Day 348/365 - Beer, Nachos, and Star Trek

I missed out on seeing the newest "Star Trek" movie in its first run in theaters. My buddy Chris and I were going to see it on one of our Monday guy night at the movies, but because of scheduling issues we never got around to it. I figured I'd have to wait and catch it on DVD, but then Chris' wife Des noticed that it was playing at the Arlington Cinema 'N Drafthouse and gave us a heads up. So tonight I drank beer, ate nachos and fried mac and cheese, and finally saw "Star Trek."

I think this was the first J.J. Abrams movie that I unreservedly enjoyed. Generally his films fall apart in the final act. Most of the time it's like he has ADD and loses interest in developing a project all the way through to the end, so the last third or so tends to suck and not make much sense. This one was good thoughout, however. It excellently balanced character development, action scenes, romance, and special effects and was perfectly pitched to appeal both to diehard Trek fans and newcomers who didn't know or didn't care about the "Star Trek" universe.

All the key touches were there: Kirk made out with a hot green chick, Bones groused "Dammit, I'm a doctor not a [fill in the blank]," Spock said "fascinating," Scotty said he was giving all the engines had to give, Uhura was hot, Chekov spoke in a bad Russian accent, and the alien baddies got blasted. Yep, that's "Star Trek" all right.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 323/365 - Handcrafted Flesh

Tonight was another "Phillips After Five" session at the Phillips Collection. This time the bill of fare included a dj playing chilled out and funky international lounge music, Peroni beer, pitas, hummus, crackers, cheese, sundry dips, crudités, and a screening of the 1935 classic film, "The Bride of Frankenstein." I was curious as to why they'd selected that particular film to show, but the curator lady who introduced it did a good job of tying it to the museum's current exhibit Paint Made Flesh.

Basically, the common thread between the artists featured in the exhibit and Dr. Frankenstein is that both fashioned a semblance of life from base materials -- oil paints in one case and bits of cadavers in the other. I'd forgotten how good "The Bride of Frankenstein" is. It's one of those rare instances where the sequel is better than the original.

After the credits rolled, I stopped by Kramerbooks and Afterwords for a bowl of mac & cheese and a Toasted Almond (Baileys, Amaretto, and coffee). Yum on both counts. I also picked up a couple of new pirate books. Too bad I couldn't study pirateology in undergrad.

(Taken with my iPhone)

Day 321/365 - Inglourious Basterds

Went to the movies to see the new Quentin Tarantino flick "Inglourious Basterds" with my buddy Chris tonight. We were originally going to go yesterday, but he had a domestic scheduling conflict so we had to push it back a day. We like going to the movies on Mondays because it tends to be less crowded.

I had done all I could to avoid seeing/hearing/reading anything about the movie. Whenever the commercial came on tv I'd change the channel or close my eyes and put my fingers in my ears. I really hate most movie trailers/commercials they release now because they tend to blow the entire plot point by point and spoil any sort of surprise. Most times after you see the preview you don't need to see the movie, because you already know what happens. I don't know who is in charge of assembling most movie trailers, but they suck.

Okay, rant over. So I avoided knowing much about this movie. Chris didn't and he already knew how it ended. Despite coming at the film from two different perspectives, we both liked it. It wasn't what I was expecting. It's not a new Dirty Dozen. It's a love letter to the movies twined about a revenge fantasy. I guess I could best describe it as a mix of the "Dirty Dozen," "Cinema Paradiso," and "I Spit on Your Grave." Also unexpected, Brad Pitt wasn't really the star. Both the guy playing the SS colonel and the woman playing the refugee theater owner had larger parts and took up a bigger share of the storyline.

It's a long movie, 2.5 hours, but it moves well. I think the fact that it is broken up into several acts and subplots makes it seem like several smaller movies than one long one. That's pretty much standard Tarantino, though. I think this is probably his best work since "Pulp Fiction." His signature touches are there -- it's brutal, bloody, bizarre and funny with dueling dialogue and quirky and absorbing characters. He seems to have gotten quite a bit better at cinematography. A lot of the shots are sumptious and lush.

