Going the Distance

So, I just realized (today) that as of maybe a week ago, Benson and I have been dating for over 10 years now. We've never celebrated dating anniversaries or anything, and I don't know the exact day we did start, to be honest, just that it was a few days before the Superbowl, which is a thing that I can look up. (I just remember being super giddy and seeing the Superbowl up on a screen in the student center, so I can't really get much more specific then that. Kind of random how memory works sometimes.) We've been doing the long distance thing since graduation, which means of that 10 years, 6.5+ of them have been long distance. 

So! To celebrate/brag/give support to other LDRers on this occasion, here are some date suggestions and general advice for things that we've done long distance. I don't claim uniqueness or creativity for any of these, by the way... I've definitely looked at ALL the articles online on doing stuff long distance. 

- Talk. Skype. Call. Figure out what times of day work and just schedule when you can make time for each other, and make this HIGH priority in your life, even if you are going crazy with homework or presentations or paper writing.

- DON'T talk. You have a ton of work to do? So do they? Just put Skype up in the background and work on your stuff in companionable silence where you can occasionally glance up and smile at the other person and listen to them working while they try and figure out why their code isn't working, dammit, and you wrestle with trying to find the bit in this stupid paper that is relevant to your research. It doesn't even need to be work, just hang out and browse the internet together. Leading to...

- Youtube videos, articles, and general internetness. Just, if you are doing nothing and interneting or listening to music on your own (or simultaneously on each end of the line), if you find and interesting article or video... link it or play it back and forth. You know how the "oh that reminds me of this other thing" chain goes. Similarly, things like Podcasts and audiobooks and music *CAN* be listened to at the same time over Skype. 

- Music! You can play music together and sing separately/together. Just rocking out to Bohemian Rhapsody together or putting on some Sondheim and singing along to Sweeney Todd. Benson and I have also gone another route a couple times -- he plays the violin, so he's played some jigs and reels on his end while I danced to them on this end.

-Games. Games with remote co-op like Monaco or Castle Crashers or Portal (which we often do over Steam, which has the nice chat and voice chat options). Or Vassal is a free system where you can download and remotely play many different board/card/dice games, including straight up cards. We often play cards, or games like Pandemic or Ghost Stories. We've also both just gotten our own physical decks of cards and played things like Cribbage or other games where you don't have to actually interact extensively with the discard pile and it doesn't really matter if you are playing with 2 separate decks. You can also just separately play games and recommend them to each other and discuss strategy, of course. But I'm assuming that "tell your partner about things that interest you and you think they might like" is pretty much understood in a relationship, long distance or not. Actually, it can be pretty darn fun to watch your partner play something you've already done as you wait for something awesome to pop up so you can watch their surprise and delight. (Stanley Parable, I'm looking at you. Benson literally just watched me play that game as I DEVOURED it and he kept laughing at me as I worked through it and was being boggled and bemused at different parts of the game. It was quite fun.) Online puzzle games are also an option -- we have finished all but a few levels of the NotPron online riddle, and are currently working on the Tim Tang Test. We've both worked together and separately on the puzzles. We keep the solutions as we get them in a file in Dropbox, naturally. Also, good to note that screen sharing can be quite useful for solving puzzles and things like that. 

-Many many movies and TV shows. Download the thing, Dropbox it, get on Skype and IM and count down from 5 and press play at the same time, then mute them and chat on IM about the thing as you watch. We usually have multiple TV shows that we've got in the Dropbox so that depending on our mood we can go comedy, fantasy, sci-fi, drama, etc. We keep up with a number of shows (ie Game of Thrones, Agent Carter, Hannibal, Mad Men, Doctor Who, Mushishi, etc), but also glut on old shows we're interested in (ie. Farscape, The Wire, Twilight Zone, Arrested Development). Movies are generally for weekends where we have more time, and keep those in the box as well. 

- Books and stories. You can read the same books at the same time, separately, and discuss them, of course, like Benson and I did on the Game of Thrones series. You can ALSO just take turns reading back and forth chapter by chapter, like we're currently doing with Dune. Also, short stories are great for this. I've read Benson a bunch of fairy tales before bed, and am now going through Kipling's Just So Stories for short stories. 

