Never knew I could feel like this

A couple weeks ago I watched Moulin Rouge, and I remembered the first time I ever saw that movie. IT WAS MAGIC.

You know how sometimes you watch a movie and it just completely sweeps you away and you feel like everything is right with the world? I have a couple of other movie experiences like that--Roman Holiday and Funny Face, at home. 500 Days of Summer and Enchanted, in the theater. I'm sure there are others too, but those are the ones that stick out in my mind.

But really, topping them all, is Moulin Rouge.

But first you must understand this--I saw that movie in like 2007. 2006, maybe? I don't know. Sometime around then. And I think it came out in probably 2002. I already knew the music, and about a million people had told me that it was SO WEIRD. And the more people tell you how weird something is, the higher your expectations for weirdness are. So by the time I saw Moulin Rouge, and had heard people talk about how strange it was for 5 years or so, it really didn't faze me one bit. Plus I wasn't in high school anymore, I think that helped. The point is, the weirdness didn't really bother me.

The setting was wonderful too. Char and I watched it in my room during a sleepover. (Side note: When we were little, Char and I shared a room. I had a day bed with a trundle, and that's where she slept. It could be raised up to the same height as my bed, and that's what we did almost every night, so it was practically like sharing a bed. When I was 9 we finished our basement and I moved down there to my own room. But we missed each other, so my mom let us have a sleepover once a week, which we kept doing for years. At this time I was going to BYU, but I always moved home for the summer. So we had sleepovers every once in a while.) Anyway, we were having a sleepover in my room, and we watched Moulin Rouge on my laptop.

It was really dark, and really late, and that movie was just magic to me. I LOVED IT. And all of a sudden Ewan MacGregor was my favorite person alive. Here's the crazy thing--Emma is my favorite movie. But I had never cared about Frank Churchill one bit. I didn't think he was handsome and didn't care for his singing. But after I saw Moulin Rouge, suddenly Frank Churchill AND his singing were so wonderful to me. Similarly, Obi Wan had never had any appeal for me. I think it's the braid. It's got to be the braid. But ever since seeing Moulin Rouge, I have just felt so much affection for every other movie Ewan McGregor is in. Don't even get me started on Big Fish. I actually saw that AFTER Moulin Rouge, so I was already converted. But I love him in that.

All because of Christian/Ewan. He is so perfect in that movie. Does he ever NOT look like a sensitive Bohemian lovesick writer? It's so good. It's perfect.

The end made me cry. The whole thing just left me in an altered state. For days, I think. It was incredible. It was a magical cinematic feast that I shall cherish always.

Also, Char and I both love this movie. But anytime we talk about it, and my mom says, "I need to see it," we both end up going, "Um . . . I don't think you'd like it." And she's always like, "It's bad, huh? If you guys love it so much, why wouldn't I love it? It must be kind of bad." And we're like, "Um . . . it's not THAT bad, but yeah, you wouldn't like it." Because she wouldn't. That's just a fact.

ALSO, one time I was on study abroad, in Europe, in 2007, with a wonderful girl named Kalisha. We were in Florence, and a group of us was sitting on the Ponte Vecchio at night, listening to a street musician and just soaking up the awesomeness of our lives. And somehow we started talking about Moulin Rouge, and Kalisha did a perfect impression of the duke going, "Why would she choose the penniless sitar player over the Maharaja?" with the accompanying little hand gesture he does, and it was the funniest thing in the world to me for some reason. I nearly fell into the Arno. And nearly every time I think about Kalisha I think about her being the Duke on the Ponte Vecchio.

Also, when starting out this post, I never imagined I would write this much. All I planned to say was, "I watched Moulin Rouge, and it reminded me of the first time I saw it, which was magical. The end." And it's not even my favorite movie! I like it a lot, but it's not numero uno. But, here we are.

ALSO, I am never finishing this post. JK, I am. I just have to say one more thing, which is that today is my little brother Jordan's birthday. He is 17, which is basically freaking me OUT. I can't believe that someone 8 years younger than can have a car and be over 6 feet tall and take girls to Prom and stuff like that. Growing up is the craziest, am I right?