Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone is having a lovely Christmas Day. It's balmy warm here in Sioux Falls - It's 32 today and was 41 yesterday. I'll share my knitting related Christmas present when I get back home, but I thought I'd post about a couple of movies I saw. I forgot to post about this movie last week:



I'd give this one a mixed review. There are a lot of different characters and storylines about oil in the middle east and American foreign policy. It's a complex subject and can't be told easily, so perhaps the film is purposefully very confusing. Maybe you're not meant to exactly track everything, but rather get an overview that no one has clean hands in this situation. In the second half of the film I got really into it and was on the edge of my seat by the end of the film. I'd definitely like to see it again and see if I can connect the dots a little more. There are a number of good performances, including one of my all time favorites, George Clooney. Another really interesting performance. A world away from the charming Dr. Ross.

I have a tradition of going to the movies on Christmas Eve and this year I saw this one:



Loved it! Such a gorgeous movie and a great story. The opening scenes in Depression-era New York are visually stunning. Other than a few scenes with Kong and Ann Darrow together, the special effects are great. The many creepy monsters in the film were really effective (even the Geiger-like fallic monsters). I was completely caught up in the love story between Ann and Jack as well as the relationship between Ann and Kong. The only thing I didn't care for was Jack Black's performance. I'm a big fan of Jack Black, but I thought he was wrong for the part of the selfish director.