Working Title

Criticism of the Christian Church pt2

2011-03-03T08:24:00.001-08:00

(more from The Reason for God)

The typical criticisms by secular people about the oppressiveness and injustices of the Christian church actually come from Christianity’s own resources for critique of itself. The shortcomings of the church can be understood historically as the imperfect adoption and practice of the principles of the Christian gospel. Sommerville says that when the Anglo-Saxons first heard the Christian gospel message they were incredulous. They couldn’t see how any society could survive that did not fear and respect strength. When they did convert, they were far from consistent. They tended to merge the Christian other-regarding ethic with their older ways. They supported the Crusades as a way of protecting God’s honor and theirs. They let monks, women, and serfs cultivate charitable virtues, but these virtues weren’t considered appropriate for men of honor and action. No wonder there is so much to condemn in church history. But to give up Christian standards would be to leave us with no basis for the criticism. What is the answer, then, to the very fair and devastating criticisms of the record of the Christian church? The answer is not to abandon the Christian faith, because that would leave us with neither the standards nor the resources to make correction. Instead we should move to a fuller and deeper grasp of what Christianity is. The Bible itself has taught us to expect the abuses of religion and it has also told us what to do about them.

Criticism of the Christian Church pt 1

2011-03-01T08:32:00.000-08:00

In Jesus’s and the prophets’ critique, self-righteous religion is always marked by insensitivity to issues of social justice, while true faith is marked by profound concern for the poor and marginalized. The Swiss theologian John Calvin, in his commentaries on the Hebrew prophets, says that God so identifies with the poor that their cries express divine pain. The Bible teaches us that our treatment of them equals our treatment of God. While the church has inexcusably been party to the oppression of people at times, it is important to realize that the Bible gives us tools for [the] analysis and unflinching critique of religion... (From The Reason for God)

Kids, stay tuned for pt 2 when we talk about the Anglo-Saxons...

Slight Delay - but back on track

2011-02-25T09:43:00.000-08:00

I'm sorry for the delay in posts. I travelled home from being in Miami working for two weeks and am now back in Atlanta. Thanks everyone for reading, following, and especially for posting (Sam, Jared, Ann: move your post here!). It'd be great if we can really get some discussion going. If not though, I hope you continue to enjoy excerpts from what I've been reading.

How about some Keller referencing Lewis:

"My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of “just” and unjust”?…What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?…Of course I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too—for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies…. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple. Lewis recognized that modern objections to God are based on a sense of fair play and justice. People, we believe, ought not to suffer, be excluded, die of hunger or oppression. But the evolutionary mechanism of natural selection depends on death, destruction, and violence of the strong against the weak—these things are all perfectly natural. On what basis, then, does the atheist judge the natural world to be horribly wrong, unfair, and unjust? The nonbeliever in God doesn’t have a good basis for being outraged at injustice, which, as Lewis points out, was the reason for objecting to God in the first place. If you are sure that this natural world is unjust and filled with evil, you are assuming the reality of some extra-natural (or supernatural) standard by which to make your judgment."

Self-defined Right and Wrong

2011-02-18T04:48:00.000-08:00

From The Reason for God by Timothy Keller

"One of the most frequent statements I heard was that “Every person has to define right and wrong for him-or herself.” I always responded to the speakers by asking, “Is there anyone in the world right now doing things you believe they should stop doing no matter what they personally believe about the correctness of their behavior?” They would invariably say, “Yes, of course.” Then I would ask, “Doesn’t that mean that you do believe there is some kind of moral reality that is ‘there’ that is not defined by us, that must be abided by regardless of what a person feels or thinks?” Almost always, the response to that question was a silence, either a thoughtful or a grumpy one."