It's certainly a movie worth seeing and I'm anxious to find out what the DVD version will be like. The extras should be good. My friend Chris pointed out that there were likely a lot more character-establishing scenes that were cut to pare the movie down to its current running length. But don't wait until the DVD comes out. Go and see it now and then you can compare it later.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 306/365 - G.I. Joe (Doesn't Blow)

Suprisingly the GI Joe movie doesn't suck. My friend Chris and I went to see it as part of our occasional "Monday guy night at the movies." I was expecting it to be rather craptastic, but with some cool action sequences and effects. However, apart from the Paris sequence -- which was overlong, largely unnecessary, and absolutely ridiculous, it was a fairly good movie. Definitely enjoyable.

The characters, while two-dimensional (it was based on a cartoon after all), were entertaining and the story almost made sense. The action sequences, which are really the star of a movie like this, were pretty damn cool. It wasn't a particularly original piece of cinema. There was pretty heavy borrowing from Star Wars and also the Bond movies, but I didn't feel cheated after it was over.

It ain't art, and it ain't particularly smart, but it is fun. Yo Joe!

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 303/365 - French Twofer (Deux Pour?)

There is a French restaurant in Georgetown called La Chaumiere that I've been wanting to try for a few years and tonight I finally went. I was going to see the movie "Julie & Julia" that is, in part, about Julia Child's formative years in France and I thought it would be cool to have dinner in a French resaurant beforehand. La Chaumiere is a small, intimate restaurant with a rustic and cozy feel to it. The food is very good. I had an emmenthaler cheese souffle to start and followed that with the venison medallions. Plus a couple glasses of champagne. Why not?

I took the unforgivable step of skipping dessert so that I would have time to stop by an ATM and get to the movie theater on time. When I got to the electronic kiosk at the theater to buy my ticket, I discovered that my debit card was not in my wallet. Cue moment of minor panic. I decided I must have neglected to take it out of the folder thing the bill was in at the restaurant. I started heading back to La Chaumiere when it hit me that I'd still had the card when I stopped by the ATM, at which point I realized that I'd gone off and left my card in the machine after taking the cash. Ugh.

I wasn't too, too worried given that there was no one else around the ATM when I went, it was inside the bank foyer rather than on the street in the open, and I believe ATMs are designed to suck your card back inside if you forget to take it. My card wasn't there when I got back to the ATM, and this is where buying an iPhone came in handy. I used it to get on my bank's website and find the number for reporting a lost or stolen card. There hadn't been any activity on my card since I'd withdrawn money, and they went ahead and cancelled it and sent me a new one. Phew.

By that time I'd missed the 7:15 show, but there was another one at 8:15 so I pulled up the map on my iPhone, found the nearest Starbucks, went and got myself a mocha frappucino, and did the Wall Street Journal crossword puzzle on my phone to pass the time. If it's possible to love a little hunk of metal and plastic, I'm coming to love my iPhone.

Back at the movie theater, the lady at the ticket counter recommended heading straight to the auditorium to get a good seat because it was looking like the show was going to sell out. Great recommendation, and something I wouldn't have gotten had I used the electronic kiosk rather than dealing with a person. The show did turn out to be packed and a lot of people who came in after me had trouble finding a decent place to sit.

The movie was very good. It has two storylines, both of which are based on real events. One is about Julia Child discovering French food in post-WWII Paris, learning to cook, and putting together her groundbreaking cookbook. The other is about a woman who decides to prepare all 500+ recipes in Julia's book in one year and blog about it daily. The plotlines echo each other in several regards, much in the way that the subplot informs on the main plot in Shakespeare. The first hint of this is in the introductory scene for each character when we see Julia drive by the Eiffel Tower in Paris and Julie drive by a rusty water tower in Queens.

