Sundry Sunday :: an “I went there for you” 6 list

“I went there for you” lists are lists of actors who I appreciate so much based on one or more performances that I will literally go out of my way to view one or more other performances of theirs.  This is sometimes rewarding; this is sometimes disastrous.  But hey.

6. Nathan Fillion

Nathan Fillion.  Geeky god-king of the Whedonverse.  Someone I have never not enjoyed.  I appreciated Nathan for Firefly and for Dr. Horrible, and because of my appreciation for him, followed him to Super and Castle, the latter of which is seen above and which I admit that I am woefully, heinously behind in (approximately season two, because I just keep getting distracted with other projects).  I realized that I had already seen him in Slither, which was directed by James Gunn just like Super was; I had watched that just because I enjoy campy-ass, morbid horror semi-comedies, but that works as well.  He is just delightful.

5, 4. Lea Michele and Matthew Morrison

As I have before mentioned, I was basically a Spring Awakening groupie.  I still love it with all my heart.  I naturally found Lea through that, and thought she sang pretty and such.  I saw the original cast of The Light in the Piazza, too, and I absolutely was in love with Matthew Morrison in it, singing so beautifully in Italian all over the place.  So naturally, when I heard all that while ago that they were going to be in a singing television program together, I went “YAY!!” and prepared to fangirl.  Glee, seen above, is one of those “I went there for you” moments that I am now… mildly regretting, though, for the reasons I’ve mentioned before; also, it sucks that I don’t really like… well, a lot of the characters, but I really don’t like Rachel that much, and I really don’t like Will that much, and while Lea gets to sing all the time, Matt doesn’t get to show off what he can actually do.  I miss when he sang in Italian and sustained notes and it was lovely.

3. Dichen Lachman

I love her more every time I see her face.  I fell for Dichen because of Dollhouse, obviously (just like I fell for… most of the cast that I hadn’t already fallen for already).  But I’ve followed her now to two different places: Torchwood: Miracle Day and now the US Being Human, seen above.  I’d never watched Torchwood before, I’d never watched Being Human before, but that’s just how it is.  I didn’t really love Torchwood (I hear that I would enjoy the original more, so I’m not ruling it out in the future), and I admit that I watch her Being Human episodes on my laptop and just do other things in other tabs until I hear/see her scenes come on, but I do love her.  Even when it’s something I do not otherwise care about whatsoever.

2. Patrick Fugit

Surprise!  This is a predictable list, yes.  After falling in love with him in Almost Famous, I proceeded to follow Patrick Fugit to Saved, to Bickford Schmeckler’s Cool Ideas (which is an example of psychic going there for someone, too, since my much-loved Fran Kranz is there t00), to The Amateurs, to Wristcutters: A Love Story, seen above, to We Bought a Zoo, to Cinema Verite… yeah.  Everywhere.  But the thing is, I’m usually not disappointed.  A lot of those aren’t my favorite movies like Almost Famous is, but I don’t dislike any of them.  And I always love him.

1. Summer Glau

But my darling Summer… takes me to places I regret going sometimes.  Firefly was what made me love her, too, and I didn’t follow her to Dollhouse because I was already there, but I obviously regret nothing about that experience; it’s… well, a lot of the rest.  It’s following her to The Cape, seen above; I think I used that picture back in the day when I tried to put the most positive spin I could on my Cape-watching experience, because really, aside from the one girl who was on Deadwood who I decided was my Nolanized Harley Quinn, the above scene is kind of one of the only things I remember about that show.  I tried so hard to enjoy myself with it, but I couldn’t even finish it, and that’s saying something considering my compulsion to finish everything I begin.  It’s following her to Deadly Honeymoon, which I tumbled about that once and… well, yes.  I didn’t mind following her to Alphas, that I liked fairly well; I still haven’t actually watched that show aside from her episode, though I know I should (more with the time constraints).  But it’s not as unfailingly successful, following her places.  Which is a shame, because she tries to make the best of everything no matter where she ends up, and that’s admirable.

–your fangirl heroine.

