the groundhog day project

There is a detail I love in Josh's carnival ride tragedy: though he is distraught at being too short to ride, Cynthia, the girl he has a crush on (who is there with another boy... who drives ), immediately says the height rule is stupid. She stand s up for Josh even as he is already too stuck in his own short - person head to notice. He Charlie Brown walks through the carnival and finds himself in front of that fateful Zoltar machine. And our setup is complete. He is a kid with chores, and a crush on a girl, and when he dares something scary -- and I went on a ride like the loop one he tries at a carnival once, and it was pretty frightening -- and gets close to that crush in line, everything falls apart. Hi s whole world comes apart, really. And, then gets twisted by magic into something else entirely. And, at the other end of the film, the trick is that it is not rejection that pushes him to change back, but something like the opposite. Billy brings him the location of the...

No Jazz Singer tonight. Instead, I took my daughter to see Lady Bird . And, the affection for Sacramento inherent in Gerwig's direction throughout, plus more explicitly regarding the titular character's (Saoirse Ronan) affection for the city, despite her claims to the contrary, stood out. Sister Sarah Joan's (Lois Smith) pronouncement that is today's blog title had me thinking on a couple things: 1) on an obvious level, because that line was about the city, I was thinking about Pasadena, where I grew up. About places I used to go, the mall that no longer exists, movies theaters that have been turned into (I think this is what they are now) a bank, a church (which seems like blasphemy), and a school supply store. Another one was turned from a giant single-screen theater into a multiplex, and is now a gym of some sort. The theater where I worked for a while in my 20s is now a jewelry store. And, it's not all about movie theaters. Three used bookstores I used to f...

The remarkable thing about Lars and the Real Girl is how easily it allows the audience to understand its characters. The damaged, the desperate, the concerned--they are all painted with such care. We can relate immediately to Lars (Ryan Gosling), to his concerned (and pregnant) sister-in-law. Karin (Emily Mortimer), to his interested coworker Margo (Kelli Garner). Even his brother Gus (Paul Schneider), though he doesn't have much to do but play support to Karin early on. And Dagmar (Patricia Clarkson, thankfully given better material than Pieces of April ). It's like I've said regarding Linklater's films; they embody these character seemingly effortlessly. Yet, the plot makes a very explicit effort to complicate things beyond understanding (and fails, as it turns out). Bianca (the doll) is a missionary, very religious, and she barely speaks English, plus she's in a wheelchair, plenty of detail to explain why she doesn't talk much. That and her shyness. Gosling...