Although their lives are very different on the surface, the two women's stories share many of the same elements. Each is trying to find something to do with her life, something more than just what she's done in the past and something more personally meaningful than just another way to pass the time. Each finds the answer in French cooking. BTW, don't go see this movie when you are hungry. I can only imagine it would be torment.

The Washington Post movie critic made a big noise over noting that the Julia Child scenes are more compelling than the Julie the blogger scenes. How insightful. Let's see, Julia Child and her husband are portrayed by Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci. Who'd have guessed that their performances would outshine those of Amy Adams and the anonymous guy who plays her husband? There's some rocket science for you. I enjoyed both storylines. So go, see this movie and have a fun night out. Just make sure you eat beforehand.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 284/365 - (500) Days of Summer

Today was another day that was too beautiful to let pass by without getting out and enjoying it, so I decided to head to Bethesda. My friend Pia had raved about Ali Baba's Falafel in Bethesda and the arthouse movie theater there was one of the three in the area showing (500) Days of Summer, which I'd been anxiously awaiting. Who am I to resist kismet?

The falafel was the second-best I've ever had (first best is still L'as du Fallafel in the Marais section of Paris) and while I was sitting there on the curb scarfing it down who should walk by but Pia? She and another friend of hers were there perusing the goods that the outdoor bazaar at the Farm Women's Market had on display. We chatted for a bit and then I did my own turn of perusing the wares before heading down the hill to the movie theater.

After buying my ticket I still had some time to kill before the show started, so I popped into the Gifford's next door and got myself a peanut butter cookies and cream ice cream cone. Yummmmmmm. The movie turned out to be as good as I'd hoped. It was sadder and more realistic than most romantic movies. It's a non-linear, out of sequence narrative that charts various events over the course of a guy's life in the five hundred days that pass after he meets a woman named Summer.

There are sweet, romantic, happy, funny scenes and bitter, cynical, sad, funny scenes -- with the latter predominating toward the end. The casting is perfect. Even though Zooey Deschanel doesn't fit the cookie cutter Hollywood sex object mold, she's completely believable as the irresistible attractive and destructive force in the guy's life. The lead characters are both annoying and likeable in their own rights. They're much like real people in that regard.

The movie's bittersweet love story of a quirky couple and scrambled narrative style are probably most similar to another movie I loved, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Even the soundtrack for (500) Days is awesome, with the exception of two snippets of Patrick Swayze warbling "She's Like the Wind." Gack. The excellent group dance scene set to Hall and Oates "You Make My Dreams Come True" in the middle of the movie atones for even that horror, however.

I'll be curious to get a woman's perspective on the film to see if the apportionment of blame for the couple's problems is different from the female point of view. I put most of the fault on Summer, while recognizing that the guy had his own share of issues. I could maybe see the pendulum of blame swinging the other way, though.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 280/365 - Playing Hooky with Harry Potter

Thanks to my subversive instigation, nearly my entire office (including both our interns) snuck off to catch a noon showing of the new Harry Potter movie today. Don't worry, we used our vacation time to go so there's no issue of tax dollars being squandered while federal employees go AWOL.

Given that it's summertime I was expecting the theater to be packed with kids, but it was almost exclusively a crowd of nerdy adults. Comme nous. The movie was good, but as usual there was a lot they left out. They kept most of the comedy and romance bits intact, but surprisingly they cut a major action scene from the book. Still, it was a satisfying film and skipping off in the middle of the day to go to the movies was great. Coming back to work afterward, not so much.

Surely there has to be a magic spell to chase away work. Some variation of expelliarmus perhaps, or maybe this calls for a patronus.


(Taken with my Nikon D90)

Day 254/365 - Stranded in New York

So to resume from yesterday's entry, I missed the last train back to DC due to a rain delay at the Nationals-Yankees game and the next one wasn't until 3 a.m. That left me plenty of time to kill in New York City in the wee hours of this morning. I wandered around Time Square for a bit and spotted a couple of movie theaters. One was closed, but the other still had one show playing at midnight -- "Year One" with Jack Black and Michael Cera. I had been hoping to catch a screening of "The Hangover," but figured 'what the hell, it's a way to pass a couple hours.' Ugh.

