New Year's Resolutions

One of the reasons I started this blog was to keep track of the movies and TV I watch and the books I read. Someone I used to work with told me he wrote down all of the movies he saw and the books he read along with a short review because it helped him to remember them, his initial reactions, and what he liked or disliked. That stuck with me because I've read so many books that years later I can barely recall the plot of. Anyway, going back to tracking that stuff is one of my resolutions for this year, along with posting in this blog more regularly. No time like the present to get started!

Now, technically, I watched most of the movies I'll mention in this post last year, but Pat and I have watched a lot of movies in the last two weeks as part of our holiday vacation and they seem like a good starting point. Now that we're past our BU days, we did have to work between Christmas and NYE, so it wasn't technically a "vacation," but we did more relaxing than we've done since I started grad school. I didn't even realize how much we both needed it, but it's been really nice. On to our holiday viewing! (In no particular order.)

WALL-E I wasn't even interested in seeing WALL-E. I'd heard that it was unsubtle in its message and that it had long, dialog-free stretches. I usually read a magazine or play around online while watching a movie, so I doubted my ability to pay attention well enough to follow something with little dialog. After hearing from several co-workers that it is really cute, though, I decided to bring it home from the Pflug and give it a try. It is so frickin' enjoyable, I can't stand it. I'm sure you've read a zillion positive reviews (96% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, an addiction I formed in 2008), so I'm just going to mention a couple of things I liked about it that I haven't seen mentioned in a million other places.

I loved the relationship between WALL-E and EVE. Okay, sure, that part you've read everywhere, but maybe not for my reasons. I liked that WALL-E and EVE were equals, partners. They rescued each other. Often, when you have a super tough-girl heroine (and EVE is super tough; at first, in fact, I thought she was a little scary and off-putting and said to Pat, "wait, he's going to fall in love with her? But she's scary, with the shooting-first, asking-never), either she ends up being a huge mess on the inside that really just needs a man to fix her or the guy is a super-dolt who has to be rescued from himself every five minutes. EVE's a tough girl, but WALL-E can stand on his own two feet, too. I also liked that in the end, mankind participated in its own salvation. A lot is made of this movie's indictment of mankind, our laziness, our wastefulness, etc. But, in the end, the captain of the Axiom stands on his own two jello-y legs, and decides its time for humans to go back to Earth and clean up their mess. It's hopeful. We're not a totally lost cause. I like that.

Daredevil I picked this up from Sam and Julia's when they giving away DVDs. I'd heard it was bad, but thought it might be nice for one of those nights when I just want to watch a totally mindless movie. Besides, I though, how bad could it be? It's a movie based on comic books, it's not as if those are ever Oscar-fodder (of course, that's changing in recent years, but you get the gist of my train of thought). As long as I'm not expecting Schindler's List, I'll be fine. But, no, this movie really is pretty bad. I know I'm about to make some enemies, but honestly, Jennifer Garner just doesn't do it for me at all. I don't think she's a very good actress. I almost want to say I'm annoyed every time she's on the screen, but she's got that "All-American, nice-to-people-who-cut-her-off-in-traffic" thing going on that makes her seem so likable so I don't really feel annoyed. Just...I don't know. I wish she wouldn't be in things I'm watching. Not to single her out. She was better than Colin Farrell, whose Bullseye is possibly the cheesiest villian of all time. Even Jon Favreau couldn't save this one. I made it all the way through and I didn't actively hate anything about it...it just isn't a particularly well-constructed or well-acted movie and it didn't have that pure-entertainment factor that can sometimes make up for those things.

Oh, and if you're wondering to yourself why Jennifer Garner and Colin Farrell both get skewered but Ben Affleck gets off scott-free, I'll tell you: Ben's got a lifetime pass from me for starring in my favorite Kevin Smith movie, Chasing Amy. He was also in Armageddon, which I've recently rediscovered my totally irrational love for.

Okay, gotta go play Wii with Paddy, but still to come: Slumdog Millionaire, Marigold, Mistress of Spices, King of Kong, and Kit Kittredge and Diner.