The Abbott Family Blog

For years, we didn’t watch many movies. Why? Well, the theater is really expensive, and most of our movie rental picks, since we do prefer comedies, were duds. It’s hard to get a really good comedy without something being dorky or a “Comedy-Drama,” which has no real humor besides maybe somebody spilling a coffee in the beginning.

Recently, we got a card in the mail from the good folks at Netflix about a 30-day free trail offer. Papa and I were all for trying it out but Luke and Mama were opposed. Mama had reservations because she was wanting to support our local Mom & Pop movie store, although our $3.00 every few months wouldn’t really keep them afloat. Luke was opposed because…well, I’m not really sure. They were saying we didn’t have time to watch movies and the time we had should be used for playing music and such, though they weren’t ready for my comeback response of “since when do we play music at 8:00pm?”

But, as past history has shown, when an opposition is denying something good for not much reason (other than “principle”) they’ll back down instantly once the goodness comes. And that’s what happened.

We got a free trial at Netflix and got two free movies: Casino Royale (while good, I think some of the previous Bond flicks were better) and Man of the Year (cute, enjoyable). We then decided to go past the free trial and actually subscribe.

So, we got through a few comedies and action flicks. After watching Blood Diamond and Bourne Supremacy, something weird happened with Luke. He was suddenly a lot more picky about the “realism” level. He didn’t want to see Live Free or Die Hard because apparrently Bruce Willis is firing an AK-47 at a helicopter as he is falling from it—although I guarantee that if we get it, he’ll watch it. He’s more picky about realism now yet he’s queued up movies like Harry Potter and Transformers by rationalizing it as “Oh, well if it’s supposed to be unrealistic, I can get in that “frame of mind” and it’s easier to transport myself into the movie and enjoy it.” Puh-leeze. I say if the story is good, who cares if it’s not realistic! If I want realistic, why even watch a movie in the first place?