Sometimes it's easy to forget that we spend most of our time stumbling around the dark. Suddenly, a light gets turned on and there's a fair share of blame to go around.
SPOTLIGHT (2015) dir. Tom McCarthy
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda

Andulka
trying on a metaphor
Monterey Bay Aquarium

Janaina Medeiros
No title available
PUT YOUR BEARD IN MY MOUTH
Cosmic Funnies
Show & Tell
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@theartofmadeline

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let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open

Discoholic 🪩

❣ Chile in a Photography ❣
noise dept.
Not today Justin
DEAR READER
wallacepolsom

#extradirty
seen from United States
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seen from T1
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@abnormalpi
Sometimes it's easy to forget that we spend most of our time stumbling around the dark. Suddenly, a light gets turned on and there's a fair share of blame to go around.
SPOTLIGHT (2015) dir. Tom McCarthy
When life gives you bears… trick them into doing market research?
@mercuryjellyfish
What I really like about this is that the containers all have prominent labels with a camera pointing directly at them, but it’s still called a double-blind trial because the researcher isn’t present and the bear can’t read
Swords Into Plowshares | Before he becomes King Qian.
Wouldn’t leave my mind sorry
RYOMA TAKEUCHI as Shinya Suzuki 10Dance (2025) | Trailer
And for that matter why do we trust the narrative that Jefferson Wicks was Grace’s son?
None of the flashbacks actually show Grace being a “harlot”, or with any man, or pregnant, or being in any way motherly or even friendly towards Wicks. Prentice already had one child so who is to say that he didn’t have another illegitimate child and he used Grace as a cover, the same way that Wicks and Vera’s dad would later use Vera as a cover for Cy? It would explain the animosity between Prentice and Grace and why she was rightfully so pissed off when Prentice, in the end, left her with nothing. After she had shouldered his burden, with grace, for so many years.
I mean Prentice built a mausoleum for himself with TWO spots. For him and his son.
something deeply poetic about grandfather wicks playing the role of the snake in the garden in “tempting” grace to stay with the promise of inheritance, and then being the one to actually eat “eve’s apple” himself. all the while making everyone blame grace for sin that was entirely his own. the cross which grace tore down and which they never replaced so that they could hate and blame her for years to come, its absence ironically signifying the lack of faith and “god” in the church. wicks himself succumbing to temptation in the form of cyrus’ promise of his “cult of personality”, failing morally more than grace ever did. every man in the flock going out of their way to protect wicks for the same sin they’d been cursing grace over for years. samson who was betrayed not by his delilah, but by her faith in the misogyny that led to the diamond being in the crypt to begin with. samson who died because yet another man could not resist temptation……but somehow the apple is still “eve’s”
AND!! jud telling blanc “do these stories convince us of a lie? or do they resonate with something deep inside us that is profoundly true that we can’t express any other way except storytelling”
not “do these stories convince of a lie or a truth” because he wasn’t trying to convert blanc or prove his beliefs were right- he was trying to show him his why and that they believe in the same things because religion doesn’t (and shouldn’t) have to be so shameful
Ok just rewatched wudm and the thing that grabbed me the most this time around was how much of it was built on storytelling, narrative, and the relationship between fact and fiction. I think this film has some really interesting things to say on how we all rely on these narratives and storytelling devices, whether it's faith in God, detective stories, police procedurals, someone we trust, or our own mythologies to decipher real life when that isn’t always practical or truthful, but they can still bring us comfort anyway and there is always a reason to believe in something to a healthy capacity. What it lands on, that having faith in and grace for both ourselves and others is the most important/practical use of that belief to enact real change in the world, is just a perfect way to handle these themes without getting too meta (although the meta-ness of Blanc's aspect of this theme playing out is great and provided some much needed humbling for him).
I'm obsessed with the decision to give Monsignor Wicks' mother the name "Grace".
Something she was never given in life and certainly not in death. We're introduced to her as the "Harlot Whore" and what we're told of her is through the eyes of someone who despises her and sees her only as a sinner. Her only presence in her son's life is the outline of where a cross once was, memorialising an untrue version of past events.
For all the years that Monsignor Wicks has been head priest of that church, that's all that has ever been of Grace. He built a church of hate on the bedrock of her shame and hate. Her memory is one of sin and temptation. Her legacy is a fairytale where she is the wicked mother and the wicked daughter. Her name is never uttered; she is simply the "Harlot Whore".
