The Bechdel Test for movies

From chocolate to movies...  and now for something completely different:

Watch this youtube clip and see if your favorite films pass the test...

All they need to do to pass is

1. have 2 women in it
2. have those 2 women have names
3. have those 2 women talk to each other - but not about a man. 

Or ask yourself... is there any movie going where there aren't 2 named men talking about something other than women...

Lots of interesting commentary about this (and the other rule - have 2 minorities in it,  talking to each other,  about something other than race..) here

Charlie Wilson's War

We just saw Charlie Wilson's War (downloaded from Amazon, amazingly high tech, of course I couldn't do it at all, DH is the king of all things technical in our household.)

I remember when it came out and there was something about the trailers that just didn't appeal to me, so we didn't go. But I was wrong, it's actually an excellent film.

Both Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts are not always my favorites actors. I mean I loved Pretty Woman (well, I was younger then) but I don't often like her and if she doesn't smile, it doesn't work for me. And Tom Hanks isn't my favorite either. But here, under the direction of Mike Nicols, they both give really strong, unactory performances. Julia doesn't smile much, but is entirely believable, and Hanks affable charm breezes along nicely. Philip Seymour Hoffman, as always, is superb. I don't think I've ever seen a film where he wasn't excellent.

It's funny, talky, got great witty lines, pretty texan gals, absurdity and gallows humour - because we know what happens after the movie ends. It ends with the Russians fleeing, and then chariasmatic Charlie no longer being able to get his funds, and thus no schools or infrastructure being built, and the seeds of the Taliban and Osama are sown. The movie ends with the quote, apparently by the real Charlie Wilson: "These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world... And then we fucked up the endgame" Good review of the film here.

So it goes to show, that we sow the seeds of our own demise with our lack of follow through.

It was a nice glimpse into life in the '80's which feels far less politcally correct than life today. I also looked up Charlie Wilson and he pretty much appears to have been correctly portrayed in the film. A fine drinking man, who managed to get things started...

Wanting...

We wanted to go and see the film Wanted this weekend - but not enough to actually leave the house at 9.30pm and get to the cinema.

My 10 yo son really wanted to go and see Wall-E this w/e and booked tix on Fandango even before I woke up (7am, mummy, I found a session at 1.40, let's go...)

I actually loved Wall-E. I thought it was beautiful, and sad. The depiction of Earth and the future of the humans, who become these gormless baby like things, was horrible to me. I so don't want that future! But the romance, especially the two so human machines (more human than the humans by that stage) floating/dancing in space was just beautiful. They did something exceptional there.

In the end, instead of going to Wanted, I played around on the internet and found a few more friends for my facebook page - though I have real issues with the word 'friend'. Some of these friends are acquaintances, and I don't get it when people I don't know at all keep inviting me to be their 'friend'. I don't want friends I don't know. Friends to me implies a level of intimacy, that I do want and respect, and won't throw away this precious word on people I've meet once at a conference, or people I don't know at all. And yet, when I see that people have 121 'friends' and I have barely 40, I feel less popular, in that teenage angst way. I tease my sister that she has 'false friends' because she's up to 167 or thereabouts. And yet, most days when I walk down the street I know faces to say hello to, and that anchors me in this place/street like nothing else. DH laughs that walking with me is like walking down Sesame St, where I keep seeing people I know. That's what volunteering at a local school does for you, it satisfies the want/need to be recognized, to be known.