-Write/be creative.  As per the previous suggestion, Benson has been reading to me from Burton's Book of One Thousand and One Nights. And from that, we're working on a grand index together, summarizing the events of each story, which level of story it is (meaning, tale within a tale within a tale and which tale it is within), and where Scheherazade breaks off the story each night and which night it is. We're keeping the master file in the dropbox and splitting it up by story. I imagine this could work for other types of things, too.

- A wild and crazy blast from the past: Actually write letters. Physical letters. We've not been doing this one since Benson moved to England, but let me tell you personally, the joy of getting an actual physical letter is well worth the 49 cents it costs within the US. And you can do stuff like write in cyphers or with constricted writing that you don't tell your partner what the key or rule was and they have to figure it out themselves. Or make crosswords and word searches for each other. Or send sketches. Or puzzle pieces. Or care-packages of goodies, of course, though this is more expensive.

- Cooking. What? Yes. Cooking. We've only done this a couple times, usually on special occasions like Valentine's Day, and it takes some planning. But. Choose a recipe, and each of you buy the ingredients. Then set up your computer in your kitchen so you can Skype. Start sautéing, or chopping, or prepping each ingredient at the same time. Alternatively, you can just eat and/or drink together without syncing to quite that degree.

- Time Zones suck. But sometimes it's totally worth it to go sleep deprived for certain things if you are both eager to do the thing together. This is why Benson got up at 6am to watch the Breaking Bad finale with me while I watched it at 1am here. And yesterday we did the same thing for the premiere of Better Call Saul. And when our time zone difference was a little less dramatic we'd do stuff like watch the State of the Union together.

There are many other things you can do, of course, but this is a good selection. But I feel that making the relationship and time together a priority is the most important thing for making things work. Within that, you can be pretty creative. Keeping positive, planning out visits and things to do together in the future, also good. And for us, Dropbox and Skype are apparently the key to our relationship. Thank goodness for modern technology!

Beautiful Cars update!

Just a quick picture -- my Dad hasn't sold the car yet, so I got to drive it around the park last month when I visited home. It was quite a treat!

Beautiful Cars and Driving Lessons

Chatting with my parents on the phone today, I discovered that my dad is selling the gorgeous old convertible, that he inherited from his dad, on eBay. I think I last drove this car more than 10 years ago, the first time I learned to drive stick shift, right after getting my drivers license in high school. Now, I say the first time I learned stick because I re-learned how to drive manual and got a heck of a lot more comfortable with it about 3 years later, in college, on a different car -- still learning from my dad, but on a Honda from the late 90's(?), rather than on the gorgeous old Mercedes from the early 60's that he was rather (and rightfully) protective of. The second time, on the Honda, I got comfortable driving it every day to and from the girl scout camp where I was working all summer. The first time, on the Mercedes, it was just around a parking lot, around a cemetery, around a park -- not on any major roads -- after I had already gotten comfortable on an automatic. That time it was mainly so that I'd get the theory down and be ABLE TO DO IT rather than be comfortable with it, I think. I've written before (even just in my last entry) about my dad's insistence (and my subsequent gratitude) that everyone should know how to drive a manual transmission car. 

I can't claim to be a car person in the sense of knowing tons about different cars or having a big mechanical aptitude -- I don't really know anything more technical than how to (and this is just in theory because I've never done it, only watched) change a tire or change oil. However, I *am* a car person in the fact that when I see a gorgeous car, I stop and look and drool a bit (usually figuratively, that, but only usually). I appreciate how beautiful they can be, and how lovely they are when they are running just as they should, and when a lovely car in the street, or on a television show to which I am semi-guiltily addicted, or on a website I'm browsing, or wherever, I can't help but stop and admire it. And I truly enjoy driving (though not in heavy traffic, no one likes driving in traffic). Give me a nice, hilly, up and down country road; or the twists and turns of CA-1 up the coast; or honestly just the car radio and a bit of lightly traffic'ed interstate through Pennsylvania to let loose my thoughts, and I'm content. I drove about 1400 miles from Cambridge to Manchester, to Edinburgh, to the Isle of Skye and back one over a period of a week this past summer. Parts of it were miserable, with stop and go traffic, and of course driving for LONG periods of time -- especially driving manual -- left me stiff and with a sore left leg. But the parts where I was flying through the Scottish countryside? Or driving around Skye's coast, occasionally stopping and admiring vistas? Those parts were utterly fantastic. Partly because of my love of travel and seeing new sites, but also partly because of that feeling of "WHEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!"

