Russell Crowe Movie Month

A couple of weeks ago I was listening to the Proof of Life Rewatchable podcast.  During it Bill Simmons kept talking about what a great actor Russell Crowe was.  I couldn't have agreed more and wondered why I hadn't watched more of his movies.  I was sure that he had made some recently that I hadn't seen and decided to do a little research on his IMBD.  As the long list showed up on my computer screen, I was actually shocked at how many of his movies I hadn't watched.  Since Doug was going to be traveling a lot and I had a few tedious paperwork projects to do while he was gone, I decided to make September "Russell Crowe Movie Month."  

Since I had seen all of Russell Crowe's Oscar nominated movies, I decided that I would start the month off with a movie of his that I had never seen.  I looked through the long list and picked out the 2018 film, "A Boy Erased."  I had no idea what it was about, but it had Nicole Kidman in it along with Crowe, so I figured that it had to be good.  As soon as it started, I was absolutely hooked.  The movie centered around a teenage boy who thought that he might be homosexual.  When his Baptist pastor father (Crowe) found out, he decided to send him to "gay conversion camp."  It definitely was not a positive experience for the boy and led to some emotionally intense scenes.  Thankfully, there was a happy ending which I prefer and overall I enjoyed the movie.

The next Russell Crowe pick of the month was "Fathers and Daughters" from 2015. It was a complete tear jerker and had a surprise appearance by Aaron Paul of Breaking Bad fame which I thoroughly enjoyed.  I was engrossed in the movie from beginning to end.  As I talked about it to Doug tonight, I realized that it didn't matter what movie Russell Crowe was in - happy, sad, thriller, good, bad, etc., he is just a great actor and makes even the dullest movie better.  I am really looking forward to exploring more of his movies this month.  To answer the question that he posed as Maximus in Gladiator, "Are you not entertained?" Yes, actually I am.