Don't be Nominal (Fanatics? Pt. 2)

2011-02-17T00:07:00.000-08:00

From The Reason for God by Timothy Keller

Many people try to understand Christians along a spectrum from “nominalism” at one end to “fanaticism” on the other. A nominal Christian is someone who is Christian in name only, who does not practice it and perhaps barely believes it. A fanatic is someone who is thought to over-believe and over-practice Christianity. In this schematic, the best kind of Christian would be someone in the middle, someone who doesn’t go all the way with it, who believes it but is not too devoted to it. The problem with this approach is that it assumes that the Christian faith is a basically a form of moral improvement. Intense Christians would therefore be intense moralists or, as they were called in Jesus’s time, Pharisees. Pharisaic people assume they are right with God because of their moral behavior and right doctrine. This leads naturally to feelings of superiority toward those who do not share their religiosity, and from there to various forms of abuse, exclusion, and oppression. This is the essence of what we think of as fanaticism. What if, however, the essence of Christianity is salvation by grace, salvation not because of what we do but because of what Christ has done for us? Belief that you are accepted by God by sheer grace is profoundly humbling. The people who are fanatics, then, are so not because they are too committed to the gospel but because they’re not committed to it enough. Think of people you consider fanatical. They’re overbearing, self-righteous, opinionated, insensitive, and harsh. Why? It’s not because they are too Christian but because they are not Christian enough. They are fanatically zealous and courageous, but they are not fanatically humble, sensitive, loving, empathetic, forgiving, or understanding—as Christ was. Because they think of Christianity as a self-improvement program they emulate the Jesus of the whips in the temple, but not the Jesus who said, “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone” (John 8:7). What strikes us as overly fanatical is actually a failure to be fully committed to Christ and his gospel.

Fanatics? Pt. 1

2011-02-16T16:51:00.000-08:00

From The Reason for God by Timothy Keller:
Many people who take an intellectual stand against Christianity do so against a background of personal disappointment with Christians and churches. We all bring to issues intellectual predispositions based on our experiences. If you have known many wise, loving, kind, and insightful Christians over the years, and if you have seen churches that are devout in belief yet civic-minded and generous, you will find the intellectual case for Christianity much more plausible. If, on the other hand, the preponderance of your experience is with nominal Christians (who bear the name but don’t practice it) or with self-righteous fanatics, then the arguments for Christianity will have to be extremely strong for you to concede that they have any cogency at all...we have to address the behavior of Christians—individual and corporate—that has undermined the plausibility of Christianity for so many people. Three issues stand out. First, there is the issue of Christians’ glaring character flaws. If Christianity is the truth, why are so many non-Christians living better lives than the Christians? Second, there is the issue of war and violence. If Christianity is the truth, why has the institutional church supported war, injustice, and violence over the years? Third, there is the issue of fanaticism. Even if Christian teaching has much to offer, why would we want to be together with so many smug, self-righteous, dangerous fanatics?

More about Love

2011-02-15T19:13:00.000-08:00

Today many of the skeptics I talk to say, as I once did, they can’t believe in the God of the Bible, who punishes and judges people, because they “believe in a God of Love.” I now ask, what makes them think God is Love? Can they look at life in the world today and say, “This proves that the God of the world is a God of love”? Can they look at history and say, “This all shows that the God of history is a God of love”? Can they look at the religious texts of the world and conclude that God is a God of love? By no means is that the dominant, ruling attribute of God as understood in any of the major faiths. I must conclude that the source of the idea that God is Love is the Bible itself. And the Bible tells us that the God of love is also a God of judgment who will put all things in the world to rights in the end. The belief in a God of pure love—who accepts everyone and judges no one—is a powerful act of faith. Not only is there no evidence for it in the natural order, but there is almost no historical, religious textual support for it outside of Christianity. The more one looks at it, the less justified it appears.

-From The Reason for God by Timothy Keller

Love -a Valentine's Day post

2011-02-14T15:37:00.000-08:00

All sorts of people are fond of repeating the Christian statement that ‘God is love’. But they seem not to notice that the words ‘God is love’ have no real meaning unless God contains at least two Persons. Love is something that one person has for another person. If God was a single person, then before the world was made, He was not love. Of course, what these people mean when they say that God is love is often something quite different: they really mean ‘Love is God’. They really mean that our feelings of love, however and wherever they arise, and whatever results they produce, are to be treated with great respect. Perhaps they are: but that is something quite different from what Christians mean by the statement ‘God is love’. They believe that the living, dynamic activity of love has been going on in God forever and has created everything else. And that, by the way, is perhaps the most important difference between Christianity and all other religions: that in Christianity God is not a static thing—not even a person—but a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama. Almost, if you will not think me irreverent, a kind of dance. —from Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis

