We had some sun today

for the first time in weeks. I kept thinking I'd been living in the Lincolnshire of Dicken's novel 'Bleak House' and expecting to find Lady Deadlock's ghost roaming about in the courtyard, harbinging revenge.

Luckily, a crop of movies popped up on my subscription site, so that was some distraction. First I watched 'Rabbit Hole'. Nicole Kidmann had a nomination for that.... and I can't for the life of me imagine WHY. Immensely boring.

Then I tried Alice in Wonderland, nearly turned it off immediately when the Disney logo came up, but it was directed by Tim Burton. And his films are for anyone who have Halloween as their most sacred horriday of the year. This version has Alice at nineteen going back. She has to end the red queen's reign of terror. The visuals were excellent. It begins with parallels to the original, then turns very dark, which is what Burton's movies normally do. Enjoyable, and Johnny Depp's Mad Hatter was a ton of fun and very amusing.

And although I'd been putting it off... I watched 'The Fighter'. Had mixed reactions to it. Christian Bale deserved his award. Melissa Leo, don't know, she seemed so exaggerated, but reminded me of my bio-Mom. Mark Wahlberg really pulled back and gave a quiet performance.The film wasn't boring. But disturbing to me on a mess of levels. I don't think it did any great service to Lowell, Massachusetts. It depressed me on so many levels, most of them purely personal. But is a very good film.

Today's afternoon feature for me was 'How Do You Know'. Yeah, the title didn't appeal to me either at first glance. But if you have a cast like Reese Witherspoon, Paul Rudd, Owen Wilson and Jack Nicholson, you have the perfect foggy afternoon movie to lift you up a bit. It's just a light, girl has to choose between two guys comedy, and Jack Nicholson being comic-surly-irritating. It was solid, has some hilarious dialogue at times, and was a nice escape movie. I'd recommend it as a date flick...