40th Favorite Movie - The Indiana Jones Series

Make sure you have read the first post in this series ("My 50 Favorite Movies") before you read on...

In that I am the Creator of this list, I am naturally the one who sets the rules. And according to my rules, I can categorize an entire series as one movie as I have done here, or just focus on one or two movies of a series and act like the others don't exist, which I will be doing later.

If I had to rank them, I would rank the Indiana Jones movies like this:

1. Raiders
2. Crusade
3. Temple

which seems to be how most people rank them, although for some it looks more like this:

1. Raiders
2. Crusade


(this space represents a large gap)


3. Temple

I guess most people were disappointed by Temple of Doom, but I wasn’t. Yeah, all Kate Capshaw did was scream the whole way through it… and it was definitely darker than the other two, with the beating hearts getting ripped out of people’s chests and voodoo dolls and the kidnapped children being used as slaves. But it was still a good adventure flick. I saw it in the theater when I was in the 4th grade, sat in the front row, and loved it - especially the chase with the railroad car. Something strange I remember about the first time I saw it: my class that year was taking an overnight field trip on a sea ship and we were all learning how to tie complex knots. I actually took a rope into the theater and was practicing the “monkey’s fist” during the movie. Don’t know why I remember that. I guess I was a multi-tasker before we knew what that was.

There is no need to discuss plot and acting and all that stuff because you have all already seen these movies. But I have to mention John Williams’ score. That guy is “simply the best”. Bethany and I were watching Superman Returns the other night and the only thing I liked about the movie was the music, which was the same theme Williams wrote for the original 1978 Superman film. Just a few of the other hummable scores he has written: ET, Star Wars, Jurassic Park, Jaws, Harry Potter, Close Encounters, Home Alone, Catch Me If You Can… let’s just say the guy picked the right profession.

You may have heard that there is an Indiana Jones 4 in the works, to be released in 2008. Harrison Ford will be joined by Sean Connery once again and Natalie Portman is rumored to be in it. Marion (from the first film) and Sallah are also said to be in it. Hopefully Lucas and Spielberg will make a worthy addition to a one-of-a-kind series.

P.S. Tom Selleck (from Magnum P.I.) was originally offered the role of Indiana - as was Nick Nolte but he too turned it down. So the next time you are trying to think of things to be thankful for in life, there you go.

Random Happenings

It's been a while since I've posted pictures and random family news, so here is a quick rundown of what we've been up to.

The first ever Fitelson-Hall collaboration Christmas tree is up! Actually, it's been up since Thanksgiving weekend, but I didn't have time to get the pictures onto the computer. We love our first Christmas tree because it has ornaments from both our childhoods as well as new ones we (meaning I) bought this year.

Our tree is leaning just a bit, probably because we couldn't agree on where to put it AFTER screwing it into the stand so it was dragged all over the living room. Danny says it has a "gangsta lean" which his friends think is hilarious and I don't understand at all.

Two weekends in a row we hosted big events at our little apartment, and it all went really well! Danny was the best husband ever since he worked so hard to clean the whole house while I stressed about cooking and baking to feed a ton of people. I hosted a bridal shower (the picture is for the moms, aunts and grandmas) and we were able to use our wedding china for the first time! Then we had people over to watch the Cowboys beat the Falcons (and served bridal shower leftovers) and the next day we hosted the youth group student and adult staff Christmas party. Yup, that means we fed and accomodated about 17 people, but it was a ton of fun! I've said this before and I'll say it til I die: Pampered Chef is a life-saver! All the food I made for all the parties was from Pampered Chef recipes (and using their super cool tools) and they make it so easy to throw a party for 20 people!

Now that the parties are over, we really get to relax and enjoy the holidays, although we're filling our calendar up fast because we don't know what to do with all this time! Plus, I have two days left at work before I start my new job, so work has been really easy and it feels great.

I'll leave you with a little laugh, and although it's at Danny's expense you should know that no one laughs harder at himself than Danny. I'm always telling Danny he should spend more than 6.99 for a haircut, so he sucked it up and went to a nicer place that charges a whopping $14 for a haircut. The day after his haircut, we were driving in the car and I was in the driver's seat with a perfect view of his left ear....and the huge bald spot the lady left on his head! I couldn't stop laughing, and for the rest of the day as we drove around I would turn to tell him something and it would come out like this: "We should remember to...teeheeheehee!" So, we had to share with the rest of the world.

41st Favorite Movie - A River Runs Through It

Make sure you have read the first post in this series ("My 50 Favorite Movies") before you read on...

With most of the movies on this list, I can tell you why I like them and what I think it is that they are "saying".

With A River Runs Through It, I'm really not sure about either.

Why do I like it? Maybe because it is about a minister and his family. Maybe because it is sort of a retelling of the parable of the prodigal son. Maybe because it is beautiful to watch (and I don't mean Brad Pitt... the film won the 1993 Academy Award for Cinematography). I'm not really sure what it is, but this film moves me.

What is the movie "saying"? Well, it seems to be making some sort of comparison between fly-fishing and religion (both invole ritual? both involve waking up early on Sunday mornings to go somewhere?), but other aspects like nature and family play an important role in it as well. Overall, I'm not really sure what it is saying.

