Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:05 — 31.9MB)
Subscribe: Email | TuneIn | RSS
11 years ago today, I tried a thing called “podcasting.”
It’s gone OK since then. Stuff has happened. It’s been neat.
I also talk to Raven Oak, one of the authors in the Joy to the Worlds anthology, out now!
(affiliate link)
Another movie review:
This one is… weird. A career-driven Hollywood PR consultant is managing a wild and uncaring young pop star. She’s designing a big Xmas day TV event that has everyone grumbling that they want to be home then. Unfortunately, the party-hard star chokes on an olive and dies. Realizing she has to turn the Xmas day event into a memorial, our PR person is haunted by the star who sticks around to show her three spirits to illustrate her shallow life.
Only… it’s called Christmas Cupid…
But it’s clearly A Christmas Carol…
Whatever.
This movie, not good. And yet I watched it all the way through, the way I wouldn’t have other movies, because for one reason: the Marley/Cupid character, Caitlyn. While Jacob Marley was repentant and remorseful in death, Caitlyn appears to be just like she was when she was alive. She watches with interest as the PR firm plans the spectacle of her funeral, and acts bored when something poignant happens to Sloane, our Scrooge. She is there to help Sloan see the error of her ways, but she does it with the zeal of a teenager mowing the lawn while thinking about the party she’s going to later. It’s actually pretty funny.
Flaws: Lord, everything else. Sloane falls under our cookie cutter bitch label. The whole “the coffee you fetched for me is just the wrong temperature, minion” bitch executive move is officially cliche’ now. It’s like a villain kicking a puppy, and only it’s used for identifying evil corporate women.
Ratings:
Stars: Christina Millan, Jackee
Storytelling: 1/5
Characters: 3/5 (bumped up from 1 because of Marley/Caitlyn and Jackee, who is always funny)
Closeness to Christmas Carol: 11/10 (Come on. Own it, already.)
Feminism: 3/5
Romance: 2/5
Is Christmas Saved?: I don’t even remember. I guess. Do I have to watch it again?
Deadly olives: 1
singing time – as long as we can remember the words…
Music by John Anealio: Batman’s Rebuttal – buy the song or album and tell him how awesome he is!
As always, inspiration coming from Grant’s Advent Calendar. Go see how it all began.
Seventh day of ADVENTure, second night of Hanukkah!
Music by John Anealio: Batman’s Rebuttal – buy the song or album and tell him how awesome he is!
As always, inspiration coming from Grant’s Advent Calendar. Go see how it all began.
I found this novella on Audible while traveling by myself last November and wanted something short and comforting.
Millie Arnold is a young British woman who works in an office, loves Christmas about as much as I do, and loves loves LOVES her man, Duncan.
Seeing as how she starts the book utterly in love, you can guess what happens.
Millie is dumped on November 29th, and the crushing depression (and hangover from Bailey’s and orange liqueur) threatens to ruin Advent. But for the sake of her young nephews, she attends their family December 1 lunch to write letters to Father Christmas with the boys. And wishes start to come true.
Think of it like The Monkey’s Paw, but Christmasy. The wishes are not fulfilled in the way that Millie intended. Nothing dire (well, no one comes back from the dead), but they still aren’t exactly what she wanted. For example, one of her first wishes is for flowers. A week later, three dozen red roses show up at her door. Delighted, she takes them, but finds that not only are they NOT from her ex-boyfriend, they’re not even for her; there’s another woman’s name, an apology, signed “John.” The deliveryman got the address wrong. She calls the florist who urges her to keep the roses since she’s already arranged them.
Later, the way some of the wishes are granted are still far from the realm of intent Millie wanted, even though with her second letter, she tried to word everything very carefully.
This could easily be a book that tanks because, frankly, Millie is a wretched whiner to start out with. But her character is deftly balanced by her doting, but cynical, older sister Cal, who comforts her without coddling her. The florist is an angry agent of fate, determined to fire her deliveryman and punish the guy who bought the roses “He had his secretary order them! Just said to send something appropriate! You keep the roses and I’ll send chrysanthemums and maybe his girlfriend will have another think about him.” Then she goes on a tangent about dogs. And then there is the charming and slightly dorky Mark Clark on the radio, a local DJ and minor celebrity that they listen to at the office.
It also helps that, with the aid of Duncan’s next door neighbor (“I don’t mean to be lookin it’s just that he hasn’t replaced the curtain rod that fell down six months ago!”) and her friend who professes to be psychic (although the one bit of information she had on Duncan came through gossip, not the stars,) Millie does begin to not only get over Duncan but also discover that their relationship wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.
Like A Christmas Kiss, this is actually a story about a woman learning her own self-worth first, and finding love second. The love story is pretty minor, coming only at the very end. The climax is surprisingly exciting for an otherwise mundane tale of a broken heart, and the story is set up quite deftly with plenty of foreshadowing.
Flaws: I’d actually prefer this longer. I’d like to see more of Millie’s transformation, and somehow more with the florist. She was a hoot. I actually have no idea how old anyone is, which threw me off a few times.
