Christmas Time is Here...December 19,2010

Since I posted a film list at Halloween, thought I'd do the same for Christmas. So here is a list of my 10 must watch movies at Christmas time. These are the movies I have to watch in order for my Christmas season to be complete. I am not counting holiday specials as movies as many of these lists seem to do. The only Christmas specials I have to watch each year are A Charlie Brown Christmas and How the Grinch Stole Christmas. When I was growing up these 2 specials always seem to come on back to back. As for the others I love Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, and The Little Drummer Boy. I also really like the Hey, Arnold Christmas episode but that's not shown anymore. Also, fortunately for dvd, I also have to watch the holiday episodes of The Facts of Life, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, That Girl, The Brady Bunch, Laverne and Shirley, Supernatural, and of course, Saved by the Bell. Bewitched, The Andy Griffith Show, and Happy Days also have good episodes but I don't own them.

Okay, here's my 10 must watch movies ( I do include made-for-tv movies)

10. Love Story-Sharon insists this is not a Christmas movie. It is for me. There is a nice Christmas sequence and she does die during the Christmas season. And there are many sequences in the winter and snow. I know this is a really bad movie. Ali MacGraw doesn't even look close to college age and she flares her nostrils too much. Ryan O'Neal is pretty good though and I always kind of laugh at the way he says "hot chocolate". The romance is so unlikely though and the characters are kind of unlikable but I'll be danged if you don't get involved and invested in the romance. And even though you know it's coming, Sharon was boo hooing plenty at the end.

9. The House Without A Christmas Tree-I first saw this tv movie in 1972. It's the story of a young girl, Addie, who lives with her widowed father and her grandmother. More than anything she wants a Christmas tree for her home but her father, for reasons unknown to Addie, refuses to let her have one. Addie tries to take matters into her own hands but her father is unshakable in his stance. The House Without a Christmas Tree stands the test of time and remains poignant and heartwarming. If you've never seen it before or haven't seen it in a while, it is well worth checking out.

8. The Trouble With Angels- Another movie that doesn't quite fit into the traditional Christmas movie mode. This is Sharon's favorite all time movie. This is a family film from the sixties that can still be enjoyed by all ages today. It tells the tale of two high spirited girls enrolled in an all girls Catholic High School and the havoc and maturation they go through over the course of 3 years. There are two very touching Christmas sequences but the whole movie has a Christmas feel to it. It's uplifting with the spirit of love and forgiveness and even redemption. Perfect for the season I think.

7. Love, Actually-Multi-character movie with several subplots that intertwine set at Christmas. It's funny, sad, hopeful, joyous, and definitely worth investing a couple of hours in over the holidays.

6. Home Alone-Elijah and I usually watch this at least once during the season. This can actually be a quite moving film. I can do without all the Bugs Bunny, Looney Tunes violence but the story of a mother trying to get home to her son puts me in the spirit. They did make a sequel but at that point I thought I would be contacting family services about the neglect of a family that can't seem to keep track of their somewhat obnoxious kid.

5. Gremlins/Die Hard-My action twosome. Both set at Christmas time, both (according to my wife) totally inappropriate as Christmas choices. It is my list though. I never thought of Gremlins as a horror movie. I always thought it was kind of a black comedy. It turns some Christmas traditions on their heads yet still keeps that feeling of family alive. And it has to have the most bizarre yet hilarious/sad story of someone losing their belief in Santa ever. Die Hard also has that sense of family running through it. It is also big and noisy, action packed, funny, suspenseful, with an uplifting ending. Again perfect for the season.

4. Miracle on 34th Street-I like to watch this on Thanksgiving to kick off the season. This film is nearly perfect. I can't find a false note in it. Natalie Wood was such a charmer as a child actress and Edmund Gwenn captures the essence of Santa Claus to a tee. Be sure to watch the 1947 version and not the dreadful remakes. I hated both versions I have seen. Anyway, look quick for a small role by Jack Albertson of The Poseidon Adventure fame.

3. It's a Wonderful Life-This one always tears me up at the end. But it is a joyous celebration of life and humanity. Jimmy Stewart is just so dang likable that you can't help but pull for him while identifying with his plight. Meanwhile Lionel Barrymore is so evil and creepy as Mr. Potter that you just long to see his comeuppance. I have to admit, I do kind of giggle at the end when George is singing Auld Lang Syne. Just the way he moves his mouth. Oh well.

