See me.
Time Warner Cable came today; I am officially reconnected to the world of the interwebs, plus have a fancy new cable connection (HDTV, DVR, plus the challenge of choosing an aspect ratio that doesn’t stretch out everyone’s faces) to play with. As I type this, I’m sitting at my table in my underwear, with nary a concern about frappucinos or signal loss. If I want to, I can peruse IMDB at 3 AM, say, to look up a certain film (see below) I’ve been compulsively watching over and over again…not to mention delete spam while waiting for my dinner to cook, finish uploading the "cookies against the war" pictures I mentioned in my previous post, you name it.
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Incidentally, the film to which I was referring, The Holiday, is a romantic comedy that came out just before last Christmas. Those of you who know me well may understand why part of me feels the need to cringe (or shower) when acknowledging my affection for a "romantic comedy." On the other hand, those of you who know me even better know that my personal movie collection includes well-worn copies of Moonstruck, Betsy’s Wedding, The Wedding Singer (in fact, an astonishing/embarassing number of movies with "wedding" in the title), Amélie, and other, less-traditional fare that nonetheless has something in common: happy endings. I admit it, despite my cynical and even at times, faux-frosty exterior, I can be a bit of a sucker for them.
…Maybe it’s because I am living vicariously through them…
The truth is, despite the various things in my life for which I am grateful, the good fortune of which I may even be somewhat undeserving, and the amazing daily miracles that I try to remember not to take for granted…I’m still not happy. Or rather, not content. I still feel like there is more out there for me, and there’s no reason I shouldn’t have it. Specifically, I am not happy about the one area of my life that makes watching those films rather bittersweet…the area that, regardless of all the other successes and luck I’ve experienced, feels empty.
In case it isn’t obvious enough to you what that area is, rent The Holiday. I saw it for the first time over Memorial Day Weekend, after choosing it as likely to be a crowdpleaser for the group of 5 adults over the age of 50 who were all upstate with me (my dad, somewhat egocentrically, chose Babel- I was indeed interested, but it’s absolutely not the kind of thing my mom enjoys). I had no interest in it when it came out last December, and held similarly low expectations for the rental version.
However, it completely surprised me.
Then a month or so ago, I spied a previously-viewed copy of it on sale at Hollywood Video, and scrounged up 3 other DVDs to get the 4/$20 sale price…convinced Jackie that she needed to see it as well, then at some point invited her over to watch it together. That was awhile ago. Now that I’ve moved into my new place, by chance (or not) it was the first movie I put into my new (well, used) DVD player…and it’s been in there ever since. I’m ever-so-slightly sheepish about admitting that I have watched some or all of this movie *every day* since then. Yet I figure at this point, I’ve confessed enough here already that it’s hardly going to tip the embarassment scale…
Why am I so drawn to this film? I think, besides the happy ending, there are two other main/related reasons. One is that the narrator, Iris, reminds me tremendously (and in some ways, painfully) of myself. The other is that Iris + happy ending = hope for me. I feel like going into any further detail here will just be beating a dead horse, so all I will add is that if you still don’t get it, but really want to understand…rent it and see.
See me.
