This post has to start with an apology. Recently I received an email asking me to write a list of films in my Netflix queue, and I thought, well that sounds like a wonderful idea, and then accidentally deleted the email concerned, because I am a space cadet in a polka dot pinny. So this is for that lady, and for anyone else who wants to know what it is I do when all that darn housekeeping is done…
I watch films all the time. Though my Mum is mildly appalled that I spend so much time in a cinematic wonderland, I like nothing better than settling down with a plate of kale chips and losing my mind to someone elses…
Ok, so how about we make this a regular series? I will share what I have been watching and what I plan to watch over the following month and you can throw in your two-penneth, grab some inspiration and tell me when my mildly berserk taste in films has gone too far…
My favorite film last month…
Celeste and Jesse Forever…
Oh how I loved this. It tells the story of a couple who have broken up but can’t quite break up and it is charming and true and a testimony to the power of love and friendship after divorce.
And on my list this month?
On Netflix…
Quartet.
(I have seen it, but it is so lovely I might just watch it again…)
“A trio of retired opera singers’ annual celebration of Verdi’s birthday sours when their estranged fourth member shows up but refuses to sing…“
His & Hers
Director Ken Wardrop enlists 70 Irish women to tell the tale of a lifelong love affair, capturing the unique way men and women interact over time.
Melancholia
“This inventive drama charts the disintegrating relationship between two sisters, just as Earth hurtles toward collision with another planet…”
On Snag Films…
The Culinary Browns
“The Brown’s, my great-grandparents, published dozen’s of cookbooks from the 1930’s to the 1950’s while simultaneously publishing an expatriate magazine from Brazil and several volumes of Bob’s experimental poetry. This short paragraph only hints at the intellectual bohemianism of their world—they lived in Paris, Greenwich Village and Brazil, they traveled the Amazon by raft, they knew Peggy Guggenheim and Gertrude Stein—and they wrote cookbooks. Yet, most of this history remains buried under layers of familial discomfort: a legacy of alcoholism and depression, a pattern of distant fathers, and a memory of words stored in boxes…“
Penny Serenade.
Because I do believe I have never seen it…
“A young couple falls in love while on a trip to Japan, but face tragedy when an earthquake causes June (Irene Dunne) to lose the baby she is carrying. When she and Roger (Cary Grant) return to San Francisco, they consider adoption as an antidote to their now-struggling marriage. Meanwhile, June’s favorite records seem to unfailingly chronicle her life throughout this warmly-entertaining drama.”
And on Curzon Home Cinema…
What Maisie Knew
“David Siegel and Scott McGehee’s excellent take on Henry James’ novel shows us life through the eyes of a young girl who witnesses the implosion of her parents’ marriage, the fissures that appear in their subsequent relationships and the narcissism that lies at the heart of their every decision. Appearing in every scene, Onata Aprile is stunning as the irrepressible Maisie, as are Steve Coogan and Julianne Moore as her narcissistic parents.“
Happy viewing Housekeepers!
Alison, dear, you’ve inspired me to spend part of this Sunday evening, as the pumpkin pie bakes, adding movies to Netflix I’ve never seen. Top of the list are several with Johnny Depp, my favorite actor. And then for the past several days I have been thinking about famous old black and white movies that I’ve never seen like Casablanca, etc. So now I’m sitting here adding away. I shall take my laptop to work this week and watch movies at lunch.
What a great idea! Quartet is on my list because anything Maggie Smith is in is marvelous. Can’t wait to see everyone’s suggestions. I also have a lot of Curious George and Mickey Mouse in the queue but that’s because my grandkids can’t get enough!
I second Quartet (delightful). I add Mike Leigh’s Another Year (hope to see it tonight): sounds really good.
Oh Antonella, Another Year is a wonderful, sad, meandering kind of film. I thoroughly enjoyed it in the way it is only possible to do when you are confronted by the kind of touching, gritty films that Mike Leigh does. Enjoy.x
Have you ever seen Crossing Delancey? It’s a little older, from 1988, with Peter Riegert and Amy Irving. It’s full of fantastic Yiddish grandmothers, a blowsy matchmaker and the sweetest and most romantic leading man I’ve ever seen. I have watched this movie when I’ve been single, married, dumped and heartbroken, and love it even more every time I watch it.
Oooh I havent Keri, but you betcha I’m going to hunt it out now! ~Thank-you so much for the recommendation!
I don’t really like Kirsten Dunst, but she was outstanding in Melancholia!
I don’t really like Kirsten Dunst, but she was outstanding in Melancholia!
I love the part in Penny Serenade where they give a lift to those people, and the child gets out of the car — it breaks my heart.Try a French film allied Romantics Anonymous. It is just a sweet movie.
Also, The Decoy Bride. A formulaic Romantic Comedy that I ordered because of David Tennant (my sons and I are becoming proper Whovians), but just loved it for Kelly Macdonald. She was just so CUTE! You’ll see what I mean.
For a quick pick-me-up “I Dance Myself to Sleep” (Bert and Ernie, Sesame Street) on YouTube.
Sorry for the extra posts all the time, but there is no “Edit”.I’m a huge original Star Trek fan. I LOVE all the characters, so I was a bit miffed when they decided to make a prequel that rewrote time, so that all the adventures I loved never existed.
However, once I got over that — and the PARADOX they created (come on guys, if you change the past and thereby change the future, the reason in the future that made you go back to the past no linger exists, so you wouldn’t go back to the past and change the future which would mean that the original event would still occur that would send you back to the past that would change the future… — uh, where was I again, oh yeah, once you get past everything, the movies, are really good, and the actors show certain glimpses of the original actors’ characters that I love so much, and I just love what they’ve done with Spock in the Into Darkness film.
So, give ’em a try!
Penny Serenade is one of the all time BEST movies IN THE WORLD. I watched it years ago and recorded it on VHS (did I say years ago – I think it was back in the 80’s). I’m thinking I still have that VHS tape somewhere packed away. I watched it SO many times and cried each time. I had not even thought about it be online now. Happy happy happy!
Oh blast! I wanted to watch His and Hers but it doesn’t seem to be on my Netflix. I am so sad now 🙁