Merylathon: an update [and a digression about Barbra, and another about hats]

One of my New Year's resolutions was to watch every movie for which either Katharine Hepburn or Meryl Streep was nominated for an Oscar.

I decided to do Meryl first because I had seen less of her movies. I had already seen Music of the Heart through years of Orchestra classes. I've seen that movie/Mr. Holland's Opus way too many times, The Devil Wears Prada, and Julie & Julia. So I started with Kramer v. Kramer because it was her first Oscar win [and I was NOT watching The Deer Hunter by myself in my room (her first nomination)] and it is my dad's favorite Meryl movie. I won't give anything away, but I was especially excited with the ending because somehow in my dad's description of it I interpreted it ending the opposite way. And of course, Meryl is supporting in this role, but not out shined by Dustin Hoffman [whom I also adore, The Graduate is my favorite movie of all time]

Then I went to Doubt, simply because it was on Netflix instant watch. And holy moley, if Meryl can make me hate her, it just makes me love her more. Possibly her least fabulous role I've seen, she plays a nun, she is still Meryl through and through and doesn't let up until the credits role.

These were all preludes to my now favorite Meryl movie. I think Kramer v. Kramer is better and she is better in it. But five words: Robert Redford sans Barbra Streisand. I could go on and on about how much I hated Katie Morosky in The Way We Were as the only reason to watch that movie is the boat scene, but I digress.

Out of Africa was amazing. I don't think I can capture how much I loved this movie. But I can capture how much I loved Meryl's hats.

This is not the first time a movie has been ranked higher in my favorite simply for millinery. See His Girl Friday and A Room with a View

You're the moon over Mae West's shoulder [you're the top] pt. 4

25 Best Movies of 2000's, according to flippee.

Chronologically

2000

High Fidelity

O, Brother Where Art Thou?

Almost Famous

For how little music I liked that was released in 2000, it was a great year for soundtracks! All three movies have some of my favorite soundtracks of all time. John Cusack is at his adult best in High Fidelity as a jerk who we fall in love with as he reminisces about girlfriends, music and what a lameo Jack Black is.

O Brother Where Art Thou? is probably one of the most creative/best adaptations ever, earning both a stop in our hearts and the 9th grade English curriculum.

Almost Famous, annoyingly pretentious and hipster or adorably endearing and indie? Critics are still arguing. But whatever. I love Kate Hudson and if-you-blink-you-will-miss-them Anna Paquin and Zooey Deschanel. I still listen to the vinyl Bookends so I can pretend that I am Zooey Deschanel. And I dream about a singalong in a bus of '"Tiny Dancer." But I think everyone does after watching that movie.

2001

Gosford Park

The Royal Tenebaums

Amelie

Altman's last great film that was his own doing as Prairie Home Companion was tainted by Lindsay Lohan. A great ensemble film, as all of Altman's best are, Gosford Park is really just so good. You have to watch it multiple times to get all the dialogue. The story line is great and Maggie Smith, Kristen Scott Thomas, Jeremy Northam, Helen Mirren, Derek Jacobi, Emily Watson, Sophie Thompson, Ryan Phillipe (a little random, but he is annoying and supposed to be so it works) and Clive Owen. They are all wonderful and it shows that Altman is an actors' director through and through.

Ah, Wes Anderson--you are amazing. He may be seen as pretentious and overrated. I don't care. I love his movies and The Royal Tenebaums is probably his best. It captures what he does best, showing a family in turmoil, with no actually likable characters but the viewer ends up falling in love with all of them. AND ANGELICA HUSTON! Could she be more perfect? I want to look like her now, much less when I'm 60.

Amelie is the best of what it is. What it is in a sweet, endearing movie that doesn't make much sense plotwise, or logicwise. But with Audrey Tautou's page boy hair-cut and knowing smile, the viewer willing gives up logic and stick her hand in the coffee beans.

2002

Chicago

The Hours

Chicago is one of the best movie musicals of our time. I love stage musicals, it's true. But I really love movie musicals, and that may offend the purists, but I love seeing how a director captures new things from the music and choreography. And this ones works the best. Except for maybe Oklahoma!

The Hours-I really am sucker Virgina Woolf, Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore and Nicole Kidman. WHOA. This movie was made for me. One of the best adaptations of a novel I've seen.

2003

Finding Nemo

Lost in Translation

Pixar's best of the decade, Nemo is both visually engaging and so emotionally endearing! Marlin and Nemo and Dory are so sweet, and they are fish, but some of Pixar's most human.

Sofia Coppola return to sanity and good movie-making entered her into Hollywood's favorite circle of directors with a little indie whisper. ScarJo before her chest was more famous than her major acting chops. and Bill Murray is his best role to date.

