Quarter-Final Two
Propaganda...
Willougby (1995) :
95 Willoughby is testosterone on legs when he whisks Marianne into the cottage. Everyone is flummoxed by him and I love it. You feel Marianneβs pain and shock that this seemingly perfect man who was her soulmate is a cad. She questions her own judgment in everything wondering if any of it was real. Pretty perfect.
Look is the man a rake yes! But you can't be a rake if you're not hot and this is a hotness competition - out of all the men left in this tournament John Willougby is the man who knows the art of seduction. Look at how he takes off Marianne's shoe in this scene - think of how he would take off everything else. He runs through the rain - sweeps her off her feet and then asks to call - comes the next day with flowers and a pocket of SHakespeare sonnets - he may not be reliable but he is undoubtedly hot!
1995 Willoughby was so good that Emma Thompson married him
Captain Wentworth (1995):
Ciaran Hinds has that perfect ruggedness yet friendliness to his face that makes him the perfect charming Wentworth. And all of the longing that he manages to convey in his eyes is so hot.
Wentworth may be angry/resentful with Anne but in general he is charming and the best friend you could ever have. Ciaran gets the pleasant parts of his character and brings them out, while keeping a guarded coolness (protective camouflage) with Anne.
I dunno if this counts as propaganda or not, but Ciaran Hinds has a face that looks like it was jackhammered out of a shale cliff.
If a line like 'I am half agony...half hope' comes out of a face like that you know that man has a soul for poetry.
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Intense Subtext in Front of Oblivious Side Characters: "I had no wife in the year six"
There's a thing, I guess it would be considered a trope, that is one of my favorite such things in any form of media but especially any sort of romance-centered story. I don't know of an existing term for this and I'm terrible at being concise so I'm not sure how I could put it briefly. Basically, it's the thing that happens when a larger interaction is happening with a group of people but there's a subtext to it that means something very different--and generally, much more meaningful--to the central characters. You could call it something like Intense Subtext in Front of Oblivious Side Characters.
I've been thinking for a while about possible parallels between BLs and Jane Austen novels and/or adaptations. This is my attempt at taking a small, specific example of a parallel I sometimes notice and talking about it. Austen's novels do a lot of this trope I mentioned. That's in part because of choices Austen made in what she wanted to write about. But it's also because of the social context of her time. There was a lot going on that people couldn't be explicit about, for a variety of reasons. I think one reason why I see similar things happening in some BLs--and maybe one reason for the appeal of certain types of BLs--is the fact that being queer in a homophobic society makes openness complicated in a way that doesn't come up as much for hetero relationships these days. Especially when we get into things like office romances, in which appearances have higher stakes. These complications around openness have a kind of similarity to the reasons Austen's characters had to play a lot of things close to the chest.
Fellow Old Fashion Cupcake fans will remember an example from that series that I think really fits here. Nozue and Togawa agree to attend a goukon, or "mixer" as it's sometimes translated--basically a group hangout intended to help men and women meet for the purpose of finding people to date. Nozue is hitting it off with a cute younger woman, which is bad enough. But then he mentions his "anti-aging" efforts, and because of the mysterious way he words it, the woman asks, "Does that mean you're in love?" which of course catches Togawa's attention even more. He's clearly affected when Nozue answers, "If I were, I wouldn't be here."
@jdramastuff did a great screenshot post of this scene if you want to see what this looked like.
After Nozue's comment, Togawa starts knocking back alcoholic drinks like it's going out of style, ensuring that Nozue will have to help him home instead of going home with the woman who's been flirting with him.
(You could argue that this isn't so much a case of subtext as it is the significance one person assigns to what another is saying. Subtext really requires some degree of communication between more than one person. But while Nozue doesn't fully grasp what's going on, I think he does understand in some ways what he's communicating. I don't want to go on too much of a tangent, so I'll just say that having just read the manga the series was based on, it strengthened my belief that while Nozue is repressed, insecure, even deluded at times, he has glimmers of awareness of his feelings for Togawa and even suspicions of Togawa's feelings for him, and on some level he knows what he's saying, though I don't think he knows in this moment how much these words will hurt Togawa.)
I have another favorite example of this, a scene from Persuasion. It's rendered really well in the 1995 adaptation of the novel with Ciaran Hinds and Amanda Root. (The whole thing is phenomenal, by the way--I think it's the best Austen adaptation ever made, personally.)
A bit of background for anyone not familiar with the story: Anne Elliott was engaged to Captain Frederick Wentworth in 1806 but was convinced by Lady Russell, her neighbor/family friend and a kind of surrogate mother to her following her mom's death, to break off the engagement. She has regretted it ever since. Wentworth was deeply hurt and angry when she broke things off, not surprisingly.
More than eight years later, Anne is visiting her sister and her sister's in-laws, the Musgroves, when Wentworth comes to the area and starts spending a lot of time at the Musgrove place (and with the Musgroves' eligible young daughters). Wentworth acknowledges Anne, but just barely, while paying enough attention to both the Musgrove girls that everyone is gossiping about which one he's going to marry. Anne's sister Mary was away at boarding school when her previous relationship with Wentworth happened, so neither Mary nor the Musgroves are aware Anne and Wentworth were involved and think they were only acquaintances.
At a dinner party, the Musgrove girls try to look up the ship that Wentworth first commanded, the Asp, in the Navy List, a book that chronicles the various ships in the British Navy, their commanders, and so forth. Wentworth tells them not to bother--"she" is not in the current version of the List because "she" no longer exists.
Louisa and Henrietta Musgrove are suitably horrified.
Admiral Croft, Wentworth's brother-in-law and superior in the Navy, remarks that Wentworth was lucky to get a command so early in his career at all, no matter how seaworthy (or un-seaworthy) the ship was.
(Remember, 1806 was the year that Anne and Wentworth became engaged and then un-engaged.)
Gut-wrenching. And nobody else sitting at that table has any idea what just happened. I love it.
I have some more thoughts about this languishing in an excessively long post in my drafts, which I'll try to get out one of these days. I know I've talked to a few people about trying to do some BL/Austen posts and had meant to tag them but the only person I remember talking with about it was @absolutebl. If you're reading this and you want a heads up next time I write about this stuff, let me know!
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Propaganda...
Captain Wentworth (2007):
Can't believe Rupert Penry-Jones' Captain Wentworth is barely winning!!!! It's Wentworth - the man is half-agony half hope - writer of the most romantic letter in existence! He has lovely fun friends and you'd get great in- laws!!! He looks like Rupert Penry-Jones!!! Likes music! remembers you don't like to play cards after 8 years!!! Speeds back to his friend regardless of how hard or relentless the journey to make sure he's not on his own when he gets bad news!! Has great stories!!! He looks like Rupert Penry-Jones!!! Loves the sea!! Is Rich!!! Notices you're tired and makes sure you get the seat in the gig even when he wants to hate you!! Is so deeply in love that even after 8 years he can't get over you!! Self-made man!!! Looks like Rupert Penry Jones!!! Look at these besties!!!!
Captain Wentworth! All it takes is that one ten seconds at the end of the film where Anne tells him thereβs nothing whatsoever going on between her and Mr Elliot and you can literally see hope dawning in his eyes ALONE even though his face is the same. Thatβs the Darcy βthere is more going on here than Iβm letting my face showβ thing only for good and not evil! He HAS to take this thing!
Captain Wentworth (1995):
Ciaran Hinds has that perfect ruggedness yet friendliness to his face that makes him the perfect charming Wentworth. And all of the longing that he manages to convey in his eyes is so hot.
Samuel West was rather cross at being asked to read for Mr Elliot - until he learned that Captain Wentworth was being played by CiarΓ‘n Hinds.
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