Last night I asked my mom if she wanted to watch a movie with me. She did, and suggested a movie she had heard about but not seen. "It has Meg Ryan in it," she said, so I looked it up on IMDB and we found it - City of Angels.

I went to the video store. I always make an effort to find whatever movie I'm looking for without asking them if they have it, but I can never seem to find the one I want. The layout of the Hollywood Video store in Bonney Lake is infuriating! The only way to see the signs telling what genre each section of videos is in, you have to walk all the way around the store. And sometimes it still doesn't make sense.

I looked everywhere for this movie. It was Meg Ryan, and I'd seen her other chick flick stuff, so I was looking in "Comedy". By the time I waited in line to ask where it was, I was annoyed. They told me it was in "Drama". So, unless I'd already seen the movie, how would I know it was there?

I knew I'd already looked there but I allowed her to lead me to the spot. There it was - "City of Angels" - with a sticker covering "City of An". That's why I hadn't seen it.

As I followed the lady back to the counter, she grabbed another video off a shelf, tossed it at the other guy behind the counter, and said "I'm going outside to smoke." I didn't know why she threw him the video, but I assumed he knew. But he didn't, so he put both on my bill.

So he had to go get her, and she had to come in and give me a refund.

The trip there and back, and the time I spent inside, probably took half an hour. It doesn't sound like such a big deal now, but at the time I was seriously annoyed.

Okay. So I got back home and we watched it.

I'm glad I saw it. Now when somebody says "What's the worst movie you've ever seen?" I'll have an answer.

Part of it is that I already don't like Nicholas Cage that much, and he's just a mumbling, whining mess in here. I almost snorted out loud when Meg Ryan looks at him and says "You're so beautiful". No, he's ugly, and he doesn't enunciate, and he has no concept of personal space, so I'm automatically leaning away every time he leans in close to her.

Part of it is the excessive drama (that's why it was in the drama section). Even with really predictable parts, they take forever to go through it. Near the end of the movie, there's a scene where he's in the shower, and she's setting the table. Then he's in the shower and she's shopping. Then he's in the shower and she's riding back on her bike. But it seemed to flip between the two at least a dozen times, with dramatic music playing the whole time. That annoyed me.

I got really antsy about half of the way through the movie. I just wanted it to be over, but it draaaagggeedd out.

Okay, I know this shouldn't really bother me, because it's just a movie. There's all these angels. 90% of them are men (but it's okay, they have some blacks and Orientals too) and they all wear ominous black cloaks and live in the library. (Why the library? Who knows.) To some extent, I can take whatever information the movie gives me and live with it. If it's a fairy tale, I'm not going to say "Hey, that can't be real! Fairies don't exist and this movie sucks." So to some extent, I can allow this movie to put the relationship between angels and humans in a way that seems ridiculous to me and not get offended. After all, I knew this wouldn't be a "Christian" movie.

It's creepy. To think that an invisible (to you) humanoid male being might be watching you or trying to touch you all the time is creepy. And it's cheap - they could have done some cool special effects but they didn't (except for the one where the knife went through his finger without cutting it - that was cool). We noticed several blatant advertisements. So blatant that we kept commenting. I wonder if the whole sucky movie was funded through advertising.

Something I found interesting: In order for an angel to become human, he must "fall" - that is, jump off a high building. (Strangely, when Cage jumps off a high building, his hands bleed, but he's fine. Odd.) Angels who have jumped are referred to as "those who fell", never as "fallen angels", but the Christian will automatically want to put in that phrase.

Oh, and the only reason to be an angel is to hear the beautiful music of the sunrise.

Well, for anyone who didn't want to wade through that whole post, I had a heck of a time renting a movie last night and a worse time watching it. Ugh.