Safety not Guaranteed

Every once in a while a movie comes along that pleasantly surprises you. Safety not Guaranteed is one of those films. Although made with relatively unknown actors, this cast of characters brings something fresh to the screen.

Safety not Guaranteed is a fairly understated & genuine film about taking chances. There is also an underlying message about regret and how we should cope with it, either by living with it, forgetting it, or changing it.

The movie begins at a Seattle magazine where the boss (Mary Lynn Rajskub) is looking for story ideas. Jake Johnson who plays Jeff suggests investigating a bizarre classified ad that reads:

"Wanted: Somebody to go back in time with me. This is not a joke. You'll get paid after we get back. Must bring your own weapons. I have only done this once before. Safety not guaranteed."  The three journalists who investigate this "time traveler" are all on different tracks in their lives as far as time goes. They're all on a journey of self discovery.

So many movies like this starts off strongly and then  peter out in a swirl of poor writing. However this gem was quite the opposite.As the movie progresses, little by little you find yourself rooting for the "crazy time traveler" and really hope that he travel back in time despite the fact it is obvious he will not. (Not a spoiler)


For me, Safety not Guaranteed struck a long and very deep note, as we are all unfortunately time travelers, but the opportunity to go back and repair however a bit cliched, is what we as humans have longed for since the beginning of time.

I love my Kindle!

I love my kindle, words I'd never ever in a million years thought I'd say. Well, my friends, it looks like I have finally crossed over into the 21st century of reading! For the past few years whenever someone has mentioned  how much they adore their kindle, or other ereader, I have gotten this look of horror on my face, isn't that blaspheme?(especially if you are a book lover?) How could anyone who enjoys curling up with a good book, curl up with an ereader?

I just didn't get it. I love the smell of a new crisp book, the way it feels in my hands as I turn the page. I love that when I am tired and ready for bed, and struggle to see the print because my eyes are glazing over, I place my book mark into my last page read and then lay it on my night stand and turn out the light.

I have been an avid reader since I was 6 years old. I love knowledge that comes with reading a book. I love the escapism that comes with reading a book. I realized a very long time ago that a library was my window to the world. I have read in my lifetime hundreds of books, from fiction to nonfiction. If I want to learn more about a topic, I read. If I want to learn more about an occurrence or happening, I read about it. If I am feeling sad, I read. If I am feeling happy, I read just because I can!

So by now you are probably wondering...why did I decide to get a kindle? Actually I didn't, a friend offered my hubby and me his, and we accepted.(A big thank you to Jared) So after about a week of it laying on my nightstand I decided to familiarize myself with it. Our friend had a few books already loaded on it and I decided to read one (Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury). When I first began it felt a little weird, it seemed cold, very stiff. However the more I read, the more I began to enjoy it. A few days later when I had finished the novel, my first thought was...WOW I need to get more books on this thing! My second thought was....WOW how am I going to afford this? One face palm later it dawned on me; I have a world of books at my fingertips every single day of the year! I work at a library! And the library has a collection of eAudio as well as eBooks.

Before this day I hadn't really thought much about our eBook collection. I looked upon it more as a nuisance than a great service, due to the fact I maintain the library's database and have to make sure that all eBook records are complete and correct.(Which isn't a horrible job, just time consuming)

I decided I needed to try to check out a few of these eBooks and see how difficult the process was downloading them to my kindle. After going to the eBook website and figuring out how to do it, I learned I was able to check out 10 items for 7 days. That first day I downloaded 4 different books that I had been wanting to read. I was able to use my library card number, peruse the catalog by marking all books available in kindle form and then choosing from a list I was able to download them and save the file to my pc and transfer them over to the kindle. With the four books loaded I was ready to roll.

At home that evening I created a monster. I read and read and read until I could no longer keep my eyes open. I was a little bit worried about closing up my kindle for the night, worried that I would lose my place, however the next day when I opened the kindle back up, it went right back to the page I was on the night before.(who needs a bookmark?)

I have to confess my kindle and I are rarely separated now. I have over 24 books loaded onto it, some are on loan, others I downloaded from free sites like www.gutenberg.org. Even Amazon offers some free books for download. Will I ever go back to a good old regular book? As long as I have my kindle the world may never know.

Halloween is a real Treat!