The number one purchase I think about if someone asks me what I'd do if I ever won the lotto (not that I actually ever play the lotto unless my grandfather gives me a scratch off ticket) is an increasingly detailed dream car. And the image of that dream car is based off of this one. This car -- the one that my grandparents used to drive up to our house when I was little; that's been sitting in my parent's garage since I was about 16 -- old enough to be thinking more seriously about learning to drive and getting my license and whatnot. This car has been around all my life and all my formulative years regarding car beauty. This dream car that I shall purchase first thing with my imaginary lotto winnings, in case anyone is interested, is a sporty little convertible with has a body shape that looks suspiciously like this car -- only with all the amenities that one wants in a car like air conditioning, a working radio, a clock, and an actual back seat. My dream car is is a lovely shade of silvery-blue; is one of those cars that can be driven either in manual or automatic -- because manual is FUN in the right situations, but you sure don't want to drive one uphill in a city with stop and go traffic; is a hybrid -- because the other car, the *automatic* car, that I learned to drive on was a Prius, and I like to be environmentally conscientious and gas prices are only going up and yes in this fantasy I've already won the lotto but still. 

Anyway, I am kind of hoping my dad doesn't sell it before I visit home at the end of the month, since I'd love to take it out for one spin in the cemetery or something, just because DAMN. How often do you get to drive that kind of car? (Damn in the "ain't that fine" sense, not in the "cursing the world" sense). Like I said, I don't think I've been allowed to drive it in 10 years -- it rarely came out of the garage, for one thing, except for the occasional 'Fall leaf drive' and other quiet meanderings through the park. I certainly don't begrudge him of it if he sells it off before that, though -- I mean, I certainly could have asked before this to drive it again. I'm pretty sure I even have, a few times, but again, he's been protective of it and I'm not on the insurance or anything as a driver and I haven't had all that much stick practice in the past few years. But. It would be nice. And I *have* been practicing my stick shift lately, even if it was with the opposite hand and on the wrong side of the road. So maybe. We shall see. Either way, it will be sad when it goes. It's a lovely car. But hopefully it will go to someone who will appreciate it, who will fix it up and take it nice places, and who will keep it in good condition, and will be able to spend time enjoying it.

Travelogue: Scotland

Eilean Donan Castle

Having never been to the UK before, I really wanted to see some parts of it that were a bit further afield. So it is important to grab opportunities to travel when they come. Last week, there was a mini nova conference near Manchester, just the local astronomers around the UK which they hold every 6 months or so, kind of informal but a good opportunity to see other astronomers who focus on novae and even some of my collaborators that I rarely see face to face. This was actually held on my birthday -- I made some comments to Benson about this, saying that the ONE DAY I knew I had to work ALL SUMMER without taking off was, of course, the day I'd most want to NOT work and take off and celebrate. So, anyway, the day prior, I rented a car, then woke up at 6:15am on my birthday to drive 3 hours to the conference (with Benson navigating/snoozing in the passenger seat -- he just worked in a nearby library the whole day while I was chatting with folk).

Benson and I at Jodrell Bank

All in all, it was a decent birthday (terrible traffic aside) - I had a lot of good conversations with people, talked about science, got some feedback on my research, and so on. But because we were already going up towards Manchester, Benson and I reasoned it was a good time to just keep going north. Which is why we rented the car for a full week and spent a long weekend in Scotland! So, after spending a chunk of Friday afternoon visiting a collaborator at the Jodrell Bank Observatory (the central hub for the radio telescope array eMERLIN, which is spread over the UK -- we got quite a nice tour of the facility, in fact) we drove up to Edinburgh. Our first night was a simple one -- we just checked into our hostel (which was made entirely of shipping containers and absurdly inexpensive), went into town and walked around old town. There, I lusted over the multitude of plaid clothing that was *everywhere* (if you ever look through my wardrobe, you may notice that I have a fondness for it), and, more importantly, went for dinner and drinks. Naturally, I had to have haggis for my first ever trip to Scotland... followed by four shots of whisky (divided by two, though, since Benson and I split them). You see, we deliberately went to a place called Whiski, which I would highly recommend, which has 300 different whiskies available for tasting. Which is a good selection, I think. We actually went back again on Monday night to get 3 more shots. Benson is a BIG whisky connoisseur, so I pretty much let him chose what we got. Between the 2 tastings, we got one whiskey from each of the regions -- Highlands, Lowlands, Islays, Speyside, Campbeltown, and the Islands, plus an extra Lowlands -- I don't quite recall what we got, honestly, you'd have to ask Benson -- but they were all very good. I tend to prefer whiskies that don't have an overly strong peat taste and that are smoother, but I'm also not that fussy or knowledgable about the whole thing. I know more now than I did at the beginning of the weekend though.

