IF "Chick Flick" stories
green_g...@my-dejanews.com
(predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
No, I don't mean "Ken Meets Barbie" or "Debbie Does Dallas", but something
more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
the gothic romance/historical romance category. For the sake of argument,
let's say there will be no "heaving or throbbing" so as to remove the
vicarious thrill aspect (yeh, I know, that's the good part). This is not the
same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people would
call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
Kathleen (who writes for her own enjoyment and has yet to finish a thing so
what ya'll think isn't going to change my plans... I was just curious.)
<ASIDE> It's been many years, but I seem to recall that the Nancy Drew
stories were basically the same as Hardy Boys, but with a girl instead. If
I'm right that they weren't about things like "The Case of the Missing
Lipstick", I wonder how many boy's read them. I know I read both. </ASIDE>
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Bill
green_g...@my-dejanews.com wrote in message
<6vb9us$nei$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>...
>No, I don't mean "Ken Meets Barbie" or "Debbie Does Dallas", but something
>more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
>the gothic romance/historical romance category. For the sake of argument,
>let's say there will be no "heaving or throbbing" so as to remove the
>vicarious thrill aspect (yeh, I know, that's the good part). This is not
the
>same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people
would
>call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
Isn't that similar to the Infocom "Plundered Hearts" sort of game?
Bill
Andrew Plotkin
> A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
> (predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick"
> game.
We'll try just about anything, at least once.
> No, I don't mean "Ken Meets Barbie" or "Debbie Does Dallas", but something
> more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
> the gothic romance/historical romance category.
What, like _Plundered Hearts_? :)
> This is not the
> same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people would
> call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
I wouldn't call anything a "chick flick", and I'm sort of hesitant to
categorize plots as "male", "female", or "neuter". But romance is a pretty
well-understood category.
(One of my friends -- female -- once spent an evening in movie theaters
seeing the "Chicks With Big Guns" diptych: Terminator 2 and La Femme
Nikita. She described this with the same sort of vengeful glee that she
now uses to explain why she watches "Xena"... "It's never too late to have
a TV role model." Heh.)
(She's just not a chick, I guess?)
> <ASIDE> It's been many years, but I seem to recall that the Nancy Drew
> stories were basically the same as Hardy Boys, but with a girl instead. If
> I'm right that they weren't about things like "The Case of the Missing
> Lipstick", I wonder how many boy's read them. I know I read both. </ASIDE>
I read a few of each -- probably more HB, yes. (It was Tom Swift that was
my style, and there was no female equivalent of that series...) I don't
really remember them. Did Nancy Drew get into high-speed motorboat
chases with the bad guy?
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the
borogoves..."
Paul F. Snively
green_g...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
>A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
>(predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
>
>No, I don't mean "Ken Meets Barbie" or "Debbie Does Dallas", but something
>more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
>the gothic romance/historical romance category. For the sake of argument,
>let's say there will be no "heaving or throbbing" so as to remove the
>vicarious thrill aspect (yeh, I know, that's the good part). This is not the
>same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people would
>call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
Well, there _was_ "Plundered Hearts," and I recall the distinct pleasure
that I, as a male player, took in seeing what was, AFAIK, the first piece
of IF authored by a woman. And I also must say that one of the more
pleasant aspects of RAIF is the unusually (by way of comparison to other
programming-related newsgroups) high level of participation from women.
During the period of time that I was at Activision, the Associate Producer
who was responsible for the "Lost Treasures of Infocom" was a woman who had
received her CS degree from Carnegie-Mellon. It's rare, as a programmer, to
find anyone in a producership role who "speaks your language," let alone
for that someone to be a woman.
>Kathleen (who writes for her own enjoyment and has yet to finish a thing so
>what ya'll think isn't going to change my plans... I was just curious.)
Heaven forfend that we should affect your plans. ;-)
><ASIDE> It's been many years, but I seem to recall that the Nancy Drew
>stories were basically the same as Hardy Boys, but with a girl instead. If
>I'm right that they weren't about things like "The Case of the Missing
>Lipstick", I wonder how many boy's read them. I know I read both. </ASIDE>
I would occassionally read them. It's true, IIRC, that they were pretty
gender-neutral. To my way of thinking, that was a good thing--it helped
break some stereotypes that women are generally bad at such things as good
ol' linear, deductive reasoning. Better still would be a series that
actually _upheld_ ways in which women's ways of being are advantageous to
the process of detection.
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>http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Snively
<mailto:ch...@mcione.com>
"I had the sense, too, of the illicit side of the casbah, of a kind of
trade in human (or, in this case, executive) flesh." -- Michael Wolff,
"Burn Rate"
green_g...@my-dejanews.com
Yes, several people have mentioned that (an annoying thing about DejaNews - I
can read new posts on my other reader, but I have to wait forever before I can
reply!)
I haven't played "Plundered Hearts" :( but I plundered :) the plot from
http://chan.csd.uwo.ca/~pete/Infocom/plundered.html
"Plundered Hearts is set in the late 1600s, where youuu are living the
genteel life of a beautiful young Englishwoman. You have received news that
your dear father is ailing, and so you are travelling to the West Indies to
care for him. As the story opens, the ship you are aboard is attacked by
pirates, and you are carried off by the dashing pirate captain! But this does
not dissuade you from your determination to find your father. Along the way,
you shall encounter danger, adventure ... and more than a touch of romance."
Sounds rather more adventurous then Jane Erye :) however, it is a historical
romance...
