Month of Gratitude, Day 24: Movies

I am grateful for the movies.  

As in, "I'm/we're going to the movies."

Not watching at home on the VCR (old days), or on DVD, or streaming on your computer.  Actually going to a movie theater, to watch a movie.  And here's where I've probably seen more of any in my life -- at the wonderful Fairfax Theatre, in Fairfax California . . . the closest theater to Bean Up The Nose Art's California digs, and which offers a great random sampling of first-run "shows" (as my grandma used to call the movies).

We're coming up to the final days of the Month of Gratitude, and the stakes are getting higher . . . what are the biggies, without which life would just be something completely awful?  What are the things that mean the very most?

Movies are definitely "final week" material for me.  They have nurtured my creative, emotional, and spiritual soul ever since I can remember.  There is NOTHING ON EARTH like sitting in a dark theater and letting the magic of creative vision pour over you.  Getting lost in the story.  Getting inspired by the heroics.  Getting blown away by the abilities of humans to create worlds and ways of seeing things that make you think, on your darkest days, that life nevertheless remains amazing and wonderful.  

The first movie I remember seeing -- in Reno, Nevada, where my dad drove my mom and me downtown for the big show in our best dresses, was "Mary Poppins." 

That did it.  I was in love.  Cartoon penguins who danced with Dick Van Dyke?!?!  Chimney sweeps leaping across rooftops?!?!?  Medicine that changed colors?!?!  Laughing making you drift up to the ceiling?!?!?  SIGN.  ME.  UP.  

I was totally hooked.  

I loved everything.  "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,"  "True Grit," "The Cowboys," "The Way We Were," "The French Connection,"  "Little Big Man," "The Sting."  And though I did not see it at the time it came out (for some reason, my parents found this movie -- though not others -- too dark), "The Godfather" has since become a complete favorite.  

Another life-changer was "The Natural."  The cinematography of Roy Hobbs running around the bases in the rain with sparks from the lights coming down onto the field . . . in  . . . super . . . slow . . . motion . . . makes me sigh a gigantic sigh of appreciation even as I type.  

Baseball movies abound on my appreciation list.  There is "Bull Durham," along with "The Natural."  And "Field of Dreams."  

Which gets me realizing that many of my most-appreciated flicks are "real-life-with-something-extra" stories.  Not fantasies or sci-fi or alternate universes.  Nope.  Real life, but with a little extra elbow-in-the-ribs by the filmmakers, saying, "See what's really going on, underneath?"  Yes, there are dead baseball players who would like to come play in your backyard.  Yes, you can recover from catastrophic injuries, and become a mythical homerun hitter.  Yes, you can get stuck in some sort of time-loop, which ironically will give you the chance to learn how you really want to live your life:  

I have loved many, many movies since "Groundhog Day."  Dark dramas that wrestle with notions of what is truly moral, what is good and what is evil:  "Miller's Crossing," "Elizabeth,"  "Gladiator," "Hotel Rwanda."  And, back to the "real-life-with-something more" genre, there is the amazing "Pan's Labyrinth," which unbelievably melds real life historical peril with the "something more" behind it.

My most-appreciated movie so far this year?  "Get Low."  Because, as I am getting older, Ifind myself appreciating film-makers who obviously cherish older and quirkier folk, and who make movies about their rich, experience-filled stories.  

My most-looked forward to movie:

 
Fabulous writers.  Fabulous directors.  Awesome actors.  Cowboys.  What more could a girl want?

Thank you, thank you, thank you to the movies, for all the entertainment and sustenance, "surprise and reassurance," that you have provided me for my whole life.  You are the most expensive and complicated of all the art forms.  It is thus a miracle when a movie turns out to be wondrous -- because there are so many places along the way that things can fall down, and people can screw up.  When it all comes together, it is truly a thing of beauty.  For all of those, and for all the attempts, and for all of those people involved . . .  I AM GRATEFUL!

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ONLY SEVEN DAYS LEFT!  Post a comment letting us know what you're grateful for this month, and be entered in the November 30 drawing for Bean Up The Nose Art goodies!  Tweet, blog, or Facebook about this and receive five additional entries in the drawing.