2004

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

I Heart Huckabees

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

The Motorcycle Diaries

Danny Deckchair

Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle

Three of my favorite surreal movies in one year! Sunshine, Huckabees, and Life Aquatic are in my cycle of fun indie films that make me feel like a little hipster. Of course these movies do have cinematic value as well. Jim Carrey when he isn't funny is at his sweetest and Kate Winslet! If I could two sets of movies to watch for the rest of my life it would Katharine Hepburn's canon and Kate Winslet's. she is just so wonderful. Huckabees is trippy, but really humane and fun, and Jason Schwartzman's character is one of my all time favorites. Then my favorite Wes Anderson film. Rushmore was more influential and Tenebaums was a better movie but Life Aquatic is so funny and quotable, Bill Murray in my 2nd favorite role of his is deadpan and hilarious.

2005

Walk the Line

Reese at her best and Joaquin before the crazy fully settled. I love June Carter and Johnny. They are so damn cute in the most destructive relationship way ever.

2006

Little Miss Sunshine

Stranger Than Fiction

Little Miss Sunshine- My first reaction was GRAPES OF WRATH. Which it totally is. And Steve Carell is so funny when he isn't being funny. Dwayne is the love of my indie life and I've adored Toni Collette ever since she portrayed Harriet Smith in Emma.

Stranger Than Fiction got a lot of crap about being too out there or whatever. But Emma Thompson is so serene as an actress in any role. And again features one of my favorite things, comedians not being funny. Maggie Gyllenhaal could be better. probably had her character been played by Zooey Deschanel. But Dustin Hoffman is sweet too.

2007

Juno

Once

Watching Juno now, I don't like it nearly as much as I thought I did when I was a junior in high school, but is changed what being a teenage protagonist meant. All of the sudden Juno was short, brunette, saucy and pregnant. She wasn't a fallen Christian girl, or a slut who needed to find the way. She was 16 and pregnant and herself. And that's why everyone took notice. Not to mention Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman's stellar performances as the yuppie adopters!

Just recently saw Once, and I felt like I had been punched in the stomach by the gods of music and love. or god of music and love; this movie makes it seem like they are the same. Again like Juno, Once is really real. Guy and Girl aren't perfect for each other, but perfect for each at that moment, which is a fact of humanity that is glazed over a lot in romances that create the idea of "the one." Once provides an alternative the cleanliness of that version, something truer and deeper and more congruent with the lives that we lead.

2008

Slumdog Millionaire

WALL-E

Another punch movie. Except Slumdog punched me in the face. Part Bollywood musical, part low-budget endearment, part sappy bildungsroman, Slumdog changed how I looked at movies. Before any indie movie I found was something I happened upon and liked in a little niche of my existence, like Wes Anderson films, that are rarely accepted into the wide canon of great movies, only to be praised by little hipsters. But Slumdog captured the country and made them love and not look away from the torture, game show or Bollywood dance number. Everybody loved to love Slumdog because it was just that good.

WALL-E will forever be known as the Best Picture that shoulda been. Oh well. Maybe it was the shout out to Hello! Dolly or the Fred-and-Ginger dance between WALL-E and EVE or the silence in which WALL-E commits all his actions, but WALL-E felt so retro, except of course it takes place in space and in the future. The retro and modernity gave Pixar their best film of the decade, and Toy Story a run for its money as the definitive Pixar film.

2009

Up

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Two animations in one year and no live action movies. Granted I haven't seen my pick of Best Picture right now (Up in the Air) yet, but these were my two favorites of the year. Up and Fantastic Mr. Fox were the most humane movies of the year. They addressed human issues of family and loss and love and that's what I love most about movies. Identifying with the characters, or feeling pathos for them. I felt more connected to George Clooney as a fox than I have a character in a long time. and if you didn't cry during Up, I'd suggest you go back to your charger or home planet because you are obviously either a robot or an alien.

Still Haven't Seen

Up in the Air

An Education

A Single Man

Invictus

Sherlock Holmes

You're a melody from a symphony by Strauss [you're the top] pt 2.

Best Albums of the Decade, according to flippee.

Chronologically

2000

Various artists: O Brother Where Art Thou?

released December 5, 2000
2000, as a year for music, was not a good one for me. Well first off, I was eight. And in love with George Gershwin. So I wasn't into the current music scene that much. But looking back on what was released in 2000...not much of a fan. But this compilation/soundtrack was one of my favorite albums then and is a now, and is considered one of the greatest soundtrack albums of all time. Seriously stick Emmylou and Gillian on a record and I will listen to it. Plus Alison Kraus! If I could sing, I would want to sing like Gillian Welch. In the spirit of country that isn't really country, the country music that escapes Nashville's commercialism and is marginalized as "Americana," O Brother sounds both old and new at the same time. And it is still very current as the country's fate looks more and more reminiscent of the time in which the movie is set.