So far its been mentioned, what, 4 times(?), but don't think anyone has stated
whether they actually LIKED it (or not, as the case may be).
Kathleen (who's not trying to be a pain, really)
Ricardo Dague
> No, I don't mean "Ken Meets Barbie" or "Debbie Does Dallas", but something
> more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
> the gothic romance/historical romance category. For the sake of argument,
> let's say there will be no "heaving or throbbing" so as to remove the
> vicarious thrill aspect (yeh, I know, that's the good part). This is not the
> same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people would
> call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
I would. Why not?
_The Bookstore_ by Penelope Fitzgerald is one of the best books I've
read, about a woman starting a bookstore. The writing style is beautiful.
Shirley Jackson and Joyce Carol Oates good writers, too. Also, I think
I've read most of Marcia Muller's detective novels.
-- Ricardo
=========================================================================
"To see a picture of the house, Mrs. Montague needed only to lift her
eyes in any direction, but, more than that, she had of course neer used
any other model for her embroidery; she had of course learned the faces
of the house better than the faces of her children. The dreamy life of
the Montagues in the house was most clearly shown Margaret as she watched
Mrs. Montague surely and capably building doors and windows, carvings and
cornices, in her embroidered house, smiling tenderly across the room to
where Carla and the captain bent over a book together, while her fingers
almost of themselves turned the edge of a carving Margaret had forgotten
or never known about until, leaning over the back of Mrs. Montague's
chair, she saw it form itself under Mrs. Montague's hands."
-- Shirley Jackson, "The Lovely House"
Paul O'Brian
> A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
> (predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
I think if you write high quality IF in *any* genre, it will find an
appreciative audience here.
Paul "seen Steel Magnolias 3 times" O'Brian
obr...@colorado.edu
http://ucsu.colorado.edu/~obrian
e...@uclink4.berkeley.edu
> A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
> (predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
> No, I don't mean "Ken Meets Barbie" or "Debbie Does Dallas", but something
> more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
> the gothic romance/historical romance category. For the sake of argument,
> let's say there will be no "heaving or throbbing" so as to remove the
> vicarious thrill aspect (yeh, I know, that's the good part). This is not the
> same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people would
> call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
I've considered making a work of IF along the lines of P.G. Wodehouse; would
this count as a "chick flick"? That is, there's no death, fighting, etc. :)
Seriously; they are based on romance, but with male leads (mostly), they
are funny, and they involve puzzles that deal with manipulating characters,
rather than objects. I'd love to play a game like this; but I imagine it'd
be a hard thing to get right.
> <ASIDE> It's been many years, but I seem to recall that the Nancy Drew
> stories were basically the same as Hardy Boys, but with a girl instead. If
> I'm right that they weren't about things like "The Case of the Missing
> Lipstick", I wonder how many boy's read them. I know I read both. </ASIDE>
I read a few; as I recall, they were essentially the same sorts of stories
(no doubt ghost-written by the same authors (an aside; is it ghost writing
when the "author" is made up?)), but the characters did /act/ differently.
So they were meant to appeal to girls, but I think both could enjoy them.
--
Erik Hetzner <e...@uclink4.berkeley.edu>
Drone
green_g...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
> (predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
>
At this point I would far more willing to try that than another Sword &
Sorcery jaunt. But if it didn't deliver on characters I would be more
critical...
Drone.
TenthStone
minds on Mon, 05 Oct 1998 19:38:49 GMT:
>On Mon, 5 Oct 1998 21:15:08 GMT, erky...@netcom.com (Andrew Plotkin)
>wrote:
>
> <snip>
>>
>>I read a few of each -- probably more HB, yes. (It was Tom Swift that was
>>my style, and there was no female equivalent of that series...) I don't
>>really remember them. Did Nancy Drew get into high-speed motorboat
>>chases with the bad guy?
>>
> I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure that she once went up
>against smugglers. :)
Incidently, (and I'm afraid I may be condoning what's becoming rather
off-subject, but what the hell) did anyone else see the article in the
Washington Post about the original author bearing the pseudonym of
Franklin W. Dixon?
The writer of the article had recently discovered how awfully written the
Hardy Boys series actually was, and went off to find out who had written
it. Evidently the first author was a noted, skillful writer who was
forced by the Depression into writing terrible serial books -- he was
given the general plot, and had to fill in the rest of the story. He
would write in his diary all the time complaining about how much he
detested the very books he was penning.
-----------
The imperturbable TenthStone
tenth...@hotmail.com mcc...@erols.com mcc...@gsgis.k12.va.us
Doeadeer3
In article <6vbm79$dvh$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, green_g...@my-dejanews.com
writes:
>So far its been mentioned, what, 4 times(?), but don't think anyone has
>stated
>whether they actually LIKED it (or not, as the case may be).
Yes, I liked it a lot and it was very adventurous. Lots of derring-do.
I am not sure if anyone has written yet a more traditional romance IF (if "Jane
Eyre" style, add "damsel in distress period piece").
All you can do is try. You would probably have an audience, if only for the
"something different" factor. But most romance is passive, so you would have to
do something to make it more "active" and thus involving for the player. (Such
as Plundered Hearts did, I really suggest you play it first. It was a very
active game.)
Doe :-) "Chick Flick" isn't very pc, btw.
(Anyone calls me a chick, they get a dirty look or *much* worst.)
Doe doea...@aol.com (formerly known as FemaleDeer)
****************************************************************************
"In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane." Mark Twain
Brent VanFossen
wrote:
>A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
>(predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
I would. If the writing is compelling, I'll read and play almost
anything. Particularly in the medium of IF where the audience and the
game pool are both fairly small, any work that is carefully crafted
will get the attention it deserves.
