One of the things that I love about being in my hometown is that it’s a good time for me to go to the movies. I don’t go out to movies all that often when I’m in San Francisco. This is due mostly to the cost of seeing a full-priced movie there (actual cost plus transportation cost etc.) compared to hitting the matinee with my mom in Tucson. It’s also due to the fact that there are so many other cheap/free/similarly-priced events and activities to enjoy in San Francisco so it seems like a waste to spend that time and money on a mainstream movie. And I suppose it’s due a bit to the fact that I don’t ever find it all that easy to find a friend in San Francisco who also wants to spend the time and money on the same mainstream movie that I do. So going to the movies is something I don’t do much anymore but still love to do when I’m back with my family.

I wouldn’t say that we typically see the smartest movies although some of the ones that we go watch are certainly smart. I’m just as happy to see a dumb chick flick with my mom and sister as to see the latest smart indie film. It’s more about the experience and the time spent together than the film itself. So I wasn’t necessarily expecting much from Blind Side which we went to go see this morning. All I really expected was that it would be a decent story with decent actors and that we’d have a good time together just hanging out at the theatre. We did have a good time together but Blind Side ended up being better than I’d expected it to be.

For those who don’t know, the movie is based on a book which is based on the true story of a teenager who grew up in the ghetto and ended up homeless when he’s taken in by a rich white family. The story is fairly predictable … they become his family, they help him with school, he ends up succeeding and gets a football scholarship. It’s a pretty straightforward story line.

However there were definitely some smart things about it that I liked. The main thing was that the movie depicts the fact that these rich white Republicans have some self-doubt as to their own motivations for taking this kid in. They wonder if they’re doing the right thing and if they’re doing it for the right reasons. Are they just getting a feel-good kick out of helping someone out? Are they pushing their own expectations on to him? Although the movie doesn’t delve deeply into these feelings, it poses the questions and acknowledges the fact that this is an issue that people in their position would have to deal with internally. Although I think that we often see characters in films having to deal with this issue externally (which we see here as well when the mother’s friends question her choice and consider it a charity act) we see it less often in terms of how people themselves question their own motives. It’s a smart twist even if it’s not explored in depth.

There were certainly some aspects of the storyline that I wondered about. The movie depicts this seventeen-year-old kid just naturally fitting in fairly well with this new family. I find it difficult to believe that the transition into a family was easy for him at that point. Based on my own experience working with foster children, there’s just a lot of wariness and a period of adapting that we don’t see in the film. In that way, I don’t think that the film revealed enough about the issues that the characters must have dealt with. So it falls short of what my full expectations would be if I were going to write the film but it exceeded the expectations that I had of it as a mainstream movie.

Mostly I guess I the movie captured my attention less for what it showed than what it didn’t show. It got my curious about the life of Michael Oher and how it all really played out for him as compared to what the movie depicted. I am particularly interested in learning more about how college went for him, how difficult it was to adjust to leaving his new family as soon as they’d adopted him and how hard the transition was to living on his own on a college campus. I am curious about the politics behind the NCAA investigation of his choice to attend the alma mater of his new foster parents – why did the NCAA do this and what other cases similar to this have there been. The movie interested me because it left this questions open which makes me inclined to do more research into the topic now that I’ve left the theater.

Is Blind Side worth seeing? I probably wouldn’t have bothered in San Francisco but I’m glad that I saw it while back at home. If you saw it, I’d love to know what you thought about it! Leave it in the comments.

What other bloggers have written about Blind Side:

• Televisual – Interesting thoughts on why the movie is making so much money
• Be Happy NYC – Sums up the movie and talks about the fashion in it
• Online Film School – “Overall this film is full of inspiration”
• Scrap with Suzy – A visual post

Tags: blind side, diary of a smart chick, entertainment, films, movies

I went to a barbecue earlier in the summer at a friend’s place in Berkeley. There were a lot of great things about the BBQ (great food, great people, etc.) but the thing that stands out most in my memory of this event was the outdoor fire pit that she had in her backyard. I’m convinced that the whole reason that this BBQ felt like an awesome party was because of the fire pit.