The next morning, we arose from our shipping containers,  bright and shiny early, and drove to the Isle of Skye. Which was a lovely drive across the lowlands and highlands, going through a national park at one point. Now, you'll note that I was driving. Benson hasn't really driven since he got his license 10 years ago, and doesn't really trust himself behind the wheel. Whereas, I actively enjoy driving (assuming no traffic). This was my first experience driving in Britain, however, and it took some getting used to not only DRIVING on the wrong side of the road (and through endless roundabouts), but also shifting gears with my left hand. Manual cars are the norm in the UK, and much cheaper to rent, you see. My dad taught me how to drive stick shift when I was in college -- he kept a manual car around in part for this purpose, and had me drive said car to my camp job over the summer every day, so I'd get used to it. So it's a useful skill! I never finished writing up my last summer's activities (whoops) but this came in handy last year when we were in Italy, as well -- we stayed at a friend of Benson's house, and borrowed his grandfathers car. Which was stick. And I was the only one of the four of us that could drive -- which made me the designated driver throughout the Italian countryside, and enabled us to see much more of it than we would have been able to otherwise. So worth holding back a bit more on those italian wines....

Anyway, the Isle of Skye was GORGEOUS. We did a lot of hiking over the weekend, drove all around the island, had lots of delicious fresh seafood (and were even taught how to shuck oysters by the proprietor of the wonderful Oyster Shed), saw a TON of sheep (sheep EVERYWHERE), visited the Portree harbor, and, naturally, toured the Talisker Whisky Distillery. Talisker is one of Benson's favorite whiskies, so we got to sample a few very nice ones, too. We stayed at a lovely little B&B which overlooked the Eilean Donan Castle in the town of Dornie (not on the Isle of Skye itself, but within driving distance). After we spent a very nice 2 days in Skye, we headed back to Edinburgh, to explore the town a bit more in depth. We still mainly wandered -- I bought myself some plaid items as souvenirs, we had more delicious food, more whisky at Whiski, visited the main castle there, and climbed up Arthur's seat for a gorgeous view of the city. All in all, a good trip! Now, we're back in Cambridge again, which means... we should probably start thinking about buying tickets and planning our trip to Greece for the last week of August. Yeah... things to get on soon...

The view from Arthur's Seat

Cooking in Cambridge

So again, I'm spending the summer in Cambridge, visiting Benson. Both of us very much enjoy cooking, and I've been eating better here then I usually do at home, since usually at least *one* of us feels like cooking, and it's a  lot more fun to cook for two then to cook for one. So, the result of this is that Benson and I have made breakfast (or brunch) at least once every weekend since I've arrived, which has been pretty awesome. I actually brought to England with me a small bottle of maple syrup which I bought in New Hampshire last week as a gift to Benson -- it's already over half gone!
We've done pancakes, omelets, Dutch Baby, the world's best scrambled eggs, Challah french toast (from scratch -- with my friend Zahava's amazing homemade Challah recipe), and this weekend we made Oeufs en Cocotte (eggs in a pot). I'd never heard of these before (and thus had never made them before), but while we were browsing in a kitchenware store (looking for a cheese grater, amongst other things) we stumbled across these little ceramic mini-casserole dishes which were just too cute for me to pass up (my one true weakness: kitchenware). So, while commenting to Benson, waiting in line, that I had no idea what we would make with them but I had to have them anyway, the lady in front of us suggested making Cocette - a french dish she knew, with eggs and ham all made in a tiny ramekin - perfect for the little crockery we were purchasing. So, with help from Google, we had this for brunch this morning.



