Yesterday I spent much of the day at the American Consulate waiting for Hot Latin Boy to renew his tourist visa.

As such, I spent four hours people watching and wondering what sort of decision-making process would start out “What should I wear to my very important potentially life-changing government interview” and arrive at “shredded thigh jeans, shooties ordered from the back of Modern Streetwalker and a hickey the size of Gorbachev’s port wine stain.”

Baffling.

Anyway, it’s been a while, but since it’s time to resurrect the featurette and see What Miss Plumcake is…

Reading: “The Sunday Philosophy Club” by Alexander McCall Smith. Not quite as good as his more famous and thoroughly charming No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, but a pleasant, entertaining light read for people who don’t leave their brains behind when they go to the beach.

Watching: Mary and Max. An uncomfortable yet tender black comedy from the country who does it best: Australia. The story of a neglected Australian school girl and her middle-aged Asperger’s penpal from New York is somewhere between Nick Park (Wallace and Gromit) and Tim Burton, with the signature dark quirkiness of the best of Oz cinema . It’s not without flaws, but it’s worth a watch just for the blackboard at the Over-Eaters Anonymous meeting.

Hearing: La Bamba: Sones Jarochos from Veracruz. Like most Americans, I was only familiar with son jarocho via Ritchie Valens’ electric iteration of the oeuvre’s 800 pound gorilla, La Bamba; but last night Hot Latin Boy and I were treated to a more traditional setting of the Afro-Cuban influenced music of Mexico’s largest Atlantic port. Two scruffy young men in tight-brimmed fedoras called out verses while playing jaranas, small eight-stringed guitar-like instruments native to Veracruz, while a willowy woman –all shoulder blades and arrogance– stomped out a sort of flamenco percussion with her feet. I downloaded this album last night as a sort of primer course, and I’ve been listening to it nonstop.

Smelling: Poivre by Caron. Scandalously expensive, notoriously hard to get and heart-wrenchingly sublime, Caron’s 1954 ode to pepper and carnation is a masterpiece of composition, a savage dance contained within absolute restraint; it’s Stravinsky in a bottle. It’s the 1913 Sacre Printemps riot at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées. It’s magnificent and I’d trade my Birkin for an ounce of the original juice. Interestingly, I’m not the only one making symphonic comparisons. Read more about Poivre and its little sister Coup de Fouet, at Perfume Shrine.

Loving: Kay Unger Shimmer Bolero on Super Sale (sizes limited). Where the heck was this when I was going to six weddings a month and couldn’t find a damn dress with sleeves?

Hating: Candycornsayswhat? I can almost see a good dress in there somewhere, were it not afflicted with the dreaded shapelessness that Saks Fifth Avenue (among others) seems determined fat people want.

Wanting: Gourmet Sea Salt Sampler There’s nothing quite like a good dose of cholera to set one’s usually adventurous dining habits straight back to “just some buttered toast please” for another six weeks. I take my toast –and there’s been so much toast– buttered, with just the lightest imaginable sprinkling of salt. I’m a sucker for exotics, and although the local cheapo stuff is actually a surprisingly subtle, flaky sea salt, I’ve been having almost untoward fantasies about this sampler.

Buying: Almond Meal. A few weeks ago while fantasizing about my future life in Spain, I whipped up a simple orange and almond olive oil cake inspired by one I sampled at a dinner party thrown by a charming Iberian lawyer and his two equally charming (and equally Iberian too, I suppose) sons.  At least it would’ve been simple if I hadn’t had to grind the almonds by hand in my molcajete. The cake is right up my alley –a simple unfrosted round, bright with citrus, olive oil and ground nuts– so I invested in a large bag of raw almond meal. Now I add it to everything I bake. I love the texture, the nutty taste and hey, replacing a bit of wheat flour with almond meal increases the nutritional value and flavor profile at the same time. What’s not to love?

All of the films I’m going to recommend today are available through Netflix. I’ll also point out those you can get from Amazon.

