New Year's Eve Resolution Week Twenty One: Out Of The Past

I've only seen this film once.  It was during TCM's Summer Of Darkness.  I saw so much Noir that summer.  It was FAB-U-LOUS!  Some of it was a blur though.  This film was a bit of a blur.  I remember loving Robert Mitchum.  But who doesn't?  And I remember Jane Greer was evil. And Dickie Moore, but I always remember him.  Those eyes....

I was trying to come up with dinner tonight.  I've been taking advantage of a little time off and doing just a ton around my house.  Thing are all ripped apart!  We're going through all of our storage.  How did we get so much stuff?  I swear that we're storing stuff for other people, because I don't recognize half of this crap!  So the place is in shambles.  When you go through stuff it always looks worse before it gets better.  I keep telling myself that.  On top of stuff being everywhere, I'm just filthy from going through it all, so needless to say, I wasn't terribly prepared for this one.  For some reason though, Noir always makes me think of Chinese food and beer.  Seems like in old films(unless they're fancy), when people ate out if was at diners(and I just did hamburgers), Italian restaurants for spaghetti(and I just ate pasta), or Chinese food for chop suey.  So chop suey it is!  Honestly, I've never had chop suey, so this was a first.  Seems pretty popular, so how bad could it be?  And you can order veggies only!  I also had to order egg rolls, cause you know, ya gotta.  And almond cookies, cause they're the best!  Luckily I had some non-alcoholic beer around, so I was set!

Here's my Chinese dinner and fake beer!  Ya'll knew I was going to serve it on depression glass, right?

This film is the quintessential Noir.  Watching it again brought everything back.  The use of light and shadow.  The innuendos.  The quick clever dialog.  The incredible Femme Fatale.  The "hero" trying to go straight, but trapped by his own human limitations.  It has everything Noir is supposed to be.  

Everyone's performance in this film was brilliant.  Robert Mitchum was his usual tough guy self.  You really were on his side in this one.  His acting is always so good.  And it doesn't hurt that he sure is pretty.

Even with his hair messed up, he sure is pretty.

Jane Greer.  Now I own several movies that she's in, but this is the only one I've seen.  I know, I know, I'll get to them eventually!  She was so very very good in this, that I'm inspired.  It's not just because she's lovely, she's really good at conveying who her character really is to the audience without letting the other characters see it.  Beauty really is a requirement of this role.  It's needed to cover and disarm.  It also is required to make the men stupid.  And she does, she makes all the men stupid.

This is a perfect example of seeing who she is under all the beauty.

Note the use of shadow too.

All in all it was a great night.  Loved the movie!  Got even more out of it, I won't forget it this time.  I didn't like the chop suey though.  I ate it, but it was meh.  Very plain, not much flavor.  No wonder it's considered American Chinese food!  The rice was the best part if you wanna know.  So glad I had egg rolls and cookies too!  If I had thought about it, I coulda had Mexican food, cause they were in Mexico.  ::::shrug::::  Punishment for not putting much thought into tonight.  Booooo!

Happy Sunday!

Love, 

Olive

New Year's Eve Resolution Week Twenty: The Best Years Of Our Lives

I was on a Myrna Loy binge when I bought this movie.  I know nothing about it other than my girl Myrna is in it.  As you can figure out, I have thousands of movies.  I have to keep a spreadsheet of all of them so that I know which one's I have.  I kept buying duplicates!  I'm constantly trying to fit them all in and watch them. They aren't going anywhere though!  So I'm glad this was on the list.

I've had some crazy busy days lately, so forgive me for being a bit lazy again.  I had no direction with this movie.  Like I said, I only knew that Myrna was in it.  I read the back of the DVD and got a general idea of what it was about and when it was set.  So I decided to look up 1944 food.  Food was still in short supply, so women had to be creative with their cooking.  FYI, creative = pretty gross.  Lots of weird combinations.  Bleck.  And lots of things that are very difficult to make vegetarian.  And like I said, I've been short on time. There was some spaghetti and meatballs that I could have done, but I just had a big bowl of pasta yesterday.  So I'm pasta'd out!  And like I said, I've been short on time, so I really didn't want to cook tonight.  So I started looking up what people ate when they went out to eat.  Not fancy, I didn't want fancy I wanted plain old diner fair.  Came up with, you guessed it, spaghetti and meatballs.  LOL!  But there was also Chinese food, in particular Chop Suey.  Not in the mood for Chinese though.  Kept looking.  Found it!  Plain old burger and fries.  Perfect!  There's been a burger place that I've been dying to try.  A good veggie burger is hard to find.  Especially delivered.  I could have cooked my own I guess, but I didn't feel like grocery shopping either.  Too much.  So I ordered me a veggie burger and fries.

