Day 05 - Favorite love story in a movie



So what if one of them has a toothpick waist and Bambi eyes and the other is more hirsute than your average leading man? It's a tale as old as time!

Day 04 - A movie that makes you sad



At first I was going to choose Avalon, because that was the first movie that ever made me cry, but this movie made me miserable. For days. And I loved every minute of it.

Day 03 - A movie that makes you really happy



Michael Redgrave directing folk dance. Need I say more?

Day 02 - The most underrated movie



And also its accompanying Part II, The Four Musketeers. Richard Lester is a genius. He manages to:
a) Make Alexandre Dumas' classic swashbuckler a comedy.
b) Use stunt casting to his advantage.
c) Film an epic with what looks like a shoestring budget.
and, despite all this, d) remain remarkably faithful to the book, which was my favorite for at least five years.

Nonetheless, it remains overshadowed by the bad (Oliver Platt notwithstanding) Disney version. Not everyone is as discerning as Subcontinent (obsessed with Aramis), and I (Athos 4 eva!).

Day 01- The best movie you saw during the last year



I'm assuming they mean movies that came out in the past year. So, yes, definitely, definitely this.

Here we go. A taste of what's to come.

Day 01- The best movie you saw during the last year
Day 02 - The most underrated movie
Day 03 - A movie that makes you really happy
Day 04 - A movie that makes you sad
Day 05 - Favorite love story in a movie
Day 06 - Favorite made for TV movie
Day 07 - The most surprising plot twist or ending
Day 08 - A movie that you’ve seen countless times
Day 09 - A movie with the best soundtrack
Day 10 - Favorite classic movie
Day 11 - A movie that changed your opinion about something
Day 12 - A movie that you hate
Day 13 - A movie that is a guilty pleasure
Day 14 - A movie that no one would expect you to love
Day 15 - A character who you can relate to the most
Day 16 - A movie that you used to love but now hate
Day 17 - A movie that disappointed you the most
Day 18 - A movie that you wish more people would’ve seen
Day 19 - Favorite movie based on a book/comic/etc.
Day 20 - Favorite movie from your favorite actor/actress
Day 21 - Favorite action movie
Day 22 - Favorite documentary
Day 23 - Favorite animation
Day 24 - That one awesome movie idea that still hasn’t been done yet
Day 25 - The most hilarious movie you’ve ever seen
Day 26 - A movie that you love but everyone else hates
Day 27 - A movie that you wish you had seen in theaters
Day 28 - Favorite movie from your favorite director
Day 29 - A movie from your childhood
Day 30 - Your favorite movie of all time

According to my Mayan Astrology Reading:
"I harmonize in order to beautify
Modeling art
I seal the store of elegance
With the galactic tone of integrity
I am guided by the power of free will"

Nice.

Other things have been happening--good things--but I am a little too busy to write about them now. I'm taking notes, though, and a more thorough entry will soon occur!

Time for the annual What I Have Read Since Last April! I suspect this list will be less epic than last year. Oh well.

1) John Bull's Other Island by George Bernard Shaw
2) Juno and the Paycock by Sean O'Casey
3) Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner
4) Paradise Lost by John Milton
5) The Lost Language of Cranes by David Leavitt
6) Amongst Women by John McGovern
7) The Commitments by Roddy Doyle
8) The Vagina Monologues by Eve Ensler
9) Blue Heaven by Joe Keenan
10) The Deportees by Roddy Doyle
11) Time Travel in Einstein's Universe by J. Richard Gott
12) (I am) Nobody's Lunch by The Civilians*
13) Gone Missing by The Civilians
14) Arkham Asylum by Grant Morrison and Dave McKean
15) The Man Who Fell in Love With the Moon by Tom Spanbauer
16) The Night Listener by Armistead Maupin
17) The Day of the Scorpion by Paul Scott
18) The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper
19) The Heather Blazing by Colm Toíbín
20) Nameless by Sam Starbuck
21) The Master Butcher's Singing Club by Louise Erdrich
22) Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier
23) A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
24) The Towers of Silence by Paul Scott
25) Regeneration by Pat Barker
26) The Strings are False by Louis Macneice
27) A Dream of Scipio by Iain Pears
28) A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
29) Girls with Slingshots by Danielle Lorsetto
30) Native Speaker by Chang-Rae Lee
31) The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett
32) A Division of Spoils by Paul Scott
33) The Eye in the Door by Pat Barker
34) The Ghost Road by Pat Barker
35) Darkmans by Nicola Barker
36) Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland
37) And the Band Played On by Randy Shilts
38) The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño
39) The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
40) City of Thieves by David Benioff
41) The Golden Gate by Vikram Seth
42) Skipping Toward Gomorrah by Dan Savage
43) Another Country by James Baldwin
44) The Squire's Quest by Gerald Morris
45) Iphigenia in Aulis by Euripides
46) Chicas 2000 by Carmelita Tropicana
47) The Commitment by Dan Savage
48) Duffy by Dan Kavanagh
49) The Bacchae of Euripides translated by C.K. Williams
50) The Heidi Chronicles by Wendy Wasserstein
51) Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lori Parks
52) The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kyd
53) Gender Trouble by Judith Butler
54) Third by Wendy Wasserstein
55) Titus Andronicus by William Shakespeare
56) In the Next Room or the vibrator play by Sarah Ruhl
57) Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare
58) Fun Home by Alison Bechdel
59) the bull-jean stories by Sharon Bridgforth
60) Execution of Justice by Emily Mann
61) Polyeucte by Corneille
62) The American Play by Suzan-Lori Parks
63) Ajax (por nobody) by Alice Tuan
64) Ruined by Lynn Nottage
65) Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
66) The Appeal by Young Jean Lee
67) The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
68) L.A. Confidential by James Ellroy
69) Hamlet by William Shakespeare
70) The White Devil by John Webster
71) The Changeling by Thomas Middleton
72) The Duchess of Malfi by John Webster
73) The Revenger's Tragedy by Thomas Middleton and William Rowley
74) The Lion in Winter by James Goldman
75) Big Sur by Jack Kerouac
76) Jeb and Dash edited by Ina Russell
77) Anthony Blunt: His Lives by Miranda Carter
78) The Secret Pilgrim by John Le Carré
79) The History of Sexuality Vol. 1 by Michel Foucault
and then junior paper rereads of:
80) Tales of the City series
81) Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carré
82) The Untouchable by John Banville
83) Single Spies by Alan Bennett
84) Another Country by Julian Mitchell

*ohmigoodness foreshadowing

And then, of the newly read...
Top Five of the Year, in order for once:
And the Band Played On by Randy Shilts
L.A. Confidential by James Ellroy
Another Country by James Baldwin
The Lion in Winter by James Goldman
A Division of Spoils by Paul Scott

Of all of those, there were really only three I would never, ever read again.
Once again, this was an Armistead Maupin year, followed closely by Paul Scott and Pat Barker.
Surprisingly, for me, my favorite book of the year was nonfiction. Maybe this marks the beginning of a new trend? Maybe not.