I’ve always liked fire pits. They’re great at parties because they provide a central gathering place for everyone to come together and talk. At other barbecues I usually see people standing around in groups of 3 or 4. When there’s a fire pit, everyone tries to hang out together near the fire. This means that you end up getting the chance to talk to more people when you attend a BBQ that has one.

This was definitely the case with the party in Berkeley. I probably would have only talked to the few people that I knew if I didn’t have a good reason to go gather with everyone. However, since we were all sitting around the fire together, I was able to meet several new people that I’ve actually started to become good friends with. I think the fire pit helped break the ice in that way.

There’s another reason that the fire pit was particularly great for this party – and it’s reason that would make outdoor fire pits good at any BBQ in the San Francisco Bay Area. The reason is that it was actually functionaly. It was technically summer here when the BBQ happened but it was one of those summer days that rapidly turns cold as soon as the sun goes down. We had all been excited to get some sun through the fog but then it went away and we were all chilly. The fire pit made us comfortable enough to keep the party going outside even though the air wasn’t warm anymore.

I probably won’t purchase a fire pit myself since the shared outdoor area at my apartment doesn’t really welcome things like this. However, I’m really glad that I know at least one person in the area who has one.

Tags: entertainment, fire pits, fun, party, socializing

I recently did research into the relationship between movies and mobile phones. What I learned from this research is that there are three main ways in which movies and cell phones are linked:

1. People watch movies on their cell phones. More and more phones are getting advanced enough to be capable of watching streaming or downloaded movies. There have been a lot of recent announcements about this link between movies and mobile phones.
2. People film movies on their cell phones. This is just cool. Lots of people use their phone’s video camera to film movies. There are film festivals specifically for these phone-made films. I love the creativity of it!
3. The movie industry markets on phones. There are tons of different marketing ploys used by movie promoters that involve mobile phones include interactive mobile advertising.

Are there other links between cell phones and movies that I’m forgetting?

Tags: art, cell phones, entertainment, kathryn vercillo, mobile phones, movies, society, Technology, Wireless

I almost never watch the news. I almost never read the news. And yet, I do tend to more or less know what’s going on in the world. It’s hard to avoid news completely. It comes in through posts on Twitter and headlines on blogs. So it’s not that I stay out of touch with what’s going on and what people think about it; I just rarely get that news from traditional sources.

And what I’ve seen lately about swine flu pretty much sums up why that is. The media is designed to sensationalize news and to create what amounts to a sense of panic about what’s happening in the world around us. Every time that I turn on a news program I start to worry that I’m going to get murdered or lose my home or catch the latest deadly flu that’s going around.

And while I think it’s good to know what’s happening around you, I think it’s a lot better to get that information first hand from actually experiencing what’s going on around you than to get it from the headline reports about what others say is going on.

Blogs and social networking comments seem to provide a more well-rounded, balanced picture of what’s happening with real people in the world. They say, “yeah, I’m scared of this but I’m also doing x,y,z and can’t go crazy worrying about it right now”. Perhaps that’s why I liked these ten funny videos about swine flu. They remind us to put our fears into perspective, to laugh at our lives and to socialize with those around us instead of locking ourselves up in our fears.

Tags: entertainment, fear, hubpages, media, news, pandemic, swine flu, videos

If I have any sort of addiction then it is probably an addiction to television crime shows. I like almost all of them and will watch pretty much any of them if I can get my hands on a whole season’s worth of shows at once.

Mostly I think that this addiction is a negative thing. I make myself paranoid about crime and have to remind myself that these shows don’t depict the real statistics of crime in my area. I waste a lot of time that could be spent on better endeavors than watching TV.

But every once in awhile, I think that I learn things from these shows. From watching these shows, I’ve gained a pretty accurate understanding of a lot of modern crime issues including the controversy of the national DNA database, the tough issues surrounding how to deal with transgender people in the prison system and the emotional side of being someone who fights crime.

I do think that TV is generally bad for you in big doses but also think that it can be watched in moderation as an educational tool. Now I just need to learn how to do that moderation thing!

Tags: crime, crime shows, dna database, entertainment, hubpages, kathryn vercillo, television