Yes, this is a movie based on the cutest true story ever. Proclaimed as the Sleepless In Seattle of whatever year it came out(Oh, 1994. Thank you wikipedia), I’m inclined to agree. They had Sleepless In Seattle-ish music, Bridget Fonda even looks like Annie from Sleepless In Seattle when her hair is pulled back, and Nicholas Cage is just awesome in general, considering the fact that he was in National Treasure(Too bad I can’t remember any of the good parts of that movie other than the little duck tape parts, just the part where some guy says “Okay, I’ll hold the thing open so you guys can get out. Who cares if I don’t live for three minutes after you leave, I found the city of gold!” or something like that). Me, Lumpy and Bunji got to watch it when mom and dad went to get grain so I didn’t have to milk the goat with wheat, and to spy on Evelyn at her rehearsals for the summer musical Into the Woods (She got the part of Florinda, one of Cinderella’s stepsisters), on Thursday, and thankfully took Matthew with her(New baby brother… I am a really bad blogger, leaving people in the dark about everything… he was born the 25th of April) because otherwise he would have been awake within fifteen minutes of mom leaving, we were so loud. There are some parts throughout the movie that are so funny, I thought I’d choke on my apple juice. The plot is as follows: (Warning: Spoiler Alert)
Policeman Charlie Lang (Nicolas Cage) is a kind and generous man who loves his job and the Queens borough of New York City where he lives. His wife Muriel (Rosie Perez) works in a hairdressing salon and, unlike Charlie, is selfish, greedy and materialistic, constantly complaining about their situation in life. Waitress Yvonne Biasi (Bridget Fonda), is bankrupt because her husband Eddie (Stanley Tucci), whom she could not yet afford to divorce, emptied their joint checking account and spent all the money without her permission, while also leaving her with a credit card debt of over $12,000. Charlie meets Yvonne when she waits on him at the diner where she works. Since Charlie doesn’t have enough money to pay the tip, he promises to give her either double the tip or half of his prospective lottery winnings the next day. He wins $4 million (in 21 annual payments) in the lottery the next day and keeps his promise, despite the protests of his wife. He and Yvonne become stars almost immediately. Yvonne buys the diner she was working in. She sets up a table with Charlie’s name at which people who cannot afford food can eat for free. In another development, Charlie becomes a hero for foiling an attempted robbery at a grocery store but gets wounded in the process, forcing him to take leave from the police force.
At a gathering on a chartered boat for the lottery winners and other members of high society, Muriel gets to know the newly rich Jack Gross. She flirts with him and develops a strong liking for him, which is mutual. Meanwhile, Charlie and Yvonne spend a lot of time together, on one occasion paying for the train journeys of passengers of the subway, and on another treating the children of his neighborhood to a day out at Yankee Stadium, about which the media report. Muriel gets fed up with Charlie’s constant donations and overall simplicity and throws him out of their apartment, asking for a divorce. That same evening, Yvonne leaves her apartment after her husband shows up and threatens to stay until he gets $50,000 from her. Quite innocently, Charlie and Yvonne run into each other at the Plaza Hotel and, unintentionally, end up spending the night together.
During divorce proceedings between Muriel and Charlie, Muriel demands all the money that Charlie won for herself. Charlie doesn’t mind giving his share of the money but Muriel also wants the money he gave Yvonne, and Charlie’s steadfast unwillingness to do so causes Muriel to take the case to court. The jury decides in her favor. Yvonne, feeling guilty at costing Charlie all his money, runs out of court in tears and tries to keep away from him. But the cop, by now hopelessly in love with the waitress, finds her at the diner and tells her that the money means nothing to him, and they declare their love for each other. While ruminating about their future at the diner and considering a possible move to Buffalo, they are gracious enough to provide a hungry and poor customer some soup, which he eats at the special table. The poor customer is none other than the disguised Angel Dupree, who takes photos of the couple and in the next day’s newspapers publicly eulogizes their willingness to feed a hungry and poor man even in their darkest hour. Just as Charlie and Yvonne are moving out of town, the citizens of New York City, no doubt touched by the generosity of the couple, send “the cop and the waitress” thousands of letters with tips totaling over $600,000, enough to help pay their debts.