Gunless stars Paul Gross as a wild west gunslinger who, on the run from a not very talented lynch mob and bounty hunter Callum Keith Rennie, finds himself in a tiny Canadian hamlet where nobody owns a pistol. The humor is very tongue-in-cheek, and a talented cast gives the wry script everything they’ve got. This is a film with few if any axes to grind, a slightly elastic take on history, and lots of heart. Turn off your mind and just enjoy it. Oh, and make sure you stick around for the credits. They’re liberally laced with outtakes that will leave you giggling.

In November of 1924, William Randolph Hearst’s yacht, the Oneida, set sail with a glittering cast of celebrities to celebrate the birthday of Thomas H. Ince, film producer. Before the weekend was over, Ince was dead. The official cause of death was a heart attack, but no autopsy was performed, nobody on the ship was interviewed by police, and Hollywood being Hollywood even then, rumors began flying. The most popular rumor of what had happened was that Hearst accidentally shot Ince mistaking him for Charlie Chaplin and believing Chaplin was having an affair with his (Hearst’s) mistress Marion Davies.

The important part of all this is not whether the rumors or the official reports contain more truth, but the fact that Peter Bogdanovich put together one of the most amazing casts in recent film history to tell the tale of the rumor and called it The Cat’s Meow. Who’s in that cast? Well, let’s start with Eddie Izzard as Charlie Chaplin, Joanna Lumley as Elinor Glyn, and Cary Elwes as Thomas Ince… and then continue with a smattering of Kirstin Dunst as Marion Davies, Edward Herrmann as Hearst, and Jennifer Tilley as Luella Parsons. What more do you need? Check it out. It’s a brilliant film.

For those who like their humor on the dark and bitter side, Children of the Revolution is a great choice. A devoted Australian Communist, Judy Davis, meets with her hero: Josef Stalin (played with great humor by F. Murray Abraham). Later she turns out to be pregnant, but will not tell anyone who the father of her son really is. She’s pretty sure she knows, though.

Is Joe really Stalin’s son? Maybe, maybe not. But through this darkly humorous mockumentary, Joe grows in political power. Is he the scariest thing in the film? Again… not necessarily. Standout performances by Judy Davis, Geoffrey Rush as the man she marries but never really appreciates, Sam Niell as a double… possibly triple… maybe even quadruple agent working for… somebody or possibly everybody, and Richard Roxburgh as Joe make the trip well worthwhile. If you enjoyed The Ruling Class, you’ll probably like this one, too.

What do you do when you live in a tiny town with zero opportunities, your ex has married somebody so rich he can put a basketball court in your kid’s room, and you’re down to your last dime? Well, if you’re Jeff Bridges in The Amateurs, you convince all your friends to help you make a porn movie and make a fortune.

With a cast lead by Bridges, William Fitchner, Tim Blake Nelson, Glenne Headley, and Lauren Graham, it’s hard to go too far wrong. Add in a clever and surprisingly sweet script for such a raunchy concept, and you’re golden. In  big surprise to me, Ted Danson turned in one of my favorite performances in the film.

I remember years ago seeing a novel in a bookstore that I didn’t buy despite the intriguing title largely because I was low on funds at the time. It was entitled The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. Little did I know it was eventually made into a buddy road trip movie called Smoke Signals and billed as the first feature film produced, written, directed, and acted by Native Americans.

Smoke Signals tells the story of Victor Joseph’s (Adam Beach) trip to gather the remains of his father with his friend Thomas Builds-the-Fire (Evan Adams). As is usually the case with road trip films, the point isn’t the destination but the journey. The journey includes meditations on identity, honor, guilt, heroism, unresolved anger, and forgiveness. There’s a lot of humor, a bit of rage, and tremendous tenderness along the way.

The biggest downside? Now I absolutely have to try my hand at making fry bread.

So what good films have you seen lately? What would you recommend to us all?