DO NOT go and see this movie. Not to be unduly flippant, but it's the cinematic equivalent of waterboarding. If someone you know mentions the possibility of going and seeing this movie, beat them about the head with a rolled up magazine until they come to their senses. Based on the previews, I figured "Year One" would be about 25 percent funny. However, even my lowered expectations overshot the mark by at least 15 percent. It's dreadful.

It did successfully throttle a couple of hours to death, though, so I guess I got what I wanted from it. After that, I ambled back over to Penn Station to wait for my train. I was expecting the station to be full of freaks and derelicts at that time of day, but it wasn't. It was largely empty except for a cluster of weary travelers waiting for their trains to come.

Mine finally came and after fidgeting and squirming in my seat for about an hour, I was able to doze off for the rest of the trip. We pulled into Union Station at 7 a.m. this morning, 23 1/2 hours after I'd caught the train up to NYC the previous day. I metroed back to my apartment, brushed my teeth, and collapsed into my bed.

Home at last.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 250/365 - Modern Day Drive-In

The Business Improvement District in my neighborhood stages an outdoor film festival every summer. They erect a movie screen on a grassy sward in the courtyard of an office complex and show movies for free every Monday after dark. Last summer they showed all the James Bond movies. The theme for this summer is superhero movies and tonight's show was Superman II, so I decided it was high time I put in my first appearance at this year's festival.

Superman II is my favorite of the Superman movies despite all the logic holes, such as:

-- Why, when the villains drop the flags after attacking the lunar expedition, do they immediately fall to the surface of the moon rather than drifing down slowly?
-- When Superman uses his laser vision while in his Clark Kent disguise, why doesn't he burn holes through his glasses?
-- After being stripped of his superpowers, how do Clark and Lois make it back to civilization from his remote Fortress of Solitude?
-- How does Superman get his powers back after his mom tells him the process of removing them is permanent?
-- And just how does his amnesia-inducing superkiss manage to neatly erase Lois' memory of his secret identity?

In the final analysis though, who really cares? It's still a fun movie and seeing it makes me feel like a kid again, just like sitting outside to watch a movie makes me think back to when we'd go to the drive-in theater when I was little. That's worth overlooking a few gaffes.

(Taken with my Nikon D90)

Day 216/365 - Wolverine

Chris, Adriana, and I went to the movies in Georgetown tonight to see "Wolverine." It was about what we expected from a comic book movie. It's a bit long and meandering without much in the way of a tightly-constructed plot, but there are some good action sequences and some suprisingly good performances, particularly by Hugh Jackman and Liev Schreiber. It deviates a fair amount from the comic books, which I found a little distressing given that Wolverine was one of my favorite characters from back in my comic collecting days. Adriana particularly enjoyed all the half-nekkid male eye candy. Unfortunately for Chris and me, there was no female equivalent to balance things out. Life is so unfair.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 209/365 - Happy Cinco de Mayo!

Happy Cinco de Mayo a mis amigos. I spent mine eating queso, drinking Corona, and watching "The Mexican" on dvd. Perhaps not the most authentic way to celebrate Mexico's victory over the French imperialists at the Battle of Puebla, but it was fun anyhow. "The Mexican" is an odd little movie, but I like it. Great cast (Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, James Gandolfini, Gene Hackman) and quirky humor. If you haven't seen it, rent it. There's quite a bit of bloodshed, though, so be advised.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 180/365 - High Brow/Low Brow

Today was a pretty apt summation of my random and eclectic interests. This afternoon, I attended a rehearsal of the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela in preparation for their concert tonight at the Kennedy Center. Then tonight, I met my friend Chris at the theater in Georgetown to see the new "Fast & Furious" movie. Both were entertaining in their own way.

