At the flicks

...whilst stuffing a whole chocolate cake in my mouth.

So what movies would you reward if it were the Andrés?

Oh Mary...

Well, if it were the Marys, I would award Moon, Good, The Road, An Education, District 9 (for trying). Best RomCom would be 500 Days of Summer, and best Comedy The Men who Stare at Goats. Best Actress would go to Carey Mulligan and Best Actor to Viggo Mortensen. Any missing films are the product of my terrible memory.

Saw The Men who Stare at Goats. This is a fictionalised account of military doings that you won't believe! I found it refreshingly funny on many levels.
The sight of Ewan McGregor denying any knowledge of Jedi Knights, the deadly seriousness with which George Clooney treated his psychic superpowers, the dark situations in which they found themselves, all made for my type of humour. And the ending is great.

Saw An Education last night. Loved it from beginning to end. I think I want to go to Paris again and explore her beauty. Carey Mulligan was delightful and Alfred Molina as her father was superb. All about 'cads' and 'bounders' and the innocence of youth. Go and see it...one of the best I have seen for ages.

That's why I awarded it a 'Mary', André

I like the idea of a Mary, Mary. I've got the White Ribbon DVD too. I'll probably watch that over the weekend, complete with popcorn, buttered of course.

Not chocolate?

Ssssh Mary...secret supply here.

Watched Julie and Julia. I wasn't sure about this one at all. I really enjoyed Meryl Streep as Julia but something was lacking in the final storytelling. Still worth a watch but didn't do it for me on the 'wow that was fabulous scale'.

The fudge bar I bought for the occasion did, however, have that 'wow' factor, smooth as silk...

Aarrgghh!!!!!

Saw MicMacs, a French comedy about a band of unlikely 'superheroes' who wage 'war' on a couple of arms dealers. I was amuséd!!!!

Watched The White Ribbon, black and white film. It was a long, long film but I enjoyed it up to a point...but it had no ending so to speak...why is it that directors think that will suffice? It had such a good storyline but he let it hang in the air, nothing was resolved...sigh, still worth a watch. Have choccy at hand, a good glass of plonk and maybe some popcorn.

Hello, girls. For better or worse, I'm more or less back from the house hunting. Agree about the ambiguous endings. "Brothers" thought that would raise it to some higher lever than it acheived with the story telling and sad to say amazing cast couldn't take this script there.

Of course we all know "lever" should be "level."

of course, Terry. BTW...did you move to the coast or are you still in your fabulously clean, renovated home?

Trying to sell fabulously clean house which is source of panic since we've contracted to buy new house whether or not we sell here. Sign me Bound for Mortgage Hell....
T

Oh no! Grab a choccie, a dvd and a glass of plonk..quick!

Quick! What is plonk! I need to know!

vino, my dear...you sound as if you need it!!!

I have just watched "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo". I enjoyed it even with the subtitles. It was similar to the book. #1 son watched it with me and he understood what was going on. Obviously some bits were chopped to make the 500+ page book into a 2 and a half hour movie.
I didn't indulge in any chocolate though as I have had a surfeit of easter eggs and really don't want to look at chocolate for at least another couple of hours.

Hi Victoria, the film was a massive sellout at the recent outdoor festival. They even sold tix to sit on the ground. I see Hollywood is planning a remake...heaven forbid the Americans could understand subtitles...(sorry Terry ).
I understand your sentiments on chocolate....thank goodness it's over for another year...though next year as it will be the end of April, it will be 4 months of eggs on the shelves from Boxing Day !!

It's not just the subtitles that's the issue, Mary. We want to see George Clooney and Julia Roberts playing the leads, car chases, lots of things blowing up, and all the conflicts resolved in the end.

For a nice American remake of a French film, see Cousins (not a single explosion!). I actually prefer it to the French version.

I just remembered, Cousins is the reason we live where we do and will be moving. We fell in love with the location and watched the credits to see where it was filmed (British BC) and resolved to live in the closest US geographic equivalent. Bellingham, WA, is 10 minutes from Canada (a very short move if this country gets any crazier, as my husband says).

[Location should have been Victoria, BC. Scuzie.]

Hey Terry, will have to check out Cousins. If there are no car chases or explosions then it's my kind of film. Will also check out the Canadian scenery. Here we are flat, sunny and dry! Not like that there????

Tonight my 16yo daughter and I went to see Alice in Wonderland 3D. This was my first foray into the world of 3D (having not seen Avatar), and I must admit I enjoyed it immensely.
The movie was clever in its adaptation, Alice being now a 20yo woman, and the actors and voices of the animated characters were well chosen.
An enjoyable school holiday flick.

Haven't seen 3-D since I was a kid and it was used gratuitously. Don't remember the flix other than they were really bad.

Mary, Pacific NW US, BC, etc., are lush green because of rainfall. Bellingham is on a bay off the Puget Sound and our new house has views of the water (reason for moving). Summers short, sunny, and not too hot. Winters cold, damp, and often overcast, with some snow and freezing days, but not too extreme b/c winds off the Pacific temporize temps west of a north/south mountain chain running parallel with the coast. Similar to Great Britain w/less fog. See www.bellingham.org.

Saw Up in the Air. Great movie! I would have given it the Terry for best picture. I thought Hurt Locker was good, but overrated. HL's main appeal, IMHO, was novelty of a good war movie made by a woman, and by giving her awards, Academy got to thumb its nose at James Cameron (her ex-husband).

Hey Terry, am packing now...let me know when you're in .
In today's paper it said that Alice was made in 2D and then adapted afterward...supposed to be an inferior method....maybe only the purists would know?

You're always welcome, Mary. We'll sit on the balcony watching the sun set on the bay, sampling Washington State Pinot Noirs.

Sounds good to me, Terry

I may pop in too Terry if you have a spare seat!

I watched 'There will be blood' - Daniel Day Lewis. It was on for nearly three hours and felt like five hours. You know when you think to yourself I've just lost a valuable few hours of my life when I could have done something more...well. I didn't enjoy it at all, although Lewis was good. The film was dark and forboding. I wish I had spent the time walking instead. I think I yawned over a hundred times.

Pop on over,Andre'. I'm relatively sure there's enough pinot in Wash st. for the 3 of us.

you think, Terry?
Just saw Io, Don Giovanni...a look at the 'real' DG as he assisted Mozart to write the opera....I think...
Luckily the leading man had the same chiselled cheekbones as Jonathan Rhys Meyers, so the time passed quite pleasantly.

I loved -- LOVED -- August Rush. I know it was panned for being too sentimental by the critics, but the child, Meyers, and Russell are all so appealing, and the story so whimsical.... My kinda movie. Think I'll watch it again.

Decided to check out what Keri Russell is up to because she's one of my fave actresses. She's in a movie with Edward Norton -- Leaves of Grass -- coming out this summer. Roger Ebert says it is g-r-e-a-t. (And the grass is pot; nothing to do with Whitman, though the characters are somewhat philosophical.)