I watched two really good movies this week, one a comedy that made me laugh all the way through it, and one an action adventure thriller, that was really pretty good.
The first movie was called Waiting for Guffman. This movie is a mockumentary written by and starring Christopher Guest, who plays Corky St. Clair, a local theater impresario. It is a look at the funny aspects of community theater. In honor of Blaine, Missouri's 150th anniversary, St. Clair stages a mediocre musical tribute to the town with hopes of taking the production to Broadway.
As a member of a local community theater, there were many things that rang true, which, of course made it all the more funny. It has an R rating due to some profanity, but probably by today's standards, would probably be PG-13. The character development was so good, as you could see different people from your own small town in these characters. As they performed this musical tribute to the town, it reminded me of living in Glendive, Montana, and being a part of a musical tribute during Glendive's Centennial celebration. It was probably just about as corny, but you do it because you love performing and you love celebrating the town.
This group has made other mockumentaries, including This is Spinal Tap, about a fictional rock band, Best in Show, about a dog show, (I saw this a few years ago, and it was funny, except I didn't like the fact that they dissed the keeshond), and A Might Wind, about folk music.
I also went to the theater last night with The Princess. We had plans of seeing Slumdog Millionaire, but the time changed at the theater from Thursday to Friday, so we were a little late to see it. So we decided to go see the movie Taken instead.
Taken stars Liam Neeson as a former CIA operative who goes on a rescue mission after his teenage daughter has been taken while on a trip to Paris.
I always enjoy a good action movie, and this was very good. But I find it interesting who the bad guys are these day. When I was growing up, during the Cold War, the "bad guys" always seemed to have an eastern Eurpoean look, and sounded like Russian spies. Now, these bad guys, even though they are also eastern European, have a more Mediterranean, olive skinned, dark hair look. The look of our enemy has changed somewhat.
The movie is rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence, disturbing thematic material, sexual content, some drug references and language.
And, at the end of the movie, The Princess and I knew we had seen the daughter in something else, but we just couldn't figure it out. Well, like all industrious teens with a laptop and Internet connection, she consulted IMDB (for those of you unfamiliar with this website, it is Internet Movie Data Base, a website that gives you about everything you would want to know about information about movies and television shows) and found out Maggie Grace was the actress who played Shannon in the first couple seasons of Lost. Except back then she was blonde. And Grace does an incredible and believable job portraying this 17-year-old, even though she herself is 25-years-old.
There were parts of the movie where Bryan, Liam Neeson's character, reminded me of Martin Riggs in the original Lethal Weapon movie.
So, if you like action adventure movies, I'd recommend this one for sure.
I hope to get some more movies watched that are on my shelf. Two others I received from Netflix are Snowcake, with one of my favorite actors Alan Rickman, what looks intriguing. And I have never seen any of The Godfather movies, so I have the first one here ready to watch.
I also recently purchased Australia, The Secret Life of Bees and Fireproof. Some of these may have to wait until the end of the month to watch over spring break, but I can wait.
Today I'm helping Kiki Aru finish her History Day project, a documentary on May Arkwright Hutton, and wait for PKR to return from his half-marathon he is running with his friend AB down in the Snake River Canyon south of Pullman.
It is a good day to be holed up inside so I don't have to look at that frozen white stuff fall from the sky ( that I refuse to call by its real name).
I'm ready for spring, and found this quote that expresses my thoughts on the weather. Normally I don't mind the flakey precipitation, but now I'm ready to say goodbye to the frozen white stuff, and hello to sunshine, spring and flowers.
A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.
--Carl Reiner
1 comment:
That frozen stuff just doesn't seem to want to go away. No wonder we don't have many memories of spring break. I don't think we often had spring until May! GRRRR!
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