Caroline and Will Drunk Blog Moulin Rouge

As I’ve mentioned before, I take movie watching very seriously. But even a serious critic like myself likes to cut loose every now and then. Last week, my good friend Will (check him out on Twitter!) and I decided to order Indian food, drink our weight in gin & tonics, and watch everyone’s favorite musical melodrama Moulin Rouge. So here is the first (of hopefully many) Caroline and Will’s Drunk Liveblog: Moulin Rouge Edition.

MAIN TITLES

 

8:40pm         The movie begins and we start on gin & tonic number one.

                        Caroline: I feel like I’m coming out of the closet as a Moulin Rouge fan.

                        Will: Join the club. Except for the Moulin Rouge part.

                                             

8:41pm          Will and Caroline sing along to the 20^th Century Fox theme

8:42pm          Will: This whole thing takes place on a stage. How meta.

                        Caroline: Do you think our theatre major perspective will be helpful here?

                        Will: Is our theatre major perspective ever helpful?

THERE WAS A BOY

8:44pm          Caroline: When Ewan McGregor cries, I want to cry.

                        Will: Calm down, we’re only two minutes into the movie.

Caroline: The Force is strong with this one.

Will: You’re a nerd.

AT THE MOULIN ROUGE

8:45pm          Will: So many colors, it’s kind of frightening. Ooh Jim Broadbent!

                        Caroline: Are you a Broadbent fan?

                        Will: Have you seen the cinematic masterpiece that is Harry Potter and 

                        the Order of the Phoenix?

8:46pm          Caroline: Is it weird that I love Ewan’s depression beard?

                        Will: Is there anything about him you don’t love?

                        Caroline: His teeth are weird.

                        Will: He’s Scottish, give him a break.

8:47pm          Christian: The woman I loved is... dead.

                        Caroline: Spoiler alert!!

8:48pm          Caroline: Why does Ewan capitalize the word Narcolepsy?

                        Will: Are we focusing on the right things, here?

THE GREEN FAIRY

8:56pm          Will: Kylie Minogue is a gay icon.

                        Caroline: She was also on an episode of Doctor Who!

                        Will: That pretty much sums up our interests.

8:58pm          Will: Plotwise, I don’t understand what’s going on. Ooh Nirvana!

Caroline: I think this was the first time I heard ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’.

Will: That’s not good.

DIAMONDS ARE A GIRL’S BEST FRIEND

9:00pm          Time for gin & tonic number two!

9:01pm          Will: So did all of these men just happen to wear the same suit and hat?

                        Caroline: They must be so embarrassed.

9:07pm          Will: That’s a lot of dudes holding hands. This movie is a lot gayer than it 

                         seems. And it seems pretty gay.

9:10pm          Our food arrives! Chicken tikka masala, mutter paneer and a million pieces of naan. We’re too hungry to pause the movie.

A POETRY READING

9:17pm          Will: This could be called the “That’s What She Said Scene.”

                        Caroline: It’s very sexually explicit. Did we really watch this in middle 

                       school?

9:18pm          Will: Nicole Kidman? Not very funny.

YOUR SONG

9:19pm          Caroline is drunk enough to sing along. Will is not pleased.

9:20pm          Will: What’s up with Ewan’s vibrato? He’s just yelling on pitch.

Caroline: It’s raining sparkles!

9:22pm          Will: She’s a crazy whore who was being super weird. Why did Ewan fall 

                       in love with her?

                        Caroline: Shhhh.

9:25pm           We run out of tonic so we switch to Sprite. (Just FYI a gin & Sprite is not 

                         nearly as good as a gin & tonic.)

THE PITCH

9:27pm          Will: For the record, Jim Broadbent is still killing it.

9:30pm          Caroline: I will never get tired of the word maharaja.

9:33pm          The Duke: “And in the end, should someone die?”

                        Caroline: Foreshadowing! Baz Luhrmann is a genius.

 ONE DAY I’LL FLY AWAY

9:38pm          Caroline: Do we like her voice?

                        Will: Nope.

ELEPHANT LOVE SONG MEDLEY

9:39pm          Caroline: The Elephant Love Song Medley, aka why this movie was made.

                        Will: His voice is so much better than hers.

