I can't help but be reminded of the Fortress of Solitude.