My Second Most Favorite Thing

 Reading is perhaps my first love, as pastimes go.  Second only to it are movies.  Movies have always been a large part of my life and continue to be.  I have recently identified myself as a HSP (highly sensitive person) and I respond very profoundly to the arts and movies get quite the reaction from me.

As I mentioned a bit ago, my father was in the media in my young childhood and when I was about 10 or so he decided to become the Cecil B. DeMille of San Antonio, Texas.  There are so many things wrong with that concept but I digress.  When he left the field of news reporting he opened an audio visual business where he did several things including some political films for up and coming politicians.  He also made three movies — one being 

It is a terrible movie, made in San Antonio and surrounding areas and starring many folks from the local little theater.  I mean, when you consider that San Antonio is not a movie making paradise, maybe it wasn’t so bad but…..I still watch it every year on my father’s birthday because he is a narrator and I can hear his voice and I can hear my own as a “screamer” off camera.  Not everybody can say those things so there is that

Anyway, we were big movie goers.  We went to the movies almost every weekend.  We frequented the neighborhood theater 

And the closest drive in theater —

When my parents didn’t go I would go with my cousin.  How many movies I sat through with her — some more than once — “West Side Story” comes to mind.  Oh, and “Lawrence of Arabia”.  So many movies, so many hours, so many memories.

So, today, I am still watching movies.  I watch old movies, like vintage black and white films (The Haunting of Hill House” is a go-to). For a while now I have found it difficult to sit through a full length movie without fidgeting and messing with my iPad and stitching — I blame it on my anxiety — I think I am going to buy a fidget spinner.  However, lately we have done a lot of streaming — “Yellowstone”, “Heartland”, “Call the Midwife”, etc. so I am actually sitting for a longer period and watching and am finally able to watch a whole movie.

Now, I have to say that when I was young I always admired the male leads in the movies.  I had the fiercest crush on Frank Sinatra when I was about 11.  My father didn’t get it, Sinatra was an old man, he said, but as we all know the movies keep you forever young.  I believe “Young at Heart” is my favorite Sinatra movie but “From Here to Eternity” was a fav as well.

So recently my attention was grabbed by the current Bleu de Chanel ad featuring Timothee Chalamet.  All I will say about this is I am old, not dead.  “Nuf said, check it out and see if you concur.  Anyway, I started looking at his movies and yesterday I sat and watched “A Rainy Day in New York”.  Typical Woody Allen.  

Woody Allen is weird, I like his work but I find him repulsive so I am glad this movie didn’t star him — I would have never watched it.  But I enjoyed it.  It stared Chalamet, Elle Fanning and Selena Gomez — all up and coming young stars and they were great but what was even better was the setting —

Let’s face it, the setting is what makes a movie, right?  The apartments (“You’ve Got Mail”, for instance), the outdoor scenes (“In the Garden of Good and Evil”) and the “Rainy Day” movie.  I will probably watch it again just to enjoy the scenery — I have never been to New York so it was a treat.

Today I might watch the 2019 version of “Little Women”, also starring Chalamet along with Saoirse Ronan, another of my favorite young stars.  I saw “Little Women” in the theater with granddaughter and loved it and I think today might be a good day or, perhaps on Thursday when we will be having a cold rain — so cozy!

So, I recommend any of the above mentioned movies for your viewing pleasure.  Well, except for my father’s.  I loved my father but I don’t recommend his movie and no, that isn’t a tease.  I really don’t.  

Do you watch movies?  What are your favorites?  What genre?  You have heard of book clubs — maybe somebody should start a movie club!  Yeah, no, not me.  I still have to get a fidget spinner.

Have a wonderful day!