But I can tell you what I hear everytime I see it. I hear the words that the minister says in his final sermon:

"Each one of us here today will, at one time in our lives, look upon a loved one in need and ask the same question: We are willing Lord, but what, if anything, is needed? For it is true that we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don’t know what part of ourselves to give, or more often than not, that part we have to give is not wanted. And so it is that those we live with and should know are those who elude us. But we can still love them. We can love—completely—even without complete understanding."

I think we all probably know someone who is in need who really wish we could somehow help, but we don't know what to do. And I think we all have someone close to us that we just don't understand (sometimes it may be our own spouses!) And this lack of understanding so often leads to conflict, frustration, and separation. But the message of this film is that we do not need to understand in order to love. Maybe it is possible to love completely without complete understanding.

This statement can be true of our relationship with God as well. Last week at youth group one of our high school staff members gave a talk about the question "why, God?" Not understanding God or his plans can lead to these same outcomes: conflict, frustration, and separation. But maybe it is possible to love completely without complete understanding.

Understanding is so naturally a part of love, but it does not need to be. In the most well-known passage about love in the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, the apostle Paul concludes by talking about the role that understanding plays in love:

"Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." 1 Corinthians 13:12-13

While we will never completely understand God and why he lets some things happen, we can take comfort that there will be further knowledge to come and that love trumps all.

Is this what the film saying? I'm not entirely sure. But this is what I hear.

Big News (no, it's not a baby)

This has been the year of change. In 2006, I moved twice, got married, changed churches, started graduate school, and now...I got a new job!

Most of you know I have started studying for my Masters in Theology at Fuller Seminary's Northern California extension campus. Through being a student I found out that Fuller had a job opening for a new staff member, so I applied and got the job! The job title is Marketing Associate, but what I'll be doing is pretty open-ended and will change every day. I'll do office work and help with student needs like applications and phone calls, and hopefully I'll get to do some marketing, writing newsletters and other PR as well as student recruiting. I'm thrilled to be leaving Information Technology for a job that's both writing and ministry with a lot of people interaction. No more fixing computers, yay! (No offense to the computer geeks, it's just not for me.)

The staff at Fuller Northern California has been so wonderful during the interview process and I'm confident it will be a great working environment. I can't wait! I start January 2nd, so I have two more weeks at Juniper (less with Christmas vacation). Come January, I'll no longer roll my eyes and mumble something about "It's really not interesting" when people ask me what I do for a living! (Again, no offense to the computer geeks, but when you tell someone you work at the Helpdesk then they start asking about the new Microsoft patches or something and like I said before, it's just not for me.)

If anyone in Northern California is looking to do Biblical graduate school, now you know who to call!

42nd Favorite Movie - The Incredibles

Make sure you have read the first post in this series ("My 50 Favorite Movies") before you read on...

A few weeks ago we had a "Disney Night" with the high schoolers. That night I said my favorite Disney movie was Robin Hood. Now this can be a touchy subject for some people, but if you were to include Pixar under the category of "Disney", then my favorite Disney movie would be The Incredibles.

The mastermind behind The Incredibles was neither Disney nor Pixar. It was Brad Bird. Previously an executive consultant for The Simpsons (he is partially responsible for taking the show from 1 minute sketches on The Tracey Ullman Show to half-hour episodes) and King of the Hill, Bird wrote and directed The Incredibles despite never before being involved in a Pixar project. Brad Bird earned that opportunity by making The Iron Giant, a fantastic movie with a deep theological message that just missed making this top-50 list. It seems that The Iron Giant impressed enough folks at Pixar that Bird got a chance to make his next film with them. He went out on a limb by making The Incredibles, a cartoon that grown-ups would love.

Pretty much everybody in the world has seen this film as well as some space aliens that are just now receiving a constant video feed since it was released in 2004. Of course there is action and humor and great characters and a great story and impressive animation, but that is the case for pretty much all Pixar films. The thing that makes The Incredibles unique is that it works on two levels: a child can watch it and enjoy it for one reason and a parent can watch it and enjoy it for an entirely different reason... and the two reasons actually complement one another. It could have been that the adult issues took a backseat to the action/humor and the kids got bored, or the action/humor took a backseat to the adult issues and the adults would be left with just another movie that the kids would want to watch 5,000 times on DVD. But it all blends perfectly, making The Incredibles a film that is truly "for the whole family" - which is appropriate since it is about the relationships within a family.

In The Incredibles, each character's superpower was not assigned randomly but ties in to where he/she is in life and to their struggles. Mr. Incredible himself is the strong and courageous hero every dad wants to be... but he is approaching middle age. His wife Elastigirl is able to stretch herself... which she needs in order to "hold her life together" as she tries to raise three kids, support her husband and keep the house clean. Violet, the middle school aged girl, is shy and beginning to figure out who she is... so she naturally can turn invisible and is just learning how to harness her ability to create force fields. Dash, the elementary school aged boy, has legs that don't stop moving and a head full of steam... so he struggles with wanting to show off and not stopping to think before acting. The "normal life struggles" that each character is going through have a direct tie-in to the superpower that Bird gave them.

