Paul Blart Mall Cop 2

I know. I know. But I really like Kevin James. I guess that's my guilty movie secret. What's not a secret is that I adore film. Like good film. I can toss around terms like noir lighting and French new wave and tracking shot and archetypes and Oscar bait. I've read The Seven Basic Plots and Awake in the Dark. Heck, I've been to Ebert-fest. I have a BFA and I am not afraid to use it. Basically, I adore film. All film.

I think Kevin James is that perfect combo of funny and sweet. Or maybe it's because he kinda looks like my husband. Or maybe it's because his pratfalls are well honed, well-timed, and remind me of prime Laurel and Hardy. But, you know what, it doesn't matter why. I just like him and that's OK.

We all have our Kevin Jameses. Yours might be B monster movies from the 60s or Smokey and the Bandit 3 (I'll grant you 1, even 2, but 3? Seriously, that thing is a mess.). Maybe you love Adam Sandler or you watch Showgirls when no one else is home or maybe you think anything that John Travolta makes on his own is misunderstood genius. And I don't judge you for it. Well, I might. A little. In my head. The same part of the brain that has you judging me for liking Kevin James. These things are not explainable. But they might be hereditary because I took the 7-year-old to see this one and he found it screamingly funny. Here is his review:

"He is so fast! And he runs around and rides these cool scooter things and there are bad guys. And he doesn't kill the bad guys because he is a good guy and has all these cool way of stopping them. And he has a super smart daughter who is really pretty. And Las Vegas looks really shiny but kinda dangerous, so I am glad that Paul Blart and his security people were there to protect everyone. And make me laugh."

Made me laugh too. Don't judge my Kevin James and I won't judge yours. Deal?

Oscars Rules

Dear Oscars-

My mother and I have been watching the Oscars for a very long time, and we have developed a few rules for you. These aren't suggestions; these are pretty hard and fast.

1.) Speeches: they need to be eloquent, funny, or short. This isn't our first rodeo; we know you aren't going to do all three. Just pick one that works for you and stick to it.

2.) If you win, do not pull out your speech and read it. It looks like you thought you were gonna win: tacky. Furthermore, most of you are actors and can memorize a few lines. One would hope.

3.) We want to see movie clips. We love movies; that's kinda why we are here. Show us some movie clips. Do NOT do that weird thing you did a couple years ago when 5 former Oscars winners showed up and talked about the 5 actors who were nominated and we had to endure hearing about Angelina Jolie's luminance and grace. Nobody wants that. Everyone wants movie clips.

4.) If you can't manage any of the things in rule number 1, then get drunk and do something outrageous. We love scandal; that's kinda why we are here. Mom and I don't get to watch the Oscars together and we call each other at every commercial; make sure we have something to talk about, other than Gwyneth Paltrow's ugly dress. (You know it will be.) And don't make the Foreign Film winners bring all the sparkle and eccentricity. You are making Americans look boring. Do something; I don't know, act interesting perhaps.

5.) Boob rules. There are a lot of these:

A.) We are not prudes, you are welcome to show some cleavage. Just make sure it is from the top. No side boob or under boob allowed.

B.) Please make sure that more of your boob is covered than uncovered. If more of your boob is uncovered than covered, you are violating Boob Rule A. It's just simple math.

C.) Wear a bra. Or have one built into your dress. (Yes, they can do that.)

D.) Do NOT tug up your dress on the stage. (several million people just saw that) Do NOT tug up your dress in the audience. (you never know when the camera is on you) Do NOT tug up your dress at all. There are at least 75 costume designers in this place, go get some help (pre-show) if you think you are slipping. They'll have safety pins or some double-sided tape. Get help; don't tug.

6.) Hey, sound wizards, I don't wanna hear the applause during the who-died-this-year montage. It's tacky to hear the clapping swell when some actor pops up, and then crickets when, let's say, some sound engineer is honored. Crank the maudlin ballad you have playing over it or just block out the applause until the end. Be all sound wizardy; do it for your tech brethren everywhere.

7.) Tulle? No.

8.) We want some sort of weird song and dance number, maybe 2. I am thinking for the opening and then for the nominated songs. Neil Patrick, this one's on you, Buddy. You can do it. But keep it short and toned-down; this isn't the Tonys.

9.) Steer clear of politics, unless your movie was political. Then you are allowed, but make sure you make sense and stick to Rule 1. No rambling. Documentaries, you are allowed to be as political or rambling as you want. They are gonna play you off anyway.