Deeper and Truer

2011-02-13T08:30:00.000-08:00

When Martin Luther King, Jr., confronted racism in the white church in the South, he did not call on Southern churches to become more secular. Read his sermons and "Letter from Birmingham Jail" and see how he argued. He invoked God’s moral law and the Scripture. He called white Christians to be more true to their own beliefs and to realize what the Bible really teaches. He did not say “Truth is relative and everyone is free to determine what is right or wrong for them.” If everything is relative, there would have been no incentive for white people in the South to give up their power. Rather, Dr. King invoked the prophet Amos, who said, “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream” (Amos 5:24). The greatest champion of justice in our era knew the antidote to racism was not less Christianity, but a deeper and truer Christianity.

-From The Reason for God by Timothy Keller

Just Splashing Around

2011-02-12T17:43:00.001-08:00

Another thought from C. S. Lewis:

This is my endlessly recurrent temptation: to go down to that Sea (I think St. John of the Cross called God a sea) and there neither dive nor swim nor float, but only dabble and splash, careful not to get out of my depth and holding on to the lifeline which connects me with my things temporal. It is different from the temptations that met us at the beginning of the Christian life...This temptation comes later. It is addressed to those who have already admitted the claim [that the eternal has on us] in principle and are even making some sort of effort to meet it. Our temptation is to look eagerly for the minimum that will be accepted. We are in fact very like honest but reluctant taxpayers. We approve of an income tax in principle. We make our returns truthfully. But we dread a rise in the tax. We are very careful to pay no more than is necessary. And we hope--we very ardently hope--that after we have paid it there will still be enough left to live on.

A Dry Spell

2011-02-12T05:34:00.000-08:00

Screwtape (a demon and master tempter) offers advice to his demon nephew on ways to cleverly exploit a Patient’s (the Christian) dry spell:

There is an even better way of exploiting the trough; I mean through the patient’s own thoughts about it. As always, the first step is to keep knowledge out of his mind. Do not let him suspect the law of undulation. Let him assume that the first ardours of his conversion might have been expected to last, and ought to have lasted, forever, and that his present dryness is an equally permanent condition. Having once got this misconception well fixed in his head, you may then proceed in various ways. It all depends on whether your man is of the desponding type who can be tempted to despair, or of the wishful-thinking type who can be assured that all is well. The former type is getting rare among the humans. If your patient should happen to belong to it, everything is easy. You have only got to keep him out of the way of experienced Christians (an easy task nowadays), to direct his attention to the appropriate passages in scripture, and then to set him to work on the desperate design of recovering his old feelings by sheer will-power, and the game is ours. If he is of the more hopeful type your job is to make him acquiesce in the present low temperature of his spirit and gradually become content with it, persuading himself that it is not so low after all. In a week or two you will be making him doubt whether the first days of his Christianity were not, perhaps, a little excessive. Talk to him about ‘moderation in all things’. If you can get him to the point of thinking that ‘religion is all very well up to a point’, you can feel quite happy about his soul. A moderated religion is as good for us as no religion at all – and more amusing.

-From The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis

An Intellectual Stand

2011-02-11T17:15:00.000-08:00

Many people who take an intellectual stand against Christianity do so against a background of personal disappointment with Christians and churches. We all bring to issues intellectual predispositions based on our experiences. If you have known many wise, loving, kind, and insightful Christians over the years, and if you have seen churches that are devout in belief yet civic-minded and generous, you will find the intellectual case for Christianity much more plausible. If, on the other hand, the preponderance of your experience is with nominal Christians (who bear the name but don't practice it) or with self-righteous fanatics, then the arguments for Christianity will have to be extremely strong for you to concede that they have an cogency at all.
- from The Reason for God by Timothy Keller

A New Focus

2011-02-11T14:22:00.000-08:00

I always want to write. I love it. I want to continue posting here, but I neglect it. From past posts you can tell I've been looking for a theme. I've been through several. AFI, on-set adventures, etc..