Brent VanFossen
Lelah Conrad
wrote:
>
>So far [Plundered Hearts] been mentioned, what, 4 times(?), but don't think anyone has stated
>whether they actually LIKED it (or not, as the case may be).
I loved it. Very fast moving, fun. Genre fiction, so "you know what
you're supposed to do."
Lucian P. Smiith (I think it was him!) once said here that "yes, we
[either the denizens of IFMud or the newsgroup community] have agreed
that we love Plundered Hearts".
Lelah
Joe Mason
>
>The writer of the article had recently discovered how awfully written the
>Hardy Boys series actually was, and went off to find out who had written
>it. Evidently the first author was a noted, skillful writer who was
>forced by the Depression into writing terrible serial books -- he was
>given the general plot, and had to fill in the rest of the story. He
>would write in his diary all the time complaining about how much he
>detested the very books he was penning.
From http://www.webcom.com/referral/host.shtml (found on a Metacrawler search
for the phrase "Ghost of the Hardy Boys"):
Ghost Of The Hardy Boys; Leslie Mcfarlane
by Mcfarlane, Leslie // Introduction: Mcfarlane, Brian
ISBN 1557094667
This is the autobiography of the original "F.W. Dixon". IIRC, he worked on
several series before the Hardy Boys, which were the ones he detested. But he
also said that when he got the outlines for the Hardy Boys books, he decided
they were a cut above the others and that he would really put his best into
them. He played the police for comedy ("Honestly, anyone who would name the
policeman Collig and Smuff deserves what they get." - paraphrase from memory)
and added scenes to the plot in order to give them more time to screw up in
Keystone Cops style. (The publisher eventually got mad at him and told him to
start treating the police with respect - but in the next outline they gave him
Aunt Gertrude to play around with.)
Strange how much of that book I remember. It must have been a really fun read
- I read it once, in grade school.
Joe
--
I think OO is great... It's no coincidence that "woohoo" contains "oo" twice.
-- GLYPH
green_g...@my-dejanews.com
foxg...@globalserve.net (Drone) wrote:
> At this point I would far more willing to try that than another Sword &
> Sorcery jaunt. But if it didn't deliver on characters I would be more
> critical...
I'm not sure I follow... (maybe I should wait till after that next cup of
coffee)
All things being equal, you would be harser on a "damsel in distress period
piece" (thanks Doeadeer) with bad NPC's than a S&S with bad NPC's? Or are you
saying you would be harser on a DiDPP with bad NPC's than a S&S with bad
<objects/puzzles/???>. The former seems more than fair... the later? Hmmmm.
Kathleen (who is off to get that coffee now...)
Lucian Paul Smith
: Lucian P. Smiith (I think it was him!) once said here that "yes, we
: [either the denizens of IFMud or the newsgroup community] have agreed
: that we love Plundered Hearts".
I did indeed mention that, but it wasn't I who did the original survey.
It was Julian Arnold:
http://x7.dejanews.com/getdoc.xp?AN=225264972
I must admit that I played it because I thought it would be humorously
bad, and quickly became engrossed anyway. It's just a very fun game.
-Lucian
Werner
>
>Isn't that similar to the Infocom "Plundered Hearts" sort of game?
Yes and although I'm male and I usually hate stuff that is targeted
for a mainly female audience (I hate soap operas, most romatic movies
(not all of them but most cause they are so preticitive) etc...). I
absolutely loved this game.
Werner
-----
Memory Dragon
we...@my-dejanews.com
Check out ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive for something which has
been forgotten years ago.
Laurel Halbany
>>A rather general question -- I was just wondering what percentage of the
>>(predominately male) IF audience would be willing to TRY a "Chick Flick" game.
>
>I would. If the writing is compelling, I'll read and play almost
>anything. Particularly in the medium of IF where the audience and the
>game pool are both fairly small, any work that is carefully crafted
>will get the attention it deserves.
Depends on what is meant by "chick flick" anyway--are we talking about
something like _Ghost_, or like _A Gun for Jennifer_?
Drone
green_g...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> In article <foxglove-051...@dialin1816.toronto.globalserve.net>,
> foxg...@globalserve.net (Drone) wrote:
> > At this point I would far more willing to try that than another Sword &
> > Sorcery jaunt. But if it didn't deliver on characters I would be more
> > critical...
>
> I'm not sure I follow... (maybe I should wait till after that next cup of
> coffee)
>
> All things being equal, you would be harser on a "damsel in distress period
> piece" (thanks Doeadeer) with bad NPC's than a S&S with bad NPC's? Or are you
> saying you would be harser on a DiDPP with bad NPC's than a S&S with bad
> <objects/puzzles/???>. The former seems more than fair... the later? Hmmmm.
>
Definitely the former is what I meant. I go into an S&S High Fantasy type
story in *any* medium prepared to forgive a certain amount of shallow and
stereotypical characterisation. Many people do, because characters are
often not the point of epic fantasy. They are pleasantly surprising when
they feel real, but when they don't, they are rather charitably called
'archetypes'.
But any "chick flick" type story (I'm thinking Steel Magnolias, Madison
County, Little Women...) definitely belongs to a type that depends on
getting you to crawl inside those characters and live there, and if it
doesn't do this well, it would be like a fantasy that isn't very
fantastic.
So what I'm saying is I would really like to see what you're talking about
come into being, but I just meant to warn you that it will probably be
judged on different criteria than a lot of other games.
