Movie List 2011

I forgot to put my list of 2010 on the blog but I have added it for 2011. If anyone still follows this blog I hope you enjoy these movies.

The movie I am most excited about in 2012....HUNGER GAMES!


Honorable Mentions-
The Adjustment Bureau- Prototypical Matt Damon movie. Certainly worth watching.

Source Code- This is a poor man's 'Inception'. About a soldier that jumps from body to body from Afghanistan to a man in a train in Chicago. Action film. Jake Glyndehall's acting is solid in this movie.

Contagion- Very interesting concept about a disease that takes over the world and battling it. Lots of A-list actors. Good rental for redbox.

10- Limitless- An action movie about a writer who discovers a drug that changes his life. He starts to use 100% of his brain as opposed to the 10%. It is really interesting to see how he thinks and he has rises to success and then back to reality. Acting by Bradley Cooper is great.

9- Rio- Not sure how this movie didn't get on Brennan's list but it was one of my favorite movies of the year. Really cute movie about bird in Minnesota that goes to Brazil. It's made by the same guys that made IceAge. Cute and clever humor.

8- Moneyball- Brad Pitt played the role well and it's certainly was a good movie worth watching but I expected more. The movie failed to mention that part of the reason that Billy Bean (main character) had three of the best pitchers in the MLB and that he had all of his success from pickign players based on statistics. While there is some truth to this, when you have Hudson, Mulder, and Zito in his prime you MUST recognize this. Note- if you don't follow baseball, you likely will not care about the lack of these pitchers in the movie.

7- Warrior- Since Aubrey bought me a boxing membership for my birthday this year I have been more interested in fighting. The Warrior was about a

6- Mission Impossible- Saw this movie in Mannassas with the family. I liked Tom Cruise performance in this. The movie kept my attention. Another action movie.

5- Puss in Boots- I wasn't expecting much from this movie but I should have. After seeing the Shreks I was expecting this to be taken off of Shrek. It was unique to just Puss. Very clever. Made me like cats more. Good family fun. Would highly recommend this to anyone.

4- Water for Elephants- A movie that took you inside the circus from the early 1900's. I liked this movie so much that I read the book afterwards. I really enjoyed the story within a story from the narrators voice. If you haven't read the book, I would recommend it. I guess there are a couple bad parts but by the time I got to it, Aubrey had already ripped out those pages.

3- Rise of the Planet of the Apes- Based in San Francisco, prequel to the original. I never saw the original but the graphics in this movie were superb. I liked to see the Apes interact together and the psyche of the movie. I love animals.... probably the reason I put this so high.

2- Midnight in Paris- Owen Wilson is one of my favorite actors. This movie makes me want to visit Paris. I thought it was interesting to see the personalities of some of the most famous Authors portrayed. I didn't appreciate it's beauty the first time I saw it as much as the second time I watched it with Aubrey and she explained so much of it to me all over again.

MOVIE OF THE YEAR 1- The Help- I read the book AFTER watching the movie because I was so intrigued with how good the movie was. I even got choked up a little bit in this one. The book was also very good. I LOVED actress Mae Mobley in the movie "You is Kind, You is Smart, and You is important". This is one of my favorite movies of all time.

Huntington Beach

For those of you that actually still follow this blog that has been much outdated, Aubrey and I moved from Provo to Huntington Beach. I recently got a job with a different Medical company and we have moved to the sunny side of the country. We're excited to be here.

Jamaica-

Since we haven't posted on here for a month or so, I wanted to let everyone know we should have some good pictures this time next week because we're headed to Jamaica on Wednesday for a couple days. Should be a BLAST. Aubrey has been excited for it for nearly a month with her countdown and I am starting to feel it creep closer and starting to get more and more excited. I was disappointed BYU lost to Kansas State but I am stoked for Jamaica, snorkeling, pina colada's, pool, beach..... awwwwww da life.

Serving Others

So while I was at work today I came across a lady that I work with on a pretty consistent basis. She is a social worker that works with elderly people as they're leaving to go home and she is the sweetest lady. She is an older woman with grandchildren and so she connects well with many of the geriatrics that are in the facility. Today, I sat down and talked to her about how she's planning on going on a mission next summer with her husband and will be leaving the facility. She went on to tell me about how she feels that the best way to be happy is through service. I have been taught throughout my life that through serving others you can see the true beauties of life but this is one o those ladies that really lives what she believes. She inspires those around her and serves those around her. She's the type of person that people want to be around because she is such a nice person. I know that I am blabbering and a lot of this is incoherent but i felt that this was something that touched me in a manner that was atleast worth posting. As we talked about her mission she was planning on going on she mentioned that she had a friend that told her the most important thing to do as a senior missionary was, "show you are happy in our marriage because a lot of people don't have examples of happy marriages." I thought this was so interesting and so true. She continued to say, " That's something I think I can handle!" because she truly is happy. This woman has it figured out and there is something to be learned from her.

