New movie diary 2021

Couldn't finish it and I was a gender studies major. Just too cliched and juvenile. The main character goes from not caring about a cause to full on enlightened feminist in 2 seconds. Also considering that the movie begins with a white girl considering stealing the feelings of a black girl (shown already many times on TV), I just couldn't get over how white feminist the movie felt, even though it did its best to include a lot of girls of color.

I’m so sad how bad this movie was. It had such amazing potential. I loved the original.

1. The acting was shockingly bad. The main actress was okay but had an emotionless face (purposeful or not). Also I know it’s a thing in Hollywood that they ask Asian actors to sound “more Asian,” and I feel like they purposefully made them speak in heavy accents. Nothing wrong with it if it’s natural, but because I can sense that it’s not, it just feels ridiculously forced.
2. All the emphasis that she is a girl. Omg beating us over the head with it.
3. It was just boring and corny as hell. They changed the original storyline and made it worse. I can’t describe it better than imagine the original Mulan but like a corny, basic soap opera with low budget acting. Extremely predictable, and not in a I’ve seen the original way, but in a this is a painful, non- original trope way.
4. The emphasis on chi in this movie took away from Mulan’s hard work and motivation and made it seem just luck and predetermined.
5. She removes her armour and takes down her hair to go into battle because she’s being a full woman... What?? For fuck’s sake let women actually dress appropriately for battle in 2021.
6. They shouldn’t have removed the classic music. It was part of the joy of the original.
7. Honestly, yes the movie was beautiful, but they should have taken advantage of it being live action and made it fantastically beautiful. Mulan deserved that.
8. Does it say something that no good, famous Asian actors are in this movie? I mean it's great to discover new actors but like? How low budget was this movie?

Amazing actors but my god this movie is like feminism beating you over the head while saying *such profound lines* to classical music. Again I say this as someone who identifies as feminist, I don’t like to be beaten over the head, especially with things so obvious. I’m just not into the type of film ***where everything is on a crescendo*** because it’s so *wow* and it knows it. It has no subtlety.

Beautiful movie with a deeper meaning. An actual piece of art. The editing is quite unusual and contributes to you feeling like you’re watching fragments of memory.
Great actors.
It’s also my god extremely slow with a touch of melodrama. But overall I’m glad to have watched something more original, creative and meaningful than the usual Hollywood fare.

Bad acting. Dumbed down dialogue that is very explicitly expositional. God forbid the viewers have to perceive any subtlety. Simplified events. Cutting back and forth between character story lines rather than giving the time to develop the strength of one.
I read all the books and found them mostly entertaining but with a lot of flaws.
The show is definitely not a faithful adaptation, which is fine. But it frequently changes events that made the books strong and engaging to read. Eg. It passes pretty quickly over Alina’s struggles with her powers, never showing her as weak as she was in the books. Mal is portrayed as only caring about his friends’ deaths for literally 2 seconds before he’s back to being obsessed about Alina. Every scene between Nina and Matthias has such expositional beat you on the head dialogue that I cringe. + In the books Mal was acting cold to Alina before all the fold stuff so it makes more sense that she gives up on him as she receives no letters.
If I hadn’t read the books I wouldn’t tolerate the terrible acting and writing. You can just feel when a show’s parts do not click together.
Jesper and Inej are keeping the show alive for me for the moment.