{ keeping in the family }

My family are insane and amazing. Much fun was had by all. More of an update later when I recover from the champers. And lack of sleep.

In other news, I now own a kettle and a new hi-fi. And money. Wahey!

{ all for one and one for all }

Eeee! I love Alexandre Dumas and I wish, I wish, I wish I could read fluent French, not to mention fluent Old (?) French. Mostly, I adore Jeremy Irons and John Malkovich and Gabriel Bryne (and not Leonardo DiCaprio) and yay!

Ahem.

So, I totally just watched the Randall Wallace (1998) version of The Man in the Iron Mask. Granted, I do prefer the 1977 version (just like I prefer both Zeffirelli and Lester's versions of Three Musketeers to the 1993 Disney version featuring Sutherland jnr., Pliver Platt and the wondrous Charlie Sheen as Aramis. Well, not wondrous because Sheen is an ass but I love Aramis. I love that Disney version too but it's awful) but I'm just squee happy that it's on TV again.

Now to watch the truly disasterous MI:2, redeemed only by the delectable Thandie Newton. (And then WaT, bien sur).

Edit: In an eerie turn of events, I looked up Jeremy Irons on IMDB because I knew I'd seen him somewhere else before. Guess what his last film before Aramis was? Lolita. *headdesk* Nonononono. Creeeeepy. Now I'm stuck between ooh sexay Aramis and ughyeuchnonono Humbert Humbert. Of course, I could ignore both and opt for, heh, Scarr!

{ WaT S3, "Upstairs, Downstairs" - UNCUT SPOILS }

There are S3 WaT spoilers in this post. They are not cut because to the best of my knowledge, anyone who cares has already seen the episode. If someone on my flist has an issue with the non-cuttage, comment and tell me so that I can cut future episode spoilers.

In a startling turn of events, I actually enjoyed tonight's WaT. Granted, Chad Lowe's appearance as the father of a kidnapped baby pretty much ensured that I knew he would in some way be responsible but there overall story arc was actually quite sad. Susan Floyd's character was suffering post-partum depression and was still in love with ex-boyrfriend, The Cliché The Hunky Gardener. (Floyd, btw, is a L&O repeat offender, so to speak. Her last appearance was on CI as a rich woman whose husband trieds to frame her for an attempt on his life. He did this because she was a better defence attorney than he was a prosecutor. God).

Anyway, Chad Lowe totally covers his wife because she suffocated their baby when she passed out drunk on the child whilst trying to breast-feed. Except, Lowe's character really loved Floyd and all Floyd wanted was out of the misery that was her life. There was also stuff about the nanny (did she kidnap the baby? Did she kill the baby? Why did she runaway yadda yadda) and a contrived plotline about Jack's kids - again. But that was a minor irritancy; the writing was fast paced, the story was clever plotted and executed (with the introduction of the not-sitting-up-whilst-breast-feeding thing in one of the flashbacks and the misleading teaser with the false ghosting); the acting was superb. I actually liked Lowe's performance; Floyd's, as ever, was excellent. yet another small actor who doesn't get nearly enough screentime. She and Lowe stole the show.