The Center Seat

There are currently three projects on the way that fuse Pride & Prejudice (one of my most sacred cows) with sci-fi... basically zombies or aliens wreaking havoc on Jane Austen's most beloved cast of characters.

Do me a favor: read one or two (or all) of the following articles, then let me know what you think by answering the poll on the right.

• io9: THREE Jane Austen Science Fiction Movies in the Pipeline?
• EW PopWatch: 'Pride and Prejudice and Zombies' author talks about his literary monster mash-up
• EW PopWatch: Elton John to exec produce 'Pride and Predator'

I know I've been complaining about my inability to get into the theaters lately, ad nauseum, but it really is my current greatest frustration. Seriously, I see a movie preview on TV and I almost cry. Well, the new guy in my life* must also be getting pretty sick of my whining, because he made sure we got to two** movies this weekend!

I've been waiting to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button for about a year. That's when Entertainment Weekly started talking it up, probably just because of the crazy-ass concept. (It also didn't hurt that it costars my favorite actress, the sublime Cate Blanchett.) For those of you who don't know, here's the film's premise: for no apparent reason, the title character is born as an old man, who then ages in reverse for the rest of his life. So he's wrinkly and feeble for a few decades; then he's Brad Pitt-a-licious for a little while; then, inevitably, he turns into a kid and dies.

So the concept is crazy. And, I admit, that's what sucked me in. But what kept me sitting in that seat was the amazing love story between Benjamin and Daisy (Blanchett). I generally have a HUGE problem with most movies' portrayal of love. A lot of films, especially mainstream ones, completely get it wrong. Movie love tends to be trite, unrealistic, and, frankly, insulting to my intelligence. Not Benjamin Button; this film gets it right. The love between Benjamin and Daisy is real: it's rarely glamorous, and it's certainly imperfect, but it's solid, sweet, simple, and enduring.

I have to take issue with some reviews that have knocked Benjamin Button for its format. The story is a flashback, à la Bridges of Madison County, in which a dying mother relates the romance to her incredulous daughter. To add a bit more drama, the mother and daughter are in a New Orleans hospital in 2005 as Hurricane Katrina comes ashore. To be honest, I can't really see anything wrong with that. The bulk of the story takes place (or has its roots) in New Orleans, and Katrina was arguably among the most profound events in that city's history (along with the Civil War, I guess). Actually, the Katrina situation reinforces one of the main themes of the movie: nothing lasts forever, no matter how much we might want it to. And if you know anything about Brad Pitt, the boy's been neck-deep in Katrina charities for years, even moving his whole huge-ass family to live down in New Orleans. So what's the problem? I don't get it.

I do really recommend this movie. It was lovely. And it had me in tears towards the end. I think that actually surprised Nuevo Man a bit, but seriously--he's going to have to get used to that.

*Pistola calls him Nuevo Man, and I think that's as good a handle as any, though it does make him sound a bit like an archaeological find. "Nuevo Man walked upright but had weird dorsal fins." Kidding. Haven't found any dorsal fins... yet.

**We also saw Doubt, which I will do my best to review sometime this week. Really, I will. ...Click here for the rest of this tasty post.

This year, things are different. It may have something to do with my decision to drop my subscription to Entertainment Weekly.* It may also have to do with my recent negligence in following my favorite movie blogs. But I think the main reason I'm a bad, bad movie geek this year is that I've got two jobs, and a desire to crash and do nothing on my rare night off.

So last night I took a step in rectifying this sad state of affairs... I actually went to a movie in the theater.** I'd wanted to see Australia ever since I heard it was coming out, mostly because I adore director Baz Luhrmann and believe he can do no wrong.

I was not disappointed last night. I know it's gotten mixed reviews, but I have to believe they came from people who don't understand the genius that is my Baz.

If you're not familiar with Luhrmann's work, he's known for his Red Curtain Trilogy, which includes Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, and Moulin Rouge! His movies tend to be visually stunning (and a bit head-spinning); they're unique for their over-the-top characters, intense cinematography, and wildly avant-garde style.

Interestingly, Australia had more in common with classic epic romances like Gone With the Wind and Titanic than with any of the Red Curtain films. There's still a bit of the trademark Baz Luhrmann stuff (those of us who love him most will recognize it), but this film is by far more mainstream. The setting is lush, wild 1930's Australia, and our story comes complete with a swashbuckling, mysterious hero and a refined-but-feisty heroine.

Truly, it's just fun to watch (how often does that happen at the movies anymore?), but what really knocked me on my booty was the ROMANCE. Oh, Lord, it was romantic. I'm actually feeling kind of swoony right now thinking about it. The kissing. And the Hugh Jackman. And the guy who can't declare his love at all till it may be much too late. (God knows I've got experience with that.) And the rescues. And more kissing. And more Hugh Jackman.

OK, yeah, I gotta go cool off.