The equally divine Miss Charles Busch admitted he had Marilyn’s dress in mind when he asked Michael Bottari and Ronald Case to design the famous black and white number for his smash satire Die, Mommie! Die! where he plays aging star Angela Arden whose career is as dead as her husband is about to be.

and now Coldwater Creek (I know, no I know, but I went through the whole catalog without coming down with early-onset menopause, maybe I’m just lucky) is offering a very pretty variation on the black and white floral theme.

This can easily be a four season dress. A pair of sweet heels and a clutch in sherbet colors makes it perfect for Spring. Little sandals for Summer, pumpkin skimmers (and maybe a thin ivy belt?) for Autumn and Winter is a no-brainer with screaming red stilettos and coordinating cardi.

Let me just say I am aghast, no, several ghasts at so many of your treasonous cinematic ways.

It’s like that time a few years ago when I played that April Fools joke where I shamefully admitted to having promoted Crocs in exchange for cash and prizes (do I LOOK like a mommieblogger? Do I talk about gluten-free cupcakes, knitting or fabric with owls on them? No, I do not.) and a whole bunch of people were calling for my head, offering themselves as my editorial replacement.

Treacherous harpies.

Of course there are classic films I don’t enjoy.

I adore Vivien Leigh but I’d be fine without sitting through another viewing of Gone with the Wind, and although I won’t say neither love nor money could make me sit through Lawrence of Arabia again, it would take large quantities of both to get me to watch Omar Sharif ride in from the horizon on his camel, no matter how cinematically important that scene remains.

(like this, but for about five minutes)

These are not bad films.

It’s the rare piece of pop culture that stays relevant 50 years (as in the case of Lawrence of Arabia, released in 1962) or nearly 75 years.

It’s amazing so many of them still are.

1939 brought us GwtW, The Wizard of Oz, Of Mice and Men, Ninotchka, Dark Victory, The Women, Mr Smith Goes to Washington, Gunga Din, Stagecoach and a whole bunch of other classics that lend credence to the idea that it’s been all downhill in tinseltown since the clock struck 1940.

Ideals, tastes and conventions, not to mention technology, have changed dramatically since Greta giggled, so it’s important to appreciate film (or music or, I don’t know, body shape) on their own merits and not how well they compare to modern tastes, no matter how deeply or subtly engrained those tastes are.

Take, for example, the top musical hits from the same year.

You’ve got plenty of Glenn Miller, Bessie Smith singing “God Bless America”, a doubtlessly timeless ditty called “The Adventures of Piccolo Pete” and a personal favorite of mine, “Little Brown Jug” (it is a Plumcake family tradition to bounce wee children on one’s knees and sing Little Brown Jug, dipping them dramatically during the “we fell in!” line).

You can’t really fault Glenn Miller or Bessie Smith even if they’re not your preferred genres, but for my imaginary money, the only song that sounds as fresh and painful today as it must have then is Billie Holiday’s haunting “Strange Fruit”.

It reminds me of a brutal breakup when I was 26.

Uh, the over-easy rejection of classic films, not the horrifying epidemic of lynching of the thirties and forties, although I once had to gently tell my sweet but occasionally oblivious voice teacher that even though he was doing an all Billie Holiday tribute, as a middle-aged white man from East Texas with a twang thicker than day old grits, he didn’t exactly have the cultural pedigree to get away with singing that particular song.

Anyhoodle.

Back when I was 26, my long-term fella dumped me HARD for an East German amnesiac who couldn’t remember her name.

I’m not EVEN making that up.

Although he’d always been all about my big girl body, and his new strudel had all the svelte daintiness normally associated with a brain-damaged East German shot-put champion (I’m just guessing about the shot-put part, but the rest is dead on) he told me

“Just because you don’t hate your size doesn’t mean your size is okay.”

I was, for one of the very few times in my life, speechless. How could someone so smart be so wrong wrong wrongitty wrong?

It was then I realized –because I’m not very bright and hadn’t figured it out sooner– that some people really did decide on a person or object’s value and virtue based on whether they liked it or not.