Oeufs en Cocotte
4 eggs
150 grams (5.5 oz) créme fraiche
nutmeg (a pinch)
salt and pepper (to taste)
handful of fresh chopped dill
butter
Optional additions: chopped up ham, bacon bits, asparagus, smoked salmon, cheese, anything else that might go in a delicious eggy breakfast dish!




This dish was quite easy to make - first, preheat the oven to 180C/350F (switching units of measurements for temperature and cooking in England has been a tad aggravating, I admit, but I'm getting used to it). Mix the créme fraiche with dill, salt and pepper, and a dash of nutmeg in a small bowl. Then, butter 4 ramekins (we just did this in the 2 little dishes, but ramekins are usually smaller) completely, and put  a generous spoonful of the creamy mix in the bottom of each one. If you are adding ham, cheese, or other things, put those in next (we just used ham, which was a nice addition), and crack an egg on top of that (in our crockeries we put 2 eggs, since they were large enough). Finally, put a dallop of the créme fraiche mix on top of all of this, and put another sprinkle of salt and pepper and a dash of dill to garnish. Put your ramekins in a baking pan, and fill the pan with warm to hot water until it comes halfway up the side of the ramekins. Bake for 15-20 minutes, until the eggs have set nicely.

These are great. I particularly like the taste that the dill gives to the recipe - dill is something I really like but don't actually go out and get very often (it doesn't dry well in my opinion, fresh is the way to go, and I usually don't buy a lot fresh herbs because they only come in huge packs at the store and they go bad before I can use them all). I also associate the taste and smell of dill with my grandmother (on my dad's side) -- she was a fantastic cook, and I don't think I encountered dill very often anywhere other than her house when I was little, so it's a pretty strong sensory memory associated with her. Can't have it without thinking about her. Anyway, so yes, a delicious brunch, and pretty easy to do, if you have ramekins.

Dinner is also a thing Benson and I have been making, obviously. So we also recently made the *best* chicken wings I've ever made in my life. We combined two recipes for the task -- first, Korean chicken wings are amazing, so we found a recipe for the sauce used in San Tung Fried chicken wings (here). We lack a deep fryer, however, so instead we decided to bake our chicken wings. However, the best thing about Korean chicken wings is how deliciously crispy they are. Which means we managed to discover a recipe which crispifies chicken wings in the oven extremely well instead (here)! We modified the crispy bit a little.


Crispy, Oven-baked San Tung Chicken Wings
Wings:
4 lbs chicken wings
2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup flour

Sauce:
2-3 scallions
10-15 cilantro sprigs
2-3 tbs soy sauce
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup water
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 tbs rice vinegar (we substituted apple cider vinegar mixed with white wine)
1 tsp chili garlic sauce or red peppers (AKA - Sriracha sauce!)

Preheat the oven to 250F (yes, two hundred fifty, not a typo). Pat the chicken wings dry. Mix baking powder, flour, and salt and sprinkle/coat the chicken wings with the mix -- you don't want to heavily coat your wings, because then they taste like baking powder, but you want to cover them well. This is the agent which is going to make your chicken wings crispy! You can add the flour mix through a sifter or a mesh strainer to sprinkle it lightly over the wings if you would like, rather than rolling it in the flour mix to coat it.

You are going to bake the wings on a wire rack -- so you want to put the rack on a cookie sheet, with aluminum foil covering the sheet (for easier cleaning). Then evenly arrange the wings, skin side up, in a single layer on the rack and bake at 250F for 30 minutes (this dries out the skin). Then, increase the temperature of the wings to 425F for 40-50 minutes more, rotating the sheet halfway through. The wings should be lovely and crispy and brown at this point, so take them out and let sit for 5 minutes. Then, simply toss in the sauce until they're all coated and delicious.

Ah yes, the sauce. Also an important thing you should make. The sauce is quite easy though -- just mix all the ingredients in a sauce pan, put on low-medium heat, and simmer (stirring frequently) for 5-10 minutes until it has thickened. We found that starting the sauce right after you rotate the chicken wings is about the right amount of time, giving you 20 minutes or so.

These are AMAZING. We served them over rice -- we actually made a half recipe, which was plenty for two with the rice. But for a larger group, make more!