Spoiler Alert Saturday :: my thoughts on We Bought a Zoo

Five things I usually despise:
1. Inspirational “based on a true story” movies
2. Inspirational animal movies
3. Inspirational single/widowed dad movies
4. When movie audiences audibly go “awwww”
5. Soundtracks that involve a song sung by a man in a high-pitched, incomprehensible voice

Five things that will get me in the door anyway:
1. Patrick Fugit
2. Patrick Fugit
3. Patrick Fugit
4. Patrick Fugit
5. Cameron Crowe directing Patrick Fugit

This may be the most overtly fangirl movie review I’ve put up in a while, but nobody (who isn’t Fran Kranz, Summer Glau, or Christina Hendricks) can uniformly melt me into a puddle of fangirl want like Patrick Fugit.  Eight years and counting.  My crush on him has lasted longer than… most real life relationships I know that aren’t belonging to parents.

Yes, I understand that he had… not that much screen time.   I understand that We Bought a Zoo was a movie about Matt Damon and Scarlett Johansson and Matt Damon’s children.  But it’s been approximately five years (since Wristcutters) since I actually got to see my Patrick on a big screen, and I couldn’t resist.  Even though the first time I saw the trailer to this movie, and didn’t see Patrick in it, I shot myself in the head with a fingergun.  Inspirational anything movies make me want to crawl into a hole and never emerge, a lot of times.

But.  I’m not sure if it’s because I was in a happy place, or because it was actually sweet, or because there are times when I can become a total sap for a minute before reverting to my usual morbid self, I actually did think it was a nice movie.  “Nice” isn’t a very apt descriptor, but it’s an appropriate one, I think.

The audience in my theater did audibly go “awwww” multiple times.  Usually at Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones), and I’ll admit that was well-founded.  Even if it’s a plot device that’s getting tired, I can’t deny that the adorable little girl’s presence is a guaranteed way to make people smile.  And this particular little girl was especially adorable.

Also pretty adorable was Lily (Elle Fanning).  In a different way, but damned if she’s not an endearing adolescent.  She’s got one of those infectious smiles, and she wasn’t acting too young or too old, so that’s nice.  Even if sometimes I was rolling my eyes (the “I love you” scene between her and Dylan [Colin Ford], for example, because really) she didn’t seem like a “Hollywood” adolescent.  She seemed like someone who’s actually that age.

And Matt Damon was fine.  Like usual, I don’t have anything particular to say about his performance.  He got done what he needed to.  The hallucinations of dead wife sequences were a little much, and the dancing in the kitchen one made me think about The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood for some reason, but it was okay in the end.  Thomas Haden Church was good, too.  He’s good at being That Other Guy There Talking To The Main Character.

Scarlett Johansson… is a serviceable actress who does what she needs to, and damn if she’s not cute.  And I really liked that they only kissed the once and acknowledged that it wasn’t going to be a relationship right away because of it.  That felt like a real people thing to do.

My Patrick… well, for one I’m convinced that his character, Robin, was totally dating that girl with the flapper haircut who also worked at the zoo, or at least they flirted.  I loved his one little silly interaction with Johansson’s Kelly; that it was just banter, plain and simple, nothing weird about it.  If the inspector (who was a d-bag, and I hated him) had been a woman, and had been eyeing him up, she would have bantered with him in the same way.  He was so capable and helpful and friendly and, like always with him, I felt like he knew more about everyone than they did about themselves.  (He’s really good at that.)

Basically.  It was cute, it was sentimental, it was based on a true story (and I heard someone behind me go “ooh, field trip!” in all seriousness, and I just shook my head, because cute sentimental movies draw in an audience that I don’t wanna watch movies with, I like when it’s late enough that we’re the only ones in the theatre, or close to, and we don’t have to listen to a ton of other reactions from people, but hey), and despite this I didn’t hate it.  It was pretty good.  Which is probably to do with Cameron Crowe, who is commendable always.  (Except for Vanilla Sky.  But let’s not get into my Vanilla Sky problems.)

–your fangirl heroine.