What a crippling way to live.

Which isn’t to say there aren’t empirically rotten films or people out there, and there’s a whole conversation to be led by someone much more erudite than I about the joys of good taste and whether the enjoyment of quality craftsmanship is better or purer than the pleasure derived from “ooh, shiny thing go boom!” and whether, from a pleasure aspect, having good taste is more of a blessing or a curse.

Oh, and the next person who dares to say The Searchers is a bad film, when it is fairly and universally acknowledged as one of the best American films ever made, gets a one way trip to the woodshed behind Villa Plumcake and will be treated to a lengthy lecture on its cultural import, visual beauty and merciless examination of racism and the attitudes about Native American genocide. You don’t have to like it, but it doesn’t mean it’s not great.

But then there’s Gone With the Wind.

I know there are people who would willingly trample their grandmothers to see this film again, and more power to them. One of the most interesting Cultural Experiences of my life was going with Mr. Twistie (who is a huge fan) to see the 50th anniversary re-release at the Castro theater in San Francisco. I know Hattie McDaniel had all the same lines she ever did, but I didn’t hear one of them through the cheers, and the anticipatory screams for ‘Frankly my dear, etc.’ began about twenty minutes before the line was spoken.

It’s clear that a lot of people are passionate fans of this film. Me? I’m not one of them. I don’t find the story line terribly compelling, I can’t work up much nostalgia for the Antebellum South, and I don’t really care about any of the characters. No, scratch that last one. What happens is I see them and my slapping hand starts itching up a storm.

Not to rain on anyone’s parade, but this is a film I decided years ago to give a miss to at every possible opportunity.

The other Great Classic Film I will never sit through again?

That’s right, The Wizard of Oz.

I was pretty meh on this one even as a very small child. And then my parents gave me the book. After that, I was really done with the movie. There’s so much more in the book, and I read what L. Frank Baum said about what he’d hoped to achieve with his book. What he wanted was a real American fairy tale where the child had amazing adventures and it didn’t turn out to be all just a kooky dream.

For me, Oz is so much better when it’s real, when Dorothy goes back again and again and has further adventures that are equally real. I prefer the winged monkeys when they’re controlled by a magical golden cap. I prefer silver slippers. I like the balance of two good witches (North and South – which is where Glinda comes from), and two evil ones (East and West).

In my book, Judy Garland just isn’t compelling enough to make me like Oz as a coma fantasy.

My guess is that everyone has at least one Great Classic Film you couldn’t pay them to sit through again. One of my very best friends practically froths at the mouth at the mention of Citizen Kane, which, as I said before, is a great favorite of mine. My father couldn’t watch The African Queen (another great favorite of mine) because he said the boat couldn’t possibly work the way they had it set up. I believe him, too. He knew his boats. And you can see what I think of two of the most sacred cows of American cinema.

So what’s the Great Classic Film you intend to avoid for the rest of your life?

I love movies. I love some true masterpieces, some of questionable taste, some for their quaint awfulness. One of my favorite things is finding some jewel of an obscure film that’s all the more precious because nobody else on the face of the planet seems to know it exists.

But never let it be said that I’m stingy when it comes to sharing the cultural wealth! Today, I’m sharing with you all a smattering of the obscure, the offbeat, and the nearly unknown films that make me smile.

Highway 61 is the tale of Corky, a small town Canandian barber, who sets off on a mission to deliver a coffin to New Orleans. If that weren’t enough, a man who may or may not be the Devil is hot on the trail of Corky and the roadie whose brother is purportedly in the coffin. It’s ridiculous, surreal, and completely bizarre. Don McKellar as Corky (he also wrote the script) is gloriously lost most of the time. You will never look at bingo or chicken dinners quite the same way again.

Watch for a cameo by Jello Biafra as an American border guard. This scene alone is worth the price of admission for me!

