Movie Monday 12/14

I won't have much time for blogging this week (or next) with so much to do for Christmas. In the next 3 weeks, we have holiday celebrations in Connecticut, Delaware, and Oklahoma! But it was a good movie weekend, so I wanted to at least keep up with Movie Monday!

The boys and I watched LOTS of movies last week, with all three of us crashed all week and splayed out all over the family room - Harry Potter 4 and 5, Bedtime Stories (which was better than I expected), The Last Mimzy, and whatever movie was showing on Disney at noon every day! It was a looong week. Thankfully, both boys went back to school today.

Ken and I watched more DVDs than usual, since all of our favorite TV shows are now on hiatus until 2010:

• Lars and the Real Girl. OK, this one sounds really strange, but it was very good! It's about a lonely, extremely shy guy in a quiet northern town who orders a life-sized doll named Bianca from the internet and then treats her like she's his real girlfriend. I know, I know...Ken said to me, "Does the back of the DVD describe this one as quirky?" As a matter of fact, it does! It's funny but also surprisingly warm and sweet, with a great performance by Academy Award-winner Ryan Gosling.
  
• The Great Debators. An amazing movie starring Denzel Washington and Forest Whitaker based on a true story of the first African-American college debate team that competed against white colleges, including Harvard. It's set in the 1930's in Texas and is both disturbing and inspiring. It's the kind of movie that gets you cheering for the protagonists! I'd love for Jamie to watch this one, too.
• The Kite Runner. Ken and I both read and loved the book, and the movie was just as incredible. It's a fascinating story of two boys growing up in Afghanistan before the Communists invaded. One boy, Amir, is the son of a wealthy, well-educated father, and the other, Hassan, is the son of their household servant. The boys are best friends until something terrible happens to Hassan that Amir feels guilty over for the rest of their lives. The story follows the boys as they grow into men and Amir and his father flee the country amid the terrible destruction of the invasion and subsequent wars. Although what happens to Hassan is deeply disturbing, Amir find redemption in the end, as their story comes full circle. It's a powerful and compelling movie (and book) that also gives you an inside view into the devastation Afghanistan has endured.

That's it for this week - 3 good movies out of three! Have you seen any good movies lately?