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How cool is this!

Anything that has J.R. Tolkien, live music, food, all-ages welcome and canned goods entry fee is FINE BY ME!

I luuuuuuv Portland.

Just had to post the trailer for a movie Misty introduced me to last night-

This movie is just incredible, a modern musical of sorts based in Dublin, very moving.

Enjoy…

Ok, so yesterday our pastor Rick told us about this movie that just came out from the same guy who did “Supersize Me”. It’s called What Would Jesus Buy? (seriously, watch the trailer) and its a spoof with a tele-evangelist character named Reverend Billy and his church, The Church of Stop Shopping. He and his Stop Shopping Choir are out to warn the world of the coming Shopocolipse, by doing things like exorcizing a WalMart sign, singing special Christmas carols in malls with lyrics replaced by Stop Shopping messages, and praying that the boy who plays video games come to see the difference between the virtual world and reality.

This is not a “christian” movie or anything, and yet this guy can see that there is some obvious idiocy with buying butt loads of presents for a holiday that is about celebrating the birth of Jesus, who was perhaps even anti-materialistic, a Man who gave gifts of sacrifice and service and used his resources to help the least of these. This year we’ve decided we are not buying more than one or two gifts for each other and are sending family and friends cards, letters, and a cd of family photos to be “near them” during Christmas. It’s more than “Jesus is the Reason” and corny conservative church cliche’s- its about spending less money on material things, giving to the needy, and spending more time in worship and contemplation.

Again, I don’t want to sound cheesy here, but perhaps if you get a chance to check out this movie (I know its only in select theaters) or just spend some time this year considering why the hell we spend so much on gifts at Christmastime, we can start to make a difference in the way Americans celebrate this time of year.

Ok, I’ll leave you with song lyrics from the movie, which are just too funny:

Beatitudes of Buylessness

Blessed are the Consumers, for you shall be free from Living By Products…..

Blessed are you who stumble out of branded Main Streets, for you shall find lovers not downloaded and oceans not rising.

Blessed is the ordinary citizen who holds onto a patch of public commons, for you are the New World.

Blessed is the artist who is not corporate sponsored for you shall give birth to warm fronts of emotion and breakthroughs of Peace.

Blessed are you who confuse “Consumerism” with “Freedom,” for you shall be delighted to discover the difference.

Blessed are the advertisers and commercial celebrities, for you are waiting for the remarkable restfulness of honesty.

Blessed are city neighborhoods that people have flown from in fear, for your children shall return to illuminate the dark economy.

Blessed are the workers in the supermalls, for the town your employers’ killed shall come back to life!

Blessed is the breadwinner with out-sourced dreams who sits in the SUV stuck in a Christmas from Hell, this year a gift will set you free

Blessed are the young women in sweatshops, for the things you make will fly you like magic evening gowns to the City of Light

Blessed are you who disturb the customers, for you might be loving your neighbor.

is kinda lax this week- I didn’t watch any movies because of my work load…

HOWEVER-

I did read a chapter ABOUT movies from Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, and decided this piece was so well said it deserved to be quoted for Saturday movie mania…

“… it’s impossible to deny that the chances of seeing an uber-fantastic film in a conventional movie house are growing maddeningly rare, which wasn’t always the case. It wasn’t long ago that movies like Cool Hand Luke or The Last Picture Show or Nashville would show up everywhere, and everyone would see them collectively, and everybody would have their consciousness shaken at the same time and in the same way. This never happens anymore (Pulp Fiction was arguable the last instance.) This is mostly due to the structure of the Hollywood system; especially in the early 1970’s, everybody was consumed with the auteur concept, which gave directors the ability to completely (and autonomously) construct a movie’s vision; for roughly a decade, film was a director’s medium. Today, film is a producer’s medium (the only director with complete control over his product is George Lucas, and he elects to make kids’ movies). Producers want to develop movies they can refer to as “high concept,” which - somewhat ironically- is industry slang for “no concept”: It describes a movie where the human element is secondary to an episodic collection of action sequences. It’s “conceptual” because there is no emphases on details. Capitalistically, those projects work very well; they can be constructed as “vehicles” for particular celebrities, which is the only thing most audiences care about, anyway. In a weird way, film studios are almost requiring moves to be bad, because they tend to be efficient.”

Would love some hearty discussion on this point, I could talk about this all day (just ask my poor mother-in-law!)

So come out you lurkers, I know you have a thought or two about movies. And I’m not asking because I care about how many comments I get, but because I REALLY need adult conversation after being home all day with my toddler. See, now you are guilted into commenting, which I don’t feel a darn bit of shame about.

Ok, ok, so making a plan to blog about a certain topic on a certain day each week is NOT my forte (whatever happened to consistent Wednesday LOST blogs?)