Bottle Shock is based on a true story that I remember, because I lived in California Wine Country at the time. Back in 1976, a blind taste testing of wines, California (specifically Napa County) vs French took place in France… and California won. I was fourteen and had never had a single sip of wine in my life, but I, too, nearly burst with pride. Sure, it was Napa and I lived in Sonoma County (which also produces some pretty drinkable wines), but the important part wasn’t that: it was that we beat the French at their own game, on their own soil, using their own tastebuds.

More than thirty years later, a charming and quirky film based on the story was made, starring Alan Rickman, Bill Pullman, Dennis Farina, Eliza Dushku, and a host of other talented and pleasant to view people. Add in a soundtrack composed mostly of vintage Doobie Brothers music, and we’re talking about a darn good time. You don’t even have to care about wine to enjoy it… but it helps if you do or if you know something about life in California at that point in time. I got mighty nostalgic just looking at the cars.

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter is… perhaps not as artistically worthy as the others mentioned thus far, but I never promised these would all be good. I only said I love them. Still, how can I not love a film that sets Jesus down in the middle of Canada facing off against vampires with the help of his sidekick, Mary Magnum, and some pretty cheesetastic Kung Fu moves? And then there’s the Godburger.

This one is sick, offensive on levels I cannot begin to contemplate, and done on a budget that would have made Ed Wood blanch. It’s also hilarious, hip, cartoonishly gory, and willing to laugh at itself as hard as it does at everything else.

And in honor of the late, great Davy Jones, I cannot finish this list without mentioning Head, the only film The Monkees did, and the only project where they had complete artistic control.

The result is… fascinating as Mr. Spock would say. Also fascinating is the fact that I think Leonard Nimoy was one of about four famous people at the time who didn’t appear in this film. How often to you get to see Victor Mature, Annette Funicello, and Frank Zappa in the same movie? To the best of my knowledge, this is the only one they were all in. It’s also a gloriously absurd exploration of control, power, anarchy, and desire that I doubt their handlers understood at all.

Oh, and there are some darn good tunes in it, too.

How about all of you? Have you got a little known gem of a film you want to tell us about? Please! Share with the class!

Watching: Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work I was never a Joan Rivers fan. I didn’t dislike her per se, but the red carpet fixture never exactly struck me as anything but a Catskills comic better suited to the center square than center stage. This biopic chronicling a year in the life of the groundbreaking (seriously, she was making abortion jokes on TV when it was still in black and white) comedian changed all that. I’m still not a fan of her comedy but I admire her as much as I admire anyone in the entertainment industry today because Joan Rivers hustles. She always hustles. She works constantly, is completely dedicated to her craft and providing for herself and her many dependents, including the children of her employees, who go to private school on her dime. She tells of Johnny Carson, who gave her her start, blacklisting her from NBC when she dared get her own show, how her husband committed suicide and left her a single mother with a ton of debt and over and over (and over) again you see the usually-unspoken bias against female comedians come into light throughout her career. I can’t recommend this doc enough for anyone interested in feminism and the entertainment industry, and it should be required viewing for those of us who attempt to ovulate and make people laugh at the same time.

Hearing: Lyle Lovett – Road to Ensenada
A classic from the Long Tall Texan himself, I pulled this, quite naturally, for this weekend’s drive down the road to Ensenada. This immaculately crafted combination of big band blues (well, it’s not big, it’s large) and Texas-twinged singer/songwriter fare is one of my top 50 albums of all time. Oh, and when Lyle sings the road to Ensenada is plenty wide and fast, he’s using artistic license. It’s a beautiful winding deathmaze as twisted as Charlie Sheen’s psyche and twice as dangerous.

