I’m not sure that 2009’s New In Town with Renée Zellweger and Harry Connick Jr. is a rewatch because I don’t remember seeing it before. When we were at The Compound, all of the DVDs lived in the Doll House with Timothy. This made it easier, whenever one of our writing partners visited, for someone to sit on the floor and read out titles to the rest of us until we all agreed on something to watch. But when we moved to Houndstooth Hall, we had more room over in the house, so the DVDs are shelved here, including ones Timothy added. He remembers watching this one, so it’s probably one he grabbed from the used bin at Blockbuster. I enjoyed it, not only the leads, but the supporting cast.
About A Boy, from 2002, isn’t really a RomCom so much as comedy/drama. I’m pretty sure I read Nick Hornby’s novel (same title), and it felt like something I wanted to see today. Directed by brothers Chris and Paul Weitz, it features a solid cast that includes Hugh Grant, Toni Collette, Rachel Weisz, and Nicholas Hoult.
I also finished the seventh and final novel in the series I’ve been rereading. It was quite strange, because there were passages that seemed different to me, and I didn’t think that could be possible. I’ve read these novels so many times. One of the passages was so jarring that I took my iPad to Debby’s to read to her, asked if she remembered it as having been written the way that was unfamiliar to me, and she did. That’s when we discovered that her physical book versions of at least one of the novels and the versions I downloaded on my iPad match, but are different from the physical books I’ve been reading since I was an adolescent that were published by a bookclub. The editor in me has what I think is a good grasp of why the bookclub made the edits it did (and I prefer the bookclub versions). I’d like to know how the author felt about the changes. (She’s been dead since 1984, and these are not books that would have gotten literary analysis/criticism that I could research.) Another problem with my ebook versions of all seven novels is that they contained many copy errors (e.g., misspelled words, missing words, wrong character names). If I ever read the series again, I’ll stick to my print copies.
Ooh, I saw ‘About a Boy’ many years ago! Maybe when it was first released, but don’t hold me to that.
There hasn’t been a great deal of movies which have appealed to me this year, but hopefully that will change. I do enjoy going to the cinema – and there’s a lovely 1930s cinema run by a charitable trust down the road in Wareham. I think the last film I saw at the cinema was Wicked Little Letters. That’s a good movie. The Penguin Lessons looks fun, so hopefully they will show that.
I haven’t been inside a theater since just before the pandemic shutdown.
I do enjoy going to the cinema. I need to keep a better look out for what’s showing.
You could always pick something to see during a quiet time. The first films I saw at the cinema once they started re-opening here, there was hardly anyone in the auditorium. And you can wear a mask when and where you want.
I never hesitate to wear a mask. If that triggers anybody’s anti-mask behavior, they can get over it. There are lots of health reasons people wear masks, and really, why is it anyone’s business?
Here, though… I don’t remember which mass shooting incident it was that made Debby decide she wasn’t going back to the movies, and I understood her choice. The movies I saw after that, I literally would take time before the movie started to find all the exits, all the possible entry points where someone could come in. It’s a sad reality to live with.
The pandemic happened after that.
I have seen some reaction videos on YouTube (what better way to spend one’s time), where I have heard other Americans say a similar thing. It simply wouldn’t even cross my mind. For better and ill, we live in different worlds.
I abhor our gun violence, our gun culture, and our reputation because of it. It makes me sick.
Yeah. I find the sentence ‘I don’t know which mass shooting incident it was..’ to be very telling. That the US has so many to choose from is rather disturbing. Not going to the cinema because I might get shot is simply not something that would cross my mind, though it could happen anywhere of course.
I just watched a video about how the UK gun laws changed following the Dunblane massacre in 1996. Sad that that had to happen first to change things here.
And sad that nothing that happened provoked gun reform here. The refrain is “they’re going to take all our guns!” It’s not possible to take everyone’s guns. That isn’t what commonsense gun reform advocates. It advocates education, the types of guns available, and waiting periods. It advocates procedures in place that keep anybody anywhere from walking into any gun show or gun shop or big box store and buying a gun and ammunition without some kind of waiting period and background check.
Also, it’s the mass shootings that get the publicity, but the heartache is also all the children who get hold of a parent’s weapon and accidentally shoot themselves or someone else to death. It’s the suicides that might not have happened without a weapon within easy reach.
And it’s maddening that a majority of the population wants gun reform, but lobbyists have bought politicians and prevented it.