There’s No Business Like Show Business
Posted By AmyD. on September 24, 2007
Our culture to a certain extent revolves around the entertainment industry. People love movies, music, celebrity, and gossip. I’m certainly no different, although, I have to admit, I’m not that big of a movie fan.
I can’t tell you why, I do watch them, I have my favorites, but it almost takes an act of God to get me to sit down and actually watch a movie. The only exception is Christmas when I definitely have a list I have to get through before Christmas. There is something about giving up 2 hours of my life to sit through something that bothers me sometimes. I suppose I’d rather waste the time doing something else.
When I do watch a movie, I want to be entertained. I’m not that big into dramas although, admittedly, there are many I like. I like action, adventure, comedy, and occasionally romantic comedy. You won’t catch me watching “Braveheart” or “300″ or God forbid, “Pulp Fiction” or something as nasty as “American Me” – which I did watch one time and I can honestly say, it scarred me for life.
I don’t do prison movies or movies with unnecessary brutality, rape scenes bother me tremendously and really sad things bother me as well. “Dragonfly” with Kevin Costner was a good movie, but it was also incredibly sad and depressing for me. I’m one of the few people who left the theater crying after “The Sixth Sense.” It killed me, it was so, so sad. Ditto with “The Others.” Traditional sad movies like “Love Story,” “Beaches,” and “Terms of Endearment” are movies I made the mistake of watching ONE time and they depressed me for DAYS… DAYS. And given that I have mentioned I have issues with depression and anxiety (on medication for both, remember) I sort of have to take that kind of thing seriously. But, that’s just me.
So, good movie or not, critically acclaimed or not, I only watch movies that entertain me in some way. I also don’t go over them critically or make fun of their ability or inability to “suspend belief” blah blah, I just watch movies I like and watch new movies that I think I’d like. Otherwise, what would be the point in wasting two whole hours?
That being said, there are obvious contradictions to my watching preferences. I like Law & Order (tv show, I know, I know) but I won’t watch SVU. There are certain episodes of CSI: Miami that I’ve enjoyed and others that I haven’t handled so well.
The really strange thing is that there are days when I decide I’m not leaving my bedroom and I flip the television on with every intention of watching a documentary, or something on HGTV or the History channel. That’s about the time that the history channel is doing “The History of Lug Nuts” and HGTV is showing “Sell This House” and I realize that I might very well be bored to suicide (that is a joke!) or at least tears. This happened a couple of weekends ago and I ended up watching “Basic” with John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson (I love him, he’s great in nearly everything he does) and “Walking Tall” with The Rock and Johnny Knoxville (I love Johnny Knoxville, I just do).
Now, I happen to think The Rock is a cutie-pie. I do… can’t help it. Don’t know what it is… but I do. John Travolta, I am not a HUGE fan of and I can’t tell you why exactly. Truth is, I really liked Basic, I think I’d buy it and might even watch it a couple of times.
Which brings me to the point of this post. I happen to adore RW and his blog, Chasing Vincenzo. Recently he ran a series on his favorite 50 movies. (that links you to the beginning of the series, read it, comment, please!) I was impressed, not only with his choices but with his dedication and ability to succinctly state what it was about each movie that he loved.
Originally, I thought, well, I can maybe come up with 10 favorites and then it occurred to me that I better make it 25, but since I’m spending Monday explaining what I’m about to do that leaves 4 days left in the week, which means I’m down to 20. So, this week will be about my Top 20 favorite movies. Blatantly stealing this idea from RW, I plan to work my way down to my #1 pick.
And, just an FYI – Wednesday I’ll be guest posting over at Avitable’s because he seems to think he’s due for some sort of blogging vacation or something. What a pussy. :whistle:
About The Author
I like movies. I’m not gaga over them. I do like to be entertained, like you. However, I don’t possess the chip inside my brain that makes me remember actors or plots or scenes from movies. I don’t know what it is. I just completely blank them as soon as I’ve finished. I mean, I remember that I LIKED the movie, but I couldn’t tell you a thing about it. That being said, I could never pick a top 10, 20, 50 movies of all time that I love. I just couldn’t do it.
I plan on stealing his idea for next week and doing 50 movies. It really was a great series of posts.
Like you, I watch movies to be entertained and I tend to prefer the older ones. Although, the Walking Tall remake with “The Rock” was wonderful!!
Looking forward to your posts this week!!
I was thinking of stealing this too. Except, I LOVE movies – I’m one of those people who always says “OH MY GOD THIS IS MY FAVORITE!!”.
I’d have to do my top 150 or something extremely ridiculous.
I’m interested to see if you list any movies that will surprise me.
KG – I do that too, honestly. Not all the time, but with many movies.
Avi – it’s a great idea! I love the way he did it and I sort of did it in my own way because, like I said, I’m not one of those “critical” movie watchers.
Trish – I’ve never seen the original “Walking Tall” but my husband says it is really good. We both liked remake. He said there were some slight differences but that it was really, really good.
Miss B – Ok, I’m a little like that. My favorites tend to change. There really were only about 5 or 6 that would never, ever change. I started by writing out all the movies I could think of that I really liked or loved. I sort of gave myself a flexible criteria to go by and the list wasn’t nearly as long as I thought it was going to be. And, while you might list The Godfather or Steel Magnolias (Steel Magnolias is a GREAT movie, but SO SO sad, so I’ve actually only seen it maybe 5 or 6 times) – I don’t think I have many that are critically acclaimed or big Academy Award winners or something.
Thanks Amy. I didn’t think it was going to turn out to be so hard. And even then I know of a whole bunch of movies i like that aren’t on the list. I liked A League of Their Own, The Wizard of Oz – even the old Kirk Douglas Spartacus.
If you want to do a real thorough job – this is hard!
But I have the opposite problem – I can’t get details of movies out of my head. Sometimes in a conversation I will see the perfect spot to say a line from an obscure movie as part of the conversation. Nobody notices. It’s weird…
I think your nutty only because it would take me too long to come up with the movies I like. unfortantly I can quote the movies I do like and even give a plot synopsis. I know I am sad, but I am a theatre major after all.
:lmfao:
Okay, RW, I do that too. But I never know how I remember it. It just “comes” out of no where. I can go back and forth with someone on stupid movie quotes. But my brain can’t seem to process the whole thing. Isn’t that weird? Maybe I am ADD. :confused:
RW – The Wizard of Oz and A League of Their Own, those are brilliant. Oh! And Jaws! I didn’t list Jaws and I LOVE LOVE that movie. I do have movies that I remember the details from as well, not just favorites, but sometimes obscure films that I can’t recall the name of. LOL And, I do the same thing, I’ll quote a movie mid-conversation and no one gets the humor… “you’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
Megan – There are probably a lot of awesome movies that I haven’t seen and would probably love. You have a film addiction – you’d be better off chatting with Avitable, except he has no appreciation for older films so you’d end up flying out to Florida and strangling him.
KG – Ha! I hate to say it, but there is a part of me that thinks, No kidding! With all the stuff going on in the world and all the things you could learn and remember and ponder, why waste brain space remembering all the movies you’ve seen!
But, then, there are some pretty unforgettable movies as well.
And, then there’s “Dude, Where’s My Car?” Which I rented one time with my sister and friend, Erika, we were drunk and begged Mike to drive us to the video store where in our state of drunken intelligence we actually thought that “3,000 Miles To Graceland” and “Dude, Where’s My Car?” would be AWESOME Friday night viewing.
:dunno:
I just would like to that night sucked, and who knew a movie could sober you up that fast. :what: