Three Xlnt Movies

"Uncle Teardrop was Jessup's elder and had been a crank chef longer but he'd had a lab go wrong and it had eaten the left ear off his head and burned a savage melted scar down his neck to the middle of his back. There wasn't enough ear nub remaining to hang sunglasses on. The hair around the ear was gone too, and the scar on his neck showed above his collar. Three blue teardrops done in jailhouse ink fell in a row from the corner of the eye on his scarred side. Folks said the teardrops meant he'd three times done grisly prison deeds that needed doing but didn't need to be gabbed about. They said the teardrops told you everything you had to know about the man and the lost ear just repeated it. He generally tried to sit with his melted side toward the wall."

When I heard Daniel Woodrell read that paragraph from his book "Winter's Bone" on Terry Gross's show, I knew I had to read it. I could scarcely put it down. Gripping, vivid, beautifully written, and now an amazing movie too.

I don't remember when I last saw three good movies consecutively, but over the past several days in addition to Winter's Bone the Girl and I went to The Kids Are All Right, which helped me remember what a fabulous actress Annette Bening is, and I took the grandkids to Despicable Me, which I absolutely loved. Every character in the film is sweet and they do 3D right. In fact, tomorrow we're taking the little maggots to see it again as I was alone with the twerps last time. Does that mean I'll be able to say I've seen four great movies in a row? Great movies four times in a row?