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Movie time



   My husband and I couldn’t have more different taste in movies. And a few other things. But for the sake of brevity, we’ll stick to movies here. He likes action – the more guns, knives, tanks, ropes and leaps off tall buildings in the film, the better he likes it. My youngest son is still at home and he feels pretty much the same way. This means I’m out numbered. There’s no one joining me while I watch Driving Miss Daisy on the family television. Something like that causes the menfolk to go upstairs to the “other” television where they can sit in an overstuffed chair or even lay on the spare bed and watch the blood flow to their heart’s content. Not me.
   There are a few tough-guy movies I like but that’s generally because really good-looking men are in them. I’ll watch Denzel Washington recite the alphabet just to get a good look at him. And back in the day, I would never have missed an Al Pacino movie. I even had a giant poster of him with the photo taken while he was starring in Serpico. His dark eyes seemed to follow me in my bedroom – the one with the giant, white, furry rug shaped like a foot lying on the red and black carpeted floor. Those were the days. Lately I’m into Mark Wahlberg. I don’t know if it’s his acting ability, his biceps or his devout Catholicism, whatever it is, there’s definitely something there.
   Our taste in movies doesn’t usually create a real problem other than the fact that the spare TV is in our “loft” in what is a pretty small house, which means if you spit at the living room TV from the loft, you’ll definitely hit it. So we end up with dualing televisions with one of us begging the other to, “Turn it down, PLEASE!!!” So much for the “open concept” in our house. Thankfully, my husband’s movie choices are short on dialogue.
   My idea of a great night of television is a Sidney Poitier marathon on AMC. Don’t make me sing “Amen” here. A Patch of Blue and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner back-to-back is the epitome of good luck in my book. I’m the kind of person who will consult Wikipedia to find out whether Katharine Hepburn’s niece was Joey in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner or Selina in A Patch of Blue. It’s that important to me.
   My husband just doesn’t get it. He watches a house blow up, three people die in a car crash, or an alien infestation at a supermarket and he’s good to go. I think his logic is like most men’s – you watch the movie as an escape and then it’s over and done. Not so with me. I watch the movie, agonize over the dialogue and the expressions on the actors’ faces and then I ponder it all for the next several days, finally coming to terms with the fact that, as my son often says, “It’s just a movie.” I think I’m going to go Google where Mark Wahlberg goes to Mass.


   My wife collects knickknacks. – Sidney Poitier

Comments

Deb said…
Have Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg ever co-starred together? If not, why not?
February 28, 2013 at 4:42 PM
Unknown said…
now that would be the best....i'm going to have to go Google it now.
March 1, 2013 at 10:09 AM
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