So, all in all, having a lovely time in Cambridge. I've also gone into London 3 times now -- once as described in the last post, once for a live show of a comedy radio program I really like, and once to go to the Victoria and Albert museum as well as to track down the *best scotch egg* in London. We succeeded in this second task, finding ourselves in a really great Michelin star pub for lunch which served game and had *perfect* venison sausage covered scotch eggs. That was a good day!

Until next time!

An American Abroad

So, as I may or may not have mentioned, I'm spending this summer in Cambridge, England, where Benson works as a postdoc. I've been here almost three weeks now, and overall, I'm just very content and happy. I've settled in here pretty well.

I've got official visitor status at the IOA now, and am moving from desk to desk as various astro grad students are on vacation, or working in the library when no desks are available. The people here are friendly and interesting to talk to, I've been having good conversations about science and about non-science things, too. I'm chatting with the grad students at lunch and during coffee and afternoon tea (both of which are daily here... which is good except it makes it overly easy to take breaks and not be working!). My paper is coming along, not as far as I would have liked, but I feel like I'm making progress. After work, Benson and I cook nice dinners together on almost a daily basis, then hang out, watch TV, play games, or even work a bit at home. Or we bike into Cambridge and watch 'football' (aka soccer) at a pub with some of his friends, or go to the market (there is a very nice market in the town square), or watch movies at his department. Watching the world cup has been a lot of fun here -- even if the USA is now out. We watched the USA/Belgium game at the "Isaac Newton Pub," where apparently a bunch of Americans had gathered to watch the game. (Our keen senses picked up on this when people on the other side of the pub started belting out the National Anthem at the beginning of the game -- of course, the Americans at OUR table then joined in as well.) Quite a gripping game, even if we got out at the end. Tomorrow for the 4th, we're going to a pub with a German friend of Benson's to watch the Germany/France game, then are going to wander the town and do *something* vaguely patriotic or celebratory, I suppose -- perhaps we can find other Americans out and about.

Benson's flat has the most gorgeous view out the back of a huge field and trees and whatnot in the distance. I'm biking to work every morning past horses (well, one field of them, anyway), but the town center is like 10 minutes by bike, extremely easy to get to, we go in pretty regularly.  And honestly, the IOA couldn't be closer to the department, it's like an 8 minute walk, which means it is barely even a bike ride. EVERYBODY bikes here, the town is *quite* bike friendly. It's also easy to get into London by train. We've only gone in once so far -- we went to the British Museum and attempted to do the entire thing in a day -- an exhausting and somewhat hopeless task, but we did walk through every room at least, even if we didn't look at most things closely. We then went around town to see all the big landmarks: Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament, westminster abbey, the Eye of London, the Tower of London, the famed London Bridge (aka the Tower Bridge). A fun day!  And of course I've been trying to eat all 'typical' English foods -- bangers and mash, meat pies, fish and chips, tikka masala (which is as English as the fortune cookie is American, plus there is a LOT of good Indian food here).

As I mentioned, there is a market in town, so we've been cooking a lot. Mostly simple things -- stir-fry with rice, oven baked chicken, sloppy joes, the most gorgeous and huge artichokes from the market that I have ever seen, a homemade omelet and bacon (the bacon here tastes different, and is a lot leaner, which is fine, I guess, but leaves us without extra bacon grease with which to cook other things... and the bacon doesn't feel quite as *decedent*) -- but we've also done stuff like homemade wonton. And this weekend we're thinking of doing another French Laundry project, we haven't decided quite what to do. In general, I find it's a LOT nicer to cook for two than to cook for one, so I've been eating and cooking more here than I usually do back in NYC, with more variety and fewer leftovers. We're also planning on going back into London next Monday, do another museum (we're deciding between the Tate Modern and the Victoria Albert museum, we'll do them both eventually, it's just a matter of priority), get a nice dinner, and then I managed to get us free tickets to a recording of a radio show I like: John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme (basically, a radio sketch comedy show). So that should be fun!

That's all for now, I'll be sure to post a few more status updates while I'm here.

Movie Review: Maleficent

Or: How did you fail me? Let me count the ways.