Smelling: Demeter Fragrance Library – Bulgarian Rose
Y’know, I’ve been feeling a little old school lately. Simple, pared down. My highly exclusive masterwork fragrances seem a bit out of place at the open air market where I buy my produce and get abused by the little Oaxacan lady who works there. A sunny stroll along the beach attempting to count the unattended naked children running feral on the shore does not require an almost architectural opus of scent composition and for this reason I’ve been feeling Demeter’s Bulgarian Rose. You don’t get much more old school than Bulgarian Rose, but with typical Demeter style, this isn’t an old lady perfume; it’s merely a precise if breathy reproduction of the scent of a hearty pink Bulgarian rose. Nothing more, nothing less. It’s also one of the rare rose scents that doesn’t turn into pickles on me and it’s cheap enough to use up in two months spraying it on everything from bed linens to tablecloths for a classically pretty but not at all cloying finishing touch.

Loving: Cake Beauty Products
Were you to ask one of my perfumista pals to describe what your devoted Plummy does NOT want in a fragrance they’d probably say something like “Nothing foody or fruity or twee.” and okay, that’s true, which is why Cake Beauty products, particularly their Lemon Cupcake moisturizer are such guilty pleasures. I got this liter bottle of Lemon Cupcake lotion on sale somewhere and it smells straight up like Froot Loops. Now, there’s probably something wrong with a grown woman wanting to smell like Froot Loops, and I certainly don’t want to Loop it up in public, but for the after-shower, pre-bedtime moisturizing, this product is ideal. The scent isn’t long-lived and it doesn’t have any parabens or nasty stuff. Plus it’s inexpensive as all get out so I can afford to slather it on, enjoy my Froot Loopiness and wake up in the morning with hydrated skin sans the breakfast cereal scent.

Hating: Tardiness
I believe my two friends I took to Ireland with me last year will attest how I feel about tardiness. They nearly made me miss our plane from Heathrow and as soon as we landed in Shannon I marched myself directly to the reservation desk and tried to book myself a ticket to Spain because I sure as hell wasn’t going to spend a week with those no-time-keeping fools. In the intervening year I’ve managed to calm down a little, but Mexico, where it’s the cultural norm to be two hours late to a party, is working overtime on my delicate last nerve. Totally hypothetical situation: let’s say one person threw a party that started at four, and spent a lot of time and money making sure everything went off without a hitch, which is pretty darn difficult when your power inexplicably goes out for almost 24 hours the day before. Two and a half hours roll by, the barbecued brisket is turning into shoe leather and the first guest has yet to arrive. Four hours later several invited guests (plus even more uninvited ones) show up and don’t leave until midnight. That hostess should be allowed to spend the next day in bed eating grapefruit and drinking bourbon until she doesn’t to kill anyone anymore, right? Right.

Wanting: ReVive Serum Presse
Got this little potion in a Barney’s goodie bag last year and have just started to use it and wow, it’s great. Spendy but great. Maybe the magic gift with purchase fairy will wend a full-size sample my way when next I load up on my favorite Barney’s-only scents.

Buying: Weighmax Electronic Kitchen Scale
Man, I was surprised at my reluctance to buy a food scale. Most recipes here are done by weight not volume so it’s a necessary evil, but it roused a whole mess of latent fat girl feelings in me. I don’t know if my eating disordered grandmother or my pudge-prone mother ever used one of these things, but it FEELS like deprivation. Like I should be measuring out my 200 grams of lean protein and breathlessly waiting to see whether I’m allowed six or seven almonds as my healthy mid-afternoon snack. Living so near the sea and working with unfamiliar familiar ingredients (refined sugar isn’t white here, and flour has a slightly different texture) using a food scale is crucial, but I’ll admit I bought it online because I didn’t want to be the fat girl with the food scale standing in line at the supermercado. Weird, huh.

Me? I’m finishing up some last-minute baking and watching Christmas movies. There are a lot of great films based on a Christmas theme. You know, like It’s a Wonderful Life:

Treacly? Yes, yes it is. But then Capra’s genius lay not in his subtlety, but in his optimism.

And then there are the not-so-greats, like Santa Claus vs the Martians:

Unforgettably craptastic.

But some of my favorite Christmas films aren’t really recognized as being holiday-centric. And a couple of my other faves… well, the theme is undeniable but they don’t make for the most traditionally heartwarming viewing.

