Marley and Me: What Was I THINKING???

Like I'd mentioned earlier, there is a base theater here which shows almost-first-run films.  They show other stuff too (I saw "Goodfellas" the other day, "Scarface" is running at 2am Saturday morning).  As for the first-runs, they're currently showing "The Wrestler", "The Day the Earth Stood Still", "Nights at Rodanthe", "Miracle at St. Anna", and "Marley & Me".

Many of you know that I wanted to see "Marley & Me".  I'm always game for cute movies about dogs.  It played at 11am today, since my bedtime is 2pm it was perfect.  I even had time for a run beforehand.

Boy, watching that film was like watching a movie made about Dave and me. 

"WHAT?  Since when would anybody cast Jennifer Anniston to play YOU in a movie?"*

Okay, okay, kill the glamour of it all.  Break it down to the storyline.  Newlyweds, each getting along in their careers, decide to get a dog.  Then a couple years go by, they decide to start a family (in Florida, no less, sound familiar?).  When the second child comes along, Mom makes a conscious decision to stop working to raise the kids (again, sound familiar?).  She goes through the exhaustion, the periods of bitterness and resentment of giving up her career for the family, etc.  Dad is faced with relocating the family (sound familiar 6 times over?).  The dog is there through all of that.  He sleeps on the kids' bunk bed (sound familiar?), the kids don't know life without the dog (sound familiar?).

(Note: Our Howie's behavior is nothing like Marley's.  Unless faced with a squirrel.)

Anyway, while most people would cry at the end, I was in tears all through the movie, from them choosing the puppy all the way to the end (which I won't give away).  I guess I was really missing my boys.  All my boys.  Dave, Howie, Jacob and Timmy.  All of us girls in the theater cried, we all had to run to the bathroom afterwards to grab paper towels.

I don't think I reacted that way to a movie since "My Dog Skip" (2000), which, incidentally, stars Luke Wilson.  Owen (Luke's brother) was in "Marley and Me".

Bottom line: I highly recommend the film, but bring a BOX of Kleenex.  Perhaps I was better off waiting till I got home to see it.