Movie: Groundhog Day

"What would you do if you were stuck in one place and everyday was exactly the same and nothing you did mattered?" 

-Bill Murray, Groundhog Day

I now understand.  It is what the unemployed feel every day.  Here, we are waking up every day with the objected to get a job.  So we do the same routine daily. Check online search engines, read the classifieds, hope for a happy email, get rejected and then we do it again. We do it again, because we have to keep going. But what are we going to do about it? How are we going to make it matter? 

The only answer I can give is make it matter.  Keep a positive outlook and remember that good things will come.  And in the meantime, find something that does matter like say begin a blog about your struggles, hardships, life goals and random thoughts.  

You now know why I am here. 

{Stay Tuned}

P.S. Bill Murray eventually does get unstuck, the day is different and what he does mattered. 

Wednesday's Movie: The Soloist

I haven't been much of a movie renter this summer but this past weekend I finally got caught up.  {The Curious Case of Benjamin Button}, {New in Town} and {The Soloist} fluttered on my parents beautiful wide screen, flat screen, HD, a picture of perfect TV last weekend.  

You might be surprised as to which film "wowed" me the most.  It was {The Soloist}. The film came out earlier this year with Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr. in the lead parts. I hadn't wanted to see it because it was one of those trailers that I just thought looked like it would lead to a movie going experience where I would used more tissues then when I saw The Notebook.  

Surprise, surprise there were no tears but a new outlook on what it means to be a friend and the power of being someone's story teller. 

The movie takes place in Los Angeles in September of 2005.  Downey's plays Lopez a columnist for the Los Angeles Times.  Foxx plays Nathaniel Ayers, a drop out cellist of Juilliard and a homeless man that has been on the street for three decades.  As you would imagine, they meet by chance. Lopez becomes fascinated with this talented musician man who is currently playing a two stringed violin beautifully and ranting about Juilliard. Lopez immediately thinks story.  It begins as a story.  However, Lopez begins to learn there is so much to this story and he has the ability to tell it and with the ability to create a better life for Ayers.  Along the way of Lopez's going for the story we learn of Ayers actual talent on the cello, his troubling mental state and his survival on the streets. 

Now if this is getting to Lifetime Movie network for you, I assure you this film has so much more to offer.  Not to be a spoiler but what we learn from this movie is that some things are bigger then the help of one person and the ability to just be there as a friend can be more helpful then anything else.  

It is my hope that the next time you have a few few hours for a film consider watching The Soloist.  I think the true story and the message at the end will be more worth it then watching Brad Pitt get hotter and hotter or Renee Zellweger going from stilettos to Uggs in Minnesota. 

{Stay Tuned}

Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze?

Is the juice worth the squeeze?

Always know that the juice is worth the squeeze!

In other words is the outcome worth the effort?

Just some worldly advice from {The Girl Next Door}, one of my favorite movies which concludes with a gift to one of the other characters saying, "The Juice Was Worth the Squeeze". 

{Stay Tuned}. Busy today making some squeezes!

Wednesday's Movie: Post Grad

Recently one of my friends and I were talking about movies and what's coming out soon.  

He said, "Have you scene the trailer for {Post Grad}?"

I said, "No...what's it about? My life?"

He said, "Kind of."

I said, "I'll check it out.  But if you had a blog you could blog about it."

Well, he hasn't started a blog and we had that conversation over a week ago.  So I checked out the trailer myself and invite you to do the same. Got a few minutes?  Then its time for you to watch.  {Here on YouTube}. 

My favorite line from the trailer is "Your not suppose to come back when you've left the nest." I hear yea! 

{Stay Tuned} Hope to see it later this August and let you all know!

Wednesday's Movie: The Ugly Truth

Last night I went to the movies and saw {The Ugly Truth}.  

My opinion was good but not great. Funny but not hilarious.  And predictable.  

It was a romantic comedy after all built around a successful women that can't get a date and a outspoken lust-expert male who helps her land a man.  If you've seen any movie made this century you know where this is going.  The two of them, while polar opposites, fall in love.  

Although, it was a bit on the slow side in the first half-hour the jokes got better and the interaction between Katherine Heigl and the man she is trying to woo did leave me laughing.  Especially a certain scene in which her cat climbs a tree and Heigl's character gets a great opportunity to check out her new neighbor.  But as luck would have it (or romcom Hollywood would play a part) something happens which leads to an embarrassing first impression.  

I recommend it for a laugh but will let you know that last nights viewing in Mason, Ohio was filled with quite a lot of couples.  So if your lucky enough to have a significant other it could be a date night.  Or if your like me you can take a long your always going movie girl friend and ask for a student ticket.  (We have college student ID's we can flash if you question it). 

{Stay Tuned}

Wednesday's Movie: When Harry Met Sally

Harry: We've got eighteen hours to kill before we hit New York.

Sally: The story of my life isn't even going to get us out of Chicago I mean nothing's happened to me yet.  That's why I'm going to New York.

Harry: So something can happen to you?

Sally: Yes.

Harry: Like what?

Sally: I can go into journalism school to become a reporter.

Harry: So you can write about things that happen to other people.

Sally: That's one way to look at it.

