Date Night In: Our Movie List

Here in the Wier house, we love our babysitter. She’s well qualified, has medical training, is responsible, and she cares about the kids. They love her, too. The only problem is that we don’t see her nearly enough. Between our often hectic lives, busy travel schedules, and the $15 an hour babysitter rate, Colin and I do good work to have a date night once a month. This summer, we went out at the beginning of May and it was August before we had another date night. We just couldn’t get it together until then. With this kind of random dating schedule in mind, Colin and I took Lisa’s cue and sat down one night in May after reading her “It’s Not Too Late to Date” post (click here to read) and made a list of movies we wanted to see together. We scoured through internet “best-movie” lists and thought about movies that we’ve seen in the past and came up with a list of 28 movies. Some are old, some are new, some comedies, some serious. The only stipulation was that we both had to agree before the movie went on the list. It was actually really fun just making the list together. Colin was blown away by how many movies I haven’t seen (I have a hard time sitting still long enough to watch an entire movie). So we’re working on that and enjoying spending some quality time together. 😉

In the beginning, we decided we would watch a movie together every weekend, but that hasn’t happened either. Still, after the kids are in bed on the weekends, we’ve been slowly chipping away at “the list”. We cuddle up on the couch with popcorn and there is a strict rule of no computers, no phones, and no iPads; only popcorn and a blanket. For fun, below is our list of movies and a quick note on the ones we’ve seen together so far.

1. Les Miserables – We really enjoyed this one, but then we’ve seen the musical together a few times and knew what to expect. We both agreed that Anne Hathaway deserved the Oscar for best actress in a supporting role. If you aren’t into musicals, however, you should skip this one.
2. The Lord of the Rings – To be fair, this should have been six entries on our list. There are three movies to this series and each one is at least three hours long and broken into two DVD’s. Luckily, Colin had bought the entire set when the movies first came out so we were able to just watch as we wanted. It took us three weekends to get through the entire series. That being said, it was a fantastic story and even though I didn’t plan to like it, I really did!
3. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey – After we finished Lord of the Rings, it was only logical that we would start watching The Hobbit movies as well, since they’re interrelated. I liked this first movie of the series and am anxiously awaiting the second installment (due out in December of this year). That being said, watching it so soon after seeing The Lord of the Rings trilogy left me a bit underwhelmed with The Hobbit. It’s still a great movie, but it just can’t compare to the grandeur of the imagery and the captivation of the storyline in Lord of the Rings.
4. Silver Linings Playbook – Colin really enjoyed the movie. I thought it was pretty good, but since I had already read the book, I had some trouble accepting all of the differences between the book and the movie. There are a lot of them. If you’ve read the book and that kind of thing bothers you, I would skip this one. Otherwise, it’s a decent movie.
5. Little Miss Sunshine – A lot of people really like this movie and I had heard a lot about it. Plus, we both really like Steve Carell, so we gave it a try. We really, really disliked it…lol. In fact, we were both so bored by the time we got 3/4 of the way through, that we just turned it off. This one was a dud for us.
6. Star Trek Into Darkness – Surprisingly, I loved this movie! I remember being surprised way back in 2009 when Colin convinced me to see Star Trek in the theater and I actually liked it. I was surprised again this time. I really enjoyed it.
7. Field of Dreams
8. Trouble with the Curve
9. Seabiscuit
10. Charlie St. Cloud
11. The Princess Bride
12. Memoirs of a Geisha
13. Braveheart
14. The King’s Speech
15. Good Morning Vietnam
16. Dead Poets Society
17. Citizen Kane
18. E.T.
19. Unforgiven
20. Desperado
21. The Italian Job
22. Moulin Rouge
23. Secretariat
24. The Count of Monte Cristo
25. Blazing Saddles
26. Robinhood: Prince of Thieves
27. Lincoln
28. Argo

As you can see, we still have quite a way to go, but I have to say that this is something we have really enjoyed and I would encourage any couple having trouble finding time for a true night out to make time for this kind of thing. It’s amazing how much you can enjoy just watching a movie together when you devote 100% of yourself to just sitting still, tuning out any distractions, and just being together.