                        Caroline: I’m melting. I’m a puddle.

Will: Her boobs are pretty rocking in this scene. I’ll give her that.

                       

9:43pm            Caroline: People didn’t date back then, they were just married. That’s my 

                         dream life.

9:45pm            Bathroom break for Will. Caroline steals some of his naan.

9:50pm            Will returns: Is she dead yet?

ON WITH THE SHOW

9:51pm          Will: His name is Ziegler? Like Toby Ziegler? Can we watch West Wing?

                        Caroline: I think it’s Zidler.

                        Will: Bartlett for America!

LIKE A VIRGIN

9:53pm          Will: The Duke is secretly hilarious.

                        Caroline: And he secretly has a great voice.

                        Will: I’m rooting for the Duke.

           

SATINE IS DYING

9:54pm          Christian: “For the first time he had felt the cold stab of jealousy.”

                        Will: That’s poetic.

                        Caroline: That’s pathetic.

                        Will: Did you just make a Rent reference?

                        Caroline: Did you just get my Rent reference?

                        Will: Touché.

9:55pm          Satine: “On opening night I have to sleep with the Duke.”

                        Will: If I had a dollar for every time I’ve said that…

 COME WHAT MAY

9:58pm          Caroline is crying. Will is not.

10:00pm       Caroline: Secret songs are the best songs.

                        Will: Is this supposed to be romantic? They barely know each other.

                        Caroline: The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and—

                        Will: Shut up.

10:01pm        Time for another round of drinks!

I DON’T LIKE THIS ENDING

10:02pm        Will does a great impression of the Duke. Caroline laughs for way too long.

10:03pm        “Why would the courtesan go for the penniless writer? Whoops. I mean 

                        sitar player.”

                        Will: That whore is a bitch.

10:05pm        Caroline: Wait, they’re still writing the ending one day before opening? 

                         How will they learn their lines?

LE TANGO DE ROXANNE

10:07pm        Caroline: Finally the Argentinian earns his paycheck.

                        Will: I forgot he existed.

                        Caroline: I think Baz did too.

10:10pm         Will: Is this what prostitutes do on their day off? Sing Sting songs?

10:14pm        Caroline: I never understood this part of the movie. Who is that black 

                      drag queen? What is he doing here? What’s going on? God I love Ewan 

                       McGregor.

THE SHOW MUST GO ON

10:21pm         Will: I’m sick of her stupid, breathy singing voice. Go away Nicole 

                         Kidman. Go back to Keith Urban.

10:23pm        Caroline: God I love sad things.

                        Will: God I love Jim Broadbent.

10:25pm        My roommate returns. She looks concerned.

HINDI SAD DIAMONDS

10:26pm        Caroline: Is this Indian number offensive?

                        Will: Maybe a little.

10:29pm        Will: He basically just made their life into a Bollywood musical.

                        Caroline: Write what you know.

10:35pm        Christian: “I’ve paid my whore.”

                        Caroline: I try to use that in everyday conversation as much as possible.

COME WHAT MAY (REPRISE)

10:37pm        Will: That should be a belting moment for her right there. Missed 

                       opportunity.

                        Caroline: She’s got consumption, what do you expect?     

10:39pm        Will: This production is going awry. The stage manager must be so 

                         overwhelmed.

                        Caroline: This is like nineteenth-century Smash. Where’s Debra Messing 

                        and her scarves?

Will: They all know the choreography for a part of the show they’d never 

rehearsed. They’re the most amazing ensemble in the world.

                        Caroline: Someone get them a Tony!

10:40pm        Caroline: That gun bounces around way too much not to be shot. 

                        Chekhov is rolling in his grave.

10:42pm        Will: She’s bleeding out of the mouth. That’s not a good sign.

                        Caroline: She probably shouldn’t have been belting that love song.

                        Will: She wasn’t exactly belting….

 

10:46pm         Will: Thank god she’s finally dead.

Caroline is in the fetal position.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Will

There was not enough substance to back up the emotional blah I was supposed to feel.

Caroline

Can I use the extra naan to dry my tears? Just kidding, I ate it all.