BTW, I liked Plundered Hearts too, but I consider it to be a Romance, a
genre which gets away with the 'archetype' effect as much as Swords &
Sorcery does. Romance and S&S are like gender-stereotypical sides of the
same coin. In fact, they share the same roots and the word 'Romance' used
to be an acceptable way to refer to both genres.
Drone.
Michael S Gentry
both written all over it.
--M
================================================
"If you don't eat your meat, you can't have any pudding.
How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat?"
Adam J. Thornton
>more on the lines of Jane Erye - a plot that might traditionally fall under
>the gothic romance/historical romance category. For the sake of argument,
>let's say there will be no "heaving or throbbing" so as to remove the
>vicarious thrill aspect (yeh, I know, that's the good part). This is not the
>same a having a female protagonist in a male/neutral plot. Few people would
>call Aliens a chick flick, even though there is a female lead!
_The Horror Of Rylvania_.
Gothic.
A Romance, of a weird sort.
Adam
--
ad...@princeton.edu
"There's a border to somewhere waiting, and a tank full of time." - J. Steinman
Adam J. Thornton
Doeadeer3 <doea...@aol.com> wrote:
>(Anyone calls me a chick, they get a dirty look or *much* worst.)
Oooh! Ooooh! Please describe!
Preferably in graphic detail!
Mister Chainsman
I realized that I was actually a woman.
Kris
Michael J Hayes
> I think "Anchorhead" is a chick-flick game. I played it for a while before
> I realized that I was actually a woman.
That reminds me. One of my favorite games of this type was Lost in Time, a
graphical puzzle-solving adventure for the PC. I thought the overall game was
very well done: the challenge was just right (not too easy, not too hard, and
there wasn't a clumsy interface to make the game even harder like in the
Gobliins series); the plot unfolded at a reasonable rate to keep the story
interesting; and the distored time-space continuum added a nice sci-fi twist to
what would otherwise have seemed like a dry romantic adventure. I remember
reading an article in an InterAction magazine that said that the box art ruined
the sales of the game because it looked like a Harlequin romance novel. What
was everybody else's reaction to this game?
> Kris
> chai...@ibm.net
> http://members.aol.com/chainsman/
__________________________________________________________________________
http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~mjhayes ( mjh...@cse.buffalo.edu
"Update your bookmarks, links, and ) "The Department of Computer Science
listserves. My home page URL and ( is now the Department of Computer
E-mail address have changed." ) Science and Engineering at UB."
Charles Gerlach
>
> On Wed, 7 Oct 1998, Mister Chainsman wrote:
>
> > I think "Anchorhead" is a chick-flick game. I played it for a while before
> > I realized that I was actually a woman.
>
> That reminds me. One of my favorite games of this type was Lost in Time, a
> graphical puzzle-solving adventure for the PC. I thought the overall game was
> very well done: the challenge was just right (not too easy, not too hard, and
> there wasn't a clumsy interface to make the game even harder like in the
> Gobliins series);
I disagree. I had a comparable number of interface glitches in both
LiT and Gobliins. I even downloaded the LiT walkthrough, and *still*
had difficulty solving some of the puzzles. Also, some of the puzzles
seemed just as silly and arbitrary as the Gobliins games. I was very
glad I had the walkthrough.
the plot unfolded at a reasonable rate to keep the story
> interesting; and the distored time-space continuum added a nice sci-fi twist to
> what would otherwise have seemed like a dry romantic adventure.
What was romantic about it at all? I agree that the box cover was
ill-designed and kept me away from buying it until I found it in a
bargain bin for $2.00, but the actual game didn't strike me as being
romantic at all.
OTOH, I thought that many of its puzzles were well done, and I liked
the crude 3D renderings of the ship. It wasn't a bad game, but I
didn't think it was a great game.
--
Charles Gerlach doesn't speak for Northwestern. Surprise, surprise.
Roger Carbol
I think Winterson's "Sexing the Cherry" could be the basis for
a *very* interesting piece of IF (not to mention extraordinairily
difficult to pull off well.)
Anyone else have any nominations for books, movies, etc in this
(admittedly ill-defined) genre to become IF?
.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca .. the measure of love, loss
Doeadeer3
In article <Pine.GSO.3.96.98100...@pollux.cs.Buffalo.EDU>,
Michael J Hayes <mjh...@cse.buffalo.edu> writes:
>> I think "Anchorhead" is a chick-flick game. I played it for a while before
>> I realized that I was actually a woman.
I think "Chick Flick" is being defined by Kathleen Green differently than that.
A game with the protagonist as a woman is not necessarily female oriented. Off
hand, there is I-O, which I would call heavily male oriented (because of the
"quick and easy" sex) and most women actually wouldn't like it. Also
Christminister, woman protagonist, but not really oriented toward one gender or
the other.
I might not agree with Kathleen's overall definition, but romance IS a category
of fiction that mainly women read.
Just as I tend to think of "spy thrillers" as a category men mainly read (James
Bond, et all.). Which is why I did not like Spider & Web (I felt it was not
something I really wanted to play to begin with so I have only started it).
I am not sure that there is a male oriented category of fiction (other than
pornography), but romance is definitely a female oriented category.
