December Movies (finally) and other stuff

I'm heading to bed shortly as 4:30 comes pretty quickly, but felt the need to post. Not that I have a thing to say, but what the heck.

Does anybody watch The Graham Norton Show on BBC America? It's on Saturdays at 10:00 p.m. (I think - I DVR it) and it is so bloody funny. I laugh out loud all the time. I love that he has his guests come out right at the beginning and he talks to them together. One show last season he had on Marilyn Manson and Nigella Lawson, the cooking show woman. Stinking hilarious. If you have BBC America and you're not watching, you're not doing yourself any favors. They do stuff on British telly that is just insane. And they get to swear, but of course, it gets beeped out here. Our family values will explode if they're allowed to say the c-word for a male anatomical part on TV, I guess.

Even though Christmas is officially over I still have tons of knitting to do. I have gotten into slightly more complicated knitting, as I found myself actually a little bored with my usual scarves. I've finished two scarves of late that includes slipping stitches and passing the slipped stitch over, and yarnovers and knitting stitches together. It's quite exciting. I've even started, for myself, a 20-row lace pattern. This means that rows 1-20 are different from each other and when you reach row 21, you start over again with row 1. Not really the mindless knitting I've always preferred. It's quite scary. I might even tackle cables sometime this year. *shudder*

I did my civic duty today and voted in Michigan's "primary." It's in quotes, because I've heard that because the Michigan legislature voted to move our primary up from its usual Super Tuesday date, in order to get a little bit more attention from the candidates, the Democratic Party has taken our delegates away from us. And the Republicans only get half the usual number of delegates. So, that worked really well. The only Democrat who came to the state was Dennis Kucinich, while the Republicans (minus Giuliani, of course, who is planning on winning the Republican candidacy on only Florida) were criss-crossing the state all weekend. It was making me sick listening to Mitt Romney talking about how he's a native son, blah blah blah. He hasn't lived here since he was 18 when he left to go to Harvard (or some other Ivy League college), and that's a good three + decades.

I watched a ton of movies in December, but I don't feel like linking, so if you're interested, you can google, IMDB or rottentomatoes them yourselves.

Evil Under the Sun - old Agatha Christie with Peter Ustinov as Hercule Poirot. Always a good time.

Howl's Moving Castle - This was up against The Corpse Bride and The Curse of the Were-Rabbit for best animated Oscar a few years ago. I liked it a whole lot more than I thought I would. I will, however, stand by my assessment that The Corpse Bride deserved that Oscar - and I love Wallace & Gromit.

The Other Side of the Street - This was billed as a Brasilian Rear Window which it kind of was with an unexpected twist at the end. It's not better than Rear Window, but I mostly liked it.

Led Zeppelin: The Song Remains the Same - I have NO clue what I was thinking when I netflixed this because I *hate* Led Zeppelin. I watched the entire thing, though, so give me credit for trying to broaden my horizons. The little vignettes that supposedly showed the mindset of the individual members of the band were just plain strange. The only one I liked was the one of the drummer (John Bonham, I think) because it included all sorts of cool cars, including him drag racing. SWEET.

The Squid & The Whale - I try to watch most films nominated for an Academy Award, even if I don't get to them for a few years. That's why I watched this one. I fucking hated this movie. I hated Jeff Daniels (I think it was Jeff Daniels) beyond words. I didn't hate Laura Linney quite as much, but it would have been hard to reach the level of malevolence I felt for Jeff's character. Do not waste your time with this one unless you want to stab people when it's over.

American Hardcore - Very cool documentary on the hardcore music scene in the States. I loved it.

Friends With Money - A movie that looks like it's a comedy, but isn't really. Jennifer Aniston plays the poor friend of three couples who all have way more money that most of us. I think this is the first movie I've seen with Joan Cusack where she played somebody not completely likable. It was "meh."

That Touch of Mink - Cary Grant, Doris Day...love it!

