Movie Weekend

I finally had a chance to catch up on a few movies this weekend instead of worrying about work or other obligations in my professional life. I have been buying a movie here and there for the past few weeks. This weekend I enjoyed (500) Days of Summer, On Our Merry Way, The X-Files: I Want to Believe, and Bell, Book, and Candle. The only one I didn't particularly enjoy was the X-Files movie. I have been a fan of that show since I was 12 and did not think that the storyline lived up to any sort of a true X-Files mystery. (500) Days of Summer was great because it's smart and funny. The only problem is that I couldn't enjoy it with others. When I tried to watch it with friends or family, they were easily distracted and didn't appreciate the intelligence of the storyline. The two classics I saw on TCM last year and were also better enjoyed alone. While nearly everyone enjoys Jimmy Stewart movies, I think I've pushed it a little too far. I'm quickly acquiring a large Stewart collection. My goal is to have a complete collection of his movies on DVD someday. I just didn't know it would be this big already!!

I guess it's time to leave the fun of movies behind and get back to work. But since there are still a couple of movies coming in the mail, I'm sure I'll be able to schedule another movie marathon soon.

An aside about movies

I don't know many instances where watching an editing version and an unedited version of a movie vary so much than the experience I had Saturday night. Because I love classic movies, I bought the Mill Creek Entertainment 100 Family Classics movie pack. I watched some of these movies previously on archive.org and wanted to have a copy for myself without putting my computer out of commission for a couple of hours to burn it. The versions of these movies didn't vary until I started watching Calendar Girl. From the beginning, I knew that there was something different with this version. The credits started too abruptly and they ended with a huge splice. I kept watching, then I realized what this version had done: it completely changed the story! The original story centers around Patricia and her Irish fireman father. She meets two young men at the boarding house next door and falls in love with one of them. I'll stop there so I won't give the rest of it away.

Anyway, the edited version included in this movie pack cut out almost every scene with Pat by herself, Pat and her father, and almost the first five minutes of the movie itself. While not containing vital information to understand the plot, it turned the movie's focus from Pat to the two boarders competing for her affection. Even though Jane Frazee is listed as the star, it turns the supporting cast into stars.

As a writer, I wonder what the screenwriter thought of this edited version, if they ever saw it at all. I also wonder what person thought that this movie needed to be reedited in this way and for what purpose.

My movie habits

Most of the time, I try to watch movies that are playing on television. But this gets me into a lot of trouble. Most television stations play the same movie week after week. You never have a choice to what you want to watch, so that's why I choose to rent movies on a regular basis.

I used to only rent a movie about once a month because it was such a hassle to go get the movie and take it back to the store before I was charged late fees. But now with BLOCKBUSTER Online Advantage it's a lot easier to work things out. Instead of trying to get someone to drive me to take the movie back, I can just return the movie through the mail. I love this concept, because I hate to bug people to help me out for something as small as returning a rented movie. And since this program has a ton of classic move options, I'm happy with it. But it's also a good way to get me to watch newer releases that I might not have a chance to watch otherwise.

And BLOCKBUSTER offers a ton of options when it comes to customizing the plan you want. You can receive and return DVDs at the store or through the mail. The number of movies depends on your plan, but you can choose to rent as few as just one at a time. It saves gas, time, and money. That's something I'm for.

Redirecting

Redirecting my attention has been very hard this weekend. Most of the time, I'm well on my way to meeting my weekly goals by the end of the weekend, but this time I just can't seem to focus. I received my movie in the mail, so that was 80 minutes lost. i babysat, which is another two hours. I cleaned... that took maybe another hour. So what happened to the rest of the hours in between? One article. It's safe to say I completed one whole article. This means I got to get in gear tonight... no more excuses. I just spent way too much on groceries and have to get my new laptop within the next couple of weeks, so it's back to work hardcore. Late nights, little sleep, lots of coffee. I want money, and I'm not ashamed to admit it!

Oh, speaking of that article I wrote, it's a sort of test article for my travel series. See what you think: Visit Indianapolis: The Eiteljorg Museum.