Want to know my top five fave Christmas movies? Read on after the cut… and remember that neither of the above films is on that list.

Bad Santa. It’s rude, it’s crude, it’s full of utterly despicable characters… and yet I adore it. Billy Bob Thornton is brilliant as the slow-witted conman whose annual big con is to play a department store Santa and rob the store on Christmas Eve. Tony Cox is the elf who plans it all and does his level best to keep Thornton sober enough to keep his job. The late, great Bernie Mac turns in a gloriously wicked performance as the crooked department store security man, the late lamented John Ritter is howlingly funny as the HR guy so full of white guilt he can’t even fire a drunken Santa and his abusive elf, and the very much still with us Lauren Graham is gut wrenchingly funny as the woman with a very kinky Santa fixation. This one is not for the kiddies and it won’t give you sugarplum dreams, but it’s the perfect antidote for too much seasonal saccharine.

A Christmas Carol. Specifically, the 1984 one with George C. Scott as Scrooge. As good as various other Scrooges have been over the years, Scott is the only one I feel makes him an entirely human character. This is also the one production I can think of where Tiny Tim really looks sick, rather than just using a crutch. This boy (Anthony Walters) looks like you could knock him down with a feather. Add in terrific supporting performances by: David Warner, Roger Rees, Angela Pleasance, Frank Finlay, Susannah York, and Edward Woodward (whose turn as the Ghost of Christmas Present is clearly the deranged bastard son of Michael Caine and Richard Harris) and suddenly Dicken’s tale of redemption becomes far more plausible and touching.

The Lion in Winter. See? I told you there would be something most people wouldn’t think of as a Christmas movie. And yet the whole story takes place over Christmas. Peter O’Toole and Katharine Hepburn lead an amazing cast in this tale of treachery, in-fighting, and family holidays. It also contains my mother’s favorite line from any film ever. The first person to guess what that might be wins a gold star and my unending admiration.

The Nightmare Before Christmas. It’s not just for Halloween anymore. From the Kurt Weill-inspired music to the exquisite claymation to the wonderful vocal performances, this is hard to beat.

So those are some of my favorite films for this time of year. What about you? What do you love? What do you wish would never be shown again? And what is my mother’s favorite line ever in any film?

You tell me.

After several years of nonsense (and when everyone else moved from lollipops to cocaine) I quit, and from that day to this, I’ve seen maybe a dozen first-run films in the theater.

However, fate and fortune, not to mention being jerked around by the office of the Mexican Consular General for half the day until I nearly cried in two languages, conspired against my anti-filmic ways and I found myself at an art house double-feature. The menu consisted of Pedro Almodovar’s new film “The Skin I Live In” and “The Way” starring Martin Sheen.

The Almodovar flick couldn’t have been more effed up if it came with its own anti-gravity vibrat…personal massager, but “The Way” was touching, gently funny and although I Do Not Cry In Public, something got in my eye several times and it absolutely ruined my makeup.

It’s the story of a buttoned up father who, upon learning his estranged son died the first day into a pilgrimage along the Camino de Santiago through France and Spain, decides to complete the pilgrimage for his son, scattering his ashes along the way.

He reluctantly takes on a handful of traveling companions, first and for our purposes most importantly, “Joost from Amsterdam.”

Yorick van Wageningen plays jovial Joost, the mountainous Dutchman –think a lumberjack in the off season– who is walking the 800km way to lose a few pounds to fit into the suit he needs to wear for his brother’s wedding. Throughout the film Joost provides good-hearted comic relief and despite his desire to drop weight, he gladly, gleefully partakes of local lamb and fresh goat’s cheese and every simple gastronomical pleasure the road offers him. He’s never portrayed as a glutton, just a bon vivant with an appetite for everything, including food.

The peregrinos (pilgrims) are well over half way through their months-long trek when it’s revealed Joost’s wife doesn’t want to sleep with him because he’s fat.

