Thank You Kindly

[source]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!! In addition to being full of (delicious delicious) food, I'm also full to bursting with thanks. As is appropriate at this holiday and in light of a tumultuous year, I think it's only fitting that my next post should celebrate those things for which I am most thankful. And I gotta tell you, this year's list is a doozy.

My apartment

[source]

As I may have mentioned before, there was a period of about a month this year where I was significantly homeless. However, thanks to diligence and sheer dumb luck, I've now been living in my first big girl apartment! This is a twofer "thanks" because in addition to being thankful for my apartment (and the potential to decorate and, well, NEST), I'm crazy thankful for my (amazing, talented) friends who put me up (and put up with me) during those weeks. I'd like to say that I don't know where I'd be without them, but I'm pretty sure I'd be on the streets. So thank you Apartment #15 and thank you friends!

Family

Well, come on. This should go without saying. My family got me where I am today, and are the reason I'm still going. I love those silly bastards more and more every day.

Vitamin D & Zyrtec

[source]

Because apparently I'm as frail as a Mrs. Haversham [though could we argue she's quite hardy? An argument for another time (nerd jokes rule.)] and I see the sun even less - but thanks to modern medicine I can finally function.

Real Good Books

[source]

With all the commuting I do now in my urban setting, I'm thankful now more than ever for good books. This year I got to dig into some new favorites, including Let The Great World Spin by Colum McCann, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, and Divisadero by Michael Ondaatje. Yes, ok, I'm behind several eight balls on all of those, but whatever. At least I'm reading them now. I'm starting The Hunger Games series now and I must say, having a good (or at least entertaining) book to slip into on the subway makes for an almost enjoyable ride to work.

Real Good Websites

[source]

Thank goodness for sites like Flavorwire and HelloGiggles. I don't know how I would make it through the day without articles like "Hilariously 'Ugly Renaissance Babies'" or "Guys, I Have Brain Tumors" or "TV Characters and Their Literary Counterparts". They also give me little drops of inspiration every day, so I'm definitely glad these sites exist. Keep up the good work, guys (and ladies).

Real Good TV Shows

[source]

New shows like Pan Am and American Horror Story (two wildly different shows, by the by...what does this say about me that I enjoy them both equally?) make my week so very bearable. I'm so glad that new shows like this are getting made and seem to be thriving, especially in the face of what seems like a an explosion of crappy reality fluff.

Adele

[source]

Damn if I don’t love her. And not only her, but the fact that a strong female voice got the recognition that it deserved this year. That someone who said: "I love seeing Katy Perry’s boobs and bum. Love it. But that’s not what my music is about. I don’t make music for eyes. I make music for ears" is the same person whose songs my small cousins will spontaneously bust out for no reason other than they like her music. Oh, thank you thank you for Adele.

Michael Fassbender

[source]

Ladies.

Never Fail Cry Fest

[source]

I can't say for sure what has inspired this post. Perhaps the blame belongs to my hormones, or, perhaps to my stunning lack of vitamin D (don't worry Dad, I stocked up today). Most likely, though, I think it's fair to place the blame squarely on this article that I happened upon today. Thanks a lot, awesome girls at The Frisky. Despite the length of this list, I must assert that I don't melt in to a useless pile of mush with every movie I watch. Usually. Almost not all the time. Whatever, movies get me - in everyday life I promise I'm a stone cold bitch.

Be warned, spoilers ahead.

Saving Private Ryan

[source]

Two words: "Earn this." When a babyfaced Matt Damon suddenly morphs into the elderly Pvt. James Francis Ryan and desperately looks at his wife, pleading with her to tell him he's a good man...well, that's just 'game over' for me. Luckily, it's 'movie over' too, so I get to sob uninterrupted through the credits. Until my roommate comes in and tells me that the movie's "been over for an hour now" and it's "time to turn off the dvd". Such a buzzkill, that one.



Schindler's List

[source]

The little black dress of weeping uncontrollably. You're the worst kind of person if this film doesn't just wreak havoc on your soul. Seriously, if you don't cry during this movie...you belong in a mental institution. Don't you understand? He could have got more out.


