The Winter of the Movie

Good morning, all.  I don’t know what’s up with me waking up early like this on my day off.  It’s about nine o’clock now, when I’m starting to write this post, and I had every intention to sleep until ten o’clock or so. Alas, it wasn’t meant to be.  I do have several things to do today, including calling the Branson public schools to see if they need any substitute teachers.  See?  I am doing something about this job-related anxiety!  (I did have another brief moment of panic this morning- same as yesterday- but when I walked outside to turn off the Christmas lights I didn’t see Jenn’s car across the street, so that made me feel better.)

We’re right in the middle of rehearsals for Annie, which is the Tri-Lakes Community Theatre production for this year.  Now let me make something clear here.  I’m a redhead.  I always have been.  My hair is curly and kinky and when I was a little girl I would wedge myself onto my windowsill and pretend that I didn’t have any parents and sing the song, “Maybe.”  So being in Annie now is kind of a cool thing.  I had only seen the movie, so I didn’t realize that the actual stage show is pretty fun.  It has some real tongue-in-cheek moments (like the song, “Hooverville” that comes at the beginning.  Very “social commentary-esque.”)  I am a Boylan Sister, which means that I get to sing the song “Never Fully Dressed” on the radio show where Annie and Warbucks go to announce to America that they are looking for her parents.  I am also a servant and a townsperson, so I get to be in a lot of scenes.  The show is going to look amazing because Alison, the director, is immensely creative and she has a gift for blocking and choreography.  It’s going to sound amazing because Danielle and Morgan are two of the best musicians I know.  So, we’re in good hands.  

Jumping tracks, I said yesterday that I would evaluate the other two fall movies that I saw right around Thanksgiving: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and Pride and Prejudice.  I’ll start with Harry Potter.

In a previous post I said that I liked it and that it was a good movie.  It was.  Many of the moments were spot on (When Moody turned Malfoy into a ferret, when Harry brought Cedric’s body back) but a lot of the scenes were rushed.  Now, I know that the book is huge, the biggest yet to be made into a movie.  They cut out a lot of stuff altogether (everything to do with house elves and SPEW, for instance.)  My complaints:

1. The dragon scene was overlong (though it looked marvelous, I have to admit) and the scene where Voldemort came back was too short.  That is the pivotal scene from the series and they rushed it?  It was powerful, it was scary, and it could have been more so if it had been given the treatment it deserved.


2. No Mrs. Weasley at the last task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament.  For that matter, no Mrs. Weasley at all.  She is a stabilizing force in Harry’s life and the only example of motherly love that he has ever had, and I thought it was horrible to cheat him like that at the end of the movie, when she was supposed to be there to comfort him after Cedric died.


3. Very little Sirius.  He’s also supposed to be there at the end of the movie, and all was saw of him was his head in the fireplace.  He is dreadfully important, especially in the next story.  Things in this book set up action in the next story- they’re going to have to backtrack a little to make up for some things if they want to do Order of the Phoenix right.

Anyway, those are just my little beefs.  It really was a good movie, I immensely enjoyed it, it just wasn’t what I expected it to be.  On to Pride and Prejudice.

This is another example of literary interpretation, and having to cut stuff to make an extremely dense book come in under three hours on the screen.  The A & E Pride and Prejudice, which some consider the best adaptation (although that could be on account of Colin Firth’s wet shirt scene) was a six-hour miniseries.  Every nanosecond of the book played out on the screen in that version.  The new adaptation doesn’t drag us to every single party, but they do give us a sense of what is going on while elaborating on the action that really interests us: the love story between Darcy and Elizabeth.  And holy crap, did they make that sizzle.  This movie reaffirmed my belief that you don’t have to show people having sex for something to be romantic or sexy.  Darcy and Elizabeth didn’t even kiss until the end of the movie (it wouldn’t have been proper) but their romance boiled through dialogue and longing looks.  My favorite moments:

1. The ball where Darcy and Elizabeth dance.  I love this for two reasons.  A: In the scene when they dance, the director shot the first part of it with them dancing with other couples, and the last part of it with them dancing alone in the room.  He kept the shot tight so you didn’t really see them dancing alone, you just got the feeling of space and the impression that they felt like they were alone in the room. B: There was this really neat, long steadycam shot, winding through the entire party.  The different members of the Bennet family came into frame in their own way, and it really illuminated the characters.  It ended on Elizabeth, short of breath because Darcy takes it out of her.


2. The scene where Darcy tells Elizabeth that he loves her, and Elizabeth tells Darcy that she wouldn’t have him if he was the last man on earth.  The acting is superb.  Everything about this scene is top notch.  This was one of my favorite scenes in the A & E movie, as well, and it totally delivered here.


3. The photography, cinematography, and camera work was the most beautiful I have seen in a movie, excluding Lord of the Rings.  (It’s not really fair to compare any movie to Lord of the Rings, because I think that it’s the best movie of all time.)

Let me explain something.  I am not really a sappy girl.  (That title belongs to my beloved Jess.)  I normally hate romantic-type movies.  This movie melted me.  I loved it.  It was the most gloriously romantic movie I have ever seen.  It almost made me forget how much I love Colin Firth and that he wasn’t in this movie, it was that good.  Anyway.  I’ll drop it.  I’m just saying, it was a magnificent movie.

All right.  I’m wrapping this up.  This weekend, Danielle and I have plans to watch Walk the Line (the last of the big fall movies that I have to see) and The Chronicles of Narnia, (the first of the big winter movies that I have to see.)  I have heard raves about both, so I am excited.  It’s The Winter of the Movie!  (And it will be The Spring of the Book, but more on that later.  I’m going to go broke because I have four books coming out within weeks of each other.)  Also, completely off the plot, I had a dream last night where Anthony Rapp made an appearance.  I don’t even remember what was going on, only that he was there.  I guess that my Rent obsession is still going strong.  Until next time,

Brianne <><