ellen_datlow

Shutter Island was a good flick. It's 1953 and two federal marshals are sent to Shutter Island, off Boston, to a hospital for the criminally insane to investigate the report of a missing patient. The movie trailers didn't do it justice. Suspenseful and riveting to the end, which is, I think, perfect.

Grizzly Man is a 2005 documentary about Timothy Treadwell, a troubled, idealistic guy who spends 13 summers in grizzly country in Alaska, studying them, "protecting them" (although from what, is never established as they're protected on Federal Land--it is established the some bears are "culled" annually, but he doesn't seem to have tried to change this in any way), and living with them. He and his girlfriend are killed and eaten by one particularly nasty fellow that shows up that last season. Treadwell most definitely had a way with animals, making friends with a family of foxes and at least came to an "understanding" with most of the bears he met over the years. Fascinating and disturbing.

Vampires and werewolves and love oh my...yes, the sparkly vampires are back in New Moon -what an odd place is the town of Forks, with all these monsters running around. I enjoyed it --what can I say? (not saying it's good and I'd rather see the movies than read the books).

I watched this 1987 movie for the first time since it came out--because jezebel had an article about it as a feminist movie, and a movie that deals very much with class.

It was fabulous --Jennifer Grey (you should never have had your distinctive nose fixed--it DID destroy your budding career). Patrick Swayze--oh, what a bod. Jerry Orbach excellent as Baby's doctor father, who has taught her certain principles but is shaken when she actually practices them.

In 1963, "Baby," who wants to change the world and make it a better place (she plans to join the peace corps)her vain, puff brain sister, and their parents go to a Jewish resort for three weeks. I used to go to them with my parents and grandparents but was mostly younger than Baby's 17 when we went. There's a sharp divide between the patrons of the resort, middle class assimilated Jews and the entertainment, working class kids of various ethnic groups (blacks and Hispanic included)--it's a time when "dirty dancing" is taking hold in the basements but hasn't yet hit the upstairs yet (this is referenced in the movie). Baby is bored with the resort activities and patrons (the son of the owner is interested in her) and starts hanging around the entertainers, including Johnny (Swayze) and his dance partner Penny. Sex, economic politics abound. I loved it this time around. I think I enjoyed it more this time than when I originally saw it.

Also watched Paul Newman in the 1959 The Young Philadelphians synchronistically, also about class and going for your dreams and sticking to your ideals. An apt pairing. Newman is the son of a woman who has married above her class and had a disastrous wedding night, with the groom running off and killing himself. She's loved by a working class guy (Brian Keith) who she goes to after the groom has run off and gets pregnant. Newman knows only that "Uncle Mike" is close to his mom. He's brought up with the upper class Lawrence name but not their money and unknowingly faces a similar dilemma as his mother when he falls in love with an upper class girl. Robert Vaughn plays Newman's classmate at Princeton, who is ruined by his family for falling in love with a girl out of his own class. He won a deserved Oscar as supporting actor for his role. This one is much better than a few of the other old Newman movies I've watched over the past few months.

And...my mom got wifi--whoopie!