Top 10 Movie List for 2009

Here's my 2009 list of my top movies. If you haven't seen them, check them out. Most are good family fun!

Honorable mention- 500 days of summer, Up in the Air

10- The Proposal- I sincerely enjoyed this comedy. If you haven't seen it check it out.
9- Sherlock Holmes- Robert Downey Jr. is great in this movie, I loved the story. One of those movies you'll hae to see more than once to catch it all. LOVE the music
8- Ice Age- Dawn of the Dinosaurs- Could not believe how much I liked this movie. Def the best of the three ICe Ages
7- Taken- Intense drama that gives us an ugly insight of trafficking
6- State of Play- Clever, had me on the end of my seat the whole movie
5- The Princess and the Frog- Great Disney movie. Impressed with the storyline and LOVED the firefly Ray
4- UP- Great Pixar production
3- Avatar- Didn't have any interest in this movie until I saw it and flew through 2 1/2 hours. Story, production, directing all were great
2- The Blindside- I had to fight to not put this at number one. Maybe because of my love of sports maybe because it's a true story, maybe because Sandra Bullock was AMAZING .
1- Everybody's fine- VERY REAL movie. I thought the acting was phenomenal and I thought the story line seemed very real. Felt for a few minutes that I had actually seen into someone else's life. If you haven't seen it, check it out.

Everybody's fine

So, I know that I don't write on my blog very often but last night Aubrey and I watched a movie that I thought was worth mentioning. As we sat and watched the Nebraska vs Texas game until the very in, hoping for Texas to lose so that TCU and the Mountain West would get a chance to go to the national title game. As Nebraska kicked the ball out of bounds and then eventually lost the game on a last second field goal Aubrey and I headed out across the street to the movie theater to watch what we believed was going to be a Christmas movie. We chose Everybody's fine because Aubrey is a big fan of Drew Barrymore and it had a good cast and seemed to have a good trailor that we had seen from watching other movies. We walked in after getting our popcorn bucket filled and our Large Mr. Pipp (really enjoying the movies) and sat in our seats.

As the continual trailors for other movies played, I thought that we had come to a movie that might not be as good as I was hoping but I have to admit that I thought this movie was a top 5 for the year of 2009 that I have seen. I don't think Aubrey enjoyed it as much as I did but I really, really enjoyed it. Without trying to spoil the movies for others, the movie is basically about a widower father that has four children that live all across the country. He was a father that always pushed his children for success and always wanted them to have the best. Because of this they would tell their mother everything and not him. As he surprises his children showing up at their house they seem to make continual excuses as why he cannot stay longer. He then leaves to go to the next child's house. While this movie didn' thave the cheer and joy that I was hoping for from a christmas movie it touched me in a way a movie hasn't in so long. It was very heavy, even so much so that Aubrey said she liked it but likely would never want to see it again. The moral of story and what I got out of it could be entirely two different things but I thought the movie was attempting to portray that the most important thing is not how successful you are but rather that the most important thing is family. The movie had Aubrey and I walking out speaking how lucky and grateful we were for our family and how lucky we were to be put in a situation where we could succeed. I felt inspired enough by this movie that I thought I would even post a blog about it to publicy express my gratitude for my family and my new family. I am very lucky for the people that I have had in my life and for their influence on me and in this christmas season, the most important thing is certainly family.... not items. Merry Christmas to all, and if you get a chance, go watch 'everybody's fine'.

BYU Cougars Found Their Foe

I don't post on this blog that much anymore becuase my wonderful wife has done such a tremendous job on our marriage blog that covers my life very much. You can find that HERE. Anyways, I thought that I would be wasting space if I wrote about my Cougars on our family blog so I figured I would post my thoughts here. This picture above is actually from a game last year. We didn't take any yesterday, and that's probably a good thing because we both would've been red and angry from the horrible game. As all the media and followers of the Cougars said all week, it was supposed to be a big win against the Florida State Seminoles.

On our way in to the game, we talked to some FSU fans that were tailgating and I said to them, "Welcome to Provo!" (I was trying to immulate some of the classy schools around the country). The FSU fan said, "take it easy on us today." Geez ,that was the beginning of the end. They ran all over us in every bit of the sense. The Cougs couldn't slow FSU down at all and unfortunately by the end of the game, it was them that was taking it easy on us....after their 54 points and a silent stadium. Luckily we're still ranked at 19 and have plenty of football left for the season! Aubrey was good at making me feel that football isn't the end of the world and I started realizing that we don't neeed a undefeated season to be happy this year. THe game sure did have the feel of the TCU game that Larson Laidlaw and I traveled to last year. Either way, i'm still excited for the season and figured I needed to post something on here. Follow our blog at aubreyandhunter.blogspot.com. I love my wife.

Hunter