epershand

With all the different discussions of the Bechdel test I've seen in the last week [obsession-inc] [kateelliot] [februaryfour] [Scalzi], the original Alison Bechdel comic, "The Rule", seems relevant. One thing I find notable in the comic is that passing the test doesn't automatically make the subject good (the example of a passing movie is Alien.) The point is the almost total desolation, which I think gets lost in discussions of whether individual movies pass, or what technicalities count. (This doesn't mean I don't have a little Bechdel test check box whenever I watch movies or tv shows.)

Via Gizmodo, sergey_larenkov has been posting incredible photoshopped photos where he merges photos from WWII with modern photos taken from the same angle. The result is haunting and creepy and makes me glad to have broken my "no more WWII this month" pledge.

Last night at dinner laurieopal showed me John Berger's BBC program Ways of Seeing. His discussion of women viewing themselves through an "objective" male gaze is 101 enough that even Ovid made the point, but the way he applies it to paintings of nudes is fascinating.