Kathleen is specicially speaking of a subgenre know as "Gothic Romance" (if she
is speaking of a true "Jane Eyre style"). Brave (or stupid) damsel in distress
in a big spooky mansion hears a noise in the hallway at night. Does she take a
weapon (blunt object)? No. Does she get help? No. She boldly investigates
herself. Most of those damsels would not be in distress if they had used a bit
of common sense. ;-)
Like I said, I am not sure I agree with any other definition of "Chick Flick"
and I would hope that IF is not STILL so heavily male dominated and oriented
that a game with a female protagonist is automatically seen as being female
oriented.
Doe :-) Otherwise that makes it very hard on us female authors.
John Francis
Doeadeer3 <doea...@aol.com> wrote:
>
>Like I said, I am not sure I agree with any other definition of "Chick Flick"
Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
Anything with Pamela Anderson in it definitely isn't
--
John Francis jfra...@sgi.com Silicon Graphics, Inc.
(650)933-8295 2011 N. Shoreline Blvd. MS 43U-991
(650)933-4692 (Fax) Mountain View, CA 94043-1389
Hello. My name is Darth Vader. I am your father. Prepare to die.
Andrew Plotkin
> and I would hope that IF is not STILL so heavily male dominated and oriented
> that a game with a female protagonist is automatically seen as being female
> oriented.
Amen.
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the
borogoves..."
green_g...@my-dejanews.com
Sorry - didn't mean to offend :(
ne...@norwich.edu
jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com (John Francis) wrote:
> Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
>
> Anything with Pamela Anderson in it definitely isn't
That is probably so. :-)
Melodrama is what we are getting at isn't it? Films like "Ghost" and "The
English Patient" and "Immortal Beloved". I personally dislike them and referr
to them as "manipula-dramas".
I am just as affected by them as people who like them; I just don't enjoy
being affected that way. I still gag back tears when I think of "The English
Patient".
"Grampa, what did you TELL me this for?" -- small boy in "The Princess
Bride"
The only game I've played that contains this degree of manipulation is
the very provoking "Tapestry".
--
Neil Cerutti, turtle in ice
ne...@norwich.edu
Doeadeer3
>Doeadeer3 <doea...@aol.com> wrote:
>>
>>Like I said, I am not sure I agree with any other definition of "Chick
>Flick"
>
>Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
So Casablanca would be a "Chick Flick"?
>Anything with Pamela Anderson in it definitely isn't
That one is much less detabable, since Pamela Anderson's inclusion in ANYTHING
obviously has more to do with her "eyeability" than acting ability.
Doe :-)
Mark J Musante
> and I would hope that IF is not STILL so heavily male dominated and oriented
> that a game with a female protagonist is automatically seen as being female
> oriented.
I didn't think "The Lost Spellmaker" was female oriented at all. In addition,
my impression is that it wasn't taken as such by the community at large.
So your hope is not in vain.
-=- Mark -=-
Roger Carbol
> I am just as affected by them as people who like them; I just don't enjoy
> being affected that way. I still gag back tears when I think of "The English
> Patient".
What did you think of the book?
.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca .. Can Lit
Jonadab the Unsightly One
John Francis <jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com> wrote in article
> >Like I said, I am not sure I agree with any other definition of
"Chick Flick"
>
> Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick
Flick"
>
> Anything with Pamela Anderson in it definitely isn't
I've always defined "chick flick" as follows:
Character interaction *is* the plot.
So if the greatest thing that hangs in the ballance
is whether Person A and Person B will break up,
I consider it a "chick flick".
Now, if a movie *contains* character interaction
but also contains *other* significant literary
elements, then it may escape that classification.
I definitely don't consider "E.T." a chick-flick,
for example.
I also don't think most females really like that
kind of movie/book/whatever all that well. A few
do, but by the same token a few men like movies
that are basically a swearing and killing contest,
which are equally stupid.
-- jonadab
(email the above name at bright.net)
Jon Petersen
> Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
Oh, I don't know, people probably keep some tissues handy when they
watch pornog... ah, never mind.
Jon
Darin Johnson
> Now, if a movie *contains* character interaction
> but also contains *other* significant literary
> elements, then it may escape that classification.
Like explosions?
--
Darin Johnson
da...@usa.net.delete_me
Adam J. Thornton
John Francis <jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com> wrote:
>Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
Whoa! Sodomania v. Six is a Chick Flick?
Chris Lang
(if "Jane
>Eyre" style, add "damsel in distress period piece").
>
>All you can do is try. You would probably have an audience, if only for
the
>"something different" factor. But most romance is passive, so you would
have to
>do something to make it more "active" and thus involving for the player.
(Such
>as Plundered Hearts did, I really suggest you play it first. It was a
very
>active game.)
>
Plundered Hearts is a very active game indeed. Amy Briggs (the author)
is right when she says that you won't get very far if you act like a
'damsel in distress'. As the heroine, the player has to take charge. She
can't wait for the signal from the island before coming to help Captain
Jamison; she has to leave the ship on her own (and also SAVE the ship
from two disasters).
Of course, Plundered Hearts does have its flaws. First, the two ship
disasters. Perhaps I can accept the crew not noticing the lit fuse in the
hold until it was too late, but surely SOME of the sailors must notice
how close to the reefs the ship is getting. Yet, for some reason, they
don't. For some reason, only our heroine notices the ship's danger.
Similiarly, I am left with the overall impression that Captain Jamison,
though handsome, courageous, and strong-willed, is not much in the
brains department. First, he goes to Lafond's mansion alone, with anyone
to back him up. This can be explained by saying that perhaps Cookie is
the only man Jamison trusts, and he has trusted Cookie to stay and watch
the ship (and keep the heroine safe--though he doesn't do a very good job
of either task--more below). Still, I have to agree with the leader of
Lafond's guards in thinking that Jamison is arrogant for coming alone.
(SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!..................................................
.................................................there be spoilers ahead,
mateys..........................................................be
warned....................................................................
.........................Non-givers of spoiler warnings be keel-hauled!..
.........................................................................
.........................................................................
......
Okay, back to Jamison....
Jamison can be annoyingly dense. I tried to lead him to the secret
passage , but he does not follow me there. My attempts to convince him
that it was not as guarded as well as he thought fell on deaf ears.
In the endgame, Jamison foolishly rushes off to fight Lafond,
despite the beating he has taken from Crulley. This, by itself, is
forgivable; it's Jamison's anger (and male ego) taking him over. The
heroine has to save Jamison not just from Lafond and Crulley, but from
himself as well. Still, when you combine all of the above examples, one
has to wonder how he got to be captain of a pirate ship. (Then again, as
I noted above, these particular pirates don't seem very bright, either).
Jamison leaves Cookie in charge of the ship and the heroine's safety,
as mentioned above. And, as mentioned above, Cookie does a terrible job
of it. Not only does he not notice that the ship is moving closer and
closer to the reefs, but he is no help at all in protecting the heroine
from the pirates' lust; the heroine has to avoid calling attention to
herself on her own.
The game's villains, on the other hand, are much more cunning and
resourceful. The player, as the heroine, has to outwit Lafond during the
scene in Lafond's room. The puzzle involving the drugged wine shows that
Lafond is not an easy man to fool. Our heroine triumphs by keeping her
head together in
these dangerous and frightening situations, and using her wits (though of
course she does have a certain advantage of surprise--being a woman, men
like Lafond and Crulley understimate her).
While it is good to have a strong female protagonist in IF, I cannot
help but think giving a large role for the player as the heroine might
have been accomplished without making Captain Jamison and his crew (aside
from Crulley) out to be dimwits.
Chris Lang
Lelah Conrad
wrote:
>Anyone else have any nominations for books, movies, etc in this
>(admittedly ill-defined) genre to become IF?
Zorro.
Lelah.
Jonadab the Unsightly One
Darin Johnson <da...@usa.net.removethis> wrote in article
> "Jonadab the Unsightly One" <jon...@zerospam.com> writes:
>
> > Now, if a movie *contains* character interaction
> > but also contains *other* significant literary
> > elements, then it may escape that classification.
>
> Like explosions?
Well, when I said "significant literary elements"
I was thinking more along the lines of plot and
irony, but I do suppose a lot of explosions might
rule it out of the "chick flick" genre.
Say, what if a movie was made consisting of
two entirely separate, um, parts, interwoven
in thirty-second timeslices (possibly with
some variation in length)? Say, for example,
every other scenelet is something blowing up,
and the ones in between are gossip? Would
that qualify as "innovative"?
Josh Westbury
>
> Anyone else have any nominations for books, movies, etc in this
> (admittedly ill-defined) genre to become IF?
>
Sliding Doors, a recent (trivial) romantic comedy film, featured a non-
linear plot. This might work well in IF. Just a thought...
Josh
Roger Carbol
> Sliding Doors, a recent (trivial) romantic comedy film, featured a non-
> linear plot. This might work well in IF. Just a thought...
Didn't see it; can't comment.
"What Dreams May Come" is just tempting enough...but I think that
the game would soon take on a radically different tone.
I suppose I tend to see the chick-flick genre as lying closer
to romantic-drama than romantic-comedy, but that's just me.
.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca .. but it's so sad
Roger Carbol
>>Anyone else have any nominations for books, movies, etc in this
>>(admittedly ill-defined) genre to become IF?
> Zorro.
You mean the book, I imagine? Hmmm...I never really saw it as
part of this particular genre, but I suppose it could fit.
It can sometimes be tricky to get over a player's "superhero"
preconceptions.
"The Pillow Book" (the movie) has some IF potential, in certain
bizarre ways...
.. Roger Carbol .. r...@shaw.wave.ca .. written on the body
Laurel Halbany
Francis) wrote:
>Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
And one that doesn't is what, a "Dick Flick"?
(I always got the impression that "Thelma and Louise" was a 'chick
flick,' but it was hardly a weeper. Not for me, anyway...)
Drone
myt...@twisty-little-maze.com (Laurel Halbany) wrote:
> On 7 Oct 1998 17:13:48 GMT, jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com (John
> Francis) wrote:
>
> >Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
>
> And one that doesn't is what, a "Dick Flick"?
>
I'd just like it to be generally known that I resisted the temptation to
reply to this. Oops.
Drone.
green_g...@my-dejanews.com
doea...@aol.com (Doeadeer3) wrote:
> I might not agree with Kathleen's overall definition, but romance IS a
> category of fiction that mainly women read.
>
> Just as I tend to think of "spy thrillers" as a category men mainly read
> (James Bond, et all.). Which is why I did not like Spider & Web (I felt it was
> not something I really wanted to play to begin with so I have only started
> it).
>
> I am not sure that there is a male oriented category of fiction (other than
> pornography), but romance is definitely a female oriented category.
I read somewhere that men tend to be "inspired" visually, while women prefer
literary means. Have no idea if its right, or where I read it.
As for male oriented catagories - I would cast my vote for war movies
(Platoon, Full Metal Jacket). Just my $.02(US)
Kathleen
Adam J. Thornton
>obviously has more to do with her "eyeability" than acting ability.
There are two reasons to see any Pam Anderson flick.
But we've all seen them lots and lots of times.