Some of you might think I am reading in to this too much, but this film was obviously intended to work on two levels - one for kids and one for adults. As proof of this, it is the only Pixar movie to get a PG rating. Plus, Bird himself has a family who supposedly inspired him to write The Incredibles. Bird has gone on record as saying that animation can be used to tell any kind of story, not just stories for children as American animated films and shows tend to be.

The next story that Brad Bird and Pixar will be telling is about a rat in Paris named Ratatouille, scheduled for reason this summer. As you can see from this description on imdb.com, Bird is at it again in making a cartoon that grown-ups will love:

"Remy is a rat, constantly risking life in an expensive French restaurant because of his love of good food, as well as a desire to become a chef. His father and brother do not approve, and would rather stick to the normal rat life of eating garbage. The family can't be split up, but who is in the right? The one wanting the dangerous but better life, or the ones who believe in an easy, if somewhat lesser, life?"

John Lasseter, who is now the Creative Director at Disney after the Pixar merge says about Ratatouille: "It is a wonderful story about following your passions when all the world is against you. A rat to a kitchen is death; a kitchen to a rat is death."

You can check out the trailer here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0382932/trailers-screenplay-E27826-10-2

Normally a cartoon about a rat would not appeal to me, but with Brad Bird's name attached to it, I'm going.

Establishing Thanksgiving Day

This is a little late, but I wanted to share this Thanksgiving Proclamation because it really impressed me. My Dad shared this in his sermon Thanksgiving weekend so I asked him to send me the notes. (Shameless plug: if you want to hear great sermons every week, you can listen to my dad at www.campbellchurch.org under the Listen link, or subscribe to the Campbell Church Podcast on iTunes.)

In school we always learned that Thanksgiving began with the Pilgrims and Native Americans, but I never learned that it was Abraham Lincoln, in the midst of the Civil War, who made Thanksgiving an official holiday. Lincoln's spirit is remarkable as he looks for the good in circumstances, even during a brutal and heartbreaking war. Read President Lincoln's words:

Proclamation Establishing Thanksgiving Day

October 3, 1863

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.

A. Lincoln

43rd Favorite Movie - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Make sure you have read the first post in this series ("My 50 Favorite Movies") before you read on...

On our trip last week, I noticed one of the signs in a subway station said "To Montauk" and I immediately thought of a key line from this film: "meet me in "Montauk". I had never realized that the film takes place in New York and that Montauk was an actual place. Now I want to see it again and see if I can pick up on any other NY references. The day we got home from the trip, I skimmed through The Catcher in the Rye (one of my all-time favorite books) to see how many Manhattan locations are in it that we saw. There were a lot: Radio City Music Hall, the carousel and pond at Central Park, Rockefeller Center, the Museum of Natural History, Broadway, the interior of a NY cab... ok now I'm stretching. But for some reason it is more fun to see these places after you have read about them in a book or seen them in a movie. Why that is, I don't know. Maybe it just provides some context and meaning to the place. Maybe it makes for a more solid memory in your head since you have seen it in person.

The next movie on my list, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, is about the power of memory. The film stars Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Kirsten Dunst, Elijah Wood, Mark Ruffalo, and Tom Wilkinson. Pretty solid cast, huh. But it is first and foremost a Charlie Kaufman movie. Charlie Kaufman is the guy who wrote Adaptation, Being John Malkovich, and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind along with Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind. He has a style all to his own. In a Charlie Kaufman script, reality is thrown out the window and you often find yourself "in the head" of one of the characters. This is never more true than in Being John Malkovich, which is about a portal that literally takes you into the head of the actor John Malkovich. At one point in the film (the scene I liked the most) Kaufman shows us the memories of a caged ape who reflects on being free in the jungle before he was captured. In short, I don't like Kaufman and I absolutely hated Adaptation. I think his style is pretentious and show-offy and too "Kaufman-esque". But with this story, which requires a break from reality and for us to really get into the minds of its principal characters, it works perfectly.

The film is basically a love story. Anyone who has ever been through a bad break-up can probably relate to this film. After breaking up with Joel (Jim Carrey), Clementine (Kate Winslet) decides to take advantage of the newest technology and have all memories of him erased from her brain. Who hasn't wanted a totally fresh start after a painful breakup? Joel hears about this and decides to do the same thing. Although halfway through the procedure, he decides the memories he has of Clementine are so precious they are worth the pain associated with them.

I'm not going to say any more and spoil what happens for those of you who haven't seen it, but the film makes you wonder, "if I were to have met the person I love now at a different time in both of our lives, would we still be together?" It also poses the old question, "is it better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all?" Can 'eternal sunshine of the mind' only be achieved by ridding the memory of its painful 'spots'?

This is a movie for people who love cinema and like to analyze films, which is evident from its #38 ranking on the Top 250 at imdb.com. I think it is cool that Kaufman chose to name Kate Winslet's character Clementine. After hearing that she has decided to erase him for her memory, you can almost imagine Joel being tormeted by that song that goes, "you were lost and gone forever, oh my darling Clementine..."