Thursday, Feb. 10

Word of the day: aprosexia : inability to concentrate

Gabriel and I went to COSI today and had a rip-roaring good time. Trouble is, he had too much fun and fell asleep for ten minutes in the car. Furthermore, he didn't take a nap at home, pretty much abrogating my plan to read some more of Gone With the Wind and check out the programs at a community college in Statesboro. In a little bit, we'll go get my haircut and maybe some cupcakes.

Here's the rest of my decade-in-film picks:

Best Actress:

Julie Christie, Away From Her (2007)

Vera Farmiga, Down to the Bone (2005)

Maggie Gyllenhaal, SherryBaby (2006)

Sally Hawkins, Happy-Go-Lucky (2008)

Julianne Moore, Far From Heaven (2002)

Imelda Staunton, Vera Drake (2004)

Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia (2009)

Charlize Theron, Monster (2003)

Naomi Watts, Mulholland Drive (2001)

Kate Winslet, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

Most Underappreciated Films:

17 Again (2009)

Birth (2004)

Black Book (2006)

Dark Blue (2003)

Drag me to Hell (2009)

Ghost Town (2008)

Insomnia (2002)

The Lookout (2007)

The Matador (2005)

The Mist (2007)

Nothing but the Truth (2008)

Open Water (2004)

Prime (2005)

The Proposition (2006)

Revolutionary Road (2008)

The Ruins (2008)

The Station Agent (2003)

Taken (2009)

Whatever Works (2009)

The Woodsman (2004)

Valentine's Day is this coming Monday and I haven't gotten my wonderful wife a gift yet, but I will. Sunday, Julia, Gabriel, and I will be going out to eat at either Ruby Tuesday or Cracker Barrel or Texas Roadhouse. Tonight, we'll watch a movie (The Romantics) and Top Chef and have some pizza. Can't wait!

The above image is sculpture called Walking Man by the Swiss sculptor and painter Albert Giacometti. I posted it because I remembered that in Steve Martin's An Object of Beauty one character was quoted as saying that Giacometti was one of the six most important (the only important) artists of the 20th century. I had never heard of him! Looking him up, I see that he travelled back and forth from Geneva to Rome to Paris from the 20s to the 40s, met Dali and other surrealists, befriended Sartre and other Existentialists, focused extensively on the human body (its frailty, in particular), usually the head. Consistent themes were human alienation, the misery in the faces of the silent oppressed all around him. His sculptures, mostly conceived from memory, were thin, often featureless. He was intensely self-critical, from an avant-garde turn-of-the-century family. He tried to introduce perspective into sculpture and in February of 2010 his above work, "L'homme qui marche I," sold for 65 million pounds, the largest amount ever at an auction house.