Lelah Conrad
wrote:
>Lelah Conrad wrote:
>
>>>Anyone else have any nominations for books, movies, etc in this
>>>(admittedly ill-defined) genre to become IF?
>
>> Zorro.
>
>You mean the book, I imagine? Hmmm...I never really saw it as
>part of this particular genre, but I suppose it could fit.
No, that's not what I meant.
I don't think we've defined this genre! If Plundered Hearts is a
"chick flick" (I think it's also a swashbuckler, with a typical
swashbuckling heart) then I'm for more of _that_, not of the weepy
type stuff that some of the others have mentioned here.
(English Patient was awful, imho. Bob and I still cannot
figure out why we sat all the way through it. 3 hours of our lives
into the vacuum!)
I've never read the book Zorro -- can you say more about it?
Lelah
Doeadeer3
In article <361d7c63...@news.nu-world.com>, l...@nu-world.com (Lelah
Conrad) writes:
>I don't think we've defined this genre! If Plundered Hearts is a
>"chick flick" (I think it's also a swashbuckler, with a typical
>swashbuckling heart) then I'm for more of _that_, not of the weepy
>type stuff that some of the others have mentioned here.
Romance is the only definition I agreed to. Tentatively (obviously it depends
on the romance and whether or not it also has explosions ;-) ).
> (English Patient was awful, imho. Bob and I still cannot
>figure out why we sat all the way through it. 3 hours of our lives
>into the vacuum!)
AGREED. Why did everyone love that? I really can't imagine. I thought it stank.
(Of course, I have a hard time with a love story that is based just on sex,
i.e. with no real interpersonal relationship shown at all. For that he is
supposed to be terminally hung up on her, later? I didn't "buy" it. Three
Weddings and a Funeral suffered from the same problem -- although I liked it
much, much better.)
Doe :-) Some movies have such an abbreviated plot they really don't "work".
Doeadeer3
In article <6vc33k$cn3$2...@cnn.Princeton.EDU>, ad...@princeton.edu (Adam J.
Thornton) writes:
>n article <19981005224546...@ngol05.aol.com>,
>Doeadeer3 <doea...@aol.com> wrote:
>>(Anyone calls me a chick, they get a dirty look or *much* worst.)
>
>Oooh! Ooooh! Please describe!
>
>Preferably in graphic detail!
>
>Adam
Singing...
~/o Oh, I'm making out a thwap list and checking it twice,
Keeping track of the names of who's been naughty or nice,
Oh, I'm making out a thwap list... o/~
Doe :-)
Andrew Plotkin
> >>(Anyone calls me a chick, they get a dirty look or *much* worst.)
> >
> >Oooh! Ooooh! Please describe!
> >
> >Preferably in graphic detail!
> Singing...
>
> ~/o Oh, I'm making out a thwap list and checking it twice,
> Keeping track of the names of who's been naughty or nice,
> Oh, I'm making out a thwap list... o/~
Chorus:
"Making out a thwap list, thwap list, thwap list,
A sort of thumpy tap list with a crunchy kind of snap!"
Now you explain how you became an admiral. Go on.
John Francis
Adam J. Thornton <ad...@princeton.edu> wrote:
>In article <19981005224546...@ngol05.aol.com>,
>Doeadeer3 <doea...@aol.com> wrote:
>>(Anyone calls me a chick, they get a dirty look or *much* worst.)
>
>Oooh! Ooooh! Please describe!
>
>Preferably in graphic detail!
>
I think it means you get a lot of german saosage.
John Francis
>John Francis <jfra...@dungeon.engr.sgi.com> wrote:
>>Anything that requires a box of tissues is definitely a "Chick Flick"
>
>
>Adam
Doe isn't the only person who can hand out >thwap<s, you know ...
Doeadeer3
In article <erkyrathF...@netcom.com>, erky...@netcom.com (Andrew
Plotkin) writes:
>> Singing...
>>
>> ~/o Oh, I'm making out a thwap list and checking it twice,
>> Keeping track of the names of who's been naughty or nice,
>> Oh, I'm making out a thwap list... o/~
>
>Chorus:
>"Making out a thwap list, thwap list, thwap list,
>A sort of thumpy tap list with a crunchy kind of snap!"
>
>Now you explain how you became an admiral. Go on.
>
>--Z
Good ending. But it actually comes from "Santa Claus is Coming To Town", not
Gilbert and Sullivan (however, I couldn't remember the words in the original,
so I guess that is not surprising).
Doe (Hmmm, should I add Zarf to the list? Did that qualify? Hmmmm.)
Joyce Haslam
> >>
> >> ~/o Oh, I'm making out a thwap list and checking it twice,
> >> Keeping track of the names of who's been naughty or nice,
> >> Oh, I'm making out a thwap list... o/~
> >
> >Chorus:
> >"Making out a thwap list, thwap list, thwap list,
> >A sort of thumpy tap list with a crunchy kind of snap!"
> >
> >Now you explain how you became an admiral. Go on.
> Good ending. But it actually comes from "Santa Claus is Coming To
> Town", not Gilbert and Sullivan (however, I couldn't remember the
> words in the original, so I guess that is not surprising).
Maybe Z was being clever. So verse two should come from another song.
I saw Mummy thwapping Santa Claus...
J.
