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bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 04:00 pmAustralia revokes visa of South African seen at neo-Nazi rally
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 10:35 amMoment Ex-Bangladesh leader Sheikh Hasina's sentence is announced
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 09:52 amCommunist and far-right candidates head to Chile presidential run-off
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 09:32 amDozens of Indian pilgrims killed in bus accident in Saudi Arabia
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 09:17 amMan who grabbed Ariana Grande at premiere jailed in Singapore
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 09:00 amHow Tanzania police crushed election protests with lethal force
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-15 02:23 pmEpstein files: Who else was mentioned?
zompist_feed) wrote2025-11-17 08:21 amThe Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
For some reason Youtube started showing me clips from The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. I liked them and then watched the whole movie twice. It’s a really fun movie and I recommend it to all my classmates.
I can’t do much better than jwz’s review:
This is great. It’s basically Inglorious Basterds but funnier and without Tarantino’s weird tics. You wanna see a feel-good romp about some Nazis getting fucked up? Oh yeah you do. How does Alan Ritchson just keep getting larger?
Basic idea: retell the story of Operation Postmaster, a commando raid in January 1942 which secured two German tugboats and an Italian cargo ship which had been up to no good in Fernando Po (now known as Bioko)— Spanish territory, therefore neutral, off the coast of Africa. This was one of the first missions of the Special Operations Executive, which (more or less) was later incorporated into MI6.
The raid was led by Gus March-Phillips, played here by Henry Cavill. At least half the movie concentrates on Gus and his four fellow commandos: chill brainy Appleyard (Alex Pettyfer), wild-man Dane Lassen (Alan Ritchson), pilot Hayes (Hero Fiennes Tiffin), and explosives expert Freddy (Henry Golding). Gus describes all the men as “bad”, but one of the charms of the film is how extremely polite they are to each other. They’re ultraviolent against Nazis, but that’s how you have to treat Nazis. The film is from last year when maybe Nazis seemed more historical.
Now, two things you need to know to be in the right mood for the movie: 1) it’s comic, and 2) it’s a video game. That is, it is not a super-serious re-enactment of historical events. The real Operation Postmaster in fact had no fatalities. The action sequences in the movie are just one step beyond the fight scenes in Ritchson’s Reacher: cinematic demonstrations of beautifully choreogaphed, carefully justified force.
Some Internet comments have made fun of Ritchson’s accent, but a lot of this is I think based on the first scene— where he and Cavill are pretending to be Swedes to fool Germans. It’s intentionally over the top.
The other half of the movie concerns the spy work on land, focusing on the composite character Heron (Babs Olusanmokun) and the movie star turned spy Marjorie Stewart (Eiza González). Their main antagonist is the sadistic Nazi Luhr (Til Schweiger). All this is worth watching once— González in particular is very easy to look at— but I have to admit I fast-forwarded through it the second time. Marjorie basically has to seduce the Nazi commander to keep him distracted during the raid, which mostly involves some mutual recitations of poetry and verbal sparring… it’s all well acted, and very important to the plot, but not very satisfying.
(I think it’s the tonal shift that doesn’t quite work. When we’re juiced up by scenes of killing Nazis, trading repartee with one is jarring. And maybe director Guy Ritchie’s heart was just back on that boat. Also, honestly, there’s a structure problem here. The commander is important because he’s the commander, but he’s given little to do.)
There’s also a subplot involving British officers insisting to Winston Churchill that Britain should surrender to the Nazis. To my knowledge this is ahistorical, or at least anachronistic: by this time the Battle of Britain had been won and the US had already entered the war. It’s probably libellous to Admiral Pound, but he died in 1943.
I only bring up the historical facts because the movie will make you want to know them. It’s just a fun story well executed, with some really hilarious bits.
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hunningham) wrote2025-11-17 08:31 amJournal is good for me, like eating kale
I know that if I try and write about the big things I freeze up. So instead of "my father is dying" we have "today we et potatoes" And I can't do a "what I did today" journal - I just bore myself. So instead it's just what I'm thinking about right now this minute. 3 random things.
