(Embarrassing) Sick Movies

Sunday was a big day around this house. Brontë turned five, she and Viola were in their first joint production of The Nutcracker and I came down with the most extreme case of food poisoning I’ve ever experienced. 

First, a couple cute photos. Then the vomiting and the embarrassing sick movie(s??) I love so much, oh my gosh. 

Need a video of a four year old dancing her little heart out? Here you go.

Okay. The nausea hit just as the ballet ended. I had to clench my jaw on the drive home from The Nutcracker. I almost didn’t make it. I did! (Way to go, Meggi!) When I wasn’t vomiting, losing control of my bowels (Sorry! Food poisoning is not polite!) or hallucinating, I watched tv shows and movies. 

According to pretty much everyone, we’ve entered a whirlwind of a sick season. We’ve certainly not been immune, I recently wrote about my four year old getting pneumonia during the antibiotic shortage. I imagine, even with the best precautions, a lot of us are about to get fairly sick, fairly often.

I tend to watch shows that fall into two categories Love and Hope + Something. Any kind of love. If Beale Street Could Talk, The Dig, When Harry Met Sally, Spiderman : Into the Spider-verse, The Farewell, The Big Sick and Arrival fall into this category for me. But I am generally open to anything hopeful, hopeful and devastating, hopeful and funny, hopeful and (insert other thing here). The Dig and Arrival, also, for example, fall into this category. Actually…so do the rest of them? Maybe it’s just one category? Hmmm. 

Anyways.

This go around I finally started and finished Loot. The first episode didn’t quite grab me. But I love Maya Rudolph so much. Plus, I couldn’t move - what else was I going to do? So I kept watching. And mid-way through the season, I was all in. I am very relieved it was renewed. Yay Maya!

I also watched Practical Magic. Okay. The last time I saw this movie it was in theaters. I was thirteen. I’d gone in expecting…I don’t know…something less about domestic abuse and dark magic. I was so upset that they actually killed Sandra Bullock’s husband at the beginning of the movie. What was happening?! I left the theater unsettled, and feeling a little like I’d broken some rules. It wasn’t well-reviewed at the time. And honestly, I’d kind of forgotten about the movie, but then I saw someone tweet about it a few months ago, favorably. And I was like…QUESTION MARK?!

So I finally watched it again, and like…I forking love it? It is not like…a “good” movie. But it is so good?? It’s basically Hope Floats but with pentagrams. EXCELLENT. When I tweeted about it, I found out I wasn’t alone. It’s going to be a regular sick day movie for me from here on out. 

And then finally, no sick day is complete without a viewing of Working Girl. There’s plenty to dislike about the movie - including the fact the whole thing is about a woman trying to become a stockbroker which is…not necessarily a heartwarming goal for me, personally. It’s definitely a proto girlboss movie, if I am being honest? But like…I just LOVE THIS MOVIE. I cannot help myself. I love Melanie Griffith in it. I love Harrison Ford in it. I love Melanie Griffith with Harrison Ford in it. I love Alec Baldwin in it. I love Joan Cusack in it. I love Sigourney Weaver in it. I love the hard and soft of the movie. The clothes and the old technology. But also how the villain’s practiced feminine softness hides a petty girlboss hardness. 

I love the scene of Griffith vacuuming topless in heels even though I KNOW while her character might vacuum topless, she’d never vacuum in heels. Because she’s too damn smart for that. And so it’s just pandering to a male audience to keep them invested in a vehicle that is definitely dominated by women. But still, the scene…it makes me laugh! Idk! Maybe that’s why it is a sick day movie. It’s a little inexcusable, so I can only justify it when I am feeling really bad. So maybe I have three categories of sick day movies - Love, Hope + Something and Movies I Can’t Justify in Every Day Life But Love Nonetheless. 

I am sure your sick day choices are more elevated than mine. lol.

Of course, getting to lay down and watch a show while sick is….not something to be taken for granted. Plenty of people have to do paid and unpaid labor while ill. And it’s apparently a newsworthy item when that doesn’t happen.

I wrote a little bit about what being temporarily bedridden made me think about work, sickness and beds in offices yesterday in This is a Rant About Beds.