The Kids are All Right
I know. Everyone else saw this movie last year. I just saw it Sunday night. I figured it wasn't one of those movies that you needed to see on the big screen. I was right about that, but now I want to talk about it and everyone else is like, "Eileen, that is so 2010."
BTW, this post will be positively BURSTING with SPOILERS. Alert. Alert. Alert.
Can I talk first about Annette Benning's face? OMG. She's beautiful. She appears to have resisted pressure to have plastic surgery. She looks so real and her emotions are so real on her beautiful real face. The scene at the dinner table when she realizes that her partner has been unfaithful to her and yet she has to endure the rest of the meal with her partner, her children and the man her partner is sleeping with? OMG. Amazing. Everything is on that face. She doesn't need to say a word. In fact, she doesn't.
I love that this family is essentially exactly where I am now. Two teenagers. Two adults trying to keep everything together. To be there for each other and for the kids and still find some level of self-actualization. The movie totally captured what that's like, right down to the fact that any house with teenagers in it can explode at any second. It just can. It's the way it is. They're crazy volatile and have a complete scorched earth policy. I have great sweet kids, but hand to God, it could go south any second. I've seen it. BTW, loved the way they handled the daughter leaving for college. She had to get that little snippet of rebellion in there before she left. Because they do need to. They have to separate from us. But she's still the same smart sweet loving kid she was.
It also captured how easy it is for two smart caring adults to lose their connection despite how much they love each other. I feel like I'm constantly fighting to keep from taking that step to where they are in this movie. I don't want to be Julianne Moore trying to control my partner's almost drinking problem or be the one with the problem who can't listen to what my partner's saying because I want that glass of wine that bad. The sex? That cracked me up, too. Who hasn't phoned it in here and there? Do that too often, though, and someone could end up doing Mark Ruffalo doggie-style in the middle of the afternoon.
Oh, and those moments when one or the other mom was totally tone deaf to what she was saying to her kid? I've heard that crap coming out of my own mouth. I know I'm screwing it up, but I can't help it. The thank you note thing? The one mom trying to be honest with the kid about sexuality and going oh, maybe a little too far, but maybe not and the other mom shutting her down. Okay. I guess it was always Annette Benning who was tone deaf.
So I loved loved loved this movie. I loved the people and the problems and the resolution at the end. It was a little like Molly's post about great reading experiences. I saw this movie at the exact right moment in my life.
Thanks. You may now all resume your previously scheduled 2011.
BTW, this post will be positively BURSTING with SPOILERS. Alert. Alert. Alert.
Can I talk first about Annette Benning's face? OMG. She's beautiful. She appears to have resisted pressure to have plastic surgery. She looks so real and her emotions are so real on her beautiful real face. The scene at the dinner table when she realizes that her partner has been unfaithful to her and yet she has to endure the rest of the meal with her partner, her children and the man her partner is sleeping with? OMG. Amazing. Everything is on that face. She doesn't need to say a word. In fact, she doesn't.
I love that this family is essentially exactly where I am now. Two teenagers. Two adults trying to keep everything together. To be there for each other and for the kids and still find some level of self-actualization. The movie totally captured what that's like, right down to the fact that any house with teenagers in it can explode at any second. It just can. It's the way it is. They're crazy volatile and have a complete scorched earth policy. I have great sweet kids, but hand to God, it could go south any second. I've seen it. BTW, loved the way they handled the daughter leaving for college. She had to get that little snippet of rebellion in there before she left. Because they do need to. They have to separate from us. But she's still the same smart sweet loving kid she was.
It also captured how easy it is for two smart caring adults to lose their connection despite how much they love each other. I feel like I'm constantly fighting to keep from taking that step to where they are in this movie. I don't want to be Julianne Moore trying to control my partner's almost drinking problem or be the one with the problem who can't listen to what my partner's saying because I want that glass of wine that bad. The sex? That cracked me up, too. Who hasn't phoned it in here and there? Do that too often, though, and someone could end up doing Mark Ruffalo doggie-style in the middle of the afternoon.
Oh, and those moments when one or the other mom was totally tone deaf to what she was saying to her kid? I've heard that crap coming out of my own mouth. I know I'm screwing it up, but I can't help it. The thank you note thing? The one mom trying to be honest with the kid about sexuality and going oh, maybe a little too far, but maybe not and the other mom shutting her down. Okay. I guess it was always Annette Benning who was tone deaf.
So I loved loved loved this movie. I loved the people and the problems and the resolution at the end. It was a little like Molly's post about great reading experiences. I saw this movie at the exact right moment in my life.
Thanks. You may now all resume your previously scheduled 2011.
No comments have been added yet.