Harry: Suppose nothing happens to you.  Suppose you lived out your whole life and nothing happens you never meet anybody you never become anything and finally you die in one of those New York deaths which nobody notices for two weeks until the smell drifts into the hallway.

This past summer, I finally saw {When Harry Met Sally}.  The film was one I always wanted to see but having not been say between the ages of 18-50 when it came out, I had to wait for a lazy day and Lifetime Movie Network allowing the film to grace the air time.  Thank you Lifetime Movie Network.

I really did enjoy the film for the obvious reasons.  Number one, I am single.  Do my guy friends want to have sex with me? Number two, can men and women be friends? (Wait this goes back to number one).  Number three, could a male friend of mine and myself be destined to be together?

But that’s not what I am here to discuss.  (Some other blog post I am sure). 

My career choice has recently landed me to get some snide remarks.  At a recent funeral I attended my mother shared with a family friend I was between jobs and seeking a position as a reporter.  The family friends said something along the lines of why she could do so many other things.

I am still spinning by that remark.  What’s wrong with being a reporter?

I still remember a high school substitute asked me my senior year of high school where I was going to school and what I would be studying.  After sharing Elon and journalism, the substitute said something along the lines of oh you want to be on TV. 

No, would of said broadcast journalism if I did want to be on TV. 

I don’t look for support in my career decision.  I am sure many other people have experience some comments here and there of no support in their career choice.  However, it wasn’t till I watch When Harry Met Sally, that I thought is this the reason?  People question my decision in career because I am just reporting on other peoples interesting lives while mine remains boring?

Of course, in the film Sally acknowledges that nothing has happen to her yet and that is why she is moving to New York to go to journalism school. But hold your guns, Harry that doesn’t mean she is bond to live a boring life. 

I find myself around Sally’s age and as I do not wear day of the week underwear nor am a waiter’s worst nightmare, I know how she feels.  Given the opportunity to share the story of my life I wouldn’t give you more then a good 15-minute version.  Where do you begin with a stranger on a car ride for heaven sakes?

But that’s the thing about journalist; we aren’t trained to share our thoughts.  We’re trained to ask the questions, get your thoughts and get the story. 

So Sally you said the right thing and you proved Harry wrong.  At the end of the film the two of you are together and well, something has happened to you in the mean time of that terrible New York City death Harry thinks your bound to live.

But a secret undisclosed to Harry and the rest of the world that think journalist get into the field to write about what happens to other is about to be shared.  The truth is we get into this field because we care.  We care about getting the issues out to the people. We care about sharing a member of the community story who can’t.  We care about informing you about decisions that will change your life.  Yes, we write about what happens to others.  But that doesn’t make us boring.  It makes us far from it.  Think about.  

{Stay Tuned}

Movie Wednesday: UP

I don’t take my love advice from movies like He’s Just not that into You, Man of Honor or the latest Jennifer Aniston flick at theaters.

No offense but Hollywood has it wrong.

But who has it right?

I am not saying myself with my relationship status of single. But lets look to the wonderful people at Disney.

You know Disney! The people that brought us “and they lived happily ever after”.  Well, maybe they didn’t come up with that but they let the concept fly through out the twenty century. 

But it’s the latest film {Up} that really hit me. I know what your thinking if you have never heard of this latest Pixar film, some sort of princess and a prince that live happily ever after right after they have some enduring hardship with some catch musical numbers.  Well, your wrong.  Instead Disney shows us what we all hope for.  A man and women that become smitten with each other at an early age and who never dream of being apart. 

What they do dream of is adventure and a life long goal of traveling to Paradise Falls, South America.  But as we see in the film, the two build this goal in to their daily routine dropping coins in a wish jar and working at their local zoo (adventures).  But we see through out the years, that the couple endures their share of hardships.  Ellie can’t conceive, the car breaks down, years go by.  The Paradise Falls trip never happens.

I am not running anything by telling you Ellie, the wife, dies.  Yes, she dies in the first 15 minutes but she dies with no regrets in a beautiful manner that “thank you Disney I strive for this” moment goes through my mind. 

However her enduring husband knows he must make the trip to Paradise Falls.  This is where the movie begins for the rest of the generation under age 10 and balloons appear.  But for me it was a moment of beauty.  You got it right Disney. 

Most likely, I will not run out on three guys at the alter. (Runaway Bride).  I am not going to fall head over heels with my fiancé brother while my fiancé is in Rome with his dying mother. (Moonstruck).  Oh yea and I am not a dedicated Delilah listener to call in and met a man on Valentines Day at the Empire States Building in NYC. (Sleepless in Seattle). I doubt if anyone will say to me "No one puts baby in the corner". (Dirty Dancing).

When I meet a guy I am interested in, I hope to hack into what they want.  What their dreams are.  Where they want to be in a few years or fifty.  If it sounds remotely what I want, call me in.  If not, see yea.  For Carl and Ellie, it was there sense of adventure.  For me, what?  Haven’t met him yet. 

But I just hope that one day it is as enduring, loving and as mind blowing as Carl and Ellie’s relationship. 

Wait, what am I saying, this is a G rated film.  Disney, you know a love story when you see it and thank you for sharing this one.  {Stay tuned} for next Wednesday's Movie Thoughts.