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Top Ten

10 Things I Love About 10 Things I Hate 

About You 

John Hughes dominated the teen comedy genre in the 1980s with a plethora of endearing, slightly crude films like The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Pretty In Pink. Teen comedies continued to enjoy success in the 1990s as the genre moved from sentimental to ironic. Films like Scream and Clueless took a very self-aware look at the teen genre, while other films like She’s All That kept the sentimentality, but lost the edge of Hughes’ work.

One secret gem of the 90s teen comedy genre is 10 Things I Hate About You, directed by Gil Junger and starring Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger as high school outcasts. 10 Things balances ironic comedy with just enough heart to produce a surprisingly satisfying teen romance. To celebrate this underrated film, here are the Ten Things I Love About 10 Things I Hate About You:

10. The Shakespeare References. The movie is loosely based on Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew and the film is littered with references to the Bard. The play’s two sisters, Bianca and Katherina Minola, become Bianca and Kat Stratford (ala Shakespeare’s birthplace Stratford-upon-Avon,) The students attend Padua High School (the city where the play is set). Heath Ledger plays Patrick Verona (who in the play is named Petruchio and comes from Verona). Characters frequently quote sonnets and even the song played at prom, “Cruel to Be Kind”, gets its title from a Hamlet line.  

9. The 90s Clothes. Midriff-baring prom dresses, platform shoes, crop tops and so much gauzy floral fabric. It’s a trip down memory lane to an era of fashion we’d all probably rather forget, but it’s still a little fun to remember.

8. Solid Adult Roles. Any teen comedy is bound to feature a few adults in relatively thankless supporting roles. 10 Things cast a game group of actors as the parents and teachers in the Stratford girls’ lives. Allison Janney (Ms. Perky), Daryl Mitchell (Mr. Morgan) and David Leisure (Coach Chapin) turn in goofy performances that go a long way to fleshing out the world of Padua High. Character actor Larry Miller threatens to steal the movie with a neurotic and, dare I say, nuanced portrayal of a single dad trying to raise two teenage daughters. 

7. The Music. I have to confess, I still have the 10 Things I Hate About You soundtrack on my iTunes. It’s a fun, eclectic mix of music (with a pinch of ska), and features tunes by Joan Armatrading, Sister Hazel, and Letters to Cleo. The music is mellow and perfectly compliments the film’s laid-back attitude.

6. The Blooper Reel. Are you the kind of person who turns off the TV as soon as the credits start to role? If so, than you may have missed out on this blooper reel which features the cast being both adorable and hilarious.

5. The Decent Script. Alright, it’s not Citizen Kane, but the script is frothy fun with a nice sense of self-awareness. The characters feel fleshed-out, the comedy is genuinely funny, and there are one or two rather poignant scenes that stay on the right side of saccharine.

4. The Solid Central Relationship. While a lot of teen comedies focus on romance, male bonding, and bitchy cliques, the real heart of 10 Things I Hate About You is the relationship between two sisters. Bianca and Kat’s bond feels appropriately antagonistic yet based in love. The girls’ mother is absent (I’ve gotten into arguments with friends about whether she walked out on the family or died, I firmly believe she left by choice) and there’s a nice sense of two teenage girls navigating a new relationship after a big change. There’s also a really lovely scene where Kat explains her descent from popular girl to outcast. It might not pass the Bechdel Test, but it’s nevertheless a nice piece of writing and acting that gives the film more weight than a lot of teen comedies.

3. That Poem. Like many rom coms, there’s not a ton of resolution once the drama is over and it’s time to get the main couple back together. After realizing her date was paid to take her out and ditching him at prom, Kat reads this pseudo-apologetic poem to her English class. It’s a simplistic resolution, but Stiles sells it so well that you almost (almost) don’t notice. Plus according to IMDb trivia: “The scene in which Kat reads the "10 Things" poem was the first and only take, according to the DVD extras. Kat's tears towards the end of the poem were not planned.” Good job Julia.

2. Heath Singing. Some people remember Heath for his intense dramatic work or jumpy personality, but I will always remember him as an adorable Australian serenading a girl’s soccer team.

