OK y’all as promised…….will the real Vanity Fair please stand up?

Loooooooong before Vanity Fair the magazine, there was Vanity Fair the book. This literary adventure was written in the 19th century (1847 – 48 to be exact) by William Makepeace Thackeray. He was a contemporary of Charles Dickens (who wrote such classics like The Adventures of Oliver Twist, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, A Tale of Two Cities, Great Expectations, (we loved the Gwyneth Paltrow, Ethan Hawke version by the way!),  A Christmas Carol, etc…). In 2004, Thackeray’s masterpiece was adapted for the silver screen starring the ever captivating Reese Witherspoon as the plucky heroine Becky Sharp. (Filmed while Reese was pregnant, but you’d never guess because the director was so creative.)

Now, Becky Sharp was very unhappy about her station in life to say the least. Never one to leave her fate and fortune in the avaricious hands of others, she determined to climb to the top of the social echelon. She is a truly audacious woman, yet charming for a rogue, and she desires nothing more than to prove that she is just as good as the duchess next door. Though Becky is a fictitious character, she is most memorable and truly extraordinary. In fact, Vanity Fair is one of my favorite movies. It juxtaposes the adages anything is possible and be careful what you wish for and all’s well that ends well. As a woman in the Victorian age of strict class and tight circles, she proves that one can be more than what society deems you should be. As a woman with no title, family alliances or money, she was faced with many, many obstacles and disadvantages, but our Becky took all this in her stride. (Might I add that despite her father being an artist, this prestige was unfortunately cancelled out due to the fact that her mother had been a singer, which was tantamount to saying she was a woman of questionable morals, if you know what I mean.) Through Becky Sharp’s ambitious eyes we can catch a glimpse of English elitism. We can also revel in Miss Sharp’s ruthless desire to hike to the highest rung of the social ladder by almost whatever means possible. This movie is definitely a fun filled romp and I highly recommend you watch it. It is filled with roguish high jinks and spunky, daring maneuvers, yet sweet and still possessed of a certain innocence and charm, and even grace. There are moral pitfalls around almost every corner and keen explorations into the complexity of human relationships. It left me feeling happy and thinking that it is indeed funny how life works sometimes and who and what we end up with when all is said and done. Sometimes because of the choices we make, sometimes because of fate, and sometimes because of luck.

~P.S.~ I wonder what Mr. Thackeray would have thought of this movie? I’m pretty sure he’d be pleased.

Just in case you haven’t already heard, Charlize Theron has been tapped to play the lead role in Jinx. No, don’t panic. This is not the same Jinx played by Halle Berry opposite Pierce Brosnan in the James Bond flick Die Another Day. This movie is based on a character created by Brian Michael Bendis and his comic book world Jinxworld. Miss Theron will play the comic book bounty hunter Jinx. If you saw her in Aeon Flux you already know she can kick butt while looking great in a poured on vinyl suit. This movie is just one of many comic book creations coming to life and looming large on the big screen. What fun, what fun. Will you check it out? Has anyone ever even heard of this comic book series before? Hollywood is like a hungry marauder searching for treasure on every land mass. They can’t turn books of all kinds into movies fast enough. (I love it even though it’s alarming!) I wonder if the voracious Big H machine is ever in danger of running out of fodder? There is soooo much money to be made plundering comic book territory. Have you seen the size of the Marvel Universe alone? What’s next I wonder?

~P.S.~ Can y’all say The Spirit, due out Christmas day. That dude knows how to roll. Just check out his mask and tie. Very classic. I’m beginning to think all these comic book creators, story writers and illustrators are planning to take over the world. Remember that Brad Pitt movie, Cool World? Nowadays, cartoons are real in Hollywood. Go figure.

