"We are locked and loaded here. We are non-refundable!"

[ebonlock]

Bought my family's tickets for their trip out here for the holidays. Was pleasantly surprised by how fast and easy Orbitz made it to do, and how delightfully inexpensive! Ok, comparatively inexpensive, all things considered. Still, that takes care of a nice big portion of my Xmas shopping for the year. Hooray!

Busy weekend, but lord did I accomplish a lot. Friday night I got to enjoy great angry liberal flicks with cyranocyrano and aelfsciene. Yay uppity progressives! We had a weird moment when C- made a funny comment about the CIA and crack, and then it was echoed on the film by someone in the audience. Got to bed later than intended, but it was well worth it.

Getting to the SJ Flea Market on Saturday was fabulous, and I got some amazing deals. Some gorgeous plum colored silky-looking fabric for $2.50 a yard, and the most spectacular sage and white sari I've ever seen for $15. I made the woman at the stall repeat the price three times before I would believe her. I gave her my money and ran out of the place before she could tell me she'd actually meant $50 (which was what I was expecting). If the temperature at the market hadn't be roughly that of the surface of the sun I would've enjoyed staying longer. As it was leaving around 1 gave Aelf and I time to run errands before going to see "A Midsummer Night's Dream" that evening. Have I mentioned recently how much I love Shakespeare productions in the great outdoors? Sitting in a forest glade watching the play with stars overhead and few to no mosquitos is damn near bliss as far as I'm concerned.

Sunday was off to the shelter where I heard the bad news. Apparently the woman who runs it is being hassled by her neighbors and she may be moving, so who knows what's going to happen next. If anyone was even considering taking on another kitty now would be a very good time. There are some absolute dolls there.

After that zoomed home to get my own cats' litterboxes taken care of, and managed to sweep and mop before tersa arrived for a viewing of "Chicago". My reaction to the film was about what I'd expected it to be.

Ok, I know that many people treated this film as if it were the musical equivalent of the second coming, but I came away rather thoroughly unimpressed. Yeah they did a nice enough job putting the musical onscreen, but..um..folks do realize that Hollywood's been doing that very same thing for, oh about 70 years now! And weirdly enough they used to actually get the real singers/dancers rather than actors they taught to sing and dance, to be in them. I know it sounds crazy, but it's true! And perhaps the most heartbreaking thing for me was seeing the amazing Chita Rivera in a throw away cameo, I think she got all of 10 seconds of screentime and only the fact that I actually knew who she was allowed me to spot her at all.

And this thing won Oscars? I had this intense desire to go out and rent Cabaret, or Kiss Me Kate, or any number of other incredibly good movie musicals afterwards if for no other reason than to get THAT DAMN SONG OUT OF MY HEAD! You know the one, I'm not naming it here because I finally did replace it with the theme song to the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes last night and I don't want to start the cycle again.

I had a weird moment when listening to Richard Gere singing "Razzle Dazzle 'em" and thinking, "Ok is this meant to be ironic, or did it just turn out that way?" Replacing actual talent with glitz, glam, and clever staging with big names that will surely draw in box office bucks works, I mean I'm not arguing that. I'm just saying it doesn't make a good film.

Glad I got that out of my system. Now I can smile fondly on having a roommate who allows me to watch 4 hours of Sherlock adventures in a single evening without complaint. We watched some incredibly good ones, "The Naval Treaty", "The Crooked Man", "The Dancing Men", and "The Solitary Cyclist". Mmm, Jeremy Brett in period costume, mmm English countryside, mmm violins, and mmm well written and clever mysteries! Oh how I've missed them. I re-watch those episodes and remember why it is that I can't watch most American mystery movies or t.v. shows. I am a mystery snob, I admit it.

Oh and I got a great deal done on my Halloween costume, yay! I might just get this sucker completed in time to wear it this year.

Comments

[kirbyk.livejournal.com]

I liked Chicago a great deal - but that's because I love musicals, and it was a pretty good production of a decent musical. But it definitely was - intentionally - more stylish than substantive. I'm pretty surprised that it got the Oscar Buzz, but that's just more evidence that what goes on at the Oscars is about a lot of things, the actual content of the movies being a minor component.

I'm glad I saw it before it became the thing, so my expectations weren't absurdly high. It was pretty much exactly what it set out to be, and you'll like it as much as you like that kind of thing. :-)

Now, the rumors I hear of a movie version of Rent, directed by Spike Lee - that's what's exciting.

[ebonlock.livejournal.com]

Now, the rumors I hear of a movie version of Rent, directed by Spike Lee - that's what's exciting.

Wish I could be as excited about the proposed Phantom movie. I mean Joel Schumacher? Jesus, what the hell was ALW smoking?

[tersa.livejournal.com]

Jesus, what the hell was ALW smoking?

The $100 bills.

[jakejr.livejournal.com]

nooooooo, not the Schumacher! Anything but that!

I dug Chicago quite a bit, but I wouldn't call it the Second Coming of anything.

[tersa.livejournal.com]

Now, the rumors I hear of a movie version of Rent, directed by Spike Lee - that's what's exciting.

This both made me scream and laugh.

Scream, because when I was talking to A- and E- yesterday after the movie was over, I initially said I would love to see them bring RENT to film, and then stopped, because I realized I do *not* think they could do a good job of it.

Laugh, because Spike Lee doing RENT would bring delicious irony to the lyric: "I hear Spike Lee's shooting down the street"

[tyee.livejournal.com]

*grin* the "I hear Spike Lee's shooting down the street" lyric was the first thing that popped into my head and I cracked up as well.

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

So you liked the movie of Cabaret?
I'd been avoiding it because I heard they carved up the story to give more screen time to Liza Minelli.

[ebonlock.livejournal.com]

So you liked the movie of Cabaret?
I'd been avoiding it because I heard they carved up the story to give more screen time to Liza Minelli.

Yeah I liked it a lot, and they did mess with the story quite a bit to beef up Sally's role, but it's still a great flick and a great musical. Fortunately they realized they also had pure gold in Joel Grey so they let him shine in it as well. If nothing else you must see her do "Mein Herr" and the two belt out "Money".

hey!

[aelfsciene.livejournal.com]

Allows, nothing. At this point, I'm enjoying the Holmes stuff immensely, though I'm aware I can't hold a candle to your fervor for the series. ^_^

Plus, it's great to have something episodic and fun to fill in the time before there's more Stargate to watch, too!