Being a resident in good ol' Knoxville, Tennessee you are either a Volunteer or you are banished. Needless to say I love my city so Volunteer it is. So, when I found that Tom Hanks does a movie called Volunteers you get a little excited.
This crazy comedy is about a spoiled rich brat of a man, Lawrence, who finds himself in a massive amount of debt. He comes to his father asking to have the money to pay off his debt his father refuses. With sharks hot on his tracks, and out for blood, Lawrence flees and finds his college roommate about to board a plane to join the Peace Core. One quick deal later Lawrence is on a plane to Southeast Asia, where is will stay for two years.
Tom Hanks has got to have one of the most distinct voices in Hollywood. So when watching Volunteers you expect to hear his normal talking voice. That I not the case in this movie. You know that corny fake "rich people" accent that happens in cartoon and other comedy films? Tom Hanks does that voice for this film. Him doing that "rich people" accent with his voice was one of the funniest part of that whole film! All I could think about was... well I'll just show you.
Now if you have no idea who this is then you need to educate yourself! Thurston Howell III is a character form the TV show Gilligan's Island. Mr. Howell always talks in that "rich people" accent on the show! All I could think about whenever Tom Hanks talked was how much he reminded me of him!
I really thought that this was going to be a lame movie when I started watching it because of the plot. I thought it was going to be very predictable and thus making it not as funny. However, I really did enjoy myself! There were a couple of things in there that made me laugh because of all of the classic films I have watched they had a few jokes that tickled me more than others.
If someone were looking for a goofy movie to watch that might be one I would recommend.
From 1984, the next movie on our Tom Hanks journey is Bachelor Party.
In the movie Bachelor Party Tom Hanks plays a young man who falls in love with a beautiful girl and decides that he wants to get married. When he tells his buddies that he is going off the market they decide to throw him the craziest bachelor party of all time! They have everything from booze, to chick, and to drugs. Between the party, and the fact that his fiancés' ex is out to kill him to get her back, we being to wonder if he is going to survive his own party.
BOOBS!!!
Yes, boobs! That is the word that comes to me when I think about this movie now! I never thought I would see so many boobs in a Tom Hanks movie! Dear lord! When I think of Tom Hanks I think of him like this...
Not this...
Yet, here we are!
I did enjoy myself watching this film. However, I did ask "what in the world am I watching" more than once during the film. They is crazy! Comedies are usually predictable, lets just be honest they are. This one was predicable but it did have a few twists that you didn't see coming.
I have do say it probably won't be one of my all time favorite Tom Hanks movies but I mean you can't really go wrong with Mr. Hanks in a comedy. This movie sure did prove that.
That is something that most everyone in the world like to do. I am not one of those people. Don't get me wrong I love watching baseball, St. Louis Cardinals are the best, but I can't do sports to save my life. I know how to play baseball, basketball, volleyball, basically any sport where i have to run and move. I don't like sports where you aren't in control totally of what you are doing from the get go. So, basically almost any winter sport.
That does include skiing. I don't like the idea of it because you go really fast, down a big hill, with lots of other people in the way, and you can't just stop unless you fall. To me there is no winning.
I wish I had the love of the sport like Eddie Edwards did. Eddie, known as Eddie the Eagle, became the first Ski Jumper, since 1928, to represent Great Britain at the 1988 Olympics.
His is a great story about doing something you love no matter what other people think.
So, watching the movie Eddie the Eagle was the perfect movie to watch in preparation to go skiing.
My best friend in the whole world, Alaina, said that she help/do some of the things on my list with me. Skiing was one of them. The day before we went I asked her to come over and watch the movie with me to get pumped!
The whole movie watching situation was so perfect! Not only was it the perfect movie to watch but during the movie it snowed in the valley of Knoxville, TN! So, or course we had to do something about that.
We got warm stuff on and ran outside and played in the very little snow that we had! It's was fun and I think my neighbors think I am a loon now, but I don't care! We were so excited to go experience skiing for real!
We got up and went to Ober Gatlinburg, which I have lived close to for nearly 20 years and never been, and got all of out stuff rented. I was feeling really good, and slight mad at myself. Reason being I got to the point where I didn't feel that scared. Like that I had over thought how scary it really was in my head and that I was gonna do it and not be scared...
Then we went outside.
I saw the mountain that we were supposed to go up to ski down and wanted to run away. I was about to get on a pair of plastic 2x4s that slide... WHAT AM I THINKING!
I started to get really nervous. Alaina was really helpful she kept telling me that I could do it and that I would be alright. As we were waiting in line to do our skiing lesson we heard some screaming from the base of the mountain. Two paramedics skiers were transporting someone who got hurt off the trail and into an ambulance. Not what you really want to see when you are already scared and have never done it before.
