Blue Valentine review

Blue Valentine is not a movie to take your girlfriend. Unless her favorite book is 1984 and she slows down to watch car wrecks, you’re better off with 500 Days of Summer. That is if you want to watch a film about disintegrating relationships, choose the one where Minka Kelly is happily waiting for you at the end. Blue Valentine is no Minka-Kelly-happily-waiting-for-you-at-the-end.

A Cautious Resolve

This new year I have made the usual resolutions I never seem to accomplish completely. As I sit here with Patty Griffin's "Coming Home to Me" playing in the background, I feel good. I may never get passed the first draft of my novel. I may stay in the same funk I've waded in and out of last year. But maybe not. Maybe instead of the 39 books I read in 2009, I'll read 50. Maybe I'll be able to pay off my car and save for New Zealand in 2011. Maybe I'll be braver. Kinder. More hopeful.

It's too soon to say whether this month is going towards or away from these goals. In any case, I'm going to try.