The Artist - 2011

 On the face of it, this movie is pure gimmick. It's a black and white movie, made entirely in the style of a silent movie. With few exceptions, the only sounds we hear are in the movie score. There are cards with quoted dialogue on them, just like in old times, but most of the movie is conveyed through the acting. 

At first I was irked by this, because it felt very gimmicky, but it really grew on me. The acting that is needed in such a genre is different than in the "talkies" and it was interesting to experience it. It required close attention, and it drew me in to the story. The movie has a ton of heart and it's easy to see why it got so much praise.

The story is somewhat similar to 'Singing in the Rain'. A silent movie star (Jean Dujardin) has the rug pulled out from under him but the inclusion of sound in movies. He rejects it and feels that it will have no place for him. (Very late in the movie, we find out why.) The change in movie style happens just as the Great Depression hits, so he goes from stardom to poverty.

Early in the movie he meets a young woman with a great smile (Berenice Bojo) who wants to get into film. He helps her with some advice and she soon becomes America's sweetheart. She succeeds just as he fails, like two arms of a balance. Their relationship is interesting. At many other times in the movies, they would have ended up in bed together, but 'The Artist' really shows them as having a strong friendship, without hinting at more.

This won the Oscar for Best Picture in 2011, which I remember as being seen as a surprise. When I've watched all of the movies from that year, I'll circle back and say whether I thought it was deserving or not.

Oscar Nominees

 Long time readers of the blog will remember that I've had a thing for watching movies that were nominated for Best Picture. In fact, the very first function for this whole thing was to record my watching of the 50 movies that had that distinction in the 90s. I still enjoy doing so, but marriage and kids have sometimes been an obstacle in watching arthouse style movies. 

Sometime in the 00s I stopped being a completest when it comes to watching the noms. That was true by the middle of the decade and became even more of a thing when the Oscars expanded past five noms per year in 2009. I don't know that the quality of the movies declined, but carving out time to watch nine movies is simply a more daunting task. Harder to start and (much) easier to slough off. 

A few weeks back, it occurred to me that I could fix that. I could watch the ones I haven't seen and rewatch some that I don't remember well. I like to have some kind of project going and if I approach this in a casual way, then I could finish it in a year or two. Plus, with all of the streaming options out there, it's easier than ever to catch movies without paying additional money. 

So I did what I always do in situations like this and made a spreadsheet. By my count, there were 88 movies nominated for Best Picture in the '10s. Before I started this project, I had watched just under half of them: 43. Several of the movies that I haven't seen are available to stream on Netflix, Amazon Prime or with YouTubeTV. In addition, I'm one of the few (the proud!) that still gets DVDs from Netflix in the mail. In time, I'll see them all. 

And, because I love you all, I'll put up some reviews here on the blog. 

More Physical Media

 In the spirit of my post from last week, I'm thinking about this article, suggesting that we print our blogs before they disappear into the technical ether. 

Thinking really hard about making this happen...

Comet Neowise

 I want to share some of my favorite pictures of this past year. Right before we went up to Camp Van Vac this year, news broke about a comet that would be visible to the northwest, after sunset. I knew that this would line up perfectly with our nightly sunset watch and it did. We dutifully went out several nights and saw it. I got to play with the nighttime settings on my camera and I got this dandy. 

Thanksgiving

 I don't know if I've done a "things I'm thankful for" in a long time - or ever. Today seems like a good day to change that. I'm thankful for:

• My family, of course. I'm thankful for my children who are (often) wonderful. And my lovely wife. This past year has been a taxing one, with all of us stuck at home together. But I've come to appreciate them more than I think I would have if this was a typical year. (I'm also thankful for headphones, both theirs and mine.)
• The family I don't live with. I'm thankful for my brother and sister, who are both wonderful people. I'm thankful for my mom, who is also wonderful. I don't get to see them nearly as often as I'd like to and this year drove that home. The same is true of my aunts and uncles and cousins and so on.
• My friends, who I'm still attached to thanks to social media. Places like Facebook have their downsides but being able to quickly talk to so many people I hadn't seen in years is great. And I get to do this every day if I want.
• My health. In this year, with rampant disease, we healthy people should all be thankful for what we have. And I am! (Thankful that my family has been healthy as well!)
• Our modern world. There are so many modern things that have made staying at home easier than it would have been. Thirty years ago we wouldn't have been connected with each other or to easy entertainment. Food delivery was a thing but nearly as robustly as it is now. Same with other deliveries. 

It's been hard but not unbearable and I'm thankful for that.