Down to the River to Pray - Al...

2001

Gillian Welch: Time (the Revelator)

Jay-Z: The Blueprint

The Shins: Oh, Inverted World

2001 was a year that changed music for me. Out of these three albums, I think I only listen to Time (the Revelator) contemporaneously to the year. My dad bought the album and I fell in love Gillian's solo voice as much as I had with her duets and trios in O Brother.

Revelator - Gillian Welch

But I'm pretty sure I heard the Shins in 2004 and Jay-Z around the same time. And they were some of the first times I liked music my parents had never really listened to. The Shins really did change my life and Jay-Z showed me that rap wasn't "crap" like my suburban peers kept announcing. Rap could be music as much as the indie folk of The Shins could be.

New Slang - The Shins

Girls, Girls, Girls - Jay-Z

2002

Coldplay: A Rush Of Blood To The Head

Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

Norah Jones: Come Away With Me

Maroon 5: Songs About Jane

Again this year, I listened to one of these albums contemporaneously. Norah Jones Come Away With Me was the first album I ever bought with my own money. I would say I got off to a pretty good start. Norah Jones was a young woman with a great voice, who had musical talent. whoa. That didn't seem to happen a lot in the early 00's.

Come Away With Me - Norah Jone...

Now, so many people hate on Coldplay. I really don't get it. I like them better than Radiohead. It seems when a band gets popular, they sell out. Whatevs. I love Coldplay. I feel like people who hate on Coldplay are the people who put in their facebook profiles under music "everythig (sic) except country and rap." They listen to Radiohead because someone who they thought was cool said Radiohead was cool. I like Radiohead too, but I always felt Coldplay was more accessible. And "Clocks" is probably one of my favorite songs of all time. I think this album works better as a whole than Parachutes, which is why I chose it as best of the decade.

Clocks - Coldplay

I didn't really listen to Wilco until this year, but this album is amazing and I can see why so many of my favorite artists cite Wilco as an influence.

Pot kettle black - Wilco

Maroon 5, I love you. One of the best pop groups of the decade, Songs About Jane was just a a great album. The whole thing was amazing. Every song, every harmony, every falsetto by Adam, incredible. I've seen them live at least three times and they are great in concert. And Songs About Jane is an album of what Adam Levine does best, sing about heartbreak and sex in a way that every 12-99 y/o woman in the United States falls in love with him.

This Love - Maroon 5

2003

Outkast: Speakerboxxx/The Love Below

The Shins: Chutes Too Narrow

Death Cab for Cutie: Transatlanticism

Yellowcard: Ocean Avenue

Fountains of Wayne: Welcome Interstate Managers

2003 was my year, for shizz. Outkast really was my first exposure to rap and I fell in love and by means of them I found Jay-Z and Kanye. I think "Hey Ya" could easily be one of the greatest songs ever written. I don't know anyone who doesn't like it. It is a little bit like "Twist and Shout" except dirtier, but I still listen to it and shake it when Andre tells me too.

Hey Ya! (Radio Mix/Club Mix) -...

Is it wrong that I put another Shins' album on here? Maybe. But I love them so much. And I would say Chutes Too Narrow is the best album of the Shins if not my favorite.

Young Pilgrims - The Shins

Death Cab brought indie pop/rock to middle school for me and once all the emo girls got over them and started to like Hawthorne Heights, little indie hipsters had them all to ourselves. whoo hoo!

The Sound of Settling - Death ...

Yellowcard's Ocean Avenue will probably not be remembered in 20 years as a great album. Because it isn't. But it was the first rock album I ever bought and I still listen to it. The melodies are a little weak and the vocals scream a lot. But for a 13 year old girl I loved rocking out to it. so it made my Best list, even if it was the experience that was the best, instead of the music.

Ocean Avenue - Yellowcard

Fountains of Wayne. They knew how to write a pop song. Sure "Stacy's Mom" had great novelty value, but the album as a whole is incredible. "Hey Julie" "Mexican Wine" "Supercollider" "Yours and Mine" all amazing, even if usually only musicians recognized it. See Robbie Fulks song "Fountains of Wayne Hotline"

Hey Julie - Fountains Of Wayne

2004

Iron & Wine: Our Endless Numbered Days

Kanye West: The College Dropout

The Killers: Hot Fuss

mmm, Kanye. Don't really care what he did to Taylor Swift [still love you Taylor!], his music is awesome, especially Dropout. "Jesus Walks" is one of my favorite songs of all time. It is great running music by the way. This album is a rap album through and through, but has the musicality of a rock-concept album without the cheese of R. Kelly (barf)

Jesus Walks (Live Version) - K...

Iron & Wine-one dude. and what a sweet dude he is. Iron & Wine is kind of like easy listening music for people care about music.

