Beowulf

Husband and I really wanted to go see this movie in 3D when it was playing at the IMAX over the holidays, but it just never worked out. Having watched it on DVD on our sad little regular-def 19" TV this past weekend, we now know what a tragedy it is that we missed the chance to see this much awesomeness amplified by like a thousand.

We watched the unrated version, which was pretty no-holds-barred with the violence and gore...which is part of what made it so damn awesome, actually. It was a fantastic take on the story, and I was riveted to the screen for most of it, the only exceptions being after the exceptionally cool bits when we'd start geeking out over what a perfect medium this would be for A Song of Ice and Fire; but then that just gave us an excuse to rewind and watch the cool bits again, so that worked out.

As for the animation, at times it was mind-blowingly realistic, but at rarer times it missed the mark by a wide enough margin as to be mildly distracting, but that's a small quibble. This movie has earned itself a permanent spot in our collection. And if it ever makes it back to the IMAX, or even just to a big screen somewhere, we are THERE.

"As long as there's, y'know, sex and drugs, I can do without the rock and roll."

We were at Best Buy on Saturday when Matt asked me if I'd seen This Is Spinal Tap. When I confessed that I hadn't (I've seen bits and pieces, but never sat down to watch the entire thing), he decided to buy it, but before we made it to the register, he re-decided that it wasn't something he needed to spend money on right now, and put it back. And then he spent the rest of the weekend lamenting that decision. So when the fates decided to reward him for his financial responsibility by showing said film last night on VH1 Classic, of course we had to watch it. All of which means that I TiVo'd Heroes and likely won't get to see it until Saturday, so please don't spoil it for me.

(We actually had a minor "You love Heroes more than me!" row last week after I got irritated with him for talking over it while I was trying to watch, so I didn't dare blow him and his movie off in favor of my show this week. Spinal Tap was pretty funny, though, so it wasn't that great a sacrifice.)

Sunday morning I woke up with a sore throat, and by Monday morning it had grown into a sore throat with ear ache, headache, everything-else-ache, and absolutely no energy whatsoever. I knew there was nothing pressing happening at work, so I didn't really see the point of dragging myself into the office just to sit there and feel miserable and possibly spread my contagion beyond the borders of my cubicle, so I took a sick day and went back to bed for about five hours. When I woke up again I felt marginally better, and spent the rest of the day (minus the two hours of watching Spinal Tap) camped out on the sofa reading Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrel, which has gotten very exciting in the second half and has become excruciatingly hard to put down. I'm now only about 150 or so pages from the end. I wanted to stay up to finish it last night, but I was just too darn tired, so I went straight to bed after the movie. I also let myself sleep in this morning (i.e., didn't come in early to write). Between all the rest, drinking plenty of fluids, etc., I'm back to functional today. I was a little tempted to call in sick again anyway just so I could finish my book, but I didn't. Obviously.

In other me news, I promised Matt that if he got me strings for my guitar and put them on, I'd start learning to play it again. He bought the strings on Saturday, so we're halfway there. I also started knitting a guitar strap for it. It's punky black and purple stripes. It won't really go that well with my folksy acoustic, but maybe that will encourage me to hurry up and get good enough to earn myself something a little more rock & roll, like the totally girly-punk Hello Kitty! guitar I saw at the shop where we bought the strings. Me wantses.

Finally: Hie thee and watch this trailer for Stardust, which is loaded with awesome. I can't wait for this movie.

More fan geekery

Neil Gaiman's been posting pictures from the Stardust movie in his blog. They look gorgeous, and I think it bodes really well for the film that, if you've read the book, you can look at each still shot and instantly recognize which scene it's from.