Evening

I just saw Evening based on a book by Susan Minot. The movie received terrible reviews but has a stellar cast: Merril Streep (with a brief part) and her daughter, Vanessa Redgrave and her daughter Natasha Richardson, Toni Collette, and the super cute Hugh Dancy just to name a few. But the big draw for me is Claire Danes. Even though the movie is pretty scholcky, soap operaesque and all over the place, it is still fun to watch her. Worth seeing? Probably not -- unless you like watching great actresses in a kinda dumb movie.

Dark and Light: Away from Her and Miss Potter

Last night I saw the DVD Away From Her about a 60ish couple who lose each other due to Alzheimer's disease. The couple, Fiona and Grant, played by the beautiful Julie Christie and an actor unknown to me, Gordon Pinsent, live comfortably on a lake in Ontario when Fiona begins forgetting words for common objects and sticks a frying pan in the freezer. Grant is destroyed at the thought of losing the love of his life -- they have been married for 44 years -- and fights her wish to go to a care facility, even after she gets lost after cross-country skiing near her home. While watching the movie, I had a sick feeling in my stomach; it was painful to watch Gordon's sadness and Fiona falling into oblivion. The experience of watching this movie reminded me of watching Wit, with Emma Thompson who dies slowly and painfully from cancer. Both are not fun but are incredibly powerful and beautifully made movies.

On a much lighter note I also saw Miss Potter finally. Finally because last summer I put Miss Potter on my Netflix queue and mostly it was no. 1 but for some bizarre reason I did not get it until two weeks ago. I even called and emailed Netflix about this and was told that they only have so many copies of some movies and when they are very popular blah blah ... blah. Really, Miss Potter is a hot item in the US, seems unlikely but who am I. So anyway after all that build up, I enjoyed the movie and have always liked the real Beatrix Potter and her clever and beautifully drawn stories. While Renee Zellweger did a fine job as Miss Potter, I couldn't help wishing the wonderful Emily Watson would have played the artist instead. Instead she plays the publisher's sister. The publisher is Ewan McGregor and he is Miss Potter's suitor. The movie is cute and pretty and fun to watch but at times a little fluffy.