As Halloween approaches, scary themed items will be everywhere. If you're thinking about entertaining guests with a good old spook fest I suggest you come into the Warsaw Community Public Library and check out our Halloween material

To set the mood, we have CDs with scary sounds and music, “Halloween Howls” or “Scary Sound effects” are some of the titles the library has. Want to bake up some scary treats? We can assist you with a few books on baking, “Halloween Sweets and Treats” by Ruth Owen or “The Halloween Cookbook” by Sarah Schuette just might be what you need. How can a party be complete without the decorations? Well WCPL has you covered on that as well. We have “Horrorgami” by Chris Marks, if you are interested in making Halloween themed origami. In need of a costume idea? We have “Stick or Treat” by Patti Wallenfang. If you prefer one book to meet all your needs then “Gooseberry Ghastly-good Halloween” is a great one to check out. Goodies baked, decorations and costumes complete, all that's left is choosing some great Halloween movies to scare your guests.

If you are looking for a movie that's not so scary and can be enjoyed by all then “It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown” is just the movie to get your party started. If you’re a Zombie fanatic then “Night of the Living Dead”, which was released in 1968, is a perfect choice. These flesh eating ghouls are just as terrifying as their modern-day counterparts. If you're just not into all the scare and instead prefer comedy, we have that too. “Shaun of the Dead”, “Zombieland”,“Beetlejuice” all mix horror with comedy and are great films to watch on Halloween.

Not into the whole Halloween party scene? Prefer to spend the holiday night home alone? Why not curl up with a scary novel? “Dracula” by Bram Stoker and “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley are horror classics. If you prefer modern literature why not try Stephen King's “The Shining”, Anne Rice's “Interview with the Vampire”, or the Newbery award winning “The Graveyard Book” by Neil Gaiman.

Warsaw Community Public Library has all your Spooky needs for the Halloween season. We are even participating in the Spooktacular on November 1^st. So bring out the kids for some fun and treats. We are open from 9AM to 8PM on Monday-Tuesday, 9AM-6PM Wednesday-Friday,10AM-2PM on Saturday and closed Sunday.

World War Z has shambled into the Library

For more than 40 years, blank-eyed creatures have shambled across our movie screens, providing us with midnight movie screams, blood, guts and gore. World War Z is the latest in this ever growing movie genre. I admit I love everything that is zombie! In fact in our house we are prepared for if and when the Z apocalypse finally arrives. I have always felt that I could survive a zombie outbreak and that out running these fellows would be a piece of cake. (Not so much now) World War Z introduced me to zombies that simply cannot be out run, or hacked to death with a machete. No, these undead initiates a new kind of fear. They act almost superhuman.

WWZ wastes no time in getting started. Less than 10 minutes into the movie and we are thrown in! Brad Pitt plays Gerry Lane, a former military man who goes back to work for the military in return for securing his family shelter during the zombie apocalypse. They send Gerry around the world investigating a possible cure for the zombies, or a weapon to use against them.

It is truly an impressive movie, especially considering it is PG-13. For being a zombie movie, it doesn't have many action scenes, and this might come as a surprise, but there is very little blood and gore ANYWHERE. I saw this coming 15 minutes in and thought, oh no...but truth be told, this doesn't ruin the film. While I tend to like the gore in a zombie film, WWZ proves you don't really need it to be horrific.

I highly suggest it to zombie fans, and to anyone else that wants a scary, enthralling tale. However be warned, if you are into the slash and run zombie films, then you won't find this as entertaining. And if you're expecting WWZ be a dead on version of the book then understand it isn't even close! But it is certainly one of the most gratifying zombie movies in years. And if nothing else watch it because Brad Pitt proves he's still a big-screen star. Even when he's being chased by hordes of the undead, he is cool, unflappable, and ridiculously good-looking.

So why not shamble into the Warsaw Community Public Library and check out World War Z or another Zombie flick? We have a wide assortment of items to meet all your Zombie needs.

Breaking Dawn...Thank God we are free!

So it's finally over and thank God we are free at last! The most over-blown, over-hyped, over-extended movie series ever to have been made has at long last limped(maybe a better word is stumbled) to a close. After the debacle of Breaking Dawn Part 1, it would have taken a miracle to make Part 2 even remotely entertaining.(Not even close) Why? Maybe it was the creepy, computer-generated baby they used (apparently there just wasn't a baby cute enough); maybe it was the fact that a good 90% of the dialogue was spoken over dramatic music (This, in my opinion was done because most of the dialogue was so awful no one would ever want to hear it)

Kristen Stewart, as usual, gives her lip-biting, mouth-breathing, one-note performance as Bella, trying to look fierce during the climactic fake battle scene and managing only to look somewhat constipated.(Will someone please get this girl out of showbiz!)

