Watched for forty minutes then quit. Didn't get what was going on, never saw the first? one so the backstory wasn't making sense ... wasn't interested. Didn't click. Also it's two hours and sixteen minutes which is at least forty-five minutes too long. Red rating.
Margaret Smith -- Just Say Yes
Love this bit from Margaret Smith, the comedian:
Parents are drugging their kids now too. You've heard about this drug Ritalin? They give it to kids for hyperactivity. And the teacher recommends it. They send the note home, "just say yes!" Hyperactivity? When I was growing up, we were all hyperactive. We lived on wax lips and pixie sticks. Difference was to cope our parents did the drugs, as it should be. Now it's like, "Here honey, you take this, Mommy's sober. C'mon, down the hatch."
Long Bond Yields To Go Much Lower
Everyone saw this set-up last summer ... I'm using the weekly TLT chart here instead of the TNX/TYX yield charts, but it's all the same pattern ... in the last few weeks another long set up appeared ... the low on the 30 year bond yield back in January 2015 was 2.226% ... frayed-shirtcuff chartists expect yields to drop below there, maybe significantly below there ... it's just what the chicken bones are forecasting, take it with grain of salt.
Movies Watched -- Guardians of the Galaxy
Enjoyed this blockbuster, though at two hours is about 20 to 30 minutes too long. Has a lot of goofy humor to offset the violence, which I appreciated. And the music is great. There are several blockbusters ($100+ million in domestic gross revenue) on the Rotten Tomatoes Top 100 list and I plan to watch all of them. Green rating, recommended.
Movies Watched -- Gone Girl
Made it thirty minutes in then quit. It's two and a half hours long, meaning at least an hour too long. Ben Affleck is a good-looking guy but he just can't act. The girl was awful and I didn't care that she was missing. Did she stage her disappearance to get out of Missouri? Wouldn't blame her. Red rating. (Rex Reed got it right, once again.)
Everyone's favorite frat boy?
Movies Watched -- The Rocket
Sort of a feel-good pic from Laos, made by Australians maybe? Heart-string music at all the right spots which drives me mad. Watched to the end with no fast forwarding intermittently over several days so it gets a yellow rating, but I'd never recommend it.
Movies Watched -- Starred Up
Fifth movie I liked and can recommend from 2014: Starred Up. Prison pic. Would have been incomprehensible to me without the subtitles. Had Ben Mendelsohn in it, whom I know from Bloodline, a good one season TV series on HBO? that I can recommend. Body language of young star Jack O'Connell is something to see, great stuff.
"Starred Up" joins "The Lunchbox," "Nightcrawler," "Omar," and "Under the Skin" as movies I can recommend.
Movies Watched -- Lucy
A fellow Twitterer who liked "Starred Up" recommended Lucy to me. It wasn't on my radar since it's not on the Rotten Tomatoes Top 100 list, and I learned the reason for that: it is terrible. I made it 15 minutes in before quitting. Taipei as backdrop was kind of nice to see. I think Scarlett studied Chinese in real-life, but may be confusing her with another blonde. The characters on the wall in pic below say "Keep Clean," more nonsense script that looks cool?
Movies Watched -- In Bloom
Who knew Georgia (not the one in Dixie) was this screwed up? About two teenage girls growing up, sort of ... friendship, loyalty, dysfunctional families ... lots of drunkenness and violence and desperation ... not a feel-good pic ... I watched it to the end, no fast-forwarding, so it gets a yellow rating. Can't recommend it because it's too bleak ... all the post-Soviet movies are like this, places just look godawful (though the girls are beautiful ... a documentary I did like and can recommend is "Girl Model"). Georgian language sounds like Arabic? Central Asian people, they appear to be an interesting mix.
One on left soon to be child bride.
2014 Movies Watched -- Master List
Italics means I've seen it or attempted to watch it. In bold italics means I liked it and can recommend it. I'll list documentaries separately.
- The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2014)
- Gloria (2014)
- Leviathan (2014)
- Starred Up (2014)
- Song Of The Sea (2014)
- Boyhood (2014)
- Mr. Turner (2014)
- The Babadook (2014)
- A Summer's Tale (2014)
- Two Days, One Night (2014)
- We Are the Best! (2014)
- Ernest & Célestine (2014)
- The LEGO Movie (2014)
- Ida (2014)
- Blue Ruin (2014)
- The Lunchbox (2014)
- The Rocket (2014)
- Nightcrawler (2014)
- Snowpiercer (2014)
- A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014)
- The Dance of Reality (2014)
- Whiplash (2014)
- Love Is Strange (2014)
- The Normal Heart (2014)
- In Bloom (2014)
- Stranger by the Lake (2014)
- Child's Pose (2014)
- Diplomacy (2014)
- Birdman (2014)
- The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
- Frank (2014)
- Force Majeure (2014)
- Pride (2014)
- X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
- Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
- Locke (2014)
- How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)
- Dear White People (2014)
- Omar (2014)
- Live Die Repeat: Edge of Tomorrow (2014)
- Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes (2014)
- The Imitation Game (2014)
- Wild (2014)
- The Guest (2014)
- Bears (2014)
- Wetlands (2014)
- Alan Partridge (2014)
- A Field in England (2014)
- Under the Skin (2014)
- 22 Jump Street (2014)
- Lucy (2014)
- Gone Girl (2014)
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)