None But The Lonely Heart - I had to look this one up. 1944 Cary Grant movie where he plays a drifter, essentially, who comes home for a while with every intention of leaving quickly until the neighborhood doctor informs him his mother is dying. He gets mixed up with the wrong people, and it goes on from there. It's Cary Grant, which means I recomend it, of course.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation - I watch this every year with a group of friends from when I worked at the University. I had never seen it before 2000 or 2001, but I can say appreciated it more this year than any of the previous years.

The Bicycle Thief - I had heard about this classic post-war Italian movie for years, and I finally saw it. The YS (younger sister) had seen it in college in a film appreciation class and she didn't appreciate it at all. I did, however.

The Polar Express - Wow, I really didn't appreciate this Christmas movie at all. About halfway through I was absolutely hating it, but came to not hate it by the end. I don't think I'll be making this a Christmas tradition, but it didn't suck completely.

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeousie - I did not "get" this movie. But it was directed by Luis Bunuel, so what did I expect. It had Fernando Rey whom I love, so that helped get me through it. A little strange, especially when the two couples and Fernando Rey would be walking down the middle of a country road...it was interspersed throughout the movie and the meaning went right over my head. If someone could explain, I'd be oh so grateful.

My Left Foot - Yeah, yeah, I know, the whole world saw this back in the 80s, but I didn't. I can now say, "Yes, Daniel Day-Lewis definitely deserved the Oscar for this movie." After reading Angela's Ashes back when it first came out, I have avoided most movies and books that have anything to do with the bleak Irish life, but this one was worth watching, as it wasn't completely bleak.

Wilde - Movie with Jude Law about Oscar Wilde. It depicted Oscar as quite a congenial fellow. It was OK, not stellar, but not hideously hateful. Sad, of course.

To Have & To Have Not - Bogey & Bacall's first movie together. LOVE IT!

Casino Royale - This was not the Daniel Craig/James Bond movie of last year (or the previous), this was a Peter Sellers/David Niven spoof movie. I wrote in my notebook - complete ridiculousness, as you'd expect from Peter Sellers, no? Orson Welles is in it and I read somewhere that he and Peter Sellers hated each other and one or the other of them wouldn't show up for their scenes together. That had to be fun.

White Christmas - Mom and YS had never seen White Christmas, so the Sunday before Christmas we went to Grandma's to watch it with her. I love Danny Kaye. If you have never seen this movie, you must see it. At the end, I teared up, as always, but tried to be surreptitious about it, until I saw the YS going for the tissue and then passing it to Mom. All three of us were crying - Grandma's not that sentimental, cute as she is.

Aguirre: The Wrath of God - I've finally gotten to the Werner Herzog movies in my Netflix queue. The man is in a class by himself. And it's not altogether good. The movie is good, but he has some interesting ways. Klaus Kinski plays Aguirre, a Spanish explorer, conquistador in Peru who is a little crazy and mounts a mutiny against the leader of the expedition. It's a little weird to hear "Spanish" conquistadors speaking German, but it doesn't really detract from the movie. As is normal with Herzog's films, this isn't exactly uplifting.

The Blob - Steve McQueen's first movie - I liked it better than I thought I would and saw where Slither (the Nathan Fillion movie I watched back in November) got most of its ideas.

Besides these movies, I went to three live performances. The first was my friend Dan's daughter in a Salute to 21st Century Broadway. She was fabulous. Next up was The Brian Setzer Orchestra's Christmas Extravaganza. I've seen them twice before and loved those shows. This one I didn't think was as good. I hate and despise long-ass guitar soloes and drum soloes...and they were definitely more prevalent this time area. I hope he doesn't do that next year. And finally, Stuart McLean of CBC Radio brought The Vinyl Cafe Christmas Concert to Windsor. It was fabulous fun, as always, and we even got TWO Dave & Morley stories. If you have never heard Stuart, go to CBC Radio. If you live in a border state, find it on your radio. If you don't, you can go on-line and I understand there are podcasts now, so you don't have to try to catch it at 10:00 a.m. ET on Saturday mornings on-line.

Whew, only halfway through January I finally listed my December movies. I'm such a slacker.