Off the Mark

Unfortunately, most of my movie watching is no longer at the wonderful Normal Theater [How many of you have theaters in Wikipedia?]. We do have two “art” theaters here in Champaign, but they are not the same. They certainly aren’t non-profits, and the snacks are much more than a $1 each.

Most of my movie watching is now done at home. At least I have a better sound system than the local theaters.

I have no idea if this list is 100% complete. I do believe that it is close, but I think I may have missed one that I saw at the theater.

The list is divided into 3 groups: theater movies, borrowed movies from the ex, and those I rented from That’s Rentertainment. If there is link it is to a blog post where I wrote about, or at least mentioned, the movie. I may link to the WorldCat or IMDB records, especially for the more obscure ones, but that’s a lot of linking!

Anyway, here is the list of movies I watched in 2006:

Saw in the theater:

Syriana - 5 Jan with Em
Heart of Gold (Neil Young) - 14 Apr
Superman Returns - Harvest Moon Drive-in 7 Jul with “the kids”
Snakes on a Plane - 18 Aug with “the kids”
Little Miss Sunshine - 27 Aug with Tracy

Borrowed from Mary and Terry in the 1st half of July 2006:

Foxfire
Pitch Black (Roddick)
The Chronicles of Roddick
Dark Fury (Roddick animated)
The Italian Job - Michael Caine
The Bone Snatcher
Mercury Rising
Unbreakable
Around the Fire
Donnie Darko

I talked about these movies in two posts.

Got a 40 movie Block from That’s Rentertainment on 1 Jan 06

1 Jan 06
Batman Begins
The Brown Bunny
Lords of Dogtown - skateboarding

3 Jan 06
Broken Flowers - Bill Murray / Jim Jarmusch

6 Jan 06
Winterschläfer (Winter Sleepers) - Tom Tykwer (Germany) imdb
Serenity
Kick the Moon (Korea)
Kinsey

11 Jan 06
turtles can fly (Iran-Iraq) imdb Although heartbreaking at the end, this was an incredible movie.
23 Jan 06
Put the Camera on Me (doc) imdb Darren Stein’s home movies.
Up and Down (Czech) imdb

17 Mar 06
Kung Fu Hustle (China, Hong Kong) imdb Pure camp.
Look at Me (France)
Zelary (Czech) imdb Simply wonderful.

20 Mar 06
Layer Cake (Britain)
The Baxter
House of Flying Daggers

22 Mar 06
Sex and Lucia (Spain, France) - ranger recommendation
Sueno
Off the Map

24 Mar 06
2046 (China, …)
Sideways
Osama (Afghanistan, …) An extremely powerful movie.

4 May 06
Thumbsucker
The Hot Spot (Virginia Madsen, Jennifer Connelly)
The Constant Gardener

7 May 06
Breakfast on Pluto
Mad Hot Ballroom (doc)
Dandelion

10 May 06
Memoirs of a Geisha
The Story of the Weeping Camel (Mongolia)
Dark Blue World (Czech)

2 Jun 06
Weather Man
Transamerica

5 Jun 06
The Squid and the Whale

6 Jun 06
Mrs. Henderson Presents
The Education of Shelby Knox, et. al.

16 Jun 06
The Same River Twice
Missing In America
Munich

10 July 06
Brokeback Mountain
Walk the Line

2nd 40 movie block from That’s Rentertainment 17 Nov 06:

17 Nov 06
Steamboy (Japan) (anime) - “science” (steam tech) at the 1851 Great Exhibition/Crystal Palace
3 Burials of Melquiades Estrada
Kingdom of Heaven - 100 yrs after England took Jerusalem

These and many of the next several movies are mentioned here and talked about here.

20 Nov 06
Adaptation
Paradise Now (Palestinian) (via LibraryTavern 22 Apr 06)
Junebug (music by yo la tengo)
Sirens
Napoleon Dynamite
Maria Full of Grace

22 Nov 06
Word Wars
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Spellbound

3 Dec 06
X-Men 3: The Last Stand
Schlock! The Secret History of American Movies
Mr. Death

6 Dec 06
Mongolian Ping Pong (China) imdb Awesome movie!
3-Iron (Canada/S Korea)
Über Goober - documentary on role players and related geeks

9 Dec 06
Rock School (doc)
Under the Sun (Swedish) imdb Lovely movie!
Genghis Blues (Tuvan throat-singing) (doc) Good!

11 Dec 06
Kinky Boots (England) - based on a true story. Was pretty good.
The Cavern - stupid, not scary, with a completely gratuitous rape at the end.
Blossoms of Fire imdb documentary about the Juchitecas (supposed matriarchy of the Zapotec peoples) of Juchitán, Mexico. Was very interesting and colorful.
The Cockettes (doc) imdb I had been looking for this movie since January when I read The Riddle of Gender.

16 Dec 06
Ultraviolet
Stick It - commentary on elite gymnastics; pretty good.
Bad Education (Spain)

19 Dec 06 — bought
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

19 Dec 06
goldfish memory (Ireland) [20 Dec] imdb Highly recommended.
Mind the Gap imdb Also highly recommended.

22 Dec 06 (8)
Touching the Void (snow/ice climbing documentary)
Imaginary Heroes imdb
Nobody Knows (Japan) imdb

24 Dec 06
Lady in the Water — video at Mary and Terry’s. Both Sara and I decided this movie was “interesting,” in the most negative and sarcastic connotation available to ‘interesting.’

26 Dec 06
King Kong
Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing & Charm School imdb
Other Side of Sunday (Norway) imdb This was a very good film. It takes a hard look at repressive organized religion.

All in all, several great movies, quite a few good ones, even more decent ones, and a few bad ones.