*It was getting WAY too expensive. Why don't they offer renewal rates that are as low as the rates for new subscribers? No worries. My card's in the mail.
**This used to happen 2 or 3 times a week... but last night was my first time since W. In October. ...Click here for the rest of this tasty post.

Maybe it's because Nathaniel and I had an AMAZING DATE last night, or maybe it's just because I'm intrinsically a big giant sap... but EW's list of 25 Most Romantic Gestures in Film got me all gushy today.

My favorite romantic gestures on EW's list are the ones from Moulin Rouge!, Brokeback Mountain, Once, and The Wedding Singer... but I felt there were several glaring omissions from my own romantic movie canon:

1. Forgetting Sarah Marshall: Peter retrieves the topless photo of Rachel from the men's bathroom at the bar, knowing full well that in doing so he'll get the crap beaten out of him.
2. Never Been Kissed: Sam publicly forgives Josie and demonstrates his love with a full makeout session on the pitcher's mound of a packed baseball stadium.
3. Love Actually: Jamie learns to speak Portuguese... poorly... and flies to Portugal to propose to Aurelia, with whom he's never actually had a real conversation. (Meanwhile, she's also learned to speak English... poorly.)
4. Somewhere In Time: Richard falls in love with a woman in an old painting... and goes back in time to woo her.
5. Walk the Line: Johnny proposes to June on stage, mid-song, and won't take no for an answer.
6. City of Angels: Seth renounces his immortality and becomes human so that he can be with Maggie.
   

Your turn... ...Click here for the rest of this tasty post.

Remember when you were a little kid, and you got in an argument with a playground rival, and there came a point when you resorted to sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling "La, la, la, la, la..." at the top of your lungs?

I'm nearly 30, and I've found myself doing that repeatedly over the last week or so.

This is the problem. Nathaniel. He's so great. We're going to see The Dark Knight on Sunday at noon. Now, those of you who know me even a little bit can see right away how much I like this guy... otherwise, there's no way in hell I'd wait so long to see a movie that's so highly anticipated, and so much of a sure thing, on top of essentially being Heath Ledger's swan song. But I am waiting--and I don't mind--except...

Except that The Dark Knight is EVERYWHERE. A quick search of my Google Reader reveals no less than 121 Batman-related items. That's thanks, in large part, to Big Mike's Movie Blog, which has been running a Batman Blogathon (if you're not at a Batman overload stage, you really should check him out; he's a fantastic blogger), though everyone's been hyping it up, from Slate to EW. (I'm actually adding to the hype too, huh? Irony. Hm.)

I'm one of those people who would prefer to have absolutely no information prior to a movie viewing; too much hype can kill my enjoyment of a film. So I've been avoiding Batman like he's the Ebola virus, but since this is such a monstrous story, that's damn near impossible.

Yesterday I was watching "The Today Show" in bed, as per my usual routine, when they announced they were going to review The Dark Knight in the next segment. Groaning, I dragged my ass out of bed and went into the bathroom. I turned on my radio, and my favorite morning people were--you guessed it--discussing The Dark Knight. Ugh. I got ready for work in silence. It was maddening, to say the least.

So it's Friday, and The Dark Knight is actually in theaters. Now I have to avoid friends as well as media, and all my favorite bloggers... until Sunday. I suppose I could sneak into a theater and see it early... but, no, I can't do that. Nathaniel reads this blog (hi, cutie), so he would know. And I really am looking forward to seeing a fantastic movie with an equally fantastic guy. I don't know, maybe a little self-denial is good for me?

And of course you know as soon as I've seen it, Batman will be splashed all over this blog too. So I don't know what my point is. Maybe I just needed to whine a bit. ...Click here for the rest of this tasty post.

As we all know, a movie's ending is critical. There's nothing worse than being captured by a seemingly fantastic movie, only to be let down in the end by a major cop-out of a finale.

So Entertainment Weekly (aka The Keepers of the Lists) came out with this slideshow, "20 Movie Endings We Love." I'm thinking certain filmmakers should be rounded up and forced to watch these selections. Anyone know who I'm thinking of?

My favorites are The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Lost in Translation. Comments, please.

If you've been reading this blog o' mine for a while, you know about my love affair with lists. (If you haven't, you can go here, here, and especially here.)

So imagine my delight when I got home yesterday, and waiting in my mailbox was the 1,000th issue of Entertainment Weekly. The cover boldly proclaimed: "The New Classics: The 1000 best movies, TV shows, albums, books, and more of the past 25 years". Did I wait to read it till I got inside? Silly blogosphere. You know me better than that. Of course I ripped it open right there in the apartment lobby.

And now you get to be treated to the movie portion of the list. This is EW's 100 best movies of the past 25 years... basically, anything that's come out since 1983. The ones I've seen are in bold; also, because I'm eminently proud of my own top 100, my ranking appears next to the title of any movies that happened to make my list.

