What Emily's Been Watching, November Edition

I ran into a big stumbling block on the first day of November. My Salt Lake County library card expired after 8 years. If you've been keeping track, I moved to Utah County, but kept my card (shhh), since SLC has an incredible library system and I couldn't give it up. Cedar Hills has of course- no library. They do however try to compensate by reimbursing you for the library fee of surrounding cities. That's cool enough, so I got an account at American Fork. Guess what? American Fork has the most woeful selection of movies ever. It's probably more like what renting a video at the library is like in normal places though. Except I would expect more artsy and foreign movies of which I saw NONE, all they had was pure crap. I kept putting in movie titles to the data base and coming up with nothing. I canceled my Netflix like a year ago because our laptop died and that meant I could no longer watch streaming movies in bed. (I am not going to sit at my computer desk in our uncomfortable chair and watch movies.) Also, SLC had a great selection of movies- pretty much they had everything- so I was totally set without Netflix. Well, this has all ended and my selection of movies I watched this month will demonstrate this. No fear though- I am restarting my Netflix account, so things should improve and movies WILL be seen again.

Date Night (2010) [PG 13] :Comedy. Rob and I watched this one night while I helped him strip cabinets. We would rather had watched Shutter Island, but decided this one was a better flick to be working on cabinets to, since it was a movie you could watch while doing something else as opposed to Shutter Island, a film you want to pay attention to every minute. It turned out to be a pretty good choice. It was about what we expected- a few laughs, but mostly fairly stupid- but it did star two talented, funny people. Let's put it this way: we could have picked something worse. So if you have a project to do and want something playing in the background, Emily can recommend this. It did have the Thom Yorke look alike guy in it (that was just a fun fact).

Babies (2010) [PG] Documentary. I have been wanting to see this since I heard of it. Then, I saw a trailer for it, and ever since, I had REALLY been wanting to see it. Perhaps it is my status as a mother, especially one that has a little baby barely out of her first year of life. Perhaps it is just cause I am a chick who likes babies. I don't know, but it was cute and it will make your ovaries hurt whether you have them or not. It is a French documentary and it basically follows 4 babies through their first year of life. One lives in a hut in Africa, one in a little goat farm in Mongolia, one is a hippy baby from San Francisco (yuppie hippie not Haight and Ashbury hippie), and the last is a little diva baby in Tokyo. It was interesting seeing 2 from middle of nowhere, outskirts of the world juxtaposed with 2 from big and modern (yet culturally different) cities. All four being raised in very very very different environments, but of course, there were many similarities beings as how they are babies. That's the thing about babies, which I took away from this- babies are babies (I also took away from watching the 2 year old Mongolian older brother an appreciation for having had my kids 4 years apart. What a pill!!) There is a funny scene where the Japanese baby is playing with this toy and she is frustrated and keeps dramatically falling over. Made me laugh. But oh how that little baby from Namibia won my heart (the opening scene of the trailer, showcasing this baby, was what jet propelled me to see it- she won my heart in like 2 seconds). I have no idea if it was a girl or a boy- the name and the clothing were not gender specific to my American ears and eyes, but I suspect she was a girl. She was SO cute and SO smart. I was tempted to feel bad for her/him every time I saw her(him), but I couldn't do it. She was happy and healthy and smart and content and very loved. There was a funny scene where she is just lying on her stomach in the dirt, playing with it and eating it etc. Directly after it shows the hippie baby at a baby yoga class and you were obviously supposed to reflect on that and all that means and I did. Emily recommends this movie if (big surprise) you like babies. In fact, if you like babies, this is one not to miss. There is virtually no dialogue and what is said, is not translated or subtitled and I don't know about you guys, but I am only able to understand one of the four languages spoken. This is not really a factor though, you just watch the babies. There is also plenty of nudity, but it is of the National Geographic variety.

The Big Chill (1983) [R]: Comedy/drama. So I've heard about this movie my whole life but had never seen it. I needed something this week to watch while I did my eyebrows and folded laundry and Scout was at school. This was On Demand, so I gave it a go. My opinion: eh. It was ok. I have heard of The Breakfast Club being referred to as "The Little Chill" and I must say, I like The Little Chill better. Not that I didn't dislike this movie, I just wasn't "wowed" in any way. Perhaps it is a generational thing, meaning it speaks to a specific generation that I am not a part of. I can tell you with authority that the filming really sucked. Perhaps it is just a product of early 80's mid set, where these things weren't considered. I don't know, I do know that I am no authority on filming, but that should tell you how bad it really was- that it bothered me and I noticed. I am inclined to believe that perhaps since The Breakfast Club has been compared to it, I was expecting a character reckoning at the end where everyone learned something about themselves and came out changed people. In a way, these people did, but not as drastically, which made the ending fall flat a bit. Despite all I've said, I liked the movie well enough and Kevin Kline (as always) was a definite high point of the movie. Emily can't decide if she recommends this movie or not. I suppose it won't kill you to see it, it IS a good film about a specific generation and time in one's life (specifically, if you graduated college around 1969 I'd say). "Won't kill you to see it" something tells me I am being a wee bit hard on this movie.