Meghna and Sugarlove Girl's Movie Marathon

This holiday season, we didn't manage to see the gorgeous lights at Van Dusen or to ride on the miniature train in Stanley Park, but we DID manage to have a post-boxing day movie marathon. Essentially, we came up with a list of about 10 films that both Meghna and I were interested in seeing. And then I got out the movie listing section from The Georgia Straight and tried to cobble together a schedule that would give us a breather between films, but not so much time that would leave us wanting to go home and crawl back into our pyjamas.

Then we sent an email out to a bunch of folks we know and love, telling them when and where we'd be. I was prepared and packed up the following to enhance our movie going experience (hey - I wasn't a brown nosing Girl Guide for nuthin').

• 2 bottles of water (check)
• 1 bag of Twizzlers (check) (because maybe I'll let them take me for a ride on the popping corn, but I'm not gonna let them force me to empty out my pockets for a few stands of licorice!)
• 1 Fresca (check) (see above)
• 1 turkey sammich (check) (because there's no actual meal break scheduled in the day)
• 1 Coke (check) in case an energy boost is needed in the final film (it wasn't actually necessary). Plus, see above.
• 1 box of "after Christmas discounted miniature, individually wrapped Toblerone Bars" (check) (for sharing - ergo the individually wrapped thing)
• 1 container of soylent green (AKA nutritional yeast) to sprinkle on the popcorn

We started with an 11:30 a.m. screening of "Avatar". Despite the complicated politics which will probably warrant a veritable tome of cultural studies papers in the not-so-distant future, it is truly, TRULY one of the most beautiful films I've ever experienced (and the 3-D thing does help one "experience" the film). And you really could argue the politics of the film from many sides of a heady and complicated debate. (Though you can't really argue the truth about a film that espouses the need for environmental accountability, will, in fact, make millions of dollars from millions of plastic Avatar toys that will be sold by the mega corp McDonald's, and most of which will end up in land fill sites). All of that aside, it is astounding to watch. And while it weighs in at a hefty 2 hours and 45 minutes, I felt like I'd slipped into the lavish worlds I loved in the Myst games.... Mister Man joined us for this one.

Then M and I had ourselves a speed walk to take us to the next theatre for a 4:40 screening of "It's Complicated". Okay. It's not gonna change your lives. But for those of us who went to the theatre with no real expectations, it was quite lovely. I was happy to see that the story validated the experience of a woman in her 50's as a sexual and independent being. This is frighteningly rare. I mean it's always been okay for a man to be attractive and sexual well into his 60's, but if you believe everything you see on tv, well let's just leave it there.... It wouldn't be holiday-like of me to start foaming at the mouth on New Year's Eve. We were joined for this one by the lovely Bunklelife and by the founding members of the original movie club, Suzo and Emma. (pictured below, Suzo mocks my sammich - I think she was jealous. It WAS delicious.)

And then we slipped into the food fair for a 10 minute meal before the final film of the day, "Nine" in which Bunkle, Meghna and I were joined by Ana and Ms. Lori. Beautifully shot, "Nine" features some stellar performances and, despite a slow start, all of us musical lovin' types were quite enthralled by the end of it. Every time I was about to step on my soap box when the film was careening down the "let's endorse the myth of the tortured, womanizing male genius", one of the female characters in the film would address my thought as though they had just reached into my head and plucked it from my brain.

By 8:30 at night, we were full from our film buffet (though we only ate of the popping corn once, and we didn't even break into the bag of Twizzlers.) It was a perfect post-Christmas pursuit. Next year we're goin' for 4.