Rec-Cember Day 2: Vid: Not Gonna Stop Me Getting Through (Babylon 5)
Dec. 2nd, 2025 06:49 pmVid by



Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World wastes no time in getting the viewer acquainted with the HMS Surprise; in a few brief moments we’re given a sailor’s-eye view of the cramped below decks, home to the crew in their hammocks and livestock in tiny pens, a series of 12-pound guns and some very low ceilings. Then we’re on deck for the dawn and the change of crew, and as this is 1805, this involves sailors climbing up and down rigging and officers in stiff suits and tall hats. It’s all very peaceful, until the French privateer Acheron comes out of the fog and starts taking the Surprise apart with its cannons.
And those scenes, too, waste no time at all: In impressively quick fashion the Surprise is blasted near into splinters, some of which impale themselves into the bodies of the crew; the Captain, “Lucky Jack” Aubrey, is concussed near to death; the ship’s surgeon Stephen Maturin is so quickly drenched in the crew’s blood that he calls for sand to be thrown on the floor to keep him from slipping as he operates; and despite the courage of the ship’s crew and the pounding of their own cannon, it is only a lucky fogbank, and the backs of rowers, that keep the Surprise alive to live another day.
It’s all beautifully shot and nothing about it is in the least bit romantic. One or two lucky cannonballs more and this movie would have been an Oscar-nominated short film, not an Oscar-nominated feature. In its way, this opening was a risk for the story: Very few movies this century would open with their dashing hero (and attendant film star) so comprehensively being handed his ass as Aubrey and Russell Crowe, who embodies him, are here.
But then, this is one of the things that makes Master and Commander so watchable; it’s unflinching, in a strikingly cinematic way. Unlike its nautical contemporary Pirates of the Caribbean (both released in 2003), this movie isn’t about pretending the past is full of dashing adventures where everyone is beautiful and nothing really hurts. Lots of things hurt in this version of the early 19th century. Everything is crowded and cramped, the joys of the day are limited to an extra ration of rum, you may find yourself whipped for disrespecting an officer, and you might be given an order by your captain that sends your best mate to his death. Oh, and there’s still the Acheron out there somewhere, waiting to stuff you full of grapeshot and death.
One of the things that sells all of this is Crowe, who in 2003 was in the imperial phase of his career, and on a streak of indelible performances that started with LA Confidential, continued through Gladiator and A Beautiful Mind and ended up here. Crowe’s Aubrey is an interesting study of contradictions: both a proponent of order and a little bit feral, a man who can inspire nearly mythical levels of loyalty, and then turn around and offer some of the worst puns recorded to celluloid. He can slap down his best friend Maturin when the two of them are at philosophical odds, and then go to heroic lengths for Maturin’s well-being. Crowe at his height was a movie star of the first water, and he was pretty close to his height here.