1. Pulp Fiction
2. The Lord of the Rings trilogy (1,2,3)
3. Titanic (77)
4. Blue Velvet
   
5. Toy Story
   
6. Saving Private Ryan
   
7. Hannah and Her Sisters
   
8. The Silence of the Lambs
   
9. Die Hard
   
10. Moulin Rouge (4)
11. This Is Spinal Tap
    
12. The Matrix (21)
13. GoodFellas
    
14. Crumb
    
15. Edward Scissorhands (40)
16. Boogie Nights
    
17. Jerry Maguire
    
18. Do the Right Thing
    
19. Casino Royale
    
20. The Lion King
    
21. Schindler's List (7)
22. Rushmore
    
23. Memento
    
24. A Room With a View
    
25. Shrek
    
26. Hoop Dreams
    
27. Aliens
    
28. Wings of Desire
    
29. The Bourne Supremacy
    
30. When Harry Met Sally...
    
31. Brokeback Mountain
    
32. Fight Club
    
33. The Breakfast Club
    
34. Fargo (34)
35. The Incredibles
    
36. Spider-Man 2
    
37. Pretty Woman
    
38. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (72)
39. The Sixth Sense
    
40. Speed
    
41. Dazed and Confused
    
42. Clueless (59)
43. Gladiator
    
44. The Player
    
45. Rain Man (86)
46. Children of Men
    
47. Men in Black
    
48. Scarface
    
49. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
    
50. The Piano
    
51. There Will Be Blood
    
52. The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad
    
53. The Truman Show
    
54. Fatal Attraction
    
55. Risky Business
    
56. The Lives of Others
    
57. There’s Something About Mary
    
58. Ghostbusters
    
59. L.A. Confidential
    
60. Scream
    
61. Beverly Hills Cop
    
62. sex, lies and videotape
    
63. Big
    
64. No Country For Old Men (41)
65. Dirty Dancing
    
66. Natural Born Killers
    
67. Donnie Brasco
    
68. Witness
    
69. All About My Mother
    
70. Broadcast News
    
71. Unforgiven
    
72. Thelma & Louise
    
73. Office Space
    
74. Drugstore Cowboy
    
75. Out of Africa
    
76. The Departed
    
77. Sid and Nancy
    
78. Terminator 2: Judgment Day
    
79. Waiting for Guffman
    
80. Michael Clayton (60)
81. Moonstruck
    
82. Lost in Translation
    
83. Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn
    
84. Sideways
    
85. The 40 Year-Old Virgin
    
86. Y Tu Mamá También
    
87. Swingers
    
88. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
    
89. Breaking the Waves
    
90. Napoleon Dynamite (81)
91. Back to the Future
    
92. Menace II Society
    
93. Ed Wood
    
94. Full Metal Jacket
    
95. In the Mood for Love
    
96. Far From Heaven
    
97. Glory
    
98. The Talented Mr. Ripley
    
99. The Blair Witch Project
    
100. South Park: Bigger Longer & Uncut
     

There you have it. I've seen 61/100, and 15 of my favorite 100 movies made their list. I've done much better with this list than either the IMDB 250 or the AFI 100, probably because EW picked so many mainstream movies.

So now it's your turn. How many have you seen on this list? Do you have any thoughts on EW's choices? ...Click here for the rest of this tasty post.

I'm a very naughty girl. I have The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford sitting in its Netflix envelope on my coffee table, untouched. I caucussed yesterday, so maybe I have an excuse? I'll try to get to it tomorrow; tonight, Captain Crash and I are catching an advance screening of Taxi to the Dark Side.

I did see No End In Sight this weekend, though. The critics all seemed to love it (a rare "A" rating from Entertainment Weekly and a 94% on the Tomatometer), and Mark Harris of EW's back page feature wrote a full column just on why this movie was a must-see. That's generally more than enough to get me to throw it on my Netflix queue, but then it got its very own Oscar nod for Best Documentary Feature. OK, done deal.



I don't know what I was expecting. This was the year I saw Sicko and Ghosts of Abu Ghraib... so I was braced for another angry documentary, bellowing for political change. Instead, it was more like a cool-headed History Channel presentation. No End In Sight walks the viewer carefully, methodically, almost dispassionately, through the myriad mistakes that transformed the liberation of Iraq into a violent insurgency, and then civil war. There was no political posturing, just a cold recounting of events. Of course it made me angry (how could it not?), but the facts were presented in such a calm, matter-of-fact way that the anger came from inside me, not from the words of the filmmakers.

Even if you have what Mark Harris calls "outrage fatigue", you've got to see this movie. It's not outrage ... It's just chilling, distilled truth.

P.S. The press are reporting that Heath Ledger died of an accidental overdose from prescription medication. We all knew he wouldn't have left his little girl on purpose, but it's nice to have it confirmed. Such a devastating tragedy... there will always be a Heath-shaped hole in American cinema. Rest in peace. ...Click here for the rest of this tasty post.

Here is Entertainment Weekly's list of the 15 worst movie lines in history.

Personally, I actually really liked some of these. Know which ones?