For better or for worse, many precious hours of this unseasonably mild Summer have been spent by Miranda and myself examining frames and frames of celluloid. We've taken in some surprisingly fun Summer fare at the theater including Transformers, The Simpsons Movie. We've also enjoyed a few second run showings at ye ole dollar theatre such as Disturbia (a modern day knock-off of Hitchcock's Rear Window which still manages to be rather watchable due to the performance of a charming young lad known as Shia), Meet the Robinsons and Spiderman 3 (round two for me... that makes about two too many). We've also embarked upon the rather ambitious quest of checking off the entire AFI 100 films of the past 100 years from our "To See" list... yeah, we've still got some work to do on that one. So far we've managed to squeeze in The Last Picture Show and Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid, two classics which surprisingly neither of us had ever seen. I have only this to say: Cloris Leachman was mesmerizing; I can't believe TLPS made the list by the skin of its teeth at #95; The music of Burt Bacharach + Western Shoot-em-up starring Newman and Redford = Movie Gold! Which leads me to the next item of attention.
In recent years, my favorite films have included all of those imagined by Mr. Wes Anderson. His attention to detail among the dysfunctional and the quirky characters realized by his rotating ensemble win me over every time. Needless to say, I was quite excited when the trailer for his most recent film starring Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman and "Flowin' Like" Owen Wilson, The Darjeeling Limited, was released online. I'm not ashamed to admit that I've watched the trailer at least fifteen times. The trailer is carried along gloriously by the song "This Time Tomorrow" by The Kinks. This is another reminder of what I love so much about Anderson's films... the music. Some of the most memorable music-in-film moments have come from his perfect juxtapositions of scene and song whether it be 1960's Brit-rock, Icelandic post-rock or the score written by Mark Motherbaugh. I'll be in the seats for The Darjeeling Limited when it opens in September and I'll probably eventually own the DVD and never tire of watching the dysfunctional family shenanigans just as I have with Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums and The Life Aquatic. However, after three films featuring the brilliant Bill Murray, I don't know how I'll react to his absence from this one. Let's just hope Darjeeling helps us forget all of those unfortunate Owen Wilson roles from recent films so we can remember why we all fell in love with Dignan.