2. A Christmas Story-There are just way too many memorable lines and images from this movie to recount them all. I think my favorite is watching the mom in the background when Ralphie's father is trying to fix the lamp. Classic. This is another film that I can watch several times during the season and I guess TBS gives me that chance.

1. A Diva's Christmas Carol-Ok. I have no rhyme or reason why this is my number one Christmas movie but I just love it. Vanessa Williams is touching and hilarious as Ebony Scrooge, grade A diva. The story is familiar, of course, but I love all the updating and this has my favorite version of Sleigh Ride ever. I think the movie was originally made for VH1 but it plays on Lifetime sometimes as well. It is also available on DVD, which I proudly own. Favorite sequences involve trying to some "damn french toast" while in France, talking to the "skinny bitch" Kathy Griffin as the ghost of Christmas Past, and Ebony's visit from the ghost of Christmas yet to come. I know this is an odd choice for my number one Christmas movie but there it is. Oh, yeah, and don't forget, New Year's Eve is coming, break out your copy of "The Poseidon Adventure"!

Have a happy holiday.

Roger

December 11, 2010 The Chronicles Of Narnia-The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

We went to an early showing of the new Narnia movie today. There were actually quite a few people there for a 10:00 am showing. I like going early in the morning in Madison as tickets are only $5.00 for a non-3D movie. Sometimes a movie is not worth even the $5.00 but other times it's worth more. Luckily for us it was definitely worth the price of admission or more.

Elijah is a huge Narnia movie fan. He has watched repeated viewings of them and eagerly awaited this third. His opinion was that the movie was very good and it even made him a little sad at the end. He didn't feel like it dragged at all and kept him interested throughout.

I enjoyed it as well. I've seen both of the other movies and what I really liked about this movie is that I felt I didn't have to see them in order to enjoy this one. The plot once again calls Lucy and Edmund Pevensie back to Narnia along with their cousin Eustace. They travel through a series of adventures to reach the end of the world. Along the way there are some impressive special effects and nice action pieces.

I've never read the Narnia series of books so I can't really comment on how the movie differs from the book but I enjoyed watching the action sequences that didn't involve big long battle scenes. I also found the actors, especially the actor who played the young Eustace quite appealing.

I would recommend The Chronicles of Narnia-The Voyage of the Dawn Treader for older children and adults. It was an enjoyable way to spend my $5.00 and a morning.

Have a good one.

Roger

Late November Releases December 4, 2010

Thanksgiving weekend was a very busy one. We had many visitors and it was great fun. Fortunately we also had time to take in a movie. Love and Other Drugs is the new romantic comedy/drama starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway. It is a film that goes on a long way based on the charisma of its two leads and they both have it in spades. As usual I don't like to give away too much about the plot because I really hate when I read reviews that do that. I will say that it is a film that sometimes plays like a comedy and then suddenly becomes very serious. Not necessarily a bad thing but at times it played a little awkward. Life can be awkward though. Either way I enjoyed it.

This weekend I went to see Disney's new animated feature Tangled. I also got a chance to see how it played to me as an adult, my son as a teenager, and my great-niece as a preschooler. We all loved the movie. It was the Disneyfied version of Rapunzel and they did a great job with it. The animation was fun and lively, the songs pleasant if not memorable, and it moved along at a brisk pace. My niece didn't even ask if it was time to go yet. The story maintained the basic story of Rapunzel with enough twists that I almost forgot how the story ends. I did have the aha moment though in time to save me from getting too misty eyed.

Luckily for me I went 2 for 2 and fully got my money's worth.

Have a good one.

Roger

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows November 21, 2010

I am a big Harry Potter fan. I've read all the books and have seen all the movies multiple times. I've appreciated the change in film style as we've gone from the magical, bright beginnings to the dark tales that have unfolded in the present. So it was with great anticipation that I saw the new Harry Potter movie this past weekend. I'm glad that, for me, it did not disappoint.