I love to read. I'm always noting things in books (and now highlighting with my nifty Kindle) and wanting to share with someone the awesome thing I just read. I turn and say "Can you believe C.S. Lewis made that so clear and concise?" But, there isn't anyone there next to me. I'm just alone in a coffee shop thinking about the fantastic things/ideas/explanations that I'm discovering. These feelings pretty much always come when I'm reading something about God. I so want to share my excitement about Jesus. I've been praying about it and then it occurred to me that perhaps I should blog about what I'm reading. Not a review, or really even my comments. Maybe just direct passages from the books. Kindle makes it easy, so I'm going to give that a try. I've never been one for screaming online about my faith. People that know me know, but I have never thought posting on Facebook was appropriate. My blog is a way for me to share with people that actually want to read it, (Hi Mom! You're possibly my only follower =) ) instead of forcing what I'm learning on people that happen to be my "friends" on Facebook. So, here's a new start.

A Tale of a Hungry Crew

2010-09-12T16:54:00.000-07:00

We filmed in a hotel last week that did not allow us to bring in any outside food. That meant no craft service (the department that provides everything but actual meals) the hotel instead would provide snacks. Well, we come to set the first day and it's teeny fancy soft drinks and Fiji water. We have only yogurt and granola bars to eat. This was bad. We all really missed Reagan and Sanford ( who were keeping busy playing cards in their truck). We came back the next day expecting more of the same instead it was worse. The deal wasn't negotiated properly and the hotel had charged us per drink/snack the day before as if we had ordered individually from the restaurant. In six hours we had run up a $3500 bill. Sanford feeds us for $400 a day. The answer? Don't have anything but water on set. We're working 12+ hours a day and the only food is at base camp which is outside the hotel and more than a block away (except of course for the contraband that will fit in our pockets and must be consumed quickly in dark corners). Awesome. Tomorrow is our last day there. Needless to say everyone will be especially appreciative of all Reagan and Sanford do for us. Time to get back to work boys.

My Story, so far.

2010-09-09T19:21:00.000-07:00

As my career has progressed I've had some interesting adventures. I started as an unpaid intern on a low low budget feature in which Burt Reynolds had a bit part. He's a small man in real life. Short, petite (so is David Duchovny, sad right?) I scored a paid position and lost the paid position (my boss was doing a lot of coke and had a fight with the producers). I flirted with the grips far too much, and eventually wrapped the show. I moved on to paid PA positions and within a few months worked on a Rolling Stone Music video. (What?!) I know. Cool. My jobs were never that glamourous though, I mean I worked 20 hours that day for $175. I did buy Keith Richards some vodka from the liquor store in Little 5 though. Score.

Fast forward a handful of years and now I'm a union Costumer. I've worked on lots of stuff and been so blessed. Right now I'm on a made-for-TV-movie as Lucy Liu's personal costumer. It's been great so far. Tomorrow is day 8 of 40.

An Update

2010-09-09T19:03:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted on this blog in over a year. I once was doing movie reviews. I then was watching the AFI top 100 films and writing my thoughts. Well, I became busy. Really busy. I now work in the film industry in the costume department. All this movie making has kept me from movie watching. I thought perhaps my adventures on set (and off) would provide interesting content for my ever changing (and long neglected blog). Let's see how this goes...

Gone with the Wind

2009-04-28T07:32:00.000-07:00

“Yankees in Georgia! How did they ever get in?!”

Perhaps writing about a movie as prolific as Gone with the Wind seems a bit superfluous, especially when written 70 years after the release, but with Max Steiner’s sweeping theme still echoing in my head how can I not at least touch on the anniversary of this film and my experience today seeing it at The Fox Theatre in Atlanta.

Robert Osborne, film guru of Turner Classic Movies, was there to greet us. From the stage he spoke of the history and impact of Gone with the Wind as well as answered a few questions. Our screening was sold out (over 4000 tickets) as well as the one that evening and Mr. Osborne told us he called Olivia de Havilland (“Melanie” who will be 93 this year) to tell her of the large turn out in Atlanta. She already knew, “My spies are everywhere,” she explained. She also sent her regards to all of us . This was quite special for some of us in the audience. As a long time admirer of Ms. de Havilland (the only surviving Gone with the Wind principle cast member) it’s quite touching to hear someone relay a message from her, even if it weren’t for me personally.

