I became obsessed with this Gipsy Kings album while spending a summer in Seattle 4 years before actually moving here. I spent my days listening to this album nonstop and reading Marquez' "One Hundred Years of Solitude" on the green slopes of the Ballard Locks.  "Montana" and "Trista Pena" still get me to this day.

The other album is also interesting because, though I know the story behind Christopher McCandless' ultimately tragic exploration of human freedom, I have never read the book or seen the film that this soundtrack comes from. I was able to listen to all of it in one sitting while driving back from my parents in the rain and darkness along Lake Washington. I can say that it made me visibly uncomfortable traveling in the complete opposite direction of McCandless (back into the city) and the music made me want to drive towards rainy wooded mountains far far away. Maybe I shouldn't see the film.

I never thought that I could care so much about a coming of age story centered around the turbulent life of a thirteen year old Chinese kid whose overbearing mother runs his life very much like the motel that they own. A great film along the same jarringly realistic depictions of life found in "Me and You and Everyone We Know".

Joyeux Noel

There is a point in this "Christmas movie" when a german soldier singing "Stille Nacht" is accompanied by a scottish bagpiper from across no man's land. My heart was filled with joy and I wept out of happiness and sadness.

Idiocracy

This film is hilarious and scary. Hilarious because it is a Mike Judge film. Scary because it is actually coming true in some parts of America.

Death Proof and Planet Terror

I have been a fan of Rodriguez and Tarantino's films for some time now and these two grindhouse flicks are superb as homage's to the old slasher/zombie movies. They are extremely violent and gory but in a way so dissimilar to current Hostel-like movies. The violence and blood is almost comical in its presentation and I am left wondering if this is good or bad.

Both flicks adhere to the Rodriguez/Tarantino standard of incredible dialogue and very strong female characters.

Frisbee: The Life and Death of a Hippie Preacher

I was amazed at the connection between this 60's era Jesus freak preacher and two prominent churches today. It is a sad story about a time in America when experimentation moved between all facets of life. How people were to make sense of all they discovered during this time led to some being ostracized and others denying their own histories.

Days of Glory

I'm watching more films during this Christmas break than any other time before and I've been meaning to watch this one for some time now.

Promoted as the French "Saving Private Ryan", it is ultimately an indictment of the French government and the prevalence of racism no matter what the context.

To End All Wars

I just finished this film so I might still be a bit moved from the emotions that it brought up. Though I am a theology student I cannot stand "Christian" films. I find them over-preachy and just generally bad films. I do not think this film is placed in that genre but there certainly is a message of forgiveness stemming from Christian protagonists. One of the great things about the way this film brought forward the Christian message was in conjunction with other forms of education. The prisoners studied Plato's Republic (probably one of the best books to have in that situation), music and Shakespeare. 

I highly recommend this film for a more personal account of those POW's that were forced to build The Bridge on the River Kwai.

And yet...

And yet I do nothing about it.