Ratings:
Stars: N/A (audiobook)
Storytelling: 4/5
Characters: 4/5
Closeness to Christmas Carol: 0
Feminism: 5/5
Romance: 2/5 (this is rating quantity, not quality)
Is Christmas Saved?: Definitely
Number of British car names I didn’t recognize: 3
Random thoughts: This is a Kindle single, so you can get the ebook, but if you like audio I HIGHLY recommend the Audible version, as the narrator is excellent with her different accents.
Sometimes you just gotta get the work done.
Music by John Anealio: Batman’s Rebuttal – buy the song or album and tell him how awesome he is!
As always, inspiration coming from Grant’s Advent Calendar. Go see how it all began.
We gotta roll with the punches, and the fears of people who were convinced the calendar was over. What does the new calendar bring?
Music by John Anealio: Batman’s Rebuttal – buy the song or album and tell him how awesome he is!
As always, inspiration coming from Grant’s Advent Calendar. Go see how it all began.
Here we go with another movie review:
One of my favorite romcoms. It edges out A Christmas Kiss, even.
This is our first “magic of Christmas” story. Kate is a woman hung up on her ex-boyfriend. She has a blind date for Christmas Eve, though: her step-mother’s (“-‘lady friend.’ They’re only married in the eyes of the law.”) godson, Miles. Before the date, she shops for the ex-boyfriend (nothing says love like cashmere) and is knocked out by a perfume sample spray.
She gets up, manages to be a distracted, rude ass on the (short) date with Miles, meets up with the ex (who is bringing her the dog they apparently share custody of), and discovers he’s heading to The Cabin with a new woman. Devastated she goes back home and at midnight, the clocks turn back and suddenly it’s Christmas Eve again and she’s getting up from being sprayed with perfume.
So, you think, this is a Groundhog Day-like story about how she lives each day over and over again to get over the ex and hook up with the blind date, right? You are only a tiny bit right. This story is very clever the way it interweaves small plots: everyone has a story, from the next door neighbor giving Kate a cherry-chip-loaf to the schlubby guy who looks up hopefully and says, “Phyllis?” every time she goes to the bar for her blind date. (“No, I’m not Phyllis. Phyllis is never coming!” she cries at him several days in.) There’s a guy building a tacky sculpture of Christmas lights. There’s a lonely older gentleman who helps her up after she falls in the mall. She has to mend things with her step-mom. Her best friend is also lonely. There’s EVEN A LOST ORPHAN BOY. AND TWO DOGS. Kate is responsible for tweaking everyone’s situation to make things work out.
When the woman successfully gets the guy in the first third of the movie (I think it’s Day 4 or 5?), you can wonder what’s left to tell. But this movie is incredibly clever at showing that there is more to your life than love, and you touch many lives with small actions. (also in future days she messes things up with him, proving she hasn’t found the “right” way to win him.)
With her actions helping out so many others, it’s almost as if she’s Santa, but no movie would be so subtle as to let you assume that without slamming you over the head with it over and over and over again.
There is also the requisite “This isn’t real, so I can do anything I want to” scene, with a tattoo, doughnuts, fancy car, and shopping for fur – and then giving the fur to a homeless woman. Also we have the “help me, doc, I’ve gone crazy” scene.
I think I have less to say about this movie than the others, because it’s rich with sub-plots and I don’t want to ruin them. I can’t ruin the HEA- you know it’s coming. But there’s a lot of surprising depth to this made-for-TV-movie and it’s highly worth watching. Also she isn’t locked into doing the same things every day. Some days she doesn’t even go to meet Miles. One day she shows up early, sees him arrive early too, and they “meet” as strangers (no names) and she finds out she likes him when they don’t have the “BLIND DATE” weight hanging over them.
My favorite use of the repeated days has nothing to do with the love story. She finds a runaway, recognizes him, and he runs from her. She can’t catch him in her current clothes so she stops, frowns, and says, “let’s try that again.” Then we cut to the next repeat where she hasn’t fretted about the date or the ex at all, but she’s in a track suit and appropriately dressed to run after the kid.
Flaws: A few people (mostly people of color) in the movie deserved bigger roles. I would have loved to see side plots featuring the woman who sprays Kate with the cologne, and the guy who hits on her friend at the office party in the first scene.
I think this is a rare “(wo)man vs (wo)man” Christmas plot. No one is working against Kate, except she has to learn to change. She’s not even Scrooge-level selfish and needs to think of others. I think she’s more of an Everywoman because we all struggle against change and often just need to open our eyes a little wider.
Ratings:
Stars: None that I recognized
Storytelling: 4/5
Characters: 4/5
Closeness to Christmas Carol: 0
Feminism: 5/5
Romance: 5/5
Is Christmas Saved?: Yes!
Tattoos received: 1
Donuts eaten: 6
Makeovers: 2
Sometimes intrepid adventurers have to deal with wild animals.
Music by John Anealio: Batman’s Rebuttal – buy the song or album and tell him how awesome he is!
As always, inspiration coming from Grant’s Advent Calendar. Go see how it all began.
No director! No camerawoman! No script! This is the first real trap!
Music by John Anealio: Batman’s Rebuttal – buy the song or album and tell him how awesome he is!
As always, inspiration coming from Grant’s Advent Calendar. Go see how it all began.