The film began and the audience went silent. For the duration of the film, nearly four hours, an audience of over 4000 people sat in silent admiration. Silent that is, except for laughter, and more than a few sniffs during “Melanie’s” death. There were also a few moments when the audience spontaneously began to cheer and applaud. The most memorable were the first time we see Mammie (Hattie McDaniel, the first African American to win an Oscar) and during the fabulous down-the-stairs dolly shot landing on Clark Gable’s amused smirk. Hello Rhett Butler.

The 70^th Anniversary screening of Gone with the Wind was something to be treasured. It was splendid to see Atlanta turn out to celebrate part of her own history as well as a fantastic film. When there was any mention of Atlanta in the film, the audience appropriately cheered, laughed, or just seemed communally aware that we were watching our Atlanta. Whether the history that impacted you was of the Civil War reflected on screen, or that of the 1930s when Gone with the Wind premiered and Clark Gable, Vivien Leigh, and the rest paraded down Peachtree Street in the midst of thousands of adoring fans. Gone with the Wind is tightly bound to Atlanta and her people.

2009-04-28T05:49:00.000-07:00

The film opens with the narrator on screen addressing the audience directly. “This is a true story,” he tells us; a film based on a book about a young Georgia woman (“Eve”) who suffers from multiple personality disorder. Her psychiatrists, Drs., Corbett H. Thigpen and Hervey M. Cleckley, of the Medical College of Georgia, published The Three Faces of Eve in 1957, that same year the film was released.

Joanne Woodward’s performance was impressive, and one can understand why she won the Best Actress Oscar in 1958. Her change in tone, accent, and body language was quite convincing. The film’s structure however left something to be desired. While one did become involved in Eve’s condition, the episodic nature of the film was negatively emphasized by constantly fading to black after every emotional moment. Its tone was also confusing. It teetered unsteadily between near comedy and drama. Very little progress was made (or at least depicted) over the years that Eve was in counseling, therefore the key scene depicting her mental victory was somewhat anticlimactic.

The story was interesting and clearly established the difference in the personalities but one never felt very connected with any of them. Part of the fault lies with the quick snippets of scenes (Eve Black in the back of a stranger’s car for example). Perhaps the point was never driven home, so the speak, because of scene length but quite possibly because of the Production Code which was still very much in control of content in 1957. How can we truly experience Eve White’s regret and horror over Eve Black’s sins if those sins are barely hinted at and certainly never shown?

Though the film shows Eve’s recovery, in truth, her story of struggle was not yet over. The real Eve, Chris Costner Sizemore, later in life wrote two books about her experience with, and treatment for, what is now known as “dissociative identity disorder.“ (First she had to sue 20^th Century Fox for the rights to her own story because her psychiatrists had previously signed them over to the studio. She won the case.) In her books, she revealed that though she took a big step towards healing in the 1950s, in reality she was later treated by seven other doctors and experienced more than 20 personalities before eventually overcoming the illness in 1974.

Further Reading: http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org

All About Bette Davis

2008-03-22T13:47:00.000-07:00

I recently flipped on TCM right as a movie called All About Eve was beginning. It sucked me in and I watched the whole thing, later to discover it was on my top 100 list. How convenient.

The voice-over annoyed me in parts but Bette Davis (above) blew me away. What a fabulous actress! She was so real. She wasn't the usual glamour leading lady of the era nor was she some other archetype. She had a lot of dimension. I highly recommend checking out this flick. It's about fame, and relationships, and most importantly keeps you wondering about people's true intentions right until the last 20 minutes.

I'm back (The Silence of the Lambs)

2008-03-17T12:44:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the big gap in posts.

So I finally saw The Silence of the Lambs. Spoiler alert (it is 17 years old though)....

Hannibal totally cut off that guys face and used it as a mask! Holy crap, yes he did.

That was crazy.

Terminal 13

2008-02-20T06:14:00.000-08:00

This is the scene (above) where I died, well to say more correctly where I was laid out on a cold floor for 2 hours drenched in blood with pencils stuck in my chest.