Before I start, I should state I'm going to be spoiling pretty much the entire movie in this review. Because when I'm frustrated with a movie (or excited with one, let's be honest) I can get a bit carried away in my discussion of the topic. (Indeed, after this movie, I actually went and spoiled an old Hitchcock movie for a friend because I got caught up in my rant on disappointing movies. Hint: if you ever want to watch the movie "Suspicion", don't get me started on how I feel about that movie and how of all the movies I've seen, it was the one that let me down the most because it was *GREAT* until about the last 5 minutes and then it RUINED EVERYTHING because of STUPID STUDIO EXECS and wasn't Hitchcock's fault at all, he had a brilliant ending planned but nooooooooo. Can't have THAT. Mumble mumble spoilers mumble mumble.)

So. Don't read on if you haven't seen the movie unless you don't mind spoilers.

Now. Maleficent.

I was extremely excited by this movie (which is part of the reason I feel so let down now). The trailer looked great; I *adored* the single "Once Upon a Dream" that was released from the teaser; I have a strong partiality towards fairy tales redone, and those retold from the villains point of view are usually a lot of fun (Wicked, for example, is great fun. And things like the 100 Kingdoms books. Or Ella Enchanted.) So I went in with high expectations. Indeed, prior to seeing the movie, I made a point of re-watching the original Sleeping Beauty (which I also love, but hadn't seen in ages -- it's a gorgeous movie! They don't do animation like that anymore - hand painted backgrounds with incredible detail, drawn stills based on live models....) and listening to Tchaikovsky's original Sleeping Beauty ballet (on which the original movies score is based -- "Once Upon a Dream" is based on a waltz in it, for example.)

First off: technical stuff. The score was disappointing, especially as the first thing that drew me to the movie was the gorgeous creepy take on "Once Upon A Dream." Alas, that song appeared only in the final credits. I didn't notice any other references to the original scoring during the movie, and the scoring that was there was just... I want to say standard modernish fantasy music with heavy inspiration from Harry Potter that was neither creepy, moving, or in any way special or memorable. And while we're going with look and feel, the CG was not great. The moors were supposed to be a realm of magic and wonder, they certainly could have tried to make them a bit more impressive. The original art from the 1959 movie is so beautiful -- this was... not so much.

Now for the main issue: the plot. The plot did not know what it was doing.  It starts off decently enough: there is a kingdom where all the humans live, and a separate realm for all the fae creatures. A young Maleficent falls for a young Stefan (an ambitious and curious child) but they grow apart as they age. However, when Stefan finds out he could succeed as king if he kills Maleficent, he uses their former connection to establish trust, drugs her, and -- while he can't bring himself to kill her -- cuts off her wings to bring home as a trophy, to prove he has what it takes to rule and as a promise that he'll try and take over the fairy realm, like the current king wants. Which is a *terrible* and *horrifying* thing, but completely reasonable as a premise (and as the review here states, is a thing that while children might be shocked by this betrayal, adults, unfortunately, won't be.) So far, so good. However, this is where things start going wrong.

This movie *could* have gone the "she's protecting her realm from invaders" route. Or the "misunderstood and not actually doing anything that evil" route. Or even the "gradually starts making choices that lead her down a darker and darker path until she's completely corrupted" route. But no. Instead, rejected, mutilated, and heartbroken, she does a complete 180, takes over the fairy realm and instantly establishes herself as an evil and terrifying queen (modifying and darkening the landscape around her), and, of course, curses Stefan's firstborn child to die. [Now, a minor note here: in the first scene of the movie, it establishes that the moor where the fae live does not need a ruler and everyone lives in harmony! As she grows, Maleficent graduates to a protector of that realm (being the strongest fairy) but as soon as she gets betrayed, she immediately seizes power and none of the others put up any fuss about this. And at the end, when things are supposedly back to their happy state at the end, she randomly declares that Aurora is going to be joint queen of that realm and the human kingdom! Huzzah! Yeah... does not compute.]

This brings us to the three 'good' fairies. I do not know WHAT was up with them. I think they were supposed to be comic relief? The fact that they showed up at all to the christening was a little odd, considering the fact humans tried to invade the moor and Stefan mutilated their realms protector. Are they just traitors to their species? I was prepared to snicker despairingly that the gifts from the fairies were beauty and a lovely voice -- clearly the most important things for a young lady to have! However, they swapped the second fairy's gift to "She'll NEVER be UNHAPPY or BLUE." What the hell??? That's a TERRIBLE GIFT. You will never be able to feel unhappiness. You have no control over your emotions! Plus, it didn't even WORK - I was wondering if Aurora was going to go through the movie in a state of clueless bliss because of it, but, while certainly clueless, she definitely had some moments where she was less than thrilled. And then the three fairies take charge of the baby and decide to do so without magic and are hopelessly terrible at it and it's a wonder the poor kid doesn't die.

