Fairytale gone bad, part I

♫ Indica – Lilja's Lament

I'm surprised to see I've got some new readers again. *gasp* You are all warmly welcome aboard.

Today I'm going to write about some revamped fairytales. I really liked fairytales when I was a kid, and basically I still do. However, having heard the traditional variations once or twice or too many times, I've got more and more interested in their alternative versions. Certainly, these ideas are not particularly new. Traditional stories have been used as an inspiration source in literature, movies, game industry... You name it.

One of my favourite titles is Ludwig Revolution, which I already briefly mentioned in my A-B-C~! post. It's a manga series by Kaori Yuki (whose most famous series is Angel Sanctuary, which hasn't yet got me on my knees). To cut a long story short; I was a much more avid anime and manga fan at teenage, and back then I went through hundreds of unknown titles. I never knew mainstream particularly well. However, I read many somewhat-entertaining titles, but after all these years, I can only remember a few which really stood out from the rest. Ludwig Kakumei, in other words Ludwig Revolution, was one of those.

The main character Ludwig is basically a prince, or the prince of many well-known fairytales. However, not all the stories revamped included a prince in the first place in their original versions, but what-bloody-ever; why not make Little Red Riding Hood run into Ludwig anyway?

"My face isn't my only useful feature. It's magnificent when I take off my clothes too."

"From the moment birth flings them unprepared into this world, humans are lonely creatures. Don't think that you'll gain anything just by sitting around waiting for something to be handed to you. So long, 'sleeping beauty'." 

Another title I really truly like is probably also much better known; Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. On the other hand it doesn't question the course of Alice's original adventure in her childhood as it tells a story of what happened when she returned there on the threshold of adulthood.

And the Wonderland turns out to be entirely mad, doesn't it? At least it's probably much darker and more violent than it was in Alice's childhood.

Some people said that the movie probably proved that Tim Burton had been cooperating with Johnny Depp for too long. I can barely agree because I liked Depp as the Mad Hatter. He was probably the strongest character – I mean, the most harmonious, the most interesting personality, the strength that kept the movie in one piece. While Alice was a bit flat, Mad Hatter saved the day.

Colleen Atwood won an Academy Award for best costume design for Alice in Wonderland, and in my opinion she truly deserved the award. Mad Hatter and the Red Queen looked amazing and imaginative. On the other hand the movie won the best art direction award as well – and it can barely be denied; it's full of eye candy.

Since this theme is of great interest to me, I'll probably delve more into revamped fairytales and eventually write more blog posts about them. I wonder if the new movie Red Riding Hood is worth watching? I think I read it got a bad reception. In 2012 Untitled Snow White will also be released – maybe it's something to look forward to?
So long (sleeping beauties)!

Reading can be risky for women on the verge

♫ Turisas – To Holmgard and beyond

A while ago a friend and I ordered some books from Amazon, and a while I go I fetched them from the post office. And this is what I got:

Alice in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass. I'd been thinking of buying it for such a long time, but I'd never bothered to order it all alone. I'd been waiting for a time when I'd have something else to purchase too. I guess it's a must for me to own, because:

We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.
- Cheshire Cat

Through the Looking Glass is relatively strange to me still, I've never had chances to familiarize myself with it. Reading it at the moment.

I don't know why exactly I got the urge to buy Tim Burton's poems. Might be all the movies I've watched? Anyway, the book is awesome. I'm very picky when it comes to poetry. I want poems to really have some ingenious language, not necessarily rhymes, but something. I easily regard modern poetry as wannabe arty, and thus, rarely like it. However, Burton's poetic language was brilliant, and the stories were hilarious. I guess I could relate to Voodoo Girl:

But she knows she has a curse on her,
a curse she cannot win,
For if someone gets
too close to her,
the pins stick farther in.

Last but not least, I also bought something that's supposed to be useful.

AdamsMorioka & Terry Stone's Color Design Workbook, which is supposed to be of some help in my thesis work. I hope it'll also be... Although the whole thesis work frustrates the hell out of me. I realized I rather read fairytales than anything that'd help me to graduate.
I guess this is it for now, so long!

So I fell in love with an uncommonly gentle man

♫ Waves Under Water – Serpents and the tree

I don't like Sundays. They usually turn out useless, as I wake up very late, but know I'd better go to bed relatively early. What could I try to do if I could comfortably be awake for only ten hours? No wait, I could try not to screw up my sleeping pattern during weekends, but that's no fuuuuuun... I guess it's somewhat alright to be inefficient every now and then. A friend and I tend to talk about Sunday angst, which basically means that you cannot enjoy your day off since you know the following day will be Monday. At worst, Sunday angst begins on Saturday, when you think that Monday is the day after tomorrow... I'm not saying that working is like hell, I just don't like early mornings – that's it.