2 years ago I worked as a PA on (and occasionally died in) a little low budget indie called The Signal. This film went on to play at Sundance and get a distribution deal which means it's hitting theaters this Friday. There is a list of theaters it will be playing on the site The Signal. I saw an earlier version almost a year ago, so I can honestly vouch for it and say, it's great.

Here's what Mike over at Thoughtmarker had to say: "If you enjoy survival thrillers like 28 Days Later or Dawn of the Dead, then you have no excuse not to see locally produced, critically acclaimed, triumphantly thrilling The Signal . It opens nation wide this weekend, but if you slept with the right people you'll be watching it with me at Thursday's premiere at The Plaza."

So you know where I'll be Thursday night.... Do you have the crazy?

"If I say I'm an oil man you will agree."

2008-02-19T16:36:00.000-08:00

In the past I was never a person to rave about a performance. I appreciated good acting, but typically only mentioned it if it were bad. If the movie wowed me I usually took it to be because of great storytelling, execution, and acting, I thought of acting last and least (not that I didn't admire it, I just didn't consider it often). Today I cannot write another entry about an AFI film without first raving about Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood. I feel like I met Daniel Plainview today. I sat in the theater and met a real person. He stunned me. I was desperate to see his reactions to life. I understood him, I was confused by him, I felt many emotions, but more than that I just sat in awe. His wonderful performance in no way took me out of the film (I didn't sit there analyzing him and not enjoying the movie) it only drew me in. This is not to discredit Paul Thomas Anderson's directing, or attribute the film only to Daniel Day-Lewis, a group effort is always involved; but today Daniel Day-Lewis just blew me away.

The Millennium ...I mean The Maltese Falcon

2008-02-18T10:58:00.001-08:00

The Maltese Falcon is one cool (though hard-boiled) detective film. Many consider it a film noir, and it does have many of those elements, but I don't think it is quite as dark and cynical as the typical noir (go google "film noir" if you don't have a clue what I'm talking about).Humphrey Bogart is at his most sly. He's a PI hired to find a lady's missing sister, and it get complicated from there. Everything Sam Spade (Bogart) does is calculated. Even when you think he's finally lost his cool in all the conniving, and hurls a glass across a hotel room, he leaves smiling; Sam's given just the performance he intended.You're never quite sure what he's planning, but you know that he's already two steps ahead. There are several interesting facts about this film. One, is it has three of the cast members of Casablanca (1945) in leading roles: Bogart, Peter Lorre, and Sydney Greenstreet. This was Sydney Greenstreet's first film and the beginning of a sucessful career (he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for this film). Perhaps most notably this is John Huston's directorial debut. He was already an established screenwriter (he wrote this film as well) but had never been given the chance to try his hand at directing. The Maltese Falcon marked the beginning of a career that would span four decades and bring us such classics as: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Key Largo (both 1948) to name a few.

Sunrise

2008-02-16T13:20:00.000-08:00

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927) this silent film starring Janet Gaynor and George O'Brian was overall quite enjoyable. It had parts in the middle that got a bit long, but the scary parts (leading up to a murder) were still very intense. The music helped this feeling a lot and was Fox's first movie with a recorded score . The romance was sweet and the acting wasn't over done. So often a movie from the silent era seems over-acted and it's hard to get into the mood of the film because you're watching something practically for another world. This film however, holds up well. One thing about silent movies that some people don't realize, is that often the scenes are just that....silent. We don't know what they said. The cards slipped in with lines are often just one sentence like "I love you," while the lovers on screen are actually deep in a conversation of admiration for one another. Good acting has to carry these scenes. We have to feel like we know what is being exchanged between two people even though we're only told a little of what is said. I think Gaynor and O'Brian had a chemistry that did this wonderfully. Janet Gaynor reminded me quite a bit of Olivia de Haviland (one of my favorites). The movie had some cool and artistic camera tricks involving double exposures (all done in-camera). In 1927 the Best Picture oscar went to "Wings" but "Sunrise" won the top prize in the category of "Artistic Quality of Production" This was the only year that award was given out. Though "Sunrise" wasn't a huge commercial success, the Academy did recognize it's beautiful and artistic qualities.

What I've yet to see...