1. Casting Legit Actors. The real unsung hero of this film is the casting director who had a sixth sense for casting future A-listers. Julia Stiles continued to find success in teen dramas and later onstage and can currently be seen in Silver Linings Playbook. Heath Ledger went on to star in Brokeback Mountain and won a posthumous Oscar for his performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight Rises.  Joseph Gordon-Levitt has become a beloved Hollywood presence since his big screen turn in 500 Days of Summer. Compare that resume to other 90s teen comedies like She’s All That or Drive Me Crazy and it’s easy to see what keeps 10 Things I Hate About You entertaining, fourteen years later.

Review

Love, Wedding, Marriage

Released: 2011

Director: Dermot Mulroney

Starring: Mandy Moore & Kellan Lutz

Grade: F

After finishing Love, Wedding, Marriage I had the desire to retroactively raise the grades of all my previous reviews. This movie is so bad every other crappy rom com seems better by comparison. Love, Wedding, Marriage is directed by long-time rom com veteran actor Dermot Mulroney. Mulroney is suave enough as the romantic lead in films like My Best Friend’s Wedding and The Wedding Date, but his wedding-themed directorial debut trips down the aisle before face planting into a chuppah of horrible.

The film stars Mandy Moore as Ava, a successful marriage counselor who returns from her honeymoon to discover that her parents are getting a divorce, weeks before their 30^th anniversary. Ava decides to use all the tricks in her psychologist handbook to get them back together. It’s like The Parent Trap except instead of two adorably precocious twins, it’s a shrill twenty-seven-year-old doing the scheming. As Ava focuses her energies on forcing her parents back together, she loses sight of her own marriage to pretty-boy Kellan Lutz (best known for a very minor role in the Twilight series). In the great tradition of ridiculous movie-careers, Lutz manages a winery. Highlights of said career include a blonde assistant bursting into the room to announce, “Your interview with Wine Magazine is confirmed for one o’clock,” and later, “It’s your conference call to discuss the new chardonnay. They’re on line two.” The wine business can be so demanding.

Rather than focus on character development, Mulroney just tries to cram as many visual gags into the movie as possible. Here’s an old guy taking a body shot! Here’s a fat lady doing a trust fall! Scenes alternate between unfunny and painfully unfunny. And to top it all off there’s a bizarre cameo by Christopher Lloyd as a hippy-dippy marriage counselor.

There’s not a strong performance among the bunch. As Ava’s mom, Jane Seymour's biggest achievement seems to be remembering her lines. James Brolin, as Ava’s father, is trying a bit harder, but the poor guy just has nothing to work with. His biggest dramatic plot involves deciding to become an observant Jew, a thread that is neither enlightening nor funny. Jessica Szohr (Gossip Girl’s infamous Vanessa!) is fine as the slutty little sister, but she looks so unlike Moore it’s hard to understand why she was cast in the first place. Lutz is there to take his shirt off (which he does quite often) and Moore, who I like in other films, is just dreadfully whiny, manipulative and naive. To be fair, I’m not sure even an all-star cast could have made something coherent out of this script.

The writers, Anouska Chydzik and Caprice Crane, have only a handful of minor credits to their name (including a few episodes of the new 90201 and the MTV Movie Awards) and their first big-screen endeavor probably won’t have studios scrambling to greenlight their future projects. Characters say exactly what they’re feeling and continue to have the same arguments over and over again throughout the film’s painful 90 minute run time. There’s nothing logical to anyone’s behavior. Ava, a licensed marriage counselor, makes her own decisions based on horoscopes (a trait which is promptly dropped about halfway through the film). She also finds it incredibly romantic that one of her friends gets married to a hot Polish woman after a drunken encounter at a bar. This is a woman who fixes other people’s relationships? I can’t imagine her functioning at the grocery store, let alone as a psychologist.

The movie pulls deep from the well of rom com clichés- karaoke, couples classes, speed dating, depressed women eating ice cream out of the carton. In what I can only imagine was a desperate attempt to inject some energy into the script, there are one or two big “twists.” Not only are they unsurprising, they’re not even interesting. By the end of the movie I disliked Ava so much I was actively rooting for her marriage to fail. Don’t get me wrong, I had fun trying to figure out how many ways she could end up sad and alone, but I hardly think that was the intention of the screenwriters. The look of the movie is bland in a Pottery-Barn-catalogue kind of way, and it’s hard to get too worked up about two people whose reunion comes as they speed towards each other in his-and-hers convertibles.