We went ahead and did the lesson. I fell... a lot. I could not for the life of me figure out how to turn. Correction, I figured out how to turn but could not figure out how to turn the way I wanted to go. Which left me falling, or crashing. Not just crashing but crashing into the tunnel that took you back to the top of the bunny slop. It happened only twice but it was enough for someone one to do this...
Yes, someone wrote "crash here" in the snow where I crashed into it twice...
I won't lie, Alaina and I never got off the bunny slope. Not because it was too scary, but because after the lesson we were freezing, wet, and both a little over it. I didn't mind not going down the mountain because the bunny slope was scary enough for me! Between all the kids that were skiing past us like it was nothing, and that evil tunnel that I could not avoid from crashing into, I didn't need a whole mountain to go down. The little hill was enough. However, I did get proof that I did it!
I also got proof that Alaina did it as well!
What I learned from skiing is that it looks way easier to do than actually doing it yourself. I also learned that I had more self control skiing that I originally thought. That it would take a lot of practice to get the hang of it if I wanted to do more. Sitting here thinking about my day there I feel like if I had a few more hours, and less people around, I would have gotten that hang of it. Most importantly I learned not to beat myself up about not being able to do something right away. Everything takes time.
I most likely won't be getting back on the slopes anytime soon but I would go again if given the chance. I know that Alaina and I both had an amazing time on our adventure and I am looking forward to a Year of Courage with her!
The first movie in the Tom Hanks Hustle is the movie Slash.
Splash is about a young man by the name of Allen Bauer. A hard working, likable man who gets a call from his soon to be ex-girlfriend saying that she is moving out of the apartment that they share. When asked if he loved her, Allen can't say that he can. After attending a wedding of a friend of his he realizes that he wants to find love but is about to give up. He goes to Cape Cod to clear his head. On his way to the island that boat he is in breaks down and he is stranded. In an attempt to get the boat to work he falls out and almost drowns. He is saved by a beautiful girl but has no idea where she came from. Over the next week, Allen's life is turned upside down by not only find the love of his life but finding out the love of is life is a fish.... Life's a Splash isn't it?
Oh 80's movies! I am so unfamiliar with you!
They really are not my strong suit. This movie, however, is every bit of what you would imagine and early Tom Hanks film would be like. You have hilarious moments and a slightly corny, yet charming, man falling in love on screen. What a wonderfully corny movie to watch! I am sorry that I have to say that any Tom Hanks film is corny but how do you fall in love with a fish, without animation, and be able to do it seriously?
Clearly, you can't.
I have to say going back and watching a young Tom Hanks you can see the same funny man you see in interviews and such but you think "man how much he has grown as an actor". It's still interesting seeing this Hanks to that of Forrest Gump and even Sully. Yet, as corny and cheesy as the script may be, and as funny the movie is, Tom Hanks still sells it! He totally makes you want to say "I wouldn't mind falling for a fish. It looks like it would be fun".
I think anyone who can get someone to say that is a great actor!
I don't think I quiet realized how much he would change as an actor over time. It's very unique to know an actor by what they can do and then go back and watch them try and figure out who they want to become. Like I said Tom Hanks still rocks it! I am just waiting till we get to the first drama that he does and then see how much it changes in the course of a movie!
"If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. It's the hard that makes it great." - Tom Hanks
I love this man! Tom Hanks has got to be one of my favorite actors to ever appear on any screen! With how much I love him I am a little shocked that I decided that I was going to watch all of his movies. The reason I am so shocked was because I love old movie and old actors. There were a few reasons why I ultimately picked Tom Hanks.
It was summer of last year, 2017, that I was thinking about what I was going to do this year. I already decided that I was going to do my year of courage but that was going to be once a month and I really wanted to watch more movies. I was on facebook when a story came up about a young woman who sent Mr. Hanks a letter and she got a reply back rather quickly. He was so nice in the letter and I admired him for it. In the article it had said that he was really good about replying to his fans that write him a letter. I thought it would be cool to do that but I wouldn't know what to write to him about really. Not long after that, a video started to re-circulate on my facebook page. It's a wonderful video of Tom Hanks with James Corden doing snippets of all of Tom Hanks' movies in the "Role Call" skit.
After those two things I realized that as much as I love Tom Hanks it's crazy that I haven't seen that many of his movies. Now, I have seen all the Toy Story movies, I am a 90's baby after all, and Forrest Gump is my 7th favorite movie of time. Other movies like Big I still have never seen.
