Family history across the seas

Turns out this was a trickier meme than I thought when I amended my own Music Meme. Of course I can never just keep it short and snappy, but here’s my own response.

1. What’s the earliest movie you can remember: Fantasia – I went to see this with my mum and my great-aunt Emily in the city…those creepy brooms freaked me out! I was about five I think.
2. Where did you go to the movies (place or type of venue): Mostly in the city but occasionally at the local picture theatre though I have no clear memories of this.
3. Did you buy movie programs: Most of the block-buster films of the day had programs and I used to have quite a few. I’ve kept some of them but only the covers of others.
4. Did you take in food and drink (and what did you like): Back in the day it was Fantales, Maltesers or Jaffas. Now it’s coffee <smile>. We only get popcorn with the grandkids.
5. Movies of your teenage years: Gidget, some Elvis Presley (but which?), original James Bonds, Hawaii, My Fair Lady, Sound of Music
6. Mischief you got up to in the movies: I was a goody two shoes like Robbie, but when we went as a group in my late teens, the blokes would often roll Jaffas down the floors (something of an Aussie tradition)
7. Did you watch movies at home: We didn’t get TV until late, but the first movie I remember was Three Coins in a Fountain (part of my travel addiction). Our own family often borrowed videos or later DVDs.
8. What was your favourite movie to watch at home: With our own family: When Harry Met Sally, The Princess Bride, Top Gun.
9. Do you prefer to watch movies at home or at the cinema: Some movies are best suited to the big screen which I prefer (for example Sherpa, or Eye in the Sky, which we’ve just seen, or The Water Diviner) but others I don’t mind either way.
10. Does your family have a special movie memory: Taking the kids to see a Disney movie in the city and having to get tissues half way through because of the tears (we may be the only family that banned Disney); seeing a movie about a cat, Thomasina, days after we had to put our old girl down. One of my daughters letting out a loud sigh/sound during the Top Gun volleyball match – sounded like she was ecstatic rather than repulsed – turned a few heads <wink, wink>. Or seeing Hawaii with an early boyfriend – the birth scene was pretty dramatic from the front rows.
11. Movies you fell in love to/with: I loved Out of Africa to the max right from the beginning. I remember I was in the ladies’ room afterwards and everyone was crying about Robert Redford dying and I was crying about her leaving the servant and telling him she’d send for him (haven’t quite forgiven her for that). We fell in love to Elvira Madigan and Dr Zhivago. On my first ever trip to Sydney, on my own, I cried and cried over Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.
12. Favourite romantic movie theme music: I’d have to say Mozart’s 21^st, from Elvira Madigan, since we used it for our wedding march and made my mum-in-law cry.
13. Favourite musical movie: My Fair Lady.
14. Which movies made you want to dance/sing: Sound of Music, Mamma Mia (pathetic movie mostly), Mad Hot Ballroom.
15. Do you watch re-runs or DVDs of old movies: We have a stash (thanks Bali for our wide selection!) that we watch regularly. I’m not such a big fan of vintage movies though.
16.  Do your children/family enjoy the same movies: Some of them: Summer Holiday (strangely), When Harry Met Sally, Princess Bride. It’s something of a family tradition as adults for us all to go to the movies on Boxing Day.
17. What’s your favourite movie genre now: A tough one, mostly I go to the movies for escapism so I’m a sucker for a feel-good movie but I also like dramas. (My TV watching is nearly all crime…or house shows or WDYTYA)
18. Did you read the book before or after the movie: After, definitely. There have been some where the movie captures the book perfectly: The Joy Luck Club; 84 Charing Cross Road.
19. Which did you enjoy more, the book or the movie: The book mostly, but see above.
20. What’s the silliest movie you’ve seen: Basically we don’t go to see silly movies so nothing leaps to mind…or perhaps I’ve sublimated them. Then again, one man’s great movie is another’s person’s silly movie.
21. Pet hate in movies: A sound track that goes from super-loud to super-quiet; “jumpy” or too “artistic” camera work. In my rebellious teen years it was having to stand for God Save the Queen….so we didn’t. Judy Garland movies. I remember we left the movie Papillon part-way through because it was too freaky for an anniversary outing.
22. A movie that captures family history for you: Do you know, I can’t think of one – look forward to others’ suggestions. Maybe The Water Diviner since it covers the power of family relationships and the horrors and impact of war.
23. If you could only play 5 movies for the rest of your life, what would they be: Out of Africa, Hopscotch, 84 Charing Cross Road, Mad Hot Ballroom, The Water Diviner.
24.  Favourite movie stars (go ahead and list as many as you like): Glenda Jackson, Audrey Hepburn, Katherine Hepburn, Meryl Streep (mostly), Hugh Jackman, Sean Connery, Harrison Ford, Kenneth Brannagh, Morgan Freeman, Geoffrey Rush, Colin Firth, Spencer Tracy.

And a late addition:

26. Other movies that caught my imagination: Reds, Dances with Wolves, Passage to India, Samson and Delilah, Romeo & Juliet (di Caprio and Danes).

And here’s where I wrote about movies in the 52 Weeks of Personal History and Genealogy series a few years back – I wonder how consistent I’ve been?