Yesterday was a good day. I got some exercise, I managed a journal entry, I ignored the greenparty WhatsApp, and I coloured my hair for the first time in about 3 months (I use henna and it really needs to be redone every 2-4 weeks).
And - above all - I am sleeping better. This does mean decamping to the sofa at about midnight with an eiderdown and a pillow, but it is working. If I'm sleeping okay I have superpowers, and I can do anything.
And the first thing I have to do today is order a lightweight single duvet. For my sofa escapades, I am using an old feather eiderdown which Mrs. Next-Door gave us some time last century. I think she bought it shortly after WW2. It has been stuffed into an old duvet cover to stop it leaking feathers, and it's very warm but it smells funky. Not exactly wet sheep, maybe elderly hens?
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 12:31 amBritish Columbia v Alberta - how oil sparked a feud between neighbours
vriddy) wrote2025-11-17 08:21 amNearing the end of another extensive revision round
vriddy... talking about... writing!! Everybody, act surprised!!! Haha. Thanks for indulging on my last post related to this. Rationally I knew it was just my brain being silly but sometimes knowing doesn't help, you have pop that cork by actually getting the stupid thoughts in the sun where they can burn the way they should.Anyway! I'm nearing the end of this round of cursed witch revisions. Current tally: 87 hours over the last 4 months. That makes it longer than the actual chunky round I called "prose editing" (where I added tons of descriptions and worldbuilding too) which took 81 hours over, huh. Five months. Would have sworn it was 3. So this round will probably end up around 5 months too (to be followed by another round of proofreading in a couple months or so, with all the new stuff I need to look at). However, the work felt a lot nicer overall thanks to allowing chill fic breaks, I think. I still need to be careful how I handle this to avoid Shiny New Project syndrome, but I think that went well.
I basically have the last chapter/epilogue left to edit, as well as the last scene from the previous chapter. The beginning of that penultimate chapter also saw extensive changes that I'm SO EXCITED ABOUT, sets up more worldbuilding and also sets up some of the foundations for the sequel that I'm really really excited to get on with writing hopefully soon.
However, I have to figure out what I want to do with the ending itself. ( Read more... )
I will absolutely need another set of eyes on this version. Even if I were to change nothing else and leave the epilogue as is, the story leaves the readers with completely different feelings now. Antagonistic(ish) characters that were easy to hate aren't anymore (...I think). I need to understand if this works for other people, too.
Normally after a big round of editing I'm like "THIS IS THE FINAL ONE I AM SO SICK OF IT" but... I'm not totally sure if fixing some of the major issues didn't make formerly minor ones more obvious now, and I'm curious about what's been surfacing *pokes* *pokes* I'll have to see what I think when I'm done for real, and get an external perspective. I think it's also interesting that I believe I would have the stamina for another round (however, no interest in spending another 80+ hours on it). I also like that I'm being more cautious about working on the ending. My previous way of doing things meant that I was so sick of it by the end I always rushed it once the end was in sight. Allowing small mental breaks, but not ones that completely take over (just one or two days here and there) has been really fruitful for my process, I think.
hunningham) wrote2025-11-16 07:00 pm3 Cat Things
Cat & father-in-law are getting on well. They share the sofa, have naps and listen to radio 3 together. My father-in-law has told me that one of the big regrets of his life is not getting a cat when his wife died. I am very surprised by this, because he is so not a cat person.
James-the-robot-vacuum-cleaner now has googly eyes. This has not endeared him to the cat. I think the robot is cat's equivalent of a dalek. It's approximately the same size as cat, makes very threatening unpleasant noises, will slowly pursue cat with obviously hostile intention. Have discussed this important matter with family & decided that big googly eyes would not have improved the daleks. Wise design decision on part of the BBC.
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 02:59 amEcuador votes against allowing foreign military bases in country
bbcnewsworld_feed) wrote2025-11-17 12:17 am