In the Wee Small Hours....

I wonder how 2013 is panning out already for others? I don't like it much so far! Husband has been laid low with a very nasty cough and cold for well over a week. I've slept on the couch in the living room for the past 4 or 5 nights to allow him the freedom to cough with required shrillness, get up, wander around, devoid of worries about disturbing his spouse. I've so far avoided the worst symptoms of whatever virussy affliction his is, though not for much longer - the tonsils are fighting a brave rearguard action, but............

Anyway, during my nights exiled to the couch I've been encouraging sleep by watching whatever movie I could find on TV until the eyes began to close automatically. There are some rather strange movies around in the dead of night! A couple of old black and white sci-fi offerings were good for a quiet laugh; then, another night brought a newer (2003) British-made movie, The Mother shown sometime between 1 and 3 am.

Oh my! I was to quickly realise why this film had been relegated to the early hours. Several scenes wouldn't have been out of place in a real porno movie. British film makers have certainly moved with the times, put the old "lay back and think of England" thing well and truly to rest.

The biggest shock was to see actress Anne Reid who I remembered last seeing in the iconic English soap opera Coronation Street, back in the late 1960s and 70s, playing the part of sensible northern gal, young mother of twins Valerie Barlow, who, after several years in the part met an untimely end, electrocuted while drying her hair with a faulty appliance. It was an unsettling leap from her portrayal of young Valerie Barlow to the 68 year old grandmother, May, who in early widowhood takes leave of her senses and sensibilities and.......well what ensues involves a young Daniel Craig playing a 30-ish Darren, carpenter and handyman (very handy, as it turned out), doing construction work on her son's swish London house.

In looking for a pic to include here I came across an article where Ms Reid, now 77, said she "wishes she had Been sexually wilder". Hmmm.....really? Now that is bravado - or would the correct term in this case be bravada?

Suffice to say that the characters and their doings in Coronation Street were always far more believable and true to life (as we knew it then) than I found the unrelievedly nasty characters and attitudes portrayed in The Mother: May's husband, son, daughter and their respective spouses. Surrounded by that lot there's little wonder May experienced a loopy turn or two: bewitched, bewildered and generally discombobulated.

Dune, showing the following night, even with its Kwisatz Haderach, Bene Gesserit, the spice Melange and giant worms proved far too tame to keep my eyes open longer than through the first hour. Last night it was an hour or so of The Day After Tomorrow, enough to give a gal nightmares - but I'd seen it before, and therefore immunised against after effects.

Meanwhile, during daylight hours, it has not been possible to go see Les Miserables at a movie theatre in a neighbouring town. I doubt we'll make it now, virussy affliction rules it seems. There'll be a DVD soon enough, 'til then I'll sink my head into the doorstop of the Les Miz book, it arrived yesterday. I read up to page 42, and to my surprise found it a pleasantly easygoing read.

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Rooney Mara, Daniel Craig, David Fincher & Some Astrology

We watched The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo on DVD during the week. Neither of us had read the book, the first of a trilogy by the late Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson. I recalled, though, that my husband's daughter had told us how much she had enjoyed all three novels; so we opted to rent the DVD, rather than going to the cinema to see The Hunger Games. As it happens, both movies have a young woman as hero (can't use heroine here as it sounds too prissy for these two go-get-em females!)

The Dragon Tattoo movie, a "thriller" set mainly on a Swedish island, was directed by David Fincher, female lead is Rooney Mara, co-star Daniel Craig lately star of the James Bond series. (Trailer at end of this post.)

It's good that there's one mature co-star, it gives us oldies a character to which we can more easily relate - and possibly have more chance of drooling over? As it turned out Daniel Craig's role as Mikael Blomkvist, publisher of the Swedish political magazine Millennium and something of an investigative journalist, doesn't allow for a lot of drool-worthy characterisation this time. He remained fairly subdued throughout, but provides a wonderful foil for Rooney Mara's superb portrayal of manic swash-buckling Lisbeth Salander, (21st century version of swashing the buckle, of course: world-class hacker, bisexual, martial arts expert, photographic memory) possibly the weirdest character, outside of animation, to be encountered in a movie for quite some time.

We enjoyed Dragon Tattoo, in spite of some really, really nasty sexually violent scenes, about which I'll not elaborate here.

I'm interested to have a quick peek at Rooney Mara's & Daniel Craig's natal charts, as well as that of David Fincher, the film's director. There they all are in the photograph below somewhere in Europe promoting the movie -




Rooney Mara born 17 April 1985, Bedford, New York. No time of birth available so a look at a 12 noon version of her natal chart must suffice.



Ms Mara was born with the right astro-stuff to play this role: Sun and perhaps Moon in Aries (can't know about Moon without time of birth)- Aries ruled by Mars, the fighter.

Expansive Jupiter in mentally-driven Aquarius in harmonious sextile to Aquarius's ruler Uranus (the eccentric and unexpected) in Sagittarius (which Jupiter rules) is a good aspect in itself in relation to a actress playing this role. Additionally, these planets are in what astrologers call 'mutual reception' i.e. they have an even improved rapport, beyond the sextile - there is a reinforcing of the characteristics of each planet/sign.


Daniel Craig born 2 March (some websites have 11 November??) 1968 Chester, UK - 12 noon again, as no birth time is known. Craig is said to be a very private person, so I'd not wish to intrude by going into much detail here. Just a quick glance at the 2 March version - which is likely to be correct unless Mr Craig is unusually paranoid about it, by even allowing a birthday celebration to proceed in March if it wasn't really his birthday (that would, anyway, actually link to Scorpio!)

I'm dealing only with the way the 2 March astrology relates to his part in this movie.

There's an Aquarius link between the co-stars: MR has Jupiter at 13 Aquarius DC has Venus at 13 Aquarius - and a slightly less close Aries link MR has Venus/Mercury at 6and 7 Aries, DC has Mars and Saturn at 10 and 11 Aries. These links in their real-life astro-natures would have been helpful in honing an ability to produce the on-screen rather peculiar yet palpable chemistry between the two disparate characters.




David Fincher born 28 August 1962, Denver, Colorado - again 12 noon version.




A quote about Fincher from one of the pieces linked below:

He's a master of the meticulous -- famous for his obsessive research and endless takes, sometimes 50 or more per set-up; even so, he shrugs, "At best you get 60% of what you want."

Doesn't that describe quadruple Virgo traits exactly?

Look at his Sun (self) flanked by Pluto (darkness) and Uranus (the eccentric and unexpected! Those are words which describe elements in many of his films:
Seven, The Game, Fight Club , Panic Room , Zodiac, and this current one. Mustn't forget The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - a Uranian-driven movie if ever I saw one!

Note this Yod (Finger of Fate) linking a sextile between that Sun/Pluto/Uranus cluster and Mars in Cancer by two 150* quincunx aspects to Saturn in Aquarius.

Astrologer Kim Falconer describes a Yod at her website, she summarises thus:
"the Yod means that three, or more, of your planets are in dialog with each other and it's up to the pointing planet to harmonize the energy. It's called the finger of fate or God because for most people this is a default".

Saturn connects to career and professional interests, so at the apex of this Yod Saturn could be said to be drawing the characteristics of the 4 planets from the sextile together through his work.





Two good articles on the movie, Rooney Mara and David Fincher:
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/david-fincher-complex-mind-social-95704

http://www.vogue.com/magazine/article/rooney-mara-playing-with-fire/#1

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