I think that now is a really appropriate time to make a few confessions on my blog. First, I am a hopeless romantic! I want the guy and the girl to get together. Every time. No exceptions. Second, I am a total teeny-bopper. When I was in Jr. High, I read Bop and Tiger Beat and all those magazines for preteen girls. But while I’ve given up those particular magazines, I still love teen movies/TV shows. You name it, I’ve probably seen it. Ned’s Declassified Survival Guide is one of my all time favorite shows. And I love movies like Ice Princess (caught 2 seconds of it on TV this weekend) and Sleepover. I read YA books like they’re going out of style, and … well, you get the picture.

It doesn’t matter that I’m just a few years away from 30. 🙂

Sometimes I’m still shocked that I’m a “grown-up.” At least, that’s what people call me. I mean, yes, I hold down a full-time job and actually do okay at it. And, yes, I pay rent, own my own car, and even get my bills paid on time. I’m officially a published author, and I sometimes I’m surprised that I’m not 17. Am I the only one who feels that way?

Anyway, one of my favorite parts about being a teeny bopper is being able to watch really bad made for TV movies from ABC Family. This weekend’s offering was Au Pair 3: Adventure in Paradise. We first met Jenny and Oliver and Oliver’s two precocious kids back in 1999 in the first Au Pair. Jenny was mistaken as a nanny candidate for Katie and Alex, but she needed a job badly and took off around the world with the family. Oliver, a business mogul, was of course too busy for his family and to notice that his fiancee was a horrid woman. But all was well in the end and Jenny and Oliver found love together.

Fast forward 10 years.

Alex is graduating from high school and Katie has just finished her freshman year in college, so Jenny and Oliver decide to take the family to Puerto Rico for a summer vacation and some much-needed family bonding. Katie’s roommate/best friend Ariana tags along. Oliver’s overly protective nature gets in the way as he has bodyguards trailing his kids every which way, which drives Katie crazy. And he fails to see that his son really wants to study art instead of business. He can’t see either that Jenny doesn’t want to work for his company any more. She wants to stay home with their young daughter Sarah and manage a charity foundation.

It was a cute movie, and I had such high hopes for it. It started off like every good teeny bopper movie should. With Alex having a crush on Ariana (who turns out to be an undercover bodyguard–very First Daughter, another of my favorites!), and Katie gets free from her trailers and meets a guy, too. All should be well, except it’s not. The whole movie focuses on the relationships, all but ignoring the business angle–will Oliver be fired by his board of directors?–until the very end. The conclusion satisfies Oliver’s business problems, and even addresses Alex going to art school and Jenny running the foundation. But it ignores the young love.

I’m not asking for wedding bells or even a kiss. But is it too much to ask for some hope? I just wanted hope for Alex (he was adorable, and, incidentally, the actor is from Colorado) and Ariana and Katie and her guy Danny. I got squat.

Bummer. Oh, well. I’ll survive, I suppose. 🙂 Waiting for the next great ABC Family flick until next time. -LJ

So this week I’ve decided to feature a fantastic movie that I didn’t see this weekend. Instead I’m featuring a movie that will be available on dvd tomorrow.

FIREPROOF

From Sherwood Baptist Church, the creators of Facing the Giants and Flywheel, comes a story of a marriage on the rocks, a man who doesn’t know what it is to love, and a woman who’s given up hope. And encompassing it all is a story of God’s restoring love.

Kirk Cameron stars as Caleb Holt, a fire captain, whose motto is “never leave your partner behind.” He receives the respect of the men at his station and everyone in town, except his wife Catherine. Their home is a battlefield over money, jobs, and housework, and Catherine wonders when she stopped being “good enough” for her husband.

And then Caleb’s dad challenges him to take the Love Dare, a 40-day daily choice to act in love toward Catherine. At first Caleb is hesitant, only doing the bare minimum and barely biting his tongue when angry words jump to mind. And when he’s met by Catherine’s skepticism and cold shoulder, he longs to give up on the Love Dare and on his marriage. But the more frustrated he becomes, the more his father prays for him and encourages Caleb to keep to keep at.

This movie is a beautiful illustration of God’s continuing love for us, even when we turn our backs on Him and refuse to receive His love.