Dumbo

[source]

I can't even think of the words "baby" and "mine" without a little lip quiver. This one goes back a long time, folks. I literally used to go over to my grandmother's, plunk myself down in front of her television and demand Dumbo. And then I would cry. Like a lot. And Ninny would just laugh and shake her head (and, you know, comfort the crying child in her living room). It was a weird little ritual...but it was our ritual. She still brings it up and laughs and I still think, "It was SAD, woman!"


Up

[source]

The first five minutes of this movie are impressive in that they managed to just decimate me. Like, really, Pixar? I came into this thinking, "Oh, balloons on a house! Cute little chubby Asian kid! Grumpy old man! Cute cute cute!" and you just have to punch me right in the soul nuggets. Blindside me with all that emotion. So rude. Yet so so beautiful.


It's a Wonderful Life

[source]

Ok, these are happy tears, but tears are tears. George Bailey is a good man. I may or may not have machinations to name all of my hypothetical future children after him. I know that hardcore movie critics are all "Oh, Frank Capra is too sentimental - this movie is so sappy snoot snoot snoot." What I say to that is this: I will fight you. Physically. This is an incredible movie and everyone can learn something about being a human being by watching this. And I should know, I've forced all of my friends into watching this and now they're much better humans.


Atonement

[source]

The end of this movie sucker-punched the hell out of me. I was all, "Oh good she made amends. James MacAvoy is pretty." and then Vanessa Redgrave has to be all "Psych! Everyone died horribly and I never got to make it right." Ugh, I was just not expecting that...or the onslaught of overwhelming sobs.


Children of Men

[source]

The entire plausibility of this starkly gorgeous movie is enough to make one weep for the future. But what got (and continues to get) me is when Clive Owen's character walks through a war zone - hunching over this tiny crying baby and everything goes silent at the sound of that cry. At this point I'm mostly bawling from sheer lack of oxygen because it takes my breath away every time.



Free Willy

[source]

WHY ARE THESE NETS SO STRONG?! HE JUST WANTS TO BE WITH HIS WHALE FAMILY YOU HEARTLESS BASTARDS! (sidenote: baller theme song)



The Pursuit of Happyness

[source]

When Homeless Will Smith is in Homeless Church, and everyone else around him is swaying with Homeless Religious Rapture and he just scoops up his little precocious son and hugs him and hugs him and hugs him and then later he finds out that he got the job he's been working so hard on and he just sheds one manly tear and claps a lot in public. Also, when Little Precocious Son drops his Captain America and they can't go back for him because they won't be able to get a room in the shelter for the night? Just stop it.

Titanic

[source]

Oddly enough, I don't really cry when Jack dies. I mean, that is sad. Like really really sad. And I don't, like someone I knew growing up, cry at the beginning when everyone's waving goodbye at the docks because as she tearily explained to everyone in the theater "WHAT?! You know what's gonna happen!". No. It's the little Irish mother's last bedtime story to her children. And the old couple that hug each other tight as water fills their room that makes me dissolve into tears. Damn you, Cameron.



Life is Beautiful

[source]

Life is beautiful, but my sob-face when I'm watching this movie is not. Not to sound like a snob, but if you've only seen this movie dubbed, you haven't actually seen this movie. There's a reason that Roberto won the Oscar for his role (sidenote: holy strong best actor field, Batman!). I hate/love that this movie is also so damn funny, because once I'm done laughing and then bawling I feel significantly bipolar.

Lilya 4-Ever

[source]

This movie could easily be named Hard to Watch: Based on the Novel "Stone Cold Bummer" by Manipulate. The story of a 16-year-old Estonian girl who lives a shitty life in Estonia and then gets tricked into being sex trafficked by her "boyfriend", then shipped off to Sweden to have unwilling sex with gross old men and then throws herself off a bridge. I should have been tipped off when it was required viewing in my Gender and Women in Communist and Post-Communist Societies class (Yeah. I took that - what's up?)


Which movies reduced you to tears?

