consistent with my life-long patterns related to diet & exercise, i often start out strong on new goals, roaring out the chute at full speed. then not too long in my commitment level wanes, and before i know it i’m eating krispy kremes & can’t even find my gym punch card. so it makes perfect sense that my summer movie marathon was a bit like that! since it’s labor day my endeavor to watch as many movies as i could is now officially over, although i will always be a movie hound. my summer-of-movies was really fun, and i honestly wouldn’t have watched even ¼ of what i ended up making time for. the past month or so has been a little slow (only 10 more to make my summer total 39, the other two lists are here & here). i was happier reading books & being at the lake, but i did manage to catch a few good ones, mainly lots of summer theater releases & not too many artsy indie ones. for labor day, i thought i’d take a little carnival-intensity diversion and share the latest flix i watched to wrap up my little summer project:
get smart – of course it was so goofy but we thought it was funny. steve carrell cracks me up no matter what he is in.
journey to the center of the earth – i took the little kids to see it & it was definitely a rental, but i am a sap for the oldies and for sweet and simple. the terrible special effects somehow worked as long as they weren’t really trying to be the real thing (i wasn’t quite sure?)
the dark knight – i went with my oldest two kiddos who of course like most of america thought it was the greatest movie ever. yes, it was so well done in all kinds of ways. the metaphors were amazing, no doubt heath ledger should win a post-humous academy award, and i can so appreciate what incredible movie making can do, but i will admit, it took me a few days to shake off the evil of it all. it really did get under my skin, i guess that was the idea?
iron man – okay this was my favorite superhero movie in a long time! loved it. great comeback, robert downey junior, and i just thought it was clever, simple, and extremely entertaining.
step up 2 – the escobars love these kinds of movies, sports and dancing and underdogs, those are our favorites! of course, not the best acting in the world but we all loved the dancing, and one of the twins is really into hip-hop dancing so we had post-video dance parties on our coffee table (we watched it a few times!)
mamma mia! – that is why i go to the movies, to escape. this movie definitely isn’t for people who aren’t into sappy & silly & goofy & fun, but i thought it was great. my favorite part was the very end. i kept thinking what a blast they must have had making it. look out refuge-es, halloween’s coming!
henry poole is here – loved it. if you haven’t seen it, check it out, it stars luke wilson and is a compelling story about faith. we talked about it for a long time afterward; it really got under our skin & we had a big discussion about how much faith is enough & all kinds of beautiful things related to our spiritual journey. jose & i went with some friends and all 4 of us gave it a thumbs up.
gandhi – too much to share about this one. i think it is a must-view for the church right now in all kinds of ways. so powerful, that nonviolence does not mean passive cooperation & submission to an unjust system. the spirit of unity & justice & love that permeated gandi’s call is a message for all of us. the part i loved the very most was towards the end when he told the hindu man who was out for muslim blood because they had killed his son that he should “go and find another boy with no parents to love and raise him as a muslim.” oh, that did me in. stellar, stellar, stellar. jonathan brink just posted a list of great gandhi quotes.
be kind rewind – i had wanted to see this but it came and went at the theater so we rented it with our friends visiting from portland (more on the things all four of us are most passionate about next post!) i love jack black, he makes me laugh. i admit i fell asleep for a small chunk but it wasn’t because of the movie, i was just bone-tired. we watched it after the refuge where we just had a big conversation there about collaboration & community. it couldn’t have been a more perfect pick related to that. everyone’s voice, everyone a part, working together.
traitor – jose and i snuck away to see and both really liked it. don cheadle is one of our favs and we like suspense-drama-cia-kinds of things & it was just one of those “wow, that was really much better than we thought it would be!” movies.
okay that was it my friends. i still have a long list of things i want to see, mostly from the recommendations you sent me from other posts (tracy, your latest two are already on my queue!). keep ‘em coming!