The idea of focusing a rom com on a couple already in love (rather than one falling in love) is not a bad one. Unfortunately Love, Wedding, Marriage has nothing going for it beyond a semi-interesting premise and an attractive cast. I have a high tolerance for bad movies, but even I could barely stomach this one. Movies are meant to entertain, to provoke thought and to arouse emotion. Love, Wedding, Marriage fails on all three accounts and does so in such a shrill way, it’s not even fun to watch it crash and burn.

Reality factor: Ridiculously young, wealthy, beautiful people who meddle in each other’s problems instead of going to work. Thankfully the over-the-top physical comedy was kept to a minimum or I may have just turned it off. [2 out of 5]

Eye-candy factor: There are plenty of scenes where Kellan Lutz takes his shirt off, but not even a million shirtless Lutzs could improve this film. [3 out of 5]

Aww factor: Nope. [0 out of 5]

What These Lifetime Movies Should Have Been About

Until they make a holiday celebrating battered women and mysterious kidnappings, Christmas is probably Lifetime’s favorite time of the year. Around November, Lifetime begins to churn out an excess of holiday-themed fair. Ranging from campy melodrama to melodramatic camp, these movies feature low budget sets, horrifying scripts and wooden acting. Just what you want around the holidays!

To honor the network that made a movie called “An Amish Murder” (I’m not kidding, it premieres in January), I decided to take the titles of eight holiday-themed Lifetime Original Movies and try to guess what they might be about, based solely on the title. I’ve also listed Lifetime’s actual plot summary so you can see how close I got. Let’s just say that I don’t think Lifetime will be calling me up for a job anytime soon.

1. A Dad for Christmas

What It Should Be About: Eric is a washed up actor who comes up with a brilliant money-making scheme. He hires himself out as a “dad” for Christmas morning. His holiday schedule is booked as he bounces between the houses of divorcees and single moms. Eric’s got a long list of rules that keep him from getting too attached to the families he visits. At first it’s all fun and games until Eric meets Shelia, a single mom who breaks every rule in his book.

What It’s Actually About: “Matt, who is nineteen, goes to the hospital to see his newborn son, only to discover that his young girlfriend has already made arrangements for a couple to the adopt him. With the adoption imminent and no means to stop it, Matt takes Luke out of the hospital to his grandmother's house.”

(That’s literally the description I pulled from Lifetime’s website. Talk about a boring way to sum up what sounds like a pretty dramatic movie.)

2. Comfort and Joy

What It Should Be About: Two high-class escorts, Comfort and Joy, ply their trade around the holidays. It’s a madcap comedy as the two girls are invited to an important Christmas party where hundreds of their clients are in attendance. Mistaken identities, physical comedy, and holiday hijinks ensue as these two wacky hookers with hearts of gold scramble to keep their true professions a secret.

What It’s Actually About: “An upscale, single, career woman is knocked unconscious in a car accident on Christmas eve and when she wakes up, she's told that she's a married housewife with a husband and two kids. After spending time with her "family," she finds that she likes the loving wife and mother she has become though she has no recollection of how she got there.”

(Any movie that starts with the description “an upscale, single, career woman” is bound to be awful.)

3. A Boyfriend for Christmas

What It Should Be About: A young girl named Caley finally raises the money to complete her gender reassignment surgery. She breaks the news to her conservative family on Christmas Eve and is kicked out of the house just before the egg nog is served. Caley finds a new friend in Mia, a street artist also spending Christmas Eve alone. A tentative romance blossoms between the two outcasts and Mia takes Caley to the hospital for her procedure. With her surgery complete Caley (now Carl) finally becomes what she always wanted to be- a boyfriend for Christmas.

What It’s Actually About: “Holly professes that she doesn’t believe in Santa Claus since she can’t meet the man of her dreams. When Santa sets her up with Ryan, he seems perfect until it is revealed that he has kept some secrets from her. Ultimately, Holly must choose between her bland boyfriend Ted and Ryan.”

(Don’t tell me you wouldn’t rather watch my version.)

