The Man in the Moon
Being a movie buff is a bit like panning for gold. You come across a lot of things that glitter but don't hold up under closer inspection. That makes finding the rare pure nugget all the more rewarding. "The Man in the Moon" (1991) is a pure nugget.
In his 1991 review of this movie, Roger Ebert mentions that previously Robert Mulligan had directed To Kill a Mockingbird, Same Time Next Year, and Summer of '42. But Ebert says that "Nothing else Mulligan has done, however, approaches the purity and perfection of The Man in the Moon.”
See details about this movie (including the complete Roger Ebert review)
The lead role in this movie goes to a 14-year old Reese Witherspoon. The movie is set in the mid 1950s, which makes this is a coming-of-age movie about a young girl of my generation. This is a movie that seems to be of ultimate simplicity, but its whole is way greater than the sum of its parts. Here are some of the comments in Roger Ebert's review:
- “The Man in the Moon” is a wonderful movie, but it is more than that, it is a victory of tone and mood. It is like a poem.
- This isn’t just a movie about teenage romance, it’s a movie about idealism - about how we idealize what and who we love - and a movie about the meaning of life.
- “The Man in the Moon” is like a great short story, one of those masterpieces of language and mood where not one word is wrong, or unnecessary. It flows so smoothly from start to finish that it hardly even seems like an ordinary film.
- As the film approached its conclusion without having stepped wrong once, I wondered whether he could do it - whether he could maintain the poetic, bittersweet tone, and avoid the sentimentalism and cheap emotion that could have destroyed this story. Would he maintain the integrity of this material? He would, and he does.
All movies begin at 7 PM. Feel free to bring your dinner with you if you don't have time to eat at home. And bring snacks to share if you are so inclined. If you're bringing food or snacks you may wish to arrive a bit early to partake or to share your snacks.
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