Day #69 - The King and I

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"Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera" :)

The King and I was such a cute movie! Admittedly it took me awhile to get into it - I think with musicals, if you aren't already familiar with the music, it takes some time - or mutiple viewings - to really appreciate it. I also thought a few of the scenes were quite bazaar, but they were overshadowed by the cute scenes. Honestly without Yul Brynner this movie would have been so much less endearing. EVERY time he said "et cetera et cetera" I laughed out loud - or every time he said something was "scientific".

Deborah Kerr's character was very similar to Maria's in The Sound of Music just because she was so proper but had some real strength to her - and coming in to watch over all of those kids was similar as well. I hate that she didn't do her own singing. It seems like it wasn't that uncommon back then but now it would be unacceptable. Can you imagine if say, in Chicago, Renee Zellweger acted but someone else sang? There would be such an uproar.

......and since when did Rogers and Hammerstein musicals have sad endings like this? Sheesh! So - The King and I won 5 Oscars - Best Actor (Yul Brynner), Best Art Direction, Best Costumes, Best Music and Best Sound. It was also nominated for Best Picture, Best Director (Walter Lang), Best Actress (Kerr) and Best Cinematography. Did you know that Yul Brynner was actually RUSSIAN? Yet he plays the King of Siam so well!

Day #68 - Wuthering Heights

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Heeeeeey Laurence Olivier :)

Wuthering Heights - ah, is this a romance? drama? tragedy? all of the above? What a GREAT movie - I really enjoyed it. Another 1939 classic, Wuthering Heights lost the Academy Award to Gone with the Wind, and I think, rightly so - but that being said, it was a fantastic movie. This was my first Laurence Olivier experience and OOH LA LA, what a man. Very handsome. Merle Oberon played Kathy and I didn't care for her much - she was alright, neither here nor there. You know who I really liked in it? The servant - Isabella, played by Geraldine Fitzgerald. She and Olivier were both nominated for Oscars but did not win. Wuthering Heights was directed by William Wyler.

This story revolves around the relationship of Heathcliff (Olivier) and Kathy (Oberon). When Kathy and her brother are kids, their Father brings home an boy from town - he acts as one of their servants but he and Kathy become really close friends. When their Father dies, Kathy's brother treats Heathcliff very poorly, and as Heathcliff and Kathy fall in love, they know they are forbidden to be together. Though Kathy loves Heathcliff, I think she was really tempted by the rich life of her neighbors and often used it against Heathcliff, knowing he could not give her that. One day, she meets her neighbor Edgar and as time passes he falls in love with her, proposing marriage. Kathy is forever torn - Heathcliff is her real love but Edgar could give her money and a lavish lifestlye. Eventually she chooses Edgar, and even after Heathcliff leaves for America and returns with money and status, even purchasing Wuthering Heights, she cannot be with him. Heathcliff marries Edgar's sister, not out of love, but out of a desire to be close to Kathy - he leads a miserable life. When Kathy becomes ill, he asks her to haunt him, to drive him mad - just not to leave him alone - and when she dies, she does haunt him until the day he joins her.

The only problem I had with this movie was that Heathcliff and Kathy were kind of unlikable - Kathy was in love with Heathcliff but kept choosing Edgar - what?! She wasn't in love with Edgar so really it just made her superficial. Heathcliff was passionate and brooding but not altogether a nice man - so in the end, I loved the movie but definitely want to learn more about the characters to see what I was missing.

Day #67 - The Ballad of Jack and Rose

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I can't believe it took me so long to watch this movie - as a huge Daniel Day-Lewis fan I should have been all over it. The Ballad of Jack and Rose was written and directed by Rebecca Miller, daughter of famed playwright Arthur Miller and wife of Daniel Day-Lewis (which, I can't really imagine - I wonder what that's like?!). For the first half hour or so of the movie, I could NOT take my eyes off of DDL. For the FIRST time ever, I felt like he was so exposed - here I was looking at the closest thing to the actual man - not a character. When you see Bill the Butcher or Daniel Plainview, the last person you see is DDL. But here - it was different - he wore clothes like what he typically wears, he spoke with a Scottish accent, very similar to the British accent he would normally speak in, his hair was as it typically is and he even had his earring in. I felt like this was as close as I would come to seeing him raw.