4. Christmas in Paradise

What It Should Be About: The title leans heavily on irony as there’s nothing perfect about this Christmas vacation. The Barnes family are shipwrecked on a deserted island and spend the holidays trying to survive. Just as they settle into their new lives, mysterious noises emerge from the jungle. It soon becomes clear that there’s something else out there. The entire clan is killed  off one by one, leaving little Jimmy to fend for himself against a mysterious monster on Christmas Day.

What It’s Actually About: “Two families looking to escape bad holiday memories take a vacation to an exotic Caribbean island over Christmas. Given all they have in common, the parents and kids develop bonds over the course of their stay. When an unexpected visitor from the past appears and threatens their tentative romance, what promised to be a happy Christmas filled with fresh hope and new relationships turns complicated. Eventually, the two families come back together in love, friendship and filled with the Christmas spirit.” 

(Does someone get paid to write these things?)

5. Holiday Baggage

What It Should Be About: Two flight attendants, Crystal and Carmen, cook up a crazy scheme to rob from the rich and give to the poor. It’s a sort of Robin-Hood-in-the-skies story as the attendants steal the baggage of greedy businessmen and give it away to needy families. Everything’s going according to plan until Crystal falls in love with the very businessman she is supposed to be stealing from.

What It’s Actually About: “A marriage and family who rediscovers the meaning of Christmas when pediatrician by day, single mom by night, Sarah invites her estranged pilot husband, Pete, back to their suburban home for the holidays on one condition--he must reconcile with their daughters before she agrees to finalize their trial separation with divorce.” 

(I hope her business cards read “pediatrician by day, single mom by night.”)

6. Christmas Crash

What It Should Be About: A sequel to the 2004 Oscar winning film Crash, this movie takes a hard look at the issues of race and class that plague our society. But this time it’s set at Christmas! Ludacris is the only returning star from the original film and he turns in a stunning performance as a mall Santa dealing with prejudice.

What It’s Actually About: “A couple on the brink of divorce crashes their private plane into the woods and are presumed dead. Their children do not give up hope and find them after days go by. We learn that one of his business partners was responsible for the crash. Their near death adventure reminds them of how much they still love each other.”

(Wow, that was way darker than I expected.)

7. Crazy for Christmas

What It Should Be About: After suffering with mental instability for years, Angel’s family commits her to a psychiatric hospital on Christmas Eve. Angel is reluctant to join group therapy at first until a no-nonsense nurse (a surprise cameo by Rob Lowe) changes her mind. In therapy, Angel meets a whole host of characters who teach her that there’s no shame in being crazy for Christmas.

What It’s Actually About: “Shannon is stuck working on Christmas Eve, driving around an eccentric, wealthy older man who keeps giving away his money. The single mom would rather be home with her son, but it will turn out to be one of the craziest and most incredible nights of her life -- this chauffeur and her passenger will change each other's lives in ways you could never imagine”

(I actually kind of want to watch this one.)

8. Holiday Switch

What It Should Be About: A Jewish family and a Christian family pull a freaky Friday and learn a little about each other’s culture in the process. Henry makes a wish on a Christmas tree, just as Abraham wishes on the menorah and now nothing will ever be the same again. The Johnsons and the Goldbergs have to figure out the true meaning of Christmas and Hanukkah in order to switch back in time for New Years.

What It’s Actually About: “A week before Christmas, Paula finds herself struggling with bills and life with her blue-collar husband Gary and her two daughters. When Nick, her high school boyfriend returns to town, a wealthy art gallery owner, Paula wonders if she made the wrong decision when she took the wrong date to the prom. What would her life have been like if she stayed with Nick?”

(At least mine has the potential to be fun and educational.)

That’s it for this year folks! Thanks for following along on my blogging adventures. If you like what you read, please pass the blog along to your friends. (It’ll be your Christmas gift to me.) See ya in 2013!

