Three sentence movie reviews: A Star is Born

This 1937 version* is yet another 1930s movie that is fabulous to watch.** In this non-musical version, Janet Gaynor is charming as the fresh-faced aspiring actress while Fredric March charms as an actor on a downward slide.***  There’s a lot of good stuff about love****, and the trappings of alcoholism, back when it was something to be hidden.

Cost: free from library via Hoopla (for this movie, I figured out how to watch Hoopla via the app on the TV.  It’s a little bit wonky, but works great once you figure out all the steps.)
Where watched: at home.

*Regular commenter Jan watched the 1954 version and alerted me to the fact there will be four versions, once the 2018 one is released.  Four versions of the same movie? With the exact same title?  There was no way I was leaving that alone.
**Though it presents a very different lifestyle than my previous 1930’s movie: The Grapes of Wrath.
***Also very good was Andy Devine, playing Gaynor’s friend Danny.
***Both of career/movies and romantic love.

Poster from: https://alchetron.com/A-Star-Is-Born-(1937-film)

Postcard from NYC via Minneapolis


Another odd-sized postcard from the Whitney Museum.  Are modern art museums the place to go to find odd-shaped cards?  Test my hypothesis. Visit modern art museums and send me postcards from there.

The translation is “a giant tomato”

Sara writes that she’s doing the tricky process of revising a piece and also dealing with computer updates that took long enough that I got a postcard out of it.  Thanks computer updates!  And Sara!

Three sentence movie reviews: The Grapes of Wrath

A “classic film” that is gripping to watch, rather than something to be gotten through so you can check it off your list.  Henry Fonda is good, but Jane Darwell as Ma Joad steals every scene.  Also interesting: to see how different things were 35 years before my birth.

Cost: free from library
Where watched: at home

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/1940/grapes_of_wrath_ver2.html

This is one of my favorite scratch-offs so far.
The first time I watched this classic was at a free movie showing on Boston Common.

I found this one rather predictable.

Three sentence movie reviews: The Meyerowitz Stories

He’s a straight white male mostly telling stories from the limited perspective of well-off, neurotic straight white males.*  So why do I find his movies so delightful, more often than not?  You’ll watch this movie for stellar performances from Sandler** and Stiller, and if you are me, you will ignore all the parts with Grace Van Patten’s student films (which were a repeating joke that wasn’t really funny the first time.)

Cost: Netflix charge
Where watched: at home

*Most of whom I wouldn’t be that interested in spending time with in real life.
**If all of Adam Sandler’s performances were as good as this one, he would be an actor I sought out more often than one I took a pass on.

Poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2017/meyerowitz_stories.html

A walk on Mississippi Ave.

I spent a lovely morning walking on Mississippi Avenue looking for Help Wanted signs for Job Spotter.  I found none on Mississippi.  Maybe the stores there are too fancy for help wanted signs in the window? I also took some pictures.  Here they are:

On the lower left, ghost stairs that are probably not long for this word given the pace of the development.  You can see a new building that has gone up, looming over the original house.  Will something else be built on its other side?

Some great side-of-building art.

 

Someone has repurposed a disco ball into a very large Victorian-style garden looking glass. That’s a really big disco ball.  I wonder where it once was?

New construction happening where there once were ghost stairs. In fact, I have pictures of those ghost stairs.  See them here.

 

I love this gate.

Here is some art embedded into the side of building with a QR code to go with it.  I did not scan it, but you probably could.

 

Amen to this statement.  @UnzippedPDX turns out to be two strippers who talk about whatever they want.  Here’s a link.

 


I liked this oddly-shaped bumper–or back panel–sticker.  The internet tells me it’s a famous line from Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues” which also led to a discussion of if Bob Dylan coined the phrase.

Overall, this was a good day for a walk.

Three sentence movie reviews: I, Tonya

Margot Robbie is amazing as Tonya Harding, in this funny and hard-to-watch story based on interviews given by Harding and Jeff Gillooly, her husband at the time of the ice skating.  It’s tough to watch the abuse both from a parent (an excellent Janney) and the domestic violence* (by the also excellent Sebastian Stan). There is greatness and tragedy in a story that everyone who lived through it the first time has an opinion of plus, the wigs are really on point.

Cost: free due to gift cards
Where watched: Regal City Center Stadium 12 with Matt

*”I have never seen so much domestic violence depicted on film before,” said with a sense of awe by Matt, the DV counselor.

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2017/i_tonya.html

Requiem: The Below-Thirty-Degrees Coat

Is there anything better than a plaid wool coat?

This was my coat for when it gets really cold* in Portland. It’s wool construction makes it super warm, and I pair it with real gloves (not the $1 stretchy guys I usually wear) and a hat that covers my ears and neck.  Then, I’m ready for any sub-30 degree weather. (Portland rarely sees temperatures in the 20’s and even more rarely does the mercury drop to the teens.)

However, my hips have exceeded the capacity of this coat, and thus I am sending it off to be consigned.  Hopefully, the next person will love it as much as I do.

*I realize that Portland’s “really cold” is laughable when compared to other areas.  I’ve lived in colder places, and had more intense coats.   But intense coats are not needed here.

Three sentence movie reviews: The Good Place, Season 1

The writing sparkled in this 13-episode first-season comedy. While Bell and Danson brought their usual top-of-the-line performances, I also greatly enjoyed William Jackson Harper as Chidi, Jameela Jamil as Tahani, D’Arcy Carden as Janet and Manny Jacinto as Jason Mendoza.  In short, great cast and great acting, plus funny premise and sharp writing equals quality TV viewing.

Cost: monthly Netflix charge
Where watched: at home, with Matt.

poster from: https://www.tvseriesonline.tv/the-good-place-season-1-episode-4/

Three sentence movie review: King Kong

This movie excels in how lifelike King Kong is; the way his eyes were animated, I believed he was a huge creature.  I didn’t not enjoy it, however, as it is the kind of conquering-with-violence tale that hurts my heart to watch.* Sadly, this movie had the largest number of Black people I will probably see while watching my Scratch-off 100 Essential Movies; they  all played “primitives.”

Cost: free
Where watched: at home

*Me: Sweetheart, if you encountered a dinosaur that had long been thought was extinct, what would your first reaction be?”
Matt: Um, I guess document it?”
Me: I know, right?

It also made no sense, Mr. Kong fighting all those dinosaurs.  Doesn’t he regularly encounter them on Skull Island?  It’s not a very big island.  They would have all killed each other if they fight like that all the time.

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/1933/king_kong.html

Do you want to scratch your movie poster itch? Get the scratch off poster here.

(Pssst.  Citzen Kane spoiler alert! Things will be revealed in the Citizen Kane picture below. Be warned.)

Not only did I not enjoy the movie, the picture was wrong when I scratched it off.  Even before watching the film, I could have told the artist those were biplanes, not helicopters.  What’s the drama in a hovering helicopter?

This was predictable, but nice.
I need to find a decent scratcher.  The butter knife I’m using takes off a layer of shine along with the silver part.  I have a great one store in my Christmas stocking, but that’s at my aunt’s house.