Movies

Over the past week, I have mooched off Cheryl and taken her membership to the Writer's Guild for my own advantage. From that, I got to see 3 free movies plus Q&A's.

The first movie we saw was Man of the Year, where Robin Williams plays a comic who ends up winning the presidency. I had very low expectations going into this movie, seeing as I don't particularly like Robin Williams as a comedic actor. Those low expectations were pretty much met. The main reason I went was the Q&A with writer/director Barry Levinson afterwards. He's a Marylander who has directed Diner, Rain Man, the Natural and Wag the Dog, among others. Also, he was the co-creator of Homicide: Life on the Street. He was very interesting because there are few who know the Hollywood system better than him. He's worked with all the top stars and been part of so many iconic movie moments.

The next movie was Little Children, which I was very excited for. It's based on Tom Perrota's 2001 book of the same name. Tom Perrotta is one of my favorite writers (he wrote Election, for example) and has always done such a wonderful job chronicling the nuiances of suburban life. Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson starred. This movie also focused on suburban life. It was very much a dark comedy, and I highly recommend it. The Q&A afterwards was with Tom Perrotta and director Todd Field. I even got to ask Tom a question regarding his writing. That was fun.

The last movie was Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette. Do not see this movie. I saw it for free, yet feel I deserve some sort of monetary compensation for sitting through it. Cheryl and I found it very disjointed and we kept waiting for something, anything, to happen. I'm sensing the rest of the audience felt the same way because when the end credits began to roll, there was pure silence for over a minute. Even Man of the Year got applause. That Q&A featured Kirsten Dunst and Jason Schwartzman. Both were good sports, but both also looked like they wanted to be anywhere but there. I can hardly imagine that with such hard-hitting questions as, "Kirsten, you were so amazing in this film. Honestly, I feel my life is now complete that I have seen you in this role. Tell me, what was it like wearing all of those corsets?" or "Jason, I think this film makes Citizen Kane look like The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Tell me, was it hard for you to look so fat in the movie?" *sigh* If you want to learn about Marie Antoinette, check out the latest PBS documentary on her. It's a better two hours than Sofia Coppola's movie by far.

And yet, you gotta love the free. So Cheryl, thanks for letting me mooch.

Quote of the Day:
"It was like shaking the hand of a great, waspy, wooden totem pole of awesomeness." -John Hodgman on Meeting George Plimpton