Time Passes

 One of the strangest things about being stuck in the pandemic is how completely unhooked from the normal passing of time I've become. Before the plague struck, the routine was largely:

• M-F, everyone leaves in the morning and comes home in the afternoon. We spend the evening together (over a shared meal or otherwise) and then go to bed with some thought to the next day.
• Sat/Sun, usually an outing. Possibly out for breakfast or brunch. Watch a sporting event one of the afternoons, possibly both. Sunday night has a feel of getting ready for the next week of work or school.

This is no longer true. The FP Gal and the kids still have school and work but it's different. No one leaves home so it doesn't feel like they've broken away to a different thing. They simply go down to their various rooms and do their thing. The kids filter up at various times every morning and I try to keep the boys quiet. I see the ladies at lunch and again later in the afternoon when they're done with school for the day.

In the evening we may or may not eat together. (My kids are now all expert in getting their own meals ready.) During screen time the kids disappear, giving me the much needed mental break of not trying to keep them quiet. Then bedtimes happen and their day is done.

Sometimes I feel like the lotus eaters from the Odyssey. I don't have quite enough time to launch big projects of my own so I nibble at smaller things. A few times this year I've gotten hooked by a large book but those times have been rare. Usually I simply can't concentrate for the long times needed to really enjoy it.

The seasonal thing has been harder. The pandemic hit in March and promptly canceled one of the big events in the sports calendar: the NCAA Men's basketball tournament. All of the other sports shut down too, including that annual harbinger of spring, baseball. By the time my White Sox came back it was July and it felt very off. Don't get me wrong, they were a lot of fun to watch this year, but the empty stands made it feel something like a huge succession of practice games.

More recently, we had a huge snowfall in October, the largest in recorded history for our area. We had significant snow on the ground and it felt like winter was starting six weeks early. The snow did melt as we had a very warm early November. In fact, here we are on the day before Thanksgiving and the ground is still clear of the white stuff. Which is fine with me, but it's still messing with my mental calendar.

Celebrations are all wrong, with only immediate family able to attend. We aren't driving to see family on any of the big family holidays. We aren't gathering together as a community to watch fireworks. There are no parades. All of the special things are . . . different. (I don't blame the planners, things are different. But that doesn't make it easier.) 

I'm sure when we look back and try to communicate this era to later people, this will be the hardest thing to explain to them. Yes, we were afraid to be sick. Yes, we were uncertain of what measures were needed. We were especially uncertain of how much of the measures were needed. But for me, the hardest part has been the passing of time. Internally, I don't know when it is. 

Maybe even more importantly, I don't know when I ever will again.

Status Updates

 It's been so long since I've written anything that I should probably say something about how we're all doing. 

Relia is now a teenager. She has a good, tight group of friends with which she is in constant contact. They're all good people and I'm very happy for her. She is artistic and capable and frustrated whenever she's told she can't do something Right Now. I'm impressed by how she will decide on a project and then jump right into it. At the moment she is leaning towards being a psychologist (psychiatrist? therapist?) and I'm sure she'd make a great one.

DF is ten and loves gaming. He plays video games whenever he has a chance and is thinking of going into the field someday. In many ways he is a copy of me. Physically he looks like my younger twin, except he started growing his hair long at a much earlier age than I did. I'm sometimes frustrated that he isn't reading the same books that I did at his age, but he is a reader. In third grade, he tackled all of the Harry Potter books. When we told him to stop after the third one, he checked the fourth one out of the school library and quietly advanced on his own. 

LL is eight and I think the Covid has been hard for him. Second and third grade are a prime time for making friends. It's about the time that kids can push past their normal selfishness and care about how other people feel. He's been spending that time at home with his family and that's made connections with others hard. 

Right now LL likes wearing dresses. We're fine with this (natch) and curious where he'll go from here. His personality has always been stubborn but he's starting to soften. He's incredibly artistic and beginning to love history. 

The FP Gal has been teaching from home ever since March. She's thrived while working via video in a way that I don't know many others have. She likes the medium and works very hard to present things to her students in a way that helps them. I keep telling her that this may point to an educational career outside of the traditional classroom. We'll see.

Me? I'm fine. No, really, I am. I'm something of a homebody so not going out has only been an occasional issue for me. Having everyone home with me all the time hasn't been great but I'm getting used to it. Before the pandemic hit I had trained to be an independent bookkeeper but about the time I was ready to find clients, the economic situation got very uncertain. I still plan to do that but my writing is higher up in my brain. I have the stories and I'm confident in my writing ability. It's just harder to get things down on paper when the house is full. 

And that, as of this moment, is how we are.