Earl Grey Books

Jumping straight into it this month! Let’s talk about what I watched and listened to in August.

Far From the Madding Crowd

Buckle up for this one, my friends, because I have some thoughts. First up, I was watching this movie to help me get through the book—I’d tried it a few times (including as audio) but was finding it hard to follow. I thought it’d help me get a grip on who the characters were and the general plot so I could focus more on Hardy’s writing. The movie itself is stunning—there are some really gorgeous shots. The acting is also superb, like the four main actors—Carey Mulligan, Tom Sturridge, Matthias Schoenaerts and Michael Sheen, were all phenomenal. But the actual story? God, I’ve never wanted to put my head through a wall more than I did while watching this. It both seriously depressed me and made me extremely angry…which was the exact same reaction I had more than ten years ago to Tess of the D’Ubervilles. So basically, not one I’d personally recommend or ever consider watching again, but my love for Michael Sheen is stronger than ever.

Melbourne Writer’s Festival

With us back in stage four lockdown here in Melbourne, our wonderful writer’s festival moved online this year. Honestly, I really enjoyed it being online, for one it meant I could attend back-to-back sessions without worrying about being late. This might be a bit of a strange bookish confession too, but I loved not being able to walk into the festival bookshop—my bank account is much happier this way. I listened to something like fifteen of the events, but my favourite events included; Ellie Marney & Will Kostakis, Jing-Jing Lee, Mikki Kendall and Brit Bennett.

Cheese in the Trap

What’s the best way to bring up my mood? A cutesy kdrama, of course. This one was really sweet. I really loved the character In-ho, and it turns out that actor is in another drama on my watchlist, so that one is definitely being bumped up my list for September. With all that said, this had one of the most disappointing endings I’ve seen in a kdrama so far. I’m not going to spoil it, but I felt very let down by the ending. I’m still kind of sad about it and it’s been more than a week since I finished. I still loved the drama, but it could’ve been a favourite if it had a more satisfying ending.

Miscellaneous

I was having a pretty rough mental health month this August, so naturally, my way of dealing with that was to re-watch the 2005 adaptation of Pride & Prejudice for the millionth time. It hasn’t disappointed me yet. But speaking of classic adaptations, I also watched Madame Bovary. The plan here was basically the same as Far From the Madding Crowd—I’d watch it and then finally get through the book. Yeah, no. This was honestly one of the most boring films I’ve ever sat through, so much so that I actually fell asleep and that never happens. I also rewatched the first Captain America and Captain Marvel because I’ve decided to do that whole ‘watching the MCU in timeline order’ thing.

So that was my August in terms of TV, movies and etc. What did you watch and listen to?