AND THE WEEKEND GOES TO

Just a quick bounce through before I try to manage a couple of days off line.

Saw The Fighter. Good movie, excellent Mark Wahlberg and Amy Adams performances — also Jack McGee as Ward’s father (see previous blog post for more comment.) I know there is mad love for Christian Bale’s acting skills in the universe, but he works too hard for me. I like quieter performances. But The Fighter and Black Swan both scored for me as movies where the characters express themselves physically. You have to pay attention to Wahlberg’s and Portman’s performances; their characters drive the worlds they exist in, maybe quietly, maybe subtly but the gravity holds you even after.

Weekend plans? Unplug, remove Winter’s Bone from the red envelope and watch, see a semi staged performance of The Magic Flute, do some more walking if the weather holds, finish Plays Well With Others, return Living Opera to the library (yep, finally finished it and The Crushing Edge blog post it inspired), oh, and watch the Oscars.

The Fighter and the discussion after made me realize my Best Movie vote would have gone to Black Swan of the movies I’ve seen. Swan had everything I look for in a movie: great performances, tight writing/plotting, mood, stellar costumes, music that adds to everything, and the ability to transfer me to somewhere else for 2 hours or so.

I am surprised I don’t want to see True Grit, I used to be a big Western fan, but I think Unforgiven and Tombstone used up my Western quota and Tron: Legacy and last year’s massive Crazy Heart push/coverage used up my Jeff Bridges quota.

Still enjoying Kristyn Burtt’s lead up to the Oscars coverage. I think this year I’ll plug in my router, pull out my iPad and jump into tweet #oscars. You can follow along @mdnightmaverick.

And a new haiku:

The Mornings I Don’t Enjoy

Mad to see portents
Tired, prophecies crowding me
Will and choices lost

But on a more cheerful note, we’ve been watching How I Met Your Mother reruns for our laughter quotient. Lost track the last couple years, but the first two seasons are in syndication and still one of the better doses of ensemble comedy out there. I do want to start watching Community; caught a couple episodes, really liked them, but it doesn’t seem to fit in the schedule.

So be sure to laugh at something, leave your top Oscar choice in the comments and have a great weekend!