50/50

Great. Except questionable ethics for the therapist.

6 Month Update

Time sure has passed!  I haven't been going to the movies as often and life is worse because of it.  So, I only have a few to write about.  And I can't even remember what I've seen (or what I've missed), so here they are:

Midnight in Paris -- Of course I loved it.  It was so lovely.  I adore Woody Allen and he did not disappoint.

Horrible Bosses -- Maybe the biggest surprise of the summer.  Very funny.  Super funny.  And uncomfortably awkward.  Jennifer Aniston, great job.   

Captain America -- Very entertaining.  I have no foundation of knowledge for this comic book story, so coming from that, I enjoyed it very much.  I'm interested in seeing how The Avengers will come together.

Cowboys and Aliens -- Jon Favreau, I hate when you disappoint me.  The movie was fine, just not all that great. 

Crazy, Stupid, Love -- I wish I rented this one.  It was not bad, and some scenes were super funny, but otherwise, it lacked something.  Definitely worth Netflixing.

And the Oscar goes to ...

I can only comment on the movies I have seen and I'm only voting in the categories that I understand (sound editing?  Whoever does it, thank you, but I have no idea what that is or why I would even be qualified to judge that).  And I have already Netflixed several of the movies that I missed.     

BEST PICTURE
Probably will win: The Social Network
I hope will win: The King's Speech
I have a feeling that The Social Network will rack up the awards as Facebook has taken the world by storm, and apparently 2010 was a big year for it.  Mark Zuckerburg was TIME's Person of the Year and FB is becoming ubiquitous, so why wouldn't it win?  Also, it won the same category at the Golden Globes.  HOWEVER, The King's Speech was all about the classic movie experience.  Great story, not boringly historical, all star actors, enchanting characters; it was just a nearly perfect movie.  I didn't want it to end, but when it did, it was satisfying.  Like a good book, but for watching.    

ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE
Probably will win: Colin Firth
I hope will win: Colin Firth
I adore Colin's characters.  He does not disappoint.  Also, he's all over the magazines and he's already won this one at the Golden Globes.  He deserves to have a statue for every room in his house.

ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Probably will win: Christian Bale
I hope will win:  Christian Bale
Already won this at the Golden Globes.  He is transcendent.  Transformative.  Also, it seemed to me he was more of a co-leading man than a supporting actor, but whatever.  He'll win.


ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE
Probably will win:  Natalie Portman
I hope will win: Natalie Portman
She already won it at the Golden Globes and there's really no contest that she'll win again.  Admittedly, I've only seen 2 out of the 5 nominated movies, and out of the two, Annette Bening is not going to win (although The Kids Are All Right was very good, but not particularly because of Mrs. Warren Beatty) mostly because being a lesbian with a drinking problem is not enough to win; you need to go ass out crazy and hallucinate that you had sex with yourself but not quite yourself as played by Mila Kunis.  Although, I did not care for Black Swan at all.  At All.        

ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Probably will win: Melissa Leo
I hope will win: Hailee Steinfeld
The Fighter was fantastic and Melissa Leo brought her character to reality.  But Hailee Steinfeld (again not sure why she is considered "supporting" as the story line was about her character as much as it was about Jeff Bridges' Rooster) was superb as the wise talking gritty revengeful girl.


ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
Probably will win: Toy Story 3
I hope will win: tie between Toy Story 3 and How To Train Your Dragon
This is like picking your favorite child.  You secretly have one, but it changes daily.  Toy Story is one of my all time favorite movies ever in the history of my life.  I was Woody for Halloween in high school (we placed like 3rd in the costume contest with my best friend as Buzz), I adore all things Buzz Lightyear, and I love love love toys.  And Pixar, no one can touch Pixar.  Dreamworks is coming close, but Pixar's always a nanosecond in the lead.  Now.  How To Train Your Dragon.  This is what 3D was waiting for.  The movie was thrilling in 3D and I fell in love.  I also have an affinity for dragons.  And the story was one of those solid, moral "everyone would be better if we just all learned from this movie" kind of movie.

CINEMATOGRAPHY
Guess: True Grit
This movie has got to win something!  The Coen's always choose beautiful scenery, landscapes, open spaces.  But, ya know, like a gritty kind this time. 

COSTUME DESIGN
Probably will win: Alice in Wonderland
I hope will win: Alice in Wonderland
Even though this movie totally disappointed me in a way that I really can't even access because it runs so deeply, the costuming was brilliant.  Not what I would have chosen for such a classic, close-to-my-heart-and-have-seen-it-one-million-times-in-my-imagination, but good enough because I can understand that no one else can really see what's in my mind's eye.  Oh but if they could.   


DIRECTING
Probably will win: The Social Network
I hope will win: The King's Speech or The Social Network
I get that directing a film (and also writing one) about the internet and a social networking site -- which people typically use alone in a most uninteresting way -- was probably incredibly challenging.  But I just loved The King's Speech so much.  BUT  I'll give it up to The Social Network, A for effort in making a boring topic surprisingly engaging. 

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
How terrible.  I haven't seen any documentaries. 

DOCUMENTARY SHORT SUBJECT
Not even the short ones. 

