Away from Her

I've been hearing rave reviews about this flick, so I went to check it out at this afternoon's Stars & Strollers screening, which is the showing where women can attempt to enjoy a movie with their crying babies. Hey, I have kids, I can tune it out. Written and directed by Sarah Polley, Away from Her is based on a short story by Alice Munro.

Gordon Pinsent stars as Grant, a man who is home caring for his wife. Julie Christie is Fiona, Grant's beautiful wife who is slowly slipping further into Alzheimer's disease. Fiona insists she needs to be put into a permanent care home, but Grant is in denial about her condition and is hesitant to live apart from her. Fiona gets her way and she soon develops a closeness to a fellow resident, a wheelchair bound mute named Aubrey (Michael Murphy). Grant watches helplessly as Fiona forgets who he is and spends more and more time caring for Aubrey. Grant gets some kind words of comfort from a nurse on Fiona's ward named Kristy (Kristen Thomson). Grant also strikes up a friendship with Aubrey's wife, Marian (Olympia Dukakis) based on mutual understanding.


This film is great. I was surprised when I came home and read on the IMDB page that Sarah Polley had directed it, given her young age. The film is so subtle, nuanced with a plot that is winding. The timeline jumps around a bit, but it all makes sense in the end. It's a beautiful portrait of the trials and tribulations of being a spouse taking care of their life partner suffering with Alzheimer's. It's clearly harder on the spouse. What would be worse, losing your memory and having your cognitive thoughts fade away while having your body in proper working order, or being of clear mind and having your mobility and body go? This film made me wonder about that.


The buzz about the film is Julie Christie's Oscar nom in the bag, but I have to say that although she was excellent and beautiful, as always, it was Gordon Pinsent that blew me away. He was heartbreaking to watch as he stayed a devoted, attentive husband while watching his wife fall in love with another man. Even as the audience, you find out that their marriage wasn't always so perfect, you still feel for him. This was a beautiful, moving film and highly recommended. Words of wisdom from the nurse Kristy:
" It's never too late to become what you might have been."


More ramblings to come......

Knocked Up

I decided I hadn't been to the theater in awhile and saw Knocked Up. I loved The 40 Year Old Virgin so much that I was anxious to see the Judd Apatow/Seth Rogen team in action again.

Written and directed by Judd Apatow, the film is about a one night stand that ends up in an unwanted pregnancy. Katherine Heigl stars as Alison Scott, a young woman who works at E! and desires to be an on-air personality. She gets her wish and is out celebrating her recent promotion when she meets Ben Stone (Rogen). They have a wild, drunken night that ends in Ben spending the night at Alison's place. She realizes in the morning what a loser he is and cuts and runs. They had fun, but Alison is focused on her career and Ben is a perpetual stoner who's career goal consists of starting a pornographic website.


Fast forward 8 weeks later when Alison pukes while interviewing James Franco on the air. She realizes she's late and begins panicking. Alison discovers that she's pregnant and decides to tell Ben. They arrange to meet with Ben assuming she wants another piece of him. They decide they want to keep it and that they will try to get to know each other and see what happens.


The humour is kind of hit or miss. The film has some of the same humour from The 40 Year Old Virgin, but it doesn't work as well. There was an elderly couple sitting in my row and I wondered what they thought about all the jokes about balls and pot and being gay. The best comedy came from the relationship issues that arose between Alison and Ben, and also between Alison's sister Debbie (Leslie Mann) and her husband, Pete (Paul Rudd). The same sex bonding time between Alison and Debbie and Ben and Pete was also very funny. Ben's friends were also meant to bring comic relief, but there was five of them, which seemed too many and didn't allow the viewer to really connect with them as an ensemble, also the humour somehow seemed out of place. Although it was still funny at times.


I really liked it, but it didn't quite hit the bullseye the same way The 40 Year Old Virgin did. It was a very humorous look at the emotional rollercoaster that a couple shares when they are expecting a child and trying to get to know each other. The two couples were great. The group of Ben's friends did a good job with their characters,but it just didn't seem to work the way it was meant to. I chose two quotes, both from Pete, one humourous look at marriage and one more profound look at why he feels there are problems in his marriage. Enjoy....

Pete: Marriage is like a tense, unfunny version of Everybody Loves Raymond, only it doesn't last 22 minutes. It lasts forever.

Pete: Do you ever wonder how somebody could even like you? The biggest problem in our marriage is that she wants me around. And I can't even accept that? I don't think I can accept pure love.

More ramblings to come.....

Before Sunrise

I loved Before Sunset so much that I decided to see the first movie. Written and directed by Richard Linklater, Before Sunrise was filmed 9 years before the sequel, Before Sunset.

Ethan Hawke stars as Jesse, a young American traveling through Europe alone. He meets a pretty, young French woman named Celine (Julie Delpy) on a train. They share an attraction and strike up a conversation. He convinces her to get off the train with him in Vienna to spend the night with him until he has to fly back to America the next day.