Childhood Dreams

This is, I suppose, a bit of a companion piece to my previous post - Role Models. With a little dash of Historical Hotcakes. Recently I've been on a whole go-back-to-the-beginning kick by revisiting all my old favorite books and movies (I'll try to skirt around going back to my old nerd-child habits), and on the way I've been able to revisit all my old cinematic (and literary) childhood crushes. Was there anything more fun than pining after a fictional character when you were wee? My adolescent self didn't think so, and while it may have affected my current standards (fictional men make for very unsatisfying boyfriends - but we'll delve into that psychological quagmire...never), it is providing us now with an exhaustive list of boys I once imagined holding hands with, or exploring gloomy moors with, or fighting off evil royal henchmen with! Well, here goes:

Dickon Sowerby - The Secret Garden

Don't worry girl, I'm just calling some birds.
[source]

Oh, Dickon. Sweet, gentle, nature-loving Dickon. Giggle-inducing name aside, I loved Dickon ever so. He appealed to the romantic in me by being British and nice, and to the shallow brat in me by having an awesome white pony. I would have done anything for a boy with a pony in my youth, just like some women my age now would do anything for a man with a nice car (I still prefer ponies to cars, by the by). I was even blissfully unaware of the bird flu, so I wouldn't have even minded his little crow companion - in fact I would have welcomed it. But no, that skank Mary Lennox had to get my man in the end. Some girls have all the luck. Post Script: I also just realized that the same actor that played Dickon in the 1993 movie (aka a masterpiece of cinema and that's not sarcasm) was also Joe Green in the 1994 Black Beauty. Do I need to reassert my love of ponies or will that do?

Theodore "Laurie" Laurence - Little Women

Inspired by the power of reading, Laurie turned into Batman
[source]

The second literary character to make this list (what a shock.), Laurie was the wealthy yet affable neighbor of the March girls. He had the outstanding good taste to fall in love with Jo (my girl), and I have to say - Jo, you might have missed the boat on this one. He was smart, and fun and the only reason you didn't want to marry him was because you saw him as your brother? Ok, valid reason. But, the fact that Laurie eventually ended up with Amy might be the source of my bitterness towards blondes...

Benny "The Jet" Rodriguez - The Sandlot

Look at that form. No wonder he [SPOILER ALERT] made it to the majors
[source]

Not sure I really need to back this one up. Benny The Jet might be perceived as "the jock" of the group, but in reality he was just a kid who loved his friends. And baseball. And PF Flyers. Benny had the gorgeous eyes of a sensitive poet-type, the patience and kindness of a saint, the sprinting ability of a young Jesse Owens, and the leadership of Winston Churchill. That totally makes for a heartthrob in my book.

Westley / The Dread Pirate Roberts - The Princess Bride

Men of unusual attractiveness? I don't think they exist.
[source]

Westley had steel enough to beat a Spaniard in a fair swordfight, brawn enough to beat a Giant in a bare knuckle brawl, and brains enough to outwit a Sicilian (when death was on the line!). He traversed the world for love and literally came back from the dead to be with his Buttercup -who, by the way, treated him like poo for the better portion of their relationship (self-esteem issues much, young farmboy?). So, even at the tender, impressionable age of however-old-I-was-when-I-first-saw-this-movie, I knew that any guy who always answered with "as you wish" was a keeper, even if he did dabble in piracy now and again.

Any incarnation of Harrison Ford

What do you think would happen if they fought each other... other than the universe imploding, I mean.
[source]

Ok, ok, ok. I know. "Harrison Ford" doesn't really constitute a character (doesn't he, though?) and he also was and is wildly age inappropriate for me, but c'mon! Indiana Jones and Han Solo? It was almost more than my young mind could handle. On the one hand we have Indy - the somehow always covered in dust, bookish yet adventurous and morally upright Nazi-puncher. On the other hand we have Han - the sharp tongued, stuck up, scruffy-looking nerf herder who, while mercenary and dashing, was also an adventurous and morally upright...space-Nazi-puncher. Dream man.



Who were the characters you used to swoon over?