I saw Cake as more than a movie about a woman addicted to prescription pain pills. And it’s more than a movie about a woman recovering from a debilitating accident. That said, it could have been even more. I’m not sure how, but something was off. Jennifer Anniston was not one of those off things,…
Boyhood was a great film to watch, even if it wasn’t a particularly great film. The premise, filming a movie using the same cast over a twelve-year period, filmed to watch as Mason grows from the pictured six-year-old to a young man graduating from high school, is unique and makes the movie stand out. And…
For many (if not most) people, watching Wild will be a view from the outside of a woman on a journey to heal her soul as she hikes the Pacific Crest Trail. For me, it was a journey of my own as I tested the fortitude of the healing scars of my own path. Wild…
Oscar winner for Best Foreign Language Film, The Great Beauty (La Grande Bellezza from Italy) is, well, different. As my movie companion and I left the theater, we shared our perplexity over what, exactly, the movie was about. I’ve sat with it for several days now, but still, I’ve not much more than questions and…
Inside Llewyn Davis is an enjoyable movie—dare I say, an easy movie. After the other movies I’ve seen this season, it was a nice change. Don’t get me wrong: this isn’t a pretty movie or a happy movie. But it’s basic. It’s also basic done very well. It doesn’t have a grand statement on life;…
The summer was full of “coming of age” movies, telling the tales of those turning the page from the teens toward adulthood. But Frances Ha finds the real time of coming of age to adulthood—those years in the late 20s when’s so many truly figure out how to settle into the person they’ve become. The…
Much from the first book I read by Brené Brown (I Thought it was Just Me) is repeated here, but it’s “packaged” in more easily accessible chunks. The information is good, but it feels like it glosses the surface in a way that feels a bit too commercialized. (I suspect that’s my take based on…
“If enough of us make small changes in our lives, we will see big changes.” “Change doesn’t require heroics. Change begins when we practice ordinary courage.” I learned about this author, Brené Brown, from several people. It’s almost as if I was *supposed* to read her work, but the Universe knew that I didn’t pick…
The Untethered Soul has good things to say. And they are pretty basic. Admittedly, for the researcher/scholarly writer I am, I had difficulty at times with the lack of references, research, data, etc. But this isn’t about that. This book, instead, is about depth and getting along in life. As I read this book, I…
Anger. Grief. Victimization. Joy. Hope. Helplessness. Shame. Trust. Outrage. Support. And love. Love. Short Term 12 is a movie that moves through the above things with the heart and openness needed to truly get a glimpse into the lives shared in the film. I laughed. I cried. I ached deeply inside at the hurt portrayed…
What started many of these Summer 2013 coming of age movies? It was Mud, which opened early this past summer. I got around to watching it only this past week. When I think of Matthew McConaughey, I tend to think Rom-Com. But in retrospect, I suppose that’s not completely fair. He was in The Paperboy,…