The Youth Orchestra was excellent. The kids were very skilled, talented, and energetic and the conductor was so lively it looked like he was dancing at the podium. The movie was escapist fun. It's essentially a two-hour long adolescent male fantasy of fights, guns, good buddies, fast cars, and hot women.

It's good to be well-rounded.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200 and processed using Microsoft Publisher)

Day 177/365 - Everlasting Moments

A few days back my friend Pia invited me to go see the foreign film "Everlasting Moments" with her and tonight we both finally had a free night to go. The movie chronicles the experiences of a Swedish family in the early 1900s. The style of the movie is similar to the realist movement in literature in that it doesn't feature a strong central plot that drives the narrative, but instead focuses on the ordinary details of the ordinary lives of an ordinary family. As such, it proceeds at a very leisurely pace and meanders a bit in spots, but it is a journey worth taking.

One of the central themes of the movie is the search for fulfillment and happiness. For the coarse, abusive brute that is the family's husband/father, this search initially leads to the illusory joys of alcohol and adultery, and later to caring for an injured horse. For the eldest daughter, it's her desire to become a teacher. For the eldest son, his desire to become a scholar. But the movie's primary focus is on the wife/mother of the family's quest for happiness, a search which leads her to discover photography.

Photography is in many ways the deus ex machina in this movie, working to push and pull the characters in various ways. At the beginning of the movie, the eldest daughter who narrates the film recounts how her mother won a camera in a raffle with a ticket purchased by her eventual husband. When he said the camera should be his given that he paid for the ticket, she said he could only have if he married her, which he then did. The camera, however (a portable Contessa with a collapsible bellows), is quickly packed away and forgotten, only to be rediscovered many years later when the women is cleaning house. She takes it to a local photography studio to sell it, but the proprietor of the studio convinces her that she should at least try the camera before she sells it.

She does, and quickly discovers that she has both a passion and a skill for photography. Her talent for photography eventually leads to her selling a photo to the local newspaper, taking portraits for her neighbors and later for merchants and more well-to-do clients, and also serves as the seed for her unconsummated affair of the heart with the studio owner.

From the end credits, it appears that the movie is not a work of pure fiction but is instead based on the lives of an actual family as recounted in the reminiscences of the eldest daughter. The movie is interesting and compelling, if a bit long-ish, but don't expect slam bang action or neat resolutions to difficult questions. In the end it's a realistic portrait of people's lives, much in the way that a photograph is, and real life is seldom sensational or tidy. But, just the same, life is worth living and this movie is worth seeing.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 175/365 - I'm on TV!

April Fool's!

This week's self-portrait is a shot of me playing the part of a private detective in an old movie on tv. Thankfully, it's no April Fool's Day joke that my cable is working again at last. After a week and a half with no tv, I'm finally able to resume rotting my brain out with vulgar tripe. Bring on the bread and circuses!

(Taken with my Nikon D80 and manipulated using Microsoft Publisher)

Day 150/365 - Who Watches the Watchmen?... Me, that's Who

Today I went to a matinee showing of the new movie 'Watchmen' with my friend Chris. We decided to see it at the Uptown where they have a really big screen and we opted to try our luck with the 12:15 showing, figuring it would be less crowded. We were right on that score. The theater was only about two-thirds full and we were able to snag prime seats in the balcony. As we left we noticed that there were already people in line for the next showing, even though it was still more than an hour away.

'Watchmen' has gotten some bad reviews, but Chris and I both liked it. I read the graphic novel back when I was in high school and I had forgotten most of it. Basically all I could remember was who the bad guy actually was, and that Dr. Manhattan was kind of an ass. I think they did a good job of adapting it for the big screen. They devoted a fair amount of time to developing the story and the characters and it wasn't just stunts and fights, although it was a fairly brutal movie in parts.