My lazy lazy dinner of delivered veggie burger and fries. And Depression Glass. <3

 
Now that dinner was set, onto the movie!  This sucker was looooong!!!  Almost three hours!!  Wow!  It's the story of three men returning from WWII and the struggles they face.  It was so long because it really had three story lines.  In spite of being a very long film, it was just enough time to cover everything.  I really couldn't see anything that could have been cut out.  I did have some trouble keeping focused.  I just can't sit still that long.  I tried though!  At times it was hard to watch.  Very depressing.  There were wonderful high points though, and the ending just made you happy.  My dear Myrna didn't have a major role.  I always want more of her!

Three very different men return from WWII.

Wonderful film.  Needed more Myrna though. Ya always need more Myrna.

Harold Russell's story was by far my favorite and the most touching.  His struggle as a disabled veteran was very real.  The piano scene was wonderful.  He was excellent throughout and I was really surprised to find out that this was his first role!  He actually won two Oscars for this film.  One was an honorary Oscar for "bringing hope and courage to his fellow veterans".  The other was for Best Supporting Actor.  This is the only time that two Oscars have been awarded for the same performance.  Very cool.  

I think this is my favorite scene.

Harold Russell and his well deserved Oscars.

In spite of the length, I really enjoyed this film.  The story line was great, the acting was wonderful, and the direction was smooth.  Dinner was nummy.  I found a great burger place that delivers veggie burgers!  The brioche bun was the best part I think.  You coulda put doggie doodie on that thing and it would have been good!  Well maybe that's a bit much....  Ewww, sorry for that image.  All I'm seeing is Divine in Pink Flamingos.  Gag.  Anyway, MY dinner was delish!  

Can this really be week twenty?  How cool is that?  Still having a great time doing this.  Next week I get to do Noir!!  Woop!  

Love,
Olive

New Year's Eve Resolution Week Nineteen: Leave Her To Heaven

I saw this movie years ago.  I loved every second of it, so I was really looking forward to tonight.  Such a good movie!  This is gonna be fun!

I spent all week trying to come up with an idea for dinner tonight.  Then I started thinking about what my idea of heaven was.  In my heaven, I would have Italian food and cake and ice cream.  :-)  Lots of it.  And it would be calorie free.  Since I'm not in heaven, there's not much I can do about the calories, but I can get my favorite foods!  So I ordered from one of my favorite Italian restaurants and picked up a slice of cake and my very favorite ice cream.  Heaven!  I got me a panzerotti with extra cheese, basil, tomatoes, and garlic.  Then I got a very moist piece of chocolate cake with white icing.  Simple.  For my favorite ice cream?  Chunky Monkey.  It's such a favorite that I usually only have it on NYE.  I had a bad day though.  I was supposed to see a really rare silent film with a live score, but it was cancelled at the last minute.  The didn't tell us until we got there.  Sucked.  So I decided to treat myself.  And lets face it, I really like treating myself.

Here it is!  Heaven on depression glass!  Chunky Monkey ice cream.  Panzerotti.  Chocolate cake!

Onto the movie!  The plot of this film is awesome.  It goes so fast.  You'd never know that it was almost 2 hours long.  We all know by now that I can't sit still very well, I sat still through this one.  Well, as still as I sit.  Even though I remembered the plot, it was still wonderful to watch how things unfolded again.  It really has a great build.  You slowly get to know the main character played by Gene Tierney.  It's just right so that it doesn't spoil the mood, but builds it.

There's something under sleeping here....

Now ya all know what I'm going to say about Gene Tierney, right?  Stunning!  She is amazingly beautiful.  I mean, the woman is flawless.   She's so beautiful that it almost distracts from what a good actress she is.  When her true character is revealed, it is even more off putting because of her beauty.  I'm sure it was intentional.  You'd never suspect someone so perfect of being cray-cray.  And even though she does unforgivable things, you kinda wonder why someone would leave such a beauty.

Way to beautiful to be nuts!  Even she's surprised!  Thank you very much!

The other thing that strikes me about this movie is how lush it is.  Each scene is just vibrant.  It's so gorgeous, you almost wonder if the color wasn't enhanced.  It's just a dessert for the eyes!

Every single scene is like this.  So lush and beautiful!  You can almost taste the color.

So I spent the night in heaven!  Some of my favorite foods and a movie that was entertaining and beautiful to watch.  I don't really need to tell you how good my dinner was, do I?  Considering the menu, how could it not be fabulous?  And I didn't have to cook!  Ended up not being a bad Sunday after all!