Except it's not a wonder, apparently. After Maleficent curses the baby, she finds it right away, and instead of letting the three neglectful fairies do her work for her, or just taking care of things there and then, she decides to protect the child and follow her around as she grows up. She naturally grows to care for her (though I can't say I grew overly fond of Aurora) and eventually even tries to lift the curse (but fails). Aurora mistakes her for her fairy godmother and decides she wants to live in the fairy realm with her as they grow to care for each other. However, once Aurora finds out that Maleficent cursed her, she doesn't even give the woman she had JUST said she loved and wanted to live with forever and take care of her and be happy with a chance to explain, or ANYTHING. Nope, she just runs off, straight into the arms of her father. Her father, who has just been growing more obsessed about finding and killing off Maleficent as the years go by, even ignoring the death of his wife, the Queen who did not even merit a name (though according to IMDB she had one - Leila. It didn't ever came up in the actual movie, though.) He barely looks at her, and just sends her off to a tower while he prepares to try and kill Maleficent when she approaches.

I won't go through the entire climax. Maleficent decides to make sure that Aurora gets cured on her own, gets into the castle, Aurora awakens (see my positive notes, below) and as they go downstairs, Stefan attacks and there is a big fight. Stefan gets what is coming to him, dying a predictably Disney death by falling to his doom after Maleficent spares him, thus negating all responsibility on anybodies part. The ending is abrupt and saccharine and doesn't really track very well at all. In general people's motivations aren't well explored or understandable, and while I understand if you want to make this movie about Maleficent and make her the 'good guy' you have to make changes to the story, you can still make the other side more complex and interesting, and you can still try and make people behave in ways that make sense for *them* instead of doing things all over the map.

On the plus side: Angelina Jolie was magnificent. She was working with poor source material, but she *worked* it, and looked dead on as Maleficent. When she was on screen, my eyes were glued to her. Definitely the highlight - she was creepy, wounded, and lovely, even when I was let down her actions, she was still brilliant doing them. Whoever designed her look also deserves props - she could alternate between beautiful and terrifying while keeping all the same features - her horns made her look gorgeous in the right context!  I also liked that it was Maleficent that added the "true loves kiss" thing to the curse as a mocking note to Stefan, who supposedly give her a 'true loves kiss' when they were younger. She also got to use her awesome opening lines from the 1959 movie, and delivered them perfectly.

Additionally, I was quite pleased by the fact that Prince Phillip was understandably -- but considering how things usually go in movies, unusually -- reticent about kissing a girl he'd just met the once while she was sound asleep and thus completely out of it. And then it didn't WORK because you don't get true love after one conversation with a person. Seriously. Thank goodness for smashing THAT sort of trope. They handled the manifestation of the dragon well (though I wish it was closer to the original movie design) and they didn't suddenly hand Maleficent shapeshifting powers, they did it in a logical manner by giving that to the shapeshifting crow. The fact that they made the thicket around the castle a nest of cold-iron thorns was pretty cute, though easily circumvented. Indeed, I really appreciated that they made it clear that, like in the lore, fairies are weak against cold iron.  I also appreciated some of the small touches referencing the original movie: the cottage design looked like the cottage; the castle looked like the castle; the abandoned ruin which makes her headquarters in the original looked spot on.

So. To sum up. Disappointing CG, design, and score. Plot is patchy, doesn't track well, and doesn't create a new and interesting story from the original. The reason why people do certain things and make various choices is completely incomprehensible at times, inconsistent at others. It really doesn't say anything new. I would say that the ads were quite misleading, in fact - don't go in expecting Wicked. Nothing is all bad, there are some highlights, but overall, not worth it.

(Huh. Both my movie reviews in this blog were movies I felt strongly disappointed by (the other being the Hobbit). I should try and remember to review a movie I actually like at some point.)