The Royal Pain.in.the.Baum

I love cinema. I love the history of cinema. I know a disgusting - read, appalling - amount of movie and movie star trivia dating back to the silent era. Heartbreak and anguish awaits he who challenges me to Trivial Pursuit, Silver Screen Edition. Just don't do it.

That was a fairly unnecessary preamble to the non-impressive point: over the years of extennnnnsive movie-viewing - after each of which I find out everything there is to know about anyone who acted any part of it - I have amassed a few favorites. "Favorites" to me means I can watch the movie multiple times perhaps even inside of a year without tiring of it. I can't honestly say how many times I've watched BBC's Pride & Prej (that's what the insiders call it) since it came out in '95 but it is certainly upwards of 30 (my social life might have flourished better in middle school if I were exaggerating on that score...but I'm not).

Recently I decided to lay bare my soul and share one of my Favorites with Sean:

Ok this movie has become a personal tradition of mine. It has the Wes Anderson Greats: Bill Murray (naturally), not one but BOTH of the Wilsons (Wes spoils us), plus a couple of my faves like Danny Glover (because Angels in the Outfield of course! (which by the way features a 13-year-old Joseph Gordon-Levitt))  and the Gwyneth. And, the soundtrack is a must.

For whatever reason, I always feel like watching Royal during the holidays. Shortly before Thanksgiving for the last few years, I gather: the ingredients for the perfect pumpkin pie; a crackling fire (c/o my parents house, this tradition cannot take place in tiny apartment); this movie; and myself, and go to Cinema Sublimity and Baking Bliss Town. The picture I'm trying to paint for you is that this movie is important to me.

So Sean and I settle into it. I'm snickering at the dry and physical humor; I'm getting emotionally invested in Luke Wilson; I'm volleying between pitying Gene Hackman and thinking he's an a-hole. As the final scene comes to a close, Sean exhales a long sigh in which he softly slips the announcement "...that was the worst movie I've ever seen..."

Guys I'm not surprised or even hurt. I knew he was going to hate this movie. Anyone who knows anything about Sean knows that he can't decide which movie of these two is his favorite:

or

 

He didn't have a Butterfinger's chance in Jordan's pudgy hands of liking any Wes Anderson film, and I knew this. Honestly, I just felt like watching it. I enjoyed myself. Especially when he said, "There's no way anyone likes this movie!", and I pulled up Sean's movie bible (Rotten Tomatoes) and waved the 80% critic and 87% audience score in his copper-bearded face.

But I've learned from this experience. I don't think I'll ever bring myself to show him Hook. If he didn't like that one I don't think we could grow old together.