Lady for a Day (1933, Frank Capra)

I missed the first third-to-half of this, but we’re gonna count it anyway. Clunky comedy with a weeper ending starring a bunch of white people who all look the same.

Young Louise wants to marry some fancy European, but has to impress his dad (Walter Connolly of the much livelier Twentieth Century) with her family. Louise’s mom (May Robson) is actually a lowly apple seller. But May is the good-luck charm of powerful New York gangster Warren William (Julius Caesar to Colbert’s Cleopatra), so along with his buddy Guy Kibbee (righteous reporter in Power of the Press), they fake being high society long enough to get the girl married. By the end, reporters are kidnapped and the mayor and governor are enlisted in the scam. America! Nominated for four oscars but something called Cavalcade won.

Just Like Heaven (2005, Mark Waters)

Maybe I was in a weird mood, but this was an enjoyable movie – well written with decent acting, even if its ultimately a girly soulmate drama with ghosts and people in comas, winning the contest of who would be the first movie to cast Jon Heder in his first post-Napoleon Dynamite comic-relief sidekick role, from the writers of What Planet Are You From and Pay It Forward. Couldn’t possibly be any good. But it kinda was.

The Five-Year Engagement (2012, Nicholas Stoller)

Katy watched with Maria and I sat in for most of it. I think lead couple Jason Segal and Emily Blunt are broken up for at least six months of that engagement while Segal sleeps with some young hottie and Blunt plays the young hottie to some older professor. It’s one of those movies featuring young people in struggling careers who seem to have an endless supply of money, though they envy their seemingly-billionaire friends who have circus-like weddings. Blunt is cute, but I mainly looked up to watch the recurring roles for Chris Pratt and Brian Posehn and cameo by Dr. Spaceman. Speaking of Chris Pratt, now that every major Parks & Rec cast member has been appearing in movies for the last two years without quitting the show, I hope Mark Brendanawicz is regretting choosing Water for Elephants over the series.