Visually speaking it was very well done and it avoided looking fakey. The performances were mixed. The actor portraying Nite Owl did the best job with his role, and he's really the only completely likeable character. The other characters you can like, but with some reservations. The rest of the cast was so-so. The actor playing Rohrschach was quite good, but his character is pretty one-dimensional. Homicidal sociopaths tend to be like that.

All things considered it was a pretty good movie. It does a good job of taking a look at the dark side of being a superhero and the costs that lifestyle carries with it. The movie is rather hard on women, though. There are only two female characters and they flip between being vixens or victims, plus there is a vicious attempted rape scene that was tough to watch. Also, I could do quite nicely with a little less screen time for Dr. Manhattan's swinging and swaying blue male member. Would it have killed him to wear pants a bit more often?

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 123/365 - Coraline in 3D

I'd never heard of Neil Gaiman's book 'Coraline' before, but when Erin got all excited that they were making a movie about it and gave me a quick synopsis of the story, I figured I had to see it as well. I'm glad I did. And I'm even more glad that I saw it in 3D.

I think the first 3D movie I ever saw was the old black & white monster movie 'Creature from the Black Lagoon.' When I was a kid the high school my brother and sisters attended had a screening of it one weekend as a fundraiser. I still remember this arm sticking straight out of the screen and in my face.

The 3D they use in 'Coraline' is quite a bit different than the old school variety, as are the glasses. Instead of white cardboard frames with red and blue lenses, the new 3D (called Real 3D) glasses look sort of like Ray Ban wayfarer sunglasses. There don't seem to be as many gimmicky 'comin' right at ya' moments in the modern 3D movies either, although there was a scene with a sewing needle early in 'Coraline' that had me drawing back in my seat.

Watching a modern 3D movie such as 'Coraline' is a lot like watching one of those old Viewmaster Viewer paper discs that has been turned into a movie. The depth of field and illusion of distance are amazing. In particular, there is a recurring scene in 'Coraline' involving a secret tunnel that just seems to stretch on and on and on far beyond the wall of the movie theater.

'Coraline' strikes me as being more of an adult fable than a kid's story. Parts of it are quite creepy, nightmare-fuel and there is a mildly racy bit involving a buxom old burlesque/cabaret performer prancing about in pasties and a thong that I'm sure had some parents in the audience second-guessing themselves. The litle boys sitting behind me thought it was hilarious, though.

The story is captivating, as are the characters. Coraline and her negligent, 'please leave me alone/I'm busy' parents have just moved into a strange old house with strange old neighbors and it doesn't take long for our spunky young heroine to discover that the house contains a passage to an alternate world peopled with an 'other' mother and 'other' father (not to mention 'other' neighbors) that are attentive and indulgent.

It seems at first as though this alternate world holds everything Coraline could want and nothing she doesn't. If only they didn't have those creepy buttons for eyes. And therein hangs the tale. I really enjoyed the movie and now I want to get my hands on a copy of the book. I'm sure it will be even better than the movie, despite the fact that it's only in 2D.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 99/365 - Curious Case, Great Movie

Tonight I met up with my friend Adriana and we went to the movie theater in Chinatown to see "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button." It was excellent. Although it's a fairly long movie (2:47), it never seemed long and didn't drag at all. The story kept moving and kept you interested in learning what was going to happen next.

In case you are unfamiliar with the plot, the movie concerns a guy who is born backwards in time -- he starts out as an old man with arthritis and cataracts and then grows younger as he 'ages.' It's based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald and although it's a bit of a "high concept" premise, the movie never feels contrived. It's engrossing, adventurous, dramatic, romantic, melancholy, and -- in quite a few spots -- flat out funny.

The performances were good. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett did a nice job with their parts, but the movie was absolutely stolen by the actress who played Pitt's adoptive mother. The actor who portrays the tugboat captain did quite a good job as well. They also did an amazing job with the make-up and computer animation, so that it never looked fakey as the characters either aged or got younger.