The other reason that hit home with me watching all of his movies is because one of his movies got me through a hard time in my life. In April of 2016 I came home from church to find my mom sitting out in front of the house. It was one of those things that didn't seem out of the ordinary, however, you had this feeling that something was wrong. I sat down and my mom had to tell me that my 22 year old cousin, Dean, had died in a car accident during the previous night.
My family had just gone through the loss of my grandmother not a month before and now we had to work through another death that came out of no where. Dean and I were not very close but we did love each other. The last time I saw him was a few years before at his father's funeral. We had a good talk, and talked about happy times and good memories. We hugged told each other and said that we loved each other. That was the last time I would ever see him. I am glad that I had that moment. I am glad that we were brought together one last time before he was gone. I am glad I got to tell him I loved him.
However, the week leading up to his death is something I will always regret. All that week I kept getting a feeling to message Dean on Facebook and tell him how awesome he was, and how proud of him I was, and that his dad and my Grandma would be proud too. I never got around to it...
Learning about his death is the worst pain I have ever felt in my life. The depth of sorrow that I experienced when he died has been something that no other sorrow has come close to. I spent the rest of the day dreading coming near my dad because my dad was getting updates about what happened, how it happened, and I didn't want to hear it. I didn't want to go to any movie, even though that was originally the game plan, because I wasn't holding it together at home very well. I didn't want to go out in public and try to "act normal". After a while though, I could not take being in my house. There was too much going on inside my head! I had too many emotions happening that I could not process at once and something had to be done!
I got in my car bought a ticket for Tom Hanks' film A Hologram for the King.
I was really hoping it was going to be a comedy when I went. I knew it wasn't but I really hoped. This movie I haven't seen since that day in the theater. Since the day Dean died. However, this movie helped me with the grieving process. No, no one dies in this movie but it does have a lot of emotion. A lot of questioning "where do I belong" and "how do I fit in here" and also "do I make a difference". It was a lot of searching to become yourself in this movie. It not a easy journey either. This movie really asked the question "who am I" and went on a beautifully hard journey to get there. It dealt with a wide range of emotions in a growing period of this man's life and in watching all of these emotions on screen it helped me to pick apart, and work through, all the emotions I was dealing with in that moment in the movie theater.
I don't think I can thank Tom Hanks enough for choosing to do this movie and it helping me so much.
After realizing how much Tom Hanks has impacted my life I really wanted to see all of his work. First, I had to thank him.
So, I finally decided to write him a letter.
I wrote to him about everything I put in this blog and how awesome I think he is. I wrote like 4 drafts of the letter cause I couldn't get it right! This is the first time I have ever wrote fan mail and it had to be right! I sent it to him on New Year's Day to start the year off. I don't know if I will get a letter back but I know that I will write him again at the end of the year and tell him what I think.
I am not 100% sure what I am going to think of all his movies but I know it's going to be a fun experience either way! I will have a ball doing to the movie hustle with Tom Hanks!
When I first saw the previews for this movie I thought it looked interesting but it was going to be more of a kids movie than anything. I thought that it was going to be some fairytale about how a family bought a zoo and they lived happily ever after. I as I have said many a time in this blog... I was wrong.
You see this beautiful story is unique. One, it is based off a true story, not sure how much of it is true but still. Two, it hold some pretty great advise that anyone can follow. "You know, sometimes all you need is twenty seconds of insane courage. Just literally twenty seconds of just embarrassing bravery. And I promise you, something great will come of it". Let me tell you what I have not used this as much as I have wanted to over the last few years since I have seen this movie but I have used it in the last few month.
This movie is what I am basing my year of courage of off. Some of these scary things I have gotten used to the idea that I am going to do them, other I have not. I am hoping that by watching this movie again I will be able to remind myself of that saying and apply it as needed through the year.
I love this quote because it's an easy way to remind yourself that you have more in you than what you think you do. When you think you can't go anymore there is always a little bit there that can take you further. If I didn't have this say I don't think I would have the job position that I would today. I don't like change all that much. I am not opposed to it but I am not a fan. If I am going to make a big change in my life I take FOREVER to get to a point of saying that I am ready to do it! I mean I work at the same job for nearly 8 years before I changed it. When I got to my new job I didn't want to go for any positions hire. One month after my one year anniversary I got the promotion I applied for. That took so much more courage in me that I thought I had to say I wanted to go for it and even more when I actually had to apply and interview all over again!
I hope that as I go and basically torture myself slowly this year, that this movie and line will help to remind me there is more to me than there is to me.
So, Over the last three years I have given myself challenges to do. In 2015 I started the Best Picture Challenge and literally finished that on December 31, of 2017. Then in 2016 I did the Year of Review challenge where I tried to predict the Oscars. Both there very fun and both had a lot of movies to watch. This year I have decided that I am going to do two challenges. Both are shorter set of movies to watch and if you add up all of the movie it will be less movies that I watch in 2017.