However, I’ll still report on the movies I watched since last last Saturday…

A Scanner Darkly- I some what enjoyed this, in the sense that I found some parts funny, some parts well written, and I thought the animation aspect was creative. I wasn’t through the roof about it though.

Before Sunset- I LOVED this movie, and I never even saw the first one. It was like sociology experiment, watching the two characters interact in a 2 hour period, as they at first are very “best foot forward” and slowly they lose control and break down a bit, only to pull back, and on and on. In the end I SO wanted this couple to just stay together, because in that two hour conversation I was convinced NO ONE would have that much connection. I guess that’s why its not reality.

Calendar Girls - Very cute chick flick, a lot of fun!

A Great New Wonderful - Some parts of this were funny, but mostly it was kinda sad. I didn’t remember it was about the aftermath of 9/11 for every day new yorkers’ until the very end. I’d watch again; it was a thinker.

Office Space- You might see a common  release time frame of a lot of these movies- they came out during the time of anti-secularism in my life. So I have some catching up to do- (and the public library makes it easy to do without breaking the bank!) I was glad to finally watch this whole movie, though I don’t think there was anything brilliant about it, it definitely helps me understand the references in just about every Gen X book or film Gotta love that “Don’t it feel good to be a gangsta” song and when they smash up the printer- I doubt I could ever sit in a cubicle, esp if I didn’t have a family to support. Noooooo thanks.

The OH in Ohio - hahaha… It’s foolish, really, most of the movie is pretty scanky for my taste, but some parts were funny. It would make a good gal night, with the right gal’s… and the right martini’s.

The Wind the Shakes the Barley -  This was worth watching as a drama film- it’s the story of two brothers, initially on the same side of the Republican’s in the 1920’s in Ireland, though in the end they are drawn to opposite sides after the peace treaty. It’s war, so be prepared for that. I liked this movie up until the end, because I felt it was marketed as though the brothers were divided by the war for most of the movie, but instead it spent a great deal of time following the band of rufkins in the Republican “army” struggle with the concept of killing, torture and war. It was not until the end that the treaty divided them and it ended leaving much of the storyline to be explored.

I REALLY want to see Into the Wild and the Darjeerling Limited in theaters now. It’s driving me crazy.

I love movies… it would take me a long time to sit down and write a list of all the movies I’ve enjoyed in the last two decades. Films can at once portray a starking reflection of our own humanity and the altitude for humanity’s most incredible gift: creativity.

The more I watch films that are slightly less Hollywood, with atypical characters, imaginative settings, brilliant writing both poetic and absurd, the more enamored I am with films.

So I’d like to try something new by making Saturday a day I post about movies I have watched in the previous week, if I can even remember them all. If I have seen the movie before, but not posted about it, I will still include it in my synopsis each week, but with an * noting that it was not my first time (so you’ll know I might or might not have enjoyed its subsequent viewing, which is sometimes an entirely different experience.)

This week:

I welcome suggestions! More next Saturday…

The Oscar nominations this year leave me with the feeling that I’ve been hiding out in no man’s land. I think I’ve seen one or two of the films mentioned. This is sad. I plan to take the day Sat or Sun this weekend to watch at least a few more that are out on DVD, (are any?) to fill myself in. I definitely liked In Pursuit of Happyness and Little Miss Sunshine was okay.

I’ve got a good LOST post cooking over in my draft area for tomorrow evening- stay tuned.

Also to come- Thursday hop on over for mama’s lesson on unrefined eating!

I strongly recommend that all you female readers grab your closest gal pals, stuff your oversized purses/diaper bags with candy and small bottles of wine, and go see The Holiday. OHMYGOSH it was more fun than I’ve had in YEARS! The pizzeria boys asked us if we were in high school- LOL!

And I wrote an article about it here. It’s meant for next week, Thanksgiving, but hey - go get some ideas!

I’ve been on a movie binge, in particular an independent, artsy fartsy movie binge. Highly recommend: Everything is Illuminated and Thumbsucker. Oh my gosh -a lot.

Also, I think that every week it would be healthy for all involved, (you, me, and everyone we know- ewwww, an allusion to another movie I’ve heard is goooood), if I were to confess something which most of you do not know.

Today, it is that I sit, (my workspace cramped -lovingly- along the wall at the foot of my bed, on an old writers desk where I do the bulk of my freelancing and blogging), on a broken chair.

I’ve given it some thought and I don’t know why I don’t just go get another chair, except that the only other chairs in the house small like this one are on the porch with the kitties and have lots of mildew. The one that currently holds my tush is a small wooden chair, faded red paint, wicker seat.The problem is that you never know when it will give out on you, as many of the horizontal spokes are displaced. Three or four times a night I fall over, and occassionally I take the time to hammer all the pieces back together with my palms as a temporary fix.

But please do not buy me another chair, because a little teetering chair suits me right now. Yeah, it might be inconvenient, reek of poverty, a little mildewy, and of course, broken.

But I can live with that.