The Rabbit Hole

I made it through January and February somehow, but the real time of peril for my movie-a-week-in-the-theaters new year's resolution is from now until December. Despite the best efforts of the movie industry to transform the Academy season (only movies that people win awards for, none that people actually see), there are really only two event movie weekends, Thanksgiving and Christmas, and everything else is scatter-shot. It's worrying because August was already a really slow period for movies. I mean, I saw 30 Minutes or Less because of desperation-driven interst and not much else. (Verdict? Not really worth it.) I was looking forward to a bunch of August movies--Fright Night, Conan, Colombiana--before they got horrible reviews and I gave up. (Except for Fright Night. If I'm damned for causing the reboot/remake crisis because I keep going to them, at least I'm seeing that one. And I did, so shut up.)

But things are looking not so hot. Contagion I will see because any movie about diseases wiping out humanity are okay with me. It's like a zombie movie, but no one's dead. (And, if they are, they stay that way. I approve!) My lab-mate, A, convinced me to go see some movie with Ryan Gosling about cars, but I'm not exactly looking forward to that. I can't even look forward to that Straw Dogs remake even though it had two men I lust after in it because...really, Hollywood? A Straw Dogs remake? Was that called for?

After Contagion, the next movie I actually have an interest in seeing (as opposed to Paranormal Activity 3 which I'll see because of tradition, which is how come I've seen every. single. Saw. movie. including seeing one in the dreaded 3D format) is In Time. It's a movie that literally gives an excuse for Hollywood only ever casting young people in movies, and they have cast some exceptionally attractive (and, even occassionally, actually talented) people in it besides. (Except the ladies. Count me out of the Olivia Wilde/Amanda Seyfried fan brigade.) I wish I were a person who loves/loved the Muppets ever, or their new movie would intrigue me at all. (Spoiler: it doesn't, not even with Amy Adams and the clever-ish ad campaign. I will still probably see it, possibly with Muppets fans, which could rub off on me and make it better.) A Sherlock Holmes sequel? Eh, okay. Another Mission Impossible movie? Fine, but only because of Jeremy Renner.

Honestly, Academy season is sounding better and better. One of the Academy-bait movies is Iron Lady with Meryl fucking Streep as Margaret Thatcher. She'll do too good a job, per her usual, and I'll be put in the uncomfortable position of having feelings in favor of Margaret bloody Thatcher, but it's Meryl Streep and she'll make it happen. Other women who hoped to win Oscars this year? Go suck it. She got denied for Julie and Julia, and barring a terrible movie, she'll win this time. She'll probably win anyway. It's not like she's got much competition, and not just because she's Meryl Streep. (Hollywood. Gender politics. Best not to get into it.) And then there's War Horse, which I will see for the preponderance of British actors of quality in it, though I somehow doubt that the real horses will be as moving as the puppets I saw in the stage production. (SEE IT. IT IS THE BRILLIANCE THAT MAKES THEATER ART.) That's it. Balls.