About half way through last year I was thinking about the challenges that I had done and realized something. The Best Picture Challenge was all about being grounded. Finding out the Best of the Best movies (in theory) and watching them and getting a "base line" of what movies are capable of doing or making us feel. These pictures were "home" to me. Then in 2016 I got really passionate about predicting the Oscars. For me that took a lot of "heart"..... So, when I decided that I was going to do a year of Courage I realized that I am following a Wizard of Oz pattern here.
I did not go into thinking that I was going to do that but here we are!
Every month this whole year I am going to do one thing that scares me and then a movie that kind of goes with that theme of what I am doing. So, for instance, January I am going to go skiing with my Best Friend Alaina. Skiing really does scare me because I have never done it before and I don't like putting myself into situations where I can be thrown down a hill really fast with no real way of controlling myself but I am going to do it. The movie that I am going to watch to go with that is, a movie I did watch in my Year of Review Challenge, Eddie the Eagle. My plan is to watch the movie before I do the activity and then after the activity write about it.
The other challenge is going to not be nearly as scary! I was thinking about this last year as well that I wanted to watch a whole bunch of movie again. Maybe not like 80-100 again, but a bunch in a year. I didn't want to do another Best of List or predict something though. I wanted to pick an actor that I love and watch all of their movies from the first one they made to the newest. I thought about doing an older actor like Gene Kelly or something like that. However, I realized that when it comes to movies in the 80s to the present I really haven't seen that many. So, I knew I needed to do an actor, who is still acting, and that also does a wide range of things. The Late Late Show came to the rescue! The day after this skit was done it was already going viral! James Corden did all of Tom Hanks' movies with Tom Hanks in a six minute video. Once I saw all of the different stuff he has done, and a lot of movies that people love, I knew I had to watch all of his movies. So, with the Year of Courage I will also be doing The Tom Hanks Hustle as well.
So, all I have to say so far is cheer to an interesting new year!
Alfred Hitchcock's Rope is a fantastic movie that I fell in love with the first time I saw it. It was not a Best Picture Winner but it's because of this movie that I started this blog or any challenges at all.
See, back in 2014 I was watching Conan on TBS, my favorite Late Night TV show. Conan had Michael Keaton and Edward Norton on the show in the same week talking about a movie that was gaining in popularity called Birdman. Now, at this point I really didn't want to watch the movie because it didn't sound that interesting. It wasn't until both of the actors starting talking about how the movie was filmed in one continuous shot that I was interested.
Rope was filmed in the same way. Now, because of camera limitation in the 40s it could not be done in the way Birdman was. They do have some shots that do cut away, and how the editing was done mad it a bit odd at times. However, it's one of the only films that dares to even try.
While watching the 2015 Academy Awards I was getting more and more interested in the film. During the show I decided that I was going to watch all of the Best Pictures because I wanted see how we started until how we got here. It was all because of this charming film that stars Jimmy Stewart...
Just goes to show that inspiration can be found in the most odd places...
Dear lord that was a lot of movies in a short amount of time...
Well, when I went into this I thought I was going to be let in on some secret of what makes a Best Picture really a Best Picture. Was it a theme? Similar storyline? Was it something else entirely? What I did find is really shocking.
There's nothing in common....
Yes, there are some Best Pictures that felt similar to other movies, or were sequels, but there was no theme....
I was really shocked to find how much range in the Best Pictures there were! Most of them are drama but even all of the dramas were not the same type of drama. Some were comedy dramas, some were mysteries. Some were even lighthearted dramas that no one thought would do any good. You had several musicals, comedy, and you even had a scary film in there! You dealt with war, harassment, history, sexuality, race, and you even had some real shock thrown your way!
Before I did my Year of Review I would be on of the many people who said that Hollywood has no new ideas. They have no new stories to tell. In reality that is not true.. It's the same story that is being told over and over again that is what is selling tickets and that is what people are dishing out the big bucks to see every years. It's the movies that get overlooked that are the movies that people are begging to see. Original ideas, and amazingly true stories of people we did know they existed. In reality when you look at the nominations in the last five or six years or so you start to see that the ones winning Best Picture were not films that were wildly publicized across the U.S.. They were movies that were so under the radar sometimes you never even heard of them.
I am glad for that. I am glad for that because that means that there are still stories being told and people getting recognized for them. Movie studios know that superhero movies are making them money now but it's stories told with a purpose that will go down in history.
Friends, I don't think I have been more happy about being more wrong in my life.
