March 31, 2012
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Our Adventures: Flick’s Family Film Fest!
Twice a year in Grand Rapids, Celebration Cinemas (which has something like 12 locations in town as well as the outlying areas) has something they call “Flick’s Family FilmFest“. I’m telling ya, there’s no place like Grand Rapids for free/cheap family focused events. It’s truly amazing. Anyhow, for eight weeks in the spring and the fall they show eight films at the theatre – kid-friendly films – and admission is completely free for all children, and $4 per adult.
My friend GraceyCate was the one who tipped me off to this – we went with our kids together once to see… oh, crap, I don’t remember. But I liked it. And the kids loved it. And we had a great time, for very little money. Which, when you have a family of seven, is kind of a thing.
So a couple of weeks ago, Flick’s announced their spring line-up on Facebook (which, I have to admit, is VERY useful to me, these days, between PixelOfInk, my GR mom site suggestions, Pure Michigan events, and things like Flick). This spring they’re showing… well, let me get the graphic for you:
We went to see ‘Rango’ and ‘Mr. Popper’s Penguins’ last fall, and out of these, I was considering ‘Puss in Boots’ (for Brian, but he declined; we’d heard it stunk), and ‘Spy Kids 4′ (which is… meh… but if it’s raining that week…) – but the movie in this spring line-up that I really wanted to see was ‘Dolphin’s Tale’.Based on a true story, the film has Harry Connick, Jr., Ashley Judd, Kris Kristofferson and Morgan Freeman in it. It’s about Winter, a dolphin whose tail gets caught in a lobster trap and is so badly damaged that it needs to be amputated… and how they work with her to learn to swim with a prosthetic tail. Of course they added two young children to the story (Sawyer, the boy who finds her on the beach, and Hazel, a homeschool girl who’s dad runs the
aquatic medical center and befriends him so that he can be a part of Winter’s rehabilitation, since Winter only responds to him). The side story is that Sawyer’s uncle is wounded in Iraq and comes home ‘broken’ – like Winter – and finds his new footing by way of the quest to help Winter.
So we got in the car Sunday night last week, and went to the movies! I didn’t know that it was in 3-D until the previews started – it wasn’t billed as such, but next time I’ll bring our can of 3-D glasses along, just in case. Because I *think* it was 3-D… from the way things looked like they might’ve been sticking out of the screen. Live and learn.When we got there, we were the *ONLY* people in the theatre, but by the time the movie started fifteen minutes later, the theater was PACKED. Which is kewl. It’s a good movie, with a good lesson to learn, and a nice pace – instead of the whacked out crazy that most kid movies are, these days. Flick’s films make the theatre some nice change, considering. And it allows people who can’t afford $8 a ticket to see films on the big screen – even if they are already out on video.
I really liked the part of the movie where the mom goes to school for a teacher confrontation. Her son had been so despondent about everything since his father left, and because he wasn’t turning in homework or putting any effort into school, he’d been sent to summer school. But he started cutting classes to help Winter, and the mom went to school to ask if he could – instead of spending the summer at a desk – work with Winter and turn in a paper on his work at the medical center. The teacher said absolutely not, and the mom said,
“He’s finally engaging, he’s got a love of life and is showing interest in something REAL. That’s what we want for our kids, isn’t it?” And the teacher shook his head and said, “I’m sorry”… but she stood her ground and pulled Sawyer out of school, regardless. GO, Mom!! You got it right!! And the whole Hazel homeschooling thing? She was a well-adjusted, polite, intelligent child who had a better grasp on life than school kids. It geeked my little home-ed soul!!
We were also completely thrilled – ALL of us – when Kris Kristofferson quoted from ‘Sea Fever‘… remember the chalk picture I did of the sailor in the yellow raincoat? “I must go down to the sea again…?” It was awesome, watching my kids light up when they heard it – recognizing the poem from our schooling! I love moments like those, when everyone sits up and looks at each other in shock and excitement. Very awesome.
Because we were out during the supper hour, we just held off until after the movie, and went to our favorite Mexican restaurant. It’s a rather out-of-the-way place, so it’s not very busy, but the food is SO delicious, and my kids like saying ‘gracias’ and ‘de nada’ to the waitresses. I’m always afraid if we practice our bare-bones Spanish, someone will think we actually speak the language, and start rattling off in Spanish and we’ll be “blink-blink!” But mostly they humor the kids. On the way out, we noticed that there was a bright grouping in the sky – the moon, Jupiter and Venus were really bright, although nowhere near as close together as they had been earlier in the month. But I took a picture, anyhow. And the next morning I read about it:(from SpaceWeather on Monday)
SUNSET SKY SHOW, AGAIN: A month ago, Venus, Jupiter and the crescent Moon aligned beautifully for evening sky watchers around the world. Tonight it’s happening again. On March 25th and 26th, the three will form a bright triangle in the western sky at sunset.So the extra bonus was that we got to see TWO shows on Sunday night – the celestial one, and the movie. Wonderful wrap-up to our adventure!!