Anyway. After watching Beetlejuice I had to entertain myself with another Tim Burton movie too. About the time for Edward Scissorhands too – I really had not seen it earlier, although I had wanted to. However, I'm lazy to do anything about the movies I'd like to see... It really took me this long, I should have watched it about twenty years ago. Okay well, at least ten years ago, maybe it wouldn't have been too good for me to watch it at the beginning of the 90's... However, I had seen lots of pictures of Edward, and I'd always been fascinated by his attire, and many sharp objects – such as scissors, knives and swords – are beautiful in their own right.

I've learnt that my opinions often differ from the masses, and thus, I was not certain at all that I would like Edward Scissorhands, although I know what kind of people usually like it. I was rather surprised to find out it really struck a chord with me. Johnny Depp has never stirred up strong emotions in me. I've seen him in only a few movies, thought he's okayish, rather flexible and such... But well, he did awesome job as Edward, making him so disarming.

I really liked the mansion in the movie, it was visually so stunning. All in all, a wonderful movie.

On Friday I decided to watch Coraline. I think I had even considered going to watch it in a movie theater, but I guess I forgot... The main reason for me wanting to watch it would be because it is an animation, another reason could be the director Henry Selick – who also directed The Nightmare Before Christmas. I think there were some common aspects between the visuals in those two movies – I wonder if the art departments comprise same talents...

However, Coraline was a little disappointment. It was entertaining, nice, relatively interesting... But not fantastic. For some reason, I couldn't really root for any of the characters. I guess it was worth watching once, but maybe not twice...

I need to find more interesting movies with fantasy or macabre elements that are not full of gore horror... But I guess now I'll just go curl my hair. So long!

I've finally seen the exorcist...

♫ Gary Moore – Over the hills and far away

I'm not a Monday girl. Yesterday was pretty frustrating. I felt like anyone could tell the day of the week by looking at me... A typical Monday morning I suppose: I put on a grey shirt in a hurry, then I notice my bra with a butterfly motif is showing through, then I grab a pinstriped vest to save the situation, but realize (once I've put it on already) that it's low-cut in such a way that it doesn't cover that part of the chest. And then, I have to hurry over to the bus stop. Being aware of the fact that the vest doesn't suit my skirt...
Maybe a tasty glass of absinthe-coloured apple soda at Café Europa with a friend was better than an average Monday.

Tuesday was better. I wasn't in such a hurry in the morning, didn't have a remarkable bad hair day and I figured out that my new skirt goes well with my relatively short Ashbury Heights T-shirt.

Sure you can disagree, but I personally liked being able to hide the hem of the shirt. I don't think I had a particularly creative day otherwise, just a regular work day. I would very much like to dress nicely every day as I really like it, but I'm bad at planning outfits ahead. Well – excluding special occasions, but I have a very, very hard time deciding my everyday clothes. I guess I don't give it any thought earlier than when I'm applying make-up in the morning... Results are like this.
I guess I look young? Girlish rather than feminine... The last time someone guessed my age they said sixteen. More than half a decade wrong...

I love the back print of this shirt. However, I am not trying to be particularly provocative. I've once heard that's "horrifying". At work the coffee table is located behind my back. Had I known there would be a meeting (=others gathering behind my back, I didn't participate) today, I would either have chosen something else to wear, or I wouldn't have taken off the blouse I had on top of that. I don't care about what our clients or co-operating companies think of my style, but I do care of what they think of the company because of me. Now I only hope the scary businessman didn't notice or didn't care.

Photowhoring is a strange issue to me. I may do that a lot (or I'm not sure if it is a lot compared with someone else) but I rarely publish those photos anywhere, mostly because I'm such a perfectionist and my appearance is far from perfect. I know that facial distortions and other such things I think I see are somewhat fake, since I'm used to seeing a reflection of myself and not the "real me". However, I guess photos reveal such things that are real, such as my skin flaws...

That said, my blog won't be all about me showing off myself. However, I think I have to break the ice with some photos anyway. :D

No need to tell me I'm holding the camera wrong. Had I done it in such a way right-handed people usually do, my hand would have been in front of my face. Though I'm not sure if it's necessary to see that arrogant expression...

And speaking of something else, I finally watched Beetlejuice today. I did it because of the vinyl wall art quote I posted here earlier. Not that I wouldn't have enjoyed the other Tim Burton movies I've seen... which are few and far between. I'm not a movie geek.
Well, the 1980's = instant win, I guess. I'm not into live action horror movies because I don't like gore and splatter at all. I would barely watch horror movies with the age limit of 18. However, Beetlejuice was exactly the type of macabre yet slightly bizarre horror that I enjoy. However, I couldn't root for Betelgeuse himself that much. (His speech was just a bit annoying. Difficult to follow every now and then, I had no subtitles...) Somehow I found Adam and Barbara very agreeable.

He reminds me of someone, but I'm not exactly sure who... Anyway, it might be Edward Scissorhands' turn next, maybe tomorrow. I admit I haven't yet seen that movie either... So long!