If you have read any of my reviews you probably noticed I don't like to go into great detail about the stories. Too many reviews give too much away and I hate that. So, I will say the film stays true to the tone of the book. Unfortunately, even divided into 2 parts there were scenes that I missed and others I felt unnecessary. As with the book I felt that the middle section needed to be edited more as it tends to drag a bit. There were several scenes of suspense and poignancy. The young actors are excellent and Rupert Grint truly seems to stand out here. Once again, I can't wait to see the next and (oh no!) final film.

Have a good one.

Roger

Unstoppable/Skyline November 14 2010

I love the fall season around Thanksgiving. It means all the good fall/winter movies will start coming out. Too many at once unfortunately but I get to catch a few. So glad my kids are older so that I don't have to wait for everything to come out on video. The first two I went to see were PG13 and action-based so my son came with me to see them anyways so it didn't really matter.

Today I saw the movie Unstoppable. The plot is pretty simple. Runaway train. It's pretty straight forward with very little extraneous material. Denzel Washington and Chris Pine star. They are both very charismatic performers and get the viewer invested in their characters with very little effort. The movie gets going very quickly and doesn't really let up. Glad I got the big bucket of popcorn because this really is a popcorn movie. The action is almost nonstop and very suspenseful! The plot is pretty unrealistic but hey, they don't talk about the suspension of disbelief for nothing! Elijah, Sharon, and I really enjoyed this one and would definitely put it on our must see list.


The other movie I was was Skyline. This one wasn't quite as successful. The movie deals with a group of visitors trapped in a high rise apartment building when alien visitors attack the Earth. Despite some really horrendous reviews, I actually liked most of this movie. Of course this will come as no surprise to anyone since I love these kind of "end of the world" movies. But it hooked me and kept me curious as to what was going to happen next. On a reported budget of $10-20 million dollars the special effects are really quite good. I liked the lead actor Eric Balfour very much and he created his character of a young guy caught in turmoil pretty well. He was in turns heroic and vulnerable. I didn't really care for most of the other characters. Through most of this movie I thought it was worthy of a DVD purchase. Then came the ending. I won't hint as to where the movie goes but it really is bizarre and doesn't seem to fit the rest of the movie. It really is so bad though that it is no longer on my purchase list.

For an early movie Skyline was really crowded! The overall feeling was that most people liked it but I did hear a couple say the ending killed it for them. Oh, well, 2 movies down and tons to go. Yay, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is next!

Take care

Roger

Alpha and Omega November 7, 2010

Got a sort of bonus this weekend. Sharon and Brenna needed a break so I took the boy child out to see the movie Alpha and Omega. He's been wanting to see this for a while (and I've been desperately trying to avoid it). Well, in Elijah's estimation it was worth the wait. He enjoyed it thoroughly, thought it funny and liked the romance. He wouldn't compare it for me to Megamind because they were two completely different movies. So he got my money's worth.

On the other hand, from my perspective, this was a passable but not very good movie. Unlike Megamind, I didn't care for the characters, the story was slow, predictable and uninvolving. The movie ran about 86 minutes but seemed much longer. The story involves two wolves at the end of the social order. She is the Alpha destined to lead the pack while he is the Omega, lowest of the social order. Geez, wonder how this will turn out? While many of these movies travel familiar territory, the journey to the inevitable conclusion has to be entertaining, maybe with some unexpected twists or something to keep one invested in the story. Nothing like that here. So, I didn't really get my money's worth but my wife and daughter at least got a couple hours of quiet.

Roger

Megamind-November, 6 2010

Elijah and I attended an early morning showing of Megamind, the new Dreamworks 3-D animated action/comedy. First of all, we threw out the 3-D and went 2-D. Elijah and Brenna both like to save their 3-D experiences for movies they hear are truly extraordinary in the use of that medium. They also hope that the extra money we save can be used on them at a later point.

First Elijah's review since this is a film geared toward kids. He was very happy with the movie. It lived up to the preview, in his opinion. It was pretty funny yet also kind of sad in parts. He also thought the previews of coming attractions were really good.

As for me, I enjoyed Megamind. It had a great deal of humor and adult references and inside jokes. The storyline kept me interested even though there weren't a great deal of surprises. But if the presentation is good, that's ok. And the presentation was good. The film created characters that I cared about and there was an interesting question addressed of what makes a hero and what makes a villain.

It was not a bad way to spend a Saturday morning. I'm excited, though, that there are so many good movies coming in the week ahead!