The Turning

It does feel heroic to go to work when it is -12 degrees outside. Especially when it’s New Year’s Eve. So I stayed under my covers until I could do so no longer, and then I put on my long johns and went out. The past few years, we’ve had the great pleasure of hosting a group from the Minnesota Women’s Press over New Year’s Eve. They discuss books and hang out and some adventurous ones even hiked up to campus and back.

I was anxious to get home and start cooking. I’d planned a reprise of my New Year’s Eve 2012 meal. I somehow convinced myself it would be simpler– I’d keep it simpler, and do some things ahead. I wouldn’t make as much cavatelli, and I’d make the tart crust the night before.

Well, after 3 hours and wrestling with both the pork roast (it had a bad bone) and the cavatelli dough, I lost focus. This resulted in an epic fail on the chocolate tart. I didn’t recheck the ingredient amounts and poured in the whole carton of half and half– ending up with a nice chocolate soup! It will actually be a nice chocolate fudge for ice cream, but wasn’t what I had in mind.

When I opened my e-mail, the stats on the blog for the year had arrived in my in-box. I looked at it and guess what the top post was? Six-minute chocolate cake! Just what I needed! I even folded some chocolate fudge into the batter…. New Year’s Eve is saved.

While cooking, I thought about the things I love. High on the list is film and music. I listened to podcasts of “Sound Opinions,” a great music review show out of Chicago, while I cooked.

And just as last year I thought about Fred Astaire on New Year’s Eve, this year I thought about Preston Sturges. If you’re looking for a New Year’s treat, find one of his more available classic films: Sullivan’s Travels, The Great McGinty or The Lady Eve.

Over Christmas Steve and I spent two nights in Chicago at a hotel, with a day in between to explore. We went to Mass at Holy Name Cathedral and went to the Museum of Contemporary Art, which was fantastic as always. We knocked around looking at the furniture at Crate and Barrel, as none of the real furniture design shops were open (that was Monday). We had an early dinner of stuffed pizza.

For the evening, I had identified a showing of Miracle of Morgan Creek, a screwball comedy by Preston Sturges, showing one night only at the Gene Siskel Film Center. Our hotel was just a short walk over the river. I knew it would be amazing.

I tried to explain to Steve what an audience for a Preston Sturges film downtown the Sunday night before Christmas Eve would be like. “It will be some serious film geeks,” I said. Then I proceeded to fully geek out with a primer on Preston Sturges and the screwball comedy in American cinema.

It turns out the film was part of a series put on by the Northwest Chicago Film Society, who have been holding screenings there while their usual facility is renovated. And these people love films.

On the way in, we saw a great art piece that consisted of doodles and drawings of projectors made by projectionists. It was very cool, and very geeky. Inside were about 25 people, most of them sitting by themselves. I think there was one tourist family who wandered in by mistake, and the rest of the folks were scattered around the theater. Two men were talking about film loudly to each other over the span of 6 empty seats between them.

Which is not to say these people didn’t know each other. They did. They just like to have some space when they’re watching a film.

After the introduction, by a young man who unfortunately did not introduce himself, Steve said, “That alone was worth the price of admission.” The host was a rumpled man with curly hair and a tie and coat but his shirttails hanging out. He held the mic in one hand and gestured with the other as he gave us the most lucid and wonderful introduction to the film possible. It included a history of its release and some marveling over how it got past the censors, some choice lines by the critics, audience response, the life of the film with the studio and beyond (including an explanation of what we get to see on TMC and why), and many delightful facts. There was also a short before the feature, and everyone was very glad to hear that.

The short was a Christmas story about three cowboys who bought a bunch of Christmas gifts and didn’t know what to do with them. They followed a star that led to the Star Motel, where there was no room for Jose and Maria except a shed. You can guess what happened.

2013 was a great year for film. Truly great. It is hard for the critics to pick only 10 films for their lists. Back here I’ve been curating our own little Netflix film festival, including wonderful foreign films: Barbara (Germany), The Hunt (Swedish– with our favorite Mads Mikkelson), London River (England/France), La Sirga (Colombia, on par with John Sayles’ film “Men with Guns”) and The Silence (German). 

Making me think– who cares about the chocolate tart epic fail, when there are such epic film experiences to be had!

Happy New Year everyone.