Bit by bit, I’m emerging from my Cinderella spider hole. Over the weekend, I started to chip away at my movie backlog by watching a couple of DVDs (I’m so far behind that some of the films in my backlog are already available in disc form). Ruth has been pestering me to watch Pirates of the Caribbean ever since that DVD came out, and she finally screened it for me on Christmas Day. I like swashbuckling adventure films, and this one definitely fits that description. I think the sword duel in the blacksmith’s shop may well end up on everyone’s lists of classic action scenes, along with the shootout at Marion’s tavern in Raiders of the Lost Ark and the gun battle on the riverboat in The Mummy.
The next day, my nephew Jason dumped a half dozen of his newest DVDs on the table in front of us and said we were welcome to watch anything we wanted. I immediately latched onto Finding Nemo, which I missed when it was on the big screen. There was no question that I would enjoy it; Pixar never disappoints. As Bob has pointed out, what most people notice about Pixar is the superb computer-generated graphics, but that’s not what makes all Pixar films huge successes. People of all ages love Pixar movies because of the quality of the writing. Nemo is no exception. I find the movie’s theme — the triumph of hope over fear — very moving. I would try to explain why, but Iain Murray has beaten me to it; his article on the subject was published today at National Review Online.
I still have a lot of movies to watch before I’m caught up. Some of them aren’t out on DVD yet, so I’ll have to go to one of those buildings with lots of seats and a great big screen on one wall. It’s been so long since I’ve been to one that I forget what they’re called. It’s a word something like “theatre,” but I know that’s not right; “theatre” is the place with dressing rooms and a stage where I spent the last two months of my life. Oh, well, it’ll come to me eventually.