Like a chocolate pinot

Last night, having decided that sometimes the courageous thing to do is to NOT call someone to go out, I stayed in, by myself, and watched a couple movies.

I think the theme for the night would be touching, as in, both movies were very much so, even though I’d seem them both before.

Sideways follows two men as they travel in the California wine country for a week before one of them gets married that weekend. The thing I like about the film is that neither character starts out to be particularly likable. Miles almost immediately steals money from his mom, and flashes toothy smiles between depressed sighs so often that you’re made to feel like the whole world may be bipolar and you’re just missing out. Jack, on the other hand, is more laid-back, but also more fake towards people.

In any case, the movie moves me because by the end, I like both characters. No matter what shitty thing they’ve done, or who they’ve hurt, I’ve spent hours getting to know them, and somehow they already feel like old friends.

Chocolat is a modern fairy tale that could be set in any age, and it’s that quality that moves me. Once again, the characters progress slowly from cold and implacable to joyful and vivant, or more simply from unlikable to likable, though this time through the exertions of the main character, who is herself something of an angel sent to show the town the way.

In either movie, it’s the triumphs that captivate. The love for life that polks its head through, and the idea that everything rarely is perfect, but sometimes things can turn out that way.