I liked this film, but I do like the sequel even better. Filmed during the tail end of the "grunge era", the fashions are grunge-y and Jesse and Celine have to do all the crazy things young students do when they are traveling in a strange country. They do "cool and edgy" things like have a deep conversation walking through a cemetery, sit in a listening booth together in a record store and drink wine in a park at night. They share the same carefree experiences that all young, twenty somethings wandering aimlessly, trying to find their way through life have.


The sexual tension between Celine and Jesse is palpable. It takes a little bit for them to let their guard down. Celine is quiet at first and optimistic about things. She's very pretty, but seems to do that "I'll rely on my youth and beauty and act quiet and pouty because it's sexy" thing instead of just being herself. Which is why I like her better in the sequel. She has come into her own and is more fiery. Jesse is more pessimistic and cynical about life. They both have transformations in their characters between the original and the sequel.


Linklater wrote this based on a night he had wandering around Philadelphia with a woman named Amy. Jesse and Celine embody that brief love affair that you never forget. They idealize and romanticize each other and interestingly enough, Jesse discusses what I had wondered in my last post. He stated that if two people who idealize each other so much spent more time together doing mundane, everyday life things, they probably wouldn't see them in the same romantic way. I found that Before Sunrise is more about the experiences Jesse and Celine have and Before Sunset is more about their deep, soulful connection. Both are good, but the sequel is better.

One last thing before the quote.....when did Ethan Hawke have the hotness sucked out of him? He was so hot in Before Sunrise, not so much in Before Sunset. From the part where Jesse rants about breakups......

Jesse: You know what's the worst thing about somebody breaking up with you? Is when you remember how little you thought about the people you broke up with and you realize that is how little they're thinking of you. You know, you'd like to think you're both in all this pain but they're just like 'Hey, I'm glad you're gone'.

More ramblings to come......

Before Sunset

I have had at least three friends and/or readers recommend this movie to me. I finally got around to seeing it and I'm glad I did. The same people who recommended Before Sunset, the sequel to Before Sunrise, said they saw the sequel before the first movie and liked the sequel better. I still have to see Before Sunrise to see if I agree.

Written and directed by Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused), this sequel picks up 9 years later where Before Sunrise left off. In Before Sunrise, two strangers (Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy) spend a day in Vienna connecting over a long conversation and pledge to meet up again six months later. In Before Sunset, they meet nine years later in Paris and re-connect over another long conversation.


Jesse (Hawke) is an American author who wrote a book based on his experience in Vienna with Celine, a French environmental activist. They meet again when Jesse is in Paris for a book signing at Celine's favourite bookstore. They have one long conversation about everything in their lives. They reminisce about the night they spent in Vienna and talk about their lives now and what happened in between. They also discover that they've both thought a lot about each other.

I loved this film because it's one long conversation, but it's done so smoothly that you don't think about the fact that they do not stop talking for the entire film. It's shot pretty much in real time. It feels European in that way and feels like you are on the journey with them. It was shot in 15 days and Hawke and Delpy helped to write the film.


The characters are also so real and human. It's also cool that they connect so well. They spend such a short amount of time together, yet the conversation winds its way around so many different subjects and levels of intimacy. They laugh a lot, but also disagree on things. I think the two movies went over so well with audiences because it presents that "what if?" dilemma that a lot of people must have. I'm sure everybody has someone that they connected so well with, but it just didn't happen and you're left wondering "what would have happened if things went differently?" The films give people a chance to experience that.

I won't give away the end, but both films end ambiguously. I do wonder though if they were together all the time if that would change things. Could they continue their long, deep conversations all the time? Would that connection still be there after a few years? I didn't want the film to end so soon and I wanted more. Also, how much did fate play a part? I had my palms read recently and the palmist (is that their title?) said I was supposed to have gotten married sometime between 24 and 26, but that it wasn't meant to last. I was 24 when I got married...and it didn't last. I think it's the same case as in Les Enfants du Paradis in that fate is the one that does the betraying. I'm going to try to get Before Sunrise this week so I can watch the original. Apparently a lot of people saw the two films backwards (sequel before the original). I love this quote....

Celine: "Memory's a wonderful thing if you don't have to deal with the past."

More ramblings to come....(I swear)....

I'm Still Alive and Well....

I've had a few emails concerned about my whereabouts and I swear I didn't forget about my blog. I've been taking a journalism course for the last five weeks, heading into the last week and it kept me SUPER busy. Also, I felt like I was learning to think differently and had to turn off that filmmaker part of my brain. I was too busy and tired to go see movies, and I just didn't feel any like getting any inspiration from movies. For some reason, when I did get a chance to watch anything, it was action movies. I was in the mood for lots of explosions and no substance and it's hard to write about stuff that doesn't get your brain thinking about things.

Also, I know people don't usually read a total strangers rambling thoughts, but I've gotta get my creative brain working again. My project that I finished in April and that I'm proud of started as one of my first blog entries. I have a few ideas for my next project, I just have to flush them out. Anyhoo, I saw something that inspired me to start thinking and it will be posted above this one. I just wanted to reassure any readers still checking into this thing that I am alive and well and will attempt to get back up on the blog horse.