I enjoyed The Half of It and it definitely doesn’t force you to have empathy for the Trump supporters at all. So I’m confused by Alice Wu’s own words lol It has the religious aspect but it’s so subtle and not in your face that it didn’t bother me, like it was just there (not sure if that makes sense). Overall, it was cute.

Sorry, I meant the other way around, watching it might give Trump supporters empathy for us (and other people not like them). And as for religion, I don’t mind a strong touch, it’s so large in so many of our lives, that wasn’t at all a criticism from me that it included it.

It does seem very cute and already an integral part of the f/f movie pantheon. 🙂

During Danielle’s live, she said that the two handholds weren’t scripted! Being able to do that now on numerous occasions and have it feel so natural just shows how comfortable they are with each other and how in tune they are with their characters and what they think the couple would be like. That’s chemistry.

Oh, right! I was going to ask what you meant by numerous occasions and then remembered the whole “kiss me” sequence and probably there are more. 

You’re right, they’re super comfortable not only with what they’re given but actually adding these other very natural gestures and moments. I said before that to me chemistry is the willingness to play into their roles and they do it so well. Like I was saying to a friend, they both seem very comfortable with their characters’ sexuality (in a sensuality sense, not orientation–although also that) and don’t play it down in any kind of awkward, self-conscious fashion OR play it up like, tee-hee, girl on girl, it’s all very natural. 

It’s funny how some couples have so much of it that it’s this noticeable. In the previous live with Stefania, when they talked about her time on Station 19 and she was describing how nice and welcoming it was, and then brought up how after their first table-read together, everyone got quiet and stared at them because it was so intense. And like, it’s true, you tend to see comments toward ships trend in certain ways, “they’re so cute”, “they’re so hot”, and for this ship, it’s a lot about their chemistry.

Have you seen The Half of It? It’s on Netflix now :) [[MORE]]

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Not yet, no! Now that it’s finally here, I feel oddly reluctant to sit down and start. Sometimes hype makes me really want to watch something, sometimes I’m scared to start and be disappointed or worse, love it and have no more of it. Also, you know. It’s a movie. I still haven’t watched A Secret Love either. (Or The Favourite or Carol or The Handmaiden. :x) But I hope you enjoyed it!

And another two anons (one is mildly spoilery and negative):

<tried to insert a read more here, it wouldn’t do it…oh…it inserted the link in the ask itself, freaking geniuses>

I just watched the half of it and it wasn’t bad? I mean towards representation is not the best movie ever but it was nice and like the way it was shot was great?

The half of it vaguely spoilerish if you haven’t seen it yet… I am so glad I found out ahead of time that this wasn’t a lesbian rom com Bc whew I woulda been pissed watching it had I not known that. As it was, I was honestly kinda bored a lot of the movie. I love Alice Wu and she made very lovable characters in Ellie & Aster, but this movie had so much focus on Paul. I’m sick of white boys dominating narratives honestly. He wasn’t a fresh character at all but he was still so much the focus.

These two came in so close together this morning, they made me laugh. You’re like two sides of the same coin, all, yeah, I guess it was okay??

To the first anon, heh, you seem unsure? You can like it or even love it without any issue! It DOES hit a lot of rep points, unless it’s willfully apathetic or offensive, I feel like you’re free to enjoy what it is more than add disclaimers for what it isn’t. If you enjoyed it, that’s awesome.

To the second anon, well, I get it. Maybe that’s why I’m not in a rush to watch. I’m not currently in the mood for a story that is basically, in Wu’s own words, an attempt to reach out to people who made Trump happen. And okay, that’s not fair, it’s so many more things, a coming of age story for an Asian American lesbian teen, the story of a second gen immigrant and her dad in a small American town, among other things, friendship between seemingly fundamentally different people, how to grow and learn past learned biases, even the effects of religion on Aster.  And heck, even if it were just the first thing, that’d be an admirable goal, let alone the many other things it manages to be to so many people. I’m not saying it has to be something different.

But if this movie has two main roles, to teach empathy to an external group and to be relatable to an inner group, it is…neither of those things to me. I’m a Southeast Asian American who grew up abroad, my experiences are very different from Ellie’s and while I have a bunch of guy friends, I don’t care about Paul. Which will probably change when I actually watch, the way I love Dutch and Johnny in Killjoys. Or currently, Isaac on Vagrant Queen. I end up liking a lot of male characters, tbh. I dunno. I guess it’s what the focus is Presented as. Ellie may be the lead of THOI, but a movie’s inherent lack of time forces Paul and their dynamic to be so central, and a part of me does resent that a bit. It’s sold as a different kind of love story, their dynamic itself is the main character.

It could be a combination of many things, a difference between what I want and what it is, the fact that it’s a movie and just didn’t have the time I like to develop. I really liked In My Skin, a TV show, and that wasn’t particularly relatable, I guess I’m more open to stories when the female lead is front and center in every way. The story is about her. It’s like in Stumptown, I FAR preferred the episodes that treated Dex as the main than those where Grey or Hoffman had some adventure and Dex was just, like, there. 

But annnyway. It’s fine, right, we don’t have to like everything. I get the FOMO, something like this is so big and the f/f community’s still so small, it’s hard to ignore it and everyone around us engaging with it in some way. But aren’t we reaching a point where we don’t have to like something because it’s f/f but can go on to something else? Well. I say that as someone who prefers TV to movies, because damn, pickings are slim if you want happy central f/f in movies. Honestly, that’s really what it comes down to, the issue isn’t this movie but that there aren’t enough f/f movies out there. Every one of these discussions boils down to that basic point, that this one movie shouldn’t be responsible for everything this industry’s failed to do. You don’t have to like this movie, but you should have the opportunity to watch more than one happy ending every few years.