On Monday I was given charge of the remote controls and decided that it was a good time to watch the Paddington films again: the weather outside was miserable, as Storm Bert and then Storm Conall were making their presences felt with rain, wind and general mankiness, and I was in the mood for something gentle and funny.
We loved the Paddington films as soon as we saw them – the casts are great, they are funny and heartwarming and Ben Whishaw voices the little lost bear beautifully. Hugh Grant is making a proper career out of being a bit of a villain, too, and camps it up well in the sequel while the role of the explorer’s bitter daughter suits the rather icy Nicole Kidman very well. Julie Walters and Sally Hawkins are always great, of course. Thing 2 and I are plotting a cinema trip to see the third one soon.
In this house we have a list of family films that we love and are happy to watch whenever we find them on the TV. They’re Sunday afternoon films, stuck-in-the-house-and-feeling-poorly films, bad weather films and – as it’s that time of year – I’m going to share some of them with you.
- Nanny McPhee/Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang. Excellent use of Emma Thompson, and all the children end up well behaved in the end.
- The Railway Children. Ideally the original but the remake is OK too. You cannot go wrong with Bernard Cribbins.
- Five Children and It – Suzy Eddie Izzard as the Psammead.
- Hugo – early Asa Butterfield and beautifully filmed.
- Fantastic Mr Fox – Wes Anderson does family friendly, with a great voice cast.
- Slumberland – a more recent entry, magical mayhem with Jason Momoa.
- Stardust – I’m still cross with Neil Gaiman but this is a great film, full of magic and ghosts and skypirates and Robert De Niro in a dress.
- Batteries Not Included – tiny aliens! Big business getting its comeuppance!
- Hook – Robin Williams as an aging Peter and Dustin Hoffman in an excellent wig.
- The Spiderwick Chronicles – more magic, and a grumpy house gnome addicted to honey
- Bridge to Terabithia – even though I cry every time.
- The Princess Bride (duh).
There are of course many more films that I will watch every time they are on, but these are the family favourites that even the grumpy teens will join us on the sofa for. I was excited to discover that the BBC are finally reshowing The Box of Delights, starting next weekend: more E. Nesbit transformed into TV magic. And Christmas film season starts tomorrow!
Things making me happy this week
- The first of the Christmas fairs, which went very well. I’m glad I’m still making little robins!
- The second National Illustration Day: so many people shared the illustrations they use and see every day, and the director made an excellent cake.
- Coming back to work and finding paper chains all over the office.
- The Asda order having everything in stock!
- Tiny Christmas jumper brooches.
- Clear skies so I see stars when I leave the house and dawn when I get to London.
- Baking the Christmas cake that I definitely wasn’t going to make this year.
Things I’ve been giving hard stares to this week:
- The weather, especially when it causes traffic chaos like floods and road closures.
- Decisions made by the local council which add to the traffic chaos.
- People who have no idea where they are going in tube stations and decide that the best place to stop is immediately beyond the ticket gates.
- Evri drivers who claim to have delivered the parcel to the delivery address, when in fact they have delivered it to a house in a completely different road. At least they got the number right, which minimised the ‘excuse me, is this your doormat’ conversations.
Today I’m going for my first swim in ages and am expecting it to be cooooooold….
Same time next week, gang!
Kirsty x
What I’ve been reading:
Going Rogue/Dirty Thirty/Now or Never– Janet Evanovich (Audible)
Wayward – Hannah Mathewson
The Guest Cat – Takashi Hiraide
Bad Monkey – Carl Hiaasen
What Kirsty did next 