Her son does not know the truth about her until sixty years have passed and even then, he does not show her grace, instead only thinking of himself. He does not see her as the person she was; as the desperate woman trapped under the thumb of her controlling father and his church who is denied the escape she was promised. He doesn't think of her at all, he thinks instead, ironically, of how he himself can escape this church.
She is not given one ounce of grace until after her son dies, sixty years later. It's only when another woman, similarly trapped by Grace's controlling father and his church, confesses the truth that she is finally given the grace she has deserved for over sixty years. When the truth comes out and she is shown to be a person, however flawed, and not some caricature with only hate in her heart. And only then does Martha, the other woman, finally see that herself and show Grace grace.
And that's what the whole movie is about. Showing grace to one another, being kind and being caring and helping our fellow man.
The movie ends with Grace's presence and memory in the church being put to rest as Father Jud puts up a new cross, which so happens to have Eve's Apple hidden on it.
Though it's sixty years late, Father Jud makes sure to give Grace both her namesake and the key to the escape she was promised.
Man, these movies are fucking good.
Rian Johnson was a genius for creating a franchise where the conceit is a Sherlock-Holmes-style detective is paired with a new Watson every movie who is also the film’s heart. It goes such a long way towards making each movie truly its own. I want a billion of these, Rian.
It isn't just that Knives Out protagonists win by being kid and steadfast. They win by sticking to what it is they're good at. What they've been called to do, as thankless and as demeaning as those jobs can sometimes make them feel. They didn't play the "game" like Benoit did. They just did what they knew they were good at.
Marta wins because she was a nurse and a caregiver before anything else. She wins the inheritance because she gave Harlan companionship, not just medical care. She gets the truth out of Ransom because she acted as a nurse, trying to save Fran even though she still dies in the end. Had Harlan just fucking listened to the actual medical expert in the room instead of himself, he would have lived.
Helen wins because she's a third-grade teacher—her job is literally educating, caring for, and looking out for kids. Glass Onion isn't just the working class vs the wealthy, it's an actual functioning adult woman vs a bunch of adult-sized toddlers, whining and throwing temper tantrums and thinking only of themselves. She plays games with her third graders, and in the end she wins by making a game of destroying everything Miles ever held dear, even getting the others to side with her.
Jud wins because he's an actual fucking priest, who actually embodies everything his god taught. He doesn't try to poach Wick's "flock" or anything, nor does he allow himself to surrender to anger and vindictiveness in the way Wick did. Jud is absolved of all his crimes because he just wants to do good by his church, in the name of his god.
Just as Blanc is an excellent detective, so too are these three spectacular at their jobs.
Rian Johnson and Daniel Craig just keep reiterating the same points in every film and I do love them for it.
• Respect the working class
• Fucking respect women.
• Listen to the local queer person who is excellent at their jobs and you will go far.
• Be kind in a cynical world.
I love how, in Wake Up Dead Man, all men was looking for Eve's heart ruby or something, and all the women weren't that interested in that jewel because I guess they all have one in their chest. As for Grace, the Eve's heart is more like the heart that was taken away from her by her own father and the cruel side of the religion (read: the patriarchy). She was desperately needing her heart back, to be human again.
I know this is reaching. I just wanna let this out. As a fan of Jung Seo Kyung, I'm disappointed with the Vietnam plot in Little Women, as a Vietnamese. But again, Little Women is still an excellent show despite its...wrongs.
But Tempest, what is this? What is that fucking political plot involving indirectly Iraq? What even is this plot implying? Was the subtitle wrong or mistranslated?
This plot seems to imply that the North Korean defectors are lying to trick the U.S. into a war. By drawing a parallel to Iraq, is the show suggesting that the U.S. was the victim of deception rather than the architect of a false pretext? Are they arguing that Iraq 'tricked' the U.S. into invasion, absolving American leadership of the decision to launch a war over non-existent WMDs?
If this isn't the intended message, and it's merely a red herring. If the point is simply that a new Korean War would be a catastrophic waste of life (which is true), then this is a terrible way to make it. Why twist history to make the aggressor look like the victim? There are better ways to argue against war and not dick-riding the U.S without being intellectually dishonest.