MUSIC (ORIGINAL SCORE)
Probably will win:  The Social Network (Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross)
I hope will win: The Social Network or Inception
I think that straight up, The Social Network had a traditional, but awesome soundtrack, mostly because Trent Reznor is pretty awesome and I'm glad that his name is back out there (btw anyone want to make me a NIN mix?).  BUT I loved the ingenious creativity behind the use of Inception's soundtrack; the slowing or speeding up of of the Edith Piaf song "Non, je ne Regrette Rien" as sound effect and as part of the story. 

VISUAL EFFECTS
Probably will win: Inception
I hope will win: Inception
As far as I'm concerned, other than the animated films, there was no other movie that was more visually mind blowing than Inception.  

WRITING (ADAPTED SCREEN PLAY)
Probably will win: The Social Network
I hope will win: True Grit
Again, The Social Network's premise is incredibly bo-ring, so bravo to making court documents and FB seem far more interesting than it really is.  True Grit's dialogue rivaled The Social Network's feverishly fast paced dialogue with smart quips too many to recall.  The Coens are Oscar movie making machines.    

WRITING (ORIGINAL SCREEN PLAY)
Probably will win: Inception
I hope will win: Inception
I'm sure, dollars to doughnuts, that there was no movie in the running as original as Inception.

The Fighter

The Fighter was excellent.  I think it is in the top movies that were fantastic in 2010: How to Train Your Dragon, The King's Speech, Social Network, Inception, True Grit, The Fighter.  Christian Bale did it again with just totally transforming himself.  He even had a bald spot, for goodness sake!  It was a complete, fully developed film that had a balance of levity among the serious drama.  Good job!

Burlesque, Gulliver's Travels, True Grit, Black Swan, and The King's Speech

So.  After abstaining from movie-going for like 2 weeks, I ended up seeing Burlesque.  Not awful.  Probably could have done better with choosing a movie to interfere with my principles.  I did not like Christina Aguilera's character by the end.  But it was nice to see Cher; she looks good except for her hands, which betray her age -- plastic surgery doesn't go down that far, I guess.

Then I really did stop.  I did.  I waited until right after Christmas, and then I binged.  I just could not help myself.

I saw 4 movies in 1 week.

The King's Speech was brilliant.  So great.  It was like a book that you don't want to end, but when it does, you are totally satisfied.  Everyone was cast perfectly and the story just moved.  Wonderful.  True Grit was of course fantastic -- it is amazing how the Coen brothers churn out the most delectable dialogue.  Gulliver's Travels was cute -- rentable, definitely.  Black Swan was totally not worth the hype.  Mr. Aronofsky, I'm very sorry to say, this was regrettable.  I really wonder why I wanted to see it in the first place.  Oh, right, hype.  I guess if I had to dissect it, I'd wonder if the slow pacing was purposeful and the superfluous violence and sex were part of -- what exactly?  I was just sort of bored.      

BAD NEWS!

As of the end of October, unbeknownst to us Movie Tuesdayers (cause we skipped a couple of weeks because there were only scary, bad movies out), MOVIE TUESDAY DISCOUNTS WERE DISCONTINUED!  According to the manager, it was permanent because the new owners did not like "losing money" because of the promotion.  Devastated, of course -- initially because we had to pay regular price for a 3D movie (Megamind -- very cute, but not really worth the 3D) -- I wrote a letter the next morning:

To Whom It May Concern,
The Rave Movie Theater in Hazlet, NJ is a great theater.  The movie house is clean, the employees are friendly, and the $6 bargain Tuesday promotion was simply the best deal around.  Eight friends and I formed a Movie Tuesday Group and each week for a year and a half we happily met up on Tuesdays after work to see a movie – and it did not matter what kind: good, bad, or otherwise.  Unfortunately, we discovered that as of 10/28/10 the bargain Tuesday promotion had been suspended indefinitely.  This came as a shock when we went to see and pay for a 3D movie and were told to hand over $14.75, which if we had to do so weekly, would be cost prohibitive.  Even the regular movie price of $10.75 has priced us out of weekly movie going (that’s why we were so thrilled to discover bargain Tuesdays).  There was a different air out the movie theater that night – most notably there were far less customers.  And now we will be among the “less,” and our group activity has ended.  I write this letter to appeal to whoever decided that this discontinuation would be positive and permanent.  Please reconsider and reinstate bargain Tuesdays.
As of today, Rave has lost 9 regular customers.


Sincerely,


Lindsay Nelson       

And the (very prompt) reply:

Ms. Nelson,

Rave has not stated that this is permanent. This is being discontinued for now during the holiday period, as has been done in the past by the previous owners as well. [NOT TRUE!] What we will do with this program or something similar to it, is unknown at this time. We are assessed penalties by the studios for so heavily discounting these tickets that it is completely cost prohibitive to continue doing so.

In order for a program such as this to work, it must work on both the customer’s end and our end, and that just isn’t the case right now. This actually costs us money to run, especially during the holidays, hence the current discontinuation.

Regards,

Ron Walker

DEVASTATION, LIES, OH THE HORROR! 


Needless to say, Movie Tuesday stopped.  On principle.  So sad.

Easy A, You Again, The Town, Social Network, and Life As We Know It

Don't even bother to rent You Again.  It was disappointeningly bad.  Otherwise, all were great, especially The Town, Social Network, and Easy A.