After Muriel gets remarried, her new husband Jack Gross flees the country with all the money from their checking account, revealing himself to be a con man. She then has no option but to move in with her mother in the Bronx and go back to her old manicure job. Eddie Biasi, now divorced from Yvonne, ends up becoming a taxi driver. Charlie happily returns to the police force and Yvonne reclaims the diner. At the film’s end, Charlie and Yvonne get married and begin their honeymoon by taking off from Central Park in a hot air balloon that bears the New York Post headline “Cop Weds Waitress”, just before the closing credits roll.
Some swearing, and a couple of awkward scenes, and everything but the part about a cop splitting his lottery winnings with a waitress is fictional, but overall, it’s quite good. I believe my exact words, actually, as it ended were “OH MY GOSH, THAT’S THE CUTEST AND BESTEST THING EVER!!!!!” …Or something along those lines. :hide
So then the next day(Friday), mom and dad went off on a ‘romantic date’ to a book club meeting run by Evelyn’s boss’s son(She works at some local catering company, and gets to do her first wedding at the end of the month), and left Evelyn babysitting that night since she didn’t have rehearsals. Although she did walk around with a towel safety pinned over her eyes so she could ”practice being blind.” Apparently its hard, and very boring. Anyway, all the screaming monkeys more commonly called siblings, went up and wrestled three more years out of mom’s bed’s life, until Maisy came down with a big scratch running down her leg. Then I made meat cookies(Which Maisy was convinced were some sort of placebo that would fix her scratch), and we watched it again. Evelyn and Joshua, who had passed up on the chick-flick-watching the night before, had a similar response to mine.
Then yesterday, after much goat milking and duck nest finding(Mrs. Duck is broody again, and doing it well), and after mom had unsuccessfully tried to carry out a conversation with dad, which Matthew incessantly interrupted with his frequent hiccuping, mom decided that she and dad needed to watch it. I didn’t get a response out of them, however, because I went to bed immediately after reading a chapter of the Magicians Nephew to Lumpy. That’s enough to make anyone tired, although since I never got into it like I did Prince Caspian, Voyage of the Dawn Treader and the Silver Chair, it was pretty interesting for me too
I’ve been reading Hugh Howey’s blog of late, mostly to watch the little percentages for his next books, I, Zombie(83 % done), SAND(14 % done), and Wool 9(26 % done). Can’t wait until I can figure out a way to read First Shift-Legacy, The Hurricane, and Half Way Home… I haven’t read any of Howey’s standalone books except the Plagiarist, so that should be cool. I’ve also been trying to figure this little doohickey of his out:
What, does it mean he wants readers to mail him money so he can put in tons of hours writing and not fall over with exhaustion on the keyboard, so he can finish his books faster? I don’t know.
Also of late, me and Evelyn have been raiding our mother’s Facebook page for various things, such as this, which describes my current situation perfectly:
I sometimes scare myself, mind or no mind!
Not sure where Evelyn found this one, but I like it:
ROFL. Now, because I’m overly pleased with myself that I’ve finally figured out how to stick pictures into my posts, and I can’t go without mentioning Star Trek for long…
From the 6th season Next Generation episode Rascals. The kid is Captain Picard, who had to throw a temper tantrum and pose as Commander Riker, the other person in the pictures son. I don’t think anyone on the ship respected him quite as much after that fiasco with the Ferengi… going from being sixty to twelve, and having to hand over command of your ship, which happens to be the Federation’s FLAG SHIP “Until further notice” is rather discouraging. I don’t think anyone took Ensign Ro seriously either. Keiko and Guinan were good however.
Eleanor
