On this Easter Sunday, I had the time to do one of these. Not too much to share during this update, but despite some ups and downs, nothing too negative to mention and I really shouldn't complain, all things considered. My Easter was & will be spent at home, relaxing. Some baseball has been watched since the full season began a few days ago. As for March, I visited some restaurants for the first time in awhile; new to the area was Potbelly Sandwich Works, a chain popular in the Midwest. They have decent sandwiches.
The one new to me location was The Legacy Restaurant at Nancy Lopez Country Club, up in The Villages. A relative was visiting so me and various people went to that relatively nice place for dinner. It was good food. Otherwise, March was a quiet month where not a lot happened. That is OK after how hectic February was at times. I did try the two new limited edition sodas from Mountain Dew (Point Break and Laguna Lemonade), which are both quite refreshing. Other than that... the rest will be me discussing some random movies I saw theatrically.
Love Lies Bleeding was that rather peculiar romantic movie featuring Kristen Stewart, the buff Katy O'Brian and a hilarious-looking Ed Harris. It was rather odd (and set in 1989) but despite some odd fetishistic moments and an ending out of nowhere which almost lost me until the final scene allowed me to rationalize what it meant... it was something I enjoyed.
A few nights ago I saw a little horror movie designed for a niche audience... which I happened to be a part of. Late Night with the Devil was a found footage thing where the gimmick was that the viewers saw a faux 70's late night talk show where a possessed teenage girl was a guest—of course she eventually caused havoc. It did look and feel the part, but most importantly for me, a key character was right up my alley: someone obviously modeled on the late magician turned renowned skeptic James Randi, who debunked pseudoscience. As I know that lore pretty well and so did the filmmakers, they greatly targeted my esoteric tastes. Unfortunately, some people online had a massive overreaction and got upset that the movie used THREE AI images which were interstitials on the program. Yes the filmmakers shouldn't have done it as otherwise the world that humans created was authentic. At the same time, the calls for boycotts or bootlegging the movie (no, really) was way overblown and even now is just preposterous that they freaked out over something so minor. The film is great, but I'm not the most objective here.
Finally, I went to a place I hadn't visited in years (the CMX Plaza Cinema Cafe in downtown Orlando) to check out Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. Some were curious so I felt obliged to. Afterlife was fine, although too dependent on nostalgia for the first movie. Frozen Empire was at least different and not as nostalgic. Still, it was overstuffed w/ plot & characters and as I think too often w/ modern movies, the humor did not always land. Overall, though, the movie was fine. Plenty of lousy modern movies are out there, so I'm happy when a movie does enough well to just be fine. As for the Plaza Cinema Cafe... there's no reason for me to return. The service was only OK; that doesn't even include the giant pile of spilled popcorn in my auditorium from a previous screening that no one bothered to clean up. It wasn't a surprise that I was the only one at this screening.
I'll return sometime in April. The month will be busier, I am pretty confident in thinking that.
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