Well, dear readers, I am sitting here like so much fish, listening to one of the many albums I downloaded from Apple Music, this one Alexandre Desplat’s score for the latest Jurassic Park movie, Jurassic World. So far, it’s not that interesting, frankly, and the best track so far is the first use of John Williams’ great theme. I plan on watching the movie soon, since it’s now cheap to stream it. Superman, too, which is actually free to stream. I did finish watching The Host and, for me, no, it isn’t the greatest monster movie of the 2000s (I’d give that prize to the latest Godzilla movie from Japan), and it certainly is not the best monster movie ever made – the people who make such pronouncement have serious reality problems. I just couldn’t get past the tonal changes from minute to minute and it just goes on a bit too long. The monster is done well, but the whole thing just sort of lays there, at least for me. I also watched Ballerina, a movie that’s sorta kinda in the John Wick universe – I think that’s what they call this stuff today and I wish they’d stop it already. Now, I enjoyed the first two John Wick movies – they were fun, easy to follow, and the action scenes were incredible. Then came Wick 3 and 4, and I hated both of them with quiet exuberance. Why? Because both overstayed their welcome by huge amounts, both were so convoluted in plot that they were almost impossible to follow, and they were anything BUT fun. I’m happy to report that Ballerina is FUN. It’s like the first Wick movie. And why does it work? Because it’s CLEAN. The plot is easy to follow, the heroine has one purpose, and the movie never diverges from that singular purpose – revenge. Everything in the movie serves that purpose and we want our gal to succeed in that purpose. And when the gal is Ana de Armas, then we DO care because she’s really a good actor. The action and fight choreography is great, although it does get a bit repetitious towards the end. But the pace of it is just great – never a wasted moment – and at two hours and four minutes (that includes about six minutes of end credits) it never overstays its welcome. Keanu Reeves does appear in about fifteen minutes of the film, most of them at the end. If you saw and enjoyed the first two Wick movies I can definitely recommend Ballerina.
Otherwise, it was the third night in a row of five hours of sleep and it’s starting to get to me, so I have to really get a good night’s sleep – several good night’s sleeps – and get my internal clock back where it belongs – at the Harmonia Gardens. Once up, I answered e-mails, put more CDs up on eBay (close to thirty now and more to come), and sent Amazon Seller Central a final appeal giving them two choices – reactivate immediately or send easy to understand instructions on how to nuke the account. I don’t really give a flying Wallenda which option they choose. eBay sent a payout yesterday morning for three times more than the most I’ve ever made on Amazon in a WEEK – and this was for sales for less than three days. I don’t think that will happen every week, but that remains to be seen. For the big meal, I had mac and cheese – it was pretty okay. I took pill one and the other pills with that meal.
Later in the day, I had an English muffin with a bit of peanut butter and jam on it and took pill two. Then after the movie, I had an ice cream bar and took pill three and here we are.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll check with the mail place, I’ll do whatever needs doing, I’ll eat, I may or may not put gas in the motor car (there’s over a quarter of a tank left), it’s the big boy pill day, so the usual pills and now eight of the tiny pills that I do only on Mondays. Yikes. And then at some point, I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
Wednesday, I have the eye doctor and maybe bloodwork, although I haven’t had confirmation of that yet and I can always do that on this side of the hill, Friday I attend an opening night, and I have no idea what’s happening on the weekend.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, check with the mail place, do whatever needs doing, eat, maybe put gas in the motor car, take a LOT of pills, then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: What are the best fight scenes in movies that you’ve ever seen? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, where I shall have dreams with plots that are CLEAN.