I take for granted how much of an accomplishment it is to sit up. I notice it now when I see the extreme effort, the ab workout that my daughter is doing to be able to accomplish something that no longer gains me my wife’s applause.
My daughter definitely is cuter than me trying to sit up.
Also! Make sure that you watch Alejandro Monteverde’s masterpiece, Bella. Very awesome movie.
It’s pretty much a slap in the face to cliches/stereotypes/conventions. And how does it do that? By portraying life.
Monteverde wrote it/directed it himself and many of the actors and production staff were working for passion and not money.
Many things I love about this film, but one of the cool parts is that it takes out all of the filler. You know how some movies will be all, “Leading man! I must leave now out of anguish and fear. Here is an establishing shot of me walking away to segue! Segue!”
Monteverde takes that out. It leads to some pretty interesting timeline aspects. Is this a flashback, foreshadow, or just a possible future?
Beards and scarves, baby.
But Bella avoids melodrama. It’s not a telenovela, not even close. The incredibly tense-emotion-type stuff is released by natural means, like in my favorite scene. Main man is reminiscing with main woman in an old car. “Last time I drove this, I went to jail.” We see why and there’s tears and all that, but then younger brother hops into the back seat with a, “I’ve met the woman I’m going to marry.” (Even though he’s known her for only a week.)
Monteverde and Eduardo Verástegui (main man) said in the “making of” that they wanted a refreshing movie where a Latino family didn’t have to deal with drugs, gang violence, or running from La Migra. Those issues are nowhere to be seen, because frankly not everyone in New York is living in the seedy underbelly.
It won lots of awards, including top prize at Toronto. It’s in the same category as Chariots of Fire, American Beauty, Life is Beautiful, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon “Li Mu Bai!!!” and Hotel Rwanda .
Not bad for a dollar rental from the kiosk.
(I should have learned from Stardust. The kiosk rocks. (Even if I did fall asleep during 300.)(The Spirit? Hmmmm. Will Eisner…Samuel L. Jackson…Intriguing noir.))
And yes, Devin, A Study in Emerald is amazing.
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