Vanity Fair is a brilliant, savvy magazine which has had a lot of great covers and even better interviews. In fact, no one does avant garde and controversial better. It is a glossy extravaganza of ads and money, Annie Leibovitz and a stellar celebrity galaxy. They’ve produced issues that are definitely archive worthy; like the infamous issue where they interviewed Jennifer Aniston and probed for answers on the divorce of the century between herself and the dubious Brad Pitt. A scant few years later, they were anything but bashful when preening after scoring a gorgeous cover, breathtaking pitures and a juicy interview in July of 2008 with the new Mrs. Brad Pitt, the ever beautiful and voluptuous lipped Angelina Jolie. (Did I mention how we loved it, by the way?) Vanity Fair is after all unbiased, and all is fair in love and war. (We love that, too!) It is a media outlet that is a very fine reflection of our pop culture; it maybe even defines who we are as a western culture, civilized and polished, all glossy and airbrushed and well financed in order to be considered perfect and worthy and accomplished. If one would look back on our society 100 years from now and gather information based only on the content of a Vanity Fair magazine, I think they’d be very amused and entertained to say the least, at how much pandering we were obsessed with and how star struck we were on a whole. Now don’t get me wrong, this is not a rant, it’s more of an unbiased observation. I am right there with the best of them enjoying the pantheon of the stars in the entertainment constellation and the great past time of wanting more. I think it is amazing how little we’ve changed as a civilization. Celebrity is the new nobility, and now anyone can be king or queen, no matter their station in life. If you have the heart of a social climber, and the grit and the fangs to get you to the top, a meteoric rise to stardom is not impossible if you’re hungry enough. Vanity Fair is such a fitting name for a magazine that showcases the lifestyles of the rich and famous and what you need to get there. However, before Vanity Fair the magazine, there was another piece of literary success that chronicled the fictitious life of perhaps the most prolific social climber and one of the most important heroines of the Victorian era. Tune in later and I’ll tell you what and who.

So, you have to be dead not to have heard by now the craze that Rob Pattinson has caused as Edward Cullen in the monster hit Twilight. In fact, because of this movie, he has been catapulted into stellar stardom almost instantaneously. Rolling Stone has dubbed him the hottest actor of 2008! Go figure. Even Rob himself is baffled by his sudden effect on women, declaring one minute he couldn’t get a date, now girls are clamoring over him. LOL. Let me tell you, I have stood in line at bookstores accidentally eavesdropping on teenage girls gushing and nearly swooning over this movie!!! It is quite hilarious and painful to admit however, that I, too, have joined the plethora of gaa gaa girls and am a willing acolyte of the Twilight Saga. But I digress. You see, I have been waiting a looong time for a vampire like Edward. Edward Cullen fulfilled all my wishes for the depth of feeling and anguished yearning I ever wanted from Lestat but was never given. If truth be told, I have been waiting a long time for the blatant honesty of Bella Swan, too. She embodied all the earnest awkwardness and angst ridden devotion of being a teenager. Their casting as the lead characters was a stroke of pure creative and instinctual genius. There was an electric chemistry between these two actors. There was a deep ebbing of passion coursing through this movie, yet Pattinson and Stewart were able to retain the pureness and innocence of first love, of true love. My thoughts on Twilight? Beautiful. The film style was up close and personal; it is a character story mostly and the camera feels like you’re actually in the room. It almost felt like spying at times. Forgive the special effects and the $37 million dollar budget. It’s a story about love. Deep, abiding, and eternal. A love worth waiting for. Twilight has loud whispers and strong undercurrents of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. It also has deeper, slightly theological nuances and pulse. Eve does fall for temptation, but it is Adam who offers her the forbidden fruit, and desire is the serpent in the garden of the undead. In a surreal twist of fate, Bella Swan is tempted by everything that Edward Cullen is. She is tempted by the very curse that makes him immortal. And she is irrevocably tempted, beguiled, enthralled by the knowledge that she is unfathomably and seductively different from him; human. Edward Cullen is tormented by her mortality, and inexplicably drawn to the one person who could make him want to be human again. How can he stay away from her when she is his life? How can he be near her when his very nature is to lust for her blood?

~P.S.~ If you haven’t seen the movie yet, go see it! You will love it! Folks at Hollywood.com say, “The most epic romance since Titanic.” Justified!

Suprisingly, yes, discombobulated is in fact a real word. It is a fancy adjective, and we here at The Scribe’s Desk absolutely love, love, love adjectives of all kinds, and the fancier the better. The definition of discombobulated as found at www.dictionary.com is as follows: to throw into a state of confusion. Less fancy synonyms for discombobulated are addled, confuse, upset, frustrate, you get the picture. The word rose to fame on the popular sitcom Seinfeld. In fact, the first time I ever heard the word was on that show, which by the way I watched religiously as part of my I think it was Thursday line up on NBC. Years passed before I heard it again, and I never heard it regularly. If I ever used it in my repertoire I was met with doubtful stares. I remember thinking, “This is not a real word!” I thought it was a “Georgeism”, just a funny word that George would use whenever he relayed another lame excuse or an anecdote of his daily foibles. Now I hear the word everywhere and almost daily. It’s used in everything from TV commercials to my daughter’s kids’ shows on the Treehouse station. So, now that you know, try using it in a sentence sometime. Carefully watch the expression on peoples’ faces as they try to figure out if you’ve just used a real word and if and where they’ve heard it before. It’s absolutely hilarious!