Movie Reviews (When There's Nothing Else To Do)

 I'm totally boring lately. I think things always get more interesting as the weather warms up and we start to shake off the coils of wintry gloom and spring into new weather and activities. So, I've been spending a lot of naptime watching netflix movies (new love). Here are the ones I've recently watched:

Eat Pray Love

I heard alot about this movie when it came out--I mean, how can you go wrong with Julia Roberts?! Right?! Well, it turns out the first 1/2 of the movie focuses on the "Pray" part of the plot and it's agonizingly ridiculous. Her big crisis in life is that her husband wants to go back to school and so she cries out to God to free her from her marriage. An absolutely ridiculous premise for a movie! I suppose she ends up happy at the end--by learning to truly "love" herself. What an empty promise to base a movie on--that self love is the key to happiness--when in fact, I've found that loving yourself more than everyone else only ends up making you miserable. Just my two cents. =)

New In Town

I was flipping through the Netflix instant watch section and came across this little "gem." Starring Harry Connick Jr. and Renee Zellweger AND from 2009--how bad can it be? Well, let's just say--it's Lifetime Movie of the Week bad....but also good. I love a good *bad* movie and this one was enjoyable for me but definitely wouldn't win any awards for the cold fish romance between Renee and Harry, her utterly unlikable personality and emoting, and the unlikelihood that Harry could overlook all of that and fall in love with her.

Letters To Juliet

The most redeeming quality of this movie is the amazing beauty of the two lead actresses--Amanda Seyfreid and Vanessa Redgrave are so lovely--the former is not the most convincing actress but here beauty helps you forget her banality.And Vanessa is stunning--as an actress and person--I hate that Hollywood will underutilize older actresses--when here is a supreme example of grace, great acting and presence! The movie was predictable but enjoyable and ended happily--which is my favorite type of ending! 

Cold Comfort Farm

This is another netflix gem I unearthed while exploring their archives. It actually stars Kate Beckinsale which I didn't realize until after I watched it--she was SO young and looked utterly different. I HATED this movie when it started. I had to put on the subtitles so I could "understand" what they were saying. That still didn't work! It all annoying gibberish as it started sharing the adventure of a young, wealthy, orphan looking for book material by visiting crazy distant relatives. She hit the jackpot at Cold Comfort Farm! Full of creepy and crazy this motley crew learned through her tutelage to free themselves from their self-inflicted unhappiness as she taught them to embrace change, happiness and cleanliness. Slowly the characters won me over and left me a fan--but that first hour was a struggle to get through!!

The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button

The last movie I recently watched--I had very low expectations for. The previews looked weird and I'm not a huge fan of Brad Pitt or Cate Blanchet. The movie is so original and it's concept so moving--as Benjamin went from abandoned infant, to young-old-man, and how his story intersected with that of Cate's character--it was utterly moving and beautiful, brilliant, tragic, depressing, wonderful and redeeming. I know that's a lot to say for this movie--I hate to give anything away--but it is a great love story with interesting characters and let me just say--that seeing Brad Pitt change from grizzled old man and slowly becoming more beautiful and young was breathtaking. Cate is a stunning woman too--they were beautiful together in this movie. I count myself a fan of theirs now! Great acting, cool story, must see!