--
c o m u s @ a r g o n e t . c o . u k
Chris Lang
MKS...@prodigy.com (Chris Lang) wrote:
>
> Plundered Hearts is a very active game indeed. Amy Briggs (the
author)
>is right when she says that you won't get very far if you act like a
>'damsel in distress'. As the heroine, the player has to take charge. She
>can't wait for the signal from the island before coming to help Captain
>Jamison; she has to leave the ship on her own (and also SAVE the ship
>from two disasters).
> Of course, Plundered Hearts does have its flaws. First, the two ship
>disasters. Perhaps I can accept the crew not noticing the lit fuse in
the
>hold until it was too late, but surely SOME of the sailors must notice
>how close to the reefs the ship is getting. Yet, for some reason, they
>don't. For some reason, only our heroine notices the ship's danger.
> Similiarly, I am left with the overall impression that Captain
Jamison,
> though handsome, courageous, and strong-willed, is not much in the
>brains department. First, he goes to Lafond's mansion alone, with anyone
>to back him up.
Oops! I meant 'WITHOUT anyone to back him up'....
This can be explained by saying that perhaps Cookie is
>the only man Jamison trusts, and he has trusted Cookie to stay and watch
>the ship (and keep the heroine safe--though he doesn't do a very good
job
>of either task--more below). Still, I have to agree with the leader of
>Lafond's guards in thinking that Jamison is arrogant for coming alone.
> (SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!.................................................
..................................................
there be spoilers ahead, mateys...........................................
....................
be warned.................................................................
............................
Non-givers of spoiler warnings be keel-hauled! ...........................
................................................
>.........................................................................
TenthStone
in our collective minds on 8 Oct 1998 07:28:42 GMT:
Well, we can consult The Literary Critic's Field Guide to
Postmodernist Film.
1. Is there a pyschotic involved with the movie?
Yes:
2. Is there a psychotic involved with the making of the movie?
Yes:
3. Are any of the directors psychotic?
No/Unknown:
4. Are any of the principle players psychotic?
No/Unknown:
5. Please pick the position of the psychotic:
D: Film editor.
6. Is the average scene thirty seconds long or less?
Yes:
7. Do successive cuts regularly contrast severely?
Yes:
Excrementum psyche
This species of film, so-named for the strange, nullifying
effect it has upon the mind, consists largely of a long stream
of quick shifts in mood, perspective, and direction. The reason
for these frequent cutaways may be found either in the film editor
or in a director; however, the responsibility often falls upon the
former.
Descriptives: innovative, confusing, psychedelic, sympathomimetic
I think that sums it up.
-----------
The imperturbable TenthStone
tenth...@hotmail.com mcc...@erols.com mcc...@gsgis.k12.va.us
Paul F. Snively
wrote:
>"Jonadab the Unsightly One" <jon...@zerospam.com> caused this to appear
>in our collective minds on 8 Oct 1998 07:28:42 GMT:
>
>>
>>Darin Johnson <da...@usa.net.removethis> wrote in article
>>
>>> "Jonadab the Unsightly One" <jon...@zerospam.com> writes:
>>>
>>> > Now, if a movie *contains* character interaction
>>> > but also contains *other* significant literary
>>> > elements, then it may escape that classification.
>>>
>>> Like explosions?
>>
>>Well, when I said "significant literary elements"
>>I was thinking more along the lines of plot and
>>irony, but I do suppose a lot of explosions might
>>rule it out of the "chick flick" genre.
>>
>>Say, what if a movie was made consisting of
>>two entirely separate, um, parts, interwoven
>>in thirty-second timeslices (possibly with
>>some variation in length)? Say, for example,
>>every other scenelet is something blowing up,
>>and the ones in between are gossip? Would
>>that qualify as "innovative"?
Um, doesn't something "innovative" have to not have been done before? Rent
"He Said, She Said." Kevin Bacon, Elizabeth McGovern. Each scene is done
twice, once from each point of view, with identical dialogue, but with
radically differing meanings. Great fun.
Paul
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Snively
<mailto:ch...@mcione.com>
"I had the sense, too, of the illicit side of the casbah, of a kind of
trade in human (or, in this case, executive) flesh." -- Michael Wolff,
"Burn Rate"
Phase
>Maybe Z was being clever. So verse two should come from another song.
>I saw Mummy thwapping Santa Claus...
--
PHASEFX @ VM.SC.EDU - http://www.cs.sc.edu/~jason-e
"Character is much easier kept than recovered" - Thomas Paine
Drone
> This species of film, so-named for the strange, nullifying
> effect it has upon the mind, consists largely of a long stream
> of quick shifts in mood, perspective, and direction. The reason
> for these frequent cutaways may be found either in the film editor
> or in a director; however, the responsibility often falls upon the
> former.
Hmm. The editor usually does the actual cutting, but if the director
didn't ask for this style or at least approve it, it wouldn't make final
cut. The only way the director might deny responsibility is if final cut
is exercised by the producer.
Drone.
TenthStone
minds on Sat, 10 Oct 1998 18:52:56 -0500:
True, but the inner workings of movie-making aren't generally known
by the people watching the film. I meant "responsibility" as in "blame"
without the negative connotations (in writing a guide book, no matter how
spoofed, one should try to maintain some level of objectivity -- unless
obvious subjectivity itself is what is being ridiculed).
LucFrench
> (English Patient was awful, imho. Bob and I still cannot
>figure out why we sat all the way through it. 3 hours of our lives
>into the vacuum!)
Reminds me of a line I once heard from Mr. Cranky:
"If somebody were to ask for me to choose between watching Shaoh and this
movie, I'd hock up the next 9 hours of my life without blinking."
Anybody here had a similar experience?
Thanks
Luc "BAD FILMS" French