10.) Don't take yourselves too seriously. You are a room full of rich people handing each other golden statues for playing pretend. Have fun!

We'll be watching. Don't make us add your name to our "yeah-don't-much-care-for-him/her list." You wanna be on the "Oh-I-love-him/her!" list with Helen Mirren.

Happy Oscars!
Erin and Cathy

Paddington

Tonight's film:

Will: It was amazing, I loved it, it was even better than I thought it would be!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Will insisted on this level of exclamation points.) My favorite part was when (spoiler) Mr. Brown dresses as a lady, it was funny!!!

Sean: I liked the part when the bathtub floated away!

Lucy spent the movie running around the theater.

This rare moment of stillness was only due to the fact that she fell,

slipped on some popcorn she spilled no doubt. 

No worries, she's fine,

although she may be possessed.

(but if she is, she's been that way for awhile now.)

The baby enjoyed himself by diving into the popcorn bucket. He even said "uh-oh!" during a particularly tense scene involving some pigeons, so that was exciting. 

It was a fun movie, with a surprisingly imperfect protagonist family; much like our own. And I loved this director's vision of London, A bit of magically real storytelling, sort of Wes Anderson-ish. And who doesn't love Wes Anderson? (Do not comment and tell us you don't love Wes Anderson. We won't be able to compute such a statement.)

See it; super sweet!

Godzilla's Revenge

So, Henry and I have decided to expose the children to more classic film in 2015. We differ on what constitutes classic film. Tonight Henry won:

So, this part of the Godzilla franchise has some of the worst reviews ever. Perhaps because it is basically a children's movie and the monster antics are confided to the protagonist's mind. There are 2 main plots; one involving some bungling bank robbers and one involving a little boy being bullied at school and left alone a lot by 2 overworked parents, thus retreating into a dream world involving the always fun "Monster Island." My day-dreams usually don't involve fire-breathing monsters, but I'm not a lonely Japanese boy from the 60s, so what do I know.

It has the trippiest music ever, and I am grading on a curve here due to its release date of 1969. Godzilla has a child in this one; a rather alarming dinosaur-like fellow named Minya that speaks English and is bullied by the less verbally advanced monsters. Our oldest said that he looked and sounded exactly like Barney the Purple Dinosaur. Henry says that Godzilla's son sounds more like Don Knotts. The bad reviews are starting to make sense now, eh?

All in all, it wasn't a bad way to spend an hour and a half. The children were entertained and remained on the couch the whole time, instead of their usual bored move of wandering in and out with various toys. Anything that can keep their attention that long can't be all bad.

Henry likes that "they are telling multiple stories" and doesn't like that "both stories move incredibly slowly and seem rather pointless." He also isn't sure what the message is exactly; "is it that to deal with bullies you should become angry and aggressive like Godzilla? Or is it that you should retreat into a dream-world where you get chased by scary monsters and hang with a reptilian Don Knotts? Or is it that you should rob banks?" So many questions.

Our 4-year-old says he "kinda likes it" and "monster fighting is always fun."

Our 6-year-old says "it's good. Who doesn't like Godzilla movies?"

Our 3-year-old slept through the whole thing, after declaring that she was stronger than Godzilla and was going to her room to playing with some ponies.

And our baby couldn't believe his luck when the 4-year-old knocked a whole bowl of popcorn on his head during a particularly intense battle.

The Holy Land of Tyrol/Bergblut

or

For some reason, I think they look better in the German poster.

Don't ask me why, I'm not getting a lot of sleep these days.

So, the baby is teething. This leads to a lot of hanging out with him at night, when he only wants to sleep in a very specific position in my arms. This position is not good for sleeping myself, but it is good for watching strange foreign movies with the sound way down. I like to pick foreign films for the reason that I can have the sound nearly off and still understand what everyone is saying. (God bless subtitles.) And I like to pick strange foreign films because watching them with Henry always leads to the inevitable "foreign films end too abruptly fight," followed by the "we could have watched Avengers, Lord of the Rings, or pretty much anything else cool instead fight." And I'm too tired for that mess right now. 

Hence, me and the baby watching this strange little gem about a Bavarian woman who marries beneath her, and thus has to move to Tyrol with her new husband and learn to fit in there during the Napoleonic Wars. Spoiler: It isn't easy. 

