Snowed In

I can't think of a better way to spend a snowy weekend than to watch old movies on Turner Classic Movies!

On Saturday we watched Dinner at Eight where the upper class Manhattanites, the Jordans, attempt to plan a dinner party to honor friends from England. Both hysterical and sad, this was a fabulous movie starring two Barrymores - John and Lionel, the latter playing a part very sadly biographical of his own tragic life. It also stars Billie Burke as Mrs. Jordan and Marie Dressler as Carolotta Vance, an aging star of the cinema. It also stars Jean Harlow playing a smart sex-kitten. This star-studded cast did an excellent job talking about the Great Depression, growing older, being young or old and in love and especially, disappointments.

Based on a Broadway play with the same name, as the dinner party gets closer we learn that each invited guest has much going on in their lives and each is seamlessly connected with another member of the dinner party. We laughed and cried, but you must listen and process quickly or you will miss the humor!

Sunday's feature was Niagara, a drama featuring Joseph Cotton and Marilyn Monroe. While some scenes of Marilyn Monroe being serious are almost laughable as she pouts her lips and wiggles her behind, it was an interesting story of a couple on their honeymoon at Niagara Falls that gets involved with the un-trusting, interesting couple of Cotton and Monroe. The movie was really a simple story with predictable plot twists. The real star of the movie was the Niagara Falls! There were plenty of shots of the falls at all times of the day including them lit at night and daytime shots of the mists and people on boats wearing raincoats. You felt as wet as the vistors in the movie looked. By the end of the movie, you feel as if you had indeed visited the entire Canadian side of the Falls. Was the cheapest vacation I ever had!

Nausea rating: Dinner at Eight: 0
Niagara - 1 for seasickness

Slumdog Millionaire

This little advertised movie from India was one of the best movies I'd seen all year. Okay, you caught me - it was the first movie I had seen this year, but let's include the slew of movies coming out recently and this movie becomes one of the best!

At first I wasn't sure what it exactly was about. On all the year end "best of" lists I saw this movie listed on, it looked like a sappy version of boy loses girl, boy wins ten million rupees, boy finds girl - but oh - it was so much more than that!

Accused of cheating, Jamal is taken away by the police at the end of his first appearance on the popular game show and interrogated. Though uneducated, it is because of his life in the slums in an overcrowded, filthy poor area and his horrific experiences that he is able to answer the questions and become a hero to the poor all around him.

Based on the novel Q&A by Vikas Swarup and adapted for the screen by Simon Beaufov, the directors Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan don't spare us from life inside Mumbai where dirty children sift through garbage to survive and Hindi and Muslims fight in the streets. After Jamal's mother is killed in one of these religious battles, he is forced to fend for himself along with his brother.

Dev Patel portrays the young adult version of Jamal and gives a spectacular performance of a disillusioned young man who trusts no one and can't believe himself that he's won. This movie is filled with wonderful Indian actors, including the original host of the Hindi version of Who Wants to Be an Millionaire.

This movie teaches us that sometimes being smart isn't based only on how many books you've read or the grades you got in school. We know what we know because of our life experiences and how we view the world around us. We choose whether to walk around aimlessly in life or to look around and observe what the world is offering us every minute of every day. To be truly wise, we must find the perfect blend of both being book smart and street smart.

Nausea rating: 2 out of 5 for scenes of torture and extreme poverty

Soylent Green

It's New York City in the not-too distant future (though it was way in the future when this 1973 film was made) and the population has reached 40,000,000 in that city alone. Food and shelter is scarce and most people survive on rations of water and soy-based wafers of food - except the very wealthy of course.

When a higher up is eliminated (Joseph Cotten), Police Officer Thorn (Charlton Heston) tries to find out who did it while he loots the wealthy deceased things and sleeps with the man's live "furniture" girlfriend. His "book", played wonderfully by Edward J. Robinson, finds out what soylent green is really made from - but I can't tell you that here. That would spoil the surprise!

This was Edward J. Robinson's last movie, but he plays his role as Charlton Heston's knowledge base as well as any other role he ever played with emotion and perfect timing. It really was a pleasure to watch him here. His character, Sol, reminds Thorn over and over how life was once greener and food abundant and he longs to return to those days. Legendary Joseph Cotten only has a small part, but an important one, so be sure to look out for his performance. Charlton Heston? Well, it was Charlton Heston who usually turns out campy and dramatic in anything I've ever seen him in (though I loved him in Touch of Evil).

Based on the novel Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison and directed by Richard Fleisher, this movie really is a warning about our future if we don't take care of the Earth. If we do not learn to live sustainably, we too could be fighting over soylent green wafers for our dinners.

Why do all portrayals of Earth's future always include overpopulation and shortages - and usually food and fuel? Are we that pessimistic about our own futures that we image future generations will only suffer looking to higher ranked officials to tell us how to live and eat and breathe? This story, as well as many other of the stories that show our future in this dismal light, should be taken as warnings that we need to change things now. Maybe by showing that we can change, movies about our future will become more hopeful and optimistic and remind us that our future and our children's future can be something to look forward to, instead of something to dread.

Nausea rating: 2.5 out of 5 for sad vision of future.

Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Curious indeed.  How did a sappy movie about a troublesome dog beat out this beautifully told story is what I am very curious about.

Brad Pitt only improves with age in both his acting and his looks, as he gets younger and younger in this movie.  Cate Blanchett improves with age as well, but I wonder if her looking like she had too much makeup on was done on purpose to show how vain women really are about getting older?  With Brad de-aging thanks to CGI, couldn't they have aged Cate the same way? Either way, beautifully told and beautifully done.

Based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, a man who loses his son in WWI designs a clock for a local train station that runs backwards - and in sync to Benjamin's life.  Much like the seats at the theater, I think.  They re-did our local theater at the mall, including stadium seating.  Long overdue in my opinion, but what happened to those well worn seats with protruding springs?  They were at the smaller theater we saw this almost three hour movie in, and I had that seat that was trying to de-age too.  My bad seat made the movie seem longer than it really was, but like a really good novel that follows a person's life from beginning to end, I almost didn't mind.  I was as lost in this movie as I am in a good book.

Verdict?  Not nauseous at all.  In fact, I felt pretty good when it was done.