Jack and Rose are a father and daughter who live alone on an old commune on an island off the Eastern coast of the U.S. Right away you see that Rose really worships her Dad - he is the only man she has ever known and they seem to have a strong bond. Early in the movie we learn that Jack is dying, and he is worried about how Rose will fare after he is gone. In order to fix this problem, he goes to the mainland to see a woman who he has dated off and on, Kathleen (Catherine Keener - amazing). Kathleen has two sons from other men and I think Jack felt like if they moved in, they could provide care for he and Rose, especially after he died. He calls this an "experiment" and once Kathleen and her sons move in, everything changes. Seeing her Dad with another woman, Rose acts out, trying to lose her virginity right away and cutting all of her hair off. As the viewers, I think at this point we are really starting to understand there is more than a father/daughter relationship between Jack and Rose - and perhaps that is why Jack really brought Kathleen to the island - to protect Rose from himself. The rest of the movie shows the challenges the two families face in trying to live together and how Jack and Rose eventually have to face the truth of their relationship - I won't ruin anything for you by going into more detail.

I thought this movie was EXCELLENT. I LOVED the writing and the story was very original. The acting was of course amazing - I was surprised to see Camilla Belle (Rose) act alongside DDL - I was afraid she would disappear but she really held her own. It's not a light-hearted movie but I strongly recommend it.

Day #66 - 500 Days of Summer

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I have many different feelings about this movie. I just got back from seeing it - I had really high expectations and I was a bit disappointed. Two things I really liked about it - first of all, the story was REAL. It wasn't froo froo and full of happy endings and perfect situations and dialogue. Secondly, I knew going in I was going to love Zooey Deschanel, I already did - and sure enough, she was SO cute. That being said, I didn't care for the guy AT ALL - Joseph Gordon-Levitt. He just didn't make me care about him, I found him to not have much charisma or anything worth my attention. I know it's harsh, but hey - it's my blog :)

500 Days of Summer is about a guy, Tom, who meets Summer, a girl who works in his office. In a nutshell, he is a believer of love and relationships - she, however, does not believe that love exists. She prefers independence and freedom. As they begin their relationship, she tells him she doesn't want anything serious - he says OK, but you know he will try for that anyway. The movie actually starts by showing her breaking up with him, and the remainder of the movie takes you through the 500 days of Tom's life after the day he first met Summer. I've already talked about the actors and the story - but let me say about the style - it's very unique. I appreciate its originality but what on EARTH was going on with the mini coreographed dance in the middle of the movie? OH my goodness, no.

I'm going to label this as Romance - NOT Romantic Comedy....it's more of a Romanti Drama but I don't have that as a category ;)

Day #65 - Easy Rider

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Talk about an unexpected ending. I didn't see that coming AT ALL.

There is a theater here in town called The Enzian that shows some mainstream movies but really focuses more on "indie" type films and old classics. It's not a large theater because it holds different sized tables and you get to order food, beer, popcorn, etc. Tuesday nights are for "cult classics" and last night was Easy Rider. Having never seen it before, I was curious - I've heard about it for a long time but didn't know much other than it had to do with drugs and motorcycles.

Easy Rider was written by (and starred) Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda in 1969. It's about two guys who take off from LA on their motorcycles headed for Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Along the way they meet some interesting, and some not-so-friendly strangers. One of these strangers is played by Jack Nicholson, who, to me, really stole the show. He was hilarious. The "UFO" scene was hysterial. In the scenes where they are smoking pot they are ACTUALLY smoking, haha. There are a lot of drugs which I typically don't like but I didnt' mind it here. The movie feels pretty iconic but I think you had to have seen it at the time it came out to really appreciate it. Another one of those movies where context is key.

Peter Fonda was intriguing to me - first of all, he looks just like his Dad...but also, I don't know, he has this interesting look to him. Dennis Hopper was about what I expected - apparently he was in a bad state of drug-induced paranoia during the production of this movie and many of the crew quit. I wonder if they were high when they cut the movie too - I didn't care for how it was edited, really choppy and jumpy.

Oscars Best Movies Montage - AMAZING!!

Amelia Poster

Cool!