Today I watched the first of my recently bought movies, Memoirs of a Geisha. It was actually hard to pick which one to watch. I have been wanting to see this movie for a long time but kept putting it off for many reasons.

When I first read the book, I did not actually know it was fiction. Someone had bought it for me, and I thought it was an actual Memoirs of a Geisha. The book was so beautifully written. To get to the end of the book and find out not only was it fiction but it was written by a man was quite a shock.

I was looking forward to seeing what the movie makers did with it – the first thing I’ll say, the movie is very long but compared to the book it is actually short. Much more happened in the book. But the thing the movie had that the book did not was the beauty of Geisha and the beauty of Japan though from the looks of things little of it was filmed there.

It was lovely. I’m not sure what I was expecting but I don’t think that was it. I do think the movie could have used more of the writing from the book as narration. I think I might have to watch it a couple more times to really absorb it. But if you get a chance, see it yourself. ;) It reminds me very much of Oshin in some ways, the young life of the girl was somewhat similar though Oshin did not become a Geisha.

The other half has a product night tonight and won’t be home for a little while so I might go watch Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with commentary. I am really interested in this one. ;)

I posted this over here if you’re looking for something to read.. :)

So the weekend was fairly busy, driving here there and everywhere. Last night we were supposed to go to the Chinese but The Other Half was not feeling too well so we ended up staying home. He cooked me something in the microwave and I went out to the lounge to eat it, and I was flicking around on the TV and I found Charlie And The Chocolate Factory – which I had not actually seen yet, the one with Johnny Depp. I had been looking forward to seeing it and it did *not* disappoint, I loved it. I’m assuming you’ve all seen it. I’ll try not to spoil it for those who haven’t, but it’ll be hard, maybe go see it and then come back and read this! ;) What I loved most –

• The first part with Charlie, somehow Tim Burton seemed to crank up the emotion-ometer to the point that it actually made me overwhelmed with sadness. Especially when Grandpa gives him the money to get another chocolate bar, he goes to get it, and there was no ticket. The look on both their faces was so sad.
• The arrival at the factory with the puppets, how hilarious!
• Filling in the backstory on who Willy Wonka was – what a great idea. I loved it!
• The Oompa-Loompa(s) were brilliant!
• Showing us how the Oompa-Loompa(s) came to work at the factory.
• The kids realising – how did the Oompa-Loompas rehearse these songs ahead of time? And Willy Wonka completely enjoying the performances.
• Changing the ending – it was much better that way. It wasn’t until the last kid was gone that I realised the movie was missing a vital part of the original, so how were they going to end it?
• The whole, entire performance of Johnny Depp. It was simply magical. Right down to the facial movements and the new stuff he brought to the character.

I loved it so much, I bought it today when I went to JB Hifi, again. :) As well as Ed Wood and another movie I can’t remember the name of right now. I’ll let you know what it was tomorrow. So I got a lot of stuff to watch this week.. ;) I might not be around as much as I thought I would be.. hehe

Just a quick two ;)

Ones I have watched recently – I snuck in another viewing of Pretty Woman without commentary last night. I intended to follow it up with a viewing of Chocolat – Vivian and Vianne. I love both these characters. If you have not seen Chocolat, you should, it is just a gorgeous movie. But now I admit I am a little tempted by Shakespeare in Love again. Girl with a Pearl Earring was also just gorgeous.

But from this shelf my favourite movie and one that took me down a path I was not expecting was Dead Man Walking. After seeing that many years ago I found myself a pen pal on Death Row. He was somewhat unique among people on death row in that he admitted he was guilty. That was one reason I kept writing to him.

The second was, he was really interesting, and he didn’t want anything from me other than to receive letters from time to time. It didn’t matter what I wrote about and to be honest I don’t really remember what I wrote about. Mostly just about life in general, or funny jokes people had told me, or interesting news stories.

He really liked to hear about going places, like you could sit down and write about taking a plane trip and you could tell him every little detail, he found it fascinating, mostly I guess because he couldn’t do it himself. His letters to me always had little drawings on the envelopes, he was a fantastic artist. I’m not sure where I put them when we moved and I’m looking for a bunch of stuff that seems to have gone missing including my paint brushes and sequins but if I find them I will scan one. He was executed in 2001. Incidentally the day Elvis died.

The box sets shelf – Pacino, Titanic, Back to the Future, Xfiles season one, Yes Minister, The Mummy one and two , and Oliver’s Twist.

Two today to make up for yesterday –

some of the tv show dvd’s I have – I love Seinfeld, Felicity you can’t seem to get the second, third or fourth series out here which sucks. ER is now hugely cheaper than what I bought one and two for, so some day I will continue the collection of those. The Sopranos I tried but didn’t get into it as much as I expected.

Whoa there’s Degrassi Junior High, cool! ;) And a few of my personal favourites which are getting on in years now but I still love them.