For just the second time in 17
years, I went to a movie theatre Monday night. I had yet to see a "3D" movie,
and although we have that new television and it does have that technology, my
daughter and husband swore the experience was different in the theatre, and they
were right.
There were six of us for this
outing—my beloved and our daughter [I guess you could say the rest of us
infringed on their usual Monday night excursion] our second daughter, and her
two kids, who are the grandchildren I take care of. The movie: Pixar's
Brave.
I can't tell you why I stopped
being a movie fan. We used to go to the cinema from time to time, but when VCRs
became all the rage in the 1970s and 80s [oh my God, I am getting old!]
we used to not only rent movies every weekend; we rented a lot of
them.
Sometimes we'd watch 3 movies on
Friday night and 3 movies on Saturday night. This was a family activity, with
all five of us in our living room, enjoying the entertainment together. We
watched all different genres of films—except, of course, horror movies, or films
that had tragically sad endings. I absolutely refused to watch them, period. It
just wasn't ever going to happen.
One incident in particular sticks
out in my memory as I look back on those days, but I have to kind of qualify
this story first.
As parents, my beloved and I took
an unusual stance: we would both rather our children see a movie that had a bare
modicum (pardon the pun) of nudity than have them watch a movie with extreme
violence or where people got hacked to pieces. Now obviously, we generally
didn't go out of our way rent movies with nudity in them. But once in a while we
would get "flashed".
The year after it came out, we
rented The Sword and the Sorcerer with Lee Horsley. In this movie there was one
scene when the hero swung through the "harem" on a rope. For the span of about
four or five seconds, while the camera `followed' the hero's swing, the viewer
was treated to a background scene of several sets of naked, female
breasts.
We were neither of us expecting
this; we looked at each other, said nothing, and the movie played on. And, I
thought, okay, no harm, no foul as not a one of our three children said a word
about it. Christopher was nearly 11 at the time, Anthony 6, and Jennifer 5. I
thought: whew, bullet dodged.
The next morning I awoke early to a
strange sound. It was click, click, silence for about five seconds then click,
click again. Coming from the living room, which was just outside our bedroom, it
happened more than a dozen times, and I decided to get up to
investigate.
There was my six year old son,
Anthony, on the floor in front of the television, remote control in one hand,
thumb of the other in his mouth, as he ran that harem shot on the screen over,
and over again.
I kind of think my drifting away
from watching movies—and television too, because I really don't watch more than
a hand full of hours of that a week—is tied to my reading and writing. At some
point after my heart surgery, my interests changed, and I found that, given the
choice, I'd rater either read or write than watch a movie.
Through our cable company, we're
able to rent movies on a "pay per view" basis without leaving the house, and if
by chance I am in the mood to see a movie, then that is generally what I do. In
the past couple of years, I've seen The Social Network, The King's Speech, and
The Iron Lady. My sister-in-law (my beloved's sister) has made it her personal
mission to see to it that every couple of months I'm subjected…er,
treated to a "girls night". She brings a couple of movies, "chick
flicks", usually, and she and I and my daughter commandeer the living room to
indulge in this female bonding ritual. Hence, I've also seen Fried Green
Tomatoes, Love Actually, and The Lake House. On the most recent of these
evenings, we watched "It's Complicated" starring Meryl Streep and Alec
Baldwin.
There are often margaritas
involved in these rituals, so I guess they're okay.
Ironically it's my role as author
that has prompted me to try and fit in a few more movies recently. Our film
media does, after all, reflect our lives, and our collective consciousness. We
can take our "social temperature" by looking at the movies we create and watch.
It can be argued that it's difficult to be current with the world if one is
ignorant of the art, and art forms, being produced and celebrated by
it.
Films and television shows draw the
largest audience of all the arts.
While that is true, and I don't
want my books to begin to sound as if they are novels written by a woman not in
tune with her times, one thing remains non-negotiable.
I still refuse to watch horror
movies, or any movies that have a dreadfully tragic ending. It's simply not
going to happen.
Love,
The only dream I've ever had was to be a published author. It was a dream formed in childhood, and held on to through the business of growing up. Life intruded, as life does, and my dream was put on hold. But now, through hard work, faith, and luck dream has evolved into reality.
Romance is a wonderful genre that accommodates every other. Comedy, mystery, paranormal, suspense, or science fiction, romance embraces them all. Erotic romance gives all of that, and so much more.
For readers who want all the best traditional romance has to offer – great characters, compelling stories and a happy ending – and who crave that extra bit of heat – I invite you to read one of my novels and let me know what you think!
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