2008-02-16T12:54:00.000-08:00

Here is a list of the movies that I have yet to see. Over the 31 days of Oscar on TCM I'm taping 28 of the movies needed, so after I work through those I'll reevaluate what remains...

At risk of being shocked and appalled by some classics that I haven't seen (sometimes a movie slips through the cracks you know) here is what I need to watch:

Raging Bull (1980)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
Schindler's List (1993)
City Lights (1932)
The Searchers (1956)
Sunset Blvd (1950)
The General (1967)
On the Waterfront (1946)
Chinatown (1974)
Some Like it Hot (1959)
The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
High Noon (1952) ---I saw this as a child, but it was so long ago that I'm going to rewatch it
All about Eve (1950)
Apocalypse Now (1979)
The Maltese Falcon (1941)
One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
Bridge over the River Kwai (1957)
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
King Kong (1933)
Midnight Cowboy (1969)
Shane (1953)
It Happened One Night (1934)
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)
Intolerance (1916)
West Side Story (1961)
Taxi Driver (1976)
The Deer Hunter (1978)
Mash (1970)
Jaws (1975)
Nashville (1975)
Duck Soup (1933)
Sullivan's Travels (1941)
Cabaret (1972)
Network (1976)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1966)
Unforgiven (1992)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Saving Private Ryan (1998)
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
In the Heat of the Night (1967)
All the President's Men (1976)
Modern Times (1936)
The Wild Bunch (1969)
The Apartment (1960)
Sunrise (1927)
Easy Rider (1969)
Phantom of the Opera (1935)
Platoon (1986)
Swing Time (1936)
Sophie's Choice (1982)
Goodfellas (1990)
The French Connection (1971)
The Last Picture Show (1971)
Do the Right Thing 1989)
Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)

The Ones I've Seen...

2008-02-15T13:51:00.000-08:00

Thanks for the suggestion Mike, I'd actually already planned to post a list of the movies I've already seen. So out of the 100, here they are:

Citizane Kane (1941)
The God Father (1972)
Casablanca (1942)
Singin' in the Rain (1952)
Gone with the Wind (1939)
Vertigo (1958)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Star Wars (1977)
Psycho (1960)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
The Graduate (1967)
It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
E.T. (1982)
To Kill a Mockinbird (1962)
Double Indeminity (1944)
The Godfather pt II (1974)
Snow White (1937)
Annie Hall (1977)
The Sound of Music (1965)
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
The Philadelphia Story (1940)
Rear Window (1954)
LotR: Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
North by Northwest (1959)
Rocky (1976)
The Gold Rush (1925)
American Graffiti (1973)
The African Queen (1951)
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Tootsie (1982)
Forrest Gump (1994)
Spartacus (1960)
Titanic (1997)
12 Angry Men (1957)
The Sixth Sense (1999)
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Blade Runner (1982)
Toy Story (1995)
Ben-Hur (1959)
.....a list of the ones remaining coming soon....

The Beginning

2008-02-13T12:43:00.000-08:00

So I've thought about starting a blog for a while, but could never settle on what it would really be about. In the midst of the writer's strike (and at the suggestion of Entertainment Weekly) I decided to work my way through all of the American Film Institute's top 100 movies (the 10th anniversary list). I've always enjoyed writing about movies and the AFI list provides a solidified theme to the blog. I'll probably also include various entries about what I'm up to, what new clothes I've created, (I'm also tailoring friends clothes for good prices...keep that in mind) and other not-on-the-list-movies, but AFI is the thread that runs throughout.

I chose the AFI list as opposed to just the Best Picture winners because the AFI list was more inclusive, as Mike (the boyfriend, his name will probably come up often) pointed out more than one movie from a certain year can be on the list.

I downloaded the list, which you can do here: http://connect.afi.com/site/PageServer?JServSessionIdr004=pli90lk0c4.app46a&pagename=100yearslist (it's lame, they make you register to get the full list) and checked off the ones I'd already seen. Thanks to film school and a general desire to see older movies I've already seen 39 out of the 100 films on the list. This was a perfect time to start doing this because TCM is in the process of the 31 days of Oscar. I made a list of when AFI list movies would be on, got a bunch of old VHS tapes from my mom's, and have been taping films since the beginning of Feb. First review to come soon...