(To be clear, he’s helped by having a counterweight in Paul Bettany’s Maturin — the two men had worked together very effectively in A Beautiful Mind, and their chemistry continues here. Bettany is not here nor ever was the movie star Crowe is, but he’s as good an actor for certain, and his angularity and sardonicism complement Crowe’s ruddiness and bluster. You can believe these two could fight so explosively and still be friends afterward. A shame they have not worked together since this.)
Master and Commander was a passion project for Tom Rothman, then head of 20th Century Fox, which explains how it was made at all. The Pirates of the Caribbean notwithstanding, no one in the early years of the 21st century was screaming for a naval adventure, particularly a realistic one set in the days of the struggle between Britain and Napoleonic France. Certainly the movie’s box office reflected this: it brought in $82.6 million at the domestic box office, below Freddy Vs. Jason and Daddy Day Care.
But then, what’s the point of being boss if you can’t occasionally make what you want to make? Fox and Rothman certainly spared no expense; the film had a $150 million budget and an A-list director in Peter Weir, whose career had an interesting range to it, from Witness to The Truman Show. The film was nominated for 10 Oscars, including Best Picture and Director, and deservingly won for cinematography (Russell Boyd) and sound editing (Richard King, the first of five, so far, for him). This film was a classic prestige play and Oscar bait, and in that respect it paid off pretty well. In a different year it might have even won Best Picture, but in this year it was up against The Return of the King, so.
Are there flaws to note in this film? Well, it’s a nautical sausage fest, for one, which one hand isn’t terribly surprising given almost all of the movie takes place on a 19th century British naval vessel, where women mostly weren’t. The Patrick O’Brien novels on which the film was based do have notable women characters, so it’s possible that if the movie had been more financially successful, at least a couple of them might have appeared in the sequels. But here there’s exactly one, glimpsed briefly by Aubrey as his crew is buying oranges and monkeys for their journey. A Bechdel Test passer, this film is not.
Speaking of the novels, fans of the Aubrey-Maturin novels might grumble that the movie doesn’t especially closely follow any one of them, and made significant alterations to ones it did borrow from. I can acknowledge their potential dissatisfaction while at the same time saying that for someone who is not a devotee of the series (raises hand), what is here seems to work well enough, and it was a shame, if not a surprise, that we didn’t get any more films out of these books. Nor do I think we will be getting any more films out of these books; if I were pitching these books in Hollywood now, I’d be pitching them as a prestige streaming series, a medium and mode where I think there would be more appetite for such a thing, and where the story might make more economic sense.
Still, I’m glad that Rothman decided to spend a little bit (or actually a lot) of the money Fox was getting out of the X-Men and Ice Age series to make this extremely handsome, extremely rewatchable ballad to the high seas. I’m glad I didn’t live in an age where I might find myself on one of these ships, and Master and Commander really confirms that if I did live then, I would best be left on dry land. But given appropriate distance in time and nautical miles, I’m happy to get this glimpse into a life on the sea, and wave as it sails by.
— JS
I'm pretty sure this is some kind of phishing scam, because I think an email from Esteemed Academic Publishing Conglomerate would have a more professional style about it:
[Nothing in the way of branding heading or footer...]
Hi [Name],
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Username: [part of my email address].netmya
Bizarre.
***
Also bizarre: partner has signed up for a hearing test in conjunction with forthcoming eye-test, and has received this upselling email (does not at present have any kind of hearing-aid) for an exciting new model on which they are offering A Deal:
Key Features:
Advanced Voice AI for natural, personalised sound
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Built-in Smart Assistant & Telecare AI, providing on-the-go adjustments and support
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Hands-free phone calls for complete convenience

The social media site r/PetsWithButtons (created in 2020) is full of interesting observations and questions. One of my favorites is "My cat has started to use “vacuum” as a curse word":
Basically the title. I gave him a “vacuum” button because the vacuum is stressful for him and I wanted to be able to clearly communicate that the vacuum was going to happen and let him know “vacuum all done.” He definitely knows what it means because when the vacuum is running he will push “vacuum” repeatedly and also add “nervous” in there too. But now he has started spamming vacuum after I tell him no, like he is using it as a curse word. For example, he will ask for “snackie” when we JUST got done with snackie and I will say “snackie all done” and then he will go spam the vacuum button. Yeah, ok bud, I hear you loud and clear that you feel “vacuum” about “snackie all done.” Or he snuck a lick from the end of my spicy curry dish (I did not authorize this, I looked away for ONE second), I could tell he regretted this (spicy), and then he went and pressed “snackie vacuum.” Yeah, ok bud, that snackie made your mouth feel “vacuum”.
I don’t know what I’m asking really, just commiserating. I guess maybe he needs a “mad” button?
I doubt that the "mad' button would work as well as the "vacuum" button, for the same reason that curses is only a good curse in (ironic interpretations of) bowdlerized fiction…
Some other r/PetsWithButtons samples: "My cat wants more words? or there’s too many?"; "Last night I had some regrets about giving my cat a walk button.."; "Suggestions for new words"; "Most used buttons"; "URGENT: Cat not eating (treat button)".
A 2017 paper surveyed the emergence of Animal-Computer Interaction as an engineering and scientific discipline — but now it's a social media site.

Hovertext:
I know you're out there somewhere, disgruntled Disney animator. This is your moment.