2005-05-09 11:34 p.m.

The Movie Meme

Tagged on this one by Snarkypants.

1) Total number of films I own on DVD/video:
About 20. I tend to rent rather than buy, so the ones I own are the ones I really love. (I've also been stocking up more on the TV DVDs, because who knows how long stuff like Wonderfalls and Arrested Development are going to stay in print?)

2) The last film I bought:
I bought two at once (along with the aforementioned Wonderfalls DVD): Election and Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle. Election is a genius character study that manages to have an actual plot (see #3), and Tracy Flick is the tightass type-A Reese Witherspoon was born to play. And Harold and Kumar is the best movie about the munchies ever made, managing to be stupidly funny while slipping in some sly commentary about race and stereotyping along with the fart jokes.

3) The last film I watched:
Napoleon Dynamite, and I didn't like it nearly as much as I'd hoped to. It didn't seem to have plot or much character development, and the 70s and 80s kitch aspect seemed annoyingly self-conscious.

4) Five films that I watch a lot or that mean a lot to me:
The Philadelphia Story. Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn and Jimmy Stewart as smart, snarky and romantically confused rich people. Has one of the funniest drunk scenes ever filmed.

Memento. A layered, complex, trippy character study of a man who may or may not have murdered his wife. The going-backwards-in-time aspect could have become a total gimmick, but as used here, each turn twists the plot and changes the way you think about the main characters. An amazing piece of filmmaking.

Blazing Saddles. My family and I used to watch this every time it came on TV, back in the days when they didn't edit the sound out of the campfire scene. In fact, what with the jokes made at the expense of blacks, women, Jews, gays, drunks, old people, the Irish, the Chinese, the Germans, ignorant townsfolk named Johnson, and Hedy Lamarr ("that's HEDLEY"), this movie could probably not get made today. Every time I see this I'm glad my momma raised me right. It's twoo, it's twoo!

The Third Man. A beautifully-shot and -scored mystery, a languid meditation on cynicism and greed, set in postwar Vienna and featuring God himself, Orson Welles. This film's justly recognized for having the best entrance in cinematic history, but the exit at the end of the movie is pretty cool too.

Amelie. Recluse with gnomes.

5) Tag five people and have them put this in their journal:

Amblus, Rumblelizard, Captvfirefly, Sue, matrushkaka, you're it.

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