Top 5 Favorite Christmas Romances

I start getting excited for Christmas around July and even though I pretend to be annoyed, I secretly love when the radio starts playing Christmas music the day after Halloween. Sure it’s just an excuse for rampant consumerism, but I love the holidays. I come from a large family with lots of traditions. (We actually gather around the piano on Christmas Eve and sing carols, how cute is that?) One of our traditions is to screen our favorite Christmas movies in the weeks leading up to the big day. It just doesn’t quite feel like Christmas until I’ve seen Will Ferrell in a giant elf costume or watched a claymation reindeer befriend a yeti. It’s no surprise that most (if not all) Christmas movies feature romance. After all Christmas is a time rife with warm feelings, mistletoe, and a whole lot of spiked egg nog. In honor of this most wonderful time of the year, I thought I’d count down my Top 5 Favorite, Must-See, It’s-Not-Christmas-Until-I’ve-Watched-These, Romances.

5. Meet Me in St. Louis. Chalk this one up to geographical bias (I’m from St. Louis), but this 1944 Judy Garland film never fails to make me laugh and warm my heart a bit. The film documents a year in the life of a turn-of-the-century family. In musical form no less! Christmas is just one small portion of the movie, but I have to give this film major props for giving us Garland’s incomparable rendition of Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. It’s one of the most beautiful (and secretly devastating) Christmas songs of all time.

4. White Christmas. Growing up, this was my all time favorite Christmas movie. It’s the epitome of the classic Hollywood musical: the drama is low key (let’s put on a show to save an old man’s business!), the songs are great (I would listen to Bing Crosby sing the phonebook) and the choreography is wonderfully energetic. The movie’s got a quirky sense of humor, the costumes are to-die-for and everyone just seems like they’re having so much fun hanging out together. Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney and Vera Ellen costar alongside Bing and we’ve got not one, but two charming romances to follow.

3. The Holiday. It may look like a generic modern day rom com about overworked, crazy female protagonists, but it’s not. At least, it’s not just that. Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz switch houses for the holiday season and manage to find love in the process. Old Hollywood, Jude Law, a charming Jack Black and adorable British children all work their way into the plot. It’s surprisingly delightful and much better than most of the big budget rom coms released around the holiday season.

2. It’s a Wonderful Life. People remember this movie for George Bailey’s angel intervention, but most of the film is actually a coming-of-age story about one small town man with big dreams. Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed are simply adorable as the central couple who grow from young sweethearts to doting parents. The finale is melodramatic, but most of the film is actually a sort of low key character piece about a charming small town and the people who populate it.

1. Love Actually. Is anyone surprised? Love Actually is less than ten years old, but it’s become a holiday classic and my number one must-watch Christmas romance. While the abundance of actors might overwhelm a lesser movie (take a look at Valentine’s Day or New Year’s Eve), Love Actually brilliantly balances it’s plethora of storylines to depict the highs, lows, and in-betweens of the holiday season. It’s optimistic without being schmaltzy and sentimental without losing it’s comic edge. (I could watch this scene all day.) To me, it’s the perfect Christmas movie and one of the best rom coms of the last few decades.

I'll be trying to post reviews of these five films (and other holiday classics) leading up to the big day so if you have any Christmas-themed recommendations, please let me know in the comments below!

Review

SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK

Released: 2012
Director: David O. Russell
Starring: Jennifer Lawrence & Bradley Cooper

Grade: A

  

When you meet someone for the first time you probably run through a checklist of labels which help you conceptualize that person: male or female, old or young, gay or straight, married or single. Society seems to be creating more and more specific labels, words to identify people by their food habits, religious sects, age group, and ethnicity. (You can now introduce yourself as a panethnic, Protestant, pescatarian preteen.) Particularly in the field of mental health, labels (in the form of diagnoses) are constantly being refined. Centuries ago people were defined as either sane or crazy. As scientists learned more about the brain and the field of psychology rose to prominence, a whole arrange of conditions between sane and crazy emerged: ADHD, bipolar disorder, manic depression, OCD, dementia, Aspergers. These labels are undoubtedly a good thing. They help doctors and patients identify and treat conditions that in the past would have been written off as untreatable mental instability. But you also run into the danger of being defined solely by a label. “My gay friend Steve.” “My Jewish friend, Anna.” “Alan, the one with bipolar disorder.”