There is a scene where good-natured Joost looks at himself naked in the mirror as he sits down to a beautiful tray of room service, delivered on the one indulgent day of their journey. Watching him cry in frustration and shame…well, something got in my eye again. I think the mold is going around.

I won’t ruin the end of the film, I know how people on the internet are about spoilers, but I cannot recommend this film enough. Watch the trailer and then see it for yourself.

As autumn creeps in and the weather turns colder, there are few things I love as much as curling up with a good movie or two… or even three. And after a long day, I love having something to laugh at.

So here are some of my favorite comedies in no particular order, in case you’re looking for a source of a few good giggles anytime soon.

Whiskey Galore, also known in some places as Tight Little Island. There are those who say that to understand the Scots, one must watch the original version of Wicker Man. Pffft! say I! This is the stuff if you want to understand my ancestors. I’m only a second-generation American on my father’s side, you know. His grandparents crossed over to Canada from the Isle of North Uist. Good luck finding it on a map.

Anyway, Whiskey Galore is based on a novel by Compton MacKenzie, who based his story on a true incident during WWII. With all the rationing because of the war, the tiny island of Toddy finds itself in a terrible predicament for Scotsmen: there is no more whiskey! As the dire effects of this disaster make themselves felt more and more, a ship hauling a cargo of thousands of cases of whiskey goes down off the coast of the island. The officer in charge of the local militia (an Englishman, of course) decides that the precious cargo must be guarded from all looters. The Islanders, of course, have a very different take on the matter. And so the mirth begins.

The cast includes some great character actors of the time, including the pictured James Robertson Justice, Basil Radcliffe, Joan Greenwood (the only woman who could growl and squeak at the same time!), and a young Gordon Jackson some twenty-odd years before he made his mark playing the butler, Hudson, on Upstairs, Downstairs.

All About Eve. Ah, the delicious, delicious sarcasm and wiliness of this film! The brilliant camera work! The fabulous cast! From Bette Davis and Anne Baxter through Celeste Holm and Thelma Ritter (one of my personal favorite performers of all time), to the inimitable George Sanders, right down to Marilyn Monroe’s breakout performance, this is one not to miss. Decades before Single White Female, this is the original movie about being stalked. Enjoy the poisonously funny ride. Oh, but fasten your seatbelts. It’s going to be a bumpy night.

Animal House. It’s rude, crude, sexist, sophomoric and still one of the funniest films ever made, in my not so humble opinion. It also launched the careers of some of my favorite actors currently working, including Kevin Bacon. Without this film, we would have to come up with six degrees of some other actor. Without this film, Karen Allen would never have made it to Indiana Jones. Without this film, well, we would have had to do without the late, great John Belushi’s arguably greatest work.

I think that’s worth a little T&A humor… which I also happen to laugh heartily at.

Blow Dry. This little-known gem features a truly stellar cast. Alan Rickman, Natasha Richardson, Bill Nighy, Rachael Leigh Cook, Rachel Griffiths, Josh Hartnett, and a host of other wildly talented people. As for the story, well, it’s an international hair dressing competition being held in a two-bit village in England. Rickman and Richardson used to be hairdressing partners and used to be married… until Richardson ran off with their best model (Griffiths). Can the three work together again to win back their laurels?

Yeah, I know, it doesn’t sound like much on the surface, but stick with me. The script is smart, funny, and sometimes truly touching. And then there are the characters in the competition. Besequinned glitterati of the salon, they bring touches of the surreal to the simple story. And then there’s the mayor, played by the always fabulous Warren Clarke, who goes more and more and more Vegas with every appearance. And on top of all that, there’s Heidi Klum in her film debut in all her deranged glory.

This is a film that tends to wind up in the ‘please, for the love of pretzels take this dog off our hands’ bins in the rare places where you can find a copy. But really, it’s well worth giving a good home.

And hey, if anyone out there has a good comic gem to share, please tell us all about it! I would love to be turned on to a new source of yucks.