Robert Pattinson, a much better actor, does what he can with the excruciating lines he has to say ("We're the same temperature now." Seriously?) Some of the other supporting roles (Rosalie, for instance) have been so shortened they hardly have anything to say. Except for Jacob, the wolves don't do anything but act wolfy. And the Volturi are nowhere near as menacing as they were in "New Moon" and "Eclipse". Jane was a truly diabolical character, sending out excruciating pain with a baby-faced grin. Now she's just standing around wearing too much eyeliner looking almost as bored as we are watching her(Seriously Dakota deserves more)

Save for the battle scene most everything else was downright horrid and even that scene turned bad once we found out it was a F-A-K-E. Don't get me wrong this “fakery” did manage to liven up a laughable confrontation between the good guys and bad guys. However in the words of the Comedian in the movie Watchmen “It's a joke. It's all a freaking joke” (My spouse, bless his heart walked around all night with fists clinched uttering “Well that was a waste of another two hours I could have spent gouging my eyes out!” Sadly, I agree!)

So now that the Volturi has run off with their tails between their legs and everything is safe once again for the Cullens and the wolfpack now what? Happily ever after into infinity? We do get a glimpse into Renesmee's(Gotta admit that's an ugly name) future and of course we see Jacob because we shouldn't forget that he imprinted on her when she was a mere babe in the woods...can you say creepy?

Crazy is the New Normal

Looking for a little entertainment this weekend away from the heat? Why not come and peruse the video collection at the Warsaw Community Public Library? If you're not quite sure about what to choose, have I got a film for you...Silver Linings Playbook.

Every now and then a movie comes along that works on nearly every level and bowls you over. For me, Silver Linings Playbook was one of those movies. When I first sat down to watch this movie, I wasn't sure what to expect, but as I settled in, I began to recognize parts of my life in this story and could relate to its characters. Set in Philadelphia, the movie shows Pat Solatano (Bradley Cooper) returning home from a stint in a mental institution after a domestic incident with his ex-wife highlighted his struggle with bipolar mood swings. Pat moves back in with his parents (Robert De Niro and Jacki Weaver) as he tries to get his life back together, hoping to reunite with his ex-wife. Things get very interesting when Pat meets Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence), a young woman with issues of her own.

At heart, this is a film about mental illness and its effects on everyday life. And how sometimes we are left with the task of putting our lives back together and starting over, and probably not for the last time. It's about dealing with unemployment, failed relationships, feeling 'less than', different, like we don't fit in...the older than our years wisdom that we acquire from years of suffering, dealing with our demons and doing "a lot of therapy", the long list of medications we have tried, looking for something that works and learning to accept the side effects, the realization that we are not the only ones with issues, that we are all, in the end, just human beings and everyone around us is struggling with something and that we all have our strengths and weaknesses. And how we just need to find that "silver lining" to get through life.

This film is good medicine for anyone who deals with the ups and down of mental illness. It is ultimately a joyous affirmation of life's possibilities. And who doesn't need a little of that?

Let's pretend this never happened

First of all I'd like to say that Jenny Lawson had me on her book cover alone! Who doesn't love a white mouse doing Shakespeare? Her memoir entitled “Let's pretend this never happened made me laugh so hard that I cried. Even as I was laughing, I was thinking, "Should I be laughing at this?”

Let's pretend starts out with hilarious childhood stories that revolve around Jenny's unconventional taxidermist father and kindhearted mother. Most of us did not grow up with dead animal carcasses hanging around the house but Jenny Lawson did and it served many humorous moments. She holds nothing back. She tells of her struggles to get pregnant, of her marriage, of her patient husband, and many other anecdotal incidents along the way. Though this book is written as a humor novel, it is also a tale of a woman who struggles with anxiety disorder which often inhibits her in social situations while providing her a unique strange view of the world.

I could relate to Jenny Lawson in that, like me, she realizes that her experiences in life has made her the unique individual she is and that she wouldn't trade it for anything else. Plus, she also believes in the impending zombie apocalypse! Definitely a woman after my own heart!