Actor’s Profile – Jennifer Lawrence

This year, I’m focusing on different actors every month, all are my favorites. And of course I had to start my year with Mr Robert Pattinson. So it seems only fitting that on February I shall choose one of my favorite actresses to feature. I’m going to write about J-Law and link to my movie reviews on Letterboxd. Check out all my actor’s profiles here.

Jen and I go way back, over ten years now. The very first movie I saw by her was ‘Winter’s Bone‘. It was around that time that I started to really get into watching Oscar-nominated movies, a habit I’ve kept until this day. Not that I always agree with who the Academy chose as winners or even the nominees but I still like to watch the movies. I was blown away by this brutal little movie, with a very young actress as lead whom I’ve never seen before but looked like she was a veteran. She acted like she was a veteran. Acting is the wrong word, because she wasn’t acting, she was that person for the duration of the movie. The camera loved her, and I fell in love with her.

Before and after ‘Winter’s Bone’, Jen had just done some small roles like in the aggressively mediocre ‘The Burning Plain‘, the heart-breaking and beautiful ‘Like Crazy‘ and the quirky yet heartfelt ‘The Beaver‘. Even in the fantastic ‘X-Men: First Class’ as Raven, she was the supporting actor. She did a great job in all of them but none of them used even half of her potential.

Then came the one movie and suddenly the whole world was watching – The Hunger Games. I was initially conflicted whether I wanted to even watch it or read the books, cos I’m a huge fan of ‘Battle Royale’ and at least the premise of the of The Hunger Games are way too similar to be a coincidence. But finding out that Jen was going to be Katniss, I knew I had to give the trilogy a go. And I ended up really really enjoying the conclusion of the story. Jen as Katniss was steady and excellent, despite not all the movies were that well done. At times, she was the one carrying the whole thing forward. I’m glad that this is Jen big franchise experience.

And in between and after being Katniss, she kept herself busy another X-Men movie (Days of the Future Past), a shitty horror movie ‘House at the End of the Street‘, and a disastrously messy ‘Serena‘ completely ruined in post-production. She also did three David O. Russell movies, David obviously found a temporary muse in Jen and he did bring out this slightly unhinged side of Jen that I did enjoy watching at the time: ‘Silver Lining’s Playbook‘, ‘American Hustle‘ and ‘Joy‘. Jen was energetic and magnetic in all of those three and definitely elevated all three movies with her delightful presence.

And by this time, she had already won an Oscar for best actress and nominated thrice. But I feel like she was still looking for herself, looking to find roles that would showcase her talents and use all her potential and also be more than mediocre movies at the same time. Movies such as ‘Passengers‘ and ‘Red Sparrow‘ didn’t really manage to do those things other than show that Jen was willing to go for edgier roles. But this one movie did fulfill of that.

The last Jen film that I watched for February is actually perfect – ‘mother!‘. It quickly became one of my favorite movies because it was batshit crazy but at the same time made me think so much. After a week of seeing it, I was still thinking about it and I know I have to see it again. And again. Jen was luminous in it. She shreds the melancholy young girl and the loud, slightly unhinged woman we got to see so much previously and she showed us yet another type of acting of hers – subtle, gentle and warm with such depth and hidden frustration and finally rage. She went through so much in ‘mother!’ and she had this certain air of maturity now to her acting that I actually like a lot. And funny enough, in ‘mother!’ she reminds me of her role in ‘Winter’s Bone’, subtle yet highly effective in conveying different emotions.

I feel like Jen really went through a journey in finding herself and I can’t wait for her to come back and give us more excellent performances. I believed in her from the beginning, and it feels really special to me. I’m proud of myself for finding her from the start, and I’m proud of her of being her, and I’m grateful that she allowed her fans to watch her grow as a performer. I really feel like that she is our generation’s Meryl Streep.

Marjorie – Taylor Swift

When I listened to Taylor’s albums lately, I only listened to ‘Marjorie’ for once, it was a pretty song Taylor wrote about her grandma. I felt sad listening to the song because I grew up without grandparents, being an immigrant kid. But now, ‘Marjorie’ hits different.

My grandma, my mom’s mom, passed away this week, and she was the last grandparent who left us. She was 95 and as healthy as could be until the end. My grandma was a quiet, shy lady who didn’t say much but there had always been this hidden little kid inside of her and was alive and well until the end. Once in a while that little kid would burst out and grandma would giggle at the silliest things. Even if I didn’t grow up with her in my every day life, I would like to think that I inherited that little kid from her, and I would proudly keep that childish spark in me till the day I die. Hope you have a great weekend, and if you are too having a sad one, I wish it’s at least bittersweet like mine. ❤

Breakfast Around the World, part 7 – Bangladesh

‘Breakfast Around the World‘, this week – Bangladesh!

Vegetable vaji, paratha and fried eggs 

I was pretty excited about this week’s breakfast since it involves flatbread. I love all types, such as naan, roti and now paratha. I fried up some vegetables in turmeric and it turned out a little saucier than I expected since I used tomatoes too. But it was pretty good with the eggs. I had my parents over to eat this breakfast, and since my mom can’t really take any heat, I left the vaji pretty mild. Otherwise I would have prefer a little more spice or even just more turmeric. But the paratha was great! ❤

Save Your Tears – The Weeknd

Anyone else impressed with the meme-worthy awesomeness that was The Weeknd’s half-time show at Superbowl. I know, I’m like so late to the party, I was supposed to put this out last week but Tay-Tay comes first. 😀 So here we are, a week late. This music video is fire, btw, so is the song too. 😛 I’m seriously considering getting this album of his. So enjoy and have a great weekend. 😀

Breakfast Around the World, part 6 – Poland

‘Breakfast Around the World‘, part 6 – we are going to Poland! 😀

Cebulaki and pierogies – onion rolls and Polish dumplings

Disclaimer, although I shamelessly advertise myself as being great at cooking, I absolutely suck at baking and for my utter chagrin, I realize many breakfast dishes around the world require baking skillz. For me, that’s just more loops to jump over trying to keep any baking to the minimum. And that’s the long explaination to why I didn’t make cebulaki and pierogies from scratch. 😀

I purchased some frozen bun dough and pierogies from my local supermarket and both turned out great. I know my rolls don’t look that fluffy, it’s because I only de-froze like one third of the package I got, thinking it would be enough but they ended up being tiny and flat. But hey, they were still delicious and crispy. The frozen pierogies I boiled in water and then fried them in butter and onion and put some green onion for garnish, and ate them with sour cream. They were super delicious and even my parents who were supercritical dumpling masters themselves agreed that these potato-filled versions of a very familiar dish were surprisingly delicious and creamy and fresh at the same time.