On Your Wings - Iron & Wine

The Killers: WElCOME TO MY EIGHT GRADE LIFE FOLKS. The Killers's first album and I are like this [make gesture to show closeness with fingers.] Another sign of me swinging into the indie scene, I anticipated the release of this record and raved about it. Then "Mr. Brightside" got ridiculously over-played. I didn't care. Brandon Flowers could do no wrong in my mind. Then of course, they released Sam's Town. Day and Age was a lot better than the scum of a sophomore concept album that was Sam's Town. But no album will ever replace Hot Fuss in my heart.

Mr. Brightside - The Killers

2005

Bright Eyes: I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning

Shakira: Oral Fixation, Vol. 2

I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning could also be called I'm Conor Oberst, I started listening to Mike Mogis and got over my emo self, now please listen to good music that will follow. I never thought I would see the day where I liked Conor Oberst. He was for girls who liked guyliner. no thank you. But Wide Awake is folky enough for me to like and signaled the change in where Bright Eyes was going [btw, that would be towards the glory that is Monsters of Folk]

Lua - Bright Eyes

^^^also check out Gillian Welch and Conor Oberst's duet of this song on Dark Was the Night. AMAZINGNESS

Shakira, Shakira, Shakira. I love her. She's a diva, first and foremost. But she also is super smart and just makes great music. Look past the single of "Hips Don't Lie" and Fixation is a flat out great crossover pop album.

Hips Don't Lie (featuring Wycl...

2006-2009 coming soon!

all music links from lala, a great website if you want to listen before you buy because you can listen to the whole album, not just a little snippet. but you can only listen to it once, so pay attention!

At words poetic, I'm so pathetic [you're the top!] pt. 1

my favorites of 2000's...so far. you have 9 days to change my mind!

I'll be posting these in a series over the course of the next 9 days.

1. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

This book literally changed my life. I read it when I was 16, probably the most tumultuous year of my life so far. And Oscar's life was way more tempestuous that mine was, but I felt deeply connected to the black Dominican whose family was cursed by fuku.

Junot Diaz's way of writing was unlike anything I had read before. The narrator switched constantly and he used footnotes liberally. The entire book is in a weird Spanglish dialect that I couldn't understand half the time, but I don't think I really was supposed to. The diction was slightly different with each narrator, Oscar's sister's boyfriend sounding full of pathos and disgust simultaneously for the chubby nerd in his life. Oscar's sister, Lola, was always full of worry for her brother but bubblyness of someone who doesn't know or appreciate the troubles and curses of her parents. And Oscar, he always flows against the current, of his university, of expectations, of his family, with his words and actions.

The life that is wondrous in this novel is the family. I found Oscar's mother and sister's stories as compelling as his, and though the book is about Oscar, their stories are need because family interconnectivity is such a big theme in the novel and I believe Dominican life.

2. Persepolis

Um. Whoa. If you've only seen the movie, please read the book. I'm an advocative for great adaptations and I think this is one, but a lot is cut out and I found the movie a little hard to follow without knowing a lot of the history of the Iranian Revolution. But in the book, the reader literally learns with Marji because she has been presented with two differing realities, one from her teacher and one from her parents, about the justification of the Shah's power.

The book is a lot more powerful than a newscast about the situation in Iran could ever be because Marji, in all her little black-and-white panel glory, creates so much pathos for the reader towards her. It really led me to question both our country's past actions in Iran and our current policy there. And just like Marji, I sort of come up blank with answers for how I feel because just like Marji, I have been taught one thing my entire life and questioning it, no matter how logical it is, it seems too against the grain.

This voided feeling is unsatisfying, but the knowledge I gained from reading the book made up for it

Sadly, these really are the only good books that I've read from this decade. Not because the decade sucked. But because I suck!

really. c'mon I'm eighteen. I've spent all 10 of these years learning about old Literature to the point of exclusion of the good new stuff. I am ashamed.

but here are books from this decade I fully plan on reading by next december 22.

The Tipping Point-Malcolm Gladwell: my dad really liked this book, and read three Gladwell books in about three weeks. And this man does not read quickly. In 18 years I've known him, he's finished maybe three books for sure. He loves books, but tends to just stick receipts in them as book marks and buy new ones. So this one must be engaging.

Fast Food Nation-Eric Schlosser: Another finished Daddy book.

Atonement-Ian McEwan: Every girl I know read this after the movie came out. But I have neither seen the movie or read the book. So I'll read the book first so I can be cute and hipster and annoying and remark about how much better the book is than the movie.

Everything is Illuminated-Jonathan Safran Foer: My mom really loved Incredibly Close and Extremely Loud, which I am reading now, but Foer's debut is supposed to be phenomenal.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay-Michael Chabon: Paste Magazine's number one book of the decade and I LOVE PASTE. so yeah.