Silver Linings Playbook examines labels: the ones that are diagnosed clinically, the ones we give ourselves, and the ones others give to us. The film follows Patrick (Bradley Cooper) a former high school sub who has just finished an eight month stint in a mental institution after brutally assaulting the man he caught having an affair with his wife. Released on a legal technicality, Patrick returns to his Philadelphia home to live with his parents Dolores (Jacki Weaver) and Pat Sr. (Robert De Niro). Patrick is determined to get in shape and win back his wife, a woman currently holding a restraining order against him. He’s got good days and bad, sometimes functioning fairly well in society, other times driving himself to hysterics over a song.

Patrick meets his equal in Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence) a young woman with her own set of labels. She’s the widow of a former cop, she’s a “whore” who channeled her grief into sexual energy, and she’s the “screw-up” of the family compared to her successful older sister. Like Patrick, she’s been on every antidepressant under the sun. She too lacks a filter and projects an edgy, forceful persona that keeps her one step removed from those around her. Tiffany agrees to help Patrick get in touch with his ex-wife if he agrees to partner with her for a big dance contest. It’s a set-up that feels less contrived onscreen than it does on paper, and it works because of the natural chemistry between Cooper and Lawrence. They are both tentative yet aggressive, scaring people off even as they yearn for companionship. Perhaps because they are the two most heavily labeled people, they are able to see past the other's labels.

The film examines the impact a label can have on whether we view someone as sane or crazy. Pat Sr. makes his money betting on sports games. He folds handkerchiefs, carefully places remote controls in specific locations, and counts envelopes to send along good luck to his Philadelphia Eagles. While the younger Patrick’s stint at the institute has permanently labeled him as “crazy,” Pat Sr.’s condition goes largely unlabeled. To some he's exhibiting symptoms of OCD, to others he's expressing the normal quirks of a sports fan. Then there’s Patrick’s seemingly stable neighbor who admits to thrashing around to Metallica in his garage when he feels upset. After all, he reasons, “You can’t be happy all the time.”

That’s a lesson Patrick is unwilling to take to heart. He’s determined that with a little effort and self-discipline, he can make his life perfect. (The film’s title comes from Patrick’s positive-thinking, “silver linings” philosophy.) He makes mistakes and has unexpected outbursts, but he’s sure that if he can just explain himself on paper, write out what he meant to do, things will be okay. It’s a feeling I’ve had many times, and Patrick’s determination to get in touch with his wife and explain everything to her, though obsessive on the outside, probably isn’t too far off from desires we’ve all had. But Patrick’s history of institutionalization will forever color people’s perception of him. His behavior is labeled as unstable, yet my similar behavior may not be.

For all of it’s heavy subject matter, Silver Linings Playbook remains surprisingly enjoyable throughout. It’s a sardonic comedy that can flip on a dime to something much weightier. While it’s got some of the contrivances of a rom com, it thankfully exceeds the genre’s limitations. The laughs come quickly and often until suddenly they stop, brought to a screeching halt by an offhanded comment. And that perhaps is the best representation of Patrick’s struggle with controlling his aggression. He’s fine until he’s not. It’s a masterful understanding of tone and director/writer David O. Russell has crafted a film that takes itself seriously without losing its sense of fun. Cooper and Lawrence are both fantastic, playing against type and seeming to have a blast doing so. While I expected nothing less from the always-terrific Lawrence, Cooper proves here that he’s more than just a sculpted face and chiseled abs.

Russell doesn’t come to any grand conclusions about the dangers of labeling, but I’m not sure he needs to. This isn’t a film about mental health as a whole; it’s a film about one man and how he deals with his own issues. We label things to understand them, to give us a frame of reference. There’s not a way we can exist without labeling the world around us, and the best we can do is try to remember that the words we use to describe something are only the tip of the iceberg. And that’s where Silver Linings Playbook really shines. It’s a story that presents characters in a way that both embraces their labels and looks beneath them.

Reality factor: As he proved in The Fighter, director David O Russell has a great eye for capturing the family unit of the working class. Everything from the wallpaper to the food (crabby snacks and homemades) feels grounded in the grit and grease of real life.  [4 out of 5]

Eye-candy factor: Bradley Cooper is dressed in baggy sweatpants and trash bags for most of the film, which makes his dance contest ensemble seem that much more dapper. [4 out of 5]

Aww factor: The film’s finale may be too sentimental for some, but I thought it was a well earned and heartfelt moment that didn’t stray too far into fantasy. [4 out of 5]