Leaving Normal & Favorite film
I'm fairly certain I liked Leaving Normal, despite the fact that I found a lot of the plot points predictable (Let's do everything in our power to get to a house in Alaska we've never seen and can only assume is there! Nothing can go wrong!) and some of the characters' traits irritated me--Darly's negativity about small-town life and Marianne's innocent assumption that Darly wouldn't mind their "leaving money" being used for flowers and a porch swing, for example. The dialogue and the plot could have been better, but I still enjoyed watching the film. The relationship between Darly and Marianne actually illustrated what Robin tried to explain while on the stand in Boys on the Side when talking about relationships between women. Darly met Marianne on a bus bench in the middle of the night, yet was perfectly willing to take her on the road the next day with very few questions and with a certain amount of instant loyalty.
My favorite film this semester was Little Miss Sunshine, which was one of my favorites anyway, but it was interesting to watch it in the context of the "normal" American family and the roles the Hoovers were trying to play throughout their journey. I enjoyed watching the film through a different lens and actually thinking about the underlying issues (as opposed to just laughing).