Gift Vid: Strange Angels - for beccatoria

[chaila]

Title: Strange Angels
Recipient: beccatoria
Vidder: Sanguinity
Music: Laurie Anderson, "Strange Angels"
Summary: Heaven is a world that doesn't need you.
Notes: canon-typical violence

Link: Link to signed vid post.

Comments

[beccatoria]

Thank you! :D

I love how you use the black and white to create a motif an then bring in the old movie footage too - really interesting! And it's also a really intriguing (and effective) song choice. It's got a tone that both fits and exists in total tension with the character and her journey. Particuarly evident when the song shifts gear at the same time Sarah puts the gun to her head. Great moment there.

I like how when the singer shifts into a more "spoken word" style, you cut to appropriately...candid shots? (That's not the word I'm looking for but I'm sure you know what I mean - you capture the tone of "talking" without having to use talkyface shots). It added a sense of levity and poignancy to see them so human.

Thank you, anonymous vidder person!

[sanguinity]

I'm very glad you think the song works! Parts of it -- the intro, the choruses -- are very Sarah, while other bits are so anti-Sarah as to run toward cracky. But I hoped it was possible to highlight Sarahness via anti-Sarahness: this is what Sarah's version of old college friends dropping by and chatting all night looks like!

The musical switch from heaven!lighthouse to the onslaught of days was one of my favorite moments in the process of vidding it.

I'm glad you enjoyed the vid, and you're very welcome!

[ghost_lingering]

Ooooh, very cool! I really like how you use footage from the films. It's still firmly a vid about the show, but these moments from the films give texture to Sarah's story in a way that's only implicit on the show.

[sanguinity]

Thank you! There are so many shout-outs and callbacks between the show and the movies, and it's difficult for me to think about why Sarah does what she does, without acknowledging the personal narrative weight of the first two movies on her.

[chaila]

I love this a lot! The intro gives me a lot of feelings about Sarah, the idea of the lighthouse as "TV", as a world she can just watch that doesn't need her, is so heartbreaking. But then, of course, the world does need her, and she has to be right in the thick of it. The "flashbacks" are seamless, how they incorporate both show and movie moments, and really add emotional texture to what's happening (the pen drop, Sarah in Pescadero while John's in therapy, Marty Bedell and Sarah's name in the phone book!) along with a real sense of how long she's been doing this. The more domestic moments with John add a lot too; sometimes she's just telling him to do the laundry, but then he goes and gives it to a killer robot. And other times she's cleaning his girlfriend's blood off the floor. And that montage of her leaving John towards the end. Oh Connors. But I love how after that, there's a sense of how she'll go on and keep being in the thick of it, off to whatever catches up with her next. I love her. <3

[sanguinity]

Sadly, TV has never worked like that for Sarah. With the exception of Charlie's CCTV at the lighthouse, TV in the show is almost always about someone coming to get her or John. :-(

SHE HAS BEEN DOING THIS SO LONG! Even with the years she skipped, 1984 was a long, long time ago! And she had hardly been an adult for long at all when it started. (When Andy asks her if she'd ever meant to be anything other than a waitress, she can't remember!)

She'll still be in the thick of it, because John is in the future somewhere, and she'd like to believe it's not a post-Judgement Day future. So she's doing what she can to make sure that wherever John is, it has grass and trees and mall food courts.

[frayadjacent]

Damn I love this vid. You really bring out how strong and consistent Sarah's characterization is -- this vid is great for understanding why she doesn't go with John, and the way she'll keep fighting after he leaves. I love the timing, e.g., when T2!John is is low-5ing the Terminator.

[sanguinity]

Heh, going into this vid I had NO IDEA why she didn't go with John (or, alternatively, drag him out of the time bubble and send him to bed without supper). The whole latter half of the vid is an exercise in me trying to work that out, haha.

Aw, I'm particularly fond of how the timing works on that low-five, too! ("Well, obviously, that clip is going to sit nowhere but there, and I'm going to have to somehow sort the rest of the narrative around it.")

[colls]

Nice! I really like the juxtaposition of violence and domesticity early in the vid, and the use of the movie footage was really well done.

[sanguinity]

Thank you so much!

[caramarie]

Oh, this is really great! I love the use of the flashbacks, and how smoothly you've incorporated the movie footage there, and then at the end, when the flashbacks switch to being what we've thought of as the present ... oh, Sarah.

[sanguinity]

Thank you! I'm very pleased with the way the movie footage came out, and glad that the perspective shift at the end worked. :-D

[nicole_anell]

Oh Sarah. <3 I really loved your editing here, and the movie parallels were subtle and well done, especially leading to the end! The relaxed or mundane moments were also nice here, whether the idyllic lighthouse or the bit with Derek and the toothbrush, right before we're back to ASSEMBLING GUNS and constant danger.

[sanguinity]

I'm so very glad you enjoyed!

When Sarah is sad, it makes her feel better to clean her guns. (I lol forever that right after that touching scene with Charlie in the yard, SHE HAS TO CLEAN HER GUNS NOW. I also lol forever that when Derek is stressed he, too, NEEDS TO CLEAN SOME GUNS. And then they have territorial disputes about WHO HAS BEEN TOUCHING WHOSE TEDDY BEARS GUNS.)