from It’s Thursday, Cate, #5 (May 19, 2016)
Cate, as you’re well aware, I’m back home again instead of at school, which is fun, and I had four of my wisdom teeth removed yesterday, which is less fun. I’m in some pain but not a lot and my cheeks aren’t even that swollen, so, you know, you count your blessings. And right now I’m sitting on the deck writing this newsletter, but in the larger scheme of things I’ve been laying on the couch with ice on my face and watching movies. Most of the movies I’ve watched so far come from our public library, because, well,
But we also have plenty of movies right here at our own house, Cate. And that brings us to a segment we’re calling
“Tim Decides Which Five Movies At The Hatton House Are The Best To Watch When You’re Home Sick”
followed closely by a segment we’re calling
“Tim Decides Which Five Movies At The Hatton House Are The Worst To Watch When You’re Home Sick”
(Obviously, these are kind of subjective, because these segments are about my choices, not everybody’s. Sorry if you disagree, but I’m going to play the surgery-patient card on you with this one)
The best movies at the Hatton house to watch when you’re at home sick are:
5. Winnie The Pooh (2011)
Everybody loves Pooh. Pooh is the best. This movie does a good job of letting Pooh be Pooh, simple and happy and fun and just sad enough. Very good all around.
But also, can you imagine trying to pitch a character, much less a stuffed yellow bear, named Winnie-the-Pooh in the year of our Lord 2016? His name is so strange. But we love him anyway.
While we’re on that subject, it’s just Pooh and Eeyore with proper names (even allowing that donkeys make the sound “Ee-yore”). Why is that? All the others are just animal names. By all rights, it should be Bear at the front of that boat/ hunny pot and Donkey at its end. I’m not questioning the simple brilliance of A.A. Milne, but it does make you think.
4. The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)
Tom Holland in Captain America: Civil War puts the other Spider-Men to shame, I realize that. But I like this movie very much. Andrew Garfield is just a delight (even if he’s too cool to be Peter Parker), Emma Stone is a delight in equal measure, and their chemistry is absolutely stunning. I’m not saying anything new there.
It’s not the best superhero movie ever made (which may well be Captain America: Civil War, we’ll see how it holds up after we have time to kick its tires a little at home), or even the best superhero movie on this list, but it’s funny and fun and has those two in love in it, and Spider-Man beats the bad guys and also the Coldplay song “Til Kingdom Come” is in it, and there’s not much more you can ask for when you’re home feeling rotten.
3. Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)
So far we’ve got two movies based on children’s books and one superhero, with more to come, so I’d say I’m pretty on brand with this week’s newsletter. They can take my teeth, but they’ll never take my brand.
This is probably my favorite movie on this list. It’s so good. It’s one of the cleverest movies I’ve ever seen, it’s beautiful and succinct in the best Wes Anderson way, and the hard emotional elements of family conflict give its fun an undercurrent of intensity in a really gripping way.
Also, it has lots of tweed, a motorcycle with a sidecar, a lone-wolf wolf, and a calculator watch. Terrific. What an adventure.
2. The Princess Bride (1987)
The entire premise of this movie is that it’s the perfect story for when you’re sick. It’s got everything, the grandpa even says so right at the beginning: “Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles….”
You can’t do better than the most quotable fairytale of our day. Iconic.
1. The Incredibles (2004)
The Incredibles is a modern classic. It’s both innovative and simple all the way through- script to costumes to characterization. Easy to watch and rewatch, because it doesn’t try too hard. It’s got a clear idea and executes it well.
The thing that strikes me most, watching The Incredibles again in my old age, is how visually perfect it is. The midcentury modern aesthetic throughout the whole thing is great, also filled with futuristic elements like the planes they use and Syndrome’s whole compound on Nomanisan Island. It still looks like it’s from the sixties, but it doesn’t quite exist in time. I think that’s great in a story. Easier to get lost in a story that doesn’t exist in quite the same world as you.
Their costumes and logo are even better. Bold and simple. More than that, Edna’s little speech about the hobo suit and capes and her general approach to making supersuits is filled with great ideas about costume design. This is a great movie to watch even more than it’s a great story to be told.
The worst movies at the Hatton house to watch when you’re at home sick are:
5. Toy Story 3 (2010)
Good movie, sure, great movie, even, but it gets real emotional at the end. You don’t want to process too much emotion lying sick in your bed. Bad time to be crying. Better than most, I guess, but you want to feel better and not worse, so, not a great choice.
4. Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)
There’s a time and a place for this movie. Maybe at a sleepover with friends, to laugh and cry at it together. Or alone with your own dreams about what high school could be and should have been. That time and place is not, for example, on a tour bus with the Fort Dodge Senior High marching band who are not nearly as interested in watching the movie as you are, which is how I first saw it. Sick and at home in the early afternoon is also the wrong time and place. Good as it is, this movie is sad and it’s complicated. That makes it a solid nope.
3. The Fault In Our Stars (2013)
Again, fine movie. Funny. Killer soundtrack. But it’s a movie about being sick, a movie about being sad, and a movie with more than its fair share of human suffering and SPOILER ALERT death. These ideas are not ideas you want to fill your mind with alone and sick at home.
2. Samantha: An American Girl Holiday (2004)
Honestly, Cate, why do we have this.
1. Where The Wild Things Are (2009)
I think this movie is great. I love the original book, and just uploading that picture of the wild thing filled me with a kind of childlike joy.
The thing is, this movie is a confusing movie. Difficult plot to understand and remember. Because it’s a story about growing up, there’s childlike frustration and sadness in it just as there’s childlike joy. There’s a lot of meaning in the movie, but you have to be on your game to pick up on it. Not a movie to try to follow sick in bed.
It’s just super weird.
This has been
“Tim Decides Which Five Movies At The Hatton House Are The Best To Watch When You’re Home Sick”
and
“Tim Decides Which Five Movies At The Hatton House Are The Worst To Watch When You’re Home Sick”
NOTTAHMIT 