Oh lord I vidded again

[sapote]

Was struck down by fierce vidding craving during the viewing chat for SGA 3x08.

Title: Bittersweet
Episodic minivid (about 1:30) for "McKay and Mrs. Miller".
Summary: Jeannie and her choices.

Imeem here
Megaupload download here (reupped on March 13 2008!)

My editorializing here

Comments

[justabi.livejournal.com]

I think you really captured Jeanie there with just that little bit. Lovely.

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much! I wish I could have done the whole song, but I have a pathological fear of talky-face :) so it's hard to get enough footage. Jeannie is so interesting. ::goes looking for some Jeannie gen::

[springwoof.livejournal.com]

very cool! I think you amply and simply made your point about the "aliens made them do it"-ness of Jeannie's choices. Especially with the scene of her sitting and laughing with Rodney's team, and the hugging scene--she is as brilliant as Rodney, she could have been the one in Atlantis, except for the small matter of her gender....

(except, devil's advocating here, to be fair to the ep and the show, that's exactly why she and Rodney had a falling out, no? because she did choose to have a "normal life" and not sacrifice everything to her career the way her brother did--and the way he thought she should have as well.... If she had...well, Rodney made it to the stars, Samantha Carter made it there, as well as several other female characters in the SG universe... so--bittersweet choice indeed...)

very powerful vid, left me wanting more, which doesn't happen often...

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! I'm glad you liked it :)

re: devil's advocating: exactly! The episode is very sympathetic to the decisions that Jeannie Miller neé McKay made, the choice that Rodney disagrees with. And yet I found myself going "that is a shame. I wonder if she regrets that." It's so complicated! And therefore really, really interesting to me.

[cerriddwen.livejournal.com]

EEE! It captured everything we were talking about in the chat and some of the things that were not. This vid totally filled my need for Jeannieness. Thanks for making it. (I'm Phnelt btw)

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Pnelt! HI! Welcome to my lj! And thank you for the compliment!

[phnelt.livejournal.com]

I know you totally don't know me, but I was wondering if you were ok with me friending you. I'd really like to keep up with your stuff, anything a tenth as good as this would make me like Kermit.

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Yay friends! I am pro-friend.

some thoughts and a little Margaret Atwood

[phnelt.livejournal.com]

Ok,I return a day later with some slightly more coherent thoughts. I emphasize the slightly. In the show, Rodney is represented as disappointed that his sister gave up academia, like he really thought she was brilliant (a high compliment from a man who usually stops at "not a complete waste of air"). So, go Rodney. At the same time, she's given it up to have a family. I'm not going to take sides on the staying at home thing, 'cause it's a really complicated issue, and I am not good enough at conveying what I mean without expansive hand gestures. But I will say that I feel the way the show presented it as that there are only two choices. And maybe there are.
Mostly I end up disappointed with the show (and I try not to with SGA, mostly because once I start I'll never stop-the holes are too deep) because they didn't do anything with it. They never say anything about the women, whether they be scientist, military, or something else special. I don't have that much more to say, mostly because it's been said better by people more eloquent than I, but I wanted to let you know how I feel your vid took steps to address the writers' gross failings. As a woman, I appreciate it. Now, because I am pretentious, here are some Margaret Atwood quotes from the poem Spelling:
I wonder how many women
denied themselves daughters,
closed themselves in rooms,
drew the curtains
so they could mainline words

A child is not a poem
a poem is not a child.
there is no either/or
However.

Spelling (the poem) captures to me the paradox of work and children. You can have both, you should have both, and at the same time you can't. I hope this made any sense at all.

Re: some thoughts and a little Margaret Atwood

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Yes! yes! Those words! ::dances::
Thank you for bringing me those.

Maybe the vid looks like I take sides, but I really can't either. I want to have children someday. I used to work as a nanny, watching other women try to navigate those boundaries. I don't know the answer. I just like to poke at the question from time to time.

Re: some thoughts and a little Margaret Atwood

[phnelt.livejournal.com]

I don't know the answer either. And I didn't mean to imply that you were taking sides (curse lack of gestures), I just wanted to express my appreciation for you bringing it up at all and treating it fairly. No more, no less (for this is by far enough)

Re: some thoughts and a little Margaret Atwood

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Hey! I actually got that, and intended my reply as agreement, not defense!
::contemplates potentially infinite regression of misinterpretation possible on the internet::

In conclusion: this conversation has been PRETTY YAY, in my opinion.

Re: some thoughts and a little Margaret Atwood

[phnelt.livejournal.com]

*whew*, maybe I'm getting the hang of this communication via written word thing. :contemplates the asymptotic progression incomprehensibility in conversation:
I love having conversations like this.

[kyriacarlisle.livejournal.com]

As much as I love this episode, I will admit that watching it makes me uncomfortable for the very reasons you've caught here (I kept mostly quiet in chat so as not to quell the squee - and to keep from treating everyone to an 45-minute rant about the Mommy Track). I wish we got to see a bit more of what Jeannie's thinking about going home after having been handed the universe; the last cut you've used, of her turning back to the dishes, makes me so *angry*. Which, okay, yes, trivializes her ability to make her own choices, but...

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

Seriously: aliens made them do it is my working metaphor. There are so many situations where someone's individual choice is so bound around by choices they don't get to make that it's an open question whether their choice can be called free. Someone can be happy with the decisions they've made, but it still sucks not to have all the options.

Well, the vid was my Mommy-track rant, and I'm really happy to see all the discussion happening here! (and I keep pausing to do my "I got my point across! I got my point across!" dance.) Thanks for commenting!

[thingswithwings.livejournal.com]

hey, buddy, can you reupload this? I missed it when you first uploaded. Jeannie vid!

[sapote3.livejournal.com]

It is at http://www.megaupload.com/?d=YM6M3R60 ! Hope you enjoy it, it's a wee bitty thing (and the only vid I've made with a purpose-built video editor, which for some reason made the aspect ratio wonky)