Walk, about

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Crit

Truth is, seeing those camels did nothing for me as much as give me a yen to watch Lawrence of Arabia tonight, and if I'm going to screen that 4-hour trek across the desert on a school night, I need to get an early start. But not quite this early, which is a good thing, because an unfunny couple of things happened on the way to seeing this flick, leaving me with a couple of outraged emails to write:

1. Unsurprisingly, given past experience, especially since returning from vacation, when I'd had to call customer support twice in two uses, my MoviePass wouldn't behave. Except this time, no customer support was available (I suspect, notwithstanding the Varick Street business address, customer support is based on the West Coast, because I've been unable to raise them once before for pre-noon Eastern Time help), so after trying and trying and trying, I surrendered to cashing in some more of the 1,000+ Criterion points I was told I had before cashing in 200 for a ticket yesterday. But . . .
2. the cashier told me I couldn't. Something about "lifetime points," usable only for the concession stand (yeah, like I'm ever going to have a small popcorn). Can't remember whether I've mentioned this before, but this is not my first screwing re loyalty points, and while my loyalty is pretty much enforced by proximity and transportation limitations, I'm not feeling very loyal at the moment.

Do I have anything to say about the film, you ask? Well, yeah: I enjoyed it, particularly the gorgeous Australian landscapes, but I'm pretty stunned by the 80% Rotten Tomatoes rating; I didn't really find that much there there. Continuing my everything-is-connected filmic weekend, this is another child scarred by a parent's suicide, though she seems equally devoted to the dog that had to be put down when she was sent to live with an aunt and the one that accompanies her across the desert, such that late in the film, when she breaks down and sobs, "I miss her so much," the antecedent of that pronoun is not at all clear.

Another quietly strong performance by Mia Wasikowska, another obnoxious and/or endearing performance by Adam Driver.

Trailers

• The Imitation Game--Alan Turing and the Enigma machine, a story that has needed telling on film for a long time.
• Big Eyes--Amy Adams as the painter behind those once-ubiquitous kitsch waifs; Christoph Waltz as the slimeball husband who cheats her out of (saves her from?) recognition.