Love,
Olive
 

New Year's Eve Resolution Week Eighteen: Meet Me In St Louis

I've been meaning to watch this movie for years!  Wanna know exactly how many?  I have it on my DVR from November 29th, 2014!  It's the one that Aurora/CitizenScreen hosted!!  I just never got around to it and couldn't bring myself to delete it.  I've also got it on DVD, of course.  Cause I'm obsessive about buying movies and I have to own everything for some stupid reason.

So tonight, since I have never seen this movie and there was nothing in Movie Night Menus, I was left in the dark as to what to make for dinner.  I decided to look up St Louis cuisine.  Turns out they're known for some pretty simple(and really fatty) foods.  Toasted ravioli, pizza, gooey butter cake, BBQ, and sandwiches.  I decided to go for pizza and gooey butter cake.  St Louis pizza is supposed to be very thin with provel cheese on it.  I did my best.  Provel cheese is difficult to come by and I couldn't find any.  I did find a pizza with a whole bunch of different cheeses on it and went with that.  It had goat cheese, cheddar, feta, and mozzarella.  Meh, why not.  Then the cake.  I found a recipe by Paula Deen.  Apparently this is a really famous recipe, so I went with this one.  Really easy to make and you can use boxed cake mix.  And I didn't have to buy and weird ingredients.  Not that I mind hunting and buying weird stuff, I just kinda wasn't in the mood.

Pizza with loads of different types of cheese and Ooey Gooey Butter Cake.

And depression glass, of course!

This movie was so sweet.  I really don't like musicals too much and I have to be in the mood for them.  Judy Garland usually changes that pretty quickly.  Easter Parade is just WONDERFUL anytime!  Though I do watch it every Easter.  It's a rule!  Judy did it again with this movie.  She's so lovely.  I never understand why she always said she was treated like one of the guys.  She's just so elegant and delicate.  Those big doe eyes of hers.  With like the world's most perfect hair.  I wanted her hair so very badly.  Wonder if it was really hers?  And do I really have to talk about her performance?  Her voice.  That amazing voice.  Even her speaking voice is beautiful.  There's something about it.  A warmth.  She can hug you with it.  And she's so funny in this movie.  I particularly like the scene where she beats up her neighbor and then goes home to brag about it.  I adore a beautiful tough broad!

This is by far my favorite part!  She's wonderful

I loved Minnelli's direction too.  Every scene was beautifully framed.  It was just luscious and colorful.  Even if you enjoyed nothing else about this movie, it's just pretty to watch.  And the way he captures Judy is just wonderful. You can tell how beautiful he thought she was.

She's so beautiful and you can tell how much Minnelli thought so too.

Those eyes.....

The other real standouts for me were Marjorie Main and Mary Astor.  Marjorie Main plays the same character she always plays.  Ma Kettle.  It's the perfect role for her though.  She plays it marvelously.  She's always funny and pushy and lovable.  To me, Mary Astor always plays two different roles and they are polar opposites.  She's either a noir dame or a loving mother.  Two very extreme roles that she pulls off every time.  I can't really think of any roles that were "in between" these two, but maybe I'm wrong.  It's just what she is in my mind.  She's a great mother and wife in this movie.  Warm and loving.  It's a lot like the character she played in Little Women.  Come to think of it June Allyson in Little Women had the same hair as Judy Garland did in this movie.  Hmmmmm......  

  

Halloween is really vicious in this movie.  It's like Devil's Night or something.  Who doesn't stop children or anyone for that matter from lighting a fire in the middle of the street?  It's a weird sequence.  I do love all the kids costumes though.  Wish kids still made their costumes and everything didn't have to be so perfect.

I thought this was a bit much.... Loved their costumes though!

Yet again I had another great night.  The movie was so pretty and the story was so warm.  Made me want it to be Christmas time though.  It's a great movie any time of year, but it put me in the Christmas mood.  And I love Christmas.  231 days till Christmas, BTW!!!!  Less that two-thirds of the way there!!!  WOOOP!  The food?  Weeeelll, goat cheese and feta on a pizza is kinda gross.  I think they put too much on.  They're both so flavorful, you jut need a teeny bit.  So it made me kinda sick to my stomach.  Never again.  Pizza should have lots of cheese, but they should all be Italian.  New rule!  However, the cake was divine.  Very very very sweet, but so nummy.  It was kinda like a white brownie.  So good.  And so easy.  

So good end to a weekend.  Even with gross pizza.  I don't think Imma be ok for a few days after that one.  Bleck.

Love,
Olive