Midnight in Paris

 

Movies are my books. People read books to be taken to a different world, one that is different from theirs, and can act as an escape from the mundane world that they live in. People read a book to connect with a character. People place themselves in the story and can just relate. People admire that character, and feel like that character is them. They then will take the courage of that character and use it in their life. That is the power of books, the author creates this world, and we see ourselves in it. It is a way to escape from our problems, and trails.

Now I like to think I enjoy reading and read on a regular basis, but I don't. It is hard for me to keep reading a book, that is why I do movies. Not every movie can have that power of a book, but from time to time I get lost in the movie, and come out thinking about how I want to live in the world of

                                                   

                                             John Keating in Dead Poets Society

                                                  or Will Hunting in Good Will Hunting 

                                                    or Scotty Smalls in the Sandlot

Now I must first say that I am not comparing this movie, or the story anywhere near that of those I mentioned. But it was a movie that I really connected with right now with where I am right now. I must add that I went to this movie alone, during the day on a Tuesday, and was the only one in the theater which was a first.




Midnight in Paris stars Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, and Kathy Bates. Owen Wilson is a movie writer that is trying is luck at writing a novel, and is currently engaged to Rachel McAdams. They are on vacation with her parents in Paris, and Owen Wilson loves Paris, and the idea of Paris.

He just wants to walk around Paris and take it in. We all have an era that we dream about growing up in. Mine is definitely the 50's when kids rode their bikes, and life was so simple. Owen Wilson's character would love to have lived in 1920's in Paris.

That is where F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and Cole Porter where hanging out. Paris is where the artists, and thinkers of that generation went to do their thing. When McAdams wants to do other things and spend time with this old friend that they bumped into, Wilson got his chance to just explore Paris.

He found this world that was all that he could wish for. He goes back each night, and is able to look at his live and find a direction that is best for him. He also learns what it means to love, and to take chances, and doing what you believe in. Then when he comes back to reality he applies what he learned.

What I gained from this cinematic experienced while at the theater on a Tuesday afternoon by myself was that I need to follow my dreams, to not fear the result, but to go at it with my head up and do what I love. That I can't just stay at McDonald's getting fresh fries for complaining customers, I can't continue to go to movies by myself on weekday afternoons. I need to find my passion for a job, and do it. I need to find someone to attend these movies with me on Friday and Saturday evenings(although they are a lot cheaper on a Tuesday afternoon).

If by chance you do go see this you might not get anything close to that from the movie, and when it comes down to it, it is a creative story and a twist to the cookie cutter romantic comedy. And I think you will enjoy it. Owen Wilson did a great job, he is one of my favorite actors with his casual acting that seems so natural, and his simple humor.

Easy A

This movie isn't exactly new, but it was the next movie on my blockbuster Que. And with seeing Emma Stone in Crazy Stupid Love, I wanted to see her in something else. I wasn't sure what this movie was about before viewing it, but I have decided I like going into a movie not knowing much and letting it tell me the story from scratch.

Nothing drives me more crazy than watching a movie with someone that wont wait for the movie to explain something. Seriously, just wait. That might be why I am privy to going to the movies alone or I am just that pathetic, not sure.

So Easy A is a Mean Girls like movie. They are so much a like that they are both stared with red heads that narrate the movie. At least one isn't crazy. Emma Stone is an average girl in high school, and one day her friend asks her about her weekend and Emma Stone, who is rather sarcastic in the show jokes that she was with some guy from a community college. The friend begins to assume that she had hooked up with this guy, and all of a sudden the rumor spread through out the whole school. She was now the school bimbo.

Now we all have had rumors started about us, and we can react two ways, either you deny it, or not deny it. By not denying it people just assume it is true. That is the road Emma Stone chose, and mainly it was because people now noticed her, she wasn't average anymore. Then the rumor turns to more rumors and she is now getting return from guys to just let them say things happened, but in all reality nothing ever happened. She then is playing into the rumor and it gets to the point where she starts to believe it and she hits rock bottom. The ending was alright, a little anti climatic, but it was creative in a sense that it incorporated things that had been mentioned earlier in the show, so maybe a cute coincidence.

This movie really brings out the question do we care what people think about us if we are getting attention? People want to be noticed, even shy quiet people, people that make fun of popular people, everyone wants to be noticed. Its just natural.

But does it matter what is getting us noticed. This girl had let a rumor between her and her friend change how the whole school thought of her. And it wasn't good, she was the girl that slept around with everyone. In the end the movie shows that it does matter, that it is better to not be noticed than to be thought negatively. And really people notice a lot more then they let on, so why make what they notice be negative.

One of my favorite parts about the movie was the interaction between Emma Stone and her parents. It was a lot of give and take, and sarcasm, and I thought that the family was well casted. Overall an average movie, funny lines but just mindless entertainment really.