Not that anything appears to be easy in Tyrol. This state in western Austria is known as the heart of the Alps, and it rivals Poland for most popular place to invade and trade between powerful neighbors. During the time of the movie, this involves Germany and France. And let me just say, I am glad that the baby speaks neither because the slurs going on were not polite. (If you wanna know more about Tyrol, Wikipedia has you hooked up.) 

The movie was by turns sad and heroic and joyful, and the energy stayed mostly on our main lady, Katharina. Her growth from young scared wife to strong confident medic was really neat to watch. I suppose anything else would give too much away, but there are a lot of nice twists and turns that don't end predictably or too tragically. Which is impressive, given the overwhelming presence of war that pervades the whole movie. And the views are out of control beautiful because, umm, Alps. 

Don't wait until you have a teething baby, see Bergblut now! (If you are using Amazon Prime to stream it, look for it under its English name.) 

It's a Wonderful Life

"No man is a failure who has friends."

And no mom is a failure who has a movie-loving son. 

So, I have seen It's a Wonderful Life untold times; most of them on snowy Christmas eves while I frantically wrap gifts and giggle as Henry's Mr. Potter impressions get bigger and bigger, the more egg nog he consumes.  My oldest son has seen up to the lassoing-of-the-moon scene for 6 years in a row, at which point the sugar crashes, his little body gives out, and he retreats to visions of sugarplums. Neither of us have ever seen it on the big screen, so we decide to head over to the Michigan Theater today and watch it. It was magical and I could wax poetic for hours. Believe me, I could; it's one of my favorite movies. However, I thought it would be more fun to let my son do this one, given that it was his first complete viewing. Here's what he has to say:

1. Mom let me have candy, which was awesome. I picked Dots and I like them all, but Cherry is, by far, my favorite flavor. 

2. The theater was really pretty. Mom says it is called Art Deco, which I guess means art decoration for short. And it was really decorated, lots of lights and gold stuff. 

3. A man was playing the organ before the movie and that was really good. 

4. Mom, are you gonna number everything I say? Why? Oh, alright. I guess it does make it easier read. OK, go ahead.

5. The beginning of the movie is funny. Well, sorta funny. When that old sad man was hitting...what? Oh, right, when Mr. Gower was hitting George, that wasn't funny at all, but the rest was pretty funny. 

6. Esp. when the dance floor opens up and they all fell in the swimming pool. That was so funny and the best part of the whole movie! I wish our school had a floor like that.

7. Uncle Billy has a pet crow and that is really nice.

8. The middle part is pretty hard to understand, except Clarence does some magic and then George is happy again, even though he is going to jail. He's kinda happy he is going to jail, which is weird, but maybe he is just happy that he has his kids again. 

9. Our house is almost exactly like the Bailey's because it's kinda broken and messy and we have 4 kids too and everyone is always loud and doing weird stuff, but we like it. George likes it too at the end and all the people come over and everyone was shouting so I didn't hear what they said but I think it was good stuff. And Mom cried, which is silly because I told her, "he's not going to jail now because they have money again."

10. And Mom says that you can be rich in money like Mr. Potter or rich in friends like George. And the right answer is that you want to be rich in friends, but I think it might be good to be both. 

The next Roger Ebert, ladies and gentlemen. 

Birdman

Or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance. 

What's unexpected is that Henry and I got to go to a movie.
In the theater.
On a Saturday. 

Birdman is delightfully weird and totally unexpected. I couldn't describe it if I wanted to, but I do want to mention that the depiction of the world of the theater is dead on. Believe me, my B.F.A. may be nearly 15 years old, but you go NOT forget just how dirty and real the theater is. This movie has an ultra-realism that had me squirming in my seat, and it totally worked. The intimacy of the stage was captured perfectly in super close-ups, lingering and excruciating. Everyone is solid and praiseworthy, but Michael Keaton was a powerhouse; heartbreaking and heart-swelling all at once. The Oscar buzz is very very deserved. The parallels to his own career are not: Michael Keaton is no celebrity trying to stay relevant. He is, and always has been, an actor of the finest stuff.

Great, really good-weird, movie.

P.S. The early appearance of an unflappable costume designer, who takes one look at Edward Norton's total nudity and declares that he "needs to go shopping for bigger pants" made me giggle and remember those long ago theater days of just rolling with whatever. Henry whispered "Are actors really like that?" And I said "Oh yes. They are very much like that."

P.P.S. The fact that we viewed this movie at the rather gritty, kinda uncomfortable, I-think-they-might-have-showed-porn-here-in-the-70s State Theater only added to the ultra-realism.