As a big fan of Facing the Giants, I was thrilled to go see this movie in the theater during its opening weekend, and I wasn’t disappointed. The production, acting, and story quality from the Kendrick brothers’ films just continue getting better and better.

I saw this twice in the theater and will definitely get it on dvd. It’s a fantastic film, and I highly recommend it. I eagerly await the next movie from Sherwood Baptist. Until next time. -LJ

I’d been looking forward to seeing Defiance all week. Jess B. and I decided to make it our last horrah–at least until she gets back from Australia in February. I don’t know what I’ll do without my writing buddy for more than 2 weeks … but that’s another story all in itself.

So Jess and I met up at the Cinemark Carefree (so I could use one of the passes I won in the Gazette Holiday Fiction Contest–more details to come on that on my Short Story page) on Sunday afternoon. Now it should be noted that I’m generally not a Sunday-afternoon movie fan, but since we were celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. and his amazing accomplishments and contributions to our country with a day off on Monday, I took the plunge for a Sunday movie.

And I couldn’t have been more thrilled! This is the true story of four Jewish brothers in Eastern Europe who stand against the Nazis. In 1941 Tuvia (played by the very talented–and if I may be so bold, handsome–Daniel Craig) and his brother Zus (portrayed by Liev Schreiber) take their other brothers into the forrest to escape the SS after their parents are killed.

The story is one of compassion as the brothers tell each other they will not welcome anyone else into their community, yet at every turn, their numbers are growing, as they can’t turn anyone away. And when one of the women breaks the rule of pregnancy, Tuvia is faced with a difficult choice. Should he turn her out of the community or offer her grace?

The brothers’ story made me want to call Micah and tell him how much I love him and how proud I am of him. And at the end, I was crying, but not really out of sadness. More out of the joy of seeing such a group of people triumph in the hardest circumstances. I think I was also crying out of anger. How on earth did the world let Hitler get to that point? Why did no one stand up for Jews? And it made me ask myself some difficult questions, for which I don’t think I have an answer. What attrocities are happening now that no one is standing up against? Can one person stand up and make a difference?

I’m glad I went to see Defiance, but I must recommend it with reservations. The language is fairly coarse, especially at the beginning, and as it is a war movie, there’s quite a bit of violence. But all-in-all, I thought it was a well-told, very high quality production. I’ll probably see it again at some point down the road. -LJ

It’s pretty much a given that I’ll see at least one movie over any given weekend, so I thought I’d share my views on said films in a weekly segment I like to call Monday Movies. If I haven’t managed to catch a recent flick in the theater or on dvd, well, then you’ll be subjected to favorites from my past, likely ranging from the classic muscial Seven Brides for Seven Brothers to the more recent editions of Pride and Prejudice. But this week, I’m featuring …

I caught this action flick, starring Shia LaBeouf and Michelle Monaghan, at the dollar theater on Saturday afternoon. Let me just begin by telling you that the cheap theater–while totally fiscally responsible–is not always the best moving-going experiece. The lines can be obnoxiously long and the seats are hugely uncomfortable, but a friend and I decided to give it a go. We were late, so the theater was dark and pretty full by the time we tried to find seats. We managed to find two on an end toward the front, my feet only sticking to the floor like it was coated with regular Elmer’s glue (not the heavy-duty stuff).

Let’s just say that by the time I squeezed into my seat, I wasn’t sure I’d made the right decision. After all, the movie is already on dvd, so I was thinking that maybe I should have just rented it.

And then it got going. From the jump, I was hooked! Its fast pace and detailed plot kept me guessing, and I confess that I really didn’t know who the bad guy was until the end. The acting was tight and the story of two strangers who are coerced into following a mysterious voice on the other end of the phone was completely far-fetched–just what I was hoping for. Shia and Michelle had great chemistry and the screenwriter had a wonderful sense of suspenseful build-up followed by a little down time for the audience to catch our breaths.

Well worth the sticky floor and itty-bitty seats. I’m so glad that I didn’t miss it on the big-screen.

Eagle Eye does have some rough language and bits of violence, so I don’t recommend it for the kids. But I sure texted my sister-in-law the minute that we got out of the show to tell her that she and my brother should rent it.

Until the next one … LJ