The movie definitely has echoes of "Forest Gump" in that it deals with a boy growing up with the stigma of being 'different' who is very close to his protective mother, who comes of age traveling the world and serving in wartime, who has a star-crossed romance with a woman he's known since childhood, and who fears that any child of his will suffer from his condition. Despite that, though, it doesn't feel like a retread or a knock-off of any other film.

Two things to look out for if you decide to go see this movie -- the guy who pops up occasionally to discuss being struck by lightning and the moment every woman in the theater sighs simultaneously. Here's a hint, it features Pitt riding a motorcycle and seemed to have a pretty universal effect on the distaff portion of the audience (including Adriana). The guys were less impressed. It was a cool motorcycle, though.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 77/365 - 'Twas the Night Before Christmas...

...and I was nestled all snug in my bed, but it wasn't visions of sugarplums I saw -- it was the Christmas Story marathon on TBS instead!

Merry Christmas to all, and to all, a good night!

(Taken with my Nikon D80)

Day 72/365 - Bright Lights, Big Screen

My favorite movie of all time is the Frank Capra Christmas classic It's a Wonderful Life. I've seen it about a zillion times before, but always on tv. I'd never seen it on the big screen in an actual movie theater until tonight. Just across the DC border in Silver Spring, Maryland is the AFI Silver Theatre -- an old art deco movie palace restored and operated by the American Film Institute. It's a lovely old structure with a gorgeous main auditorium and is an outstanding place to see a movie.

I met up with Erin M. in the theatre lobby. She planned this trip to the movies as an outing for the DC Social Group on Flickr, but through the process of attrition it wound up just being me and her there tonight. That was fine. We had a great time anyhow. She thinks it's the best movie ever made as well, so since it was just the two of us we didn't have to deal with any non-believing cinematic heathens pooh-poohing our adoration.

It was very cool to see it on the big screen. The lighting and shading seemed better and I noticed a lot of little details in many of the scenes that I had never noticed before when I watched it on tv -- like the skull and crossbones patches on all the boys stocking caps at the beginning, the little skull carving that was on Mr. Potter's desk, and the way Ernie the cop shot out one of the lights in the 'Potterville' sign when he was shooting at George during the 'alternate history' sequence.

Yes, it's maudlin; yes, it's simplistic; yes, it's far-fetched and full of logic holes -- but it makes me laugh a lot and cry a little and for that I love it. I love it.

(Taken with my Nikon Coolpix S200)

Day 16/365 - Black & White Movies on a Grey Day

It was cloudy and overcast in the DC area today, perfect weather for curling up on the couch and watching old movies. I love old B&W movies. Directors and cinematographers back then did absolutely amazing things with light and shadow (Casablanca is one of the best examples of this) that modern filmakers just ignore. When I lived at home my parents could never understand why I always watched old movies and tv shows. At some point they would invariably shake their heads and say "I don't know why we bothered buying a color tv when everything you watch is in black and white."

I think Turner Classic Movies is my favorite tv channel. If I'm not watching an old movie on TCM, then I'm probably watching sports. I don't really watch much broadcast tv anymore. The Amazing Race and 24 are about the only series I still follow. I gave up on Lost after the second season. I don't really miss it.

The movie on my tv in this picture is Hotel Berlin from 1945. It's all about layers and levels of intrigue, schemes, and plots taking place among a group of people from different walks of life in a grand hotel in Berlin toward the end of WWII, most of whom are looking to get the hell outta Germany before it's too late. It was pretty good. It had been sitting on my DVR for a while, but tonight I finally got around to watching it (BTW, DVRs get my vote for most awesome invention of the past few years).

Now it's time to dash downstairs to the convenience store in the basement of my apartment building and grab a pint of Ben & Jerry's before they close. Then I'll browse through the list of movies waiting on my DVR and see what I want to watch next. It's a Friday night double-feature at my place -- bring your own ice cream and join in the fun.

(Taken with my Nikon D80)