Sunday 26 June 2011

"Goodbye, Mr Anderson." "My name...is NEO!"

The Matrix.

I finally saw it after my friend lent all 3 DVDs to me. Well, firstly, I can see why people have compared it to Inception, with the whole dreaming/what is reality? theme. It's also different too, MUCH more dystopian. The plot's not quite as mind-bending as Inception, but there's still a fairly complex storyline.

The action scenes were spectacular, and so were the special effects. It's hard to believe it was made over 11 years ago. The famous bullet-dodging scene was just as cool as I'd expected, if not more, while the opening scene with Trinity (who I adore, by the way, with her being a non-damselly, completely awesome female lead) kicking the crap out everyone in the room left my jaw on the floor.

The whole look of the film was great, leading me to a couple of questions: 1. Just how much leather did they buy to make everyone's costumes?! and 2. Why is every scene inside the matrix so GREEN? I get the whole showing genre through tone thing, but really - do things need to be that green?!

I loved it, though. Can't wait to watch the second and third ones now!

Z

Sunday 19 June 2011

Take this pink ribbon off my eyes...

...I'm exposed
And it's no big surprise

Don't you think I know
Exactly where I stand
This world is forcing me
To hold your hand


I can’t actually remember when I knew I was a feminist. I know, I should be able to recall the exact moment when the light bulb went off over my head and I realised it. But I can’t. It was definitely after I started high school, maybe some time in Year 8? I think it just occurred to me one day that this anger I felt whenever someone said anything sexist, this disgust at the treatment of women in society, this want for equality between girls and guys...it had a name. Feminism.
 

Tuesday 14 June 2011

Book Review: Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

I read Never Let Me Go for the second time recently. It’s just as sad, profound and emotional as it was last time.

It’s hard to talk about NLMG without giving away the twist. When asked, you say, “Well, it’s about these 3 kids, and...” And then you stop, mouth open as you realise there’s not much else you can say. This twist is such a huge part of the novel – there would be no story without it – and yet saying it straight off ruins the mystery. So I’ll do my best to review it without major spoilers.

Saturday 11 June 2011

Musings on a lazy Saturday

Long weekend, yay! Plus we have next Friday off school because it's report-writing day.
It's a gorgeous Saturday...well, it was morning, but somehow it's slipped away into afternoon. It's been terribly cold this week since it's June, but outside it looks beautiful right now. The sun's shining and the sky is a wonderful clear blue, peeking through the branches of the gumtrees outside my window. (That all sounds so cliched-ly Australian, but it's true. I live near the coast, in a small town. It's not like this everywhere in Aus.)
Not much else to say. My friend's coming over this afternoon, it'll be awesome. And the Doctor Who final's on tonight, can't wait.
I need to get Jebdediah's new album from the library, and buy the new Arctic Monkeys one. J'adore AM <3
And I saw the clip for Boy & Bear's "Feeding Line" on Rage this morning, it's an amazing video clip. It doesn't make much sense, but God, the whole look of it is beautiful. The song's really good too. I was going to link to it, but it's not up on YouTube yet, grr. Look out for it!

That's all!
Enjoy the weekend, long or not :)
Z

Wednesday 8 June 2011

See, I can write about serious stuff too, sometimes!

My article is up on the Fbomb. Whoo-hoo!
It's here: Click the link! ---> http://thefbomb.org/2011/06/cat-calling-in-the-australian-senate/

If you have no idea what the Fbomb is, you are deprived. Fbomb is this *awesome* website where people (mostly young women, though not always) submit articles about feminist issues, and have discussions about it. Whether you don't know much about feminism or you're passionate about it, I highly recommend you check it out. As a proud feminist, I look through it regularly ^-^

My article's about the recent controversy with David Busby meowing at Penny Wong in the Senate. I've also done another article for the FBomb, about the sexist backlash against Julia Gillard when she became Prime Minister. You can read it here: http://thefbomb.org/2010/06/julia-gillard-and-why-we-still-need-feminism/ I wrote this, like, 5 days after JG became PM. Now it's nearly a year after she started ruling the country and I've lost a lot of faith in her; some of her policies have really disappointed me. I wrote the article before she'd become PM and let us down, but regardless of that, I still dispute the fact that everyone seemed to jump on the "She's a woman! She'll be crap!" bandwagon as soon as she moved into Rudd's office, before she'd even done anything in her capacity as leader.

So, there you go.
Check it out if you want,
Z