Latest Movie Review

To relax last night, I wrote a new movie review. I saw it yesterday on TCM for the third or forth time, and I thought I would share my opinion.

Strategic Air Command

Those that love patriotic movies, Jimmy Stewart, and a big slice of Americana will love Strategic Air Command released by Paramount Pictures in 1955.

Strategic Air Command is a flag-waver of a movie. Not only does it contain appreciation for those that served in American wars (particularly World War II), it also stresses the importance of serving your country in peace time.

...Continue reading my review

Chronically Confused

Because I've been having such a hard time at work, I thought I would turn to my other options that I take for occasional writing jobs -- including working with this blog. My intention to have a blog was never to make money on it, but I would take the occasional paid post. I still do. But I try to only take posts that I know would interest a wide variety of my readers.

So yesterday I spent some time trying to better my blog in order to attract more readers and more sponsors. But it turns out that if you don't put any money into your blog, you can't get anywhere. Very few people like the idea of using Blogger. I guess since it takes less than ten minutes to set up a kind of blog like this, I don't blame anyone for being wary about the quality. But I really wish that before casting me aside, my blog posts would be read. I try to write high quality posts, and I believe that this should be the deciding factor, not whether my Google page rank is higher than 5 or that my blog lives on a domain name that I have no money to pay for.

I guess I'm just upset because of the way some of those sponsor groups I work for. Now there are another set of rankings for blogs, and it put mine down lower on the totem pole than it has been before. I can get paid $5 for a post that someone else gets $250 for, and each post is probably of comparable quality. And I do understand that sponsors are paying for a wide range of exposure that I cannot give them. So I guess I'm saying that once again, I find myself a failure. But at least this time it's not a failure as a writer. It's a failure at being a marketer or advertiser. I guess I just don't believe in the "spend money to make money" concept. I only believe in hard work.

Maybe I should just get a job stuffing envelopes. Then again, even I could screw that up the way my life is going.

Let's forget how I like to complain and move onto something a little bit lighter in mood. I've written a new poem for Earth Day, which you can take a look at on Associated Content:

Mother Nature Cries
An Earth Day Poem
http://www.associatedcontent.comarticle/1576980/mother_nature_cries.html.

I also wrote a movie review on one of my favorite movies, It's a Wonderful Life:

A Wonderful Classic: It's a Wonderful Life
A review of the box office bust turned Christmas classic.
http://www.associatedcontent.comarticle/1577225/a_wonderful_classic_its_a_wonderful.html

I started packing too. I had an empty box sitting in my office for the past week, and since July will come up pretty fast if I don't pay attention, I started packing away a little bit of the decor in my office.

And now I'm going to go sit in front of the television for awhile to see if I can forget about anything that's happened this week.

I Love TCM!!

I think I'm officially obsessed with this channel. I spent all day watching it yesterday, skipping my traditional 2 hours of I Love Lucy. Take that, TVLand. Anywhoo... yesterday it was a Katherine Hepburn marathon. And although I get really sick of her Shakespearean airs (even in the comedies!) I can tell you that I loved watching Stage Door, Bringing Up Baby, and The Philadelphia Story. And although Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? was not a movie played, that's another Hepburn classic I really like.

But through watching TCM a lot these last few weekends, I have discovered that I really like Ginger Rogers too... not for the dancing, but for the acting, which is something that does always bring her legend the praise that it deserves. I mean, she was great in Stage Door, but she danced less than a minute throughout the whole movie.

I don't know why I'm rambling on and on about classic movies when I have work to do... I guess it's dinner, Nightly News, then back to all those articles. Maybe I can get enough done tonight so that I can sleep in tomorrow.

TCM

I cannot tell you just how much I love my TCM channel. Now I get to watch some of the greatest movies without having to buy them or wish I could buy them. Today was a Henry Fonda marathon, so I caught Stage Struck and Yours, Mine, and Ours. The latter I've seen a dozen times on television when I was little, but this was the first time for Stage Struck and I loved it. But of course this title isn't available on DVD, so I am a little upset about that. But at least I have TCM, which actually plays classic movies like it advertises, instead of tricking you like TVLand or AMC.